Vengeance (The Kurgan War Book 4)

by Richard Turner

  Cole walked over beside his friend. Both men scanned the crowd for any sign of another attacker hidden in their midst. They were about to lower their weapons and go check on Elba when an armed man stood up, grabbed hold of a terrified teenage girl, and pulled her close to him.

  “Get out of my way . . . or I’ll kill this girl,” stammered the man.

  Sheridan lowered his weapon and walked slowly toward the Chosen operative. “Let her go and I promise you no one will hurt you.”

  “You’re lying . . . now step aside and let me get into the nearest elevator.”

  Cole stood fixed in place. He watched every move the imposter made and followed him with the barrel of his pistol.

  “The elevators have all been locked,” explained Sheridan. “Please believe me when I tell you that you’re not going anywhere. So why don’t you let the girl go?”

  Nervous, sweat poured down the man’s face. He glanced over at the elevator trying to see if he was being lied to.

  “Look, I’ll put my gun down,” said Sheridan as he got down on one knee and placed his pistol down on the carpeted floor. With his hands held open to show that he was unarmed, Sheridan stood up.

  “What about the man behind you? He’ll kill me the instant I let the girl go.”

  “He’ll only shoot if you do something stupid. Now, what do you say? Lower your weapon and release the girl.”

  For a second, the gunman seemed to hesitate.

  Sheridan thought he was going to surrender when he let out a yell and turned his weapon toward him. His heart froze at the sound of the pistol firing. He expected to die. Instead, he saw the Chosen’s head snap back with a hole right between the eyes. The terrified hostage screamed and pulled the dead man’s arm from her shoulders and ran to her mother. Sheridan couldn’t believe that he was still alive. He turned his head and saw blood gushing from a wound on the bottom of Cole’s left ear.

  Cole lowered his pistol and reached a hand up to check the damage. When he saw his hand covered in blood, he grimaced and shook his head. “I guess I should have ducked.”

  “Let me grab something to staunch the bleeding,” said Sheridan as he dashed into the nearest bar, grabbed some clean towels, and gave them to Cole to apply to his wound.

  “How’s it look?” Cole asked.

  Sheridan grimaced. “I think you’re missing the bottom of your ear.”

  “Better that than another piece of machinery, if you catch my drift.”

  Sheridan shook his head. He looked around at the scene of devastation. When he couldn’t see Elba, his heart began to race. He called out, “Anne, it’s me, Michael, are you okay?”

  “Yes, I’m over here,” she replied.

  He heard the sorrow in her voice and ran to her side. He clenched his jaw when he saw her sitting on the floor holding her friend in her arms. It was obvious that the man was dead. “What happened?”

  “He was murdered by a Chosen traitor.” Her eyes were bloodshot and filled with tears.

  Sheridan looked over and saw the dead imposter lying face up on the ground. He let out a mournful sigh and placed a hand on Elba’s shoulder. “I’m sorry for your loss. I’m going to check on Master Sergeant Cole’s wound. Take a few minutes here if you like.”

  Elba nodded, lowered her head, and carried on rocking Blackstock in her arms.

  Sheridan turned about and noticed the two dead guards’ bodies lying in front of a shop. He walked over and picked up their compact assault rifles and all of the ammunition he could find. Sheridan checked that both weapons were loaded. Half the size of a military assault rifle, the R-76 Carbine had a three-hundred round drum along with an optical and laser sight. By the time he made his way to Cole’s side, his friend was being looked after by an off-duty nurse who had cleaned and dressed his wound. He handed Cole a carbine and two extra drums of ammunition.

  “How’s Anne?” Cole asked.

  “She’s okay, but her friend is dead.”

  “Damn. How’s she taking it?”

  Sheridan shook his head. “Not well.”

  Cole felt for the young woman. He took a deep breath, jammed his spare drums away, and checked that his weapon was on safe. “What I’d like to know is, how did they find us? I thought we were all but invisible with the stuff Vlad sold us.”

  “Perhaps someone got lucky and identified one of us from an old picture. Doesn’t really matter now. Harry knows we’re here and that’s all there is to it.”

  Cole looked up at a camera on the wall. “You could be onto something there. I think there are more cameras per kilometer up here than back down on Earth.”

  “Sir, what are we going to do now?” asked Elba, joining the discussion. In her hand was the scanning device Blackstock had been using to look for the virus.

  “Okay, here’s what we do know. Here on the station and back home on Earth there have been targeted attacks against government and military installations by Chosen insurgents. What they hope to achieve in the long run is still a bit unclear.”

  “I can’t see any of the attacks down on Earth succeeding,” offered Cole. “Sure they’ll inflict a few casualties but in the long run, our forces will cut them to ribbons.”

  “Casualties aren’t their focus. For now, fear and doubt among the civilian population is what they are after. What I don’t understand, at least not yet, is why they bothered with Tranquility Station.”

  “It’s the virus,” said Elba. “It’s here. Sean believed it and so do I. At some point, perhaps just before our people try to retake the station, they’re going to infect everyone here. If this place isn’t isolated, it will spread like wildfire through the human population killing billions and leaving us open to invasion by the Kurgs.”

  “She’s right,” said Cole.

  “Did your friend have an idea where the virus was being stored?” Sheridan asked.

  “He thought it was lower down in one of the station’s warehouses.” She held up her scanner. “He said he could find it with this device.”

  “Well, we’ve got to get you down there then,” said Cole, eyeing the nearest elevator.

  “But they’re locked.”

  “A lock is only a deterrent to an honest man.” With that, Cole walked to the nearest fire station, opened the metal case, and removed an ax. He swung it around in the air for a few seconds to get a good feel for the ax before stepping over to the elevator. “Step back,” he warned as he brought his arms back and then swung the ax right between the two closed halves of the door, splitting them open.

  Sheridan and Elba saw the opening, dashed over, grabbed the doors, and pulled back with all of their might. As soon as the doors were a shoulder width apart, Cole flipped the ax around and jammed it between the doors, holding them open.

  “Voila, our way off this floor,” announced Cole, pointing to a ladder bolted to the wall of the elevator shaft.

  Sheridan turned around and looked into the crowd of curious onlookers. He spotted a station guard, barely out of his teens, and waved him over. “What’s your name?” he asked the young man.

  “Crewman Rodger Ng,” replied the guard.

  “Well, Rodger, I’ve just drafted you into federal service. I need you to accompany Staff Sergeant Elba while she looks for a deadly virus possibly hidden on one of the floors below us.”

  Ng’s eyes widened. “Did you say a virus, sir?”

  “It’s a very nasty one too,” added Cole. “Now, you can wait here for it to be released or you can go with the good sergeant and help save not only your life but the lives of a quarter-million people.”

  Elba looked over at Sheridan. “Are you not coming, sir?”

  “No. I need to find out what is really going on up here and maybe stop whatever they’ve got planned. If Cole and I fail, then it’s all up to you and Rodger to prevent the virus from being used.”

  “Good luck, sir,” said Elba, holding out her hand.

  “You too, Anne,” Sheridan replied as he shook her hand. He watched as Anne a
nd Ng climbed out onto the ladder and began to climb down into the depths of the station.

  “So, what do you have in mind?” asked Cole.

  “What’s the easiest way to take a building?”

  “That’s easy. From the top down.”

  “Precisely.”

  Cole stuck his head in the tall shaft and looked up. “You do realize that we could climb for a week and still not reach the top of this thing.”

  “Why climb when you can fly?”

  Cole grinned. “I like where this is going. There are several airlocks below us on the loading docks on the outer ring.”

  “What are waiting for?” said Sheridan as he reached out and grabbed hold of the ladder.

  Cole waited until his friend was a floor below him before joining him. Before starting his climb, he grabbed hold of the ax and yanked it free. With a hiss, the elevator doors slid closed. He jammed the ax as best he could inside his coveralls and began to climb down. The only thing going for them, he thought, was that they were at least climbing down and not up to the loading docks.

  Chapter 22

  Solari bit the end of the nail on her thumb while she paced back and forth waiting for the signal from her accomplices that Dorset Station had been secured. The seizure of the command and control centers on Tranquility had gone far smoother than she had expected. With a war on, she had anticipated additional security guards to be placed throughout the vital areas of the installation. Yet when they struck, most of the sentries were not at their posts. Most had left their duty stations early to mingle at the bars with the civilians in the lower decks. If Colonel Rutland hadn’t been shot by Harry Williams, he would have been brought up on charges of negligence and dereliction of duty by the ADF when the dust settled.

  “Miss Solari, I’ve got them on a secure channel,” announced a Hispanic woman sitting at a console.

  Solari walked over, picked up a headset, and spoke into the mic. “Dorset, this is Tranquility, what is your status?”

  “Everything went according to plan,” replied Miguel. “We control the station and the command center.”

  “Is your perimeter secure?”

  “Yes.”

  “Casualties?”

  “Only one. A human technician was killed during the initial assault.”

  Solari smiled. They had done it. “Miguel, it won’t take the ADF long to figure out what has happened. Make sure that you can hold that base for at least twelve to twenty-four hours.”

  “Don’t worry. I have sufficient firepower to keep a company of soldiers at bay. Besides, I have plenty of hostages. I can use them as human shields if need be.”

  “Okay then. Good luck. I will be transmitting our demands to the federation president shortly.”

  Solari placed the headset down and turned to look at a display screen on the wall. On it was an image of the station. She studied it for a minute before looking over at Williams. “Harry, are all of the station’s defensive weapons’ systems fully operational?”

  Williams nodded and pressed a button on his keyboard. A second later, the automated gun batteries on the outer skin of the base showed up on the screen. Designed to protect the station from an enemy attack, the guns had been installed at the beginning of the war but were untried.

  “What is their effective range?” asked Solari.

  “I can create an impenetrable wall of fire out to five kilometers. After that the explosive warheads in the shells explode.”

  Solari nodded and spoke to the comms operator. “Put me on the base’s PA system.”

  “You’re on,” replied the woman.

  “Good evening, ladies and gentlemen. My name is Lieutenant Monica Solari. My people and I now control Tranquility Station. What I need you to do is stay calm and remain where you are until this incident is brought to a peaceful conclusion. I know that there are several hundred armed guards trapped below deck with everyone else. If you attempt to take back this installation by force, I will be compelled to open the airlocks on the floor you are on, killing you and everyone around you. As we control the command center, I can see what is happening on each and every deck. Play it smart and sit tight.”

  Solari ran a finger over her throat indicating to the operator to end the transmission. “Get me ADF Headquarters.”

  “I have their operations room online,” said the Hispanic woman.

  “Put them on the main screen.”

  The image of an ADF colonel came up on the screen. Solari recognized him as General Sadir’s executive assistant. “Good evening, Colonel MacDonald, I take it General Sadir and President Martinez have been whisked away to the Eagle’s Rock.” In the event of a direct threat to the life of the federation president, he and his chief advisors would be taken to a secure location deep inside the Swiss Alps until the crisis was over.

  “Yes, they are. Lieutenant, what is going on up there?”

  “In the name of the Kurgan Empire, I have taken control of Tranquility Station.”

  An exasperated look crept across the colonel’s face. “Lieutenant, you’re not making any sense. If this is some sort of joke, it is not the slightest bit funny. We’ve got hundreds of people killed and wounded in the streets down here. Where is General Wagner? I need to speak with him right away.”

  Solari snapped her fingers. A second later, two men hauled Wagner over beside her. His face was bruised and there was a strip of electrical tape across his mouth.

  “What the hell is going on?” demanded MacDonald. “Release the general this instant.”

  “No,” Solari replied, shaking her head. “Now, Colonel, make sure you pay close attention to what I am about to say. You will contact the president and inform him that he has twenty-four hours to enter into ceasefire negotiations with the Kurgan Empire, or I will kill every living soul on board this station. As a demonstration of my resolve, I am going to throw General Wagner out of the nearest airlock.”

  Wagner heard the words and struggled to escape but could not break the hold the two men had on him as he was dragged to the stairs and taken up to the next level where there was an airlock.

  “Okay, Lieutenant, I see you mean business,” said MacDonald as he impotently watched Wagner being taken away to his death. “You can let the general go. I’ll get in touch with the president and pass on your message.”

  Solari’s eyes lit up when she saw Wagner thrown into the airlock and the inner door closed, trapping him inside.

  “Lieutenant, if you do this, you will be held responsible.”

  “I don’t care. The man is a pig,” she replied, her voice as cold as ice.

  On the screen, one of the imposters reached over and pressed a button on a wall panel. The outer door opened and Wagner shot out into the cold vacuum of space to die of asphyxiation.

  Solari turned off the image from the airlock and switched her attention back to the main screen. “Colonel, I expect you to call me back in precisely one hour. I will have more directions for you at that time. One last thing, don’t try to storm this station. All of the perimeter guns are armed and operational. Any attempt will inevitably end in failure. Solari, out.”

  The screen went dark.

  Solari couldn’t but help but feel positive about how things were unfolding. Everything was going in their favor. She walked over to Williams’ station and looked down at the screen showing where all of her people were. She knew something was amiss when she noticed that the operatives sent to kill the human agent on the fourteenth floor weren’t moving. She tapped the monitor with her hand. “Bring up the cameras on the fourteenth floor.”

  She gnashed her teeth at the sight of several bodies lying on the ground in a row and covered with blood-soaked sheets. There were several station guards walking back and forth near the remains to keep onlookers away. Her anger, held in check so far, exploded. She lashed out with her hand and struck Williams in the mouth. “They’re dead. They’re all dead. I knew I was wrong to let you play your little games with the humans. Luring your fr
iend back to Earth was a mistake. Find the men who did this and kill them!”

  Williams sat up in his chair, wiped the blood from his split lip, and smiled at Solari. If her violent outburst had bothered him, he didn’t let it show. Instead, he turned his attention back to the security monitor and ignored her.

  Solari swore up a storm as she walked way. People in the room rushed to step to one side as she walked past them. When she was out of the control center, Williams reached down into a pocket on the leg of his coveralls and grabbed hold of a small communicator. He quickly typed in a message before placing the device back in his pocket.

  The game was about to change.

  Chapter 23

  With a swing of his ax, Cole split the sealed elevator doors open. A second later, Sheridan reached over and held the doors while Cole jammed his ax into place propping them open. Both men climbed up into the loading dock. Sheridan turned around and yanked the tool free, allowing the doors to close.

  A man in dirty coveralls sitting on a pile of crates saw them emerge and got to his feet. “Hey, didn’t you two idiots listen to that crazy woman’s warning? Are you trying to get us all killed?”

  Cole never hesitated. Like a trap springing, he shot his right fist into the man’s face, knocking him out cold. He scowled at a group of men sitting at a nearby table and said, “Anyone else want to tell me what to do?”

  The workers all shook their heads and looked away.

  “Well, that’ll endear us to the people we’re trying to protect,” said Sheridan to his friend.

  “Oh yeah, what would you have done?”

  “Same thing, you just beat me to it,” Sheridan replied as he handed the ax back to Cole.

  “That’s where we’re going,” announced Cole, pointing to a room further down the dock.

  As they walked, Sheridan glanced up at a surveillance camera on the wall and saw that it wasn’t following them. He nudged Cole and said, “I don’t think we’re being monitored anymore. Either the jammers are doing their job or our friends have bigger fish to fry right now.”