John Krygelski - The Aegis Solution

“All of you fall back. Take cover behind the first row!”

Leah and Wilson roughly helped Kreitzmann up and moved him to the back of the room, then joined Tillie in the first aisle. She had already taken her old position behind the makeshift gun slot.

Seeing they were all behind cover, Elias, after firing off a short burst, more for effect than anything else, moved back and joined them. Within moments, the left side of the door frame was marked with a red dot, a sighting laser, yet no fusillade came. Seconds passed before he saw a flash of light just outside and slightly past the doorway, followed an instant later by an explosion. The jamb was shredded by shrapnel.

“They have an OICW!” Leah shouted. “EVERYONE DOWN!”

As they all dropped to the floor, Tillie yelled, “What’s that?”

“Basically, a mini grenade-launcher,” Elias answered, “with a range finder. It shoots a 20mm or 25mm projectile that travels to a preset distance, then explodes.”

“So they can kill people around corners?”

Before Elias could respond, there was a second flash and the room was filled with the sound of a thousand pieces of shrapnel striking the walls, floor, ceiling, and the pile of steel parts on the shelving in front of them, ricocheting wildly.

“I guess they fine-tuned the range,” he said matter-of-factly.

A third round arrived with the same result. Tillie yelped in pain as one of the tiny metal shards tore into her upper arm.

“Next will come the tear gas,” Leah yelled loudly enough to be heard through the muffling earplugs, as she turned to check Tillie’s wound. “The OICW will keep us back. We won’t be able to toss them out.”

Before she could even finish her warning, the first canister flew into the utility room, careening off the side wall and popping. The confined space quickly began to fill with the white gas. A second arrived moments later. In less than a minute, they could no longer see the doorway through the gas.

Elias’ eyes were already watering heavily, as the welder’s goggles were not designed for this type of eye protection. His nose and throat started burning. He could hear hacking coughs coming from the others. He knew that it would be only a matter of a minute or so before rational thought became difficult, if not impossible. Twisting around in the dense white cloud, by memory and feel, he crawled to the end of the aisle and around it, moving toward the doorway.

As he crawled, he reached up and lifted the painter’s respirator and called out, “FAULK, I’M COMING OUT!” Lifting the mask to be heard caused a strong dose of the gas to flood his throat and lungs. He pushed his rifle through the doorway, sending it skittering out to the center of the corridor.

Behind him, Leah yelled, “Elias, I’ll go. It’s me he wants!”

“It doesn’t matter,” was all Elias was able to get out before his throat closed in spasms.

Using his elbows, hands, knees, and feet, he scrambled forward, hoping that he was not greeted with a bullet to the head the moment he emerged from the doorway. As soon as he cleared the threshold, the intensity of the gas diminished and he could see five agents, wearing full-face gas masks, and body suits to protect their skin from irritation. They were all pointing their assault rifles directly at him.

Several yards back stood Faulk, looking foolish in his face mask and business suit. Pulling the mask away from his face, he ordered brusquely, “Get up, Elias. You two, keep him covered. The rest of you, cover the doorway. We should have the other members of this gang in about a minute.”

Behind him, Elias could hear harsh, racking coughs coming out of the utility room. Wilson and Tillie emerged, their arms raised. The last to come out was Leah, supporting the semi-limp form of Rudy Kreitzmann, who leaned against her heavily.

As Faulk was about to speak, Leah let Kreitzmann drop, revealing that she was holding the AK-47 behind his back. Firing before she had it fully elevated, she directed the first spray of slugs toward the two closest men, wounding one in the leg and hitting the other in the elbow as her rifle swung around. The backup agents were afraid to begin shooting, as their boss was standing in the line of fire.

Leah’s magazine was empty, and as she hurried to slam a full one in, Elias dove for the closest agent, the one she had hit in the leg, and wrestled his weapon from him. Turning and hoping to take out Faulk, he saw that his target had hastily run behind the other men, freeing them to open fire, which they did, their first shots going wild. Tillie and Wilson, seeing the pandemonium, hurried back to the utility room, as Leah and Elias, lying flat on the floor to minimize their profile to the agents, opened fire, catching the three men who had accompanied Faulk forward and were now attempting a retreat.

Faulk and the remaining agents had all taken cover behind the corners again. Elias knew it was only a matter of moments before the OICW was brought to bear, or even basic grenades. He knew that Leah’s decision to attack was a decision based on the knowledge that they were all minutes from their deaths, anyway.

The agents, flanking both sides of the “T” intersection, took turns executing their new plan. One extended his weapon around the corner and fired blindly, followed a moment later by a second man who stuck out his head and weapon, aiming his shots. The slugs ricocheted off the concrete near Elias, and he heard the sudden whimper when Leah was hit. In the chaos of the moment, he dared not look to see how badly, as he was intent on taking out the second shooter.

A part of Elias’ mind, still coldly calculating their chances, determined that they had less than a minute to live. They were out in the open with no cover; they were outmanned and outgunned; and the opponents could continue their current technique until a lucky shot took both of them out. It made no sense to retreat to the utility room, as Faulk would only repeat the OICW and tear-gas attacks. Elias decided that if he jumped up and did a running, screaming charge, he would last four paces before he was cut down.

The second man popped out to fire again. Elias was able to brush him back before the man got off a shot, but still did not connect with his target. Suddenly, above the thunderous noise from the gunfire, he heard a loud rumbling coming from the utility room and managed to sneak a peek. What he saw lifted his heart. Tillie was running full-tilt through the doorway, pushing the rolling, steel gang box ahead of her. As soon as she cleared the doorway, which was only inches wider than the box, she moved up to run along the side of it, still propelling it forward, until it came to a stop in front of Leah and only a couple of feet from Elias.

He rolled to his right to move behind the cover, as Tillie punched the button lock on the lid and lifted it, pulling out the shotgun. The gang box immediately rang with multiple shots from the agents. But with the steel walls of the box and the solid pile of heavy tools inside, the bullets did not penetrate to the other side.

He took a moment to see how badly Leah was injured and was alarmed at the amount of blood coming from her shoulder. Tillie, seeing this also, reached back inside the box and pulled out a plastic bag filled with clean rags, wrapping the wound quickly and slowing the blood flow, as Elias kept up a steady succession of short bursts from his rifle to keep Faulk’s men back.

Finished with her hasty bandaging job, Tillie lay flat on her stomach and extended the shotgun under the gang box in the narrow space.

Elias’ momentary hopefulness crashed at what he saw next. Leah, who had moved to the opposite side of Tillie and was watching from the right side of the box, saw it too, and gasped, “Oh, shit,” pulling and holding the trigger on her rifle.