Beckham stopped at Outpost Manchester’s civilian shelter on his way to the lab. People clustered around, asking questions about what was happening outside. He waved them off and pushed through the crowd until he found Horn trying to keep the kids calm.
“Dad!” Javier shouted. “Please don’t leave again.”
“Sorry, buddy,” Beckham said. “I promise everything’s going to be okay.”
“So you’ll stay?”
Beckham hesitated, but his son was tough. He would understand. “I’ve got to go check on your mom. Once she finishes her work, we’re all going to leave this place.”
“Good,” Tasha said.
“Can’t wait,” Jenny said with a snort.
Once the kids returned to their cots and chairs, Beckham pulled Horn aside. He found a corner they could whisper in without the kids overhearing.
“How bad is it out there?” Horn asked.
“We got hit by a bunch of rogue juveniles. Seems like they’re really pressing the defenses now, and Presley kicked me out of the command building.”
“That son of a bitch weasel. I had a bad feeling about him.”
Beckham thought back to the kid collaborator in the jail. He had a feeling there were more of them out there, waiting to strike.
“I’ve got good reason to believe this is going to get a lot worse,” Beckham said. “We have to get out of here.”
“Jesus.”
“President Ringgold will send an evac as soon as we call for it,” Beckham said. “If things go south, and I can’t get back here, you take the kids and the dogs to the tarmac, okay? Leave without me if you have to.”
“Screw that,” Horn said. “We ain’t going anywhere without you.”
Horn had a look in his eye that Beckham recognized. Like he wanted to roll outside with the M249 and mow everything down.
“The kids, Big Horn. You’ve got to stay with them and stay calm.”
Horn clenched his jaw, but nodded, finally relenting. “Fine. What are you going to do?”
“I’m going to the lab to make sure Kate’s good. She told me they were almost done.”
“Okay,” Horn said. He put a hand on Beckham’s shoulder. “Be careful, boss.”
“You, too.”
Beckham said goodbye to the kids and dogs before returning to the street where Fischer waited with his men. The sound of distant gunfire rattled in the night, but it was more sporadic now.
“Everyone okay?” Fischer asked.
“For now.” Beckham jerked his chin. “Let’s go.”
They set off with Tran and Chase down the empty road. Even the routine patrols had been called off to other areas.
When Beckham reached the lab building, it wasn’t guarded by a single vehicle or soldier. He wanted to march back to the command post and knock Presley out.
Chase halted on the sidewalk. “They didn’t even leave a single damn guard outside?”
“That stupid son of a gun,” Fischer said. “What in Sam Hill was he thinking?”
“He’s lost control, and shits about to hit the fan,” Beckham said. “Come on. Let’s find a way in.”
They tried the front entrance, but it was locked. Knocking didn’t help. Beckham cupped his hands over his eyes to peer through the windows in the door. No one stood guard inside either.
He circled around the building and found a side door, but it too was locked and no one answered his knocks.
“I know Presley’s acting like a dumbass, but it’s still strange no one is in there, right?” Chase asked.
“Sure as hell seems strange to me,” Tran said.
“Think you can pick it?” Fischer asked him.
“If by pick you mean shoot, sure,” Beckham said. He motioned for them to get back. Then he aimed his M4 and fired at the lock. The well-placed round did the trick, and he kicked the door open.
Tran went in first, keeping his rifle angled at the ground, just in case there were friendlies inside. He stopped right in the entrance.
“Why are the lights off?” he asked.
Beckham moved inside. “Something’s not right.”
Shouldering his rifle, he took the lead. Emergency lights glowed in the nook of the ceilings, providing just enough light to guide him down the hallway.
Every step he took, his pulse raced faster.
God, even Presley wasn’t actually bullheaded enough to leave this place completely unguarded. Something was definitely wrong.
Very wrong.
Please be okay, Kate.
He stopped at an intersection and held up his prosthetic hand. Then he checked the leftward hallway. Seeing it was clear, he looked to the right.
His stomach flipped. Two bodies lay crumpled. Dark blood pooled over the tiled floor, but he didn’t see any sign of gashes or torn flesh to indicate Variants were inside.
“Collaborators already got here,” he whispered.
Fischer came up next to him to have a look.
“On me,” Beckham whispered. “Tran, watch our six. We’ve got at least one hostile shooter.”
Without hesitation, Beckham led the way, his rifle up and finger hovering over the trigger. The lab entrance was at the end of the passage, not far from where the soldiers had fallen.
He kept low, hugging the wall, barrel aimed at the door to the lab. When he reached the bodies, he halted to examine them.
The men had both been shot in the back. They probably never saw the attack coming. One of their weapons was gone, which told Beckham the shooter had probably taken it to give to someone else.
Judging by the looks of things, the shooter had taken the extra weapon straight to the lab.
Beckham swallowed hard and kept walking. A tremor shook the ground as he passed the dead Raven guards. He almost stopped, but pressed on to the windows.
As a defense mechanism against any potential mastermind escapes, the glass to the lab had been made bulletproof. That ruined any plans of shooting the hostiles from behind. They had to get inside if they wanted to take these assholes down.
He crouched under those windows as he made his way to the door.
A roar from the monster confirmed Beckham was going to have more than men with guns to worry about.
He held his breath and got up to scan the room. A cluster of scientists huddled behind lab benches, but he didn’t see Kate.
Two men stood near the mastermind, one in a white lab coverall. The man pointed a rifle at another person in the lab. The other gunman was dressed in fatigues and appeared to be unlocking the shackles on the beast.
Shit, shit, shit.
Beckham ducked down before either collaborator could spot him. The creature roared inside the lab again. Fischer crouched next to Beckham.
“What do we do, Captain?” he asked.
“Hold here.” Beckham risked another glance to search for Kate. His heart thumped when he saw her. The floor around her was covered in blood from two fallen scientists. She was crouched beside the bodies, crimson staining her white coveralls.
Beckham whispered what he saw to Fischer, Tran, and Chase.
They needed to get in there. Fast. He crawled back to the guards’ bodies to search for a lab key card. He found two. He handed one to Fischer.
“There is another entrance on the other side of the lab,” Beckham said quietly to Fischer. “You go there with Chase. Tran, you’re with me.”
Another guttural roar sounded followed by the clanking of chains.
They were running out of time.
Beckham held his position to give Fischer and Chase time to get to the other entrance. The wait was agonizing. Every passing second the beast grew louder and more enraged.
“You take this,” Beckham said. He handed the keycard to Tran. “Open the door on my mark. I’ll go in first.”
A nod from Tran.
“Our targets are at the north side, near the beast. You shoot them, but don’t shoot the creature unless I tell you, understood?”
“You got it, Capta
in.”
Beckham waited another beat, then peeked to confirm the gunmen hadn’t moved. They were still in the same spot. He glimpsed a blur of motion behind the other door across the lab. Fischer and Chase must have been in place.
“Go time,” he said.
Tran moved into position, and with a nod, Beckham gave him the order. He flashed the keycard over the door, and it slid open.
Beckham brought up his rifle, aimed, and fired a shot into the scientist’s neck and then two to his chest. Fischer and Chase opened fire across the lab. Their shots lanced into the soldier working on the mastermind’s locks. Bullets peppered his body as he tried to rise to his feet with his rifle.
The beast screeched and stomped the floor, a miniature quake vibrating through the floor. Fischer and Chase turned their rifles on the monster, but a scream rang out behind them.
“Don’t shoot it!” Kate yelled, streaks of blood over her face. “We haven’t finished our work!”
“Get that thing secured!” Beckham shouted.
Tran, Chase, and Fischer approached the loosened shackles cautiously as the monster swiped at them with a free hand.
Fischer fired, painting the clawed hand with bullets. The creature shrieked in pain and lashed out at the final chain holding it in place.
“I said don’t shoot!” Kate shouted.
Fischer glanced over with a crazed look. “We have to disable those limbs if you want us to secure the damn thing!”
“Okay, but don’t kill it,” Kate said.
Beckham hurried over to her, looking between her and the two shot scientists. He recognized the first. It was Carr.
The woman was still alive. She had one hand pressed down over a red spot on her white bunny suit, and her eyes blinked lethargically, her gaze unfocused.
“We need to get her to the hospital,” Kate said. “Ron, Leslie, get over here!”
Two technicians bolted over from their hiding position and bent down next to the injured woman while Beckham embraced Kate.
“Are you okay?” Beckham asked.
“The blood’s not mine.”
He looked her up and down just to be sure. There was no time for hugs or to talk about what happened. “We have to get out of here, Kate. The outpost’s under attack. Variants are on their way.”
“We’re almost done with our work.” Kate used the back of her gloved hand to wipe some of the blood from her face. “We’re so close. We really can’t leave yet. Too many people have already died for this research. It can’t be in vain.”
Tran, Chase, and Fischer circled the monster, firing at the limbs with short bursts. Blood wept from the dozens of inflicted wounds, its claws starting to twitch uselessly. The enraged creature screeched with each searing round.
Two more shots crippled its knee, and the creature finally collapsed to one leg. That gave the men a chance to yank the chains back in place and secure them to the scaffolds.
Beckham waved Fischer over.
“Have your men hold sentry in the halls,” Beckham said. “We have to buy Kate and her team time to finish their work.”
“How long is this going to take?” Fischer asked.
“Not long,” Kate said. “But I need Sammy.”
The other technicians were patching the injured computer scientist up, but Beckham could tell she was in bad shape. She had taken a bullet to the gut. One of the most painful—and potentially deadly—places to be shot. If her guts had been pierced, the resulting bleeding and infection would be devastating.
“I can work,” Sammy croaked. “Just help me up.”
They got her into a chair after finishing the bandages.
Her face continued to lose color as she tapped at the computer. “We… we about had my algorithm tuned.” She looked over at the monster. “Just give me… give me five minutes with this bastard.”
“Are you sure you can do this?” Kate asked.
“I have to do this.” Sammy grimaced. “The thing is agitated which means we’re going to get better results… There’s no better testing ground for my language processing software.”
Beckham kept his rifle up while the injured scientist finetuned her code with repeated queries and answers from the monster. He looked out at the lab’s doors with every passing minute, waiting for the eruption of more gunshots.
Fischer joined him there and they spoke quietly while they waited.
Finally, maybe fifteen minutes later, Sammy slowly pushed back from her computer. The bandage around her abdomen had already bled through.
“Done,” she said.
“Great work,” Kate said. She helped Sammy to her feet.
“We have to call in an evac now, get this data somewhere safe,” Beckham said.
She motioned at a phone on the wall. “Ron, see if you can get command on the line.”
Kate bent down next to Carr and put a hand on his back.
“We finished the job,” she whispered. Then she bowed her head. “I’m sorry you couldn’t be here to see it.”
“I can’t get a signal,” Ron said from the phone.
“I’ve got a better idea,” Fischer said, called from the door he was guarding. “I’ve already got a private plane on the tarmac. We can take it anywhere you want to go.”
“Anywhere is better than this place,” Beckham said. “Get ready, everyone, we move out in five minutes.”
He looked at the beast as he waited for the science team to gather up their gear and move Sammy.
Countless soldiers and multiple scientists had already sacrificed their lives for the intel they had gotten from this abomination, but something told him this was far from over.
***
Timothy hunched behind a shed outside the border of Outpost Portland, trying to find the courage to fight his handlers.
Me or them… he thought.
From his vantage, Timothy saw a blockaded road with a machine gun nest and patrolling guards. Snipers had to be on the adjacent rooftop watching the walled campus.
A second gate blocked off another road with a few guards just beyond it.
The buzz of his collar hit his ears before he felt the pain. The jolt nearly dropped him to his knees. Scorching pain flamed across his neck. When it passed, he took in a deep breath, tears brimming in his eyes.
Time to move.
The collaborators were watching him and if he didn’t get going, they would shock him again.
Keeping his hoodie cinched above his neck, he walked out from behind the shed and started off down the road, his hands by his side. He made it three strides before a spotlight hit him.
“Contact!” shouted a soldier.
Timothy raised his hands in the air.
“Get on the ground!” yelled another guard. “And don’t fucking move!”
He dropped to his knees. “It’s me, Timothy Temper! I live here!”
Footsteps echoed down the street. He blinked to see through the intense light. Two soldiers made their way toward him.
“I live on Peaks Island,” Timothy said as calmly as he could.
“All the way on the ground!” shouted one of the soldiers over Timothy’s explanation. “Hands behind your head.”
Timothy slowly put his hands on his head and went down to his belly.
“Keep your head—” one of them yelled.
Before the soldier could finish, his head flew back from a bullet that blew out the back of his skull. Two rounds hit the other in the chest. He slumped next to Timothy, still alive, gasping for air.
Screeching tires tore down the road. The black muscle car turned a corner. A pickup followed, and a rocket streaked from the bed.
Timothy rolled off the street and into the ditch as the grenade slammed against a mound of sandbags. Another projectile hit two concrete barriers blocking the gate. The explosions shook the ground, and the gate collapsed, clanging against the pavement.
He crawled back up as the muscle car sped toward the flames. It thumped over the fallen gate, and the passenger
tossed something out the window. Several soldiers at the secondary checkpoint vanished behind a fiery blast.
The car raced around the wreckage followed by the pickup truck, their tires squealing.
Timothy rose to a kneel. The dual cab pickup that Pete drove pulled up. Alfred jumped out and aimed his rifle down the street. Then he grabbed Timothy.
“Get in,” he said, opening the back door.
The other prisoner was gone. Timothy was afraid to ask what had happened to the man who had told him the location of the collaborators’ base.
Pete drove toward the sound of gunfire and sparkling muzzle flashes from the rooftops deeper within the outpost.
The high-pitched shriek of a Variant pierced the chaotic noise.
Several of the beasts leapt from the shadows and took to the sides of buildings, scaling them like demonic lizards. Near the monsters, a patch of grass and soil gave way. A hulking monstrosity pushed itself from the crumbling soil, and Timothy nearly gasped at the abomination with wide, bat-like ears and a scrunched face. Fangs hung from its mouth.
It raised its muscled arms, and long tendrils along its back stood straight like the spikes on a porcupine. Red vines clung to parts of the creature’s body as it hoisted itself from the earth.
A high-pitched clicking noise sounded and the other Variants burst from the ground where the monster had tunneled, each squirming past the red vines.
Collaborators, Alphas, and all their thralls were descending on Portland.
Timothy couldn’t save the outpost, but he could still get the enemy’s location to soldiers here.
Nick drove down a side street littered with twisted and torched bodies. The pickup thumped over one with a sickening crunch.
As the truck sped closer to the university campus, an army of Variants bounded along the roads to either side of them. Another Alpha exploded from the ground, rallying the smaller monsters and charging toward the heart of the garrisoned outpost.
“You’re going to let the beasts kill them all?” Timothy asked. “You told me if I got you in, you would spare them.”
Nick and Pete exchanged a glance, but didn’t reply.
“Those that respect the New Gods will be spared,” Alfred said quietly. “But first the blood of the heretics must be spilled.”
Explosions bloomed ahead.
Extinction Cycle: Dark Age Box Set | Books 1-4 Page 63
