Read Online Ragnarok Rising: The Crossing (The Ragnarok Rising Saga) by D.A. Roberts - Free Book Online Page A

thicker than the glass we used in the jail. All in all, I couldn’t see any way that we were going to be breaking in without explosives. Even the windows around the building were of the same thick glass. Obviously, someone didn’t want uninvited guests inside.
    The lock was heavy-duty and I held no illusions that any weapon I had on me would do more than damage it. I wasn’t going to break it with my knife and I didn’t have any armor piercing rounds that could punch through it. Bashing it down with a Humvee might work, but it would do a lot of damage to the vehicle. I wasn’t willing to take the chance on disabling one of our rides to get inside.
    The only good thing was if we couldn’t get inside, then the dead couldn’t either. If we could gain access without taking out a wall, we had our place to shelter for the night. The clock was ticking and I was running low on ideas. We only had a few hours left until sundown. In less than an hour, I wanted to be either inside or clearing the area.
    There was a rigid steel plate covering the actual locking mechanism, so the old credit -card trick wouldn’t work. The lock was probably too stiff, anyway. The plate also kept me from using my knife. I didn’t have a set of lock picks and even if I did, I didn’t know how to use them. My options were quickly dwindling away.
    “Well, if all else fails,” I said, “look for a key.”
    We searched the area around the door for hidden keys in rocks, wood, bricks and everything else we could think of. If there was a hidden key, we couldn’t find it. I was seriously considering the Humvee option when an idea struck me like a bolt from the blue.
    “We need some tools,” I said, smiling. “Everyone look around for anything that looks like a maintenance or tool shed. There’s bound to be one somewhere.”
    It didn’t take long to identify a building near the Visitor’s Center. It was a plain brown building with a garage door. The sign in front that said “Maintenance” was a good indicator, as well. It had windows on one side and they appeared intact. If there hadn’t been anyone inside when the shit hit the fan, then there wouldn’t be any reason for the dead to be inside, either.
    We fanned out in a line and headed for the building. I didn’t want any of us to be too close together. It would interfere with our ability to shoot effectively if we ran into trouble. I kept Elliott close to me on my left with Spec-4 on my right. Southard was on the left end of the formation, covering Elliott’s other side. By unspoken agreement, we all kept an eye on him.
    Fortunately, the locks on the maintenance building were nowhere near as formidable as the ones on the cache. I used my hammer to smash the padlock on the side door and kicked it open. There was scattered light inside from two small windows, but mostly it was shadows and darkness.
    I lit up my tactical light and started scanning the interior. There was plenty of landscaping tools and a few toolboxes, but no sign of Stalkers or any other kind of dead. What I did see made me smile like a kid in a candy store. Against one wall was a set of tanks for a cutting torch. If they weren’t empty, I could cut my way into the building.
    I inspected the dials and found the tanks to be about half full. Grabbing a mask, a striker and the handle to the trolley that the tanks sat on, we headed back to the cache building. The sun was getting dangerously low in the sky, so I knew that time was of the essence.
    Slipping the mask over my face, I adjusted the airflow until I could hear the gas escaping. With a click of the striker, there was a loud pop and the torch lit up with a bright yellow flame that trailed curls of black smoke. Then I adjusted the feed until I had a concentrated flame that was a bright blue and hissed with a life of its own.
    The azure flame made short work of the covering plate, and then I concentrated on the locking mechanism. The lock had to have been made of a heavy