Lady Death

thought he’d be a fountain of information; not so. Now they were going to let him rot.
Omar Talman wasn’t a big man. He was tall, but thin and wiry, and the cell provided enough room for regular exercise. Push-ups, sit-ups, knee bends—he performed them all several times a day. He needed to stay in shape when “the moment” arrived.
The door opened. A uniformed guard holding a tray of food stepped through the doorway. He remained curled in a corner. He regarded the guard with blank eyes. It was an act. They thought he was broken and subdued. They’d stopped ordering him to stay in place at the point of a gun months ago.
The guard bent to put the tray on the floor. A second guard remained in the hallway. He wore a Taser on his hip.
Omar Talman struck like a coiled rattlesnake.
He tipped the food tray into the guard’s chest. The second guard grabbed the Taser. Talman shoved the first guard into the second. Both continued backward to smash into the hallway wall behind them. Talman continued his attack. Two solid blows into the first man’s stomach sent him to the floor. Talman blocked the rise of the Taser in the other man’s hand and struck with two fingers at the man’s throat. The guard gagged. Talman punched him in the balls, then the stomach, and he joined his partner on the floor.
Talman scooped up the fallen Taser and ran.
The hallway seemed longer than he remembered, but his legs pumped like pistons. He turned left at the corner. Elevator ahead. As soon as somebody activated the alarm, they’d lock the elevators. He didn’t want to get stuck. He bypassed the elevator for the stairwell.
By his estimation at the time of his capture, he was three levels underground. Long way up. But he’d reach the surface or die on the way. Survival was the priority, though. Tanya was counting on him.
He crashed through the stairwell door and took the steps two at a time, rounding each landing without pause. His bare feet didn’t slip on the cold concrete. By the time he reached the second landing, the alarm blared. It echoed in the stairwell, hurting his eardrums, but he ignored the pain and kept going.
The response force would meet him with automatic weapons. They wouldn’t hesitate to shoot. But they might hesitate if he used one of them as a shield.
He reached the first level and crashed into the door. It didn’t budge. He pushed the locking bar. Nothing. He peeked through the square of glass in the door. Three men with M16A4 rifles converged on him. They wore body armor. He waited.
Stepping back, he raised the Taser as the first man opened the door and ordered him to get on his knees. The muzzle of the M16 didn’t bother him. He’d had guns pointed at him many times. Talman let the Taser to the talking, and the electrodes hit the man in the neck. He screamed, recoiling. Talman let go of the Taser, shoving the barrel of the M16 away from his face as he pushed the guard through the doorway. His partners aimed their weapons, but Talman’s human shield blocked him from view.
Snatching the man’s pistol, turning it in his hand, he fired rapidly over the guard’s shoulder. One of the two guards dropped from a head shot. The other dodged back to avoid the falling body. Talman turned his captive around and shoved with his right foot. The first guard’s body flew away from him. As the third trooper tried to fire, the autoloader in Talman’s fist barked again. Another head shot. Talman ran to the guard he’d grabbed, shot him as he tried to rise, and helped himself to two M16s. He held one rifle in each hand. He left the pistol behind.
He ran down the hall. Shouting behind him. Talman pivoted, shuffling backwards, and fired a burst from both rifles. The salvos drove his pursuers around the corner. Talman turned forward and took the next right turn. Another door ahead. He blasted the lock and pushed through.
The main entry hall. The duty officer, behind his bulletproof glass, yelled into a phone. Three more security officers converged from a side door. The M16s in Talman’s fists crackled. He aimed for the legs, cutting the security team down. Their bodies dropped like chopped trees. He stepped over them, firing into their heads. He grabbed another rifle when the first two locked open over empty magazines. With his free hand, he grabbed a key card from a security guard’s belt.
He ignored the duty officer as he shoved the card into the slot near the door. The lock clicked. He charged into the office and shot the duty officer in the chest. The man’s body crashed into his console, smearing the controls with blood, but Talman didn’t hesitate. He flipped the switches to unlock the elevator to the surface, then stepped back. With the M16 at his hip, he fired into the panel until the action locked open. Sparks flashed as the bullets ripped through the electronics.
Exiting, pulling the door shut so the electronic lock engaged once again, he swung his rifle back the way he’d come. The three guards in pursuit were in the open, racing his way. He squeezed the trigger. The M16 bucked in his hand. The guards dropped as their legs and kneecaps popped, spreading blood across the white floor as they fell. More head shots ended their struggle to return fire. They were sitting ducks. Too much faith in their body armor, and not enough practice against somebody shooting back.
Talman moved to the dead men on the floor. He ripped spare magazines from a guard’s utility belt, and he entered the elevator. The ascent to the surface began.
He breathed hard as the cabin climbed. He assumed they had a secondary control in the facility to stop the elevators. Until they saw the duty officer was dead and his equipment destroyed, they wouldn’t realize the need