Extinction Machine Read Online Free Page A

see.
    We went in anyway.
    I wish I could say that there were no surprises, but …

 
    Chapter Six
    Shelton Aeronautics
Wolf Trap, Virginia
Thursday, October 17, 2:19 p.m.
    We called it in. Police, FBI, Homeland, the coroner’s office.
    As each new team of professionals arrived on the scene, we had to flash our NSA IDs and retell the same sanitized version of the story. Then we had to take the poor bastards up and let them visit the horror show.
    That’s what it was, too.
    There were sixty employees at this particular Shelton Aeronautics lab. Twelve top engineers and a lot of support staff. Everyone showed up for work that day. No one was lucky enough to have the flu or a broken leg or a sick child. Sixty people clocked in.
    And then Henckhouser and Spinlicker showed up and destroyed them.
    There’s really no other word for it.
    Destroyed.
    I stood next to the Fairfax County deputy coroner for almost five minutes, neither of us speaking, both of us staring at what lay inside the big conference room. If you caught it out of the corner of your eye you’d think it was splashed with red paint. Walls, floor, ceiling.
    Then, when you took a closer look, you’d understand. When you smelled the stink of copper and feces and the thousand other odors released when a body is burst apart, you’d understand.
    But, like the coroner and the rest of the people there, you would not understand how.
    I thought I did. The clunky little gun—the one that looked like a Taser but wasn’t—was snugged into the back of my waistband, under my coat. Bunny had the other. They were mentioned in no official report that anyone outside of the DMS would ever read. I called in a full description to Mr. Church.
    An EMT looked us over, put Band-Aids on minor cuts, gave us chemical ice packs for the bruises, and made sure not to look us in the eyes. He’d been upstairs already. He was dealing with that.
    The only thing the coroner said to me the whole time was, “Jesus H. Christ.”
    Top, Bunny, and I got out of there four hours later. We got into my Explorer, buckled up for safety, and made our way to I-95. Church called and I put him on speaker.
    “What’s the status of your team?” he asked.
    “Dented and dissatisfied,” I said.
    “I passed along your description of the pistols you obtained and your account of the damage done. Dr. Hu tells me that they fit the profile of a microwave pulse pistol, an MPP.”
    “How come I never heard of it?”
    “Because until today it was a hypothetical weapon. Dr. Hu says that it’s never been practical because the energy output would require a battery approximately the size of a Subaru. His words.”
    Top currently had one of the pistols, turning it over very gingerly in his hands. “Can’t weigh more than a pound.”
    “Someone cracked the science then,” said Church. “I’m sure Dr. Hu will be delighted to study them.”
    Dr. William Hu was the DMS’s pet mad scientist. He was way past brilliant and he had a pop culture sensibility that almost made him likable. But then you got to know him and it turns out he’s an asshole of legendary proportions. He’d have probably gotten a chubby looking at the damage the clunky little gun had caused. He was like that. He’d be sorry it hadn’t been used on me. Neither of us broke a heavy sweat worrying about the other guy’s health.
    “What about the computer systems and research materials at the lab?” asked Church.
    “Slag,” I said. “The computer room looks like melted candles, and the file cabinets are full of ash. This was a very nasty and very thorough hit.”
    “That is unfortunate.”
    “You talk to Shelton?” I asked.
    “Briefly,” he said, “but remember we’re not running this show. There are, at last count, eleven separate investigative agencies working on this case. The president asked us to provide some extra boots on the ground.”
    That was not entirely true, but the real reason wasn’t something generally shared among