Contagious

The grayness.

“Dew,” Perry said. “I think they’re trying to jam me again.”

Before Dew could respond, the Osprey landed hard, throwing men against their seat restraints.

“Get up and move!” Nails screamed. The rear ramp dropped open, and men rushed out. Perry started down the ramp, looking out at what had to be the most surreal thing he’d seen yet.

The open, green expanse of a high-school football field.

“You should feel right at home, Dawsey!” Dew shouted.

Perry hit the green artificial turf and cut left along with the other men. They’d landed almost on the fifty-yard line. He ran across a black circle decorated with the yellow letters MLK, and then he was on the green again.

Somewhere in the back of his head, the ghosts of his past cheered for Scary Perry Dawsey one more time. He was even wearing a helmet.

In front of him, a man’s head snapped to the left. The man stumbled and started to fall. Perry reached out and grabbed his jacket, then flipped the limp body up onto his right shoulder. He never even broke stride.

From far off to his left, a deep stuttering sound, then an explosion. He only semi-heard these things—all he could think of was reaching the empty aluminum stands that stretched out in front of him. Suddenly he was on the red track, heading for the corner of the stands, then curving around them—their bulk s.h.i.+elded him from more bullets. Men surrounded Perry, helping him lower the wounded man. As soon as Perry set him down, it was clear the man wasn’t wounded.

He was dead.

A bullet had hit him on the right cheekbone and gone out the other side, the exit wound much larger than where the bullet had entered.

“Nice try, Perry,” Dew said. “An A-10 went after the snipers on that building. We’re probably okay for now, but we have to move.” Dew checked his watch. “According to you, we’ve got twenty-three minutes—so which way do we go?”

Perry looked away from the dead man. Forty-odd soldiers stared at him. Some were breathing hard. All were waiting.

“Perry,” Dew said. “Now or never.”

Perry closed his eyes and just felt. Without looking, he raised his right hand and pointed. When he opened his eyes, he saw that he was pointing toward the smoking Renaissance Center.

Nails drew in a big breath.

The men turned and started to move out by squads.

Perry took one more look at the dead man, then stood and began jogging after the men of Whiskey Company.

1:00 P.M.: The Pythagorean f.u.c.king Theorem

Corporal Kinney Johnson was no Corporal Cope. That was for sure.

“Talk to me,” Ogden said. “This isn’t the Pythagorean f.u.c.king theorem here—just give me a f.u.c.king head count.”

Kinney was on one knee, handset held to his ear, trying to contact the remaining soldiers. He scribbled away on a note pad as he talked.

“Johnson!”

He looked up, his face showing anguish, panic and fear all at the same time.

“My guess, sir, twenty men. That’s the best I can do.”

Twenty. That was not good.

“Sir,” Johnson said, “I’m also getting reports from the inner perimeter. Large force of maybe fifty men moving southwest down Lafayette, toward our position. Regular army. Snipers are slowing them, but we can’t stop them.”

Ogden hung his head. Whiskey Company had found a way. So close to success. Fifteen more minutes, that’s all they needed. As long as Murray didn’t know what building they were in, he’d have to bomb half the city. Or drop the nuke, and Gutierrez didn’t have the grapes for that.

But the attackers probably had Dawsey—he would sniff out the gate, and that would be that.

Ogden had to protect Chelsea.

“Tell all units to fall back to Bravo positions,” Ogden said. “That includes Mazagatti and my personal squad.”

Ogden closed his eyes and reached out. He had to prepare Chelsea.

1:02 P.M.: Bravo Positions

Maraget and Otto sat motionless beneath a loose chunk of plaster and lath. They were in what had once been a small closet, or a smaller bathroom, she wasn’t sure—some of the holes in the floor might have been for plumbing.

She hoped their black suits would let them fade into the shadows. Clarence was down to one bullet. If the three soldiers found them here, it was all over.

When they’d entered this room, they’d been careful to avoid the crack vials that littered the floor. Even with the gunfire echoing through the city, any noise might give them away. Ogden’s men had been searching for ten minutes, rummaging through the ground floor while Margaret silently prayed they would leave. They hadn’t. Now they were going through the second floor. Every few seconds the men shot something. Probably firing into shadows, just to make sure.

Soon they would fire into this shadow.

“They’re coming,” Clarence whispered. “Our only chance is for me to shoot the first guy in and take his weapon.”

“No,” Margaret hissed. “They’re moving as a team.”

“We have to try something. When I move, you stay here. Maybe if they get me, they’ll think we split up. After they leave, you sneak out as best you can.”

Margaret couldn’t speak. If they got him, meaning if they killed him, he hoped it would give her a chance to live.

Clarence Otto was willing to die for her.

She heard a crunching pop of gla.s.s, a foot stepping on a crack vial. She grabbed Clarence’s hand and squeezed it tight. Then she remembered he needed the hand to shoot, and she let go.

Moments later, feet softly crunched the broken gla.s.s as a second man entered the room. Even through the suit, she felt Clarence’s body stiffen.

“Hey, Sergeant Major, hold up,” one of the men said. A pause, then: “That douchebag Kinney says the general ordered us back to Bravo position.”