HOT ZONE: A Post-Apocalyptic Pandemic Thriller (The Zulu Virus Chronicles Book 1)

by Steven Konkoly

  “Check this shit out,” said Peck, pulling open a hinged circular hatch to expose a dark hole in the concrete floor.

  Dixon raised his night-vision goggles and pointed his rifle into the hole, triggering its side-mounted light.

  “Sweet Jesus,” said Dixon. “Looks like a bomb shelter or something.”

  Morbid curiosity got the better of Larsen, and he started toward the hole, getting halfway there before a mechanical hum reached his ears. Shit. No. He reversed direction, lurching toward the vault-like door, which had already swung shut with surprising speed. His fingers reached the edge of the door as it sank flush with the steel wall. They were trapped.

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  Chang set his house as the next GPS waypoint and took off running, leaving the overstuffed backpack behind. If he needed it again, his GPS track could lead him back to it. He stumbled a few times, miraculously tumbling headfirst onto the soft forest floor instead of into an immovable tree trunk. After one too many close calls, he slowed to a fast walk, moving as quickly as he dared through the nearly pitch-black forest.

  He held the GPS unit in one hand and the smart phone in the other, keeping himself pointed toward the house while monitoring the situation in the safe-room bunker. Chang needed to get back fast before the team tried anything drastic. He couldn’t think of any way they might escape, short of using explosives, which would be catastrophic for the team and likely render the bunker’s contents and equipment useless.

  He’d designed the two-story bunker complex to be self-sustaining, even if the solar panels failed. A dozen micro-hydro generators, each no larger than eighteen inches wide, were connected along various lengths of the piping used for the home’s geothermal energy system, and connected to the home’s massive battery storage banks. The batteries could run the air filtration system, well and geothermal pumps, keeping the entire system going in the face of a disaster that killed the electrical grid and somehow managed to take out the solar panels.

  The closed-loop system wasn’t one hundred percent efficient. Slowly, the electricity required to run the geothermal pumps and any other systems in the bunker would outstrip the power created by the micro-hydro generators, depleting the batteries. To combat this, he had four micro wind turbines installed at various locations on his property, each connected by cable to the backup electrical system. Even if two of the turbines failed, the remaining two turbines would create enough power to keep the system running perpetually. That was the theory, which wouldn’t matter one way or the other if the team set off any explosives in the bunker.

  All he could do now was watch and pray that they didn’t overreact. He needed the home security tablet to talk to them. The phone could be used to monitor and control the different systems, but it was designed for remote use. The tablet served as the primary in-home control unit, additionally allowing the user to listen or speak to intruders in any room of the house. He could sit in his closet and inform an intruder in his kitchen that the police were on the way, or activate a series of lights in the house that might convince an intruder that he was on his way downstairs with a shotgun. Once he got the tablet, which sat in a drawer in the kitchen island, he could try to talk them down.

  The GPS unit said he had one hundred yards to go, but he still couldn’t see the house or clearing. He triggered the exterior lights in front of the house, a bright aura penetrating the forest in front of him. With the GPS now stowed in his pocket, he broke into a run, using his free hand to feel for trees. When he broke into the clearing outside his house, the situation on the phone screen looked dire. The team was engaged in an argument, which he guessed centered around blasting their way out of the room. It just wasn’t possible, and he had to let them know before they tried.

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  Larsen was pretty sure he’d have to subdue and restrain Peck shortly. The guy was losing it, repeatedly aiming his rifle at the walls and threatening to shoot his way out of the room, which was dangerous for everyone—not to mention plain stupid. Based on the thickness of the door, nothing in their possession was likely to breach the walls. They might have a chance of creating some kind of shaped charge to blow through the door they found in the basement level, but he wasn’t sure, and the last thing he wanted to do was create an explosive shockwave that couldn’t escape the enclosure.

  The blast’s overpressure would kill them instantly, no matter where they stood. He doubted closing the hatch between levels would make much difference. With nowhere to go, the blast would break through the weakest point, which looked like the hatch. Same result. Everyone dead.

  “Peck, we are not using explosives,” said Larsen. “End of discussion.”

  “Then how the fuck are we getting out of here?” said Peck, his finger on the trigger of his rifle again.

  “We’re not going anywhere at the moment,” said Larsen. “Command will send a team to investigate when we haven’t reported. Four teams jumped over Indianapolis. I guarantee one of them was a backup.”

  “What if we’re the backup?” said Peck.

  That didn’t even make sense. They’d found Chang’s name on paperwork and files in the office. The guy owned the house. How often he used it was a different question.

  “We’re not a backup team,” said Larsen.

  “How do we know?” said Peck. “You keep that stupid tablet hidden from us all the time. For all we know, this Chang guy is dangerous. Maybe they wanted us to remove him from circulation. He led us in here like mice to cheese, then locked us in!”

  “We locked ourselves in,” said Larsen. “That’s how safe rooms work. This one was designed to shut by itself after someone entered. Can you imagine trying to close that door with a home intruder chasing you? As soon as I stepped all the way in, it shut.”

  Peck stood in front of the door, shaking his head and muttering something unintelligible. Shit. He was going to do it. Larsen moved his right hand slowly across his thigh, waiting for enough noise to conceal the sound of the Taser holster unsnapping. He glanced furtively at Dixon, who nodded imperceptibly.

  “Damn it, Peck! Get your finger off that trigger!” yelled Dixon, giving him the cover he needed to unsnap the holster.

  “Someone has to do something,” said Peck, the rifle coming up a little more.

  An unfamiliar voice filled the room, the sound originating from the back of the room.

  “Mr. Peck, I wouldn’t do that if I were you.”

  Peck reacted predictably, aiming his rifle past them, the barrel pointing at Larsen’s head for a fraction of a second. They all ducked, yelling at him to safe his weapon.

  “Who the fuck said that?” demanded Peck, shifting his aim back and forth along the back wall.

  Crouched on the floor below the line of Peck’s aim, Larsen said, “My guess is Eugene Chang. And he’s not in the room. Please safe your rifle before you get someone killed.”

  “He’s right, Mr. Peck. On both counts. You can’t shoot your way out. The bullets would ricochet off the steel until they hit something softer. I’d hate for that to be one of you,” said Chang.

  “Eugene Chang, my name is Eric Larsen. I’m part of a team sent to protect you. I have no idea why you’re important or what is going on in the greater world that requires us to protect you, but I assure you that is our only purpose here. I was woken up a few hours ago and put on a plane with no details about you or my mission. I only learned your identity and the location of this house about thirty minutes ago. You didn’t appear to be home, so we accessed the house, or you let us in on purpose—to lead us here.”

  “Jesus. He doesn’t need to know who we are. He just needs to let us out of here,” said Peck, pounding the door next to him.

  “That’s not going to happen until I get some answers,” said Chang. “And don’t even think of trying to blast your way out with explosives. The steel enclosing the upstairs safe room is designed to survive an F5 tornado. It’s bullet resistant well past fifty caliber. In fact, I was told that
it could withstand a hit from a handheld rocket launcher. Sounds a bit like salesmanship overkill to me, but either way, I’m pretty sure you’ll end up killing yourselves by detonating explosives—on either level.”

  “Mr. Chang, what can I do to convince you that we mean you no harm?” said Larsen.

  “First, you can show me your orders,” said Chang. “I assume you have them stored on your tablet thing?”

  “How the hell?” muttered Dixon.

  “I’ve been watching you since you landed,” said Chang. “I was warned that someone might come for me at some point, but I never expected it to come by parachute.”

  “Where are you?” said Brennan.

  “I’m actually right outside the safe-room door,” said Chang.

  “Once I see the orders, you drop all of your weapons down the hatch and close it,” said Chang. “I can lock the hatch remotely, but I can’t move it like the door.”

  “I told you he locked us in here,” said Peck. “He ain’t who we think he is.”

  “Peck, please.”

  “So if we disarm, you’ll let us out of here?” said Larsen.

  “He’ll mow us down the second we throw our weapons down the hole,” said Peck.

  “I don’t own any weapons,” said Chang, “aside from a few survival knives.”

  “We’ll toss our weapons,” said Larsen. “I can live with that.”

  “First I need to see your orders,” said Chang. “I have no doubt any of you could break my neck with little effort.”

  “See. This makes no sense,” said Peck. “Why would he want us to toss the weapons after checking out the orders?”

  “Mr. Peck, you’re the reason I want all of the weapons well out of reach if I open this door. You look like you want to shoot someone,” said Chang. “In fact, I’m starting to seriously question what I could possibly gain from any of this.”

  “Jim, hand me your rifle and pistol,” said Larsen.

  Peck turned to face him, but didn’t make a move to disarm. “So now we’re on a first-name basis?”

  “Just do it, Peck,” said Dixon, unslinging his own rifle. “Brennan. Everyone.”

  Larsen unclipped his rifle from the one-point sling and started to walk over to the open hatch. Brennan was doing the same. The quicker they got the weapons down the hatch, the better. There was no way Larsen could show Chang the tablet, not with anyone still armed. He was quite certain that Peck would attack him.

  “Mr. Larsen,” said Chang, “I’m not opening the door until I see your orders. You can hold the screen up to the camera in the front corner of the room, across from the door.”

  He glanced in that direction, seeing a black dome camera mounted in the corner.

  “You could probably hold up the tablet from there. I can zoom in pretty far,” said Chang.

  “Let’s get all the weapons down the hatch first,” said Larsen, turning to face Dixon and Brennan.

  Dixon furrowed his brow slightly, indicating that he didn’t quite track Larsen’s logic. Brennan looked uncomfortable with the order, but continued to comply, although a little slower than a moment ago. Fuck. He had to disable Peck before they killed each other.

  “Just show him the tablet,” said Peck. “Just a minute ago you were giving him a blow by blow of our mission. Show him the tablet; then we toss our weapons.”

  “I’m sorry,” said Dixon. “Are you the team leader now?”

  “Might as well be. Ochoa is right. This guy can’t get the most basic shit right,” said Peck. “Tablet. Then weapons. Simple. Right, Mr. Chang? Whoever the fuck you are.”

  “Mr. Peck is right. I need to see your orders. Once I confirm you’re not here to murder me, we’ll meet face-to-face, without guns. Guns make me nervous,” said Chang.

  Larsen wasn’t sure how he was going to do this without either getting half if not all of them killed or dooming them to this prison. The first thing he needed to do was incapacitate Peck. Unfortunately, Peck was on edge, his rifle gripped in both hands. He had the weapon pointed toward the floor, but there was no way Larsen could draw the Taser and fire it before Peck unloaded on them. Judging from the amped look on Peck’s face, he had no doubt that was what would happen. He needed more time and an opening.

  “I can’t show you the orders, Dr. Chang,” said Larsen. “I can’t even show them to my team. The information is highly classified and everything in this unit is compartmentalized—for a reason.”

  “Suit yourself. Lucky for you, there’s at least three years of food split between the two levels. The sink down below is serviced by a well. Air filtration is self-sustained. You’ll be fine until they send someone to look for you.”

  “Show him the tablet,” said Peck. “Fuck all this classification shit. The mission’s straightforward. Locate, secure, protect and escort. Obviously something’s going on out there that put you on this list. Am I right?”

  “There’s been a major bioweapons attack,” said Chang. “Multiple cities. You didn’t know this?”

  “We’re kept in lockdown on base for a month, waiting for a CHASE mission. One month on. One month off,” said Larsen.

  “What’s CHASE?” said Chang.

  “Critical Human Asset Security,” said Larsen. “We secure and protect assets critical to national security in times of crisis. You would not have heard of the CHASE program. It’s like a doomsday contingency. Continuity of national operations level.”

  “And now that you disclosed top secret information in front of all of us,” said Peck, “I see no reason why you can’t show him the orders on the tablet.”

  “We’ll say this was the only way to accomplish the mission,” said Dixon quietly.

  Peck had backed him in a corner, so he decided to go the honest route, which would for all practical purposes sound like the lying route to some of them. At this point he didn’t see another option. Chang would either believe him or not, and Peck would either follow Larsen’s orders to disobey the update or he’d kill Peck. He had no idea what Dixon and Brennan would do, but he didn’t think they’d go along with what was obviously an illegal order.

  “I’m going to show you both sets of orders,” said Larsen, removing the tablet from his hip pouch.

  “Both sets?” said Peck.

  “Mr. Chang, can I ask you a question first?”

  “I suppose so. It’s Gene. Dr. Gene Chang.”

  “Dr. Chang, do you have any reason to suspect that your life is in danger? I mean outside of whatever it is you normally do for a living,” said Larson, not finding the right words.

  “I conduct pharmaceutical research in a field related to bioweapons,” said Chang.

  “Fuck,” muttered Larsen.

  “What the hell does this have to do with anything?” said Peck, closing the distance between them.

  “What did you mean by two sets, Eric?” said Dixon.

  Peck stopped a few feet in front of him, rifle pointed away, but his finger near the trigger well.

  “How can there be two sets?” said Peck.

  “I received an update to the original mission order when we hit the drop zone,” said Larsen. “I disregarded it because it’s unlawful and has zero to do with our job.”

  “I’ll be the judge of that,” said Peck, lunging to grab the tablet.

  A brief struggle for the tablet ensued, ending with Larsen shoving Peck back a few feet. Peck’s rifle came up, and before Larsen could react, Brennan pushed by and jammed her pistol under Peck’s chin.

  “Drop your rifle, or I’ll blow the top of your motherfucking head off,” spat Brennan. “I’m tired of your shit.”

  “You’re gonna pay for this, bitch,” said Peck, remaining rigid.

  The barrel of Dixon’s rifle inched forward in Larsen’s peripheral vision, aimed at Peck.

  “Stand down, Peck,” said Dixon. “Right the fuck now.”

  Larsen instinctively took a few steps back and raised his own rifle.

  “Peck, this situation is fucked, but we ne
ed to pull together,” said Larsen. “We don’t kidnap or kill. Bottom line. Either the new orders are a mistake, or the CHASE program has been bullshit from the start.”

  A disturbingly calm look spread across Peck’s face.

  “The other team leaders were right about you.”

  Larsen removed some of the slack in his trigger, the barrel aimed at Peck’s head. This would go down at any moment.

  Chapter Thirty-Nine

  Chang backed away from the safe-room door despite the fact that nothing could possibly hurt him from the inside. He knew this logically, but the scene unfolding inside defied logic, and it didn’t look like he’d get a chance to process it. The maniac called Peck seemed hell-bent on immediate violence. He considered saying something to Larsen, who seemed reasonable enough, if not a bit conflicted, but decided against it. His words echoing through the room would only serve as a distraction from a peaceful result. This Peck guy was beyond reason.

  He bumped into the wall behind him, startled by its sudden intrusion, but never taking his eyes off the tablet screen. With three weapons pointed in Peck’s face, he felt sure the standoff was over. No sensible person would try to buck those odds. It was suicide. Pure and simple. What Peck said next froze Chang in place. Something about the statement was final.

  “The other team leaders were right about you.”

  And that was it. Metallic bangs and muffled screams sounded beyond the door as his tablet’s speaker transmitted automatic gunfire and yelling. He watched in horror, his view briefly obscured by the smoke from their weapons. When the thin haze cleared, he took a quick breath. All four members of the team lay on the blood-splattered concrete floor. He could barely believe what he was seeing. His eyes focused on the digital tablet next to Larsen, not that it really mattered anymore. Chang believed the man had fully committed to disobeying his orders. He could tell by the exchange in the room. They’d been duped on some level. Even Peck had expressed disbelief.

  He watched his tablet for a few more seconds, looking for signs of life, but nobody moved or made a sound. What a miserable waste. There was no point to opening the door. He had everything he needed now, including the knowledge that some faction of the government wanted him dead. Stan Greenberg had been right. He was about to shut down the tablet when Larsen moved. The man pushed himself up with one arm and rolled over onto his back, surveying the room and shaking his head.