Life Goes On by Tayell, Frank (large ebook reader txt) 📗

left when this defensive line was breached. We remained because we must keep the dead souls away from the children.”

“Those are your kids at the airport?” Tess asked.

Laila laughed, and when she translated Tess’s question into Portuguese and then Arabic, so did two of the other women, while Saleema gave a wetly guttural grunt. “We’re not married,” Laila said. “We’re nurses. We brought the children here from the hospital. We wanted to put them on a boat to Madagascar where they would be safe. So we were told.”

“Ah, got it,” Tess said.

“G’day, ladies,” Oakes said, appearing in the door. “The name’s Nicko. I’m told one of you knows which of those tanks was fired this morning.”

“At the end of the bridge, next to the crane,” Laila said.

“Bonzer,” Oakes said. “Mind your ears, there’s gonna be a bang.”

“Wait, Oakes!” Tess began, but the sergeant was already sprinting back along the bridge.

“Any more?” Leo asked, taking Oakes’s place a second later.

“Take what you can,” Tess said, her fingers twitching as she kept on reloading.

The bandaged woman, Saleema, hissed a pained question in Arabic.

“Is she all right?” Tess asked.

“Second-degree burns,” Laila said. “She would like to know if you’re a soldier.”

“I’m a police officer,” Tess said.

“Police?” Laila translated. Saleema gave a rasping reply. Laila laughed, then spoke in Portuguese. The other two women laughed in turn. “She asked if you’ve come to arrest the zombies for loitering or for littering,” Laila said.

Tess forced a chuckle. “Hey, at this point, I’m willing to try anything.”

A loud pop came from the north, a sound Tess didn’t have time to interpret before a massive explosion erupted in the south, drowning the irregular drumroll of rifle fire. The bus shook. The windows rattled. Tess’s heart skipped a beat.

“We had three tank shells left when the tank drivers ran,” Laila said calmly.

And the second was fired a moment later. The third so swiftly afterward that the bus didn’t have time to settle between each mini-quake.

Tess picked up a carbine, slotting a magazine into place, but placed the M4 next to her leg.

Laila did the same. “My sisters and I will ensure you can retreat,” she said.

“We’ll all retreat together,” Tess said. “Get ready for the rush,” she added, seeing Zach jump down from the dozer.

“Yeah, it’s over,” Zach said. “You should have seen the explosion. It was awesome!”

Gunfire crackled from the barricade.

“If it’s over, why are they still shooting?” Tess said. “Take over. Finish loading the magazines.” She paused in the doorway. “Zach, this woman was bitten. She might turn.”

“Oh,” he said, suddenly deflating. “I… What do I do?”

“Kill me, if you have to,” Laila said calmly. “Sit down. There is work to be done before then.”

Chapter 8 - A Bridge Too Far

Rio Mutamba, Mozambique

Tess held tight to the edge of the dozer’s cab as she leaned forward, but she couldn’t lean far enough. “I see what you mean,” she said. “You can’t see the zombies lying right up against the blade.”

Below, the living ghouls banged and clawed, slithered and crawled over each other, only occasionally managing to stand and present their heads as a target for Clyde or Toppley. Everyone else held their fire. For now.

The bridge-way had become an open graveyard of occasionally moving corpses. Hundreds of dead had created a thick mat close to the dozer, thinning towards the barricade at the bridge’s far end. Beyond, and below, more milled and gathered around the large craters the tank’s shells had left at the edge of the flood plain. They came from inland, and from east and west, and from among the long grasses of the lush river basin immediately below the bridge.

“How many zoms are still down there, close to the dozers?” Tess asked.

“Assume fifty for the purposes of planning,” Hawker said. “We can’t move the dozers without opening a point of entry. It’s a solid defensive line. We can hold against two more similar assaults. The trouble will come from below. That river isn’t wide enough to stop them.”

“That’s why you fired the shells?” Tess asked.

“It was a case of use ’em or lose ’em,” Hawker said. “Because if the zoms get across that river, we’ll lose this position. They follow each other, don’t they? The gunfire will lure them in, but the clock’s ticking on how long before we have to retreat.”

“We’re far further from Inhambane than the New Zealand commander implied,” Tess said. “I think this is the wrong bridge. We’re not where the New Zealanders think the front is, and it’s less well defended than it should be. But you saw them off.” A louder than usual bang came from dozer-blades, followed by a sharp rifle crack. “I mean you’ve stopped the advance. No, that’s wrong too.”

“We destroyed that wave,” Hawker said. “But they’re approaching from the southeast and southwest. Southwest isn’t an immediate problem. They’ll follow the lowland and the river basin until it becomes the estuary. It’s the southeast we’ve got to watch. If they knew what they were doing, they could ford that river, and get behind us. That they don’t know what they’re doing, that they can’t think, that’s what’ll allow us to hold this position for a few more hours.”

Sergeant Oakes bounded across the bridge-way and leaped up the ladder. “Did I hit the wicket, sir?” he asked.

“Close enough,” Hawker said. “Help the major snipe any targets within range. Commissioner, we need to get word to town that we’re under-equipped, and overextended. We need people and material to create a secondary barricade. Build a defensive line ten metres back that way, fuel up these dozers and drive them forward to crush the zoms. That’ll preserve a good portion of ammunition, and kill enough of the enemy to reduce the threat to the city up north.”

“We’ve