The Kill Box

by H. Ripley Rawlings

  “War.” he said bluntly, “Then I . . . we . . . most of us come home, and our peace is shattered. Our government, our country, all turned upside down.”

  “Those aren’t real answers.” She looked into his eyes. “You don’t have anything that scares you anymore, do you?” Her own pretty, deep-blue eyes remained fixed on his, awaiting an answer and ready to judge its truth.

  “Sure I do.”

  “Like what.”

  “Like . . . like . . . I don’t know. What scares you?”

  “Non c’è modo, I asked you first.”

  Tyce couldn’t escape her gaze, and what’s more, he liked it. He respected her opinion. So he answered, “There’s probably too many to list, but I keep . . . I . . .” She leaned in and kissed him gently on the cheek, as if to say, You’re safe, you can tell me. “I keep thinking I’ll lose my leg in combat.”

  She looked puzzled and backed away. “What. The other one?”

  “No, no . . .” Now he was embarrassed. “The one I already lost.”

  “I don’t follow. You already lost it, so . . . che cosa?”

  “I know, it’s stupid.” He tried to look away from her. “It’s irrational.”

  “What the hell? Why would you be worried about that. That’s so silly.”

  When she said it, Tyce knew it did sound rather silly. He knew it was foolish, yet something about his leg coming off in the middle of a battle terrified him. But he didn’t want to talk about it anymore and tried to change the subject. “So what are you afraid of?”

  “No, no. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to downplay your fear. It’s just that, well”—she puffed her chest out and made the frowny face again, deepening her voice in imitation—“you’re Colonel Tyce Asher.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?” he asked, scratching at the scar again.

  “It means your men will follow you anywhere. Losing your prosthetic won’t matter a hoot to those guys. They follow you because you kick ass.” She bounced once on the bed lightheartedly.

  “Well . . . I don’t about that, but . . .” Tyce was still looking for a way to be done with this conversation. “You haven’t answered my question, though.”

  Right as Tyce said this, someone knocked on the door. Tyce sprang up and threw on his camouflage pants while saying, “Yeah, what is it?”

  A voice came through the door, “Colonel Asher. It’s four a.m. You told me to come get you before your discussion with the leaders this morning.”

  Victoria dashed over behind the lockers. She was still only half clothed, and she knew the last thing that either of them needed was for one of the troops to find them together.

  “Okay,” yelled Tyce. “I’m coming now.” He pulled on his T-shirt and camouflage button-up and was headed for the door when he turned and ran over to Victoria, kissing her quickly. “We’ll talk more . . . we’ll finish this later, promise.” And he left.

  Victoria collected her uniform and started to put it on. She needed to prepare for the very same meeting. She sat on the bed, tugging her boots on. “Leading,” Victoria said in quiet answer to Tyce’s disappearing form. “Leading men into battle.”

  CHAPTER 11

  Tucker County High School

  West Virginia

  “Where, or better yet, how, do we intercept this train, sir?” Gunny asked, staring at the school’s oversized roll-down wall map of the U.S. “I mean, what the hell are we supposed to even do with it once we find it?”

  The teachers’ conference room was a pretty good command post. It had maps, office supplies, and plenty of reference material in the adjacent school library. Tyce had enjoyed their stay at the Omni Hotel, but now it finally felt like they had some practical resources and a tangible purpose to boot.

  “Can’t we just blast the thing?”

  “Probably not a good idea,” said the general from a corner, where he sat in a wheelchair with a blanket across his lap. Not walking much anymore, he was wheeled around by his friend Bill Degata. The general’s eyes were watery, his voice was hoarse, and he looked frailer with each passing day. “Do you have any clue what’s going to spill out and infect the water, the people, the crops? You might just be headed into a disaster worse than Union Carbide.”

  When no one responded to the general’s reference, he added, “Bhopal, India . . . 1982. Sixteen thousand killed, over five hundred thousand injured . . . Worst chemical spill in history.”

  “Ugh,” said Gunny.

  “How exactly is this our fight?” asked Captain Ned Blake. “I mean, shouldn’t there be some kind of national task force? We’re not equipped to secure chemical weapons.”

  “There is one,” said the general. “It’s called CBRNE, or more often NBC. Short for Nuclear, Biological, and Chemical response forces. Mostly National Guard, and even some Marine units in D.C.”

  “How is that any help? Because I swear, you ain’t getting me in one of those biohazard hazmat suits,” said Gunny.

  Tyce shook his head at Gunny. “Whoever goes near that train brings suits. Every soldier, sailor, and Marine has one issued, and I’ll want all that and gas masks on the gear list. We’re not NBC guys, but we have good gear.”

  The general interjected, “It’d be better to get some NBC specialists. The training facility for the NBC national response force is right over near Charleston. What if you grabbed one or two of their specialists? You’d at least be on par with whatever knowledge the Russians have about this stuff.”

  Tyce looked at Gunny, the general, and then Ned.

  “Oh no, sir,” said Ned. “I can already tell where this is going. I know you like using me and my men for all kinda snoopy-poopy missions, but—” Ned stopped short and stared at the gathered leadership team of the 150th. They all stared back at him, and he sighed at their expressions, especially Tyce’s set jaw and steel gaze. He had a “let’s just get it done” look that the troops had come to understand meant the decision was made. “I’ll get a squad together. When do I launch?”

  “We gotta jump on this thing ASAP. According to the VP, we’re the only organized unit that can even come close to dealing with it. Get out of here within the hour. Find and wake those NBC guys. Shouldn’t be hard to find, since they’re part of the West Virginia National Guard. One of the admin bubbas can probably track down their addresses. Then bring them back, and we can have them figure this whole thing out for us.”

  Ned and First Sergeant Hull didn’t wait; they knew they could ask questions later. They grabbed their helmets and gloves off the table and went to organize their men.

  “Well, that solves half our problem,” said Tyce, “but we still are no closer to finding the train.”

  “Maybe you need to think like a Russian chemical officer. I can’t imagine they’d put anyone on the case who wasn’t trained to deal with this kind of thing.”

  The general often prodded Tyce and the others to think about their tactical problems. Tyce thought it meant he had all the answers. He didn’t. But he did have a vast wealth of historic knowledge. Enough to get everyone thinking about the things they needed to focus on and usually adding some historic context that affirmed their decisions.

  “Well, since I don’t speak Russian and I know bupkiss about NBC,” Gunny said sarcastically.

  “Not sure you need either one of those, Gunnery Sergeant Dixon,” said the general. For a minute, he sounded like his old self, the old army paratrooper and one-star general dealing with a doubter before a big mission. It was enough to get the Gunny to stiffen up a bit. “If you were carrying a chemical weapon across the United States, what would you worry about?”

  “Insurgents. Us,” said Gunny.

  “Surely, but what I mean is do you cross through major towns? Cities, like Chicago.”

  “Not during the daytime,” said Tyce. “Any kind of misstep, and you’d be accountable for a huge humanitarian disaster.”

  “Truly. And I am certain that’s not their intent. They aim to use it just as the vice president sai
d they would, on some U.S. military unit. Shorten the war.”

  “Could they be taking it out here to use on us?” asked Gunny, his eyes widening at the sudden realization.

  “Doubt it,” said Tyce. “Too tricky to use in the mountains, and we’re just a small unit. Not a likely target when there are still big U.S. Army and other units fighting them. So for that, you’d stick to backwoods tracks.”

  “Yes. I am sure you would,” said the general.

  “You’d only travel at night,” said Tyce, starting to get into the role of a Russian with a bunch of chemicals at his disposal. “You’d send reconnaissance ahead during the day. You’d use a civilian, unmarked train. Anything else, like big cargo or box cars, even bulk tanker cars, and people would think you were someone trying to smuggle food or fuel across the U.S. No one’s moving much cargo these days, so you’d probably get overwhelmed by locals looking to help themselves.”

  “Now you’re thinking,” said the general.

  “So if they came from somewhere out near California, went to Dugway through Utah and then to Denver”—Tyce picked up a wooden yardstick and traced the route slowly, pointing out the locations on the wall-sized map. The old school maps showed most of the major rail lines—“you’re pretty much already stuck on the northern routes. Except maybe once you get farther east. I mean, just look at the northern routes. You’d be stuck going through Iowa, and from there you’re locked into going through Chicago. You wouldn’t want to do that.”

  “Ah, yes. All rail does lead east, then north and south,” said the general, “So is there a southern route that goes somewhere off the beaten path?”

  “Hmm. Well, there aren’t that many crossover spots to go from the northern rail lines to the middle or southern rail lines,” said Tyce as he and the others stepped in closer to examine the small train tracks that crisscrossed the map.

  “Makes your job easier, doesn’t it, Colonel Asher?”

  “Yes.” Tyce leaned the yardstick against his chin and drummed on it, contemplating the map. He pulled back and pointed with the stick. “Right here in Nebraska, you can cut through into Kansas and into Missouri on the Union Pacific lines.”

  “But we don’t even know how far he’s gotten,” said Gunny, a little nervous that more doubt would provoke the general again.

  “Well, I guess that’s the question,” said Tyce, looking up doubtfully.

  “And that’s the easiest thing you have to worry about,” said the general. “That part is all just a question of mathematics, my boy.”

  Tyce looked at Gunny, who said, “Don’t look at me, sir. You officers are supposed to be the ones with all the fancy college degrees and all.”

  Tyce pulled out a pencil and a notepad. “Let’s see. Traveling at . . . I’m guessing fifty-five, maybe sixty-five miles per hour. Going eight, maybe nine hours a night, then stopping only in the middle of nowhere. Hmmm . . .” he wrote out the arithmetic. “That’s about four hundred eighty miles a day.”

  “Now add those calculations to their last known point,” said the general.

  “The vice president said the last spot anyone saw them last was two days ago in Denver. That puts them about . . . here.” Tyce picked up the yardstick and put the tip on Louisville, Kentucky.

  “Holy shit,” said Gunny. “That’s closer than I thought.”

  “Yeah. That’s if you are avoiding Chicago and not taking the other populated routes. Pretty much all of Illinois, Indiana, and most of Ohio. Those are so full of American industry, and densely populated, as well. No chance you’d get through on any side tracks. You’d be lucky if there weren’t a bunch of long trains still blocking the tracks, too, stuck there since the war began.”

  “Probably all picked clean by now,” Gunny added.

  “Exactly what our Russian train is trying to avoid,” said Tyce.

  “All of the United States is still divided up by the old rail networks,” said the general. “What you’ve just figured out are the old Union Pacific to BNSF routes. Now your Russian chemical train—theoretically, at least—is entering the zone in which you find the Norfolk Southern routes.” He was looking up in the air now, his sightless eyes staring into nothingness, but his knowledge was deep from years of school learning and thinking.

  Damn, he’s like a living Google, thought Tyce, suddenly wishing he’d paid better attention in high school.

  “I guess I can see why the VP called us. We’re pretty much the only thing in its path if they want to avoid all of America’s rust belt and slip a train from the West Coast to the East Coast, then up the East Coast to New York.”

  “That is, if our math on the back of a napkin is even close. There’s a huge gap in there for error,” Gunny said. “Besides, why didn’t the VP just tell us we were the only unit in its path?”

  “If he knew, he would have. I’ll bet he’s half guessing too. Maybe even turning out other forces to our north and south to look for the train, too. Maybe the Canadians still have a satellite up. They used to have access, and might still have some back door. Who knows? But at least we can get the NBC guy and find out what to do.”

  “Yeah. Unless it’s a huge waste of time and the train has already passed us,” said Gunny. The general glanced in his direction, his white, sightless eyes giving Gunny the creeps.

  “That math is inaccurate, but very close,” interrupted a voice from the corner of the room. It was Stacey. She was behind a laptop and holding up her own notepad of scribbled notes. Everyone had pretty much forgotten she was there, but as one of the newly acquired intelligence chiefs for Tyce’s unit, her early warning of an impending Russian attack had earned her a place in the headquarters. “I redid the math, and my numbers put the train east of Charleston, West Virginia. Tomorrow night.”

  “Holy shit,” said Tyce. He went over and peered at Stacey’s math. “I think she’s right.”

  “So what are your orders, sir?” said Gunny. Like most senior enlisted men, he was glad to be a part of the figuring, but he recognized when the talk was over and the officers needed to just assign a mission.

  Tyce looked around the room and at the disarray of maps and notes on the command post’s central table. He came over and stared at the map for a second longer. “We ambush. Tomorrow night.” He pointed to a spot on the map with the yardstick. “Look, there’s a natural choke point here right at Huntington. One side of the train is against the Ohio River. If they have a force in front of them controlling the tracks or something, they can’t switch tracks in this spot. Nowhere else to go.”

  “Hit the engine, sir? Cripple them?” said Gunny.

  “Then pick them off as they come out. Avoid hitting any of the cars that might have the chemicals.”

  “Keep the ambush away from population centers if you can. Remember Bhopal,” said the general.

  “Right. Gunny, go tell Ned to wait up. We’ll take his company and my 4th LAR guys.”

  Gunny sprinted off to tell Ned to prepare a larger force. The general, who till now had been really enjoying being back in the thick of things, gave in to a fit of rough coughing. Bill wheeled him out and back to the battalion aid station.

  In the suddenly still room, Tyce sat for a moment, thinking about the steps that they needed to go through to prepare for the ambush.

  Trigger had been lying nearby, and when the meeting broke up, he stood, his tail wagging hopefully. He trotted over and bumped purposefully against Tyce’s leg. Tyce patted him on the head and focused on jotting down some notes. Equally as absently, he reached into his pocket, pulling out some stale gummy bears, Trigger’s favorite treat. Trigger eagerly chewed on them, shaking slobber from his chin and onto the floor. Tyce stood and hurried off to his office to write up some orders. Trigger began to follow, then stopped to stare at the last person left in the room. Stacey was still there, silently listening and observing everyone’s departure.

  “What are you looking at, dog?” she said.

  Trigger’s tail halted mid-wag. He let out a l
ow growl and bared his teeth. Stacey kept her eyes on him, then picked up the yardstick. “Try it, dog, and I’ll split your stupid muzzle in half.”

  Trigger didn’t move. He just stared steadily at Stacey.

  “Whatever, you stupid fleabag. I have places to be.” She stood up slowly, keeping the yardstick trained on Trigger as she backed out the door.

  CHAPTER 12

  Russian Pentagon

  Washington, D. C.

  Pavel knocked on the open door to General Kolikoff’s office and looked inside. The general sat in what was once a U.S. Army strategic planner’s office. Maps and cross sections of tanks and fighting vehicles covered the wall. He was lost in concentration, staring at his SPETS-VTOR computer terminal, and didn’t hear Pavel.

  “General, it’s time. Wolf and Panther have both arrived.”

  Kolikoff looked up, still lost in thought. “Ah, okay. How does she move around so quickly?,” he said absently. Then he seemed to come alert. “Wait, what time is it?”

  “It’s time for your early meeting, sir. Both the Spetsnaz officers have arrived and are waiting in the Iron Room. They only have an hour before they have to leave again.”

  “Crap.” Kolikoff glanced at his watch. He had spent the better part of the night tinkering with the West Virginia intelligence data and entering it into the SPETS-VTOR, so far with no discernable results. He grabbed a swig of his cold coffee, his fourth cup of the morning, and took a stack of folders, then raced off down the eerily empty Pentagon hallways and into the Iron Room.

  When Kolikoff entered from the rear of the room, he could see it was still a hive of activity. The 10th Mountain division had gotten ahold of a fresh stock of weapons and supplies and had managed to fend off two major offensives, and all the Russian intelligence services were trying to sort out how they’d gotten ahold of the weapons.

  We should be focused on the enemy 10th Mountain in New York, not this West Virginia sideshow, thought Kolikoff. But General Tympkin ordered him to get rid of the 150th cavalry, and so far, nothing was working. Maybe the Spetsnaz have some useful information.