Army life is not as bad as it seems. That’s what he thought, anyway. Mike Jones joined the United States Army Cadet Corp at seventeen and on his eighteenth birthday, became a United States soldier. Having prior experience and marksmanship trophies, young Jones excelled.
The world had daily reports of confusion concerning zombies. Since the outbreak was small, most believed them to be lies, remembering the infamous War of the Worlds broadcast. No sir, people these days were not that gullible and backward. They dismissed the nonsense, opting to believe government authority and their explanations.
Florida was south of the North Carolina outbreak. The army thought they had contained the outbreak before Jones’ basic training. They were wrong. Zombie infiltration could not be stopped and cascaded nationwide. Eventually, they would learn the caves of Missouri and the foothills of Mount Mitchell were ground zero for the outbreaks.
Mike Jones and his company sat quietly in the mess hall listening to Brigadier General Holt as he told them of their new mission. They thought they were at the end of their basic training, but new information had been discovered that required more training. They would be deployed from Fort Jackson, South Carolina to the foothills of Western North Carolina to undergo new training in a hidden base. The Land of the Sky would be their new home.
All went well, until they neared the end of this new training. Word came from the leaders of a zombie surge in Missouri and they would deploy tonight to assist fellow soldiers in crisis. Jones excelled and with heavy losses, used his command presence to quickly move up in rank to Corporal. He was a rising star with a bright future ahead.
After landing at Fort Leonard Wood, Jones and company continued training. They would not venture into the fray for a while. Others would fight in the caverns while they trained.