Mina and Jacopo advanced into the corridor, firing, wading through rats to close the door.
Maul darted between my feet and into the cell with his mate. Spy sent out a burst ofSave! Fast!
I ran toward her location. Caught a glimpse of cats in the cell, fighting with two rats, a human behind them, sitting unmoving on a small high bunk.
“Jump!” I shouted.
The cats leaped to the top bunk beside the woman.
I jumped inside and landed where they had stood. Kicked the rats back through the door. Fired at the marauding rats in the hallway. And kept firing when some turned toward me. They charged, teeth bared, tails whipping. Until a second later, their innards boiled. Using short bursts, I swept left and right, my weapon aimed down to avoid hitting anyone outside the cell. Only three mutated rats got past me. Spy and Maul attacked them. Screeching.
In the hallway, my team killed more rats. Burning them. The stench filled the hallway as dozens died. More rats crowded into the cell. I boiled them, but I couldn’t take care of Evelyn and also shoot rats. The cats were hissing, fighting, yowling, killing the rats that got past me.
All at once, the rats turned to me. They seemed to understand that I was the leader of their killers. In lockstep, they charged.
Camilla leaped over the pile of dead rats and charging rats into Evelyn’s cell and behind me. Jacopo and Mina chose firing angles and blasted away, their killing arcs slowly but effectively cooking rat meat. Camilla and I blasted from inside the cell. The cats jumped back onto the bunk.
“I’ve got the woman,” Camilla said.
She lifted Evelyn into a fireman’s carry, keeping one hand free to fire her weapon. I shifted my attention to the cats long enough to make sure they were still ambulatory and not bleeding to death. Then I took a place in the cell doorway and helped boil a path through the rats in the corridor. Jagger appeared at the juncture of the hallway and the cell corridor and picked off rats who made it past Jacopo and Mina.
It was a long, vicious, but one-sided fight. We proved that even mutated rat teeth couldn’t bite through armor, though they tried.
When the last rat was cooked dead, nothing moved in the hallway. Rats were piled well over half a meter high. There must have been a thousand of them. Camilla emerged from the cell with Evelyn over her shoulders. Evelyn was emaciated, a corpse-pale body. Limp as a rag doll. No one had needed to shout the code word “Mateo” to gain her cooperation.
Breathing hard, trying not to react to the stench of cooked rats, I said, “Jolene. Team Alpha reporting. Rats down. Objective One secured.”
“Condition?” Mateo demanded.
“Alive,” Camilla said. “For now.”
Jolene said, “Area clear. Security system in the corridor is down, but I can’t leave it down for long.”
I switched my mic to the general channel and stated, “Team Alpha has acquired Objective One. Report.”
“Team Beta reporting,” a woman said. “Wingding here. Hospital wing is locked down. Eight medical assistants, one doctor, and three patients are secure. Have left a small team, designation Beta One, in place to cover them. Team Beta Two is proceeding to the food supplies on this level. Have ended four humans. Am alert to the number of rat droppings. Over.”
“Team Gamma, reporting. Have entered and secured the vehicle storage and maintenance area and are moving toward the armory.” Before his mic muted, gunfire sounded in the distance. Screams sounded closer. “Team Gamma taking heavy fire. Heavy fire! Require assistance. One man down!”
“Team Beta Two, are you in position to back up Team Gamma?” I asked.
“Team Beta Two redirecting. Three reinforcements to Team Gamma. We will be approaching at the enemy’s six.”
More gunfire sounded. More screams.
“Jolene, did the opposition get word to their security center?”
“Negative. At the first shot, I shut off their comms.”
Through the mental connection that Spy had with her clowder, I saw another made-man, this one a woman, fall. The woman writhed on the floor, her body pulled back by a foot and an arm. Gamma was down two fighters.
The watching cat looked at the enemy.
The enemy firing at us wore . . . uniforms.
Of the US military.
I nudged Spy to pass along a careful study of the enemy’s clothing.
