Dead Team Alpha (Book 2): The Stronghold Read online

  The Mates watch Scotty until he is around a bend and lost from sight. They can’t help but flinch when he fires the first round where they can’t see him. It takes about twenty minutes, but soon all of the Zs have filtered out of the compound and are on the road moving towards the sound of the now far-off gunfire.

  “That’s ten rounds,” Henshaw says. “We better hurry so he has three left.”

  The Mates rush down from the overhang, using their blades and sharpened collapsible batons to put down the few stragglers that just couldn’t get it together enough to follow the crowd.

  “Always the rebels left behind,” Stanford says as he jams his knife through the temple of a tall, bone-thin man dressed in the remnants of an MP’s uniform.

  “You mean the slackers,” Cole says, dispatching a couple of Zs that look like they may have been cooks, their whites long since stained to a deep brown by their bodily fluids. “Only you would call them rebels.”

  “Only you would call them slackers,” Stanford says.

  “And only me would kill them without having to whip my dick out and show it to everyone,” Val says as she stabs three Zs in a row, kicking their bodies aside as she follows Sister up the winding access road to the main doors of the facility. “Come on, boys. Grown up time.”

  “You know, we’re both TLs, Val,” Stanford says. “You should talk with more respect. I expect a sir out of you from now on.”

  “Teams don’t exist anymore, Ford,” Val says. “We’re all just doomed Mates now.”

  “Awesome,” Alastair says as he stabs a Z then shoves it against another one to give him time to yank his baton free. He stabs the second one and flicks the gore from the tip. “The doomed part really helps the situation.”

  “Telling it like it is,” Val laughs.

  “Preach it, sister,” Sister says, her hands in the air. “Hallelujah.”

  They arrive at the doors to the facility and everyone stops except for Sister. After a couple seconds, she realizes no one is following and she spins about.

  “Hello? We have to go inside, ya know,” she says.

  “You said doors,” Cole says. “These are some big doors.”

  They all stare at the opening which is at least one hundred and fifty feet high and just as wide. The doors stand open, pushed against the massive walls outside the facility, each at least ten feet thick with recessed round bars in their middles. Corresponding holes are set between the bars, showing everyone that when the Cheyenne Mountain facility is locked down, its stays locked down.

  “How did you get these open?” Cole asks.

  “I had the code,” Sister says.

  There are few moans that echo to them from inside and Sister taps her foot impatiently.

  “Are we doing this? Yes or no?” she asks.

  “Yes,” Cole says and marches towards her, his M-4 up.

  He fires a shot into the air. Everyone waits a minute then they hear Scotty fire two shots, one after the other. Then a third shot only a second later.

  “Shit,” Cole says. “He must have gotten trapped. We better hurry our asses inside.”

  “Good plan, genius,” Sister says. “Y’all coming?”

  Cole rushes up to her and inside the facility. The rest follow behind him and they are quickly swallowed whole by the mountainside.

  ***

  Diaz drops a Z with a shot from his carbine then turns and drops a second one.

  “I thought the place was going to be cleared out!” Diaz shouts as he fires a third time. “This is not cleared out!”

  “How much farther to go?” Shep yells as he drops his third Z. He steps back from a fourth that almost grabs him and kicks the thing in the knee, shattering its leg and sending it falling to the ground. One stomp and it is silenced. “We’ve had to be walking for at least a mile now.”

  Lucky for the Mates, the huge concrete tunnel they are in has lights strung along the walls and ceiling. Only every third or fourth bulb works, but it’s enough to see and fight by.

  “About four more miles,” Sister says as she snaps a Z’s neck and throws it into two more coming for her.

  She leaps into the air and breaks one’s skull open. When she comes down, she goes into a roll and comes up with her shoulder buried in the third’s belly. She lifts it off the ground and rams it into the wall, crushing it into a useless pile of undead flesh and splintered bones. It hisses at her, but that’s about the only part of it that still works.

  A shot from her boot heel and the thing stops moving.

  “Did you say four miles?” Cole asks, having shot five Zs and elbowed another hard enough its brains shot out its ear. It helped that half its skull was already hanging against its neck, barely connected by a couple threads of flesh. “Four miles?”

  “Yep,” Sister says, wiping her boot heel against the concrete ground. “They weren’t fucking around when they wanted to secure a place. Five miles in and then another set of doors just like the ones at the main entrance.”

  “Are those open too?” Val asks.

  “Sure are, little lady,” Sister says in a bad cowpoke voice. “Wide open so the cattle can roam free.”

  “You are fucked up,” Stanford says. “Let’s keep moving. Four miles is not a fun stretch.”

  “At least you don’t have to deal with the trip wires and other booby traps the Code Monkeys set up,” Sisters says. “You are welcome.”

  “We’re making a lot of noise,” Henshaw says. “When can we close the outer doors?”

  “Not from inside the control room,” Sister says. “Control lines to the exterior doors rotted out a long time ago.”

  “Where the hell is this place getting its power from?” Alastair asks, wiping gore from his vest. “No way it can be running off of old fuel.”

  “Geothermal generator,” Sister says. She’s met with a few blank stares. “The Earth’s energy. They used to drill deep, deep holes down into the earth and use the natural heat to generate electricity via a bunch of pipes and machines and shit that goes vroom.”

  “She sounded intelligent for a second until the shit that goes vroom part,” Stanford says.

  “We’ll see how intelligent you sound talking through a mouth without teeth,” Sister sighs. “You can really be a rude jerk, Stanford Lee. Fucking knock it off.”

  “Damn!” Diaz laughs and is joined by almost everyone. “She put you down, dude!”

  They keep walking for a couple miles, all thankful they only run into a stray Z here and there.

  It’s only a few more minutes before Tommy Bombs holds up a hand. “Hey? You hear that?”

  Everyone stops and listens.

  “Zs?” Shep asks, his voice low so it doesn’t echo in the tunnel. “Probably just more stragglers.”

  “No, no, it’s not footsteps or anything like that,” Tommy Bombs says. “It sounds like machinery.”

  They listen, but except for a couple of moans far, far behind them, they hear nothing.

  “Never mind,” Tommy Bombs says, pointing at his ears. “Years of working with explosives means my ears are shit.”

  “I haven’t found that to be true,” Stanford says. “Stay alert, TB. You hear anything else, let us know ASAP.”

  “Will do, TL,” Tommy Bombs replies, obviously happy that Stanford gave him a compliment.

  “Not too many times,” Alastair says as he and Diaz pick up the crate with the phosphorous bombs. “This thing gets heavier every time we fucking stop.”

  “That was nice of you,” Val whispers as she sidles up to her cousin.

  “I know how to work with my people, Val,” Stanford says. “I’m not the rude jerk everyone always thinks I am.”

  “No, that’s really Cole,” Val snickers. “Sister got it wrong.”

  “I can hear you,” Cole calls back from his position next to Sister.

  They get another half mile before Tommy Bombs holds his hand up once more. “You guys can’t hear that?”

  This time they do and everyone tur
ns in circles, all trying to pinpoint the direction of the noise. Alastair and Diaz swear under their breath as they set the crate down yet again.

  “It’s coming from ahead,” Cole says. “Maybe some Zs banging around in the facility?”

  “Zs in the facility,” Sister mutters then her eyes go wide. “No! It’s not Zs! Shit!”

  She takes off running and is gone from sight as she sprints around a bend in the tunnel.

  “God dammit!” Cole yells as he takes off after the woman.

  Everyone else moves as fast as they can, hurrying to keep up with Cole and Sister. They jog for a half mile and then come face to face with the interior facility doors. Which are shut tight. Several red lights spin above the doors, bathing the tunnel in a revolving, bloody glow.

  “No! No, no, no!” Sister yells as she pounds her fists against the closed doors. “Those shit fuckers! Those lousy, son of a bitch, shit fuckers! Why did they close the doors? There was no need to close the doors!”

  “Who are the shit fuckers we’re mad at?” Stanford asks.

  “Code Monkeys,” Sister says. “They’re already here and heard us coming. But they wouldn’t need to close the doors. Code Monkeys fight. They kill. They’d love it for us to walk inside into an ambush.”

  “Maybe it isn’t Code Monkeys,” Cole suggests. “Maybe someone else got in there.”

  “Do you need a code to close the doors?” Val asks.

  “No,” Sister says. “In an emergency, anyone can close them. Just slam a hand on a button and shut they go.”

  “Okay, so if Code Monkeys wouldn’t close it then who did?” Henshaw asks.

  “Cannies,” Sister snarls, her shoulders slumping. “Fucking cannies, of course.”

  “Or crazies,” Shep says. “Could be ordinary wasteland crazies that stumbled upon this place and found the doors wide open.”

  “Nope,” Sister says. “It’s cannies. I know it is. They found a road and followed it because cannies do that. They follow roads because roads mean people and people mean food.”

  “Yeah, we know how the whole canny thing works,” Stanford says. “But how can you be sure it’s cannies?”

  “Because I can smell them now,” Sister says. She raises her nose and takes a long sniff. “Yeah. It’s cannies. Motherfucking cannies.”

  “Hey guys,” Alastair calls from behind them all.

  “Just set the crate down, Al,” Cole says without turning around. “We’re going to be here a while.”

  “Yeah, we left the crate back there,” Diaz says. “We brought something else.”

  “What?” Cole asks and everyone turns around.

  Alastair and Diaz are on their knees, completely stripped of all weapons and equipment. Standing behind them, with blades to their necks, is a row of eyeless people.

  “See,” Sister says. “There’re the damn Code Monkeys.”

  From the line of Code Monkeys, Skye steps forward. She lifts a long blade and points it directly at Sister.

  “Nice coat,” Sister glares.

  “Put your weapons down,” Skye orders.

  “Yeah, probably not going to happen,” Cole says, his M-4 trained on her.

  All of the Mates have their carbines up and pointed at the Code Monkeys.

  “There are six of you and eleven of us,” Cole says. “We have guns, you don’t.”

  “We don’t need guns,” Skye says. “We have proven that before.”

  “They really don’t need guns,” Sister says.

  “I know. I’ve seen what they can do,” Cole says. “I watched them kill my friends and neighbors. Time for that debt to be repaid.”

  “Hold on,” Sister says. “If they wanted to fight then they would have killed Alastair and Diaz. They didn’t.” She looks at Skye. “What do you want?”

  “Answers,” Skye says.

  “That’s all? Because I want like three days to soak in a hot tub and drink wine and eat chocolate,” Sister says. “I miss wine and chocolate.”

  “What the hell is she talking about?” Val asks Stanford.

  “No clue,” Stanford replies.

  “Okay, enough daydreams,” Sister says. “You want answers, Skye? Then that means you have questions. Lay them on me.”

  “You gave us the rest of the codes. Why?” Skye asks.

  “Huh? What do you mean?” Sister replies, but she sounds less than sincere. “You took my coat, Skye. I had them sewn into the sleeve. I didn’t exactly give them to you.”

  “You wanted us to find them. Why?” Skye asks.

  Sister starts to protest then shrugs. “Oh, fuck it. Yeah, I gave them to you. You were supposed to use them to prep the launch sequences so all I had to do was come here with the second genetic match and press the damn button.”

  “You are not part of the way,” Skye says. “Why do you consort with a Team yet still want to bring about the end to everything?”

  “Who said I want to bring about the end of everything?” Sister responds. “I just want to nuke the country, that’s all. Is that so wrong?”

  “When you say it that way, it is,” Stanford whispers.

  “Shut up,” Val mutters.

  “Valencia Baptiste,” Skye says. “Your mother was a strong fighter. She could have been one of us if she was born into the right family.”

  “I don’t think so,” Val says.

  “Let my guys go,” Cole says. “No need to hurt them. You let them go and there’s no need for us to hurt you.”

  “In this shit, we’re on the same side,” Sister says. “So everybody chill the fuck out.”

  “I don’t know about that,” Skye says. “You still have some convincing to do.”

  “Listen, Skye, sugar,” Sister says. “There are fucking cannies inside the facility doing who the fuck knows what to all the equipment. The longer they’re in there, the longer they screw things up. I say we call a truce and kick their asses then we can sit down and figure out where we stand with each other.”

  Skye says nothing. None of the Code Monkeys lower their blades, especially the blades being held to Alastair and Diaz’s throats.

  “Skye? Hello?” Sister says.

  “Perhaps,” Skye says finally. “But you must follow us.”

  “Where to?” Cole asks.

  “To the other entrance,” Skye replies. “Our entrance.”

  “We can do that,” Sister says. “Uh, where is your entrance? Because I have been having a shit fuck of a time trying to find it.”

  “Back the other way,” Skye says. “Outside.”

  “Through the herd?” Sister asks.

  “Through the herd,” Skye replies, smiling like a psychotic toddler that just killed her nanny for a candy bar.

  “Yeah,” Sister sighs. “I was afraid of that.”

  Chapter Nine- Down the Rabid Hole

  “It’s in the middle of that?” Cole asks, pointing from the hillside down at the herd of hundreds of thousands of Zs that fill Peterson Air Force Base. “How the fuck are we supposed to get through that shit to get to your secret entrance?”

  “Damn, they took this place down fast,” Diaz says. “What the hell?”

  “There’s a connecting tunnel!” Sister nearly shouts as she slaps her forehead. “Duh. That’s how you have been getting into the Cheyenne facility without me being able to figure it out.”

  Skye tilts her head and smiles.

  “We prefer the dark,” Skye says. “You should have guessed.Sister.”

  Sister glares hard in Skye’s direction even though the eyeless woman cannot see her.

  “How did so many get inside the fence line?” Val asks. “You had this place pretty secure.”

  “It is impossible to stop nature,” Skye says. “The will of the Earth is not something one puts up a fence against.”

  “I don’t think the Earth has anything to do with this crap,” Stanford says. “Hell might. But not the Earth.”

  “Cole, we can’t stand here forever,” Henshaw warns.

&nb
sp; “She’s right,” Lang says. “We have company.”

  Everyone except the Code Monkeys turn around to see a long line of Zs marching their way. They have split off from the main herd which is less than a quarter mile from the hill they stand on and twists around the landscape to fill the AFB. Through sheer determination, and some uncanny guidance from the Code Monkeys, the Mates were able to find a narrow avenue of semi-safe passage and make it this far.

  That semi-safe passage is gone.

  “We’re surrounded, TL,” Tommy Bombs says to Stanford, a pair of binoculars to his eyes. He lowers them and shakes his head. “We can’t get back to Cheyenne if we want to.”

  “Then you people better be on the fucking level,” Cole says, pointing at Skye. He looks at his finger, at her eyeless sockets, back at his finger, and lowers it. “If this is a trap then we plan on taking as many of you down as possible.”

  “If it was a trap, TL Wright, then you would be dead,” Skye sighs. “You are one tedious man. And pointing is rude.”

  Cole frowns then shakes his head. “Whatever. How do we get through that to your hatch?”

  “You were watching us,” Skye says and grins. “That means you have promise. We did not detect your observation. Perhaps you won’t die as quickly as I thought.”

  Cole starts to raise his weapon, but Sister places a hand on his arm and shakes her head.

  “She’s shit fucking with you,” Sister says. “Messing with your head to see how you hold up. Code Monkeys are head-messers. It’s what they do.”

  “Let’s cut the psychological warfare bullshit, okay?” Stanford snaps. “I’ve dealt with that shit my whole life. How do we get through that herd and to your fucking hatch so we can find your secret tunnel, sneak back into the Cheyenne facility, and kill some cannies?”

  “Then press a button and blow up the world,” Val says. “Don’t forget that part, Ford.”

  “Yeah, that part too,” Stanford says. “Whee.”