“Prepare for landing,” Liam said.
The plane dropped lower to the brown terrain, and now Beckham saw a more detailed picture of this city. Nature had regained control. Weeds and overgrown prairie grass sprouted over lawns and covered parks.
To the east, a few blocks of houses and buildings were burned to their foundations. It took him a moment to realize their LZ was in the middle of the charred wreckage.
The wheels lowered toward an air strip at the Air Force base, now nothing but a few buildings standing amid a sea of rubble and flattened hangars.
“Touching down,” Liam said.
The plane bounced slightly when it hit the airstrip as Liam fought against a choppy side wind. As they slowed, Beckham searched for the Marine recon team and their chopper.
“Anyone see ’em?” he asked.
“There they are,” Rico said, pointing.
Beckham twisted and followed her finger toward a mountain of rubble. A stealth Black Hawk sat nearby. Liam directed the small plane toward the bird. When they reached it, he killed the engine, and leaned over.
“Best of luck on your mission,” the grizzled pilot said.
“Thanks for the lift,” Beckham said, reaching over to shake Liam’s hand. “It was great to meet you, my friend.”
“Yeah, it wasn’t as bad as I thought,” Horn said. “I didn’t throw up.”
Liam chuckled. “Good because then I’d have to charge you for cleanup.”
The team and Liam hopped out into the cloudy, cold afternoon.
Beckham cradled his rifle, looking around the base. A breeze rippled his fatigues. He started toward the Black Hawk.
Rico picked up her bag and started off for the bird, but Beckham held out his prosthetic hand.
“Hold on,” he said. “Where the hell is everyone?”
Something was off.
The Marines and pilots were nowhere in sight. While Beckham wasn’t expecting a welcome party, he thought they would be greeted with more than stone cold silence.
“Get down!” an unfamiliar voice shouted.
Rifle fire cracked through the air, and Beckham’s prosthetic leg kicked out from under him. He hit the pavement hard, on his side. At that angle, he spotted a Marine in a prone position on the other side of the Black Hawk. The man was gesturing for Beckham to take cover.
Horn pulled Beckham back behind the plane where Rico and Liam had already taken cover.
Another round split the air, and a bullet lanced into the engine, oil spilling out.
“Son of a bitch,” Liam said. “Where the hell is that coming from?”
Beckham looked down at his shattered prosthetic. The bullet had blown off the bottom half. It definitely had to be a high-caliber rifle.
Another one punched into the plane with a crack.
Liam cursed. “Where is he?”
“Twelve o’clock, on the roof of that radio building,” Horn said. “Cover me, and I’ll distract him.”
“I’m faster,” Rico said. “Let me do this.”
Beckham pushed his rifle scope up and zoomed in on the building. He couldn’t see the sniper, but he could see the rooftop.
“Okay,” he said. “Rico, you go.”
“You head left, and I’ll blow this fucker’s head off,” Horn said.
“I’ve got you too, Rico,” Beckham said.
She crept toward the tail of the plane as Horn counted. On three, she took off running. A shape pushed up over the lip of the roof, and Beckham fired a concerted burst.
Horn let loose a spray of bullets from his SAW. A cloud of red mist exploded upward.
Beckham lowered his rifle and searched for Rico. She had made it behind a concrete barrier. Relieved, he looked back through the scope and waited for another shot.
“Contact!” Horn shouted.
“Friendly!” someone yelled back.
Horn aimed at a Marine gripping his shoulder, blood soaking through his fatigues. Beckham hopped and Liam reached out to help him amble over to the Marine. He was short with a five o’clock shadow, brown eyes, and a cleft chin. Maybe twenty-five or thirty years old.
“Damn good to see you,” he said, his voice wheezing. “I’m Sergeant A.G. Parnell.”
“Any more snipers out there?” Horn asked.
Parnell shook his head. “That was the last one.”
“Where’s the rest of your team?” Beckham asked.
The young man looked down. “I’m it.”
“I’m sorry,” Beckham said.
Liam helped Beckham sit on a pile of rubble. As soon as he did, Beckham felt the deep dread of the pointless losses. The men who had been willing to risk their lives, hardened warriors, had been cut down before the mission even got off the ground.
“About an hour after we landed, three snipers opened fire. Must’ve seen us or heard us when we flew in,” Parnell explained. “We took cover behind that rubble. We got two, but they flanked us and took out everyone but me. That guy had me pinned. Couldn’t even stick out my head without him cracking shots.”
“Rico, Horn, go make sure the snipers are actually dead,” Beckham said.
“You got it,” Horn said, already running off with his SAW. Rico stayed close behind him.
“I’m going to check the plane,” Liam said. “One of those shots hit the engine.”
“Bring us a field kit, please,” Beckham said.
Liam left Beckham seated on the rubble and returned with the kit before heading back to check the plane.
Beckham looked at Parnell’s wound. The top of his shoulder was a bloody mess. The Marine was definitely not in fighting condition.
“Have a seat so I can help,” Beckham said.
“I’m fine,” Parnell said.
“Bullshit, Sergeant. Sit down.”
Parnell finally complied, and Beckham went to work.
“Honestly, I’m surprised you can still stand,” Beckham said. “How bad’s the pain? Do you need anything for it?”
Parnell shook his head. “I already took what we had in our field kits. The pain’s barely a dull throbbing.”
“You’re going to want more when that wears off.”
He applied antibiotic gel and wrapped the wound in quick-clotting combat gauze. By the time he finished, Horn and Rico had jogged over.
“Dead?” Beckham asked.
“Dead as rocks,” Horn said.
“Were they collaborators?” Rico asked.
“Not sure,” Horn said. “They didn’t have radios, and I didn’t see evidence of Variant activity nearby like that nasty red webbing stuff. These guys might’ve just been some desperate bandits.”
“Bandits who knew how to shoot,” Parnell said, grimacing. “I still can’t…”
His words trailed as he looked out over the airstrip where his brothers were dead.
“Can you bring them here?” Parnell asked. “I don’t want them out there, just rotting.”
“Yeah, man,” Horn said ruefully. He walked off to retrieve the bodies with Rico.
Liam returned from examining his plane and let out a long sigh. “The plane is done. I had a feeling this was a one-way ticket.”
“Not necessarily.”
“Oh?”
“Can you fly a chopper?” Beckham asked.
Liam shrugged. “I haven’t for years.”
“Well, you’re gonna have to try.”
Rico helped Horn finish dragging over the bodies of the Marines. Together, they laid the men beside the chopper and covered them with jackets.
Parnell went over and knelt, whispering prayers under his breath.
On both flanks, Beckham was joined by Rico and Horn.
“We got to get going,” Rico said quietly. “No time to bury them.”
“Bring them with,” Beckham said.
They started to load the bodies while Beckham searched the troop hold, trying to figure out how he would carry out this mission with his busted prosthetic leg.
There were crates of gear, inc
luding CBRN suits and masks to protect against the radiation in Denver, but he didn’t see anything to fix his busted prosthetic. Nothing in there could help him walk, let alone run if he had to.
Parnell watched Horn and Rico carry the last of the bodies into the troop hold.
“I’m sorry, brother,” Beckham said.
Parnell nodded and wiped at his face with his bandaged shoulder.
Beckham looked to the cockpit where Liam was still going over the controls while stroking his bony chin.
“We good?” Beckham asked.
“I think so, but you better all hold onto something,” Liam replied. “This is going to be a rocky ride.”
“Before we get into the air, put one of these on,” Rico said. She held up a CBRN suit to Liam. “You won’t have a chance if you’re flying.”
Liam waved the suit away. “I’m not going to live long enough for it to matter anyways. And if we’re going in dark, I can’t wear night vision goggles with that.”
Rico held the suit back.
“Seriously, I’ve got death inside me,” Liam said. “This is my last hurrah.”
Beckham felt his heart crumble. This man was the best of humanity, in a time where the best were needed more than ever.
It was a rough lift off, but Liam got them in the air. Beckham looked over at something else humanity desperately needed. Marines. The five brave warriors were no longer in the fight.
— 17 —
Dripping water echoed throughout the webbing-covered tunnel. Kate listened for the telltale scrapes of claws against walls or the rasping growls of a stalking Variant under the hum of the generator.
Floodlights illuminated their rudimentary workspace, casting the tunnel in a brackish glow. The light reflected off the thin layer of water rising just under their ankles. Water from a broken main.
Her team was spread between heavy black folding tables like those Command used in their forward operating bases. Ron, Leslie, and Sammy each wore splash suits and respirators to protect themselves from any potential contaminants, which was even more important with the dirty water.
The more she listened to the creaks and groans of the tunnel, the more every creeping sound reminded her of clicking Variant joints. Every shadow seemed to move, like a monster preparing to strike. Even with the four outpost soldiers holding security, she couldn’t shake the uneasy feeling.
This place was frightening enough on its own to inspire nightmares.
She shook away her fear and pictured the hope she’d witnessed with President Ringgold’s arrival. Sure there were people who didn’t want her here—people who blamed her for the new war. But most were just glad to have their president with them.
“Sammy, get the computers set up,” Kate said. “Ron, Leslie, hook up the microelectric arrays to the webbing. This time, we won’t be gating them.”
The lab techs started opening the packs and boxes they’d brought. Sammy slipped a pair of laptops from her pack and placed them on a table.
Sweat trickled down Kate’s nose as she worked. She resisted the urge to lift her mask and wipe it away. Instead she checked her wrist-monitor. The temperature was nearly ninety-degrees.
Sergeant Nguyen, the outpost soldier leading the escort team, saw her glancing at her monitor. “Why’s it so damn hot?”
“The webbing,” Kate said. “It has a very high metabolism. It’s kind of like a warm-blooded animal producing body heat.”
“So this shit is living?”
“Absolutely. It burns through a ton of calories to produce that kind of heat and keep itself nourished.”
Nguyen tilted his mask at the wall to examine the webbing. “That means the damn stuff needs a lot of us to keep it fed.”
Kate nodded. “Aside from us, they eat every animal the Variants can find. Even bugs are absorbed.”
“Connections are ready,” Leslie said.
Ron traced a network cable over the tables. The cable connected to a microelectric array clamped to a segment of webbing. He handed the end of the cable to Sammy, and she plugged it into her computer.
“I think we’re ready to go.” Sammy stood at a table as Kate joined her. “Just give me the word and I’ll tap us in.”
“We can decode everything, right?” Kate asked.
“The code worked on all the signals we recorded before. So unless the Variants and collaborators are using new modes of communications, we should be good, but…”
“It’s okay,” Kate said. “You can do this. Decode the signals, and if it actually works, we can move on to trying to communicate with them.”
Sammy had promised Kate she wouldn’t make a mistake again, and now Kate could tell she was nervous.
“I need to sit,” Sammy said, gripping her side.
Ron set up a folding chair for Sammy, plopping it into the water. Sammy clutched her injury as Ron helped lower her into the chair. The way Sammy worked, Kate sometimes forgot it hadn’t been that long since the engineer had taken a bullet to her abdomen.
She was extremely lucky it hadn’t caused any significant organ damage.
In fact, they were all lucky.
Without Sammy, Kate had no idea where they would be with this research.
“Okay, I got this,” Sammy said with an exhale. She tapped at the laptop. “I’m engaging the connection.”
Nguyen shifted nervously. “Anything we need to prepare for?”
“Not if we’ve done our job right,” Kate said.
“And if you didn’t?”
“Then get ready to run.”
Nguyen turned slightly to look down the corridor.
“All systems are booting,” Sammy said. “The processing algorithm is reading incoming signals.”
A flurry of text scrolled across the computer screens, each color-coded to represent different signals.
Hundreds of messages scrolled before the team.
“Prisoners incoming,” one said.
“Squads requesting access to transport tunnels.”
“Supplies requested for forward operating units.”
Everything was in decipherable words, although the meanings weren’t perfectly clear. Kate assumed squads referred to human collaborators, and supplies meant weapons or food. Finding the information they were looking for was like trying to keep her eye on a single rock in an avalanche.
“Sammy, is it possible to isolate signals with keywords?” Kate asked. “We need the most important details first.”
“Just give me a few words. I can narrow it down right now.”
Kate thought about their most pressing concerns. “See if you can narrow down the next outposts they’re attacking.”
Sammy typed a couple commands into her program. Seconds later the clutter on the screens cleared to reveal a few select communication intercepts.
A stab of fear coursed through Kate when she saw the messages isolated by Sammy’s filtering. One stood out to her.
It was their location.
They all knew that another attack was inevitable but seeing the outpost in Lower Manhattan as an immediate target chilled her to the core.
“Sergeant Nguyen, radio Commander Massey,” Kate said.
“And say what?”
“That it’s time to leave,” Kate said. “We’re a target and there’s no telling when this attack will happen.”
“Shit…” Nguyen hesitated.
“Go,” Kate said.
He nodded and went topside to deliver the news. Kate continued to work with the team.
“We could try sending out a message to stop the attack,” Leslie offered.
Sammy shook her head. “We’re still trying to make sure we understand all the signals. If we try communicating back now, it’ll be a red flag to them. I need more time.”
Nguyen returned twenty minutes later.
“Uh, Doctor Lovato,” he said, sounding nervous. “The president said she isn’t leaving without you.”
“I’m not going anywhere,” Kate said.
“She said she knew you would say that.”
Kate looked over her shoulder. “What else did the president say?”
“That she won’t evacuate until she’s sure there’s an imminent threat. And if you think it’s safe enough for your team, it’s safe enough for her.”
Ron, Leslie, and Sammy all looked at Kate for orders.
“Keep working,” Kate said. “Sammy, any evidence of when this attack is expected?”
“I can scan for more info, but it might take a bit.”
For the next fifteen minutes they collected more data, but some of it was difficult to decode. Just when Kate felt they were about to get a real answer, a loud thump resonated through the tunnel.
Dust and dirt fell from the ceiling plopping into the water. Strands of webbing broke free, hanging like dead snakes.
“What the hell was that?” Nguyen said.
More loud thumps shook the tunnel. These were more powerful. It sounded like boulders slamming on the surface above.
“I don’t…” Kate was interrupted by a cacophony of explosions above ground. Cracks formed in the ceiling. Dumping dirt in torrential columns.
“Move!” Nguyen grabbed Kate.
The rest of the soldiers backed away, their rifles aimed at the dark passage.
Sammy grabbed a computer, then hobbled to scoop up the microelectric arrays.
“Sammy, leave them!” Kate yelled.
Ron and Leslie helped the injured engineer and together, the team hurried the best they could through the shallow water. But their speed was hampered by Sammy’s wounded gait.
Explosions boomed above the tunnel as they moved. The webbing recoiled, as if the throbbing tissue itself was trying to retreat.
Kate reached the entrance of the cavern just as the thuds tapered off. Shaking, she looked back into the tunnel. Piles of dirt and rock protruded from the shallow water, but it hadn’t collapsed.
Nguyen aimed his rifle at the steps leading out of the hole. “Clear.”
The science team and soldiers made their way up the stairs to the sight of fires raging across the former construction site.
Screams sounded in the distance, and Kate spotted figures running from the flames. Black smoke plumed away from tents and buildings.
Nguyen guided them forward cautiously, around blackened craters pocking the memorial site. Trees burned, their branches raining embers.
Extinction Cycle: Dark Age Box Set | Books 1-4 Page 85
