Call Me Mr Smith, page 23
part #6 of The Fallen World Series
“Weird,” Rachel said.
Three shrugged. “We’re used to it.”
“Your gear’s in the LAV,” Dax said. “Everyone suit up.”
David walked around to look inside the vehicle. “Holy shit!”
I grinned.
“There’s a setup for everyone. Get into the camo and body armor. Trade out your weapons for what’s there, unless you are better with what you have or can’t handle what we have for you,” Dax said.
There was a good bit of ‘ooohing’ and ‘ahhhing’ over the brand-new body armor and weapons.
“Hell of a stash. I didn’t think you’d have a vehicle,” I said.
He shrugged. “I like to keep an ace up my sleeve.”
“I’m glad you did. This’ll help. A lot.”
He gestured me over to the side of the road where we could talk in private.
“Your team up for it?” He asked.
“Bill is an Agent, so he’s solid. He’ll stick with me. The rest are proven, and I trust them, except the twins, who were recommended by people I trust. Plus, they all know Miss Todd.”
“What’s the plan?”
“If I can get to the control room, we own the facility. I had blueprints on file…just in case.”
He grinned and nodded knowingly.
“Primary objective has to be that. Miss Todd is secondary, but I would like to get her back alive if at all possible.”
He raised an eyebrow. “You’re not…attached to someone are you?”
“She’s had a tough time, and she’s damn good,” I said.
“Uh huh. Okay, you focus on the control room. My team will do what we do best.”
I nodded and we rejoined the rest of the team, who had just finished getting into the new gear.
“Okay, everyone ready?” Dax asked.
A round of nods was his response.
“Okay, let’s take over a nuclear power plant!” He grinned.
Everyone loaded up. We closed the rear hatch, and we were off to Pickering.
Along the way, after everyone put on headsets that were wired into the vehicle, I briefed them on the details of the plan. From memory, I described the layout of the facility from several entrances. There were a lot of buildings to be cleared with such a small team, but everyone had their role.
I knew exactly where the control room was, and Bill and I would go there. The members of my team from the Defense Force would run interference until we got there, and then assist with maintaining security. The extraction team would work on finding Cindy, which was the harder mission, but they were trained for it.
Dax added that they had spotted scouts away from the facility at a few locations, but he had a plan to eliminate them. The downside was that the anarchists had working radios, which meant once we took out the first scout, they would know someone was coming.
We would not have the element of surprise, but our approach and numbers might just tip the balance. Our hope was that they would expect a large assault, rather than a small team infiltration. That’s where the LAV would come in.
There was ammunition for the 25 mm chain gun mounted on top of the vehicle, so that would be the big, loud, distraction. The driver had us up near the top speed of the vehicle, right around 100 miles per hour, so the trip didn’t take long. We stopped about two miles short of the facility and unloaded most of the team. The vehicle would continue with the extraction team, who would deal with the scouts, and then move to their point of entry.
Bill and I both carried large packs on our backs, which contained specialized equipment for breaching heavy steel doors, like the kind we would encounter in the facility. I also equipped each person with a simple radiation detection badge. I hoped they wouldn’t be necessary, but I wouldn’t put anything past these people.
The kits provided by Dax included advanced gas masks with integrated multi-spectral vision displays. Those would go on as soon as we got inside, just in case, since everyone was also equipped with canisters of CS gas, a potent tear gas used in the past for riot control. The masks also had an integrated radio system, so we were all in constant contact.
Lastly, everyone, including me, would be carrying an H&K UMP submachine gun with an advanced suppression system. It was the preferred weapon of the extraction teams, since the .45 ACP round was subsonic, which resulted in less noise when fired.
* * *
We moved to within sight of the facility and waited. David was on point with a laser cutter, also provided by Dax, which he would use to cut through the fence around the facility like a hot knife through butter.
I heard two clicks from the radio. That meant the anarchists’ scouts had been eliminated. It was also the signal for what happened next.
I heard, then watched, the LAV speed down the road and through the barricades into the facility’s perimeter. The 25 mm chain gun immediately opened fire along the roof line. I saw three sentries fall because they failed to take cover.
Within seconds, the LAV started taking fire, but none of it was effective…yet. While they were focusing on the vehicle, we made our move.
David led the way up to the fence and cut through. The cutter worked as promised, and we got through in less than a minute. On this side of the building, there was only one service door. Bill and I took the lead on the other side of the fence and ran to the door at top speed, which left the rest of the team slightly behind.
Once we were all stacked up, I waited another minute. I expected at least a few people to come out to secure the side, but no one did. I pulled a breaching charge from Bill’s pack and placed it around the lock. It would blow away the door around the lock and allow it to open freely.
“West entry in three, two, one,” I broadcast over the radio and triggered the explosive. It was relatively quiet compared to the continued chattering of the 25 mm bursts from the vehicle.
I pulled an extension mirror from a pocket and used it to look around the corner. I saw rifles poking out from around corners on the left and right of a four-way intersection. They had good positions and weren’t exposing themselves.
I looked back and used hand signals to indicate what I’d seen, and Bill handed me a CS gas grenade. I pulled the pin and cooked it off for two seconds, then threw it. The grenade had a three-second delay, so it went off as soon as it hit the ground in the hallway. I put out the mirror again and noticed the rifles were still there.
“No good, they have masks,” I said.
Bill handed me an incendiary grenade, and I considered. One of the things about CS was that it was incredibly flammable. Even if the gas didn’t take them down, they were now coated in flammable, fine powder. The downside was that burning CS resulted in hydrogen cyanide. With those CS grenades, a fire would also release hydrogen chloride and chlorine.
I debated for a few seconds and decided that the odds of them having Cindy this close to an entrance were low, so I threw the second grenade. Two seconds later, a jet of fire and smoke blew out of the door, and I heard screaming. I waited for several minutes, until the screaming stopped, then gave the go signal.
We streamed through the door in a tight line. Once we arrived at the four-way intersection, I took the left side, Bill took the right, and the rest covered the front and back. I looked left and right and saw four people in smoldering body armor. Some were still on fire but were dead.
“Watch your uniforms; don’t let any of this get on your skin. As of now, the air can kill you,” I said on our team channel.
“Building One clear, five eliminated. Moving to Building Two.” Two said on the radio. They’d cleared the administration building, which was the farthest out. I didn’t expect Cindy to be there, but it needed to be cleared.
We heard two loud explosions from outside, which I had expected. Likely RPGs to take out the LAV.
On cue, Dax’s voice came over the radio. “LAV is down, no casualties.”
I motioned forward, and we continued straight down the hallway. While the facility was a warren of hallways, the path to the control room was fairly straightforward. Just a few turns, though it was a lot of distance to cover. Most of the building, itself, was nearly half a mile wide and two stories tall. What we were after was right in the center. I expected mounting resistance as we progressed, and I was not disappointed.
We moved without encountering anyone for a while, but that stopped suddenly when we reached another layer of internal security. It was another door that would have to be breached, and I could see a prepared defensive position on the other side of it through what I had to assume was a ballistic glass window.
“This won’t be easy; they’ve got riot shields set up on top of sandbags, and it’s the only way in,” I said.
“No problem,” Bill said. “You didn’t look all the way through our packs of goodies.”
He took his pack off and set it down. From the inside, he pulled a satchel charge. I recognized the model. It contained C-4, and it would certainly do the job. I held out my hand, and he shook his head and moved around the corner to the door.
They must have seen him move, because I saw the people on the other side aim their weapons. Shit, this was going to be ugly.
I looked around to make sure the rest of the team had their eyes everywhere else so we weren’t taken by surprise. Now that the anarchists knew exactly where we were, I had no doubt there were more on the way.
Bill set the breaching charge and blew it immediately. As soon as the door opened, the anarchists fired and pinned him down. I leaned around the corner and fired a few bursts from my UMP to get their attention. Once a few of them turned their focus to me, Bill armed and threw a second breaching charge around the edge of the door. It slid perfectly and bumped up against the sandbags right before it exploded.
The concussive force in the closed space made me wince as the compression, as well as the sound, hit my ears. I once again leaned around the corner and started firing. There were still several of them up and active, but the barricade was gone. The door had been blown off its hinges by the force and was lying on the floor.
What really concerned me was that Bill wasn’t moving, but I had to focus. I took down two of the three remaining targets before my mag ran dry, and I had to pull back to change out.
David pulled on my arm. “You’re hit!”
He pointed at my arm, and there was a hole clean through. There was blood, but not enough that I was concerned about an artery being hit. I waved him off, but he pulled on me again.
“Dammit, let us do our jobs!” he yelled into the radio and stared at me through the face shield of his mask.
I stared at him for a moment, then nodded. I moved to the back of the formation and took a knee to quickly wrap my arm.
Rachel backed up a few steps, then ran and suddenly jumped. She crossed the hallway doing a front handspring and landed solidly on her feet on the other side. Then she turned around and started firing from the corner, while her brother, Logan, fired from the near side.
I shook my head and stared for a minute. I’d never seen anything like it, but it was certainly effective. I was most impressed that she could do it while wearing body armor and carrying her weapons.
A few seconds later, Rachel transmitted. “Clear. Moving up to check on Bill.”
The entire team moved up to the next intersection, and I stood over Rachel and Bill. Rachel had knelt down to check his vitals. She looked up and shook her head. That didn’t make sense, so I knelt down beside her, and then I saw it. Something had found its way to his unarmored throat and blown straight through his neck.
“Incoming!” Nathan suddenly shouted, and we were under fire from multiple directions.
It was chaotic as reinforcements arrived from the direction we had just cleared at the same time as more anarchists came at us from the other three directions. We were, quite literally, surrounded.
Grenades started flying, and all I could do was focus on one direction…forward. This wasn’t my kind of fight, but I wasn’t ready to die just yet.
After what felt like an hour, but was probably more like two minutes, silence fell as I shot the last anarchist who was still a threat. I looked around to check on the rest of the team and found that I was basically alone. Nathan and Donald were both down with wounds to the head. Rachel and Logan were alive…barely. They were holding onto each other, but the armor on their chests had taken such a beating, they had collapsed. Pools of blood were forming under them, and they were going to be gone soon as well. There was nothing I could do.
I checked on David last. He pushed himself up to a sitting position as he peeled his mask off and coughed up blood. I knelt down beside him and sighed as I put a hand on his shoulder.
“I’m sorry, David,” I said.
He shook his head. “Just make sure Carolyn and Junior are taken care of?”
I nodded. “You got it.”
He grinned. “Give ‘em hell, Mr. Smith.” He pulled two grenades off of his belt and pulled the pins.
I gave him another pat on the shoulder and moved deeper into the facility.
* * *
I moved up the hallway a bit toward the control room and ducked into an office to evaluate my equipment. I took my pack off and set it down. I still had several breaching charges, of which I would only need one more, and multiple explosive charges of varying sizes.
As for weapons, I had one spare magazine left for my UMP and a half-full one loaded. I also had three mags, plus a full mag already loaded, for the 9mm I carried. I debated leaving the pack of explosives behind but decided they might come in handy, if only as diversions.
Since I felt like I had a little breathing room, I used it. I moved back and set quite a few booby traps at various corners and doorways. They were as random as I could make them and didn’t indicate any particular path. They were just there to kill anarchists and slow down anyone they didn’t kill. Even if a trap was found and disarmed, it would make a person slow down, because they would assume there might be a trap around every corner.
As I was about to move on, I heard two explosions from behind me—the grenades David had held. I frowned and moved on toward the control room. I paused now and then to trap a random door or hallway until I finally reached the door to the control room. I was surprised not to find guards outside it. I carefully looked through the small, head-sized, portal window and saw why.
Sitting in the central control chair was Cindy. There were five men and women in the room, using consoles as cover, with weapons pointed at the door. There was a sixth man standing behind her, holding a knife to her throat. Even if I were to shoot and kill him instantly, the odds were, that when he fell, he would slice her throat open.
“Smith here, how do you read?” I said into the all band broadcast.
The only response was static. I had expected that, this deep into a building like this, but it was worth a try. So, it was me against six armed anarchists. There was only one entrance to the room, so they knew where I had to come from.
I considered my options. First, I could set aside my desire to rescue her and take the room. I had little doubt that I could kill them all, in one way or another. They were counting on the fact that I wanted her alive. Second, I could move back toward the exterior far enough to get a radio signal to bring in the extraction team, which ran the risk of getting me killed. Lastly, I could wait and hope they’d get impatient or the extraction team made it to me, but given the number of buildings they had to clear, that would be hours.
“Is that you, Mr. Smith? Do come in!” a muffled voice from the other side of the door yelled.
I frowned. Great. Not only do they know I’m here, they figured out who I am. Maybe I shouldn’t have sent that warning.
I tried the doorknob, and it turned in my hand. I pulled the door open but stayed out of sight. “You know who I am. To whom am I speaking?” I asked.
“You can call me Star.”
“Oh, good grief. One of those,” I said.
“Yes, one of those. Do come on in. I have a deal for you,” Star said.
“I’m fine out here for now, thank you. What’s your proposal?”
“Give yourself up, and we’ll let the beautiful Cindy go free. Simple as that.”
“You honestly don’t believe I’ll do that, do you?” I forced myself to chuckle.
“No, I guess not. It’ll be a shame to separate her head from the rest of her.”
“You have to know that if she dies, you definitely die. Even if you get me, I have another team of specialists on the way.”
“Oh, them…yes, they’re being kept busy. I assure you, they won’t last long.”
At that, I truly did laugh. “You have no idea who you’re up against.” This wasn’t going anywhere. The only solution I could think of was a precision shot to Star’s right elbow to collapse his arm. That was the only way to get the knife away from Cindy’s neck. The problem would be that then I would have to continue shooting until they were all dead, or they might take her out just for spite.
There was no doubt that, in that time, I’d be hit at least once, and my mission to take over the facility might become a failure.
* * *
I closed my eyes and took a few deep breaths to focus myself as I set the UMP aside and drew my 9mm. I visualized where I had seen the anarchists and saw each shot hit home in my mind’s eye.
I took in another deep breath and wheeled around the corner as I pulled the trigger. It felt like the entire thing was in slow motion. I went through the motions I had practiced in my mind and fired six times, then time went back to normal.
My knees buckled, and I controlled myself down to my knees and remained upright. I was right, they’d fired just as fast as I had. I looked at Cindy, and she was still alive. There was a light scratch on her neck. The man who’d had the knife to her throat wasn’t done though. His right arm was useless, but he scrambled to reach across his body with his left arm to draw his sidearm, which was on his right hip. I struggled and raised my 9mm one more time and shot him between the eyes.
