69. The deadly obstacle

Lightning flashes and thunder resounds while torrents of water fall from the sky and although the Ranges’ wipers work at full speed, they can hardly see in front of them. Joss frowns and stares ahead.

“Spyker, reduce speed immediately to a snail’s pace. The whole road ahead is blocked by vehicles. Look, there is a bus in a ditch down the sharp decline right along the road. Maybe it was an accident.”

Anxiously Leo leans forward trying to see what is going on. The heavy thunder clouds above cover the sun completely, and although it is still early in the morning, it feels as if it is dusk already. He doesn’t like it at all! It was fine when they drove with some speed, but now they are creeping towards obstacles and will probably have to stop and find a way around it. The declines on both sides of the road are steep and there is no space for them to pass with the dense pine woods on both sides preventing it. The bushes and shrubs are lush between the trees and Leo wonders if maybe monsters are hiding there because there are quite a few vehicles in their way. But where are all the people?

Joss, Spyker, and Recce are increasingly working on his nerves because they are too self-assured and reckless. After many skirmishes with the monsters in town, it seems as if they cannot get enough of it because they go into town almost every day. Their pantry and freezers and fuel tanks are full and they have a storeroom filled with weapons and ammunition, but why they have to after the cabs have been filled up with provisions, provoke the cannibals to a fight before they return to the farm. It became a nice game to cut off the monsters’ limbs with their swords before they return.

These ugly scenes haunt Leo frequently so that he has problems sleeping at night. How the monsters pick up the bloody, chopped-off limbs and frantically rush to their den. How the maimed monsters with blood spouting from their veins continually spit at them like cobras. How other monsters drag those injured back to their nest. He is not made of the same stuff as his mad friends. He is a nerve-wreck and sometimes he jerks awake in the middle of the night, soaking in sweat and shivering profusely.

Recce is an ex-Recce-4 and gave them high-quality training in combat and Spyker and Joss are ex-executioners for the organized crime underworld syndicates. Things that had to vanish like mist before the sun like witnesses or someone who didn’t want to co-operate or when a corpse was left behind, or get information they would extract by torture. They are accustomed to filthy work.

Leo thinks they realize the vast advantage they have over the monsters in bright sunlight. If they encounter them someday when it is dark, the sun won’t help. He just hopes this isn’t that day.

Leo voices his concern. “Why are so many vehicles in front and even a bus? Maybe motorists are ambushed here and so the monsters multiplied. I don’t trust this place a bit.”

Joss isn’t worried: “Rather monsters than people because the monsters don’t carry weapons. If there are, we will slay them.”

Leo shakes his head. “Each time the sunlight helps us. Look how dark is it now with these thunder clouds above.”

Joss shakes his head: “We simply must pass here if we want to reach Port Elizabeth in time, there is no other way. Recce heard the Puma departed and flew away from the farm after his last conversation with Paola. There is quite a good chance that we are going to encounter soldiers on that smallholding waiting for us. We must simply reach there today so that we have ample time to deploy Recce’s plan B if that is the case. I bet you the keys are still in those vehicles, and if not, we only turn the steering wheel until it locks, get it in neutral and push them out of the way or Spyker can push them with Ranger, easy.”

Leo is still worried: “I also dislike the fact that the trees and shrubs are so dense on both sides of the road. What if we are attacked from both sides and are surrounded? Who says they aren’t just waiting for us to climb out and try to ambush us like they probably did with the owners of those vehicles? That is maybe why there are so many cars here. Remember, maybe it is dark enough so that sunlight doesn’t chase them back to their lairs.”

Spyker doesn’t agree. “Leo, those things are too light-sensitive and the thunderstorm is temporary. Where had they hidden from the sun in the bushes before it started raining? I think if they are around, they will hide in that bus. But somehow I doubt that also because the bus has windows and they wouldn’t know how to cover it. We don’t know how intelligent they are. If you ask me, they have one or other nest further on at a smallholding or farm and only emerge by night to ambush motorists and pull them back to their nests. Maybe you are right about the bus, and if there are any, we will entice them to come out and kill them with our swords because gunshots might call the rest.”

Joss hits Spyker with his flat hand hard behind the head: “Once again, my mate, you hit the nail right on his head.”

Spyker stops at the first car in the middle of the road and Joss gives instructions over his radio to the five Rangers following him: “Soldiers, come in! Confirm that you all hear me and are ready for action, over.”

One-by-one they confirm; from Bravo to Foxtrot and Joss continues: “Drivers, be ready in your cabs. The rest get out. It looks like three cars blocking the way and it doesn’t rain, it pours! So, I suggest you keep your face shields open so that you can see well in the rain. I see no life or movement. We must push the cars off the road before we can proceed and also the bus that is stuck in a deep ditch alongside the road. Alfa, Bravo, and Charlie will go directly to the cars and push them from the road as quickly as possible while Delta covers the bus might monsters be hiding in it, Echo cover the road on the left side and Foxtrot the woods on the right side. The moment we get the cars off the road, the cabs must come and you jump in and we hit the road, okay? Only if we see a whole lot coming out of the woods you may fire. If there are not too many of them use your arrows and swords. We don’t want to invite an overwhelming force that hides in the bushes. No games today! We must get to PE as soon as possible because we don’t know what awaits us there. Okay, here we go!”

Joss jumps out, followed by the rest. Alfa runs up to the first car and peeps through the windows. The car is empty and the key still in the ignition. Joss opens the door, disengages the handbrake, and turns the steering wheel until it locks. He waves his hand and Leo and Recce easily push the car off the road down the decline where it comes to a standstill with a bump in the ditch.

In the meantime, Bravo has reached the following car and they do the same. Now it is only Charlie that has to move a delivery van, standing across, blocking the road. In the meantime, Alfa helps Delta to cover the bus and Echo and Foxtrot intently watch the bushes for any movement.

It is dead quiet but when they come near the bus, Joss frowns and talks over his radio: “Soldiers, be alert! The bus’s windows are covered with clothes on the inside. There is quite a possibility that something hides in there that doesn’t like sunshine. Foxtrot, get the van out of the way and drivers, be ready to come as soon as it is removed far enough.”

Lesley, the Foxtrot woman soldier in front, hastily opens the door of the van but is utterly surprised by a monster who jumps upon her and she lands on the tar with the thing upon her. Her helmet connects hard with the tar and it luckily causes the shield to come down and keeps the biting face of the monster away from her just in time but now she sees nothing and his weight pins her to the ground. She feels how the monster tries to get hold of her throat and she is thankful the metal scales protect her neck and all around under her chin.

Jenny and Andrew are alarmed when Lesley is being attacked and just want to help her when the sliding door of the panel van suddenly jerks open and four monsters catch them by surprise and attack them before they know what’s happening. Instinctively both of them pull their triggers shortly one after the other and shoot the monsters away from them. Jenny puts the barrel of the gun against the monster on Jenny and shoots his head from his body.

Suddenly the bushes around them swarm with monsters and out of the bus come several and rush towards the nearest soldiers. Alfa, Echo, and Delta start to fire at them. Leo becomes ice-cold when his fears come true. An overwhelming amount of monsters from both sides of the road rush out of the bushes and Joss yells instructions: “Come Alfa, let’s go and help Foxtrot quickly to get that fucking thing off the road. The rest of you keep them busy and jump into the first Ranger that comes along. Come on, Spyker, bring the Rangers!”

Alfa reaches and finds that Andrew, in the meantime, disengaged the handbrake and gets it in neutral and Joss indicate that they must push and easily they push it off the road down the decline and it lands with a bang in the ditch. Just in time for the monsters are almost upon them. Joss shouts: “Come, drivers, come! Automatic fire! Empty your magazines on them. Then use your pistols!”

The machine guns cut the nearest monsters down and then cut them to pieces and allow the soldiers to jump into the Rangers as they come along. By the time the last two Rangers arrive, Alfa and Foxtrot have to defend themselves with their pistols just before they also jump in. Here and there a monster jumps on a Ranger and desperately tries to hang onto it, but eventually, they have all shaken off before the Rangers chase away.

Alfa landed in Echo’s Ranger and Joss hits the driver, John, on his shoulder as they speed away. “We did it! Wasn’t it fun? Fuck it, I am now so full of energy!” He shouts over his radio: “Excellent people! We will stop ahead on an open spot where we can sanitize ourselves and the Rangers and we can change to our designated Rangers. Are all of you okay? Rapport immediately if someone maybe has been spit upon, bitten, or scratched. Foxtrot, is Lesley okay? Make sure she doesn’t have scratches on her.”

Lesley answers: “I am okay, Joss, only got a hard bump on the head through my helmet, with a little headache now, but further quite fine. I’ve seen today how important our gear is. That thing at first tried to get to my face but the shield protected me and then he went for my throat but our equipment was excellent or else I would have seen my ass today.”

“Excellent! Remember soldiers you must keep your gear on, helmets and all, until we have stopped and sanitized everything before we take anything off.”

Leo wonders: “Where did they all come from? The vehicles in the road don’t warrant so many of them.”

John has already put two and two together: “Most of them came out of the bushes. It seems as if they come from a squatter camp hidden deeper in the bushes.”

Leo frowns. “You realize we must return and pass there again when we come back and I won’t be surprised if the road will be blocked again, even much worse.”