by Jeff Olah
“Where?”
Griffin paused, as if he was trying to remember. “Back… behind… back behind the reception counter. I think I saw someone move into the hallway.”
“Okay,” Ethan said. “Are you sure?”
“I don’t know Ethan, could just be my lack of sleep. Did you see anything?”
“No, but I also can’t seem to place where that noise is coming from. Maybe you’re right, maybe we just need some sleep.”
Griffin moved to the edge of the door, leaned in, and checked through the glass one last time. Nothing moved. “Yeah, I think we’ve been out here too long. Let’s head back.”
117
Standing on the opposite side of Las Vegas Boulevard, Dalton recognized the familiar face. The head of security for BXF stood six-feet five-inches tall and weighed somewhere in the neighborhood of two hundred fifty pounds. Even from this distance, his features were undeniable. A face that had to have been carved from stone, arms like telephone poles, and if there remained even an ounce of fat anywhere on his body, he was sure to scare it off. The lifelong private security officer was quicker than men half his size, and possessed the strength of three average men combined. He was essentially the perfect weapon.
Dalton wiped his forehead and turned to Goodwin. “Anton.”
As the behemoth of a man marched toward them, he was flanked by a younger man Dalton remembered as Travis, and second man he had yet to recognize. They were both at least a head shorter and stayed in the larger man’s shadow. As the trio approached, Goodwin extended a hand and pointed back over their shoulders.
“That our building?”
Anton nodded. “Yeah, fire started yesterday, not sure how.”
With Nicholas and Walter at his side, Goodwin addressed Anton as he looked back toward McCarran. “So, I’ve lost a twenty-five million dollar jet and a building worth ten times that amount in the span of a few hours? Okay then, where in the hell is my other plane?”
Anton offered slight grin. “I’ve got some good news, some bad news, and some really bad news.”
Goodwin hated games… even more than he hated that lead in. “I don’t care,” he said. “Just tell me how you plan to get me out of this hellhole of a city. This place smells like losers.”
Anton looked down on the older man like he wanted to smash him into the ground and walk away holding his teeth. “Your second jet, the one you left here three days ago, is still in the same spot you left it… behind an eight-foot fence. The only problem is that there are two to three hundred Feeders on the opposite side of that fence. Now, I can get you to the plane without much problem, but finding enough room to get that bird into the sky is going to be another issue altogether.”
“Do we have access to a vehicle?”
Anton nodded. This was going to be fun. He knew what Goodwin was looking for, but needed to do this. “Your Rolls Royce is parked inside the hanger, or did you forget?”
Not impressed, Goodwin snapped back. “Do we have access to any other vehicles?”
Smiling, Anton quickly turned to Dalton and then back to Goodwin. “You think I’d be out here walking if I had a Humvee parked across the street? No, we’ve only got one option, and you have a decision to make. Just how much is that Rolls really worth to you?”
“At this point, not a damn thing.”
Anton nodded. “Keys are locked inside the safe in the hangar, you okay with me driving your baby, or would you rather have your boy Dalton get behind the wheel?”
“Get us back to Los Angeles and you can consider the car a gift.”
Anton motioned back toward McCarran. “Alright, there’s a section of the southern entrance that was clear a few hours ago. It’s the only spot we’ve found that will get us onto the airstrip without being spotted.” Staring down at Dalton’s shoeless feet, he grimaced. “Don’t worry, kid. It’s less than two blocks from here. You’ll be on that jet resting those disgusting feet of yours in no time. I personally guarantee it.”
Sarcasm wrapped in something resembling compassion. Dalton hadn’t spent more than an hour total in Anton’s company over the last year. So getting a true read on the larger man’s intent would be at best an uneducated guess. But, he didn’t care. As long as the behemoth got him onto the jet and back to the coast, he was good with whatever nonsense came out of the hole in his face.
“On me.” Anton was running. Travis was on his right, with the yet unidentified third man close behind. Dalton moved next, cautiously in pursuit of the fast-moving trio. Goodwin kept pace as Nicholas and Walter brought up the rear.
They moved quickly, staying within a few feet of one another, like a small herd of gazelle running crossing the savannah. And with the heat radiating off the asphalt, Dalton imagined the conditions weren’t much different.
One hundred feet from the eight-foot-high chain-link fence, Anton began to slow, although just enough that the others could hear his every word. “The gate on the left is where we’re headed. It’ll drop us between two large commercial hangars. Once we cross over, you’ll need to stay close and remain absolutely silent; those things are close.”
In between labored breaths, Goodwin attempted a question. “The jet, where is it?”
Anton again increased his speed and as he reached the gate, he knelt where the two sides came together and pointed. “Outside our hangar, maybe a few hundred yards north of Sunrise Aviation’s building. You’ve been here before, you know where it is.”
Sliding the half-inch Grade 304, Stainless Steel Chain off the support members, Anton laid a hand on Travis’s shoulder. “You’re with them. Get them inside that bird and then swing back around to the main runway. I’ll take Red and create a distraction. If those things get to you before we get back, just fly the hell out of here. I’ll drive that beast back to LA if I have to.”
Travis nodded and then they were on the move again. He slipped in alongside Goodwin and said something that Dalton wasn’t quite able to catch. And striding up to the two massive commercial hangars, the group again slowed.
Out in front, Anton held up a hand and turned to Travis and the youngest of the group he referred to as Red. “Slow through here, weapons at the ready, and not a word until we reach the opposite end. Sound travels through these structures like a warm knife through butter. Once we’re out in the open, you’ll see the fence over your right shoulder—stay low and focused. The plane is sitting alone near the BXF hangar. Let’s go.”
He didn’t want to know what came next, what was waiting on the opposite end of the massive buildings. For the first time in the last few hours, Dalton had a brief moment where he wasn’t fighting for his life. The pain in his left foot was only marginally excruciating and although his stomach was twisted in knots, this time it was from hunger alone.
The shade afforded by the two structures must have cut the surface temperature by a good thirty degrees, and as the group again started to move, Dalton slipped in behind Goodwin. The pavement was free of debris and much cooler than the unforgiving asphalt he’d been running on for a better part of the day. His right foot was still partially numb, and for now his left had stopped oozing blood, which for a day like today was a win. A micro-victory, but a victory nonetheless.
Reaching the end of the shaded corridor, a private helicopter sat in front of the first hanger, partially blocking the view of the fence and what lay beyond. Anton craned his neck around the second structure and then turned back. To Red he said, “Let’s do this.” And then both men were gone.
Before anyone left could question Travis on what came next, he motioned out past the helicopter and reached for his sidearm. “We go on three.” And glancing back at Dalton, he said, “Stay with us, at least until we get to the plane. I’m not willing to watch anyone else die today.”
Dalton gave a weak thumbs-up and waited for the count.
“Okay,” Travis said. “One… two… three.”
118
Maybe the whispered stories he’d heard of Anton were just
that… stories. Maybe he wasn’t as demented as Goodwin described. Maybe his outward demeanor was simply a façade. Because from where Dalton was standing, the man now running in the opposite direction, while carrying an MP5 in his right hand and a Mossberg 590 over his left shoulder, along with his two-man wrecking crew, was keeping this group alive.
Running away from the shadow of the twin hangars and ducking around the silent helicopter, Dalton moved out into the fading sunlight. He turned toward the glossy G280 and beyond that the eight-foot-tall chain-link fence. Something was wrong, and as the others turned toward the plane, he assumed he was the only one who had noticed.
He wasn’t.
Swallowing hard, his mind hadn’t fully finished making sense of just how screwed he and the others really were. Before this very second, he’d hoped that firing a weapon, firing the Beretta in his right hand, was something he was past. As the realization caught up with him, Dalton’s knees gave out and he dropped his only form of protection.
His only thought as he lurched forward and rolled to a stop, one hundred feet from the luxury jet, was that if hell had been recreated, piece by piece, and then set down on earth, he was absolutely sure this is what it would look like.
It was obvious that at some point since Anton and his men had left here, the horde had broken through the eight-foot-tall chain-link fence. They were told the crowd numbered between two and three hundred, but Dalton was sure that there had to be twice that amount, just between the hangar and the jet.
As Dalton reached for the Beretta and got back to his knees, he looked over his right shoulder to see Walter also raising his weapon, Goodwin sweeping the muzzle of his shotgun across the approaching crowd, and Nicholas backing toward the helicopter.
Pushing to stand, Dalton was tugged from behind and as he turned, Travis stepped forward. The younger man moved quickly from left to right, and retrieving a second pistol from his utility belt, handed it to Nicholas.
All five men were now armed; however, as the majority of the crowd took notice of their presence, the odds were far from being in their favor. And although the horde had lost all interest in the G280, and their numbers around the jet weakened, creating a path through the densely spaced corpses would be impossible.
As the crowd continued forward, Goodwin and Travis stepped out first. Leveling their weapons, a low rumble ran through the dry desert air. Twisting left and looking back over his shoulder, Dalton backpedaled three paces as the blacked-out Rolls Royce Phantom raced across the blacktop.
From the passenger window, the kid with the bright orange close-cropped hair fired one round after the next from his shouldered AR-15. Bodies from the outer edges of the horde were falling to the tarmac faster than others could fill in.
Pulling his weapon from the open window, Red ducked inside just as the most expensive vehicle any of these men had ever seen plowed head-on into the first row of Feeders. Coming to a stop almost instantly, the heavy framed vehicle forced a dike into the flood of decimated bodies pouring in from beyond the downed eight-foot fence.
Dalton started counting and was able to reach three before slowly, the oversized sunroof along the top of the Rolls began to slide back. Anton was the first to appear, and shouldering the Mossberg 590, he jumped out and knelt just behind the sunroof.
Leaning forward and reaching into the vehicle, Anton pulled Red through the sunroof and pointed him toward the others. Stepping left and moving around the younger man, Anton leapt onto the hood, fired off three precise shots, and eliminated a trio of Feeders that had begun to climb their way onto the destroyed vehicle.
Leaving the Rolls, Anton moved in between the next wave of infected and the men he was here to protect. But he wasn’t going to be able to handle the entire crowd himself, and as Travis and Red stepped in alongside, he shouted for Goodwin
“GET IN HERE, IT’S TIME TO TAKE A STAND!”
Before the behemoth had finished speaking, Nicholas had joined the men near the Rolls Royce and pulled off his white button down oxford. Tossing it aside, he readied the nine millimeter Travis had given him, peered down the line at the others, and nodded.
Also coming forward, and only a step behind his pilot, Goodwin moved in alongside Anton. The difference in the height between the two men was roughly six inches, however it was the disparity in their shoulder width that was most apparent. The muscled giant now appeared to outsize Goodwin and Travis combined. As absurd as it seemed, even the pair of weapons he trained at the advancing horde paled in comparison to his overwhelming physical appearance.
Dalton was next. He stepped to the right and stood near Travis, his feet now just a forgotten hindrance as he nervously held the Beretta at arm’s length and stared down the advancing horde.
Only one was missing. Eyeing the older man over his shoulder, Dalton watched as Walter froze in place. His shoulders were slumped forward, his arms low at his side, and as he gazed back into the eyes of the soulless beasts coming for him, he appeared unafraid.
“WALTER!” Goodwin shouted.
Nothing, the transfixed pilot didn’t even blink.
“MR. OSBORNE!”
Not even the twitch of an eye.
Goodwin turned back to Anton and motioned into the crowd. “He’s gone, but we aren’t. Let’s go.”
Dalton would have testified under oath that the first weapon fired was from the man standing twelve inches from his left shoulder. The sound exploded in his ears and sent shockwaves up and down his spine, but really it could have been any one of the six men holding a weapon. His knowledge of firearms began and ended with the many action hero movies he’d seen in his late teens and twenties. Safety off, squeeze trigger, loud fiery explosions.
The sensation was short lived as the others also opened fire, each new explosion more violent than the one before. Stepping left and giving himself a bit of room, Dalton closed his left eye, aligned his weapon with the head of an approaching Feeder, and without giving the act a second thought, pulled the trigger.
The round went high, tearing off into the late afternoon sky. But before it did, it skipped off the top of the beast’s head, sending it stumbling backward. Quickly recalculating the trajectory, Dalton fired a second shot, this one striking the large male Feeder less than an inch from its left eye socket, and sending it to the pavement.
Back to the right, Travis had dropped an empty magazine and was reaching to his hip, in the process of reloading, when a pair of female feeders broke free from the front of the horde and darted toward him. Taken by the moment, Dalton swung right and attempted to fire. The trigger pulled back, but the only sound was a soft click as the Beretta misfired.
He was out of his element. He didn’t have the proper training to even begin to help these men. Dalton looked at the weapon and then back at the others. He was in the way here. He felt like a survivor, but most definitely not a soldier. He wasn’t brought to BXF for this, no one was, but now he felt more like a liability than anything else.
Before the others even realized there was an issue with his weapon, the man at his side had reloaded, taken out the two Feeders, and was lining up his next victim.
The rapid explosions continued and for the moment, he was invisible. Not one of the others had even noticed he’d stopped firing, let alone that he’d only fired two rounds. They were busy emptying what was left in their weapons into the diminishing horde.
One at a time, the men took small steps backward. First to make room for the lifeless corpses dropping down all around them, and also at times to reload. Although with less than ten feet between the men and the chopper that Walter stood frozen next to, Anton dropped his shotgun and stopped firing his MP5.
Goodwin was incensed. “What the hell are you doing?”
“We gotta go around, boss.”
Scanning the airfield, Goodwin barked back. “No time, they’re already moving onto the runway.”
Anton shook his head. “We don’t have a choice; they’re locked onto this location. We can make it if
we go now. If we don’t, we may as well lay down right here and die.”
Goodwin didn’t hesitate. He looked back down the line as if calculating their odds and then turned to Anton. “We do have one chance.”
“What?”
Goodwin strode quickly back to the chopper and stood facing Walter. Reaching down, he pulled the Glock 22 from the older man’s hand, stared into his lifeless eyes, and asked, “Mr. Osborne, can you fly us out of here?”
Walter didn’t appear to have heard the question. He continued staring straight ahead and only blinked every few seconds. It could have been so many things, but Dalton assumed he’d just reached the end. The older pilot had just seen enough. His mind was shutting down, even though his body was still present.
His eyes moving from Walter to the approaching crowd and then back to Walter, Goodwin ignored the shouts from the men as he asked once again. “Mr. Osborne, can you pilot that plane… can you get us home?”
Blinking through the fog holding him somewhere beyond this place, Walter exhaled slowly and finally met Goodwin’s eyes. “Not on my own, I’ll need—”
Raising the nine millimeter to Walter Osborne’s chest, Goodwin pulled the trigger. And as the pilot’s body crumbled backward onto the blood-soaked pavement, he turned and walked away, allowing the savages an uninterrupted feast.
Looking only at Anton, and marching quickly away from the chopper, Goodwin shouted over Walter’s tortured screams. “Now we have a chance.”
119
He knew Griffin had seen something inside the offices of City Hall. It wasn’t exhaustion and although his friend had quickly dismissed the idea, Ethan had a sense that whatever it was that moved out from the reception area and into one of the offices was somehow connected to everything else that was off about this little town. He didn’t know what, but he was afraid that he and his friends were about to find out.
