by L. T. Ryan
The woman on the other side of the window had retreated against the far wall at the sound of the gunfire and bullets hitting the window. She was kneeling on the floor, her right arm covering her head. Sean found the behavior peculiar, and he wondered if these creatures were similar to humans in that they had their own quirks and fears and desires.
The woman rose from her crouched position and rushed the glass. Her appearance seemed distorted as she crossed the hall, almost like a blur. He recalled Gilmore saying that the man’s head shimmered, up on the hill, moments before that same man killed him.
“She’ll move on.”
Sean spun around and planted his back against the glass. Karl did the same a few feet away from him. They both held their pistols out and aimed at the figure in the middle of the open doorway in the back of the room.
A small, fragile man with wisps of white hair atop his head and a thick white beard framing his face stepped out from the darkness. He held a pistol in his hand, but appeared to be careful not to aim it at the men.
Eight
“What was that?” Turk cast a glance over his shoulder and saw that none of his men offered up an explanation in regards to the noise he’d heard. It sounded like a knock on a door, but so far the hallway walls were solid on both sides. No doors, no windows. A shriek followed the sound, but the sounds of people screaming had become commonplace, and he couldn’t tell if the yell was related to the knocking. “All right, let’s keep moving. Keep your eyes open.”
The feeling that they were being followed had been with Turk the entire time they’d been inside the facility. It was something he couldn’t shake, which was unusual. Turk was the kind of man who could push anything aside in order to focus on the task at hand.
He’d noticed the cameras when they exited the tunnel that led in from the outside. They were mounted near the ceiling throughout the facility and were protected by plastic bubbles. He figured the cameras were off, since they didn’t move, and there weren’t any indicator lights blinking. Then again, maybe whoever installed them was smart and placed electrical tape over the lights. It didn’t matter, though. Turk was paranoid and he figured it was the presence of the cameras that made him so.
Or perhaps it was the fear that the building was full of those things.
The hallway opened up to the right, twenty feet ahead. They were near the center of the facility, close to the stairwell, still on the first floor. Turk stopped, motioned for Bates to step forward. He resumed walking once Bates fell in next to him. The two men moved on, took three steps, stopped to listen. Turk heard nothing other than the faint hum of the fluorescent lights. The sound had been present everywhere they’d been in the building, and it was a little unsettling that he hadn’t tuned the noise out.
Turk and Bates stood five feet from the corner that led to the opening he expected would lead them to the stairwell. He stooped over and closed his eyes, hoping that doing so would enhance his other senses. It was a maneuver that had paid dividends in the past. Thirty seconds passed and Turk prepared to open his eyes and resume his approach. Then he noticed a dull thumping sound.
“Hear that?” he whispered to Bates.
“I just hear that damn humming,” Bates replied.
“Listen,” Turk said. “Close your eyes and listen.”
Turk noticed that Bates attempted to steady his breathing. A move, he figured, to help the man better attune himself to the environment.
“Thump, thump, thump,” Bates whispered, mimicking the sound that Turk heard over the electrical buzz above them.
Was the thumping getting louder because he was aware of it? Or because it was getting closer? He decided if the cause was the latter, he wanted the team in formation and ready to act.
Turk motioned for the rest of the SEALs to join him and Bates. The men moved into position. Together, they approached the corner. Turk squatted and eased himself past the wall. The barrel of his submachine gun left the safety of the concrete barrier. His head followed. The hallway stood empty. He saw steel handrails mounted against the wall on both sides, about waist high. The rails led to the descending stairwell.
“Let’s go,” he said.
The SEALs moved down the hallway toward the stairwell, each man’s movements in time with the man next to or in front of him, as if they’d choreographed it. They were silent killers. A man could have been standing ten feet away, and they wouldn’t have heard Turk and his men approaching. Everything went smooth as butter, thought Turk. At least, it did up until the point when Ruiz started coughing.
“Everyone back,” Turk ordered.
The team retreated to the far end of the hall, splitting into two groups. One went right, the other left. They faced each other and waited.
“Who did that?” Turk said.
Ruiz stepped forward, his head hanging, eyes cast down at the floor.
“Ruiz?” Turk said. “You alerted anyone down there to our presence. You realize that, right? Or are you the damn FNG now?” Turk brought his right hand to his face and squeezed the bridge of his nose. “You’re leading the damn way now, Ruiz.”
“Yeah, I got it,” Ruiz said.
Turk motioned for the group to get ready as Ruiz stepped past him. He noticed that sweat soaked the man’s short spiky black hair and face. He looked over the men nearest to him and saw that they also had sweat on their foreheads. He didn’t find the temperature in the facility uncomfortable, but the airflow left a lot to be desired. Plus, nerves were racked, with some men more than others.
Ruiz led the team down the hall toward the stairs. Turk and Bates followed close behind, with the rest of the group in formation behind them. The thumping grew louder the closer they got to the stairwell. The noise rose loud enough that it drowned out the constant buzzing. Turk thought the banging sounded more like a soft thud the closer they got.
They reached the edge of the stairwell and Turk whistled for Ruiz to stop, then he moved up to take position next to the man. There were a dozen stairs that connected to a wide platform. He leaned forward and looked over the inside railing. He saw another set of stairs heading down on the other side of the platform, heading in the opposite direction.
Turk turned and faced his team. “Bates, Schmitty, Spencer,” he said. “You three with me. Ruiz, your ass is going first.” He looked at the man out of the corner of his eye, but saw no discernible reaction. He wondered if Ruiz was even paying attention to what he was saying. “The rest of you, wait until we clear the platform, then head down. I don’t know what’s after the next set of stairs, but if it’s a wall or a door, we’ll all meet there. If it’s open, we’ll figure it out after twelve more steps.”
He turned and nudged Ruiz in the back, sending the man toward the first step. Ruiz hunched over, extending the barrel of his M4 in front of him, began descending the stairs. He took a step, then stopped, presumably to listen. Then he took another step. He stopped twice more before descending the remainder of the stairs to the landing. Despite the speed at which he traveled, he remained silent.
Turk and the three men with him moved without hesitation. They reached the bottom, and the five SEALs leaned against the outer wall. Turk looked over his shoulder at the rest of his team and saw five faces staring back in anticipation. He crouched, approached the other side of the landing. The banging was louder and continued to intensify as he moved past the barrier the stairs had created.
“What am I seeing?” he muttered to himself. He gestured with his head for Ruiz to join him. He wasn’t going to send him ahead again, though. Ruiz had served his punishment for potentially ruining their cover, and Turk wasn’t going to place the man in a situation where he could be killed without backup to watch out for him.
Turk stayed low, Ruiz remained high. They moved in unison past the relative safety of the stairs that shielded them.
There, on the next landing, facing away from them, Turk saw the source of the incessant banging.
Nine
The old man lifted his ha
nds in the air, aimed his pistol toward the ceiling. Sean could tell it was a small-caliber weapon, and felt certain that the bullet wouldn’t be able to penetrate his body armor. Plus, the man didn’t appear to be the type that would resort to using deadly force. However, Sean had learned long ago not to trust appearances. Why hadn’t the man retreated back into the room behind the command room?
“How did you guys get in here?” the old man asked in a thick eastern European accent.
Sean looked at Karl, who didn’t appear interested in answering questions.
“Please,” the old man said, “I’ve been trapped in here for ten days. If you got in, that means we can get out. Right? Can we get out?”
“We’re not going anywhere,” Sean said. “At least, not yet.”
The old man nodded and started to take a step back.
“Stop right there, Pops,” Karl said. “Step forward and move to that corner.” Karl gestured with his head to the corner of the back wall, furthest from the door. “Leave the door open.”
The old man complied. He took two steps forward, then sidestepped toward the other side of the room. He made sure to keep the pistol pointed at the ceiling. The look on his face was a mixture of anxiety and excitement. Perhaps he believed they were there to rescue him. Was this the guy who had reached out for help? A shiver ran down Sean’s spine at the next thought he had. Did someone in the U.S. government or military know about this guy?
“This far enough?” the old man asked when he reached the corner of the room.
“You can’t go any further, can you?” Karl said.
“Suppose not,” the old man said.
“Ryder, cover me,” Karl said as he started toward the old guy, his MP7 aimed at the man’s head. “All right, Pops, lower that arm to the side till it’s parallel with the ground.”
The man did as he was told. His thin arm shook as he held it perpendicular to his body, locked straight at the elbow, his wrist angled so that the gun pointed toward the ceiling.
Karl approached slowly and cautiously. Sean figured that the SEAL had seen enough, as Sean himself had, to tell him that everyone was a threat inside, and sometimes outside of, hostile territory. A ten-year-old kid could kill you as fast as a trained operative could. Maybe not as gracefully, but he’d kill you all the same. An old man could, too.
Karl reached out and took the pistol from the man. He tucked it away and then turned the guy around, patted him down. Said, “He’s clear.”
The old man turned around, slowly. “I’m not here to hurt anyone. I just want to go home.”
“Yeah, well, don’t we all,” Karl said.
Sean stepped forward. “Karl, why don’t you go check out whatever’s behind that door?”
“What if those things are down there?”
“Then I doubt he would have been able to come up.”
Karl appeared to study the old man for a moment as if the answer were written on the guy’s face, then he hiked his shoulders in the air an inch or two and nodded. “Yeah, guess so.” He took one last look at the old man, then walked toward the other side of the room.
Sean waited until Karl slipped past the open doorway, then he turned his attention back to the man. “Why don’t you sit down?” He gestured toward the seat in front of him, which was also in front of a working computer. He figured the man to be a technician of some sort, maybe one who knew where to find hidden information within the computer’s file system.
The old guy took a deep breath and exhaled loudly, then walked toward Sean. “You aren’t going to kill me, are you?”
“I don’t think so,” Sean said. “Don’t give me a reason, though.”
The old guy’s lips lifted at the edges, wrinkling the paper thin skin on his cheeks and crumpling his eyes. He stood motionless for a few seconds before sitting down, his face crinkled like used wrapping paper.
“Who are you?” the old man asked.
“I’m an Air Force PJ,” Sean said. “So is that guy over there.” He pointed toward Jules, who was leaned back in a chair with his eyes closed.
The smile on the old man’s face retreated and he looked somber. “What about the other guy?”
“He’s a Navy SEAL.” Sean studied the man for a moment, waiting for a reaction, then continued. “There’s a team of SEALs here. They’re checking out the lower levels now.”
The old man shook his head. “They shouldn’t do that. Can you call them and get them back up?”
“We’re on radio silence. For now. I’m only calling if my life is in danger, and best I can tell, it’s not at the moment.” He offered up a smile, but the old man didn’t react. Sean waited a minute, then asked an obvious question. “Why shouldn’t they be down there?”
“It’s… it’s not safe down there,” he said. “Anywhere in here, for that matter. Except for maybe this room. But even then, for how long?” He looked past Sean and his eyes settled on Jules, then he added, “Judging by your partner, it’s not safe outside, either.”
“Care to tell me why?”
The old guy said nothing. His eyes drifted to the opposite corner of the room.
“Look,” Sean said. “You can talk to me, or the SEALs will make you talk. Understand? They have ways to get you to speak if they feel you have information. I’m a PJ. I fix people. Those guys kill people.” He lifted an eyebrow and lowered his head. “Now, considering you’re the only person we’ve run into who isn’t dead or howling or screaming, the consensus will be that you can provide us with some intel. So why don’t you start talking?”
The old man brought his withered hands to his face and pressed his palms into his eyes. Blue veins rose against his flesh and snaked along the backs of his hands and wrists. Brown spots dotted the skin on his arms.
“Where to begin?” he said, shaking his head.
“What’s your name?” Sean said.
The man smiled and nodded. “That’s a good place to start, I suppose. My name is Richard Knapp.” He paused to clear his throat. “Doctor Richard Knapp.”
Sean noticed that Knapp held his chin an inch higher as the man added Doctor to his name, and he wondered if perhaps Knapp was famous in some circles. He decided to bring him back down to the ground.
“Never heard of you,” Sean said.
The man looked disappointed for a moment, then lifted his eyebrows and puffed his cheeks as he forced a large breath out. “Most people haven’t, but the ones that have, consider me a legend in the field of—”
“I don’t care about all that,” Sean said. “Here’s what I want to know. What purpose does this building serve? What are those things inside of here and roaming around outside of the building? Where the fuck are the Rangers and guys from Delta Force?”
Knapp steepled his fingers together, rubbed his chin with his thumbs. His mouth opened three times, but he didn’t say anything. He jerked his head to the side at the sound of footsteps. Karl had reentered the room, and it seemed to have startled Knapp. The man straightened up in his chair while watching the SEAL cross the room and come to a stop next to Sean.
“What’s going on?” Karl asked.
“Dr. Knapp here was about to give us some information,” Sean said. “What did you find down there?”
“Doctor, huh? Whatever. It’s a bunker. Stocked to the hilt. He probably could’ve lasted three years in here.”
Sean turned toward the doctor, saw the man nodding in response to Karl’s assumption. “Anyone else down there?”
Karl opened his mouth to answer, however, Knapp cut him off.
“No,” Knapp said. “I was the only one fortunate enough to be in this room when it happened.”
“When what happened?” Sean said.
The old man sighed. “You asked what this place is. Well, simply put, it is a research facility. A biological research facility, to be exact.”
Sean had a feeling he knew where this was going, but remained patient and let Knapp tell him in his own words.
“As you can tell,�
� Knapp said, “this place is pretty well hidden. I’d think that if all these different military groups hadn’t been by recently, you might not have even noticed it. I’m not sure how those initial men got in here. Wish they hadn’t, though. They really set them off down below.”
“Them?” Karl said.
Sean placed his hand on Karl’s forearm, shook his head. “Let him continue.”
“Yes,” Knapp said. “Them. Anyway, when it happened ten days ago, we were operating on a skeleton crew. One man slipped and hit the wrong button. Instead of securing the cells, he leaves an entire cell block unlocked.”
Sean thought back to the diagrams he’d seen of the floors below. He imagined that the big rooms in the corners were what Knapp was referring to when he said cell block. Were the remaining Rangers and members of Delta Force in one of those cells?
“So a group of them got out before I could hit the alarm,” Knapp said. “One of them, perhaps one who wasn’t completely gone, or changed if you will, had noticed what the guard did and he repeated the process for the remaining cells on the floor. It wasn’t long before they made their way to this floor, and who knows where else by this point.”
“What are they?” Sean said.
“Humans. Or, they were. Now, they’re an experiment gone horribly, horribly wrong.”
“This is a research facility for biological warfare, isn’t it?” Sean said. “You were…”
Knapp’s eyes glistened and he turned away for a moment. When he looked back, he stared at the floor between Sean and himself. “I was forced to come here against my will some years ago. I don’t want to go into details about it.”
“Someone threatened your life?” Sean said.
The man snorted. “I’d gladly let them take my life if it meant I had never created such a beast.”