Time Patrol (Area 51 The Nightstalkers) (17 page)

“Someone made contact,” Moms reported. “There’s blood and a bunch of expended brass.”

Nada was staring down the corridor at the black opening at the end. “Someone put up a fight. And lost. No body, though.”

“What can you tell us?” the Keep asked Edith.

“We’re not clear yet,” Moms said, gesturing with the muzzle of her automatic rifle toward the steel door guarding the other end of the corridor. “Can you open that?” she asked Edith.

“Hold on,” Mac said, pointing. “We’ve got another door that isn’t sealed right here.” He pointed at a slit in the ceiling. “I’m willing to bet Eagle’s Prius that it slides down when that door opens, keeping containment.”

“Keep it from sliding down,” Moms ordered.

“Roger that.” Mac pulled some gear out of his pack and, with Kirk’s help, got to work. After a minute of drilling and hammering into the side wall, Mac gave a thumbs-up. “Should be shorted out.”

“ ‘Should be’?” Scout muttered.

Moms turned back to Edith and repeated her question. “Can you open it?”

“I don’t know.”

Mac was looking at the sensor. He whistled. “Never seen nothing like it except in mock-ups. A DNA sensor.” He pointed at Edith. “If she belongs here, her DNA can open it.” He hooked his finger. “Come here, darling.”

Edith came forward and Mac gently took her hand and placed it over the sensor. The light flickered and the door slid up.

The rest of the Nightstalkers pushed past Edith Frobish. They gathered, weapons at the ready, at the entrance to the cavern.

“Give me some light, Kirk,” Nada ordered.

Kirk pulled a flare gun out of his pack. He fired one, reloaded, and fired two more as quickly as possible.

They arced up into the cavern and promptly were sucked into a dark wall twenty meters in.

“Whoa!” Roland said. “What the frak is that?”

Kirk fired a flare at an angle, bouncing it off the walls of the cavern and avoiding the pitch-black entity.

The rough rock walls and ceiling and the smooth floor were illuminated in the flickering red light, casting dark shadows on the crevices and being absorbed into the darkness. The Nightstalkers moved in, spreading out, eyeballs scanning, muzzles of weapons following each person’s gaze. They were all avoiding the darkness.

“It’s shrinking,” Doc said. “A meter at least since we entered.” He had a handheld scanner up and was peering at the readings.

“What was in here?” Moms asked. “Or in there,” she added, with a gesture of the muzzle of her assault rifle toward the darkness.

Kirk fired another flare as the last one sputtered out.

“I don’t know,” Edith said from behind them, standing at the entrance, but not taking a step in. She had a hand pressed against the side of her head, her eyes screwed shut in concentration.

“This feels bad,” Scout said.

“Roger that,” Kirk said. “We need to get out of here.”

“Ditto,” Nada muttered.

“All right.” Moms indicated for the team to back up out of the cavern. “Let’s get an idea of what we’re going into before stepping into it. It looks like that thing is going away, so that’s good. I guess.”

Nada gestured. “Kirk. Mac. Maintain overwatch that way.” He indicated the cavern.

The two Nightstalkers had their weapons at the ready, pointed in.

The rest gathered in a circle around Edith and the Keep.

Scout was back by the cavern entrance between Kirk and Mac and the rest of the team, part of the group, but separate. She wasn’t sure of her role, so she figured she’d do what they had recruited her for in the first place: Scout. Which right now meant watch and observe.

“What do you remember?” the Keep asked Edith.

She shook her head. “I know my name. But I don’t really know where I am right now.”

“The Time Patrol,” the Keep nudged.

“Sounds vaguely familiar.”

“And?” the Keep asked.

Edith shrugged. “That’s it. I did what I was told to do in case something happened, and so I pulled the alarm. Beyond that, I’m having a hard time remembering clearly.” Edith struggled, working her jaw, but she remained frustrated. She pressed both hands against the sides of her head. “I know it! I know I know something about this place. But I can’t remember what!”

Moms put a hand on her shoulder. “Calm down. Let’s back up. Why here? Why are you here underneath the Met?”

Edith blinked and nodded vigorously, touching on something she could access. “I track the art.”

“Why?” Moms asked.

“I don’t know. But I went to Columbia and majored in art and history.”

“Art
is
history,” Eagle contributed. “A record of it.”

Nada took half a step forward as if to say something, but stopped. Behind him, Scout felt a chill touch her back, sliding up her spine and lifting the hairs on the back of her neck. She looked over her shoulder into the darkness of the cavern, but could detect nothing. Of course it was dark in there. Darker than anything Scout had ever seen. The black wall sucked in what scant light there was. But it was further away, receding and shrinking, so she wondered why she felt worse. Sick to her stomach. Kirk and Mac were sweeping their weapons back and forth, quartering the floor of the cavern with the high-powered lights on the guardrails of their artillery.

“Hey guys,” Scout said. “Why don’t we discuss this upstairs?”

No one paid attention to her, except for Nada, who frowned and moved out of the circle close around Edith and stood next to Scout.

“And if the art or history changes?” the Keep asked.

“That’s called a . . .” Edith stopped short of the answer. She closed her eyes, trying to remember.

“Nada,” Scout whispered.

Nada leaned close. “Yes?”

“We need to get out of here.” Scout looked over her shoulder into the cavern. “There’s something bad in there. Something bad coming this way.”

“ ‘Coming’?” Nada repeated. He turned around. He flicked on the light underneath the barrel of his submachine gun and aimed into the darkness. The thin finger of light was sucked into the black wall, but it was still shrinking. “Anything?” he asked the overwatch team.

“Negative,” Mac said.

“What kind of bad?” Nada asked Scout.

“Bad bad,” Scout said. “Stay Puft Marshmallow Man bad. Do I get a gun?”

“Surprised you didn’t ask earlier,” Nada said.

“Surprised no one gave me one earlier,” Scout said. “I qualified on everything they handed me in training.”

But then a look crossed Nada’s face and he hesitated. He swallowed hard. “All right. Take my pistol. But be damn careful with it, Scout. It’s not a toy.”

Scout stared at him for a moment. “I know it’s not a toy.” She grabbed the pistol out of the cross hand holster on Nada’s combat vest. She pulled the slide back slightly, confirming, as she expected, that there was a round in the chamber. The safety was off. “My finger is my safety,” Scout whispered.

“Always,” Nada said.

“Excuse me,” the Keep called out, interrupting the dead-end questioning of Edith Frobish. “What are you two doing?” The Keep was closest to the guard station, having let the operatives take the lead entering the facility.

“Scout says there’s something bad in there,” Nada said. “Kirk. Get me some more light.”

Kirk took a step forward and fired a flare upward into the cavern.

It hit something less than five feet in front of and above him and bounced back, missing Kirk’s head by a fraction of an inch, and skittering ablaze down the corridor.

A moment later a spear darted forward, piercing through Kirk’s body armor and impaling him. He was lifted up, his body sliding down the haft of the spear. A clawed hand reached down from above, grabbing the top of Kirk’s head as he disappeared upward.

Nada and Scout fired at the same moment. A tall figure was swooping up, holding Kirk in one claw, twenty feet above the cavern floor, while the other held the spear. It was over seven feet in height, encased in white armor, with a red cloak swirling about. Blood red hair crested over shoulders. Two red bulging bulbs instead of eyes. No mouth.

It was hovering about five feet over the ground.

Kirk was screaming, while both hands were on the claw, trying to keep his head from being ripped off his body.

Nada and Scout kept firing, bullets flashing close by Kirk. The creature emitted what could only be described as a scream, a sound that cut into everyone’s core and caused even the stoutest Nightstalker to take a step back.

The thing let go of the spear and sliced with its other claw, passing right through Kirk’s body armor and body, cutting him in two. The separate parts of what had once been the Nightstalkers’ commo man fell to the floor.

With a deafening roar to match the scream, the rest of the Nightstalkers opened fire. Their bullets slammed into the creature, having little apparent effect. The Keep hung back in the hallway, weaponless and with no experience in this type of event.

Mac fired the 40 mm HE grenade loaded in his launcher and hit the thing right in the chest. The round exploded, dangerously close (arming distance having been modified by Roland), and the thing was finally knocked back, the team momentarily stunned.

Momentarily, and then the fusillade began again.

The thing hovered, motionless, bullets bouncing off the hard white.

Without Moms or Nada issuing an order, the team was moving forward, vengeance for Kirk drawing them into the cavern. Magazines ran out and new ones were slammed home.

“Eyes,” Nada yelled, as he pulled the trigger of his sub, 9 mm bullets hitting the red bulges. Moms followed suit and her larger and more powerful 7.62 rifle rounds punched home. A spark of red exploded from the right bulge and the thing screamed once more, abruptly accelerating backward into the blackness of the cavern, heading for the shrinking patch of absolute darkness near the top.

“No, you don’t!” Nada shouted.

Again without an order, training and vengeance the driving forces, the team quickly moved forward as Doc knelt next to Kirk’s remains. Mac picked up the flare gun and fired another one ahead of them.

The creature was racing away now, toward the darkness. The team began to run as they fired, maintaining a semblance of discipline, fanning out to ensure they kept each other’s field of fire clear. Their rounds were beginning to chip off pieces of white and the creature was turned away, protecting its eyes.

Finally just before it reached the blackness, it turned once more. One eye was completely shattered and, within seconds, so was the second.

“Pour it on!” Nada yelled, and the team did just that. “Mac!” Nada ordered. “Thermobaric!”

Mac grabbed the correct grenade round on his vest by instinct, developed through many hours on the range in live fire exercises, and slammed it home into the breach of the launcher. Developed for combat in Afghanistan, upon detonation the round used oxygen to initiate an intense, high-temp explosion, which was more powerful and lasted longer than a conventional round. Mac loaded and fired.

The round exploded and blew off the thing’s right arm.

It remained perfectly still for a moment, and then the thing simply dropped and slammed to the floor.

The team ceased fire.

And the darkness stopped shrinking.

Nada had the light underneath his smoking barrel pointed at the blackness. It was now about ten feet high and six feet wide, fifteen feet above the floor of the cavern.

“It was trying to go through that,” Scout said.

“ ‘Through’?” Moms said.

“Like a Rift,” Scout said.

“Doc,” Moms ordered, emotions shut down and in combat mode. “Check it out. Nothing you can do for Kirk now.”

“Secure the rest of the cavern,” Nada ordered. He moved forward with Scout on one side and Moms on the other. The rest of the Nightstalkers moved out, checking every crevice in the place while Doc opened up his laptop underneath the dark rectangle and plugged in his handheld scanner.

“I need a bigger gun,” Scout said, a tremor in her voice as she and Nada reached the thing and stood over it.

“We all need bigger guns or bigger bullets.” Nada fired two rounds into the hole where one of the red bulges had been, a double-tap. “I think it’s dead.”

“What
is
it?” Scout asked.

“Doc?” Moms asked. “Is that a Rift?”

Doc was looking from his laptop screen and up to the black rectangle, and then back to the screen. “I don’t know. Something like a Rift, but not like any I’ve ever seen. Nor is it giving off any of the usual indicators other than a low-level muonic emission. Surprised the Can back at Area 51 didn’t pick it up. Very localized, as if the power is under tight control. I’d have to send a probe into it to learn more.”

“Negative,” the Keep said. “Not until we know everything we can about it from our sources here.”

“We fall back for now,” Moms ordered. “Send in a Support team to pick this thing up and analyze it. Secure the chamber and that gate as best we can until we get an idea what the hell we’re dealing with.”

“Roger that,” Nada agreed.

The team pulled back, several with anxious glances up at the dark rectangle. Roland had unrolled a poncho and tenderly placed both halves of Kirk in it. He wrapped it closed. Without a word Mac took Roland’s weapons. Roland picked up the body, cradling it in his arms.

Carrying their dead, the Nightstalkers, along with the Keep and Edith Frobish, packed up the elevator and began the ride to the surface in silence.

It was a defeat and a retreat, and they all knew it. They’d lost one of their own and that reality was pouring into each one as the adrenaline drained out.

“Here there be Monsters,” Scout whispered, and everyone in the elevator heard her.

Nobody disagreed.