Sabredancing with the Dead

by SabreKai

Fellow travels across the Pacific to visit an old girlfriend teaching at Fujimi High. They just get settled in to chat in the teachers' lounge when all hell breaks loose. Two OCs, Probably meet up with the gang later in the story.

8. Chapter 8

Sabre dancing with the Dead Ch 8

Tokonosu Yacht Club

15:55 April 16, 20xx

Day 2

By the time Wolf and Kat got back to Sabre Dance it was pushing 4pm. The sun would be gone by 7:30

and it would be full dark about half an hour later. Plenty of time if things went smoothly. Wolf was already running the mission through his head, trying to determine where they might run into problems and how to deal with them.

As he opened up the gun locker and pulled out the SKS and the Mini 14 and ammunition for them both, he thought about how they would exit the compound. Thinking about it, he took the P-38 out as well. He had already come to the conclusion that some one would have to get up the stairs to the top of the wall and see where the critters were and to distract them. While they were occupied, the gate would open for the Komatsu and out they would go. Right.

He opened the drawer on one side of the chart table and picked up the loudhailer. Turning it on, he clicked the talk button a couple of times. Yup, it was still good to go. That should draw them away from the gate.

His next thought was how to open a shipping container, that was locked. The battery powered mini grinder that he had on board to cut the shrouds in case of a dismasting would do nicely. Bolt cutters wouldn't hurt either.

Now since they were going to what was potentially a treasure trove, it made sense to know what was in the building. To do that they'd have to take away all the import documents. Thankfully this shouldn't amount to much more than a couple of filing cabinet drawers full of paper. To handle that he pulled out a bagged genoa and dumped the sail out. The bag would do nicely.

Communications. He'd take the hand unit and make sure Kat and Wally were monitoring the same frequency. First aid? Not much point was there? If you got bit, you died. That pretty much covered the gear for the mission.

Kat watched him as he prepped. "Do you want me to come along?" She asked him as he dug out his load bearing harness and filled the canteens and put the ammo for the SKS into one of the pouches.

"No, why put both of us in danger? I think it will go well, but you never know. I don't want you hurt" he replied.

"So you just want me to sit here and wait until you come back... IF you do?" She asked sharply, slightly annoyed with the idea, afraid of the horrors walking around outside the compound. And of what could happen to the man who had just walked back into her life.

"No Kat, you won't be sitting here waiting. First you can get Eriko to working on the trench and washing down the parking lot. Then I want you and a couple of volunteers to strip some horns and batteries out of the cars here, get some wire and rig them up on top of the tsunami wall. Put one in the middle of our wall, and then a couple more farther out a couple hundred yards down towards the warehouse." Wolf replied as he pulled out the Mauser with the scope. "If you can't find the wire, don't worry about the ones out past our boundary wall. Just hook them up to the battery on site and someone will have to man that station if we need it. I also want you as high sentry, with the rifle. You can tell us what's going on while we are inside the warehouse."

"You trust my shooting after all these years?" She asked, some what mollified by his answer.

"Damn right I do. I watched you shoot out to 800 yards before. You can still do it. I'm depending on it"

"Right then, horns and sentry. Are we ready?" Kat asked while pocketing a box of shells for the 6.5mm long rifle.

"Yeah. Lets hump this stuff into the dink and we're off."

10 minutes later they were tied up to the club dock, and walked into the dining room. Wolf handed the Mini 14 to Saburo, along with 4 magazines and then started to brief the four who were going with him on the plan. Most importantly, silence was of utmost importance. Kat in the meantime approached Wally and Elaine, both of whom were still there, hoping to help. She waved over Eriko as well. When she had them together, Kat started to outline what needed to be done while Wolf and the rest of them ran the mission.

"Eriko, could you start digging the pit? The sooner that is done, the sooner we can wash the muck into it. You figured that it would be best to dig over at the far end of the lot?"

Eriko nodded. "Yes, I'll get started right now. I will get Tamichi to pull out the spray wash units and get them ready as well."

"Good. The tractor can help draw critters to the wall at that point, letting the truck have an easy exit from the other end." she said as she looked at Eriko.

"How big do you want the pit to be?" Eriko asked

"I think it would be best to dig a long trench. That way we can spread the crud out over a long area and put more lime on it once the others get back. Plus it will be easier to direct the muck into a trench that it would be to steer it all towards a small pit. What do you think?

"Yes, that would be easy to do and make it a lot simpler to wash down the parking lot. I'll get started right away." She said as she headed over to Tamichi, the other yard worker over to get that end of things going.

"Wally, how about you pulling some horns and batteries out of the cars in the lot. Leave the trucks alone, we can use them to carry stuff we scrounge. I also need you and a couple of the others to find some wire to rig up the horns to the outside of the Tsunami wall. We need them to draw any critters away from the gate that the truck will use."

'OK, I'm on it." Wally agreed. He went off to speak to Kenji and Yamato the city guy.

"Elaine, could you get with Fujiko and see what we need in terms of medical supplies? Right now you're our senior medic. When the guys get back from the warehouse we can see about getting what you need. I found a phone book and a city map behind the front counter. Oh and poll the people that haven't come ashore yet and see if there is a doctor in this crowd. That's one thing we forgot about. Who knows, maybe we'll get lucky." Kat paused in thought for moment. "Actually, grab the club register or some ledger out of the office, and see if you can put together a list of who has what skills. It'll come in hand. Kat suggested.

"Right. Sounds like a plan." Elaine said over her shoulder as she headed over to where Fujiko sat quietly watching.

In the mean time Wolf and the others went over a rough game plan as Saeko Sahashi outlined the layout of the warehouse and office space. She noted all the doors, and other access point, but wasn't sure if they had been secured before they made the mad dash down the road to the club. She, like the others had figured safety afloat was the ticket and was lucky in having a small cabin cruiser moored here. She wondered if her husband was still alive.

Plan hashed out, they all headed to the Komatsu. Wolf and Saeko climbed into the cab, while the others rode in the box. As soon as he was ready he radioed Kat to head up onto the wall with the loudhailer. She came out of of the club but headed to the truck. She climbed up the ladder, opened the cab door, said "excuse me" and leaned past Saeko. Whispering in his ear, she kissed Wolf, then turned and headed for the far steps. She reached the top and was soon back on the VHF.

"Wolf, there are a couple of dozen in a loose bunch near your gate. I'm going to start on the loudhailer now. I'll let you know when you can open the gate."

Ok, Keep em busy. The truck has cooled off. I need a couple of minutes before she is up to operating temperature. If you can't draw them all off, I'll wipe the ones who don't move towards you." He replied.

Kat stood on the platform at the top of the wall. She was down at the far north end, just where the club boundary wall hit the Tsunami Wall. She looked down and saw the tractor with the shovel coming towards here, and noticed that some of the critters out on the street were indeed tracking on that noise. She clicked the on/off switch on the loudhailer, and started talking. The critters farther way turned towards her as well and started ambling away from the gate Wolf would use. After a couple of minutes she paused to give Wolf the go ahead to start up.

She looked to the south end again, just in time to see a jet of black smoke belch from the Komatsu's stack. She checked the progress of the critters, and the nearest ones to the gate Wolf would use were at least 60-75 feet away and heading towards her. She continued to speak, drawing them. As she looked towards the north in the direction they would be traveling, she could see more coming towards her position. She figured there must be at least a hundred. She glanced into the compound next to their's and saw more critters shambling towards her from that direction. She also noticed a few fishing boats also had people waving at her. Something to be checked into later.

Five minutes later, Wolf called her. "We are warmed up and ready to roll. How's the gate?"

"They are all at least a hundred yards from the gate now and more coming from the north. At least a hundred or so. I would say you are good to go."

Tamichi was standing by on the gate controls and started them open at Wolf's wave. Wolf put her into gear and they rolled out past the gate. As soon as the truck's back end was clear, Tamichi hit the close button and the gate rumbled shut. Turning left once on the street, Wolf brought the truck up to maximum speed. He made a point of wiping out any critters in his way and within a few minutes they were turning into the Takagi Shipping complex. As planned they drove around the building, checking doors to see what was open. Saeko wasn't sure if her people had shut them all as the panic started or had just bolted.

The complex was huge, projecting a thousand feet or so into the bay, with docks on either side. One side was equipped with the big overhead cranes needed to load and unload container ships, one of which was tied along side. The gangway was up, and Wolf wondered if the crew was still on board. As they moved round the building they ran into small groups of critters. Saeko recognized some of them as being Takagi employees. Wolf looked at her, and with a grimace she told him to run them down. They had to secure the area before they could even think of getting out of the truck. On the other side of the building, this dock was equipped with a series of roll on/roll off dock plates. There was another ship here, but the gangway was down, and they could see critters milling around up on the deck. It appeared that all of the ground level doors were closed on this side, which meant that some one would need to enter the building, clear it (that would be fun) and open one of the double doors.

During the planning, it was decided that Capt. Sakai, Cpl Yamata and Kuma would make their way in via one of the personnel doors and quietly open the ground level overhead door. Saeko and Kuma both agreed that there wouldn't likely be that many people inside as most of the workers had fled in different directions when the shit hit the fan. It was after all a bonded warehouse with tight entry restrictions to most areas. Large areas of floor were delineated with chain link fences for the bonded goods.

Wolf pulled up to one of the personnel doors, they bailed out, and waited while the truck moved a hundred feet towards the overhead doors. Wolf put her in park and started laying on the horn to attract anything inside to that area and give the entry team a better chance.

Kuma ran his pass card over the reader, while Saburo and Shinji covered him. The door opened outwards, so he pulled it open and waited while the other two cautiously checked out the immediate area. It was clear. They could see a half dozen critters milling around near the overhead door and these would have to be cleared. The two armed men took positions behind a stack of boxes, using them as steady rests for their rifles. Two shots rang out, two heads exploded, and the team moved silently off to one side to a new position as the remaining deaders turned and staggered toward their firing position.

Again they sought out a stack of boxes for steadying the rifles and two more bit the big one. Not bothering to move, they nailed the last two, and moved towards the overhead door, keeping an eye out for any stragglers. Kuma hit the door switch and it lifted up. Wolf in the mean time had moved right up to the door, and was into the building as soon as he had clearance. Kuma shut the door again.

Wolf and Saeko got out, and they set off on their part of the mission which was to pull the records from the office. The other 3 would head down slowly to where the containers were, and open up the one they needed, then pull out one barrel of quick lime and load it into the truck. As the three headed off into the depths of the warehouse, Wolf was pleased to see that Kuma was not having any problems reading the hand signals that the other two were using. Ex-military? He'd have to ask when they got back. One thing for sure, Kuma had his head constantly swiveling around. As did they all.

Saeko followed him to the front of the building, staying on his right flank. He'd passed the P-38 to her for defense, after a quickie course on which end did what, but they were all hoping stealth would serve. The 6 shots from the other team had sounded like cannon fire in the huge building, and they didn't want to inadvertently draw more deaders if there were some around. They kept to the sides of the isles, and only ran into 3 individuals on their way to the front offices. As each one came into sight, Wolf tossed something towards the opposite side of the isle and let them pass unmolested. Saeko was visibly freaked by this but kept her cool. It helped her a lot that Wolf settled into a double handed Weaver stance and was tracking the critter's head with the 686 until it was well past.

It didn't take them long to get into the office, and Wolf made short work of the two poor girls who'd turned. The wrench handles still did the job. Once they were down, Saeko took the sail bag and opened up the file cabinets. The paperwork made a fairly large pile but fit nicely into the bag. That part of the mission complete, they both headed back to the truck. As they approached the door leading out to the warehouse a dead dock worker came lurching round the door jam and almost got Saeko, who now freaked and started blazing away with the P-38 while screaming at the top of her lungs. Out of 6 shots, she missed him at least twice and never once hit the head. Wolf took him down with his 686, grabbed the warehouse manager by the arm and dragged her away, out into the ware house. He then wrapped one arm around her and put his other hand hand over her mouth to stop the screaming. She struggled, until he whacked her on the head with the muzzle of his pistol. That shut her up.

"Shut up for cryin' out loud." he whispered in her ear.

"S s sorry, I'm just not as f f fearless as you. That thing scared the s s shit out of me."

"OK. Well try to keep quiet, and let's get moving before all the rest of them get here. God knows the screaming and shots will have dragged every one within a mile to us. Look! We gotta move now!" he said, pointing to the corner of the office about 40 feet away where a couple more were coming round the corner.

He grabbed Saeko by the hand and dragged her off towards the truck, constantly looking around for any more deaders. As they advance, a couple of shots rang out from the far end of the warehouse. Then a dozen more. Wolf started to sprint towards the truck, Saeko hot on his heels. Climbing into the cab he started the truck up and turned it down the wide isle fronting the racks, towards the end of the building where it appeared that the other guys were in deep kimchi. Running down the isle along the doors to the end of the building, they hit the inside container area at the far end. This is where Kuma had parked the cans they needed. As they turned the corner they came upon some more deaders, all heading towards a large container lift. This vehicle was like a large cherry picker with a boom out front and a large grappling set for picking up a can and moving it around. They saw Kuma in the cab, Saburo and Shinji on the roof, firing at about 2 dozen critters milling round the machine. Slamming on the brakes, Wolf laid on the horn. Kuma shut down the cherry picker, and this allowed Wolf to draw them away. Slowly he backed away, dragging the crowd with him.

Kuma waited til they were well away, started the cherry picker up again and reached up to grab the 3rd container in a stack. Wolf was now a good 100 yards back, still laying on the horn. Shinji and Saburo stayed on the roof, as Kuma started to follow the truck with the can up enough to see under. Coming up on the crowd following the truck he stopped as some turned towards him. Timing it well, he dropped the can down on top of them, then lifted it again. Now he laid on his horn. More turned back towards him and he repeated the action. Jesus what mess!

Wolf had stopped backing and was now on the catwalk of the Komatsu, shooting. After several minutes, the horde of deaders was down. Looking around, no more could be seen. Wolf backed up to the double doors, and turned to face nose out. Kuma followed and dropped the can off to one side. Saburo quickly jumped down, and used the mini grinder on the lock while Shinji stayed on the cherry picker roof as high sentry. While he did that, Kuma climbed down and ran to a small forklift, started it up, and headed to the can as Saburo pulled the doors open. Kuma paused while his partner spread the forks a bit so that they would slide round either side of the barrel. Moving forward Kuma picked up one barrel, backed up and turned to the truck, getting into position to place it in the truck box. The other two ran over to the Komatsu, and boarded it to help landing the barrel. Shinji again took up sentry, while Saburo guided the barrel down into the box. That done, Kuma ran to the personnel door to check the outside of the building. Saburo jumped down from the box, and went to the overhead door controls, waiting on Kuma to give him the thumbs up.

Kuma quietly opened the small door and looked out. It appeared that all the noise they'd created at the container end of the building had cleared this end, and he gave the thumbs up. The big door slowly opened, stopped and started down as the truck came clear. Saburo climbed aboard and he followed. So far so good.

Wolf headed back down the road towards the club compound. He picked up the VHF and called up Kat or Wally, advising them they were on their way back. By the time they got near the compound they could all hear the car horn blaring, drawing any critters to the sound. Wolf waited til all that were coming were massed under the horn, milling about. He brushed the big truck along the wall, wiping them out. By the time he got to the entry gate, it was open and they drove in. Quickly the gate shut. Eriko waved them over to where the trench had been dug, across freshly power washed pavement. She marshaled the truck to park parallel to the trench, signaled the shut down and told them to stay in the truck when they started to climb down. The bottom of the steps were covered in gore and the whole undercarriage was dripping crud on the pavement. Then she and Tamichi proceeded to hose down the truck and drive the putrid mess into the trench. It was pretty gory. Once that was done, she waved them down off the truck.

Wolf looked around and noted a few new faces, people he figured had gotten over the fear enough to come and help. Good. Many hands make light work and all that crap. One new guy brought over a ladder to the back of the truck box, and climbed up to open the drum while others passed up buckets and a shovel. In short order the lime was being spread over the remains. One person noticeably missing was that dipshit, Yamato. Probably still had his nose out of joint from the massive rejection of his power play. Oh well, too bad. As they started shifting the lime and spreading it over the pit, Kat came up to him and gave him a hug and a kiss. Relief showed clearly on her face as she stood beside him, hand in hand.

Clean up completed, every one headed into the dining room where Elaine, Fujiko and one of the new additions had turned to and created dinner for them all. After some pretty good chow, introductions of the new people, they did a couple of hours of debrief, picking apart the mission. This included some "no shit, there I was" tales by Kuma and Shinji, and a couple of hugs for Saeko who was still a bit shaken. Things learned on this trip would be used to improve their technique for more runs in the coming days. Taking Saeko aside, Wolf quietly took the P-38 back from her, figuring that there had to be a better shot than her. She'd done good but was a tad twitchy. Maybe she'd work it out. Finally, the party broke up around 11pm, and everyone headed off to their various boats.

So ended day 2.

Author's notes: I don't own HOTD, or any of its characters. I just get to play in their universe. All characters in this story (So far) are my own.

Thanks to MarshalZhukov and Draco38 for their reviews and PMs. Good guidance, which I will try to follow. Other reviews gratefully accepted, as long as they are constructive and non-abusive.