Hellfire

by Richard Turner

  Jackson tossed his rifle over to Mitchell, got up onto his feet, and sprinted for the parked Hummer.

  Mitchell grabbed the weapon out of the air, tucked it in tight into his shoulder, and dropped anyone foolish enough to try to stop Jackson.

  Jumping into the driver’s seat of the Hummer, Jackson turned it on, shifted it into reverse, and jammed his foot down on the gas pedal. With a loud squeal from the vehicle’s tires, Jackson drove the Hummer straight back, coming to a sudden stop in front of the car Mitchell was using for cover.

  “Get in,” yelled Mitchell to Yuri. He looked over at Grace, Sam, and Cardinal and told them to run.

  Grace fired off her last bullet and dropped her rifle. She didn’t bother to crouch down as she ran for her life.

  Mitchell watched as his friends piled into the back of Hummer. Turning his head, he looked back towards the stairwell, expecting to see Jen and Owen.

  Yuri said, “Pretty lady took man to find another way out.”

  Mitchell hesitated. He couldn’t leave, not without Jen.

  “Ryan, we have to go,” called out Jackson.

  Mitchell jumped in, angrily slamming the door shut.

  Jackson changed gears and, with his foot all the way down on the accelerator, took off after McMasters.

  “Where are we going?” asked Sam from the backseat.

  “McMasters and his goons went this way,” pointed out Jackson, as he drove through a thick cloud of black smoke and turned down a long, dimly lit tunnel. In the far distance, he could see the taillights from one of the Hummers.

  “How much time have we got left?” asked Grace.

  “I don’t know, a couple of minutes, maybe,” replied Mitchell as he glanced down at his watch.

  McMasters, riding in the armored truck containing the weaponized anthrax, dug out a remote and pressed a small red button. A couple of seconds later, two steel blast doors opened at the end of the tunnel, and the convoy raced out into the open and turned onto a narrow trail at the back of the mountain. In the distance, the sky was turning gray on the horizon. The convoy paused for a moment to let David Houston get into his SUV. With the architect of the coming global genocide aboard, the convoy quickly picked up speed. They wanted to put as much distance as they could between themselves and the base before the UAVs struck it in the next couple of minutes, obliterating everything and everyone trapped inside.

  “Speed up!” Mitchell yelled at Jackson. “The doors are closing!”

  “I’m already doing eighty.”

  “Do ninety!” screamed Sam.

  Up ahead, the doors were slowly moving towards one another.

  Mitchell could see the light from outside begin to fade as the doors swung inwards. With his hands on the dash to brace himself, Mitchell knew it was going to be close, too close for comfort.

  Jen put her back onto the closed hatch above her head and pushed hard. To have come this far and be trapped made her want to cry. She was scared and nearing exhaustion.

  “Move over and let me help,” said Owen as he climbed up the ladder.

  There was barely enough room for both of them in the narrow passage.

  “On three,” said Jen.

  Together they counted down. With their shoulders on the hatch, they both pushed as hard as they could. For a moment, it didn’t budge. With a loud creak, the hatch moved a little and then flew wide open. Cool, refreshing air rushed down from the outside.

  “Come on,” said Jen as she scrambled up and out of the tunnel and out into a thickly wooded forest. Dew covered the ground. She took a quick look around to make sure they were alone, turned around, and helped Owen climb out.

  By the gray light of dawn, Jen could see that they had come out near the top of the mountain that housed the installation. She was about to look for a trail that led off the mountain when she heard a strange sound. Jen lifted her head up and looked up into the sky. At first, it was hard to see what was making the noise. A couple of seconds later, she saw an odd-looking plane suddenly pop up at the far end of the valley. She was about to point it out to Owen when she saw two objects fly out from under the wings of the plane. She wasn’t sure what she was seeing, but her gut told her something bad was about to happen.

  “Down!” yelled Jen as she grabbed Owen and pulled him to the wet ground.

  With an ear-shattering explosion, the two Paveway bombs, guided in by a laser on the Predator, struck the closed blast doors and tore them off their hinges. Anyone within one hundred meters of the doors was either killed in the blast or by the thousands of pieces of jagged metal that tore through the air. Precisely three seconds later, two thermobaric bombs flew in through the opening and exploded deep inside the complex. The air inside the base instantly superheated to over five thousand degrees, incinerating everything in its path. The blast wave, like a demonic creature let loose on the world, surged through the tunnels. Outside, the row of executive jets exploded one by one, as the blistering heat from the explosion ignited the planes’ fuel tanks.

  Mitchell heard and then felt the shock wave shake the Hummer as if it were a child’s toy. He glanced up at the rearview mirror. His eyes instantly widened as a wall of flame suddenly appeared behind them and raced down the tunnel.

  “Nate, speed up or we’re all dead,” said Mitchell.

  “I see it,” replied Jackson through clenched teeth.

  The doors up ahead were already halfway closed.

  With a loud yell, Jackson aimed their vehicle at the ever-diminishing opening.

  Less than a second later, Jackson’s Hummer struck the doors. The loud shrieking sound of metal being torn off the side of the vehicle filled the cab as it forced its way outside.

  Without taking his foot off the gas, Jackson drove out into the forest. Behind him the flames, as if sensing that the Hummer was about to get away, reached out to try to stop it, but quickly retreated as the doors closed.

  “Ease up Nate, we’re safe,” said Mitchell.

  A couple of seconds later, Jackson brought the Hummer to a sliding halt.

  Mitchell opened his door, stepped outside and looked back. From the front of the base, a huge black pall of smoke climbed up high into the air.

  Overhead, a UAV flew over the top of the trees like some kind of massive bird of prey; its shadow raced along the ground.

  Mitchell felt an ache in his heart. If Jen had been inside the base when the bombs struck, he knew that she’d be dead.

  Jackson walked over to his friend and placed a hand on his shoulder. “She’s not in there.”

  “How can you be so sure?”

  “What’s your gut telling you?”

  Mitchell looked at this friend. “That she’s okay.”

  “Ryan, Jen’s smart and resourceful,” said Jackson. “She’ll be fine until we link up with her again.”

  With a nod, Mitchell turned to look at their battered Hummer. “We’ll never stop Houston with this hunk of junk.”

  “I think I can get us some better wheels and maybe some guns,” said Grace, poking her head out the door.

  “From where?” asked Jackson.

  “From some drunken soldiers, that’s where,” responded Grace. “Now, jump in and drive.”

  “What drunken soldiers?” asked Mitchell.

  “It’s a long story,” replied Jackson as he got back into his seat. “I’ll tell you as I drive.”

  With her heart still beating in her ears, Jen poked her head up and saw an ominous black cloud rise up over the top of the mountain. The ground under her body still rocked as secondary explosions tore what was left of the base apart. She couldn’t believe that she was still alive. She carefully got up onto her feet and helped Owen up. He was covered in mud.

  “My God, do you think anyone is alive down there?” said Owen.

  “No,” replied Jen somberly. “That was the point, wasn’t it? Your uncle didn’t want any survivors, did he?”

  “No,” replied Owen, shaking his head.

  Jen looked over
at the sun as it slowly edged over the mountains. Somehow, deep in her soul, she knew that her friends hadn’t met their deaths in the fiery hell below. It wasn’t over, not by a long shot. Jen took the stolen cell phone from her pocket and looked down. She smiled when she saw that the phone had a strong signal.

  “Now what are we going to do?” said Owen.

  “First, I’m going to make a call, and then we're going to hike out of here. I suspect that every cop in this part of the country is on his way here. They need to know that your uncle planned all of this and that he’s probably on the run.”

  46

  Mountain Road

  With a pounding in his head that would not go away, Corporal Aleksi stood up and stared in disbelief at the black cloud of smoke hanging over the mountain. Through the haze in his mind, he knew that something terrible had just happened.

  “Corporal, what the hell just happened?” asked one of Aleksi’s men as he staggered out of the narrow wooden building they called home.

  “I don’t know, but you’d better get everyone up and then get rid of the women. Also, you’d best hide the booze before the sergeant comes sniffing around.”

  “Will do,” said the man as he staggered back to the barracks to wake everyone up.

  Aleksi could feel his stomach churning. He fought the urge to be sick.

  A damaged-looking black Hummer burst from a trail and sped towards Aleksi. It came to a sudden stop right in front of him, spraying him with mud. Before he could open his mouth, a redheaded woman jumped from the back and ran towards the barracks.

  A second later, he found his voice. “Hey, what are you doing?” Aleksi shouted at the woman.

  She ignored him and dashed inside the barracks.

  A moment later, a shot rang out, startling Aleksi. It was quickly followed by all of his men pushed out of the building at gunpoint. Some were dressed, while others only had their underwear on.

  Aleksi reached for his pistol. It was a dumb move. His world instantly closed in on itself as he tumbled to the ground, knocked out cold.

  “Good one,” Mitchell said to Jackson, who stood there holding a wrench in his hands.

  “I aim to please.”

  Mitchell bent down and helped himself to Aleksi’s pistol. He jammed it into his belt and walked over beside Grace. He grinned as the women Grace had hired to keep the soldiers busy quickly disarmed them and tied them up.

  Cardinal collected the weapons and said, “Okay, we’ve got eight AKMs and four 9mm automatics.”

  “Ammo?” asked Mitchell.

  “Plenty, and I found two fully charged radios as well.”

  “Give me one and you take the other. Distribute the weapons and then see if you and Yuri can’t get a couple of their Land Rovers up and running. If there’s one with a machine gun on it, make sure that we take that one.”

  “What are you thinking?” Jackson asked.

  “You, Grace, and I will take one of the Rovers and see if we can catch up with Houston while Yuri, Sam, and Cardinal act as backup.”

  “Sounds like a plan.”

  Two minutes later, with everyone on board, Mitchell’s Rover pulled away from the barracks, followed by Cardinal. The despondent soldiers sat in the cold, wet mud, not sure what was going on, but more than anything else, dreading the arrival of their grizzled, old sergeant. There would be hell to pay, and they knew it.

  47

  The Convoy

  Houston sat tight-lipped in the back of his Mercedes SUV. He could see in the driver’s rearview mirror a tall, black, mushroom cloud rising up into the early-morning sky, blocking out the sun. The first part of the plan had gone practically flawlessly. Mitchell’s foolhardy attempt to escape had ended when he and his compatriots undoubtedly died in the inferno consuming the base.

  His SUV followed the two lead Hummers as they wound their way along the narrow mountain road. Behind his vehicle was McMasters inside the armored truck, followed closely by the semi-trailer and two more Hummers packed with men loyal to the cause. Just across the border in Montenegro, an Ilyushin Il-76 cargo plane and two Learjets waited for them on a private runway.

  “Sir, McMasters would like to talk to you,” said Sophie as she handed Houston a small tablet.

  McMasters’ image filled the screen. “What’s on your mind?” asked Houston.

  “Sir, I just spoke with our man in Montenegro, and he said that the planes are fueled up and ready for our arrival.”

  “Any chance of interference from the Albanian authorities?”

  “None. The path is wide open. The necessary bribes have secured us safe passage all the way to Montenegro,” reported McMasters.

  Houston smiled. “You’ve done well.”

  “Thank you, sir,” replied McMasters, ending the call.

  On the tablet’s screen, a video-feed image from the inside the semi-trailer came up. Houston could see the reinforced containers with the anthrax inside secured to the floor. All he had to do now was have McMasters meet his women in Rome and give them each a bottle of their favorite perfume, a Christmas gift from him. Once they applied the perfume containing the anthrax onto their skin, they would be doomed, as would anyone who encountered them. The remainder of the anthrax in the semi-trailer was scheduled to be flown to Venezuela where a lab, identical to one that had just been destroyed, was waiting to receive the deadly cargo. Within a week, the second phase of his operation could commence. Three months later, two billion people would be dead.

  Houston sat back in his seat and relaxed for the first time in days. There was nothing that could stop them now.

  “Nate, I’d tell you to drive it like you stole it, but we already did that,” said Mitchell to Jackson as they sped around a sharp bend.

  “If this is the road that they took, we’ll catch them,” replied Jackson. “They’re armored and were not. It’s only a matter of time.”

  “There, there they are,” called out Grace from the back of the Rover. She leaned forward and pointed at a dark shape in the distance, just before it disappeared around a bend in the road. There was no mistaking it; it was one of the up-armored Hummers.

  Mitchell grinned and told Jackson to floor it.

  Like a tiger chasing after its prey, the vehicle surged ahead and began to chase down their quarry.

  In the other Rover, Sam drove while Cardinal sat beside her and Yuri sat in the back.

  Suddenly, Yuri blurted out, “Little lady, turn right. Turn right now!”

  Sam reacted and furiously turned the wheel over. The Rover may have not looked like much, but it was in decent condition and turned on a dime. In seconds, they were speeding down a muddy trail that led into a thick forest.

  “Where are we going?” yelled out Cardinal. “Ryan didn’t turn down this trail.”

  “Trust me,” replied Yuri.

  A few seconds later, their Rover came out into a clearing. Sitting in the middle of the field was a massive, all-gray helicopter. To Sam, it looked like a giant praying mantis. The helicopter stood on four steel legs and was over thirty meters in length with long rotor blades that drooped over the side of the craft. A huge steel claw hung under the belly of the fuselage.

  “Park over there,” called out Yuri as he pointed at the helicopter. Before the vehicle stopped, Yuri leapt from the back of the jeep. He ran over to the helicopter, dashed up the stairs, pulled open a door near the cockpit and ran inside.

  With a look of disbelief on his face, Cardinal stared at the helicopter. It looked positively ancient.

  “What the hell is this thing?” Sam asked Cardinal.

  “I don’t know. I’ve never seen one before. All I know is that it’s probably Russian and looks about fifty years old.”

  The whine of the engines coming to life filled the air.

  “Come on,” said Sam as she took two stairs at a time.

  Cardinal ran after Sam. At the top of the stairs, he pushed them away from the helicopter.

  “Mind telling us what you’re doing?” s
aid Sam to Yuri.

  “Little lady, this is a Russian chopper, I know I can fly it,” replied Yuri as he busied himself making sure that everything was working as it should in the cockpit.

  Cardinal popped his head in, and said, “Yuri, what the hell is this thing?”

  “It’s an old MI-10, heavy-lift helicopter,” replied Yuri. “This one looks like it has been converted for logging.”

  “How did you know it was here?” said Sam.

  “I saw sign on the road. Now I need Gordon by the door and little lady here,” said Yuri to Sam as he patted the co-pilot’s seat.

  Cardinal shrugged his shoulders, made his way back beside the open door, and took a seat. He found a headset hanging on the wall and put it on his head.

  Less than a minute later, two irate men still getting dressed ran across the field towards the helicopter.

  Cardinal said, “Yuri, we’ve got company.”

  “Da, please tell them we need to borrow their chopper,” replied Yuri.

  “I’m going to hell one day,” said Cardinal to himself as he flicked his AK’s safety off and fired a burst into the ground right in front of the men. Shocked, both men stopped in their tracks, turned around and ran for the safety of the woods.

  Jackson held the steering wheel tight in his hands as they sped around a bend doing over eighty kilometers an hour on the narrow road. The Rover’s tires squealed loudly as they fought for traction.

  “Car!” yelled Mitchell as an old BMW suddenly appeared in front of them.

  Jackson’s heart jumped into his throat. He frantically turned the wheel to the right, trying to avoid a head-on collision. With bare millimeters to spare, the cars sped past one another.