An Unlikely Hero (1) (16 page)

Wiping the perspiration from her forehead, Tessa watched the ground swim up to meet them. When the door slid back, Tessa didn’t wait for assistance in unbuckling her restraints. The rotor blades whipped her hair into her eyes as a hand pushed her head down and forced her forward.

Two men in military type uniforms waited in the shadows of the main building. They motioned for the three to join them. They carried the carbine Black Diamond Specter XLs. Tessa thought the weapons alone looked menacing enough to get the situation under control. Bullet proof vests lay on the ground behind them and were immediately snatched up. She watched how quickly the captain and Zoric slipped into them. Abruptly Tessa found herself under the capable hands of Captain Hunter as he fastened her into the third vest.

Chase secured the vest and let his hands linger a little longer than intended on Tessa’s arms. “You’ll be alright, Mrs. Scott. However,” he drank in the wide pools of blue in her terrified eyes. “I need your promise you’ll follow my orders.” The pilot joined them carrying gas masks. The captain handed her one as the others took theirs. “We have reason to believe there’s been a breach here. A mayday call went out at 0600. Said they were under attack. Enigma has secured the perimeter, but…”

Tessa turned nervous eyes to her surroundings and began to spot other heavily armed men in shadowy corners. “But what?” she whispered in trepidation.

The captain pulled down her gas mask before answering. “Our video feed has people face down in some of the corridors. Gas sensors are on the inside. We won’t know the threat until we enter.” Zoric handed Chase some kind of electronic device that he checked quickly. When lights began to blink he turned his attention back to Tessa. He didn’t like a civilian getting involved in this. He could see that Tessa had begun to hyperventilate. Pulling up her mask so she could take a gulp of air, Chase couldn’t stop himself from reaching out to move an unruly curl that had fallen onto her forehead. Suddenly, Chase realized Tessa was watching his forefinger trail down her cheek with narrowed, angry eyes.

Slapping at his hand, Tessa squared her narrow shoulders. “I’m asking you for the last time, why am I here? Either tell me or I’m going to start screaming bloody murder.” Chase straightened to his full height and frowned. He took out his phone, punched in a code and turned it for Tessa to see. “Dr. Haskins made the distressed call. He said there were men in gas masks.” His look grew hard. “His instructions were to wire 100 million dollars to his off shore account by 1100 hours or the scientists he’d secured in a safe vault would die.” Chase played the recording as he glanced at his watch. Time was running out. He watched Tessa’s expression turn from resolve to uncertainty.

“Dr. Haskins would never do that!” Tessa protested and pushed Chase’s hand away as he tried to pull down her mask. “He’s a kind and a decent man. I once saw him rescue a cockroach from his garage and take it to the woods so his wife wouldn’t stomp on it.”

“That was then.”

Just as Tessa reached up to touch her mask she poked a finger in the captain’s hard chest. “Tell me what you want.”

Zoric knew Chase would not take this civilian’s obstinate manners much longer. His team followed orders blindly and without question. Even Benjamin Clark, head of Enigma, rarely second guessed Captain Chase Hunter’s methods. The captain, for all his education and experience, found it difficult to communicate with civilians in this line of work.

“You’re our eyes. The last schematics we have of this place,” Zoric tried to nudge Chase aside to defuse his rising temper, “is fourteen years ago.” Tessa’s brow creased at the preposterous notion that Home Land Security hadn’t reviewed this information after 9/11. “We’ve heard of a super vault. Do you know anything about that?”

“Yes! Dr. Haskins and another scientist I never met designed it. The vault could be used to store sensitive experiments, research and even people during a state of emergency.” Tessa shrugged. “I thought it was for tornadoes or something. Then one day,” Tessa’s eyes grew large, “he said it was only a matter of time before someone started a war. Dr. Haskins said everything you’d need to live for six months would be there.”

“Have you seen the vault?”

“Yes. He made me sign a document to never reveal its location because of its importance to national security. Dr. Haskins said there were only ten people who knew about the vault and only three who knew of its location. I was one of those.”

“Why you?” Chase smelled a May December romance. He could just imagine what a looker Tessa Scott had been fourteen years ago. Take away the ten extra pounds from childbirth; add a healthy tan, a free spirit and you have all the makings of a goddess in the eyes of a nerdy scientist who has his head stuck under a microscope all day.

“He trusted me because we went to church together. I was his kids’ Sunday School teacher.”

“Perfect,” Chase moaned as his eyes cut to Zoric who bore the faint smirk of a man who had been thinking the same scenario. “Well it appears your Dr. Haskins has made a deal with the devil himself. If he has allowed terrorists into Oak Ridge and murdered our scientists and done God knows what else, I’ll personally make sure he burns in Hell!”

Tessa surrendered with a nod as she pulled down her gas mask. It certainly didn’t look good for her friend. As plastic explosives were applied to the steel enforced door, she began to doubt her devotion to a man she’d known in college. A Christmas card with the family newsletter she received each year didn’t mean all was well. The children she so lovingly cared for were grown now, attending college at Stanford. What would make such a decent man go so horribly astray? She felt Zoric and the captain push her against the concrete wall as a blast opened the door to the unknown.

“Stay close, Mrs. Scott!” Chase warned as he motioned for his men to enter the building. “I don’t want any more civilians getting hurt. Follow my orders.” Chase watched her nod furiously that she understood as he pulled down his mask.

Tessa bent low behind the captain as he entered the building with Zoric at his side, both carrying P-90 automatic weapons. Nothing could have prepared her for what lie ahead.

“We’re under fire! Where the hell are you, Carter!” Sam demanded as she forcibly escorted three scientists down a smoke filled corridor. Moments before she’d set off a smoke bomb to cover their escape. Two men had appeared carrying pistols and began shooting wildly as Sam pushed her charges into a safe room and returned fire. She’d hit one of them in the chest but the remaining terrorists had yelled for help. When she heard the gunman coughing, Sam ordered the frightened scientists out into the hall. “Take a deep breath, and then run down the hall as fast as you can!”

“But what if there are more of them at the other end?” the short man in glasses said as he practiced gulping air.

“If we don’t get out of here, there won’t be an ‘other end’! Now move!” When they timidly stepped out into the corridor, Sam pushed them down low so as not to inhale too much smoke. They froze until her automatic weapon began blasting the silence. Sam later confessed she didn’t know the pudgy guy with glasses would be able to run so fast. He easily sprinted pass the younger, more athletic woman as return gunfire began to echo down the once tranquil halls of Los Alamos National Laboratory. The woman screamed as indiscriminate bullets bounced off the walls.

“Go! Go! Go!” Sam yelled as she stopped to reload behind some kind of computer tower blocking the hall.

“Sam! They’re safe! Now get the hell out of there,” Carter said not far from her. “I’ll cover you.”

“Here they come!”

Carter stepped out into the smoky fog and began firing his Glock as Sam backed up also firing before turning and running. Together Sam and Carter took cover and waited for the terrorists to approach. Visibility started to improve enough for the terrorists to slip from their protection. “Aim for their arms, Sam. We need to interrogate them. Are we clear?” he said whispering into her ear.

Sam kept her eyes on the target. “You get that close to me again and I’ll shoot you some place other than your arm.” Sam turned her face to Carter who smiled with desire. “Are we clear?”

“Perfectly.” Carter was but a breath from Sam’s enticing mouth. “Shall we?”

Sam nodded as they both stood and charged down the hall, yelling at the top of their lungs. The two terrorists were so stunned they didn’t get a round off before the Enigma duo slammed their weapons upside their faces, bringing them down to the floor with a loud grunt. The sound of their weapons hitting the floor drew a sigh of relief from Carter.

Sam’s man tried to get up until she kicked him so hard in the side that he curled up into a quivering ball. Slowly, Sam squatted down next to the man and rammed her gun into his ear. In flawless Arabic, Sam growled, “I love my job you piece of crap. Give me a reason to unload this gun into your head.”

Carter jerked the second man to his feet. When he tried to squirm free, Carter landed his pistol on his nose. Blood splattered on the both of them. “We have a few questions for you,” Carter said calmly looking down at his uniform. He looked at Sam. “I just had this cleaned.”

Sam stood. “So? Do you have a date or something?”

“Chicks dig this kind of thing. Now look at me!”

The man spit on Carter’s boots. “I tell you nothing!”

Carter sighed and looked at Sam. Without hesitation she shot her man in the thigh. A scream pierced the hall which got him another kick in the side.

“I told you in the arm!” Carter frowned. A satanic smile spread across Sam’s face as she began to reload her pistol and eye Carter’s captive. “Now,” his eyes turned back to the captive with the bleeding nose. “We were saying? Oh! We have a few questions we’d like to ask you if you have time.” Carter had transformed into his charming self.

“That woman is crazy!” the terrorist shivered as he dragged a sleeve across his bleeding nose.

“Yes. She’s also really hot,” Carter said smiling over at the angry Sam who had begun gritting her teeth. Never a good sign. “So, buddy,” Carter said slipping an arm around the terrorist’s shoulder. “Either you can talk to me,” he said before lifting a finger toward Sam, “or to her. She also really hates all that Taliban-control-the-women stuff. Unfortunately she doesn’t quite get the whole end objective of interrogation,” he laughed. “Am I right, Sam?”

Sam pulled the trigger and shot her captive in the arm. Another scream.

“Sam!” Carter shouted.

“You said shoot him in the arm!” Her wide, dangerous eyes went to Carter’s man then smiled sweetly with a sadistically show of gritted teeth. “Just following orders.”

Carter nodded. “I did tell you to do that didn’t I?” He shrugged nonchalantly.

“I’ll tell you anything! Just keep her away from me!”

“Can I kill this one?” Sam asked coldly as she looked down at the unconscious man on the floor.

Carter slapped the quivering captive on the back. “Well, let’s see how this one does. We may need that one if…What’s your name?’

“Jeremy.”

Carter laughed. “Of course it is! If Jeremy doesn’t work out we may need to ask yours a few questions.”

“Better hurry,” Sam said holstering her weapon. “Looks like this one may bleed out.”

“Got it! Hurry it is.”

Carter and Sam could play this kind of game all day. Fortunately for them, Jeremy was more than eager to answer all their questions.

Ten armed soldiers, Tessa guessed they were black ops, not that she really knew anything about black ops, but it seemed a reasonable assessment, surrounded them as Captain Hunter led them down the corridor. The first causality was a man in his late forties, early fifties. Face down in his own blood, it was obvious his throat had been slit. The sight of such a horrific murder forced Tessa to wobble with nausea. To think that she watched all those crime dramas on television using science to solve cases disgusted her. This drama became surreal as she lowered herself behind two of the soldiers. Stepping over the dead man, Tessa cringed, but forced herself to not look back. Her legs quivered with uncertainty and fear.

The captain tested the air and shook his head at the others. Tessa wasn’t sure if that meant there were no traces of gas or that they needed to proceed with extreme caution. Either way, Tessa reassured herself by touching the heavy mask again for the hundredth time.