Black Flagged Apex (57 page)

**

Michael Brooks stood facing his security crew as they slid their shovels into the ground. He hadn't decided if they would be buried in the same holes. It really all depended on how much space remained in each hole when they finished piling the bodies into the ground. Brooks really didn't feel like digging. He had a busy day scheduled and didn't need the delay. Plus, they might come in handy at the distribution center. Anne Renee said they could use some more help, especially given the compressed timeline. He swatted at a fly that buzzed by his head. He really hoped this group would finish their work within the next few minutes. The flies were already swarming around the pile of bodies littering the ground behind his men. He hated flies.

Jason Carnes, whose corpse formed part of the tangle, had never seen it coming. Even when Brooks' men corralled the laboratory group out of the back door for "instructions," he had ignored the dubious looks from his own people and even went so far as to make excuses for the few lab technicians that had already vanished. Two of the techs had tried to escape in one of the delivery trucks early this morning. Their absence was discovered a few minutes before one of the early morning convoys departed for the distribution center, and the trucks were searched. They were found jammed between crates, cowering in fear. They had every reason to be afraid. Their bodies were hidden outside of the gate, until it was time to "sanitize" the facility.

The last convoy of delivery trucks carrying crates of freshly packaged bottled water to the distribution center had left the compound around 8:00 AM. Carnes' lab crew spent the next hour shutting down the packaging equipment and sterilizing laboratory equipment. Brooks started to sense that the techs were stalling, hoping that the security detail would leave. He decided to expedite his last remaining task at the facility by directing everyone outside to receive instructions for their follow-up assignment to the distribution facility.

Twenty-three men and women filed out of the door and milled around, waiting for him to speak. His assistant, Jason Ryband, stood next to him and started to shoot into the group without warning, catching Brooks by surprise. Brooks had been waiting for his security detail to walk out of the back door and form a hasty line abreast. Instead, Brooks drew his own pistol in a desperate measure to keep Carnes' people from reaching him. His security team heard the shooting and ran through the door, firing at the runners or anyone not huddled into a group that served no purpose other than to absorb bullets. It lasted less than twenty seconds. The digging followed, after a few distrustful glances from the security team. Brooks watched the shovels carefully, noticing that the men were not straining to move the dirt. Frankly, he was surprised they agreed to dig at all. He started to open his mouth to address this discrepancy, when one of them suddenly grabbed his rifle and tried to swing it around.

The movement startled Brooks, causing him to scramble for the pistol in his thigh holster. A fucking mutiny was underway. Before he could get his hand on the pistol, the security guard's head snapped back. The hiss and snap of passing bullets filled his ears, followed by thunderous explosions that drowned out every sound around him. He removed his hand from the pistol and glanced over his shoulder. His assistant lay face up on the ground, wheezing and rasping through a hole torn in his throat. When he turned back around, only one of his men remained standing. The others twitched or lay motionless on the grass. He didn't dare look for the source of the gunfire. Instead, he raised his hands slowly above his head, nodding at his last guard to do the same.

**

Daniel jogged over to the presumed leader of the group, keeping his rifle trained at the man's head. Through his peripheral vision, he could see the rest of his team moving toward the second surviving guard. They had a leader and a follower. Not bad for three seconds of work. Munoz announced that he would clear the doorway and make sure they didn't have any surprise visitors from inside the building.

"Clear and restrain," Daniel said.

Jessica sprinted over and yanked the leader's pistol from his thigh holster and tossed it into one of the shallow graves. She patted him down for any other weapons, removing a small folding knife from his back pocket. She stepped over to the second gunman and cut his rifle sling with the knife, letting his rifle fall to the ground. Aside from the K-Bar knife attached to his belt, she didn't find anything concealed. She tossed the knife to the ground and proceeded to zip tie their hands behind their backs.

"Over here." Daniel motioned to the two prisoners.

The two men hadn't said a word since the ambush, which surprised Daniel. These two might be harder to crack than he expected. Normally, someone was demanding answers or exhibiting some kind of useless bravado. These two were either scared out of their minds, or they were cool customers. He'd soon find out. The two begrudgingly moved to where he had pointed his rifle, roughly ten feet behind where Daniel currently stood. He wanted them to have a nice view of the festivities.

"Pay close attention," Daniel growled, as they walked past him.

Daniel walked up to the man who had been armed with the MP-9 submachine gun. A wet rasping sound passed through the hole in his throat, which bubbled and overflowed with blood. His eyes looked ghastly, even to Daniel. He held his M4 CQB rifle in one hand and placed the barrel in the man's mouth.

"Can you tell me what's going on around here? What's the purpose of this facility? Were the virus canisters stored here? I'm sorry, I can't hear what you're saying," Daniel said, addressing the mortally wounded man sprawled out on the ground.

"Who's he talking to?" the leader said, finally breaking their code of silence.

Daniel pulled the trigger, firing a single 5.56mm M885 projectile through the back of the man's skull into the ground.

"What the fuck! Oh, Jesus Christ!" the follower yelled.

Daniel turned to the two of them. "I have absolutely no use for anyone that can't…or won't answer my questions."

He walked over to the last remaining guard who appeared alive. He kicked the man in the side of his ribcage, where he had suffered from a messy exit wound. The 5.56mm projectile had a nasty habit of tumbling around inside the human body, bouncing off bone and finding its own unique pathway out. He could see three entry wounds in the center of the man's chest, which put this particular exit nearly ninety degrees off the original trajectory. The man emitted a guttural, animal-sounding moan in response to the kick.

"I can't imagine this guy answering any questions." Daniel kneeled down and picked up the discarded K-Bar knife, raising it high before slamming it through the man's neck.

"Fuck this!" the follower screamed, struggling to break free of Jessica's hold on his collar.

"This is psychotic. Who the fuck are you?" the leader said.

Daniel rushed up and placed the sticky blade under his chin. "But executing twenty people and rolling them into a shallow grave is perfectly normal? You've been hitting the Greely-Harding Kool-Aid a little heavy," he said and shifted over to the follower, grabbing him by his hair.

"Do you really think this fucker was going to let you leave this place alive? I've seen people dig their own graves before. Once they figure it out, they start to shovel half loads in an attempt to put off the inevitable. I've been watching you dig for a while now. How long does it take to dig a fucking hole?"

"He's full of shit, Douglass. Nobody was planning to shoot you," the leader said.

Daniel released his hair. "I wonder what he told them," Daniel said, pointing to the fly-encrusted pile of bodies with his bloody K-Bar knife. "So, here's the deal. I'm going to take a little tour of your facility. When I'm done, I'll be back with lots of questions. You don't want to be the first person to stop answering my questions."

**

General Terrence Sanderson answered his phone immediately.

"Daniel, I presume everything is moving along smoothly up there?"

"Not by any measure. I think you need to call the president and have them converge on the distribution hubs. From what I can tell, they're bottling up the virus and transporting it nationwide. We caught the last of the security crew here tying up loose ends, Milosevic style."

"Have they confirmed this? What are the targets?"

"We've been working over the two that we captured. They confirmed that thousands of bottles were transported from this site to one of the distribution hubs over the course of the last twelve hours. They both claim to have no knowledge of what went on inside the industrial-grade laboratory we found in this place. This site resembles a miniaturized, standalone version of a bottled water plant. They have at least three thousand square feet dedicated to assembly and packaging. Now I know where most of Benjamin Young's money was spent," Daniel said.

"The bottles were poisoned? I didn't think this was possible. The virus wouldn't survive suspended in the water for very long. Are you sure this was their plan?" Sanderson questioned.

"I'm not seeing any other conclusion to be drawn. We found the original virus canisters shipped from Europe. They sure as hell did something to the bottles that left this facility. Whatever they're planning for those bottles, I guarantee it won't be random. They've carefully crafted the events leading up to this sudden demand for bottled water. You need to convince the president to shut this whole fucking town down," Daniel said.

"That won't work. First of all, I'm back on the shit list. They won't believe a word I say, especially with Director Shelby whispering in their ears. Secondly, the bottles might already be on the way to their intended targets. Unless someone confesses on-site, the FBI has no way to force this information out of them. This water will disappear into the population as soon as it hits the shelves. Give me specific targets, and I'll try to call the president."

"The president could go on national television and tell the American people not to drink Crystal Source water! How hard can this be?"

"He'll only do that if he believes me. You know how this works. If I call him up right now, rambling about poisoned bottled water linked to a bottled water company, I'm going to have a problem with credibility. Especially when I try to explain how we obtained the information. Anyone that could prove we were working in good faith on behalf of the FBI task force is either dead or unconscious. Right now, we are once again enemies of the state. Get over to the distribution hub and unfuck this situation. Please."

The line went silent for a few moments.

"All right. We'll close up shop around here and try to figure out which hub they're using. Things sound a little tense down there, General," Petrovich said.

"We're leaving the compound. Headed to more populated areas east of here. I'm not taking any chances."

"It wasn't a bad run while it lasted," Daniel said.

"A minor setback. I'm nowhere close to finished," Sanderson said.

"There's no place for someone like you or me in the system they've created. They'll congratulate you with one hand and put a gun to your head with the other."

"Don't lose the faith, Daniel. We're their last line of defense. It's worth the trouble. Can I count on you to see this through to the end?"

"Have I ever disappointed you, General?"

"Just once I wish you'd quit answering my questions with another question. Is that too much to ask?" Sanderson said.

"Yes."

"Enjoying yourself?"

"Not really."

"Get me some targeted information, and I'll make the call."

"We're on it," Daniel said.

Sanderson disconnected the call and walked up a short path to meet with his operations officer. Standing on the covered porch of the headquarters lodge, Parker looked disturbed.

"What's wrong?" Sanderson asked.

"I just lost all satellite connectivity. They're shutting us down," Parker said.

"Can they do that without Argentine cooperation?"

Parker shook his head.

"Shit. What's the impact to our organization?"

"We're temporarily cut off from our EW teams in the States. We'll probably lose our sat-phones next. We need to get out of here immediately and reestablish our entire communications network. We've been transmitting from a fixed position known to the U.S. government for at least a week, which has given them plenty of time to sniff around our system. I've been careful with our data management. All of our U.S. feeds were one way, which is impossible for them to intercept. I scrubbed the return data in case they had somehow managed to piggyback the satellite we were using. Our network hacks are still intact. The team in McLean has full access to FBI headquarters."

"Issue backup SATCOM to each vehicle and clear out. I'll meet up with you in Neuquén," Sanderson said.

"We'll be ready to roll in fifteen minutes. I guess we should be thankful for the cloud cover," Parker said.

"Let's hope it's cloudy all the way to Neuquén. Start working on a plan to take us to the coast. Neuquén's bound to shrink really fast if the Argentine government gets involved. Senior Galenden told me he had to back off this for a while. We're more or less on our own."

"We'll be fine. We have the best team possible on the job up north," Parker assured him.

Sanderson pondered the ex-SEAL's statement. Daniel's sense of duty was confused. He had long ago ceased buying U.S. patriotism wholesale. His dedication to Jessica overshadowed all of his motivations, which was why Sanderson always framed their conversations around what was best for their future together. It wasn't a disingenuous tactic. Daniel could smell his bullshit for miles, so there was no point in trying to psychologically sway him. Framing it for their benefit allowed him to continue conversations that Daniel would normally dismiss.

He thought about Daniel's tone near the end of their most recent phone conversation. Petrovich resorted to humor when he was undecided. He also tended to quickly agree with Sanderson when he had no intention of following instructions. Daniel remained an enigma to this very day, which gave Sanderson no comfort. Unfortunately, there was little he could do to control the situation. If Daniel walked off the mission with Jessica, he still had four extremely capable operatives to continue the mission. He didn't want to think about it. He had enough to worry about on his end.