Masks of Ash

by Adrian J. Smith

  “We don’t know if there are sentries, and an unnecessary detour would tire us out. What if you go ahead and look?” Cal said.

  “I’m with Ryan on this. OPIS is paranoid, especially since we snuck in a few years ago. Even more so now,” Booth said.

  Ryan nodded his agreement, stood, and adjusted his pack and weapons. “Stay frosty. I’ll be—”

  From the distance came the thumping of a helicopter’s rotors, perhaps two. It was difficult to decipher as the noise bounced off the valley walls.

  Were they OPIS? Ryan wouldn’t have worried about being seen in the coming darkness under ordinary circumstances, but if the choppers were OPIS, they would have thermal imaging cameras. Zanzi heard the helicopters too, and looked back, frowning.

  “They sound like they’re in the next valley over. Get your survival blankets out. Tuck them in a pocket or somewhere handy,” Ryan said.

  Thirty-One

  Sierra Nevada Mountains, Northern California

  First one helicopter thumped into the valley, followed quickly by a second. Ryan observed them through his spotting scope. One was an Apache, while the bigger of the two was a Black Hawk. They were on the opposite side of the valley to Alpha team and tracking north, moving away. As a precaution, Ryan had covered Zanzi and Tilly in a space blanket before helping Cal wrap another around themselves. Booth’s form was wedged between two boulders, a few meters along the trail.

  “What are they doing?” Cal said.

  “Nothing. Passing through,” Ryan said. He raised his voice so Zanzi and Tilly could hear. “Give it ten minutes, then we move.”

  He continued to follow the helicopters until they disappeared.

  “Move. I’ll be back in a bit. Stay away from the hut if I’m not back.”

  “Wilco,” Zanzi said. “Be careful.”

  “Watch yourself, Connors,” Booth said. He held Ryan’s gaze for a few moments before flashing a lopsided grin.

  Ryan jogged away, eager to put as much distance as he could between himself and Alpha team. This was a critical phase of the operation, which was why he had pushed them so hard.

  The trees thinned out as he climbed, to be replaced by alpine scrub and flowers: fleabane, rosy sedum, and the bright blue flowering sky pilot. Ryan wished it were daylight so he could appreciate the flora. He’d always preferred the wilderness to city life. Up here, it was almost primal, like he was some ancient explorer looking for food and shelter while avoiding death at every turn.

  Using the moonlight, he crept on. He soon spotted the ranger hut and campsite, two hundred meters ahead. It was difficult to see any details, even through his spotting scope. As far as he could tell, there was no one around. Taking care, he picked his way through the scree and headed east to circle the hut.

  As he got to within one hundred meters, he heard an odd buzzing sound. It was familiar, but he couldn’t discern its origin.

  Ryan crouched and, once again, used his spotting scope. Now that he was closer, the reason for the lack of light was evident. Someone had placed black material across all the hut windows. Blankets?

  The buzzing returned, louder this time. He swiveled his head, searching, but came up short. Nothing moved anywhere. So what was that damn buzzing? He wedged himself between two boulders and continued to scrutinize the surrounding area. Nothing. Was he being paranoid?

  There was so much at stake. Sofia had shown him the files Yamada had given The Nameless on Offenheim. They included a list of all the known properties Offenheim owned. They were everywhere. On every continent. Offenheim even funded a research station on Antarctica. But all the intelligence pointed to him being at The Eyrie.

  Ryan couldn’t shake the sense they were being played, that some unknown force was influencing all the players. He pushed aside his doubts and refocused.

  The buzzing was still there and appeared to have multiplied. Ryan frowned. As he scanned the sky with his scope, he spotted a smudge against the moon. He followed the smudge as it flew closer. And just as he realized what the buzzing was a sharp sting erupted in his shoulder, quickly followed by two more. Pain lanced through his body as he understood what he was seeing. Drones, four of them, buzzing around. Two moved fast, while two hovered ten meters above him. One of the drones had shot him.

  Ryan’s survival instinct kicked in and he rolled away. He clicked the talk button on his radio and grimaced at the pain flooding his system. As he rolled, electricity coursed through him. He cursed himself for his carelessness and tried to click his radio twice more, to give Cal the SOS signal. He gasped in a breath and blacked out.

  ***

  “He must be in trouble,” Zanzi said as she paced back and forth on the track. She craned her neck to peer back up the steep incline in the direction Ryan had gone. It had been an hour since he had left, thirty minutes since the lone squelch of radio static.

  “The signal is three clicks,” Cal said.

  “Maybe he couldn’t make two more. Maybe one was all he could do.”

  “I’ll go,” Booth said.

  Cal shook her head and jogged a few meters up the hill before returning. “All right. We’ll go. Wrap the survival blankets around you, though. If something has happened to Ryan, it must have been something out of the ordinary to fool him.” She dropped her rucksack on the ground and wedged it into the roots of the pine tree. “We go in light. Tactical gear only.”

  “Got it,” Zanzi said. She hurried to remove anything unnecessary and turned to help Tilly.

  “You okay?”

  “Just tired.” Tilly yawned as if to emphasize her energy levels. They’d been on the go for nearly eighteen hours.

  “Here. Eat this.” Zanzi handed her a high calorie gel like the ones high-performance athletes used to eat. “Keep behind us and wait until I give the all-clear, okay?”

  Tilly nodded and yawned again.

  Zanzi pivoted and joined Cal and Booth on the trail. Together they crept forward, meter by meter. They would pause every sixty seconds and stand still, letting their eyes adjust to the light and keeping alert to any sounds.

  Silence.

  One hundred and fifty meters.

  Silence.

  One hundred meters.

  A faint humming sound came, like several hummingbirds feeding on sweet nectar.

  Fifty meters.

  The humming sound became a buzz. More of a fast whir.

  Booth held up his fist, then flattened himself against a granite boulder. Zanzi pulled Cal to the side of the trail and waved Tilly down. She pulled the survival blanket tighter around her frame, hardy daring to breathe. Zanzi desperately wanted to check on Tilly. She prayed that her friend had managed to get all her limbs under the blanket.

  “What’s that sound?” Cal whispered.

  “Drones,” Zanzi said. “Not sure how many, or what equipment they’re carrying.”

  The drone left. Zanzi gestured for Tilly and Booth to join her and Cal.

  “We have to keep under these blankets at all costs,” Cal said. “If they caught Ryan, let’s assume they have thermal imaging.” Cal lifted her spotting scope and inspected the ranger hut.

  “He has to be in the hut. We’re going to move as one toward the hut. If it takes us all night, so be it.”

  “I’ll take point,” Booth said.

  Zanzi watched him go. For the first time in her life, she was seeing a different side to her father’s oldest friend. She was used to seeing him cracking jokes and telling wild stories about his adventures. Now, on a mission, she could see his serious side. He was professional, quiet, and moved with assurance. It gave Zanzi new confidence.

  It was agonizingly slow. Whenever they detected a drone coming too close, they’d stop and hunch down, sometimes for a few seconds, sometimes for what felt like hours.

  As the mountain sky showed signs of the new day dawning, they finally reached the hut. Minutes before, the drones had stopped their buzzing and disappeared.

  Zanzi shrugged off the space blanket and peek
ed in the nearest window. Someone had draped blankets across but had left a thin sliver on the edge. Two figures moved around in the room. One appeared to be cooking. She inhaled, trying to identify the scents. Nothing, apart from the pine trees and the timber cladding of the hut.

  Zanzi looked back at Cal and held up two fingers, then shrugged, signaling that she wasn’t sure if any more were present. Booth, five meters away, shook his head. Nothing around the blind side of the hut.

  Cal waved them around the back, which wasn’t visible from the trail, thanks to two large rainwater tanks obscuring the view and a short fence that sectioned off an ablution block. Zanzi followed her mother around the showers, and they came to a halt, one on either side of the back door. Muted voices carried through in the still morning air.

  “All I’m saying is, he wouldn’t be alone.”

  “But we searched for over three hours and found nothing. The cameras on my drones are infrared,” a second, higher-pitched voice said.

  “Look at what he’s carrying, weapons and tactical gear.”

  “Look, 404. If it makes you feel better, after breakfast you can go down the trail and have a look.”

  Zanzi frowned. She knew that number. He had helped her and Tilly in Devil’s Falls. Could it be the same guy?

  “Well, at least call it in.”

  “501 has to fix the aerial.”

  “I thought he’d done that?”

  “He did, but it’s glitchy. You’d think that with all their fancy tech they’d give us better radios.”

  Both men chuckled and spoke no more, eating sounds replacing their voices. Cal, using sign language, outlined a plan to Zanzi and Booth, pulling out the tasers they had brought, to make it crystal clear. With the pair’s radio out, fate had dealt them an advantage.

  Zanzi leant closer to Tilly and dropped her voice to a whisper. “Stay here.”

  Tilly grasped her shoulder, her eyes full of worry. Then she brought up her MP5, determination replacing the concern. Once again, Zanzi admired the young woman’s courage.

  Zanzi grabbed her own taser and signaled to Cal and Booth that she was ready. Cal counted it down, and on three, they burst into the room. Zanzi went left and aimed her taser at the Black Skull digging into a plate of bacon and eggs. He pushed back and reached for his gun, which lay before him on the table, but the electricity traveled faster. He convulsed, eyes bulging as saliva frothed from his lips. Zanzi hit him again, and once more for good measure. She drew her Glock and spun, looking for more targets. Cal stood over the prone figure of another man, thin wires spiraling from his body to the taser still in her hand. 404 sat in his chair, staring straight at Zanzi. Booth had his Glock aimed at 404’s forehead, while 404 had his HK416 pointed directly at Cal’s chest.

  Zanzi slowly raised her hands. “Mom,” she said, her voice catching in her throat.

  Cal drew her pistol.

  “Shoot her and I shoot you,” Booth said to 404. “You know as well as I do that you won’t survive.”

  “Wait!” Zanzi shouted when Cal aimed at 404 but didn’t pull the trigger.

  404, using the distraction, twisted, and jabbed his own taser into Booth’s leg. Booth went rigid and sank to the ground.

  “Drop it,” Cal hissed through clenched teeth.

  404 grinned but kept his carbine where it was. “Well, I must say I’m surprised to see you again, Zanzi, and your mother too. And you brought a friend.”

  “Drop it,” Cal said again.

  “No. I don’t think I will.”

  “Where’s Ryan?” Zanzi said.

  404 gestured with his head toward a darkened room in the back of the hut. “If you mean the guy we caught snooping around earlier. He’s alive. You can check if you like.”

  Zanzi slowly stepped over the Black Skull she had incapacitated and poked her head in the next room. She found her dad tied to a chair, his head resting on his chest. Apart from three wounds on his upper arm and torso, he appeared unharmed. His chest rose and fell in a steady rhythm.

  “That’s far enough. Come back and sit down,” 404 said. “We’ve been up here for ten days, bored as hell. Finally, we got some action. Trust it to be you guys.” He looked Zanzi in the eyes. “I saw what you did to Alba.” He chuckled, a deep, baritone sound. “I always thought someone would pay her back.”

  “She killed a friend of mine, cracked her open like she was nothing but an experiment.”

  “We were all subjects and playthings to her.” 404 wiggled his gun, pointing to the table and chairs. “Take a seat.”

  Zanzi walked toward the table. Cal sat with a grunt and dropped her Glock. When it clattered on the floor, 404 didn’t flinch. Didn’t give any indication he’d heard it. His focus was entirely on Cal. Once Zanzi was sitting down, 404 walked to the open door.

  There was a scream, then gun shots. Zanzi spun to see Tilly, feet planted, clutching her Sig Sauer P365 in both hands. Tilly kept firing and screaming until the magazine clicked empty. When Tilly’s scream subsided, Zanzi turned to look at 404. He had fallen backward onto the floor and sat on his butt, staring down at the wounds in his chest, his mouth gaping open like a stranded fish, brow creased in confusion.

  At that moment, Cal jumped up and zapped him with her taser. 404 blinked once and toppled over.

  Zanzi stood and took the pistol from Tilly’s hands. Her friend gasped and tears began to fall. “Is he dead?”

  “I don’t think so. The nanites will heal him,” Zanzi said. “Thank you, that was really brave.”

  “I couldn’t let him hurt you.”

  “I know. You did the right thing.”

  Cal ran into the back room and untied Ryan. He was still unconscious, so, with Zanzi and Tilly’s help, they placed him on one of the beds. They sat Booth upright and made sure he was still breathing. Next, they duct-taped the three Black Skulls to the kitchen chairs and collected up any weapons. Cal fiddled with the radio, to no avail. The guards had been telling the truth: the radio was down.

  “After you get our packs, find those drones they were using. I want to know everything we can about them. Then get some rest,” Cal said.

  “What are you going to do?” Zanzi asked.

  “Radio Lisa. And I’ll take first watch. Two hours each.” Cal looked at the time. “We need to leave at noon, no later.”

  404 groaned in his chair and struggled against his bonds. Cal leant over and zapped him again, then zapped the other guards for good measure.

  As Zanzi headed back down the trail, she let her eyes wander over the mountains. Snow glistened in the morning light, in stark contrast to the black rocks. Eagles flew on thermals, ignorant, or uncaring, of the chaos unfolding in the world. She blew out a breath and calmed her thumping heart. Less than twenty-four hours into their mission and they had already run into trouble.

  Thirty-Two

  Beale Air Force Base, California

  OPIS had hit Beale hard. Not only had they destroyed much of the infrastructure, buildings, hangars, and most of the Pave Paws, but the runways had giant craters. Fences and trees were blackened by fires. The remaining Air Force personnel had managed to repel the attack and save one of the radar antennas. They were operating, but on limited staff, and had dug in next to the main buildings. Defenses had been erected and patrol flights constantly took off. Two more attacks had followed the first, but ten days had passed since the last attempt. Pilots had reported ground troop movements in the Rockies, Sierra Nevadas and Cascades, but all had stopped in the high passes, going no farther. It was as though an imaginary line had been drawn on a map. This side is ours, that side yours.

  Lisa steepled her fingers and gazed at the images of Doctor Monica Johnson and General Munroe on the split screen in front of her. Alongside her, taking the video call in the Beale operations center, was Colonel Andrew Jessup, Beale’s CO. Jessup, a tall man, had his silver hair cut close.

  His square jawline jutted out. “So Doctor Johnson. You’re confirming everything Director Omstead has claimed
? The combusting event was caused by nanites?”

  “Correct,” Monica said. “As you can see by the slides. I enlarged one of the nanites.”

  Jessup grunted. “That’s some undertaking. Now that I’ve seen that video of Ward conspiring with OPIS, I can understand why. Tell me, Doctor, any luck figuring out the mutated humans and why they’re congregating around my communications equipment?”

  “Yes. I’ve been working with another doctor. We think it’s all to do with corrupted nanites. From the subjects I’ve tested, I’ve learnt that their Alpha nanites never formed properly. They want our cerebrospinal fluid because that’s where the dormant nanites are stored.”

  “And why are they attracted to my radar equipment?” Jessup said. “Every day we slaughter hundreds, and every day more show up.”

  “We think they’re awaiting either updates or the self-destruct code. We can’t be sure,” Monica said.

  “Can we send a code of our own?”

  “We’re working on that as we speak. Now that I have Doctor Lahm working with us, the process has advanced a great deal.”

  “How long before you nail it?”

  “I can’t be sure. A week at the most.” Monica juggled the pile of folders in front of her. “Like I said before, we need computer engineers.”

  “We’re looking.” Jessup sighed. “You’d think, with Silicon Valley close by filled with tech companies, some would’ve survived.”

  “Thank you, sir.” Monica reached out and her side of the screen went dark.

  Lisa shifted in her seat and sipped her coffee. The bitter beverage recharged her like no other drink could. At least coffee wasn’t in short supply yet.

  “Happy, Jessup?” Munroe asked.

  “I just wanted to be clear. You have to admit, it’s a lot to take in.”

  “I told you nearly two weeks ago, as soon as you’d got your radio operating again.”

  “Yes. If I hadn’t seen that video, I’d still be skeptical. Omstead, what else do you know?” Jessup said.