Operation Wild Tarpan Read Free

tablet she was getting a feed from Northwind with.
    “Don’t think so.” Miller handed her the binoculars as she got up.
    Bands of roving Infected, some wearing filthy bloodstained clothes almost ready to rot from their bodies, with inky, bruise-like blotches eating into their skin, were gathering to meet the troops at the far end of the cordon. And where they did, there were embraces, as if they were civilian girlfriends welcoming their boyfriends home with a kiss.
    A soldier handed his rifle to one of the local Infected, and they all crowded back into the Bravo together.
    “Great.” Morland grunted from beside Miller’s shoulder. He hugged his weapon to his chest—a custom 3D-print-milled monstrosity of blocky metal and polymer wrapped around an assault rifle and integral shotgun. “Why couldn’t we be in a horror movie instead of this shit, eh? Zombies don’t run around sharing guns.”
    “They’re sick. Not dead.” Miller patted Morland’s shoulder.
    “So they get to be a terrifying horde and we get to feel terrible for shooting back?” Morland glared at him. “I don’t think bloody Tasers are going to work against the fuckin’ Army .”
    “It’s not going to come to that,” Miller said with more confidence than he felt. “This is peacefully resisting arrest.”
    “Like fuck it is. That might be what Harris said to the media, but we don’t have escape routes planned because this is peaceful.”
    Miller had to shake his impulse towards idealism. It was such an attractive lie, though—that peacefully resisting Stockman’s 11th Infantry would cause them to simply leave them alone. The reality wasn’t nearly so cut and dry, however.
    Out in the avenue, Lewis and the Infected command squad continued to yell at each other.
    “This here is private property! ” Lewis shouted.
    Stockman’s captain squared his jaw. “We will not let you criminals destroy the evidence of the illegal chemical weapons BioGen has been producing. We are taking control of this facility with immediate effect, and you and your men will stand down immediately!”
    One by one, the lieutenant and the enlisted men stepped forward, striking the same posture, wearing the same glare.
    Step by step, Lewis and the rest of Cobalt-1 backed away, down towards the roadblock. “We don’t want a fight! We’re private citizens!”
    “Tar-black citizens,” PFC Klansman howled after them, joined by his African-American lieutenant’s cry of, “Empty-eyed terrorists!”
    “Just give us time to call our superiors and ask what to do, okay?” Lewis held up his hands peacefully, backing up towards safety behind the roadblock. “Nobody has to get hurt, here!”
    “ You do, you fucks—” “—terrorists—” “—company stooges—”
    The rest of the convoy fell over themselves to join in shouting obscenities against Cobalt-1—‘ungifted,’ ‘empty terrorists,’ ‘soulless’—the captain, struggling to keep up with his men, was pulled helplessly into the zeitgeist of the moment.
    Miller swallowed, his dread growing. It was like the Parasite dug deep and brought up every flimsy wedge mankind had ever used to divide ‘us’ from ‘them,’ encouraging twisted prejudice in any way it could. Was that biological? He wondered. The stinking old justification for looking on anyone different with fear and hatred?
    Like hell this was ever about peaceful resistance . Stockman’s 11th Division seemed intent on finding incontrovertible evidence of Schaeffer-Yeager’s wrongdoing, supposedly bound up in that BioGen lab.
    Thankfully, Miller knew every computer in the building had been remotely wiped and filled with garbage random-encrypted files by Northwind’s operators overnight. The labs were cleaned up and all equipment had been shipped out to some corner of the Astoria Compound.
    This whole charade was about putting up enough resistance to make the Infected really want the damn place, to waste their time holding onto it before they