Site Kilo-29
Military Area - Main Facility
Winter, 1993
Day Two-Night
It was lit in the room, but the lights were behind me, a conscious decision that I'd had done to me more than once. It put me in shadow, but she'd be able to see my eyes and mouth while she talked.
She'd known me as Sergeant Ant, a drunken, somewhat lecherous young Army sergeant who suffered from nightmares but worked hard and kept his mouth shut. The perfect lover for a lonely officer, since I didn't go for the public displays of affection, understood the difference between on duty and off duty, and was perfectly willing to keep my big fucking yap shut and everything a secret. Then she'd known me as a fairly homely guy besotted with his pretty wife and infant daughter with an Army career that was going nowhere fast.
What she was seeing wasn't the person she'd made love to, drank with, watched TV and played with the baby with, the person who's wedding she'd attended.
Staring at her, I was the same man that 2/19th had made me. The man who survived 4 years in that hell hole, who'd been sent back again and again, and who'd done whatever it took to survive.
...we killed each other in the dark and cold, howling out our blood lust and stalking each other through hallways and tunnels...
I knew what she was seeing, and I didn't care.
"Start talking." I growled at her.
"Are you sure you want to know?" She asked. I narrowed my eyes and she held up her hands. "Just knowing this might put you in a world of hurt." She glanced up at the camera, saw it was covered, and smiled.
"It can't be worse than what they've done to me already." I told her. She raised a questioning eyebrow.
...Captain Lewis coughing over the radio, the bubbly sound of a punctured lung audible. "Get out of here, boys, we're already dead here..." and then horrible silence...
...Bomber thrashing on the mattress, burning up with fever and dying by inches...
...my hands tied behind my back as Oakes pressed her thumb into my one good eye at the LT's instructions...
"It might put your wife and kid in danger." She tried. "If I tell you, someone might decide to give you a warning about keeping your mouth shut by paying a visit to your wife and that little daughter of yours."
"Nobody in their right mind would hit my family and leave me alive." I told her. "Nerve gas doesn't care who it kills, and I helped write the manuals on using it in an urban environment." She paled slightly and I smiled. "Yeah. It'd be like that. Read my fucking psych file." I stood up. "Start fucking talking, Colonel."
She shrunk back and almost seemed to deflate.
"How much do you know about the Continuity of Government project?" She asked me.
"Enough. Keep talking."
"You know what it was tasked with."
"Stop dancing around it and fucking tell me."
"This site was initially complete in the late 1950s, one of the largest ones to that date, but some sections of the government weren't sure if a shell shocked civilian populace would be able to handle living in a facility like this, much less be any good to rebuild the US." She said. She stared at me for a long moment. "Someone got permission to gather up a 'sizeable population' mostly drawn from transients, with a handful of people from asylums that were wards of the state with no families."
Oh Jesus...
"Since the civilian populace was to be directly taken to this facility from staging areas without any detox or mental health care the people in charge figured that it would be the best simulation of how the civilian populace would be after a nuclear exchange. They had to know if the weak link in the whole plan, the civilian population, was worth even bothering to bring into these shelters." She told me. The look in her eyes chilled my blood, and I wondered if the Deb I'd made love to in that cornfield had ever existed. "For 36 hours they were sequestered, underwent sleep deprivation and no food, with taped messages that Russian bombers had penetrated US airspace and that World War III had started. Sound effects and drugs were used to make them more pliable and more consistent with what experts thought that survivors would be like, emotionally and physically. They were brought up here in convoys of various vehicles, forced to drive no matter what their condition, and brought inside, being told that this was their only chance to survive the atomic holocaust."
I felt sick. I'd heard rumors, but to actually hear it said so matter of factly...
"Once they got here, they were assigned to the civilian living quarters and the doors sealed." She shifted on the couch, an innocent looking movement. "They were supposed to be sealed for 365 days, long enough for the effects of living in an area like this, with the data gathered to be used to help improve living quarters in other sites."
I kept silent while she shifted again, sitting on her hands.
"Something went wrong during the tests, they lost contact with the bunker less than sixty days in. When the Church Committee and the Rockefeller Commission investigated the various programs that the Office of Scientific Intelligence had performed at the time, the Civil Defense Agency found hints about Kilo Sites due to an unredacted cross reference file number, thought the sites were theirs, and the sites were opened back up and refurbished."
You can't lie to me, Deb
"They did it again." I interrupted, watching her hands slide back toward her butt.
...her butt was warm in my hands, firm and smooth despite the 10 years that separated us, the muscles clenching as she moved up and down above me, the scarecrow staring down at us as we strained against each other in the Nebraska night...
"What? No." She looked startled. "Don't be ridiculous." She scoffed.
"Looks aren't brains, Colonel."
"No, Sergeant, they didn't do it again. But the later refurbishing teams saw no sign of any people, so they carried out the upgrade and rotated the stocks." She shifted again, inhaling deeply so that her plentiful breasts lifted.
"Apparently they were still down there in the lower levels where the work was never finished. The areas slated for later expansion that were left unfinished due to budget cuts."
liar
"And they've been in here the whole time, breeding?" I asked.
"Apparently." She told me, shrugging.
"How much of the military section have you been in?"
"Not much. I couldn't gain access to it, I didn't have the codes." She told me. "And I was afraid to use the elevators."
I thought about the tape in my pocket, and the blown free panel in the stairwell.
"So your team got jumped by them?"
"Yes. When we went down to check the civilian Event Locker we got jumped."
"Wait, what the hell is this 'Event' shit I keep seeing?" I already knew, but she might let something slip I didn't know yet.
She stared at me for a long moment, then shifted uncomfortably. "They're areas where the US can rebuild after an 'Event' like nuclear war. They have everything needed to restart society. Buildings, vehicles, educational materials, decon equipment, the whole nine yards."
"And how did you find all of this out?" I asked her, slumping slightly. I pulled a small medicine bottle out of my pocket, rattled two small white pills into it, and swallowed them without taking my eyes from her. "Anti-psychotics." I told her when she raised her eyebrow. "Helps prevent flashbacks." She nodded.
Yeah, aspirin is a great anti-psychotic.
"Some of it was in my briefing, the rest I figured out from records left behind that my team and I found going through the offices over on the civilian side." She shrugged. "As near as we could figure, they didn't use the military side, the people in charge figured soldiers would just do as they were told and weren't worried about the psychological factors."
She grinned at me. "They planned on staffing the military side with Army, mostly. You guys are good at just doing what you're told. No offense."
I shrugged.
"What about the Spetz?" I asked.
"Spetsnaz? What Spetsnaz?" She asked. "What makes you think they were involved?"
"Nothing. Sorry, my meds are kicking in and I got sidetracked." I lied.
"So you were exploring, you found these records, and didn't think to pull back and scream for a security team?" I asked.
"We honestly didn't expect to find anyone, Ant. Honestly." She smiled at me, warmth and affection in her expression and body language. "You saved my life, another day or two and Bishop probably would have killed me."
She leaned forward, taking the weight off of her butt, and her hands slid back a tiny bit.
...her hands reaching behind her to cup her buttocks and spread them open, her tongue running across her lips as she whispered 'there, in there' in the corn field...
"Why are you still Army, Ant?" She asked, licking her lips. "Switch to the Air Force, you'd do good in the Air Force, and I'd make sure that you got decent postings instead of those crappy places they send you." She smiled wider.
It didn't touch her eyes.
"You don't need the knife, Ant." She told me, her voice low and soothing. "I'll tell you what you want to know." Her smile turned wicked. "Then we can get reacquainted."
I nodded and resheathed the knife, putting my hands on my knees.
"Transfer over to the Air Force, we'll get some of those scars fixed, fix your knee and shoulder, and get you into a nice MOS where you can spend time with your family instead of running all over the US cleaning up old Cold War refuse." She tilted her head to the side, shifting her body slightly and bringing her left up up to rest on her knee.
The shift put her in position where the coffee table was no longer between the two of us.
"Aren't you tired of getting busted up only to be sent right back out again?" She asked me. "You told me about what they do to you. Cancel your convalescent leave and wave honor and duty in front of you so you go right back out there. Aren't you tired of it, Ant?"
I nodded and let my arms and legs relax, let the tension drain out of them.
"How many days did you spend in the hospital after the last time they sent you out?"
"Twelve." I told her, letting my head drop to the left and sighing.
"So they sent you out here on painkillers, told you it was just some old Cold War junk heap, didn't they?" She sounded sympathetic. "Just like Desert Storm. You were only a week out of surgery when they sent you to that, still on convalescent leave, weren't you?"
"Yeah." I sighed again.
"And after Dana died, they didn't even let you go to the funeral, did they? They just told you to suck it up and sent you off again, didn't they?" She probably thought she was really twisting it in.
"I'm tired, Debs. I just want to go home." I told her honestly.
"And make love to your wife? Hold your baby?" Her tone was low and soothing, but she was leaning forward just right, her hand out from under her butt, but pushed into the gap between the arm of the couch and the cushion.
I nodded.
"Been awhile since you've made love, Ant?" I nodded again. "Yeah, I thought so. Remember us?"
I sighed again and rubbed the left side of my face, nodding to her.
"Remember how much you liked titty-fucking me?" She asked, leaning a little further forward and shimmying, sending her breasts swaying, smiling invitingly at me.
...straddling her stomach, her hands pushing her breasts together as I thrust between them, her lips open slightly and her eyes bright as she watched me, urging me on with wicked whispers of encouragement...
I'd suckered her completely. She was seeing me as going under from medications, pain, and exhaustion. She'd either jump me, and I'd kill her. Or I could yank the rug out from under her and put her off balance.
I made my decision out of sentimentality.
"Seriously, Deb?" I asked, suddenly straightening up and staring at her. "You think you can take me with that knife you're hiding in the cushions? Think you'll just jump on me, stab me, and that'll be the end of it? You'll just poke me with your secret agent stabby and I'll fall down dead?"
She flushed and glared at me in hatred.
"I'd take that knife from you and feed it to you by inches if you tried it." I told her. "Then, I'll tie you to that fucking chair, invite the Major and my crew in here and find out everything I want to know so they can hear it too." She shrunk back slightly, even though I didn't raise my voice. "When did you join the Company?" She opened her mouth to protest and I cut her off. "Don't even fucking try. I spent three days trying to find information on Kilo sites, and you just happen to have a full fucking briefing with information I couldn't even get out of the DIA? I'm not fucking stupid."
She was silent for a long moment. "Last year."
"Do you really think it'll be like training when you jump?" I asked her. "Did you think Debra Killain, Secret Agent, was going to just be able to jump on Sergeant Dumbass and it'd be just like training?"
She flushed deeper and glanced at her hand. When she glanced back at me my knife was in my hand and her eyes went wide.
"Yeah." I told her. "You actually did." I pointed my knife at the coffee table. "Set it down, Debs, and you might live to get out of here."
"Or what?" She asked me.
"Or I'll take it from you, you'll scream for a little while, then you'll tell me what I want to know, and afterwards
I smiled.
"I'll cut the bottom of your spinal cord you and leave you in the tunnels at the bottom level in the dark."
Her hand was shaking as she put the knife on the table.
"It's the vaults down there, isn't it?" I asked her.
"What vaults?" She tried.
"Don't play fucking stupid with me, Agent." I snapped. "I put it together why those other three dipshits were here as soon as I saw the goddamn seals."
"Put what together?" She tried again.
"Please. Those are records from prior to all the shit-storms of the 70's and 80's, complete and unredacted records from the biggest dirty dealers in America." I told her. "No lost or destroyed records in those sections, just all of the information that the FBI, NSA, and CIA had at the time this place was built. Probably whole vaults full of microfilm so it could survive any kind of EMP and wouldn't be subject to someone cruising ARPANET stumbling across it."
She looked startled and it pissed me off. I was ugly, not stupid.
"What was it they tested on those people? A bioweapon or chemical?" I asked her.
"I don't know." She told me. She did.
"Doesn't matter. If I have to I'll brew up some mustard gas and flood the lower levels with it." She stared at me in horror. "What's the big deal? Hell, there's probably chemical weapons in here anyway, I can just flood the lower levels with thickened Tabun and that'll take care of the fucking problem right there."
Her face went even paler.
"So there are chemical weapons here." I chuckled. "No matter."
"You wouldn't..." she whispered.
"Why the fuck not? They're the enemy. You said there were a couple thousand of them, that they killed your whole team." I grinned. "I'll just gas this place, rig charges on the blast panel in the deflection tunnel, and we'll get the hell out."
"But..." She started.
"Then the world would find out, and you'd be fucked." I said. "Plus, you know as well as I do that there isn't 'thousands' of them. How many are there?"
"I..." She was trying to come up with a reason for me not to gas the place. I should do it just to fucking spite her.
"You don't know." I said, shaking my head. "And you didn't come here with a full team, you came here with Bishop and a handful of others." She looked surprised again that I'd figured it out and I wanted to smack her.
"How did you..." She asked.
"I saw LT Rolands a week ago." I grinned. "She was heading to that cluster fuck in North Dakota, Heather and I had dinner with her and her girlfriend. It was a nice story, though, almost believable, except you went a little too Hollywood on it." She flushed angrily again, and I remembered how that blush would cover her breasts when she came.
"How long has Bishop been tracking you?" I asked her. The fear in her eyes was real this time.
"Two weeks. That part was real." She insisted, and I shook my head.
"No, it wasn't. What really happened?" I asked her. "Why'd you kill him?"
She opened her mouth then closed it, and the fight went completely out of her. "He was talking about telling the world what happened here." She said quietly. "He wouldn't shut up about it, him or Sergeant Richardson. I'd made the mistake of telling them where those people had come from." She looked at me. "You have to understand, Ant, I had to do it, it would have ruined my career if he'd told the press."
Her precious fucking career. She'd killed the CO that had stood up for my brother and I when we'd made honest mistakes or done some stupid shit, the man that had dragged me out of a crashed CUC-V and half carried me two miles to help, that had come to define in my mind the quintessential officer. For her fucking career.
She was still talking, pleading with me to understand. "I caught him setting up a satellite phone outside one of the egress tunnels. I tried to reason with him, I even ordered him to stand down, but he wouldn't listen."
...kill her, Ant...
...cut the whore's throat, Ant...
...leave her in the dark and cold with a broken leg, brother...
...do it quick, bunny, for who she used to be...
"He kept babbling about that goddamn picture of your old barracks, he was screaming at me that we were all going to die." She kept saying. "He wouldn't stop, he said he was calling for immediate evac, that everyone had to know what happened here."
She looked away.
"I pointed in the woods and asked if that was 'Candy' or whatever he was raving about, and when he turned around, I shot him." She told me, then looked at me. "He was going to violate National Security, Ant, I had to do it."
She expected pity or understanding from me, I could see it in her eyes.
Bomber was standing behind her, rage and betrayal on his face, his eyes wounded from her admission of murdering a man we'd both respected. Nancy looked physically ill. My brother looked murderous, staring at her and clenching his hands, his shoulders bunched up.
"You of all people should understand that hard choices have to be made to protect America, Ant." She was telling me. "Just because the Cold War is over doesn't mean there isn't still threats! People wouldn't understand why it had to be done."
I knew what she was going to say next.
"Is a bunch of homeless and crazy people worth the damage it could do to National Security if this all came out?" She asked me, her tone telling me damn well what she believed.
Had the woman I'd known ever even existed? Already those moments were contaminated, the woman I'd made love to replaced with the murderous betraying bitch in front of me.
"It didn't work, did it?" I asked. "He came back and started killing your team, didn't he?"
She nodded. "I thought he was dead, but now he's on some kind of Rambo revenge kick."
You stupid bitch.
I leaned forward and picked up her knife. "What happened to Richardson?" I was looking at the knife, not her.
"I don't know. He might still be in here somewhere alive." She told me. "I think he's working with Bishop. Why? Are you going to help them?"
"And the rest of your team?" I asked.
"Dead." She told me. "Between those people and Bishop, they're all dead. We held out where you found me." She half lied.
"And now we're here." I told her.
"And now you're here." She smiled. "Along with the three agents who were tasked to retrieve me when I didn't report in."
I stood up and backed a few steps back.
"You know, Ant, if you get me out of here, I can make sure there aren't any repercussions for you." Agent Killain smiled. "Wouldn't you like to be on the winning team for a change, instead of living in the goddamn dirt like an animal?"
My back hit the door.
"I'm serious, Ant. Help me accomplish my mission, help me get out of here, and I give you my word that I'll make sure you can change from some faceless Army grunt to something where you'd be more appreciated. Spend some more time with your family." She was smiling.
"My Father would kill me himself." I told her. "No thanks. I'll be fine in the Army."
"But will your wife?" She asked, smiling.
I opened the door behind me. Kincaid was standing there with his rifle, rage just pouring off of him in an invisible cloud.
"She'll be fine." I told her. I handed her knife to Kincaid and drew my pistol.
She went pale, realizing that she might have gone too far.
I put two bullets into the light switches and the small suite went dark.
"Goodnight, Agent Killain." I told her, and shut the door before the echoes of the gunshots faded away.
"Jesus." Kincaid breathed.
Major Darson was coming out of the office, his face pale.
"Did you hear it all?" I asked him.
"I heard." He said. "Was she really telling the truth?"
"Most of it." I told him. "She can't lie worth a damn to me. I don't know why, I just know when she's lying." I shrugged. "As far as she knows, a lot of what she said was true."
"She executed an Army Lieutenant Colonel in cold blood. As far as I'm concerned, she's a murderer." The Major told me.
"Want me to go in there and shoot her?" Kincaid asked hopefully.
"No. I don't condone murder." The Major told us. I nodded. Kincaid looked a little disappointed, but he nodded too. "When we get out of here, we'll make sure she's turned over the proper authorities."
I grinned at that.
"MAJOR DARSON!" One of the meatheads was yelling. All three of us spun. The meathead was only about 50 yards away.
"Meyers made it!" He was saying, reaching for the locking bar. "He says OK."
"DON'T OPEN THE DOOR!" I yelled, breaking into a run.