Ground Control

The three members of the City Dogs were nearly into the city. Just one more kilometer, and they'd strike home. The squad moved between covers, to avoid the least possibility, of getting spotted.

The Kor Ondrone began to expand. Every minute, one of its outstretched wing-like structures expanded by 10-20 meters. The core was busy sparking, and showering radiation on Times Square.

"CJ, help me get some flanking fire on those zombies!" RJ pointed at a roadblock, ahead. Zombies dressed in cop uniforms, held G3A3 heavy assault rifles, and stood on a watch, for any intruders. Some parts of their bodies were flesh, some were skeletal. Their faces were half-skulls, and half-the ugliest face you can imagine.

Carl Jason took out his Saiga 12k shotgun (the standard gun of the City Dogs), and aimed through the scope. The Saiga looked like assault rifles, but their impact force is similar to a shotgun. One shot might get all three of the cop zombies.

"Okay, RJ, I'm on," CJ viewed through the scope attachment. Carl held the gun into a steady position. Light breathing and light footsteps were coming from the blockade. When he peeked over the edge of an upturned truck cover, he saw two more cop zombies had joined the opposing team; this time, they were armored heavily, and held MP7 SMGs. The new zombies looked tougher and fiercer.

"No time to lose! C'mon man, shoot to kill!" the two other City Dogs couldn't risk getting caught, so they both hid behind a van, about two meters away from Carl Jason's position. "Man, c'mon! What're yah waitin' fo'?"

With both hands clutching the heavy shotgun, CJ opened fire. One zombie fell down to the earth; slowly... two, three, four of the cop zombies dropped dead and bloody. The last one standing was hard to kill.

"Gofero mofogeh!" the zomboid growled something in his weird zombie language, as he barraged away at the upturned truck, that was serving as cover for CJ. The zombie paced towards the City Dogs, shooting with his G3A3 and MP7. The guns never seemed to run out of ammo, but it ran out of users when the zomboid was thrown back by the impact of the Saiga 12k. And that's the reason why everybody loves the Saiga 12k!

The City Dogs' squad was about to proceed over the blockades, into the inner states, when a distant rumbling intruded the silence of the dead cops.

"Did yah hear some'in'?" LJ asked the others, as they jumped over the police blockades. Then they stopped dead in their tracks.

Whatever the vehicle was, not a single picosecond was there to lose.

"R-run! Fallback!" RJ shot with the Saiga, but none of it was useful, against the armored HE tank, now rumbling towards them. "Quick! Over there, into that alleyway!"

The three comrades dived over the second layer of police blockades, and into a narrow alleyway. The tank homed a missile at RJ, first ('cause maybe the alien-zomboid driver thought that he was the leader or something).

A green laser locked onto RJ's back, and fired.

"Duck, bro!" the missile missed him by inches, and blasted into Channel 24's building's ground floor.

Metallic clinking noises inside the heavy artillery vehicle indicated that the zombie driver wasn't alone; there were more two or three of those freaks inside, reloading the main turret.

"Forward, forward, let's go, let's go!" Rogue Jacob took the lead (as usual), and strafed left, as they were through the alleyway. Another missile missed them, and went sailing into the midnight sky.

"Okay now, follow me!"

"10-4, pal!"

City Dogs' squad snaked their way through the twirling maze of wrecked cars, double-decker buses, taxi cabs, street lamps, bits of glass, etc. The surrounding buildings soared to extreme altitudes. The buildings were all tilted, or slanted, due to the pressure exerted by the Kor Ondrone. Broken glass littered the empty window frames. One small problem that seemed so huge: where the hell are the damn people?

Sudden tremors answered their thoughts. The tank tore apart the glass, steel, and concrete of the narrow alleyway, to make it wide enough for the entire tank to pass through.

"Aw... not again!" Carl Jason groaned, as he reloaded his Saiga 12k. "These bullets cost me a damn fortune! Have you any idea about that, you slow, old, creeping loser!"

Instead of blasting them all to pieces, the tank used its secondary turret: a narrower, shorter pipe-like thing, on the front left side. The secondary turret shot rapidly.

"LMG!" Rogue Jacob announced. "Get the **** out of this ****ing place of this mother****ing city!"

The LMG turret would've almost hit Li'l Jacob on the right knee, if Rogue Jacob hadn't tugged onto the collar of his leather jacket. The squad split up; each man for himself.

Carl Jason switched paths repeatedly, between the destroyed vehicles lying scattered on the road.

Li'l Jacob proned below the high suspension cars.

His elder brother, Rogue Jacob, was busy sliding over the hoods of shiny and brand new sportscars. He was almost over the edge of a Ferrari Laferrari, when the tank shot the missile turret, at a Buggati Veyron parked just thirteen meters away from RJ.

"Hurry up, bros! This way!" RJ crawled over to a van for cover, but it was blown up to shrapnels, as a missile hit it. "Ho shit!"