Kilo-29 (Damned of the 2/19th, Book 15)

Part 4

Site Kilo-29-Civil Defense Entry Area
United States of America
Winter, 1993
Day One-Night

"God, it stinks." Donaldson the Meathead coughed, but I ignored him, looking underneath the door. It was dark, the lights just starting to glow as the system gently fed them power to avoid weakened filaments from blowing out. My NVG's were on my helmet, which was attached to my ruck, but I wanted to avoid those as long as possible. I'd learned last year that sometimes NVG's didn't help.

...Captain Lewis coughing over the radio, the bubbly sound of a punctured lung audible. "Get out of here, boys, we're already dead here..."

I shuddered slightly, exhaling and scooting under the door as soon as my ruck would clear it.

The light was dim, but I could still see well enough. The door opened up into a room about twenty by twenty with the overhead ceiling about ten feet up and slightly bowed in such a way to let me know that this room was probably an "eggshell" design, which meant it was in the middle of a circular area, the area outside of the room nothing but heavy duty springs who's coils would be as wide as a fucking horse and up to thirty feet tall. It could take the shocks of a direct hit on the mountain. I scanned the room, but all that it contained was a desk, some plastic plants, and rows of chairs. Above the desk it said "SECURITY CHECK, PLEASE HAVE BADGES READY!" and there was an empty weapon's rack on the wall behind the desk.

The room felt slightly warmer that the outside had been, and the stench of rotting meat and blood filled the room, making my eyes burn.

"Sergeant Ant?" Donaldson the Meat Head's voice was shaky.

"I'm all right, son. Wait for the door to open." I told him. The lights came on, and two of them blew out spectacularly. All told, out of three rows of four, only three lights came on, barely illuminating the room.

It was pastel blue, with the CoG logo on the door to my right, the CoG logo on the door to the right of the desk, and a half dozen clocks on the wall. None of them were right.

"Check the desk drawers." I ordered when Donaldson came in. While he moved to the desk I grabbed one of the chairs and pulled it over to where I'd spotted a air vent in the wall. Climbing up, I sniffed, and the odor almost knocked me off the chair. Shaking my head I pulled it to each of the 8 vents in the room, checking all of them.

The odor was the same from all of them.

I closed my eyes, trying to visualize the "egg" and how the venting would be routed.

We hadn't smelled it in shower decon, or the hallway, so it had to be in the venting that serviced this room, and that venting had to be separate, but that meant that they'd made 2 air duct channels past this into the interior, which didn't make sense. Carving through solid rock was rough work.

...unless these were caves, Ant... I squeezed the bridge of my nose to banish Nancy's voice.

"Nothing, Sergeant." Donaldson told me.

"Roger." I answered, and headed to the interior door, pulling the lever up. More sirens sounded, but it only lasted ten seconds before cutting off.

A warning in case the Soviets breached the facility or starving refugees.

The door took 10 seconds, which looked like Site standard, to raise up, and the lights didn't come on at all.

"Shit." I grunted. I shrugged out of my pack and pulled my helmet off, then dug in one of the cargo pockets of my extra-large infantry ruck, yanking out a second set of NVG's, these ones in much better shape than the battered ones on my helmet.

"Go to IR lamp, stay sharp." I told him.

"Yes, Sergeant." He sounded scared.

I didn't blame him.

...Ant, I love you... My shoulder twinged and a cold shiver ran down my spine from the base of my skull.

The IR lamp on the NVG's brought the hallway into sharp relief. A series of bad paintings was on the left wall, and the right said: "CONTINUITY SITE K-29 CIVIL DEFENSE ACCESS CORRIDOR" on the right. The air was slightly warmer, but didn't reek of rotting blood.

"Shut the door." I told him once we'd moved into the hallway.

"How? The bar is straight down like the one on the other side was when it was closed."

"Just pull it up, it'll cause the system to shut the door." I told him. "I don't know if we can open the inner door with that one open."

I walked up to the other door, staring at it. The door had the US Seal on it, and the name "Blue Rabbit's Burrow" underneath it. Great, a named site. That meant it was like Raven Rock, Lamb's Knoll, Black Briar, Mount Pony, The Dead Men, Mount Weather, or Big Painted Horse. Except none of those were Kilo sites.

This was not going to be fun.

I threw the lever and stepped back. I had that tight prickly feeling between my shoulder blades. The door rattled, and I heard it clunk twice, trying the Tertiary systems before it began to shudder it's way up.

"We leave this one open." I said, then saw the shape inside the room.

It was man shaped, in a camouflage uniform, kneeling on the floor with something in his hands.

"GET DOWN!" I yelled, lunging through the door to my left. The guy was right handed from the way the rifle was held, which meant he'd be an split second slower pushing the rifle outward than if he had to pull it to my right, across his body.

There was a pinging noise, and I heard a zipping sound as I came in fast, low, with my bayonet by my waist.

The rifle cut loose, rattling on full auto, for about a micro-second before my knife hit him under the chin. Everything was slowed down, my options flashed through my head, I was instantly aware of the shape of the room, and that my blade came in right under his chin, striking solidly at the front of his neck, my thumb wrapped around the hilt, the guard against the bottom of my hand, my arm straightening out. The blade hit solidly and I felt the shock run up my arm.

And his head came off.

What the fuck?

The body twisted, and the rifle's bolt shot back as it was hauled into the air. His body looked wrong when he hit, and his head rolled across the floor.

A fucking mannequin?

"Are you OK?" I shouted, my ears ringing from the gunfire in the enclosed area.

"Holy shit, Sarge!" the kid yelled.

"Looks clear." I called out, waving him in.

I looked around the room, and saw what was going on.

There was a rope strung across the roof, down the rifle, and it looked like when the door opened 3/4 of the way up it dropped a weight which triggered the rifle.

"You fucked his ass up." Donaldson said, and I nodded absently, kneeling next to the mannequin and pulling off my NVG's. I grabbed the flashlight clipped to my LBE and switched it on, squinting and leaning down. I had the opaque white disk in to lower the visibility.

The uniform had several holes in the chest, was covered with blackish crust that blended with the camouflage, and was Air Force patched.

"Take the rifle." I told the kid, patting down the pockets.

"There's no ammo." The kid complained. I grunted at the fact I didn't find anything in the pockets, not even lint. The nametag read 'DRYERS" on it.

"Don't leave material for the enemy behind." I warned, tugging back on my NVG's and looking around.

The room was good sized, with multiple doors leading off of it. The steel walls had been painted a pastel blue, and the doors were labelled.

Or they had been before someone had spraypainted over them.

Still, they hadn't covered the edges of the door, leaving the color coding on the doors. Five doors, yellow, red, blue, green, and orange.

If Kilo Sites followed the standard, I wanted green. It was from when the uniforms were OD Green, which meant it was off limits to most personnel, and probably led to the main control area.

And maybe an access to the military area.

"Why would someone boobytrap this room?" The kid asked.

"To keep people out." I grunted. My hand twitched toward my pocket by I ignored it. I needed to stay sharp, not dull my nerves with micro-doses of medication.

"Duh." He muttered, but I just grinned.

The doorway had a normal handle, and I could see the hinges. I checked the handle but it was locked.

The hinges were recessed, and I recognized the door type. 2/19th had used them for every light security access, including outside.

...hurry up, Ant, I think he's behind us... I gritted my teeth till Taggart's voice went away.

"Give me the rifle." I ordered him. He handed it to me, and I started bashing the buttplate against the handle.

"If we had bullets, we could just shoot it open." The kid said.

"And we'd have shrapnel flying around in here." I warned him, grunting as I finally knocked off the handle and started working on the cover plate. It took over a dozen blows before it suddenly popped off and I could see the inner workings of the lock.