Extinction Edge

-17-

An involuntary jerk shook Kate’s body. She awoke in the same leather chair she’d slept in for countless nights. She rubbed her temples, her mind held captive by a fog that wouldn’t clear.

Kate wished that Reed was there to hold her and tell her everything would be okay, even if they both knew it was a lie. She couldn’t think of him now. She had to keep focused, for the sake of her team and Horn’s girls.

What time was it?

With a sigh, Kate rose from her chair. She moved like a zombie, slow and sluggish. If only the Variants were like the shambling undead creatures that pop culture had obsessed over. Then maybe, just maybe, the military could defeat them.

Flipping the lid on her laptop, she punched in her passcode and waited for the system to boot. She checked a wall clock as the computer loaded. It was after ten. Tasha and Jenny were probably fast asleep back in her personal quarters. She would check on them in a few minutes. But first she had something else she needed to finish.

General Kennor had issued a request for all scientific outposts to compile reports detailing new information on the Variants. He wanted to know what their weaknesses were. The two-paragraph document on Kate’s screen proved the creatures didn’t have many. There wasn’t some magical pill or treatment that would ever bring them back. And there was no easy way to kill them, besides a bullet to the head.

Sighing, Kate reached for a cup of cold coffee and slurped down a gulp. The bitter taste made her cringe. She shivered, goose bumps rising on her arms. It was so cold.

Her teeth chattered as she typed. She wanted to finish the report before going to bed. That way Cindy and Ellis could look it over in the morning. But when she got to the end of the document, she paused. The cursor blinked. She didn’t know how to finish the memo. She read it over for the fourth time.

Kate palmed her forehead. The report told Command nothing that they didn’t already know, and the one weakness they had identified was embarrassing. Sensitivity to sunlight was hardly an Achilles’ heel. The Medical Corps staff had performed grueling tests on the creatures, some bordering on torture, but none of them had revealed anything substantial. It made sense, Kate thought, considering the Variants could heal faster and didn’t seem to be bothered much by pain.

After spending her entire adult life studying medicine, it pained Kate to admit there wasn’t anything science could do to save the human race. She bit her bottom lip and then finished typing the document.

Fitz paced around the small guardhouse marked L4 with a smile on his face. It felt good to have a rifle in his hands again and the vantage point was spectacular. The eight-by-eight box had a view of the entire island. A cool spring breeze gusted through the windows. It was intoxicating. Salty, fresh. Clean. An amazing improvement from the putrid scents back at Bragg.

He took in a long breath and swung the muzzle of his M24 over the window to the east. A maze of barbwire fences zigzagged across the beach. Yellow signs warning of electric shock hung every hundred yards or so.

No one was getting through that barrier without making a lot of noise and severely shredding some flesh. He swept his rifle to the south, scoping the domed buildings.

Industrial-sized light poles lit up the center of the hexagonal post. He could see several Medical Corps guards patrolling the circular concrete path connecting the buildings. The entire place gave him the creeps. It reminded him of the Area 51 books he’d read as a kid.

Given the chance, he would have picked an alien invasion over a viral outbreak. But beggars couldn’t be choosers. That’s what his mom had always said, and he was simply glad to have a roof over his head that didn’t stink of rotting flesh.

He turned away from the base and thoughts of his parents. They were gone now, but not because of the outbreak. They had died in a car accident several years before. A month later his brother had taken friendly fire to the chest in Afghanistan. His flak jacket had done little to stop the .50 cal round. A closed-casket funeral followed. Then Fitz had lost his legs in Iraq.

He was a survivor, or as he liked to refer to himself, an anomaly. The doctors told him he should have died when the IED blew off his legs. And the truth was, he had. Flatlined four times before some medic brought him back. He’d never forgotten the look on the face of the kid who saved him. It was a mixture of shock and awe.

Fitz was the lone survivor that day; the bomb had killed everyone in his Humvee.

He had come home to a different world, and with his family gone, those first few months of recovery at Walter Reed were mentally and physically grueling. He’d considered ending his life many late nights when the whiskey ran dry and he could no longer taste the cigarettes.

But he never gave up, and now he used his strength to help inspire others. When the outbreak hit, he had been giving a speech at Fort Bragg to wounded warriors just like himself.

Gripping the rifle tighter, he thought about the irony of his situation. After losing his legs, he’d found a new way to help save American lives by preventing vets just like him from committing suicide. Now he once again found a weapon in his hand—a weapon he could operate better than ninety-nine percent of the world’s population.

He stood in the darkness, listening to the breeze and slurp of the surf. A seagull swooped down toward the waves, its gray body shimmering in the moonlight. For a beat he felt like he was on vacation at some exotic island. Fitz caught a glimpse of a blinking red light on the horizon. He quickly shouldered his M24 and scanned the skyline. Holding in a breath, he zoomed in on the sleek object. A chopper filled his scope. The bird was long and wide, with double rotors. A Chinook by the looks of it. And it was in trouble. The military transport craft was flying at a low altitude, jerking from side to side.

Punching the comm, Fitz said, “Command, this is Tower 4. I have a bogey coming in hot.”

“Copy that, Tower 4. Eagle 9 has permission to land.”

Fitz magnified his optics. The nose of the chopper lurched toward the water and then corrected. Something wasn’t right. He watched for several seconds, studying the erratic behavior.

“Command, this is Tower 4.”

Static crackled over the comm. He tried again.

“Command, this is Tower 4. Do you copy? Over.”

A panicked male voice answered. “Eagle 9 reports hostiles. I repeat, pilot reports hostiles on board.” He sounded unsure, like he didn’t quite believe what he was saying.

Had the Variants suddenly learned how to fly? “Come again, Command.”

“Eagle 9 is carrying a load of Variants for research. Pilot reports—” The line cut out and Fitz dropped his jaw in shock as flashes of light lit up the porthole windows of the incoming Chinook. Bullets punched through the side of the craft.

“Oh my God,” Fitz whispered.

A new voice came online. “All towers, this is Major Smith. Eagle 9 has been compromised. Permission to engage target if they cross into home turf airspace.”

Fitz swallowed. Engage the target? Had he heard correctly?

“Command, this is Tower 4. Come again, I missed that last transmission.”

“Tower 4, if bogey crosses into airspace, you shoot them down.”

Fitz ran a hand over his helmet. Now he knew why the FIM-92 Stinger was lying in a case on the ground. The impressive piece of machinery was designed as an anti-aircraft weapon. It would take out a Chinook with ease.

Fitz hit the comm. “Copy that.” He watched the chopper. Its trajectory hadn’t changed. The craft was on a crash course with Plum Island.

Fitz cursed. First night on the job, and he was dealing with a crisis. When Major Smith had handed him his assignment, he had been ecstatic, but shooting down a chopper—even if it had hostiles on board—sent a chill down his spine. He thought of his brother and the friendly fire that had taken his life.

Friendly goddamned fire, he thought. Fitz didn’t know if he could do it.

The bird swooped low and then pulled high like the pilot was trying to shake something. More gunfire tore through the side of the bird.

Fitz rested his M24 against the wall and then reached for the case to the Stinger with urgency. He’d only fired the weapon once, back in Iraq when a suspected insurgent vehicle was racing toward their post. The Honda had burst into a flaming heap of twisted metal. It was overkill, but it ended up saving countless American and Iraqi lives.

Fitz remembered the promise he’d made to Beckham. He had to protect the island. Grabbing the launcher, he hefted it onto his shoulder. He was running out of time. The Chinook flew low over the water, on a crash course with the island.

A missile streaked out of Tower 2. The shot arced across the night and went wide, narrowly missing the tail of the craft and curving out over the ocean.

The radio came to life a second later; Major Smith’s tone was panicked and angry. “All towers, take out that fucking bird!”

Fitz aimed and waited for the sight to line up. He said a mental prayer and then pulled the trigger. The missile joined a trio of other shots that roared through the night. Dropping the launcher, he watched as two of the missiles hit the Chinook. The bird shook violently, orange explosions bursting from the nose and side of the craft.

Shielding his eyes, he braced himself against the wall of his tower as the chopper spun out of control. The rotors whined in protest. Fire rained from the shaking craft. By some miracle the pilot was able to crash-land on the tarmac. The belly hit the concrete with a crunch and then rolled on its side, screeching across the concrete. The rotor blades came apart, boomeranging in all directions. One of the shards whizzed by Tower 4 just as Fitz dropped to the deck. The small box shook and rumbled as more explosions rocked the Chinook.

Fitz pulled himself up and watched in awe. The flaming mess of ruined metal skidded across the runway, sparks and fire trailing the bird, until it finally ground to a stop.

“Jesus,” Fitz said as he took in the destruction. Grabbing his rifle, he glassed the ruined aircraft. Fire streamed out of the cockpit. One of the missiles had peeled the roof back like the skin of an orange, exposing the smoldering interior.

He lined the crosshairs up with the back of the craft. The cargo door was wide open. Another explosion sent a fireball into the air.

Something moved at the rear of the craft.

No one could have survived the crash, Fitz thought, sweeping the gun over the craft. But something was definitely moving. Silhouettes. Three of them.

No, six. Fitz felt his heart racing. He zoomed in on the smoldering bodies piling out of the back of the Chinook.

And then he saw the others.

A dozen of the creatures galloped down the runway toward the aircraft. He hadn’t seen them before, but they must have jumped out of the back when the bird was going down.

Fitz swung his rifle back toward the wreckage. Two of the creatures were still on fire, rolling on the concrete.

The screaming noise of an emergency siren wailed. Major Smith’s voice spilled over the radio, barking orders. Fitz watched as the Variants formed a group and then took off in a mad dash toward the domed buildings. Their bodies jerked as they moved, flickering in the garish light of the burning chopper.

Three seconds passed before the shock wore off. And then Fitz did what he was best at. He raised his rifle and squeezed the trigger.

“Ten missing. Two confirmed KIA,” Lieutenant Gates said with a groan from the passenger seat. “And we’re only halfway to the coordinates for our main attack.”

Beckham and Jensen sat in the backseat of the lieutenant’s Humvee, tense and nervous. Both men wanted to be out on the street with their team, not sitting in the safety of the armored vehicle. But Gates had asked for a SITREP.

The longer Beckham sat inside the cramped, dark interior of the truck, the more he wondered if Gates was actually looking for reassurance. That was something Beckham couldn’t give him. He kept silent, keeping an eye on the street as Jensen and Gates spoke.

Jensen shifted in his seat. He made no attempt to conceal his irritation. “I told General Kennor myself that there were hundreds of thousands of those things unaccounted for. The man didn’t listen.”

The convoy was fucked. They were lucky to have survived the first Variant ambush. If Beckham were in charge, he would have ordered 1^st Platoon to turn, run, and call in the Air Force to blow the shit out of the subways, sewers, and every other dark hole beneath New York.

There was a vast network of tunnels snaking for hundreds of miles beneath the city. Like Rome, New York was built on top of old buildings and foundations. There was no way to know exactly where the Variants were without deploying teams. The best thing—the only thing—was to burn it down and salt the earth.

A tremor rattled the Humvee and Beckham watched through the filthy windshield as the Bradleys tag-teamed a CNN Satellite truck. Steam Beast smashed the vehicle onto the sidewalk with grace and Beckham smiled, overcome by a small sense of pride. He still couldn’t believe the young track commander had made it by the tanker a few streets back.

Gates cleared his throat. “Are we sure the Variants are hiding underground?”

Jensen played with his mustache, plucking out pieces of dry blood and flicking them onto the floor. “What do you think, Master Sergeant?”

Beckham thought he wanted to smack Gates in the face. But no matter how hard he hit him, there was no knocking sense into an inexperienced commander. Battlefield smarts wasn’t something you could magically pull from a hat. Even worse were the fuck-ups behind Operation Liberty. General Kennor and his staff had jumped the gun. To make things even worse, the acting president was so desperate to take back the streets that he had gambled with what was left of the United States military and given General Kennor the green light to do whatever he wanted.

Gritting his teeth, Beckham said, “Sir, I have no doubts. Get Central on the horn. Request an extraction and an air strike. They need to drop bombs into every fucking hole in the city.”

Gates shook his head incredulously. “I already told General Kennor. He isn’t listening. He said the other platoons are working their way to their FOBs as we speak. Maybe the Variants are only using the tunnels in Manhattan.”

“That’s bullshit. Sir.” Grabbing the door handle, Beckham clicked it open and tapped the driver seat. “Hold up.”

The Humvee rolled to a stop.

Gates shot him a glare. “Where are you going?”

“If Kennor is going to get us all killed, then I’m going to die with my men, where I belong.”