V Plague (Book 17): Abaddon

by Patton, Dirk

  “An old friend,” I said, grinning ear to ear. “One we thought we’d never see again.”

  “I can see her soul,” Mavis whispered to me, sending a cold shiver down my back.

  “How ‘bout me, Doc. I get a hug like that?”

  I hadn’t realized someone else had stepped in out of the rain and it took a moment before I recognized Vance. A pair of unsmiling Marines wearing some sort of exoskeleton suit stood on either side of him. Rachel smiled and ran forward, giving him the same treatment Martinez had gotten. Pushing aside Mavis’s comment for the moment, I stepped forward with a smile and my hand extended.

  “Son of a bitch! How you doin’, Nutcracker?”

  “You’re still a mean asshole, I see,” he said with a broad grin. “Now, I hate to interrupt the love fest, but we’ve been here a while. Already fueled, pre-flighted and ready to go. How ‘bout everyone gets caught up once we’re in the air?”

  I looked around, seeing Lucas, his family and Natalie standing a few yards away.

  “Lead on,” I said to Vance.

  61

  “There it is again, sir!”

  Lieutenant Commander Small stood behind the sonar operator aboard the Key West. They were currently submerged, with the Colorado’s XO, Lieutenant Commander Arnold Patrick in command of the boat. Small hadn’t been relieved of duty, which was surprising, and he’d decided the best thing for the boat and crew was to support their temporary Captain while they were escorted to Pearl Harbor. He didn’t want to think about what was going to happen once they arrived.

  “You sure it’s not an anomaly?” he asked, staring at the waterfall display which provided a visual representation of the sounds the system was detecting.

  “No, sir. It’s not. Here’s the Colorado, a thousand meters off our port beam. Almost undetectable, but it’s there. And here’s the new contact. It’s weak as hell and intermittent, but it’s there. Directly in the Colorado’s baffles.”

  “Range?” Small asked, unable to see what the man was talking about, but willing to trust him.

  “It’s about two thousand meters behind them, sir.”

  Small leaned in, grabbed a sound powered phone off its cradle and called for Commander Patrick. Five seconds later, the lanky man appeared at the door.

  “Unknown contact, trailing the Colorado,” Small explained, unable to bring himself to address the man as skipper.

  Patrick frowned, pressing in to see the display.

  “Don’t see it,” he said after a long minute.

  Before he could turn away, two tiny variations in the scrolling lines of data appeared. They were so insignificant that if the sonar operator hadn’t jumped and stabbed a finger at the screen, he would have ignored them.

  “Right there, sir! I heard it, too. Just a whisper, but there’s definitely another boat out there!”

  Patrick glanced at Small who nodded. It was a question about the capability of the Chief Petty Officer manning the sonar station and a confirmation that he was good.

  “Any indication the Colorado’s detected it?”

  “None so far, sir. And I don’t think they could. It’s directly in their baffles. They won’t hear it over their own propulsor’s noise.”

  “Any idea if it’s one of ours?”

  “Can’t hear enough to tell, sir. But it’s damn quiet. I can make a guess, but that’s all it would be.”

  “Go ahead, Chief,” Small said without waiting for Patrick to answer.

  “I think it’s a Yasen class, Russian boat.”

  “They only ever produced two,” Patrick objected. “And we have confirmed kills on both.”

  “The Key West made one of those kills,” Small said.

  Patrick looked at him in surprise.

  “That’s how I know what a Yasen class sounds like, sir,” the Chief said. “And even though this is so faint it’s almost not there, it sounds exactly like the one we sank.”

  “The Russian boat we were supposed to meet,” Small said, turning to face Patrick. “And that RP was over a thousand nautical miles from where we are right now. How the hell did they find us? It’s a goddamn big ocean.”

  Patrick shook his head.

  “Maybe the same way we did. When you surfaced a few days ago. Why’d you do that, anyway?”

  “Had to make a call,” Small said with a shrug. “But that still doesn’t make sense. While we were surfaced, the system would have automatically synced up with a satellite. That’s how you found us. How the hell did the Russians do it without access into our secure systems at Pearl?”

  “We’re not having this discussion,” Patrick snapped. “Set General Quarters. We’re going to slip in behind our uninvited guest and if we verify it’s Russian, put a couple of torpedoes up his ass.”

  Small considered arguing for half a second, then acknowledged the order. The higher priority was to kill the submarine stalking the Colorado. Once that was done, they could worry about how they’d been found.

  The crew went into action when he issued the order for General Quarters. They were well drilled and less than three minutes later all stations were reporting ready for battle. Ten minutes of careful maneuvering and changing speeds put the unidentified contact less than a thousand yards directly in front of their bow.

  “Verify contact,” sonar called. “Signature is Russian, Yasen class. This is a previously unidentified boat.”

  Patrick increased their speed by a knot, waiting patiently until the Key West had closed to within eight hundred yards of the Russian sub.

  “XO, make sure the limiters are set in those fish. We don’t want one bypassing the Russian and locking on to the Colorado.”

  “Already done,” Small said, earning an approving nod from Patrick.

  “Open outer doors,” Patrick ordered.

  There was a several second delay before confirmation was given that the outer doors on the torpedo tubes had been opened, exposing the weapons to the sea.

  “CONN, SONAR, HE HEARD THAT!” the sonarman suddenly shouted. “Contact is turning to port and diving hard. He’s cavitating!”

  Cavitation is caused when a propeller turns very fast, such as an emergency maneuver. On the side of the individual blades closest to the vessel, rapidly spinning props create negative pressure which results in the formation of air bubbles. The Chief in the sonar room could clearly hear the disturbance caused in the water as the Russian boat came to full power in an effort to evade them.

  “Fire all tubes!” Patrick called in a loud, calm voice.

  “All fish away,” a voice reported.

  “Tracking,” sonar called. “And the Colorado is maneuvering!”

  “Torpedoes going active,” another voice reported, telling the commander that the weapons had locked onto the Russian sub and turned on their active sonar. “Target is accelerating through thirty knots.”

  “Time to impact?” Small barked.

  “Two minutes, sir.”

  “Conn, Sonar. Confirm weapons are tracking target. The Russian’s maxed out, sir. Thirty-four knots.”

  The Russian boat was going to die. Everyone in the control room knew that there was nothing the enemy skipper could do. The Key West had, through a great stroke of luck, been in position to fire its torpedoes at nearly point-blank range. Only the incredibly rapid reaction by the target’s commander at the sound of the outer doors opening was why they weren’t already on the way to the bottom of the ocean.

  “One minute to weapons’ impact,” a solemn voice intoned.

  It was silent aboard the Key West as every member of the crew listened, waiting for the muted thumps of detonation that would mark the destruction of a submarine and the death of its crew. A submarine that could just as easily have been theirs.

  Fifty-one seconds later, no one aboard the Key West needed headphones connected to the sonar system to hear the torpedoes impact their target. Soon, the sonar operator began reporting on the sounds he was hearing as the enemy boat sank and was crushed by the irr
esistible pressure of the ocean depths.

  Small moved close to Patrick and mumbled so none of the crew could hear, “Perhaps this is a good time to discuss how that bastard knew where to find us.”

  After a moment, Patrick slowly nodded his head.

  62

  I remembered the jet from Groom Lake, and I was still enthralled with the adaptive camouflage. When we’d walked into the hangar and I’d shown Mavis what happened when it was touched, she’d dashed forward to try it for herself. Happily running around the outside to try every spot she could reach, including climbing up the landing gear, I’d had to nearly physically carry her inside once everyone was loaded.

  The thing was, the first time there’d been enough light for anyone to get a good look at me or Lucas was inside the aircraft. One of the Marines had been the first to notice our eyes, shouting a warning and raising his weapon. Everyone scrambled away, staring at us in fear.

  “You’re gonna want to lower your weapon, son,” I’d said, holding his eyes with mine.

  There was silence inside the aircraft, no one knowing what to do or say. My adrenaline was pumping and I was seriously considering taking the rifle away from him when Jessica stepped into the no-man’s land that had formed in front of me.

  “Out of the way, Chief,” the Lieutenant in charge of the squad had said.

  “Easy, sir,” she said, staring him down. “They aren’t the first people this has happened to. I’ve seen it before. They aren’t infected!”

  “What are you talking about? Look at them!”

  “Better listen to her, Lieutenant,” I growled.

  “Sir, shut the hell up,” Jessica said without taking her eyes off the Marine.

  Rachel, Lucas and Dog moved next to me while Jessica explained what was going on. As she spoke, I was glad she’d had the opportunity to meet Nicole. The experience gave her the knowledge she needed to get the Marines to stand down. Not easily, mind you, but after several very tense minutes, the Lieutenant signaled for his men to lower their weapons. However, it was obvious he wasn’t comfortable with me or Lucas.

  “That’s all the conversations with Joe Revard, isn’t it?” I nodded to Jessica’s question. “How’d it happen?”

  “Beats me,” I said, shrugging. “Happened in Sydney, but I don’t have a clue why.”

  After that, everyone slowly settled down. Dismissing the incident, I started greeting people I thought I would never see again. Martinez had lightened my heart, but also made me start musing about other possibilities once I had time to think. I’d been shocked and happy to see Anna, and pleasantly surprised to find Titus sitting by himself with a grumpy look on his face. I’d talked to him for a few minutes, then pointed Mavis in his direction. She was probably exactly what the cranky old codger needed.

  After a few minutes, Vance had told everyone to strap in and headed for the cockpit.

  “Hawaii?” I asked him.

  “Yeah. Little field on the north shore. Runway’s pretty short so be ready for some hard braking when we touch down.”

  “Sure that’s a good idea? All the radar guarding Pearl Harbor?”

  He looked at me and chuckled.

  “Flew this out of Nevada and right over the top of downtown LA. Fucking Russians never even knew I was there. This baby’s a game changer.”

  “Go ahead and ask him how long it took to get here, sir,” Jessica said.

  “Hour fifty-two,” Vance said with a grin when I looked at him.

  “From Hawaii?” I asked in amazement.

  “Hawaii, hell. Nevada! Now, buckle up buttercup. Only ‘bout an hour to Oahu.”

  The flight had been nothing like I’d expected. But then I didn’t have a clue what to expect. I’d never flown supersonic, let alone hypersonic. I knew what sonic booms are like when you’re on the ground and a jet goes over, but not what’s it like inside the aircraft. And hypersonic? I was prepared for a wild ride.

  Which it was, until we broke through the top of the clouds on our way to one hundred thousand feet. With the storm behind, it was one of the smoothest flights I’d ever been on, despite Vance’s aggressive hand on the stick. He’d seemed to have forgotten he had a plane full of passengers, or just didn’t care. Course adjustments were nerve jarring, to say the least.

  “Tell me what happened in Idaho,” Martinez said after we were in level flight.

  Rachel and I shared a look that she didn’t miss.

  “Okay. Just spill it. Something really bad, I’m guessing, and I can’t get a straight answer from anyone.”

  “You died,” I said.

  She smirked, thinking I was being a smartass, but a look at Rachel erased the expression on her face.

  “What? That’s crazy. I’m sitting right here!”

  “You were dead,” Rachel said softly. “We died, too. A few weeks later.”

  “Watched a video of it,” I chimed in.

  “You feel something is off, don’t you?” I asked, a look of surprise registering on her face.

  Finally, she nodded.

  “Us, too. Took some time to reconcile everything. There’s a time travel project the government had going. Some asshole named Bob came back and intervened. Saved us. Did you meet him?”

  “Didn’t meet anyone but Titus,” she said.

  “What’s the last thing you remember before meeting Titus?” I asked, frowning in concern that something was even more fucked up than normal.

  “The airfield outside of Seattle,” she said quickly. “I’ve been thinking about it a lot. I remember the Russians attacking. Scott was killed. Lost sight of the Colonel, Igor and Dog, then they caught me, Irina, Katie and you.”

  She was looking at Rachel.

  “Nothing after that?” I asked gently.

  “Big Russian bastard shooting me in the leg,” she said. “Then being moved to a transport plane and nothing after that.”

  “Let me see your leg,” Rachel said suddenly.

  After some rearranging, I held up Martinez’ rain poncho like a curtain as she lowered her pants. Rachel leaned close, examining a still healing wound on Martinez’ outer thigh.

  “This is no more than a couple of weeks old,” she said in surprise.

  “Okay,” Martinez said in confusion as she pulled her pants back up.

  “You were shot several months ago,” Rachel said.

  I tossed the poncho aside and resumed my seat, staring at the shocked expression on Martinez’ face.

  “That’s not possible,” Martinez breathed. “There has to be a mistake.”

  “You remember being cuffed outside a Russian helo? You, Irina, Rachel and Katie?”

  “No,” Martinez said after a moment’s thought.

  “You were. That’s where that transport took you. Mountain Home, Idaho. They were trying to draw me out.”

  “What happened?”

  “The Russian commander was angry because John wasn’t cooperating. He didn’t know which one of us was John’s wife, so he was trying to force us to give Katie up, but no one would. He got too close to you and you bit a couple of his fingers off. Spit them right in his face.”

  Martinez smiled at the idea, but it was obvious she didn’t remember.

  “What happened then?” she asked.

  “Cocksucker shot you in the head, Missy.”

  I turned, surprised that Titus was standing behind us. Martinez stared at him, a gamut of emotions passing across her face.

  “Watched it on video,” he continued, moving to sit next to her. “Sorry for not tellin’ ya sooner. Weren’t quite sure how to say it.”

  She looked around, eyes pausing on Rachel as she nodded confirmation of what Titus had just told her.

  “I was standing five feet away,” she said gently. “There was no doubt you were dead.”

  “Then...” Martinez’ voice trailed off as she struggled to process what we were telling her.

  “I don’t know,” I said, anticipating what she wanted to ask. “This guy, Bob, just showed u
p and took out a sniper he said had killed us. Showed us video proof. Said things were changed and that we’d live, now. Then he just vanished.”

  “Vanished?”

  “Out of a locked safe house with me standing at the only exit. I’ve kind of had to accept this is real. Seeing you, well, that erases all doubt. I held your corpse in my arms, yet here you are.”

  She sat there with a haunted look on her face.

  “Anyone else?” she asked in a far-off voice.

  “What?”

  “Like me. Us. Anyone else walking around that should be dead?”

  I started to shake my head, then stopped in thought. I had no idea. Didn’t even have a clue how or why Martinez was sitting here in front of me. I shrugged my shoulders, then moved forward and pulled her into my arms.

  “I missed you,” I said.

  63

  The squad of Marines that were on board spent the flight in a tight group, keeping to themselves. Four huge shipping containers were strapped to the floor near where they sat. After checking on Mavis, I wandered over and introduced myself to the young Lieutenant in charge of the squad.

  “Sorry about earlier, sir,” he said.

  I nodded, dismissing the incident. I hadn’t reacted any better the first time I’d seen Nicole.

  “What’s with the Terminator get up?” I asked.

  “TALOS exoskeleton, sir,” he said, standing with a faint whine of servo motors. “Strong and fast as hell, plus full body armor.”

  “That could have come in handy,” I commented, receiving a nod of agreement. “What’s in the crates?”

  “Sorry, sir. Need to know.”

  I nodded and smiled, not the least bit put off by his response.

  “You know what’s going on in Hawaii?” I asked, moving away from the rest of his squad for a private conversation.

  “I know something’s wrong,” he said softly. “Admiral Packard tasked us with this mission and I haven’t been able to reach our controller for a few days.”

  “Who’s that?” I asked, afraid I already knew.

  He hesitated, then shook his head.