by Adams, P R
Pasqual set aside the last of a dozen wipes, shaking his head at Rimes.
“Negative on testing,” Rimes said.
Moltke was silent for a minute. “Hold position. Radio check. Any symptoms?”
“Red One, all clear.”
“Red Two, all clear.”
Rimes responded when the other teams were done. No symptoms among eighteen men, no reaction on any of the wipes, no sign of residue or particulate matter—but he was looking at fourteen corpses of seemingly healthy men. Whatever had killed them was fast-acting and left no detectable signature.
“Hold position for five minutes. Green, estimate the time the agent took to act.”
Rimes considered the corpses. Some were still holding weapons. One had collapsed over a portable computer array; another, the one Rimes had shoved aside upon entry, had been headed for the door.
“Seconds.” Rimes shook his head. “Or hours, possibly.”
It was possible—although unlikely—that prolonged exposure had caused the reaction. But if it had been prolonged exposure, differences in immune systems and exposure levels should have led to different reaction times. No, they died in seconds and almost certainly within seconds of each other.
“Correction. It must have been within seconds.”
“Green, secure the roof. Red, hold until my signal, then move to Ops. See if you can retrieve data from any of the equipment there. Blue, take up Red’s position on my signal. Maintain NBC posture.”
Rimes led his team to the stairwell door, pausing until Bhat disarmed the alarm he’d set on it. They took the stairs in a staggered line.
Whatever killed them, it has to be something new, something we can’t detect. Maybe it’s outside the known arsenals. It’s not the virus that hit the Eurica teams. Those had extremely high temperatures, connective tissue disintegration, hemorrhaging. That took hours, days.
That wasn’t a weapon. This was.
On the roof, Rimes deployed his team to the corners, with Orr covering the door. Then, from the north wall, he scanned the research building windows for any threats.
After a moment, he reported the team in position.
Perspiration rolled down his face. He did his best to blink it away.
Moltke ordered the Red team in to secure the operations building and Blue to remove the corpses before redeploying to the building to the northwest.
After several minutes, Rimes watched Kirk and the Blue team spread out across the other rooftop, less than fifty meters away.
There was still no sign of any other activity in the compound.
“Barlowe’s downloading data from the T-Corp computer,” Martinez reported.
“Barlowe, can you give me an estimate?” Moltke asked.
Barlowe clucked into his earpiece. “It’s taken some damage, Captain. It’ll be a while.”
“Is it intact?”
Barlowe clucked again. “I think there’s a chance I can recover it.”
A few heartbeats passed, then Moltke responded. “Red, leave Barlowe on the computer work. Take the rest of your team to the research building. We’ve got eleven operators unaccounted for.”
Rimes opened a private channel to Moltke. “Gold, did you say leave Barlowe in there alone?”
“Roger, Green,” Moltke said with a hint of irritation. “Keep your focus.”
Barlowe’s not ready for this.
Rimes tracked the Red team’s movement through his scope, running his sights ahead of them in an arc. He stopped suddenly twenty meters shy of the research building, where a small structure stood in a clearing that had long ago been a parking lot.
He’d seen something.
“Movement, twenty meters southeast of research building,” Rimes said calmly. “One Tango.” He caught another flash of movement in his limited peripheral vision. “Two. Two Tangos.”
“Red, take cover,” Moltke ordered. “Green, identify Tangos.”
“Lost visual,” Rimes said. He looked to his right. Chung, positioned at the northeastern corner, looked up from his scope, signaled there were three targets, but he’d lost sight of them.
“Update. Three Tangos. Lost visual at the structure in the southeast of the parking lot. They were moving fast.”
“Blue?”
“Negative, no visual.”
“Red, increase spacing and interval. Bringing Horus in for a closer look.”
Rimes listened for Horus’s telltale hum. Moltke was understandably reluctant to risk their eye in the sky, but the situation justified it.
Rimes scanned the structure in the clearing again. The rain had completely stopped, and he was slowly cooking inside the sealed suit.
Another flash of movement.
Rimes fired. “Red, eastern flank, down!”
The target sprinted first north, then east, then disappeared completely behind a stunted tree. Almost as if he’d sensed what was coming.
Horus’s hum became audible as it bathed the field in ultraviolet light that their optics picked up. Moltke hissed a curse under his breath as the high-resolution imaging system identified potential threats.
“Red, fall back to Ops,” Moltke said hurriedly. “Blue, fall back to Ops, double time. Green, cover them. Focus attention on north and northeast. Six Tangos, closing.”
Chung opened fire, a controlled burst of three rounds. Wolford joined him a moment later. Rimes saw a blur of movement headed for a trailing Red team member—Martinez.
There was no time to shout a warning.
Rimes sighted and squeezed off a three-round burst, striking center mass.
The target staggered, slowed. It had a knife in one hand, its other hand struggled to un-holster a pistol. It was within a meter and still closing.
Martinez turned, put another burst at point-blank range into the target. It fell.
“Tango down,” Martinez said.
He’d been a heartbeat away from a body bag and seemed completely unfazed.
Six rounds to take down one target. What the hell?
They used specialized rounds that would take a normal man down with one hit, two at the outside. Then again, a normal man couldn’t move as quickly as what he’d just seen.
Genies. We could really use the latest BAS upgrades.
Moltke fed Horus’s imaging into everyone’s optics. Two targets were advancing on Rimes’s building from the east, while Chung and Wolford were maintaining a steady cover fire. Two more were moving toward Blue’s building to the northwest.
With one down, that left another unaccounted for.
Rimes moved to the west wall, scanning Horus’s targeting feeds. Pasqual and Bhat were doing the same. They found one of the targets as it sprinted toward the north door of Blue’s building and opened fire, driving the target back to cover.
“Blue, target advancing at high speed on your building from the northwest,” Rimes said.
He let off a burst in front of the target as it cleared cover. A second burst and the target staggered. A third and it dropped.
“Tango down.” Rimes continued scanning as he reloaded. “Gold, this is Green. I can’t find the sixth Tango.”
“One second, Green.”
Horus gained altitude and increased UV output. Digital signals replayed the last minute on Rimes’s optical display. Two signals stopped where the targets had been dropped.
Rimes surveyed the display, identifying the two targets Chung and Wolford had engaged, and the one Pasqual and Bhat had pinned down. Finally, he spotted the sixth. He cursed.
“Blue, Tango in your building.”
As if in response to his call, Rimes heard gunfire. He spotted along the other building’s eastern wall, looking through windows for any possible targets. He couldn’t see anything. The gunfire stopped.
“Blue, status,” Moltke said calmly. “Blue, report.”
There was no response. Rimes brought up a window with the Blue team’s vitals. One was dropping fast, the others were flat-lined.
“Their vitals
—” Rimes said.
“I can see their vitals, Green,” Moltke said, his voice emotionless. “We’ve lost Blue.”
A crack of gunfire followed by a wet gurgle caught Rimes’s attention. He turned. Wolford collapsed backward from the southeastern corner of the wall, clutching his throat.
Lewis!
Rimes ran across the roof and took Wolford’s position.
The target was hidden behind a low cinderblock wall, part of a drainage system.
Rimes pulled a grenade from his belt, waited a beat, pulled the pin, and threw it to the right of the wall.
Before the grenade detonated, the target moved to the left—into Rimes’s sights.
Three bursts and the target went down.
“Tango down,” Rimes said.
Gunfire erupted to his left.
“Tango down,” Chung said.
Rimes signaled for Chung to move to the western wall, then checked Wolford. There was a pulse, but it was weak. Wolford’s eyes looked at something far away for a few seconds before closing. Blood spurted from his ruined throat, pooling on the rooftop.
Rimes closed his eyes for a moment. “Wolford’s down.” Rimes took Wolford’s grenade and hoped he wouldn’t have to leave the body.
He hoped there wouldn’t be more.
Silence settled over the communication channel for a moment.
Rimes scanned the parking lot, looking for flashes of more-than-human speed.
The silence was broken by an almost sheepish announcement: “Red in Ops. Room is secure.”
Rimes moved back to the west wall. Pasqual and Bhat still had their target pinned down, but were no closer to eliminating it. Rimes signaled Chung; a moment later, a grenade landed on either side of the target, forcing it out of cover. Pasqual and Bhat dropped it.
“Tango down,” Pasqual said.
Bhat looked at Rimes. “Please tell me that’s the last one?”
Rimes held up a finger and pointed to the building where the Blue team had been slaughtered. The Tango was still in the building, possibly escaping out of sight to the west. It was equally possible that it had circled and was now inside the building somewhere below them.
“Gold, this is Green. Permission to engage final target.”
Rimes signaled Pasqual and Bhat for a grenade and directed them to observe the northwestern building while Orr moved to cover Wolford’s position. Once confident Orr was going to be okay working next to Wolford’s corpse, Rimes slung his carbine over his back and took Bhat’s assault shotgun.
“Granted, Green,” Moltke said, finally.
Rimes tapped Chung, and the two descended to the first floor. Rimes reviewed Horus’s image overlay, relieved to see the sixth target hadn’t yet exited Blue’s building.
They were halfway to Blue’s building when shots rang out. Glass shattered, and the sound of Horus’s motor changed: the target had hit the UAV. A moment later, the motor gave out completely, and Horus crashed to the ground.
“Horus is down,” Moltke said, with more emotion than when he’d lost the entire Blue team.
Rimes reached the building first, pressing tight against its wall. He had the assault shotgun at the ready, hoping the greater area it covered would compensate for having to fight indoors. Pasqual and Bhat suddenly opened fire, their bullets shattering windows and ricocheting off the wall a few meters from Rimes.
The firing intensified. Bullets thudded and bounced nearby. Rimes turned, saw the target round the corner, heading for him. Rimes got a shot off, clipping the target. Chung fired and missed.
The target was on Rimes then, a flurry of blows—fist and knife, punching and slashing.
Rimes gave ground, letting the fists land, trying to redirect or block the knife with the shotgun. Blood trickled from wounds on his forearms and the backs of his hands.
Rimes managed a lucky swing with the shotgun’s stock, stunning the target. He followed it up with a kick to the abdomen, getting a knife in his thigh for his troubles.
But the kick put room between him and the target.
Pasqual and Bhat opened fire again.
The target shuddered, then dropped.
Rimes brought the shotgun butt down hard into the target’s throat, then followed up with a brutal stomp on the target’s face.
“Tango down,” Bhat reported.
9
24 February 2164. USS Sutton.
* * *
The world was divided into two spaces: quarantine, and everything beyond.
A plexiglass wall—thick, impassable, suffocating—defined the limit of his freedom. The smudge-free wall teased him, allowing him to imagine he wasn’t a prisoner for whole seconds at a time. Beyond it, three nurses in fully sealed hazmat suits focused on another round of blood work.
The Sutton didn’t just have extra weapons systems and a larger deck. Snuggled tight at the stern, immediately below decks, was a small compartment accessible by a single set of stairs. The compartment, including a small lab and a slightly larger suite of rooms, was rated for Biosafety Level 4 work.
Rimes paced his prison. The room he was in was three meters deep and two meters across. It was white, sterile—simultaneously empty and cluttered. With a bunk, card table, and two chairs, it offered little open space, but the absence of any personal effects made it feel hollow.
Rimes and Martinez were hot-bunked with Moltke, who was asleep. An adjoining room, accessible through the shared head, held the rest of the team. Rimes and the others faced days of quarantine, assuming they weren’t already dying from whatever agent the genies had used. It would be weeks before the techs would know what had killed the T-Corp agents.
We lost seven men. And for what?
Rimes ran through the inventory: two storage devices, a dozen specimen containers, a spent chemical-weapon canister, several tailor-made weapons retrieved from the genie corpses, and petabytes of data.
Along with the remaining T-Corp agents in the other buildings—dead like the rest—they’d found another portable computer array, busily downloading and analyzing data.
T-Corp had suddenly decided they had to violate a decades-old agreement. The genies—so fast, so deadly—should have fled the moment the Commandos arrived. And whatever had been in the recovered weapons canister somehow fell outside the broad spectrum the Commandos’ kit could detect.
Everything was random data points and inconsistencies, absent of any connecting elements or explanations. Try as he might, Rimes could make no sense of it.
Genies were genetically engineered, lab-grown servants designed to perform specific tasks. These had been Asian, almost certainly LoDu products. Rimes had never heard of genies directly engaging military units before. Outside of attacks on other metacorporate assets, there was simply no record of direct engagement with military forces. And the few who escaped their owners were generally wary of hiring on for anything other than corporate espionage. Of course, the bodies had no identification on them, no way of telling who had hired them and for what purpose.
The CH-121s had been Valkyries, carrying home the fallen.
Lewis, buddy. Body bags, loot. Why? What was in the computer arrays? What was worth the risk? All this death—maybe my own—and I’m going to be a father. If I survive.
As he watched the nurses cautiously catalog the blood samples, Rimes’s thoughts turned to Kleigshoen’s offer. To look at her—the soft hair, the manicured nails, the perfume—it was obvious an Intelligence Bureau agent was treated well.
He’d worked with a few over the years. They’d seemed capable—if cocky and prone to callous disregard for their military counterparts. Most had been burdened with a dangerous sense of entitlement.
Rimes wondered if he could ever become like that. A flash of his baby’s imagined face, of Molly’s warm caress, and he realized he very well might. Family was an obligation he didn’t take lightly.
Martinez returned to the room with a quiet sigh, pulling a cotton ball out of his right elbow crease. “Damned vampir
es,” he whispered as he settled at the table. He pulled a deck of cards from his thigh pocket and pointed at the table.
Rimes settled into the chair across from Martinez, and the two began a series of half-hearted games. They had access to thousands of entertainment options, but the cards’ tactile sensations and mind-numbing repetition held the greatest appeal. They passed hours without speaking, quietly shuffling, dealing, and playing.
Rimes yawned and checked the time. They’d been aboard the ship a little over fifty-two hours.
Finally, Moltke sat up in the bunk. Martinez stood, offering up his chair. Moltke waved him away and stumbled toward the head with a loud yawn.
Moltke paused at the entry and looked back. “You two up for some poker?”
Martinez shook his head. “I can’t afford it, sir.” He settled into the bunk and flipped the pillow before stretching out. “What about the old gang?”
Moltke glared at Martinez for a moment, then looked to Rimes. “What about you? I don’t feel like giving my money away to Babyface. You up for a little adventure?”
Rimes chuckled and shuffled the cards. “Is Ladell really that good, sir?”
“He knows cards like he knows computers. And don’t be fooled by that innocent face. He’s impossible to read.”
Rimes’s earpiece chirped, and he placed it in his ear. Kleigshoen was requesting a channel.
Rimes accepted.
“Jack?”
Kleigshoen was close. Rimes turned to look into the lab. Two people stood at the wall in hazmat suits.
He walked forward, peering into the faceplates. “Dana?”
A smile spread across the face in the slightly smaller suit. “Good news,” Kleigshoen said. “We made an educated guess on the weapon used to kill the T-Corp team, and just confirmed it. X-17 nerve gas. No contagion. You’d have been killed within seconds had you been exposed to meaningful quantities.”
“No one is showing any signs of exposure, Sergeant Rimes,” said the other person, a doctor who’d been one of the first to interview the returning Commandos. “We should have you all out of here by tomorrow morning. One more round of tests and you’re home free.”
