Fantastic. “Catfish, Nomad. Time to contact? Over.”
“Nomad, this is Catfish. Expect them to arrive on station in about five minutes. Over.”
“Nomad, this is Tomcat Four. Over.”
The new voice on the radio net sounded almost bored.
As he threw himself over the first line of barriers—no easy feat, given the weight of his gear—Dekker wondered how an attack pilot running on fumes could sound so blasé about what was occurring. Dekker landed on the other side of the plastic barriers with a thump.
“Uh, Tomcat, this is Nomad. Go ahead. Over.”
“Nomad, Tomcat. We can hose these guys for you if you want and hold up their advance. They’re about a mile south of the airport. We don’t have a lot of fuel left, so we can make a couple of passes with rockets, and then we’re done. We’ll need to recover at your location to take on some fuel. Over.”
“Roger all, Tomcat. It’s your call. We’ve got goblins on the ground here, so either way, it’s going to be a party. If you can bottle that remote element up for a bit, we can try to keep the refuel point secure, but no promises. You guys might get caught on the deck with the rest of us. Over.” After struggling with the weight of his rucksack, Dekker managed to rise to his knees. His kneepads scraped across the cement as he looked up over the bright jersey barriers, his rifle held at low ready.
“Nomad, this is Tomcat Four. Rog, we’ll treat this inbound column to some close-in gunnery and see how they like it. We’ll save some for the airfield. I’ll fire you a SITREP in a minute or so. Over.”
“Sounds good, Tomcat. Thanks. Over.”
To the left, two of his soldiers were heading toward him, crouching low. A staccato barrage of pops sounded as fifty caliber rounds cooked off in the flame that enveloped Nomad One’s dead MRAP. Behind him, the other MRAPs, their diesel engines idling, added to the cacophony with their M2s barking out an occasional burst.
“Lieutenant!” one of the cavalrymen shouted.
“Go ahead!”
“We’ve got dismounted infantry to our north!” the soldier reported. “Looks like that last Huey dropped ’em off just outside the fence! Hilbarger and Kent are trying to keep ’em pinned, but it’s not really working out too good!”
Dekker turned and looked to the north, past the refueling area the cavalry troops had secured. Two large hangers obscured most of his view, but another Air Force emplacement had been set up near the fence. If the Klowns came that way, they’d face another SAW, as well as an MRAP backing it up less than a hundred meters away. He could hear the pop-pop-pop of assault rifles chattering back and forth as his two soldiers shot it out with the Klowns.
“Nomad Three, you have Hilbarger and Kent in sight? Over!” Nomad Three was run by the platoon sergeant, an experienced sergeant first class named Heller.
“Six, this is Three. We have intermittent contact with them from this position. Over.”
“Three, this is Six. If you have the opportunity, roll over and give them some suppressing fire. We’ll have close air in just a few minutes, but they’ll need to refuel after a couple of passes. Over.”
“Roger, on that. Over.”
More gunfire sounded from the terminal building. Dekker saw figures moving around in the control tower, which sat just south of the terminal. He couldn’t tell who they were, but he saw rifles. Not a good sign. He shouted a warning to the two soldiers beside him, and as they looked up, the glass surrounding the control tower exploded outward. It wasn’t from hostile fire—but from one of the Black Hawks that orbited on the far side of the airport. The gunner had been sharp enough to take out the Klowns hoping to get the drop on the cavalrymen and airmen below.
“Catfish, thanks for the cover,” Dekker transmitted.
“Nomad, thank us later. There’s some bad juju going on in the terminal building. Some more good news, we’re seeing small groups heading toward the airfield. Don’t seem to be really synchronized, but we see weapons, from firearms to baseball bats. Given the body decorations, they’re not our kind of people. Over.”
“Catfish, give me some numbers. Over.”
“Nomad, call it fifty to sixty so far. Over.”
God damn. “Roger that, Catfish. How—”
Another burst of gunfire tore through the terminal’s few remaining windows. He looked at one of the soldiers crouching down behind the barriers with him and spotted a grenade launcher under the barrel of the guy’s M4.
“Hey, Ramirez. When they start massing to attack, hit them with some grenades.”
“Roger that, El-Tee,” the soldier responded.
The firing stopped. Silence reigned for a few seconds, broken only by intermittent gunfire and the constant throbbing of helicopters in flight. Dekker realized he didn’t hear the pounding of the remaining Huey, which he presumed meant it had either been downed or had retreated from the engagement area.
“Fitzpatrick, you have an M203?” he shouted to the soldier on the other side of Ramirez.
“Negative on that, El-Tee,” the man responded.
“Awesome,” Dekker murmured. They could have used another grenade launcher.
“Hey, you hear that, El-Tee?” Ramirez asked almost conversationally.
“Hear what?” Dekker asked.
Ramirez nodded toward the terminal building. “Laughing.”
Dekker lifted the ear cup off his left ear. Sure enough, he heard laughter, and the voices were getting louder.
“Get ready for it,” Dekker said, letting his ear cup fall back in place. “Nomad Two, you’re clear to engage at your discretion. Bravo Team, you’re cleared to engage as well. Keep eyes out. We’ve got goblins all around the perimeter now. Over.” Dekker glanced at the dun-colored MRAP that sat at the far end of the barrier line. In addition to its gunner, it was flanked by two cav troopers carrying M4s.
Both units rogered their responses.
Two minutes later, the first of the Klowns—civilians who had been infected, judging by their attire—started boiling out of the terminal building with hoots and hollers. Men, women, children, all giggling and tittering, cast their mad gazes across the airfield. Carrying anything from knives to chair legs to broken bottles, they surged toward the long line of orange barriers, feet slapping the tarmac as they ran.
Nomad Two’s M2 chattered immediately, cutting through the advancing crazies like a scythe through wheat, blasting body parts across the concrete. The Air Force emplacement opened up as well, pelting the exits with less impressive but still lethal 5.56-millimeter rounds. Dekker saw people falling to the ground just outside the exit, and those Klowns behind the first tripped and stumbled as they tried to pick their way across the corpses. The fifty roared again, kicking up explosions of dust as the rounds slashed their way across the asphalt, digging divots and ripping limbs off torsos. Dekker and the other troops hadn’t even started firing yet.
“Hey, maybe we’ll be able to save some grenades,” Ramirez shouted.
From the terminal building, something exploded with enough force to rattle the bits of glass remaining in the panes. A brief flash followed, and Dekker had an impression of something was speeding across the airfield, trailing a ribbon of fire behind it. Before he could move, Nomad Two exploded.
The force of the detonation ripped the M2 right off its mount, and the gunner flopped about in the open air cupola like a rag doll before slumping forward, his helmeted head bouncing off the rig’s thick armor. The two dismounted soldiers went down, screaming, as shrapnel tore across them, ripping open legs and arms and faces, anywhere that wasn’t armored.
“AT4s!” Dekker shouted. “They have AT4s! Hit the terminal building!” He raked a burst of full auto fire across the terminal building.