ccnovels Chapter 212: It’s Going to be a Long Day
Chapter 212: It’s Going to be a Long Day
The battle had only begun.
Inside the command center, every screen continued updating in real time.
Drone feeds.
Reconnaissance reports.
Satellite imagery.
The map of Central Luzon was becoming increasingly red.
Not because the defenses were failing.
But because the infected kept appearing.
Every destroyed concentration seemed to be replaced by another.
Every gap created by artillery fire slowly filled with more bodies.
The analysts no longer talked about hordes.
They talked about fronts.
Entire fronts.
The north.
The south.
The west.
All moving toward the same target.
Basa Air Base.
Adrian stared at the tactical display.
The northern concentrations were taking heavy losses from HIMARS strikes.
Entire highways had been erased.
Several bridges no longer existed.
Fields burned beneath rocket impacts.
Yet the infected kept advancing.
Then another officer approached.
"Sir."
Adrian looked up.
"What is it?"
"The southern concentrations are accelerating."
The room immediately focused on the display.
The drone feed updated.
And several officers cursed.
The infected were moving faster now.
Not all of them.
But enough.
Thousands had begun running.
Entire sections of the horde were no longer shambling.
They were sprinting.
The analyst looked disturbed.
"We’re observing abnormal behavior."
Ryan crossed his arms.
"Let me guess."
"Mutated variants?"
The analyst nodded.
"Large numbers."
That wasn’t good.
Not even remotely good.
The faster variants had always been dangerous.
They could cross terrain rapidly.
They could overwhelm positions before defenders fully reacted.
And if thousands were mixed inside the larger hordes—
The situation became much more complicated.
Adrian immediately turned toward the operations officer.
"Launch the fighters."
The answer came instantly.
"Already underway."
Outside the command center, Basa Air Base had transformed into a machine of war.
Floodlights illuminated the airfield.
Ground crews sprinted across concrete.
Fuel trucks moved continuously.
Armament teams loaded weapons beneath aircraft wings.
Everywhere people worked.
Everywhere engines started.
The entire base was mobilizing.
Rows of aircraft sat beneath the lights.
F-16 Fighting Falcons.
FA-50 light fighters.
Attack helicopters.
Transport aircraft.
Even additional A-10s prepared for launch.
The atmosphere felt less like an airbase.
More like a wartime carrier deck.
One after another, pilots climbed into cockpits.
Canopies closed.
Engines roared to life.
Inside the lead F-16, Captain Marcus Hall adjusted his oxygen mask.
His aircraft had already landed once.
Refueled.
Rearmed.
Now he was going back.
The ground crew chief stepped away from the aircraft.
Then gave a thumbs-up.
Marcus returned the gesture.
The tower immediately transmitted.
"Viper Lead, cleared to taxi."
The pilot pushed the throttle forward.
The aircraft began moving.
Around him, more fighters joined.
Another F-16.
Then another.
Two FA-50s.
Then four more.
The line of aircraft stretched across the taxiway.
Ryan watched the live feed from the command center.
Even after all this time, seeing that many aircraft preparing for combat still felt impressive.
One analyst quietly spoke.
"That’s almost the entire tactical wing."
Another officer nodded.
"Tonight requires it."
The runway lights illuminated the darkness.
The first fighter lined up.
Afterburners ignited.
Twin plumes of orange flame erupted behind the aircraft.
The fighter accelerated.
Faster.
Faster.
Then airborne.
The landing gear folded away.
The second aircraft followed.
Then the third.
Then the fourth.
Soon the night sky above Basa filled with climbing fighters.
The operation had begun.
Twenty minutes later.
The first aircraft reached the battlefield.
The pilots immediately saw the problem.
The drone feeds had not exaggerated.
If anything, they had underestimated it.
The infected stretched across the landscape in impossible numbers.
Roads disappeared beneath moving bodies.
Entire fields looked alive.
Several abandoned towns appeared completely engulfed.
The lead pilot stared through the targeting display.
"...Holy shit."
No one laughed.
Because everyone else was thinking the same thing.
The fighters spread out.
Each aircraft assigned its own engagement sector.
Its own kill zone.
Its own section of the battlefield.
The radio immediately filled with traffic.
"Viper Lead entering northern sector."
"Viper Three entering western sector."
"Falcon One entering southern approach."
"Falcon Two established overhead."
The command center tracked everything.
Colored markers moved across digital maps.
Target assignments updated constantly.
The operations officer spoke calmly.
"Engage priority concentrations."
"Prevent convergence."
"Maintain separation between northern and southern fronts."
The pilots acknowledged.
Then the killing started.
Viper Lead rolled toward the largest northern concentration.
His aircraft carried multiple GBU-38 precision bombs.
The targeting pod immediately locked onto a massive cluster moving through an abandoned industrial district.
Thousands packed together.
Perfect target.
The pilot released.
One bomb.
Then another.
Then another.
The weapons separated cleanly.
The fighter climbed away.
Seconds later—
The industrial district vanished beneath explosions.
Entire warehouses collapsed.
Factory buildings disintegrated.
Fireballs rolled across parking lots packed with infected.
The blast waves flattened huge sections of the horde.
Thousands died instantly.
The surviving infected staggered through flames and debris.
Then continued moving.
Another pilot attacked a highway north of Tarlac.
The road was completely packed.
The infected stretched for kilometers.
The fighter released precision-guided bombs directly into the center of the formation.
Explosions marched down the highway.
Vehicles erupted.
Bridges collapsed.
The roadway disappeared beneath fire.
Hundreds of infected flew through the air.
Thousands more burned.
Still they came.
The radio crackled continuously.
"Good hits."
"Secondary explosions."
"Target destroyed."
"Moving to next sector."
The pilots barely paused between attack runs.
There were too many targets.
Too many opportunities.
Too many infected.
Back near Outpost Echo, the defenders witnessed the effects firsthand.
The northern horizon glowed continuously now.
Explosions.
Missile strikes.
Artillery impacts.
Bomb detonations.
The entire countryside looked like a battlefield from another era.
One machine gunner watched a distant explosion.
"Are they bombing the whole province?"
Reyes didn’t answer.
Because honestly—
It looked like they were.
The infected closest to the outpost continued dying in huge numbers.
Machine guns hammered them.
Grenades tore through them.
Fighter strikes obliterated concentrations before they could reinforce the front.
For the first time all night, the pressure eased slightly.
Not much.
Just enough.
Enough for soldiers to reload.
Enough for medics to move wounded.
Enough for exhausted defenders to breathe.
Then another radio transmission arrived.
The operator listened.
Then immediately looked toward Reyes.
"More aircraft inbound."
The sergeant frowned.
"More?"
The operator nodded.
"Additional attack helicopters."
That earned a few smiles.
Because helicopters meant sustained fire support.
Long loiter times.
Heavy weapons.
And unlike fast-moving jets—
They could stay.
Far above Central Luzon, the fighters continued hunting.
Attack run after attack run.
Bomb after bomb.
Missile after missile.
The infected died by the thousands.
Then by the tens of thousands.
Yet every drone feed still showed movement.
Still showed convergence.
Still showed endless bodies moving toward Basa.
Inside the command center, Adrian remained silent. This is going to be a fucking long day again. But this time, it might take them days to complete it.