Apocalypse Crucible

by Mel Odom

  Zero’s eyes turned cold. “That would be their mistake then.” He turned and lifted his shirt from the floor.

  Joey spotted a gleam of an oily metallic surface only an instant before Zero unlimbered a large handgun from his shirt. Zero leveled the pistol at the television set where an alien stood frozen on the screen when he’d paused the game.

  The shot sounded like a cannon in the enclosed space. A bright flame shot from the barrel. The bullet hit the television screen and exploded the set, leaving a gaping hole where the video-game picture had existed only a moment ago.

  Zero turned to them with a smile on his face and the pistol waving before him. “I’m gonna be an ambassador. Or a prince. Some alien tries to make me his little trophy prize, I’m gonna blow his head off.”

  No one spoke for a time.

  Finally, RayRay said, “They still got cops, you know. In this neighborhood, I mean. A neighbor could call in on that shot. We know there’s a few neighbors left. We’ve seen them, and there are lights on out there now.”

  “All the more reason for us to get up and get moving,” Zero said. He glanced around the house. “We’re about done with this place anyway.” Joey thought about going home. Any place was safer than being with Zero. Maybe it was the whiskey and the pills Zero was taking, or maybe the whole disappearances thing was catching up with him, but Joey felt like Zero had lost it. If he had been dangerous before, he was decidedly more so now.

  But Joey shut down that line of thinking. Home wasn’t an option for him. His mom had turned away from him when she’d taken in all those other kids. She hadn’t even thought of him, hadn’t considered how he’d feel about getting invaded and sharing everything in his home—including his mom.

  He also felt certain she blamed him for not being there when Chris … vanished. He was supposed to have been there. If it were him, he knew he’d blame himself for not being there to take care of his brother.

  He already did.

  Even if he’d wanted to go back to Fort Benning, he’d lost his military ID somewhere since he left. Maybe an MP would look him up in the computer and let him enter the post, but more than likely that wouldn’t happen. From the scattered news reports he’d seen on local television stations, Fort Benning remained under siege by frightened citizens begging and fighting to get in.

  Still, he’d have to find a way to get across the city and back to the post before he could do anything. Predatory groups still roamed the streets, though. Murders and personal violence had escalated. Going through that dangerous landscape alone wasn’t an option.

  With a sinking feeling, Joey knew he was trapped with the others. At least for the moment. He stared at Zero and the broken television, feeling that things were only going to get worse.

  15

  United States 75th Army Rangers Temporary Post

  Sanliurfa, Turkey

  Local Time 0552 Hours

  “Goose, wait up. Goose.”

  More than anything, Goose wanted to ignore the sound of that voice because it could only mean trouble. So he pretended not to notice even though doing so made him feel bad. His father had raised him to be respectful of women.

  A Ranger private parked in a Humvee across the street spotted the first sergeant. At Goose’s signal, the private put the vehicle in gear and spun it around, bringing the Hummer to a stop in front of Goose. The driver was bloodied and covered in soot, evidence of his proximity to the front line.

  “First Sergeant Gander,” the private greeted.

  An M-1 Abrams rumbled down the street. The heavy treads smashed through piles of debris that littered the pavement and filled the immediate vicinity with rumbling and cracking. One of the stores still burned. Flames twisted along the outside of the building like they were trying to escape. Fire teams worked to control the blaze.

  Goose lifted his leg gingerly and slid into the passenger seat. He put his M-4A1 buttstock down between himself and the driver.

  “Where to?” the driver asked.

  “Away from here,” Goose answered, taking his Palm Pilot from the chest pouch of his BDU. “I’ll call it on the fly, Private. I just want to feel the wind in my face.”

  “All right, First Sergeant.”

  Anger seethed inside Goose. He didn’t like getting cut out of the investigation into the CIA’s operations inside the city. And despite his years of training and having the mind-set of an enlisted man, he didn’t like the way Remington had handled his dismissal in front of an audience. For a long time, they’d shared a deep friendship. Perhaps that friendship hadn’t extended beyond the postings and battles they had gone through together, but it was there at those times.

  It’ll be there again, Goose told himself. Once we get around this, if we’re not dead, it’ll be there again. His friendship with Remington, despite their differences on a number of things, was part of the bedrock of his military life.

  Goose’s friendship with Bill Townsend had been on a different level. Bill had gotten involved with all aspects of Goose’s life, from the military to the family. And if Bill were still here instead of among the MIAs reported after the rash of disappearances, Goose knew his friend would tell him to relax and let Remington have his way for a while. They were all headed in the same direction.

  Goose couldn’t shake the idea that Icarus knew more about the vanishings than anyone else Goose had so far talked with.

  “Goose.”

  “First Sergeant.” The driver nodded toward the approaching woman. “Lady there seems to want to talk to you.”

  Reluctantly, Goose shifted his attention to Danielle Vinchenzo. She wore fatigues and a Kevlar battle helmet. A few strands of her short-cropped brown hair poked out from under the helmet. Dirt or blood streaked one of her cheeks. Her cameraman followed her, panning the street and the soldiers.

  “Maybe I don’t want to talk to the lady,” Goose growled.

  “Might at least take a minute, First Sergeant,” the private said, gazing across Goose. “You got to at least tell her that running around in these streets ain’t no place for a lady.”

  “I don’t think she’ll listen to me,” Goose said. He was certain about that. Danielle Vinchenzo had a habit of reporting right from the middle of a battle. Talks with some of the other reporters from FOX News where she had worked before taking the new assignment with OneWorld NewsNet had revealed that her behavior in the Sanliurfa situation wasn’t new. She’d taken that tack dozens of times before. She wasn’t one to go along with the flow when she felt she had a story. A maverick, one of the journalists had called her.

  But she was easy on the eyes, another had said. She pulled in ratings for news stations. A woman in the middle of a war zone was attention-getting enough, but Danielle was also bright and articulate and knowledgeable.

  Goose’s opinion was that she was also dangerous to herself. And, just maybe, to the people around her.

  Danielle stopped at the side of the Humvee. “I didn’t think you heard me.”

  “I’m busy, ma’am,” Goose replied, not addressing the question of whether he had heard her or not.

  “Are you on your way somewhere?”

  The cameraman hunkered down to line up a shot on Goose.

  Pointing at the camera just as the bright cone of light flared out at him, Goose said, “No.”

  Danielle adjusted her helmet and squared her stance. “Cezar.”

  “Yeah,” the cameraman replied.

  “Off.”

  The cameraman looked petulant. “But you said you wanted footage of the sergeant. Said he was your golden boy.”

  “He’s a first sergeant, not a sergeant,” Danielle said. “There’s a distinction. I said, off. I meant it.”

  “You meant it when you said you wanted the footage, too.” Shrugging, Cezar turned the camera off and walked away. “When you decide you want to get back to the job, I’ll be over here.” He walked a few paces away and lit a cigarette.

  A cargo truck pulled to a stop in front of the Humvee.
Soldiers representing the American, Turkish, and United Nations forces bailed from the truck and began unloading gurneys of wounded soldiers and citizens.

  “We’re in the way,” Goose said. “Got people here with jobs to do.”

  “No problem.” Danielle vaulted with lithe ease into the rear of the Hummer. She settled in. “Let’s go.”

  Irritated, Goose swung around in the seat to face her. “Miss Vinchenzo, what do you think you’re doing?”

  “Following up on my story.”

  “Get out of the vehicle.”

  “No.” Determination showed in her dark eyes.

  Goose was surprised to see suspicion in the woman’s gaze as well. “Ma’am, you’ll either leave this vehicle under your own steam or I’ll have you escorted off and placed under guard till I figure out what to do with you.”

  “What is the CIA doing here?” Danielle demanded.

  Shock locked Goose’s mind down for a moment. He took a breath to figure out his course of action.

  “Don’t bother to deny it, First Sergeant,” Danielle said. “I saw the man myself.”

  Goose rubbed his face with a hand. The rough contact awakened pain in a dozen cuts and scratches. Stubble rasped against his callused palm.

  “Is the U.S. military working with the CIA?” Danielle asked.

  “In the defense of this city,” Goose replied, “no, ma’am.”

  “Then what is that CIA agent doing here?”

  “You’d have to ask him, ma’am.”

  “Can’t tell, First Sergeant? Or won’t?”

  “The U.S. military has conducted strategic missions with CIA assistance even before the second Gulf war, ma’am. If they’re here, I’m sure their presence is a planned insertion. I’m likewise certain that if they wanted their ops plastered across the media they’d have called and scheduled an appointment with you.”

  Danielle didn’t react to the sarcasm. “Do you know that man?”

  “No. He introduced himself. That’s all.”

  A frown knitted Danielle’s brows together. “What were he and Captain Remington arguing about?”

  Goose hesitated.

  “I saw them myself,” Danielle said. “You can deny it if you want to, but I’ll know you’re lying. You were standing right there. I saw you take a step forward when the CIA guy closed on Remington.”

  Stepping up to the defense of his friend and superior officer was a reflex. “Ma’am, you’d have to discuss that matter with Captain Remington. Or with the other gentleman.”

  “Gentleman.” Danielle snorted, folded her arms across her chest, and leaned back. “One thing I can tell you, First Sergeant, is that man is no gentleman.”

  Goose’s anger subsided immediately as interest flared to take its place. He looked at the driver. “Private, give me some space.”

  “Yes, First Sergeant.” The private switched off the Hummer’s engine and left the vehicle.

  Goose swung his attention back to the reporter. “Do you know that man?”

  Danielle gazed at Goose in open-eyed speculation. “What name did he give you?”

  Shaking his head, Goose said, “No, ma’am.”

  “Need-to-know basis, huh?”

  “Yes.” Goose shifted in the seat, trying in vain to find a more comfortable spot to ease the throbbing pain in his knee. “Now if you don’t mind, I’ve got ops to attend to.”

  “We need to talk.”

  “We talk too much,” Goose said. “I don’t have time to give right now.”

  “Then we’ll talk later.”

  Goose chose a more diplomatic course. “Later.” That was his answer, but his intention was to stay too busy until she gave up on talking to him again.

  “That’s lip service, First Sergeant.” Danielle glared at him, but her instant anger was distracted, too.

  “Ma’am,” Goose said, “I’ve got wounded men out there and a defensive line that’s been hurt badly. I need to get to them.”

  “Goose.” Danielle’s voice was softer, punctuated by a sudden distant roar of an assault rifle on full auto. “That man, whatever name he gave you, he’s dangerous. I’ve seen him before. In Romania while I was covering a terrorist group the government ordered killed.” She paused. “I was working with an informant. The informant told me about the man I saw talking with Remington in the hallway. The next day, my informant was dead. Someone had hung him inside the shower at his hotel long enough to nearly asphyxiate him, then slit his jugular and let him bleed out. He didn’t die easily.”

  The declaration, devoid of emotion, shocked Goose. The woman had seen more than he would have thought. “What does that have to do with the man you saw talking to Remington?” Goose carefully left out the fact that he’d had a conversation with Cody.

  Danielle’s eyes turned cold and hard. “I believe he killed my informant. I think it was, in some way, my fault. My director wanted some edgy copy. I gave them the story about the potential CIA link to the terrorist group, to the fact that our government possibly had a hand in the political unrest in Bucharest.” She paused to swallow. Her left eye twitched. “I didn’t warn my source. When I couldn’t get hold of him, I went to the hotel where I’d put him up. I was the one who found his body.”

  “I’m sorry,” Goose said.

  “I checked him into that hotel, you see,” Danielle said. “So it was my fault. My company credit card was easily traced. I was reporting on rogue American CIA efforts, right? I should have known they could easily trace the cards I was using.”

  “You think the CIA killed him.”

  “Yeah.” Danielle nodded. “The terrorists would have made a bigger deal of it. They’d have killed my source and thrown his body into a public area with a note pinned to his chest with a knife.”

  “But the CIA—”

  “They wanted things kept quiet. The execution was clean. The Romanian police—” Danielle shrugged—“the government does a lot of business with the United States. Movies. Tourism. And they didn’t want terrorists there anyway. The murder was kept quiet. Even the network I worked for treated the story strictly hands-off. My source was a footnote. Nothing.” Her voice tightened. “And I got him killed.”

  Goose looked away from the woman and focused on the hotel. “You think that man in there—”

  “He was there.” Danielle’s voice was firm. “He was there, Goose. I know that. I saw him. Once. But I saw him.”

  Switching his gaze back to her, Goose said, “If you only saw him once—”

  Her eyes held his. “I’m sure, Goose. It was him. Before the events were over in Romania, he and his team left a trail of bodies behind them. I never found the witnesses or the kind of proof that I needed to go on the air with the story, but I know it was them.” She drew in a ragged breath. “If this guy is here now, he’s not here to help the military. No matter what he says. He’s following someone else’s orders.”

  “Whose?” Goose asked.

  “Fitzhugh’s, maybe. There are a lot of rumors around that the American president’s hands are dirty in international politics. Or someone else.” Danielle bit her lower lip. “Maybe not. Maybe it was just independent action. Some of these CIA guys? They’re powers unto themselves. The American government doesn’t want to know every dirty little trick those agents play to get the job done.”

  Goose remembered some of the horror stories he’d heard from the old guard about Vietnam. The CIA had been responsible for a considerable amount of carnage in that war.

  “And if a president does want to know,” Danielle continued, “you can bet that he doesn’t want anyone else to. Not everyone in the agency is like this guy. Only a few of the black ops field guys. But I’m telling you now that this is one of those guys you don’t want to trust. No matter what he offers you.”

  Goose kicked that around in his head. Cody had obviously gone to Remington to retrieve his captured agent. Remington had refused.

  Both of them, he was sure, were after Icarus. But his mind seized on a
nother important fact that he didn’t think Danielle Vinchenzo had yet acknowledged.

  “This guy knows you,” Goose said.

  Danielle started to disagree.

  Goose cut her off. “If he killed your source in Romania, he knows you. If he thinks you’re a risk to him, things could go badly for you. And if he was following your credit card, like you say he was, it might even be you he wanted back in Romania. I’d watch your back.”

  She wrapped her arms around herself. “Okay.”

  “Don’t let him see you as a threat,” Goose advised. “You’re a reporter. Here. Doing a story on the Syrian push into Turkey.”

  Danielle didn’t say anything.

  “Stay away from him, Miss Vinchenzo,” Goose said. “Stay away from him until we figure out what to do.”

  Raising an eyebrow, Danielle asked, “We?”

  Goose sighed. He was getting drawn into a lot more than he wanted. There were too many sides being drawn inside the city, and the Syrian army stood just outside the walls waiting for an opportunity to kill them all. Keeping straight the alliances he had made was going to be hard.

  “We, ma’am,” Goose told her. “On this issue, I’m with you to a limited extent. And the first time you cross me up, I’m gone and you’re on your own.”

  She returned his gaze full measure, then gave a nod. “Fair enough, First Sergeant. But that threat’s a two-way street. I trusted you enough to warn you. I don’t like being wrong.” Without another word, she placed a hand on the Hummer’s side and heaved herself from the vehicle.

  Surprised, and maybe feeling a little threatened, Goose watched her go. She never turned back, never looked over her shoulder. He sat back in his seat and called for his driver.

  United States of America

  Fort Benning, Georgia

  Local Time 2255 Hours

  “Jenny! Hey, Jenny!”

  Holding the saucepan with both hands as she poured chicken noodle soup into the olive-drab thermos standing on the kitchen counter, Jenny looked over her shoulder but managed to keep an eye on the pouring at the same time. The soup smelled great, and she hoped Megan was in good enough spirits to appreciate it.