Exit 9 by Brett Battles

screen. “This one?”
    “No. The next one down.”
    Another tap.
    “Yes. That’s it,” Michael said. He leaned in. “What is that…?”
    Pax seemed to hesitate. “A leg. Looks male, though.”
    “Oh, God.”
    Even in the darkness, Ash could see Michael pale.
    “Doesn’t mean she’s in there,” Pax said. “The only way we’re going to know is to check.”
    He looked back at the screen, accessed a few more cameras, and sucked in a quick breath.
    “What is it?” Ash asked.
    Pax turned the tablet so they could all see.
    On the screen was a view of the detention level deep below the house. The angle was from above the elevator door toward the Plexiglas wall that separated the arrival area from the detention block. Remnants of smoke hung in the air on the arrival side, and on the ground close to the elevators, obscured but not hidden by the smoke, was a body. There was no way to tell for sure if the person was dead or alive, but based on the five bloody figures sprawled on the ground on the other side of the see-through partition, it was a fair guess that no one in either half would ever take a breath again.
    Pax switched to a view of the control room—bodies slumped over terminals, unmoving, with another two or three on the floor.
    “We need to treat this as a poisonous gas situation,” Pax said.
    “But the guards in the detention block look like they were shot,” Ash pointed out.
    Pax grimaced. “Yeah. That bothers me, but I didn’t see any blood in the control room, and with that smoke, we’ve got to assume the worst.”
    One of the men Ash hadn’t met until that night pulled his backpack off, and zipped it all the way open. Inside were enough gas masks for everyone, plus a few extras in case they found survivors. He passed them out.
    “No one makes a move onto the detention floor until we run a check,” Pax said. “I want to know what we’re walking into first.”
    There was a chorus of “Yes, sir”s.
    “Any signs of who did this?” Ash asked.
    Pax shook his head. “Checked cameras throughout the house and all the way to the front gate and back. Nothing. But we should proceed as if they’re still there. They have to know we’d come, so they could be waiting for us.”
    More nods.
    Pax pointed at four of the men. “Do a sweep all the way up to the front gate and back. We’ll wait at alpha position until you return.”
    “Yes, sir.”
    The men immediately headed out. Pax took a moment to report in to Matt at the Ranch, then he and the rest continued on toward the house.
    Alpha position turned out to be a dense cluster of trees about a hundred and fifty yards from the house. Ash could sense Michael’s growing anxiety as they hunkered down and waited for the others to return. Each minute would be an eternity to him. Ash had been in that position himself once, and he knew there was nothing any of them could do to lessen the stress.
    Finally, the others reappeared.
    “Seven bodies,” one of the men reported. “All ours. Three back near the side fence. The other four near the front gate. No one else around.”
    Pax closed his eyes a moment, his worst fears no doubt realized.
    “All right,” he said. “You four cut through the woods and come at the house from the other side. Browne, Solomon, Ash, and I will close in from this side.”
    “What about me?” Michael said.
    “You stay here with Billy.”
    “No way.”
    “You will , or we’ll stop what we’re doing and take you out of here right now.”
    Michael took several quick breaths. “She’s my wife, Pax.”
    “Exactly why you’re staying here. You’re too wound up and you know it. You make a mistake in there and you could get the rest of us killed. So what’ll it be?”
    He stared at Michael.
    “I’ll…I’ll wait here.”
    “Good.” Pax looked over at Billy. “Shoot him if he tries to leave.”
    The doctor nodded. “You got it.”
    Hippocratic oath or not, Ash knew he would do it.
    The two teams headed out in