The Peacekeepers. Books 4 - 6.

by Ricky Sides

  Other peacekeepers opened the door leading into the storeroom. The room was incredibly large with walls separating the various sections for structural support. Inside the huge room, it was dark. The deeper inside you went, the darker it became. The peacekeepers turned on their flashlights and soon located the twelve children they had been sent to rescue. They were located inside cages originally designed to hold experimental animals. The cages were too small to permit the children to stretch out. Most cried in fear at the approach of the peacekeepers. “My God,” said one peacekeeper. “What sort of animals are we dealing with, if they would treat children in this manner?”

  “Soon to be dead ones,” another vowed and then he spoke calmly to the children telling them that they were peacekeepers and they were there to help them.

  To his surprise one of the older boys let out a cheer and said, “I told you all the peacekeepers would come and save us. That’s why I want to be a peacekeeper when I grow up!”

  “I’ll bet you’ll make a fine one too son,” the peacekeeper responded.

  It took them ten minutes to get the children out of the cages. They had to be careful not to injure the kids inside the cramped cages so they took their time. The twelve children were led back to the waiting ship and told that this was their lucky day because today they got to ride in the biggest peacekeeper ship ever built. The young man who wanted to become a peacekeeper jumped up and down with joy at that prospect as he ran inside the ship where he was met by Doctor Michael Dean and his nurse who would escort them to the infirmary. Once the children were checked out the cook, who had warm meals waiting, would feed them. Two peacekeepers who’d received wounds were also loaded aboard the ship.

  The second floor had been cleared though no efforts had been made to secure documentation. Bill had ordered that people come first. They were to clear the floors and once that was completed they could take their time searching for intelligence. He pointed out that anything obvious should be grabbed but waste no time on searches for intelligence materials until the building was cleared.

  Now Bill launched the next phase of the operation. He sent two drones to open the windows on the sixth floor so that he could land another element of their fighting force. He also sent two drones to the fifth, fourth, third, and first floors. The drones on those floors were to conduct search and destroy missions, but their primary goals were to secure the stairwells so that the peacekeepers could safely utilize them.

  The Constitution landed on the ground in front of the hospital. Fifty more peacekeepers exited and took up positions at the eight exits that were not boarded up. They made sure that they could also cover the exits that had been boarded up, just in case someone decided to try to exit there. The Constitution took off the moment that the ground team had exited. Pilot Vince Sexton brought the ship around and they offloaded fifty men on the sixth floor.

  “You made that look easy, Sergeant Sexton. I’m also a pilot, and I know that this maneuver is anything but easy,” Bill stated.

  “With the Captain’s permission, sir, that’s corporal and not sergeant,” the corporal stated.

  “Not anymore, Sergeant,” Bill responded. The man was a great pilot and showed promising leadership ability. He smiled his appreciation as the control room crew congratulated him.

  ***

  The drones on the first and third floors made their way to the staircases killing any cult members that they encountered along the way. Once they took up those positions, the men on the second floor separated. Half went down to the first floor and the rest went to the third floor.

  Sergeant Carter was with the team that went down to the first floor. He found it every bit the nightmare that Namid had warned it would be, as cult members fired on his men from numerous positions. He couldn’t even imagine what it would have been like without the support of the drones. Slowly but surely, the peacekeepers took the first floor one section at a time. The sergeant knew that the enemy force estimates had to have been wrong for this facility. There had to be at least a hundred on this floor alone.

  They came to one area around the emergency room that was especially heavily protected. The fight to take that section lasted a good thirty minutes and several peacekeepers were wounded in the process of taking the position. Inside that suite of emergency rooms, they found ten patients in various examining rooms. Sergeant Carter was confused because they all seemed comatose. He radioed the Constitution with his findings and was told to head for the nearest exit, and be ready to meet the doctor who wanted to examine the patients. The sergeant insisted that the doctor be equipped with full uniform and armor because there was still sporadic fighting on the first floor.

  Ten minutes later the doctor entered the emergency room suites and began to examine the patients. The doctor paled as he examined the charts and then studied the instruments. Turning to the sergeant, he said, “This is bad. I can’t know the same will be the case with the rest of the patients, and I’ll have to confirm them all on an individual basis, but, Sergeant, this woman is brain dead,” the doctor said and pointed to the patient in the bed. “The bastards bled her and put her on life support. They’ve been using her as a blood factory, but took so much blood that her brain died as a result of the lack of oxygen due to the blood loss. According to her chart, she’s been here at least three weeks. My God the horror,” he said sadly.

  “What do I do, Doc?” the sergeant asked.

  “You have to document this, Sergeant. I will do the rest. It’s my duty. Get a cameraman in here. Film the patient, the life support settings, all of the instruments, and the patient’s chart.” The doctor walked to the foot of the bed and took the patient’s chart. He drew a neat red checkmark on the chart in an open space.

  “When your man has documented this patient send for me. I’ll be checking the others, and then we have to document the rest,” the doctor said.

  “The rest?” the sergeant asked.

  “Sergeant, they are brain dead. Well she is, and I will be surprised if any of the others are in better condition. Nothing can be done for these patients, with the exception of turning off the life support. It’s the decent thing to do, Sergeant. It’s what I’d want done for me if I were in their situation,” the doctor said and quickly left the room to check the next patient.

  The sergeant summoned his cameraman to document the evidence as the doctor had instructed. He also contacted the captain to verify that the doctor’s intentions were permissible. Bill replied, “The doctor told me, Sergeant. Thank you for checking with me. I know it’s a terrible decision to make, but if they are brain dead, there is nothing we can do but stop the cult from harvesting their blood and give them a decent burial. When it is safe I want those patients removed with as much respect shown their remains as possible.”

  “Yes, Captain, I understand. But that will be a while. It’s too dangerous at the moment to try to move the dead,” the sergeant explained.

  “Understood, Sergeant. The living must come first. And, Sergeant, you kill one of those people responsible for every single one of those patients,” Captain Bill Young stated.

  “You can count on that, sir,” the sergeant assured the captain.

  By the time that the first floor was cleared of all the cult members it was growing dark. The pilot landed the ship near the emergency room entrance and several guards were assigned to prevent unauthorized personnel from entering. One by one, the peacekeepers removed the dead patients. The doctor paused before boarding the ship and said, “Sergeant, there is something you need to know. Professional medical personnel hooked up those patients to the machines and kept them alive. You may encounter doctors or nurses inside the hospital. They may claim to be innocent. Hell, they may have been forced to assist, but frankly, I doubt that is the case. There were too many ways caring doctors or nurses could have stopped this much sooner and the cult would have been none the wiser. So don’t trust such personnel if you encounter them, Sergeant,” the doctor said and then he turned away and walked up
the ramp to board the ship.

  “Thanks for the warning, Doc,” the sergeant said and the man waved without turning by way of reply. The sergeant maintained his position until the ship lifted into the air, and then he returned to the grim duty ahead. By now, it was completely dark but the power was on and the hospital was illuminated in the portions controlled by the peacekeepers.

  The sergeant and the men with him had by now cleared the entire first, second and third floors and were ready to move up to the fourth floor to assist the team there who was fighting a determined foe. The cult members were now desperate. Their escape to the ground floor had been cut off and above them the fifth floor was a raging battleground as the peacekeepers relentlessly killed every cult member they met.

  The sergeant started up the last set of steps heading for the fourth floor when a corporal came down leading five people. Two were male and three were female. The two males appeared to be in their late forties. The two men and one of the women were dressed as doctors and the remaining women were dressed as nurses. The female doctor appeared to be around thirty years of age but the nurses appeared to be in their early to mid twenties. All three of the women were beautiful. The sergeant and his men froze at the approach of those people, but he soon recovered and walked back down the stairs to make room for the people to come down to the third floor landing. The sergeant’s men stayed close prepared for whatever he ordered. The sergeant greeted the doctors and nurses in a friendly manner but gestured with hand signals for his men to step behind the people. “Now if you’ll all please kneel on the floor we will confirm your identity and you can be on your way,” he said in a reasonable tone of voice.

  “Sergeant, I checked their photo identities and they seem legitimate,” the corporal stated.

  The sergeant looked at the corporal and gave a hand signal that was universal to the peacekeeper training. That signal meant that the people in question were suspected of being in league with the enemy. The corporal flashed the understood signal and cautiously watched the people he’d been escorting.

  “Sergeant, I protest this treatment,” the female doctor said.

  The sergeant pointed his rifle at the woman’s head and said, “I will repeat myself. Kneel down. Now!” he shouted and the five people knelt on the carpet. “That’s better. Ladies please extend your hands in front of you,” the sergeant requested and the ladies complied albeit reluctantly and with an appearance of resentment. None had the tell-tale razors attached to their fingernails but the sergeant noted that their index fingernails had been trimmed quite close to the tip of the finger while the other nails were significantly longer.

  Smiling he thanked the women and then he gestured for his men to point pistols to the heads of the five captives. They froze in fear. “Now ladies if you’d be so kind as to place your hands behind your backs we will get on with the examination,” the sergeant said.

  The women placed their hands behind their backs and the sergeant’s men secured their wrists. The sergeant said, “Now gentlemen it’s your turn. Hands behind your backs,” the sergeant said expecting them to cooperate, as had the women. But the men launched themselves erect. One of them flung himself upon the sergeant trying to bite his neck but the other fled for the staircase. The sergeant found his weapon trapped between their bodies and he was unable to employ it. He butted the doctor with his head and whipped his knee up into the man’s groin. The doctor doubled up in pain and the sergeant shot him in the head.

  The sergeant spun in the direction that the other man had fled but one of the guards on the landing below had stopped the man and forced him back up the stairs. They emerged as the sergeant was striding toward the flight of stairs. “Kneel down, Doctor,” the sergeant said in a serious tone of voice.

  The doctor knelt on the floor as ordered but he said. “I was never one of them. The others are cult members but I just helped because I was afraid they’d kill me if I refused.”

  “You contemptible worm,” the female doctor said in a voice dripping with her contempt. The woman was fair skinned. Her black hair fell to just a few inches past the base of her neck. The sergeant thought she had beautiful brown eyes. Laughing she said, “It was his idea to farm the victims. He was hoping to make elder as a result by increasing the productivity of our victims ten fold. Check his teeth if you doubt me. He had implants. I just had my own teeth filed down, but men like him need a little help in so many ways don’t they?” she asked in a mocking tone of voice.

  “Didn’t people come looking for those victims?” the sergeant asked unable to believe that people could just walk into a hospital and never emerge and the community would ignore the incidents.

  “A few people did come looking. When that happened we generally took them to see the patients whom they were seeking. We used cover stories. Always different so that there was no danger of the public comparing notes and becoming increasingly suspicious,” the female doctor said smugly. “From severe food poison, and infectious diseases to encephalitis, the people listened and believed us. And why not? We are doctors. They usually left with the impression that their friends were just the latest victims in the breakdown of civilization in the wake of the quakes. And we did release a few after carefully bleeding them. As for the rest, well we were apologetic to their friends and expressed our frustration that we were unable to save all of our patients because of a simple lack of civilized medical resources such as medicines, which were common prior to the quakes. Hell, I even managed to cry with several of the people.” Shrugging the doctor explained, “It was easy unless the patient was really close to the person making the inquiry. That did happen upon three separate occasions, and it was readily apparent that the people making the inquiries were going to be a problem.”

  “What did you do about those people?” asked the sergeant.

  Shrugging once more the doctor said, “Some of our people followed them home. Late at night, they received a visit from several of our members. The problem went away. You may have seen them. They were patients seven, eight, and nine,” she said, smiling evilly. “There was never any real danger to us from such people.”

  Sergeant Carter had heard all that he needed to hear. He turned his attention to the male doctor and said, “Hands behind your back.” When the doctor refused to comply, he pointed his rifle at the man’s head and motioned for the peacekeeper behind the suspect to stand to one side. “I won’t tell you again,” he warned.

  The doctor surged toward him and he fired his rifle hitting the man between the eyes. “Check his teeth,” the sergeant said and one of his men moved to the body and rolled back the upper lip. The man had fangs. “Now check theirs,” the sergeant said gesturing to the three women. Looking to the cameraman he asked, “Have you been documenting this?”

  “Yes, Sergeant. Do you want me to stop?” the cameraman asked.

  “No, I want you to film their teeth,” he instructed as the peacekeeper who had revealed the teeth of the man moved to check the women. He was reaching for the doctor’s mouth when she tried her best to bite his fingers but the man was fast enough to avoid that injury. The sergeant made a series of hand gestures and the men behind the women grabbed their hair and pulled back roughly while placing their knees in the back of the women’s necks. This caused their heads to tilt back on a sharp angle and the women opened their mouths gasping in pain and revealing their fangs. “Film them all,” the sergeant said and when the filming was done, he motioned for the cameraman to move back, but keep filming. At another gesture from him the men holding the women in that awkward position let them go, and stepped back a pace.

  The sergeant squatted on his haunches before the women and he addressed the doctor asking, “How could you do the things you’ve done? It goes against everything a doctor believes in and holds dear.”

  The doctor glared at him and said, “I don’t think you would understand.”

  “Try me,” the sergeant stated simply.

  “Maybe you would understand at that. You are a
male, so you can relate. Remember your first sexual experience, when you made love to a virgin. Well when your tongue penetrates the flesh of your victim as you feed, it is a very similar experience. It is exquisitely intimate, and permits a woman to realize the intense joy a man feels during that virginal penetration.”

  The sergeant stared at the obvious lust in the eyes of the doctor and he noted similar expressions on the faces of the two nurses. Shaking his head the sergeant said, “You were right. I don’t understand.”

  “I’ll show you, Sergeant. If I am going to die anyway, then kill me as I have killed others. Cut my jugular and taste my blood. Probe the wound with your hot tongue. Do this, if you really want to comprehend the attraction to our lifestyle,” the woman said with her eyes narrowing shut. The sexual overtones were not lost on the sergeant. It was sick as hell, but he thought that the video of this just might offer an insight into the mind set of the hardcore cult members and these people were definitely hardcore members. There was no doubt of that in the sergeant’s mind what so ever.

  Stepping around behind the woman, he breathed on her neck and gauged her reaction as he drew his pistol. Nodding to the two men next to him they also drew their pistols from their holsters. The doctor shivered in anticipation as she closed her eyes and tilted her head to make it easier for him to access her neck. She then waited for him to cut her neck and begin feeding. She was still waiting when the sergeant pulled the trigger shooting her in the back of the head. The other two men fired a fraction of a second later.

  The sergeant shook his head and ordered the women’s hands untied and their hands filmed both palm up and palm down. He instructed the cameraman to zoom in on their fingernails and pointed out the newly trimmed index fingernails. He then ordered the cameraman to secure the film of that execution in a safe spot and reload fresh film.