The fence wasn’t as impressive as I thought it would be. It was made of weathered old wooden posts and three rusting strands of barbwire. It didn’t look like it would stop an aggressive cow, let alone terrorists.
“This section we unofficially call the Scary Zone. Most of the rest of the base doesn’t even know this section exists or what my people do. Some of the things buried here date back to the forties, when we really didn’t know a lot about storing biological agents, and everyone was in a real hurry. Many of the records were lost, so what exactly is here, and where and how it’s stored, is questionable at best. Should be pretty safe now, but one time I saw a coyote cross this fence. He made it a couple hundred yards out into the Scary Zone, started to foam at the mouth, then just fell over, dead. Didn’t so much as twitch,” said the man in the lead, who still hadn’t bothered to—and probably never would—introduce himself. “We run a much tighter ship now. If anything looks even sort of suspicious we lock this place down tight, nobody in or out until we’re sure everything is accounted for. But storing things properly back then was a little more…wild west.”
There was a four-wheeler-sized path between the sagebrush and the fence. The snow had been churned into a sandy mush from many recent sets of footprints. Walking was difficult in the rubber suit. The full-face helmet obscured my peripheral vision. The booties were floppy and clumsy. I would imagine that this thing would be stifling hot most times, but since it was just above freezing with an icy wind, it was nice and toasty. My breathing sounded like Darth Vader. I kept as far away from the barbwire as possible because I really didn’t want to rip my suit.
There were flashlights set in the tops of the helmets, and the light bobbed up and down as we went at least half a mile down the path. We’d only seen a few other staff, who had also been wearing big suits, and none of them had any identifiers on them. I hadn’t seen any of the people who were supposed to shoot me if I wandered off, but I had no doubt they were out there, watching us with high-powered rifles and night-vision devices. I was not going off the path. No, sir. Place like this, you could get retina cancer just from glancing off the path too hard.
“This particular storage unit wasn’t cataloged. It didn’t show up on any of our maps or tables. The units around it all date from 1943 to 1945, so that’s our approximate time frame. Somebody stuck it in the ground and didn’t so much as make a note. No idea what project it originated from or what the nature of the unit was. I hate, hate, hate when they do that.”
“Have you been down yet, Major?” Franks asked.
“Hell no. Not going to, either. Once you people say the case is closed, we’re going to cover it back up and stick a sign on it that says ‘Do Not Touch.’ I don’t want any of my people involved with it. We’ll stick to safe things, like anthrax. I thought we had all of these damned Decision Week leftovers cataloged by now. Last time MCB was out here was when a hard rain revealed one of their experiments. A deer was exposed to it and grew tentacles instead of antlers. Tentacle deer…The Army doesn’t pay me enough to deal with that kind of shit.”
That was the second time I’d heard mention of Decision Week tonight.
“Who else went in?”
“Just the team from your agency, couple of hours after we sounded the alarm. They poked around, took some pictures, decontaminated, and flew out.”
Franks stopped. “Which team?” I bumped into him. Rubber squished and squeaked. It was very awkward.
“Two men, one woman. Good looking redhead, that one…” the Major stopped when he realized Franks wasn’t moving. “Let me guess, not MCB? Their credentials said MCB and they had all the right approvals. So, far as I’m concerned, that’s who they were, and I don’t ask questions.”
So the missing Unicorn team had been here already. That was news to Franks.
The major began walking again. “Heh, you black helicopter types, always with the games.”
“It’s no game,” Franks muttered.
“My job is to watch things so awful that a single vial could kill a city. Anything less than that sounds like games to me.”
“You know, Franks, all of this being manipulated and lied to, now you get to know how Hunters feel about you guys.” It felt good to laugh at him. “Sucks, don’t it?”
His helmet rotated toward me. I couldn’t really see his face, but I could still tell he was contemplating throwing me over the death fence to look for foaming coyotes. But he didn’t—probably decided I might still be useful—then it was back to waddling.
Several small red flags had been stuck into the ground, and the major took a right when he reached them. There was no real trail here, but the feet had made a path through the snow. The sagebrush grabbed at my clumsy booties and tried to trip me. I was glad when the major led us onto a clear spot where the annoying knee-high bushes were missing.
“Motion detectors went off at oh-four-hundred yesterday. Our responders found this hole and we lowered a camera to find the seal broken. Since there were tracks leading out, but not in, that’s when we called your agency. Tentacle deer was enough for me. It’s your problem now.”
It seemed strangely familiar, this cleared area…and then the hazy, half-forgotten dream from the night before came rushing back and my knees turned to jelly.
I had seen this place before.
Slowly turning, I confirmed that the open spot was a perfect circle. The brush hadn’t been cleared at all, it simply wouldn’t grow above what was buried beneath.
In the dream, there had been a hole in the middle, with a rusty ladder leading down to a hatch that was never intended to be unsealed. I was scared to look, because to confirm it was to confirm my worst fears. I hadn’t volunteered to be the Chosen One, or poster boy, or whatever the hell I was, for a bunch of dead Hunters and the combined forces of good, and I dreaded when they tried to tell me something. Experience taught that when I dreamed about a case, it meant that bad things were on the horizon. For a moment, I couldn’t spot the hole and I felt nothing but relief, but then I realized it was just a trick of the light. There was a depression in the snow. The footprints led right to it.
The major pointed one black rubber glove at the hole. “There’s your containment unit.”
“Shit.”
“What?” Franks asked.
If the dream had been prophetic, sent by Mordechai or Bubba or whoever, then at the bottom of that shaft would be scratched the symbol I’d been terrified to finally find in real life…the mark that belonged to a being that would bring about the destruction of mankind. The mark that would end my father’s life. “Nothing.”
I didn’t need to see his face behind the mirrored visor to know that he didn’t believe me. Franks waited.
“I’ve seen this place in my dreams.”
“You didn’t mention precognition.” Franks sounded accusatory. “You’re a terrible psychic.”
“Uh, well…” the major coughed. “I didn’t hear that at all. I’m going to go wait by the fence.” He waddled off.
“I can’t go down there, Franks. It’s dangerous.” Franks reached for his side instinctively, then realized he couldn’t reach his pistol through his suit. “No. I think the danger’s gone. I just can’t. I can’t see…Look, if the dream was right, there’s a mark down there. It’ll kill—I can’t explain…My father…It’s complicated.”
The faceless suit watched me.
“It’s not like that, Franks. I can’t go down there.”
“Hunters make everything complicated.”
The story came spilling out. “My dad was supposed to have died a long time ago, but he was kept alive by, I don’t even really know by who…all to prepare me for the end of the world. He warned me about a mark, and when I see it, then I know it means the end is here. He’s supposed to deliver a last message to me, but then he’ll die. I saw that mark in my dreams last night, scratched into whatever is at the bottom of that ladder. If I go down there, I’ll know it’s started. I’ll have no choice. I’ll have to hear him out. When his mission is over, his borrowed time is up and he dies. I can’t kill my father, Franks.”
Franks was puzzled. “Will the world end anyway?”
“I…” Probably. Dad certainly thought so. The war was coming, no matter what. “I just can’t.”
Franks looked at me, then the hole, then me again. It would have been easier if he’d called me a coward, but he simply went over to the hole, found the ladder, and began climbing down without me. Franks’ headlamp disappeared, then I was alone, standing in the blighted circle as the cold gradually leeched through my suit.