Walkerz Iraq

Week 9

Walkerz Iraq


(Week 9)

Private First Class Eric LaBelle had taken this particular post to avoid the summer Iraq heat and avoid the uncertain peril of ground patrols. For twelve hours every night, he and Specialist Ross Thompson manned a security and observation tower in their small base camp. There was no glory to be found in the post but they were more than willing to accept it without argument.

After their shift, they spent the majority of their time sleeping. Their contact with others came during meals, shift changes and the occasional Staff Sergeant checking to make sure they weren’t dozing. They were allowed a small radio at their post and were aware of the recent illnesses sweeping across the globe, so it wasn’t a surprise when members of their camp began falling ill. It was a surprise, however, when they were giving orders to man the tower 24 hours a day.

An order was apparently given to the members of their unit to begin stock piling their position with food, water and bullets. They was even a porta potty located at the base of their tower so they wouldn’t have to leave their area. In another day or two, they were given a portable generator and a generous complement of wide variety of supplies. Finally, an armored 5 ton cargo truck, a fuel trailer and more water parked at the base of their tower, before a few sickly soldiers completely fenced in the perimeter of their post. There was only one way in or out, and that was a formidable gate.,

Once complete, a sickly captain shouted up to them,
“I don’t know how much you really know. Things are bad. We’ve sent out or euthanized all of the sick soldiers. I’ll be leaving soon. The Iraqis are suffering the same, if they weren’t you’d be dead. Soon enough, you might be. We’re turning and you’re the only one’s not sick. You should be safe in there, but if you want to flee, the truck should get you safely out of here. They’ll be coming soon, the ones that have changed. They’ll smell you. Here’s the key to the gate and good luck.” With that, the captain tossed a key into Eric and Ross’s position and walked away. He got into a Humvee with another sickly soldier and drove away.

50.The captain sat in his Humvee at the head of a long column of cargo trucks. Each truck was loaded full with infected soldiers. Many were already bound and gagged to prevent injury to the other troops in the back when they awoke from their comas. The healthiest soldiers drove.

Hassan and Madib were waiting. With the American troops failing to make regular patrols because of their sickness, they were able to move and assemble the mother of all roadside bombs. It was an amazing amount of demolitions that they had assembled, hundreds of pounds of explosives were buried every couple of meters for nearly a kilometer.

Their intelligence sources were now among the infected and no longer reporting to them, but Hassan and Madib had all they needed to carry out the attack. They had known two weeks ago that the mass evacuation of Americans would take place today. They now waited unseen as the columns of American trucks entered the kilometer long kill zone. The column was indeed very, very long, but it would fit entirely in the zone when the set it off.

The sickly captain new nothing when the bomb was detonated. He and several hundred infected American troops ceased to be in a roaring blink of the eye. The magnitude of the explosion was so great that their nearly vaporized flesh and blood was carried several hundred feet in a cloud of death.

Hassan and Madib had been chanting “Allah Akbah!” when they detonated the bomb. Moments after the blast, they were coated with a fine pink spray of infected death. They had fulfilled Allah’s duty.

From their tower, LaBelle and Thompson witness the death of their battalion. They felt the shockwave and watched as a massive cloud rose from the site. It seemed to rise higher and higher, before drifting in the wind away from them.

51. Thompson and LaBelle had a quiet night and both fell asleep in the tower with no duties to carry out and no need to guard their camp. In the morning when they awoke, they noted several poorly dressed soldiers shambling within their camp.

When Thompson went down to use the bathroom, the shamblers took notice of him. There were about ten of them and they shrieked as they charged the barriers surrounding the tower. Disregarding the sharp tearing points of the concerntina wire, they press in on the barrier causing it to stretch alarmingly.

Gaps were beginning to form when LaBelle opened fire with his M16. In half a minute, all of the infected troops were dead, half suspended in the wires surrounding their tower.

With a bit of trepidation, Thompson entered the port-o-potty and finished his morning duty. After washing up, he re-ascended the tower ladder with a box of ammunition.

Within another half hour, crowds of infected were massing outside the walls and gates of the base. The walls should hold up, but the gates looked at if the press of bodies could rip the hinges straight out of the walls.

“Screw this! I’m gonna start loading the truck with all of our supplies,” said LaBelle.

“I hear ya. I’ll cover you from here,” replied Thompson.

As LaBelle descended the ladder, the crowd at the gate saw him and began pressing forward. Seeing the gate begin flexing, Thompson opened up on the crowd with the .50 calibre machine gun. The power of the machine gun is immense against massed personal. Each loud boom of the machine gun sent a thumb sized mass of copper and lead through several infected.

LaBelle worked below, tossing piles of supplies into the back of the cargo truck as quick as he could. He was amazed when he was finished, having moved a huge mass of supplies in adrenaline fueled panic. He checked that the fuel pod was secured and then moved into the cab of the truck.

Once inside, LaBelle continue up to the ring mounted machine gun on top. Another .50 cal machine gun was
mounted their. LaBelle lifted the feed tray, inserted a fresh 50 round belt and swung the weapon towards the main gate.

As soon as he turned and saw the gate, his paused in shock. The gate had failed and the walkerz were now pouring into the compound. Then the tower machine gun stopped fires and the compound was filled with the screech of advancing infected. LaBelle opened fired. As he attempted to stop the tide of bodies, small explosion began bursting with the crowd. These stopped and then Thompson was at his feet, passing up a box of ammunition.

“Blast the lock on our gate and we’ll start moving out,” shouted Thompson.

LaBelle swung the machine gun back to their own enclosure and blasted the gate to their small enclosure, shredding the lock, pickets and wires. Thompson got the truck started with a puff of thick black smoke and set the truck in gear. The infected were pressing against the wire as the truck began moving through the gate.

The got clear and began moving through the press of bodies. LaBelle quit firing the machine gun in order to use his M16 rifle to clear the infected that were jumping on and clinging to the truck. The truck struggled and Thompson put it into it’s lowest gear. He wanted to go fasted, but the mass of bodies was simply too much for anything but the lowest gear.

At 7 miles per hour, Thompson and LaBelle exited their camp through the main gates.

52. Once they cleared the gate they shifted the truck into a higher gear and began moving at a much quicker pace. Spread out, the bodies were easily knocked aside. It was pretty bone jarring when they drove completely over one of the infected, but no worse than driving over pot holes and small rocks.

As they moved through the street they also began seeing large mobs forming around buildings. They could see the flashes of gun fire from roofs as the uninfected fought to hold back the mobs of infected.

The drove for many miles before clearing the city streets and not seeing anymore hordes of the infected. They pulled up to a small service station and rinsed the gore from the front of the truck. The small store was uninhabited and unlocked. Before leaving, they topped off the fuel tanks and grabbed fresh food and beverages.

“Where to next?” asked Thompson. “Home.” replied LaBelle. Thompson then began going northwest.

1 Comment so far
Leave a comment