“No, too dangerous,” Warnick said.
Berta and Hen trotted past us to the front. “At least, let us go,” she said. “We can cover the other side in a few minutes.”
We stood in the shadows, listening for cutters. Everyone watched Warnick intently. I recognized the look on his face. He was weighing options.
“Radios,” he said. Warnick, Berta and Hen each pulled small, compact radios from their backpacks, switched them on and checked to make sure they were on the same channel. “Don’t communicate unless there’s a problem.”
“Roger that,” Hen said.
Berta and Hen checked their weapons and trotted off into the darkness of the vast facility. Silently I prayed that they would be safe.
“Let’s go,” Warnick said to us.
As we continued on room-by-room, I could hear distant skittering noises, which only served to heighten my fear. Though I was focused on finding Sasha and her brother and getting them safely out of the building, I kept thinking that Walt could still here and that when I found him, I would shoot him to death and leave his bloated carcass to rot in this place.
I knew in my heart that this fantasy was a waste of energy. He was probably miles from here, on his way back to Washington where he could continue the important work of schmoozing powerful congressional committees.
“What happens when we find Sasha?” Maritza said, keeping her voice low. “Won’t she be dangerous?”
I shook my head. “She’s been able to control the virus in the past. Usually it manifests when she’s enraged. Maybe once she’s calm . . .”
“Then she’ll calmly kill us all,” Ryan said.
As we passed the room with the glowing tanks, I heard a splashing noise. Warnick raised his hand, indicating that we should stop. He and Ryan went in to check out the situation. Maritza, John and I followed. By the time we reached the doorway, the other two were trotting between the rows of tanks, their weapons poised. Warnick waved us in.
“What’s going on?” I said.
Warnick looked at the three of us. “Looks like they’re dying.”
I ran to the nearest tank, which contained the woman with the raven hair. Her dark eyes were open and she was convulsing. On closer examination I saw that the tubes feeding her were filled with a blackish liquid. Looking directly at me, fear in her eyes, she grabbed my hand.
As the others joined me around the tank, I said, “They’re being poisoned.”
Gripping my hand hard, the woman opened her mouth and tried to speak, water gushing out instead or words. Ryan examined the outside of the tank and found a panel. When he pointed it out I looked down. It showed her life functions—breathing, heart rate.
Something in the display was glowing red. I looked back at the frightened patient, whose mouth was wide open in a silent scream. Now that same blackish fluid erupted from her mouth and oozed down her cheeks like crude oil. She stiffened and, staring straight up, relaxed.
She was dead.
Gently I pulled her hand away and went to examine the others. Each one had died in the same horrible way, the panels on their tanks bathing the room in a reddish glow.
“Someone wanted them dead,” Ryan said.
“Walt Freeman,” I said. “He’s going to shut down this site and bury the evidence.”
Warnick’s radio made a clicking noise. Berta’s voice came on—she sounded scared. “Higher, this is lower. Enemy spotted.”
He pressed his mouth to the microphone and spoke softly. “How many?”
“At least six.”
“Feeding?”
“Hunting.”
“Lower, do not engage!” A long pause filled us with dread. Warnick looked at me and spoke into the radio again. “Get out of there!”
Another long pause. Then, “Copy.”
He put away his radio and looked at each of us. “This place is not secure. There are a lot of cutters in the area. We need to stay together. If we don’t, we’re dead.” Then to Maritza, “Are you okay?”
“Well, I was, until you made that speech.”
Raising our weapons, we headed for the door, knowing that at any moment bloodthirsty cutters could overtake us.
Maritza touched Warnick’s shoulder. “What if we don’t find them?”
“We’ll find them,” he said and left the room without looking back.
Relying on the floorplans displayed on Ryan’s laptop, we made our way from section to section, hoping to find Sasha hiding somewhere in the shadows. When we reached the elevators we had come down in, Warnick signaled for us to wait. The hallway glowed in the light of the ceiling fixtures. Somewhere in the distance, a clanging noise, like a crowbar that had been dropped onto the cold concrete floor.
Warnick waved us forward. As we were about to move towards the elevators, a hand reached out and grabbed his shoulder. It was Hen. Urgently and without speaking, he directed us to an aisle where Berta was waiting. We huddled close and spoke in whispers.
Berta went first. “Hen and I thought we heard a woman crying near the elevators.”
“Sasha,” I said.
“She and her brother are trying to get out,” John said. “Let’s go.”
Berta shook her head. “No. We think the cutters are surrounding them. We already spotted a couple. There’s prob’ly more.”
“So how do we do this?” I said.
Ryan consulted his laptop. “There’s another corridor to the right. We might be able to come around the other side.”
Warnick looked at the floorplan. “That could work. Let’s go.”
They led the way as we moved single file towards our new destination. Berta and Hen brought up the rear. Soon we reached a set of double doors. Warnick waved Berta and Hen forward and they trotted towards the doors, their weapons in front of them. They checked the small glass windows to see if anyone was inside. Then Hen grabbed one of the handles and, as quietly as possible, pulled the door open.
Berta and Hen entered first. The interior of the corridor was dark. Warnick entered next, then Ryan, then the rest of us. Once we were inside, we stopped and peered into the murky depths. Suddenly the doors behind us slammed shut. I turned on my heels and caught a glimpse of someone grinning through the glass.
“They trapped us!” I said.
A whooshing noise filled our ears. I could barely make out Berta and Hen being hoisted straight up towards the ceiling as they fired their weapons repeatedly. The rest of us stood in place, aiming our guns at the ceiling. Then an AR-15 dropped to the ground, followed by another. Aiming his weapon, Warnick scanned the ceiling.
“We’re gonna die in here,” Ryan said.
Warnick punched his arm. “Shut up. Everyone, stay together.”
We did our best to form a circle around Maritza and John, our AR-15’s pointed outward. If someone was coming for us, at least we’d see them.
Gurgling noises hung in the darkness. Warnick pulled out his flashlight and aimed it at the high ceiling. The light beam played off the swinging bodies of Berta and Hen, pools of blood forming on the ground below each of them. Someone had slit their throats and taken their ears and eyes. Berta shuddered—she was still alive!
Using his handgun, Warnick fired a single shot into each of the victims’ heads. I heard a noise. Warnick dropped the flashlight, his hand bleeding.
I fired in a half-circle around us. Something flashed past and I fired again. Two cutters fell and attempted to army-crawl towards the safety of the darkness. I found their heads and sent a stream of bullets at each one till they stopped moving.
More flashes. I turned towards Ryan. He looked at me, then down at his abdomen, the blood gathering around his waist. “Feck,” he said, surprised. Then he shot straight up, a metal hook in his back.
“Dave, against the wall,” Warnick said.
He and I pressed Maritza and John against the wall and stood in front of them. Warnick looked up at the ceiling while I continued scanning the corridor. Taking aim, he fired continually. Two bodies
fell in front of us—both cutters.
“We need to run for it!” Warnick said.
The four of us raced through the corridor. On the other side I could see light coming from outside. Warnick tried the door handle. Locked! Digging through his backpack he removed a small tan block I recognized as C-4. Waving us back he stuck it to the door near the hinges and attached a detonator. Then he rejoined us and, as we huddled, set off the bomb using a remote control.
A deafening explosion rocked the corridor. I looked up and saw one of the doors hanging off its hinges. Warnick waved us forward and, one by one, we went through. My ears were ringing and when I turned around I saw more cutters running towards us.
“Warnick!” I said.
Seeing them he removed a grenade from his backpack, pulled the pin and rolled it into the corridor as the first of the cutters was about to reach us. We took cover around a corner.
A huge explosion. Warnick ran back to see what had happened. I peered at the doors. They were coated in blood and bits of flesh. A severed hand lay just outside, still holding an open butterfly knife.
Carefully we advanced towards the elevators. As we entered we found the Russian girl on her knees in a corner, holding her dead brother and sobbing. Maritza went to her and held her. Like a terrified child she clung to Maritza, muttering in Russian.
I joined the two women and, extending my hand, said, “Come on, Sasha. It’s time to go home.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
One Last Thing
It was near dawn when we emerged from the facility. Sasha was distraught. As we led her towards the exit she lamented her brother, whimpering and clinging to my body armor.
“What about the serum?” John said.
I shook my head. “I don’t think she needs it.”
The early morning air was freezing. The Russian girl was barefoot and dressed only in a hospital gown, so I gave her my coat. The next order of business was to find a vehicle. We walked around the building towards the parking lot in the rear. I decided to carry her. She felt small in my arms.
The last of the night’s stars shone brilliantly in a clear sky tinged with red and gold. Somewhere far away I heard singing—a girl’s voice that was pure. It was the angel. She was singing “O Holy Night.”
I looked at the others and knew that they couldn’t hear her. And then the words struck me as the angel’s voice swelled. I wondered how anything could be wrong with the world on a morning like this. And without realizing it I thanked God that Sasha was safe. I didn’t know what would happen to her—and the baby. I let myself believe that somehow everything would come out all right. It had to.
“It’s Christmas,” Maritza said, taking my hand.
I found myself smiling as I remembered how much Holly and I used to look forward to the holidays. We were like a couple of kids with no money and tons of imagination. I remembered one year when we’d tried homemade presents. Huge fail, but the exercise made us laugh for weeks. Another year we gave each other Starbucks gift cards.
But the best one was the year we both had to work late at Staples. We’d been so busy, we had forgotten to buy presents. And by the time we got off work, the stores were closed. The last thing we wanted was to give each other copy paper or colored markers. So we went home, ate leftover pizza and gave each other our love. Best Christmas ever.
As we trudged on, Maritza stayed close, covered in dried blood from that hellish death pit. When I looked at her, she was smiling at me curiously.
“What?” I said.
“Look at you. You saved the girl.”
Sasha stirred and I adjusted my grip on her. “We saved her.”
When we reached the parking lot we found rows of vehicles, including black Escalades. Warnick reached into his backpack and removed a small electronic device. Walking up next to one of the Escalades, he pressed a button. The vehicle not only unlocked itself, but the engine started promptly.
“You’re kidding me,” I said.
“Black Dragon tech.”
I helped Sasha into the backseat and asked John and Maritza to sit on either side of her. Then I climbed into the front passenger seat as Warnick got behind the wheel.
“There are probably more cutters inside,” I said.
“I’ll call HQ. They’ll arrange to do a sweep with law enforcement.”
We cruised around to the front of the facility and headed towards the guard shack. Warnick stopped and I jumped out to open the gate. Soon we were off.
It was only five miles to our vehicles. As Warnick started off, a lone coyote trotted across the dirt road, stopping to stare at us, its head low. He gave it a short blast with the horn and it trotted away.
We’d gone maybe a mile when we spotted boulders and sand from a recent rock slide in the road and slowed down. Beyond that, a vehicle lay on its side—another black Escalade. It looked like the driver hadn’t seen the rocks and lost control. Warnick slowed down and took a look. No one was inside, so he sped up and continued on.
A little farther on we encountered a lone figure limping in the road. Warnick pulled over. Without waiting for him to stop, I leapt out.
“Dave!”
As I walked deliberately towards the man, I pulled out my Glock. He continued moving away from me, unaware that he wasn’t alone.
“Walt!” I said.
Slowly and with the deliberation of a heart attack patient, Walt Freeman turned to face me. His forehead was cut and his shirt was bloody. He wavered slightly like he was in a stupor. He must have been alone in the Escalade. Now he was out here by himself with no one to protect him.
I knew what I had to do.
As I confronted that loathsome human being, Warnick called after me. I ignored him. Instead I pointed my weapon at the object of my hatred. My mind was focused. Though somewhere in the background I could hear Warnick and Maritza, I didn’t know what they were saying—the rapid beating of my heart drowned out their voices. It would be over soon.
“Going to kill me now?” Walt said as I confronted him with only a few feet of distance between us. He was defiant, which would make killing him even more satisfying.
“Yes.”
“You think you’ll stop this, then. Put an end to the whole business? Is that it?”
“I have to start somewhere.”
I was aware that Warnick and Maritza had caught up with me, each standing on either side. I didn’t care—this was something I had to do.
“David, please,” Maritza said, touching my arm. “He’s not worth it.”
I pulled free, consumed with rage. “You don’t understand. I have to do this.”
“No, you don’t. You can let him walk. We can still stop him. We have video evidence. We’ll let the whole world know what they’ve done.”
“Listen to her, Dave,” Warnick said. “We’ll find another way.”
“What are we going to do, Warnick—arrest him for crimes against humanity?”
Walt shook his head sadly, as though out of pity. “Killing me won’t accomplish anything, son. This is an arms race.”
“What the hell are you talking about?”
“Do you think we’re the only ones working on this? Research is being conducted all over the world. Our intelligence tells us that there are active projects going on in Russia, China, North Korea and Iran. Like-uh-said, it’s a race to see who gets there first.”
“So we have to do the same? Aren’t we supposed to be better than them?”
“Grow up, Dave. The world is a dangerous place. We have only one choice. We let the enemy win, or we fight. There was never any other way.”
“There’s always another way.”
“Afraid not.”
Satisfied that he’d made his point, Walt started to turn away from me. I fired a warning shot which sent a plume of dust into the air next to his foot. Our eyes were locked, and what I saw was a tired old man who’d been given a mission he never wanted. He’d been a bureaucrat his whole life. Making deals. Moving funds ar
ound. But now he had blood on his hands—a lot of blood. And he knew it.
“So there’s really no way to stop this?” I said.
“No. Even if I wanted to.”
I raised my weapon and aimed it at his head. “I don’t care.”
“David, no!” Maritza said.
Walt never stopped looking me in the eye, his expression like that of a man who was ready to die. A dot of light appeared in the distance, growing in size and intensity. I had to shield my eyes to see. It was the angel Holly. She was standing near the rocks, looking at me, a little girl with blonde hair and green eyes. In an instant she was standing between Walt and me, wearing that same hurt expression—like I had betrayed her.
A sudden realization hit me like a body blow. It was something the angel had tried to teach me. An idea that until now I was incapable of understanding because anger and hatred had raged within me for so long. It was a single truth, shiny and clean like the angel herself. And it was incredibly clear to me.
I was supposed to be better than them.
Lowering my weapon, I wiped my eyes. And when I did, the angel vanished. Walt continued staring at me, perplexed. I knew no one else had seen her. At last I understood what she had come to do.
“I hope you and your kind rot in Hell,” I said. Then I walked back to our vehicle with Maritza’s arm locked in mine and Warnick following stoically.
“What were you looking at back there?” Maritza said to me.
“My past.”
“In time, you’ll see we’re right,” Walt said, his voice distant. “Take care of the Russian girl.”
We drove off, leaving Walt Freeman in the road. I looked into the side mirror and watched as he became smaller and smaller. Soon we’d reached our vehicles. I’d forgotten there were three.
“What about the other Humvee?” I said.
Warnick took in the situation. “I’ll send someone down to retrieve it. We also need to recover the bodies of my squad and Sasha’s brother. You and Maritza take her to Tres Marias. I’ll drop John at his house, then join you.”
Gently I placed the Russian girl in the back of my Tahoe. Then I opened the back of the Humvee, looking for a blanket. Among the weapons there I found an RPG. What had Warnick been expecting? Ignoring it, I retrieved the blanket and covered Sasha with it. Almost immediately she fell asleep.
Even The Dead Will Bleed Page 27