Dixon and Downey are concentrating their fire on the door too, having despatched the other two Rabids that were blown out from the stairwell. The Rabids keep coming and I’m getting very concerned with how much ammo we are expending holding them back. Watts has reverted to using his rifle from behind the Browning, to pick off any Rabids that are missed. I don’t see any other option but to use more grenades to try and stem the flow of these fucking relentless creatures.
I pull the pin on one grenade and throw it down, trying to put more force into the throw and aiming higher into the stairwell in an attempt to get it further in and reduce the risk of the explosion blowing any Rabids out again. It’s pot luck though. The grenade goes off with no Rabids blown out and I throw another down. My theory is that a succession of smaller explosions won’t blow any out and do enough damage over the spread to stop them coming, or at least slow them down.
A total of four grenades explode inside the stairwell, smoke billowing out of the top of its doorway and into the dark rainy sky. Thankfully, following the fourth grenade exploding, the Rabids’ attack ends, at least for now.
“Nicely done, Sir,” Watts congratulates.
“Thanks, but let’s not count our chickens. Stay ready; they will come again!”
That I am sure of. They will keep attacking, they can smell prey nearby. We need to get the fuck off this roof. We still have thirty minutes until evac and that was only estimated, it could be longer. I hold out no hope that it will be quicker. Not with how this mission has panned out so far.
“Lieutenant Winters. Receiving, over?”
“Receiving, over,” he answers almost immediately.
“Latest ETA on evac, we are in the shit here, over!”
“Still no better, Sir, they are prepping for take-off, over.”
“Prepping for take-off? Are they taking the piss? Order them into the air now, over!”
“I’m sorry, Sir, I’ve tried everything I can to speed things up, over.”
“For fuck’s sake, at this rate, there won’t be anybody here to pick up. Apart from Zombies that is, over.”
“I will try again, Captain. Please hold, over and out.”
“Please hold,” Dixon interjects. “Is this guy for real? Does he think we are trying to get a taxi to the airport?”
Thankfully, he doesn’t say it over the radio for Winters to hear.
“I am sure he is doing all he can,” I say, trying to calm the men, even though anger boils inside me. How can they leave us out here with our arses out? If we still had the contents of the safe, you can bet your bottom dollar Colonel Reed would have had birds in the air immediately. I will have to thank him next time I see him, I promise myself. So much for trying to do the right thing. “Okay, let's do an ammo check, while we can.”
“Captain Richards, receiving, over?” Flight Lieutenant Alders’ voice comes through my headset, taking me completely by surprise as he should be almost back at base.
“Receiving, Flight Lieutenant, over.”
“Evac, ETA, five minutes, over,” he tells me, but I struggle to understand what he means.
“Explain yourself, over,” I tell him.
“I’m on my way back to pick you up, ETA, five minutes, over.”
“You can’t possibly have got back to base and back here that quickly, over.”
“I haven’t been back to base, I’ve put down in Richmond, dropped off most of the team and the holdall and turned around, over.”
“Alders, you had your orders, the mission takes priority.”
“It is, Sir, it will just be a bit late. The holdall is safe and none of us was just going to leave you behind, especially Alice. She was quite insistent, weren’t you Alice?”
“You got that right, Sir,” Alice says, “we are coming to get you!”
For a moment, I think about ordering them to turn around and complete the mission as ordered. The moment is only fleeting though, and my relief is shared by the rest of my team on the roof, that is plain to see.
“We will be ready, thank you,” I tell them.
“Well that’s a relief,” Josh says, smiling.
“We aren’t off this roof yet, son, stay alert.” Josh’s game face returns immediately, and he goes back behind his raised rifle.
Alders is going to have to pick us up from the north side of the building. That means the Lynx’s door gun won’t be able to cover the stairwell, I think, running through how we will evac. The south side has the burning Lynx at its base, giving off heavy black smoke and it could still explode further. That smoke is also affecting the east side, which is a no-go anyway because of the mangled helipad frame. We don’t want to be climbing over that, we need a swift exit and the west side has all the buildings communication antennas and arrays lined up, high into the air.
The north side is the only viable option and the Browning is going to have its work cut out, covering the evac, as is the person who is going to be behind it.
It dawns on me that there hasn’t been any lightning recently. The rain is still pouring down
