He peered out the window again. First, at the unmanned pumps.
Nobody to operate them.
If they still work.
Second, at the other planes landing in quick succession.
Are they just going to sit there and watch?
And third, at the narrow roads beyond the flattened fence that led back to the infested neighborhood. They were quiet for now. Soon, in perhaps a minute or two, a horde of creatures would once again descend on the base.
We’re exposed from all sides, and the only way is up.
If we even have that chance.
Each C-130 landed successfully and stopped in two formal lines alongside the four mobile pumps as if this were all routine. The planes were precariously close together—a small target for the incoming creatures.
We’re sitting ducks . . .
“Ramp lowering,” Roux bellowed from somewhere in the back. “Stand by to exit and take up a 360-degree defensive position.”
Humid tropical air rushed into the plane’s body, carrying the stench of death.
Undeterred, the supersoldiers disembarked in quick succession, boots hammering against metal.
Van Ness spun his chair toward the back of the plane and wheeled toward Cafferty. “Thomas, if you and your team would care to join me outside while our engineers refuel.”
Cafferty spun to face the back of the plane, now empty. Munoz, Bowcut, and Ellen stood staring toward the lowered ramp, lasers raised.
Van Ness continued forward. “Keep up. I’d hate for you all to miss this.”
The plane was now empty except for Cafferty and his team.
“This is suicide,” Cafferty said.
“I’m not so sure,” Bowcut replied. “He seems pretty confident.”
“But are we confident?” Ellen added.
“No,” Munoz replied. “I’m shitting bricks, but what’s new?”
“I haven’t been sure about anything since we landed in Antarctica,” Bowcut replied.
Something in Cafferty clicked then. Ever since New York, he had been tired of sitting on the sidelines, waiting for others to do while he watched. He didn’t abandon his fatalistic thoughts, but he also couldn’t stem his curiosity, nor his desire to do something. “If the supersoldiers fail,” he said to the group, “we’re dead anyway. At least let’s go down shooting.”
Munoz shrugged. “So, basically the same plan as the last three years. Ready, boss!”
Exactly.
Bowcut glanced outside. “Roux isn’t a madman. He didn’t come this far to get slaughtered before the real fighting starts.”
“She’s right,” Ellen said. “Neither did Van Ness. Say what you will about that a-hole, but he’s a born survivor.”
“And it’s definitely better to fight out there than cower in here,” Bowcut said to the nodding group.
Cafferty took a deep breath. “All right,” he said. “We’re all in agreement?”
Everyone nodded.
“Then let’s light this place up!”
The team turned and walked together toward the back of the plane. Cafferty’s previous words about going down shooting had come out naturally, without even thinking. He had subconsciously slipped back in his fighting zone, a place he never thought he had in him, until the Foundation had forced him into action. The problem was he liked it. The adrenaline made him feel alive. He reveled in the acclaim of taking down Van Ness in Paris. Wanted more. Jumped into the Foundation’s place as fast as he could to fill the void.
But things were different now, and he could feel it. Things were out of his control, and the team had put their lives in Van Ness’ hands.
Yet, maybe things were never in his control to begin with. And maybe that was part of what he liked, too.
Cafferty quickened his pace to catch up to Van Ness and joined him on the runway. He wiped a sheen of sweat from his brow as he surveyed the immediate surroundings.
The supersoldiers had fanned out in a circle around the planes, within an arm’s length of one another. They all stood motionless but ready, chests breathing deeply, slowly rocking on their heels.
So few, he thought. There’s just not enough.
Deploy the other soldiers! he wanted to scream.
At the same time, engineers had disembarked from one of the planes and were already working lines from jet fuel trucks to four of the planes.
Distant screeches approached. They could be from halfway across the city. They could be from less than a mile from the base. It was impossible to tell. The increasing loudness announced that the creatures were coming, and fast.
“You look nervous, my friend,” Van Ness said, smiling.
“When’s the last time you were on the battlefield, Van Ness?” Cafferty asked. “Not safe and sound in your underground bunkers or fortified towers? We’re about to get hit by the most vicious things on the planet, and all we’ve got between us and them is a single ring of soldiers.”
“Wrong again, Thomas,” Van Ness replied.
“What—”
“The creatures are about to get hit by the most vicious thing on the planet.”
It was the kind of bravado that put Cafferty’s teeth on edge. The assurance of the master of the self-proclaimed master race that brooked no argument. It didn’t lack for a response, though—only it wasn’t Cafferty or any of his team who spoke. Rather, as Van Ness made his condescending pronouncement, his voice became increasingly drowned out by deafening screeches. Beyond the base’s flattened perimeter, clouds of dust burst out of five streets, all directly in front of the runway.
All coming straight at them.
Roux strode around inside the ring of supersoldiers, yelling something at them. Cafferty couldn’t make out what. He wasn’t even sure it mattered.
If it were just a matter of numbers, Cafferty was pretty sure they were doomed. But when he remembered that the creatures had numerical superiority in terms of limbs—that their deadly tails gave them a further advantage—he didn’t think there was any way out.
How can they even be sure of the apparent kill ratio? We don’t even know the number of creatures coming to kill us. It’s reckless, considering what’s at stake.
Because everything is at stake.
The only thing he could hope for at this point was that he lived long enough to see the smug self-satisfaction wiped off Van Ness’ face.
“I’m begging you,” Cafferty shouted above the earsplitting noise. “At least unload another one of the goddamn planes.”
“I do love to hear you beg, Thomas.” Van Ness ignored Cafferty’s plea and turned back toward the oncoming creatures.
Cafferty raised his laser, preparing for the impending massacre.
Bowcut dropped to one knee, and Munoz, Ellen, and Cafferty followed suit. Back to back. Pistols raised.
Van Ness pulled a cigar out of his pocket and calmly cut the tip off. He lit it and pulled in a deep breath. “Any moment now.”
Surprisingly, the one thought that flashed through Cafferty’s head at that moment was how much he wouldn’t mind a cigar right now.
Several creatures rocketed through the dust clouds. More appeared behind them in the haze.
Only three hundred yards away.
In an instant, two hundred yards.
At this speed, the task force had roughly ten seconds before the hand-to-hand fighting started.
Cafferty swallowed to moisten his parched throat. He didn’t dare believe this was the end. Van Ness wouldn’t have planned something like this.
But here they were, ready for impact, against what he considered impossible odds. Then again, he thought, if the supersoldiers can’t win here, what chance did they have once arriving in San Francisco?
If the answer was none, everyone would die on the runway. And with it, humanity’s best chance at salvation.
Chapter Twenty-One
Bowcut swallowed hard and raised her pistol skyward through the cloying humidity. A bead of sweat trickled down her temple. S
ure, it was warm, but nowhere near how humid the New York City subway was in August.
She leveled her laser’s sight above the heads of the supersoldiers. Squinted as the cloud of dust hit the group, moments before the front ranks of creatures would with devastating force. Hundreds of dark figures rapidly dropped down from their final leaps, letting out deafening screeches as they closed within a breath of first contact.
The early-evening sun shone down on the dusty air, surrounding the area in a thick orange haze. The adrenaline surging through her body had the effect of slowing the world down. It always did during the moments before action. Just like when she used to storm into a house as an NYPD SWAT team member.
But this time, her vision fogged in the haze and dust. Clear visibility was near impossible. She shielded her eyes with her left hand.
The soldiers all rocked on their heels, ready for action, unflappable. Intimidating obstacles the creatures had yet to meet. The first and last line of defense. Roux confidently prowled a few feet behind them. He looked poised, ready.
Immediately to her left, Munoz’s pistol shook in his hand. She couldn’t blame him. This situation had ripped all of them firmly outside their comfort zones, if such things even existed anymore in this world on the brink of obliteration.
Van Ness remained still, relaxed, with a neutral expression. Chin on his knuckle, cigar between his thin lips. Acting as if he were about to watch a game of croquet, rather than a battle to the death.
I just wish I knew what he did to be as confident in this reenactment of Sparta’s battle against Xerxes as he is. Even with two hundred extra Spartans . . .
Glints of the attacking creatures appeared through the haze, descending on the task force like a living hell. Deafening screeches closed in.
She wiped the grit away from her eyes and blinked, attempting to improve her vision.
Suddenly, eight thick laser beams shot from the cockpit roof of every C-130 and swept the ground beyond the supersoldiers. The shots cut down hundreds of monsters, but their advance continued unabated. Where creatures fell, other dark figures appeared in their place. A seemingly endless supply.
To her front, dozens of razor-sharp tails lashed down simultaneously toward every soldier. The collective action created a chilling whoosh, signaling that the battle had commenced in earnest.
Immediately, every supersoldier in Van Ness’ army sprang into action, moving at incredible speed, and Bowcut blinked once more, unsure of what she was seeing. In a flash, they had repositioned themselves to deal with each individual creature. It all seemed so absurd—posturing for the sake of posturing so that their deaths would look more impressive. But nobody from the Foundation betrayed that kind of body language. Roux stood tall, alert. Van Ness sat, smoking, eyes twinkling with excitement.
And the supersoldiers . . .
Soldiers snagged tails in their thick-gloved hands, stopping engaged creatures’ momentum dead. In an instant, they rammed the serrated tips through scaly black chests, turning the creatures’ own strength against them. Just like in the lab, but this time en masse.
Then the soldiers moved on to the next creature. And the next. And the next. All while seemingly dancing between the lashing tails of the creatures they had yet to deal with. It looked preternatural to her, like they had some sort of innate sense of where the attack would come from and where to move before a blow was landed.
The spectacle was mesmerizing.
Viciously beautiful.
Pools of yellow blood spilled across the concrete as the initial monstrosities fell. Shrieks turned to gurgled screams. Writhing black bodies piled around the defensive ring. Not a single creature was breaking through the line.
And the four of them hadn’t even fired a single shot.
Bowcut took a moment to scan the runway. For the first time, she dared to wonder if the creatures’ attack methods were somehow predictable. She knew they had many different forms of attack, but the soldiers efficiently dealt with assaults from tails, teeth, and claws in an equally detached, efficient way. Again and again. Moving faster to combat every move.
They were outmaneuvering and outthinking the enemy.
However, the main body of creatures was still coming. She couldn’t see them through the thick haze, but she could feel them coming and could certainly hear them. The shaking ground and deafening noise told her that. The force had dealt with only the very first to arrive. The vanguard. Thousands more were about to join the fray. This would surely put Van Ness’ amazing military specimens to the test.
As the final thought crossed her mind, one of the soldiers collapsed, fast and hard. His back slammed against the ground only a stone’s throw from her position. A creature had its teeth clamped around his neck, its claws sunk into the sides of his head. With his dying breath, the soldier punched at a wound on the creature’s black torso. His fist rammed inside the creature’s chest cavity, ripping out its still-beating heart. Slimy blood oozed down the soldier’s forearm and the creature collapsed on top of him.
Bowcut aimed down at the carcass. Munoz and the Caffertys did, too.
Before any of them could shoot, Roux calmly stepped across and fired a laser through both bodies, slicing them in two. He then returned to the inner edge of the soldiers and barked orders. They inched back, tightening their defensive formation to close the gap while continuing the fight.
Another creature bounded to the top of the black corpses and tried to vault over the defenders toward Van Ness. A single soldier jumped up to meet it, grabbed its leg, and dragged it down. The creature’s body hammered against the runway. Before it could move an inch, the soldier gripped both sides of its head and spun it 360 degrees.
The deafening screeches that had swamped the immediate area gradually reduced to snarls. The initial fight against the creatures seemed to have had an effect.
And it had all happened in seconds.
Now, the creatures no longer purposefully charged forward.
This provided only slight relief, though the situation was still perilous. It would take only one section of the ring to fall for the creatures to reach the planes. And the engineers were still filling the first four.
What happens when the creatures come all at once? Why does Van Ness not bring out reinforcements? And if not him, why not Roux? Surely a military man of his experience knows they’d have a better chance with more men.
But maybe that wasn’t true . . .
Sarah’s experience as SWAT had shown that a tight, elite group—one that had each other’s back and trained ceaselessly to avoid mistakes—could be just as powerful as a large, unorganized opponent. She’d raided drug dens where there were way more guns against her, and never once did she doubt that she and her team would win.
So why do I doubt now?
Because with my team, I know I can trust every person around me.
These supersoldiers—they were strangers to her. She hadn’t seen them train, still didn’t know what they were truly capable of doing.
The approaching mass of creatures slowed, cautiously stalking around the supersoldiers as if looking for the weakest point, weighing their options against a previously unknown opponent.
She wasn’t the only one who didn’t know what to expect from the supersoldiers.
They remained facing outward, toward the creatures. Focused on anything that came their way. Chests heaving, but perhaps not as much as she might have thought, considering their exertions. Uniforms drenched in creature blood. Bowcut reckoned they had killed at least three hundred of the monsters, perhaps more. It was impossible to say because of the poor visibility and the tangled pile of black bodies surrounding the formation, melding into a single mass
This pause in action threw her. She’d never seen the creatures shy away from an attack.
Maybe it’s the first time the creatures have encountered overwhelming resistance. A force to be reckoned with.
“Why have they stopped?” Diego asked, echoing her thoughts.
“Meaning what?”
“They don’t understand what they are facing,” Roux said. “They are trying to figure it out, calculate any weaknesses we might have.”
“Of course, they won’t find any,” Van Ness quipped. “But I don’t think they are simply assessing us. I believe they are waiting for reinforcements. Surely you don’t believe there are not many many more creatures headed this way?”
“So we just wait?” Bowcut shouted.
“No.”
“Then what?”
Van Ness shook his head, enjoying her exasperation, and returned his focus to the defensive ring. He nodded to Roux, who in turn shouted out an order.
The supersoldiers drew lasers from their thigh holsters. Each one aimed into the haze and fired. Hundreds of red-hot beams speared through the dusty air—extended shots that all swept from left to right, up and down—carving through the creatures.
Screeches engulfed the base again.
Several creatures raced forward, seemingly more out of desperation than any coordinated move. Every one of them fell before reaching the supersoldiers, lanced by the searing shots.
But one creature leaped over the ring of soldiers and bounded straight at Cafferty. He frantically swung his laser in its direction, as it raised its claws to tear him apart. Bowcut could see the weapon would not discharge in time to stop the attack.
“Tom!” Ellen shouted out.
Suddenly, a supersoldier put both his fists through the creature’s body and slammed it backward, away from Cafferty, a split second before it took his life. The creature wriggled in agony on the ground as the life quickly drained from its body. The soldier—just as quickly as it had saved Cafferty—moved back to his place in the line, once more indistinguishable from his brethren.
Cafferty looked visibly shaken by the close encounter. Bowcut swung to look at Van Ness, who had watched the entire scene with amusement on his face.
“That was awfully close,” Van Ness finally said. “Wasn’t it, Thomas?”
That son of a bitch, Bowcut thought. But she wasn’t sure if she was thinking of Van Ness or the supersoldier at the moment.
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