Opposing Force: Book 01 - The God Particle (20 page)

"I can carry the entire unit."

"No, you cannot. We must move fast down there. You stick next to me. Campion will protect the unit."

"Yes, sir," the captain answered and transferred the V.A.A.D. from the duffel bag to a bulky backpack.

"Okay, gentlemen," Gant called to his unit. "Let’s go over the basics of this one again. We are penetrating the quarantined levels of this facility. We have to improvise our way down to the target area. Check your night vision gear and make sure your set is equipped with IR illuminators. Standard stuff, I know, but we are underground, people, and there are absolutely no sources of natural light."

"Working lights down there, Chief?" Moss asked as he checked his night vision goggles as instructed.

"There could be," Gant answered, "but we can't rely on that. I don't think they've changed any bulbs down there in twenty years."

"I hate using IRs. It's like looking through a rolled-up newspaper."

Franco referred to the IR—infrared illuminators—necessary to make their night vision goggles effective. Those goggles amplified ambient light, but in the depths of the Red Rock facility there would be no natural light whatsoever. IR illuminators projected a nearly invisible beam that gave the goggles a small source of light to amplify. However, the result was a far more constricted cone of illumination as compared to using night vision outdoors, where starlight provided ample amplification.

"When we get there Captain Twiste will do his thing and we pull out. Any questions?"

There were tons of questions, Gant knew, but at this point asking served no purpose.

"Okay, let’s go."

The unit filed out and down the corridor. The outer entrance to the vault—a solitary metal door—was open and guarded by two soldiers. A red warning light flashed above.

Sawicki, Roberts, and Van Buren watched their comrades head in, managing to catch Major Gant's eye before he disappeared inside. Despite being indoors, they offered him a rare sight—a rigid, formal, and proud salute—not the lazy, familiar gesture that had become accepted among their brotherhood. No, this one conveyed the honor they had in the unit, the trust they felt in their commander, and regret that they were not with their team.

Gant took the time to offer a similarly rigid salute in return, then he followed his boys in and the outer door shut behind them.

The Archangel unit packed into the hallway between the outer and inner doors. Once the first door was secure, the inner door opened and they entered the vestibule.

It was a tight fit: the Archangel unit, General Borman, Lieutenant Colonel Thunder, and two soldiers at the control consoles, one being Corporal Sanchez. Nonetheless, security protocols dictated that no entry could be made into the vault room proper until the entire area was secure.

General Borman barked orders to the seated soldiers: "Open the access door—turn your keys in three ... two ... one ..." the keys turned, the inner bolt mechanism buzzed with a heavy thud, and the door popped open.

Corporal Sanchez spoke the obvious: "Access door unlocked."

General Borman kindly pulled it open for the team, like a New York city doorman welcoming new guests. One by one they went through and assembled in the white, sterile vault room across from the large metal door.

Borman stopped Gant as he brought up the rear.

"Good luck."

Gant thought for a moment, then looked the general straight in the eye.

"Those of us who are about to die, salute you."

Gant did not wait for a reply—he left the straight-faced general holding the door and moved in to the vault room to join his men.

Borman looked at Thunder. She returned his glare and refused to yield. After a moment, he looked away as he pushed the access door closed with an thud.

The Archangel team faced off against the silver vault door for several seconds until Gant pushed his way through their ranks and approached the locks. He sighed, then pushed the first mechanism. The light went from red to green and an unseen electronic bolt slid open.

The major pushed the second switch and sent another light from red to green, setting another bolt free from its lock.

"Stand by," he warned.

Safeties switched off; Franco chambered a slug in his automatic shotgun.

The third lock opened. From what Gant understood, the last man who had opened that third lock had been shot in the back by his own men. If the stories were to be believed, Major Gant would now go further than anyone had gone in twenty years.

He pushed the fourth button. With the automatic alarms disengaged, the drama remained isolated to that fourth light changing from red to green. This time, however, when the locking mechanism withdrew, the heavy door crept open inwards toward the team. Gant retreated a step to give the mammoth gate a wide berth.

As it opened, a gust of stale, cold air rushed out from total blackness. Still, he knew his job. The door was to remain open for the shortest possible interval.

"Go," he commanded.

Franco moved in first, his shotgun ready. Wells and Galati followed close behind, then Pearson, whose bulky flamethrower jingled as he moved. Moss, Twiste, Major Gant, and then finally Campion at the rearguard position all went into the dark.

"Automatic lock," Borman ordered.

"Roger that, sir," Sanchez acknowledged and punched a button on his console.

The vault door slowly retreated, moving at a speed akin to a crawl. Thunder watched it through the glass, and while she feared for Thom Gant and his men, she instinctively wanted that door to shut as fast as possible. In the span of a few seconds her imagination conjured a hundred different nightmares taking this opportunity to break free.

Finally it shut with a surprising vibration. In that moment, Liz thought of it as a monster's mouth closing after swallowing prey.

The green lights turned red again, one by one, with corresponding thuds as the locks secured.

"Are we shut tight?"

The corporal checked his gauges, then answered the general, "Yes, sir. Seals at 100 percent."

"Good," Borman answered, then walked to the intercom and transmitted, "Team Two, go."

He turned and opened the door, allowing two soldiers access to the observation area.

"Open her up again, Sanchez."

Lieutenant Colonel Thunder stammered, "What—what is this??"

"Stand down, Colonel. Sanchez, open her up."

The keys turned again, the access door buzzed open once more. The two soldiers who comprised “Team Two” moved into the vault room. They carried heavy bundles as well as several large metal plates.

And welding gear.

"Cover your eyes, people," Borman said.

Sparks of yellow and red sprayed as Team Two welded plates onto the vault door, sealing its edges—making it impossible to open even if the locks were disengaged.

"General Borman, what the hell are you doing? What if they are successful? What if they complete their mission? How will they get out?"

Borman answered her while still trying to watch the progress of the welders through the bright sparks of their work: "They’re not coming back, Colonel. And no one else is going in. Ever. This is the end game."
 

Gant realized he had already made one mistake, and they had been in the quarantine zone for only three seconds. He should have dimmed the vault room’s lights. That mistake had been just plain stupid. Worse, maybe it was a sign that he was not concentrating on the mission enough. Had all the talk from Thunder and Twiste distracted him enough to cause him to miss such an important detail?

He was about to switch on his night vision when he realized there was, in fact, light in the room. He noticed small red dots along the walls near the ceiling. Some sort of emergency lighting that had somehow remained in operation.

Instead of night vision, Gant switched on a tactical flashlight, as did others on the team.

"Hold, gentlemen. Let your eyes adjust," Gant said. The tactical headset worked, but there was plenty of static. Apparently the EMP shielding built into the walls was not going to allow the units to work over long distances; probably no better than line of sight.

As his pupils expanded his surroundings took hold. The now-sealed vault door was ten yards behind. Open black space stretched forward even farther. He could see the form of walls on either side of his team, but the details of those walls remained hidden. Still, the hall was a lot wider than he had expected.

"Listen up. Franco, take us out. Stay sharp, stay focused."

The air was cold enough that he caught glimpses of frosty breath in the collection of flashlight beams. At first it felt as if they had stepped into a refrigerated room, but adrenaline kept any chills at bay.

He sensed a combination of smells in the air. Something like mold, another something like chemicals, and even a subtle hint of spent cartridges, as if a battle had taken place here long ago and the air of the sealed sublevel had captured and held traces of the aroma.

Another smell carried in the air: the smell of dust. Opening the door had kicked up a storm, and every breath nearly induced a sneeze.

His eyes adjusted more completely.

The walls were battleship gray ad looked much newer than he thought they should, despite the dust. There were no functioning light fixtures other than those red emergency lights. As they slowly moved forward, the team worked around some kind of tables and what might have been toppled chairs. After a moment, they cleared the clutter and the area opened up.

Gant spotted Franco at the head of the team. The point man stopped, knelt, and held one fist in the air. The rest of the soldiers followed suit. The major crept forward, weaving between the members of his unit, until he was alongside Franco.

Thom saw why Biggy had halted their brief progress. The hall they traversed came to a choke point, a set of large containment doors dented, scorched, and knocked halfway out of the heavy frame holding them in place.

He thought about what they knew of Briggs's containment order. It had been for expanded containment with, he had assumed, the vault door they had just entered being the perimeter of that expanded containment. So why a set of bulkheads here, and why were they obviously broken open?

"Wait a second," Gant muttered and surveyed his surroundings, but wobbling, thin flashlight beams did not illuminate the area well enough.

"Watch your eyes, people," he warned and lit a flare, which he flung into the center of the hall. After a burst of sparks, a blood-red flickering glow fully lit their surroundings.

They were not, in fact, in a hallway at all. They were in a room that had been segmented into two distinct parts. The unit had already come through the first part, but now the flare showed what they had not seen before in the dark.

What they had thought to be tables were, in fact, consoles equipped with cracked and smashed monitoring equipment. The consoles were perfectly positioned to monitor the second segment of the room, a big chamber housing the broken bulkheads just ahead of Franco.

While Gant said nothing—not at first—the sergeant managed to encapsulate his feelings perfectly.

"Deja fucking vu."

Sal Galati flashed his light over the remains and said, "Didn’t we just leave this place?"

Thom bit his lower lip as he felt his arms tremble, not in fear, but with anger. If Borman had not bothered to fill him in on the important detail that quarantine had been broken sometime in the past—that whatever lurked in the sublevels had actually expanded its reach over the years—then how many more important details had been withheld?

It was all a carbon copy of the vestibule and vault room they had just passed through on their way in, except this one was not shiny and new. It gave Gant the feeling of seeing ancient ruins from Rome or Greece, in the sense that bits and pieces of the structure remained, enough to envision what the entirety had once been.

Suddenly Brandon Twiste—hauling the duffel bag carrying the V.A.A.D.'s batteries—was in his ear, saying, "The bear went over the mountain, and what do you think he saw?"

Beyond the smashed bulkheads waited a dark hall. For a terrifying moment, he wondered if this was what they were in for: layer after layer of observation rooms and containment doors, each one broken and replaced. Thunder had told him there were stretches of time missing from the files. Had Borman covered up the fact that his expert security had repeatedly failed?

Gant spoke into his headset: "Listen up. Wells, Galati, Moss—get up here."

The three soldiers moved forward until they huddled at the front with the sergeant and major.

"Let’s make this a clearing operation. Franco, take these three and slice the pie. We’re looking for a stairwell that goes down ... should be twenty yards or so ahead."

Gant remembered the general layout of the facility. Stairwells and elevator shafts were contained between certain levels, most going between only two floors. That is what had made sublevel 5 the choke hold for the complex. All of the elevators and stairwells below were self-contained. No way to the surface except through the main elevator on sublevel 5 on the far side of the nonquarantined zone.