Objekt 221 Page 11

  They walked a bit more in silence.

  “Best guess?” she said, folding her arms across her chest. “There was a civilization of proto-humans living on planet Earth 100 million years ago. By the time we rose to power, all traces of their existence has been wiped out.”

  “That’s enough,” Beale said. His voice came in loud and clear over the faceplate speakers. “And turn your internal mics back on. I don’t want any external sound if we can help it. Many things out here want to kill us. I want to stay off their radar.”

  They walked in silence as the sun continued to set on ancient Crimea. Emi finally spoke up at the end of the formation.

  “What’s waiting for us in O221, Beale?” she asked. “Termination? Thumbscrews? Waterboarding?”

  No one spoke for several steps.

  “I’m sure there’ll be some sort of discipline,” he said. “But it can’t be as bad as being eaten by a dinosaur.”

  He meant this as half joke, half warning, but as if on cue, the underbrush exploded in front of them. Fifty meters past the team, a dinosaur erupted out of the trees and paused momentarily in the clearing caused by the remains of the road. The team stopped as one, walking on the fringe of the foliage cover. Everyone’s HUD lit up simultaneously. The image of the dinosaur in front of them was highlighted red with the flashing text DANGER immediately next to it. The note UC-0104 hovered ominously above the dinosaur.

  “Oh, fuck,” Beale said under his breath, but fully audible to the soldiers and scientists in tow.

  They were looking at an uncategorized apex predator. The word “UNCLASSIFIED” was blinking on their screens with numbers and data flashing all around the image perimeter. Soon, the word was replaced by the text UC-0104 as the shared computer accessed the saved data—comparing the image to the stored database.

  In the fading light, it was difficult to see the coloring of the creature. The team could barely make out the deep green—almost brown—hide, lined with spines, and ringed with deep blue coloring. Twin rows of spikes ran the length of its back and tapered as they traveled down the tail. Most striking, though, was that the dinosaur stood atop two thick, muscular legs and had four arms erupting from its trunk. This was an apex predator standing more than 10 feet tall.

  Staring straight at them.

  UC-0104 snarled.

  Beale’s voice came over their faceplate speakers, urgent yet quiet.

  “We. Need. To. Start. Moving,” he said. “Into the trees. Slowly. Now.”

  The soldiers, on Beale’s order, started slowly walking to the side. The temptation to drop to the ground and crab walk was strong, but, instead, they all simply walked sideways, grape-vine style, to reach the cover provided by the heavy foliage. For the most part, the researchers followed suit. Emi Tolliver and Lazlo Hollyfeld, however, were frozen to the ground, mouths agape, staring at a type of dinosaur they had never seen. The motion had attracted UC’s attention. He continued to snarl and, now, took a few cautious steps toward the group.

  “Let’s go,” Beale said, noticing that his rear flank was bunching up. “Jackson. Look out.”

  “Sir,” the soldier on the left flank said, keeping his eyes on UC. “It’s advancing.”

  “I see,” Beale said. “We’ll kill it if we have to. We’ll be back tomorrow to capture it anyway.”

  “Capture?” Calvin said, stepping to his right.

  There were a few moments of tense silence until Miles spoke up.

  “Allied Genetics is not only recording what happens over here, but capturing specimens that might prove useful. Genetically. There is no fossil record of UC-0104 and he is now in our capture protocol to carefully analyze his destructive power.” He paused. Beale had stopped moving. He was looking at the researcher, mouth open.

  “Dude,” he said.

  “We have special equipment that we use to capture and transport the specimens.” Miles shrugged. “I’m sure Beale only brought people-based equipment, though.”

  Jackson, in the back of the group, had taken his eyes off the team and looked at UC. In doing so, his feet got caught up with Lazlo’s. Both men grunted and fell to the ground. The action pushed Emi out of the way, into the actual forest.

  Everyone was nearly in the forest. The second soldier in the rear stooped to help Jackson and Lazlo to their feet. He kept his weapon pointed at UC-0104 the entire time.

  “Tuoy,” Beale said, turning his head left and speaking to the soldier on the extreme left flank. “Smoke.”

  “Copy that,” Tuoy said. He reached his right hand around to his lower back and removed two golf ball-sized silver spheres from the combat webbing there. “Two out,” he said, lobbing the two metal balls in the direction of the continuously, but cautiously, advancing UC. They arced through the air and landed about five meters apart, five meters in front of the dinosaur. There was a small thump as the two spheres exploded and covered the area in a gaseous cloud.

  “That’ll slow him down, but won’t stop him,” Beale said. “Move it.”

  * *

  All 11 people were in the forest. They heard UC roar twice while he was trying to find his way out of the chemical fog, but that was it. They couldn’t hear anything moving through the trees behind them. Suddenly, they heard the high-pitched roar of one of the tyrannosaurs.

  “Oh, for fuck’s sake,” Beale said.

  The entire team stopped and were sweeping their gazes and weaponry back and forth searching for the source of the sound. They had all switched to night vision mode on their faceplates. It was full dark.

  “Okay, let’s—” Beale started and was cut off. From their right, UC-0104 blasted out of a clump of trees while everyone was distracted. The dinosaur lifted Jackson off his feet with two powerful arms and continued to run away—never slowing down. He hit Hollyfeld across the face and chest with the spike-laden tail. Hollyfeld went down. As sudden as he had appeared, UC was gone. They heard Jackson scream once and then was silenced.

  Hollyfeld was writhing on the ground, ribs cracked. His faceplate was starred with a shatter mark, but had not caved in.

  “Weapons free,” Beale said. “Tango live. Light ‘em up.”

  * *

  “Good God,” Britta said.

  She was sitting in a corner of her office. There was a bank of 20 small flatscreen monitors attached to the wall. Britta leaned forward in her red leather chair. These monitors represented the only live feed link between Objekt 221 and the mirror base in ancient Crimea. The Other Side, as they liked to call it.

  There was no video feed, but, through quantum foam—a spectacularly long explanation that she never attempted to nail down—they could receive the transmission of each expedition team member’s vital statistics along a certain wavelength. Each of the monitors contained a name at the top and several graphs and numeric readouts that painted the picture of health. There was an algorithm that analyzed the metric data and condensed it into a text box in the bottom right corner. Elevated heartrate and ascending perspiration levels indicate anxiety approaching fear, for example.

  She could see Miles and his five researchers lined up as well as Beale and his four soldiers. One of the monitors worried her. One of the monitors elicited her verbal outburst.

  Deceased, the text read along the bottom corner of Jackson’s monitor.

  Broken ribs, bruised lungs, catastrophic failure of protective faceplate eminent, the text read along the bottom corner of Hollyfeld’s monitor.

  “What the fuck happened?” she asked herself. “Those faceplates are supposed to be unbreakable.”

  She rolled the chair across the tile floor back to the corner of her enormous desk. She reached for the phone. Why the hell was Owl Mountain not answering?

  * *

  The four remaining soldiers plus Miles formed a star around the five researchers—with Lazlo Hollyfeld lying on the ground in the center of the formation. The soldiers were scanning the area with the night vision filter on their faceplates.

  Lazlo coughed and
blood splattered the inside of his mask. Emi had her hand across his chest, fingers splayed. She could feel his labored breathing—as well as hear it over her speakers. His eyes were closed, drooling blood. It was darker—it seemed to Damon that it was darker than it should be. Emi looked up to Calvin and shook her head softly.

  He coughed again and went still.

  “Shit,” Beale said, seeing the warning on his faceplate. Lazlo had died of internal injuries. “We have to move.”

  “Do we bring him with us?” Miles asked.

  Beale thought for a moment.

  “We bring him,” he said. “McCann.”

  A soldier named McCann bent to lift Hollyfeld’s lifeless body up off the ground. Lazlo was tall and thin and weighed about 160 pounds. The soldier balanced him over his right shoulder, holding his submachine gun in his left.

  “No shame in calling it out when it’s time to trade,” Beale said not only to McCann, but to the other soldiers to make sure his point rang true. “We have a mile. Let’s rock and roll.”

  * *

  The team made it only 50 meters deeper into the forest under cover of darkness before everything went haywire. With the proximity warning flashing on their HUDs, the team didn’t know whether to run for the building or try to hide. They were getting no indications from their thermal vision, but night vision outlined three fast-moving theropods. They were still nearly a mile away from the HQ building.

  “Defensive formation,” Beale called over the team chat.

  Immediately, the four remaining soldiers formed the points of a compass around the four researchers. McCann dropped Hollyfeld’s corpse a few meters away near a heavy clump of bushes. He took up position as the east point. Miles, drawing his sidearm, joined him.

  The proximity alarm was replaced by a wire-frame outline of the three dinosaurs. They were Deinonychus—popularized incorrectly by the Jurassic Park movie—and generally recognized in popular media as Velociraptors. Walking on two legs, with heavily muscled arms and a long tail, the Deinonychus stretched more than 15 feet long and were known for having a huge claw in the center of each foot. In fact, the name is Greek for “terrible claw.” While the team couldn’t see the three predators, the HUD database described them as dark brown with yellow cabalistic markings.

  The three predators arrived at the small clearing at the same time. They formed a triangle around the group of humans and stayed just out of effective weapon range. A crash in the underbrush pulled everyone’s attention to the west. After three long seconds, they turned back to their natural positions. The body of Lazlo Hollyfeld was gone.

  “Fuck,” McCann said.

  “What is it?” Miles asked, sweat dripping into his right eye. He squeezed it shut to protect it from the stinging, salty liquid.

  Before McCann could answer, a new sound dominated the landscape. It was the low-pitched growl of the 0104. UC had finally caught back up with the group after the earlier encounter. It shook off the effects of the chemical cloud.

  Sensing that the larger predator would steal their kill, the three Deinonychus attacked with a speed and ferocity that the humans did not expect. They rushed at the huge dinosaur who simply crouched into a defensive pose and bared his enormous teeth. He bunched the hands at the ends of his two upper arms into fists and the two lower hands were opened wide—claws pointed at the onrushing group.

  The first attacker leapt into the air, right leg outstretched. He reared back, tensing his muscles to eviscerate the UC with the terrible claw. In what must have looked like a quick flinch, the UC caught the huge dinosaur with his upper arms and raked both lower arms, claws extended, across the leaping Deinonychus torso. Mortally wounded, it let out a high-pitched yelp as blood and intestines rained down around its feet.

  Already on the move, the second Deinonychus howled in anguish as it saw its fallen partner. Without slowing down its charge, it splayed its claws wide and rushed directly at the UC. For its part, the UC simply dropped the dead body directly into the onrushing dino’s path, causing it to stumble.

  The UC reared back and kicked the second Deinonychus squarely in the chest. It went down in a heap.

  The third Deinonychus, sensing the turning tide of the battle, immediately stopped its attack and scampered off into the forest. The UC roared and gave chase.

  The mission team stood in silence for a moment, watching the area where the two dinosaurs disappeared deeper into the ancient Crimean forest.

  “I thought the Deinonychus was exclusive to North America,” Emi said, breaking the team’s stunned silence.

  Suddenly, the dinosaur who had been kicked in the chest grunted, rolled over, and attempted to regain his balance and stand up.

  “Fuck,” Miles said.

  Before the word had completely escaped his mouth, the downed dinosaur was up and rushed at Derekson, the soldier at the south point of the compass, and Calvin Brunarski, who stood immediately to the soldier’s left. With a full roundhouse kick—giant foot-claw extended—the dinosaur tore through the torsos of both men. They fell to the ground in a puddle of their own blood, dead before their legs had even given out.

  The remaining three soldiers opened fire with small arms and riddled the body of the Deinonychus with bullet holes. Miles panicked and fired his borrowed sidearm. Unfortunately, his first two shots sailed wide and he hit Emi Tolliver squarely in the back. She died instantly and crumpled in a heap next to Calvin.

  * *

  Britta, watching one monitor after another go dark, was screaming at the office wall.

  “Get back here,” she yelled.

  * *

  “Leave ‘em,” Beale shouted, reloading his weapon.

  The team had been cut in half. Beale and his two soldiers Miller and McCann were only guarding two researchers—Damon Butcher and Cadey Park. Miles, of course, was aligned with the soldiers. The team turned as one and started running back in the direction of the facility. They had made it nearly a quarter mile when the UC returned to the small clearing. He was carrying the Deinonychus head as a trophy and had blood dripping from his massive jaws down his torso. He looked around the carnage in front of him and didn’t bother chasing after the remaining prey.

  Chapter Thirteen

  The Final Debriefing

  SERGOTT SOLUTIONS wore its distinction as an American company lightly. They had five offices worldwide that were each staffed with a generous mixture of diverse talents. Three of the five were in the United States—San Francisco, Chicago, Miami—with the fourth and fifth being in London and Beijing. Clay Reed was the operational leader of the London office. He sat in a small conference room at a circular table, joined by the four heads of the various military teams operating throughout Europe.

  Reed had passed a set of white binders, each three inches thick, to the four men seated around the table. They were all Wraith field commanders currently stationed in Europe. Alex Scott, Rick Everson, Jon Culver, and Eric Bilkins. They were all roughly the same age and experience level. In silence, they all started flipping through the binders, heavy with printed reports. They knew they’d have a few minutes of silence before Reed started in on the presentation.

  No one broke protocol even though all four men were making notes, highlighting phrases and scratching out thoughts on legal pads throughout the silence.

  The actual names of each installation?

  Eradicated scientists?

  Gene manipulation?

  A robotic octopus?

  Clay Reed leaned forward and pulled open his own binder. He had gone over it several times in the hour since his staff had collated the data. His paperwork was stuffed with sticky-notes, highlights, and a printed speech that he was about to give full of notes for the military wing.

  He cleared his throat and the men all looked up from their binders to the boss.

  “This is a summary with relevant information cobbled together from the three gigs versus Allied Genetics,” he started. It was a prepared opening, similar to dozens of like briefi
ngs he had given in the past. “The majority of the data comes from the most recent excursion—Owl Mountain. Known in internal documents as Rainier Mesa. Turns out that facility was designed for data storage. They had destroyed the vast majority of their stored data, but the office of Sven Mathias was untouched and yielded a good deal of information.”

  He paused, not for dramatic effect, but to look down at his prepared statement. Reed knew he had to build to the final big message, but there was so much information here that it was easy to get lost.

  “There’re a few pages in here talking specifically about the history of Allied Genetics and Precision Robotics—our client on this series of missions. The latter has paid a healthy sum for our particular brand of industrial sabotage and data mining. Nothing in our initial research suggests any overlapping business areas, but Precision’s motivations are their own. We can get into some of that a bit later. And, of course, read the binder thoroughly to familiarize yourself with the final mission for the client.”

  He cleared his throat, slid the binder slightly to his right, opened to a page, and continued reading from his notes.

  “We’re going to start, basically, from the back first. The Owl Mountain mission.” He turned to nod at Alex and Rick in turn. “Nice work, gentlemen.” The two men nodded in response. “When this data was presented to Precision Robotics, they immediately ponied up the funds for a fourth mission. In short, it was the forgotten email that grabbed their interest. Protocol Granite. Clearly, a group of researchers on Allied’s payroll stumbled into something they weren’t supposed to. They are scheduled for termination.”

  He looked at his notes.

  “Britta Vragi, the chief of Allied’s facility in Crimea—known internally as Anvil Canyon—had instructed Sven to begin preparing the necessary documentation and start researching any surviving family members that would need paying off. Precision does not want this to happen. Since we’re behind the eight ball on this one, time is of the essence.”

  Something had caught the attention of Alex Scott, call sign Beef. He flipped through the four main chapters of his binder while Reed was finishing his thought. Beef made some notes on his legal pad and Reed stopped talking.