by Kenny Soward
By then, it might be too late.
The emergency broadcast had caused people to pack the roads and highways as they tried to get clear of the city. Jake had been to Atlanta once, and he remembered what traffic was like during the best of times: not good. This was the worst of times, and most of the roads were parking lots.
If those crawlers set off a nuke, thousands of people would die instantly, many vaporized in their cars as their vehicles turned molten.
Jake’s anticipation grew as time ticked slowly by. Even sitting up high in the helicopter, there would be nothing they could do in the face of a nuclear blast. Of course, they could try to fly out of range, though Jake didn’t think that was an option Captain Stern would consider. They were either going to stop the crawlers from setting off the bomb, or they were going to go up in flames with the rest of the city.
“Ground One to Chopper One,” a man’s gruff voice spoke into Jake’s ear. It was one of Stern’s bodyguards. Stern had commanded them to be set on the ground to act as eyes and ears. “Ground One to Chopper One. Do you read me?”
“This is Captain Stern,” the captain responded. “Go ahead.”
“We found the van. Coordinates incoming.”
Jake could not see what was going on in the cockpit, however, he assumed they were exchanging tactical information on a map. He grabbed the armrests as Chopper One banked sharply and headed in the general direction of where they’d last seen the van. In less than ten seconds, they were hovering over a cluster of trees hiding the road from view.
The spotlight highlighted three US soldiers where they waved up at them through a gap in the trees.
“The crawlers have left their vehicle and are now traveling on foot.”
“Can you tell which direction they went?” Stern asked.
“Best bet is they’re trying to get closer to downtown, maybe looking to get up high.”
“Keep looking,” Stern said.
Making sure his mic was muted, Jake struck his fist against the arm rest in frustration. “This is going to be impossible. They could be anywhere.” He looked over at Spitz, who was still issuing commands on the laptop. “Any luck?”
“Nothing yet,” Spitz said. “They must not have their Box device turned on.”
“What if it’s just listening?”
“What do you mean?”
Jake shook his head as an idea began to form. “What if their Box device is on, but in sleep mode? Maybe they’re listening for a cue from their command center. I need to find their Box’s network address. Maybe I can wake it up and track them.”
Jake took the laptop from Spitz and placed it in his lap. Then he began sending random calls from their captured crawler Box to the one Yi and his group should be carrying. He had no idea what their Box’s network address was, so he took shots in the dark in hopes of getting a hit. Jake’s fingers stopped tapping when the leader of Ground One broke through on his headset.
“We’ve got contact,” the man said, and Jake could hear the rattle of gunfire close to the microphone.
Captain Stern replied, her voice tinged with urgency. “Choppers Three and Four, please assist. And be careful where you shoot. Do not shoot at crawlers carrying anything bigger than a bread box.”
The helicopter pilots replied in the affirmative, and Jake watched through the open cabin door as they banked their helicopters toward a position about a half mile closer to the city.
“The crawlers must be moving fast,” Jake said to Spitz. “They were probably already walking when Stern and their leader were talking.”
“Tricky bastards.” Spitz nodded his agreement.
The helicopters converged on the site and began spitting fire from their guns. Jake clenched his fist on the arm of the chair as tracer fire illuminated the night sky. Whoever was on the ground must be taking an awful pounding. Jake could only hope the gunners weakened the crawlers enough for the ground forces to recover the bomb before it could be armed.
Before Jake could finish the thought, a pair of rockets zipped up from the ground, leaving trails of smoke as they shot toward the helicopters. One of the rockets passed into a chopper’s cabin and struck the roof inside, exploding in a ball of fire and light. The helicopter remained suspended in the sky for a brief moment before it plunged straight down to the ground.
The other helicopter took evasive action so that the rocket hit its rear, shearing the tail in an explosion that sent the rest of the chopper spinning wildly as it sank.
The comm lines erupted with SOS broadcasts and commands from Captain Stern, so Jake pulled his headset down and let it hang around his neck.
“That was a trap,” Jake said to Spitz.
“No kidding,” Spitz replied with a dark tone.
“We’ve got to figure out where they are,” Jake said, turning back to the laptop and typing furiously as he tried to get the Yi’s Box on the ground to listen. Then he had an idea. He pulled up the original message from the New Block central command and dug into the backend coding, searching until he found the connection string that had been recorded in the log.
“I’m just going to resend the first part of this string without the message,” Jake said, “and see if I get a hit.” He formed a quick message with no body text and broadcast it in multi-band.
He waited as his mouse cursor blinked four and then five times. On the sixth blink, a cluster of text ran down the screen with the target Box’s network address.
“Got their network address,” Jake said with a quick pump of his fist.
“Yeah, but how are you going to track them?”
“I’ll just ping that address,” Jake said with a shrug. Then he typed the commands and hit enter to send the ping. Like sonar in a submarine, his device would ping, or “touch,” the crawler’s Box repeatedly, each time listing the connection speed in milliseconds.
“Normally, over a wired connection, the ping speed wouldn’t matter so much,” Jake explained. “It could be faster or slower for any number of reasons: distance between source and target, or number of hops between internet providers, etc. A good ping rate is probably anything below one hundred.”
“Yeah, I know that,” Spitz scoffed.
“But this is a direct radio-to-radio ping. Even though they’re very close, the ping rate should be well over two hundred milliseconds. It will be easy to tell if we’re getting closer to them.”
Spitz nodded appreciatively. “Not bad. You think we’ll be able to pinpoint them with this?”
“I’ll bet I can get within fifty yards,” Jake said with a wicked grin.
“Then you better get up front with Captain Stern,” Spitz said.
Jake pulled his headset on and unmuted his microphone. “Captain Stern. I think I have something for you.”
Chapter 26
Yi, Downtown Atlanta, Georgia
The remaining members of Yi’s party met no resistance as they drew closer to downtown. He had already begun searching the skyline for the perfect place to arm the bomb. It did not have to be the tallest building in the city—one with a flat roof that was at least twenty stories off the ground would be good.
One of the taller buildings lit the lower ones with enough light for Yi to take his pick. He spotted several suitable candidates and directed the group to move in that direction. There were only eight soldiers left, including Yi. The others he’d left for the diversion were likely dead by now, although they had served their purpose well by downing two helicopters and drawing the American’s attention long enough to allow his group to slip away.
They picked their way through subdivisions and past businesses that lay on the outskirts. They passed groups of people hurrying to escape the city, some of them armed to the teeth. Yi avoided the groups for the most part, and anyone who stopped to notice the black-clad operatives with their hard stares and heavy weaponry simply went the other way.
Little did they know that Yi and his group were the precise threat they were fleeing.
His remain
ing three dragon warriors carried the bomb between them. It was shaped like a medicinal capsule, with a flat bottom and three long handles sticking out. Yi estimated that it weighed two hundred pounds, so it was not too awkward for his soldiers to carry.
Yi glanced at the sky as the sound of helicopters drew closer. The remaining choppers were within a quarter of a mile from their position and steadily coming closer. That would not normally have alarmed him, except that one of the helicopters was moving forward and back in a strange pattern. It reminded him of the snout of a terrier dog rooting around for a mole.
What were the Americans up to?
On a corner beneath the waving branches of a bushy tree, Yi called for his soldiers to halt for a brief moment’s rest. The three bomb carriers set the weapon down and placed their hands on their hips, breathing heavy.
“What is it, Yi?” Chen asked, coming up with the barrel of his rifle pointed down. He’d strapped their Box to his back and leaned forward beneath its weight.
Yi jerked his head in the direction of the hovering helicopters. They could not see them from where they stood, but the sounds of their approaching rotors grew steadily closer. “I think we are being followed.”
Chen’s eyes darted toward the east, then he shook his head. “No.”
“Could they be focusing in on the bomb’s inherent radiation?”
“It is possible,” Chen stated as his brow furrowed in thought. “But this case was specially made to expose very low levels of radiation. That’s how they got it into the country in the first place.”
“I believe you, comrade,” Yi stated. “But they must have figured some way to track us.” Yi’s eyes lingered on the Box strapped to Chen’s back. Then he knew. “They are tracking us through the Box. Drop it.”
“What?” Chen’s face grew worried. “It is our only link to central command.”
“Everything that needed to be said to central command has been said,” Yi countered. “We don’t need it anymore.”
Chen nodded and slipped the device off his back, setting it down near a tree.
“Let us go.” Yi pushed his soldiers to make double time, carrying the bomb dangerously by its slippery handles.
There was a moment of fear as they sprinted across the wide-open Jackson Street Bridge before turning north toward the taller buildings. They started up the street, but Yi hadn’t realized they were standing at the bottom of a hill, and the streets heading west were on a steep incline.
The bomb carriers struggled to keep up with the rest of the group as they climbed the hill. One of the soldiers dropped their end of the bomb, and the flat bottom struck the concrete with a clank.
“Come on, pick it up,” Yi shouted at the warrior, and the man grabbed the handle and lifted it with a nod.
Noticing another soldier limping two dozen yards behind the bomb carriers, Yi waved the three by and stopped to confront the lagger. It was the African, Edet, his leg stiff and bleeding from the stained bandage.
As the warrior approached, Yi shook his head.
“Don’t worry about me,” Edet said, waving Yi forward. “I can make it. I’m right behind—”
The sound of helicopter noise exploded around them, and one of the choppers swooped around the corner of the building. The spotlight hit them with a blinding light, and Yi looked up to see the gunner peering down at them as her dark red hair fluttered out from beneath her helmet. She pressed down on her triggers and spat fire at them.
Yi leapt out of the way and sprinted up the steep street, although he didn’t sense Edet behind him. Yi glanced back as he ran to see that the warrior hadn’t even tried to keep up. He’d dodged the initial burst from the .50 cal weapon as the bullets chewed up the concrete sidewalk.
Slamming his back against the wall of a building, Edet raised his rifle and fired up at the hovering chopper, screaming as the .50 caliber gun followed him to the wall and sprayed him with lead. Pieces of the soldier flew everywhere as the bullets passed through him, hit the hard wall, and bounced back.
In less than three seconds, the man had been reduced to ground meat.
Reaching the corner, Yi quickly directed his troops to head due north, moving a hundred yards until they came to the protective overhang of a hotel valet area.
“This building will have to do,” Yi said, directing them to the entrance, which was comprised of a big, round carousel-style door flanked by two normal doors. The emblem on the glass read Welcome to the Marriott.
Yi tried to push his way through the carousel door but it wouldn’t budge, so he tried one of the glass doors flanking it. That, too, was locked, so he lifted his rifle and fired through the glass, shattering it into pieces. He stepped through into the lobby with the end of his barrel sweeping in all directions. There was enough light seeping in through the windows to give him an impression of furniture shapes and a thick bank of elevators rising up in the center of the room.
The place appeared empty of people, so Yi turned and gestured for the others to follow him inside. The seven of them stepped past a the escalators and stairs and moved out into the lobby.
It was deathly quiet but for the rotor noise outside. And while there was a ceiling above them, two large ovals opened up to the next floor. Yi looked through one of them and into an open atrium that stretched to the very top of the building. It was one of the most magnificent sights he’d ever seen, rivaling the view of the majestic Smoky Mountains.
“This is a perfect place to finish this,” Yi stated in a wistful tone before turning to give orders to his remaining troops. “Follow me to the elevator banks. There must be a—”
A sound reached his ears from the other side of the lobby. He dropped into a crouch behind the wall of a fountain, and the others ducked down along with him. He flipped down the tactical screen that ran across his field of vision, allowing him to see in infrared light. He peered across the lobby and saw distinct shapes moving stealthily between blocks of furniture and kiosks.
He pointed to Elsa and another man and made a circling gesture with his hand. Elsa nodded and crawled away from the fountain to their right. Their tactical suits would shield much of their body heat, the high-tech material something the New Block had been developing for years.
Yi raised up again and spotted a row of plush couches in the center of the room next to the main elevator banks. Looking left, he spotted the front desk.
He motioned for the bomb carriers to hold their position while he and Chen heel-toed it quietly to the couch, putting their backs against it as they sat down. Yi pressed a button on his helmet and pulled a camera cable from the top. The cable was semi-stiff, so he was able to bend it into a hook shape and hold it out, showing him the movements of three soldiers stalking toward them.
Imprinting their motions in his mind, Yi pushed the camera cable home and flipped if off so that his tactical display returned to normal. Then he gripped his rifle in both hands and waited.
Five seconds later, the sounds of rifle fire exploded from Elsa’s direction. A man screamed out, and more rifle fire followed.
Yi counted to three and then dove into the open, rolling twice before stopping in a prone firing position. The shadows of three soldiers were ten yards away, but they were looking in Elsa’s direction. Yi pressed the trigger of his rifle repeatedly, firing several bursts into the standing soldiers. Two went down almost immediately, crying out as they hit the ground. The third soldier spun in Yi’s direction and got off one shot before Chen stepped out from cover and took the man down.
A volley of gunfire zipped over his head from the front desk. Chen cried out and collapsed while Yi shifted positions in a split second, curling on his side as he swept his barrel across the front desk, shredding wood and flatscreen computer monitors to pieces.
He popped the magazine out of his rifle and reached for another, jamming it into place. Swinging his feet beneath him, Yi stood and sprinted toward the front desk, angling left. A soldier raised up to fire at the spot where Yi had been standi
ng. Yi fired a burst that swept the man back and onto the floor.
Yi fell to his knees and slid up to the desk. He listened to the sounds of one man gasping and another man whispering something. There was a cluster of clicking noises as someone exchanged magazines and loaded a bullet into the chamber. Yi pulled a grenade from his belt, pulled the pin, and tossed it over the desk.
He was off and running before the grenade hit the floor. Gunfire chased him away, and a pain shot up the back of his right leg. He tumbled to the ground just as the grenade exploded. He covered his head as fragments of wood showered him, and a cloud of dust rolled by, causing him to cough and choke.
Forcing himself to roll over, Yi waited for more rifle noise; however, the lobby remained deadly quiet.
He was able to stand, but just barely. Warm wetness ran down the back of his leg, and he knew he’d been hit. The pain was merely delayed due to the adrenaline rushing through his body.
He found Chen where he’d fallen. His second-in-command had wounds to his stomach and chest, but he was still alive and could stand on his own. His combat suit had saved his life, though judging from the look on his face, he was in great pain.
They found Elsa and her teammate dead where they’d engaged in hand-to-hand combat with three US soldiers, fighting to a deadly draw. Elsa lay atop one of the Americans in a dark embrace. Her knife was buried in his throat, though he’d returned the favor by jamming a carbon blade into her spine.
Yi and Chen limped back to the three bomb carriers where they protected the equipment most vital to the mission. Boots pounded the concrete outside the hotel as US soldiers stormed the building. Yi narrowed his eyes, head swiveling toward the doors.
“I suggest we find the stairwell and proceed upward,” Yi said with a nod all around. “Take heart, comrades. Our journey is nearly at an end.”
Chapter 27
