Читать книгу Imminent Domain - SEAN KOPING - Страница 10

April 20^th 2021

0711 hours

Gossamer Muse Super Cruise-liner

The Bridge

Not long after we arrived on the hi-tech bridge of the Gossamer Muse. The Colonel, Captain Li and Li’s second in command were standing on a balcony at the rear of the bridge that overlooked the ship’s exterior deck levels and dual-configuration stacks. The sky above the Gossamer Muse was overcast. Still, in the day-light from my vantage point I could better appreciate the immense size of the world’s third largest cruise-ship.

The deck from stem to stern spanned an impressive seven foot-ball fields and consisted of three distinct levels and containing three Olympic sized swimming pools, a water-slide, and a greenhouse/ topical garden area. To the front of the ship the forward observation decks rose four storeys up from the main deck and formed the back section sloping front face of the vessel where bridge and forward Recreation decks were located.

From the second storey of forward observation ‘tower’ a half-circle jogging track that extended to the inner perimeter balconies of the Gossamer Muse’s forward section. The halved crescent-like platform-bridge hung, free-standing, twenty feet over the main-deck jutting out from one end of the tower and arcing around to the other end of the tower directly below us.

Beneath the inner-rim of the crescent-shaped jogging track a raised swimming pool and large Jacuzzi were located on the lowest exterior deck on either side of the main entrance to the exterior deck levels. An open upward sloping pathway facing to the rear of the ship led to the open deck area. With no doors to seal and too well built to be collapsed by the class of explosives the Chinese team had brought this door way would be the ‘Podies’ only way out of the ship’s interior. If they got this far…

Past the deluxe Jacuzzi and swimming pool toward the stack, beyond the outer border of the jogging track, an un-comfortably large section of the lower deck floor was made of colored glass-tiles. These tiles were what comprised the roof of the magnificent atrium I had partially destroyed in my encounter with the creature.

Further back the gigantic double stack design of the cruise-ship that stabbed through the center of the ship at thirty degree angle effectively separating the lower deck from the higher second deck level. Yet, somehow, it still managed to be stylishly incorporated into the ship’s opulent and over-indulgent design-layout. The lower-half sections of the stack were purposely lined with narrow walk-ways that connected the lower and upper deck. There were even small observation platform areas complete with telescopes that climbed even further up the stacks at certain points.

On the other side of main stacks to the rear portion of the ship’s upper-deck, past the stacks, was divided into three distinct levels that rose to the back of ship culminating at the heliport platform.

On the lowest deck, about fifty-feet away there was another Olympic sized swimming pool in the shape of an oval. The deck surrounding the pool was littered with dozens of over-turned lounge chairs and umbrella tables. Two elaborately designed oriental styled bridges arched over the wide-middle of the oval pool.

Up the stairs to the second level was an even bigger swimming pool surrounded by a few hundred pieces of patio- furniture. This second level had the largest floor area of the rear decks and the immense pool was connected to the upper deck by an insanely spiraling water-slide. Part of the water-slide rested on a tinted glass-dome that housed a size-able in-door garden of exotic tropical flora.

The third and final level had a miniature golf course and a driving range for golfers to keep their golf-swings in shape while on board. Just beyond that was the heliport where we had made our insertion aboard the Gossamer-Muse.

The heliport was a three hundred and fifty metre square platform that could be raised or lowered by an independent hydraulic system.

Soul-train and the others had brought Portly and me to Colonel Bishop and captain Li who stood out on the bridge’s balcony that over looked the ship. Off to the side Li’s second in command Kimo softly spoke, in Chinese, into the COM-link strapped to his wrist. Behind us a frustrated technician named Stevens swore, intermittently, under his breath as he picked through a tangled mess of colored wires gutted from one of the bridges consoles.

“Negative, Li. One: We don’t have proper line of sight on the entire ‘kill-zone’ from the balconies that run along the inner perimeter of the ship. And two: firing from that range reduces the effectiveness of most of our weapons. And we definitely don’t have enough ammo between us to make this into a drawn out affair. And if it should come to that every shot has to count.”

“Very well then,” Li acquiesced, “it is agreed: We hit them hard with every thing we have and try to build a bottle-neck of bodies at the entrance to stop their advance.”

“Have your men line the lowest exterior deck with the last of their remote charges and all the additional explosives you brought.”

Li looked quizzically at the Commander.

“We brought enough explosives to scuttle this ship. Do you not find such an action… excessive?”

“Captain, if these… things manage to over-run our defensive positions it might be the best card we have left to play.”

“You under-estimate our capabilities, Colonel.”

“No. I just don’t know what theirs are yet.”

Li’s brow furrowed in disagreement at the remark.

“Captain Li,” the Commander continued, “Do you know what kind of man brings a gun to a knife-fight?”

Li was confused by the riddle.

“The winner, Captain. You have your orders.”

Captain Li looked to Kimo and rattled off his order in Chinese. Li’s second in command bounded past us barking his new orders into his wrist-COMM in Chinese.

It was then Captain Li saw me.

“Corporal,” he said stone faced, “Where is Sergeant Tan and Jin-Lao?”

I shook my head and started to answer but he already knew. He simply turned on his heels and walked away to the balcony. As he walked he spoke softly into his wrist-COM, to his men, notifying them of their loss. Later I would learn that Jin-Lao was Captain Li’s son.

Since this operation had started less than three hours ago we had already lost four men, three Chinese S.F. and a technician; added to that Huck was wounded.

Soul-train stepped past me,

“Colonel Bishop, Sir, the Podies are definitely on the move.”

“How long till they make it top-side?”

“The sealed doorways and explosives we set down below only slowed them down, sir. Some of them are moving up via alternate routes. It’s a big ship, Sir. Fifteen. Maybe twenty minutes tops.”

Colonel Bishop looked at his wrist-watch

“Lock and load, gentlemen,” he said his voice completely without emotion, “we’re about to earn our hazard pay.”

The Colonel split all the commandos into four four-man fire teams while two roaming snipers manned the highest deck and our two heavy machine gunners positioned on the second deck. We would attempt to halt the escape of the Podies from the ship by ‘maintaining’ control of the main, rear-facing, entrance beneath the main stacks of the ship. The plan was that if things went bad, we could systematically fall-back to the three upper-levels and access the heliport- platform, to the rear of the ship in case we needed to extract quickly.

We quickly gathered, just after the stacks, on the second level after hastily erecting flimsy barricades with lounge chairs, tables and whatever else that wasn’t nailed down on the first level. Wasting no time we distributed the all that was left of the additional ammunition supplies the Chinese had prudently brought along. Stevens, one of the three remaining technicians, gave each fire team an I.E.D. (improvised explosive device) that he had concocted during our short time on board the G.M.

The I.E.D.’s consisted of chemicals and materials taken from the ship’s machine-shop, kitchen and tropical green house and ‘a little something special’ as Stevens described it. Each of the four ‘special packages’ was attached to a grouping of six propane tanks from one of the ship’s kitchen’s. The I.E.D.’s were positioned at the base of the towering stacks.

Portly looked extremely sour as his scanner and lap-top had been taken away by his boss, Doctor Favre Palmer. Doctor Palmer was a skinny greasy-haired technician with wire-framed glasses and more brains than balls. He being head of the tech-team single-handedly decided that he was too valuable and should be extracted first along with all the valuable data “he” (meaning Portly) had gleaned from the G.M. As such he decided to wait on the helipad, the place furthest from the intended engagement, while the other two remaining technicians, Portly and Stevens, remained on the second level trying desperately to restore the satellite communications with the PWR Operations Command Centre in New York City or the in-bound USS Stennis; where our Arch-angel transports waited for our call. Thus far they had only been able to partially restore our short-range COMMs.

Hunched over a metal ammo-box, searching for additional clips for my USP46 side-arm I saw Huck limp over to Portly. Wincing with every step he reached out and tapped him on the shoulder.

“Better give’m here sweet-heart,” he said condescendingly as he un-ceremoniously yanked the Chinese M4A1 rifle away from the protesting technician. “Wouldn’t want you hurt’in yourself now would we?”

Limping towards me on a freshly bandaged but bleeding leg Huck tossed me his OCIWv2,

“The Colonel said to give you a weapon,” he growled. “Heard you lost yours”, he scoffed. “Stupid rookie’ll get us all killed just like Ox.” He muttered audibly as he hobbled off with the superior A1M1 triple pulse assault rifle.

His words stung like a slap to the face.

Suddenly I felt a touch on my shoulder – Sabre. She didn’t say a word. She didn’t have to. It was a discreet consoling gesture that, to me, spoke volumes. Then she said,

“Screw him, Rabbit. You earned the right to be part of this team. Now you just got to start acting like it.” Then she slapped me hard on my back and smiled at me playfully, “So man-up, ya pussy!”

A few minutes later we stood in place behind our ‘make-shift’ barricades roughly twenty metres from the entrances. Two fire-teams on the port-side. The other two on the starboard side. Every few minutes the quiet tension ramped up as a muffled explosion vibrated across the deck. The Podies were setting off motion sensitive bombs the Chinese had planted along the interior decks, that could not be sealed off, in an attempt to deter their advance. Unfortunately this measure had also failed.

As the Podies made their way up through the decks the explosions became louder and the vibrations, along the deck, stronger, punctuating the long tense silences. Ominous reminders of an approaching and relentless danger.

I was part of the starboard side fire-team closest the ramp that led to the huge open entrance where the Podies would emerge. Our temporary designation: F.T.-ONE. F.T.-ONE comprised of me, Sabre, Blade, and the Commander.

Sabre spat out some gum she had been chewing and put on a bright-red ‘Chicago Bulls’ cap she pulled from her vest. Turning it backward she tugged it tightly over her short-cropped blonde hair.

“You know I always thought it would be so cool to work on a cruise ship,” she said softly as she knelt beside me shouldering her rifle.

She actually sounded nervous.

“Really,” I said trying to sound calm. “What do you think now?”

“Honestly…,” she replied grinning. “…I think it might be a bit over-rated.”

Without warning the Colonel’s voice came in over everyone’s Comms.

“Gentlemen, I’m not going to coat this in b.s. As you all know we are trying to re- establish contact with the U.S.S. Stennis. However, at this moment we find ourselves facing an unknown number of adversaries that may or may not be the civilians and crew that were traveling on this ship.”

“Doctor Palmer believes,” he continued slowly, “that these people may have been infected with some sort of virus. And as such cannot be allowed to leave the Gossamer muse. The line has been drawn, People,” the Colonel said somberly.

Sighing sharply Bishop paused thoughtfully continued,

”Do not kill women and children. Do not engage civilians or use them as human shields. These are our rules. . But our enemies do not follow these rules. They say that it is our moral code that differentiates us from our enemies. But today, we do not have the luxury of being better men.”

The Colonel paused to give all of us a chance to come to grips with the grim realization that he was about to give the order to engage civilians with ‘extreme prejudice.’

“As it stands, we are the only thing that stands in the way of these infected people leaving this ship. If the Doctor’s theory is correct we are out-numbered. But know this – regardless of our current situation – no infected will leave this ship. And we will hold this line…at all cost. Aces…, “the Colonel paused for a moment.

“To the last bullet. To our last breath. To the last man. Today we will earn our stories! Now, let’s live to regret them!”

The Colonel punctuated his speech by un-safing and chambering a round in his assault-rifle. The other armed A.C.E. officers responded in kind in unison.

Suddenly the last motion-triggered charge placed at the bottom of the ramp, in front of us detonated with a deafening boom punctuating the Colonel’s brief monologue. The explosion was immediately followed by a spectacular fireworks-like cascade of concrete, plaster, and tempered steel. Then as the dust slowly settled they appeared.