Auspocalypse Now

31. Road Rage

Chapter Characters

Phil - Senior ASIO officer, ex-Military Intelligence, the boss

Prime Minister - of Australia

Judith and Lee - report to Phil

Ron - SAS Operator who had lead the reaction to the Shellharbour Airport incident

Phil, "give me the bad news Lee."

Lee, "one of the paddy wagons carrying the dead from the Shellharbour Airport incident has been run off the road in a road rage incident on the Hume Highway just North of Campbelltown. The paddy wagon overturned on the hard shoulder."

Phil, "is it contained?"

Lee, "no, the road rager followed the paddy wagon to confront the driver. He was armed with a baseball bat. He went to hit the driver and it appears he was attacked by the injured Pilot who was being transported."

Phil, "what were the police escort doing about this?"

Lee, "it appears the road rager was taunting the escort and trying to drive in-between the vehicles, he missed a gap that wasn't there and collided with one of the paddy wagons. His subsequent actions suggest he was looking for trouble. The police escort split, one continued with the other paddy wagon and the other stopped to apprehend the road rager. Hold on, I am receiving an update."

Lee flicked a button on her comms and had a brief conversation, she turned back to Phil, "The police escort shot and killed the road rager as he was about to hit his colleague in the paddy wagon, he also then shot the Pilot who turned on him and bit him. The Pilot then ran off across the Hume Highway towards Campbelltown. The Pilot dodged all the traffic. The driver in the Police escort could not follow him and is attending his bitten colleague until the ambulance arrives. The bitten Police officer is coherent but fading in and out of consciousness."

Phil, "he may transform, close the Highway, he needs to be isolated."

Lee, "there are HWP already doing that, they are closing the interchanges north and south of the crash site. We also have a 4 car pile up behind the crash and one of the cars is on fire. All relevant emergency services are responding."

Phil, "tell the police driver to back off his colleague and to keep him covered with his weapon until we get a response team there. Tell him to shoot him in the head if he turns into a creature like the Pilot."

Lee confirmed the message had been passed on.

Judith intervened, "We have diverted the helicopter with Ron and four SAS operators to attend the crash site. Ron will drop two Operators off there and he will then attempt to track down the Pilot. Five minutes before they arrive."

At the crash site the Police escort driver was following his instructions, his Glock was pointed at his colleagues head. They were both joking about it, they played league together in a local team and had been mates for years, both passing out from the Goulburn Police academy together. Neither thought anything would come from following a weird instruction, but both were trained well.

They heard the helicopter approach and it hovered north of them and two Operators rappelled from it. As they landed the ropes disconnected and followed them to the ground and the helicopter flew off towards Campbelltown.

The Police driver was captivated by this and hadn't noticed the minor convulsions going through his colleague. As he turned his head back to him, he was struck by how red his eyes were. This was his last thought as his colleague launched at him and took a bite out of his throat. His colleague then loped and ran away from the Operators, South, back towards the four car pile up.