It was such a relief to be inside the igloo tent and out of the dust. The tent was deceptively spacious. There was a table and chairs set up in front of a white board and a sleeping area over in the corner.

The whiteboard seemed to have what looked like a flat screen computer monitor built into it. And there were three expensive looking laptop computers set up on the table. It was pretty sophisticated for a makeshift camp in the middle of the Australian outback. It was almost as luxurious as my penthouse suite back in LA. Well, maybe not.

I took a closer look at the whiteboard monitor. It currently showed a satellite image of Australia. It was then I could clearly see the extent of the dust storm. It basically looked like a huge red cloud. It covered the entire east coast of Australia and spread out right into the middle of the country. Our camp appeared to be on the western edge of the storm.

The tall soldier who had been standing watch on top of the metal storage container had made his way inside and was now talking to a woman. He was leaning over a laptop, punching in some commands. They were gathered around the small table in front of the whiteboard.

The tall man turned to greet us. “Hudson, glad you could make it on time. Mind introducing the lady?”

“Sir. Everyone. This is Rebecca Robinson. She’ll be our guide for the mission.”

He said ‘guide’ with a touch of irony in his voice. I knew I wasn’t a guide, more like a bargaining chip, or an insurance policy. Something to prove to my friends that these guys were the right guys to trust.

“As I’m sure you all know,” Daniel continued. “She’s the only one who made it out.”

I scanned the faces of the soldiers. Three men and the one woman. In all my life I’ve never seen a rougher, meaner looking group of people. Even the woman had a constant scowl on her face, like she wanted to punch me in the nose just for looking in her general direction.

They all nodded their heads in what I hoped was approval.

Daniel motioned to the tall man. “This is Major Charles Ethan. He’s our team leader.”

“Hello, sir.” I said and suddenly realized how childish and girlish my voice sounded. I coughed and cleared my throat. “Nice to meet you,” I said in a deeper tone that was at least an octave lower.

“You’ve already sort of met Griffin and Rifleman Ben Smith, or Smitty as we call him. And this is Josephine Ramirez. Our other ‘full time’ pilot.”

The woman picked up a pen and threw it at Daniel. “Don’t call me Josephine.”

“Sorry,” Daniel apologized. “Jo Ramirez. Best and friendliest pilot in the world.”

Ethan moved over to the whiteboard so he was standing in front of everyone. He was a giant man. He stood taller than the white board. He looked like he should’ve been a professional basketball player or a football player. I’m not sure if it was his height or the steely look in his eyes but this guy commanded respect and it appeared that these soldiers gave it to him. One hundred percent.

“All right,” Ethan said. “Now that we’re all here and we’re all best friends, let’s get on with the mission brief. Apologies for the last minute change of plans. But as soon as we got word of the outbreak in New Zealand we couldn’t afford to stay there a second longer. It was too risky. We had to make a move.”

I wanted to ask him about the details of what he had heard and how bad it was, or if the quarantine facility had been affected, but I held my tongue. I wasn’t sure if I was supposed to talk or even allowed to ask questions.

“Sir?” Smitty asked as he raised his hand. “Who screwed up with the intel? Who gave us the all clear for this section?”

“Came from the top,” Ethan answered.

“Typical,” Smitty said. “Freakin suits are a bunch of goddamn idiots.”

Ramirez leant over and slapped him on the arm. “Watch your mouth. We got a girl here.”

“Freakin is not a swear word,” Smitty pointed out.

“No, but you took the Lord’s name in vain.”

Ethan ignored them and continued to explain our course of action. “Our primary objective is to locate civilian, Maria Marsh. Last reports indicate that she’s hiding out in the middle of the Sydney Central Business District. To avoid being detected by the military, we’ll fly in over the western plains, through the snowy mountains and all the way to the eastern coastline, about three hundred clicks south of Sydney. According to intelligence reports, there are US and Australian forces on the south western outskirts of Sydney. So we’ll need to circumnavigate that. Hence the reason for following the coastline. Intelligence is about a week old but it’s all we’ve got.”

“What about the navy blockade off the east coast?” Griffin asked. “Won’t they see us?”

“The blockade is situated about a hundred clicks off the coast. We stay low, they won’t see us.”

Griffin wasn’t convinced. “What about Sydney airport? What if they’ve set up operations there?”

“Intelligence reports indicate the airport has been quiet for some time now.”

“Same intelligence report that said this area was clear?” Griffin asked.

“Yeah,” Ethan answered. “You don’t like it; you know where the door is.”

“No, I love it. I just need to know when to have the safety on my rifle switched off.”

“Shut up, Griffin,” Smitty said. “So what’s the OP, Major? Is this gonna be a straight up rescue, or a shit fight?”

Ramirez punched Smitty in the arm again. “Language.”

“Sorry.”

“All we know is that the military forces operating in the area have gone dark,” Ethan answered. “Complete radio silence. And as you can see, the satellite imagery of the area is still ineffective.”

“Wonderful. So we don’t know if there are any military forces in the area at all?” Griffin asked.

“No.”

“Do we know how bad the infection is in that area?”

“From the data we have from Perth and from the rescue footage we intercepted, we can assume that Sydney will be extremely hostile.”

“Wait a second,” Ramirez said.

“Yes?”

“What’s our destination? Where’s our landing point?”

“The transmission that came from Private Kenji Yoshida was traced to the middle of Sydney, near the Sydney Tower. We’ll find a landing point as close to there as possible and attempt to make contact. Intel indicates there are several buildings in the CBD with helipads on their rooftops.”

“So explain to me why we aren’t just going in with some heavy machinery?” Griffin asked. “Like a tank, for example.”

“We wouldn’t be able to move around the city streets,” Ethan answered. “There are too many abandoned cars, too many obstacles and blockages. If we get trapped, we’re dead. Sticking to the high ground will prove crucial. And as I’m sure you’re all aware, we can’t proceed on foot. Not on street level. We can assume the streets are completely overrun with the infected. We won’t last five seconds.”

“I thought the military had spent the past two weeks clearing out the city?” Smitty asked.

Ethan shook his head. “Even though there have been some reports indicating that the military have begun to reclaim certain areas of the city, I’m not prepared to take that into account. The city should be safer than it was two weeks ago, but we all saw what happened to the rescue team and we’ve all seen the satellite images of Perth.”

Ethan then brought up the images of Perth on the whiteboard monitor. It was not pretty. The infected were everywhere. The streets were clogged with the walking dead. It was amazing how fast this virus spreads.

“Whatever, man,” Griffin said. “The infected aren’t armed. And according to the report they can’t even think for themselves. It’ll be like shooting fish in a barrel.”

Griffin and Smitty high-fived.

I couldn’t help myself. I spoke up even though I wasn’t sure that I was allowed to. But these soldiers or mercenaries or whoever they were, seemed to underestimate the situation. They didn’t understand what they were up against. Even though they had seen footage of it and even though they were just attacked by a pack of ferocious dogs that were in all probability, infected.

“Is that what you think?” I asked them. “You think it’ll be target practice? This virus managed to overwhelm the combined forces of the Australian and US military. All their containment protocols and extreme measures, and believe me, they were extreme, all their tanks and jets and Apache helicopters couldn’t stop this thing. The infected; they don’t feel pain, they don’t stop. Ever. Shooting them full of bullets, unless you shoot them in the head, won’t do a damn thing. And do you think you can shoot a thousand violent psychopathic zombies running at you? Let alone shoot them in the head? Do you think you’re that good?”

The soldiers were shocked into silence. Hopefully they were taking in the weight of what I had just said. I guess maybe they did know how messed up it was. Maybe acting tough was their way of dealing with their fear.

“She’s right, gentleman,” Ethan said, breaking the silence. “She’s seen firsthand the devastating effects. Believe me when I say we are walking into hell. And believe me when I say we will not last five seconds on the streets. Not with six million infected psychopaths trying to rip us apart.”

He picked up a manila folder and threw it on the table so that it landed open. Inside the folder were close up images of the infected. The last images from the doomed rescue mission.

“These are tough hombres,” Ethan said. “Do not underestimate this.”

Smitty shut the folder and Ramirez crossed herself.

Ethan nodded at me. “Thank you, Rebecca. OK, the plan is to land on top of one of these buildings,” Ethan said as he pointed to a map on the white board. “The Sydney Tower shopping complex connects a number of buildings in the Central Business District. This is our starting point.”

“What if there’s no landing area near the tower?” Ramirez asked.

“If there is absolutely nowhere to land, we drop in. Hudson will circle back and find a safe place to land and wait for our call.”

I did not like that idea at all. Firstly, I didn’t like the idea of abseiling out of a freakin helicopter, hundreds of feet above the middle of the city, with a million infected below us. And secondly, I didn’t like the idea of going in without Daniel. He was the only one I knew, the only one I trusted fully. And out here in the absolute middle of nowhere, about to head into a warzone, the feelings I had for him were intensified and magnified.

“Rebecca has informed us that our targets, that her friends, would’ve moved further west if given the opportunity. But we can assume they have taken temporary refuge in one of the sky scrapers in the city. Hopefully they will be able to see us before we see them. Hopefully it won’t be that hard to find them.”

“What if they’re not there?” Daniel asked.

“Then we search until we find them. We go block by block, building by building. Once we clear the city center we make our way west. We follow the river system. But we will not rest until we find them. I can’t stress the importance of this mission. We find this girl. We can stop the plague.”

The soldiers nodded their heads, visualizing the mission in their mind’s eye.

“Any more questions?”

“When do we get paid?” Smitty asked.

“Yeah, are we getting overtime for this or what?” Griffin added.

“Knock it off you two. I don’t need to remind you guys that this mission is black ops. We screw up. We’re on our own.”

“Wouldn’t have it any other way, Major.”

“All right team,” Ethan said. “I want the Ospreys prepped and ready for takeoff immediately. Weather reports for the east coast indicate the dust storm is still intensifying. But as soon as the storm settles, we’re moving out.”