by Dave Buschi
“Babel, paint me the picture.”
“Van just pulled in-between two of the trucks, my right, in-between the first and second truck.”
That’d be next to the truck with Ontario plates—the one with the keys. Marks waited.
Lip again, “One of the men hopped onto the platform... he’s lifting up the roll gate.” There was a long pause. “Guy just rejoined his partner. Looks like he’s helping his partner get something from the van.”
Another long pause.
“Can’t see what they’re carrying… just their backs. Wait. They just set it on the platform.”
Another pause. A long one.
“Babel?”
“We just went live.”
Marks knew what that meant.
Lip’s voice again, “It’s a girl; she’s tied up. They’re carrying her into the warehouse.”
48
MARKS rose to a crouch and tapped his ear mike. “Roll gate?”
“Still up. They’re inside now.”
Marks headed down the stairs. His target had just changed. With any luck, those men had just shown him where the kids were being held. He moved as quickly as he could, which wasn’t fast. Stepping as he was, one step at a time, felt agonizingly slow.
It took him two full minutes to get back down to the bottom. He stepped to the ground. His eyes swept the site. There was no one visible. He ran in a crouch over the open field and made it to the warehouse. Moving quickly, he headed around the corner.
“You’re good,” Lip said. “They’re still inside.”
Marks peeled around the next corner and moved to the loading platform. He hopped up, keeping against the building. Light was spilling from the roll gate’s opening.
He moved to the opening. His eyes took in the scene inside. It was a wide open space in there. He could see several stacked crates. The men and girl weren’t visible. Must be on his blind side.
Tough part. He stepped across the opening. His eyes immediately took in what was in there. Open space, a few crates, a forklift in the far corner next to some loaded wooden pallets.
That was it. No men. No girl.
Whiskey Tango Foxtrot.
49
WHERE the hell were they?
“Babel, did they exit?” Marks whispered.
“Negative. Still inside.”
Marks stepped through the opening. He went towards the crates to his left, his eyes sweeping the space. There were metal trusses overhead. The lighting still seemed to be firing up—there was a humming sound coming from them, and the lamps were changing from a weak glow to a whiter yellow. Those lamps illuminated the space. No place to hide. The floor was a dull worn concrete. Marks did a full three sixty. The men and the girl were not here.
He went towards the crates. They were stacked against the wall. No spot to hide there. The floor had a thin layer of dust. He looked for footprints.
Saw some.
They were all over. Some seemed to head towards the forklift. He moved that way, weapon at the ready. His eyes keyed to the corner… near the forklift… past the pallets…
Hello.
There was a stairwell opening.
50
IT was in the far corner. An opening leading down to a basement.
Marks went forward. Eyes on the opening. There was no railing around it. Just an opening in the floor with concrete steps heading down.
As he got closer, he could see where the railing had once been. It had been removed; the posts sawn off. There was metal imbedded in the concrete, like little metal disks.
Off to the side were wooden pallets with lumber stacked on them. He wondered if they were there specifically. Wouldn’t take more than a minute for the forklift to move that pile over the opening. Would explain why the railing had been removed. This opening, like the hidden compartment in the truck, could be hidden easily.
Marks looked at the steps. He listened. No noises coming from below. No sound at all.
There was light down there. Didn’t need the scope. He took it off and put it in one of his vest’s pockets. Iron sights from here on in. He gripped his weapon—in tight, barrel out—and started down the steps.
51
HE couldn’t risk using the MASS. Not with the girl. The MASS wasn’t a precision weapon. Its spread was too wide. Even in close quarters, the shotgun blast would take her out with them. Down here, Marks realized, the M4A1 would work best. He had it in semi mode. Finger on the trigger. One pull, one shot, repeat.
Make them count.
Down he went. They weren’t expecting him. He’d have the jump on them, but not until he was down there. Until that moment he was a sitting duck. That made him motivated. He had no hesitation. Silently and fast, he went down the steps. Last three from the bottom he had full vision.
He took it in. Inventoried everything instantly. The ceiling was low. Nothing on the floor ahead of him or to the left. No movement, no men, no girl. To his right was the foundation wall. The concrete steps and the wall looked to be one seamless thing, one pour.
To his left, wide open. The room was large. Like a bunker. With the low ceiling it felt claustrophobic. There was nothing in the space. Just bare concrete walls.
There was one door. A big metal one. It was to the left; recessed in the wall. It was open halfway like a friggin’ invitation.
Come on in.
The air was dry and warm. The closer he moved to the door the warmer it seemed to get. His nasal passages felt it. A dryness, like opening a warm oven and breathing in.
Marks was aware that the acoustics in here were not in his favor. Any sustained weapon discharge in this space would sound like flashbangs going off. The sonic pressure would be fierce. Sound bounces off concrete; it’s not absorbed. The place was one big reflective surface. Walls, ceiling and floor would all act together and amplify the rounds. The muzzle blasts and sonic signatures would echo as one. Normally that sound reached about 160 decibels—which was big time loud—but in here that number would get cranked up. Major danger territory. Could blow out his eardrums, and the girl’s, if he wasn’t careful.
He should have brought a suppressor. Not that it would eliminate the issue. Vision popped in his head: Lip bitching up a storm as he tended to do with certain movies. On the TV, there’d be some scene with some guy putting on a silencer. Screwing it on of course, turning it around several times like he was getting off on it. Then, when he used the thing, it just went phut!
Laughable. So freakin’ bogus. On two fronts. Suppressors didn’t screw on like that. They just turned and clicked. That was it. And a suppressor didn’t eliminate noise, not even close. Even with one on it was still major loud. Not a phut! But a CRACK!
Marks peered through the open door. It led down a corridor. About fifteen feet was a dead end. It looked to turn left at that point.
Door was unusual. He realized what it was. Made him rethink when this structure might have been built. Not pre-World War II, but maybe a decade later. Door was a blast door. Like bomb shelters would have. It was steel. Good three inches thick. The locking mechanism was on the inside, not the outside. Marks moved in.
He paused. Tapped his ear.
“Babel?”
No response. Just as he suspected, the concrete was killing the signal. He made a decision and pulled the door closed behind him. It was heavy, but swung easily. He turned the wheel to engage the bolts. It turned like it was well greased. Bolts locked in place.
Three inches of steel. Concrete all around. A person could go crazy in here and no one outside would hear. His backside secure as it was going to be, he moved down the corridor.
52
LIP was chapped and getting more so by the minute.
The coldness from the ground was coming right through his boxers. Didn’t help that his pants were split up his crack. He could already hear the fat boy comments. They were burning his ears.
He was situated up on the hill. He had a good hide. Low shrubs in front of him, trees behind
him. He was sitting Indian style with his back to one of them; a good-sized cypress. Lip was all about being comfortable. With these deals that was the only way to go. Forget Marks’s methods. Guy did it all wrong. Moving on his belly, using only his elbows and knees? You’ve got to be kidding me.
Way too much effort. You got dirty. Elbows and knees got all scraped up. Bottom line, that way sucked. Lip had the routine down. Walk in. Find a spot. Sit down. Usually worked to a tee. Not this time, though. He’d ruined his pants. Not ten paces up the hill and he’d heard them rip. And it’s not like he could buy replacements off the rack. That thought brought up an entire other reason to be chapped.
Buying things off the rack. Few things ticked him off more. Marks could find pants that fit him in a convenience store.
A CONVENIENCE STORE.
Life was not fair. One of these days, just once, he’d like to find something that fit him off the rack without having to get the damn thing altered. Suits? Pain in the rear. Made for Ken Dolls, not real people. And all those t-shirts he’d found over the years? He couldn’t fit in half of them. And when he could it was baggy everywhere it shouldn’t be and tight in all the areas he didn’t want them to be.
Third bitch. Jenny Craig was a big fat liar. That shit didn’t work. Fuckin’ rip-off. He’d tried it once. Gained ten pounds. Fancy meals my ass. Came in kid portions. Like dining in France.
Fourth bitch. Fuckin’ throat hurt. He was coming down with something. Dammit, he hated being sick. He took a tug from his Red Bull. Tapped his ear mike again. “Meat?”
No response.
Lip looked through his scope. He’d picked ‘Alice’ for this job. She did good work. She was one of his better sniper rifles. Supersonic rounds, only way to go. He scanned the opening of the warehouse with thermal imaging turned on.
Nothing. Wasn’t picking up a damn thing.
“Meat?”
No response. Not even a click of his mike. If Marks couldn’t talk—that was the protocol. One click.
Lip waited.
Nothing.
Shit.
Now he was starting to worry.
53
THE corridor led to another. Like a freakin’ mouse maze, Marks thought. He passed a warren of darkened rooms that had nothing in them. On the wall was a painted marking. It was head height. An insignia of some sort. Circle with a triangle inside it. Two letters, ‘CD’, were inside the triangle. Color of the circle was blue; triangle was white; letters were red.
Red, white and blue. Patriotic. Symbol looked vaguely familiar, but Marks couldn’t place it. Paint looked as old as the structure. The corridors were lit with fluorescent tubing; their baffles powder-coated aluminum. He’d seen the same old fixtures in military installations. Fixtures were real popular in the 50s.
The lighting cast from them was cold with a bluish tint. Add the dull gray concrete and you had the perfect recipe for creepiness. This place had it in spades.
Marks wasn’t hearing anything. Least nothing human. There was an air vent on the wall across from him. Old style thing, inset in the concrete with a fan behind the vents. Hot air was coming from it; blades emitting a low hum.
That explained the furnace-like heat. Not three minutes down here and Marks was already sweating. He felt slick under his Kevlar. He wiped his hands on his pants and got a better grip on his weapon.
He had his barrel down, weapon low. He leaned his head out and took a quick look around the corner. It was one of those rapid motions, where the head moves in and back. Eyes process what was seen by the time the head is in the back position. Snapshot: big space, columns, lighting on in only one section, other sections were dark, no men, no girl.
He moved out. Weapon raised.
The space appeared to be the same proportions of the warehouse overhead; least in width, if not length. The concrete columns were big and massive and spaced on a grid about every fifteen feet. He saw some old steel cots stacked haphazardly in the middle of the floor; the type of cots with mattress springs built in. No mattresses were on them.
Blast door. Cots. No doubt about it. This place had a bomb shelter vibe. Abandoned, run down, and crank up the creepy. Marks took in the rest of the space, fighting off the heebie-jeebies. There were three dark rooms towards the left. He went towards the first.
It was empty, except for a couch and a wooden chair. Second room was completely empty. Third room was another story.
There was no one in there. Instead, in the center of the room was some sort of table. It was medieval looking. It had restraints for hands and feet. There was a wheel that appeared to move the table to a vertical position. On the floor was some metal piping. Big plumbing pipe, about six inches in diameter. A tripod was in the corner. No camera on it.
Marks’s eyes caught something else. It wasn’t in the room, but was deep in the main space, past some columns. The lights weren’t on in that section. He moved that way.
As he got closer, he realized the something he was seeing was actually clear plastic sheeting. It was hanging from the ceiling, in-between two columns. The plastic seemed to be stuck up with duct tape. He went around the columns to view what was on the other side of the plastic sheeting.
In the dim light he saw a stainless steel table like you’d find in a morgue. There was a drain nearby. The floor was wet. There were cutting instruments—scalpels, saws, and other sharp items—on a stainless steel rolling cart. Some small Igloo coolers were on the floor.
A sound—plopp! Kishhh!
Noise came from the left. Marks turned abruptly with his weapon.
No one there. Just an ice machine. Fuck a duck. Scared the bejesus out of him. Ice machine must have dropped some cubes into its bin. Heart still halfway in his throat, Marks surveyed the rest of the area. Saw something else on the floor. It was a bucket. There was something in it.
A chill raced up his neck when he realized what it was. It was a severed human hand. At that exact moment laughter split the air. Loud raucous laughter.
54
LIP pushed a button on his Ironman Timex to illuminate its dial.
Seven minutes. Seemed longer.
“Meat?”
Still nothing. Lip scanned the site. His thermal imaging pulled up the guard near the front of the property. The guy hadn’t moved. Lip swept the grounds.
No one.
Wait…
A door opened at the building with the cars parked in front. A guy stepped out with another two behind him. Three guys. They went down the stairs. They passed the parked vehicles and started to head to the warehouses.
Not good.
“Meat, you’re getting company. Three coming to you. Click if you acknowledge.”
Nothing.
This was not good. Not good at all.
55
ANTONOFF was enjoying the show. Gori was having his usual fun. It was too funny to watch.
“Buck me!” Gori said. “Buck me!”
Vas and Davidoff, who’d arrived a few minutes ago, were cracking up with laughter. They’d dropped a new piece of jiggly on the floor, a young girl that was still bound. She was getting an eyeful.
Antonoff smirked. Welcome to the Pleasure Palace, little girl.
“Buck me!”
Gori was behind a girl they’d pulled from the cages. Gori was doing his ‘rodeo routine’. It was too funny. The girl was terrified. Wasn’t really playing along.
They rarely did, but didn’t matter. Gori made it funny with his faces. He looked over at Antonoff. Pantomimed a serious expression. “American cowboy.”
Vas and Davidoff burst out laughing again.
It was a funny scene. Gori with his hairy belly, still in his red Speedos; he hadn’t taken them off, yet. Girl was on all fours, like she’d been instructed. Gori was squatting behind her, like a big ape. He was holding the girl around her waist, his groin slammed against her tush.
He’d already told the girl what was going to happen; what she needed to do. Rules were simple for rodeo. She ha
d to be good girl and take it from behind. Once Gori came inside her she’d have eight seconds to try and break free from Gori’s grip, crawling on all fours. If she didn’t break free, it was Antonoff’s turn. Same deal. Another pump session. After Antonoff came, she had eight seconds again. If she wasn’t successful—“tch, tch, sorry,”—Vas and Davidoff each got a go.
Fun game.
The girl had listened, shaking her head. Crying. Probably hadn’t heard a fuckin’ word.
Antonoff was half drooling. She was a lovely piece of flesh. Shaved down there, just like he liked. She looked about sixteen; maybe older. Already shaving there. Big turn on for him.
Nice budding breasts, long legs like a Maxim girl. Skinny everywhere, except for her round ass and hand-sized titties. Da, she was a fuckin’ prize. Antonoff felt a surge in his pants. He was already hard. “Let me go first.”
Gori looked over. Smirked. He slapped the girl’s bottom. “Giddy up!”
He did another face. Smug one. “Proud cowboy,” Gori said. He let go of her and stood up, cracking a grin.
At that exact moment his head exploded.
56
MARKS stepped through the open door—spent round from his M4A1 carbine hanging in the air, like it was suspended, furling away in slow motion.
He’d found the source of the laughter. Seen what was happening.
Game time. He was in the bubble. In the zone. His senses, his sight, everything was amplified. That’s how it was for him. Time stretched like taffy. Seconds felt like minutes. Minutes felt like years.