ARISEN, Book Twelve - Carnage (7 page)

“That’s affirmative,” Campbell said, taking the mags, putting one in the empty pouch on her belt, and shoving the others in her pockets.

Lovell nodded at Patrick, who had been shot in the leg – also a through-and-through flesh wound, and also already being wrapped up by a nurse. As Lovell took the huge ruck with the CRRC in it off his back, he asked Patrick, “You okay?”

“Fine. Good to go.”

Lovell smiled. “Hey, if you’re gonna get shot, right outside the hospital is definitely the place for it.”

Patrick flicked him the bird.

Still, as Lovell looked back and forth between Patrick and Walker, at the faces of these two wounded warriors, neither of them so much as grimaced. Lovell could understand it with Patrick. It was the Marine mentality not to admit that a wound had gotten the best of you. “Never let the bastards see you coming out prone,” was what they always said.

LCDR Walker, on the other hand… while she might have been in kinetic situations before, as far as Lovell knew she had never been shot at before – never mind
shot
. On the other hand, she would have treated an awful lot of gunshot wounds, so maybe she wasn’t intimidated by them. Maybe it was the adrenaline making her insensitive to the pain. Maybe it was her protectiveness over her brood, and her understanding of what leadership required – that if she showed pain or fear, everyone under her would succumb to it.

Maybe she was just a pure badass.

* * *

Lovell told Patrick, “Stay and help with the defense. I’ll be back.” And he headed out fast, or as fast as he could dragging a deflated zodiac in a bag and a giant ruck of ammo and explosives, backing through the hospital and finally catching up with Sarah just outside the lab. They both moved inside, fast – Lovell not even noticing the badly wounded Marine, Corporal Raible, lying on his bed just outside.

Inside the lab, both Dr. Simon Park and Professor Close, the Oxford bioscientist, stood at the back of the room – both looking wide-eyed at the door. Sarah went straight to Park.

“You okay?” she asked.

“Fine,” he said. “I figured you’d be coming.”

“Sorry I didn’t get here quicker.”

“I’m fine, too,” Dr. Close said.

Sarah smiled at him. “Good to know.” She looked back to Park. “It’s going to be okay.”

“I know.” Park didn’t look panicked – he’d been through the wringer enough times now that he didn’t rattle – but Close did.

Lovell dropped the straps of both bags and then stepped forward, and he looked Park in the eye. “Listen up, Doc. I’m going to need you to gather up everything – all your data, all your research materials, as much as you can carry – and be ready to go.”

Both Park and Sarah looked at him.

“Go where?” Sarah asked. “Aren’t we trapped in here?”

“There’s always a way out,” Lovell said. “And if this ship falls… he can’t be on it.” He unclipped his rifle and laid it on a lab bench. “Come on. Show me what you need, and I’ll help you gather it up.”

Sarah moved to assist, but as she did so, her pocket rang, to her considerable surprise. It was the satphone Handon had given her. She got it out, found the answer button, and took the call, as she watched the other three moving through the lab at high speed.

“Go for Cameron. Handon? Oh, my God—”

But before she could say or hear more, they all heard the sound of heavy objects crashing to the deck, urgent shouting in two languages, and then rapid firing, all coming from outside in the hospital. And they all pretty much knew what that was.

Spetsnaz fighting their way in through the barricade.

Last Man Standing

JFK – 02 Deck

Browning was one of the few NSF personnel still left alive from the very beginning, and so now one of the most experienced. He was also, in addition to being a crack shot, one of the steadiest men in the unit. He wasn’t a born leader, but Derwin had no choice but to work with what he had. Particularly since what he had was being reduced out from under him in real time.

So it was that Browning now led a four-man NSF team toward the hospital, with orders to link up with Sarah Cameron and help protect Dr. Park – “no matter what.” Browning didn’t know that Derwin was using Wesley’s exact words. But it didn’t matter. He understood the importance of the assignment, and was determined to complete it.

He moved forward with his three junior shore patrolmen behind – the old salty dog Rob Callum, and the young kids Dooley and Kate, all of whom had very recently been rated as Storekeepers (Third Class in the case of the younger two). All three had been drafted into NSF after Wesley saw them perform well in the Captain’s
In Extremis
Force, clearing the flight deck in the Battle of the
JFK
.

Nonetheless, Browning knew it was basically him and three uniform-fillers. But they were his people now, and he had to lead them, and just trust they could do their jobs. All had been getting trained by Derwin and his cadre, put through local versions of the Security Reaction Force — Basic (SRF-B) course. But they were less than a week into it. And Kate, for one, looked like her helmet was two sizes too big and might swallow her, and with her wide eyes and youthful features, she also genuinely looked to Browning like she was about fourteen years old. Like she was playing dress-up.

The four of them moved forward across 02 Deck, rifles up, expecting to get jumped at any second. Browning saw there was a lot of expended brass on the deck crunching beneath their boots. But whatever had gone down here seemed to be over. For now.

But then as they approached the final turn to the passageway the hospital was on, all four froze at the sound of muted explosions ahead, and just out of sight. Following Browning’s lead, the other three pressed themselves up against the bulkheads and crouched down.

Thinking fast, Browning considered that this wasn’t the first explosion they’d heard down here. But it was the closest. And it also sounded like it came from exactly where they were going – the damned hospital. As he thought through this, he realized what it had to be.

And what they had to do in response.

Crouching and waiting was exactly the wrong reaction. They had to go – now! “Come on!” he shouted, rising and taking off, and throwing stealth to the wind. “Follow me!”

They did. But into what, they dared not imagine.

* * *

The Spetsnaz besiegers came harder, faster, and much sooner than either Walker or Patrick had imagined they would. The Marine probably should have known. If you have to assault a fixed position, the last thing you want to do is give the defenders time to consolidate and dig in. And of course the hallmarks of every SOF force worthy of the name were moving fast and hitting hard.

A few of the other hospital staff had weapons, side arms only, and had been positioned down behind cover and given instructions by Sergeant Patrick. Also on the line was the NSF guy – Petty Officer First Class Toussaint, who at least seemed to have his legs under him, after having to be urged by Walker to discharge his weapon out in the passageway. Luckily, he, Walker, and Patrick were all behind cover, if not down under it. But they all dropped to the deck electrically when the sparks from a plasma torch started flying into the air behind the hatch.

And now Patrick hoped like hell everyone here remembered his instructions – that an assault would be preceded by a volley of grenades. He’d been emphatic about it, but non-combatants had a way of forgetting everything, including which end the bullet comes out of, once shit started blowing up and the lead started flying.

But everyone kept their heads down as the breached hatches were shoved open, the barricade knocked down – and, mainly, when shit did start exploding out in front of their makeshift cover and shooting positions. Which was good because these were not flashbangs, or anything like them. These assaulters were not here to rescue hostages, and the grenades were sent in to maim and kill, to dismantle the defenders and their positions.

And the Spetsnaz shooters poured in right behind them, less than a heartbeat after they went off. But Patrick’s instructions, and Walker’s leadership, gave the defenders something like a fighting chance. The two leaders popped up before the invaders could reach them, the Marine engaging with his SCAR-L and the flight surgeon blasting away with her captured shotgun. Toussaint popped and started shooting shortly after, and the five medical officers with side arms after that.

Two of the nearly-black-clad invaders went down just inside the hatch, felled by Patrick and Walker, but others came behind them, two, and then two more, and instantly started putting out heavy and brutally effective fire. Two medical officers showed too much of themselves and went down – and Patrick could tell the rest of them were going to be hit, or else have to get the hell out of the line of fire. And as soon as they did, their lines would be overrun, and they would all get shot down that way. This fight was going to end before it really got started. It was all happening too fast for the defenders to deal with.

Which was how assaulting operators liked it.

But then something changed.

Shouts and unsuppressed firing sounded from out in the passageway. The assaulting force didn’t quite break, or get distracted. But no one else came in – and then two of the four turned and ducked back out the hatch to react to something out there.

And that left something almost like a fair fight inside.

* * *

Browning knew which side his bread was buttered on, namely marksmanship, so he put his hand up to stop his team’s frantic headlong flight. They had just rounded the corner as the enemy came into sight – a line of invaders stacked up outside the hospital, and pouring into it like shells cycling into the chamber of an autocannon, firing at their crew-mates inside.

Stopping his run, Browning took a bead and fired on the last man in the line, who dropped to the deck. He started to smile at his remarkable success – but only had half a second to do so. Because the man just ahead of him was already turning and reacting. Browning took a second shot on this man – but either missed entirely, or hit him somewhere armored. His idea had been to take down one or two off the back of the line, Sergeant York style, then attack into the remainder with his full team.

But he never even got the chance.

The rear of the Spetsnaz force reacted in seconds – two of them, then two more, turning and
running
at the NSF sailors, firing as they ran. And running flat out did not appear to affect their marksmanship in the least. They did not, like Browning, need to stop to make their shots.

Browning felt two vicious smacks in the center of his vest – and then, before he could react, something smacked him in the head like a roundhouse punch, and sent him pirouetting to the deck. He was instantly dazed, and trying to breathe through a bleeding nose, but he knew he had to get his senses back – and did so just in time to see his team get cut down. Rob was hunched over his weapon and firing – but his head rocked back, the back of his skull opened up, and he dropped to the deck like a sandbag. To his right, Dooley also had his weapon up, but jerked from several hits, then bounced into the bulkhead on the right and fell to the deck.

Hearing shooting to his left, he looked over to see Kate down on the deck beside him, firing as fast as she could pull the trigger. Somehow she’d had the presence of mind to hit the deck before she was put there. And now her rapid-fire barrage – the unsurpassed M4 atrociously loud in a small metal tunnel – gave the counter-assaulting force ahead of them pause. They ceased bounding forward, and went down on their knees, taking measured shots.

And Browning knew this was their only chance.

“Come on!” he shouted.

The cross passageway was still practically right beside them. He physically shoved her toward it and out of the line of fire, Kate doggedly continuing to fire as he did so. When she finally scurried to safety, Browning took a page from her playbook – and started emptying his mag to cover her. This time, his vaunted marksmanship aside, he honestly didn’t think he was hitting a damned thing. Worse, he wasn’t even cowing the enemy enough to throw off their shooting.

He realized this when he felt a terrible pain in his collarbone, and then another in his thigh. Screaming inside his own head, he made a straight line of himself and his rifle, and in an equally desperate and inspired moment of insanity or genius, rolled out of that passageway and to safety in the intersecting one.

When he stopped rolling and lay on his back, he didn’t think he could get up. The pain was terrible. He had pressed his eyes closed against it, but when he opened them, he saw that Kate could get up – and had. She was kneeling over his helpless and ravaged body, pointing her weapon over him toward the intersection.

She was protecting him.

The magazine dropped out of her rifle and landed on his stomach, and she got another one seated – without ever moving her aim.

Kate was the last man standing.

* * *

At the entrance to the hospital, the defenders now managed to hold the line. With only two Spetsnaz left in the room, Patrick was able to get aggressive, tagging one with a series of rapid center-of-mass shots – then plinking at the other after Walker put a spread of buckshot into the upper right of his body, causing him to wince and lower his weapon for a second – a second too long. Both were wounded, and retreated back out the hatch.

The defenders also had multiple wounded, including Toussaint, and what looked like two KIAs among the medical officers. But Patrick couldn’t bother with them right now. He, too, knew that aggression was everything – and that the last thing you wanted to do was give your enemy a chance to regroup.

Also, they had to get some kind of barrier up in front of the gaping hole where the hatches now swung free and unlockable. Otherwise, they’d be eating grenade shrapnel all day – or, rather, for the rest of their lives, which would most likely be measured in minutes.

Not asking or needing support for this part, Patrick chucked two of his own grenades out the hatch, banking them down the hall to the right, the direction the attackers had retreated to. In the enclosed space, they could inflict some horrific damage. Then again, he knew his opponents would know that, too, and might be positioned in other compartments off the passageway for that reason. In any case, the instant the grenades crumped off, he swung out wide to the left and started shooting diagonally out the open hatch.