Allegiance (11 page)

Outbreak - Day 15

Schriever AFB

Security Pod

The prisoner’s
restraints clanked against the steel table as he raked soft feminine fingers
through his full head of unkempt silver hair. Then, as if suddenly struck by a
wayward thought he might be privy to share, he sat upright and shifted his gaze
from his open palms and fixed it on the interrogator. After a few seconds he
looked away, then began to bob his head left to right, a barely perceptible
metronomic shift of only a few degrees in either direction, like he was
deciding something of little consequence. Perhaps which three hundred dollar
tie he’d wear to a dinner party, or whether he wanted a blonde or brunette
thousand dollars an hour call girl waiting in his penthouse when he returned.
Over the last forty years, money had not been an issue. In fact, he’d had
enough of it to alter elections. He’d even brought a small country to its knees
through currency manipulation. He had been able to afford
anything
and
everything
he’d ever wanted.
Immediately
. No waiting. He was the king of self-gratification,
and most importantly, he answered to no man.

But recently, things had
changed drastically for the ruthless ex-billionaire. In reality, the man Robert
Christian regarded across the table from him—the imposing figure whose gaze
even he found hard to match for any length of time without looking
away—literally held his life in the palm of his hand. And the question his
interrogator had just posed contained no uncertain words and had only one
truthful answer, an answer that Robert Christian knew would be deemed
unacceptable.

He went light in the
head. Suddenly, for the first time in three days, he saw the scale tipping in
an altogether undesirable direction. And the slide started moments after he had
been brought into the cold room and manacled to this very same table. That had
been over seventy-two hours ago, by his estimation.

The President had
arrived and watched as the interrogators quickly shattered the illusion that Christian
could threaten or buy his way out of this predicament. That way of doing
business may have worked in the old world. It held no weight in the new one.

His first offer of money
had been met with silence by his lone interrogator. His belligerent ranting
followed with a flurry of hollow threats earned him an open handed slap, and
the last time he had been slapped across the face, he had recalled at the time,
had been but a love tap delivered by a nun in accordance with Catholic school
rules. The interrogator’s sneak attack had been nothing of the sort. He could
still hear the roundhouse cutting the air before the crushing blow brought his
fantasy world crashing down around him. And before the resounding smack had
echoed into silence, he’d had a morbid epiphany:
This hard-edged man writes
his own rules and answers to no one
.

***

For Robert Christian,
formulating an answer other than the truth wasn’t an option. He couldn’t lie to
this man, he reminded himself. Without a doubt the grim-faced soldier—or
whatever he was—had been trained to spot deception. No, he decided right then
and there. He’d already told them all he knew, and spinning elaborate lies
would only prolong the agony.

He looked at his right
little finger. It wandered off at a sharp angle from the others, snapped there
by the attached tendons when the knuckle keeping it straight disintegrated.
Just looking at the swollen purple digit brought forth a fresh dose of
breath-robbing pain.

“You indicated that
Elvis was supposed to rendezvous with Ian Bishop and then kill him. As per your
orders. Isn’t that correct?” The interrogator turned in his chair, looked at
his own reflection in the two-way mirror.

“Yes, for the tenth
time. That is the truth,” Christian stated forcefully. “And Ian Bishop... that
Goddamned traitor. He abandoned me. I have no idea where he went, nor do I know
where his men took the nuclear warheads he fucking stole from me.” The thick
vein that snaked across Robert Christian’s temple steadily throbbed, seemingly
a living thing underneath his skin.

The interrogator shot up
from his seat, flipped the metal chair around so its back pressed against his
chest, then sat back down heavily. The sudden movement caused Robert Christian
to flinch and shrink away. In the attempt to distance himself from the
anticipated blow, the former billionaire simultaneously stretched the manacles
to their limits and arched his body backwards, away from the table. His chair
screeched back several inches, teetered on two legs before coming to rest
again, still upright on all four.

The man leaned in close.
Robert Christian could see the pores on his nose, the red capillaries in the
yellowed whites of his eyes. Could smell the acidic coffee stench of his
breath.

“One more time. Tell me
who Elvis was working with.” He said it slowly, enunciating every syllable.
“You give me something that I can work with and then I’ll reward you. But if
you don’t cooperate, I’m going to up the ante. And just to prove to you I’m not
such a bad guy... I’ll allow you to choose which
fingers
get broken.”

Robert Christian looked
at his damaged right hand. He kept his eyes downcast. “I have already told
you... Elvis
volunteered
to come here,” he stammered. “He was supposed
to pose as a survivor, try to gain some trust and then wait. Francis’s mission
was the same... only he was the one who had to smuggle the gun in. I wanted him
to kill that bitch
Clay
.”

The interrogator
bristled. “Why did you want the President dead?”

“So I could have the
United
States
all to myself.”

Shaking his head, the
interrogator said, “The
dead
own the United States for now.”

“But
I
had a
plan.”

“You’re insane,” the
rough man spat. “Just as insane as the fool you sent for Clay. He’s dead and
soon
you
will be too. ”

“No... no... I can help
you find Bishop. Get back the nuclear weapons. For what it’s worth...
everything I’ve told you
is
the truth. So help me—” He stopped short of
saying the three letter word that was nothing but a crutch for weak people. For
him,
power
was God. So now, sadly, shackled to the table, he was not
only utterly powerless over his situation, he was Godless as well.

Once again the
interrogator cast a glance at the mirror, pressed his finger to his ear,
adjusted something there and without saying anything more exited the room,
slamming the door behind him. The mirrored glass rattled and Christian’s
reflection staring back at him undulated with it. Then, with a viscous sucking
sound, the A/C unit kicked on. A low whoosh came next as frigid air burst
through the plastic grill. Somewhere deep inside the box a bad bearing wailed,
threatening to silence the beast for good. Having already put up with it for
hours on end, and nearly losing his mind as a result, the former billionaire
king maker silently prayed for it to fail.

Outbreak - Day 15

The House

Jackson Hole, Wyoming

Lucas Brother’s
expression changed from one of mild annoyance to a crunched up sneer. He
shuffled the picket of empty liquor bottles, lifting and slamming each one down
noisily, and then in a fit of hot rage, upended the black lacquered table
sending the empties and a two-day accumulation of cellophane wrappers and
caviar tins crashing onto the travertine tiles. “Liam!” he bellowed. “Where the
fuck
is the
clicker?
”

The younger man replied
testily, his voice easily carrying from the kitchen and down the hall. “Get off
your
ass
and look for it. And I’ll be damned if I’m watching
Die Hard
with you again.”

It had been a full two
days since their boss Robert Christian had been snatched from the mansion in
the dead of night by an enemy the brothers hoped they would never have to
tangle with again. The infiltrators had been equipped with night vision goggles
and armed with silent weapons. To call them efficient killers would be an
understatement. Clifford, Hutsell, and Ed could attest to that—their bodies
were feeding the worms in a shallow communal grave behind the pool house.
Furthermore, the way the
ghosts
had thwarted the estate’s security
system, picked the locks to gain access, and then disabled the generators spoke
volumes to their training and professionalism.

As the credits finished
and the ‘90’s synth-heavy music began its fade out, even from inside the
soundproofed home theater they could hear clearly the shuffling feet and
mournful moans of the dead gathered outside.

The twenty thousand
square foot multilevel mansion, once owned by a prominent Hollywood A-Lister,
and most recently inhabited by Robert Christian, the self-appointed President
of New America, was nearly impenetrable. Perched on a protruding finger of rock
and surrounded by steep, undergrowth-choked hillsides, the grand walled
compound was only accessible via a mile-long drive snaking up from the valley floor.
Ringed by the massive granite Teton and Gros Ventre Mountains, the locals had
contemptuously dubbed the prominent display of wealth and opulence overlooking
the valley floor, ‘
The House
.’

“We’re out of Scotch...”
Liam hollered from the hallway.

“Did you check the
butler’s pantry?”

“We cleaned it out
yesterday,” Liam answered.

Lucas gave up the search
for the remote, hastily reassembled the leather cushions and plopped back down
under the weight of a looming decision.

“That settles it...”
Liam exclaimed as he strode, empty-handed, back into the cavernous home
theater. “We
have
to leave today.”

Tilting his head back,
Lucas eyed Liam sideways and said, “I concur.” Then he upended one of the
bottles that had somehow survived his tantrum and shook it violently over his
gaping mouth, milking the last few drops of booze.

Looking disdainfully at
the sad lack of willpower currently on display, Liam shook his head. “It’s all
gone... ‘cept a couple bottles of Crème de Menthe, and I’m not going there.
Never
had a Grasshopper...
never
gonna.”

Lucas jumped up from the
couch, hurled the drained bottle sidearm at the humongous dropdown screen
(missing horribly) and said forcefully, “You unlock the gate but don’t open it
just yet, and then kill the generator. I’ll load the Hummer... then we’ll be
real quiet and maybe the rotten fuckers will forget about us and go away.”

“No way, bro. I’m not
going out there... it fuckin’ stinks. Plus the noise coming outta their pasty
pie holes makes me want to shoot myself.”

“Get your ass out there
or I’m going to shoot you, Liam,” he said, fixing him with a steely gaze. “And
please
refresh my memory... where’d you say you saw the minty-tasting stuff?”

Ignoring the last
question, Liam unloaded on his brother. “
I
got the wire out of RC’s Cadillac.
Then
I
jury-rigged the generator
all
so that
you
could
watch your precious DVDs. So how about
you
go out there and
you kill
the thing.”

Silence
. Except for the low level murmuring of the
abominations pressing the front gate.

“Tell you what, bro,”
Lucas hissed. A multitude of silver and turquoise bracelets clicked as he ran
his baseball mitt-sized hands through his stringy blonde locks. “OK... I’ll do
it. Don’t wanna... let’s call it a trade-off. I’ll take care of our
other
problem if you go outside and take care of the rest.”

Calculating the value of
getting out from under one unenviable task—the messy job neither of the
brothers Brother wished to undertake—and instead venturing outside of the
mansion, Liam finally conceded. “OK. OK. I’ll go out
there
. Just kill
that fucking repeating soundtrack,” he said angrily, pulling a bulky black
semi-automatic pistol from his waistband and gesturing towards the high end
Blu-Ray player built into the far wall. “Or I’m going to put a bullet through
that goddamn thing.”

Stretching his arms to
full extension over his head, Lucas clapped his hands. “You’ve got yourself a
deal.”

As Liam left the room,
still in a bit of a huff, he called out, “Crème de Menthe is in the kitchen by
the espresso machine.”

“Which kitchen?” Lucas
called back as he crabbed sideways between the sofa and coffee table, tiptoeing
through trash and broken glass.

“Downstairs kitchen,”
Liam called back, the echo of his voice quickly drowned out by the calls of the
dead the second he opened the outside door.

Wincing from the aural
and olfactory bombardment, Lucas grabbed his go bag: a fully stuffed black
nylon internal frame backpack, and his AR-15—a semi-automatic civilian version
of the military’s venerable M-16. He visited the kitchen first to collect the
libations, then went to the guest house to make good on his end of the bargain.

***

What’s the hold up,
little brother
, Lucas thought to
himself as he manhandled the package into the back seat and closed the door.
Fucker’s
probably bogarting a bottle of the good stuff
. He was cramming the backpack
into the minimal space between the backseat and rear hatch when the overhead
fluorescents hissed off, throwing the multicar garage into near darkness.

Good job little bro,
thought Lucas.

Diffuse rays from the
brutal summer sun infiltrated through the frosted rectangular windows inset
high along the far wall, providing just enough light so Lucas could make his
way around to the driver’s side of the Hummer without banging his knees on the
beefy plate bumpers.

He ducked his head and
forced his 6-foot-5 inch, well-muscled, two hundred and fifty pound frame into
the SUV. His knees crushed against the padding under the dash and the crown of
his head brushed the headliner when he tried to sit up straight.
Fucking
midget
, he thought to himself, cursing the Hummer’s former movie star
owner, who, when not on the big screen, was only a handful of inches over five
feet and had left the seat all the way forward on its rails and jacked up to
the maximum.
The fucker must have looked like a little kid driving this big
rig around downtown Jackson
, Lucas mused as he adjusted the mirrors from
the Lilliputian’s settings to something more reasonable.
Perfect.

With the truck set up
and ready to go, he made his way back into the house and walked right into a
wall of questions.

“You put the M-60 back
in the truck?”

“Yes
Liam
...
immediately after you blasted the shit out of everything
but
that silent
black helicopter. The
veranda
. The
air
. The air
around
the
helicopter. And if I recall correctly, the bad guys killed
Cheeto
Cliff, Ed, and Hutsell, and then took off into
the night with R.C. aboard,” came the monotone reply.

“Not my fault,” Liam
mumbled. “That thing was stealth or some shit.”

Lucas grimaced and
rubbed his eyes.

“Is the ride gassed and
ready to go?” Liam asked.

“Yes
Liam.
”

Liam stood in the
doorway staring down Lucas. “Did you take care of your part of the deal?” he
asked.

“Yes
Liam
. Any
more questions
Liam
?”

“Was it hard?”

“No
Liam
. We’ve
got a couple of hours to kill
Liam
. Can you please shut the fuck up
Liam
.”

“Yes Lucas... where’s
the Crème de Menthe?”

With a broad smile Lucas
closed his eyes.

***

Three
hours later at the ‘House’

“Wake up,” Liam
whispered.

Oblivious
to his brother’s presence, Lucas rolled over and farted

“It’s time. Let’s go.”
Words were not going to work, he decided, and against his better judgment he
put a hand on his slumbering brother and nudged him. Gently at first, and when
that didn’t bring Lucas to, Liam resorted to a simulated 5.0 on the Richter
scale. The latter approach resulted in him staring down the business end of
Lucas’s brushed metal .45.

“Relax bro,” he said,
slowly lifting his arms in surrender. “Let’s go.”

Shaking off the cobwebs,
Lucas inquired about the dead.

“There are a lot less of
them now. I told you the generators lured the pusbags.”

“Or the heavy machinegun
fire. The helicopter. The gunfire inside the mansion. Take your pick, just
don’t blame it on me wanting lights and a hot shower.”

“And Die Hard,” Liam
added with a wide grin.

“Fuck off,” Lucas
answered, patting his sibling on the back. “Let’s go... the H2 is ready. You
unlatch the gate.”

“Yes Luke...” and with a
sweep of his arm Liam said, “age before beauty.”

***

Liam popped the safety
lever and with considerable effort sent the garage door on an upward journey.

“Get in the back,” Lucas
said as he turned the key.

The inevitable questions
that began spewing from Liam’s mouth were instantly drowned out as the Hummer’s
four hundred horsepower engine roared to life.

“What the fuck...” Liam
blurted when he opened the rear door and saw Lucas’s responsibility stretched
across the floorboard, unmoving. Greeting him were the yellow-soled black
canvas slippers still attached to Tran, who had been Robert Christian’s
personal chef and sometimes driver. “Why in the name of God did you bring the
body?”

Liam looked up, meeting
the other man’s gaze in the rearview, and by the twinkle in Luke’s eyes
immediately knew he was up to something.

Lucas replied with a one
word answer. “Bait.”

“Bait,” Liam responded
incredulously. “Those things only eat the living... right?”

Ignoring the query,
Lucas inched the eyesore yellow H2 out of the garage and let it roll slowly
over the cobblestone pavers and around the perimeter of the mansion. As the
twelve-foot wall crept past the passenger windows and the gate came into view,
the sounds of the dead became more noticeable.

“How many goons are out
there?”

“Bout fifty to
seventy-five,” Liam answered.

 Lucas stabbed the
brakes, stopping the Hummer just inside of the solid twelve-foot-tall gate.
Coming from the floor, a muffled moan sounded as Tran’s body rolled forward and
then returned to where it had been placed, face down across the transmission
hump.

A string of expletives
filled the cab and Liam launched off the seat. “
Shit
... he’s still
alive!”

Lucas chuckled. “I
clobbered him good. He went down like a sack of potatoes. He was out cold...
plus he’s a little squirt. That’s why I only taped his hands.”

“That wasn’t part of the
deal, Lucas. He’s gonna slow us down.”

“Like I said, he’s
bait
.
Toss him out after I bull the gate open. The goons will go for him and leave us
be... at least most of ‘em should.”

“Good plan, bro. But you
owe me one. Cause once again I’m stuck doing your dirty work.”

Tran regained consciousness
and realized his wrists were bound but his feet were free. He kicked at the
door with both feet, inviting a swift kick from his captor’s boot. Then a sharp
pain shot through his scalp as he was pulled from the floorboards by his hair.

“Go,” Liam said as he
man-handled the slight Asian man onto his knees and then used his muscular left
arm to pin him upright against the seatback on the driver’s side.

“Pull off the tape so
they’ll hear him scream,” Lucas called out over his shoulder.

Doing as he was told,
Liam wrenched the duct tape from Tran’s face, taking with it several days’
worth of growth.