“You two are lucky to be alive.”
“Barely,” Rodriguez said, sitting down, one hand pressed against his leg and the other to the rag over his eye.
“Hold on, son. Help’s on the way.”
Seconds later, a medic raced up with a bright red bag and began to cut away Rodriguez’s bloody pant leg.
Once Chappie was sure that the cadet was in good hands, he turned to Bell.
“Lieutenant, can you tell me what’s going on here?”
“Yes, sir. The soldiers came to kill President Glass. Corporal Rodriguez and I were trying to stop them.”
Dr. Green stepped closer. “Where is she? Where’s President Glass?”
Bell pointed to the sloping driveway leading up to the West Tunnel Entrance.
“She must still be inside the bunker.”
“Please tell me that the soldiers didn’t manage to get the door open.”
Bell’s face grew long. “I’m sorry, ma’am. We did what we could, but there were so many of them.”
Green covered her mouth. “Then it’s over. The President’s dead.”
“Maybe not,” Rodriguez said, grimacing as the medic applied a hemastatic bandage to his leg.
Green seemed confused. “I don’t understand. How could she possibly fend them off?”
“She couldn’t. But, thankfully, she’s not alone.”
“Who’s with her?”
“Only the meanest lawman you’ll ever meet.”
“A lawman?”
“Yes, ma’am.” Rodriguez looked off toward the blast door. “To get to President Glass, those men will have to get by Marshal Raines. And that’s not a job I’d wish on anyone.”
Chapter 19
Mason, General Carr, and Bowie continued to act as scouts for the rest of the group with the hopes of clearing any resistance. Twice, they crossed paths with the Black Dogs, and both times they managed to avoid detection. It was a high-stakes game of hide-and-go-seek that wasn’t going to end with someone being called out.
As they drew closer to their destination, Mason called everyone back together. They huddled in a small storage room, looking down a long hallway lined with doors on either side. At the end stood the East Entrance blast door, still securely closed.
“The decontamination chamber is through the last door on the left,” he said, pointing.
“We should open the blast door before we go down into the sewers,” said Pinker. “It might fool them into thinking that we went outside.”
“Agreed.” Mason looked left and right. It was clear. “Let’s move!”
The group hurried into the corridor, warily eyeing the closed doors and vacant hallway. Without saying the words, everyone was wondering the same thing. Exactly how long could their luck hold out? They had just arrived at the bunker door when that question was finally answered by the steady thumping of boots coming from behind them.
Baker and Pinker were bringing up the rear, and both turned with their Sig Sauer .22 Mosquitoes at the ready. Mason reached out and grabbed the blast door’s cold metal wheel, twisting it frantically to the left. The heavy pistons slowly withdrew from the wall, and when he was sure they were fully recessed, he pushed the door open a few feet.
“Quick,” he said, stepping through the narrow opening, “everyone get behind the door!”
Leila, Bowie, and General Carr all darted through, but Jack Fry paused, insisting that President Glass go ahead of him. When she was finally behind the door, he tried to squeeze his wheelchair through the narrow opening. Unfortunately, one of the wheels snagged on the edge of the door, and he ended up nearly toppling face first onto the concrete floor. Baker and Pinker shoved him through, never taking their eyes or their pistols off the hallway.
General Hood, Morant, and Buckey appeared an instant before Baker ducked behind the heavy door.
“There they are!” Hood shouted, quickly squeezing off a few rounds from his Heckler & Koch USP45. Bullets ricocheted off the massive steel door, bouncing between walls, chipping out small chunks of concrete, and sending the soldiers ducking for cover.
General Carr leaned around and hollered, “Hood, you no-good bastard! I hope you rot in hell.” He pointed the submachine gun in their general direction and let it rock and roll. Only when the slide locked to the rear did he finally duck back behind the door.
Mason looked over at him. “Feel better?”
“I’d feel better knowing that I hit one of them.” He looked down at the MP5’s empty chamber and realized what he had done. “Crap! I’m out,” he said, setting the rifle aside.
Pinker stepped up and peeked around the blast door. Hood and the others had disappeared through the open doorways. He eyed the decontamination room, barely ten yards away but impossible to get to without stepping out into the hallway.
“We’re cut off. There’s no way to get down into the sewers now.”
“Even if we could,” said Baker, “they’d just follow us down.” He turned and eyed the long ramp leading outside. “Helicopters or not, we’re going to have to make a run for it.”
The radios squawked. It was General Hood’s voice. We’ve got them pinned down at the East Entrance. They may be headed outside, over.
Baker grabbed Mason’s arm. “Marshal, we’ve got to hurry before they come around behind us.”
Mason eyed President Glass. She was in no condition to win a footrace.
“No. What we need to do is get the President to safety.”
“But how? Hood and the others will never let us cross the hall.”
Everyone looked to Mason, hoping that he could pull something out of nothing.
“We’re going to add some uncertainty to the situation.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means we’re going to split up.”
The group immediately started to protest.
“Listen!” he said, holding up a hand. “The only way to keep the President safe is to get her into the sewers without the Black Dogs knowing where she went. To do that, we need to give them something else to chase.”
The group quieted, and even President Glass seemed willing to accept his decision.
Leila stepped closer, eying the partially open blast door.
“But how do we get her across the hall without being shot by Hood and his men?”
“By getting them to look away.” Mason reached over and removed the satchel hanging across her shoulder. “As soon as the Claymore blows, you and President Glass will dart across the hall and drop down into the sewers.”
She seemed to do a quick internal calculation.
“While the rest of you create a diversion by running out the back.”
He nodded. “We’ll go down the ramp and split up, giving them multiple targets to chase. By the time they figure it out, if they ever do, you and the President will be safely hidden away.”
Everyone pondered their part in the plan. There was no guarantee that any of it would work, or more importantly, that any of them would survive the subsequent hunt. Even so, it was a plan.
“I’m not going to be much good in this chair,” said Jack. “I’ll stay here at the door and try to hold them off for a few minutes. It’ll give you time to—”
“No!” said Glass.
“Madam President, there’s simply no other way.”
“No,” she repeated, crossing her arms.
“She’s right,” said Mason. “We’re not leaving anyone behind.”
“But the chair—”
“We’ll figure it out once we get outside. Right now, we need to focus on getting the women down into the sewer.”
Mason turned to Leila and held out the M57 clacker.
“Once I give you the signal, blow the mine. You’ll have to do it quickly, or they might shoot it.”
Her eyes widened. “I thought you said a gunshot wouldn’t cause it to explode.”
“It won’t, but we don’t want it tipping over or spinning around to face us.”
�
�Wouldn’t the door protect us?”
“Probably, but a few ball bearings might still ricochet around. These things are incredibly powerful.”
She took the clacker and nodded.
“Got it. Just tell me when.”
Mason set the Claymore down by his feet and swapped out the partially spent magazine with his last remaining fresh one. He set the M4 to full auto. This would be the last hoorah for the rifle until he could get additional ammunition, and that probably wasn’t going to happen anytime soon.
He took a deep breath, leaned around the door, and fired a long burst into the hallway. He didn’t intend for it to hit anyone. The goal was to get Hood and the others to stay behind cover. Meanwhile, he used his foot to slide the Claymore around in front of the door.
As soon as Mason ducked back around, he shouted, “Now!”
Leila squeezed the clacker, and a thunderous boom sounded.
“Go!” he shouted, pushing her and President Glass out into the hall.
As they dashed into the decontamination room, Leila glanced back at Mason. Perhaps she was offering an unspoken goodbye or maybe it was simply a reminder to be careful. Then she was gone. Total time of exposure, two seconds.
The walls, floor, and ceiling of the hallway were covered in hundreds of small pockmarks. As for the soldiers, they were nowhere to be seen. But that didn’t mean that anyone was safe. Hood and his men would reappear soon enough, as would the reinforcements they had called in. Even so, Mason felt an undeniable sense of pride. He had accomplished his primary mission. He had gotten President Glass out of harm’s way. It didn’t hurt that he had managed to get Leila to safety as well. Everything from this point forward came down to one thing.
Survival.
As Mason and the others exited the long concrete ramp, they found themselves standing on a loading dock. To their right was a driveway leading out to a two-lane road that circled The Greenbrier, and to their left was the service entrance to the resort’s kitchen. The road and driveway were both clogged with cars and delivery trucks, requiring any type of escape to be done on foot.
Ushering everyone away from the ramp, Mason said, “From here on, we’ll break into pairs. Bowie and I will head across the resort grounds to try and draw their attention. Pinker, you and Baker go in through the kitchen. Make your way inside the hotel and find a place to hide.”
“But they might decide to blow it up,” countered Baker.
“Which is why you should go as deep as you can.”
He nodded and grabbed Pinker’s arm.
“Come on, Tom, let’s get inside.”
They broke away, quickly disappearing through the half-open service door.
“What about us?” asked Jack. “I’m not going to be able to outrun those soldiers. And despite all the talk of carrying me,” he said, patting his soft belly, “I’m afraid that would be a short run indeed.”
“I told President Glass that I wouldn’t leave you,” said Carr, “and I meant it.”
“No one’s leaving anyone,” said Mason. “You two are going to hide in plain sight.”
General Carr and Jack both looked around. Nothing struck them as a viable hiding place.
In unison, they said, “Where?”
Mason walked to the closest of two large dumpsters buzzing with thousands, if not millions, of flies. He kicked open the heavy plastic lid, and a stench as foul as gangrenous flesh wafted out.
“Two dumpsters. Two people. You do the math.”
Jack’s face curled up. “You want us to hide in the garbage? Look at that mess!”
“Mess” didn’t begin to describe what was inside the dumpster. Rotten meat squirmed with maggots, vegetables lay decomposing into slick black mold, and congealed cooking grease bubbled with gaseous burps. After months of sitting, the entire concoction seemed more like hazardous waste than kitchen refuse.
Before Jack could protest further, General Carr wheeled him over in front of the bin and tipped him in, saying, “No time to debate the merits of the plan.” As Jack slowly sank into the muck, Carr carefully lowered the lid. When he was sure that Jack was safely tucked away, he swung open the lid to the second dumpster, batted aside a swarm of flies, and stepped inside.
Mason offered a quick nod. “If you two will stay quiet, you’ll probably never be found. No one’s going to think to look for you in there.”
Carr squatted down, sinking up to his waist as he lowered the lid.
The sound of men talking echoed down the tunnel. The enemy was coming.
Mason looked down at Bowie. “What do you say, boy? Shall we give them something to chase?”
The dog’s ears stood up.
“All right then, let’s go!” Mason took off down the driveway with Bowie yipping at his heels.
General Hood, Morant, and Buckey carefully exited the East Entrance tunnel, sweeping their weapons over the loading dock. Crates, buckets, and oddly enough, a wheel chair lay scattered across the dock, but there were no signs of President Glass or her allies.
“Which way?” Hood said, eyeing the door leading into The Greenbrier’s kitchen.
“There!” Buckey said, pointing toward the road.
In the distance, they saw a man and a dog running toward a painted green building on the opposite side of the street.
Morant turned to General Hood. “Wait here and make sure no one goes in or out. Buckey and I are going after that one.”
“But shouldn’t we wait for another team to arrive?”
“When they get the filters removed, they’ll migrate this way. Until then, the three of us are going to start whittling down the threat, one body at a time.”
“Are you saying we’re still going to gas the bunker? But what if—”
“There are a thousand what ifs, General, none of which we have the answers to at the moment. So, we’re going to stick to the plan, sealing, gassing, and clearing the bunker. Once that’s done, we’ll expand our search in a methodical way to the hotel and surrounding area.”
Hood nodded. “Right.” The plan had gone to shit, and Morant was doing his best to pull it back in. “I’ll watch the door. You two go and get rid of a thorn in our side.”
General Hood watched as Buckey and Morant weaved their way through the tangle of trucks, finally crossing the street and disappearing behind the green building. He couldn’t help but notice that any command he had once held over the men was now lost. They were essentially operating autonomously, and perhaps that was for the best. Hunting and killing was, after all, what they did best.
He turned and looked back up the tunnel. It was empty. Glass and the others had already made their escape. He eyed the door leading into the kitchen. No doubt they had gone in there, but he wasn’t about to hunt them on his own. Not when they had explosives, he wasn’t.
Hood holstered his pistol and rolled the wheelchair over to the edge of the dock. He flopped down and sat watching the road. Two dumpsters were directly in front of him, the closest less than three feet away. The stench of rotting garbage was pungent, and flies buzzed around the dumpsters as they worked to find a way in.
“Jesus!” he said, waving a hand in front of his nose. “What the hell’s in there?”
Hood stood up, but before he could move away, the lid on the closest dumpster flipped open, and strong hands reached out to pull him into the smelly garbage. He landed head first in a pile of celery, tomatoes, and lettuce, all of them slimy and rotten. He pulled free of the muck and struggled to stand. When he finally regained his footing, Hood found himself staring down the muzzle of General Carr’s M1911.
“Toss your sidearm,” directed Carr.
Hood looked down and picked a sticky blob of something green from his uniform.
“Even if you shoot me, you’ll never get out of here alive.”
“Do it!” he said, tightening his grip on the pistol.
Hood slowly pulled his USP45 from its holster and dropped it over the side of the dumpster.
“I alway
s figured you for a bastard, but a traitor? That one caught me by surprise,” said Carr.
“I’ve accepted certain hard truths. You’d be well served to do the same.”
“Hard truths? Is that what you call the murder of innocent people?”
“Don’t play self-righteous with me. We’re all doing what we need to.”
Carr moved closer, pressing the muzzle against Hood’s eye.
“If I could get away with it, I’d put a bullet through your eye right now.”
“Like I said, we’re all doing what we need to.”
Carr stepped back and holstered his pistol.
“Unfortunately, if I did that, your friends would be back here before I could climb out of this…” He looked down at the garbage. “This mash.”
Hood smiled. “I take that to mean that we’re going to settle this like the two old goats that we are.”
Carr nodded. “It’s been coming for some time.”
Hood slipped the jacket off his shoulders. He wasn’t a big man, but he was fit and lean from having lived the life of a professional soldier. Carr was a few inches shorter, but he had a good twenty pounds on him, mostly in his arms and chest.
“I’m going to enjoy this,” Hood said, bringing his hands up into a fighting position.
Carr gritted his teeth. “I seriously doubt that.”
With both men’s feet essentially trapped from the knees down, they had to slog toward one another, as if wading through quicksand. Hood fired the first punch, catching Carr on the left ear. In return, he got a split lip and a bloody nose, thanks to a powerful heel palm driven straight up the middle. Hood’s head rocked back, and he nearly fell, but as he did, he flung a handful of maggot-infested hamburger into Carr’s face. As the general wiped it from his eyes, Hood leaned forward with an uppercut, catching Carr under the chin.
Teeth clacked together, and he tasted blood.
Hood followed up with a short left hook. It caught Carr in the eye, and for a second, he thought he might fall.
He didn’t.
As his vision cleared, he lunged forward and pulled Hood into a deep headlock. The general tried to slide out, but there was so little room in the dumpster that he found himself unable to wriggle free. Carr squatted, driving Hood’s face into a jellied pool of cooking grease.
Last Stand (The Survivalist Book 7) Page 22
