Rise of Chaos 5 Read online

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  Mason looked at his team silently for a moment and knew this was the moment; this was the chance to strike a blow that the Muslim invaders would never forget. “No more speeches, no more bullshit. We are going to be walking through hell. Use your automatic weapons first. Kill everything that moves in there—let’s go,” Mason said before he started running towards the unguarded large glass doors of the entrance.

  As if it were a bad dream or a nightmare, Mason’s team was greeted by Captain Malik and dozens of Pasdarans with their super feeders in tow.

  Captain Malik looked at the intruders with complete surprise. He was personally leading the bulk of the remaining guard to reinforce the attack coming from the south side of the Space Center. There was an instant of hesitation before Mason and Strike Force Foxtrot opened fire.

  Smoke billowed out of their roaring, fully automatic assault rifles as Pasdarans and super feeders alike started to drop in the melee. Captain Malik took cover behind the corner near the elevator and radioed in for help. The super feeders were only pushed back momentarily from the barrage of bullets, they were ordered forward, and they started to close the gap.

  “Split up—move—you know what to do,” Mason shouted over the chaos.

  Pualani and Brody broke off to the eastern wing of the compound to place the C4 charges that would level this place and their signal once and for all. Pualani had her katana drawn now, and was running backwards behind Brody to cover his back.

  Kalen, Luanne and Mason took off in the opposite direction to try to draw the super feeders away from Brody. Mason pulled the pin and rolled one of his authentic MK 2 grenades into the fray. After a long second it seemed like the whole building shook with the booming, ear-splitting explosion.

  The grenade had done its job; it had brought down most of the second floor into the lobby, trapping the super feeders in the rubble. Not all of the flesh-eating, hybrid monsters were trapped, however, and they came fast and furiously.

  The trio ran like hell down the hallways of the former United States space command. Mason looked over his shoulder to see if they had drawn them off Brody and Pualani, and he was pleasantly surprised to see that the majority of the undead minions were in close pursuit.

  “Fuck… Dead end!” Kalen yelled over the bloodthirsty howling of the super feeders that were moments away from over running them.

  Mason quickly surveyed the situation and saw that they had taken a wrong turn and were trapped when the first super feeder leaped through the air, tackling him.

  ****

  “Hurry up, you dumb shit! We gotta keep moving,” Pualani said to Brody as he was strategically placing the explosive charges.

  “Just shut your mouth and watch my back. Do you want me to accidentally blow us up? You do realize, I’m doing this one-handed, right? ” Brody said, using his bayonetted sword hand to carefully make holes in the blocks of the explosives so he could insert the blasting caps.

  Two Pasdarans, with their signature red berets, came around the corner, and saw the duo setting charges on the main electrical structure of the satellite hub. They lifted their AK-47’s to open fire on the intruders when Pualani threw her katana through the air, like a spear, impaling the first guard through his chest.

  He fell backwards with his finger locked back on the trigger of his rifle. An involuntary hail of bullets followed his descent; at least six rounds landed in the face and chest of his comrade as they both collapsed dead. Brody and Pualani both stood there looking at the carnage and then each other, before Brody said, “Wait a minute. Did that just really happen?”

  “Sometimes… I even impress myself,” Pualani said, putting her boot on the dead man’s chest and retrieving her katana.

  “Alright you little badass, the charges are set. Let’s get the fuck outta here before our luck runs out,” Brody said, shaking his head in disbelief.

  She nodded in agreement as they both took off down the hallway and made their way to the main control room of the space center. This was where they were going to meet up with the rest of the teams and place the remaining charges.

  “I hope Mason and everybody is OK, there were a lot of those mother fuckers following them when we split up,” Pualani said, climbing up the stairs, three at a time, to the fourth floor of the space center.

  “I guess we’ll find out soon enough,” Brody said as he opened the door to the fourth floor hallway.

  ****

  Commander Kelly and his advisors were coordinating the attack of the wall from the pilot house of the USS Resistance. This Arleigh Burke-class guided missile destroyer was one of the few salvageable ships the resistance could put into service. The crew was a mishmash of former sailors, soldiers and civilians who were able to survive the infection-invasion, and wanted a chance to fight back.

  Master Chief Ken Gaye couldn’t wait at the bunker any longer; he arrived uninvited at the flagship to help any way that he could. The coxswain ferried him out to the USS Resistance, which was safely anchored about seventy miles off of the Florida coast. The crew lowered the knotted rope ladder down for him to climb. He made the thirty foot climb faster than a man half of his age and he landed on the main deck of the ship like a cat.

  He noted the look of concern on the faces of the crew, while they moved hurriedly about performing their respective duties. He made his way to the pilot house to see what the hell was going on.

  Commander Kelly gave the Master Chief a surprised look as he walked onto the bridge of the ship. “Master Chief… I’m glad you decided to join us. Right now, we can use all the help that we can get,” Commander Kelly said, extending his hand.

  “This is a big day for all of us. Will you bring me up to speed? Any word from the teams yet?”

  “Nothing from Mason or Cap’n Tony yet. But that’s what we expected, they’ve gone completely dark down there, we didn’t want to compromise their position. Our main thrust is going well for now. We’ve hit that wall pretty hard with our Tomahawks and Harpoons and it looks like they're rattled.”

  “So we’ve got all of their interest up here like we’ve planned. That’s good,” Master Chief said, taking a pair of binoculars to get a better look at the coast.

  “Our Seahawks have been covering the ground forces, but they’re getting pushed back by those super feeders. I don’t know how much longer we can keep this up—this was a big gamble that we made here,” Commander Kelly said, softly. The stress of this operation had taken a toll on the retired commander.

  “This attack will succeed… I know it. This is the hardest part, waiting…” Master Chief trailed off as he saw aircraft approaching the flagship. “Those don’t look like ours.”

  “Sir. Enemy aircraft approaching,” the navigator said to Commander Kelly.

  Off in the distance and moving fast, there were at least half a dozen League of Islam helicopters closing in on their position. There was no mistaking the Shahed 285 light attack Helos. They flew in a perfect formation with their black crescent moon imprinted on the body of the aircraft. Commander Kelly recognized these as the enhanced and well-armed maritime patrol/anti-ship version of the traditional one seater. These were the pride and joy of the New Jerusalem and the League of Islam, and now that they had found the location of the resistance, they were ready for a fight.

  “Sound General Quarters,” Commander Kelly ordered. He looked at the weapons officer WEPS and said, “Prepare to shoot those sons of bitches out of the sky.”

  “Roger that, sir… With pleasure.” He went right to work aiming the two 25 mm M242 Bushmaster cannons at the incoming threat.

  The 1MC or the Public Address system of the ship was blaring: General Quarters, General Quarters. All hands man your battle stations. General Quarters, General Quarters. All hands man your battle stations. Commander Kelly picked up the microphone and said, somberly, to the crew, “We have incoming enemy aircraft, man your battle stations. This is not a drill. I repeat, this not a drill.”

  The USS Resistance shook like an earthqua
ke was happening. The anti-aircraft cannons roared, knocking two of the Helos out of the sky and sending them into the warm Atlantic waters in a fireball. Commander Kelly had the anchor pulled up and ordered the ship to move towards the attack.

  The first Sadid-1 anti-ship missile hit the hull of the USS Resistance with a devastating effect. It was followed by four 2.75 inch rockets that paralyzed the main diesel engines and left the destroyer crippled.

  The ships gunners were manning the .50 Cal anti-aircraft guns on the deck. They were outmatched and getting shot to pieces. One of the gunners mates noticed a large object being released from the enemy helicopter, and then another … and another.

  “What the hell is that?” Sam Ribbon, the Gunner's mate said aloud, to no one in particular.

  He had never seen a super feeder up close like this before. The creature rose up off of the deck of the ship and focused its attention at Sam. The drop out of the helicopter didn’t seem to faze it; the re-animated infected cannibal shrieked wildly at the poor bastard, who was just a video store clerk before the outbreak began.

  Sam looked in horror as the super feeder violently moved at him and bit him in the neck—before he was devoured, like an unlucky gazelle by a lioness.

  Almost a dozen super feeders had been dropped onto the main deck of the USS Resistance. They were ferociously moving through the ship, like berserkers, killing and eating the flesh off of anyone in their path.

  The ship was in chaos. The terrified crew abandoned their positions and ran for their lives. But there was nowhere to run. They were trapped and no match for these horrific zombie-like creatures that were slaughtering the resistance crew like cattle.

  ****

  Cap’n Tony and Strike Force Echo were clearing the southern end of the space center compound. It had been a vicious battle, one that he’d remember and treasure for the rest of his life. He had only one casualty so far. It was Mike Beach. Mike had been with the resistance since the beginning, he was a good man and an excellent soldier. Unfortunately, he tripped over a fallen tree branch during the fire-fight and was bitten by one of the repulsive super feeders.

  Cap’n Tony beheaded the vile creature with his machete as soon as he saw what had happened. But he was too late. His friend was infected and would turn soon. Cap’n Tony stood over Mike Beach listening to him beg for a clean death.

  A tear formed in his eye as he raised his 9mm Beretta and squeezed the trigger twice. Both bullets entered his forehead in nearly the same spot, his brains spilled out of the back of his head —and the life was instantly gone from his eyes.

  Their diversion had worked, he thought. He had drawn the bulk of the Pasdarans and the super feeders away from the compound and into an ambush, in order to give Mason and his team a fighting chance to place the charges.

  He saw movement out of the corner of his eye and dropped to the ground instantly. He looked over and saw that his team was also taking cover and hidden from plain view. There were six or seven super feeders being led by a tall, grizzled man, with a red beret and a slight limp. As soon as he saw his face through the brush, he instantly recognized the man as Captain Malik.

  Son of a bitch, Cap’n Tony thought to himself. This sick, twisted man was single handedly responsible for the brutal torture, rape and execution of thousands of innocent civilians.

  As the head of the Pasdaran guard in the colony, Captain Malik was in charge of rounding up any of the infidel survivors in hiding, and either converting, cleansing, or killing them. He was known as the Butcher of Bagdad and was Abu Hadi’s right hand man, back when the League of Islam was just a radical Islamic activist group that no one paid much attention to.

  It wasn’t until the chaos of the Annihilation infection began to spread, that the small, well-armed Islamic radicals were able to unite the entire Middle East into one solid objective: Convert or kill any human being that wasn’t a Muslim, preferably kill.

  Cap’n Tony was not going to let this prize slip through his fingers. He lay silently on the ground, watching Captain Malik and his super feeders walk right into the trap that they had set. The seconds passing felt like hours as they stalked closer; the air smelled putrid, like death. The super feeders always growled heinously, there was blood spurting out of their black, soulless eyes. They were so anorexically gaunt, with that yellowish-gray tint to their decayed skin, it was incredible that they could be such effective soldiers, Cap’n Tony thought.

  “Now!” Cap’n Tony roared as he brought his MP5 submachine gun up and squeezed the trigger. The other members of Strike Force Echo immediately joined in, and there was a hailstorm of lead as the super feeders and their Pasdaran commander were cut to pieces.

  Captain Malik was trying to crawl away, with only a couple of superficial bullet wounds to his legs, when Cap’n Tony slammed his boot into his lower back. “So just where in the hell do you think you’re going—you son of a bitch?”

  The Pasdaran commander just closed his eyes and let out a sigh, he knew he was trapped. The searing pain in his legs momentarily abated as he felt the strike of a steel toed boot against his jaw. “Look at me, you monster—I said look at me!” Cap’n Tony shouted as he was viciously booting the injured Captain in the face.

  Captain Malik slowly turned to his side and tried, feebly, to protect his face from the onslaught. But the heinous stories of helpless women and children being raped and murdered at the hands of this man, only served to fuel Cap’n Tony’s hatred. He wanted nothing more than to take this man’s life, right here and now. And then he stopped.

  Cap’n Tony felt like he was in a daze or a trance. His hands were shaking uncontrollably, and every time he blinked his eyes he saw splotches of red. He was breathing so heavily, he was actually hyperventilating from the stress of blood lust. He took a deep breath and looked over his shoulder to check on the remainder of his team.

  The four remaining men had executed the ambush flawlessly. From higher ground, they were able to slaughter the super feeders once they reached the kill zone. The super feeders were not dead—yet. Most of them had been shot so many times by those 7.62mm rounds that they were missing arms and legs, and they were just mangled torsos wiggling around, biting at air.

  These modified and genetically mutated creatures could only be exterminated by decapitation. To cut down and then behead a super feeder was not an easy task. The members of the resistance took great pride in severing the heads from these dealers of death. Once Cap’n Tony was satisfied that the immediate threat had been put down, he crouched down next to the Pasdaran commander and drew his KA-BAR Combat Knife out of its sheath. He slid the razor sharp edge down the cheek of his mortal enemy, drawing a crescent moon as the blood started to flow.

  Captain Malik muttered a low groan, in a gesture of semi-consciousness. He felt warm blood running all over his face as he looked into the eyes of his undertaker, who had the knife now pressed to his throat. “Die, you infidel dog,” he whispered as loud as he could manage.

  “Tell Allah—to go fuck himself,” Cap’n Tony replied as he jerked his combat dagger from ear to ear, ending the life of the famous Butcher of Bagdad.

  ****

  Mason was on his back, and the pure strength of this creature was just overpowering him. His shoulders were pinned down and he could feel the pressure of the super feeder’s hands trying to peel off the flesh from his body. If it wasn’t for his Kevlar anti-bite suit, he would have already been infected.

  Mason was dodging the creature’s relentless biting attacks at his face. But his strength was starting to fade fast and he knew he couldn’t hold out for much longer. He started to reach for his last grenade; he wasn’t going to be turned into one of these bastards under any circumstances.

  Just as he felt his arms go numb and his body turn to jelly, there was an explosion. It was incredibly close and Mason was blinded by a bright white light and a painful ringing in his ears.

  He felt a dead weight fall on his chest and, as his vision cleared, he saw it was the head
of the super feeder that was a millisecond away from infecting him, or worse. He took what remaining strength he had left and pushed the super feeder’s headless body off of him. He looked up and saw Pualani cleaning the black blood and gore off of her shining katana.

  “You know, it feels like I’m always saving your ass,” she said, looking down at him with a big smile.

  “Thank, thank you,” Mason stammered back, still not totally able to comprehend what had just happened.

  “Really, that’s all you can say? I was expecting you to say something clever—go ahead, say something clever already,” she said, taunting him.

  “Okay, okay. I guess I owe you one now… Is that what you wanted to hear?” he said, grinning, as he got up and put his arms around her and hugged her tightly.

  “Well, that’ll do for now, I guess. But you can—” she started to say, when she heard Luanne screaming.

  Luanne had felt a sharp pain in her wrist that she shrugged off, until she saw drops of fresh blood leaking onto the ground. When she pulled up her sleeves from her anti-bite suit to reveal a fresh bite, and a chunk of her flesh was missing from her wrist, she just collapsed into the side of the hallway.

  “Why, damn it—why me?” she said as the screams turned to a stoic acceptance of her impending doom.

  “Oh fuck, Luanne. I’m so sorry,” Kalen said as he stood over her.

  The rest of the group stood and looked at her empathetically. She was infected. Her skin was starting to turn a pale white and her whole body was sweating and shivering. There had been an agreement reached when they were training back in Virginia. They all agreed that if one of them became infected, they would have only two choices. Allow a member of the team to kill them or they would have to take their own life. Under no circumstances would they be allowed to turn.

  “I can’t do it. She’s been like my best friend for the last two years,” Pualani said, looking away, the tears starting to well up in her eyes.