Chaos was a good word for it. People screamed, trampled one another. Soldiers on one end of the stadium fired into the opposite end, trying to knock down Logan. Judging by the yelps and screams, they still weren’t hitting anything but civilians.
Keller spread his hands. “This is why we don’t let outsiders in.”
The ground rumbled. Strange, I hadn’t felt any aftershocks in a while.
“I should have just shot you all when you got here,” he said. “I’m sorry I didn’t.”
I held up my axe in as threatening a fashion as I could. Keller gaped at me, then let a cold smile briefly creep across his features. “Really? I have a gun, you idiot.”
“So be a man and shoot me.”
“Goddammit, Vibeke!” Tony exclaimed.
Keller’s expression went flat.
“You’re going to get all these people killed,” I said.
He raised an eyebrow. “Maybe. Maybe not. But that’s not for you to judge.”
He lifted the gun.
The ground rumbled again, and this time it didn’t stop. Maybe it would just open up and swallow me whole. I’d be okay with that.
A howl shook the stands. Keller looked beyond us, his eyes growing wide. I turned around.
The side of the arena bulged inward, shook, then collapsed entirely, an advertisement for some pre-apocalypse dental office landing squarely on the dirt.
A long, slender rod jutted through, followed by the unmistakable bulk of a tank.
A tank?
I glanced back at Keller to gauge his reaction. Maybe this was one of his other special guests.
One look at his face indicated that no, it was not, and no, he did not routinely have tanks come blazing into his Kill-Fests.
The last time I had seen or heard word of a tank, it had been in Elderwood—and it had been turned against us. I didn’t know if this was that same tank, re-taken and put back to work, or if it was some other vehicle they’d gotten their hands on in the meantime.
All fell silent as the tank crunched over the fencing and rolled directly into the stadium. The shooting stopped, as did most of the screams, though the wounded still cried out for help. All eyes were fastened on it.
The hatch on top popped open, and a head poked out. It looked around, taking in the hole it had made in the outfield, then the bleachers, the undead, and the bodies scattered across what had once been the baseball diamond. It shook its head.
The tank commander pulled off his helmet and gawked around the arena, then turned to look at us.
“Good grief,” Hammond called out, “you weren’t kidding about this place being a total shit show.”
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Holy shit, Hammond had come to save us.
He climbed down from the tank and slowly made his way over to us, looking this way and that at the bodies littering the ground.
All I could think about was flinging my arms around him, and I probably would have embarrassed myself by doing just that, if some enterprising ghoul hadn’t come shambling over to me.
Hammond’s right hand dropped to his sidearm, but I lifted my left hand. “I got this, General,” I called out. I clasped the axe with both hands and swung it at the ghoul.
The head landed on the ground, where it glared up at me. I almost apologized to it on the spot. Sorry for severing you from your body, man. Nothing personal.
Its jaws worked up and down in what appeared to be silent rage.
Hammond studied my grip on the axe, and then nodded. “Not bad,” he said.
“Thanks,” I replied. “New hobby.” I pointed the axe to the figures coming into view behind the tank. They had probably gone chasing after Lara, whom I had lost track of in all the chaos. “And you’ve got friends coming over.”
Hammond turned. A handful of surviving ghouls from one of the earlier rounds or some other spot in the stadium were making their way toward the tank. I hoped the guys inside had stout hearts; watching a bunch of zombies come toward you is pretty harrowing, even if you’re ensconced in a damn tank.
I didn’t need to worry. Additional soldiers began picking their way through the entrance the tank had made, and Hammond pointed at the clump of zombies. “Lieutenant, take care of those, will you?” he asked.
The guns began discharging, and the ghouls swiftly dropped. Oh, what a sweet symphony to my ears.
Hammond closed the gap between himself and us swiftly. He nodded slightly to Tony and myself as he went by, coming to a halt only when he reached Keller. “Captain,” he said, as solicitous and pleasant as I’d ever seen him. “I’m pleased to know you’re alive. I think.”
Keller maintained his composure, but he did glance upward toward the stands. His cabinet members, or whatever they were, had largely scattered or seemed dead, and those who remained in the stands were watching the proceedings.
Hammond glanced at my axe, then at me. “I see you’ve…come up with some novel methods for entertainment.”