Then she looked at the people and shuddered, shocked. They were disheveled and haunted-looking, defeated, hopeless. Most of them stood, walking aimlessly, or talking quietly with one another. Some sat on the floor, or lay on the cold concrete, curled up on their sides, immobile. They were in hell.
Alex snapped out of her shock and focused on her task. She started walking slowly, checking out the people she saw, and looking for an armed Russian she could tackle. There he was, a brute, scars marring his face, arms the size of her thighs. That monster was her target.
She felt her blood chilling, turning to ice cubes. How would she do it? Would she stab him in the back? How much force did she need to apply? Why had she offered to come in here anyway? That’s why they had contracted the Bravos. Stupid, reckless, idiotic, she called herself, almost ready to let Martin know she needed someone else to do her job.
Then she laid eyes on a thin, frail Chinese woman, sitting against the wall and holding her baby. Tears ran quietly on her checks, as she caressed and reassured the silent, immobile infant.
Alex felt a wave of rage suffocating her. “Ready,” she whispered in her comm.
“Copy,” Martin replied. “Go on my count. Three, two, one, go.”
She made a move toward her target, her hand clutching the handle of her tactical knife, her arm lowered, hidden behind her back.
The Russian turned, startling her for a split second.
“What do we have here, huh?” he said, staring at her with obscene eyes, and grabbing her chin with his filthy fingers.
“Your worst nightmare,” she growled, then stabbed the man in the chest, plunging her knife to the bolster, throwing all her weight behind the thrust.
The man buckled, his surprised eyes drilling into hers, while his mouth opened, gasping for air. She took a step back, pulling her knife from his chest, and getting ready to strike again. The man fell to the floor in a pool of blood.
“One down,” she said into her comm, then signaled silence to the hostages around her, putting a finger to her lips.
One by one, she heard the team members confirm their kills. Then she heard Martin give the “all clear,” and he addressed the hostages from the entrance.
“Attention, everyone, we’re here to take you home,” Martin said, as incredulous hostages clamored and hurried toward the door. “Please follow our instructions to stay safe. There could still be hostiles in this building.”
No one paid much attention. They hurried to get out, to leave their hell, stepping over each other, screaming, running, just wanting to be free.
“Both teams, we need to contain the situation,” Martin’s voice came to life by radio. “Don’t let them scatter in the forest. We’ll never find them.”
Then Alex heard Blake’s voice, rising over the tumult, calling Adeline’s name.
…60
Alex followed the sound of Blake’s voice, as he called his wife’s name. He stood by the entrance, still on the outside corridor, unable to enter the dome against the flow of rushing people — tumultuous, desperate, frantic to get out.
That was something none of the team had given enough thought to. How would they control 423 passengers and 18 crew members, when they were running for their lives? What could they possibly say to slow them down, to get them to listen to reason? Not that they had their exfil figured out either. She had no idea how to get all those people to safety, from behind enemy lines. She needed a solution — a good one, and fast. One way or another, they were responsible for the lives of almost 450 irrationally frantic people, running, trying to escape.
Running to where, exactly?
There was no way to know what the enemy had coming. Maybe they had reinforcements nearby and some Russian had radioed a call for backup before being taken out. They had to move, get out of there while they still could, or risk a bloodbath.
She walked outside the dome with the flow of people, and soon reached Blake.
“Have you seen her?” Blake asked.
“No, but there are still a couple of hundred people inside,” she replied, standing on her toes, trying to find her among the faces of the running mass.
“Adeline!” Blake called again, his strong voice covering the commotion of the crowd.
Somewhere from inside the dome, a distant voice responded.
“Blake? Blake?”
Alex smiled widely. Yes! There she was, making her way toward Blake, who tried to push against the flowing crowd to get to her sooner.
Finally, he got her in his arms, lifting her up in the air and taking her a few steps to the side, away from the stampeding crowd.
“Oh, baby,” he said, burying his face in her hair.
“I can’t believe you’re here,” Adeline said, choked with tears. “You didn’t give up on me, you came for me.”
“Always, baby, always.”
Alex took a few steps to the side, to give them some privacy. That’s when she saw him. A Russian had appeared out of nowhere, and was coming toward them fast. Anger contorted his face, and he bellowed a mix of unintelligible words in Russian. His gun was drawn and pointed at them.
“Blake!” Alex yelled to get his attention, as she pulled out her Walther.
Blake let go of Adeline and turned to see what was going on.
Then she saw the Russian pull the trigger. She fired her weapon, just as Blake stepped in front of Adeline, covering her with his own body. Alex’s bullet tore through the Russian’s shoulder, but didn’t stop him.
She heard Adeline shriek, but kept her focus on the Russian, and fired her weapon twice more, in rapid sequence. One bullet got him in the head, the other in the throat. He fell forward, hit the concrete, and didn’t budge.
Alex rushed to the fallen Russian and took his gun. Then she looked behind her, and her heart sank.
Blake was down, holding the left side of his abdomen with both his hands, while blood oozed from his wound, in small rivulets flowing between his fingers. Adeline held his head in her lap, sobbing hard.
They needed help. Their situation was turning into a disaster, fast.
She pressed the transmit button on her radio and called. “Bravo One, Bravo Two, this is Alpha, do you copy?”
“Bravo One, copy,” Martin responded.
“Bravo Two, copy.” That was Lou’s voice.
“Bravo One, Bravo Two, follow my lead. Bravo One, I have a man down, gunshot to the abdomen. I need evac with a gurney, and get one of the doctors ready.”
The radio crackled a little in her ear, then Martin’s voice confirmed, “Copy. On our way.”
She remained silent for a few seconds, thinking hard. What could they do?
“Alpha, you still there?” Lou’s worried voice came through the radio waves.
“Copy, Lima, still here. Lima, these folks got here by trucks. Load them in the trucks; check them off the flight manifest, one by one. Make sure we don’t leave anyone behind. Verify we have all the dead confirmed by at least two witnesses. Put one or two Bravos in each truck, and get ready to leave.”
The radio crackled for a little while before Lou’s voice kicked in, hesitantly.
“Copy, Alpha. Exfil?”
“We’ll figure it out. I’ll hang back until evac takes over here, then we have some cleanup left in the lab. Five terrorists are in there, waiting to get our attention.”
“Alpha, Bravo One,” Martin’s voice crackled to life. “Lab cleanup executed.”
“Copy, Bravo One. Any intel extracted before cleanup complete?”
“Negative, Alpha,” Martin’s voice replied after a short hesitation.
Damn it!