Prologue

  As I was checking my gear again and running down my inventory checklist, I heard to my right, “Dammit, want to go back to bed! Why the hell are we out here, eggheads looking for ghosts!” Minstrel complained loudly… again.

  “Can it, Minstrel! We're here because this is where we are being paid to be.” A voice crackled over the radio that Minstrel had obviously forgotten to click off.

  “Copy LT!” He responded quickly and, whilst making sure the radio was off this time, grumbled, “Damn, I’d take Thunder snoring down the barracks at this point.”

  “Kid, learn to take the boring jobs as the good ones. No one wants action when outside the city, if you get it, you’re either screwed or don’t realise how screwed you are yet.” I softly chided the newest member of the Ash of Rathgar, the PMC outfit I was currently working for.

  “Shut it, and why are you still awake, old man? I thought I had first watch?”

  “You still have another hour, technically. Ibormeith and I have an awful relationship if you haven’t noticed.”

  He looked at me in befuddlement.

  “She is an old Celtic goddess associated with sleep.”

  “Don’t have a single clue why you bother remembering all that stuff, not like you’re teaching history or anything anymore.”

  I sighed, “Yup, corpos took that away pretty good after the bombings, and now my ass is stuck out here babysitting youngsters like you. Damn site better off as a career prospect I'd say, don’t you think? All danger rather than stay in a warm office or teach in a classroom.”

  “Damn, you had an office? How rich were you? Those things are expensive!” Was the shocked response that came.

  “Everyone who taught in the school had them back then, and they were free with the job. Came with my name on the door and all.”

  “Man, you crusty, washed-up old timer, stop making me jealous! I ain’t never going to see the inside of an office with my name on the door unless I move a lot higher up the ranks, and I'll probably be dead in some model's belly before then.”

  “We’ll all end up there sometime at the rate the world's going. Now go to sleep. I'll start my watch now, not getting any sleep at this point.”

  “Thanks, man I owe you.”

  “Probably the nicest thing you’ve ever said to me whelp.” I replied, but Minstrel had already fallen asleep before I finished.

  A couple of hours had passed since Minstrel had fallen asleep, and I tuned my radio to the team frequency, asking over the comms, “LT, what's the progress of the search and security teams?”

  After a few minutes, the squad's sergeant, Michael replied, “Teach, they have found some signs of an old installation and think it might be the correct one. They're moving to start cracking the doors now; hopefully, it won't be long. Tell the kid we've been asked to bring the vics closer now we know where it is exactly.”

  “Copy.” I said as confirmation and gently began to shake Minstrel awake.

  “What finally get too boring, old man, need me beaming personality?” Minstrel asked as he stirred groggily.

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  “No new update from the boss, we’re moving closer, we've got a bingo.”

  “Damn, finally!” He said, jumping into action to get the heavy cargo haulier moving along the route, and then sent it to the in-built GPS.

  The route was rather uneventful, with only a single Model 3 encountered along the way, which was swiftly dealt with by one of our MATV escorts. Horrid looking thing they are, a three-hinged jaw with two eyes vertically on the middle of its forehead in the overall approximated form of a dog and made off with a brown green bark-like skin and whatever constituted as the antithesis’s muscle being exposed and dark green at the joints.

  Once we arrived at the location ping that was sent to us, we found an old metal door half-buried under shrubbery that was obviously cut away to get access to the door.

  Annoyingly, there was no activity outside the door. The security team was getting damn sloppy if they weren’t posting a couple of people to guard the damn exit. This was in possible antithesis territory, a bad idea leaving a flank or rear open.

  “Boss, no rear guard, damn fool search team probably told them to come in and help search and the blockheads listened.” I passed the problem up the chain rather than deal with it myself.

  “Seriously, I’m going to have words with their team leads later if we're picking up their slack, we'll be getting paid for it. Rider 1, stay with your Vic, Riders 2 and 3 all but gunners dismount at your discretion who stays. Heavy all out were going in to check. It seems the facility is deeper than expected, only getting bits and pieces on the radio.”

  “Yes Sir!” Came the chorus of replies.

  Minstrel and I swung ourselves out of the heavy cargo haulier and hustled up to the open door, stacking up behind the Lieutenant.

  “Short brief guys and girls, we're going to go about this by the book since everyone on the security team probably didn't bother to sweep the facility, standard method.”

  “Teach and Minstrel, you lead in as Alpha,”

  “Barney and BJ, you are Bravo,”

  “Hands and Sticky, you are Charlie and holding rear.”

  “I'll augment Bravo and shift as necessary, Copy?”

  “Yes Sir!” came the slightly subdued reply

  “Alpha lead off.” Came the final part of the short brief.

  I swung round the corner, checking the left corner. Minstrel checked right, then we started down the corridor in front of us. Pushing our way down the corridor, we came to a two-way intersection and stacked up on the left side wall.

  There was a glass front on the wall straight ahead, Bravo stacked on the right wall and on a count of three, both teams swung out around the corridor.

  “Clear!” came the expected call from both sides

  “Open hallway,” BJ relayed

  “Single Door, pushing to clear,” I replied

  Minstrel and I pushed to the door and split the stack on either side. The door was a solid steel piece with a hatch lock similar to that on a submersible. I nodded and he turned the hatch and then swung the door open.

  Once his gun was back up we moved through the door, checking the room inside. It was a security station that was devoid of any meaningful signs of inhabitation, judging by the layers of dust present inside the mug on the table.

  “Room clear, security station long abandoned, no cams or data link,” I radioed back to the rest and quickly moved back through the door.

  “Coming out!” I warned.

  Once back in position in the lead of the formation, we continued down the right corridor clearing 2 rooms on the left and covering while Bravo cleared 3 more on the other side of the corridor.

  The rooms were 3 bunk rooms with minimal personal effects left, as if those living here had left in a hurry. The remaining rooms were a kitchen and a dining hall.

  We got to the next corner further in down the corridor before a blare of a buzzer and an alert went over the intercom on the wall.

  “Alert subject has broken containment lockdown and purge protocols initiated, all personnel please calmly and orderly evacuate to safe zones. The Queen will be notified of the situation.” A monotone female voice intoned just before we heard a slam behind us. As a panel in the ceiling opened and a blast door rapidly dropped into place, blocking our exit.

  “That ain’t good, we better not have intruded on one of Trash Bandits' hideouts. I'd rather not have my face ripped off by a swarm of raccoons!” Hands exclaimed.

  “The only way to get out of this is to keep going, and I’m getting bits and pieces over the radio again, so maybe we can have the eggheads figure this out.” Said Michael

  Then the gunfire started. And we turned to look at Michael.

  “Don't! Just don’t.” Lieutenant Murphy Michael groused.