UNSCDF Chapter 8- The Beast

Fort Calhoun, Nebraska, USA

Extraction Point Alpha

March 20, 2001

1800 Local Time

            Lance Corporal Brooks sat in the co-pilot seat in the Pelican waiting for Sergeant Trom to return from his washroom break outside. Brooks looked out the cockpit window to see if he could see his Sergeant. It’s been ten minutes since Trom left the Pelican and Brooks was starting to feel uneasy.

            “Sarge, you done outside?” Brooks spoke on the RaidCall.

            “Hold your horses Brooks. I’m just scouting the perimeter since I’m outside.” Trom replied.

            “Well, I didn’t see you.” Brooks replied.

            “Well, you won’t be seeing me with my pants down.” Trom joked.

            “You’ve got a point.” Brooks stood up from his seat to stretch.

            “Wait, I think I see something in the trees.” Trom suddenly replied with a sense of curiosity.

            “I don’t see anything here.” Brooks looked out the window.

            “Holy mother of god! Get the Pelican ready to takeoff ASAP!” Trom shouted in fear.

           “Copy that Sarge. What’s up? What did you see?” Brooks flipped some switches and the Pelican engines began to warm up.

            “A massive zombie…it’s running too fast!” Trom panted as he fired at the zombie.

            “I’ll man the turret and cover you.” Brooks offered his help.

            “Look son, I’m not going to make it in time. Takeoff without me and get in the sky. You’ll be safer.” Trom breathed heavily.

            “I’m not going to leave you behind Sarge.” Brooks complained.

            “That’s an order Brooks! Get out of here. Good luck soldier.” Trom commanded.

            “Aye sir. Good luck.” Brooks lifted the Pelican off the ground and saw some trees shaking a couple meters in front of him.

            Suddenly, a massive muscular zombie with spikes busted out behind a running Trom. Trom fired his SA80, but did no damage to the zombie. Brooks watched as the zombie whacked Trom once and splattered him into pulp. Brooks turned the Pelican to point its primary turret at the zombie and fired. The zombie was fast and quick. Before Brooks could get a good shot at the zombie, the zombie ran under the Pelican and jumped. With a graceful swing, the zombie took out the Pelican’s engines and planted a massive dent to its hull.

            “Mayday, mayday. This is Sierra 23, we are going down. We’ve encountered a massive hostile. Repeat, we are going down.” Brooks shouted on the Pelican’s communications.

            The console of the Pelican was beeping loudly and flashing red lights. Brooks realized that the Pelican had lost its communications from the hit and growled in frustration. The Pelican swerved left and spun crazily towards a hill.

            “Damn it! Lost hydraulics. Bailing out.” Brooks got up from his seat and grabbed a parachute. Brooks kicked the cockpit doors open and saw the background spinning as the Pelican continued to spin out of control. Brooks yelled as he jumped out of the smoking Pelican and pulled his parachute. Brooks jumped just in time to see the Pelican smash into the hill and explode. The explosion flung flaming shrapnel to Brook’s chute and cut his chute to shreds.

            “Oh no.” Brooks cursed as he saw the flames from the shrapnel eat away his parachute.

            In a matter of minutes, Brooks was free falling towards a giant tree. Brooks smashed his side along the tree trunk and then hit his head at a branch breaking his visor. Brooks hit the ground with a hard thump and was knocked out cold.

*          *          *

            Private Powell sat in a trench in the forest trying to hide from the massive zombie that took out his squad. Powell heard distant gunfire followed by a loud crash of metal being hit.

            “Could it be rescue?” Powell wondered.

            Powell got out of his trench and saw smoke in the sky and noticed a Pelican spinning out of control. Powell decided to head over and see where it might crash. Powell ran past some bushes while keeping his eyes peeled on the smoking Pelican. He noticed a person jump out of the rear of the Pelican before it crashed and blew up on the hill. Powell watched in horror as he noticed the massive zombie also heading towards the crash site. Powell decided he should go and find the survivor to improve his chances of surviving.

            “Screw this.” Powell took off his flak jacket and dropped it on the ground to reduce his weight.

            Powell ran as fast as he could to the outskirts of the crash site and saw an unconscious marine with a broken visor.

            “Hey!” Powell shook the marine. “Wake up!”

            The marine groaned in pain and slowly opened his eyes.

            “We need to get out of here! That beast is coming back!” Powell lifted him up to his feet.

            “Huh?” the marine replied with confusion.

        “Take off your gear. The lighter we are the more agile we are.” Powell unfastened the marine’s damaged flak jacket.

            “Oh, okay.” the marine pulled of his helmet and dropped it on the ground.

            “Let’s go.” Powell motioned for the forests for cover.

            “Aw man, my arm is pretty beat up.” the marine mumbled.

            “It’s run or die. Forget about the pain.” Powell looked at the trees shaking in the background.

          Powell and the marine picked up their pace and ran towards some high bushes for cover. They looked as the zombie walked to the crash site and stood there motionless. The marines waited for another few minutes and saw the zombie move into the forest and disappear.

            “I’m Private Richard Powell from Omega Squad.” Powell offered his hand.

            “Lance Corporal Bobby Brooks from Hawk Squad.” the marine shook his hand.

            “You here to rescue us?” Powell asked.

          “Yeah, so much for rescue…” Brooks looked at the crash site. “I wasn’t able to send a distress signal out and my helmet got smashed up.”

            “Well, I’ve got nothing on me. No armor, no weapons, just nothing.” Powell patted his chest.

            “I’ve just go my Lock 17 sidearm. Other than that, I’m pretty much the same as you.” Brooks pulled out his Lock 17 sidearm.

            “I assume there’s a team out there? Powell pointed at the direction of the nuclear power plants.

         “Yeah, two teams, Echo Squad and Fire Team Tango.” Brooks commented “Are there more survivors from Omega?”

            “I’m not sure. we got split up after we had a horde attacking us. We were fine until that beast showed up.” Powell looked with a straight face.

            “What the hell was that?” Brooks questioned.

         “We don’t know for sure. We were supposed to find out more about the meltdown and how zombies mutated. This beast seems to be a bigger version of the muscular zombies. Perhaps it got more of a mutation than the others?” Powell replied.

            “That thing sure is scary. It took out my Sergeant with one hit and splattered him” Brooks looked at his injured arm.

            “Any chance we can find the other marines?” Powell asked.     

            “Yeah, Omega Squad’s camp and the power plants.” Brooks replied.

            “Perhaps we should go to the camp, there are supplies there. You arm looks like it could use some bandages.” Powell suggested.

            “Sure, sounds good.” Brooks handed his pistol to Powell “Take it, I can’t shoot well anyways.”

            “Thanks.” Powell accepted the pistol and took one more look at the crash site.

            “Don’t worry, there’s still another Pelican in this area.” Brooks reassured Powell.

            “Let’s hope that beast doesn’t see them.” Powell hoped.

            “Yeah, me too. I think that’s our last ticket out.” Brooks spoke out his thought.