Black Ops

by Alan Baxter

  “Meaning what, big man?” asked Ledger.

  “Red tent,” said Black. “Sometimes we pick up some troublemakers along with the dead wood. Case in point… we got a couple of real hard-cases in lockdown. Couple ex-military who I think are still fighting for truth, justice, and the American way. Old school, head-in-the-sand types.”

  “Sounds inconvenient. What are you going to do with them?”

  Black’s smile brightened. “Me? Nothing. But I thought it would be a great way for you fellows to make your bones. Not to offend, Joe, but talk is cheap.”

  “What do you mean?” asked Tom.

  Ledger laughed. “Big Ike here wants us to prove that we’re not just a couple of con artists sweet-talking our way into the good life, isn’t that right?”

  “Something like that,” agreed Black.

  “So,” continued Ledger, “he wants us to go into the red tent where they have those hard-cases and put them down.”

  “I…” began Tom, but Ledger clapped him on the shoulder again. Hard.

  “Don’t turn green, kid. Wouldn’t be the first useless cocksuckers you ever killed. Not even the first this week.”

  Tom said nothing, but there was doubt in his eyes.

  “The general’s right,” said Ledger. “Talk’s cheap, and man… there’s just about nothing I wouldn’t do to sleep in a real bed and not having worry about waking up with some dead asshole nibbling on my dick. If that means popping a cap in some bad guys, then booyah. I like me more than I like some assholes I don’t know. So, bottom line, it sucks to be them.”

  “That,” said Black with a merry laugh, “is what I like to hear.”

  “When you want this done?” asked Ledger.

  “First light?”

  “Fuck no,” said Ledger. “Why wait? Let’s close this deal right damn now. I’ll pop one and let Tom do the other and then you can point us in the direction of a cold beer, if any such thing still exists.”

  “Will Irish whiskey do?” asked Black.

  “Yeah,” said Ledger, “it will. Let’s rock.”

  —19—

  Top and Bunny

  Though they succeeded in creating the chaos they’d wanted, and even slipped out of the cell when the guards opened it to come in and restore calm, Top and Bunny quickly found themselves surrounded by six men with rifles pointed at their heads while Major Diamond used the butt end of a rifle to slam them each in the stomach and send them to their knees, gasping for breath. They hadn’t even had enough room to react because of the constant crowd surrounding them.

  “You boys just bought yourself the front of the line,” Diamond said with a sneer and nodded to the two guards.

  The two prisoners were yanked to their feet as the holding pen door slammed and locked behind them, then dragged further into the cavern past cells where the white and blue banders were enjoying books, Blu-rays, furniture. Then they were shoved into a closet-sized cavern and locked in darkness.

  “Fuck,” Bunny moaned. “That worked great. What now?”

  “Now we wait 'til they come for us and be ready to jump them,” Top said. “Relax and recharge while you can, son.”

  Bunny heard shuffling as Top slid against the stone and sat on the floor nearby and he followed suit, sighing. “We shoulda had a better plan.”

  “Shut the fuck up, soldier.”

  “Just saying.”

  And then Bunny heard a chuckle. Top was laughing at him. “What?”

  “Once an idiot, always an idiot,” Top said through laughter.

  “Hey, this idiot has had your six for over twenty years, Old Man.”

  “I know, it’s a fucking miracle I still have a six,” Top replied.

  “Fuck you,” Bunny moaned and then grinned in the darkness, chuckling a bit himself.

  Soon, they were both laughing, and that was the last thing Bunny remembered as he fell into darkness and slept restlessly against the hard, cold stone.

  A bright light.

  That was his next memory, as he awoke blinded and heard men talking. “Get up!” someone ordered.

  “On your feet!” growled another.

  Then they were being lifted and dragged out of the cavern, surrounded by armed men again.

  The guards moved quickly, keeping them surrounded. Bunny only made out bits and pieces of their surroundings – a door marked ‘lab’, a few white-coated workers moving in and out, then a line of people with blue bands. They wound through a short corridor into another room past a line of white banded people waiting before a dispensary of some sort with lab-coated workers at a counter, handing out small cups of liquid or pills, he couldn’t tell which.

  Then they went through thick steel doors into another cavern, passing a line of men with red wristbands like their own, waiting. They all looked tired, shifting continuously like people who’d spent too much time on their feet for an unknown purpose. Bunny could relate. What were they lined up for?

  Then he and Top were shoved at the front of the line and they saw General Black approaching with a kid in a many-pocketed canvas vest and green khakis, a kid who Bunny recognized – a kid he’d seen the day before who looked a lot like their old teammate, Sam Imura.

  Then he gasped, his breath frozen in his lungs as his eyes came to the man in the sleeveless fatigue shirt and sunglasses standing on the other side of the general from the kid. His hair was greyer, his face lined with age, but Bunny couldn’t believe his eyes. His knees wobbled and he fought to stay on his feet. “Captain,” he whispered.

  Top stared beside him, frozen just the same. He had the same deer caught in headlights look in his eyes as he stared at the man, too.

  Bunny shook his head, trying to shake off the vision. This can’t be real. Joe Ledger’s dead. He felt tears forming in the corner of his eyes. Could it really be? He’d never believed in fucking miracles, but he was looking right at one.

  —20—

  Four Jacks and a King

  Joe Ledger stared at the two men in the front of the line. The big blond guy and the older black guy.

  They were impossible faces.

  Dead faces.

  Ghost faces.

  The ground seemed to tilt under Ledger’s feet and the light from the torches and lanterns got instantly brighter. So bright. Too bright.

  He said, “What…?”

  Very softly. So softly that only two people heard him.

  Tom Imura and General Ike Black.

  They turned to look at Ledger. The two men in the line gaped at him. The guards stood around, none of them realizing that something important was happening.

  “What’s with you?” demanded Black sharply, and that caused everyone to turn in his direction – guards, prisoners, and even a few camp civilians who were passing by. The moment froze around Ledger.

  Years ago, when Ledger had been recruited by the Department of Military Sciences one of the main reasons he had been chosen and asked to lead Echo Team was because he lacked the flaw of hesitation. He saw, processed and reacted with zero lag time, a side-effect of the Cop and Killer working in perfect harmony, blending astute judgment with instinctive reaction.

  Now he stood rooted to the ground for what seemed like forever. He could feel his mind catching fire and for a moment – a single burning moment – Ledger wondered if the delicate balancing act of juggling personality aspects had all come crashing down. He knew that such a calamity was always possible, that control over his personal damage was in no way an absolute.

  What made it worse was that he saw the realization blossom like diseased flowers in the eyes of those two prisoners. Top and Bunny were alive. They were prisoners. They were scheduled for execution at his hands. And although they were every bit as shocked as he was, he could see how they were reacting to his reaction.

  All of this – the self-awareness, th
e understanding of his own deadly hesitation, the connection with Top and Bunny – happened in a microsecond. It felt so much longer, but it wasn’t. The Killer knew it wasn’t. The Cop knew it wasn’t. Ike Black’s words had just been spoken less than a heartbeat ago.

  A heartbeat.

  And that was how long his hesitation lasted.

  Seemed like forever. Could have been.

  Wasn’t.

  Ledger turned away from the prisoners and smiled at Ike Black. “You know, Ike, something funny just occurred to me. You’ll think this is hilarious.”

  The doubt on Black’s face wavered and he half-smiled. “Oh, yeah, what?”

  Ledger stood next to him and pointed with his left to Top and Bunny. “See those two assholes over there?”

  “What about them?”

  Joe Ledger chopped the general across the windpipe with the edge of his left hand. He did it without a single muscular flicker that would have telegraphed the move. He did it the right way. And he did it very fucking fast.

  There was a second moment of hesitation as Ike Black staggered a half step back. The guards stared. The passersby stared. The other prisoners stared.

  Tom Imura did not. Nor did Top and Bunny.

  They moved.

  Tom pivoted in place, grabbed the closest guard and hit him with a cupped palm to the ear, putting a lot of torque into the blow, sending the man crashing into a second guard. Top and Bunny rushed at the nearest guards. Their hands were zip-tied but their feet were not, nor was the rest of them. Bunny ducked low and plowed his two-hundred and sixty pounds of hard muscle into a guard and hit with such locomotive speed that the man was plucked off the ground and carried with Bunny as the Marine rammed into the rest of the sentries. Top kicked the kneecap off the man closest to him, then pivoted and kicked a guard who – quicker than the others – was raising his rifle. The steel toe of Top’s boot caught him under the balls, crushing them and smashing the bottom bones of his pelvis. The gun fell and the man collapsed into a fetal ball.

  Ledger tore the front of his shirt down to release the Wilson rapid-release knife and with a flick the short, wicked blade snapped into place. Without pausing, Ledger slashed it across the throat of one man and the eyes of another. Tom caught the second man, spun him and tore the rifle from the screaming man’s hands.

  Ledger raced over to Top and Bunny, slashed the zip ties free, gave them a single dazzling, maniacal grin, and dove back into the fight. Ike Black was still on his feet, still trying to suck in air past the wreckage of his throat. Ledger slap-turned him and used him as a shield as he drove toward a pair of soldiers who had been part of the prisoner detail. The men saw their general and even though it was clear the man was badly hurt, he was still the god of their little world. They hesitated, and this time the hesitation was fatal, and Joe Ledger made them pay for it. He slammed Black into the arms of one, reached past the dying general to slash the forearm, the biceps and then the throat of the first guard. Then he grabbed the other man’s hair, jerked him free of Ike Black’s desperate clutches, and cut his throat, too.

  Gunfire erupted behind him and he whirled to see Bunny and Tom fanning out, each of them firing as they ran. Top lingered with the prisoners and Ledger saw the flash of silver. Top had found a knife somewhere and was cutting the strongest-looking prisoners free; then he pressed his knife into a willing hand and let the newly freed prisoners continue the liberation. Ledger saw a guard running toward him and dove down beneath the spray of bullets, using a dead man for cover, feeling the bullets thud into dead flesh. He took the man’s Glock, rose up and fired, fired, fired.

  There was a huge rumbling sound and Ledger whirled to see the cavern door descending.

  “The cavern!” he bellowed, and raced toward the open maw of the cavern. The others followed, though Bunny peeled off toward a parked M1117 Guardian Armored Security Vehicle. Top fired as he ran and killed a man who stood at the door controls, then he punched a red STOP button. The door jerked to a halt four feet from the ground. Ledger and Tom ducked in after him.

  Outside, a man saw Bunny coming, whirled and tried to get inside the ASV before the hulking giant could reach him. He was one step too slow. Bunny shot him center mass and from the loose way he fell it was clear the bullet had clipped the soldier’s spine. Then Bunny was inside the vehicle. Ledger was just crossing into the complex when he heard the bull roar of the vehicles muscular .50 machine gun. The mass of soldiers running toward the sound of battle suddenly started dancing and twitching as Bunny tore them to pieces.

  Tom and Top Sims caught up with Ledger just inside.

  “What’s the plan, Cap’n?” asked Top.

  “Rules of engagement are pretty simple, Top,” said Ledger. “Everyone wearing a uniform is a bad guy and there are a lot of them. This is a target-rich environment. Let’s clean house.”

  Top grinned. “Hooah.”

  “Hooah.”

  “It’s good to see you, brother,” said Top.

  “You might be a figment of my imagination, Top, but for now I’ll take it. Rock and roll.”

  They laughed, as if the world was a wonderful place. They laughed as if the odds were stacked in their favor and the night was not filled with gunfire and screams. They laughed because they were alive. For now, they were alive.

  The four of them were badly outnumbered.

  They were outgunned, even with the .50 machine gun and a full box of ammunition.

  They were not outfought.

  The men in Ike Black’s army were not soldiers. They thought they were predators.

  They were not.

  The gunfight lasted eleven minutes. The last of the soldiers fled the cavern, running from the killers who came hunting them in the steel corridor. They ran for safety into the camp.

  Where all of the freed prisoners were waiting.

  —21—

  The Quick and the Dead

  When it was over the survivors had to go around with knives and kill the soldiers they killed. Reanimation was a fact of life. Everyone who died, no matter how they died, came back to life within minutes.

  Ledger, Top, and Tom came out of the cavern to find Bunny directing the cleanup. Ledger walked past him to where Ike Black had climbed to his feet and was taking his first steps as one of the living dead. Ledger slung his stolen rifle and flicked the Wilson’s blade into place again. He stopped, though, and let the zombie shamble toward him.

  “I ought to let you stay this way,” Ledger told him. “Kick your ass out of here and let you wander until you rotted away.”

  The zombie tried to moan, but the damage to its throat was too severe.

  “You thought you were so fucking smart,” said Ledger. “King under the mountain. Shit, I had this whole plan about pretending to join and working my way up to be your right-hand man and then putting two in the back of your head when no one was looking. I was going to take over this whole operation and maybe make something legitimate of it. But you know what?”

  The zombie shuffled closer.

  “It’d be too damn much like polishing a turd.”

  The dead general reached for him.

  “Besides… as it turns out,” said Ledger quietly, “you were no general at all. You’re nothing. Not before you died and not now. If me and my boys hadn’t come along, someone else would have taken you down.”

  Ledger batted aside the hands and caught Black by the throat in an iron grip. The dead mouth snapped but Black had no angle for a bite.

  “Just between you and me, Ike old buddy,” said Ledger, “I’m kind of glad I get to kill you twice.”

  He stabbed Ike Black through one eye and then the other, and then he swept his arm over and down, driving the blade like a spike through the top of the zombie’s skull. The motor cortex died, shorting out the lingering nerve conduction that gave the undead thing its mobility. All tensi
on went out of Black’s body and he fell like a scarecrow knocked from its post.

  Ledger stepped aside to let Ike Black sprawl face-first in the mud.

  Around him the prisoners were finishing the cleanup with a relish that was every bit as ghoulish and vicious as the things they were killing. Ledger couldn’t blame them.

  He went back to the others and pulled Top and then Bunny into fierce embraces. They all laughed and there were tears in their eyes. The stories of how and where and why and what would come later. For now they stood in the glow of a miracle. They had survived when so much of the world had not. Impossibly, they were alive. Impossibly they were all here.

  “What do we do now?” asked Tom when they all stopped laughing and backslapping and shaking hands.

  They looked at the milling crowds. Top said, “The cure’s phony?”

  “Completely,” said Ledger.

  “Fuck,” said Bunny. “Once these folks get their shit together they’re going to be hurt by that. A cure… shit, that’s what brought us out here.”

  “I know,” said Ledger, “the truth doesn’t always set you free.”

  “Do you think Dr Pisani can be helped?” asked Tom. “Maybe she can come back to… well, to herself.”

  “What good would that do?” asked Bunny, “if she’s flipped her gourd, I mean.”

  Ledger said, “Black mentioned something about research Monica McReady was doing. Remember her?”

  Top and Bunny nodded. “She still alive?” asked Top.

  “Unknown. She had a lab somewhere in Death Valley, but I don’t know where it was and Pisani lost her shit when McReady stopped transmitting. But…”

  He let it hang but the others nodded.

  “Worth a try,” said Top.

  “Anything’s worth a try,” agreed Bunny.

  “I’m going to try for it,” said Ledger. “Go see if I can find McReady, or at least her notes, and bring what I can back to Dr Pisani. This place may have been a big fat lie but maybe we can change that and—”