“Help,” Wyatt says quietly.
An enormous balding man with a nose shaped like a potato and a tattooed arm gurgles, leaking drool, and begins shoving his way through the others to get at Wyatt. A small boy, no more than six years old, dashes up to him and begins jumping up and down, wild-eyed and whimpering and pawing at his running nose.
“Run, Joel,” Mooney says, his voice shaking.
“Help. . . .”
The corridor suddenly comes alive with bodies pushing and shoving at each other until a boiling point is reached and they all come rushing forward in a flood.
“Run,” Mooney screams. “Run, run, goddamn run!”
He turns and sprints on bare feet, sparing a single glance over his shoulder to see Wyatt gaining on him, his eyes big and watery, a horde of maniacs snapping at his heels. They reach the stairwell and plunge down the stairs two, three steps at a time, wincing at the jolts of pain in their feet and screaming their lungs out.
“Mooney, wait for me!”
A skinny, bearded man in a hospital gown hurtles from above, kicking and clawing at the air in his descent, and strikes the floor below with a sickening smack.
“Mooney! Don’t leave me here!”
“Keep moving, Joel!”
Mooney reaches the door at the bottom of the stairwell and holds it open, sweeping Wyatt inside with his arm and then slamming it shut.
“Get the Sergeant! Go, go, go!”
Wyatt bolts down the corridor, limping on a hurt ankle, yelling bloody murder while Mooney pushes against the door with all his might. Instantly, he is almost thrown to the far wall as the first Mad Dogs press against it. Regaining his balance, he leans against the door again, digging in his heels, but the crush of bodies is too strong.
He can’t hold them, slowly loses ground.
Finally, he lets go and rushes after Wyatt, shouting the alarm.
The boys are already spilling into the corridor, some still in their underwear and rubbing their eyes, all of them armed and swearing and asking for orders.
“What’s going on?”
“Who’s that chasing Joel?”
“Are we shooting or what? What’s going on?”
“God, what’s that smell?”
“What the hell is that?”
“Out of the way!”
The LT pushes through them, unholstering his nine-millimeter handgun and flicking off the safety.
“Halt!” Bowman calls out.
The Mad Dogs ignore him.
“Halt or we will fire on you!”
He is almost pleading now.
“Please. . . .”
His panic evaporates as he realizes he has no choice.
“Get down!” he shouts, waving at Mooney and Wyatt. “Now!”
Mooney, his lungs and legs burning, makes a last dash at Wyatt and tackles him to the floor.
“LT—” Kemper says behind him.
Bowman takes careful aim and shoots the lead Mad Dog in the face.
The other Mad Dogs do not even notice. They keep running at the soldiers, howling.
“Fire!” he says, squeezing off another shot. “Fire!”
The soldiers form a firing line and start shooting with their carbines at almost point-blank range. The effect is devastating. The rain of hot metal rips through flesh and muscle, cracks bone. A fine mist of blood and smoke fills the hall. Some of the boys close their eyes while they shoot, unable to watch the slaughter.
In less than a minute, it’s over and Kemper is calling, cease fire, cease fire.
“What the hell just happened?” one of the boys is shouting. “What’s happening?”
Bowman blinks and sees the corridor carpeted with broken, bloody bodies, some moaning and thrashing in puddles of blood. The battle was a blur to him. Despite the incredible firepower delivered into the narrow kill zone, the Mad Dogs almost made it to the firing line. His ears ring and his teeth are still vibrating from the deafening rifle reports. He feels oddly exultant, then fights off an urge to vomit.
He turns and sees a few of the boys crouched against the wall, puking and retching and bawling. A flash goes off as one of the soldiers takes a picture with a digital camera, then resumes staring at the carnage in disbelief.
Third Squad is probably crapping itself in front of the hospital as well, Bowman tells himself. They had their own firing incident, reported moments before this crazy horde showed up, and they’ve got a man AWOL.
We will all be like that within a few minutes, puking and paralyzed with guilt and shame, unless we can stop thinking and keep moving.
The LT still has doubts that he made the right call to order his men to fire, but he has a job to do and he must keep his unit combat effective.
What he wants to know is: Where are all these Mad Dogs coming from?
“Sergeant McGraw!” he barks. “Pull your men out of there and get them cleaned up and disinfected. I expect a full report on how exactly they brought these civilians down here. Sergeant Ruiz!”
“Sir?”
“Check on your squad,” the LT orders. “Not with your handheld. Go in person. I expect a full report on their firing incident. And go easy on them. Sergeant Lewis!”
“Sir!”
“Stay close to me, Grant.”
The discord of their meeting in the basement office is gone. Bowman is pleased to see the NCOs pulling together as a team. These men are professionals.
Wyatt and Mooney are already trying to stand, pushing bodies off of them, moaning at the mauling they received as the Mad Dogs trampled over them.
Wyatt gets to his feet unsteadily and starts laughing. “That was so freaking cool!”
Mooney, covered in blood and swaying drunkenly, takes a wild swing at him and by sheer luck manages to connect with the side of his head, knocking Wyatt against the far wall and sending his glasses flying. Then the boys pull them apart.
“Sergeant Kemper!” Bowman calls.
“Sir,” says the platoon sergeant.
“Get these people sorted,” he says. “Separate the dead and wounded and find a place to put each.”
“Morgue’s full, sir.”
“Find something, Mike. I want them out of here.”
“I’ll see to it, sir.”
“Sergeant Lewis will lead a squad to round up any stray Mad Dogs and then re-establish contact with Winslow and the hospital staff. If you’re not helping here, I want you helping him. I want everybody doing something.” Bowman notices two soldiers waiting for a chance to speak to him. “Well, what is it? What do you men need?”
“Just what the hell is this plague, Lieutenant?” asks Finnegan.
“We just shot all these people,” Martin chimes in. “What are we going to do, sir?”
“Sergeant Lewis, see to these men.”
“All right, morons! You heard the Lieutenant! Get your dicks out of your ears and un-ass this hallway!”
The effect is electrifying on the boys, who snap out of their funk and spring into action.
“Hey!” a voice calls from the stairwell. “You all right?”
“Come forward slowly and show yourself,” Lewis orders, raising his rifle.
Winslow steps into the corridor holding his pistol at his side, breathing heavily, looking at the dead and dying
