She’d been told that the mat-trans chamber inside the Quonset hut had been sealed in some manner by Silas before he died. Nobody could open the door to the chamber but the old man, and only then after he had placed his face to a hole in the console and let a red light play over his left eye. Sheffield had planned on stealing the eye and sealing it in a jar of alcohol to keep it fresh. But then that bastard Ryan had fried the whitecoat to a crisp and ruined the plan. Now their only hope of gaining access to a mat-trans unit was through the locked door of this redoubt. It was maddening that the blues had a gateway inside their ville, and couldn’t use the chamber.
“Big door,” the blue shirt commented, ambling over. “What is it? Some sort of bomb shelter?”
With a word, Collette worked the bolt on her Ingram and turned. Before the sec man could react, she stitched him with a long burst, the copper-jacketed rounds tearing the man apart until he resembled the partially eaten bodies on the cold, smooth ground.
Easing off the trigger, Collette turned to the keypad and began to tap in the first code. She waited, then did the second, then the third. Her anger rose, but she fought it under control. Clearly, this would take some time.
RYAN AND J.B. braced themselves for a surge of weakness, or nausea, but neither occurred.
“Bout fucking time we had an easy jump,” Ryan growled.
“It was a short jump,” J.B. said, “which means we’re still close to Shiloh.”
Reaching out, Ryan touched the wall. “This isn’t armaglass,” he stated. “Wonder where the hell we are?”
Looking around, the men noted they were in a small chamber with plastic walls painted a military green to waist height, then a dull navy gray to the ceiling. However, this clearly wasn’t a redoubt, but a simple gateway, a mat-trans chamber set outside the subterranean predark fortifications. They had encountered a couple of homemade gateways, which always meant big trouble. Checking their weapons, Ryan and J.B. braced themselves and swung open the door. Both fought back a gasp of surprise.
“Dark night,” J.B. whispered, grinning widely. “It’s payday.”
Ryan wholeheartedly agreed. Stepping out the door, the men could see the gateway was situated inside some sort of huge warehouse, with curved walls and a sharply arched roof, as if a tin can had been cut in two and placed sideways on the ground.
“This is a Quonset hut,” Ryan said, studying the distant windows. The glass, or Plexiglas, was frosted white, so there was no way to see outside. The warehouse could be in the middle of a Deathlands desert, underwater, or on the moon. There was no way of telling.
But much more importantly, the entire interior of the structure was jammed to the rafters with military supplies, neat rows of shelving filled with med kits, MRE cartons, satchel charges and endless cardboard boxes of ammo. Huge mounds of crates were stacked along the sloping walls, hundreds of drums of condensed fuel piled conveniently near a small door, and pallets full of tents, bedrolls and huge rolls of concertina wire were everywhere, along with tightly coiled belts of 25 mm shells for APC cannons, .50-caliber bullets for heavy machine guns, long crates full of AK-47 and M-60 blasters and backpacks for carrying LAW rocket launchers. The men had never seen such an incredible collection of weapons like this level since the deadly Alaska redoubt.
“Let’s get busy,” J.B. said eagerly, shouldering his Uzi and starting down the main aisle.
A forklift was parked in the near distance, obviously used to move the heavier pallets, and it was perfect for their needs. Then a movement at the extreme end of the aisle caught their attention and both men ducked out of sight, but it was too late.
“Hey, who the fuck are you guys?” a distant sec man called out, dropping a clipboard and clawing for the blaster on his hip.
In one smooth motion, Ryan stood, drew the SIG-Sauer and fired. The silenced automatic coughed once, the 9 mm round slamming the sec man backward. He fell sprawling onto an open trunk full of 125 mm AP shells for the main cannon of an Abrams M-l tank.