Davis signaled to Diaz, who ran across the road to take up a position behind the sedan. Davis then moved to the left and hid behind a tree.
The sounds of nature rose into a cacophony all around them. It was peaceful, but Davis knew the noise might disguise the monsters lurking in the darkness. The juveniles were still out there in the marsh, and their unusual behavior put her on edge.
Black flashed another signal, motioning to advance. Davis shouldered her M4 and slowly moved around the side of the tree. Black was a few paces ahead, creeping along the barbed wire fence.
Crack! Crack! Crack!
The gunshots came so fast Davis didn’t have time to react. Several rounds slammed into Black. He went down hard with a grunt. Return fire came from across the road where Diaz was hiding.
Davis peered around the tree and quickly located the hostiles. She spotted two of them, both wearing Army fatigues and using barrels for cover. They weren’t ROT soldiers, but they had shot Black.
“Hold you’re fire!” Davis shouted. “We’re friendly!”
Another gunshot lanced in her direction, kicking up dirt by her boot. Black was crawling toward her, reaching up with a shaking hand. Another shot punched into the ground next to him.
“Stay down,” Davis whispered. “And hold on.”
She raised her gun to lay down suppressing fire. In a swift motion, she sprayed a three-round burst at the barrels, careful not to aim too well. She didn’t want to actually hit either of the men if they were Army.
Davis yelled, “Diaz, covering fire now!”
More pops came from across the street as Davis bolted toward Black. She grabbed him under his arms and pulled as hard as she could, dragging him across the dirt by the fence. The men popped up, but a flurry of shots pushed them back down.
Thatta girl, Diaz.
Davis heaved Black to the safety of the trees. He lay on his back, gasping for air. She threw her shoulder against a broad tree trunk, anticipating another salvo of rounds to chip away at their hiding place.
“Hold your fire!” she shouted again. “My name is Commander Rachel Davis of the USS George Washington. I’m a friendly, okay? But by God, if you fire another shot, I’ll blow both your damn heads off.”
The gunfire she expected never came. There was only the sound of Black still gasping for air. She bent down to check on him. Instead of bleeding out on the ground as she had feared, he was making a thumbs up sign. Between panting breaths, he said, “Took ‘em to my vest…I’ll be okay.”
She let out a sigh of relief.
“If you ain’t here to take our post, then why you wearin’ ROT uniforms?” one of the men shouted.
Davis cursed her stupidity. No wonder. They looked like the fucking enemy. Now she had to figure out how she was going to explain their situation without making things worse.
“We stole these uniforms from some dead guys!” Diaz shouted back.
Davis cursed under her breath, and even Black shook his head.
“ROT commandeered my ship. I need help taking it back. Please, lower your weapons and let us inside,” Davis said. “There are juveniles a few miles from here.”
“Lower your weapons and come out into the open with your hands up,” one of the men replied.
The two soldiers stood with their rifles cradled across their chests.
“Do it, Diaz,” Davis ordered. She looked down at Black. “You see anyone else in there?”
He shook his head again, still holding his chest.
“Can you walk?”
This time he nodded and struggled to his feet.
“We’re coming around,” Davis said. “Hold your fire.”
Davis and Black slowly walked into the road, weapons at their sides. She pulled up her gas mask. Beside her, Diaz did the same thing, letting her mane of dark hair spill around her shoulders.
Both men looked at her like they hadn’t seen a woman in months. That scared Davis almost more than the thought that they might shoot her.
“Hold on,” one of them said. He came around the barrels and worked a lever. The gate slowly creaked open.
“I’m Sergeant Sanders,” said the man on the left. He was thin and sharp featured. A tattered baseball cap with the Miami Dolphins logo rested on his small head. “This here is PFC Robbie.”
The other man, thicker set than Sanders, nodded at them but said nothing.
“Welcome to OP119, Commander Davis,” Sanders said. He glanced over at Black. “Sorry about shootin’ ya, brother. Thought you were one of those bastards from ROT. They slaughtered everyone else and destroyed our radio. It’s just the two of us now.”
“How’d you two survive?” Diaz asked, her hand moving slightly toward her sidearm.
“We were on a patrol with PFC Mantel and heard the gunfire. By the time we got back…it was too late.”
“Where’s Mantel?” Davis asked.
“Juveniles got him a few days ago.”
Davis scrutinized the man for a lie but saw nothing on his face but the truth.
“So what is it exactly that you need from us, ma’am?” Sanders asked.
“You got any ordnance?”
Sanders whistled. “You’re my kinda gal. I got a few crates of C4. The ROT assholes never found it.”
“Show me,” Davis replied. She had just stepped through the gate when a new sound emerged over the chirping insects. The noise pulled her gaze to the sky. It started off as a low hiss and rose into a growl.
Everyone watched, stricken, as a missile rose from the direction of the GW toward heaven, its fiery exhaust trailing it into the night. A second missile followed shortly behind. They curved off in different directions, leaving nothing but cylinders of dissipating smoke in their wakes.
Davis’s stomach dropped, and she had to put a hand on Diaz’s arm to steady herself.
They were already too late to stop Wood.
-18-
Panicked voices echoed down the long hallway as President Ringgold and her staff marched to the elevator that would take them to the underground President’s Emergency Operations Center. She hated the PEOC; it made her feel claustrophobic. “I want updates,” she said. “What the hell is happening out there?”
“The GW launched two missiles,” Soprano said. “One is heading for SZT 61 in New Orleans.”
“And the other?”
“It…appears to be heading here.”
Ringgold halted in the middle of the carpeted passage, her heart beating so hard she felt the rush of blood in her ears.
“Madame President,” Nelson said firmly. He touched her elbow and said, “We need to keep moving.”
Soprano echoed Nelson’s comments. “We’ve got to get you below ground, Madame President. According to Commander Davis, those missiles are likely armed with Hemorrhage.”
“Jesus,” Ringgold whispered. “We have to do something.”
“President Ringgold, please,” Barnes, the head of her security team, urged. “We have approximately twenty-five minutes until impact, ma’am.”
She looked at the first of the vault doors at the end of the hall. Seven months ago, back when she was just Secretary of State, she had been evacuated to a similar facility that was eventually overrun with the Variants. She had barely escaped Raven Rock, and the idea of sealing herself underground once more made her breath come in quick, sharp gasps.
Ahead, a Secret Service agent was ushering staff through the steel doors. Another agent inside punched in the biometric access codes for the control systems. He swiped his card, and the final vault door opened to reveal a red elevator.
The agents waited at the elevator doors, every eye on her, but she couldn’t move. She felt paralyzed, overwhelmed by the horror of what Wood had done.
Instead of coming to kill her himself—and risking his men in the process—he was letti
ng the Hemorrhage Virus do the job for him. Even if she somehow avoided being turned, the infected would tear the Greenbrier apart in their mindless drive to feed.
And while she was hiding, the country could fall into civil war. Wood was proving himself to be ruthless, intelligent, and completely insane. The most dangerous type of enemy leader.
She could not let a man like that take the presidency.
That thought propelled her forward. She jogged down the hallway and entered the cramped elevator. Soprano sucked in his gut the best he could and got in next to Nelson, who was fiddling with his purple patterned tie.
The doors sealed and a slight jolt rocked the elevator as it descended. The old west wing had been six stories beneath the White House, but this time they had built the PEOC nearly twice that depth. It had taken a month and half, but it would protect them against the missile attack.
They would also be stuck down here. At least she could still lead from the bunker. Rally her commanders, coordinate with the SZTs. There would be innocent casualties, and she would bear the guilt for every single death. Safe zones would fall, but the United States of America would survive.
The elevator jolted again and the doors whispered open. Ringgold stepped out and was immediately surrounded by agents. Their footfalls echoed down the tiled floor, speeding up when they rounded a corner and the red blast doors came into view. Inside, her staff was already busy working at the big screen monitors. The inbound missile was a red blot on one of the screen, its trajectory traced by a dotted line. On a screen to the right, there was video footage of SZT 61 in New Orleans. The streets were mostly empty, but she saw several civilians running down the sidewalks.
Get inside, just get somewhere safe.
“We were able to get a message to the mayor,” Nelson said. “Because of the water table, SZT 61 doesn’t have any underground bunkers. As soon as that missile hits, it’s going to cause chaos. We can expect a fifty percent infection rate within two hours, and ninety-five percent in eight.”
“How long do they have?” Ringgold asked.
“Five minutes, Madame President.”
She forced herself to look away from the screen and walked to the long war table. Several of her cabinet members were already seated there, fingers laced together, looking at her for orders. She walked past them to Vice President Johnson and General Jay Allen, who were huddled around another monitor with radar data.
“We have twenty more minutes before impact,” Johnson said. “Plenty of time to get almost everyone down here.”
“Almost?” Ringgold asked.
“There are snipers and a Marine patrol in the blast zone who may not make it in time.”
Voices came from every direction. Ringgold slowly turned, taking it all in.
“Wood is on the Freedom Air Waves saying it was us,” Allen said.
“What do you mean, us?” The idea chilled Ringgold to her core.
“Those missiles came from the GW, Madame President,” Allen said. His voice was measured but firm. “Not all of the SZTs believe we lost the ship. They think we fired on SZT 61.”
Ringgold closed her eyes briefly. She couldn’t believe the fiendish audacity of Wood’s plan. Not only would this attack completely destabilize the country, but he’d even managed to make it look like she had ordered the strike on New Orleans. As the first territory to declare sovereignty, it would be the obvious target if she wanted to send a message to the other SZTs.
“We’re getting a message from ROT,” Allen said.
“Bring it online,” Johnson said. He and Ringgold stood side by side as equals to face Lieutenant Wood.
The main monitor showed the face of the man Ringgold hated more than any other. Andrew Wood had his left leg crossed casually over his right. Behind him were stacks of boxes and weapons.
He grinned at the camera. “Guess you didn’t believe me, Jan. I’m kind of shocked, actually. Sending in just three Marines? I figured you would risk more lives. That is your MO, isn’t it?”
Ringgold’s heart skipped a beat. Had he caught Commander Davis?
“Sergeant Marks and his men put up a bit of a fight, but in the end we got under their skin, too. I’ll spare you the details because I have more important things to discuss.”
“Trace that transmission,” someone whispered behind Ringgold.
“I figured since you aren’t going to hand over the presidency, I’ll just take it from you. Most of the SZTs are coming around.”
“You really think you’re going to get away with this?” Ringgold snapped. “People will learn the truth about what you did.”
“From who?” Wood tilted his head and waited for an answer. He grinned when none came. “You’re about to go dark. Goodbye, Jan.”
The lights flickered, and then the screens blinked and went off. Static broke from the speakers.
“Someone tell me what the hell is going on,” Ringgold said, her voice rising just shy of a shout.
Allen conferred with a young communications officer named Sarah Jean. He nodded at her to report.
“They’re blocking our outgoing transmissions,” Jean said. “But we can still listen. The comms are full of chatter between SZTs trying to figure out what’s going on. They’re scared. They’re saying…”
Ringgold studied the woman. She was putting on a brave face, but she could tell that Jean was too frightened to finish her report.
“It’s all right. Just tell me what you heard.”
“They want blood, Madame President. They think the government launched an attack against our own people.”
“SZTs 18, 33, 41, and 49 have seceded,” called a voice from another comms station.
“That missile might be a blessing in disguise,” Allen said. “Wood knows it will keep us down here long enough to turn every SZT against you, but it will also prevent anyone from storming the bunker for your head if they think there are infected here.”
Everyone was looking to her for answers. Ringgold tried to pull herself together, but how could she combat a man like Wood? He wasn’t just a terrorist; he was a sociopath. He had been setting her up for this all along. Steal the GW, hit Chicago first, then New Orleans, and put the blame on her. Even if she could get a message out, the other SZTs would be panicking. Mob mentality and bloodlust would take over.
Allen was right—threat of infection was the only thing preventing her own generals coming for her head. Ringgold paused to consider every possible strategy, knowing the clock was ticking. The only way to win against Wood was to make moves he couldn’t predict.
A thought occurred to her. “Won’t the other SZTs know it wasn’t us if we get hit with a missile, too?” Ringgold asked.
Nelson looked toward the ground, and Soprano avoided her gaze.
“What? Someone answer me,” she said, her voice rising with anger.
“Madame President, if we can’t communicate with anyone out there, then it won’t matter. They won’t know anything other than the lies Wood tells them. At this point the other SZTs are already rallying around him.”
Ringgold closed her eyes to think. The definition of crazy was doing the same thing over and over again. She had to do something to break that cycle. She snapped her eyes open and said, “How much time do we have before that missile hits?”
Allen looked back at the radar. “Fifteen minutes and thirty-two seconds.”
“We’re moving,” Ringgold said.
“What? Where are you going?” Allen said, his face going red.
“I’m going to do exactly what Wood won’t expect me to do.” She paused and scanned the room. “Nelson and Soprano, you’re with me. Barnes, grab your two best agents and follow us. Vice President Johnson will stay here and assume control of the PEOC. In the meantime, I’ll get the truth out to the other SZTs and a message to General Nixon. I will make this right.”
; She approached her right-hand man and lowered her voice so that no one else could hear them. “George, I trust you to keep these people safe. If I don’t make it, I know that you’ll take Wood down before he destroys everything we’ve built.”
Johnson held her gaze. For a moment it seemed like it was just the two of them in the chaotic command center. She had known him for only a couple of months, but together they had been through so much. He wasn’t just her second-in-command. Johnson was her friend, and she knew that after she left the bunker they might never see each other again.
“Good luck, Madame President,” he said. “It’s been an honor serving with you.”
He held out his hand and she took it, clasping it between her own.
“This isn’t really goodbye,” she said. “I’m just going to go visit some old friends.”
Piero stumbled down the long corridor, rifle clutched in one hand and a lit candle in the other. If he didn’t find food soon, he would crash. There would be no more adventures for Piero Angaran, the last man on Earth.
Antonio was dead. His entire squad was dead.
His sister, his parents. His friends. The pretty girl at the gelato shop who always gave him an extra scoop for free.
All dead.
If he was truly the last man in the world, then why go on living?
You should end this now. End it all.
The candlelight flickered as he rounded a corner into a new tunnel. A cockroach darted up the wall. Piero licked his lips.
He halted and held up the candle. His hand shook as he searched for the bug. It must have vanished into a crevice he couldn’t see.
End it. End it all, he thought again.
It wouldn’t be difficult to make the nightmare stop. He could stick the muzzle in his mouth and blow off the top of his skull in less than five seconds. What was there left to live for? He was like a cockroach himself, scurrying through the shadows underground. That was no way for a man to live, even the last man on earth.
Extinction Aftermath (Extinction Cycle Book 6) Page 24