In many ways, the Black Dogs were like every other military unit. They ate in the mess hall, lived together in military housing, and shared a special camaraderie found only in being part of an elite brotherhood. Unlike the Rangers, Green Berets, or Navy SEALS, however, conventional military ranks had been abandoned in favor of a simple three-tier system. Every man in the Black Dogs was classified either as an operator, team leader, or unit leader. Handpicked from different branches of service, they were hard men willing to do hard things.
Their existence wasn’t advertised, but it wasn’t kept a secret either. Each man proudly wore the unit insignia, a snarling black dog, on his sleeve. The patch served two purposes. It provided a sense of solidarity, but more importantly, it let military officers know that these men were outside of their command structure. Except under the most egregious of abuses, the Black Dogs answered only to their own.
Their missions were understood to be Top Secret, with only the most select officials ever being briefed. Like other Special Operations units, their numbers were kept manageable. In the case of the Black Dogs, this had meant limiting their size to four hundred for the past several decades. No more, no less. The virus, however, had taken its toll on them as well, whittling that four hundred down to a mere fifty.
Ten of those fifty had been killed only days earlier during a search and destroy mission in Lexington, Kentucky. The specifics of that operation were not yet fully understood and might never be. What was known was that the mission itself had been successful—Lenny Bruce was dead. An insider in the Fresh Start initiative had confirmed as much. The charismatic leader had reportedly been crushed when the city’s museum collapsed. Unfortunately, that collapse also took the lives of several of the Black Dogs. The rest of their casualties were suffered at a peanut butter plant, although it was not yet clear who, or what, was responsible for their deaths.
General Hood leaned back against the jump seat, listening to the helicopter’s rotor blades beat the air. He had always marveled that such an odd contraption could actually fly. Airplanes made sense. Helicopters, not so much. Despite having a small case of the jitters, it felt good to be going back into the field. For the past fifteen years, he had been hobnobbing with the political elite, which, while adding stars to his uniform, was hardly the life for a professional soldier.
He was facing the most important mission of his career. Not only must he kill Rosalyn Glass and her supporters, he also needed to remove all traces that they had ever been at The Greenbrier. Hood accepted that their deaths would be nothing short of cold-blooded murder. To suggest otherwise was to practice self-deception. But having served in two wars, General Hood understood that some sicknesses could only be cured with a little bloodletting.
Rosalyn Glass pressed up out of her wheelchair, steadying herself against the doorframe. She despised her body for being so weak and frail, but the hatred did little to improve her stamina. Despite it having been several weeks since the attack, she could move about for only a few minutes at a time. Anything more and she risked falling, something that might leave her permanently confined to the dreaded chair.
She pushed open the door and stepped into the small conference room, doing her best to hide the pain that still burned in her chest. The dull gray concrete walls were a far cry from the lavish boardrooms she had been accustomed to before the pandemic. But she had come to look past such imperfections and appreciate what was truly important—honorable intentions from patriots who loved their country.
General Carr, Jack Fry, Bill Baker, and Tom Pinker were seated around the table. Each man had held an important position in the government only days earlier, and each had abandoned it to stand by her side.
Carr started to get to his feet, but she gestured politely for him to stay seated.
“I’m fine,” she mouthed with a smile. Since her injury, she had been unable to speak clearly and had been forced to use an electrolarynx to communicate.
Carr nodded, but he couldn’t help but notice the wheelchair in the hallway.
“Madam President,” said Jack, “it’s great to see you up and about.”
She pressed the electrolarynx to the side of her throat and said, “Thanks Jack. Every day I get a little stronger.” She walked slowly to the table, patting his hand as she took her seat. “General, I believe that this is your meeting.”
General Carr stood up and moved to the end of the table. In one hand, he carried a tightly rolled blueprint.
“Thank you, Madam President. It’s been almost twenty-four hours since the broadcast, and I thought it prudent that we put together a strategy.”
“A strategy for what?” Bill asked in a gravelly voice. Having suffered a bayonet wound to his throat many years earlier as part of a peace mission to Africa, his vocal chords had never fully healed.
“A strategy for surviving the impending attack by Pike’s assassins, of course.”
“General, do you know something that we don’t?” Tom Pinker had worked in intelligence for many years, and he was a man who valued information perhaps more than anyone else in the room.
“Nothing specific, no. We haven’t yet received a warning from Dr. Greene, but I can’t imagine a scenario in which President Pike or General Hood would allow us to leave this bunker alive.”
“But why?” asked Glass. “We’ve already put the truth out there for everyone to hear. Even if we’re all killed, that’s not going to change.”
“That’s true. But right now, they’re nothing more than faceless allegations. Until we make our case in front of a judicial body, few will take them seriously.”
“I’m afraid he’s right,” said Pinker. “Lincoln Pike will only be brought down if we’re able to present the facts in person.”
She nodded. “I’ll be well enough to do that shortly. All I need is another couple of days to build my strength.”
“And that remains the plan,” said Carr. “Our endgame is simple—to survive long enough to come out of hiding.” He set the paper on the table, unrolled it, and placed an ink pen on each corner to hold it open.
“What is it you have there?” Pinker asked, leaning forward.
“This is a high-level blueprint of the bunker. It won’t provide much of a tactical advantage, but it should at least help us to understand the general layout.” He searched the oversized page, finally touching his finger to a small block located on the east side of the upper level. “We’re here, in an office adjacent to the medical facility.”
Everyone slid their chairs closer to study the blueprint. At one hundred and twelve thousand square feet, the bunker was nothing short of enormous. It consisted of two floors, each roughly square, and each containing a maze of rooms and interconnected corridors that would have left a mouse as smart as Mr. Jingles scratching his head.
“My Lord!” exclaimed President Glass. “I never imagined that this place was so big. Where do we even start?”
“It’s best if we focus on the bunker’s major areas,” said Carr. “The upper floor contains most of the infrastructures. That includes the power plant, dining room, dormitories, and medical facility.” He took a moment to point out each.
Pinker traced a four-hundred-foot-long tunnel on the left side of the page.
“Is this the way we came in?”
“Yes,” said Carr. “That’s the West Tunnel entrance.
“How many ways are there into the bunker?” asked Bill. “And, more importantly, is each one sealed up tight?”
“There are four entrances. Two are at the east end of the shelter, one is to the west at the end of the long tunnel, and the fourth is a vertical shaft that acts as the bunker’s air intake. It opens directly through the ceiling of the power plant. And yes, each is sealed with a blast door. I’ve personally checked them all.”
“Then we’re safe, right?” Jack said, looking around the room. “No one can get through those blast doors.”
Everyone turned to the person next to them, waiting for someone to disagree.
No one did.
“General?” said Glass. “Is he right?”
“It’s hard to say for sure. The doors are certainly impenetrable by normal munitions, but this is a vast underground compound.”
“Meaning what exactly?”
“Meaning that I don’t know if there are any safeguards built in to act as emergency exits.”
“You think there might be secret ways in and out of the bunker?”
He shrugged. “Frankly, Madam President, I don’t know. There’s nothing shown on the blueprints, but that doesn’t mean there isn’t a back door somewhere.”
“Even if there were,” said Bill, “would Pike have access to that information?”
“Again, I don’t know.”
Pinker hesitated. “It would seem our biggest threat is that someone inside the bunker lets them in, either by accident or malicious intent.”
President Glass looked shocked. “Why in the world would anyone do that?”
“A whole host of reasons. Money. Blackmail. Allegiance to the current government. Or perhaps Pike managed to coerce someone by threatening their loved ones.”
Everyone looked to one another, and again, there were no answers to be had.
Carr spoke up. “Tom’s right. While I can’t see any of us working with Pike, he could have gotten to one of the engineers operating the bunker. For all we know, he may have a mole on the inside, feeding him information.”
“Surely, you don’t really believe that.”
“This isn’t about what I believe, Madam President. It’s about keeping you alive. I’ll round up the engineers and send them home.”
“But what will you tell them?”
“Nothing.”
“Won’t that raise their suspicions?”
“Up until now, none even know of your existence. Once they leave the bunker, they’ll hear about the broadcast and likely put two and two together. But at that point, most will probably be thankful to be out of the line of fire. Either way, they won’t be able to compromise our safety.”
Glass nodded thoughtfully. “I suppose that makes sense.”
“Can we run this place without them for a couple of days?” asked Bill.
“That shouldn’t be a problem. The five of us, along with Dr. Tran, should be able to handle things. The generators can operate continuously for up to forty-five days, so all we have to do is keep a watch on things until it’s time to leave.”
“What’s to say that snipers won’t be waiting for us outside the bunker?” asked Jack.
“Indeed, they could be,” acknowledged Carr. “But our broadcast ensures that there will be many others waiting for us to exit as well. I can’t see Pike risking attacking us in public like that. Our murders would be even more damning than our accusations.”
Rosalyn Glass smiled. “General, it seems you’ve thought of everything.”
Carr shook his head. “No, Madam President, there are always holes. The only question is whether or not our enemy will discover them.”
Chapter 6
Mason and Leila were enjoying the warmth of the early afternoon sun as they traveled north on Highway 221. Bowie also seemed to be enjoying the trip as he poked his head around the side of the cab to feel the rush of wind blowing through his fur. They drove for nearly an hour, finally reaching Highway 194. Thick green brush and trees lined both sides of the two-lane road, as it wound its way through rolling hills, gravel pits, and the occasional family farm. A sign to the right of the highway indicated that the small town of West Jefferson lay directly ahead.
Leila was about to suggest that they stop for lunch when she heard the faint roar of engines in the distance. She spun around and looked out through the open rear window. A stream of motorcycles, cars, and trucks approached as sure as a cavalry troop chasing down a would-be deserter.
“Marshal…”
“I see them,” he said, looking into the rearview mirror.
“I don’t understand. How could they have caught up to us?”
It didn’t make sense to him either. The tire should have taken Willie an hour or more to change. The only explanation was that he had received help. Once the tire was changed, he must have rendezvoused with the rest of the Ravagers and convinced them to give chase. Even so, it didn’t account for how they had located Mason’s truck so quickly.
He recalled the large whip antenna on Willie’s car.
“They must have been in radio contact with each other,” he said, thinking out loud. “One of them probably spotted us and called the others.”
He watched as the procession slowly grew closer, sections of the convoy occasionally disappearing behind the hills. A dusty, gray armored car led the pack, confirming what Mason already knew. Willie intended to make good on his promise.
Mason punched the gas, and the F150 surged forward.
“I made a mistake leaving that man alive.”
“You couldn’t very well shoot him.”
“Maybe not, but I could have been a little slower calling off Bowie.”
“That’s not you, Marshal,” she said, touching his arm. “Thank God, it’s not.”
Mason didn’t argue the point. Every man had a list of weaknesses, and mercy was apparently at the top of his.
“Do you think we can outrun them?” she asked.
“The cars maybe, but not the bikes.”
Leila turned to study the surrounding roadway. To one side was a thick stretch of trees and, to the other, a large open field. The town of West Jefferson flashed in and out of view as the road crested and fell.
“What do we do?”
“We start by seeing if we can lose them. Hold on!”
Mason pulled the wheel hard to the left, swerving the truck off the road and down a grassy slope, narrowly threading two copses of trees. Bowie barked as he lost his footing and flopped over in the bed. The truck bumped and bounced for a quarter-mile, finally plowing through a tall chain-link fence and coming to rest on a stretch of cracked asphalt. Ahead of them was the cinder block wall of a small grocery store. Next to it sat a faded green dumpster with a sign that read “Property of Mike’s Groceries. No dumping!”
Mason circled around the store and sped past a row of gas pumps. The parking lot exited onto Beaver Creek School Road, a thoroughfare that paralleled the interstate. Directly across the street sat the Ashe Baptist Association Center, a nondescript brick building that offered neither cover nor concealment.
He turned right and began weaving his way through the logjam of cars. Pressing ahead as fast as he dared, he passed a series of rusted sheet-metal buildings, a builders supply store, and a Nation’s Inn motel—none of which seemed suitable to make a stand against a band of pissed-off Ravagers.
Things only grew worse the further north they went. A huge multi-car pileup blocked the intersection ahead, leaving it completely impassible. A few drivers had tried to squeeze around the mayhem, only to find themselves pinched between cars and the corners of adjacent buildings. Mason saw no way to navigate the narrow road, short of ditching the truck and going on foot, and that was not something he was prepared to do.
Continuing to follow the path of least resistance, he turned into a large parking lot. To the right was a Dollar General, to the left, a Waffle House, and directly ahead stood a Jiffy Lube. A pickup truck had plowed into the front of the Dollar General, leaving a gaping hole in the wall and the unassuming yellow and black sign dangling precariously overhead. Pregnancy tests, socks, miniature bottles of shampoo, and kitchen utensils littered the ground like breadcrumbs for diehard value shoppers.
Mason felt his blood pressure rising. Despite his best efforts, every turn seemed to put them in a box that squeezed tighter and tighter. With the sound of engines growing ever louder, backtracking was no longer possible. They would have to hole up somewhere and hope they went undetected.
He swung the truck around to the back of the Waffle House and parked a few feet from the building. The roof of the restaurant cast a lon
g shadow, and he was reasonably confident that the truck would be invisible both from the highway and Beaver Creek School Road.
“We’ll hide here until they pass,” he said, shutting off the engine.
“Do you really think this will work?”
He swung open his door.
“It depends.”
“On what?”
“On how determined they are to find us.”
Mason climbed out and began stuffing a handful of fully-loaded M4 magazines into his waistband. Leila scrambled out after him with her Beretta nine-millimeter held awkwardly in her left hand. The gash on her dominant hand still forced her to work the pistol weak-handed, a skill she had yet to master.
Together they eyed the back of the building. There was only one way in, a small nondescript service door. There was no handle on the outside, presumably to thwart would-be breakfast thieves, but a brick had been used to prop the door open.
“Let’s check it out,” he said, pointing.
Bowie hopped down from the bed of the truck and followed along.
Stepping to one side of the door, Mason eased it open a few more inches. When he did, the smell of pancakes, maple syrup, and bacon wafted out. As far as odors went, it was far better than most they had encountered of late.
Bowie tipped his nose up and took a few deep sniffs.
“Easy, boy,” he warned, pressing his hand lightly against the dog’s chest. The lure of food was powerful to any dog, and Mason gave him a fifty-fifty chance of actually obeying.
To his credit, Bowie stood fast, soaking up the odor but never pushing into the building.
They stood motionless, leaning forward to listen. Other than the roar of vehicles racing down the highway, the only sound was the soft thump-thump-thump of Bowie’s tail thwapping against the metal door.
Finest Hour Page 6