Kraken Rising: Alex Hunter 6 (8 page)

They passed by multiple cross tunnels on their way to the deepest level, and finally the elevator whined to a halt with a final jerk and bounce at the bottom. Shenjung cursed softly; it was too much to hope the lights would still be working, and the huge man-made cave was a solid wall of darkness.

Yang ordered everyone off the platform, and immediately sent it back to the surface for the next group. He then turned to click his fingers and point, sending two of his men scurrying off, guns up and the barrel beams of their automatic rifles leading them away into the darkness.

Shenjung noticed all the PLA soldiers carried huge packs, probably additional ammunition, climbing equipment, and supplies. More than he would have expected, and more than any of his own team brought with them.
So much for this being a rapid search and recovery mission
, he thought glumly.

The PLA leader turned to his men. “We need to gather any evidence of the American assault on the base, and we need to locate that source of the signal. This is the priority.”

Shenjung cleared his throat. “And we need to find our missing people.”

Yang grunted, not turning. “They are either here or not, alive or not.”

Shenjung was determined not to let the man ignore the possibility of survivors. “You do care about our people, yes, Captain?”

Yang turned, his dead eyes never flickered. “Comrade Shenjung Xing, I care about our people, and their safety and security. I also care about our people of the future, and their children and children’s children, and their ability to live in freedom and prosperity. I do not like an aggressor to have superiority over the oceans where they can seal us off when they choose to. We will locate the missing American submarine, and I expect we will find out what happened to our people on the way.” He took a step closer, towering over Shenjung. “Yes?”

Shenjung saw then the zealotry in the man’s eyes. The facade had cracked open and the unbending soldier stood ramrod straight within. To this man, Shenjung knew he was necessary baggage at best, and an expendable irritant at worst. He needed to take care. He nodded.

Yang spun away. “Get those lights working. Hurry.” His voice boomed in the dark tunnel.

One of Yang’s soldiers jogged back from the darkness. “Sir, there are no lights.”

Yang made a gravelly sound deep in his throat, and the man quickly pointed his rifle beam upwards as explanation. There was nothing above them – the cords, light fittings, support rails, all were gone – also the land lines for communication. They’d be out of contact until they surfaced. The soldier moved his light and they could see there were fresh gouges in the stone as if some sort of heavy machine had been dragged along, scraping everything away as it passed.

Yang turned to Shenjung. “Rock cutter?”

Shenjung ignored him, moving his own flashlight along the ceiling, and then the walls. He took a few more steps, bringing his light down to the tunnel floor. Something caught his eye, and he went to it, crouching.

“What do you have?” Yang kept his position, obviously not wanting to be seen to scurry after the engineer.

Soong came and crouched beside him. “Is that a boot?”

“Maybe once.” Shenjung prodded the shoe. It was peeled open, the toughened leather sides torn apart. He used a knife to carefully lift it. It glistened in his light, and he brought it to his nose, sniffing.

“
Phew
.” He dragged it away, wincing. “Ammonia again.” He held it towards Soong.

She sniffed, frowning. “Maybe medicine for a foot ailment?”

Shenjung bobbed his head, knowing that traditional Chinese medicines could contain all sorts of strange and exotic compounds. He dropped the boot.

“Yes, perhaps.” He stood. “Captain, the machinery should be three hundred feet further along this tunnel branch. It was there that Zheng reported he had broken through into the new chamber.”

Behind them, the elevator arrived with the second group of soldiers and engineers. Yang organized them into three groups. A team of five of his PLA would lead out with Shenjung, Soong, and Yang behind them. The central group would be primarily the engineers and miners, and the third would be the remaining PLA, who were tasked with carrying equipment.

They trudged in silence. Shenjung had to unzip his heavy parka, as the perspiration ran freely down his sides.

“Why is it so hot? There is no geothermic activity in this area,” Soong said, almost needing to jog to keep up.

“Can you feel it?” Shenjung asked. He held up a hand, the fingers spread.

Soong did the same. “Yes, the air movement again. How can there be a breeze a mile and a half below the Antarctic?”

Sam Reid came down the hallway and saw Alex Hunter waiting at the solid metal doors of the secure elevator that would take him down to the weapons research and development area below the USSTRATCOM base. Like on most of their missions, the special ordnance Alex would need was not in any armory, arms store, or weapon dealer’s manual anywhere in the world. Most of it was experiential, or reserved just for him and the HAWCs.

He smiled, easing up behind him, sniper silent, but he already knew Alex could hear what others could not. Sure enough, Alex spun.

“Boss.” Sam grinned, holding out a fist for Alex to bump. “Down to the toy store?”

“Oh yeah. Little party down south I’ve been invited to, need some extra kit,” Alex responded.

“I heard,” Sam said. “Wish I could tag along, but this damn MECH suit doesn’t exactly fit in tight places.” He grinned. “I need plenty of space to work my magic.”

“Magic?” Alex scoffed. “Is that what you’re calling lumbering around, breaking all the office furniture these days?” He laughed easily with his big friend.

“Well, I get to stay right here where it’s nice and warm.” Sam slapped Alex on the shoulder. “You can freeze your butt off all on your own.”

“Hey, maybe I’ll tell Hammerson I need a bulldozer – a Samdozer. We’ll see who freezes first.” Alex raised his eyebrows.

“Samdozer, huh? Yeah, I like that.” Sam looked at his HAWC team leader. Hunter never seemed to age; probably another side effect of his treatment. But it was his eyes that carried the scars; they were haunted. “You okay?”

Alex nodded, looking away. But after a moment he stepped in closer. “Aimee’s place … there was an incident. You know about it.” It wasn’t a question.

“You heard about that?”

“Hammerson told me.” Alex’s gaze was steady.

Sam waved it away. “Was nothing, we took care of it. Don’t worry about it.”

“Can’t do that, Sam,
ever
. What happened?” Alex’s eyes bored into his.

Sam remained tight-lipped for a moment longer. “Okay.” He guessed if Hammerson had already told him, then what the hell. “We had a minor intrusion at the family home. What we ascertained from the bodies, it was a couple of Chinese Special Forces. They were good, we were better, so they’re dead.” Sam held up a hand. “And don’t sweat it; they never laid a hand on Joshua.”

“He was there?” Alex’s eyes widened. “He was fucking at home when those torpedoes came in. It was a hit?” Suddenly Alex was in Sam’s face. At around six-two, Alex was about four inches shorter than Sam, but the big HAWC knew Alex could tear him in half in the blink of an eye. Sam went to back up a step, but Alex’s hand came up fast, catching hold of his wrist.

“What happened, Sam?”

Sam remained calm. “They came in hot, and went out horizontal. We took ’em down hard. But there’s no ID, no traces, no leads – like I said, they were good.”

“Where are they?” Alex’s words now came from between his teeth.

“The bodies?” Sam frowned.

“No, fuck the bodies. Joshua, Aimee?” Alex’s fingers started to compress on Sam’s wrist.

“Safe – nothing can get to them. Rein it in, boss.”

“
Where the fuck are they
?” Alex’s words were more a roar. The pain in Sam’s arm was now intense, his own huge hand was beginning to go numb as the blood flow was cut off and the bones ground together. Sam gritted his teeth, watching and waiting, knowing escalation was only seconds away. Veins began to show in Alex’s temples, and his other hand had curled into a fist.

“I’m not fighting you,” Sam said evenly. “But know this, while I’m alive, nothing, nobody, no time, will ever touch them.” Sam laid his other hand over Alex’s.

Alex’s entire body seemed to vibrate, and Sam knew the war with
the Other
inside him was raging. He hoped to god he was able to contain it.

“Rein it in, boss. We’re in this together. While you’re on-mission, I’ll look after them.”

Like a pressure cooker having the lid removed, Alex let go of Sam’s forearm and stepped back. The veins in Alex’s temples vanished and the fire in his eyes subsided.

“Yes.” Alex exhaled, blinking. “Yes, I need you to do that, Sam. Be their guardian.” Alex looked up, his eyes now dark and haunted. “Where I’m going, things will get a little … crazy. If anything were to happen to me, I need someone here to look after them.”

Sam put his hand on Alex’s shoulder. “I can do that.” Sam didn’t bother with the bullshit
you’ll be fine
speech. Every mission the HAWCs were assigned to was one where good people died.

Sam gripped Alex’s hand. “We are ghosts; in and out without a trace.” Alex smiled, repeating the words in unison with the big HAWC. “We are the sword and the shield. If any get in our way, they will fall.”

Alex’s expression hardened. “Yes, and they
will
fall.”

Sam nodded, and turned away, trying hard to resist the temptation to reach down and rub his bruised wrist. One thing he knew for sure: he’d hate to be the guys who tried to stop the Arcadian on this mission.

Hours later, Hammerson sat in his office, flicking through his HAWC profiles. Alex was on his way, and now he needed a backup team. He wanted HAWCs who could secure the Chinese base, and their mining tunnel system, so when Alex came back up, he’d find an open door.

He had no doubt the Chinese would make the job red-hot. So his team needed to be lasers – burn their way in, and then keep the door open at all cost. Hammerson hoped the Chinese saw reason. But there was too much at stake and too little time now. Bottom line was, his team wasn’t there to make friends.

Chilton had asked him personally,
The Hammer
, to get the job done, and he’d get it done the only way he knew how,
by hammering
. He sat back and smiled. The toughest jobs were the ones Joe Public never knew even existed … just the way they liked it.

Once again Hammerson checked Alex’s vital signs on his monitor – strong and calm – the man could be taking a stroll in the park, instead of where he now was.

*

The B1R Lancer cut through the atmosphere at 20,000 feet doing just under Mach 2. The high speed, high altitude bomber had departed from the southern tip of Australia several hours back, and was already approaching its destination – the edge of the ice shelf of Antarctica.

The single pilot began to ease back on the throttle, the plane immediately slowing among the freezing clouds, and dropping down below Mach 1 with an associated boom. He turned to look back into the small hold. There was one delivery package – a single passenger, designate unknown. He was simply referred to as
Mr. Hawk
, and that was it.

The huge figure hadn’t moved a muscle the entire trip. He sat like he was carved from stone, with hands clasped together and resting on his knees, his head tilted down at the now closed bomb-bay doors. He looked more machine-like than human. The pilot eased back around; he wasn’t paid to ask questions.

“Crazy bastard,” the pilot whispered. No one was going to survive the descent, even if he was wrapped in all the freaking tech in the world. The bulky outer suit the guy wore had rigid folds between the legs and under the arms. Normally a Spec Op high altitude drop would mean a torpedo frame made of high tensile steel, but as no metals could be worn that would cast a radar signature, it had to be a ceramic and polymer framework. He doubted it would be effective when fighting the cold, and speed, and then there was the final impact with no chute.
At least he’ll be an invisible dead man
, the pilot thought gloomily.

The radar pinged and the pilot turned back to the controls momentarily before switching the cabin lights to a deep red. He swung around and held up two fingers. Eerily, the figure was now facing him, and he nodded once. His head and face were encased in a bullet-shaped helmet, his eyes impossible to make out. He could have been a robot for all the pilot knew – a robotic human-shaped wing.

The pilot exhaled, opened the bomb-bay doors, and then hunched over. Even from where he sat he felt the murderous waves of ice-pick cold air screaming up into the interior. He gritted his teeth, and then after another moment, turned again. The cabin was already empty.

“Good luck …
Hawk
.”

He switched on the mic. “Package away.” He banked and kicked the dart-shaped bomber back up to Mach 2. He’d be long gone before the guy’s body even hit the water.

Alex stayed rolled in a ball for the first few thousand feet, falling fast. He needed to minimize surface area exposure to the biting cold. Even though he wore multiple layers, and had a metabolism that could deal with extremes, he would be powerless to stop his extremities freezing solid, making fingers useless when suddenly called to do rapid or complex work.

He had a simple job to do – take out the
Kunming
’s offensive strike capability. The Chinese destroyer could not be allowed to rain hell down on the McMurdo base.
Defang the dragon
, Hammerson had said to him.
Defang the dragon, and then all you’re left with is a big ugly lizard
, he thought and smiled.

Alex reached a number count in his head, knowing it was time to slow his descent. He unrolled, opening his arms and legs wide. The effect was instantaneous, as the folds of synthetic material acted like a combination wing and air brake on his body, slowing him from 220 miles per hour, down to just over a hundred.

Alex bit down hard on the air tube pumping warm oxygen into his lungs. The rising atmosphere was punishing as it pummeled his body, and the cold was a thousand razor blades slashing and stabbing at him, furiously seeking any exposed flesh. He grinned around the breathing tube inside the contoured helmet. He was looking forward to hitting the water.

As he finally dropped through the cloud cover, he saw he was slightly off-target. The
Kunming
was a mile out to his left, and he angled his shoulder and one arm to tilt toward it, and then swept his arms back, and legs in tight together. Alex became an accelerating arrow shape. He was an insignificant dot, invisible to radar, and traveling again at 200 miles per hour. Even if someone happened to be looking in his direction, the color of his suit against the leaden sky was the perfect camouflage.

Directly below him, Alex could make out the huge torpedo shape of the USS
Texas
, lying about fifty feet under the surface … and then, he was in position. Once again, he opened his arms and legs, engaging the folds and struts of his suit to slow his speed – he counted down: nine, eight, seven, six, five, four, three, two, one …
impact
.

The water surface collision was enormous, battering his entire frame. Multiple smaller bones in his body immediately fractured, and muscle, cartilage and tendon compressed and bruised. He had held his arms folded up and over his skull, but for several seconds he was stunned senseless. It was only the icy water that shocked him back to consciousness.

He sunk down several dozen feet, peeling himself from the wing-suit. He’d been lucky, since he’d missed all of the tiny bergs that dotted the water. They were impossible to see on the descent, and even though they might have been little bigger than a coffee table on the surface, below, they could easily be the size of a Buick. If he had struck one of those, he would have been paste and it was game over. As it was, he could feel the massive trauma to his body, but knew that his system rushed to repair the damage, while his mind screamed its urgency – the Southern Ocean, freezing water, the
Kunming
, USS
Texas.
His mind reset, and he let the drop-suit fall away into the dark water, leaving him just in the specially thickened wetsuit, with a slim pack attached to his stomach.

Alex kept the full helmet in place, as it provided both airflow and goggles. The keel of the
Kunming
soon came into view, and in another few moments he was clinging to its stern, praying they wouldn’t need to start the huge propellers as the churn would have drawn him in and shredded him in an instant.

His first task was the easiest – he needed to make the vessel go dark. To do that, he’d shut off all incoming and outgoing communications.

Alex opened a pouch in the pack on his front and brought out a flat disk which he attached to the hull, switching it on, so it first adhered, and then started to generate its white-noise net around the vessel. By the time they figured out it wasn’t a problem with their own technology, and began a search for the source, the
Kunming
would need to deploy divers before they found it – and that should give him more than enough time to finish his work below the ice.

Alex looked up at the shimmering gray surface, steeling himself and then rising slowly. He breached the surface and paused, taking off the helmet, its air supply exhausted. He let it fall. He then attached caps to his palms.
Time to join the party
, he thought, and began to climb the two dozen feet to the rear deck.

Agony
; the cold air on his bare skin was a thousand daggers, but he ignored it and slowly looked along the boat’s guard rail – his plan’s success was predicated on the crew and officers’ focus being on the area where they knew the US submarine would be submerged. Then, one hand after the other, spider-like, he came up the side of the destroyer. He paused again and then slowly lifted his eyes above the railing. He slid over, tossing the suction pads back over the side.

Alex had memorized the Chinese boat’s schematics, every room, armament, and crew capability. He had several immediate targets to destroy – the
Kunming
had anti-air, anti-surface, and anti-submarine missiles, deck-top mounted guns, as well as two 30mm close-in weapon systems (CIWS) that would be ferocious against an exposed submarine hull. The upside for him was that the missile launchers were single system, which meant the firing mechanism could shoot multiple missile varieties, but it was the same battery – knock it out, and you take them all out. The other guns would need individual attention.

Alex stayed low and moved fast. He was a dark blur speeding along the deck to his first target. The rear half of the destroyer was primarily multi-function phased array radar – numerous sensors and sonar. Basically, it was the eyes and ears of the ship, which was now blinded and deafened by the white-noise net that he’d attached to the
Kunming
’s hull. Their problem would not become apparent until the comm. team sent or expected to receive a communication.

Alex darted forward again. It was the front third of the ship where most of the dragon’s fangs were embedded, and that section was directly under the raised bridge; it would be impossible to avoid being seen. He needed to rely on speed and accuracy, and then be gone within seconds.

Alex flattened himself on the external shielding, and paused to suck in a deep breath. He blinked hard to dislodge ice crystals that had formed on his lashes. His short dark hair was frozen solid against his scalp. His body’s regeneration capabilities had to continually work to repair a body under attack from the freezing cold and its determination to turn his limbs, and face, to solid ice. He laid his head back against the cold steel and counted down.

Three, two, one, zero
 … Alex exploded forward, his hands going to the pack on his front, and drawing forth several discs that looked like hockey pucks. His first destination was the two 30mm CIWS cannons. To each, he fixed a plasma disc, and pressed down on their timers. He then sped away to the smaller deck-mounted weapons. Once again, he attached several of the pucks, flicking on their pulses, and darting away.

By now, shouts had come from the upper deck, and the sound of running boots on steel. They would find him with their gun sights soon, and he had just one last job – the huge single system multiple missile launcher. No matter what came, this weapon needed to be taken out. Alex ran hard, a puck in each hand, his focus on the central launching barrel, when the bullet caught him in the shoulder, spinning him to the deck.

The bullet was a small caliber high velocity slug – probably fired from a QBZ-95 assault rifle. Alex was glad that whoever had fired it didn’t have it on full automatic, as the Chinese gas powered weapon had an 80-round drum, and could spit them all in under a minute.

Alex rolled and came up fast. More bullets pinged off steel around him, and he rolled and ran hard now, swerving and running to complete his mission, and also running for his life. Within ten feet of the missile launcher he leapt, and threw the discs hard – one went in, the other stuck to the outside, near the base –
had to be
good enough
, he thought, as there would be no second attempt.

Time to go
. He turned, accelerating. More bullets whizzed past – angry lead bees looking to inflict their fatal sting. When Alex was six feet from the railing, he dived, spearing down the forty feet of the raised hull towards the dark water of the Antarctic.

It was like a cold fist on his face and head, but he swam down deep, feeling the grind of the bullet in his shoulder, and aware of the air bubble tunnels the bullets made as they chased him down.

He had about a thousand feet to cover to make it to the USS
Texas
for an underwater entry. The Chinese would have high velocity sniper rifles deployed on the deck now, so surfacing was out of the question. The wound in his shoulder was a dull throb, but the puncture in his suit allowed more of the sub-zero seawater to enter, thankfully numbing the wound, but also freezing his limbs, and making his movements slower and more cumbersome.

The gunfire had ceased, or perhaps his hearing had shut down as he swam. He concentrated on counting his strokes, knowing each one took him six feet closer to his goal, but burned just a little more energy from his limbs, and a little more oxygen from his lungs.

How many strokes have I made? A hundred? More?
CO2 was building up now, entering his blood stream and his brain, and making him drowsy. Flashes of light began to go off in his head, as the oxygen in his lungs was depleted. He was so tired, and all that remained was a calm voice in his head, Aimee’s maybe, he wondered, that told him to relax, to sleep. To simply stop and take that first big, deep breath of pure, warm oxygen. He hadn’t even realized he had stopped swimming. Then came the soft voice, sniggering at him.
You lose
, it whispered.

As his vision clouded, something loomed huge in the dark water before him. There came a sudden tightness as something circled his wrist, and then wrapped around his waist. He stopped caring, and his body simply hung limply in the thing’s grip as it came at his face, pushing something into his mouth.

For Alex, everything went black.

*

Onboard the
Kunming
, confusion, chaos, and shouted orders rolled across the deck and out over the freezing water. Diver detection systems were brought online, and these used sonar and acoustic location to track small movements in the water. Snipers waited, rock steady, for the intruder to surface or for the system to pinpoint his position. Below deck, engineers were running system checks, trying to ascertain if the intruder had disabled any of their infrastructure.

The loud and blaring klaxon horn was finally shut down, but the entire crew was deployed to searching the ship. Seaman Qui Long was the first to find one of the discs, stuck limpet-like, to the top of the 30mm cannon. He tried to dislodge it. It wouldn’t budge. He called over his shoulder for assistance, and then drew forth a knife from his belt and tried to wedge it under the object, without success. It was like it had become welded to the steel of the ship.

He called again for help and more sailors rushed to him, as he continued to struggle with the hockey puck sized pellet. He grunted in his efforts. “Stuck tight. Maybe an explosive.” His lips turned down in scorn. “Small. Unlikely to damage the armor plating.” He gripped it harder and tugged again.

As if in response to his derision, a small red light started to glow on its surface. Unbeknown to the sailors, the plasma-mine had initiated a tiny nuclear fusion. Inside its tiny casing, the miniature reactor collided particles and gamma rays with molten salts to generate trapped energy as pure heat – in two seconds it went from the sub-zero surface temperature of the steel plating to two thousand degrees Kelvin. Qui Long’s hands were vaporized to the elbow and he fell back screaming with the skin on his entire body red and peeling, as the now glowing disc sank into the gun, turning the surrounding steel to gray liquid as it went.

The same thing was occurring to all the guns, each of them having their barrels or firing mechanisms melted beyond use. The
Kunming
had just been taken out of the game.

*

Water bubbled around Alex as it rapidly drained away. The tightness around his waist was still there as he moved into full consciousness, and he jerked back, immediately banging hard into the side of the submarine’s seal tube.

“Easy there, big guy.”

Alex’s vision cleared, as the Special Forces underwater portal was flushed and filled with air. Two men in bulky ice-environment wetsuits stood close by, breathers now dangling at their necks. One had been holding him up, and now stepped away.

“Okay, now?” The man’s breath steamed in the freezing tube.

Alex nodded and shook more clarity into his mind. The heavy door-wheel was spun from outside, and there came a sudden sibilant hiss, as the watertight seals were pulled apart and the oval door swung open.

He then stepped into the artificial light in the metal corridor of the USS
Texas
, and sucked in a deep draft of the warm air. His exposed skin prickled from the sudden change in temperature.

“Jesus Christ.” A sailor stood waiting, mouth open. He stepped back as Alex moved further into the corridor. “
Ah,
Petty Officer Third Class, Anderson.” He saluted.

Alex nodded, peeling off his gloves. He went to return the salute, but caught sight of his own hand – it was blue, and the fingers still wouldn’t bend properly. He’d only ever seen skin like that on fresh corpses pulled from icy water.

“Commander Eric Carmack sends his regards, sir,” Anderson said in a rush.

Alex began to peel himself out of the wetsuit. He felt the pain in his shoulder, and looked down at the ragged bullet hole there. He tugged harder on the neoprene suit and a partially flattened metal slug fell to the deck.

Petty Officer Anderson looked down briefly at the remains of the high caliber bullet. When he looked back up, his eyes went to Alex’s wound, and became transfixed.