Chapter 12: Kill zones

The fireteam met them two hours later at the apartment. Hackworth had called James and Serenity an Uber, surprising James, who’d thought they’d have to catch a bus. But it was clear that the major wasn’t a stickler for formalities; he saw his goal and went for it.

In this case, his priorities included keeping James and Serenity happy and open to cooperation.

“What are we going to do with them?” asked Serenity, looking down at the street as the tan Humvee bounced up to park on the sidewalk, so broad it looked almost weird.

“Go for a walk, I guess. Show them the best tourist spots.”

They’d spent the past two hours eating ramen and watching the news. The Third Wave was in effect; reports were flooding in from millions of citizens that their notification screens had popped up at last. Half the channels now were simply repeating the safety bulletins issued by the government, along with directing anybody who didn’t feel safe to get to the closest National Guard clearing zone.

“Grand Army Plaza must be swamped,” muttered James, studying the soldiers as they climbed out the Humvee. They scanned the street before moving to the narrow door below. “Must have cost Hackworth to get us these four.”

Serenity jogged downstairs to let them in, and a moment later returned with the fire team. They filled up the space, were bulky with their equipment, their purposeful air, the way they naturally scoped out the apartment, checking corners, peering through the doorway into Serenity’s bedroom, evaluating but keeping their poker faces.

Three men and a woman. All carried black rifles, one of which was huge and had the look of a machine gun, while another had a second ribbed barrel under the first.

“Mr. Kelly?” Between the wrap-around sunglasses, the helmet and chinstrap, it was hard to make out much of the guy’s face. Lean, hawk nosed, freshly shaved but with a dark shadow already across his upper lip. He wore a blue band around his left arm. “I’m Sergeant Mancini, C Company, 1st Battalion, 69th Infantry Regiment. Major Hackworth has ordered us to shadow you over the next twenty-four hours and assist as needed with the Nemesis invasion.”

The man’s voice was firm, his words clipped, but even so James could sense the resentment that was tightly bottled up in the man’s core.

“James Kelly. This is my friend, Serenity. Do you, ah, want to take a seat?”

“We’ll remain standing, thank you.” Mancini hesitated. “We were told you’ve reached Mendicant Level 3?”

“That’s right. I put all my points into Arete, got it over twenty. Now I’ve got a Lead aura that fries gremlins when they get too close. I posted a video last night. Guess it got folk’s attention.”

The soldier with the large machine-gun loomed over the others, so that his gun looked normal sized across his chest. Square jawed, with clear shades on, he couldn’t have been more than twenty-one. His name strip read Delvecchio. “You don’t say. Last I checked that video had over thirty-four million views.”

Serenity thwapped James across the chest. “See? Viral.”

The female soldier had moved to stand beside the window and watch the street, her rifle held across her chest, muzzle down, her expression impatient. With her helm, shades, and chinstrap, she was just as hard to get a read on. “If you spent more time taking care of your SAW than you did on your phone, Delvecchio -”

Mancini cut in. “So, you’re able to ash these Nemeses before they can touch you? You’re completely protected?”

“Looks like it, yeah. Level 3 was good.” He felt an impulse to show them the lacerations that had mostly healed up overnight leaving behind little but angry scrawlings of crimson across his skin as proof, but decided it was still too soon to start stripping.

Mancini’s tone remained polite. “Could you brief us on what happened? None of us have reached level 2. We’d appreciate any intel you can share.”

“Sure.” James sat on the sofa’s back and gave a cursory run through. The woman - he couldn’t see her name strip - kept her gaze on the street the whole time. Delvecchio faded back into the corner beside the front door, while the fourth soldier, Singh, simply listened intently, his manner focused, self-contained.

Mancini asked the questions, and when James described their last stand in the cupcake shop, even the woman looked over to listen.

“Agility 16?” she asked, staring at Serenity, her tone skeptical.

“Better believe it.”

“Here, catch this.” The soldier - last name Huffman, James finally saw - dug a single bullet out of a front pouch and tossed it at Serenity. The throw was purposefully careless and wide, and the bullet thwipped through the air faster than James could follow.

Serenity snagged it cleanly and tossed it underhand back at Huffman, who closed her gloved hand over it with a neat snatch of her own.

“Damn,” said Delvecchio. “I want me some of that.”

“So, the key to advancement is simple.” For the first time Mancini sounded excited. “To draw a large number of Nemeses into a kill zone and then mow them down. You said a hundred kills will bring us to level 3 easily?”

“Yeah,” said James. “I think eighty’ll do it.”

“We need three hundred and twenty of them to level up our team.” Mancini considered. “Your tactic of driving slowly and drawing them out seems ideal, as long as the vehicle is secure and there is a destination in mind where we can establish a safe kill zone with no danger to locals.”

“Somewhere industrial,” said Singh. “Large, contained space, like a factory, maybe, or a steel plant.”

Mancini nodded. “We have James drive the car to our destination. His immunity makes him the perfect bait. Then he parks in a designated spot, and we lay down fire till we’ve killed them all.”

“How much ammo do you guys carry?” asked Serenity. “I only ask ‘cause I burned through a hundred bullets in a couple of minutes and there were still plenty more of them coming.”

“And by the time we kick this off,” continued James, “we’ll be dealing with Nemeses from the Third Wave. Who knows how many that’ll be.”

“We’ll need an exit plan,” agreed Mancini. “But we typically have a loadout of seven 30-round magazines. Delvecchio has sixteen.”

“You’ll need to triple that,” said James firmly. “If not more.”

Hoffman raised an eyebrow at him. “You saying we’ll be dealing with thousands of Nemeses?”

“After the Third Wave? Sure.” James considered. “If not more, really. The first wave was tiny. Second wave was an order of magnitude bigger. If the Third Wave follows that pattern, we could be dealing with tens of thousands of Nemeses, easy.”

The soldiers shared a look.

“We can get more ammo,” said Mancini. “And work on the exit plan. The key will be finding a sheltered location where our flanks and rear are protected.”

“Plus, James here can just wade in and kill them all if things get too heated,” said Serenity with something akin to pride. “So don’t worry too much.”

“Right. Delvecchio, Huffman, head back to base. I’ll put in an order for a couple of mag cans.”

“You brought my guns and ammo?” asked Serenity.

“In the Humvee with your phones,” said Mancini. “I thought the six mags and thousand rounds was overkill, but I guess not. I’m going to get a green light from Major Hackworth for this mission, and then will ask for assistance in locating a suitable kill zone.”

“Sure you don’t want something to drink?” asked Serenity as Huffman and Delvecchio left the apartment.

“Thank you, ma’am. I’m fine.” Mancini drew his radio from its shoulder pouch and moved to stare out the window.

James met Serenity’s gaze. “Guess tonight’s going to be busy.”

* * *

The rest of the day was spent sitting around waiting for Mancini to get clearance from Hackworth, who in turn had to escalate and get approval. Turned out military operations in friendly urban environments required a lot of planning, paperwork, and analysis.

But eventually the approval came through.

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Huffman and Delvecchio returned with several cases of ammo. Serenity happily set to taking her two new Sig Sauers apart, greasing them up and re-assembling them. James sat watching the news.

It wasn’t good.

The energy in the apartment was excited. The fireteam had relaxed in their presence; with the assignment no longer an obvious waste of their time, they took off their shades, removed helmets, and though they never lost their alertness, they extended to James and Serenity a tentative courtesy that went beyond the stiff formalities of before.

Mancini was the eldest, late twenties, but older than his years. As the team leader he seemed unable to do more than give a painful smile at Delvecchio’s and Huffman’s constant sniping at each other, but nor was he a hard ass that insisted on perfect decorum.

Delvecchio was a good-natured giant, a subtle clown who often leaned into his supposed denseness by pretending not to understand simple instructions so as to get people to repeat themselves to his private amusement.

Huffman was all pent-up energy and intensity. Her hair was shaved down to a black fuzz, and her standard expression was one of disdain. She was always pacing, peering out the window, frowning and listening intently at noises that came from afar. She didn’t sit down once.

Singh, the grenadier, was the subtlest of the four, quiet, thoughtful, and when he spoke it was to interject with some insight or pointed question. It was clear Mancini relied heavily on him.

They headed out a couple of hours before dusk. The Third Wave was hitting hard. People streamed through the streets, heading toward the clearance zones.

But not everybody.

Violence rippled across the city.

Enough people chose to fight their Nemesis that the evening air was a tapestry of gun shots, bellows, cries for help, and shattering glass.

It felt as if Brooklyn was convulsing.

The fireteam got twitchy. Mancini had to order Huffman to relax. But they had a destination and drove to it in the Humvee.

Even now there was plenty of traffic in the streets. Half the city had yet to receive their notification, and James stared out the shatterproof glass as they went about their business. What did this all look like to those folks? To them the Nemeses were invisible and left them alone.

It must feel like the world had gone mad.

The kill zone had been placed within a huge warehouse in the eastern edge of Queens. It was new development in a recently built industrial park, surrounded by a high fence, parking, and loading bays down one side for trucks to reverse into.

Opening the huge double doors however revealed why it had been chosen: the interior was the size of a football field, a huge expanse of polished concrete under six parallel lines of fluorescent lights that ran down the length of the ceiling. The walls were girded with orange and blue supports, wooden pallets stacked at their base, loading bays along the left, but otherwise it was a hundred yards of emptiness.

Mancini outlined the plan. The fireteam and Serenity would set up at the back of the warehouse, right before the back door outside of which would be parked the Humvee. James would drive in through the front and immediately cut right and hug the wall, driving if possible, to the very end of the warehouse where he’d climb out and move behind the fireteam.

“We’ll not open fire till you hit the right wall,” said Mancini, pointing it out as if to be 100% clear that James knew where it was. “We’ll kill anything that follows in behind you. If you bring Nemeses to our frontline on your vehicle, it will be your responsibility to clear them with your aura. If the quantity of Nemeses exceeds our ability to suppress, I’ll close the front doors and call our retreat.”

“Simple enough,” said James, fingering his skillet. “I just need to get myself a car.”

“It’s already in the parking lot,” said Mancini. “There’s a lot of interest in this experiment. If it works, we’ll use it as a model to level up fireteams and squads across the country. Major Hackworth is pulling in every favor he’s got to make this happen.”

The other three soldiers nodded soberly.

“Man,” sighed Delvecchio happily, gazing down the length of the warehouse. “This is going to be like shooting fish in a barrel.

“You’d better deliver,” said Huffman sternly. “You show up with only twenty targets and there’ll be hell to pay.”

“Won’t be a problem,” said James. “What time are we kicking this off?”

Mancini checked his watch. “You observed that the enemy is more willing to emerge at night. So we’ll give it an hour. You’re to ride through residential neighborhoods till you think you’ve built up a critical mass, then make your way here. Your vehicle has bullet proof glass and puncture-proof tires. Drive nice and slow. We’ll maintain contact via radio. When you drive in, head to the right wall -” Mancini pointed it out again, “and then approach. Clear?”

“Clear,” everyone said.

Serenity walked James out to the parking lot. The cold was biting, and flurries of flakes were blowing on the wind, but not enough to show on the floor. She hugged herself as he found the Ford F-150. It was gunmetal gray and gleamed as if just driven off the lot.

“They should have found a piece of shit to sacrifice,” said Serenity.

“They did,” said James, unable to restrain himself.

Serenity hip-bumped him. “Aw, c’mon. You’re not that bad.”

“Ha.” He bounced the key in his hand, then turned to gaze through the chain link fence at the broad avenue that speared straight west toward the Manhattan skyline. Light pollution painted the low hanging clouds a dirty gray, and the burning symbols slowly spun where they hung by the score over the rooftops.

“So weird,” he whispered. “Never in a billion years did I think my life would come to this.”

“Yeah? Me neither.” She shivered. “But you want to hear something truly fucked up?”

James raised his chin at her.

Serenity glanced away. “Some small, shitty part of me is happy this all happened.” She hunched her shoulders. “Life wasn’t going anywhere good before, you know? And now? Now I’ve got these amazing new abilities, I’m important, I’m helping out. Making a difference. Before? I felt like nobody. Like no-one would notice if I died in my apartment and never came back out. Didn’t even have a cat who’d eat my face when I died.”

“Shit.” But he said it sadly, in an understanding tone. “I know what you mean. And while I don’t like any of this -”

“I didn’t say I liked it-”

“I still know what you mean. I’ve not felt this… plugged in in years. Before I was… just fading. Killing time. Waiting for… I don’t know. To just disappear one day. Anybody who’d notice or care was buried long ago.” A knot formed in his throat, but he refused to let those memories surface. “But now? Shit.”

Serenity laughed brittlely. “I guess even nobodies like us get a second chance when the demon apocalypse hits.”

“Guess so.” He bounced the key one more time then closed his fist. “You be careful.”

“You should talk. And don’t hit level 8 or whatever without me.”

“I’ll see what I can do.”

For a moment they just stood there, breath mingling in the frigid air, and then Serenity leaned in impulsively, hugged him tight, then walked quickly back into the warehouse.

James watched her go, conflicted, then shoved all his emotions aside, opened the truck door, and climbed in.

Time to go rustle up some gremlins.

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