Cayo Elina 37

“I can feel them pushing back at me. They know we’re coming.” Ricardo said.

“Can you clear any of them out?” Elina asked quietly as they move forward.

“They are moving them back themselves, anyone they think I can affect. There’s a whole mess of supers at my level up ahead.”

“Define ‘whole mess’.” Elina told him.

“A dozen.”

“Oh, that’s nothing, I can take a dozen Ricardos out by myself.” Elina said.

Ricardo snorted, “I’m not joking around here. Six of us versus twelve of them?”

“Someone is alive from the crash, too. Maybe more than one person.” Elina reminded him.

“Wounded at best, dead already for most of them.” Ricardo answerd.

“Shh!” Elina said, glancing pointedly at the two marines leading them up ahead, “Don’t get on their bad side. Besides, do you think they would stop if you told them the odds?”

Ricardo grumbled quietly and called out a course adjustment to Justin, “At least I can still see the mother fuckers.”

“I’m sure it works both ways.” Elina said.

“They might not know I’m helping you.”

“You think they’ll figure it out with you calling course adjustments to Justin?”

“Damn it. Yeah, I would.”

“So it’s a fight then. One thing we can do and that’s fight. Hector!” Elina called

Hector glanced over at her, sweating heavier than the others under his load.

“You stop when Ricardo tells you to and wait for us to tell you when to move up.”

Surprisingly Hector didn’t argue with her, he only nodded and stopped moments later behind the cover a tree that Ricardo pointed out.

“From here you can cover our retreat or move up to support us when we call you. I know you want to get all super and shit, but no one has done it overnight, you’ll have your chance if you stick with us.” Elina told him.

Hector nodded and kneeled over to watch the way forward. Without word the five of them moved ahead and soon after that the bullets started flying. The steady staccatos of their military weapons were interspaced with return fire from an assortment of civilian rifles, shotguns and pistols.

Once they got into combat things became a chaotic mess, the battleground was covered in a hazy ground fog from the burning helicopter, something they hadn’t noticed when flying above it. This hindered the living more than the dead, who seemed to have an uncanny ability to know right where everyone was at. Levi took a round to the chest early in the fight and cursed loudly as he rolled behind a downed tree to continue fighting. His shotgun wasn’t an optimal weapon for range they were trading bullets, nonetheless he scored the first kill as the zombie who shot him bounded up with the intent of finishing him off. A muffled boom and the super zombies head shattered, leaving the better part of the man’s lower jaw to topple forward still attached to his body.

Elina, wanted to get closer to the enemy too, but stayed near Ricardo and he stopped behind the main burning chunk of the helicopter, near where the smoke was thickest. “We gotta move, this smoke is killing me and there’s no cover!” Elina yelled at him, squatting close to the ground.

“Where? Toward three of them or towards six of them. They all know where I am, Elina! And where you are! I told you this was a dumb idea!”

“Go towards the six and try and keep yourself from taking a round to the head, would ya?”

Ricardo did a three count and started running towards the highest concentration of superzombies he could see. He made it six steps before he was riddled with bullets, one caught him in the spine and he lost control of his legs, sending him toppling to the ground. One he was there three shots hit the top of his kelvar helmet, and he rolled over to the marginal cover of swampy hole in the mud. Ricardo didn’t see Elina anywhere.

“Oldest trick in the book. I’m so goddamn gullible. Sure, I’ll draw their fire Elina! No problem! It’s not like I just had the living shit kicked out of me a week ago by my own friends…because of you!”

Elina landed among the six super zombies with a triumphant cry and they fell back from her shooting as they went. The zombies caught each other in the cross fire and one of them went down permanently when an ill fired thirty ought six bullet passed from below one ear, through his head and out just above the other. Elina shot another zombie at point blank range and twirled to smash the head of another with the stock of her weapon, shattering both the zombie’s head and the butt of her gun at the same time. Finally they caught a break and one of the zombies shot Elina in the back with his twenty two caliber pistol. He fired twice before the pistol jammed and he tossed it at her back as she fell.

The two shots hit Elina almost dead center above each of her kidneys, her legs buckled and she fell forward reaching for her back with both hands as she let the wreckage of her rifle fall to the ground. She landed on top of the gun and lay there spinning around in the mud kicking her legs and trying to make the pain go away.

Justin was having better luck at avoiding the zombies in his chosen path. The mission was to get to the tail section of the helicopter and help the survivors he had seen firing on the zombies as they flew over.

“Ghost!” he yelled, thinking of the last password the marines had set that morning while on perimeter duty.

“Graveyard!” came the call sign. At that moment to Justin’s left a zombie stepped out of the woods carrying a shotgun in a classic firing position. Justin didn’t see the zombie or the gun aimed at his head, but he heard the sound of bullets tearing through the trees that cut the zombie down.

“Mother-fucker!” He yelled throwing himself at the water where the helicopter wreckage lay half submerged.

Gunfire erupted all around him once he hit the water, but no one seemed to be fire at him. The people in the helicopter were exchanging fire with the zombies in the woods around them. Justin half swam, half waded to the helicopter until he could see inside. As he raised his hand to get the rifleman’s attention he found himself staring down the barrel of an M16.

“What the fuck are you doing, Skinny?” Yelled Sidney from within. “Can’t you see we’re pinned down here? And you fucking came to be pinned down with us?”

Nevertheless Sidney gave Justin a hand up during a lull in the fire. Just grunted in pain as a bullet tore through his calf and he rolled down into the murky water deeper in the aircraft.

“Stupid as all shit, son.” Sidney called from behind him, “You got any ammo?”

Sidney pulled open his fatigue pockets to reveal the load he was carrying.

“Well pass it here! Reload any magazines you can find.”

Justin looked around and saw that Sidney was not alone, there were three other men in the wreck with him. Two were in the throes of sickness that Justin had come to recognize as those dying from their Maxson injections. The last man was Alban. He was conscious, but looked dazed.

“Is this it?” Justin asked, handing another magazine forward.

“I don’t know, I pulled the three of them in here when I saw the first zed and have been keeping them at bay ever since. I didn’t see any other survivors, but that doesn’t mean there weren’t any. Who’s with you?” Sidney replied.

“Whiskey, Ricardo, a norm and Elina.” Justin replied using Levi’s nickname.

The firing died down again for a brief moment before they heard a bellow followed by a shotgun firing. In quick order the shotgun stopped and they both recognized the heavy bark of Levi’s revolver.

“Should we go?” Justin asked raising himself up.

Sidney looked out and started to rise as well, before he was pinned down by incoming fire from outside. Ducking he, looked back at Justin, “I think Whiskey’s gonna have to solve this one himself.”

Behind the fallen log where he had ended up Levi ‘Whiskey’ Wogsner, watched the skirmish progress with a growing sense of trepidation. Ricardo was laying still in the mud from where he had been shot a dozen times, of Elina, there was no sign at all and only Justin appeared to have reached a position of cover…and then became pinned down with the other survivors.

Levi still saw at least a half dozen active zombies in the area and he knew there were more around firing from unseen positions at the tail of the helicopter. The firing died down for a moment and he unsnapped his light vest to check on his combat armor. There was a hole in the front of it and Levi snaked his sweaty hand down the front inside of it, breathing a sigh of relief when his hand came up without any blood on it.

“I guess I’ll just have to shoot you in the arms and legs instead.” Called a voice from behind him.

Training took over, augmented by the changes brought on by being a Maxson; Levi moved. The two zombies behind him fired as soon as he twitched, but somehow Levi rolled and brought up his shotgun taking only a grazing shot to the outside of his right thigh. His gun boomed seven times in rapid succession and his shots didn’t take down either of his opponents.  There was a good side to his firing though, both opponents reflexively used their weapons to shield their heads and the shotgun made short work of destroying them. Before the zombies could recover Levi had his pistol out and was firing. Shooting at the one on the left he his third bullet through the things upraised hand into its skull, the other was as fast as Levi and knocked the revolver out of his hands after two more shots. Levi’s first knocked the creature back a step and then both of them, a living man and an undead facsimile squared off and circled each other.

They crashed together like cars at a demolition derby, this wasn’t epic smooth dancing, it was a dirty, no holds barred brawl. Levi broke the zombies arm in two places between its elbow and shoulder, but his nose was squashed flat against his face and blood was pouring out over his chin. They backed off as suddenly as they had started and eyed each other with newfound respect.

 “Benning.” Levi stated, naming the camp where he had undertaken Ranger school training..

“Yeah, same here. Darby.” The zombie said, specifying which camp he was closer to during his intitial training.

“Rogers.”

The zombie shook his head, “You gradutate?”

“Broke my leg in the Mountain Phase. Never did recycle.”

The zombie shook his half healed arm, “Made it to the desert phase, got bit by a fucking rattler, can you believe that shit? Sent me into a coma. I didn’t recycle either.”

“There hasn’t been a Desert phase for…” Levi began.

“Since ’95, yeah, I’m old school.”

Levi assessed the man in front of him, he was older, old enough to be his father, “I wouldn’t have guessed it.”

“Age doesn’t mean anything anymore. You’ve been fighting us a long time, huh?”

They circled each other warily, Levi looking for a way to end the fight quickly either by force of arms or striking a truce. He nodded to the zombies question and “Yeah.”

“You’re from down south ain’t ya?” The zombie asked.

“Yeah.”

“You one of those super soldiers I heard rumors of?”

Levi stood up, getting out of the combat crouch, he wiped his face with one hand and no more blood poured down into his mouth. The zombie stayed down in position for a moment, then nodded to himself and stood as well.

“Why’s you shoot down our helicopter?” Levi asked him.

“Us? All we had were a few rpgs, you saw how good they were at taking you down. We didn’t shoot your bird down, Corporal.” The zombie replied, “We just took advantage of the fact that it was down.”

“Who shot it down?”

The zombie pointed to his dead companion, “Lenny saw it, he was figured you’d be back with all the flying around. Said the missile came from the east. He got us all excited about scavenging for weapons and maybe a meal, so we headed over here.”

“East?” Levi laughed, “There ain’t nothing east but….”

“Ocean” The zombie finished for him.

Levi looked the zombie up and down, “We gonna go another round?”

The zombie shook his head, “I’m good.”

“Levi.”

“Roland.” The zombie responded.

“Be seeing ya, Roland.” Levi said by way of goodbye.

“Be seeing ya, Levi.”

Roland cautiously backed up until he bumped into a tree, he sidestepped it and continued backing away into the brush. Once he was out of sight Levi bent and gathered his weapons. The sporadic gunfire came to a halt seconds later.

Levi spared a glance at Ricardo and Elina as he approached the tail, both of his companions were still moving, so he figured they would be up and taking care of themselves. “Hi! In the tail there, anyone left alive?”

“Whisky?” called Justin.

“Shoulda known you’d take cover in the worst possible spot, Skinny.” Levi said as Justin’s head peeked above the ragged edge of the helicopter’s tail section.

“It’s a knack. My super power or something.” Justin replied, cautiously climbing out.

“Anyone else alive in there?”

“One of the techs, the German lead, I think and Sergeant Sidney, of course.”

“Of course, too tough to let falling out of a helicopter kill him. You guys need a hand with the wounded?”

Sidney slung his rifle over his shoulder and shook his head, “Justin and I will get him Levi, if you cover us. Anyone else on your team make it?”

Levi nodded, “Pretty sure they’ll be okay. Probably sandbagging for extra attention.”

“Tell ‘em their momma’s aren’t around, we got more than Alban to carry out. You land the other bird on Highway 1?” Sidney asked.

“Yeah, about four hundred meters east.” Levi answered.

“Good, we can check the cargo and drag it over there, sling it and carry it back. Complete the mission.”

Levi thought about the terrain between where they were and the helicopters on the highway, “That’s gonna be a hell of a shit detail, sarg.”

“That’s why God made marines. C’mon Justin, help me grab tags and Alban.”

“You have dead in there?”

“Two.” Sidney confirmed, “Baca and Rozdale, both injected, but I don’t think Roz was really mortal. He is now. Half the team hit themselves when the helicopter started to go down.”

“About that…did you see where the shot came from?”

Sidney shook his head, “I was too busy organizing my thoughts.”

“Met a guy. A former guy. He told me they were scavengers, just here for the bodies and maybe some guns and ammo. They didn’t shoot you down.”

“That a fact?”

“Yeah, second hand, he said one of their crew saw the shot that took you out. Said it came from the east.” Levi told him.

Sidney thought for a moment, a very short moment, before figuring out what that meant, then his face shrank into a scowl, “Well shit. We’ll have to be careful going up. Did George mount the gun?”

“Yeah.”

“Not that we can shoot down a missile, but maybe we can sink a ship. Especially one of those wooden jobbies they love so much.”

“We’ll get ‘em.” Levi assured the sergeant.