Americas last war (Days of Red)
Jun 24, 2017 13:14:46 GMT -6
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Post by eltijeras on Jun 24, 2017 13:14:46 GMT -6
This is a story I am working on about US Army Capitain Johnston and his company during the zombie apocalypse. The story takes place when America and the world are on their last breaths, and the government is loosing its grip. It has been five months since the first outbreak, and Johnston is trapped in New York with his men, he wants to break his men out of the city, reconnect with the army, and change the course of the war, tell me what you think.
Chapter one: trapped in New York.
I am trapped in New York.
I haven't eaten in a day, and have not slept in four. The city is a mess, we made it a mess.
I am trapped with my entire company in a building in Hudson street. We can see the entire city from here.
In any direction you look, you can see smoke pillars, and thousands upon thousands of crazies roaming the streets.
The bay is filled with the abandoned navy fleet, and stranded civilian ships filled with infected refugees.
There are almost a hundred men trapped in the building with me, with no hope of escape. We are out of food, and soon will be out of water.
If we just had planed the whole thing through.
We have been 4 days here, ever since the city fell. We were manning the WTC checkpoint and loading dock, and it had been a few days since we had to do anything. The ships were all out of fuel, and so was every vehicle, so we had nothing to do.
Until the Brooklyn bridge checkpoint was overrun, and the entire city was filled with hundreds of thousands of crazies, who infected the millions of people in the city. There were too many for us, we didn't have enough bullets, so I ordered my men to retreat here. Some of the other companies are hiding in the buildings to, but just by looking at the streets you can see infected soldiers along the millions of crazies.
This is all because of bad planing, because of the poor thinking of our incompetent high command. I should be there instead, I would have avoided this mess.
They deployed half of the army in New York. Five divisions guarding all the checkpoints and refugee camps, several armored brigades, cavalry regiments, and even marines battalions. They even deployed two fleets in the bay. All of this to guard all of New England's refugees, there could have easily been twenty million people in the city, who are now trying to eat us all.
How much supplies do you need to support that big of an army? We needed several hundred tons of food a day, thousands upon thousands of gallons of fuel, and millions of bullets. This all arrived properly for the first few months, and the city was safe and somewhat well fed. But then San Antonio fell along their ammunition factory, and we began to receive less ammunition every day, forcing us to retreat to Manhattan and New Jersey, allowing hordes of infected to build up in Brooklyn, Yonkers and Long Island. But things just got worse. Soon after, Houston and it's refineries fell, and as the idiots in the goverment tried to scramble a back up plan, the oil supplies in the country dwindled and we were the last ones on the supply line. First, Atlanta took a big chunk of all of the gas moving north, DC took all of the rest, and all highway and city garrisons between them took all the scraps. Even the trains ran out of fuel, so we quickly stoped receiving food and ammunition. The navy needed fuel to operate, so they took all of our remaining supplies, but as soon as they ran out of it, they ditched their ships and the city, retreating south. The checkpoints in the bay bridges quickly ran out of ammunition, and the hordes of infected broke through the bridges. We couldn't even demolish them, because our aircraft were stuck on the ground. The city was desnly packed with refugees, the buildings were filled, the parks were filled, and after the metro flooded, the streets were filled. So the city was clogged, no one could get out, and millions of the refugees we protected became millions of infected trying to eat us.
And now we are trapped here.
The incompetent old men in Washington want us to hold on in the building until they give us further orders.
"We are going to be supplied fuel from North Dakota, we should expect the trains and convoys to begin arriving in the next couple of days, until then hold on." Said the New York garrison command through the radio. We expect orders to arrive today, but something tells me we will get orders that will only get us killed with out achieving anything, so I created a backup plan to break my company out of the city to avoid our demise.
We should break out while we still have strength and ammunition, the holland tunnel is not that far from here, and it was barricaded, so it should be free of infected, and it will probably flood soon, so we have until today to leave. We have planed our escape to perfection.
Hudson street is filled with infected, but if we are quick enough, we can move through it.
We just need to shoot through 20 meters filled with infected to reach Charlton St. which should have less infected. From there we should take the alleys to move down until Vandman St., there we are going through a building, then again trough the alleys until reaching the Holland tunnel.
"We only have 86 men left" says lieutenant Jordan.
"We couldn't possibly hope to reach the tunnel. And what should we do if the tunnel is filled with infected? Or New Jersey?"
I am done with lieutenant Jordan, everything scares him. I don't know how he is still fighting, maybe he is also too scare to stop. 4 days ago, he was the first one to run here. He is a capable leader for his platoon, keeps them in line, but I am done with this coward.
"The tunnel is barricaded, there should be no infected inside, and we could move through the railway lines in New Jersey, there should be no infected there, at least until we reach Newark" I say.
"Why should we even go to Newark? What if they just redeploy us in another mess? What if we end up in Atlanta or Mineapolis?" Says first sergeant Frazier. The first sergeant is a very smart man, he is very good at telling what will happen in the future. But he is very greedy, I would not be surprised if he bails out on the company first chance he gets. I hope not, because a man like that always comes handy.
"We have a country and a people to look out for, if our high comand is an incompetent bunch of old men who only care about saving their own skin and power, there should at least be someone out there who cares about the people." I say.
"I am not saying we abandon the country and raid comboys, but we could go to an infected free town, lock it down, and protect those civilians" says first sergeant Frazier.
"So you would be satisfied with saving a couple hundred people when millions are dying every day? And we could only do that while we have ammunition. If we go to new Jersey, we will more than likely be deployed in a refugee operation in Philadelphia or Baltimore." I say, tired of his selishness.
"And we would do that just to get trapped again, what could we possibly accomplish with that?" said lieutenant Caldwell. He is just a bootlicker, he agrees with the mayority always, that's not too bad, because when I coinvince the men of my ideas, he will just follow like a sheep.
"We have the possibility to change the course of the war, none of us were officers five months ago. Most of us were privates garrisoning our home towns, but through our comand and survival abilites we were promoted and redeployed here. We will likely be promoted again if we successfully leave the city. You would all be company comanders or battalion staff, and I will likely end up comanding a whole battalion.
Now think about all the displaced people who managed to leave New York, how many of them could we save with a battalion? And after the battalion comes the regiment, and then the division. We really could have a say in what happens with the war. Specially now, everyone is defecting, and even the generals are getting infected, there is a big vacum in the chain of comand, we could all be generals in a couple of months." I say.
All the company staff stays sitting looking straight at me with doubting faces.
"You know I will put the lives of my men before anyone else's. If you help me save our country, I promise that if we are ever in a situation like this again, we will do what we can outside of the chain of comand" I say.
I am tired that they only look out for themselves, that's why the world is falling apart. The men just remain sitting looking at me with out saying a word, until one of the privates knocks on the door.
I signal one of the sergeants to see whats up. He quickly leaves the room, and then comes back in holding our radio set.
"It's Central Comand sir, they want to speak with you" says the sergeant.
"Bring it over" I Say.
"This is Captain Johnston of Alpha Company, over" I say through the radio.
"Captain, in wich sector are you? Over" says the man in the radio.
"My company is trapped in sector Delta, over"
"Your orders are to move through the streets and through buildings to reach the UN building, there will be an airborne evacuation there in 4 hours for everyone in sector Delta and Echo, over"
The UN building is at least five milles from here, we would have to fight over a million infected to reach it, that is an impossible trip.
"Sir, we are at least five miles away from the UN building, we can't reach that."
"You can atempt to leave the city by your means, and report to Newark airport base of operations, but avoid leaving through New Jersey at all costs, if possible, go to Brooklin, and go around the city, or seek naval means of evacuation, but avoid reaching New Jersey through the bridges, over"
"We will exit the city through our own means, over and out" I say handing the radio back to the sergeant.
"How will we exit the city now?" Asks lieutenant Jirdan.
"We'll go through the Holland tunnel. It's our only chance, you know we can't reach The UN building, or even the Brooklyn bridge, we will have to dissovey this order. At least now you know I will put my mens lives before any orders" I say.
"Can't we wait for naval evacuation?" Asks lieutenant Jordan, too scared to diss obey orders.
"They'll carpet bomb the city long before they try to move us out, and the generals in Governors island will get to leave before any of us do" says sergeant first class Higgins.
He is the man I trust the most in the company. All of my staff are capable leaders, but they are too scared to die, I feel like only me and Higgins would take a bullet for our men.
"Can't we just wait too see what happens?" Says lieutenant Jordan. I am done with his crap.
"No, we fucking can't. Our men have not eaten in 4 days, and by tomorrow we will be out of water. Do you want the tunnel to flood? What will we do then? Lock ourselves here while our men eat each other? Or worse, try to flee and allow the infected in? We need to leave fucking NOW. Get your platoons ready, we are leaving in twenty minutes, I want all the platoons ready for combat in the lobby ready to leave. Have them cover their skin as much as possible, and have their bayonets ready." I tell the staff.
They stay in their seats, looking at me with surprised expressions, I have never exploded at them like this.
"Go" I say pointing at the door.
They all stood up, and speed walked out of the office.
After they all left, I stood up and left too.
I walked outside the office we were using as a headquarters, into the dusty photography workshop my men are using as a living area.
I walk through to the stairs watching the privates pack up all the equipment, and getting ready for combat. I lost several dozen men when the crazies broke through, now I can't sleep. I was responsible for their lives, now their mothers and sons will never see them again. I really hope not many of my men die today, but I know that I have taken the best decision out of the bunch, and planned it to the best of my ability, but only god knows if any of us will survive to him, and I pray to him that my conscience won't have too much weight to lift.
I climb up the stairs until reaching the top of the building. I walk to the edge and have a look around. The city is filled with infected, the streets are dense with them, slowly shuffling their way north. All of them are walking north, probably because everyone who was able to leave the city left through there. At least we are trapped here, just looking a little bit further north you can notice how many infected there are. I don't know how anyone will reach the UN building, maybe it's just a plan by the government to have us kill as many infected as possible before dying. I am really tired of their bullshit, first they separated me from my family, deploying me in one of the far away fronts, garrisoning a city far away from mine. At least I know my family is safe. They have VIP status in Atlanta, I heard the city is not doing so good, but if shit hits the fan they would be evacuated pretty early. But the way things are going, soon enough there will be nowhere to evacuate.
I put my hand in my pocket, reach for my cigarette pack, and grab the last one. The fall of society surely forces you to quit smoking. I got this pack when I was deployed here three weeks ago, and I used to smoke a pack a day. Now I barely crave them, but I am going to smoke this one, just in the case I die today.
I blow in some air, and look around the city one last time. It is very Erie to look at this. I know a lot of cities look like this right now. Boston, San Antonio, Athens, New Delhi, Istanbul, São Paulo, Chicago, and probably many more, but I haven't heard the news for a couple of days now, the entire world could be gone now. But this is New York, the capital of the world, the largest city in America, and now it's gone. Until four days ago I thought that life would be normal again by Christmas, but I have lost all hope for that, now I only pray that we won't be all rabid savages seeking flesh by next month.
I take one last blow from my cigarette, and threw the burning bud to the street. I got to rally my men, and lift their morale, we got a battle to fight today.
Chapter one: trapped in New York.
I am trapped in New York.
I haven't eaten in a day, and have not slept in four. The city is a mess, we made it a mess.
I am trapped with my entire company in a building in Hudson street. We can see the entire city from here.
In any direction you look, you can see smoke pillars, and thousands upon thousands of crazies roaming the streets.
The bay is filled with the abandoned navy fleet, and stranded civilian ships filled with infected refugees.
There are almost a hundred men trapped in the building with me, with no hope of escape. We are out of food, and soon will be out of water.
If we just had planed the whole thing through.
We have been 4 days here, ever since the city fell. We were manning the WTC checkpoint and loading dock, and it had been a few days since we had to do anything. The ships were all out of fuel, and so was every vehicle, so we had nothing to do.
Until the Brooklyn bridge checkpoint was overrun, and the entire city was filled with hundreds of thousands of crazies, who infected the millions of people in the city. There were too many for us, we didn't have enough bullets, so I ordered my men to retreat here. Some of the other companies are hiding in the buildings to, but just by looking at the streets you can see infected soldiers along the millions of crazies.
This is all because of bad planing, because of the poor thinking of our incompetent high command. I should be there instead, I would have avoided this mess.
They deployed half of the army in New York. Five divisions guarding all the checkpoints and refugee camps, several armored brigades, cavalry regiments, and even marines battalions. They even deployed two fleets in the bay. All of this to guard all of New England's refugees, there could have easily been twenty million people in the city, who are now trying to eat us all.
How much supplies do you need to support that big of an army? We needed several hundred tons of food a day, thousands upon thousands of gallons of fuel, and millions of bullets. This all arrived properly for the first few months, and the city was safe and somewhat well fed. But then San Antonio fell along their ammunition factory, and we began to receive less ammunition every day, forcing us to retreat to Manhattan and New Jersey, allowing hordes of infected to build up in Brooklyn, Yonkers and Long Island. But things just got worse. Soon after, Houston and it's refineries fell, and as the idiots in the goverment tried to scramble a back up plan, the oil supplies in the country dwindled and we were the last ones on the supply line. First, Atlanta took a big chunk of all of the gas moving north, DC took all of the rest, and all highway and city garrisons between them took all the scraps. Even the trains ran out of fuel, so we quickly stoped receiving food and ammunition. The navy needed fuel to operate, so they took all of our remaining supplies, but as soon as they ran out of it, they ditched their ships and the city, retreating south. The checkpoints in the bay bridges quickly ran out of ammunition, and the hordes of infected broke through the bridges. We couldn't even demolish them, because our aircraft were stuck on the ground. The city was desnly packed with refugees, the buildings were filled, the parks were filled, and after the metro flooded, the streets were filled. So the city was clogged, no one could get out, and millions of the refugees we protected became millions of infected trying to eat us.
And now we are trapped here.
The incompetent old men in Washington want us to hold on in the building until they give us further orders.
"We are going to be supplied fuel from North Dakota, we should expect the trains and convoys to begin arriving in the next couple of days, until then hold on." Said the New York garrison command through the radio. We expect orders to arrive today, but something tells me we will get orders that will only get us killed with out achieving anything, so I created a backup plan to break my company out of the city to avoid our demise.
We should break out while we still have strength and ammunition, the holland tunnel is not that far from here, and it was barricaded, so it should be free of infected, and it will probably flood soon, so we have until today to leave. We have planed our escape to perfection.
Hudson street is filled with infected, but if we are quick enough, we can move through it.
We just need to shoot through 20 meters filled with infected to reach Charlton St. which should have less infected. From there we should take the alleys to move down until Vandman St., there we are going through a building, then again trough the alleys until reaching the Holland tunnel.
"We only have 86 men left" says lieutenant Jordan.
"We couldn't possibly hope to reach the tunnel. And what should we do if the tunnel is filled with infected? Or New Jersey?"
I am done with lieutenant Jordan, everything scares him. I don't know how he is still fighting, maybe he is also too scare to stop. 4 days ago, he was the first one to run here. He is a capable leader for his platoon, keeps them in line, but I am done with this coward.
"The tunnel is barricaded, there should be no infected inside, and we could move through the railway lines in New Jersey, there should be no infected there, at least until we reach Newark" I say.
"Why should we even go to Newark? What if they just redeploy us in another mess? What if we end up in Atlanta or Mineapolis?" Says first sergeant Frazier. The first sergeant is a very smart man, he is very good at telling what will happen in the future. But he is very greedy, I would not be surprised if he bails out on the company first chance he gets. I hope not, because a man like that always comes handy.
"We have a country and a people to look out for, if our high comand is an incompetent bunch of old men who only care about saving their own skin and power, there should at least be someone out there who cares about the people." I say.
"I am not saying we abandon the country and raid comboys, but we could go to an infected free town, lock it down, and protect those civilians" says first sergeant Frazier.
"So you would be satisfied with saving a couple hundred people when millions are dying every day? And we could only do that while we have ammunition. If we go to new Jersey, we will more than likely be deployed in a refugee operation in Philadelphia or Baltimore." I say, tired of his selishness.
"And we would do that just to get trapped again, what could we possibly accomplish with that?" said lieutenant Caldwell. He is just a bootlicker, he agrees with the mayority always, that's not too bad, because when I coinvince the men of my ideas, he will just follow like a sheep.
"We have the possibility to change the course of the war, none of us were officers five months ago. Most of us were privates garrisoning our home towns, but through our comand and survival abilites we were promoted and redeployed here. We will likely be promoted again if we successfully leave the city. You would all be company comanders or battalion staff, and I will likely end up comanding a whole battalion.
Now think about all the displaced people who managed to leave New York, how many of them could we save with a battalion? And after the battalion comes the regiment, and then the division. We really could have a say in what happens with the war. Specially now, everyone is defecting, and even the generals are getting infected, there is a big vacum in the chain of comand, we could all be generals in a couple of months." I say.
All the company staff stays sitting looking straight at me with doubting faces.
"You know I will put the lives of my men before anyone else's. If you help me save our country, I promise that if we are ever in a situation like this again, we will do what we can outside of the chain of comand" I say.
I am tired that they only look out for themselves, that's why the world is falling apart. The men just remain sitting looking at me with out saying a word, until one of the privates knocks on the door.
I signal one of the sergeants to see whats up. He quickly leaves the room, and then comes back in holding our radio set.
"It's Central Comand sir, they want to speak with you" says the sergeant.
"Bring it over" I Say.
"This is Captain Johnston of Alpha Company, over" I say through the radio.
"Captain, in wich sector are you? Over" says the man in the radio.
"My company is trapped in sector Delta, over"
"Your orders are to move through the streets and through buildings to reach the UN building, there will be an airborne evacuation there in 4 hours for everyone in sector Delta and Echo, over"
The UN building is at least five milles from here, we would have to fight over a million infected to reach it, that is an impossible trip.
"Sir, we are at least five miles away from the UN building, we can't reach that."
"You can atempt to leave the city by your means, and report to Newark airport base of operations, but avoid leaving through New Jersey at all costs, if possible, go to Brooklin, and go around the city, or seek naval means of evacuation, but avoid reaching New Jersey through the bridges, over"
"We will exit the city through our own means, over and out" I say handing the radio back to the sergeant.
"How will we exit the city now?" Asks lieutenant Jirdan.
"We'll go through the Holland tunnel. It's our only chance, you know we can't reach The UN building, or even the Brooklyn bridge, we will have to dissovey this order. At least now you know I will put my mens lives before any orders" I say.
"Can't we wait for naval evacuation?" Asks lieutenant Jordan, too scared to diss obey orders.
"They'll carpet bomb the city long before they try to move us out, and the generals in Governors island will get to leave before any of us do" says sergeant first class Higgins.
He is the man I trust the most in the company. All of my staff are capable leaders, but they are too scared to die, I feel like only me and Higgins would take a bullet for our men.
"Can't we just wait too see what happens?" Says lieutenant Jordan. I am done with his crap.
"No, we fucking can't. Our men have not eaten in 4 days, and by tomorrow we will be out of water. Do you want the tunnel to flood? What will we do then? Lock ourselves here while our men eat each other? Or worse, try to flee and allow the infected in? We need to leave fucking NOW. Get your platoons ready, we are leaving in twenty minutes, I want all the platoons ready for combat in the lobby ready to leave. Have them cover their skin as much as possible, and have their bayonets ready." I tell the staff.
They stay in their seats, looking at me with surprised expressions, I have never exploded at them like this.
"Go" I say pointing at the door.
They all stood up, and speed walked out of the office.
After they all left, I stood up and left too.
I walked outside the office we were using as a headquarters, into the dusty photography workshop my men are using as a living area.
I walk through to the stairs watching the privates pack up all the equipment, and getting ready for combat. I lost several dozen men when the crazies broke through, now I can't sleep. I was responsible for their lives, now their mothers and sons will never see them again. I really hope not many of my men die today, but I know that I have taken the best decision out of the bunch, and planned it to the best of my ability, but only god knows if any of us will survive to him, and I pray to him that my conscience won't have too much weight to lift.
I climb up the stairs until reaching the top of the building. I walk to the edge and have a look around. The city is filled with infected, the streets are dense with them, slowly shuffling their way north. All of them are walking north, probably because everyone who was able to leave the city left through there. At least we are trapped here, just looking a little bit further north you can notice how many infected there are. I don't know how anyone will reach the UN building, maybe it's just a plan by the government to have us kill as many infected as possible before dying. I am really tired of their bullshit, first they separated me from my family, deploying me in one of the far away fronts, garrisoning a city far away from mine. At least I know my family is safe. They have VIP status in Atlanta, I heard the city is not doing so good, but if shit hits the fan they would be evacuated pretty early. But the way things are going, soon enough there will be nowhere to evacuate.
I put my hand in my pocket, reach for my cigarette pack, and grab the last one. The fall of society surely forces you to quit smoking. I got this pack when I was deployed here three weeks ago, and I used to smoke a pack a day. Now I barely crave them, but I am going to smoke this one, just in the case I die today.
I blow in some air, and look around the city one last time. It is very Erie to look at this. I know a lot of cities look like this right now. Boston, San Antonio, Athens, New Delhi, Istanbul, São Paulo, Chicago, and probably many more, but I haven't heard the news for a couple of days now, the entire world could be gone now. But this is New York, the capital of the world, the largest city in America, and now it's gone. Until four days ago I thought that life would be normal again by Christmas, but I have lost all hope for that, now I only pray that we won't be all rabid savages seeking flesh by next month.
I take one last blow from my cigarette, and threw the burning bud to the street. I got to rally my men, and lift their morale, we got a battle to fight today.
