Chapter 168 - A Story of a Red Face
The members surrounding the warehouse were waiting for the next move of the boy and Sato. Now that they had thoroughly made the warehouse full of holes with the armored vehicle's heavy machine gun, they thought the probability that they were alive was low. Even so, as far as they had seen the movements of the boy and Sato up until now, they couldn't be careless. In particular, the fact that Sato seemed to be a member of a special forces unit had already become known among the members. This was because there were many young men who were once Sato's comrades and had betrayed him to join the Brotherhood.
There are also former police officers and former JSDF soldiers in the Brotherhood. The ones operating this armored vehicle are also men who were once in the JSDF. However, there are no those who belonged to special forces. Now that they have already had many comrades killed, even a little carelessness would be fatal.
They made the first-floor part full of holes, and subsequently added gunfire to the second-floor part as well. The warehouse, which received the fire of the heavy machine gun with power that easily tears apart even car bodies, had now become a building with quite good ventilation. Even if they tried to escape into the warehouse, they would likely both be dead from receiving machine gun bullets that easily penetrated the walls—some of the members surrounding the warehouse were thinking so. Even so, the reason they didn't intrude into the warehouse to confirm if the boy and Sato were surely dead was because they were thinking that they might still be alive.
But they have the armored vehicle here. Unless the two have something like anti-tank firearms, no matter what they do, they cannot win against this side. Since the armored vehicle's gun mount can be remotely operated, the vehicle commander can attack safely from inside the vehicle without exposing himself to gunfire. Though, even if it's remote operation, it's not a remote-controlled gun mount equipped with a state-of-the-art infrared camera, but an old-fashioned handle-operated type, so both reconnaissance and attack are not very maneuverable, and if it runs out of ammo, he has no choice but to lean out of the vehicle to reload.
Originally, this armored vehicle was something abandoned by the JSDF at a place where combat between infected and the JSDF took place due to a breakdown or something, and the Brotherhood had requisitioned it. Because a member who used to be in a JSDF maintenance unit repaired it, it became the Brotherhood's combat power, and eventually, they planned to use it as the main force of the combat unit to fight infected and survivors who became obstacles to them, and the remnants of the JSDF and police. The Brotherhood is finding other abandoned JSDF weapons and arms and is trying to create a full-fledged army by gathering them.
Currently, they have only been able to recover and operate only two vehicles due to transportation means and logistics problems, but as the scale of the Brotherhood grows, the combat power they can operate will increasingly increase. The members receive combat training from former JSDF soldiers and are learning how to operate vehicles and arms. The Brotherhood, equipped with military firearms recovered from various places, had already become an existence that ordinary survivor groups could not compete with in terms of scale and equipment.
There are few people in today's Japan who can fight them head-on. Even if there were remnants of the JSDF, if the Leader, who is a widely known politician, comes forward, units that are under control would obey. If they don't obey, they just suppress them with military force, and the Brotherhood was becoming equipped with that power.
But before that, they had to kill the boy and Sato. It was clear that the two were fighting aiming for the destruction of the Brotherhood, and the members killed by them were also quite a number. On top of that, when they thought they had finally caught the boy, this time Sato launched an attack. Because of that, the base was already in a tattered state.
The members hadn't been told what the Leader was thinking about future policies, but since the instructions given were "Defense of current location and assassination of Sato and the boy," the members had no choice but to follow them. Furthermore, anger at having comrades killed and fear that they themselves might be killed were driving the current members.
Suddenly, along with continuous gunshots, muzzle flashes blinked from a window of the second floor of the warehouse they had just made full of holes. Along with the metallic sound of bullets hitting the armored vehicle, the members who were around all at once hid in the shadow of the armored vehicle. And using the armored vehicle as a shield, they readied their guns and fired toward the second floor of the warehouse.
The armored vehicle commander hadn't grasped where the opponent was firing from. The external view was dependent on the periscopes around the hatch, and that field of vision was also quite limited. To grasp the state of the outside in detail, he had no choice but to open the hatch and look outside, but in that situation where bullets were hitting the vehicle body, that was also difficult.
When the commander peeked through a periscope at the state of the outside, he could see the members hidden in the shadow of the armored vehicle firing toward the second floor of the warehouse. When he turned the muzzle of the heavy machine gun toward the upper part of the warehouse by turning a handle, he could see through the periscope that someone was certainly firing from a large hole in the wall that used to be a window. Considering the appearance, the commander thought it was the boy.
"Licking me...!"
He turned the handle again and pointed the muzzle toward the boy who was firing from the second floor. Seeing the machine gun moving, he must have hurriedly escaped. The boy who had been firing until then pulled back into the depths of the warehouse and his figure became invisible, but the commander pulled the trigger regardless.
In the narrow field of vision of the periscope, tracer bullets were spat out from the muzzle of the heavy machine gun at intervals, and many times more bullets shattered the warehouse wall. The commander, while looking at the impact points of the tracer bullets, corrected the aim and shot through the warehouse wall from right to left as if spraying water with a hose.
He thought, It would have been good if this were a US military remote-controlled gun mount. That man, who was previously in the JSDF, had been allowed to ride in a US military armored vehicle during a Japan-US joint exercise. Just as much as they have a budget, US military armored vehicles are substantial in both armament and equipment. Even the gun mount is completely remote-controlled, and the commander can perform everything from machine gun operation to firing smoothly with a single joystick while looking at an infrared night vision camera monitor from inside the vehicle. It was a far superior equipment than this antique-like gun mount from the Cold War era.
However, even such an antique is a too powerful substitute against flesh-and-blood humans. The commander felt pleasure in being able to swing that power as he pleased.
Even those who are smart, even those who have power, have no choice but to raise both hands and beg for their lives before the violence called a gun. The one who is overwhelmingly strong in today's world is the one who possesses power, and the ones that embody that power were arms such as guns and armored vehicles. They themselves now were the strongest in this world.
The reinforced concrete exterior wall that received the machine gun bullets scattered as fragments, each the size of a fist. The figure of the boy who had apparently pulled back into the depths of the warehouse was not visible, but the commander continued shooting regardless.
"There should have been one more; be vigilant of him too."
When he blew that into the radio's microphone, the members deployed around the armored vehicle also pulled their triggers toward the warehouse. While the boy was acting as a decoy, they might be sniped by Sato. To prevent that, they were anyway shooting a lot to keep the opponent from showing their face.
Even a sturdy reinforced concrete warehouse becomes tattered if showered with hundreds of machine gun bullets. Perhaps the second-floor floor collapsed due to the gunfire, as along with a roar, thick dust spewed out from the broken windows and holes in the wall.
Along with that, the exterior wall of the second floor of the warehouse, which had continued to receive gunfire, came crumbling down as large fragments. On the inside of the one-meter-sized concrete slab that used to be a wall, red liquid was thickly smeared.
On the concrete fragments that fell to the ground with a large sound, something like small red lumps were clinging here and there. Seeing that, the members were convinced of the boy's death.
He was showered with dozens of machine gun bullets that also split a human two kilometers away in half. The corpse must be in pieces. Judging that the threat had decreased with this, the commander issued instructions into the microphone to the members, "One more remains, don't be careless!"
At that moment, one of the members next to the armored vehicle began firing toward an absurd direction. Hearing a shout of "Infected!", when the commander peeked through a periscope, he could see the state of several human figures running from the direction the member was pointing the muzzle.
"They finally came...!"
When he turned the operation handle and pointed the muzzle of the heavy machine gun toward the approaching swarm of infected, he started firing just like that. Tracer bullets flew as if being sucked into the swarm of running human figures, and he could see through the periscope the state of them becoming disjointed.
Apparently, the infected that intruded from the West Gate Sato destroyed were entering even into the depths of the base. The security unit should have already rushed to the destroyed West Gate and be working on preventing the intrusion of infected, and the other armored vehicle the Leader boarded has also headed there as reinforcement. Even so, the fact that they are allowing intrusion even into the base interior means they are probably being pushed considerably.
"Unit 1, deal with the infected; Unit 2, continue surveillance of the warehouse as is!"
When the commander issued instructions, the members deployed around the armored vehicle began firing the guns in their hands toward the infected. However, the other members surrounding the warehouse didn't join in that and continued surveillance to see if Sato would come outside at this opportunity.
However, there was no movement in the warehouse. Perhaps Sato also died from a stray bullet, but they couldn't neglect vigilance. Rather than infected who have amazing physical abilities but no ability other than rushing straight without even holding weapons, living humans with guns were more of a threat in this place.
On the other hand, the boy was still alive.
The moment he regained consciousness, intense pain attacked his whole body. Along with that, he noticed that large and small countless concrete fragments were covering his body, and finally remembered that he had been caught in the collapse of the floor and fell to the first floor.
Although he dared to fire from the second floor to earn a gap for Sato to act, as expected, he faced a fierce counterattack. Luckily, no machine gun bullets hit him, but instead, the floor that had become tattered from receiving gunfire collapsed, and he returned to the first floor where he originally was.
He pushed away the concrete fragments covering his body and somehow confirmed that he was sound in all his limbs. The fact that his limbs weren't blown off by the heavy machine gun and he wasn't crushed by concrete fragments in the floor collapse was nothing but good luck. In exchange, the light machine gun the boy was shooting had become pinned under a large concrete lump and the barrel had bent, becoming useless, though.
He pulled out the handgun that had somehow avoided being broken and, just like that, looked at the state of the outside through a hole in the wall. While he was earning time, was Sato able to get outside somehow?
Gunfire was thundering outside as usual, but something seemed strange. When he looked outside through a hole in the wall, the gun mount of the armored vehicle that had been showering the warehouse with gunfire until just now was now shooting toward another direction. The members deployed around the armored vehicle were also pointing their guns in the same direction as the gun mount.
They seemed to be fighting infected, the boy thought, hearing the roars he had become well-acquainted with. Bombs exploded, and they were carrying out a flashy gunfight. There was no way infected wouldn't kill to get to this base.
Each time the armored vehicle's heavy machine gun spat fire, the infected in the distant place literally became disjointed. Limbs flew, and internal organs were scattered from torsos split in half. If he had taken even one hit, he would have surely died. The boy thanked his luck for being uninjured despite being showered with hundreds of such powerful bullets.
However, it didn't seem like everyone in the Brotherhood was occupied with the infected. Members in places away from the armored vehicle were still turning their gazes toward the warehouse, and it was clear that if the boy started shooting again, they would react immediately and counterattack.
Suddenly, the boy noticed that several large concrete fragments that had become bright red were fallen right next to the armored vehicle. The concrete fragments, which seemed about a handful, were dyed bright red, and several red meat-fragment-like lumps were clinging to the surface. Is it blood? he thought, but he wasn't hit anywhere, and since Sato was on the first floor, he shouldn't have been showered with gunfire. There was no way they could bleed.
Come to think of it, the boy remembered the time he was escaping from the machine gun bullets. Near the wall of the second floor of the warehouse, several pails of paint were placed. It had been at least nearly a year since they were made and left there. The contents would have become a state where liquid and lumps were mixed together.
Probably, the pails that took hits from machine gun bullets burst and scattered the paint inside around. Thinking that way, the red liquid dyeing the concrete fragments was paint, and the meat-fragment-like objects were likely hardened paint.
In a bright place, if looked at closely, one could immediately distinguish them, but in this state where lighting hadn't sufficiently recovered and it was dim, and on top of that, in the current state of excitement called combat, just as the boy had, it wouldn't be strange to mistake red paint for blood. In addition to that, it was right after they had been carrying out gunfire to kill the boy; the Brotherhood might be mistaking the paint for the boy's blood.
If so, doesn't the Brotherhood think the boy is dead? The fact that there are still members watching the warehouse means they don't think both Sato and the boy are dead, but if they still thought the boy was alive, would they turn the armored vehicle's firepower toward the infected?
The members probably think the boy is dead, seeing the bright red concrete fragments. Toward the remaining one, Sato, they are just watching, stepping in with the thought that they can kill him immediately if he shows himself.
If there were firing from the warehouse now, the members would think it was Sato's. If so, the eyes of the members monitoring the warehouse would be nailed to the boy. If they think the boy is dead, only one person, Sato, remains. Since it's over if they kill that one person, Sato, there's no need to watch if anyone else escapes from the warehouse or if there's any movement.
The boy lowered his posture and moved to the place where he was with Sato until just now. In the dust piled on the floor, the trace of Sato moving with low crawling remained. Sato is still alive.
But the fact that the armored vehicle hasn't blown up with a bomb yet means that the boy's earlier diversion was insufficient. He had to create a chance for Sato to approach the armored vehicle again and throw the bomb.
The firing of the members outside and the armored vehicle was becoming sporadic. If everyone is equipped with firearms and the distance is also separated, dealing with them is not very difficult. While the members' eyes are still toward the infected, he had to create a gap for Sato to take action again.
The boy fired the handgun from a window with completely shattered glass toward the members around the armored vehicle. Because the distance was separated, the bullet didn't hit a member and only sparks flew on the armored vehicle's body, but even so, he was able to attract the members' gazes.
"Sato was there!"
Along with that voice, a member outside fired an automatic rifle and further scraped the already tattered warehouse exterior wall. The boy, while running toward the direction opposite to the one Sato headed, fired toward the armored vehicle from windows and holes in the wall. He needed to keep the members' gazes away from the armored vehicle as much as possible.
On the other hand, the armored vehicle commander also noticed the firing from the warehouse by the impact sound on the vehicle body. Since the boy who was on the second floor died after being turned into mincemeat, the one shooting is Sato. Even though they had shot so many bullets into the first floor earlier, to think he was still alive.
"What do we do, move?"
"No, standby on this spot. I'll shoot him through along with the wall."
To the inquiry from the driver, the commander answered so. There was no need to go through the trouble of moving to secure a field of fire. If it's a heavy machine gun, it was demonstrated with the boy who became disjointed that he can shoot Sato to death along with the concrete wall.
The infected who were charging were also decreasing in number to the point where they could be sufficiently dealt with by the automatic rifles of the members on the ground. Judging that there was no need to provide fire support with the heavy machine gun, the commander blew into the radio's microphone, "Unit 1, continue dealing with the infected as is; Unit 2, kill Sato with me!"
And he operated the handle to point the muzzle of the heavy machine gun toward the running human figure visible from the holes in the wall and windows. From his hand, muzzle flashes occasionally blinked, but perhaps because he was shooting while running, he hadn't hit anyone.
Muttering "Die," he pulled the trigger. ...But, after shooting only the first two rounds, the heavy machine gun became silent. He hadn't shot enough to run out of ammo yet. If so, the conceivable thing was a breakdown of the machine gun.
"Shit, this defective product!"
Cursing so, he opened the hatch and leaned his upper body out. Even when the commander was in the JSDF, the heavy machine guns equipped on vehicles frequently caused problems. They wouldn't load well, or they wouldn't fire even if the trigger was pulled. He learned later that the manufacturer had falsified quality and delivered them, but even so, it was a machine gun with too poor a finish. It's originally a masterpiece American machine gun, but it's common in Japan for it to become a defective product as soon as it's produced domestically.
"This bastard, I'll kill you."
He pulled the charging handle and fired while leaning out from the hatch. But again, after shooting only one round, the firing stopped. He pulled the charging handle again and tried to shoot again. This time nothing happened.
"Shit!"
Deciding to leave the firing at Sato, who was escaping inside the warehouse, to Unit 1 deployed around the armored vehicle for now, the commander opened the feed cover of the machine gun. And just as he peeked into the receiver to search for the cause of the breakdown, he noticed something moving in the corner of his vision.
To the eyes of the commander who looked that way casually, a human figure running toward the armored vehicle was reflected. That one, who had become white all over with dust and concrete fragments, carried a handgun in one hand and was holding something in the other hand. And most importantly, that one was not wrapping a black cloth indicating being a member of the Brotherhood anywhere.
"Sato...!?"
Since the boy died after being turned into mincemeat, the man escaping inside the warehouse that Unit 1 is currently aiming at should be Sato. Why is he here? Then who is the one currently escaping? What were the Unit 2 guys who were monitoring doing?
There, the commander noticed that human figures were fallen behind Sato. Those were the Unit 2 guys who were monitoring the warehouse even while infected were surging. He must have shot them to death when Sato came out of the warehouse, but why haven't the others noticed?
There, the commander noticed that the members' gazes were nailed to the person escaping inside the warehouse. Because they thought until just now that the boy was dead, everyone thought it would be over if they killed the remaining one, Sato. That's why everyone is following the escaping human figure with their eyes without monitoring the warehouse entrance.
No one has noticed that Sato is approaching the armored vehicle. The commander released his hand from the machine gun that wouldn't move, pulled out the handgun from the holster on his hip, and tried to ready it. But before that, Sato was faster to fire the handgun with a silencer.
The driver, who had been waiting on the spot without moving the armored vehicle according to the commander's instructions, looked back at the sound of something falling from behind. What he saw there was the figure of the commander who had fallen powerlessly into the chair with blood flowing from his forehead.
Without even knowing what had happened, the driver instinctively opened the hatch and peeked outside. In the corner of his vision, he saw the state of someone throwing something toward the armored vehicle and then turning on his heel and running away. A sound of something hitting, "gon," echoed from the roof of the armored vehicle, and subsequently something was thrown into the vehicle from the open hatch, but the driver hadn't noticed that.
"That guy...!"
He didn't know who it was, but the man escaping now must have killed the commander. The driver grabbed the submachine gun that was placed on the floor and aligned the sights on the back of the escaping man.
Just as he was about to pull the trigger, the rear became bright for an instant. The last thing the driver who looked back inside the vehicle saw was a lump of flame surging toward him.
The bomb modified from a recoilless rifle shell thrown from the hatch of the armored vehicle exploded exactly after the time specified by the timer.
The armored vehicle was enveloped in crimson flames, and several tires were blown off. Having taken the flying fragments and blast, the members deployed around the armored vehicle lost their lives instantly.
The surviving members also didn't seem to understand what had happened. It was natural since they were firing toward the human figure they thought was Sato escaping inside the warehouse until just now, and before they knew it, the armored vehicle had exploded behind them.
Sato readied his carbine rifle and finished off the members one by one who had fallen into a panic and were only looking around. The Brotherhood, which had been superior until just now with the armored vehicle and numbers, had its position reversed in an instant.
The time Sato went outside the warehouse was when the boy, who had fallen to the first floor after the floor collapsed, was running around inside the warehouse while receiving concentrated attacks from the Brotherhood. In the gap when the gazes of the members deployed around the warehouse and monitoring it turned to the boy all at once, Sato crawled out to the exterior from a large hole open in the wall.
Even when Sato went outside, the members whose gazes were nailed to the escaping boy hadn't noticed that. Sato shot the obstructive members on his path to death and threw the bomb toward the armored vehicle.
Now the armored vehicle has literally become a car of fire and is raising black smoke. The hatches and doors and the like have all blown off from the inside, and the vehicle body is charred black from the flames spewing from inside the vehicle. Perhaps the ammunition is catching fire, as sounds of something popping are heard.
Already there was no one moving around the warehouse. When Sato called the boy's name, the boy, who had become a figure no different from a rag, came out from the warehouse unsteadily.
To be honest, neither of them thought they could survive. It wouldn't have been strange at all if the boy was turned into mincemeat by the heavy machine gun, or if Sato was turned into a honeycomb when he tried to leave the warehouse, or even if he luckily got outside, he was noticed by the members and died in an explosion along with the armored vehicle.
But luckily, they were both able to survive like this. The boy, who had been running around to escape bullets until just now, was in a daze, but he immediately came to his senses and began to seize automatic rifles and equipment from the members' corpses and put them on.
"It seems better to leave here quickly and chase the Leader."
Sato muttered so, seeing the infected running toward the two, and pulled the trigger toward its head. The members who had been dealing with the infected until just now had been wiped out by being caught in the armored vehicle's explosion. Now that they are dead, the infected are surging toward the two.
The boy, who had arranged his equipment, seemed to be of the same opinion. He shot several of the running infected to death, and the two, without being fixated on the infected any further, passed by the side of the flaming armored vehicle and started running, tracing back the route the armored vehicle had come from. In the driver's seat of the burning armored vehicle, the corpse of the driver, who remained leaning out from the hatch, was being charred black by being roasted by the flames.
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