Last Stand Read online

  Check that – worse, plus weirder, by the minute. Instead of speaking, I just gave Darby a What the fuck does that even mean? look.

  He just shrugged. “We’ve got our own set of problems.” He was right. There was rarely any point in worrying about the dizzying volume and variety of asshattery going on in other places.

  When I turned around again, I saw the standoff was now fully underway: 36 Army Rangers strung out in a paper-thin arc, far from any help or support – facing at least 100 armed Russians thronging the ship’s bow deck, and the two decks above and behind it. They didn’t look like Spetsnaz to me, but they didn’t have to. They had a naval gun, Kashtans – oh, and also cruise missiles – to back them up.

  I’d already pretty much resigned myself to all of this. But what I didn’t expect to see was a man strolling casually down the gangway toward the dock – and then turning and heading right toward us. He wasn’t armed. But the woman behind him sure was. And when I saw every single one of the rifles in our platoon tracking the pair, I hit the radio and growled: “Nobody touch nothin’.” The men knew perfectly well not to fire unless ordered to. But I figured the Sergeant Apone line would lighten the mood.

  “On me,” Darby said.

  * * *

  The two of us met the two of them at the foot of the 400-meter pier.

  “Good morning, tovarischi!” the man said. Slim, good-looking, and well-turned-out in a crisp Russian military working uniform, he looked like maybe an investment banker on a weekend hunting trip. “That means—”

  “Comrades.” Darby and I finished for him, speaking at once.

  “Just so,” the man said, smiling.

  I kept my poker face on, but shook my head internally. This cocky sonofabitch wasn’t even wearing a sidearm. But the T2-era Linda Hamilton wannabe behind him sure was. She had what looked like the latest-gen AK-12 in 5.45mm, tricked out with a skeletonized stock, integrated suppressor, transparent Magpul mag, plus expensive optics. I wasn’t even sure what the hell she had in her drop-leg holster, only that it mounted a mini-EOTech, which even most of us didn’t get. Anyway, I was too distracted by her bare arms emerging from her tactical vest, and the curve of her hip under the sidearm.

  “What?” the man asked, in an accent that was obviously Russian, but totally intelligible – educated, perhaps, or maybe even cultured. “No ‘Welcome to Syria’? Americans are usually so well-mannered.”

  “Welcome to fucking Syria,” Darby said. “My higher command wishes to advise you not to disembark any forces at this port.”

  The Russian cocked his head, a smile teasing the corner of his mouth. “Well, Captain, I believe that—” he nodded toward our men dug in on the bluffs “—is sovereign Syrian territory. And this—” he tapped the toe of his boot “—is Russian soil. So, I wonder… which of us shouldn’t be deploying forces?”

  I tightened the grip on my rifle, but kept it carefully pointed at the deck. If this did kick off, we were all still going to die. But the Captain and I would die first.

  The Russian, however, immediately defused the tension again. “You have your orders, Captain, no doubt. And, as it happens, we have our own tasks to complete – onboard ship. So. I suggest we all wait and just see if maybe your president and ours hash this out, in the lofty air way up above our pay grades. And maybe we all go home safely. No?”

  Darby almost cracked a smile. “Sure.” He started to turn, but paused and asked, “Hey – what do I call you?” The Russian’s uniform had no insignia of any sort – rank, unit, or nametape. Not even a tricolor Russian flag.

  The man pulled a notepad from his pocket, scribbled a number, and tore it off. “You can call me anytime, tovarisch.” Now both of them had to fight a smile. “That’s my cell. Commanders should maintain an open channel, no?” Darby took the paper. “And my comrades call me… Uron.”

  “Which means?” Like me, Darby had guessed this was not a Russian name but an operator call-sign, or nickname.

  “It means: ‘Damage’.”

  Darby squinted. “As in, you fuck shit up?”

  “No. The noun, not verb. As in ‘the damage has been done.’”

  Wow. I shook my head. This guy was a real piece of work. Then I gave in to a temptation I probably should have resisted. I nodded past him at the female shooter and said, “What about you?”

  “Katya,” she said. Her accent was thicker. And, somehow, more primal. Feral, maybe. Before I could ask, she said, “Means ‘pure’.”

  As in pure badass, I figured, but I kept my mouth shut this time. As we walked back to our lines, I thought: Yeah. Definitely Tier-1 guys.

  With badass call signs.

  * * *

  “Chris, I need you.”

  The men and I had been cooling our heels on the line for about an hour when Darby jumped back in my ear. When I found him back at his little improvised CP, he had a finger pressed to his ear again, and made a twiddle motion with the other hand, so I switched my own radio to the command net.

  “…no further guidance at this time. Stand by, Two Bravo…”

  And then I heard what sounded like nothing so much as a no-fucking-shit pick-up rugby match breaking out in the JOC. There was shouting, and grunting, and then: “—Hey, what the FUCK are those assholes doing in here? Show me your hands! Get on your knees!” Then the speaker fuzzed with the crack of small-arms fire. Then: “Check fire, check fire! Those are American soldi—” And then what sounded like someone having the wind knocked out of him.

  And then the channel went dead.

  I looked up to see Darby reflecting back at me the very same look I was giving him, namely: Well, shit – that didn’t sound good. Wide-eyed, still wordless, I went back to the men, staring blankly up into the muzzle of that 130mm cannon as I walked in its shadow.

  Evidently, we weren’t the only ones under the gun.

  * * *

  We saw the first civilian refugees coming over the bluffs about the same time Darby’s cell phone rang. The two of us were back at the CP, trying to do real-time contingency planning, about thirty minutes after we’d lost comms with al-Tanf – with everyone in all of CentCom, in fact.

  The Captain pulled out his phone, answered the call, and put it on speaker. The voice of the Russian, Uron, came out. To the best of my recollection, Darby had never given him his number. But that fact was basically lost in the shuffle of a day that was already pegging my personal Weird-Shit-O-Meter.

  “Hello, Captain. I just wonder if you are following the news?”

  Darby exhaled, tiredly. “Negative.”

  “Ah. Well. We watch closely from here in our ship’s CIC. And since we are tucked up safe here, and you are out there, I wish to offer you small suggestion. If I were you, I would not let any of the sick people get too close.”

  “Uh, thanks?”

  “Also, we will be disembarking quite soon. So our little stand-off comes to a peaceful end, after all. I… wish you luck in the wars to come.”

  And then the line went dead.

  * * *

  “Captain! Top!” This was the weapons squad leader, shouting from the MG position behind us – the ones closest to the new threat. “Foot mobiles, inbound!”

  We could already see them. The front edge of a line of figures was sweeping down the bluff behind us, and would reach us in another minute or two. But… behind them, we could also see a thicker crowd of bodies, just cresting the top of the rise.

  Looking across at Darby, I said, “What are your orders, sir?” I don’t use that line a lot – it’s almost always a collaboration between the two of us – but sometimes you just really don’t want responsibility.

  “On me,” Darby answered, repeating his line from before. But this time he hefted his rifle, and moved in the opposite direction, toward what very recently had been our rear. In ten seconds, we’d pushed out thirty meters behind the weapons-squad’s fighting holes, and turned ourselves into a two-man blocking force, positioned right between the platoon and the approa
ching civilians. Or whoever the hell they were.

  This was all happening really fast.

  “Stop!” Darby shouted over his rifle optic. “Don’t come any closer!” He tried it all again in Arabic. Same result – dick.

  “Yeah,” I said, flipping up my 3x magnifying optic behind my HDS, and scanning faces. “Those guys don’t look so good.”

  Darby shook his head. “I guess taking them to the deck and flex-cuffing them is out.”

  “Yeah. You first, sir.”

  Maybe we hadn’t been sitting on our asses watching CNN, but we’d seen enough to know this disease had a stupidly high lethality rate – by some reports, 100%. As in, everyone who got infected with it was a dead man walking. So we absolutely couldn’t afford to let these toxic assclowns get any closer to the men – or to us, for that matter. The Russian’s cryptic phone warning only underscored this fact.

  And now we were out of time. Doing it so the Captain wouldn’t have to, I shot out the kneecap of the closest approaching guy. He dropped. But then he kept coming, pulling himself across the sandy soil with all four limbs, including the mostly exploded one.

  And then… he fucking stood up again.

  I shot out the other knee, which dropped him again – and then put a round through each bicep. Nothing. He just kept on trucking, face dragging through the sandy soil. But then, finally… his head split open like an overripe melon – at the same instant I heard the Captain’s suppressed rifle shot, right beside me. And I knew: he’d taken that one so I didn’t have to.

  This time the guy stayed down – and stopped moving.

  Not needing to discuss it, we both turned and legged it back to our lines, dropped into the nearest fighting holes, then turned back and re-engaged. I tried some center-of-mass shots, which also had zero effect. We both switched up to headshots, which did the job.

  “Yep,” I muttered to myself. “Fucking 28 Days Later.” Whatever the hell it was, it was here now. It was another minute before anyone shot the first female; shortly after that, the first child. Finally, the MGs opened up, chattering blue murder. God forgive us, I thought.

  And I didn’t even believe in God.

  * * *

  Somehow, I heard the Russian shouting again over the sound of our slow-motion massacre – and, this time, not on the phone. I twisted my neck to see him running down the pier, still unarmed, and hands in plain view. He was crazy, but not fucking stupid.

  Before I could even react, I saw Darby hauling ass down there to meet him. By the time I caught them up, the Russian was already mid-sentence, saying, “…respectfully, fuck your orders, Captain. You stay here, you and your men are all dead.” He nodded at the piles of bodies already ringing our perimeter – and at the even bigger crowds climbing over the top of them. “Don’t be stupid. Get on the ship.”

  I heard more shouting – and looked up to see Uron’s own people yelling at him from the deck. It was all in Russian, but the body language made it pretty obvious what they were on about. Basically, by coming ashore, this guy had made it impossible for them to leave. For no reason I could imagine, he was hanging his ass out in the wind… to save us.

  And then the Captain decided, just like that, hauling me around and a few steps back. Looking up, I could see the MG crews putting shorter and shorter bursts into the converging mob of lurching figures, conserving ammo, all while the rifle squads fired over their heads. Holding the dyke – barely. Darby shouted into my ear: “Sergeant Vogeler! Withdraw first and second squads to the ship. Weaps screens the movement, then we’ll turn and follow. Go!”

  A good platoon sergeant knows when to argue with an officer’s orders, and when to shut the fuck up and execute them. Not that I felt like arguing. We both dashed forward, me getting the riflemen up, out of their holes, and displacing by fire-teams, the Captain racing on to the weapons positions. It was only when I had first squad hauling ass up the pier, and turned back to get second squad moving, that I had time to glance to the rear – which was now our front.

  And it wasn’t good.

  Half the MGs had gone black on ammo, their gunners and AGs now engaging with rifles and sidearms, firing into the writhing bodies that tumbled over the top of the meat barricade they’d built. And that’s when I saw the Captain haul somebody out of the far end of one of the fighting holes, shove him to the rear, then hop down in his place. As the evicted man hauled ass toward me, I could see… it was Specialist Smith.

  Captain Darby had taken his place on the line.

  And in that instant, the wall of bodies ringing them collapsed, tumbling over and forward. Behind it surged an angry mob, nuts-to-butts thick, probably hundreds of sick, delirious bastards, their heaving ranks stretching halfway up the bluffs – many more than the defenders could possibly stop, or even engage. Without question, they were about to be overrun. As Smith reached my position, I grabbed his drag strap and slung him around toward the pier, then turned and shouted at the last fire-team from second squad, hauling and kicking them toward safety, as well.

  I was last man up the pier.

  On my final look back from the deck of the warship, I witnessed the last stand of Two Bravo’s weapons squad – led by Two Bravo’s commander, Captain Darby. The mooring lines of the frigate got cast off even as I heard the last shot fired. And, as we started to pull away, we could all see dozens of the diseased, frenzied civilians shoving their way up the pier – still trying to get to us. Those who made it to the end kept going, tumbling into the gap, falling twenty feet down into the sea. They could no longer reach us.

  We were underway. Most of us, anyway.

  But into what… God only knew.

  PART TWO

  [SIX MONTHS LATER]

  “A man can be destroyed but not defeated.”

  - Ernest Hemingway, The Old Man and the Sea

  I rolled over on my rack, hauled myself up in my skivvies, stretched – and came fully awake when my hands didn’t bang into anything. I was in my private billet – still small, but not as narrow as the CHU back at al-Tanf. Now I rated this fringe benefit not because I was Two Bravo’s senior NCO…

  But because I was its acting commander.

  The steel deck rolled under my feet, giving my stomach a lurch, something I never quite got used to. It felt like an echo of the gigantic roll the entire world had taken, causing an even worse lurch in my soul. Then again, that seemed like a pretty pathetic complaint – given that virtually all the rest of humanity had been wiped off the map completely. But you never got used to that bigger lurch, either.

  And I’d started to wonder if I had any soul left.

  I still didn’t believe in God – who could, after everything we’d seen? – but now I often thought of Captain Darby, and bitterly envied him his religious faith. That rock and shield that had allowed him to get through the day, and move through the world, with such steadiness. As fucked up as that old world had seemed at the time, it now looked like a Garden of Eden, compared to what had come after. And, in this new fallen world, some kind of faith was probably even more necessary – and even more impossible to find, or hang onto. But hope had just about abandoned me now.

  And I had no reason to think it was coming back.

  Sitting back down on the bed, I bent over and put my head in my hands. And I tried to recall that feeling of purpose I used to have, back in Syria – bouncing out of bed every morning, energized and ennobled by our mission of protecting the Kurds, our steadfast friends. But now I couldn’t even remember what that felt like. Kind of hilariously, it turned out you really did need a higher purpose. Just staying alive wasn’t enough – mere survival had left me, if not every other member of Two Bravo, trapped in a prison of the Ego. Thinking only of ourselves.

  And of day-to-day survival.

  Though I honestly didn’t know if the prison of the Ego was better or worse than the prison of the Admiral Gorshkov. For six months now, we had been “guests” of Uron, and his three other Spetsnaz operators, as well as the 210 office
rs and men who crewed the ship. I laughed bitterly to remember how our intel desk had estimated an entire battalion of naval Spetsnaz aboard – at least 200 shooters. Hell, as I now knew perfectly well, that many guys wouldn’t even have fit on this boat.

  And instead it turned out it was… exactly four guys.

  Later, when I asked Uron how something like that could happen, he just flashed that wicked smile of his and said, “Counter-intel, tovarisch. Counter-intel and cyber-ops. Did you learn nothing from 2016 and 2020 elections?”

  Evidently not.

  Maybe we would have been quicker on the uptake, if the intel guys at al-Tanf had at least worked out that the force being inserted were actually from Spetsnaz GRU – the ones attached to Russia’s foreign military intelligence agency, and every bit as smart and treacherous as they were tough and deadly. These were the same guys who singlehandedly ended the Prague Spring in 1968, by taking control of the Czech capital. Who stole a brand-new AH-1 Cobra helicopter from an American base in Cambodia, and flew away grinning. Who stormed the royal palace in Kabul, killing or capturing the entire palace guard, and then assassinating the Afghan president.

  Who blatantly poisoned the enemies of Putin on British soil.

  Spetsnaz GRU had originally been formed to do special reconnaissance and direct-action missions against NATO, but had been widely employed in counter-insurgency actions in Afghanistan – including “pacification” of villages that supported the mujahideen – as well as against Chechen guerrillas. They had gone from brutality to atrocity, specializing in deep recon, sabotage, and kidnapping or assassination of military and political leaders. Their very deployment was considered an act of war – an act Putin had tried to commit by slipping them into Syria under cover of all the end-of-the-world chaos. So, yeah, okay, Spetsnaz GRU.

  But, still – four fucking guys.

  And now those four were more than enough to keep the 20 of us – the surviving members of Two Bravo – as permanent prisoners on board this warship. And this was for the very good reason that there was nothing outside the prison to escape to, nowhere else to go. The entire world had fallen, with breathtaking speed, violence, and finality. It took 10,000 years to build up all of human civilization – and the Hargeisa virus, a strand of RNA barely 100 nanometers long, less than 100 days to take it all down.