John O'Brien - Return

A thin, blue book lies beside each phone with the words “CDC Directory” embossed in gold on the front. That’s fortunate , the thought crosses through Lynn’s mind as she opens up the directory. Pages tucked inside clear plastic denote names and numbers by department, and, further back alphabetically. Looking under ‘Administration’ on the first page, she sees Director, CDC. Room 500, Crap , she thinks. There goes our luck. We’re going to have to climb to the fifth floor. Hopefully the office in question is in one of the lit areas of the building .

“Looks like we’re going to the fifth floor,” she says over the radio. “Drescoll, what do you have?”

“A bank of elevators to the left and right in the hallway as far as I can see. It gets dark in there pretty quick,” Drescoll answers.

“Alright then. Must be a stairwell nearby. We’ll use that. We only have 12 NVG’s so it’ll be Black and Green Team in the interior. Horace, you take and cover the lobby,” she says into the mic once more.

“I’m with you,” Drescoll’s voice sounds in her ear piece.

“Roger that, First Sergeant,” Horace responds.

Stepping out from behind the reception area, Lynn walks between the shattered glass doors, their remnants on the floor scrunching under her well-worn boots with the rest of Black Team following along behind her. Once again, as at the front door, a multitude of dried, bloody footprints leads in and out of the hallway, testimony to night runners cutting their feet on the glass spread on the linoleum tile as they transit in and out of the building. The hallway quickly fades into darkness with two banks of elevators to the left and right still bathed in a partial glow from the outside light. Their doors tightly shut and the elevator cabs stuck at unknown floors, sitting there until the cable holding them up rusts and sends them plummeting down.

Donning her night vision goggles in the dark and adjusting the strap, she lowers the goggles down; feeling and hearing them click into place, she turns the switch on. The darkened hallway immediately shows up with a sharp, greenish glow. The fuzzy image of the old styles replaced by a sharper image but still with the green glow everyone associates with what NVG’s normally look like. The later versions provide even more clarity and literally turn night into day.

Three more dual sets of elevators come into her vision in the glow of her goggles along with a door set between them on the right with a “stairs” sign above it. The emergency lighting that should have been there long ago extinguished. Turning to the rest of the group behind her, she asks if everyone is good. Meaning, all goggles are working and ready. Thumbs up and nods give answer to her that everyone is prepared.

“Okay, let’s do this,” she says on the radio, stationing team members to cover the entrance and interior. She opens the stairway door and swings it into the hallway.

A rush of cool air envelops her but that is all that emerges from the large stairwell. To the right, stairs lead upwards in the normal emergency stairwell fashion; the stairs leading to an intermediate landing before reversing to continue up to the next floor. Another door leads outward across from the one she is holding open.

“Horace, send over two to cover this bottom stair landing,” Lynn says in her radio after analyzing the situation.

“Roger, First Sergeant, they’re on their way,” Horace replies. Two soldiers quickly head her way, their boots clicking on the tile floor announces their approach.

“You two cover these doors and keep the stairwell clear,” she tells the arriving soldiers.

“Drescoll, detail two at each landing on the way up to cover the doors if they end up being double doors,” Lynn continues. “I’ll detail two on the fifth floor.”

“Copy that,” Drescoll responds.

“Anyone hears or notices anything, no matter how slight, report it right away. We have to keep this route open at all costs. If we get into an engagement, we withdraw through this stairway, the covering force on each stairwell landing folding in behind and covering the withdrawal. Any questions?” Lynn asks expecting none.

“Hooah, First Sergeant,” they all say in hushed tones.

“Okay, let’s move out,” she says and steps into the cooler darkness of the stairwell.

The faint creak of her boot marks her first step upward; weapon trained aloft to what can be seen of the stairs leading in the reverse direction to the landing above. Quietly step by step. Advancing slowly but knowing they are in a little time crunch. Not a rapidly approaching deadline but one nonetheless.

“Horace, keep watch on the time and notify us when we reach 20:15. That’s our cut off point,” she says pressing the mic button at her collar.

“Copy that, First Sergeant,” Horace responds through the radio.

Looking at her watch glowing through her NVG’s, Lynn sees they have about three hours before it is time to go. Maybe enough if they find it right away, maybe not. But that is not going to make her rush any faster. There is a time and place for that and this is definitely not one of those. She arrives at the first landing and begins climbing the next series of steps. Black Team is following several steps back. Keeping a good interval, knowing that huddling up too close in a confined space such as this will increase the odds of friendly-fire casualties in case they have to engage.

The second floor landing is clear and identical to the first floor with the exception of the concrete flooring. Well, and the fact that there is a sign saying ‘2 ndFloor.’ Big clue there. There is no need to call the landing clear on the radio as that is readily apparent. She hopes there is not a need to reverse and get out quickly while they are all confined in the stairs together. They will bunch up quickly trying to reverse and get out making the one in front, her, an easy target with nowhere to go.

The stairwell is deathly quiet. So quiet that she can hear the quickened breaths being taken both by her and the soldiers behind, fueled by adrenaline and the fear that accompanies the unknown. Her heart pounds in her chest from the adrenals kicking into high gear. The enclosed concrete block stairwell seems to close in and Lynn is thankful it is not the pitch black that it must be outside of her NVG’s. This is so much better than having just a flashlight , she thinks as she resumes her climb. The darkness outside of a flashlight’s illumination being even darker and the light ruins any night vision.

Reaching the third floor landing, she notices there is not any light coming from under the stairwell door giving a clue that light from the glass front of the building is not reaching the stairwell door on this floor. She noticed the same on the second landing but that was to be expected from the fact that the lobby is two stories tall. Not good , she thinks heading even further up into the building. As she places her foot on the first step toward her ascent to the fourth floor, Drescoll informs her that Green Team is starting its way upward meaning Black Team is stretched out behind her for two floors, each member occupying a half flight of stairs, intermediate landing or landing.

Anxiety begins to grip her as she makes her way upwards, each step taking her farther away from the safety of the daylight. Lynn tells herself not to get trapped by the false notion that if things go terribly wrong, the rooms or offices with windows outside will offer any sanctuary. Sure, for the moment they will but the setting of the sun will cause that safety to disappear. No, if something happens, this stairway and the entrance door leads to the only true sanctuary.

Alert and ready for anything, Lynn fingers the selector switch, reassuring herself that burst mode is selected. She thinks momentarily of her and Jack’s discussion on the M-4. Him telling her that the ones he used were fully automatic and her insisting that is not the case. Well, he was in a little while before her and that could be the case for the early models. He still insisted and insists that the ones he used in special ops were automatic. Those thoughts slip quickly from her mind as she reaches the fourth floor landing. Only one more to go , she thinks in the dark quiet with only the rustle of clothes, the creak of boots stepping quietly on the concrete steps, and the occasional light metal clinks sounding in the stairwell as soldiers climb behind her.