Xmas Quarantine
Posted: 2005-12-29 01:30pm
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- December 25, 2567 -
- Provo Prime, USE fringe world New Utah -
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“Merry Xmas, assholes!” Lieutenant Kate Kassidy yelled as the wall of living dead exploded all ‘round her. It was Xmas, otherwise known as Sol Invictus Day, but instead of gobbling Zigonian eggnog with her family, laughing at senile old Gramps and tearing pressies open, she was being showered by the gore and guts of zombified Mormons. Not the best way to spend Xmas Day, most folks (Kate herself included) would say. Not the best way to spend any day, all sane folks would say. But she laughed, they all laughed. Especially the tank crew who were calmly driving their Terminator tank while chewing on Hoooah! tactical snacks. Heck, if they weren’t all moaning and screeching and trying to feast on living flesh, Kate would’ve thought the zombies were also laughing. Stupid Mormons. Stupid zombies. Stupid Xmas! “Ho-fucking-ho, fuckers!”
She fired off another burst, and a fat zombie that probably looked like Saint Nick if he weren’t missing his jaw had his head (and the rest of his upper torso) replaced with steamy red mist. However, for every zombie vaped by plasma fire, it seemed like half a dozen more took its place. It didn’t help that the tank’s plasma turrets were spinning around wildly, disintegrating at least thirty deadites per second.
Kate pumped her grenade launcher and lobbed a grenade at what looked like a family of zombies, and they all exploded as the small-diameter plasma explosive (Smape) detonated right above them. Once more, the Marines on tank were showered by chunks of deadite flesh.
Kate was with two others on top the Terminator tank’s massive turret while another Marine was in front of the turret, over the driver’s hatch and behind an electrified plow that was carving their path through the undead necropolis. To avoid getting swamped, the tank had to go as fast as it could, squishing deadites against its plow like bugs on a windshield. Kate estimated that up to two hundred deadites had either been smeared by the tank’s plow, crushed under its treads, or scorched by its CESA armoring (activated only on the front, rear and flanks of the tank). Progress was good, they were ahead of schedule.
The tank sped through the desecrated colony-city, through the urban necropolis of concrete, glasstic and walking cadavers. Its streets were filled with once-human inhabitants, now turned into ghouls that hungered for human flesh. Instinctually, they gathered around the speeding warmachine, craving for the armored humans perched on top of its nuclear-powered hull. Most ran, their faces contorted with rabid postmortem rage, whereas those too decomposed hobbled, their faces decrepit masks of moaning death. Their necrotic minds only registered one thing, the scent of living flesh, the promise of the taste of human brains. They did not know fear, they did not know pain. By the dozen, they were crushed under the treads of the Terminator or vaporized by its plasma cannons. Yet they still reached for the humans on the tank. Ever hungry, dying by the droves.
“We’re ahead of schedule!” one of Kate’s subordinates, Sgt. Lyle Reese, remarked, gesturing at his wristcomputer as if it were a watch (their chronometers were actually on their HUDs). “Oh shit!” he suddenly screamed as a zombified hand grabbed his leg and nearly pulled him down street-level. Kate lunged for him, grabbed his hand and tried to make sure he didn’t come into contact with the CESA armoring (concentrated energy shield armor, which would’ve fried him) or the hundred undead diners clawing for man-flesh. She succeeded in the former, Reese’s boot caught the flank CESA and sparks erupted, but he was fine. As for the latter, if it weren’t for the tank’s constant motion, the zombies’ desperate attempts at dismemberment would have been less unsuccessful. Nonetheless, dozens of hands clawed for Reese, and he screamed as they attempted to take a chunk of him with them. “Holy shit! Holy shit!”
“Felis Navidad!” Kate hollered back. “Just don’t let go!”
“Hahahaha!” Reese laughed back as his legs and the rest of his lower body disappeared under a mass of rotting arms and snarling faces. Kate could hear them hiss and, through her respirator, even smell their putrid rot-stink. Reese continued laughing (more of a half-laugh half-bloodcurdling scream, really) while Kate closed her eyes and gripped as hard as ever.
The tank had more than a hundred cameras, microphones and temperature readers and all other forms of sensor equipment, both active and passive, scattered all around its hull. From rangefinders under its 200mm main gun to pressure-sensors on its treads. The drivers could see Reese on the verge of dismemberment in full Technicolor holovision, so they spat out their Hoooah! tactical snacks and tried to help poor Reese as fast as they could, before he’d get gobbled up by the deadites.
Flares, white-phosphorus projectiles and caustic smoke grenades erupted from the sides of the tank’s massive turrets, showering the undead with a deadly shower of burning, stinging, frying, blinding, discomfort-causing less-lethal weaponry. Deadites all around the tank screeched and wailed as they caught fire and boiled. As Kate opened her eyes to see what was going on, she saw an undead girl, probably less than ten years old, burn up and fall into a hundred bubbling pieces that vaguely resembled yellow-green Alka-Seltzer. The deadite mob released its grip on Reese, and Kate, along with another Marine who noticed his plight, pulled him back onto the turret.
As the tank rumbled on, the three of them laughed. Reese then said: “Space, I thought I was a goner!”
“Well, your belt and skirt plates are gone, that’s for sure,” the other Marine replied, gasping for air as the laughter subsided. “Still got your diaper?”
“This is the shittiest Xmas ever.” Kate remarked. All three of them, plus the other Marine by the driver’s hatch (who was busy shooting at a deadite that had somehow managed to grab onto the 200mm cannon), would agree to that.
Later on, they would chew on their Hoooah! and laugh at how they were stupid enough accept being the bait of this mission. But now, they had a job to do.
The Terminator tank exited the city, leaving the necropolis with a hundred thousand zombified Mormons struggling to catch up. The Marines on top of the tank were merely taking pot shots now, no longer fighting an undead wave that threatened to engulf them. Oddly enough, they didn’t like this seemingly fortunate turn of events.
“Xenu, slow the fucking tank down!” Kate ordered, stomping on the commander’s hatch for emphasis. “We’re loosing them!”
“Hey,” Pfc. Biff Beatrixy, the guy on top of the driver’s hatch, said over the comm. “Think Mormons celebrate Sol Invictus Day?”
“No, I don’t think they do,” Reese replied. “I mean, if they did, they’d be eating cheese and macaroni, not people!”
“Slow the fucking tank down!” Kate shouted.
“Brains, actually,” Biff retorted. Tucked in his utility belt was a pocketbook, the Zombie Survival Guide. “Anyway, Sargn’t, don’t worry. My book says that once they want to eat us, they won’t stop following us if they know where we are, and we’re leaving a trail.”
“Oh, really?” Sgt. Kate asked, her voice sardonic and drenched with sarcasm. “Then I guess that means everything’s all dandy, doesn’t it? Well, Merry Invictusmas to you too!”
Biff thought she was angry, but was surprised when his superior started laughing out loud for no reason. He shrugged. “Must be the spirit of the season, I guess…”
“What’s so funny?” Reese asked, genuinely puzzled. At the same time, his groin hurt, probably due to the incident with the zombie mob trying to dismember him to bite-sized chunks.
“Guys, we’re almost at our destination,” the tank commander said. “You guys better want to hop inside.”
“Sure,” Biff said, eager to get comfortable. “Driver dude, open up the hatch! Hey, I brought eggnog!”
The hatched opened up, and the driver eagerly welcomed Biff with a “yay!”
Biff dropped his sniper rifle in and hopped inside. The rest of the Marines on top of the tank did so too, and inside they shared eggnog and Hoooah! until they reached their checkpoint.
Well, not really. Just several meters away from their destination was a big ditch, which the tank accidentally fell into at a hundred kph, causing its crew and passengers to spill eggnog and Hoooah! all over its interior. Aside from that, the Terminator, thanks to its sturdy construction, was mostly unharmed. And soon after, the zombies gathered around the disabled tank, jumping into the ditch and smelling around for man-flesh. They clawed at the hatches, peeked into the main gun, and generally formed a cesspool of a city’s worth of zombies in the general vicinity of the immobilized tank.
Which was all according to plan.
Overhead, a missile descended from orbit like a hypersonic Xmas present from space. It detonated several hundred feet over the undead flock of deadites and, being a neutron bomb, bathed the entire area in an intense yet short-lived pulse of radiation. New Utah’s entire population of deadites caught fire, and soon, they were all reduced to ashes. The Marines in the tank, however, were all right, as was their eighty-ton nuclear-powered sleigh. And they cheered and sang songs and carols as their Xmas adventure came to a close.
In the later rescue effort, the survivors of Provo Prime would thank the Marines who brought Christmas to New Utah by saving their lives, and later on, they celebrated by drinking gallons of eggnog and eating much Hoooah!
The End
Merry Sol Invictusmas, everybody!
- December 25, 2567 -
- Provo Prime, USE fringe world New Utah -
____________________________________
“Merry Xmas, assholes!” Lieutenant Kate Kassidy yelled as the wall of living dead exploded all ‘round her. It was Xmas, otherwise known as Sol Invictus Day, but instead of gobbling Zigonian eggnog with her family, laughing at senile old Gramps and tearing pressies open, she was being showered by the gore and guts of zombified Mormons. Not the best way to spend Xmas Day, most folks (Kate herself included) would say. Not the best way to spend any day, all sane folks would say. But she laughed, they all laughed. Especially the tank crew who were calmly driving their Terminator tank while chewing on Hoooah! tactical snacks. Heck, if they weren’t all moaning and screeching and trying to feast on living flesh, Kate would’ve thought the zombies were also laughing. Stupid Mormons. Stupid zombies. Stupid Xmas! “Ho-fucking-ho, fuckers!”
She fired off another burst, and a fat zombie that probably looked like Saint Nick if he weren’t missing his jaw had his head (and the rest of his upper torso) replaced with steamy red mist. However, for every zombie vaped by plasma fire, it seemed like half a dozen more took its place. It didn’t help that the tank’s plasma turrets were spinning around wildly, disintegrating at least thirty deadites per second.
Kate pumped her grenade launcher and lobbed a grenade at what looked like a family of zombies, and they all exploded as the small-diameter plasma explosive (Smape) detonated right above them. Once more, the Marines on tank were showered by chunks of deadite flesh.
Kate was with two others on top the Terminator tank’s massive turret while another Marine was in front of the turret, over the driver’s hatch and behind an electrified plow that was carving their path through the undead necropolis. To avoid getting swamped, the tank had to go as fast as it could, squishing deadites against its plow like bugs on a windshield. Kate estimated that up to two hundred deadites had either been smeared by the tank’s plow, crushed under its treads, or scorched by its CESA armoring (activated only on the front, rear and flanks of the tank). Progress was good, they were ahead of schedule.
The tank sped through the desecrated colony-city, through the urban necropolis of concrete, glasstic and walking cadavers. Its streets were filled with once-human inhabitants, now turned into ghouls that hungered for human flesh. Instinctually, they gathered around the speeding warmachine, craving for the armored humans perched on top of its nuclear-powered hull. Most ran, their faces contorted with rabid postmortem rage, whereas those too decomposed hobbled, their faces decrepit masks of moaning death. Their necrotic minds only registered one thing, the scent of living flesh, the promise of the taste of human brains. They did not know fear, they did not know pain. By the dozen, they were crushed under the treads of the Terminator or vaporized by its plasma cannons. Yet they still reached for the humans on the tank. Ever hungry, dying by the droves.
“We’re ahead of schedule!” one of Kate’s subordinates, Sgt. Lyle Reese, remarked, gesturing at his wristcomputer as if it were a watch (their chronometers were actually on their HUDs). “Oh shit!” he suddenly screamed as a zombified hand grabbed his leg and nearly pulled him down street-level. Kate lunged for him, grabbed his hand and tried to make sure he didn’t come into contact with the CESA armoring (concentrated energy shield armor, which would’ve fried him) or the hundred undead diners clawing for man-flesh. She succeeded in the former, Reese’s boot caught the flank CESA and sparks erupted, but he was fine. As for the latter, if it weren’t for the tank’s constant motion, the zombies’ desperate attempts at dismemberment would have been less unsuccessful. Nonetheless, dozens of hands clawed for Reese, and he screamed as they attempted to take a chunk of him with them. “Holy shit! Holy shit!”
“Felis Navidad!” Kate hollered back. “Just don’t let go!”
“Hahahaha!” Reese laughed back as his legs and the rest of his lower body disappeared under a mass of rotting arms and snarling faces. Kate could hear them hiss and, through her respirator, even smell their putrid rot-stink. Reese continued laughing (more of a half-laugh half-bloodcurdling scream, really) while Kate closed her eyes and gripped as hard as ever.
The tank had more than a hundred cameras, microphones and temperature readers and all other forms of sensor equipment, both active and passive, scattered all around its hull. From rangefinders under its 200mm main gun to pressure-sensors on its treads. The drivers could see Reese on the verge of dismemberment in full Technicolor holovision, so they spat out their Hoooah! tactical snacks and tried to help poor Reese as fast as they could, before he’d get gobbled up by the deadites.
Flares, white-phosphorus projectiles and caustic smoke grenades erupted from the sides of the tank’s massive turrets, showering the undead with a deadly shower of burning, stinging, frying, blinding, discomfort-causing less-lethal weaponry. Deadites all around the tank screeched and wailed as they caught fire and boiled. As Kate opened her eyes to see what was going on, she saw an undead girl, probably less than ten years old, burn up and fall into a hundred bubbling pieces that vaguely resembled yellow-green Alka-Seltzer. The deadite mob released its grip on Reese, and Kate, along with another Marine who noticed his plight, pulled him back onto the turret.
As the tank rumbled on, the three of them laughed. Reese then said: “Space, I thought I was a goner!”
“Well, your belt and skirt plates are gone, that’s for sure,” the other Marine replied, gasping for air as the laughter subsided. “Still got your diaper?”
“This is the shittiest Xmas ever.” Kate remarked. All three of them, plus the other Marine by the driver’s hatch (who was busy shooting at a deadite that had somehow managed to grab onto the 200mm cannon), would agree to that.
Later on, they would chew on their Hoooah! and laugh at how they were stupid enough accept being the bait of this mission. But now, they had a job to do.
The Terminator tank exited the city, leaving the necropolis with a hundred thousand zombified Mormons struggling to catch up. The Marines on top of the tank were merely taking pot shots now, no longer fighting an undead wave that threatened to engulf them. Oddly enough, they didn’t like this seemingly fortunate turn of events.
“Xenu, slow the fucking tank down!” Kate ordered, stomping on the commander’s hatch for emphasis. “We’re loosing them!”
“Hey,” Pfc. Biff Beatrixy, the guy on top of the driver’s hatch, said over the comm. “Think Mormons celebrate Sol Invictus Day?”
“No, I don’t think they do,” Reese replied. “I mean, if they did, they’d be eating cheese and macaroni, not people!”
“Slow the fucking tank down!” Kate shouted.
“Brains, actually,” Biff retorted. Tucked in his utility belt was a pocketbook, the Zombie Survival Guide. “Anyway, Sargn’t, don’t worry. My book says that once they want to eat us, they won’t stop following us if they know where we are, and we’re leaving a trail.”
“Oh, really?” Sgt. Kate asked, her voice sardonic and drenched with sarcasm. “Then I guess that means everything’s all dandy, doesn’t it? Well, Merry Invictusmas to you too!”
Biff thought she was angry, but was surprised when his superior started laughing out loud for no reason. He shrugged. “Must be the spirit of the season, I guess…”
“What’s so funny?” Reese asked, genuinely puzzled. At the same time, his groin hurt, probably due to the incident with the zombie mob trying to dismember him to bite-sized chunks.
“Guys, we’re almost at our destination,” the tank commander said. “You guys better want to hop inside.”
“Sure,” Biff said, eager to get comfortable. “Driver dude, open up the hatch! Hey, I brought eggnog!”
The hatched opened up, and the driver eagerly welcomed Biff with a “yay!”
Biff dropped his sniper rifle in and hopped inside. The rest of the Marines on top of the tank did so too, and inside they shared eggnog and Hoooah! until they reached their checkpoint.
Well, not really. Just several meters away from their destination was a big ditch, which the tank accidentally fell into at a hundred kph, causing its crew and passengers to spill eggnog and Hoooah! all over its interior. Aside from that, the Terminator, thanks to its sturdy construction, was mostly unharmed. And soon after, the zombies gathered around the disabled tank, jumping into the ditch and smelling around for man-flesh. They clawed at the hatches, peeked into the main gun, and generally formed a cesspool of a city’s worth of zombies in the general vicinity of the immobilized tank.
Which was all according to plan.
Overhead, a missile descended from orbit like a hypersonic Xmas present from space. It detonated several hundred feet over the undead flock of deadites and, being a neutron bomb, bathed the entire area in an intense yet short-lived pulse of radiation. New Utah’s entire population of deadites caught fire, and soon, they were all reduced to ashes. The Marines in the tank, however, were all right, as was their eighty-ton nuclear-powered sleigh. And they cheered and sang songs and carols as their Xmas adventure came to a close.
In the later rescue effort, the survivors of Provo Prime would thank the Marines who brought Christmas to New Utah by saving their lives, and later on, they celebrated by drinking gallons of eggnog and eating much Hoooah!
The End
Merry Sol Invictusmas, everybody!
