The sound of it rolled ahead of the oncoming lights and reached the watchers on the walls. They all ran to meet the vehicle. Everyone was excited but armed in case this was some new trick by Captain Collins and her Rat Catchers. Benny stood, sword drawn, next to Karen; Alethea had Rainbow Smite ready. A few people leveled shotguns or pistols at the vehicle, which slowed to a skidding, sloppy halt just outside the gates. The passenger door popped open, and a figure stepped out, hands raised.
“No, it’s me! It’s Gutsy!”
63
SAM RODE IN FRONT TO scout the trail, but then he suddenly reined in his horse and raised a clenched fist in the military signal to stop.
Ledger waited, and then Sam waved him up. They stood in the shadows of some pine trees and looked down the slope to a small group of industrial-looking buildings just off the left-hand side of the road. Both men pulled out their binoculars.
The moon was so bright that they could easily see that the weeds in one spot along the side of the road had been battered down, leaving a gap about five feet wide. They glanced at each other, and Ledger felt a flare of hope ignite in his chest.
They tied the horses to the trees and crept down the slope, making maximum use of cover. As they drew close, they saw that the weeds were newly crushed, and that running past them were the unmistakable tire tracks of a quad.
“This is it,” said Ledger quietly, but with obvious excitement in his voice. “This has to be Site B.”
They studied the buildings and saw neither cameras nor motion sensors. Everything was still. So they approached the nearest structure, sticking to corner angles to reduce visibility of them from windows.
The tread marks of the quad’s fat rubber tires led them across the dusty and overgrown parking lot, but they ended, unhelpfully, at an ordinary-looking steel garage door with a few nondescript trucks parked near it. The fiction they sold was that this was some minor factory in the middle of nowhere, and everything was business as usual. At least, that had been the cover story before the dead rose.
Sam kept watch with the sniper rifle while Ledger tried the big roll-down door and the smaller standard door beside it. Both were sturdily made and locked solid. It wasn’t necessary for either of them to speculate on whether this was merely a front, or that beyond the facade there would be a much more sophisticated entrance, possibly a steel hatch or airlock. Instead, Ledger went to work on the exterior door. Picking locks was something any special ops soldier knew how to do, though this lock was particularly tricky. It took him nearly fifteen minutes to tease the tumblers into the right angles using a set of lock picks he always carried. The door clicked, and both men fanned back as it swung open.
No shots. No alarms. No movement.
“A very cliché movie line keeps playing over and over in my head,” murmured Ledger.
“Oh? Which one?”
“I have a bad feeling about this.”
“Ah,” said Sam. “Me too.”
They grinned at each other and shared a nod.
They went in, very fast and very savvy. Two soldiers who had done this a thousand times. Fighters who’d survived everything a fractured world could throw at them.
* * *
The horses waited with their stoic equine patience as the door swung silently closed behind their riders. They munched grass and dozed beneath the stars. They only stirred and began to whinny when the muffled sounds of gunfire raged from inside the building.
The animals began to panic when they heard the horrible screams.
64
THE GATES WERE OPENED TO allow the Humvee to roll inside. A crowd of people surged around the vehicle, staring at it as if it was something out of a dream. Everyone knew about the little quads, but here was a powerful military vehicle.
Gutsy no longer wore her hazmat suit, having instructed Sergeant Holly where to stop to pick up the strong disinfectants left outside for just this purpose. The suits were now in a plastic bag in the back, soaking in germ-killing chemicals.
Karen Peak, Alethea, and Spider reached her first.
“You promised!” yelled Alethea. “You swore you wouldn’t do anything stupid.”
“I didn’t,” snapped Gutsy. “But I don’t have time to argue. We have to get this stuff to Morton.”
She pulled the cooler out of the back. As she did, a lot of hostile eyes flicked to Sergeant Holly. Gutsy could hear the murmurs start and then spread like wildfire.
“She’s from the base…”
“… she’s one of them…”