CHAPTER THREE: THE STAIRWELL
Getting inside the building – even getting to the 10th floor – was the easy part. It's gonna be getting out that will be difficult, Snake-Eyes thought to himself, crouching in the stairwell as Short-Fuze inspected the door. They were waiting patiently, but every second of waiting seemed like it took much longer than a second should. "Clear", he whispered, allowing Stalker to swipe the key-card copy that Flash had made for them; the lock beeped softly and flashed green.
So far, everything was going smoothly. A little too smoothly, in Snake-Eyes' opinion. But he was at least comforted by the fact that Stalker was here, with him--and this was what they were meant to be doing. He and his new unit had trained long and hard at special operations such as this one.
The hallway was clear when they slid the hydraulic door open with an almost-inaudible hiss. Snake-Eyes and Rock n' Roll took positions with their M-16's pointed down the hallway.
Hearing something like movement further down the hallway, Snake-Eyes gave the "halt" signal with one hand. The group stopped, as one. He pointed to his ear, and then pointed down the hallway. Stalker nodded, once, sharply, and the others turned—in the silence, they could all hear it, now. Snake-Eyes started his slow glide down the hallway, at point, following the noise: this all looked like a normal office-type space. Maybe their Intel had been wrong? This didn't look anything like an enemy command post.
In fact... was that the voice of a little girl? Soft, chirping, unintelligible. Sneaking forward ten more feet and crouching down, peering through half-drawn blinds, Snake-Eyes saw a young girl, red hair bright as a carrot, talking to an older woman, her hair a duller auburn. Perhaps it was the girl's mother… but both of them had their backs to the glass window, and the door was closed.
He couldn't tell what the girl -- perhaps nine or ten years old -- was saying, but the mom was sitting at a computer, typing. Every so often, she turned her chin to glance at the little girl perched on a stool, and she replied in her deeper voice, but most of the time, her attention seemed to be more focused on her computer. Snake-Eyes narrowed his eyes and stared intently at the screen. It looked like… accounting figures, on a… was that an Excel spreadsheet? From what he could tell, it was most likely that she was pulling a late shift, wrapping up financial business. It looked harmless enough. Civilians, probably. Even as he watched, the little girl giggled and twirled around on her stool.
Wrong place, wrong time, Snake-Eyes thought. He almost grimaced at the irony. Wrong place wrong time -- that sounds familiar, doesn't it? But at least, by the looks of it, the two of them wouldn't be in the office much longer. He hoped. As he watched, the woman stretched, and massaged the back of her neck with a hand. We better be quick on this one.
I knew we should have waited until at least midnight, Snake-Eyes thought, but… that wasn't an idea he was comfortable sharing with the rest of the group. It was too late, anyway, but the fact that there were still civilians on this floor wasn't good. He signaled back to the group that there were two people in the room, that they appeared to be a minimal threat, and to continue on past the room.
After spending longer than they wanted to, low-crawling, investigating the spacious office space with all its cubicles and heavy desks, it was really looking like there was nothing significant for them to find. Snake-Eyes glanced back, and saw his own discouragement mirrored on the faces of the rest of the group.
"Time to try the next floor," Stalker suggested. "They did say tenth AND eleventh floors."
They made their way to the stairwell, and brought out the radio. Snakes' eyes flickered as he kept guard—using the radio was risky, and broke their noise discipline, but it had to be done. Stalker passed on "no joy" to Breaker via secure intercom, his deep voice a rasping whisper. "Floor ten appeared to be a normal work site; no evidence of enemy activity."
"Roger that," Breaker responded, his voice tinny through the intercom. "I'll tell Hawk. Continue on to the eleventh floor."
Stalker acknowledged, "Affirmative."
The team went back to the stairwell quietly and up one more floor. Again, they assumed combat positions as Stalker swiped the key-card to enter the eleventh floor.
This time, the light on the door lock remained stubbornly red.
Perplexed, Stalker tried again. Still nothing.
It only took a look, rather than words: they all knew that when the keycard approach failed, it was time for Plan B. Rock n' Roll pulled out the explosives.
"This must be the floor, if even the secure key-card won't work," Stalker muttered quietly, as Rock n' Roll carefully pressed the putty in place.
After inspecting the door one last time, Short-Fuze nodded, giving a quick thumbs-up. "Okay, stand back," their demolitions expert muttered. "This is just a small charge, but it should be just enough to blow the lock off the door quietly -- as quietly as it's gonna go, anyway."
Snake-Eyes nodded back, and saw the motion mirrored around him. They all knew what happened once the C4 came out: it meant that nothing was going to go as quietly as expected.
Short-Fuze detonated the door.
They were right: Nothing was going to go as quietly as expected.
Nothing was going to be the same for the team, ever again.