Anvil

by Dirk Patton

  Resuming their forward movement, they came out from under the trees and onto a rain slicked, sloping lawn. Fifty yards up the slope was the edge of the parking lot for the nuclear physics lab. The building wasn’t visible from their location, and remaining in their diamond movement pattern they carefully climbed the hill.

  Rain was falling steadily, masking any inadvertent sounds they might have made. But it also covered the swift footfalls of the small group of female infected that charged out of the trees when the men came into view. The SEAL responsible for their right flank security spotted them immediately, calling a warning as he began firing his rifle.

  The females were close, inside twenty yards when they came into the open, and they were sprinting. The man got off three fast shots, killing two of the females, before the remaining five slammed into the group. The other SEALs had turned at the warning, but the attack was so fast that none of them were able to get a shot off before the infected were at hand to hand combat range.

  Sam killed a young woman with his knife as Gonzales snapped another’s neck with his thick hands. The SEAL on the right flank had been unfortunate enough to have two females tackle him to the ground and one had succeeded in locking her teeth on his throat and tearing it open. He lay on the ground, legs twitching as blood fountained out of his damaged artery.

  The SEAL on the rear rolled down the slope and disappeared into the trees, a female at least as large as he was embracing him as if they were lovers. Sam killed another infected with a quick knife thrust to her heart, turned and raced down the hill as Master Chief Gonzales battled with the final attacker. She was small, no more than five feet tall, and Gonzales met her with an extended arm and open hand.

  He grasped her neck as she charged in, lifting her off her feet. Twisting his hips, he gripped one of her flailing legs and raised her over his head. Turning, he drove the female into the ground, head first, her neck snapping like a twig from the brutal impact. Glancing in the direction his two surviving team mates had gone, he took a moment to scan the area for other threats.

  The sound of a suppressed rifle came from the trees and a moment later Lieutenant Sam emerged. Meeting Gonzales’ eyes, he shook his head. The Master Chief cursed silently as he turned and continued scanning their surroundings. Their first encounter with a small group of females and they lost half the team.

  “We’ll get them on the way back,” Sam mumbled.

  He was referring to the bodies of their two fallen brothers. Gonzales didn’t like leaving them laying on the ground even to complete their mission, but losing teammates was nothing new and they didn’t have any other choice. With a nod, he turned and began climbing the slope again. Sam stayed five yards behind him and kept a close eye on the trees at the bottom of the hill.

  They reached the parking lot without further attacks. Pausing at the edge of the pavement, both men dropped to a knee to perform a careful scan of their target. The stretch of asphalt wasn’t large, no more than fifty yards across. At the far edge squatted a sprawling, two story building constructed of brick. There were no windows visible on the front, only a pair of glass doors protecting the entrance.

  Sam already knew they were ballistic glass and only opened into a small vestibule. Inside, a small security desk took up nearly half the space. It was set up for staff and visitors. They would check in before being buzzed through a heavy steel door.

  There was only one other entrance or exit from the building, a large rolling door at the loading dock on the back wall. All other doors had been sealed, the Department of Homeland Security citing national security reasons to ignore the fire codes that required emergency exits.

  Of the two entrances, they had decided access through the front would require less time and explosives. The glass doors were controlled by powerful electro-magnets. The hope was the electricity had been off to the building long enough for the backup generator that came on automatically in the event of a power failure to have run out of fuel. There were battery banks to bridge the gap between loss of power and restoration from the generator, but they lasted for fifteen minutes at best.

  The two SEALs dashed across the parking lot, heads swiveling as they watched for infected. Reaching the glass doors, they paused as the Master Chief tried to see through them with his night vision goggles while Sam turned and watched their backs. He couldn’t see through the glass and would have to clear the vestibule the hard way. Grasping the steel handle, Gonzales gently tugged, testing the lock.

  The door moved easily, and he pulled it fully open. Bracing it with his shoulder he looked into the small space, rifle tracking in sync with his eyes. Nothing moved, but the stench of a rotting body made him grimace and breathe through his mouth.

  The corpse of a security guard was half behind the armored desk. It had been there a while, the torso having swollen from the gasses of decomposition, eventually rupturing and spilling putrid fluids across the floor.

  “Clear,” Gonzales mumbled, moving into the vestibule.

  He ignored the corpse and stepped up to the steel doors guarding the interior of the building as Sam came in behind him and silently pulled the glass door shut. Using a thick, nylon flexi-cuff, he secured the doors by looping it through the handles and pulling it tight. Nothing would get in, and to get out all they’d have to do is quickly swipe a sharp knife across the cuff and it would part and release the doors.

  “Too quick, LT,” Gonzales said when he saw what Sam had done. “Gotta blast and we don’t want to be in here when the C-4 goes boom.”

  “Shit,” Sam muttered, drawing his knife.

  Cutting the nylon, he pushed the door open and stepped through, keeping watch while the Master Chief worked. He had prepped his breaching charges before they left the institute and it was only a matter of a few moments of work to locate where he wanted to attach them, then insert the detonators.

  “Ready,” he said when he pushed back out into the rain with Sam.

  The two men moved to either side of the glass doors and placed their backs against the brick wall. Gonzales activated the remote trigger, lifted the protective gate that covered the “fire” button and pressed it with his thick thumb. There was a low crump of sound and the two glass doors pushed open a foot from the pressure wave.

  Gonzales grabbed one of them before it could swing shut and slipped back into the vestibule. It only took a moment to verify the locking mechanism had been blown out of the steel doors. He called the all clear to Sam and stood waiting by the breached entrance as the Lieutenant put a fresh flexi-cuff on the glass doors.

  When the outer doors were secure, the two SEALs stacked up and carefully pushed the large steel door on the right open a few feet. Nothing leapt at them and Gonzales kept pushing until it swung fully open. At a tap from Sam he moved, the Lieutenant tight against his back until they were through the opening. Separating, each man scanned a large lobby, seeing nothing alive.

  Satisfied the immediate area was clear of threats, the Master Chief led the way to the closest door. He had no idea where they were going, but they had to start somewhere. Reaching the door, which was made of a thick slab of laminated wood, he noted the dark keypad that restricted access.

  “Nuclear physics lab, right?” He mumbled to Sam.

  “Yeah, why?”

  “Just wondering if they had any experiments going when the shit hit the fan. You know, uranium or plutonium or some nasty shit that’s going to zap us as soon as we walk in.”

  “Afraid of a little radiation, Master Chief?”

  Sam noticed the sweat beading the man’s brow. Then realized he was sweating too. He knew enough about radiation exposure to scare him. All things considered he’d rather go back outside and fight a whole herd of infected.

  “Just thinking about the cojones, sir,” Gonzales said, reaching out and pulling the door open.

  A long hallway stretched out ahead of them. Several doors were spaced along it at uneven intervals. Not seeing any threats, they moved into the hall and Sam ke
pt a hand on the door so it closed softly.

  There were no decaying bodies in the area and both men breathed deeply even though the smell of rot had clung to their clothing and come into the untainted air with them. Hugging opposite walls, they moved deeper into the building, the soles of their boots nearly silent on the polished tile.

  For a moment, Sam had forgotten they were in a university, not a government building. He was pleasantly reminded when they came to the first door and after clicking on a small flashlight he was able to read a plaque that clearly labeled the room’s purpose. Government and military buildings typically only assign a number to a room, and if you don’t know what you’re looking for and don’t have a directory, you’re screwed.

  There’s good reason for this. It helps with keeping the facility more secure. But it’s a bitch if you don’t know your way around. A university, on the other hand, has a new batch of students showing up every year and those students need to be able to find their way around. So buildings, rooms and offices are normally well labeled. And that was the case here.

  The first door was a private office for the lab director. No need to even open the door. Moving on, they cleared three restrooms, one for men, one for women and one for families.

  They passed another office, a lecture hall and two storage rooms. Forcing the doors to the storage, they made a quick scan of the contents but quickly moved on when all they found were office and classroom supplies. The hall ended at a blank wall and they went back to the lobby, carefully entering in case anything had shown up while they were out of the area.

  Three more doors opened off the space, two of them leading to identical looking hallways, the third to a staircase that accessed the second floor of the building. They checked the other two halls, only finding more offices and several large lecture rooms. No labs.

  “Upper floor,” Sam mumbled as they moved back into the lobby.

  Gonzales nodded and they moved into the stairwell. Climbing slowly, they moved sideways, rifles up and trained on the second floor landing. Passing through the door at the top of the stairs, they entered a large vestibule with two doors opening from either side.

  “We’re in the right spot,” Sam pointed at both doors.

  He used his light to read the plaques bolted to the wooden surfaces. The signs read “Fission Research Labs”. Beneath it was a prominent radiation hazard symbol and another sign that stated “TLD BADGES REQUIRED BEYOND THIS POINT”.

  Gonzales nodded. He was familiar with dosimeter badges worn by people who work in proximity to radiation, such as an X-Ray tech in a hospital or anyone working near the nuclear reactor on an aircraft carrier. The badges were used to monitor a person’s cumulative exposure to radiation over a period of time.

  “Good lock,” he mumbled, dropping to a knee in front of the left hand door and reaching into his pack for a breaching charge.

  Sam checked the other door while Gonzales worked. The right side door was also secured with an additional label that read “Materials Storage”. When he reached out and tried the handle there was an immediate thump from the far side of the door, followed by loud pounding.

  He jumped back, his rifle snapping up as he moved far enough away to fight if something came through into the vestibule. Gonzales had stopped what he was doing, spinning and raising his rifle in response to the sounds. When it became apparent the door wasn’t going to open, Sam told him to continue with his work.

  “Ready,” the Master Chief said a moment later.

  Sam turned to take shelter from the blast in the stairwell, pausing when he heard more than thumping coming from the far side of the door. He took a step closer, turning his head to align his ear and hear better.

  “Hear that?” He said softly.

  Gonzales moved to stand next to him, also turning his head to find the best angle to try and hear what the Lieutenant was talking about. Both men listened carefully for several moments before the Master Chief shook his head.

  “All I hear is pounding, LT.”

  “Thought I heard a voice,” Sam said, finally shaking his head and following Gonzales into the stairwell.

  The breaching charge cleanly blasted the lock free of the door. The two SEALs quickly came out of the stairs and stepped up to the opening. Sam noted the door was very thick, mounted on six heavy hinges and two additional pivot support arms. A half-inch layer of lead was sandwiched between two layers of solid wood.

  Beyond was a broad hall with half a dozen doors. Each was a lab, labeled A through F. A and B had thick, leaded glass windows adjacent to their door which allowed observation from the hall. As they moved through the opening, Gonzales glanced to his right and held up a hand to stop.

  Two large, open front cabinets held a variety of equipment. From a rod mounted to the wall, a dozen full body radiation suits were on hangars. Sam thumbed the switch for his light, quickly scanning all of the gear. He stopped the light moving, shining it on a two-inch diameter, bright red button set into a stainless steel plate and sticking out from the wall.

  “It’s an emergency response station,” he said.

  Shifting position, he peered at the screen on a piece of equipment attached to the wall beneath the alarm button. It was dark, coming to life when he touched it. The display showed several different values, another string of number scrolling across the bottom. Looking closer, Sam recognized it was a sophisticated Geiger Counter, used to measure the radiation levels in the lab.

  “How bad?” Gonzales asked, recognizing the device.

  “Not bad. Inside,” Sam said, gesturing at the lead lined door. “And we’ve got everything we need right here.”

  He opened an empty duffel brought just for this purpose. Folding the radiation suits, he stuffed them inside while Gonzales kept watch. A large bottle of potassium iodide pills went in as well as a smaller Geiger Counter.

  “Think we should put these on before we go back outside?” Gonzales asked.

  Sam paused, considering the idea. He didn’t like the thought of wandering around in a radioactive environment with no protection, but the suits would restrict their movement and interfere with their hearing and vision. And they wouldn’t protect them from all the nasty Alpha, Beta and Gamma rays that could be bouncing around. All they would do is prevent radioactive dust, debris, and rain from coming in contact with their skin, or being inhaled as they breathed.

  “Lets see what the levels are when we go out,” he said, jamming more equipment into the bag before closing it up.

  Gonzales helped him lift and position it on his back. Once it was in place, Sam tightened the straps, bounced it a couple of times to get a more comfortable fit and tightened again. With what they came for, the two SEALs moved back into the vestibule and headed for the stairwell.

  The pounding from the far side of the other door had stopped and it took Sam a moment to realize the significance of the absence of the noise. Pausing, he signed for Gonzales to stay quiet before walking over to the far side of the room. Carefully, he leaned in and pressed his ear against the smooth, cool surface. He didn’t hear anything, but if this door also had a thick, lead core he didn’t think he would.

  He reached for the heavy lever that controlled the lock, Gonzales giving him a look that said he thought the LT was crazy. Sam hadn’t fought a lot of infected, but he’d been around them enough to learn that they didn’t give up. If there was an infected inside, why had it stopped pounding on the door?

  Grasping the handle, he jiggled it to make noise that would be clearly audible on the other side. A few moments passed in near perfect silence, then the steel lever moved slightly as it was pushed from the inside. Sam jerked his hand away like he’d received an electric shock, but kept his ear pressed against the wood. Very faintly he could hear a female voice crying out for help.

  29

  Jessica breathed a sigh of relief when the third layer of encryption fell. She had been working non-stop for several hours in her effort to break in to the Thor System and now had o
nly a final security measure to defeat. But it would be the most difficult as she had already determined it contained a rolling algorithm that would re-encrypt itself with a new key every six hours.

  Opening a new window on her terminal, she typed in a command. Leaning forward to view the lines of text that scrolled across the screen, she nodded when it told her what she already suspected. A new key would be generated in seventy-three minutes.

  There wasn’t enough time to crack the system before the security refreshed itself and she would have to start over from the beginning. Even a six-hour window was tight, and she wasn’t at all sure she would be able to complete her work in that timeframe. But it was a much greater possibility than only seventy-three minutes.

  Looking around she noted the Marine guard assigned to watch her. He was standing ramrod straight next to the exit, hands clasped behind his back as he kept his eyes focused on her. The man hadn’t moved in hours. Hadn’t shifted his feet, rolled his shoulder or even scratched his nose. She knew because she had been keeping half an eye on his reflection in one of her monitors that wasn’t in use.

  Jessica wanted a cigarette and a change of scenery. She was reaching for her keyboard to lock her terminal when her cell phone beeped. The cellular networks in Hawaii were still up and running, to some degree. There wasn’t a civilian internet or email any longer, and Facebook, Instagram and Twitter were things of the past.

  But local calls that could be routed by the switching equipment located on the islands would still go through. So would text messages. Picking up her phone, Jessica was surprised to see it was a message from Mark asking if she could take a break.

  A wave of heat flushed through her when she saw the words on the small screen. Why wasn’t he in custody? He should be sitting in an interrogation room with the Commander from NIS and a criminal investigator from NCIS. They should be grilling him about passing secrets to the Russians. But he was obviously running around, free as a bird, without a care in the world.