He swallowed the mouthful of pork rinds and plucked another handful from the cling-wrap. He paused. The mechanical sound was louder. It was a grinding noise, like someone was mowing a lawn or starting a chainsaw. Here in the airport it seemed strangely out of place. Whatever it was, it was surging through the skyway toward him. It sounded close. Too close. He had no idea what the hell it was but he decided it was time to move.
He dropped the pork rinds and started running, hands out in front of him. There wasn’t much light creeping into his vision to guide him, so he felt his way through the darkness. He reached a metal railing. Under it, glass. He tried to remember what Concourse A had looked like when he’d walked through earlier. If he was where he thought he was, he was standing right over the train station platform. There was a weird artistic display that looked like a spaceship with four blue obelisks embedded in fake sand. As the groaning object rushed closer, he wished the fake sand was real sand.
He hurled himself over the railing and hung there for as long as possible. Then dropped down—into nothing.
The fake sand was a fiberglass-like surface that was rough on his knees. He rolled down it, banging into things along the way. Then he hit a fucking obelisk. It took the breath from him. There was no time to feel sorry for himself. He pulled himself up and pressed himself against the cold concrete wall.
The glass balcony just above him exploded. Something large and heavy smashed through it, soared hot over his head. He covered his eyes and ears and pulled himself tightly into a ball. He heard it crunch through the obelisks, graze over the spaceship, then plummet into the train station.
Silence.
Footsteps approached from above, on the skywalk. He opened his eyes. Blurred shapes and colors danced around. His vision was slowly returning. A hand grabbed his and pulled him up. Damien’s face was a blur of light and dark that swirled together and eventually took shape.
‘What the shit was that?’ Jay yelled.
‘Oh, that thing that went past?’ Damien said. ‘I think it was a subsonic stealth bomber.’
***
Damien didn’t need to lip-read any more. Jay’s voice was muffled but Damien could understand him. Quickly, he powered on the shielded radio, pleased to discover it worked. Jay stood beside him, rubbing his eyes furiously.
‘Sophia, this is Damien,’ he said. ‘We’re in Concourse A and we have the radios.’
No one responded. Damien checked the channel again. It was the encrypted channel, but Sophia wasn’t responding. No one was.
Jay clipped a mic to his collar. ‘Soph, are you there?’
Still nothing. She hadn’t switched to her shielded radio yet.
Damien shared a concerned look with Jay, then saw familiar faces across the skywalk. Denton and Chickenhead. As they moved closer, he could see their skin glistened with sweat and they looked exhausted.
‘Where’s Nasira?’ Jay said.
‘Last we saw she was facing off against Pariahs in Garage West,’ Denton said. ‘I wasn’t going near those damn things.’
Jay grabbed a spare radio and started off down the skywalk. ‘I’m going to find her. Damien, you coming?’
Damien hesitated. ‘No. I’m going down.’
Jay stopped in his tracks. ‘What? You’re not supposed to go in the OpCenter. You told me you were going to stay on the surface.’
‘I changed my mind,’ Damien said. ‘Again.’
‘Don’t do that,’ Jay said. ‘That’s suicide.’
Chickenhead held up his hands. ‘Can you not say that? I’m going down too.’
Damien could see Jay grinding his jaws as he thought it over. ‘Fine,’ he said. ‘Just don’t get yourself killed.’
‘It’s you I’m worried about,’ Damien said.
Jay headed for the skywalk. ‘You’re doing it for her, aren’t you?’
‘I don’t know what you mean.’
Jay stopped walking and turned around. ‘You want Grace to make it out alive. And the only way you can do that is to go down there with her.’
‘Yeah,’ Damien said. ‘Guess I’ll see you soon.’
Chapter Fifty-Seven
Jay made it across the skywalk and clambered down the destroyed escalator. He couldn’t believe Damien was going down to the OpCenter because of Grace. There were better things to die for. And Grace wasn’t one of them.
The body and luggage scanners in Jeppesen terminal had been overturned and smashed by the Dominator. Jay stepped over the wreckage, his Glock 39 in one hand. Directly ahead was the fountain, which now resembled a meteor crater. The roof above was torn where the Dominator had sliced through. He kept his pistol half-raised as he made his way along the western edge of the terminal. Something moved in the corner of his vision. He snapped his barrel toward it and found himself staring down the barrel of another Glock.
Nasira lowered her pistol. ‘What the hell, Jay.’
Aviary peered out from behind her. ‘Hi.’
Jay pulled a working radio from his pocket. ‘Here.’
Nasira took the radio. ‘Abraham’s men in Garage West are toast.’
‘What happened?’ Jay asked as he led them back to the destroyed escalator.
‘Pariahs ripped them to shreds. At least, until we detonated the EMP.’
‘Pariahs are the least of our concerns,’ Jay said. ‘We just ran into a bunch of Liberators.’
Nasira stopped in her tracks. ‘No shit?’
Jay surveyed the terminal once more. ‘No shit. The advance team—minus you, of course—and the infiltration team are ready to go in. What’s going on with the rest of Abraham’s grunts?’
‘We’ve fortified the hotel south of Jeppesen terminal,’ a voice boomed. ‘It’s got some height to it so we have a view of the entire airport perimeter.’
Jay looked across to see Abraham approaching, flanked by two men. ‘Wasn’t expecting to see you down here, Colonel.’
‘Abraham will suffice,’ he said. ‘I can only assume you’ve been communicating on a channel we don’t have the encryption key for. Resourceful, I’ll give you that.’
Jay cleared his throat but Nasira got in first. ‘You’re here to complain about the EMP? Save it, pal.’
Abraham’s face remained obstinate. ‘No. You managed to avoid collateral damage, this time. It does bother me, though, that you did this behind my back. I’m not a big fan of deception unless I’m the one implementing it.’
‘It was either that or be incinerated by the Fifth Column’s bombing run,’ Jay said.
‘Son, I’m not here to second-guess God’s work,’ Abraham said. ‘I’m here because Sophia needs our help. We’re joining the infiltration team. Feel free to let her know we’re on our way.’
‘I’m sure she’ll be pleased,’ Jay said, watching as Abraham and his men climbed the destroyed escalator. He turned to Nasira, who simply shrugged.
‘His funeral,’ she said.
Jay jumped on the radio. ‘This is Jay. You there, Soph?’
‘I’m here,’ Sophia said. ‘Had to switch radios.’
‘Just a heads up. Abraham wants in on your little group. He’s heading your way with two others.’
‘Oh, great,’ Sophia said.
***
Sophia kneeled down inside the corridor, checking her kit. Grace, Denton, Chickenhead and Damien were all doing the same. She had unpacked three of her four portable EMPs and all the Blue Beret uniforms so everyone could get changed. They each now wore Blue Beret kit—black boots, helmets and fatigues—over their existing police or civilian clothing. Sophia was the only one not wearing a helmet. She wanted to be their prisoner, caught impersonating a Blue Beret.
‘SWAT are staying clear for as long as DC can delay them. Even an hour should be enough,’ Denton said. ‘With a good enough distraction—like blowing up the hotel—we can slip out without anyone being the wiser.’
‘We have the FBI patches,’ Sophia said. ‘We won’t need to blow anything up.’
‘That
’s a shame,’ Denton said. ‘It’s been over a decade since I demolished a building.’
Sophia pivoted on her knee, pistol aimed down the tunnel as the door opened. A silhouette appeared; she recognized the sword hilt that protruded over the shoulder.
‘You’re meant to be in the control tower,’ she said.
‘The jaguar knights have it under control. Excuse the pun,’ DC said. ‘Besides, I think you need all the help you can get.’
‘No,’ Sophia said. ‘You think that after coming this far you’re not going to sit around in some boring control tower while the other kids have all the fun.’
‘I wouldn’t call this fun,’ Damien said. ‘We might not even survive this.’
‘This is a great pep talk,’ Chickenhead said.
Sophia tossed DC black fatigues and a helmet. ‘Since you’re here now, you may as well saddle up.’
Abraham was next to appear, followed by two of his men. They all carried SCARs and were dressed to impress in Blue Beret uniforms.
‘You’re not on the team, Colonel,’ Sophia said.
‘Abraham,’ he said. ‘And I am now.’
Sophia glared at him, then shook her head. ‘You will do what I say when I say. I don’t care if you’ve commanded an entire regiment. If you’re coming down, you’re coming down under my orders.’
Abraham’s face split into a grin. ‘You wouldn’t even be going in there if it weren’t for me. This is how it’s going to work: you give me the closed channel and the encryption so we can communicate like adults. Once you’ve done that, you command your team, I command mine. It’s really quite simple.’
‘Right up until the part where you get yourself killed,’ Sophia said.
‘Since you seem to be adept at these … unconventional situations, I won’t object,’ Abraham said. ‘I command my men, you advise me.’
‘I really don’t have time for this,’ she said.
‘None of us do,’ he said. ‘The clock’s ticking.’
Denton shook his head. ‘Just bring him along.’
The men on either side of Abraham watched Sophia guardedly. She could see they were no threat to her directly, they were just following orders. The Colonel had given them purpose again and they weren’t about to disavow that. She reached into her daypack and showed Abraham all four portable EMPs.
‘We’ll hand them out once we’ve taken security command,’ she said.
‘Do you have enough Magpuls for us?’ Abraham asked, noticing everyone’s new weapons.
‘No, we don’t. We’ll have to make do. You can form up at the rear of our team. Leave your SCARs here.’
Abraham reluctantly placed his SCAR inside one of the duffel bags. ‘And the face recognition in the tunnel?’ he asked.
‘Fried,’ Denton said, handing him three RFIDs and a roll of duct tape. ‘Tape these to your left forearms.’
‘Once we’re inside we still have Blue Beret patrols to contend with, if we’re unfortunate enough to attract their suspicion,’ Sophia said. ‘But our main concern is the 1st Command and Control Squadron.’
‘How many Blue Berets in the Control Squadron?’ Abraham asked. ‘Three hundred? A thousand?’
‘One dozen,’ Denton said.
Abraham laughed. ‘You had me worried there.’
‘That’s because they aren’t Blue Berets,’ Sophia said. ‘They’re Elohim, Cecilia’s personal guards. Ex-operatives like us. Dual-layer programming, pulsed-energy rifles. Trust me, you don’t want to tango with these guys.’
Abraham nodded. It was the first time she’d seen him look a little worried.
She hit the pressel switch on her collar. ‘This is Sophia. Report in.’
Jay was the first. ‘This is Jay. Jeppesen terminal, with Nasira and Aviary.’
The rest of the team were with Sophia, so that was a quick report.
She nodded to Abraham. ‘Your squadrons.’
Abraham asked for a sitrep and she waited patiently while each squad reported in.
He looked concerned. ‘Two squads at the hotel are fine. FAA control room on the other hand, they’re not reporting in.’
‘Don’t tell me SWAT’s on us already.’ Sophia turned to DC. ‘I thought you had them pinned down.’
‘I do,’ DC said. ‘They won’t breach. Not yet.’
‘We need to go check,’ Abraham said. ‘They should be answering.’
‘No, we’re going to the OpCenter now,’ Sophia said. ‘You’re here now, you come with us.’ She held down her pressel switch again. ‘Jay, Nasira, I need you to check the FAA control tower. We’ve lost contact there.’
Nasira’s voice crackled in her ear. ‘On it. Sending Aviary back to the hotel with an escort of Abraham’s men. She’ll be safer there.’
‘Be careful. And once you’re done, fall back to the hotel with Aviary and wait for us to return,’ Sophia said. ‘We’re going in now.’
Chapter Fifty-Eight
Jay and Nasira ran through the tunnel, passing under Concourses A, B and C. The last two were some distance apart and Jay had to stop at regular intervals to catch his breath. He was already sleep-deprived and tired from the operation so far.
‘Out of shape?’ Nasira said.
‘No,’ he panted. ‘Just. Need. A minute.’
Nasira waited impatiently. Although she had a flashlight mounted to her Glock, she was relying on his vision to detect any danger early on. Jay was cool with that. He wasn’t too keen on encountering another handful of Liberators.
‘I forgot how much of a pain in the ass you are,’ she said.
‘Yeah,’ Jay said between gasps. ‘But I’m worth it.’
Nasira rolled her eyes and started running again. He chased her and, much to his relief, they made it to Concourse C without incident. He’d only needed to stop eight times. Nasira used the push lever to open the transit station doors. They stepped out onto the platform. Above them, a small Learjet hung from steel cables. Jay knew this was the worst point of entry: they were open to all three levels of balconies above.
Moving for the inactive escalator, they reached the ground floor. The train station roof was styled with strange rectangular stone formations, ferns and other plants. Entry to the control tower was on the third floor. They had to take several more escalators just to get there. The elevator was useless of course, so they needed to breach the stairwell.
Without DC’s key, Nasira had to pick the lock. It took her a few minutes but once she had all the pins set she opened the door and switched on her Glock’s mounted flashlight. Jay moved through and shut the door behind them. He went first, his vision bleeding into infrared. Nasira’s flashlight swept across the stairwell, blinding him.
‘Not … in my eyes,’ he said.
‘Sorry,’ Nasira said. ‘Not really.’
Jay climbed the stairs. By the time he reached the top he was ready to collapse. ‘Really need to start running again,’ he said.
‘You think?’
She pushed past him and carefully opened the door. Keeping herself pinned to the wall, she left it ajar for Jay’s barrel. He stayed in infrared, waiting for targets to present themselves. There were bodies on the floor, a soft yellow color, their limbs bluish. He recognized the sickly sweet odor of human blood.
Nasira crouched and turned away to cover the other side of the control tower. Jay let her cross underneath him, then he moved forward, checking the edge of his arc. They were both inside now, standing at opposite sides of the door. Nasira let the door close behind them.
‘They’ve been dead for some time,’ Jay said.
Nasira checked the pulse of every jaguar knight and traffic controller, in case someone was playing dead. But everyone’s eyes were open.
‘Gunshot trauma,’ she said. ‘Except for this one.’ She kicked a jaguar knight’s body over. His head was missing, and it was a clean cut. ‘Whatever that was, it was a very sharp blade.’
‘Yeah, that’s interesting,’ Jay said. ‘In an I-don’t-want-to-be-h
ere sort of way.’
The 360-degree glass panels were decorated with gunfire holes. Some of the panes were splashed with blood that was already dripping downward and drying a dark crimson.
Nasira looked at him. He’d never seen her this unnerved before. ‘Liberators?’ she said.
It didn’t make sense, he thought. ‘How could they get up here? The door wasn’t breached.’
‘SWAT maybe. Snipers.’
Jay instinctively crouched, but a quick infrared survey of the taxi- and runways below yielded no sign of life. Beyond the concourses and maintenance buildings, there weren’t really many places to hide on a featureless five-mile-wide property.
‘Doesn’t explain the decapitated body,’ he said.
He took the opportunity to steal a SCAR 17S rifle from one of the fallen jaguar knights. Nasira did the same.
‘Whoever it was, they were definitely inside the control tower,’ she said.
‘Shocktroopers?’ Jay hated to say it, but it was the only possible explanation right now.
He hit his pressel switch. ‘Soph, you read?’
Nasira shook her head. ‘They’ll be under the surface.’
She picked up the cell DC had been using to speak to the SWAT negotiator. It was in two pieces. She picked out the SIM card, only to find it was cracked.
‘That’s not good,’ she said.
‘Let’s get back to the hotel,’ Jay said.
Together, they moved down the pitch-black stairwell. Nasira exited first, Jay a few paces behind, and Nasira walked right into the path of a Liberator. Jay’d missed it with his infrared vision.
‘Oh, fucking hell,’ she said.
Jay snapped back to normal vision. They were too far from the stairwell to dive back in for cover. He watched as Nasira aimed her SCAR rifle and opened fire, punching rounds into its underbelly of shiny weaponry.
The Seraphim Sequence: The Fifth Column 2 Page 48