Armageddon test run 15
Chapter 14:
The Second Day
Whoever it was continued to scratch and knock at the front door, keeping the man awake. His wife could sleep through anything, it seemed. No doubt it had something to do with whatever strange thing had been happening in town yesterday. Nobody seemed to have any real news about it.
The rumors were that the military was setting up a safe zone at the school… what sort of safe zone, or safe from what, no one was saying.
The clock on the bed stand read 3 in the morning. Way too early for anyone to be up, let alone banging on the door. It had better be important.
He groggily made his way down the stairs, and shouted once he came close to the door. "Stop it, I'm coming!"
Annoyingly, the banging on the door increased, and became even more demanding.
He yanked open the door, prepared to give whoever wanted to interrupt his sleep a piece of his mind, and had a split second to curse himself for not looking out the peep hole first.
The things that lunged at him through the open doorway looked like they had once been some of his neighbors, but now there eyes seemed glassy and blank, their expressions vacant, and tainted with blood smears around their mouths and down their shirts or chests.
He looked down to see a child biting his groin, while others were pulling at his arms, and his hair. He felt stabbing pain as they bit into him.
He fell to the ground, the things fell with him, pinning him down, continuing to bite and tear at his flesh. Others stepped past him, moving aimlessly through the house. One even began to find its way up the stairs towards the upstairs bedrooms.
He wanted to shout a warning, but realized he was already screaming… and soon he heard more screams coming from other rooms of his home.
Ooooo
The Autobots were not as idle as the humans assumed them to be. To most of the Joes they were just vehicles sitting outside as part of the barricade to keep the zombies out, but in reality, so much more was going on.
Ratchet and Prime monitored everything using their built in sensors from the school… they watched as the zombie's numbers continued to grow. Prime felt a sense of misplaced responsibility for each life he knew was being snuffed out.
Prime had sent Bulkhead back to the base, while their human allies slept with the rest of the humans in the school gym.
With Bulkhead to run the groundbridge, Prime dispatched Arcee and Bumblebee to continue to patrol the city. With most of the town's populace either asleep or barricaded in their homes the two Autobots felt free to assume a more aggressive attitude towards the undead, and assumed robot mode to thin the growing zombie hordes.
Crouching in the middle of the street, Arcee had deployed both of her guns and was firing two handed at the approaching zombies. Bumblebee took up a position next to her, and opened fire with is own double barreled weapon.
Bumblebee whirred something to Arcee.
"I know, standard tactics aren't working. They are suppose to run or flee. The ones we hit are just getting back up. If anything we are only attracting more of them!"
Bumblebee whirred, clicked and beeped a longer response.
"Right, we are just expending energon at this rate," Arcee reluctantly agreed, then activated her radio, "Bulk—Open the ground bridge, we are coming back in."
Ooooo
Only Low Light noticed the departure and return of Bulkhead and Bumblebee to the School. As far as anyone else was concerned, they were ordinary vehicles who had never left.
Scarlett, Shockwave and the other Joes were awake before the sun rose, it was debatable if Low Light had slept at all, from his lookout post on top of the school. The Joes met around the ambulance, waking June Darby in the process.
"Huh? What do you guys want?" June asked as she opened the back of Ratchet.
"We came to get an updated scan of the city," Scarlett answered.
As June opened the doors and allowed the Joes inside, Ratchet spoke, "Its gotten a lot worse over the past few hours."
He again displayed the holographic map of the town. The down town areas were void of nearly all life signs except for a few red dots that represented a zombie signal. In the suburbs, the red dots had nearly doubled since the evening before. Ratchet made sure to send the information to the Semi parked next to him, Optimus Prime.
"We should have argued harder for Hawk to go ahead and send more troops into the city. The Cobra surrender could have waited, for all the lives we lost by waiting so long," Shockwave said.
"At this rate of expansion of the plague, it is going to be very difficult to put down, much less rescue the uninfected," Scarlett said.
"It is spreading too fast. We should take out the buses with armed escorts, and use them to round up as many survivors as we can. Bring them here until extraction."
"Hell, this entire operation is going to be so classified!"
"We only have enough guns to send out two buses, and still maintain a presence here, but not much defense."
"We Autobots will lend you our military support," the red truck said.
"Optimus?" Ratchet asked."
"This crisis is too large for them to handle alone, Rachet. And the situation is far from natural."
"It is a plan then," Scarlett said, "I'll call Hawk and update him on the situation. Find out when we can expect those reinforcements."
Ooooo
"It's hard to believe," Jack said, while riding in Prime's cab, "as bad as things were yesterday, there were still areas of the city that were unaffected. But today, there are signs of zombies everywhere we look."
"I should have left you back at the school," Prime said, "This is too dangerous."
"Don't worry about that," Jack said, "with everything going on, my Mom feels safer knowing I'm with you."
Prime slowed to a stop, and the school bus pulled to a stop behind him, and Shockwave climbed out.
"House numbers 203, and 207 are filled with infected," Prime said, "205 has survivors."
"And the other side of the street?"
"Those houses are empty."
"Great."
"Uh, Prime?" Jack said while craning his head out the window.
"I know, Jack," Prime answered, "that group of infected we a while back are still following us. Shockwave has spotted them too."
"I noticed he was not being as polite to the survivors anymore; but if they keep following us, then this whole operation could be a big mistake."
"Indeed, we may need to call in reinforcements."
"Aside from Wheeljack, who else can we call? Surely the Decepticons won't feel inclined to help."
"We are staying ahead of them for now," Prime said, "But if they get close enough to be a threat, I will have to intervene."
"I got'em loaded," Shockwave shouted, "Lets get to the next street."
Ooooo
It was still before noon, when Prime and Shockwave returned to the school with a bus filled with refugees. The plan was to unload the bus, then head back out again.
"Hear anything from Hawk?" Shockwave asked Scarlett when she and Doc came out to greet them and check the new arrivals for any sign of infection.
"The orders are that the elimination of the infected will not be an issue, but the evacuation of all uninfected is mandatory. Duke is sending in more troops to assist, and Wild Bill is organizing an air evacuation."
"Great," Shockwave said, "Guess we will head back out then."
While they were talking another car pulled up, and two confused people climbed out of the car, "We have heard this is a safe haven?"
"That's right," Doc told them, "Come on inside and we will make sure you are all right. Leave the car keys, we will need to move your car shortly."
They all instinctively ducked, when a shot rang out.
"They are starting to become more frequent," Low Light called from his post.
None of the humans present were able to read the expressions on Optimus Prime's truck mode; if they had they would have seen the worry. Always in his mind, he was trying to stay four steps ahead of any given situation, and the situation was beginning to look worse than any of the humans had yet realized.