“Theoretically, yeah. But we’re going to have to switch to solid fuel for at least a couple of hours. And you know how that bitch eats fuel,” she said.
“Rough estimate?”
“Half our solid gone. It’ll fuck us if we have to top-speed it, but we’ll be fine if we can crawl out the same way we crawled in.”
“Thanks, Mary.”
Christopher checked his watch. “Dark in an hour, boss. Who do you want on body detail?”
“I’m going. I need to get my legs stretched anyway.”
“I’m with you,” Johnny said.
“I’ll go. I could use the air. Been inside too long,” Mary said, stretching her arms over her head.
“Right. Two more, and we should be good. Mary, go find us a volunteer.”
“And I’ll get Monica to come with and start familiarizing herself with the BMP,” Johnny said.
It was dark out, but Nick and his detail adjusted quickly. Gabriel and Michael had joined the detail and were helping Johnny and Mary pull the bodies out of the BMP-1. Nick and Christopher were scouting for a secure dumping location, smoking cigarettes as they walked north of the grove of trees where Bryce had parked the North Korean tank.
“Something ghoulish about this, boss.” Christopher shook his head. “Something about hauling around corpses just to get outside…it’s not right.”
“I was thinking that, too. But, you know. Fresh air, stretched legs. Get past the dead bodies, it’s not such a bad gig.”
“You’re a pro at looking on the bright side, Nick.”
“Speaking of bodies,” Nick said, stopping momentarily to snuff out his cigarette on the heel of his boot, “why do you think they drove Rogan all the way out here to shoot him?”
“Dunno. Especially if we’re assuming he came from the lab near Pyongyang. Long drive just to dump a body. ‘Specially in that antique,” Christopher said, jerking his head back at the BMP.
Nick’s right hand shot up, stopping Christopher from taking another step. Nick nodded his head down at the large, open pit in front of them.
“Think that might be why,” Nick said.
No more than five feet in front of the two men, spanning at least a hundred feet square, was a large open grave. There was no way to tell how deep it was—it was filled with bodies in Air Force, Army, Marine and convict uniforms. On top of the pile, closest to Nick and Christopher, were three men in flight suits and several more in the dark green BDUs of the 138th Rangers.
“Holy fuck,” Christopher breathed.
“Get back to the BMP. Pull Major Evans aside and tell him. Quietly.”
Christopher nodded and slowly backed away. A few seconds later, he was gone.
“Well…at least we found somewhere to stash the bodies,” Nick said to himself, trying not to look at the dead faces twisted in pain staring back up at him.
Chapter 30
Chemical Warfare
After the detail dumped the four North Korean soldiers’ bodies in with the hundreds of American casualties, Johnny, Monica and Nick took a look inside the BMP-1. It was an old tank, but a large amount of Chinese tech had been quickly added to its systems. Wires still hung from hastily installed touch-screens, and the passenger area had been filled with computers and surveillance equipment.
“Think you can wheel this big bastard, Monica?” Johnny asked as Monica slid into the pilot’s seat.
“Drive, sure. But these displays and readouts aren’t gonna mean much to me, sir.” She shrugged.
“That’s why Ryan’s coming along. He should be able to figure out what all this shit does,” Nick told her.
“Four-seven Echo secure and ready to roll, sir,” Anthony radioed. “One-three-eight Ranger’s in position to open the doors for us and join their CO in the BMP.”
“Roger that, Anthony. Go stealth and power up. We’ll bring the BMP out and switch the necessary personnel in front of the cover location.”
“Affirmative, sir. See you in a minute.”
“Hey, Nick. Can you make anything of this?” Johnny asked, nodding to a netbook that had been wired to the BMP’s comm system. The screen was scrolling characters in Chinese.
“Yeah.” Nick read from the screen. “It looks like an interface to the Chinese Army comm network. Internet, radio decryption. This must be how the NKs and Chinese forces share intel.”
“So we’ve got access to the whole Chinese Army network?”
“Well, we’ve got an access point, anyway. Still a lot of logins and encryption we’d have to break. And I suck at that, personally.”
“Our tech person’s dead. You got anyone who can maybe break those encryptions?”
“Mary probably could, if I was there to translate for her. But one thing at a time, Major. We’ve got a mission to complete first.”
“No doubt. But if we can get into the Chinese Army network, we might know what we’re walking into.”
Nick felt like physically reaching up and slapping himself on the forehead like he’d seen people do in old movies. “Shit. I hadn’t thought about it that way. I’d hate to leave my team, but—”
“But you could keep them safer if we get better intel as we roll.”
“Exactly.”
Nick toggled his radio. “Razor 4-7, come in.”
“Yeah, boss,” Anthony’s voice came back almost instantly.
“Put Chris on the line, will you, Anthony?”
“You got it.”
“What’s up, Nick?” Christopher asked.
“Hey, Chris. Slight change in plans. We found some tech over here that we might be able to use to get intel on where we’re headed. Gonna need to transfer Mary over to the BMP, along with me. Think you can babysit Razor for this leg of the trip?”
“I can handle that, boss. We could use someone to run the stealth station, though.”
“Carson can help your boys out,” Johnny said.
“Take Carson from the 1-3-8.”
“Copy that. You keep in touch over there. You know how me and your mother worry,” Christopher radioed.
“Roger. We’ll keep our handhelds tuned to 1-9 Victor—you need anything, just come straight through at us.”
“Affirmative. Don’t turn grunt on us over there, Nick.”
“No worries.” Nick laughed, toggling the radio off.
Nick spent the next four hours in an uncomfortable chair, working with Mary to see if they could crack the Chinese Army network. A few times, he looked at the rear camera feed to determine if he could see any evidence of the Razor following their smaller vehicle. No such luck.
“Checking for the Razor, boss?” Mary smirked. “You won’t see it on cameras. Ever. Designed that way.”
“Still tough to get my head around. We wouldn’t have believed this kind of tech about ten years ago.”
“Actually, a lot of it was around ten years ago. Air Force was working on it back then, using high-performance civilian vehicles. Ever hear of the Challenger Vapor?”
“Yeah, heard of the Challenger. Remember when they re-released it about a decade ago. Wanted one bad.”
“Air Force and some contractors took one of those and loaded it with tech, even the same radar-absorbing paint and camera systems the Razor uses. Only thing it didn’t have was the adaptive camo, really, but it had plenty of other goodies to make up for it.”
“They still make ‘em?”
“They only made one, I think.”
“In service?”
“Nah. It’s at a museum somewhere in Ohio.”
“How do you know all this shit?”
“I worked at a desk, remember? Lot of downtime. No unsecured ‘net access since I’m a convict, so I read a lot of the Air Force project files.”
Nick nodded. “Any luck on the hack?”
“Broke the logins. Now it’s just making sense of the data when we find it. Different encryptions for different categories. And I have no idea what I’m looking at until you translate it.”
“Any way
they can pick up our intrusions?”
“Don’t think so. I’m covering my tracks.”
Nick rubbed his eyes and peered at the netbook’s screen. “This right here—this says ‘Advanced Research Projects.’ My guess is that’s where we’re headed.”
“I’ll get started on breaking the encryptions. Can you write down the Chinese for Pyongyang? So I’ll know it if I see it?”
Nick pulled a small pad and pen from the front breast pocket of his black BDU jacket and scrawled on it in large characters.
Mary took the paper from him, looked at it, and shook her head. “Man. How does anyone learn to actually speak this language?”
“I grew up speaking both. Not so bad that way.”
“No offense to your culture, Nick, but it’s really giving me a fucking headache,” she said, blowing a stray strand of hair out of her eyes.
Nick got up to stretch out his legs. The BMP was nowhere near as spacious as the Razor, even in the back passenger area where he and Mary and Ryan had set up. He found he couldn’t even stand completely without hitting his head on the top of the compartment. At just over five and a half feet tall, Nick felt sorry for the six-foot-four Major Evans.
“Ryan? Our North Korean friends saying anything?” Nick asked, looking over Ryan’s shoulder.
“Oh, they’re saying a lot. They’ve got frequencies that cut through their own jamming. Approved, official frequencies, I’d guess. I’m also picking up a bunch of low-power transmissions fading in and out about every twenty miles or so. Getting a lot of chatter on those that’s pretty damned critical of the North Korean government, the Chinese government, the war, you name it.”
“Pirate radio?”
“I think so.”
“Are you getting those transmissions on transmit-only channels, or can they receive?”
“Based on the computer’s analysis, some of them can receive. Not many.”
“Log those frequencies. They may come in handy later, and I’m sure intel wants to know about them. Log all the official ones, too.”
“Already on it. I’ve also managed to get access to some North Korean Army emails. I think this,” Ryan said, bringing up an email in Korean on his screen, “is the duty roster for the CDMs on guard around the Pyongyang lab.”
“How many CDMs are we talking?”
“Twenty-five. Ten in reserve if the lab gets put on alert status.”
“Movements and vehicle placement?”
“They’re attached.”
“Translate and download to Mary’s netbook. I’m sure the guys on the Razor will want to see this.”
“Roger that.”
“Good work, Ryan.” Nick grabbed the handheld and switched it on. “Razor 4-7 Echo, this is BMP-1.”
“Hey, Nick. Anthony’s crashed out. What can I do you for?” Martin’s voice came back.
“Chris still awake?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Grab him for me, would you?”
“Sure.”
Christopher’s voice came down the line a few seconds later. “What’s up, boss?”
“We’ve managed to pull some intel. Twenty-five to thirty-five CDMs on guard around the lab.”
“Lovely. Considering one could probably blow the hell out of us.”
“Yeah. How’s the stealth running over there?”
“Fine so far. Solid fuel’s still right near the top, so we should be able to proceed with daytime stealth mode as planned.”
“Good. Looks as if we’ll need it. I’ll get back to you with more as I have it. How’s everyone holding up over there?”
“We’re solid, boss. Got four racked out right now. The medic managed to drag himself to an open chair. Said he was tired of lying down. He’s been running Gabriel through more EMT stuff for the last couple of hours.”
“Good to know. Call if you need anything, yeah?”
“Will do.”
Nick turned off the radio and walked back to his chair. Mary was flying through screens of information now. She’d apparently broken the encryption, because the words on the screen made sense to Nick. He read a few words about highly classified material, about how only those personnel with a level 12 clearance would be allowed to log in.
“You got in,” Nick said.
“Looks like it. I found a file tagged with the characters you wrote down for me. Breaking the logins now.”
A few seconds later, the screen filled with characters. Nick read from the screen aloud: “China/North Korea Advanced Research Projects Alliance—Kim Jong Il Pyongyang Research Facility.”
“This what we’re looking for?”
“Yep. That’s it. Click that link,” Nick said, tapping the screen. “Should be a breakdown of their current development projects.”
Mary clicked the link, and a new page loaded.
Nick read silently, tightening his lips.
Mary turned around and noticed the look on his face. “What? What does it say?”
“The page is detailing something called Project Youxia. I’m not a tech guy, but as near as I can tell, it’s a virus. A virus that targets Caucasoid gene markers only.”
“A disease engineered to kill white people?”
“Yeah. That’s the best way to put it.”
“Is that even possible?”
“Looks like they think it’s more than possible. Apparently, they expect to have it ready to release in less than a month. This says they’re going to use it in weaponized form when they attempt to push North toward Magadan in three weeks. That’ll be the first test of the virus.”
“I don’t know the demographics exactly, but if they deployed something like that on the battlefield, it would take a huge chunk out of our forces. I mean, just using the 47 and the 138 as a representative sample—”
“Ryan, Pete, Rogan and maybe me and Gabe. That’s all that’d survive. But think further. If they take Magadan, which they probably will if their virus works as planned, they could launch missiles full of the stuff across the Bering Strait into Alaska and Canada. Maybe even the mainland U.S.”
“That’s…that’s horrible. We have to do something about it.”
“Agreed. But that’s not the worst part. This is,” Nick told her, pointing to a small grouping of characters at the bottom of the page.
“Why? What’s that mean?”
“It says ‘Project one of six.’“
Chapter 31
Room Thirteen
Nick crawled into the cabin of the BMP. It was already crowded with Monica, Rogan and Johnny at their stations. Nick barely had room to stand, but he wasn’t going to be there long.
“Hey, Nick. Looks like Monica managed to squeeze a couple more MPH out of this crate.” Johnny smirked.
“That’s good. I’ve got Ryan searching the North Korean grid for a cover location. We need to stop and have a meeting.”
“You sure that’s a good idea?”
“It’s necessary. We finally found out what we’re walking into, and it ain’t pretty.”
Johnny nodded, toggling a few switches on the panel to his left. “Your mission, Lieutenant. Let us know where we’re headed.”
“Ryan will be up in a few minutes with a destination.”
“Roger that.”
He hadn’t thought of the BMP’s passenger area as spacious until he crawled out of the cabin. With only two other people in a space that was designed for eleven, Nick stretched his arms and legs as much as he could before he walked over to Ryan’s workspace. “What’ve we got?”
“I think this’ll do it,” Ryan said, pointing to a spot on the map displayed on his netbook’s screen.
“Pretty close to the lab. You sure we can stop there?”
“It should be abandoned. It’s a bombing test range, but there’s not anything on the schedule for the next couple of days.”
“Right. Let’s just hope we don’t run into any unscheduled tests. Get this info up to Monica then let Bryce know. After that, I want you and Mary to
put together all the intel we’ve gotten to this point for the guys on the Razor.”
“We’ll get everything transferred over to Mary’s netbook and, y’know, make sure it’s in English.”
“Good man. Let me know if you need anything from me. Otherwise, I’m going to try and catch a nap.”
“In here? Where?”
Nick looked around the passenger area, which was crowded with electronics and weapons. He noticed a spot in the back corner of the vehicle, about three feet square.
“Looks like that corner’s elected.” Nick sighed, balling up his BDU jacket for a pillow. He didn’t expect to be able to relax, what with the noise from the ancient tank’s engine, the smell of its diesel, and the intel he’d read through—but in less than a minute, he was asleep.
“Boss,” Nick heard.
“Yeah,” he groaned, coughing a bit.
“Hey, boss. We’re rolling up on the bomb test range,” Mary told him.
Nick opened his eyes and let them adjust to the low light in the BMP’s passenger area. He rolled to his feet, stretching out the kinks in his back as he stood. “Have we been in contact with the Razor?”
“Yes, sir. They shot ahead of us and have parked in that structure up ahead,” Ryan said, pointing out a bombed-out shell of a two-story building on the BMP’s front camera feed.
“All right. How do we look for recon? Our cameras or the Razor’s caught anything close by?”
“Nope. And the airwaves are quiet, too. I’d venture no one goes near this place when it’s not in use.”
“Which makes them smarter than us, I suppose.” Nick stuck his head into the pilot’s cabin. “Monica, would you take us as close to the Razor’s cover spot as you can? The more cover we have, the better.”
“Copy that, sir.”
“Thanks.”
A few moments later, Monica had the BMP parked about four hundred feet from the Razor, safely tucked between a fallen retaining wall and the side of a bunker. There was just enough space to open the back door. Nick led the BMP crew out and across the field to the Razor’s cover building. Nick’s crew was already standing outside the Razor, though he couldn’t actually see the huge vehicle—with the 4:30 a.m. darkness and the Razor’s stationary position, the thing was functionally invisible.
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