I turn; it’s Platt. I’m about to say something, but he speaks first, and it floors me. He says- I swear: “Why did you start shooting them?” And what floors me even more is, I can’t think of a single reason. Finally, I say, “Under what circumstances is a walking corpse NOT a bad thing?”

Platt talks, but not in answer. He says over the company frequency: “Cease fire. Repeat: Cease fire. Fall back to the outer wire. Maintain a secure perimeter. Fire only when necessary, then only with non-lethal riot rounds.” He turns off his com, and says to me: “Whatever these- these are, they have made no hostile move against us. We must proceed on one of two assumptions: Either they are ordinary civilians who are entitled to our aid, or they are representatives of a new class of entity seeking contact.” Then he orders Quimby back to the recon vehicle.

I follow him to the edge of the wire. There are about 400 corpses walking or crawling around within the circle of wire and rock. Fully 100 are clustered around the major breech in the fence, and once in a while, one comes through. The ones outside, 35 or so, are in loose clusters over a few hundred meters. They move like penguins: stiff (as it were), a little wobbly, but very regular, with short bursts of speed when they fall down and slide. What’s really weird is that they never seem to fall from slipping on ice, and they hardly ever run into each other. There’s no concerted attempt to break through. In fact, they don’t seem to be aware of the objects around them. They run into walls, rocks or the fence, turn away, but a few minutes later run into the same obstacle. It’s a horrid sight when one gets caught in the fence. It will just keep struggling until it tears loose.

At Platt’s signal, the tanks, the APC and Things take positions around the zombies outside the wire. Platt speaks, his voice amplified by a speaker in his face mask: “You are in a United Nations police sector. We guarantee you safety and any aid you require. It is in the interest of yourselves and others that you remain within the secured area.”
“They don’t seem to be answering,” says I. “Maybe they don’t speak English. Actually, far as speaking goes, they’re screwed one way or the other.”

“The UN has developed a code of visual signals for communication with uncontacted peoples,” Platt says. Then his shoulders sag. “The materials were in the APC.”
“I don’t think these things are big on visuals anyway,” says I. As we watch, one of the zombies walks off a sizeable cliff. Another follows it, and a third changes course and goes down after them. After a moment, Platt repeats his statement in three of the major Slavic languages, sometimes himself, and sometimes with canned recordings in his suit’s computers. We seem to be drawing their attention. Then Platt tries Greek. Finally, one of them, wearing an MP uniform, comes toward us. I casually slap another clip in my gun- my one clip of Casull ammo.

Platt gives another command: “Halt and identify yourself.” The zombie stops and crouches. It reaches out with its finger and pokes into the snow, seeming tentative. It makes a sloppy zigzag shape: Epsilon? It makes the same mark next to it, and keeps making the same mark, as often as not over ones it already made. I get the idea that it’s an M, which doesn’t make sense. Then I think of Roman numerals… “It’s giving us a number,” I say.
“You mean its serial number?” Johnson says. The zombie keeps making the mark. By now, it’s stirring up the snow.
“If I’m right, then M equals a thousand,” I say. That’s when something clicks. “Legion.”

Suddenly, the zombie stands up. I pull the trigger and fire a single shot, goes through one side of its helmet, rattles around a little and stops to make a big dent next to the hole where it came in. The zombie goes down, but lunges forward even as it falls, and grabs hold of Platt. He can’t pull free! Everybody else opens up, and 5 seconds and a few thousand rounds later, every zombie outside the fence is pulped. Here and there, some are still intact enough to crawl forward. After a moment’s thought, I decide I don’t have a choice but to shoot the zombie again even if it means hitting Platt. But the lieutenant solves the problem himself. His suit has a built-in taser. One shock from that makes the zombie let go. I shoot it again in the back of the head. That finishes it.

The zombies inside the fence charge- or, at any rate, lurch at a faster rate and in a more uniform direction. We start blasting them, of course, but it’s not doing much good. Most of the guys are shooting with 5.6 guns, which don’t do that much damage even to ordinary people. The zombies are wobbly enough that it’s hard to keep a bead on ‘em, and near impossible to hit the heads, which is the only spot where it does any good. And soon as they start to take serious damage, they fall over, an’ the other zombies go right over them. Within seconds, guns are running dry. Then small arms fire comes at us from the camp, none of it anywhere close to effective, but enough to keep us from covering the holes in the wire. One guy- sweet Mother, I never even knew his name!- tries to stand and fight with an automatic grenade launcher. He fires a two shot burst. Neither shot goes off. Then a zombie jumps on him from behind. It grabs the gun, and the targeting laser goes dead. He throws off the zombie, drops the grenade launcher and unslings his regular rifle. But as he does, the clip falls out. I see it happen, I see the catch move all by itself. Then the other zombies are on him. I crouch, hold my gun sideways, gangbanger style, and fire a clip of shotshells on full auto. The gun twitches to the left, across the knee. I bring down six of them before the clip runs out. There’s one little zombie that takes the better part of 2 shells right in the head. But it’s not enough. Some of the zombies are carrying knives, shovels and axes. They surround our guy, swinging all the while.

“Fall back!” Platt orders. “Bring the flame thrower to bear!” While the armored car is moving in, the drone tank executes a standard suppression maneuver: It drives across the line of the fence, blasting away with the 20 mm gun. All the group beyond the fence is knocked down, maimed or completely pulped. Two or three zombies go right under the tank’s tracks. Suddenly, it stops. The turret jerks. Then it traverses- toward the armored car. It makes some whirring noises. I figure, it’s trying to fire the six-pounder and the missiles first, which haven’t been armed. But the 20 mm gun is, and that’s the one that fires first. The armored car blows up in a huge ball of fire.