Beckham almost hesitated as a memory surfaced in his mind. This was the place Captain Rachel Davis and a small team of Navy SEALs had come to rescue former Vice President George Johnson. They had arrived too late, and the entire Presidential Emergency Operations Center (PEOC) was filled with the infected, including Johnson.
The elevator took them deep underground and Beckham tried to relax. When the doors opened again, a room bustling with activity greeted them.
Military officers and civilian staffers worked at stations facing a wall-mounted monitor the size of a movie theatre screen. It was split into multiple boxes filled with data and live video imagery.
Elizabeth crossed the room to another door. She knocked, then peeked her head in.
“Good afternoon, Madam President,” she said. “We have Captain Beckham and Master Sergeant Horn here to see you.”
Elizabeth opened the door the rest of the way, gesturing inside.
“Thank you,” Beckham said.
The door closed behind them, leaving the two retired Delta Force Operators alone with the president and vice president.
“Great to see you, Captain Beckham and Master Sergeant Horn,” Ringgold said. “I’m very sorry to keep you both waiting.”
She walked around the table. Beckham held out a hand for a shake, but Ringgold went past it, going in for a hug.
“How are your families?” she asked.
“Good, Madam President—” Beckham began to say.
“Jan,” Ringgold corrected. “I’m only going to be president a few more months, and I’m starting to train my friends to use my name.”
“Ma’am,” Beckham said with a dip of his head.
She smiled and shook Horn’s hand.
“Everything’s good at Peaks Island?” she asked.
“Very good, ma’am,” Horn replied.
The vice president had followed behind Ringgold and now stood waiting to shake their hands before taking a seat.
“I called you here in hopes that you would consider running for Senate against McComb. We need your voice and support in the chambers to help Lemke,” Ringgold said.
“McComb is weak and I’m worried he might defect to the Freedom Party,” Lemke chimed in.
Horn said something under his breath that rhymed with hit, but Beckham ignored him.
“I’m honored, ma’am, but at this time Kate and I would really like to stay out of politics,” Beckham said. “I’m happy to help in other ways of course. Advising and maybe even a little campaigning for the party, but…”
“I understand,” Ringgold said. “It’s something to think about, although it’s not the only reason I brought you in. There are matters that will affect the election more than a Senate race.”
“Lay it on us, Madam President,” Horn said.
She looked to Lemke. Beckham braced to hear what had them both looking so fatigued and worried.
“There was an attack last night on Outpost Turkey River,” Lemke said. “The radio SOS we received said Variants had penetrated the outpost. We lost communications within minutes.”
“What?” Horn said, stepping forward.
“We sent a drone a few hours ago and this is what it has sent back,” Ringgold said.
Lemke used a remote to click on the monitor across the table. Beckham stiffened in his chair and leaned forward to get a better view of the imagery on screen. With his poor vision in his right eye, he was having a hard time making out the grainy footage at first, but there was no mistaking the empty streets.
“Where is everyone?” Horn asked.
“That’s what we’re trying to figure out,” Lemke said. “The drone did not find a single body of a human, or Variant for that matter.”
“Did you ever come across anything like this during your time leading Team Ghost?” Ringgold asked Beckham.
His gaze flitted from the screen to meet hers.
“Not quite on this level, ma’am.”
“There were nearly three hundred people living at the outpost,” Lemke said. “Gone with barely a trace.”
“They’re one of the most important agricultural communities we have, too, and they had just recently started to harvest,” Ringgold said. “We need this community, and we need to know what happened to them.”
“At this point we’ve only sent in the drone, but we’re going to deploy a couple of teams to investigate,” Lemke said. “We’ve got SEALs on deck, already prepared to go. And then if that fails, we can bring in our experts.”
Beckham knew what that meant—Team Ghost was going back out there. He thought of Fitz who had spent the past ten years fighting the monsters during the war and post-war. The team had lost more souls since then.
Somehow Fitz and Rico had survived all of the operations, but Beckham feared one of these days he would get a call that Fitz had finally run out of luck.
“I’d like you two to stick around an extra day to monitor the mission,” Ringgold said. “We could use your input as this unfolds.”
Beckham had promised Kate he would be back by the next morning, but she would understand.
“Absolutely,” he said. “We’re happy to help.”
Ringgold stood and approached the screen, looking at the grainy footage. “I’m worried there is something more sinister going on out there.”
Lemke nodded. “Me too, and when word gets out about Turkey River going dark, it’s going to fuel the support for Cornelius and his plan to ravage abandoned cities with bombs and a fresh army of young men and women.”
“Not my Tasha,” Horn muttered.
Ringgold rotated from the screen wearing a mask of concern. “I know you two have already sacrificed so much, but I’m afraid we’re going to need your help again to fight this new threat.”
A chill passed through Beckham at the thought, and while he knew this didn’t necessarily mean he would need to return to the battlefield, it did mean his days living in peace on the island were numbered.
— 4 —
The screams of agony seemed to ricochet off the trees. Dohi tried to hone in on the direction, but the echo made identifying the location of its source in the treacherous terrain difficult.
Another strong gust whipped through the foliage. Leaves swirled around him and the rest of Team Ghost who had spread out in combat intervals.
Dohi led the way into the thick forest. He cradled his suppressed M4A1, searching for targets. The screams suddenly stopped.
He slowed, stepping on a dead leaf that crunched in the silence.
For a moment he stood there, listening to the woods and the rush of the river not far behind them.
He sniffed the autumn air, but picked up no sour scent from the Variants.
When the wind picked up again, he knew why.
“Christ,” Dohi whispered to Fitz. “I think we’re upwind from those screams.”
“So the Variants smelled us first?” Ace grumbled quietly.
“That’s why they silenced the prisoner,” Dohi said. “They know we’re hunting them.
“Then they’ll start hunting us now, too,” Lincoln said.
The hunters just became the hunted, Dohi thought dourly.
“Find us that trail, Dohi,” Fitz said. “Keep an eye out for camouflaged beasts, too. It may be light out, but they’ll still blend in.”
Dohi nodded, not showing his frustration. People normally thought he had some mystical power that allowed him to listen and talk with the woods when he was tracking.
That was nothing more than a stereotypical myth.
Truth was he’d learned not how to listen or talk to the woods, but how to read them. All the miniscule signs that led to your quarry were there if you put in the work.
The forest didn’t willingly give those signs up. You had to find them.
He crouched to look for any clues. The ground was covered in leaves, making it exceedingly difficult to search for the footprints. Most people made the mistake of trying to track a person or Variant down by looking at thin
gs from a single perspective: their own.
They walked, standing straight, and kept their eyes ahead of them. Not very helpful when you were dealing with monsters that could climb, burrow, and even fly, as some across the Atlantic had once done.
An open mind was the best way to come at problems like this. He raked his hands through the leaves, revealing the dried brown grass and patches of dirt underneath them. It would take hours to sift through the leaves if his goal was to find those Variant footprints.
But that wasn’t his goal. Instead, he pressed his fingers against the soil. It gave easily. Not unlike the soil around downtown Ellicott City where the flood waters had softened and eroded it.
The rain would’ve been strong enough to wash the hillside of the blood and little bits of flesh Dohi wanted to look for. What the waters hadn’t washed away, the leaves hid. The weather was conspiring with the Variants against him.
A branch cracked somewhere in the distance.
Mendez swiveled on his heels.
Fitz motioned for everyone to keep still. Then he nodded at Dohi who again took point. Team Ghost followed, walking at a hunch, their rifles roving for targets.
Rifle pointing forward, Dohi’s eyes scanned the surroundings as he sought another sign, another hint of where the Variants’ trail had gone.
He found it on the knotted brown bark of an oak. One of the gray-brown scales had been torn off to reveal a lighter patch of yellow wood, no bigger than his thumb.
Obvious to him, but maybe not to someone who wasn’t looking. He plucked something from the bark that turned out to be a chunk of fingernail.
Human from the looks of it.
Dohi motioned them forward, spotting other tree trunks with scratches on them along with saplings that had been split. The casual wear on the landscape revealed the Alpha’s preferred travel route. He could practically see a path now.
He pushed forward through the foliage, advancing along the trail at a brisk pace.
This wasn’t the first time they had been on a mission to save civilians kidnapped by the Variants, and it likely wouldn’t be their last. Most of their recent missions had ended with dead Variants but, in most cases, they were too late to save their prisoners.
The loss of innocent lives weighed heavy on his mind like a dark storm cloud.
He broke into a run, heart pounding. The scratches on the tree trunks and the depressed leaves and splintered twigs led the team. Around the next oak, a scent hit his nostrils.
Dohi slowed his pace and motioned for Team Ghost to spread out again. Through the screen of trees, he spotted a gray dome propped up by four Doric pillars about twice as tall as a man, each covered by moss.
A rusted iron cross was suspended from the dome giving the structure the appearance of some kind of altar. Bricks lay around it, and huge gray slabs rested on the forest floor where the wind had brushed aside some of the leaves.
The structure was some sort of a rotted chapel. The more Dohi looked between the trees and fallen logs, the more ruined structures he noticed. Most were barely more than a leftover foundation, while others had the remnants of brick walls suffocated by vegetation.
Dohi held his breath to listen.
A screech exploded through the trees. His stomach sank when he realized Team Ghost wasn’t the only one studying the area. He swiveled toward the source of the sound, but Fitz found the camouflaged target first. He fired short bursts—bullets chiseled into one of the low-lying brick walls as a shape flung itself down for cover.
Other inhuman shrieks blasted through the forest.
“Eyes up!” Fitz yelled.
Dohi raised his rifle at a hulking figure in the tree branches. Pangs of sunlight piercing through the leafy cover illuminated a creature with throbbing lips and needle-like teeth. Blood vessels pulsed under the mottled green and brown flesh perfectly matching the colors of its surroundings.
Cover blown, it leapt from branch to branch, staying just ahead of Dohi’s aim. When he finally had a shot, it suddenly changed directions.
Dohi fired calculated bursts at the muscled beast and finally hit the target. Blood and flesh flicked out of the exit wounds.
Mindful of his ammo, he fired one last burst as the creature sailed through the air. He jumped out of the way at the last minute, and the Variant walloped the ground next to him, limp and dead on impact.
Another camouflaged creature raced from behind one of the crumbled walls. Ragged black hair twisted in a knot behind its head. It drew back its claws, ready to use them as scythes.
A flurry of rounds cut into the abomination as it made a run for Dohi, spraying hot blood over his fatigues.
“Got you, bro!” Lincoln called out.
“Thanks!” Dohi replied.
The rattle of gunfire echoed around him as he moved to find a new target. His world became the view through his rifle’s optics.
Find a Variant. Fire. Repeat.
Surging adrenaline seemed to slow time as he sighted up each shot. Team Ghost had recovered quickly from their ambush. Ace’s shotgun boomed as it decimated the bodies of beasts that had gotten too close.
Mendez picked off the Variants still swinging down from the trees, the sunlight hitting their camouflaged skin. Fitz and Rico fended off the monsters further away, winding through the ruins with their suppressed shots.
A final boom from Ace’s shotgun announced the death of the last Variant.
The labored breaths of Team Ghost once again claimed the day, the only other sound was the moan of a dying beast that Fitz finished off with a double tap.
“Think that’s the whole nest?” Rico asked.
“No,” Dohi said. He picked up the muscled arm of one of the dead Variants. The beast was strong, but it wasn’t Alpha strong. And the way they’d thrown themselves at Team Ghost likely meant they were cannon fodder—not the leader of this pack.
“The Alpha’s probably watching us now,” Lincoln said. “Trying to figure out who the weakest link is.” He shot a glance at Mendez who spat on the ground.
“Then he’d be looking at you, hombre,” retorted Mendez.
Dohi ignored them and searched for tracks. After a few minutes of looking, he located another trail. He motioned the team up chipped concrete stairs. At the bottom of the stairs, dark shapes flitted through the shadowy woods. Two appeared to be normal Variants, loping after another. The third…
“There’s the Alpha,” Dohi said.
Fitz balled his hand. “Hold your fire, it’s got a hostage!”
The beast was a good three feet taller than the others, and slender with ropy muscles. The long limbs appeared insectile, both of them wrapped around a male human prisoner. Mottled patches of gray and black covered the camouflaged flesh.
It turned and bolted with the man. The other two beasts screeched as they followed.
Fitz gave the advance signal.
Dohi had already taken off, fearing that if they lost it now, it would melt into the forest. It was no wonder the creature had been able to infiltrate Outpost Patapsco Valley so easily. The entire outpost was located in woods just like this.
Dohi made up lost ground fast and brought his rifle to aim at one of those slender legs. The first shot found a target, ripping through a muscular calf. The Alpha let out a roar and slammed into the ground, the hostage rolling away into the leaves.
He kept his rifle shouldered, an eye on the other two Variants that had slowed. The Alpha pushed itself back up and hissed, brown saliva spraying Dohi as he approached and fired into the Alpha’s side.
Despite the rounds, the creature barreled into Dohi, knocking him to the ground. He lost his rifle and went for his hatchet, pulling it from the sheath just as the Alpha swiped his vest with jagged claws. Dohi planted the blade into its arm, yanked it out, and then struck it in the chin with a crunch.
In his periphery, he saw Fitz engage with the other two Variants, firing at them as they parried their claws with his rifle. Rico soon joined him. They formed a wall
between themselves and the person that the Variants had been carrying.
The Alpha let out another roar that nearly deafened Dohi as he tried to pry the blade free from its chin. It brought its fists down, hammering at his chest, and then climbed on top of him.
Suddenly blood sprayed from the Alpha’s mouth.
The creature screeched in agony as nerves and muscles and bones gave way to Ace’s machete. He hacked at the creature over and over until it finally succumbed to the injuries and died on top of Dohi.
Ace helped push the beast off him and then offered his hand. Dohi took it and rose to his feet, thanking Ace with a nod and a clap on the heavyset man’s shoulder.
The other two Variants lay dead next to trees. Lincoln and Rico were already fanning out to hold sentry while Ace bent down to the survivor.
The man crawled away on all fours.
“Relax buddy,” Ace said.
Mendez moved over to help.
The man struggled as they peeled off the dried mucus plugs covering his mouth. He sobbed and scooted away on arms covered in bleeding wounds. “They… They killed the others… I saw them… Oh, God! You’ve got to help me. Help… Help…me…”
“Take it easy,” Dohi said. “We’re going to get you out of here.”
Fitz pulled out his radio to reach command and walked over to Rico and Lincoln. “Help…help…” the injured man kept repeating through quivering lips.
“You’re safe now,” Mendez said. He and Dohi worked on dressing the wounds. The man was clearly in shock.
Fitz returned a moment later with a sour look.
“Guess we’re not going to have a celebratory beer tonight, huh?” Lincoln said.
“Not tonight,” Fitz replied.
“Please don’t tell us ‘all it takes is all you got,’” Mendez said. “I really, really need a hot shower and to hit the rack.”
“Yeah, bro,” Lincoln said, waving his hand over his nose. “Mendez ain’t lying. He really needs a shower.”
Fitz frowned. “Sorry fellas, but command has another mission for us,” he said. “As soon as we get back to base we’re shipping out.”
Extinction Shadow Page 5
