A Glimpse Of Decay (Book 1): Red Storm) (2 page)

Gennady looked up at the sergeant, wide eyed, his jaw slack.  “Sergeant Pushkin…Kirilenko is saying…that his men have gone mad.”

A stunned silence fell over the occupants of the vehicle. 
Gone mad...what does he mean by that?
  It then dawned on Pushkin. 
Gas!  God no, please don’t let it be gas!
  Kirilenko’s men must have been under the effect of some sort of gas or chemical.  That would be the only reason Kirilenko would issue such a wild report.  It had to be!

“The attackers must be using some sort of gas or nerve agents!” screamed Pushkin.  “Quickly, boys, put your gas masks on, now!”  The apprehensive sergeant pried his mask from its carrier and just prior to sliding it over his head, he yelled for Sokolov to alert the rest of the vehicles on the situation.  “Tell them to button up!”

“Keep trying to see what in the hell Kirilenko is talking about!” Pushkin yelled at his radio operator.  He had a sinking feeling of dread building up inside of his gut, and the less he knew, the harder it was for him to contain himself.  His worst fears were being realized.  He had no real fear of bullets or bombs, but the thought of gas terrified him.  There had been rumors of a secret facility somewhere inside of Ozersk, a facility designed to churn out vile and evil chemical and biological weapons.  Maybe there was an accident with the storage facility, like the terrible anthrax accident at Sverdlovsk in 1979.  Maybe terrorists had attacked the station, and during a fight with Kirilenko’s men, some of the Antov’s darker creations had been released.

“I’ve lost him,” Gennady said, his voice muffled through his mask.

“Senior Sergeant, we’re almost there,” Sokolov shouted, “but it doesn’t look good.”

Stricken by Sokolov’s words, the sergeant made his way up to the commander’s seat and peered out of the view port.  Frustrated that their obsolete vehicle had no infrared vision, he cursed the commander and shoved him aside.  Dark plumes of smoke could be seen coming from the direction of the plant.  Something was definitely burning.  The battered, tracked vehicles roared past an abandoned checkpoint and continued for another quarter of a mile down the dirt road before they came upon a 10 foot high chain-link fence that served as the perimeter for the first facility.

Just beyond the fence sat a series of dull-gray three story buildings.  They were windowless and the number “01” was painted in stark black stencil on the first structure.  As they pulled up to a gated entrance, Pushkin observed a lone personnel carrier sitting just to the left of a guardhouse.  It was Kirilenko’s vehicle.  The rear troop hatches were open, but no one was around.

“Stop here!” ordered the Sergeant.  He wasn’t ready to rush into the complex and get caught in an ambush, so he decided to deploy from outside of the fence.  He turned to the squad and yelled, “Prepare to deploy!”  The troopers turned towards the rear hatches.  They clutched their weapons to their chests as fear gnawed at them like a hungry wolf.

Pushkin knew that his boys would do as they had been taught to do so.  Countless hours of grueling training had made a deployment like this second nature to all of the men, but now it was going to happen under fire.  As the carrier came to a grinding halt, the rear hatches flew open and the sergeant screamed, “Go!”

The squad exited swiftly with the chorus of thudding boots, rattling gear and muffled curses.  They hastily fanned out and threw themselves against the dusty earth, forming a defensive perimeter around their carrier.  The men from the other two trailing APCs did the same and the sergeant focused his attention on the deserted carrier.  He noted that there were no casualties around it or the guardhouse, and he saw that the door to the small wooden building was standing open.

As he knelt on one knee, he crooked his head left and right, surveying the length of the fence.  He was looking for any signs of a breach.  He couldn’t help but notice how blue the sky was and he again thought of Alina.  Quickly shaking her image from his mind, he focused on the task ahead of him.

Pushkin knew that even though Ozersk was a closed town, its security was less than stellar.  It wouldn’t have been very hard for a determined foe to gain access to the town if they had made even a half-hearted attempt.  He saw no signs of anything that would have indicated an attack except for the plumes of dark smoke billowing up into the sky.  The lack of visual damage or of casualties was confusing to him, but somewhere within the complex, he knew for certain that a fire was burning.

“Secure the carrier and the guardhouse,” he ordered as he motioned with his free hand.  His squad jumped up and raced over the dirt and grass towards the abandoned vehicle.  The other two squads began to make their way towards Pushkin’s carrier.  After securing the APC, his group moved on the guardhouse, securing it with speed and precision.  Seeing that there was no action along the fence, the sergeant trotted up to the shack as the other squads took up positions along either side of the building.

Once inside the structure, Pushkin was astonished to find that there was no sign of damage to the interior.  His apprehension increased because the building was usually staffed by at least three soldiers, and now the guard station was completely empty. 

Pushkin turned to one of his troopers.  “Leonid, take a reading for chemicals!”

Responding to his sergeant’s order, a short, frumpy soldier who was wearing an ill-fitting uniform pulled out a chemical detection kit from a pouch on his tactical vest.  Tearing the kit out of its container, Leonid began to wave it around in the air, taking a reading of the atmosphere.

“Are the security cameras still functioning?” Pushkin shouted out.

“It looks like some of them are still up, but some of them seem to be damaged,” Gennady said.  He stood there looking at a bank of monitors that was mounted on the security desk.  Several of the screens were dead, but a few of them were picking up sporadic activity.  “Sergeant, there seems to be some movement by section three.”

The sergeant rushed up next to Gennady and fixed his gaze on a monitor labeled “Sec. 3,” which was a section of the complex that was located about a quarter of a mile inside of the fence.  He squinted as he tried to focus through his foggy lenses.  He was able to make out several soldiers standing in the middle of the camera view—and they were firing their rifles at something just off screen.

The sudden and unexpected sound of gunfire could be heard echoing off of the walls in the complex and Pushkin instinctively had the urge to duck and go for cover.  The troopers who were standing outside raised their weapons and began to nervously scan for targets.  Pushkin was about to yell an order when Leonid shuffled up to him.

“Sergeant Pushkin, I am not getting any reading!” the soldier shouted.  Pushkin could see Leonid’s eyes through his mask lenses.  They were wide with fear.

Noting Leonid’s report, the sergeant turned back to the monitors and saw more commotion in section three.  The soldiers on the screen were still shooting at something.  The crack of their fire was filtering its way towards Pushkin and his men and with each new and unnerving series of pops, the soldiers winced with uncertainty and anticipation.  After several more seconds of shooting, the troopers on the monitor screen turned and ran out of the camera’s view.

Pushkin ran to the door and tried to signal Sokolov.  The vehicle commander was sitting in the hatch of the turret and was busy trying to seek out the source of the gunfire.  He didn’t see that Pushkin was trying to get his attention.

Looking back inside of the building, Pushkin yelled, “Gennady, get out there and tell Sokolov to get his tracks ready to go into the complex!  And get someone to open up that damn gate so we don’t have to tear down the whole fence!”  He trotted back to the monitors as Gennady went out to relay Pushkin’s orders.  The sergeant focused back on section three.  There was no movement and the screen was empty.  A few seconds later, a second group of soldiers moved onto the screen from the direction that the first group of soldiers had been shooting in.

“Gennady,” Pushkin barked as he continued to watch the screen, “did you reach that goat fuck Sokolov?  I want him to move his—”

Pushkin stopped speaking mid-sentence as a horrific sight filled the camera screen.  He stared in disbelief at what he was now watching on the monitor.

Gennady looked over at his sergeant and saw him standing there, gawking at the flickering display.  “I didn‘t hear what you were trying to tell me, Sergeant.”

Pushkin didn’t reply.

“Sergeant?”  Gennady sprinted over to Pushkin and looked down at the monitor.  “Oh my God!  What is that?”

Pushkin continued to stand motionless, looking at the screen.  “I’m…I’m not sure,” he finally muttered.

“Sergeant…one of those men,” Gennady stammered as he pointed at the monitor, “one of those men is on fire.”

Gennady was correct.  One of the soldiers on the screen was actually walking around while his body was being consumed by flames.  He wasn’t flailing about, he wasn’t falling to the ground and rolling around; he was simply strolling around—as if he was impervious to the fact that he was burning.

Pushkin then saw another soldier who walked into the view of the camera.  He had a bloody stump where his right arm should have been.  The gory trooper was twisting and turning in an erratic fashion and it looked like he was experiencing some sort of seizure.

As Pushkin took in the unbelievable scene, he could feel his body turning cold.  Fear began to grip him by his stomach.  He again thought of Alina and was now full of regret.

“Gennady, raise headquarters and tell them we have fires burning and we have casualties!” he said in a shaky voice.  Realizing that he was exhibiting fear in front of his troops, the sergeant forced himself to regain his composure.  He knew he had to get his unit moving in order to figure out what was going on.  He also knew that his men were depending on him and he couldn’t fail them by turning into a frightened little boy.

With a sense of urgency, Pushkin pushed his way past Gennady and Leonid and he sprinted out of the building.  He now had second thoughts about sending the troop carriers into the complex and he decided to send in a squad instead.  He ran up to one of the soldiers who was protecting the guardhouse and he put his hand on the young man’s shoulder.

“Gorbachenko, get your men over to section three and see what the hell is going on in there!  Also, be prepared to handle possible casualties!”

Without so much as a word, Gorbachenko raised his hand in acknowledgment and led his squad through the gate, quickly disappearing around the corner of the windowless building.

As Pushkin directed the rest of his soldiers, Gennady and Leonid remained inside of the building and continued to watch the section three monitor.  They were in disbelief at what they were watching on the display.

More and more troops ambled into view of the section three camera.  The soldiers moved slowly, almost painfully slow.  Some of the troops were walking on tattered and torn legs while others paced around with large pieces of flesh torn away from their faces and bodies.  All of the troopers appeared to be in a daze and some of them reached up towards the sky and clawed at the air.

“Sergeant Pushkin, you better get in here and take a look at this!” Gennady yelled.

Pushkin rushed back into the guard house, pushing aside Gennady and Leonid.

“What the fuck is going on here, Sergeant Pushkin?” Leonid asked in a terrified voice.  He began to tremble and started to back away from the monitors.  It was obvious that the young trooper was completely unnerved by what he had seen on the cameras.

“Look,” Gennady said as he pointed to the screen, “all those men appear to be wounded, but they aren’t acting like it!  They are acting like a bunch of drunken fools, even that one who was on fire.  He acted as if it was nothing to be burning!”  The human torch Gennady was referring to had since fallen to the ground and was grotesquely sizzling away.  “How can this be?” Gennady asked in a terror-filled voice.

Pushkin’s mind was racing as he tried to clear away his disbelief and come up with some rational explanation.  No matter how hard he tried though, he just couldn’t think of anything that could explain what was playing out in front of his eyes.

“This is Satan’s den!” Leonid screamed out.  In his hysteria, he had taken off his gas mask and he had his arms crossed over his chest, grabbing at himself as he lost all control of his reasoning.  “For years there have been rumors about the evil things that have gone on in here!  All of you know this!”

“Put your mask on!” Pushkin yelled as he pointed to Leonid.

“It will do me no good!”

“What are you talking about?” Pushkin asked.  Unable to keep from looking at the madness that was playing out on the monitor, he turned back to the screen.

“Masks will do us no good!  Guns will do us no good!  Can’t you see?  This is the Devil’s work!”

“Shut your fucking mouth!” Gennady screamed.  “You don’t know what you’re talking about!  Now put your mask back on…like the sergeant said to do!”

“We all know that they’ve been working on things in here that weren’t meant to be worked on!”  Leonid tossed his rifle aside and began to tear off his tunic.  He was crying and tears were streaming down his dirty face.  “They have unleashed Satan and he is here!  God save us!”

Pushkin continued to watch the screen in horror.  As he kept his eyes fixed on the monitor, he raised his arm and pointed to Leonid.  “Put your fucking mask back on!  That is a direct order!”  As he chided Leonid, the cluster of troops on the monitor began to get peppered by rifle fire from somewhere off screen.