ARISEN_Book Thirteen_The Siege Read online

  Their motto was: Better to die than to live a coward.

  And Sergeant Major Pradup Sun was the living exemplar of that tradition. The Conspicuous Gallantry Cross his men had just been ribbing him about had been awarded to him after a tour of Helmand Province in Afghanistan – when he had singlehandedly defended his remote combat outpost against a force of thirty Taliban fighters, who had attacked with AKs and RPGs from three sides. In the engagement, Sun fired more than 400 rounds from his personal weapon, threw seventeen grenades – and fired off a Claymore mine for good measure. In the end, completely out of ammo, he had beaten the last attacker off the walls, and to death, with a machine-gun tripod.

  The outpost stood.

  But his Gurkha buddies weren’t impressed. In particular, they were never going to let him forget the whole tripod thing.

  As Sun settled back into the line, and mentally prepared himself to get busy doing nothing again, his radio finally went. It was his company commander – Gurkha officers were traditionally British, not Nepalese – speaking to the platoon and section leaders. “All B Company elements. We’ve got orders, and are moving out – to an HLZ, five clicks away…” Sun listened to the rest, and then informed his section.

  “Saddle up, gents,” he said. “We’re moving out. And we’re gonna be riding air assault – helos inbound, so we have to get clear of these trees.”

  “Where to?”

  “Back behind the Wall, evidently. To CentCom HQ.”

  “Why? What fun is that? No fighting to be done there.”

  “No. Just playing nurse-maid to a bunch of Ruperts. You’ll love it, you will. Might even be hot food.”

  Sun didn’t actually disagree with his men. But they all did what they were told. And whatever happened, it would be good. Sun was glad to finally be moving. He always preferred to make himself useful, happier to help in some way. Then again, like most Nepalese people, he was almost always happy. He couldn’t understand those who wasted their lives being neurotic or depressed, or couldn’t find the joy in life. It made no sense. And it was such a waste.

  As he stood, slung his pack, and checked his weapon, he cast his eye over his men, like a concerned father. And he smiled, easily as usual. They had food, sunlight, their friends around them, family back home. Well, they used to have family back home. Sun chose to believe that his family, back in beautiful Khumjung Village in the magnificent Nepalese Himalaya, were still alive. It was a very remote area, and his were people who knew how to survive. And communications up there had always been spotty. Not hearing from them didn’t worry him too much.

  Anyway, what else did a human being need?

  Everything was perfect, and beautiful. And now they’d get to take another exciting helicopter ride. They were just going to have to fight their way there first.

  Which would also be good fun.

  The men moved out, laughing and attacking.

  Flying Dick

  CentCom, Old Prison – Parade Ground

  “Stand at the position of attention when you eye-fuck me, Corporal!”

  Fick got right up in the horrified RMP’s face, so close that the badly alarmed British soldier could count the pores on Fick’s nose. The man had had the temerity to ask him, “And who the bloody hell are you, then?” Now he piped down fast, and instead stood instantly and rigidly at attention.

  “I don’t care if a bumblebee is dry-humping your goddamned eyeball, you will stand at the position of attention. Also,” Fick continued, neither retreating an inch nor lowering his voice a decibel, “you can go ahead and quit eye-fucking me any time. I’m not your little sister.”

  And with that, he pretty much had the complete and undivided attention of the mustered formation of almost a hundred Royal Military Police. They stood in three long ranks before him in one of the open prison courtyards. Behind him stood Second Lieutenant McNiven – and the newly promoted Lieutenant Wesley.

  Fick pointed back at him without looking. “That there is your new commander – LT Wesley. You knuckleheads will address him as ‘Yes, sir’.”

  And now there was also no need for Fick to answer the question about who he was. He was obviously, self-evidently, in charge – the senior enlisted leader of the men, and the company’s new enforcer. Behind him, Wesley made a look over Fick’s shoulder that seemed to convey equal parts horror, apology, and resignation. Like: This is just how it’s going to be – and I’m terribly sorry about it. He was deeply uncomfortable in his new role, and in that very special English way. But he’d been growing a lot lately, and figured he’d just grow into this.

  Somehow.

  Fick walked down the line, reviewing his new troops. One on the end was actually still holding a travel coffee mug. Fick’s face twisted into his usual terrifying smile.

  “May I?” he asked, gesturing politely.

  The RMP sheepishly held out the cup. Fick took it gingerly, sniffed, then took a sip. His eyes closed and his head tilted back as he swallowed. “Mmm, coffee. That real milk in there?”

  The RMP nodded.

  Fick sipped again. “I fucking love coffee. But it can make me a little excitable – not my normal laid-back and easygoing self.” He squinted at the cup’s owner. “Okay. Your job, Lance Corporal Schmuckatelli—”

  “Actually, it’s Lance Corporal Fr—”

  “Nobody gives a fuck what your name is!!”

  Fick had basically just screamed in the man’s face at the top of his lungs. He leaned back and straightened his uniform blouse, then lowered his voice again. “Your job, Lance Corporal Schmuckatelli…” He paused to see if there would be any objection. There wasn’t. “Your job is to make sure my coffee cup is filled at all times.”

  The man opened his mouth to speak, but nothing came out.

  “Close your mouth. Does it look like it’s raining dicks out here?”

  Fick’s head swiveled, his eye drawn to a man a few spots down the line. The young RMP seemed to be looking up at the guard tower on the walls, perhaps for someone to come save them from this surreal situation they suddenly found themselves in.

  Fick strolled down the line and addressed him in a genial voice. “What are you looking at up there, Private? Was there a flying dick?”

  The man shook his head rapidly side to side in answer.

  Fick squinted into his eye. “Did I ask you a fucking question?”

  The man just pursed his lips. There was obviously no correct answer to this.

  “Nice raspberry beret,” Fick said, flicking it off his head with one hand. “You fucking fairy.” He stepped to the next man down the line, another Lance Corporal. “Present arms!” The man did. Fick took the rifle and regarded it. “L85A2, huh? Jesus Christ.” He turned his head to the rear and said, “Lieutenant Wesley, can you take a note, please?”

  Wesley dug out a small notepad and pen from his pocket, then clicked the pen and waited.

  “If I’m ever killed with one of these things, I want you to lie and tell everyone I was fucked to death in a gay brothel.”

  Wesley clicked his pen closed again.

  Fick tossed the rifle back to the wide-eyed man, then took two steps back and raised his voice to be heard by the whole formation. “Now listen up, you glorified gumshoes. Our fucking job is to organize some kind of remotely effective defense for this ancient stone shithouse. And we’re going to get it right, and we’re not taking any fucking time off for tea and crumpets.” He pointed up and around. “When the shit starts, you men are going to go up and man those walls, and you’re going to do it as if you were actually men. And you’re going to keep doing it, for the duration, until this goddamned thing is over. We are going to be here every hour, on the hour, for an hour.”

  He stepped up into the face of the nearest man in the front rank. “You got me, Johnny Trooper?”

  The RMP just nodded and gulped.

  Fick turned and marched off, coffee mug in hand. As he passed 2Lt McNiven, he said, “We need a tour of everything – starting with your
armory.” To Wesley, he said, “C’mon. Let’s figure out how to skin this retarded potato. And maybe we can even make some kind of fighting force out of these dipshits.”

  As Wesley fell in beside him, he leaned in and whispered, “I know they’re not your Marines. But try to give them a chance.”

  Fick just grunted, and didn’t slow down. He didn’t have time to slow down.

  “Also,” Wesley added, “I’m not sure talking to the men that way is going to win them over.”

  Fick actually did take the time to answer this. “Believe me – nothing I say or don’t say is going to win them over.” What he meant was: in his world, nothing anyone said ever won anybody over.

  Only actions counted.

  * * *

  Fick whistled when he saw the crates of small-arms ammunition stacked to the high ceiling on metal shelving. The CentCom armory was a sizable room, and made an impressive ammo dump. But he was less happy when he’d reviewed the heavy-weapons storage area at the back.

  “These it?” he asked McNiven.

  The RMP officer considered for a second. “I think there are also a couple of medium machine guns mounted on trucks. Might be on helos, as well, have to check.”

  “Okay,” Fick grunted. “Those’re all going to get pulled off – and mounted up in the guard towers and along the walls. I also want to start moving most of this ammo, particularly belted MG rounds, up into those towers. This is way too far back for tactical resupply.”

  McNiven sighed and looked skeptical. “You really think the dead are going to get in – all the way to our walls?”

  Fick didn’t even look at him. Instead, Wesley answered. “One thing we’ve learned is that the dead always get in.”

  Fick pointed at two big tubes. “Those eighty-one mil?”

  McNiven nodded, then frowned. “Could have sworn we had four of those mortars, rather than two… And a hell of a lot more ammo. Elves must be nicking our kit.”

  Fick just gave him a sour look. “Leave them here for now while I decide where best to emplace them. Then we dig pits.”

  He turned to leave, not waiting for Wesley and McNiven.

  * * *

  The three of them finally stood up on the inner prison walls, on the southeast side, where Fick could get a look at the entire base, which he scanned through binoculars. Right now he was looking at the giant white Biosciences complex, which was not all that far away – but outside the prison walls. He lowered the binos and looked at McNiven.

  “Okay. Who decided to build the goddamned Palace of Saving Humanity outside the main prison walls?”

  McNiven shrugged. “The Elfin Safety Man, I think.”

  Fick gave him a What the fuck does that even mean? look.

  "Health & Safety regulations. Chemicals, explosion risk, and not to mention deadly diseases inside. Also, I don’t think there was quite room in here for the size facility needed.”

  Fick gritted his teeth and exhaled. “We’re all going to be pretty fucking unhealthy and unsafe when the dead take down the vaccine stocks.” He gestured around them. “Okay. The original complex is a goddamned prison, so it’s reasonably Zulu-proof, right off the bat.”

  Wesley took up the theme, gesturing out at Biosciences. “And yet that is what we have to defend at all costs. The heart. The whole reason we’re here in the first place.”

  “Exactly,” Fick said. “And when the walls around the Common fall, the prison will stand a lot longer. But defending that thing out there by itself is going to be damned near impossible.”

  McNiven looked ashen. “Let’s hope it doesn’t come to that.”

  Fick and Wesley exchanged a look. This guy had obviously been locked up somewhere safe. “When has it ever not come to that?” Fick said.

  “Zed’s Law,” Wesley said.

  “Wait – what?” Fick said. “Who’s Zed? And don’t tell me Zed’s dead, baby.”

  Wes laughed. “It’s the letter of the alphabet Americans inexplicably call ‘zee’. Zed’s Law is just like Sod’s Law.”

  Fick exhaled. “And what the hell is that?”

  Now McNiven answered. “I believe Americans call it Murphy’s Law – whatever can go wrong will go wrong.”

  Fick looked tired. “And Zed’s Law?”

  Wesley held his eye. “Absolutely everything will always go wrong. It’s the law of the ZA.”

  Fick nodded. “Yeah, okay. Sounds about right.”

  * * *

  The three of them got back down on the ground of the Common, and started moving smartly toward Bio. Fick wanted to see it up close. When they reached it, he rapped his knuckles on the outside wall – it was some kind of compressed plastic, prefab building materials. He wasn’t impressed.

  Sticking his head inside the lobby, he looked up at the high ceiling. “Fire suppression system?” he asked McNiven.

  “Not sure.”

  Fick shook his head. So much for health and safety.

  After a quick tour of the labs and connected areas, they exited and headed out across the Common again. As they walked, Fick looked up at the big SHQ building. It was also out in the Common – but at least backed up against the prison walls. They could definitely hold that longer, not least because it was tallest. Then his gaze moved up and out to the extended walls around them. He could already see there weren’t as many guard towers, ramparts, or fighting positions along them as along the inner prison walls. He pointed this out to McNiven.

  “We built just enough to keep watch.”

  Fick spat. “Well, the good news is the old prison complex anchors the north side – which is basically where the dead will be coming from first. We’ll set the bulk of our unfortunately limited forces on the north, thinning them out to east and west, with just single pickets on the south. But the dead won’t stop where they start. And if we can’t defend the rest of the perimeter by arms, the walls are worthless, even at twenty feet high. The dead will just pile up and over.”

  McNiven stopped walking and looked at Fick. “Look, Sergeant,” he said. “When the ZPW falls… it’s over. London’s gone. We’re all dead. There’s no point after that.”

  Fick got right up in the man’s face, and stabbed his finger painfully in his chest. “First of all, it’s never over. Second, you’re dead when I say you are. Which is going to be right now if you don’t square your shit away, stow that bad attitude, and start making yourself fucking useful. You got it?”

  McNiven nodded, looking shamed – and not happy about it.

  Fick looked around at the walls again. “Okay. We’re going to need to build some more ramparts and fighting positions. Even if we just get some scaffolding up there. The guard towers all have stairs and entrances at ground level?” McNiven nodded. “I also want ladders on the walls between the towers.”

  “So people can get down if the towers are lost?”

  “Hell, no. So we can get reinforcements up, if the towers are lost.” He stopped walking and looked at McNiven. “We also need to keep an eye out for survivors. Unlike the dead, they can pile shit up against the walls, throw up ladders, or just blow up or batter down the doors. We could easily go down that way. Plenty have.”

  He started walking again. “Come on. We’re going to set watches, and we’re going to start assigning your men into construction details.”

  McNiven said, “Only our two attached reamies are supposed to do construction.”

  Fick boggled. “Attached whatsies? Guys who got reamed out – and then sent here so their assholes could get back to regular size?”

  “REMEs. Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers. They’re combat engineers. They’ve been working their arses to the bone, trying to get this place fixed up after the outbreak.”

  “Well get their boneless asses up here. They work for me now. Wait – are you saying your men haven’t been helping?”

  “Health and safety regs says we’re not allowed to do construction work.”

  Fick ground his jaw like he was trying to eat his
own teeth. “Look me in the eye, McNiven. Fuck your health. Fuck your safety. If by some miracle both don’t get destroyed in the coming fight, I will personally fuck up both your health and your safety. I will fucking demolish your health, and jeopardize your safety in ways that will make your ancestors weep.” He paused and tried to calm down. “Okay, never mind, take me to them.”

  Six minutes later, they were at a large outbuilding that was the center of maintenance for the whole facility, the engineering shack, and Fick and Wesley met the two REMEs. In efficient language, Fick instructed them on what he wanted – sandbagging and reinforcing of all the guard towers and parapets, as well as scaffolding and ladders behind the long undefended stretches of walls.

  The senior engineer looked to the junior, and said, “The trouble’s going to be materials. We’ve got a few ladders, and we can rig some scaffolding – but not on the scale you have in mind.”

  Fick looked around the big open structure, where he could see two Bobcat earth movers parked. “Fine,” he said. “One thing I know we’ve got is dirt. Start constructing dirt ramps up to the backs of the walls.”

  McNiven interjected. “Won’t that make it easier for the dead to get in?”

  “Believe me,” Fick said. “If they get to the top of the walls, a twenty-foot drop on the other side won’t slow them down any.”

  Fick marched out again, the other two still in tow.

  * * *

  “Who here is a fucking badass?”

  The RMPs were back in formation in the courtyard, along with the REMEs and the commanders, and now Fick was making final team assignments. Most of the RMPs, as well as the rest of the so-called home guard, would ultimately be going to the walls. And all of them were going to be rolling up their sleeves and building out the defenses in the meantime. But Fick knew he was also going to need a quick reaction force (QRF) – a roving strike team he would personally lead, to stay on the ground behind the walls, and deal with incursions or mini-outbreaks.

  And he wanted men he could depend on.