The Great Divide Game

By C.S. Masters

Shocker Cahn was in a lot of trouble...at least until the world ended.

A plague, unlike anything the human race has ever seen has just killed the Vice President. Then the president falls before he can appoint a replacement. The Speaker of the House is next in line but the Secretary of State has seized the White House for himself. At Michigan State University a team of geneticists is all that stands between humanity and extinction but a power-mad governor wants their discovery at any price. The only thing standing between the world and darkest winter is a team of Marines that have to protect the scientests from a horror that is devouring our species.

• Language: English
• Publisher: C.S. Masters
• Release date: Apr 17, 2020
• ISBN: 9781370665501

Book preview

1

"D avid spoke to me with his father’s voice and looked at me with his father’s eyes. He said things to me that only his father should know. A demon must possess him! For he knows of me those things that only one man should, and that is his father. He asks me why I have grown so suddenly old and acts afraid when I tell him he is my son." -- Recorded transcript Zebunissa Akinyi. Burundi outbreak syndrome ZT952

---

Treatment Station 27, Michigan State University

---

It was bound to happen sooner or later. It was the hidden flaw, the unseen and unseeable crack that would, sooner or later, make the glass shatter.

Everyone knew that stage III SODs had completely lost their minds. Everyone also knew that the stage IIs, AKA ‘the Flashers,’ still had a mind, even if it wasn’t their own anymore. What no one had bothered to consider was that a Stage II could pretend to be Stage III.

Corporal Derek Manion thought of it first. Or, to be more precise, his great-great-grandfather Cillian O’Manion thought of it, using his descendant’s brain.

---

I’d never have thought that any place in the world was worse than the Brewery at the Five Points but here it is. A right proper mouth of hell it’s own self. Mary and the Saints preserve me, Cillian O’Manion prayed.

Life in the most brutal slum of 1850s New York City had taught Cillian O’Manion more than a few tricks of the trade when it came to survival. First and foremost, if you couldn’t make the other fella think you were bigger than he, then it was best to make him think you were too small to be worth bothering about.

When he had first faded up from where ever he had been at... Cillian wasn’t so sure, where he had been at. It must have been quite a fine night indeed for his memory to be so black. He was in a deep fog. Had real trouble struggling to recall anything basic at all. He could do it, but it was like pulling memories out of ice-cold, thick molasses.

The crushers dressed up all in green weren’t a bad sort as crushers go. They weren’t too free with swinging the stick at those that displeased them. Even had asked him, polite as all day, would he mind laying on the cot, if you please, and that this was for his own good and all when they started tying him down to it.

Cillian had disagreed and tried to go for a stroll as fast as his legs could carry him. Something was quite wrong with his legs. They seemed much longer than he was used to having. The crushers had him on his back and cinched down in a heartbeat.

From time to time, one of them would come by and ask how he was doing. He noticed that they did that for all the other poor souls strapped down on these canvas palettes. It quickly occurred to him that they weren’t at all interested in a coherent answer. What they were looking for was incoherence.

They were looking for those that had gone mad. Now, those who are completely mad act as animals and are like to be treated as such now, Cillian reasoned. The ways in which an animal will try to escape are far and away different from how a reasoning man will try it. Perhaps it’s an edge. Sure and it’s the only thing within his power to do anyway. May as well try it.

When next asked as to his condition, Cillian O’Manion screamed, barked, and howled like the most unthinking of beasts.

It didn’t quite work out as he’d hoped. They immediately took him from one part of this cavernous asylum to another. Then they cut his clothes off of him leaving him bound naked as a baby to the rack. Not a substantial improvement he thought, slowly. Thinking was getting harder for some reason.

I need to get free of this. I need to find my Soarise and our wee Michael. I need to get home! The ghost of Cillian Manning was getting desperate.

---

Detroit Michigan, Eight Mile

---

People had been saying for a while that Detroit couldn’t get any worse. Detroit always managed to defy these expectations.

The Jewel of the Midwest had once been a beehive of activity. Square mile after square mile of clean grey factories producing what looked like an unending and unendable cold, golden flow of wealth. Immaculate streets were widened again and again as this flow turned into the mightiest of rivers.

There was plenty for everybody and everybody knew it. Detroit built monuments to itself and to its power. Masonic temples the size of vast cathedrals. Elaborate and ornate fountains creating gardens of water. Magnificent opera houses and gigantic theaters crenelated like castles, rich museums, zoos and aquariums; all to provide playgrounds for the intellect. Beautiful, rich and luxurious hotels to rest the bodies of awed visitors. While its kings built palaces for themselves, skyscrapers tall enough to dwarf the ambitions of Nimrod of fallen Babylon soared to heaven, vaulted by the city’s hubris.

The beehive was always starving for more worker bees. But along with those came the inevitable drones.

Clean grey became dusty grey, and then filthy grey, and then finally greyish-green with rot. No longer a beehive, but a disorganized swarm of maggots devouring a broken ox that was still breathing. The once-magnificent buildings were ripped apart from the inside in the unending thirst for copper. Pipes and wiring were savagely torn from the walls. Wood paneling was pried out with groaning shrieks from the walls. W`indows were broken because...why not? Gutting the once beautiful, and leaving only crumbling ruins behind.

When the zombies first moved in, almost no one noticed.

---

Major Clarence Wagoner , Michigan National Guard, had been to the ruins of actual Babylon. They looked good by comparison.

The former Marine and former Army Ranger’s features settled comfortably into a scowl. He shouldn’t have to be out here, himself. Majors were supposed to be able to trust their subordinates with something this routine. Unfortunately, it had become obvious he couldn’t.

This mission was vital and it had to be done right. Morale was the biggest problem in executing this op. He understood that. Soldiers tended to come from more regressive homes. They really couldn’t get the big picture or understand how important it was that these orders be carried out. Wagoner did. He always had, and somewhere inside he felt massively vindicated that he was finally able to make the kind of difference in America that he hadn’t been able to in Iraq or Afghanistan.

The important thing is to stop thinking of them as Americans, think of them as them, he thought to himself as he watched Haskins’ platoon approach a cluster of them.

Unload your weapons, place them on the ground, and take five paces backwards! Lieutenant Haskins barked.

The civilian mob stared open-mouthed as soldiers with American flags on their shoulders bore down on them.

It was real. It was happening.

God damn it! How we supposed to defend ourselves! One voice in a group of black men yelled back at Haskins.

If you do not disarm immediately, we will open fire! Haskins snapped.

Major Wagoner nodded to himself approvingly as the group of men wearing green armbands one by one, then as a group, hesitantly and angrily unloaded their weapons, then placed them cautiously on the ground.

Lieutenant Haskins ordered his team forward and they quickly set about scooping up firearms.

Such a disorganized mob, Wagoner thought to himself in disgust. What did they think they were going to accomplish with that ridiculous collection of weapons? Hunting rifles, shotguns. All kinds of pistols. And a couple of tricked out AR-15s. Those really made his blood boil. Wagoner didn’t agree with the President about everything, but he was absolutely right about that. No civilian has a right to a combat rifle.

Truth be told, so far as Wagoner was concerned, no civilian had a right to any kind of firearm. The Second Amendment was a ridiculous holdover from the earliest days of the United States. Maybe it had been needed in its day, but that day was over and done with. It wasn’t like Congress was still issuing letters of Marque and Reprisal. Wagoner shook his head at the stupidity of it. It was a good thing this chance had been recognized by higher authorities for the opportunity it was.

How we supposed to defend ourselves, huh? The man screamed again.

You’re not supposed to. You’re supposed to call the police, Wagoner had had enough of this shit.

The police? the man blinked in disbelief before bellowing out a loud bitter laugh. I supposed to call the Po-leese?

Last month they was proud as shit they could be here in half a mutha fuckin hour! Another man revved himself up before screaming, They ain’t fucking coming at all, now!

The man’s reply infuriated Wagoner . Like that gave any of these civilians the right to take the law into their own hands. The police will come eventually. Prepare a safe place and barricade it, in case any of the Zom...any of the Afflicted attempt to enter your homes! Those were the instructions everyone had been given by the government. They needed to listen to it. They needed to be made to listen to it.

A man in the back who kept his hair short and was wearing a two hundred dollar gray parka marked Cabela's said loudly, in a clear and articulate voice, this seizure constitutes a violation of Posse Comitatus he looked Wagoner directly in the eye challenging him, as an officer of the court I demand...

Lieutenant Haskins, detain that man! Wagoner ordered.

Whut!? His articulation slipped a little at that. A little bit of streets suddenly burned in his eyes. On what charge? What are you arresting me for? As an Officer of the Court, I demand...

Nobody said you were being arrested, Wagoner said with a professional smile. You are being administratively detained and quarantined because of potential exposure to SOD. And for being an NRA house nigger, he added silently to himself. African-Americans like him are the absolute worst. Traitors to their own class and for what? A few scraps from the white man’s table? A few pats on the head? Good nigger! You get a biscuit!

The man’s eyes went wide with shock but not fear, yet. Wagoner was certain the fear would come in a moment or two.

Haskins read him his rights.

Lt. Haskins swallowed but began. Sir, you are being detained by federalized authorities in Michigan under the provisions of the Emergency Executive Order... Haskins began to drone.

No, the man said in a small voice, then louder, NO!

For a period of no more than forty days, Haskins continued in a dead voice. You have the right to communicate indirectly with family members via electronic mail three times per day...

I got a wife! The black lawyer was genuinely starting to panic. As two soldiers began to pat him down.

You have the right to an attorney, Haskins kept on.

She’s pregnant! We got a two-year-old! His arms were jerked quickly behind his back and his wrists zip-tied. The soldiers had the routine down at this point. They knew he’d panic in a moment and fight.

You have the right to file a protest with the civil courts regarding your confinement, Haskins sped up.

Please don’t do this! How can they defend themselves without me? He openly begged.

Do you understand these rights, as I have explained them to you? Haskins rushed to a finish. He didn’t want to think about what he was doing or what would happen because of it.

The man went quiet for a moment, getting a hold of himself. Then replied in a voice that belonged in a Baptist pulpit, "I don’t understand how these are rights. His voice built, I don’t understand how you can invent the law and believe it legal. Then thundered his damning peroration, I DON’T UNDERSTAND HOW YOU CAN CALL YOURSELVES AMERICAN SOLDIERS!"

I think he’s Flashing, level II restraints and throw him in the truck, Wagoner was tired of listening to this Black Conservative bullshit. Send him to the Observation Site.

A field-expedient bite guard, a dog’s blue rubber chew bone, to be exact, was jammed into the lawyer’s mouth and tied around his head. Humiliated tears were starting to trail down his eyes, as he was picked up by the elbows and dragged to the back of the five-ton.

Haskins turned to the group of men, took a deep breath and opened his mouth to speak.

Carry on, Lieutenant Haskins! Wagoner interrupted.

Haskins hesitated, clearly torn, then he shut his mouth and replied, Yes, sir!

That was exactly why I was needed here, he thought to himself. He needed to keep a close eye on Lieutenant Haskins. The kid was a bit soft on them.

At the last detention, Haskins had actually told the crowd, Someone better be looking after this man’s family. Because I’m going to be back tomorrow.

It defeated the whole point of the exercise, so far as Major Wagoner was concerned.

He wanted them frightened. He wanted them scared enough to obey the authorities like they were supposed to. Wagoner needed Haskins to think of them as THEM. The kid needed to view these civilians as the other.

The random (or not so random) selection of a troublemaker lead to a very desirable end state.

Fear.

Fear meant order and order was his real objective. He knew there was no way to keep all these civilians alive. A lot of them were going to die, but a lot more would die if everything dissolved into chaos.

Order was the only real hope.

Time to head for the next checkpoint.

---

A woman’s voice screamed.

---

It wasn’t a frightened scream.

---

It wasn’t capable of being frightened. It was the long rasping scream of a throat scarred by its own howling rage.

Get the fuck inside, NOW! Haskins screamed at the group of men they had been searching. They had stood like deer in headlights when they heard the scream. Suddenly they ran in a mad scrambling, directionless panic trying to find any place, anything that might offer a moment’s protection. Though a few of them had the sense to grab their weapons off the ground before running.

Mount up! Wagoner shouted. He briefly watched as Haskins men rushed back to the Hummers and five tonnes. The trucks didn’t have any canvass covering for this mission. The soldiers were exposed to the cold November air. They had groused and bitched about it. But now they were glad for the clear field of fire as well as the height the trucks afforded.

Wagoner heard his radio operator calling it in. ...Zombie Tango troop inbound bearing..

Major Wagoner pounded on the hood, button it up! There was a series of frantic clicks as the men inside his hummer locked him out of it.

Wagoner was already sprinting for the lead five-ton. Foot on the tire, up over the wheel well and into the back of the truck. He took up station next to the M-240 machine gunner.

Wagoner clapped his Steiner-Optik binoculars to his eyes and started his threat scan. It didn’t take long.

There she was. No mistaking one of them at this point. Squatting on her haunches, so filthy there was no way to tell what race she had belonged to before SOD had stolen her from humanity. Hair so matted with blood and filth it stuck to her back like a stream of brown clay. The hair at the sides of her head had been torn out by the roots.

Did one of the other zombies do that to her? Wagoner briefly wondered. Or had it simply found a convenient way to keep its hair out of its eyes?

It stared at them again with eyes so bloodshot they were as pools of thick red mud. It cocked its head to the side like a curious dog. Then lifted its jaw, filled its diaphragm, and bayed its fury high and loud. The sound clawed at Wagoner 's spine worse than a hundred fingernails on a blackboard.

Permission to engage, sir? the machine gunner begged.

Denied, Wagoner said with cold authority. Inside he rather wished the man had used ‘Bad Initiative,’ combined with ‘Poor Judgement’ and just fired his weapon without asking him.

The ‘Howlers,’ as they were now called, seemed to act as scouts or pickets. It was hard to tell which, because no one was studying zombie behavior patterns in any detail yet. Once the Howler spotted a nice juicy clump of humans, it would start screaming until a pack of them arrived.

That was a big part of the reason that the administration had finally gotten off its ass about gun control. Civilians had quickly figured out the fastest path to safety was to shoot the Howler.

So Wagoner was finally, finally, able to carry out his most cherished dream and exercise proper confiscatory gun control.

The downside was that the administration had also issued some very restrictive rules of engagement. After what the press was calling the Cleveland Massacre, it had been deemed necessary. A national guard unit had shot a seven-man troop of Zombies (Zulus at the time) who were attacking them. The press had feasted on it for a couple of days. At the time the Zombie troops were brand new. No one had seen one before that day. And that troop had been all African-American. There were uploaded videos everywhere.

Worse were mothers who thought their babies could have been saved. Rivers of tears pouring down their faces as they cradled dirt and blood caked heads in their laps. Then screaming loudly when faceless men in biocontainment suits tried to pull them off the corpses of their children. Finally shrieking that if the government wanted to save them, they would have been saved. They were just sick, they weren’t the monsters everyone was saying they were. Instantly, a lot of people started saying - in loud angry voices - that they would never have been shot if they were white.

Riots began almost immediately.

And then they stopped just as fast. Zombies, it turned out, liked rioting.

A lot.

Currently the Rules of Engagement strictly forbade the use of firearms against Zombies. Non-compliant gun owners were a different kettle of fish entirely. The press, thank God, was completely ignoring those incidents. Except for the Faux News Network.

But, for now, the standing order for Zombies was secure and remove.

First squad, Capture Team! Up! Haskins ordered.

Nine men jumped out the back of the second truck and rushed towards the Howler. If they could get the damn thing locked down fast enough a mob of the things wouldn’t have time to home in on her.

The zombie tactics were simple but reasonably effective. A Howler would act as a rallying point. A pack would gather. They would keep looking at each other and looking at whatever group of unafflicted they were targeting. When they thought they had enough, they would rush. Or sometimes just rush, anyway. Zombies weren’t that good at math.

So taking down the Howler was job one.

And they could. Not. Shoot. It.

The nine-man team formed a semicircle as they advanced at a double time. Three beaters on each wing armed with police batons and wearing hockey gauntlets with the three-man net team in the middle.

The zombie kept up its keening cry as the soldiers pressed in on it.

Is it saying anything to the others? the gunner next to Wagoner asked out loud.

Cut the chatter, Wagoner ordered, although he frequently wondered the same thing himself. Were they communicating at all? Did they have any brains left that could do that?

The capture team closed in. Now, it would get messy. The zombies never ran. Ever.

When the soldiers got within ten feet of her, the Howler charged on all fours, still screaming but its voice suddenly reached a high soprano. It galloped right for the center of the team. Good, Wagoner thought. This one will be easy.

It wasn’t.

The Howler suddenly slammed to a stop, jerking a pivot on its heel and launching itself at the beater at the end. It came in low, striking like a snake. The private on the end wasn’t set for it. The zombie had caught him between steps when all of his weight was balanced on one leg.

Shit! snarled Wagoner .

The Howler was on top of his man. Even as the rest of the squad rushed to save him, truncheons high. The private screamed more in terror then pain as the Howler sunk her teeth into his shoulder. Her head thrashing as her broken teeth tore into him.

Backpedal and net! the squad leader ordered. He’d’ just lost one man, he didn’t want to lose anymore. The squad skipped back a half step and the net was cast over the howler and the screaming private.

Now! he roared and rushed back in. The men grabbed its arms and legs pulling it off their squadmate. Its neck was pinned to the ground with a boot, the net peeled back. And another chew toy bite restraint was carefully inserted.

Wagoner had been worried that he wouldn’t be allowed to use the things anymore. The day before, there had been a huge internet dust-up by activists about using them. They were viewed as demeaning to the Afflicted. Chew toys simply weren’t acceptable. That morphed into any kind of bite restraint was unacceptable as well as being racist. Fortunately, Twitter had gone down last night and it hadn’t come back up yet. It was looking like it never would.

Haskins’ squad had the Howler hogtied. They carried it to the third five-ton truck. The one that was covered. The one they had just stuffed the lawyer into.

The medic approached the private who had just been bitten. He hesitated before coming any closer. He put on the exam gloves and raised his hands very haltingly towards the Private.

That Private couldn’t even be twenty, Wagoner thought to himself sadly.

The kid was wide-eyed and shaking, his face dead white. No one who had been bitten had yet failed to come down with SOD. Everybody knew it.

His voice cracked as he waved off the medic, Don’t bother doc. I won’t mind it in a little bit. The kid dropped his web gear. Opened one of the pouches on it and pulled out a bite restraint. He put the dog’s rubber bone in his own mouth and tied it around his head as he walked to the waiting third truck. Another soldier, the one who had picked up the Private’s web gear, walked beside him with tears in his eyes. He said a few unheard words to him. When they reached the truck. He zipped tied his friend’s hands together and helped him get inside, then he zipped tied his feet as well.

Wagoner watched as the second soldier pulled an envelope out of the web gear he was carrying. There was a public mailbox close by, the soldier looked at for a long moment. Clearly made a decision and stuffed the envelope into his cargo pocket.

Wagoner was pissed. All of this, he thought to himself, because this pussy of a machine gunner had to put me on the spot by asking my permission to fire. Wagoner ’s head snapped over to him.

You’re relieved. Get on the third truck.

Sir? The machine gunner asked in a high voice, that made Wagoner ’s teeth grate.

You’re on guard duty. They need an extra body now.

Yes, sir, It was a perfectly legal order. There was nothing he could do about it.

Starner!

Suh! A big kid with a Texas accent answered.

You’re on the two-forty! Wagoner ordered.

Starner got a big smile on his face. Wagoner was pleased. That idiot wouldn’t bother with awkward questions like, Do I have permission to fire?

Wagoner hopped down off of the five-ton and nodded to his Lieutenant, Smart work. Your men are very impressive.

The standard, Thank you, sir, was said with dull eyes and a duller voice.

Wagoner gripped Haskins' shoulder. The men needed to think he was ruthless. That was all about maintaining standards, but they should also see he was a little caring. They needed a bit of theater like that, I know it’s hard son. Losing a man here isn’t like losing one in the Sandbox or the Rock Pile.

Sir...

Damn it, he’s gonna talk to me, Wagoner thought to himself.

Make it quick, What was Haskin’s first name again? We still have work to do, Bryan. Was it Bryan?

Sir, it would really help morale if we still had a separate place for our own men. Instead of just dumping them into Gen-pop at the Treatment Station.

There was no longer any treatment going on at the Treatment Stations. It just wasn’t possible anymore. A few people were muttering about them being concentration camps. But, honestly, at this point keeping the Afflicted tied to their cots was about the best anybody could do.

Wagoner had looked in on the treatment station in Lansing earlier that morning before heading out here. He had gone to visit one of his wounded, just like a good CO is supposed to do. There had been some effort to segregate cops and soldiers a couple of days ago but that had been given up on. Segregating by sex was now the priority. The idea, apparently, was that the female zombies needed to be protected from sexual abuse.

If you saw the inside of a Treatment Station, you knew that idea was tragically hilarious.

---

The smell hit you before you got anywhere near the door. Human sewage, acrid and raw, married to the cloying stench of piss. Rows upon rows of cots with snarling, writhing lumps of sallow flesh lashed down to them. There weren’t any hospital gowns to go around by now and there wouldn’t have been any point to them if there had been. The howling cries of the Afflicted bounced off the concrete walls, amplifying and refining the screams to a deafening symphony of the damned. The Afflicted were being kept warm with red heat lamps, lighting every surface with the dull scarlet glow of a distant, unearthly fire.

Even worse than the mindless screaming was the terrified confused begging and pleading of the Flashers - those zombies who were temporarily seeing life out of the eyes of their long-dead ancestors. A horrifying babel from the Tower of Babel itself, as they were strapped naked onto cots and being carried into hell.

Those who saw to the needs of damned trudged from cot to cot, covered head-to-foot in full MOPP 4 chem/biohazard gear. The nurses - or were they, attendants? Or were they tormenting demons? Wagoner couldn’t decide which was most appropriate. The green uniforms were rendered black by the light of the heat lamps. They would have been terrifying to look at except for the comical addition of hockey gauntlets. All that they could do at this point was to perform only the most basic functions of hydration and feeding through tubes.

Hygiene was provided for by a high-pressure hose. The ground beneath the cots consisted of thick slats with about an inch of space between them. The shit and piss was sprayed off the cots and sluiced down between the slats.

Treatment Station 27 had been Michigan State University’s Swine Teaching and Research Center.

Which one is your man? a muffled voice had asked him through a gas mask.

Manion, Wagoner replied with a dry rasping voice. His name was Derek Manion. Wagoner blinked at himself for having said, ‘was.’ He already knew Manion was dead and what was left was just a raging husk.

I should just leave. There is no point to my being here at all, he thought to himself as he was led to a naked man who didn’t yet have a tube in his mouth, and was tied with zip ties and nylon cord to a cot.

Manion, he thought, appeared to have caught his eye. Held his gaze. Did he recognize him? Was that even possible?

The blood-red eyes appeared to be pleading with him about something. Manion didn’t look angry at all. Did he have something to say? There was a slight beckoning jerk of his chin.

Wagoner , incautiously, leaned over to hear what the man had to say.

The attendant placed a hand on his shoulder, Sir, don’t do that.

Wagoner turned his head to chew the man out, just as Manion’s teeth clicked shut on where his cheek had just been. GGGRROOOOWHHHHHaaaaaaa! Manion howled at him.

Wagoner reeled backward in terror as Manion snarled, biting at the empty air where he had been. One bite was all it took.

Wagoner had turned on his heel and fled.

---

Back in Detroit, Wagoner sighed, then assumed his command posture. Back straight, eyes forward. Right hand resting on his M9 pistol butt, left on the hilt of his Kaybar. Then he scowled. Where the hell was his Kaybar? Damn it he’d lost his knife somewhere. Annoyed, he snapped at his Lieutenant, Look Haskins, I understand that...

---

BRAK-A-BRAK-A-BRAK-A-BRAK-A

---

BRAK-A-BRAK-A-BRAK-A-BRAK-A

---

The M-240 had fired into life. Full power seven point six two cracked the air over their heads at supersonic speed.

Mount up! Mount up! Haskins yelled as he sprinted for the lead five-ton. Drop the fucking Howler and go! He screamed at the men who were still trying to drag the zombie to the third truck.

Wagoner was closer to his hummer then his five-ton. He sprinted up the back of it’s clamshell and pounded on the top hatch. Open it! Open it!

There was a cascade of boots stamping on pavement as his men charged back up into the trucks

CEASEFIRE! CEASEFIRE! STARNER, LOCK THAT SHIT DOWN! Wagoner heard Haskins yell.

Wagoner had a sudden change of heart over his choice of Starner. God, was his career over? Am I going to prison for this? How many Afflicted are dead? One Howler could have been swept under the carpet but not this. Wagoner thought as he heard Haskins barking, Ceasefire Starner! Ceasefire, you fucking idiot!

Sir, the hatch is jammed, get on the truck, sir! Get on the truck! A muffled voice cried from the inside of his hummer.

No time for that. No time. Wagoner started scanning, where Starner had been firing.

He instantly forgot about Afflicted casualties.

God, there they were and they were closing fast. The hoard that the Howler had summoned. Maybe about twenty of them.

Twenty! No one had seen a troop that big yet. The zombie troops weren’t supposed to get that big. The experts had said that seven was as big as they could get.

On they came. Bent over and galloping on all fours like a platoon of psychotic apes, in ripped and tattered clothing. Blood red eyes silently focused. All of these beasts were naked from the waist down. Pants seemed to be a major inconvenience for them. They didn’t seem to mind shirts and jackets as much. One was almost comically dressed in a three thousand dollar William Fioravanti jacket and tie but with his bare cock swinging between his legs.

Almost comically.

There was no screaming, no growling. This was a hunting pack closing in for a kill.

Forward! Forward, then right! Wagoner commanded. Gripping the lip of the hatch as tightly as he could.

The convoy lurched into life. Gears grinding. Diesel engines roaring. Smoke belching out of tall smokestacks., Heading dead ahead forward toward the charging pack.

Fifty yards between them. This is going to be tight, Wagoner thought in a controlled panic

Now forty yards. The standing orders directly from the White House was to de-escalate if you couldn’t capture the individual zombies. But those Rules of Engagement were two days old. Two days was a lifetime ago, now. Two days was another world, entirely.

Thirty yards. He could see individual faces now. The red eyes peering out of filthy crusts of dried blood on their faces. Lips peeled, jagged broken teeth through open panting mouths as they ran. Panting in what felt like the anticipated animalistic pleasure of ripping him apart with their mouths.

Twenty yards. They aren’t animals though, Wagoner knew. Four of them were left dead in the street by Starner’s fire. Animals would have been frightened. Fear wasn’t even a concept to these things.

Fifteen yards. They were at the intersection now. Turn now damn it! Turn! Wagoner yelled at his driver who suddenly swung the steering wheel viscously hard. Wagoner ’s fingers peeled off the turret, and his guts turned to water as he felt himself being hurled over the side of his Hummer and into the street. His shoulder hit the ground, the pavement graveling at his clothes. As he tumbled.

He rolled up onto his knee pads, the plastic skidded briefly. Oh, God. Oh, God. Oh, God. He tried to sprint and pain shot through his ankle. Wagoner limped frantically toward the trucks. The lead one sped by.

They weren't going to stop for him. He knew they weren’t. He’d given orders that covered this eventuality. In this situation, no one is to stop for a man who goes overboard. So don’t go overboard! He had laughed and they had laughed with him.

This was it, he was going to die in the streets of Detroit.

MAJOR! A soldier had clambered over the side, his feet on the running board, one hand clenched the truck’s railing and the other an open lifeline to Clarence Wagoner .

One that Wagoner knew he couldn’t reach. But instinctively he lurched forward anyway, his own hand frantically outstretched as the charging zombie troop closed in him.

The five-ton suddenly swerved towards him. Arms slapped as Wagoner seized a wrist whose hand closed like a vice on his own. He jumped with what little he had left as Starner yanked him upward, Gotcha, sir, Starner said as Wagoner gripped the side rails. Then he spared one hand to grip Starner on the shoulder in silent thanks.

Wagoner looked back just in time to see the third truck making a hard high-speed turn. The five ton’s high center of balance shifted so radically it lifted off its right tires. It was balanced for one moment on three of its six wheels as it sped along, about to tip over on its side.

The driver skillfully tapped the brakes and twisted the wheel sending it crashing back down to all six tires.

There was a gear grinding downshift as the third truck tried to regain lost speed. Wagoner watched in impotent terror as he saw the zombies start to claw their way into the back of the