The Cerberus Protocol (Hellstalkers Science Fiction Horror Series) Read online

  In Memphis’ case, worry a lot.

  The last time he’d gone into combat with a team under his command he’d been the only one to make it out alive. It was not a good beginning; even he had to admit.

  Relax, he told himself. Last time you didn’t know what you were getting yourself into. This time you do.

  To prove that to himself, he pulled out his tablet and began going through the visual recognition guide that the Intelligence arm had put together for each of them. Memphis thought of them as a big deck of flashcards, except instead of mathematical equations these were made up of silhouettes of otherworldly creatures with notations at to their basic abilities. Grendels, nightgaunts, slithers, banshees, there were a dozen of them in the Class One category alone. Trent had assured them that the information had been painstakingly compiled from the files captured back in World War II, but there was really no way of knowing if the Nazis had it right or not until they actually encountered one of the things. The fact that the information on the grendels matched his own personal observations was encouraging, but he knew that could have come from his own report as easily as the historical information.

  On a whim he looked for the other creature he had encountered in the tunnels of CERN, but wasn’t able to find it.

  Guess we’re just going to have to see for ourselves.

  Knowing he should get some rest while he had the chance, Memphis laid down and tried to get some shut-eye, thoughts of strange and otherworldly creatures haunting his dreams.

  *** ***

  They set down at a small airstrip outside of Krakow, where another helo, this time an old Russian Hind, was waiting for them. The pilot had them airborne just seconds after they’d boarded.

  The flight to Ogrodzieniska was only twenty minutes and Memphis felt like they’d only gotten airborne when the pilot came over the intercom telling them to get ready.

  They didn’t know the exact conditions on the ground, so Memphis had made the decision to keep the chopper airborne and have them rappel down into the target zone, which they did without incident. Once on the ground though, things were a different matter.

  Ogrodzieniska was an old farming community, with buildings that looked a hundred, maybe a hundred and fifty years old if they were a day. They looked empty, too; no lights shown through their curtains and no smoke came out of their chimneys.

  They hadn’t moved half a dozen meters from their landing zone when the demons attacked.

  It started with a thick flapping sound, like someone snapping a sheet in the wind, but that sound quickly separated into a hundred separate sounds that filled the air around them. The sheer volume of the cacophony made it hard to pinpoint where it was coming from and Memphis found himself turning in place, trying to pin it down.

  “Stone!” Ulf cried and Memphis turned to look where the German was pointing.

  It didn’t look like much at first, a dark cloud on the horizon coming toward them, but gradually it became clearer and the team was able to see the dozens of creatures flying toward them.

  They were unlike anything Memphis, or any of them for that matter, had seen before.

  They were about the size of a Saint Bernard, with hyena faces and mouths full of needle-sharp teeth. From their chests jutted small three-fingered arms, reminding Memphis of the front arms of a tyrannosaurus. Their wings were made of a leathery material that flapped loudly, generating the sound they were all hearing.

  As soon as the creatures laid eyes on them, they changed course and attacked.

  The others were far more experienced with this kind of thing than he was, but Memphis found himself falling naturally into command.

  “Fall in on me,” he cried, “Get back to back so we can cover all angles.”

  He was pleased to see the team did what they were told without question; perhaps all that drilling had convinced them to trust him. Or else they had simply come to the same conclusion that back-to-back would provide the best cover in the situation.

  Memphis didn’t care either way; as long as they did what they were asked to do. As the flock of creatures dived toward them, they opened fire with their PSDs.

  It was like shooting ducks in a barrel. Unlike the creatures Memphis had encountered at CERN, these couldn’t take more than a shot or two before crashing to the ground. With marksmen of this caliber, it didn’t take long before there was a pile of dead intruders at their feet and the rest of the flock was peeling off into the descending darkness.

  The team reloaded with fresh magazines, checked the direction they were headed in, and then moved out. The rift couldn’t be far.

  Twice more the flock attacked and each time were beaten off. Memphis had hoped the sound of gunfire might bring the townspeople out of hiding, but when it didn’t, he began to suspect that there weren’t any townspeople left to come out.

  The road they were moving down suddenly intersected with several others at the center of town and there, before them, was the rift.

  It doesn’t look like much, Memphis thought. Just a flat black disk hanging there in the air without anything holding it up.

  It reminded him of a black hole and if he looked hard enough he could see the light bending slightly as it passed over it, like at the edge of an event horizon.

  But then that illusion was broken when a clawed hand suddenly reached out of that darkness and wrapped its fingers around the edge of the rift.

  It wasn’t much, just a hand, but the sight of it sent chills racing over Memphis’ body. It really was an opening to somewhere else and right now something from the darkness on the other side was trying to work its way into this world. A fierce protectiveness suddenly bloomed in his chest.

  “Unh-huh, motherfucker,” he said aloud. “Not on my watch.”

  The other three stood cover around him while he slipped off his pack and dug out the WFMD that Harley had given him on the helo.

  The hand became a forearm as whatever it was pulled itself a little farther into their universe.

  Focus, Memphis!

  “Any day now, boyo,” Jock said, as he stared at the thing climbing out of the rift. The one hand had now been joined by its partner.

  “Working on it,” he muttered and indeed he was. He did his best to flip the switches in the order he’d been told and then punched in the arming code on the device’s keypad. The screen flashed red once and then a digital count began ticking down from twenty.

  “Armed,” Memphis called out. “Cover me.”

  Without waiting for an answer he rushed toward the rift.

  As he got closer he thought he could see the vague outline of something pulling itself through the darkness toward them and realized at the same time that he was probably silhouetted in the light behind him, like someone standing in a lighted doorway beckoning out into the night. It was not a comfortable feeling.

  He glanced down at the control panel, saw that the countdown had reached ten, shouted “Fire in the hole!” and then heaved it as hard as he could at the pair of silvery-green eyes that suddenly came into view deep in the depths.

  With the device delivered, Memphis turned and ran like hell in the opposite direction, his teammates several steps in front of him already.

  No one, not Harley, not Trent, knew what would happen when that WFMD went off and so Memphis and his team had previously decided to put as much distance between them and it as possible. There was a large shed near the edge of the road up ahead and the four of them charged toward it.

  In his head, Memphis was counting.

  Nine, eight, seven...

  He heard the flap of wings off to his right and turned just in time to deliver a short burst right into a pack of those flying gargoyle things that had attacked them earlier.

  Six, five, four...

  He threw himself down behind the shed, landing on Ulf’s legs and scrambling to get himself frather undercover as the countdown reached zero.

  There was a moment of pregnant silence and then there was a blistering whine that b
uilt up and up and up before exploding in a blast that probably could have been heard all he way to Krakow.

  Silence fell on the town of Ogrodzieniska.

  After a moment, the members of the HELLstalker team all peered, one after another, around the edge of the shed.

  The rift was gone.

  In its place was a blackened patch of earth and two severed arms the size of a man’s leg. Even as they watched, the arms dissolved into a thick paste that then fizzled away to nothing.

  “Kiss my brother’s uncle,” Jock said, “it bloody well worked!”

  Just like that the team was cheering and clapping each other on the back. They’d done battle with the enemy for the first time and had emerged victorious.

  It was the HELLstalkers first victory and they hoped it wouldn’t be their last.

  Chapter Fifteen

  The rest of the mission was anti-climatic. They signaled the helo pilot, took a moment to gather some samples and one nearly intact gargoyle body for Harley and his boys in the research division to play with, and then boarded the chopper for a flight back to a remote strip outside of Krakow. There was an inn nearby and the team made arrangements to bunk down for the night as the post-battle exhilaration gave way to post-battle fatigue. Still, they were awake enough to grab several drinks in the bar and salute each other’s success. Ulf went so far as to try and hit on Alena in his drunkenness, leaning toward her in an attempt to steal a kiss, only to receive a resounding head-butt for his troubles. It was all good-natured fun and by the time they stumbled upstairs to their respective rooms, Memphis felt like they were finally a team.

  Which was a good thing, since they were met early the next morning by a surprise visit from Trent. He was waiting for them with a very anxious expression on his face in the great room downstairs where the innkeeper normally served breakfast. Memphis had yet to see their director look worried in any way, shape, or form, so to see him like this was not a good sign.

  Thankfully, Trent didn’t keep them in suspense for long.

  “It’s CERN,” he told them. “At two-fifty-eight this morning, a host of creatures boiled up out of the sealed research facility and spread out throughout the rest of the complex, attacking any living thing they encountered. Initial reports suggest that there are more than two hundred dead, with at least another fifty missing. Only the fact that there was a substantial military force surrounding the facility due to the previous incident enabled the creatures to be contained.

  Memphis shook his head. Suddenly their earlier success seemed almost trivial.

  “Fighting continues in earnest, but there does not seem to have been a break-out among the general population for which we can be thankful. Our presence onsite has been requested through backdoor channels.”

  “What can the four of us do against these things that the armed personnel already there can’t?” Ulf asked.

  “Nothing,” Trent replied. “Dealing with the intruders is not your mission this time. You’re going after bigger game.”

  “The rift,” Alena said in surprise.

  Trent nodded. “Correct. Your mission will be to descend into the underground complex to locate and close the rift. As long as it's open, more of these things can cross over into our world from wherever the hell it is that they come from. For all we know they could have an entire invading army poised there on the brink and if we don’t shut that thing down we might be sealing the fate of the entire world. I, for one, don’t want that on my conscience.”

  Gee, thanks for the pep talk there, boss, Memphis thought. No pressure or anything.

  “Based on telemetry from the rift you dealt with in Ogrodzieniska, we believe we have identified certain unique waveforms that can be used to pinpoint this and future rifts. By the time you land in Geneva, we’ll have a better idea of where the portal is and what you’ll have to face in dealing with it. There’s a chopper waiting outside; we’ve got ten minutes to gear up and be on it.”

  Memphis frowned. “You’re coming with us?”

  Trent nodded. “I’ve got a meeting of my own there, so I’ll be riding in with you. Oh, and one other thing.” He bent down and pulled out a duffel bag from beneath the table. “You might want these,” he said, reaching inside and pulling out new, olive-colored special-ops coveralls, with the Cerberus patch sewn into the shoulders.

  Now we’re official, Memphis thought with a grin.

  *** ***

  They arrived at CERN to little fanfare, just a U.S. Army lieutenant waiting to pick them up in a HMMV to escort them to their entry point. Trent left them immediately upon arrival, walking across the tarmac to where a Gulfstream sat waiting. He glanced back once, caught Memphis watching him, then nodded and disappeared inside the aircraft.

  Memphis couldn’t help but notice that the plane bore the Stanton Industries logo on the fuselage and he filed that little tidbit away for future reference. Stanton Industries was owned and operated by none other than Miles Stanton himself, one of the world’s richest men. If he was one of their mysterious benefactors, then Project Cerberus was well funded indeed.

  The four of them climbed into the HMMWV and were taken straight away to the mobile command center that had been made available for their use. As they pulled up in front of the trailer, Memphis caught sight of the man standing there waiting for them.

  “What’s the problem, boyo?” Jock asked.

  Memphis inclined his head. “That’s the asshole who had me cashiered. Colonel Boyd Warren.”

  “That fat old bastard?” Jock asked. “Leave ’em to me.”

  Alena laughed. “That’s right. You’re one of us now. Fuck ’em.”

  And damned if that didn’t feel good, Memphis thought to himself. He’d thought his life was over when they’d kicked him out of the Army, but as it turned out, it was only just beginning. Who would have guessed?

  No sooner had they exited the vehicle that Warren moved in.

  “Stone? I want to talk with you, Stone.”

  Memphis ignored him and when the colonel tried to advance closer he found his way blocked by both Jock and Ulf. Without hesitation, the former began hollering at the colonel like he was a private in boot camp and Jock was the meanest, craziest, toughest drill sergeant he would ever encounter. Memphis wanted to stand around and watch, for the look on Warren’s face was priceless, but Alena hustled him inside and out of the colonel’s reach.

  The command center was empty and powered down. That was fine with Memphis; they didn’t need it for anything other than a jumping off point anyway.

  “All right, let’s...”

  That was as far as he got. Alena suddenly spun him around and met his lips with her own. They were soft, wet...and hungry. She ended the kiss by biting his lower lip between her teeth and then pulling away.

  “For luck,” she said, her eyes gleaming with mischief.

  Memphis opened his mouth to say something in response but that’s when Ulf and Jock entered the trailer, interrupting the scene and forcing him to focus on what was to come.

  Just as well, he thought. Probably woulda just embarrassed myself anyway. One thing was for sure though; he didn’t understand this woman at all.

  “All right, let’s get down to business,” he said.

  The plans of the CERN complex had been downloaded into their tablets while enroute and they took a few moments to review them one last time. On the plans the rift showed up as a glowing red circle in a maintenance bay about one quarter of the way along the Collider’s proton tunnel network. Which meant they were going to have to make their way down to the control center and then enter the tunnels themselves to reach the rift.

  It wasn’t going to be easy. Memphis particularly didn’t like the final part of the mission; there was only one way in and out of those tunnels and if they ran into trouble down there they were going to have a major fight on their hands.

  One thing at a time, boss, he told himself, one thing at a time.

  A review of the current action reports sta
ted that there were a wide variety of previously unknown creatures roaming the CERN complex and that no area was particularly considered safe once you moved in past the fence lines. Memphis had suspected as much, but it was good to have the confirmation nonetheless.

  It wasn’t long before the door of the command center opened and Trent strolled in. What was surprising was that he had Henderson with him.

  “Dump that ammo you’re carrying,” he told them, “I’ve got something new for you.”

  He opened the transport case he was holding and began to distribute full magazines to each member of the team.

  “Incendiary ammunition,” he told them. “We’ll be able to create better cartridges for you once we’ve had a chance to study the carcass you brought back with you from Poland, but for now this will give you a bit of an extra punch when you need it the most. I’ve got five full mags for everyone, but that’s all I could get on short notice.”

  He also pulled out a larger version of the wave frequency modulator, or WFMD, that they’d used in Poland. “This has been calibrated using some of the data we gleaned from the first field test and we think it will handle the requirements of a larger rift as well.”

  “How large?” Ulf wanted to know.

  “Twenty feet square,” came the reply.

  Memphis was shocked; that was large enough to drive a fleet of tanks through. He hated to think about the kinds of creatures that might come through a rift that size. They had a hard enough time killing the smaller ones, for heaven’s sake.

  They were happy to hear that the WFM no longer needed to be tossed into the rift itself; it would work just fine from up to twenty feet away. It still meant they had to get close, but at least they didn’t have to be right on top of the damn thing.

  When Henderson was finished, they finished loading up and then headed out the door. The same lieutenant that had picked them up at the airfield was waiting outside and the team piled back into the HMMWV for the short ride over to the complex entrance.

  Their driver took them to the fence line, but rather than drop them off he turned the HMMWV over to them. “You’re going to need it once you’re past the fence,” he told them. “The faster you reach the entrance to the complex and get undercover the better. The night is not friendly out there.”