John Krygelski - The Aegis Solution

“YEAH, TRY IT!”

“Hell, maybe I’ll untie the damn thing now.”

“HEY!”

The two men shared a silent laugh.

“All right, I’ll go,” Elias gave in. He moved to the rope, looped it around himself, and descended. Within seconds he was standing beside Tillie. In the indirect light of their flashlights, Elias thought that he saw a fleeting look of relief on her face as he joined her. He chose not to comment.

The outflow pipe was a box culvert nearly eight feet high and square. Since no storm during the life of Aegis had exceeded the capacity of the reservoir, there was no sand or silt on the bottom. Wordlessly, they began the journey.

Both flashlights had fresh batteries and were more than bright enough to illuminate the way. They walked without talking for several minutes.

The tomblike atmosphere of the tunnel caused Elias to speak in a hushed voice. “I’m guessing we are past the perimeter of Aegis.”

“Probably.”

“And you said the opening was about four hundred yards farther than that?”

“Yes. Give or take.”

Because of the straightness of the culvert and the almost perfectly square shape, there was no reason for shadows ahead. Yet Elias saw something dark on the upper lid about fifty yards in front of them.

Stopping, he asked, “What’s that?”

Tillie, who had paused with him, strained to look forward and said, “Don’t know. It looks like the top of the tunnel is stained or crusted.”

“That doesn’t make any sense. Let’s check it out.”

They again moved forward, and when the two of them were nearer, they could see that the dark ceiling was not smooth and flat, as it had been. It was now heavily textured. They could also make out the floor of the culvert and saw that it, too, was no longer the light color of concrete, but was mottled with darkness.

“Looks like some kind of sludge,” Tillie whispered, slowing her pace.

Apparently as a reaction to the sound of her voice, hundreds of tiny red dots appeared in the glow from their lights.

“Bats!” Elias said.

“Bats?”

“I’m guessing fruit bats, thousands of them. They like to sleep under bridges during the day. I think they’ve decided to call this culvert home.”

“Yuck! If they all sleep hanging from the ceiling, what’s that on the floor?”

“Guano. Bat dung.”

“Poop! We’re supposed to walk through bat poop?”

Elias moved forward several more paces, sweeping his light around. “If we’re going to get out of here and can’t clear the other exit, I don’t see what choice we have.”

“You said fruit bats, right?”

“Yes. Or maybe brown bats.”

“What do they eat?”

“Bugs or plants.”

“So they won’t bite us?”

“Usually, no.”

“Usually?”

“There are always two other possibilities. The first is that some of them are rabid. In which case, yes, they would bite us.”

“And we’d get rabies?”

“Well, yes.”

“Lovely! And what wonderful surprise do you have behind door number two?”

“That they aren’t fruit bats. They could be vampire bats.”

“Vampire bats!” she exclaimed a bit too loudly.

In reaction, they both heard a vague, leathery, rubbing, scuffling sound commence from the ceiling ahead as the disturbed bats stirred and squirmed. Elias held up a single finger in front of his lips and Tillie bit her bottom lip, not taking her eyes off the culvert ahead.

Whispering, she asked, “Is there any way to tell?”

“I’m sure there is, if I were a chiropterologist. I think that’s what a bat expert is called. Either way, I can’t tell the difference.”

“Great. I vote for going back.”

He looked at Tillie. This was the first time she had displayed any fear or timidity, and it surprised him. “They weren’t here the last time you came through?”

“Oh, God, no. If they were, I wouldn’t have made it to the grate.”

“They do go out and forage after dark, but I’d hate to lose any more time.”

“Any other ideas?”

“One.” Elias turned back the way they had come. Tillie followed very closely. After they had retraced their steps approximately a hundred yards back, he turned around to face the bats, shouldered the AK-47 he had brought with him, and fired one round. The result was instantaneous. The culvert ahead filled with a brown, tangled cloud of flying bats, startled by the thunderous crash in their normally silent lair. Panicked and slamming into each other in mid-flight, instinctively traveling in the direction away from the crash, they receded.

Their ears filled with the cacophonous sound of flapping wings, Elias and Tillie moved cautiously forward, following the retreating bats as they escaped through the passageway and out into the desert.

“OH, GROSS!” Tillie yelped as her shoes sunk into the thick, gummy substance coating the floor, trying her best to ignore the slurping, sucking noise made as she lifted each foot.

“I will never touch these shoes again.”

Elias laughed and trudged on. “Make sure you don’t drop anything.”

“If I do, it stays. Whatever it is.”

She was stepping carefully in the slime, trying to make certain that her feet did not slip out from underneath her.

Partially to satisfy his curiosity and partially to distract her, Elias asked, “I guess you knew Sweezea and Crabill before now?”

“Uh-huh. And Hutson. Tim, Jay, and Mike have been a part of our secret club for quite a while.”

“I could have used all of you when I ran the agency. So, just you, Wilson, and those three, or are there any others?”

“Only the five of us. Six, if we count you.”

“Thanks.”

“I didn’t say we were.”

“Sorry.”

She stopped in the muck and turned to look at him. “Elias, I’m teasing you. Okay? You can be a member anytime you want. And Leah, too. I like her.”

He smiled at her. “Thanks. I think we’d better keep moving.”

Leah was resting on the floor several feet from Faulk. She was still weakened by the two years of captivity and torture. Neither had said a word to the other since Elias had departed with Tillie and Sweezea. Wilson and Hutson were doing the best they could in their efforts to clear the debris from the exit. Crabill had taken Krietzmann to Madison so that his concussion could be treated.

Remembering something from earlier, Leah asked him, “Faulk, why the bombs?”

Before he could reply, Faulk’s phone, which was tucked into her shirt pocket, rang and vibrated. She pulled it out and looked at the display, which showed the name “Kennerley.” Jumping up, she ran to him and shoved the muzzle of her rifle against his temple. “I’m going to press the button. You’re going to say ‘Faulk,’ and that’s it. One extra word and you die.”

She did not wait for him to respond. Her thumb jammed down the green button, and she held the phone near his mouth. He obediently said, “Faulk.”

Pulling the phone away from him, she put it to her ear and listened, walking away.

“Director, this is Kennerley. We have a major problem.” The man on the phone sounded anxious, on the verge of hysteria. “It looks as though one of the other lab technicians was infected last night. She left the lab and went home before she became symptomatic. She must have gotten an extremely small dose and it took longer to incubate.”

He was speaking rapidly. It almost seemed that he was not even pausing for breath.

“She’s dead. Several police and paramedics are dead. The pathogen is out in the general public. I don’t know if it mutated to a form immune to the vaccine or what happened, but it seems that everybody dies, whether vaccinated or not. We had two inoculated doctors on staff at Walter Reed…they’re gone. At least half the staff there is gone. It’s spreading like wildfire. I don’t know what to do. Director…Director…what the hell should I do?”