by Dirk Patton
“Negative, but thanks for the assist. Stay in the neighborhood in case the natives get restless,” I said, shooting another female.
“Copy. Sam one-niner standing by.”
I swear, when I told him to not shoot anything else, he almost sounded like a kid who just had his favorite toy taken away. For a moment I had a mental image of a little boy standing in the dirt, looking down as he pouted and dug the toe of his shoe into the ground.
“Dog team, let’s get busy,” I called on the radio. “Three, come to my position and take over.”
Dog three was TJ. Dutch had assured me the younger man was the best shot he’d ever seen and I wanted him keeping the females knocked down as the rest of us worked on getting the generators up and running.
Seconds later the Ranger knelt down next to me, rifle up and a round going downrange before he had even stopped moving. A female climbing over the top of the fence flipped backwards and landed in the slowly thinning throng.
“Showoff,” I said.
He grinned without looking up and began squeezing off fast shots. Not hanging around to see the results, I ran to where the team had already gathered around the fuel bladder.
“Edwards, kill the strobes,” I ordered as I grabbed a reel of hose and headed for the north end of the roof.
I didn’t want the strobes left on in case any Russian patrols happened to swing by to check out the two brightly burning fires. It was possible they’d pass them off as something caused by the massive herd of infected. But if they saw IR strobes flashing away on the roof of a building, they wouldn’t have to be the smartest of Ivans to figure out Americans were on the ground.
33
The reel of hose was heavy and I was puffing with exertion by the time I reached the northern edge of the roof. Leaning out and looking down, I spotted two giant generators fifty yards to my right. Trotting to a spot directly over them, I set my burden down and stuck my head over the low parapet. Dutch ran up behind me and dropped a coil of fifty feet of fuel line before grabbing the end of the hose on my reel and dragging it back along the path to the bladder.
With Chico and Drago helping, he would get the hoses laid out and connected. It just so happened I was the most mechanically inclined of the group and had responsibility for getting down to ground level to start the generators. That wasn’t necessarily a good thing. I knew about enough to be dangerous.
As Blanchard and I were throwing this whole thing together in record time, I’d had the thought that it would be good to have a diesel mechanic along for the ride. There’s plenty of them in the Army, trained to maintain all sorts of heavy engines, but none had made the trip from the Bahamas. Combat troops and aircraft mechanics only.
Shrugging out of my pack, I looked around and spotted a large air conditioning unit a few yards away. It was really big and probably weighed well over a ton. Running to it, I secured a climbing rope to one of the steel struts that anchored it to the roof, tugging hard to make sure it was secure. Returning to the edge, I tossed the coil over and watched it play out and slap against the ground.
Next I connected an end of the coiled fuel line Dutch had delivered to a port in the center of the reel. Slapping the connector until I was satisfied it was seated properly, I stood and looked across the roof. I could see the three Rangers, along with Edwards, finishing hooking up the hoses.
“Dog three, one. Status?” I said into the radio as I waited.
“They’re still coming over,” TJ answered and I heard two suppressed shots over the radio as he spoke. “Males have mostly pulled away to the diversions, but females are still pressing in.”
“Copy,” I said. “Break. Dog two, stay with three. Everyone else on me.”
Dutch acknowledged the order and a moment later I saw him run to TJ’s position as the others began running across the roof to where I waited. When they arrived, I told Chico and Drago to watch the area as I pulled on my pack, picked up the rope and backed up to the parapet.
“What can I do?” Edwards asked, continuing to impress me.
“Feed the fuel line to me when I tell you. And stay glued to him and be safe,” I said, nodding in Drago’s direction as I stepped over the edge and put my boots against the exterior wall.
The rope was tightly gripped in my hands and I began walking backwards down the vertical surface. Halfway to the ground, I paused and looked over my shoulder when suppressed rifle fire sounded from the parapet above. One of the Rangers, I couldn’t tell which one, had taken out two females who were charging the wall. Glad they were keeping an eye out, I kept moving and stepped onto the smooth concrete at ground level a few seconds later.
I was in a large area that stuck out from the exterior of the building probably thirty feet and was at least as wide. An eight-foot chain link fence surrounded it, protecting the equipment. And me too, I thought as three females slammed against the wire trying to reach me. They were quickly put down by my teammates and I forced myself to ignore them and focus on the task at hand.
The two generators were actually giant diesel engines bolted to the thick slab they rested on. Both were bright yellow, emblazoned with “Caterpillar” across the smooth sheet metal that covered them. Each was taller than me and ten feet long.
Before I bothered to spend time fueling the tanks I needed to make sure the motors would start. That meant finding an override panel on each to verify their batteries hadn’t been drained. The units were wired into the buildings electrical supply from the local utility, equipped to detect a loss of power, or a drop in voltage below a pre-determined threshold, from the grid. If that happened, they would automatically start and supply power until whatever had caused the problem was resolved and electricity was flowing again.
There were likely very large tanks buried beneath my feet that had kept them running for some extended period of time. Certainly long enough to bridge the gap between loss and restoration of power. But the grid hadn’t come back on line. That requires human intervention to make sure the few thousand different things that go into supplying power to a city were all in working order. Without the power coming on, the generators had run until they consumed all available fuel.
My hope was that these were the more sophisticated units that also monitored the level of diesel in the tank and shut the engine down before it completely ran dry and air was sucked in by the fuel pumps. If that happened, this wasn’t going to be easy. A diesel engine that has been run dry to that point can be a bitch to restart. It’s not like the gasoline engine in your car that all you have to do is dump in some more and turn the key.
Moving around the exterior of the closest generator, I forced myself to not get distracted by the steady rate of fire from over my head. I didn’t think the fence had been breached, so where the hell were the infected coming from? I’d worry about that later. First things first.
I finally located the service panel on the opposite side. It was secured with a simple key lock and I forced it open with my Ka-Bar, slapping the door out of my way. Raising the night vision goggles off my face, I clicked on a small light and peered at the panel. It was a simple, touch screen interface with a red and green button beneath, and I couldn’t figure out how to get it to come on.
Touching the screen didn’t bring it to life. Pushing the buttons yielded the same results. Nothing. I didn’t know if it was me doing something wrong or a dead battery. Running to the other generator, I forced the panel open and had identical results. Shit. OK, at least we’d had the foresight to bring a battery with us.
“Dog four, Dog one. I need power,” I said to Chico over the radio.
While he ran back to where the helicopter had dropped our equipment, I began checking to see if there was air in the line. Finding the big fuel filter, I cracked open the bleed valve, cursing when nothing happened. Fuel should have come out.
Digging some tools out of my pack, I removed the fuel filter while I called Edwards on the radio and told him to feed the line down to me. Before I hooked up the bat
teries and tried to start the engines, I needed to prime the system by filling the filters. Hopefully that would displace enough air for the engines to start. Placing the filter on the ground, I headed for the other generator.
Taking a moment, I lowered my night vision goggles and looked out across the parking lot. There were a large number of dead females scattered around the area, taken down by the Rangers watching over me. Unfortunately, there was an even larger number coming in my direction. Shit on a stick, where were they coming from?
I didn’t have time to worry about it. Had to trust the rifles above, and fence around the area, to keep me safe. Quickly I removed the other fuel filter and snatched the line off the ground. Cracking open the valve on the end, I had to wait for diesel to flow from the bladder on the far side of the roof. It took a while, the volume of infected increasing as I fought my impatience.
Females were slamming against the fence and their numbers continued to grow. Drago was forced to stop engaging them as they approached, spending all his time just knocking down the ones that were trying to scale the barrier that was keeping me alive.
“Battery coming down.”
I looked up when I heard Chico’s voice in my earpiece. A large battery taken from a damaged Hummer was being lowered at the end of a rope. Turning my attention back to the task at hand, I was relieved when thick fuel began running out of the line and into the open end of the filter. It filled quickly and I closed the valve and reinstalled it. Running to the other unit I repeated the process.
I spent several precious minutes looking for the fuel tank, not spotting it. Where the hell would they have put it? Then a bad thought hit me. They probably wouldn’t want to have to open up the secure area where the generators were located every time they received a fuel delivery. Raising the goggles, I turned the flashlight back on and began searching for the filling point.
When I spotted it, I muttered a string of curses. A long pipe, secured to the wall, stuck up out of the ground ten feet outside the fence. Fuck me. There were about fifty females in the immediate area and I didn’t think they would let me just stroll out and stick the fuel line in the filler tube.
34
Lucas Martin stood waiting for the first of two security doors to open. It was heavy steel with a small window set at head height. As a loud buzzer sounded, it slid open and he stepped through, another identical door impeding his progress. Buzzer still assaulting his ears, the door behind him closed with a hard thump.
To Lucas’ right was a large, wire reinforced window. On the other side a man wearing an Australian RAAF uniform watched him, hands resting on the controls for the sally port. He nodded at Lucas and a uniquely different sounding buzzer went off as the second door went into motion.
Foul air immediately flowed through the opening and made Lucas crinkle his nose. Sour sweat, fear, anger, despair and the sharp tang of human urine all mixed together to create the nauseating odor of a prison. Ignoring it, he walked through into a long, well lit hallway. Behind him the second door closed with an ominous thud.
Lucas was entering a prison that didn’t have a name and didn’t officially exist. Known only as “the cottage”, it was located deep in the Western Australia desert and was built completely underground. There were no roads and nothing above the surface other than what appeared to be a dilapidated house on an abandoned sheep station.
Numerous air and ground defensive weapons were well concealed in the surrounding terrain. They would engage any vehicle or aircraft that came too close to the entrance, unless it had been pre-authorized. Lucas had arrived in a RAAF helicopter that carried the correct transponder codes to allow it to approach and land. It was painted to match a popular helicopter tour company that operated out of Perth, and was just part of the landscape to the locals.
After getting off the phone with John, Lucas had started making calls. His CO was the first, and his request had gone up the food chain from there. Only his badgering, by seeking the help of fellow NCOs who could put a bug in their CO’s ears, had gotten him permission. And he had received it in record time. He owed his life to his American friend and wasn’t going to fail when that man asked for his help.
Walking down the hall, he passed a number of high security doors that lined each side. They were offset from each other so when one was open, the occupant could only see a blank wall on the opposite side of the corridor. These were maximum security cells that housed some of the most dangerous people Australia had encountered.
None of the doors were labeled other than by a simple, two-digit number painted in black on the smooth, battleship grey surface. Somewhere in the prison were a couple of men Lucas had been involved in capturing, but he didn’t care about them and wasn’t here to renew old acquaintances. He was here to see the turncoat American CIA officer, Steve Johnson.
At the far end of the hall another man in a RAAF uniform waited for him. Lucas walked up and held out his ID badge. The man held it over a tablet computer, waiting as the RFID chip in the badge was interrogated. A beep sounded from the tablet and the man peered at it briefly before handing Lucas his ID and tapping a series of commands on the screen. A door to his rear buzzed and began trundling open. The man stepped aside and gestured for Lucas to enter.
The room was small, cramped, and very stark. The floor, walls and ceiling were painted bright white. Harsh light from an overhead bank of recessed fluorescent tubes reflected off every surface, making Lucas squint when he stepped through the door. A surveillance camera was mounted in each corner of the room at ceiling height, recording everything that was said and done from four different angles.
The heavy door closed behind Lucas with a solid boom and he took one step forward and sat in an un-upholstered metal chair. The seat and back were hard and cold, but he didn’t notice. Opposite him, across a small metal table that was bolted to the floor, sat Steve.
He was dressed in a fluorescent orange jump suit and wore shackles at his wrists and ankles which were connected to a length of chain that encircled his waist. The short length of chain that connected his wrists was locked to a stout metal ring bolted to the seat of his chair.
Steve looked like hell. His face was slack. Black circles darkened the skin around his eyes, which were dull. Defeated. Lifeless. His hair was buzzed close to his scalp and he was clean shaven and bathed, but Lucas knew that was only due to the strict hygiene rules enforced by the guards.
“Who are you?” Steve asked after several minutes of silence during which he studied Lucas’ face.
“I’m no one,” Lucas said.
He had worn a mask during the raid when Steve was captured, his face hidden. He didn’t continue speaking, letting the uncomfortable silence draw out.
“What do you want?” Steve asked, clearly nervous.
“I need you to help me work something out,” Lucas said, noting the instant dilation of Steve’s pupils.
“What?”
Lucas made a show of opening a file folder and reading its contents. He hadn’t brought a file on Steve, didn’t need one. The folder had been borrowed from one of the guards that had checked him in to the prison and was full of blank paper Lucas had grabbed out of a printer. He spoke as he turned pages, appearing to read from documents.
“You are Stephen Ridley Johnson. Born in Utica, New York in the United States. And you are an officer of the Central Intelligence Agency. Correct so far?”
Lucas looked up, miming the head position of someone peering over the top of a pair of reading glasses. Steve nodded, audibly swallowing, and Lucas continued.
“You betrayed your country. Made a deal with the Russians. Murdered another CIA officer. Still correct?”
Steve stared at him, the hope that had appeared in his eyes fading as he listened to Lucas. He didn’t acknowledge or deny the accusations.
“The only law you’ve broken in Australia is committing murder. There’s even some doubt about that. The argument is being made that the outpost was technically US soil. Kind of like an
embassy. Perhaps you haven’t committed any crimes over which Australia has jurisdiction.”
Lucas closed the file and placed it on the table in front of him, watching the impact of his words on Steve. Hope flared anew and he tried to sit straight, coming up against his restraints with a jingle of chains pulling taut against the metal ring.
“What do you want?” Steve asked, his voice sounding strong for the first time.
“Are you familiar with the CIA system that allows activation of beacons embedded in the person of specific officers?”
Steve paused a beat before nodding.
“Can you access the database that holds the codes for each person?”
“Why do you need that?” Steve asked.
“You don’t want to be asking questions,” Lucas said. “You want to be answering them.”
“Why? What do I get out of it?” Steve asked.
“Now that’s a good question. But the better question is what do you get if you don’t cooperate. The Americans want you back. With what’s going on over there, I suspect they don’t have the resources to keep you in a nice, safe prison cell. Besides, don’t you Americans execute traitors?”
Steve stared at Lucas, Adam’s apple bobbing up and down.
“Yes, I can get in,” he said after a moment. “But you can’t send me back! You’re right. They’ll execute me. And you said it yourself. I haven’t committed any crime in or against Australia. Let me go and I’ll help. I’ll even leave Australia if you want!”
Steve’s voice rose and he spoke in a rush, grasping for a lifeline he had thought he’d never see.
“First, I need to know you can really do this,” Lucas said. “Then we’ll discuss what’s going to happen with you. Tell me how you would access the database.”
“If I tell you how, you don’t need me any longer,” Steve whined, panic spreading through him.