“That must be Elise’s cell,” Daniel offered.
“Maybe. What if it’s a berserk gorilla with the XH in it they are keeping for experimentation?”
“Ugh,” Daniel said. “Yeah, point taken. We can’t be sure. All we know is it’s built to keep something in, not out.”
“Jury-rigged for that, anyway. So we clear the rest of the building and tackle that door last, with more information.” Zeke’s tone brooked no argument.
Daniel nodded in agreement.
Zeke called softly, “Zeke to Larry. We’re changing to the right side of the corridor. Emerging left.”
They moved out into the corridor and Larry moved behind them up to the open door of the bunkroom. They went back to the windowless door on the right side of the corridor. It turned out to be a half-full storeroom with lab supplies and machinery in it, unlocked. They came back out.
Edging up the right side to the next door, Zeke looked in the dark window for a long moment. He shook his head, unable to see anything. He reached over to test the door handle. It turned. He pressed it gently inward, and it opened a tiny bit. He nodded, then gave a three count with his fingers; one-two-three and in they went.
Murphy always wins, they say. Nothing ever goes smooth. All hell seemed to break loose inside that room. Screeching sounds, zoo sounds, howls and a clattering of metal together. Something soft and smelly spattered on the wall next to Daniel, and it was only lack of targets in the dark that kept him from firing.
He flipped on the light.
Monkeys. Apes, animal figures in cages stacked along the far wall, and a never-ending racket.
***
Elise heard the sudden commotion in the next room. The lab animals were all going...well...ape. Maybe it was Miguel after all, trying to mess with her by provoking the animals. Maybe they had changed their shift times.
She pushed her chair away from the screen and stood up, mentally preparing herself to have it out with Miguel for screwing with the chimps. She knew Durgan would be on her side on this one.
***
“We’re blown,” Zeke spoke into his mike. “Execute Bravo.” That was plan B. Always good to have one of those, because Plan A never survived contact with the enemy, or even with Murphy.
Zeke led the way back into the corridor, fast. They hugged the right wall to the lighted-window door and Zeke dove across the doorway to the other side, low, below line of sight. From there he reached up to the door handle, gave a quick three-count and went in low from that side, flowing around to the left.
Daniel went in right and higher, trusting to his helmet, vest and XH. He was the biggest target, and an alert enemy would have had ten seconds to prepare.
He saw Elise standing inside, her mouth agape, getting ready to yell. Daniel held up his left index finger to his lips in an emphatic gesture for silence. He closed with her quickly, crossing the big laboratory in two long seconds, still holding the finger to his lips. A rush of emotion swept through him even while he was supposed to be paying attention to the mission. So good to see her; thank God she’s all right.
Elise’s face whitened with shock. In the middle of the night, she seemed slow to react, slow to realize just what was going on. Daniel imagined her dull brain just had time to register the face-painted and heavily armed men bursting in before one of them charged her.
She backed up in reflexive alarm, but not fast enough, and Daniel let his M4 fall to his side on its retractable sling to free up his hands, making the “shush” sign the whole time. Funny how most people obey emphatic, familiar signals, he thought.
She stared stupidly at him with obvious disbelief. Finally she seemed to recognize him.
Daniel gently tackled her in a modified martial arts move he dredged out of his subconscious, which ended up with them both on the ground out of sight behind a big heavy lab bench. He covered her mouth with his hand and said into her ear, “Stay down, don’t interfere. This is a rescue.” He was so close he could smell her perfume, her skin.
She nodded, her eyes wide. “Daniel, thank God,” she breathed.
He absorbed her big blue eyes, the splash of freckles across her nose, her auburn hair, and a delicate scent that made his mouth dry up like a lovestruck teenager. He started to get dizzy. Oh God please no. Not now. He had the weirdest feeling, like he had known her all his life and she had known him too, déjà vu times two. With an effort of will he pushed her and the feelings away and went back to the job.
As he was turning back toward the door, gunfire exploded in the corridor.
He saw Larry, framed in the doorway, open up with his AA-12. Shots roared out as he walked the gun from floor to ceiling, shooting at something down the corridor to the right. The recoil kept the barrel climbing up, up and then all the way over with his hand spasm-locked on the trigger.
Time seemed to slow down with Daniel’s adrenaline surge, and he saw pieces of Larry’s armor blowing off in chunks as return fire slammed him. It was something big and heavy and deadly, because he saw Larry’s back plate lifted off his body and flap like a sail as something went all the way through him from the front.
Larry! Daniel’s whole being launched forward like a Border Collie bolting for a frisbee, every reason for his existence condensed into one pure moment, driving for the goal. That Others May Live thundered in his head as he sprinted for the doorway. He saw the big man’s automatic shotgun stop firing and fall out of his hands, and then Larry crumpled to his knees, going down slow and heavy.
Before the wounded man hit the floor Daniel threw his body into the kill zone, between his comrade and the shooter. He wrapped his hands behind Larry’s neck, grabbing the carrying handle of his armor between his shoulder blades.
Daniel felt a hot tearing burn in his thigh and then in his side below his ribs as bullets ripped through him. One round hit the SAPI plate in the center of his back and punched like a fist into his spine, but the armor held. Daniel ignored everything but the job, just glad the shots weren’t hitting Larry.
As soon as he had a grip Daniel put up a foot against the opposite wall, pushing off of it like a gymnast. He threw his whole weight back through the doorway into the lab, dragging his wounded teammate with it and out of the line of fire. Daniel screamed with effort and pain. His leg filled with liquid fire and his muscles burned.
Scrabbling on the floor, he dragged Larry backward as if he was in a strongman competition. He frantically hauled and lifted and jerked almost four hundred pounds of gear and bloody dying man back behind the heavy lab bench. Daniel dropped him, popped the quick-release on his ruck and pulled out his aid bag; he went to work, ignoring his own wounds and his suddenly acute need for food.
Elise rushed to Daniel’s side, but her face turned queasy as she saw the blood pouring out of the big man’s body.
Zeke took the door position and yelled on the net, “Hostile, hostile, southwest corner room. Man down, man down. Skull, put a few rounds through the corner of the building.”
Immediately they heard heavy, measured popping sounds begin, metallic and deadly, rifle rounds punching through the thin lab walls. They hoped Skull knew where he was aiming.
Daniel glanced up over the bleeding mess to meet Elise’s eyes, kneeling there. She looked horrified. Nothing I can do about that now.
He pulled out Gramps’ blade and she shrank back, but he ignored her and cut the body armor off of Larry. The knife sliced through the armor’s straps and seams and in ten seconds he had the man’s shell off in pieces. Daniel’s hands moved with the practiced speed of his younger days as he slid the pig-sticker back into its sheath and ran his hands over Larry’s body, searching for the trauma in his flesh. He would have to let the other three deal with the hostile if he was going to save Larry’s life.