The Chimera: A Black Force Thriller (Black Force Shorts Book 2)

by Matt Rogers

  Griffin felt a momentary stab of pity.

  Then he remembered why he was here, and all that fell away.

  He waited until the Caucasian guy had turned his back on the darkened corridor, and then surged out into open ground like a wraith released from hell.

  The guy never even saw him coming.

  Either he was inexperienced in true combat, or the death of his friends had ruined his ability to think straight.

  Whatever the case, Griffin opted not to blow the back of his skull open with the Cherokee, because that would alert everyone in the monastery that he was still near the landing.

  Instead he leapt the final couple of feet and crash-tackled the blonde mercenary into the stone floor like a football player flattening a wide receiver.

  17

  The guy had been using one hand to drag his dead comrades across the landing, and in the other he’d clutched an identical BUL Cherokee — the mercenary force must have got a batch of them from a supplier, off the books. Now that same Cherokee went flying as the man got hit by the equivalent of a freight train. Griffin deduced that no-one else was in the immediate vicinity and temporarily dropped his own weapon to deliver a thunderous elbow into the guy’s forehead as the pair of them came down on the stone floor.

  He snatched his Cherokee back up and jammed the barrel into the bridge of the guy’s nose, leaning enough pressure on the weapon to cause the man horrendous pain.

  ‘Speak English?’ Griffin hissed.

  A half-second of silence unfolded before Griffin raised the barrel of the Cherokee a couple of inches off the guy’s nose and smashed it down, destroying the guy’s septum. The man made to let out a howl of agony but Griffin clamped a hand over his mouth, cutting off the outcry.

  ‘I’ll keep doing that until your nose is mush,’ he said, his voice barely above a whisper. ‘Now answer my questions without hesitating, and if you tell one lie I’ll squeeze this trigger. Speak English?’

  ‘Y-yes,’ the guy muttered, blood pouring from both his nostrils and leaking into his mouth. ‘I’m American. For God’s sake.’

  ‘Where from?’

  ‘New York.’

  ‘How’d you get into this business?’

  ‘Uh…’

  Griffin simply raised the barrel of the weapon off the guy’s nose and he went white as a sheet, aware of the kind of power Griffin could deliver from a single stab of the metal cylinder. He held up both hands in protest. ‘Sorry, sorry. I got dishonourably discharged. Needed work.’

  ‘You needed work?’

  ‘Yeah…’

  ‘Who’s paying the scientists?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Don’t play dumb. I know what you’re protecting. Down there. Underground. Who’s paying them to make the chimera virus?’

  ‘If I tell you the truth, will you let me go?’

  ‘I think it’s best to think about what will happen if you don’t tell the truth.’

  ‘Fine. You asked. They’re the ones paying us, you dumb fuck.’

  ‘The scientists?’

  ‘Who do you think’s bankrolling this thing? We’re mercenaries. You think we’d be doing this if we had two brain cells to rub together? We follow the money.’

  ‘Who are they?’

  ‘The boys in the kitchen?’

  ‘If that’s what you want to call them.’

  ‘Bunch of undesirables. I guess that’s what you’d call them from your high horse.’

  ‘I wouldn’t get into a discussion about morality from your position,’ Griffin said.

  ‘Gotta get paid.’

  ‘That’s your reasoning?’

  ‘Spare me,’ the guy spat. ‘You know how many tens of millions of people die every year? Who gives a shit if I help a few along that path? Just trying to make something of myself.’

  ‘You trying to redeem yourself before I kill you?’

  ‘Nah. Do what you gotta do.’

  ‘The chimera virus. What is it?’

  ‘The substance itself?’ the man said.

  Griffin nodded.

  ‘How the hell am I supposed to know? I’m not a scientist.’

  ‘You’ve been around it, I assume. How long have you been here?’

  The mercenary had built up some confidence during the back and forth. He held his tongue just long enough for Griffin to turn irate. Before the man could squeeze out any information, Griffin smashed the Cherokee into the guy’s already-broken nose.

  This time, he did howl, and Griffin couldn’t clamp his lips shut in time.

  But there was no-one around to hear.

  ‘How long have you been here?’

  ‘About six months.’

  ‘And how far along is the virus?’

  ‘I told you—’

  ‘Don’t play dumb. You know something. Anything. Better start sharing it.’

  ‘Alright, alright,’ the guy said. ‘Look — you want to make a deal?’

  ‘Want me to hit you again?’

  ‘I’m serious. I know a lot. I’ll tell you all of it, but promise to kill me afterwards.’

  Griffin paused, the barrel of the Cherokee hovering ominously over the guy’s shattered septum. His face had become a mask of blood. Ordinarily Griffin would have found the sight grotesque, but that concept hadn’t even passed through his mind yet. He saw nothing but a man holding back information about a super-virus. He would do whatever it took to get that information out.

  Even if it meant causing irreparable damage.

  ‘You really want to die?’

  ‘Yes,’ the man said, with an intensity that made Griffin hesitate.

  He hadn’t noticed yet, but tears had been forming in the guy’s eyes.

  No, not a guy.

  A kid.

  Griffin stared down at this kid — only a couple of years younger than him but all over the place mentally — and understood where he was coming from. The man had been submerged in a path with a one-way ticket to riches, and it seemed he’d had been moving so fast down that path that he’d never had time to consider the ramifications of his actions. Now that there was a gun pressed into his face, beating him to a pulp, he was starting to realise what he’d done.

  Strange things happened to men who had never faced adversity in their lives.

  This guy underneath Griffin was crumbling.

  Physically, and emotionally.

  Tears streamed down the kid’s face now, mixing with the blood coming out of his nose.

  ‘What have I done?’ he whispered in the empty monastery, and in those four syllables Griffin sensed all the pain and realisation of a man whose entire moral core had shattered.

  Now the kid was trying to pick up the pieces.

  Griffin squashed the barrel of the Cherokee into his forehead. ‘Talk.’

  18

  ‘It’s a pathogen,’ the kid mumbled. ‘That’s all I know. They’re doing something with plasmids. They’re not supposed to discuss it with the rest of us, but spend a month holed up in a place like this and people get talking eventually.’

  ‘Plasmids?’ Griffin said.

  ‘They’re inserting them into a pathogen. Like a virus on steroids. Combining a bunch of different stuff.’

  ‘What stuff?’

  ‘I honestly don’t know. None of it’s good.’

  ‘Why are they doing this? What’s their reason?’

  The kid managed a wry smile through a mask of tears and blood. ‘What’s the reason anyone does anything?’

  ‘What do they have to gain by wiping out a populated area? How’s that benefit them in any way?’

  ‘You really don’t know…’

  ‘I’m new to all this,’ Griffin admitted. ‘This life is wild. I don’t understand it.’

  ‘The scientists gain nothing from that. They don’t care about ideologies. But they can sell their product to people who do.’

  ‘That’s the end goal? Give it to the highest bidder?’

  ‘There’s extremists out there
who will do anything to get their hands on this kind of shit. And some of them have billions. You know there’s trillionaires out there? No-one believes it, but I’ve seen it with my own eyes. Everyone thinks these tech tycoons are the richest people on earth, but they have no idea. That’s just the stuff on record. Most of this world operates outside of those parameters. That’s who the scientists are selling to. That’s how they never even have to think about money again…’

  Now the kid’s eyes were alive — he was consumed by the desire for cash. It had brought him into the mountains of Bhutan, and it had driven him to an existential crisis when he realised no amount of money could remove a piece of lead from your brain and bring you back from the dead.

  ‘Do they have a buyer?’ Griffin said.

  The kid grinned.

  Griffin smashed him in the nose with the Cherokee.

  More blood sprayed.

  The kid howled.

  ‘Do they have a buyer?’

  ‘Yes,’ the kid said. ‘And everything’s already in place. Why do you think I’ve spent so long talking to you? They’re already out of here. You’ve lost.’

  Griffin’s heart sank. He’d bought into the false hope that the mercenary underneath him had been ready to reveal crucial information about the “boys in the kitchen” down below. Now he realised he was crouched over a delusional child, a guy who no doubt expected to be provided with a lifetime of riches in exchange for delaying the intruder for long enough for the scientists to escape.

  The kid saw Griffin realise this. His smile grew broader, exposing blood-coated teeth.

  ‘If you were going to kill me,’ he said, ‘you would have done it by now.’

  ‘That’s where you’re wrong,’ Griffin said, and shot him through the top of the head.

  19

  There was nothing to do but select one of the corridors at random and sprint down it as fast as his limbs would allow.

  He opted to keep the Cherokee and snatch up as many spare magazines as he could off the floor. Fetching an INSAS rifle would both slow him down and prove cumbersome in the tight hallways.

  Griffin decided to follow the light. Each stone corridor had varying degrees of illumination, and he figured the brightest passage would lead to the most populated area. From there he could dispatch the four remaining mercenaries and figure out a way to reach the cave complex far below.

  It pained him to realise that even though he’d achieved massive success over the initial portion of this mission, he was no closer to achieving his goal. In fact, every second that passed gave the scientists another moment to escape. Lars had mentioned that the subterranean complex could lead anywhere, and Griffin assumed the lab had been set up below ground to provide many avenues of escape if necessary.

  So, in all likelihood, he had failed. He’d already been in the monastery for close to ten minutes, and the time he was now spending sprinting through a shadowy stone corridor signalled the chances of success leeching away. Lars hadn’t wanted an all-out assault on the fortress because of this exact reason — it wouldn’t take long for the scientists to realise what was happening and flee with the cargo.

  He picked up speed, heart pounding in his ears, aware of the problem with this approach.

  It was a lose-lose scenario.

  The faster he moved, the greater chance he had of catching the scientists in their tracks. But that left them — plus the four mercenaries — ample opportunity to capitalise on Griffin’s tactical mistakes. If he slowed down, he could approach with caution, but in all likelihood he would find an empty cave waiting for him.

  So he pushed himself even faster.

  He’d made it this far already. He had to trust his gut and press forward, even if it meant his own death.

  The corridor seemed to constrict in size, and suddenly Griffin found himself hurrying through a long tunnel barely high enough to stand up straight in. At the same time the light dissipated — bulbs had been fixed into the walls at random, but they fell away as Griffin pressed further into the mountain. At any point he expected to run straight into a dead end and feel the claustrophobia begin to set in, but suddenly the corridor opened out into some kind of strange antechamber.

  A circular stone room, devoid of any furniture or decorations of any kind, leading through into a larger room cast in darkness.

  Griffin couldn’t imagine anything lay further inside the mountain, especially not on this upper level of the fortress. He squinted, narrowing his eyes to try and make out the outline of what lay ahead. Then he noticed a dark hole in the floor of the antechamber room, and he darted his gaze in that direction.

  There was a staircase.

  Leading down.

  And, as far as he could tell, a faint trickle of light crept up from the pit.

  From far below.

  Griffin had no time to consider the consequences. He aimed the Cherokee at the open space in case the fatigue that had set into his bones masked his ability to detect hostiles. His ears were roaring, no thanks to an elevated heart rate, and he wouldn’t be able to discern if someone was lying in wait until he was right on top of them.

  By then it would be too late.

  He circled around to the top of the staircase, giant slabs of stone descending into darkness, and took a deep breath before setting off.

  He put his combat boot down on the first step.

  An explosion of noise and light and fried nerve endings washed over him — it took him a moment to realise he’d been shot in the foot.

  He jerked his leg back before it gave out, going down a second later. His combat boot slipped on the puddle of blood already pouring out of the toe, but he didn’t even put it together that it was his own blood. He thought he’d gone down on water, considering he’d lost all sensation in his foot and hadn’t quite pieced together the concept of being shot yet.

  Then the pain started to settle over him in nauseating fashion…

  …but that was all stripped away by another deafening unsuppressed gunshot, coming up from below. The bullet must have passed over his head because he felt the displaced air beating down on him. It mustn’t have missed by much either. The hostile at the bottom of the staircase had been targeting Griffin’s centre mass in a space he’d been occupying a moment ago. Now he was spread-eagled on the floor, in disbelief at the overwhelming barrage of sensations, about to catch a bullet for his troubles when the remaining mercenaries found him laid out on the stone floor during one of the muzzle flashes that lit up the antechamber.

  Griffin raised the BUL Cherokee, formed a rough estimation of where he’d last seen the shots come from, and fired three rounds in a tight cluster.

  There was no return fire.

  Griffin didn’t even have time to gather his senses. He couldn’t. He’d never experienced adversity like this — having to compartmentalise the knowledge that he’d been shot. He couldn’t look down and discern how bad the damage was. He couldn’t even make sure whether he’d killed the guy at the bottom of the stairs. The same thought from earlier washed over him.

  His life had become a flow state of chaos.

  He picked himself up, ignoring the stabs of agony coursing through his right foot, and set off hobbling down the staircase toward impending disaster.

  There was nothing else he could do.

  20

  If Griffin had considered the monastery’s interior cavernous, he had nothing to prepare himself for the gigantic space he descended into as he reached the bottom of the staircase.

  It was as if a prehistoric being had bent down, scooped a giant portion of the earth out, and resealed the ground back up again. The cavern was lit by enormous floodlights running along the natural ledges of the space, but even those artificial beams seemed minuscule in comparison to the sheer size of the underground lair.

  Griffin had never seen anything like it.

  From the outside, no-one would have suspected the mountain contained such an enormous natural space within. The entire cavern was shaped l
ike a giant egg — Griffin had burst out onto a thin ledge about halfway up one of the rock walls. Most of the space was unusable, simply consisting of a web of ledges spiralling up toward the ceiling. But the floor of the cavern ran relatively flat, and Griffin stared down at least a hundred feet below to see an outburst of activity. Men — who from this height, looked like ants — flitted back and forth between crude workstations, shoving apparatus into bags and destroying vital evidence. A couple of them had already begun high-tailing it toward a network of tunnel entrances against the far wall of the cavern.

  Griffin gulped back apprehension. He counted four men total, none of them dressed in military attire. If he didn’t know the background information he might have been completely lost observing the scene before him, considering the fact that no-one on the ground looked anything like scientists. Griffin didn’t know what he’d been expecting. The mental image of men in white lab coats almost amused him — this wasn’t a movie.

  It was very, very real.

  And that hit him when he tried to take a step forward and his leg gave out, collapsing on itself as the nerve endings in his foot jolted in agony. He grimaced, righted himself, and stumbled past the dead man at the foot of the staircase, who he could now see had caught a round through the upper chest. He was bleeding all over the rock shelf, but Griffin could barely make out the sight in the near-darkness. The floodlights tore through the space, arcing up toward the ceiling, but the cavern was so enormous that most of it lay shrouded in shadow regardless.