Kilo-29 (Damned of the 2/19th, Book 15)

Part 32

Site Kilo-29
Event Sub-Levels
Winter, 1993
Day Three-Early Afternoon
Status: Full Offensive Measures Engaged
Facility Status: Alert Two

The once-human things swarmed out of the door while I was two steps from my gear, clad only in a surgical gown. My weapons were dropped in a pile, under my Kevlar vest and my NBC suit.

Kincaid was in between me and creatures, stark naked except for the flamethrower tanks on his back and the projector in his hands.

"Come to papa Kincaid, assholes!" He yelled out. The young man was gone from the tone, in its place was a growling voice promising pain and destruction.

With a whoosh he triggered it, and the flame streamed out, arcing across the first ones in a blazing yellow arc of burning fuel. Some of them had a chance to scream, but most of them went down almost instantly, without anything more than the crackle of their fat igniting and a strange muffled sound when their abdominal cavities ruptured from the intense heat.

"Save Natchez, Sergeant, I've got this!" Kincaid yelled, stepping forward. The other man was covered in sweat, running the flamethrower stark naked as he forced our attackers back into the airlock. "Come get some!"

I pulled my rifle and LBE out from under the pile, dragging my Kevlar vest along with it since I'd attached the two by running the straps under the shoulder protection. Moving quickly I retreated to the operating theater, dropping it near me.

"Donaldson, we need to start." I barked, running my hands under the sink again.

Outside the Plexi, Kincaid was standing all the way to the door of the airlock and blasting the interior with fire. I could see him lifting the muzzle to arc the flame as far as he could down the hallway on the other side of the wide open and compromised airlock. Wilkins was backed up against the wall, his rifle out and pointing at nothing, but Shads and Donaldson were with me.

Nancy stood at Natchez's head, looking down at him.

"This isn't going to be easy, Ant." She told me. "You'll need to excise some of his tissue, connect the artery to the vein, and remove the lower nerve cluster to hold off some of the phantom pain and sensations." She sighed and looked up, her face spattered with blood, frostbite on her nose and earlobes. Her cheeks were waxy looking and peeling. "I'll walk you through it."

I nodded to her.

"OK, Nancy's Field Surgery qualified. She's going to walk me through it." Donaldson nodded, same as Shads, as if they could see her too. "Anything we miss in the book, she'll point out."

We could hear Kincaid laughing through the Plexi.

It took over two hours before I folded the flaps together and stitched him up. It was ugly, but my stitches were small and neat from long practice. We woke Natchez up at one point and screamed at him to open his hands, that we needed him to open his hands, until his only remaining hand opened, and then we put him back under. Sewing the artery to the vein was strange, but Nancy told me it would keep blood flow proper through his arm.

What did I know? I was just a knuckle dragging thug, she was the educated one of all of us. Bomber was a brain damaged Texan, and I was nothing more than a waste of space with nothing better in my future than dying on some forgotten battlefield.

Twice more they came us.

Twice more Kincaid forced them back. I knew he had to be almost out of fuel, but he never called on Wilkins to reload him.

At least he'd forced Wilkins to help him back into his suit, so he wasn't running the flamethrower with his dick swinging around.

When I staggered out of the trauma bay, I was exhausted. My hands shook, my forearms were cramped, and my back felt like I'd been hit across the kidneys with a bat. I slumped down in one of the chairs by a gurney and went boneless, depending on the chair and physics to keep me in place.

I sure as shit didn't have the energy to.

"He gonna live, Sergeant?" Kincaid asked me, stomping toward me. I just nodded, and he kind of squatted down. I could hear the fans running on his backpack. "Listen, Sergeant, I don't care if you talk to Abe Lincoln in a Speedo and play trivia games with a lizard who lives in your ball sack. I've got your back the whole way, Sergeant."

"Thanks." I told him, rubbing my face. "If I take my meds to make them go away..."

"You'll go to sleep." Kincaid said, nodding inside his helmet. I could see him through the Lexan shield. He was sweating pretty hard, and he looked like he had a sunburn from running the flamethrower without protection. "I'd rather have you awake and talking to old friends than asleep while they kill us all."

He paused for a long moment, looking thoughtful. "The people you talk to, they were with you the whole step of the way, right?" I nodded again, and he suddenly grinned. "Cool, so even if these fucks manage to waste me, as long as you're alive, I'll still be around." His eyes glittered suddenly, and his smile looked... wrong. "I'm immortal. I so fucking rock."

Before I could say anything, he stood up and clomped over to where Donaldson was stripping a gurney and Shads was checking its undercarriage. "Shads, load my last tank, will you?"

Shads nodded, and the two men moved over to where the last fuel pack had been dropped.

"See if there's an extension cord or have him stand next to an outlet so he can charge the lithium battery." I said. I was starting to feel better.

"You OK, Ant?" Nancy asked, kneeling down next to me and putting her hand on my leg.

"I'm all right, Nancy." I told her, looking at her and trying to smile.

"Surgery's exhausting, honey." She told me. "I'd felt better after a 2 mile full gear run than I did after some of the practice surgeries we did." She shrugged, and leaned her head against my leg. "During training, they brought us goats or pigs that had been hit by rifle fire or shrapnel to practice on. By the time I'd be done, I felt like I'd been drug behind a truck."

I nodded, trying to massage out a cramp in my hand.

"Who's he talking to?" Wilkins asked Donaldson, who was standing underneath the decon shower and rinsing off.

"Dude, go away." Donaldson told him, flicking his hand so water sprayed Wilkins. "Probably that Nancy chick."

"But she's not really there." Wilkins sounded almost pleading.

"She is as far as I'm concerned." Donaldson told him, turning his back on Wilkins. "There were a couple things that the book had different than she told him, and his stuff worked better."

"What if he got it wrong?" Wilkins seemed more concerned with Nancy's real or not real status than the fact he was trying to talk a naked man who was busy soaping his balls.

"Dude, go the fuck away." Donaldson turned around and hefted his dick at Wilkins. "Or were you coming over to dry off my cock with your tongue?"

Wilkins stomped away, Donaldson's mocking laughter following him.

I stood up and stretched, feeling my muscles bunch then relax in my shoulders. I winced when I tried to straighten my right arm when it was above shoulder level. I could feel something in there moving and grinding.

When Donaldson got out of the shower, I took his place, putting one hand on the decon button and leaning forward, letting the almost scalding hot water run down my back.

"This ain't nothing, brother." Bomber told me, hopping up on the counter next to me and lighting a cigarette. "Remember when the LT had the shit beat out of us because he was convinced we were KGB."

I nodded, then rolled my neck to crack it.

"We were locked in our room, with nothing but our bare hands and a few knives, and we got out of that shit." He grinned without a bit of humor. "We killed every fucking one of them, and you sure as shit did for the LT. You've got this by the ass."

"True. Could be like later that winter when... when..." My brain suddenly shuddered and stopped, my thoughts freezing up as I approached something I didn't want to remember. Bomber hopped down and touched my shoulder, the water spraying through his solid looking skin. The Fates song began to sound in my ears, gaining volume, telling me what a failure I was, how I'd failed everyone.

I could feel the warmth of his hand.

"Stop. It was a vehicle accident while we were stuck up there again." He said softly. "Just a vehicle accident, brother. Say it with me." His voice drowned out the Fates, her were whispering a single name over and over.

"She died in a vehicle accident while we were at the barracks." I said softly, aware I was crying under the hot water. The song was getting louder.

"There was nothing you could have done to save her with what was going on, Ant. Nothing." Bomber told me, squeezing gently. "Say it with me, brother." I could barely hear him over the sound of the Fates' cruel triumphant chorus.

"I couldn't have saved her." I said softly. I was sobbing and didn't know why, but it felt like a knife was twisting in my gut. "There was nothing I could have done to save her, I was hurt too bad, blind, and dying." I couldn't even pick out individual voices from the Fates' song, just one overwhelming litany of my failures.

Bomber nodded, and I was aware of a hand on my other shoulder. I knew without looking it was Heather's hand. It was warm, comforting, and I could feel our wedding ring on it.

"Hush." Heather told the Fates.

The swelling song of the Fates shattered, and I could hear the spray of the water, everyone moving around, and the noises that the facility made.

"Leave him alone, Bomber." She whispered. "He'll be OK, you're just confusing him."

Bomber nodded, backing up.

"What the fuck is he talking about?" Wilkins asked, loud enough for me to hear.

"That's his business. Mind yours." Kincaid said. His voice wasn't muffled again, he must have taken off his suit while I stood in the shower.

"I'm telling you, he's crazy. He shouldn't be in charge." Wilkins said. "We don't have to listen to him if he's incapable of command. He's on goddamn medication because he's crazy."

"Wilkins, I'm going to tell you one last fucking time." Kincaid snarled. "Sergeant Ant has gotten us this far, we'd all be fucking dead from those things or the goddamn CIA assholes if it wasn't for him."

"But..." Wilkins started.

"Shut the fuck up." Kincaid continued. "I don't give a shit if he thinks he's the goddamn Energizer Bunny, he's the reason we're fucking alive, and that's all I care about."

"But..."

"Say one more thing, Wilkins." Kincaid's voice was soft, deadly. "One. More. Thing."

"One of us should..."

I turned in time to see a naked Kincaid bury his fist in Wilkins' stomach, the other man folding over and retching. Before he could recover Kincaid drove an elbow into the back of Wilkins' head, throwing him to the ground. Kincaid dropped down, a knee in the middle of Wilkins' back, grabbed him under the chin, and hauled him backwards, so he was arced back painfully.

"I don't know if the Army calls what you're trying to do mutiny or not." Kincaid snarled at him. "I don't give a shit. Either shut your fucking mouth or..." Kincaid dragged his thumbnail across Wilkins' exposed throat. "I'll fucking do you."

He let let go of Wilkins and walked toward me, grabbing a towel off of one of the gurneys and tossing it to me when I stepped out of the water.

"I'm gonna wash the piss off my legs." He said, stepping by me. "I think I'll thread the dick-wire when I put the suit back on."

"Good plan." I told him, drying off. Wilkins was getting up, his face beet red. I could tell Wilkins was furious that Kincaid had man-handled him again, embarrassed him in front of the conscious members of our little squad. When he reached for his rifle, Donaldson grabbed it and just stared at him.

"Problem?" Donaldson asked, dropping out the magazine and racking the charging handle so the loaded round flew across the room.

Shads bent down and picked it up.

"I'm fucking sick of Kincaid thinking he can get away with hitting me." Wilkins said, fury making his voice shake. "I don't have to take that shit off of him."

"Then keep your goddamn mouth shut and stop trying to undermine me." I told him, stepping up from behind him. "Do you think I can't fucking hear you?"

He turned around, his mouth opened and closing wordlessly.

"I'm ugly, not deaf or stupid." I told him.

His eyes flicked down to my chest, to the scars, to where the bruising from my shoulder colored the flesh in various yellow, purple, red, and brown bruising. The tattoo on my chest, and the tattoo on my shoulder. He glanced down at my waist, where the scar went from under my belly button to my hip bone.

"Yes, I should be taking my medication." I told him. His eyes jerked back to mine. "Yes, I suffer from headaches and hallucinations unless I take my medication." I waved at the heat discolored airlock that Kincaid had held.

"Adrenaline flushes my medications out of my system unless I take a heavier backup dose or other medications to help bind with the adrenaline." I told him. "The side effect is that I go to sleep for a few hours."

I pointed at the charred and greasy remains of the creatures that attacked us.

"Do you think they'll wait till I finish a fucking nap?" I asked him.

He shook his head, a spastic, jerking motion.

"Then either head back on your own, or stick with us." I pointed at the airlock we'd come in through. "There it is. Step or shut the fuck up."

His eyes looked a little wild when he looked at the airlock we'd come through. He looked at me, and I could see he almost tried calling what he wanted to believe was a bluff.

"Wilkins, we have to work together, if we don't, we'll get picked off one by one." I told him. "Natchez got nailed even though we were together, think of how long you'll last in the dark by yourself."

He nodded, the flush fading from his face as he paled.

"You saw it. It's snowing in those tunnels. There's something in those tunnels that is stalking us, playing with us. How long do you think you'll last till you find out what it is?" I asked him, still trying to be reasonable. He swallowed thickly and nodded. "Stick with us, worry about your part of the mission, and we've got a better chance to survive."

He looked doubtful, stepping back from me, obviously uncomfortable with the fact I was naked and still damp from the shower. Behind us Kincaid was (badly) singing "I always feel like, someone's watching me! When I'm the shower, I'm afraid to wash my hair, I might open my eyes and find cannibals standing there!"

"You might be right, I might be totally crazy." I admitted. He nodded, and opened his mouth. "But! I know how these places are laid out. I know how to open the internal doors even if the power goes out. I know how to decipher what the labels on doors and hallways mean." I grinned at him. "I can even restart the emergency reactor, bring it off of standby, and if I absolutely have to, I can bring the reactor out of storage mode and get it hot and running."

I stepped back from him and started drying off my stomach. "Do you?"

He shook his head.

"Just do what I tell you to do, and I'll do my best to get you out of here." I told him. "Alive."

He nodded again.

"Now go help Shads get a gurney ready for us to transport Natchez on." I told him, flipping the towel behind me so I could dry off my back. He nodded again and I watched him move over by Shads, who had him start stripping the extraneous crap off the bottom of the gurney.

Above them the camera tracked Wilkins, then slowly moved back to me.

I looked at Donaldson, who had moved back over to Natchez to check his vitals on the various machines we had him hooked into. He tilted his head at the camera and then nodded.

Someone was watching us.

Good call, Kincaid. I'd almost missed it.

When Kincaid got out of the shower, I had him search all the cabinets and shelves, looking for any uniforms he could find. He came up empty, so we put back on our damp and charcoal stained uniforms after we each showered. Natchez was moved to the gurney, wrapped in blankets, then strapped down, covered in more blankets, then his Kevlar was put over his chest before another thin blanket was put on top of him. The IV pole had extra bags hanging off of it. He was low on blood, but I was hoping the ringers would help him out. I couldn't risk having any of the others give him a blood transfusion and weakening themselves.

It was a shitty decision, I didn't like it, but I made it anyway.

The memory of what I'd done, how I'd done it, was already fading, receding into some kind of mental fog where I could only remember snippets, some of it weirdly enough as if I was standing just over my own shoulder and watching.

"Everyone ready?" I asked when we were gathered up next to the airlock that we'd come in through. The entry door was already open, and Shads was going to throw the bar on the external door then rush back behind Kincaid.

Everyone nodded, grunted, or said they were ready. Well, Wilkins grunted, Shads nodded from where he was holding onto the bar, Donaldson said he was ready, and Kincaid popped the igniter on the flamethrower.

Natchez didn't say anything, but I figured he was as ready as he was going to be.

"Let's move, men." I said.

Shads threw the bar twice and moved behind Kincaid. The sirens and lights kicked on, but no spray came down, and the door started to raise.

Snow blew into the airlock from under the door, swirling around our feet, and we could all feel the temperature drop suddenly.

Too long fingers, their ends nothing more than tattered flesh with sharp fingerbones poking out, appeared under the door, curling around the bottom on our side, and a low chuckle could be heard even over the wail of the sirens.

"Close it! Close it!" I bellowed out.

"FUCK YOU!" Kincaid howled out, stepping forward and crouching down, his knee almost touching the floor but not quite. He triggered a burst from the flamethrower, hosing it under the door, spattering the steel door and the floor too.