Countdown Zero

by Chris Rylander

  My first impulse was to scream, and it took all my focus not to yell uncontrollably as I ran. I also tried to keep my eyes up. If I was stepping on snakes, I didn’t want to know about it.

  The fifteen-yard run from where I fell to the clearing was the longest five seconds of my life. My skin crawled. The hair on my neck tingled. I clenched my jaw so tightly that my molars ached. Snakes? Seriously?

  Once I reached the clearing, I realized how much I was sweating and took off my jacket. These must have been tropical snakes, because it had to have been at least eighty degrees inside the dome, if not hotter.

  I put down my jacket and then stood on top of it. Then I spun around, looking for any snakes investigating my presence. I only saw one: a green anaconda or some such massive snake. Thankfully it was in a tree at least ten or twelve feet away. Which was obviously a lot closer than I would have preferred, but considering where I was, twelve feet was better than what it could have been. Plus, a snake as thick as a softball surely couldn’t move very fast. Right?

  That’s when I heard the last thing I expected to: human voices.

  “I knew I heard something,” a man’s voice said. It was coming from the other side of Snakedome.

  “Check out the vent,” another voice said. “There’s a backpack up there. Yeah, we’ve got intruders.”

  “We should report this right away.”

  “Wait, wait. If we go now, whoever it is might get away. We’ve got to find him.”

  “Are you kidding? I’m not going in there with all those snakes! The sign outside said there are eleven different poisonous species in there.”

  “Oh, come on, they’re only snakes.”

  I realized then that I hadn’t been breathing. I exhaled as quietly as I could, spinning my head around with wide eyes, still wary of snakes. Poisonous snakes. Eleven different species that could probably kill me with a single bite.

  That’s when I realized my headlight could lead the guards right to me. I quickly reached up and switched it off. Which only gave the snakes even more darkness to lurk in.

  “Fine, let’s go,” the other guy relented.

  “If a snake comes after you, then just shoot it, man! They ain’t bulletproof.”

  “Yeah,” the other guy said, much quieter this time.

  Then the voices stopped. And I knew it was because they were inside the dome now, looking for me. They didn’t want to give away their positions.

  I looked up at my backpack still dangling from the broken vent. It contained all my possible weapons, including the tranquilizer gun, sleeping gas, the grappling hook, a Taser, and a few others that would have been better than what I currently had: nothing. I was an unarmed seventh-grade kid up against two grown men likely carrying real guns. In a dome filled with poisonous snakes, no less. And I was standing right near the very spot they would likely look for me first.

  Just another Saturday for a secret agent, I guess.

  CLEARLY I’D BE AN IDIOT TO JUST STAND THERE WAITING FOR them to come and shoot me like a fish in a barrel. Although, come to think of it, I bet shooting a fish inside a barrel would be a lot harder than people suspect, especially if the barrel was filled with water. But that’s not the point. The point is, I needed to move. Hide. Run. Something.

  The fear of the snakes had nearly paralyzed me at that point. But eventually my brain was able to make my feet move, and I ran in the opposite direction as the voices. It was difficult to see where I was going without my headlight, but the yellow emergency lights still made it possible to keep from crashing into any trees or bushes inside the darkened dome.

  My initial hope was to find the dome exit and then circle around to whatever door they’d entered through. But the problem with that plan was that the walls of the dome were glass. Which meant any guards walking by on the other side would easily see me. And I seriously doubted they’d mistake me for a Snakeperson.

  So I didn’t go all the way to the glass wall. Instead, using the curve of the ceiling above me to gauge how close I was to the edge, I stopped what I figured was maybe ten or twelve feet shy of the glass wall. I’d tried to move as quietly as I could, but I figured it was possible they’d heard me dashing through the brush.

  Before moving again, I ducked behind a tree and listened. Silence. No footsteps, no voices. Then I noticed I was crouched right next to a medium-size gray-and-red snake. Its tongue flicked out, just inches from my foot.

  I let out a shout and started running again. Obviously not the smartest thing to do. But cut me some slack. What would you do if you leaned forward right at this very moment and looked under your feet and saw a snake staring back? Yeah, I doubt you’d be silent either.

  “Hear that?” a voice said.

  “He’s over there,” the other responded.

  They sounded farther away than they had when I’d first heard them, which meant I had put some distance between us. But that was obviously about to change. I kept moving, weaving around trees and bushes, jumping over several smaller plants. I saw multiple snakes in the dark as I ran. Some right by me, others in trees, but I did my best to ignore them either way. A snake might bite me if I happened to fall right on top of one or something. Those two guys, however, definitely would shoot me if they even saw me. And bullets were pretty much always fatal, if you could believe movies and TV shows.

  So, forget the snakes.

  After running and weaving my way back toward the center of the dome, I saw a spot where several trees were growing almost on top of one another. I ran toward it, this time checking for any snakes before ducking behind the lower part of a trunk. I tried to catch my breath as quietly as I could while looking around me, making sure there were no snakes within striking distance. There was one a few feet away, but it was curled into a ball, not moving.

  For now.

  I slowly poked my head up and looked around the tree trunk. It was hard to see very far in the dark, but after a few seconds my eyes caught some movement. At first I just figured it was another snake, but it quickly became clear that it was one of the guards.

  His back was to me as he slowly crept along, his head moving side to side, scanning the environment.

  I’d somehow flanked him. I wish I could say that was exactly what I’d been trying to do. But the truth was, I had just been running away from where it sounded like their voices were coming from. The flanking maneuver was just dumb luck.

  But I still had no weapons. Everything that could have possibly allowed me to take down a trained adult with a machine gun was still inside my backpack hanging from a broken air duct. I didn’t think I could do it unarmed, even if I did have the drop on him.

  A quick search around me produced only a thin branch that was maybe three feet long and half an inch thick. It was sort of sharp on one end, but was likely too thin to actually break someone’s skin before it snapped. Plus, the idea of stabbing some guy with a tree branch felt pretty brutal and barbaric. I didn’t think I could do it.

  Still, I held on to the stick as my eyes did one last pass around me for a weapon. And then they stopped on the sleeping snake. I kept looking at it, then glancing at my stick and back at the snake again.

  The next thing I knew, I was carefully walking toward the coiled viper. My brain seemed to be fighting my actions. My feet felt like they weighed a thousand pounds. But I pushed on because it was all I had left. It was this, or face down a trained guard with a gun empty-handed.

  The snake stirred as I neared, lifting its head slightly. Its dark tongue flicked out of its mouth and it took every ounce of self-control for me to not drop the stick and run screaming toward an inevitable rendezvous with several bullets. I clenched my jaw again, nearly crushing my teeth, and slowly extended the branch toward the snake.

  It put up surprisingly little fight as I stuck the branch under its coiled body and lifted. It mostly just seemed curious about what was going on. I turned and made my way toward the guard, moving much faster than I would have were I holding a pillow or somet
hing harmless and not a snake. I crept up behind the armed guard and then ducked behind a bush. Taking a deep breath, I pulled the branch back and flung it forward, launching the snake into the air.

  The writhing, four-foot-long snake landed directly on top of the guy’s shoulders and head. He started screaming almost instantly and began running wildly across the Snakedome. I stayed behind the bush as he ran through the trees.

  “What’s wrong?” the other guy yelled, running after him.

  The Snakeguard just kept screaming and running. Right before he moved beyond my view, I saw the snake still dangling from his face, attached to the man’s cheek by its fangs. I cringed. Was that really less barbaric than impaling someone with a stick?

  “Oh, man, how did that happen?” the second guard yelled.

  “I don’t know, it just came out of nowhere! Get it off, get it off!” he screamed.

  “Your face is swelling up pretty bad,” the other guy said, perhaps a little too calmly, all things considered. “Come on, let’s get out of here. There’s got to be antivenom around here somewhere. If someone is still in here, he likely won’t last much longer. Besides, I just got word from Phil that we’re evacuating.”

  The other guy just kept cursing and screaming. I listened as their voices faded and eventually became completely inaudible. They were definitely outside the dome now, which meant if I followed where their voices had gone, I’d find the exit. I stood up and started jogging in that direction. I had gotten no more than four steps when I tripped on a rock and fell flat on my face into the dirt.

  I lifted my head and wiped away the dirt from my eyes.

  And found myself staring directly into the unblinking, unflinching black eyes of a cobra.

  THE COBRA REARED BACK. IT WAS ONLY TWO OR THREE FEET from my head. I didn’t watch a lot of shows about snakes, but I’d seen enough to know that cobras are lightning quick and could easily strike at this distance before I even knew what was happening.

  Its hooded head was spread wide as it raised itself even higher. I knew if I tried to make a move, it would likely strike. But, to be completely honest, it certainly looked like it was eventually going to strike either way.

  A bead of sweat trickled down my face and across my nose. It eventually fell off and landed in the dirt under my chin. More sweat began streaming down into my eyes. It was so hot. The salt burned. Stupid eyebrows. Not doing their job very well, that was for sure.

  I tried to slowly ease myself up so I was at least on my knees and not lying on my belly. I was maybe halfway up when the snake finally struck.

  It moved so fast, I barely had a chance to register what was happening. One second it was just hovering there, reared back and ready to defend itself. And a fraction of a second later its face was zooming in right at mine, fangs first.

  In that brief moment, I had just enough time to realize that there was no way I’d be able to dodge it. This was it; I was about to get bitten right in the eyeball by one of the most deadly breeds of snake in the world.

  But then a hand came flying in out of nowhere and grabbed the snake’s head just a few inches from the tip of my nose.

  I looked up and saw Agent Blue holding the snake as it writhed and curled in panic. He effortlessly flung it across the dome in one smooth movement. It landed on the branches of a tree a good thirty feet away and immediately squirmed its way toward the trunk. Then he reached down and helped me to my feet without saying a word.

  There was a sudden flash of movement in the corner of my eye and I took an instinctive step backward. Agent Blue’s eyes went wide and he looked down at his leg.

  A small yellow snake had latched itself on to his calf. Agent Blue didn’t grimace, or yell out in pain. He quickly reached down, dislodged the snake’s fangs, and then tossed this one away into the depths of the Snakedome.

  “Come on, let’s get out of this awful place,” he said.

  I followed him as he jogged toward a door hidden along a small patch of concrete at the edge of the dome where it connected to the main Snaketown building on one side. He opened it and then followed me into a dark hallway.

  We went through another door and found ourselves in a tourist exhibit area on the other side of the Snakedome’s glass. There were benches and placards on podiums detailing several of the species of snakes to be found within the dome.

  “We should check to see if that snake was poisonous,” I said, starting toward the information platform.

  “No, we don’t have time,” Agent Blue said. “Come on, follow me.”

  “I heard one of you was hit— Is Agent Nineteen . . . is he . . .” I couldn’t bring myself to finish.

  “He’s fine,” Agent Blue shot back over his shoulder. “Come on, move!”

  I followed him through the empty corridors of Snaketown, wondering why we hadn’t seen any sign of guards, and wondering a whole lot of other stuff as well. But Blue was moving too quickly for me to have time to ask any questions. Even with the limp he had developed.

  Then suddenly we rounded a corner and were face to face with Agent Nineteen and Danielle. She smiled slightly when she saw me, then, just as quickly, the smile was gone.

  “What’s wrong?” I asked. “Did you get the virus back?”

  Nobody spoke. Danielle answered by simply shaking her head.

  The mission had failed.

  “WHAT HAPPENED?” I ASKED.

  “Come on,” Agent Blue said. “I’ll explain it as we walk. There’s no time to waste.”

  And so we followed him as he kept moving through Snaketown back toward the front gate.

  “Phil managed to escape the complex with the virus moments before Danielle arrived at the holding room,” Agent Blue said. “Shortly after we fully engaged the perimeter following our ‘failed’ covert attack, the guards withdrew.”

  “They likely received an evacuation order,” Agent Nineteen added.

  “So at that point, we entered the complex and headed toward the signal from the virus’s tracker,” Agent Blue continued. “It was on the move by then. We found Danielle along the way, after she saw us through an open vent and alerted us to her presence. She told us what happened to you and we went immediately to the dome, knowing that the virus was already out of the complex and moving faster than we’d be able to on foot. Which brings us to here.”

  Agent Blue finished his recap just as we got to the Snaketown parking lot.

  It had taken Danielle and me too long to get to the virus. They’d managed to escape with it and it was my fault. Again.

  “But we can still follow them,” Agent Blue said, holding up the tracking device. “According to this they’re currently heading east on Highway Sixteen.”

  “No,” I said.

  “What?” Agent Blue asked.

  “I mean, we can’t track them,” I said. “Danielle and I overheard Jake and Phil talking when we were in the air duct. Phil said they found a way to remove the tracking device.”

  “No, that’s impossible,” Agent Nineteen said. “It can’t be removed.”

  “I’m telling you, they found a way,” I said. “Danielle heard it, too.”

  “It’s true.” She nodded.

  “They also said they were currently on their way to meet up with Medlock,” I added. I proceeded to quickly fill them in on what we’d overheard as we continued moving through the Snaketown parking lot toward a lone car near the back.

  “Then we absolutely need to follow this signal,” Agent Blue said. “We have to stop them before they rendezvous with Medlock. Once that happens, we’ll be too late. Even if we know where they’re releasing it, there’s no guarantee we’d be able to stop them in as uncontrolled an environment as a football game. If we have any hope of stopping them, it’s right now.”

  “That’s what I’m saying, though,” I said. “That can’t be the right signal. They said they were meeting Medlock at some place called House of Scandinavia.”

  Agent Blue stopped as we reached the car, a silver Ford Fus
ion. He looked again at the virus GPS tracker. Then he shook his head.

  “You must have misheard them,” he said. “This says it’s headed east on Sixteen, but House of Scandinavia is west on Highway Sixteen, just past Bear Country.”

  “You have to trust me,” I pleaded. “I know I heard them right. What if they were able to remove the tracker? That signal is a diversion.” I pointed at the tracker. “You ask me to trust you two all the time. Now I need you to trust me. We have to go the other way. We have to get to House of Scandinavia before they all escape.”

  Agent Blue exchanged a quick look with Agent Nineteen before facing me again.

  “If you’re wrong, then we all lose,” he said quietly.

  “I’m not,” I said. Danielle nodded, agreeing with me.

  “Then let’s go west—come on,” he said, motioning toward the car.

  “Whose car is that?” Danielle asked.

  “No idea, but it will be a lot faster than the MBU,” Agent Blue said.

  “You’ve got keys?” I asked.

  “We’ve got this,” Agent Nineteen said, holding up the same device he’d used to steal a car from the Mount Rushmore lot earlier that day.

  It was only then under the parking lot lights that I finally noticed the blood dripping onto the pavement next to Agent Nineteen’s shoes. He was holding his stomach and his clothes and hand were soaked in blood.

  He swayed slightly on his feet, but stayed standing.

  “What happened?” I asked, hearing the panic in my own voice.

  “I’ll be fine. Come on, we’re wasting time,” Agent Nineteen said as he shuffled toward the car.

  By this point, Agent Blue could barely walk himself, favoring the leg that had been bitten. Agent Blue used the device to unlock the car. He helped Agent Nineteen into the backseat as best he could with his poisoned leg. Then he crouched by the driver’s-side seat and had the car running within seconds.