The Collapse Trilogy (Book 1): Free Fire Zone

by Rod Carstens

  Cat finally stepped back and the three stood there eyeing one another, enjoying the moment. They had been a team for years and had survived all sorts of missions. After weeks of tension and danger, when frequently the only news they had of one another came from terse situation reports, it was always an emotional moment when they finally met at the end of a mission.

  “Have you got a cigarette? I ran out days ago,” Cat said, searching Tanner’s uniform pockets.

  “She's already bummed two off me,” Matos said with a laugh.

  “I haven’t seen the woman in weeks and all she can do is think of her vices,” Tanner said, handing Cat the half pack he had saved for her.

  “Baby, I never heard you complain about my vices before,” Cat replied, a freshly lit cigarette slanting from the corner of her mouth.

  They all laughed, and then Tanner checked his watch. It was 1738. Seven minutes to go. He felt as if he were holding his breath until this was all over.

  “Let’s go to the roof,” Tanner said.

  “It’s raining,” Cat protested.

  “I know, but unless I get out in the open, I think I’ll go nuts.” Tanner turned and headed for the stairs that led to the roof.

  “What’s got into him?” Matos said, picking up his pack and rifle. “He knows it’s against SOPs to show ourselves before the extraction ships are in sight.”

  “I don’t know,” Cat said, frowning. “It’s not like him.”

  They followed Tanner to the roof. He paced nervously while Cat and Matos leaned against the parapet. Cat was puzzled. She had never known Tanner to act this way before. He was always the calmest of the clam, the rock that others leaned on when things went bad. She took a last drag on her cigarette and tossed it away, then walked over to where Tanner was standing. He was staring silently out over the dark city.

  “Vin, what’s the matter?” she asked. “You’re acting awfully strange. We haven’t seen each other in weeks.”

  “Can we talk later?”

  “Sure, babe.” She stared out at the once-great city. “I wonder what it must have been like,” she said.

  “What?”

  “When everything worked. When there was enough energy to heat all those buildings, to turn on all the lights.”

  “Why don’t you ask them?” Tanner said, jerking his thumb over his shoulder at the huge, glittering towers of the inner city. The buildings rose like lighted mountains out of the darkness and decay at their feet. Some were nearly a mile high. Tiltrotor aircraft shuttled between them, landing lights flashing. They appeared bright and alive next to the dead city that stretched around them for miles. The towers were filled with those who ran the corporations and the government. The ones who made all of the decisions. The ones who received what was left of the food, water, fuel, everything. Tanner had never been inside one of those glittering towers. You had to be born into one; you could never work your way into a Mega. The city was run from there. They sat up there and decided who would live and who would die. He and every gang member and homesteader were all citizens of the city but they had no vote. Only those born into it and the corporations had votes. They set the priorities based on what they needed. Only they…

  Tanner suddenly hated them. They were the enemy, not the gangs. They were like everyone else fighting for survival, only they held all the power and all the cards. For ten years he had fought so hard to keep the peace, or so he had thought. Instead he’d fought to protect the interests of those on top. He had been a fool.

  “Bastards,” Tanner muttered.

  “What, babe?” Cat asked. She looked at him; he didn’t seem right. “Are you all right?”

  “Yeah, sure. It’s just been a long mission. And I’m tired. So goddamn tired.”

  CHAPTER TEN

  Special Action Team

  En Route to Extraction Point Reinhardt

  1740 hours

  “Lieutenant, we have three minutes to insertion,” the pilot said.

  “Check.”

  Lieutenant Muller turned to her team and said, “All right, lock and load. Gas masks on now. Remember to go in fast. Don’t give them a chance. Let’s get this over quick and clean. Just like our live-fire training.”

  There were only the sounds of weapons being checked and equipment being adjusted. The ship banked and began its run to the target. Anke checked her own weapon and pulled on her gas mask. She looked out the back of the aircraft at what was left of the city below. Nothing but deserted streets and crumbling buildings flew past. She wondered what it was like down there, fighting each other for survival, always hungry, hot, and thirsty. Anke was always surprised when she landed in a Wild Zone at just how bad things were for the “others,” as she had come to call those without the ability to find a way out. Anke had long ago stopped feeling sorry for them. Instead she wondered why they couldn’t find a means of getting out. It was the way of things. Survival of the fittest. It had always been that way, but now instead of being rewarded with a big house and fine car for understanding the game, you got to live.

  So the stakes were higher now. All the more reason to get good at the game. She had leveraged parents with good jobs to get into the corporate military. The military was where all of the vice presidents and department heads came from. She had put in enough time to be considered for a step up. With this mission and the capture of her main target in her folder, she should get that promotion. Up and out of the shit. She didn’t mind the danger and killing, but she wanted more. She wanted to move up the ladder. She wanted the big apartment and all that came with it.

  Anke glanced at the men and women around her. She trusted none of them. They were just like she was, always looking for an angle to take her job, but they weren’t as smart as she was. Unfortunately that also meant they weren’t as good as she was, and she needed a good team on this one. Well, you work with what they give you. She hoped it would be enough. If she had Tanner and his crew there would not be much she couldn’t do. It was too bad she was going to have to kill them.

  “Lieutenant, we’re on our final. One minute.”

  “One minute, everybody. One minute. Alpha, take your positions.”

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Resource Security Force

  Team Sixteen

  Extraction Point Reinhardt

  1744 hours

  “Here they come,” Cat said as she reached for her pack and weapon. Then, as she was putting on her pack: “Hey, guys, there are three ships, not one. I don’t understand.”

  Tanner took his binoculars out and focused them on the approaching aircraft. There were two gunships and a large troop carrier. They didn’t need all that for a normal extraction.

  “What the…” he said. Then it dawned on him. He hadn’t seen this combination since the last time he had been ordered to provide a secure perimeter for a corporate operation. “Shit, it's a Special Action Team.”

  “What the fuck…” Cat said, her voice trailing off. “Who could they be after in this zone?”

  Matos walked up next to them. “What the hell is going on?”

  The gunship on the left broke off, and the second fell in behind him. They swung high to begin a gun run. But on who?

  “Us!” Tanner said suddenly. “The bastards are after us!”

  Cat and Matos looked at him, then back at the dots growing larger every second.

  “Let’s get the hell out of here!” Tanner yelled and ran. Matos and Cat quickly followed.

  “But…” Cat began.

  “Move, I said!” Tanner snapped.

  They raced for the stairs. Tanner led them down, taking them two at a time until they reached the third landing. He burst through the door and into the hall. The roof of the next building was reachable from there. It was one of the reasons the building had been picked as an extraction point. Tall windows, long ago broken out, overlooked the ten feet that separated the two buildings.

  “What are we doing? How do you know they are after us?” Cat said.

  �
�Goddamnit if I’m wrong we can go back up on the roof. If not…”

  The sound of the gunships was getting louder.

  “Come on!”

  Tanner took several steps back, then hurled himself across the distance. He landed hard on the building’s roof and rolled. Matos and Cat hesitated, then followed, landing and moving quickly to a door leading off the roof. The sound of the gunships was deafening as they ducked into the stairwell.

  Tanner held them up and they turned to watch from the cover of the doorway. The gunships came in straight and fast, firing rockets. No explosions followed, just the muffled thump of gas rockets. The gunships wheeled and made another pass. The troopship landed, and the Special Action Team in full combat gear with gas masks jumped out and quickly disappeared into the building.

  “Why?” Cat hissed.

  “I don’t know,” Tanner said. He would never get out now. The bastards! Why? Why now?

  “Look out,” Matos said.

  The gunships were making sweeps around the building. Tanner, Cat, and Matos ducked deeper into the stairwell. The troop carrier was still on the roof. Tanner could see the troopers searching the building, occasionally showing themselves at the windows as they worked their way down floor by floor. Suddenly one of the troopers was at the window they had just used to jump to their present position. Tanner saw him as he started to raise his rifle. Before he could fire, Tanner’s rifle coughed, and he dropped silently without giving warning.

  “We’ve got to get out of here before they get organized!” Tanner barked.

  He turned and started down the stairs, closely followed by Cat and Matos.

  “What in the hell is going on?” Matos said.

  “Fuck, I don’t think it matters. They just tried to kill us with gas and I saw a couple of guys carrying civilian weapons. They wanted it to look like the gangs did it,” Cat said as she took the stairs two at a time.

  “What now?” Matos said.

  “I don’t know yet,” Tanner replied. “But we have got to get out of the immediate area before they seal it off. Then we can figure out what happens next.”

  Cat had been watching the Reinhardt building from windows on each floor for any sign of the Special Action Team. “Nothing new yet. No movement that I can see.”

  “Let’s move down to the ground floor. There's a mousehole there we can use to get to the next building,” Tanner said.

  They slipped down the stairs until they reached the first floor. So far the Special Action Team wasn't following them, but it would not be long before they found the guy Tanner had shot and figured out which way they'd gone.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  Special Action Team

  Extraction Point Reinhardt

  1748 hours

  Lieutenant Muller’s radio cracked. “Ma’am, Morrow’s down. Gunshot.”

  “Where?” she snapped.

  “Fourth floor. East side.”

  “I’m on the way. All team members terminate your search and meet me on the fourth.”

  She ran down the hall and took the stairs down to the fourth floor. Steiger was right that these guys were good. She didn’t have much time. They would be long gone if she didn’t hurry. Tanner and his team had just spent a whole month in this area, and they would know it like the backs of their hands. If she was going to keep them in this general area, she would have to hurry and seal off this block and at least two around it. Otherwise they were off and running and things would suddenly get very nasty.

  Anke ran down the stairs to the fourth floor. She found her team standing around Morrow’s body. He had been shot in the head. Good shot, she thought. These guys are good. She looked out of the window. Ten feet across to the next roof. They must have gone that way and waited to see what her team was going to do. Morrow had been dumb enough to show himself and they’d taken the shot and gone down the stairs. They wouldn’t risk trying to sneak past them on a floor below.

  “Headhunter Six to Guns.”

  “Go, Headhunter.”

  “Position yourselves at the intersection of Washington and 97th. And Washington and 98th. Our targets are out of the building and will be trying to cross out of the block. They are heading west. We will be blocking them from the east.”

  “Roger, Headhunter.”

  She turned to the men and women standing around her. “First squad, cross to the other building. Try and pick up which way they’re headed. They’re blocked this way but there are still a thousand different ways to run. Remember they know they are being hunted so they are in escape-and-evasion mode. They will kill you first and ask questions later.”

  The first-squad leader gathered his squad, organized them, then led them through the window onto the roof of the adjoining building. Anke watched as they disappeared down the stairwell on the roof.

  “The rest of you back up on the roof and into the tiltrotor,” Anke barked. She looked down at the body and said, “Stupid. Let this be a lesson to the rest of you. If you get sloppy, these guys will kill you. Strip him of equipment and weapons. We don’t have time to take care of the body. Somebody else will have to come back for a body pickup.”

  She turned away and headed for the roof. If the first squad could pin down Tanner and his team, she would bring the rest of her team down on top of them. How could they possibly have known? No one could have told them. So one of them must have had a hunch and played it. Smart. This was going to prove to be an interesting problem. Anke turned and ran up the stairs to the roof.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  Resource Security Force

  Team Sixteen

  1755 hours

  Tanner held up Matos and Cat in an old apartment house down the block from the extraction point. They had been able to move from building to building through some mouseholes and side doors. He felt he was far enough away to stop and get their bearings. The paint was peeling off the walls, and part of the ceiling had collapsed as the roof leaks had finally overcome the construction. Plaster and wood littered the floor. It was getting dark, but that was not going to help since the Special Action Team had the best night-visions available. In addition, the gangs would soon be out in force foraging. As if they didn’t have enough problems.

  Cat was checking the intersection through a window in the lobby. “Tanner, we’ve got a gunship hovering at the intersection, positioned just the way the book says so he can cover it no matter where we try and cross,” she said, peering out of a crack in a boarded-up window.

  “Damn. That is a smart boy up there. He recovered fast.”

  “But, Tanner, he’s too low,” Cat said.

  “What?” Tanner and Matos quickly crossed to the window where Cat was watching the chopper. Sure enough, the tiltrotor had taken up a station that was too low, and he was not taking any evasive maneuvers. He was just there in a hover. Fine if you were chasing civilians, stupid if you were chasing an RSF team.

  “We can’t bring it down. It’s too heavily armored,” Matos said.

  “No, but have you ever tried to fly or shoot with fifty micro-explosive rounds going off in your face?” Tanner said.

  Matos smiled. “Yeah. Let’s see how good this fuck is.”

  “Okay, everybody got explosives left?”

  Tanner had plenty. It had been a quiet mission, so they had almost the full loads they had left with. Both Matos and Cat nodded as they took normal magazines out and put explosive rounds into their weapons.

  “Okay, this is the way it will go,” Tanner explained. “Matos, you and I will take the gunship. We go for the cockpit window. It won’t penetrate but it sure will scare the shit out of them. Cat, I want you to open the door of that old subway entrance.”

  “What about the motor?” Matos asked.

  “He could still fly and shoot while we try and hit those small openings in the motor. If he can’t see, he can’t fly or shoot.”

  Matos nodded.

  Tanner pointed to an old, boarded-up subway entrance across the sidewalk from the lobby.
/>
  “We’ll go down there.”

  “They'll have us trapped if we go down there,” Cat said.

  “No, we’ll only stay down long enough to get out of this immediate area. We’ll be up and out before they can get organized. Then they’ll play hell finding us.”

  Both Matos and Cat nodded in agreement.

  “Okay, let’s get ready.”

  The three of them eased open a window that was under an overhang and hidden from the tiltrotor then crawled out. Matos and Tanner positioned themselves at the corner of the building. Cat took careful aim at the subway entrance door. Tanner waited for the gunship to move slightly. The pilot was jockeying for a little better position. Just a little bit more, Tanner thought to himself as the ship moved so he had a clearer shot.

  “Now,” Tanner said quietly.

  He and Matos opened up on the gunship’s cockpit windshield, and it disappeared behind a series of small explosions. While the rounds were not penetrating the armored windshield, they were blinding the pilot. The tiltrotor gyrated wildly as the pilot tried to regain his bearings. Cat tore open the door to the subway with several well-placed shots.

  “Now! Go!” Tanner yelled over the sound of the explosions.

  All three were off and running. Matos and Tanner continued to rock the tiltrotor as they ran toward the subway entrance. The aircraft was rocking up and down as the pilots fought to keep control with rounds exploding in their faces. It dipped and almost crashed. After such a close call the pilots were forced to dart behind a building to escape the fire.

  Tanner was the last through the door. A set of wide stairs led down into the darkness of the old subway. The three reached for their night-vision wraparounds and pulled them down over their eyes. The subway suddenly came into greenish-black focus.

  “You two go ahead. I'm going to seal this entrance. It might slow them down a little.”

  Cat and Matos turned and ran off into the darkness. Tanner pulled an arm out of his pack’s straps and slung the pack around to his front so he could get at the explosives in it. He grabbed several blocks of explosive that he always carried for breaching walls and doors. This time he would close a door instead of opening it.