by John Darling
“Gentlemen, this is the real deal. These are the missions you can’t train for. We’re rerouting two Cyber Defense Units to assist you in any way they can. They’ll do everything they can to keep your presence hidden, but remember the world has its eyes on New York right now. There is no room for any kind of slip up. I also won’t be able to keep High Command off the trigger forever, so time is of the essence. If they feel that bringing the building down is the only way to avoid exposure, they will do it, no matter who’s inside it. I want updates on the situation hourly. Get our people out before it’s too late.”
“Transmission terminated.”
I regained control of the vehicle. Digesting the gravity of the mission was not an easy pill to swallow. Glancing down at the console, the clock in the middle read ‘9:15 AM’.
“Trent, this is a little above our pay grade, don’t you think? They want the two of us to go into a city with millions of people, who are all probably afraid for their lives, and to secretly extract three hundred and fifty-nine doctors without anyone noticing? This is impossible”.
I ignored Keith’s negative attitude and tuned the radio to a station covering the attacks.
“This just in, Port Authority Police have just given the order to close all bridges and tunnels to Manhattan. FDNY and NYPD have dispatched every available Officer to help evacuate the lower levels of the World Trade Center. The public is advised to stay off the streets of lower Manhattan as much as possible in order to allow all emergency vehicles to get to the World Trade Center.”
“Great, now we won’t even be able to get into the City.”
“Keith, now isn’t the time. We have our orders. Let’s figure this out.”
I snapped at Keith a little and he backed down. We did have a serious problem on our hands and we were still three hours away from New York, racing south down I-93. How were we supposed to get into the city? I racked my brain for ideas as we continued to listen to the radio broadcast. The FAA had multiple reports of more hijacked planes and a few minutes later President Bush came on briefly. In a short message, he coined what was going on a “terrorist attack”. For a moment, Keith and I were relieved. We were probably the only two people happy to hear that it’s only a terrorist attack and not something much worse. There were no reports of people acting strange however, my heart sank when the radio broadcast informed us that the South Tower had collapsed. Keith and I sat in silence as we continued to listen to the horrific catastrophe that was unfolding in New York. After a few minutes of silence, another call came through.
“Incoming Transmission from Lieutenant Johnson.”
“Sophia, I hope you have some good news for us.”
“I’m in Manhattan. I was able to get in just before they closed off all of the bridges. It’s an absolute mess down here. You’re not going to be able to get in by car so I called Harry and he’s going to pick you up in an hour. Did Kenneweg give you any details on our mission?”
Sophia was incredible. She had this knack for always getting to the target areas before everyone else. And, she had already thought two steps ahead and taken care of our transportation problem. I filled her in on our mission while Keith sent our coordinates to Harry on v-pod.
“Alright I’m going to get downtown and find a high spot to get a view of the building. Oh, and Trent, we’re going to have to do something to camouflage ourselves into the city. There’s millions of people running around scared, and we can’t just walk around with our weapons without someone noticing. I was barely able to sneak my rifle out of my car.”
“One crisis at a time. We’ll call you when we’re in the city.”
We called Harry and came up with a rendezvous point in upstate New York. The spot was about thirty minutes away. The radio came back on after another devastating report hit us. The North Tower had just collapsed. It was imperative that Keith and I get downtown immediately. High Command was not going to wait, especially if other buildings were already going down. Our clock was really ticking, since leveling the building now would be the perfect cover. Lives were on the line and I was not ready to lose them.
Chapter Twenty-Four: Code Meltdown
Dust and dirt particles swarmed up into the air around us as Keith and I rushed into the helicopter. Once we were in, I hit the side of the cabin twice with my hand and we took off. I was handed a headset and greeted by a man that I had an endless respect for; Lieutenant Harry Greenwald. He was hands down the best pilot our organization has ever seen. Ever mission that he has been involved in had been nothing short of a success. I was not about to let today break that record, despite the disaster that we were flying right into.
Harry and I swapped intel and he informed me that we only had a three hour window to extract the personnel. We were still twenty minutes out from the city, and I feared that three hours would not be enough time. I sat down in the co-pilot’s seat in angst, wondering if we would even get close to these people. Just then, my headset started to buzz and Sophia was calling in again. I hope that she had something positive to say.
“OK boys, we have a huge problem. I’m on the fiftieth floor of the Millennium Hotel, two blocks east of what used to be the North Tower and it’s an absolute mess down here. And I’m seeing the potential for another major disaster. Did we receive any thermal warnings?!”
I looked over at Harry, who immediately shook his head side to side.
“No, we were not given any warnings from the Eye. CDUs are en route and should be on site within the hour.”
“Well, I’m getting at least two hundred thermal warnings from the middle floors of the Nucleus. If those are the doctors and scientists that we are supposed to extract, then we might as well call in a dozen strike teams because this is going to be a bloodbath, not a rescue mission.”
This was exactly what I had been afraid of. An outbreak in the middle of this chaos would be impossible to contain. I’m confused as to why we had never received any thermal alerts. Every satellite we have must have be pointed towards New York at this point. Part of me wants to call Kenneweg and demand answers because this is starting to feel like a suicide mission. We have less than three hours until the building is going to be leveled. Had they purposely withheld information from us so we would go into the building without question? They wouldn’t not tell us about an outbreak this large and then bring the building on top of us, would they? I’ve lacked faith in the leadership of High Command before, and I’m seriously doubting them now. They would not hesitate to kill anyone who is a threat but were the four of us on their hit list for some reason?
I searched for an answer and orders for my team. New York City began to grow in the distance and we would be there in minutes. My brain was telling me to bail and to get my own people out before something irreversible happened. The building was coming down anyway, and all of those threats would be terminated. It was sealed and no one was getting in, so why were we being sent in? I was seconds away from telling Sophia to fall back and Harry to turn the helicopter around, but one thought stopped me: Captain Kenneweg had never lied to me, and would never do wrong by me. In this situation, I had to trust him. There must have been a reason for sending us in. It took thirty more seconds of intense thought, and then I realized something; one of us has been in this building before.
“Keith! Five years ago you escorted a scientist here. He was doing an audit of the building or something. Remember?!”
Keith scratched his head for a second before answering; “Umm, yeah but I don’t remember much. I was only in the building for a few minutes.”
“OK, do you remember anything about their contingency plan? Where would they all go in the event of an emergency? They must have some underground citadel or some room where they went and waited for help.”
Keith didn’t say anything for two minutes as he tried to remember what he had seen and overheard when he had walked around with that scientist. We were getting closer to the city and reaching a point of no return. We were flying low and it was only
a matter of time before a news team saw us in the background of one of their news reports. If Keith had an ounce of useful information in his brain, I needed it right away, otherwise we were turning around.
“Wait! I remember something. When I was in the building, they showed me and this guy a very interesting room. It was fully enclosed and reinforced with layers and layers of steel. And it was on the top floor.”
As soon as he said ‘top floor’, I yelled back into my right earpiece and asked Sophia if she detected any thermal activity on the forty-seventh floor.
“I’m not getting any readings, Trent. I just re-calibrated my scope. Still nothing.”
Well that was a huge disappointment. If there had been anyone up there, they would have come up on her scope, infected or not. Abandoning this mission seemed like the clear decision at this point, but we have orders. The building could be brought down in minutes and all of those infected targets on Sophia’s scope will be dead, but we had orders and we needed to follow them. If there was any chance that even one person was alive and un-infected, then it was our responsibility to get them out.
“All right Sophia, we’re going in. We have to assume that someone in there is still alive. Whether they are on the top floor in the safe room, or not, we have to go in and rescue them. Get to street level. Try to figure out how we’re going to get into the Nucleus.”
I turned to Harry and told him to put us down on a small building a few blocks north of the World Trade Center. Keith and I unloaded my two trunks of gear from the helicopter. I climbed back into the chopper to get our weapons and just before I got out Harry grabbed my arm.
“They’re going to blow the building, Trent. Get in, and get the hell out! I’ll see you both very soon! Good luck!”
He took off while Keith and I moved our stuff towards a door. I was not sure what kind of building this was but it didn’t matter. I kicked the door in and yelled over to Keith for some help, but I received no response from him. He told me to stop and look over in his direction. I froze for a second when I saw the nightmare that New York City had turned into.
We were three blocks from where the two magnificent towers had stood. Now, there was just a gigantic mound of steel rubble surrounded by a large cloud of smoke and dust. I could see fires everywhere and sirens were going off in every direction. We peeked over the edge of the roof and watched dozens of emergency vehicles zooming by as people ran frantically the opposite way. My heart raced, and I had to admit that I was terrified. I quickly put aside my fear and remembered our mission. Keith snapped out of his daze as well, and we rushed over to the door leading into the building. My earpiece beeped and Sophia informed me of her position, as well as another crisis.
“Trent, I’ll meet you in the parking lot shortly. We need to figure out a way to get over to the building without causing suspicion.”
Sophia makes a good point. Even though we weren’t dressed in our black S.T.O.R.M. uniforms, we were carrying two very suspicious looking black cases with all our weapons and gear. With all the commotion and people running around, going into a building with two black cases could be seen the wrong way, especially if we were caught on camera.
After a few minutes of waiting in the parking lot, I worried that something had happened to Sophia. She made it sound like that she was close by when we last spoke. While we waited, I got a call from one of the Cyber Defense Units that were sent to help us. It was standard protocol to have them on site during a mission. Their job was to keep us off the grid and out of the public eye through every means possible. This task was usually not too difficult, but we were in the heart of New York City and in the middle of a national security breakdown with millions of people scared for their lives. Not to mention the rest of the country watching in fear on their televisions. Hell, the whole world was probably watching the footage from this morning by now. Keeping us hidden would not be easy. I was worried that we wouldn’t be able to get close to the building, but I was even more concerned about how we were going to get anyone out without being seen. That would only be an issue if any of them were still alive…
A siren blared and an ambulance turned the corner into the parking lot with Sophia at the wheel. She jumped out of the car and began loading the trunks. I couldn’t help but notice the EMT jumpsuit she was wearing.
“Get in, boys. This is our ticket downtown.”
Sophia floored it toward the large cloud of smoke. She got us to within a few hundred feet of Tower Seven before having to stop the vehicle. The roads were clogged with various vehicles and people running in every direction. It was only a few gunshots shy of a warzone. I prayed that it wasn’t going to turn into one.
Keith brilliantly loaded our two trunks on a medical stretcher and we rolled it off the ambulance. No one would look twice at EMT’s rushing around with a stretcher, especially since were are now all sporting New York City EMT jumpsuits. As we dodged around people on the streets, I got another call from Captain Kenneweg. I had had a feeling that he would need an update. Before he could ask any questions, I quickly started talking as soon as I pressed the button on my earpiece.
“Sir! We are downtown and approximately a hundred feet from our target. Extraction is still a go. I repeat: extraction is still a go!”
“Trent! High Command has just released a Code Meltdown for all Stormers in the area.”
My heart skipped two beats as it fell into my stomach. My forward momentum came to a screeching halt and I let go of the stretcher. Keith and Sophia turned around and looked at me after noticing that I stopped pushing. This is ridiculous. They want us to turn back? It’s way too later for that. We are on the ground. Our window for bailing on this mission has long passed.
“Sir… you want us to abort the mission...now?”
“Trent, listen to me. The demolition order has gone through and the building is coming down. Get out now. We’ve detected over five hundred thermal outbreaks within the structure. They are all contained within the building and now is our best chance to prevent a bad situation from becoming worse.”
“Sir, what about the scientists? Our people are still in there!”
“We lost contact with the head of the base two hours ago. They’re gone, Trent.”
“But we don’t know that! There’s still a chance that someone is still alive. We have to at least make sure that there aren’t any people still in there.”
“Trent, if you go in there, you and your team will die. Those threats are Stage Five infections. They were all test subjects for experimental cures that only made their conditions more lethal. You’ve never encountered targets like this. No one has.”
We came up to the front steps of the building as my mind processed that haunting piece of information. I had never heard of a Stage Five infection and was afraid of that type of target’s capabilities. However, my adrenaline was pumping and my gut told me to keep going. There was still a possibility that those people are still alive. I had to believe that there is. Despite our organizations’ protocols and new orders from Captain Kenneweg, I couldn’t turn my back on them.
“Sir we’re going in. Tell High Command to hold the detonation. Flashman out.”
I took my earpiece out of my ear and stepped on it as hard as I could. Sophia turned and looked right at me as she and Keith finished hauling the stretcher up the steps.
“So this is going to be one of those missions, huh?”
Nothing ever phases Sophia. She always adjusted to the situation at hand. That was one of the reasons I always wanted her on missions with me. Her levelheadedness always balanced out my frustration with High Command. Their lack of concern for their own people’s lives drove me insane. Regardless, we had a job to do.
Keith placed a small explosive on the front doors of the building and a few seconds later, we found ourselves standing in the main foyer. We quickly secured the inner two doors behind us, to make sure nothing, or no one, could escape. As soon as the doors closed, we got right to work. It was pertinent that we get the
se two trunks here because they contained everything we would need to search the building. Sophia took out our rifles and loaded magazines. Keith put our thermal helmets together while I synchronized a new set of earpieces so we could communicate on our own private frequency within the building. The earpieces are designed to automatically connect with the building’s network, however I wasn’t picking up any signals. This was a very bad sign.
“OK, here’s the plan. It appears that the building has no power so were going to have to go through this place old school. We’ll clear each floor and make our way to the top. Sophia if you get any thermal targets on your scope with a heat signature of a hundred and fifty or more, unleash some hell on them. Anything below that, we’ll inspect up close. I’ll take the lead. Sophia stay on my tail and monitor your scope like our lives depend on it. Keith cover the rear and make sure nothing comes at us from behind. Let’s go.”
I didn’t tell them about the Stage Five threats. Part of me still didn’t believe that Stage Five infections even existed. I had heard a rumor that some subject testing had gone wrong a few months ago, but I didn’t believe for one second that I would have to fight them. I’d fought Stage Four infections a handful of times, and those had been deadly enough. Informing Sophia and Keith about a Stage Five threat will only make them more nervous and could possibly compromise the mission.
The main floor was dark and quiet. Without our gear, we wouldn’t have been able to see a thing. We made our way over to the main staircase of the building and proceeded up the steps. Clearing each level would take a while and time was not on our side. I focused all my energy on listening. Any resistance that we encountered would be making lots of noise, whether it be on the floor we’re currently clearing… or on one above us.