KILL BOX: A Post-Apocalyptic Pandemic Thriller (The Zulu Virus Chronicles Book 2)

by Steven Konkoly

  “Chang remembers picking up his ID card at the SRF,” said Larsen.

  “That might have been a courtesy,” said Hoenig.

  “So he should have access?” said Larsen.

  “Yes. Unless the team barred his entry,” said Hoenig.

  “They can do that?”

  “Absolutely. It’s a security feature designed to immediately prevent an employee from gaining further access.”

  “Why the hell would you need that?” said Larsen.

  “Active-shooter scenario, mainly,” said Hoenig. “Viral containment. In the eight years that system has been active, I’ve seen it used twice.”

  “And they can activate it from inside the SRF?”

  “Right. They have a security hub like mine, only smaller. They can activate it from there, or remotely by logging in to one of the facility’s computers.”

  “How do we get in if his card has been spiked?” said Larsen.

  “How much explosives did you bring?”

  “Enough to blow one of the windows,” said Larsen. “I assume it’s all ballistic glass?”

  “You guessed right,” said Hoenig.

  “Well, there’s only one way to find out,” said Larsen. “Dr. Chang? If you’ll follow me.”

  They walked up the wide limestone stairs to the glass-paneled entrance, homing in on the single door to the right. A featureless glass second door sat about twenty feet to the left, which had to be the exit. It was situated far enough apart from the entry to prevent crossover. Chang approached the door to the right and pressed his card against the card reader, triggering a small red light at the top of the black, rectangular box. Shit.

  “Try it again,” said Larsen.

  Another swipe resulted in the same underwhelming indication that the card didn’t work. Larsen pulled on the door, which predictably didn’t budge. Not even a click.

  “Now what?” said Chang, shrugging his shoulders.

  Hoenig replied, having watched their progress on one of the hundreds of cameras spread out around the campus. “There’s another option, but you’re not going to like it.”

  He’d already figured it out.

  “I’m going to need everybody on deck for this one,” said Larsen.

  “That’s what I figured,” said Hoenig. “Are you thinking about a smoke screen?”

  “No. They seem to be attracted by sound just as much as sight,” said Larsen. “The smoke will just cut down on our situational awareness.”

  “I’ll start getting everyone together,” said Hoenig.

  “I thought this wasn’t mission essential?” said Larsen.

  “Do you want the help?”

  “See you in a few minutes,” said Larsen. “We should brief everyone at the same time. Not that this will be too complicated.”

  “We’ll be waiting.”

  Chang shook his head slowly. “Please tell me you’re not going to do what I think you’re going to do.”

  “You need to get in there, right?”

  He didn’t answer right away, which was the same as answering the question.

  “Then it looks like I’m taking a very short trip outside the fence.”

  Chapter 36

  David tightened his grip on the rifle, glancing around nervously. Larsen’s plan was a bad idea. It wasn’t the mechanics of the plan that bothered him. Overall, it was really quite simple. Larsen and Mitch, one of the tactical security officers, would scurry over the top of the SUV and jump down onto the sidewalk outside the fence. One of them would carry a knotted rope over the SUV and drop that on the other side.

  They would then hustle over to the mangled Homeland team about twenty yards away and locate one or more of their security IDs that had been stolen from the SRF’s real security team. With the IDs in hand, they’d return to the SUV and use the knotted rope to quickly climb over the steep tailgate while the security team provided covering fire.

  Sounded easy until you looked at the bigger picture. Given all of the recent commotion in the area, the bushes and trees lining the parking lot could be packed with infected. Even more could be lurking in nearby alleys, homes and streets. Any delay on the ground out there would increase the number of fast-moving targets the security team would have to neutralize—and he didn’t have a ton of faith in the majority of the shooters assembled to protect Larsen and Mitch.

  Most of them were regular campus security guards that hadn’t carried a firearm until yesterday, when Howard had equipped them with rifles. Half of them didn’t remember how to change a rifle magazine until about ten minutes ago. God help them if a rifle jammed.

  “How are we looking?” said David.

  “Looks clear to me,” said Roscoe, panning the parking lot with binoculars. “But you and I know they’re just waiting.”

  “Yeah. This’ll get Pavlov’s dog busy, really quick,” said David, pressing his radio button. “Gary, what are you seeing?”

  “Nothing unusual on the streets around the parking lot. A few wanderers.”

  “All right,” said David, taking another look at the men and women positioned on the rooftop and ground.

  Roscoe, the best shooter on campus next to Larsen, was in his usual position at the northeast corner of the rooftop. Eight regular security guards armed with M4s had been spread out along the front of the roof, six of them directly facing the parking lot. The remaining two covered the approach from East Street. All of them had orders to engage well beyond the fence. Under no circumstances were they to fire at targets close to the fence line.

  Eight more security guards, led by Sean, one of the tactical officers, were spread out behind the fence, ready to provide point-blank fire against anything that got too close. Including Mitch and Larsen, twenty shooters stood ready to beat back anything the city threw at them. It should be enough as long as Larsen didn’t get held up outside the fence for too long.

  “Everyone up here ready?” said David.

  “Yep,” said Roscoe before the others responded with enthusiastic nods.

  “Sean, this is David,” he said over the tactical net. “You guys ready?”

  “We’re ready.”

  “Make sure the crew pulling the rope doesn’t panic,” said David.

  Sean had handpicked four volunteers from the cafeteria to pull the knotted rope, in a controlled manner, once Larsen and Mitch started climbing over the back of the SUV. If done right, the two of them should be up and over in a few seconds. Done wrong, they could pull the rope away, leaving them stranded.

  “They got it,” said Sean.

  “Gary? Any changes?” said David.

  “None. This is as good as it gets,” said Hoenig.

  “Larsen?” he said, looking down at the two men crouched behind the SUV’s front bumper.

  “Can we get this over with already?” said Larsen, holding his hands palms up.

  “Go for it,” said David.

  “About time,” said Larsen. “We’re on the move.”

  Larsen and Mitch hopped onto the hood and ran up the windshield simultaneously, pounding their way across the vehicle’s roof. Mitch jumped from the back of the SUV, landing in a deep squat on the pavement, while Larsen quickly sat on the back of the vehicle and slid down to the bumper. A sensible move considering his leg injury. They were both on the run within moments of hitting the sidewalk. So were the crazies.

  “Contact. Northeast corner,” said Roscoe.

  “Hold your fire,” said David, scanning the vast parking lot over his rifle.

  A woman wearing a bloodied nightgown raced toward the fence.

  “Northwest corner. Two targets,” announced a guard to David’s left.

  Two equally blood-soaked men ran diagonally across the lot, pushing each other as they dodged parked cars.

  “Due north,” said another.

  “Southeast corner.”

  There was no point to holding back any longer. Word on the street was out.

  “All positions. Fire. I say again. Fire,” said
David. “Single shots. Knock them down. Move on to the next.”

  A crackle of small-arms fire erupted as the first volley of shots snapped across the corpse-littered expanse of asphalt. Half of the infected plummeted to the ground, the rest still coming. David tracked one of the survivors rushing in from the west, pressing the trigger once. The ragged figure toppled, piling headfirst into the curb next to the sidewalk.

  A quick scan across the lot confirmed his initial fears. The initial wave of crazies had been replaced by a number twice as large—all converging rapidly on the fence. The rate of gunfire had increased dramatically—but fewer of the infected were falling. The inexperienced shooters couldn’t keep up. He picked a target closest to Larsen and fired, knocking it down. A slight shift in his aim sent another spinning. David looked over his rifle and didn’t like what he saw.

  “Larsen, you have like ten seconds before you need to head back,” said David over the net.

  “We’re picking through fucking body parts down here. Feel free to come down and help.”

  David fired again, hitting a woman within fifty feet of the fence, a meat cleaver skidding across the pavement.

  “Ten seconds. Not fucking kidding,” said David. “Sean, I need you all over the situation down there.”

  “It’s under control!” said Sean.

  A quick peek downward confirmed it. Four of the security guards formed a tight line behind Larsen and Mitch, firing rapidly at the increasing number of crazies that were managing to elude his rooftop shooters. The rest focused their efforts on the flanks, preventing the infected from sneaking up the sidewalk on either side. David fired a few more times before stopping to fully make a final assessment of the situation.

  Their wall of protective fire was collapsing fast. Too many of them were getting past the rooftop shooters, and it was only a matter of seconds before the ground-level firing line was overwhelmed.

  “Larsen, time’s up,” said David. “Get back now.”

  “Without the card?”

  “Without the—”

  “I got one!” yelled Mitch, holding it up to show him.

  “We’re on our way back!” said Larsen, grabbing him and pulling him toward the SUV.

  David shifted his rifle toward the SUV, preparing to fire at the closest targets.

  “Roscoe, it’s you and me,” he said.

  Roscoe didn’t respond. He changed magazines and fired repeatedly—in a steady, controlled manner. David guarded Larsen and Mitch as they sprinted toward the gap in the fence. A fast mover broke past the gauntlet of security guards defending the far right flank, headed straight toward them with a hand ax. He centered the green reticle a hair above the crazy’s head and pressed the trigger, snapping the man’s head forward and toppling him to the sidewalk.

  Larsen reached the back of the SUV first and kneeled, covering Mitch’s escape. The tactical security officer let his rifle hang by its sling and grabbed the rope as high as he could with both hands. Sean jumped onto the hood and frantically signaled for the rope crew to start pulling. At least a dozen crazies had closed to within thirty feet of the SUV. Larsen was cutting this too close. They’d never get the rope back in time.

  “Get the fuck out of there!” said David.

  The former SEAL fired a few more times before turning to leave. David’s brain instantly did the math. Larsen wasn’t going to make it. They’d pull him off the rope before he could get out of there. Moments before the crazies reached him, Mitch grabbed his hand and yanked Larsen upward.

  Three or four infected slammed into the back of the SUV, one of them grabbing Larsen’s boot. A hard, two-handed tug nearly pulled him into the mob’s clutches, but Sean wrapped his arms around Mitch’s waist and kept them from tumbling over the back. Before the tug-of-war could be joined by more crazies, Larsen drew his pistol and emptied the magazine into the faces below. The hand released, sending the three of them tumbling backward onto the roof of the SUV.

  David snapped off a shot at a crazy that tried to climb up the back bumper, knocking him sideways onto the cement path. Another tried to follow Larsen, but fell to one of Roscoe’s bullets.

  “Sean, get everyone inside. They’ll just keep coming if they see you on the ground,” said David. “We’ll clear the deck from here.”

  “I’m moving everyone out,” said Sean. “We’ll be inside the door—just in case.”

  He watched Larsen and Mitch hop down next to Sean on the lawn inside the fence, and motion for the rest of the guards to follow. When the last of the security team had cleared the fence, he ordered the rooftop shooters to engage any infected near the SUV. As the gunfire rose to a crescendo, he broadcast over the tactical net.

  “I sure hope that card works, Eric,” said David, drawing a quick laugh from Roscoe.

  A few moments passed before Larsen responded.

  “I’ll strangle someone if it doesn’t.”

  Chapter 37

  Chang pressed the bloodstained card against the reader next to the door and waited. For a brief moment, nothing happened, and Larsen started to shake his head. Before Larsen could utter what was guaranteed to be a sarcastic, foul-mouthed comment, the small LED turned green, and the door clicked.

  “Open fucking sesame,” said Larsen, pulling the solid, pneumatically assisted door open as far as it would go. “After you.”

  Chang stepped inside the spacious lobby, walking tentatively across the dark slate floor. Something smelled off, but that was all he could tell. The reception area was silent except for their discreet footsteps crossing the hard tile. He looked over his shoulder to see Larsen and the two guards communicating with hand signals before fanning out to clear the room. Larsen spent a considerable amount of time examining the floor and walls near the reception desk, eventually turning to Chang.

  “Someone died in here. You can smell it,” said Larsen. “They cleaned up the mess pretty well. I only found a few specks of blood on the back of this chair.”

  A comfortable office chair rolled out from behind the desk, coming to a stop in front of one of the security guards, who looked like he’d rather be outside the gate than in this building.

  “We should probably locate the bodies first,” said Larsen. “Then head to your lab.”

  “You think they’re all dead?” said Chang.

  “If the security team working here was comprised of former Special Forces types, I don’t see how the Homeland crew could take any of them alive without raising some kind of alarm. They obviously shot the officer manning the desk and moved him—or her.”

  Chang had a hard time accepting Larsen’s logic, and not because he thought Larsen was wrong. It was something else.

  “I don’t get it,” said Chang. “Your team would never have done something like this. Right? I mean—I know you wouldn’t do this, but the rest of your team? I can’t see them obeying these orders.”

  “Dix and Brennan, not a chance,” said Larsen. “Peck? I’m not so sure about Peck.”

  “What are the chances that all four members of a team would be on the same page about something like this?” said Chang. “Even one of the guys on Ochoa’s team turned out to be skeptical.”

  “What are you saying?” said Larsen.

  “I wonder if this team might have been something else altogether,” said Chang.

  “How? I trained with them at Grissom facility,” said Larsen. “They’ve been in the program as long as I have.”

  “Think about it. Your orders changed when you hit the ground. It’s probably fair to say the same thing happened to Ochoa. He was just a lot more enthusiastic about following his new orders than you were.”

  “That’s one way to put it,” said Larsen.

  “But this team had to be different,” said Chang. “Irrespective of their final orders regarding me, they were sent into a specific situation requiring them to kill four security guards, and they apparently didn’t hesitate. That suggests a different breed altogether. Your team would never have been given th
is assignment.”

  Larsen looked conflicted by Chang’s suggestion, like he didn’t want to believe it.

  “Fuck,” muttered Larsen. “A secret program within a secret program, and none of us the wiser. Brilliant.”

  “There’s still one more team out there,” said Chang.

  “Ragan’s team,” said Larsen. “She’s hardcore, but not a killer.”

  “What did you think of this team back at your base?”

  “Same thing,” said Larsen.

  “Let’s get the data and get back to the security hub,” said Chang. “This is creeping me out.”

  “Everything you’ve been through today, and this is what’s creeping you out?”

  “Oddly enough, yes,” said Chang. “The part of me that still refuses to believe that the government is behind this outbreak is rapidly dying. This revelation may have put the final nail in its coffin.”

  “I wish I could say that I disagreed,” said Larsen before turning to the security guards. “Do the two of you feel comfortable hanging out here while we’re gone?”

  “I think we can manage,” said one of the guards, patting his rifle.

  “Keep yourselves out of sight,” said Larsen. “Just to be safe. Report anything.”

  “The building is under surveillance on all sides,” said the guard. “And the door is locked.”

  “Then how did the other team get inside?” said Larsen.

  The two guards glanced at each other, putting a little distance between them.

  “They were probably here before all of this went down,” said the other guard.

  “I jumped out of an airplane with one of those guys at about two in the morning,” said Larsen. “Don’t make any assumptions.”

  “Then how did they get in?” said the guard.

  “They parachuted onto the roof,” said Chang, doubting his own response. “Can they really do that?”

  “My team could do it,” said Larsen. “Shall we?”