World of Ashes II (30 page)

Some genius, who shall remain unnamed, (but who strongly resembled a modern General Custer in behavior and audacious mustaches,) had chosen to recruit or transfer in a cadre of people who barely deserved the title of human anymore. Sure, they were all salty survivors like Daniel, but when faced with the undead menace they turned into a monster that should have frozen Vic’s sledgy black blood solid. Sergeant First Class Mason, the soft spoken black man from the first meeting, was identifiably the most psychotic of this irreverently demented group. His normal whisper of a voice a howling beast, swan-diving into the herd of play zombies with a machete no one had thought to prevent the soldiers from wearing during the scenario. The entire platoon, except for three or four, broke ranks and joined in the melee and beatdown of so many screaming, padded college kids.

Major Sharp tried to “Index” the scenario by turning the floodlights on and blowing whistles. Nobody listened and eventually Daniel had to just stand up and throw one of the men off of an OpFor before he managed to hack through the padded chemical suit their Vics were wearing. A few more punches to the face and a reminder at gunpoint that
he
was
their
lieutenant and they
would
fucking listen to him and it was time to call it a night. The scenario ended in complete chaos, yes, but it defined a leader in the eyes of the men and never again would such a clusterfuck besmirch the name of the great, nay,
legendary
1
st
Viral Recon.

“Nine Privates, three Specialists and a Staff Sergeant, all hospitalized...” Major sharp said, swishing the cup of brandy he was nursing. “I admit, Lieutenant, it will be a miracle if I don’t end up a Private myself after this.”

Daniel laughed a little. He was drunk already, this was true, but now wasn’t the time to hang on ceremony and decorum. “Watch this one, Sir.” He said, replaying a segment of footage. A somewhat plump and almost simple looking country boy that had gone unnoticed by Daniel before, except for his height, picked up an OpFor and threw him over the walls that made up the borders of the training village. He then threw another zombie into the group of zombies already trying to flee. They fell like bowling pins and were pounced by a dozen more Soldiers with clubs, knives and hammers.

“Did anyone go see if that man was okay?” Sharp laughed, downing the last of his brandy and pouring another generous cup for himself and Daniel.

“Yeah, that was Staff Sergeant Gander, the one in the hospital. He landed on the turret of a camera truck. Fractured two ribs and broke his ankle.” Daniel confirmed. “I confess, I’m impressed nobody was actually killed. It was a bit of brilliance to make the OpFor wear body armor, though. If anything that will save our asses.”

There was a knock at the door to Sharp’s office. “Enter.” He shouted, preparing for a pissed off superior to kick the door down.

The door opened gently, and a large black man stood in the center of it. “Lieutenant Donovan, reporting as ordered, Sir.” He started to salute, but then realized he was looking at his new CO and a fellow officer sitting around in their civvies watching combat footage.

“Come in, Lieutenant.” Sharp tried to stand, but it was too quickly and he fell back in his chair. “Pardon me, I’m just… drunk.”

              Lieutenant Donovan sat and took his uniform top off. New regulations for an Army that was often in uniform for so long that owning civilian clothes was pointless, stated that as a signifier of being off duty the removal of the uniform top and cover was sufficient enough to engage in off duty activities. Sharp poured another glass for their new comrade and restarted the footage from his tablet.

              “It’s a shame you weren’t there for this.” Daniel teased.

              “My bird didn’t land until twenty minutes ago.” Donovan watched the footage as it cycled through. He had to stifle his own laughter when the lines broke, but in all honesty that was a deadly combination of insubordination and insanity. “I think most of your boys here are Section Eight, Major. And the Army doesn’t regularly use that clause anymore.”

              “It’s my fault.” Sharp was apparently only modest when intoxicated. “I pulled men from the Behavioral Reconditioning Units. Most of the people who’ve been out in the wild are just a bit bat-shit, so I figured if they could just be worked with they would make an effective zombie killing force.”

              Daniel shrugged. “We can work with this, Sir. We’ll work on discipline and team oriented fighting. Weed out the ones we can’t work with, and use this,” Daniel pushed play so they could see Bubba Hulk throw Sergeant Gander over the wall again, “borderline psychotic behavior to our advantage. Sure, our tactics are more Civil War-esque than they are modern, but when we go into cities and shit having people who can throw zombies over a fucking wall is going to be a huge asset.”

              “Well, tomorrow.” Sharp gave up trying to stand. “Okay tomorrow is FTX/Hangover recovery, but the day after tomorrow, we begin. The two of you draw up a plan for disciplining the troops, but no punitive actions. Not yet. It was… premature to put them all into a fight like this. It might have been too realistic.” Sharp looked at Daniel, “Did the OpFor make you afraid?”

              “No.” Daniel admitted. “But then I was on the inside of planning this. The men were meant to be in the dark about it. Maybe next time we should just use Pop-Up Ivans.”

              This time Lieutenant Donovan had the spark of genius. “Or maybe we should just use real Vics.”

              Sharp and Daniel both looked at their new man like he had lost his mind. “Trust me, you don’t want to go there. I almost got picked up by DHS for fighting my way out of DC. Read between the lines and imagine what I had to do to accomplish that.”

              Donovan smirked and tipped his glass toward Daniel. “I’ve been in the same situation. That’s how you get assigned to this unit. You gotta kill zombies, a lot of ‘em. Shoot ‘em in the face, smash ‘em in the brain, blow their fucking heads off if you can. I have a personal Vic count bordering on four digits. I’ve been frontline Infantry since we ended Iraq, seen more shit than either of you POGs will in a lifetime, and I’m not apologizing for smashing some plague ridden corpse until it’s black paste on a rock. So let’s use real Vics.”

              Daniel clapped in approval for Donovan’s speech. “You’ll never get me to admit anything.” He smiled, toasting his glass in return.

              “I’ll arrange it.” Sharp said, turning the footage off. “See you, in…” He checked his watch, started tilting forward and never righted himself. The major face-planted into the coffee table and ended his night wearing about half a bottle of brandy and a broken whiskey glass.

Chapter 13

              A wartime army is always different than a peacetime army. Sounds like common sense, yet the difference is only apparent to those who’ve seen both. For the men who’d been in the Armed Forces before the dead started not staying dead, keeping drafted civilians in line without violating their civil rights and being jailed for abuse was nearly impossible. The stick made conscripts rebellious, and the carrot made them greedy. It occurred to Daniel once or twice that a cattle prod might be helpful when spending long afternoons practicing open field tactics that had been stricken from the books more than a century before. It couldn’t be any more ineffective than bribing them with a weekend off, so why not? If he had to remind one more of these frakwits to keep their fucking hands out of their fucking pockets… well, he might do something to lose his shiny new bar and spend the rest of the war in an air conditioned prison.

              Another new officer, Captain Rambo (no relation), was in charge of VR1 while Major Sharp did some politicking to get the right resources for his pet project. Rambo didn’t want to be in charge of anything, he just wanted to chew tobacco and watch everyone practice as if he were some kind of coach on the sidelines. Daniel didn’t envy the amount of paperwork Sharp would have upon return, but he was certain Cpt. Rambo had made no attempt to do any of it.

              “Sir.” Daniel’s second in command, a Staff Sergeant named Kemper, stood at attention behind him. “First Platoon is formed and ready for battle drills.”

              Daniel nodded, going through his checklist while Captain Rambo looked on from the pulpit. In reality Daniel was drawing a flip-book animation of a stick figure being run over by a rock through all the corners of his notebook, in his mind pretending it was Cpt. Rambo. Asking the henchman of an officer to do more than just stay out of the way might have been a detriment to the war effort anyhow, so Daniel hadn’t gone to him to request permission to march the unit away yet. They were ready, Daniel had singled out the ones who didn’t like to listen to orders in the face of the enemy and let them take their chances in the Mortuary Affairs units (24/7 burial and bio-removal detail.) After that, the most effective tool he found in instilling discipline was to waste his Soldier’s free time. Now none of them had the leisure to think about anything but their jobs lately. He’d loosen their schedules soon, but for now he’d gotten the results he wanted.

              “Excuse me, Sir, but shouldn’t we get going?” Kemper stood at ease when he figured out what Daniel was doing. “You’re drawing the head too large as the pages go on, Sir.”

              Daniel let the side of his face not facing the Captain Rambo’s vacant stare crack a smile. “I’m not a friggin’ artist, Sergeant, but you know how the Skipper is about his fuckin’ checklists. ‘Never too prepared.’” Daniel quoted in a subtly mocking tone. “Here’s the list of coordinates we’ll be humping it to.” He handed the list to SSgt Kemper.

              The career NCO read the list. It was just one coordinate, and it was one he knew. “Round Top Lake, Sir?”

              “Yep.” Daniel put the clipboard back in his ruck. “Until the Major gets back we might as well take the time to smell the roses, assuming refugees haven’t eaten them all.”

              Kemper nodded. “Glad I packed my swimming trunks.”

              “Aren’t we all.” Daniel watched his Second walk away and made his own path towards Captain Rambo. “Sir. Permission for First Platoon to depart on FTX?”

              Rambo barely looked up from his daydreaming. “What? Oh, yeah. Permission granted. Just maintain radio contact, would ya? I want accountability at all times.”

              “Yessir.” Daniel saluted and walked away, making a mental note to turn the radio off immediately before his superior magically remembered something for them to do. Rambo could talk on and on about the most irrelevant shit, often repeating himself when he ran out of new things to say. Wherever Sharp had dug this guy up it had bettered be worth the effort and annoyance bringing him here. Around the other side of the building the platoon was formed in three neat rows, ready to march out. Here was the part Daniel liked. Marching off in parade formation. Was it unnecessary in a modern military? Sure, but there was something to be said for the pride and espri de corps a Soldier gains by looking like a Soldier.

              “Platoon!” Daniel shouted in a commanding voice. “
Attennnnntion. Heeerrrriiiiiiiiiiiiiiight… Hace! Afowaaaaard!
March!” For having never been a Drill Sergeant or even a cadet for long, Daniel was quite proud of his seldom practiced command voice.

              Once the platoon had marched to the end of the row of buildings where Captain Rambo could still see, Daniel turned the reins over to Staff Sergeant Kemper and let him form them into a tactical column of twos. A block from there Daniel ordered them into a parking lot, a change from the plan he’d shared with SSgt Kemper, and revealed a gift he’d strong armed his mother into providing for the unit. Two brand new, Air Force owned and maintained buses with air conditioning and heat for any climate were waiting for them.

              “What?” Daniel shrugged with a smile when Kemper raised an eyebrow. “I don’t wanna walk. Do you?”

              “No, Sir.” Kemper shrugged in return and boarded the bus after counting his men. Soft guitar music played over the speakers and most of the seats reclined. A trip that should have taken a couple of hours took fifteen minutes with light traffic, and the Air Force already had the bivouac set up for them when they got there. Inflatable tents with climate control, a shower facility and a mess-tent. It genuinely didn’t get better than that for ground pounders.

              A second lieutenant in Air Force tiger stripes was standing under the chow area’s awning supervising the unloading of food and equipment when Daniel made his way up to her. She was pretty, had dark hair made tight in a regulation bun, and she tanned well. His mother had sent her here on purpose, she was just Daniel’s type and he was definitely supposed to meet her. He’d have to figure out who she was connected to in order to decide how badly his mother wanted him to be a part of this young lady’s life, and what might be in it for him.

              Daniel saluted, “Good morning, Ma’am.” It wasn’t necessary for officers of the same rank to salute one another, but it was common courtesy when reporting to someone else’s camp, especially if they’d already done the hard part for you.

              She returned the salute without putting her clipboard down. “You must be General Brown’s son. I’m Lieutenant Kelly Hallstead, I work in your mother’s office.”