by Bobby Akart
“Dr. Spielman, yesterday you tempted me with a pretty sweet carrot in the form of that office. I assume it comes with some level of responsibility beyond my normal capabilities.”
“It does, Mac. Just a moment. I want to shut this door so we can talk privately.”
While Mac waited, she leaned forward and studied some of the paperwork on his desk, looking for a hint or a clue of any nefarious activity. Dr. Spielman returned and she quickly averted her eyes from his desk, but not before she saw a document labeled CABLEGRAM on the stationary of the World Health Organization.
“Clearly, these circumstances and this facility are highly unusual. Yet they resemble a scaled-down version of what we did at the CDC. The only difference is we’ve incorporated the USAMRIID functions and some of their personnel under one roof, or floor, in this case.” Dr. Spielman chuckled at his sly remark.
“Yes, sir,” said Mac, who was all business. “At the moment, are you supervising all of these activities?”
“I am, and now, thanks to your miraculous discovery, which I’m anxious to hear about in more detail, my workload has doubled.”
“Dr. Spielman, how can I help? Shall I coordinate with the WHO and other foreign health protection agencies in distributing the vancomycin formula?”
Dr. Spielman pushed back in his chair and gripped the arms slightly. “We’ve not been able to make contact with the WHO, and other governments are in disarray. Most don’t have the same continuity-of-government protocols our nation has established.”
Mac frowned and then swallowed. She decided to continue to ferret out his plans for her. “Are there any other tasks you can assign to me to take the burden off your shoulders?”
“Obviously, I need you to oversee the development, testing and production of the drug. Today, the development and testing phase will begin in earnest. I’m pleased to tell you that we have government zoologists capturing primates that survived the plague outbreak at the Denver Zoo and they’re bringing them here for our test purposes.”
“That’s great news, sir. I’m anxious to get started and will help you in any way,” said an exuberant Mac.
“Mac, I want to speak to you on a personal level for a moment, if I may?”
Here we go, thought Mac. “Of course, sir. Please do.”
“Your perseverance on behalf of this nation should be commended and rewarded.”
“Sir, that’s not necessary,” interrupted Mac. “I never lost my will to fight for a cure that could save humanity. Sounds like a lofty goal, but it was real.”
Dr. Spielman studied Mac for a brief moment before he spoke. “At the CDC, our mission was to protect our nation and its citizens against health, safety, and security threats. Now, thanks to you, we’re on the cusp of saving millions of Americans.”
Mac listened intently, but he sounded like he was making a speech to a new group of epidemiology recruits. She wanted him to get to the point.
He continued. “By accepting this position, you are taking on a great responsibility to the American people, but especially your government. The Chief of Staff expressed concern to me about your loyalty to this project and the President. Mac, you need to understand, you’re one of us now.”
“What do you mean?” she asked.
“Prior to the pandemic, our government operated on a hierarchal system that was out of control. By sheer attrition, the layers of management have shrunken considerably. As my number two, you would become a phone call away from the president. That makes you one of us.”
Mac was genuinely bewildered by this conversation. Dr. Spielman seemed to be talking in riddles. “One of us, sir?”
“Yes, Mac. We will enjoy responsibilities and perks that are not available to the others in the newly constituted CDC.”
Perks, there’s that word again.
He continued. “What that means is private conversations with that busybody Sandra Wilkinson have to cease. They will be used against you to undermine your position.”
How did he know about that? It was just a few hours ago. “Sir, I knew Sandra from the EOC in Atlanta. We were just catching up on a few—”
“Dr. Hagan,” said Dr. Spielman sternly, which made Mac jump in her chair slightly. I guess the personal talk is over. “Are you able to separate yourself from the others and remember who the two of us answer to?”
Here came the first of many lies Mac would tell over the next few days. “Absolutely, sir. I am one hundred percent loyal to you. Rest assured, I will follow your lead on everything.”
“Good. Now, let’s you and I go to this lunch meeting, where you will brief the team on your findings. This afternoon, I will make the announcement that you’re the new principal deputy director of the CDC.”
Mac gulped. She didn’t know who to believe. Sandra Wilkinson seemed so convincing, yet she was very conspiratorial.
Was Sandra setting me up so she could get a peek at the natural light above the ground?
But, then, could she trust Dr. Spielman? He had been evasive in his prior responses. As part of her acceptance of any position she offered, she was going to insist upon time with Hunter, but the topic never came up.
Two things struck her about their twenty-minute conversation. One had to do with Dr. Spielman’s focus on their nation and American citizens. Mac thought their goal was to save all the people in the world, not just theirs. The other had to do with his interaction with the WHO. The cablegram on his desk proved he wouldn’t hesitate to lie directly to her face.
How am I supposed to separate the truth from the lies? She needed Hunter’s advice and would find a way to manipulate her way out of the Den.
Chapter 50
Day Ninety-Two
Noah’s Ark
Boreas Pass at Red Mountain
Hunter left the negotiating—or arguing, which was a better characterization—regarding the military’s occupation of Breckenridge up to the sheriff and Doc. He and Captain Hoover drew on their experience as a covert operative and platoon leader respectively to create a plan to attack the Snow compound and save the people held there.
They did not have the benefit of a map or any details regarding the layout of the compound, which basic reconnaissance would provide. As Sheriff Andrews pointed out again, nobody had escaped the Snow compound thus far because he assumed they were remaining with Snow of their own free will. He now second-guessed this theory because it was apparent Snow, or at least his sons, were kidnapping women and holding them captive.
It was a completely dark evening, as the new moon provided no ambient lighting. A beautiful blue and green aurora lit up the northern sky, which drew the attention of Hunter as they hiked along the tree line of Red Mountain. He wished Mac was there to enjoy the incredible sight.
Armed with full chest rigs and automatic weapons, Hunter and Captain Hoover set out at midnight along the many trails created by the Snow teens. Using a compass and the benefit of night-vision goggles, the men worked their way up Boreas Pass until they reached a clearing above the compound.
The sheriff provided the men some of the gear used for riot control and SWAT team activities. He laughed as he issued the flash-bang grenades, pepper spray, and bulletproof vests. The closest confrontation Breckenridge had ever experienced that could be labeled a riot was when Deep Roots Gardening Supply ran out of marijuana seeds during their first day of operations. Demand was much larger than their supply, resulting in a skirmish between the local potheads.
Captain Hoover tested his communications with Colonel Clements but was having difficulty. “Hunter, let me try your radio,” said Captain Hoover.
Hunter backed off the edge of the cliff overlooking the compound and moved closer to his partner. Captain Hoover keyed Hunter’s mic and received the same static in response.
He reattached the mic to Hunter’s rig and grumbled, “Maybe they need to be in range. These mountains are wreaking havoc on our comms.”
“Yeah, or it’s that,” started Hunter, pointing over his shoulder
at the aurora. “I always laugh when people get all excited about the beautiful aurora. The news cameras show the beauty to all of their viewers and everyone shares their pics with The Weather Channel. One of these days, that beautiful aurora is gonna turn deadly, fry all of our electronics, and cause a massive blackout.”
Hunter got up from his crouch and started down the trail toward the back side of the compound, where several small cabins were scattered against the woodsy backdrop. Based on their conversations with Sheriff Andrews and a few of the locals, Snow assigned housing based upon importance within his community. During their briefing earlier, the owner of the builder’s supply said he hadn’t seen the Snows make any lumber purchases in a couple of years, so he doubted there had been any new construction.
That led the group to one conclusion—Snow was using the mine as a prison.
Hunter and Captain Hoover had the advantage of a dark, early morning hour and night-vision goggles, a device Hunter called the great equalizer. Whenever the DTRA undertook a mission at an unfamiliar location, night vision, which was usually not available to their targets, allowed the operatives to move through a building or street without detection. While the enemy might have the benefit of local knowledge, in the middle of the night, Hunter could see what they could not, thus leveling the field of battle.
Hunter stopped as they reached the clearing, barely forty feet from the first log house. He checked his watch. It was just after four a.m. They had two hours to clear the mine of any guards, free the women, if in fact that was where they were, and hustle them to the safety of the woods.
At dawn, the Humvees would roar up the driveway in formation and shred the compound’s fortified gate with fifty-caliber bullets and grenade launchers. Sheriff Andrews, on behalf of Summit County, had taken advantage of the Department of Defense transfer of four-point-three billion dollars’ worth of surplus and used military equipment to local law enforcement agencies around the country.
By declaring Summit County a hotbed of illicit marijuana growers, he’d received a dozen M16s, six .45-caliber pistols, twelve Mossberg 590 shotguns, and two grenade launchers. He offered up all of the above in the effort to take down Snow.
Hunter and Captain Hoover needed to begin their part of the mission now. Their goal was to extract the women from the mine and get them into the safety of the woods before the front gate was breached.
“Cappy, our plan can be executed without comms,” said Hunter in a whisper. “Let’s work with our silenced weapons and clear the mine first. Once we’ve located the prisoners and have them freed, we’ll sneak them back here.”
“What if the compound rises before dawn?” asked Cappy. “We know nothing about their routine. Hunter, we really should have conducted some surveillance first.”
Hunter didn’t respond right away since he knew Captain Hoover was right. He was taking a risk because he was being protective of Janie. He had seen the worst of what mankind had to offer and he wasn’t going to subject Janie to it for one minute longer than necessary.
“Yeah, I get it. Are you ready?”
Captain Hoover patted him on the back and the two men emerged from the woods together. Using the night scope attached to the M4 he took from the sheriff, Hunter walked sideways through the cleared area against the woodsy backdrop. He and Captain Hoover had both dressed in woodland camo clothing to blend in with the aspens and pines behind them.
After two hundred yards of maneuvering through the tall, wet grass, they reached the entrance of the mine. Hunter crossed over the opening of the mine as a burst of cold air rushed down the face of Red Mountain. The air pulled the decades-old musty smell out of the mine shaft past his nostrils.
Hunter crouched next to the massive posts holding the entrance open. He turned his rifle inside the mine and searched to identify any guards. Sixty feet into the mine was an open area furnished with an old sofa, a couple of plastic stackable chairs, and a simple wooden table. A kerosene lantern produced a faint glow revealing a card game being conducted.
To the left, and slightly out of his field of vision, two men were standing alone. After a moment, they returned with a plate full of sandwiches for their candlelit meal. Hunter looked around the interior of the mine shaft for evidence of electrical wiring. Their ability to make sandwiches confounded him, but it didn’t matter. It was go time.
Chapter 51
Day Ninety-Two
Noah’s Ark
Boreas Pass at Red Mountain
Hunter raised two spread fingers to Captain Hoover and then put them together and pointed them toward the right, indicating the locations of the hostiles. He entered the cave slowly, walking heel to toe down the slight decline. Periodically, a concrete curb had been created with weep holes on both walls next to it. These were designed to catch excessive water runoff, which would prevent the mine from flooding.
The men continued to play cards, blissfully unaware of Hunter’s advance. He was close enough to take the shot, but then he paused. Just past the men’s location, a series of single lightbulbs hanging from a cord in the ceiling ran down the center of the mine’s shaft.
Hunter traced the wire back to the opening and then to the left, where the men had emerged with their sandwiches. He quickly glanced upward to make sure he hadn’t missed the wire.
Captain Hoover stopped across the shaft and dropped to a knee. “What’s up?” He whispered the question.
“The power comes from the left side. There might be another entrance to the mine. I’m gonna drop these two, but prepare for their buddies to appear from the left side like mice out of a hole in the wall.”
“Hit ’em, and I’ll pick off the mice,” said Captain Hoover.
Hunter inched forward and chose the closest target first since he was partially obscured by the mine’s wall. Two rounds spit out of his suppressed M16, exploding into the man’s back and ricocheting throughout his chest and vital organs. The dead man fell face-first into the table, causing the kerosene lamp to crash onto the floor.
The second target sat upright in stunned silence, receiving a round to the chest and one to the face before tilting backward against the floor with a crash.
What happened next caught Hunter by surprise and instantly meant they were in grave danger. A man with a hunting rifle stepped into the clearing and got off a single round, which flew between Hunter and Captain Hoover, who were both crouched on one knee.
Captain Hoover quickly dispatched the shooter, but the damage was done. The loud crack of the gunshot echoed through the mine shaft and was most likely heard by those in the compound. The guys were trapped with only one way out—firepower.
Hunter thought quickly. He had to hope there were only the two entrances into the cave. If they could gain control of the point where the three dead men now lay, releasing their blood down the mine shaft, they could hold off Snow’s men until the Humvees mounted their frontal assault—in just under two hours.
“Hurry,” ordered Hunter as he moved deeper into the mine. Another person burst into the opening and Hunter immediately shot him in the head. “Stay low.”
The two men walked against the walls, keeping their bodies as low as possible to avoid providing an easy target.
Captain Hoover was the first to spot the arm pointing a handgun around the carved-out opening of the mine’s wall. He raised his weapon to shoot after three quick shots were sent in their direction, missing low, but still putting them at risk from a ricocheting bullet.
The shooter pulled his arm back quickly, but Hunter trained his rifle on the exact position in case he got a second chance. The instant the hand reappeared, Hunter squeezed the trigger, dislodging the weapon from the shooter’s hand, together with three of his fingers.
The man began to wail in pain, and this was when Hunter first realized all of the shouting taking place both within the mine and outside it. As they approached the apex of the two mine shafts, Captain Hoover killed the other man, who was lying on the floor, gripping his bleeding appendag
e. The shaft to their left rose up a slight incline and into the night sky, but was now empty.
Women were screaming and pounding on their doors. They were shouting for help and begging to be released. As badly as Hunter wanted to locate Janie and the others, he needed to deal with the threat posed by Snow’s men first.
“Cappy, can you see their cells?” asked Hunter as he waved his rifle back and forth, searching for targets to come down the mine shaft. “From the sounds of their voices, they must be down at least two or three hundred feet.”
Captain Hoover rifled through the pants of the dead men until he found a large ring of keys attached to one of the men’s leather belts. “Hunter, I’ve got the keys.”
Hunter quickly weighed his options. They could hold off an attack for a while as long as they managed their ammo. He looked around at the weapons left by these men, which included three handguns and a hunting rifle.
If Snow and his men rushed the mine from both directions, he couldn’t hold them off alone. However, they wouldn’t have time to release all the women in the middle of a shoot-out. From the sounds of their screams and excited calls for help, there could be two or three dozen cells to find and unlock.
He couldn’t delay his decision any longer because Snow was surely mounting an assault. “Cappy, go find Janie and let her out. Janie only, okay. If you let them all out at once, they’ll come storming up here in a panic and get us all killed.”
“You got this?” asked Captain Hoover.
“Yeah, but hurry.”
Hunter continued to watch both entrances to the mine for signs of movement. It had been fifteen minutes since they’d entered the cave and five minutes since Captain Hoover had gone deeper into the mountain to locate Janie. Where are Cappy and Janie?
Hunter glanced over his shoulder and thought he saw the shadow of a man approaching and took a little extra time to make sure it was Captain Hoover.