by Ann Charles
“I … I think,” Gertrude found her voice finally, “the story goes that the priest drained their blood and then dumped their bodies into the feeding tank. The beast saw the bodies and returned to the other hunting plane, summoned no more.”
“Why didn’t you drain my blood like the white priest did the scribes?” he asked, sliding closer to the hole.
“I couldn’t risk killing der Beschwörer.” Gertrude looked from Angélica to Quint, taking a step toward the mine opening. “Not without the proper weapons and the council’s approval. I did not want to end up like my predecessor.” She took another step closer to the tunnel. “Or worse.”
The were-jaguar turned toward the girl, its upper lip drawing away from its flesh-tearing canines. A deep snarl reverberated through the catacomb.
Taking advantage of the distraction, Angélica moved away from Quint to form a three-pointed defense around the beast. Sweat coated her skin, her muscles trembling with unspent adrenaline.
“Angélica,” Quint said. “Give me your machete.”
“No. I’m going to take a stab at it, see if I can draw it back into the mine.”
“And then what?”
“Lure it deeper into the earth so you two can get out of here.” She’d find out for sure then if this was all a hallucination or not.
The were-jaguar looked her way, its head lowering. Angélica blinked, shaking her head. Her brain had to be playing tricks with her. Didn’t it? Having fun turning what was probably a large rabid predator into a monster.
“Christ, do you hear yourself, woman? You’re talking suicide. Give me the goddamned machete.”
“I’m the captain of this ship, Parker. If I want to go down with it, that’s my choice.”
More curses came from Quint. “Listen, captain. It won’t follow you now that it’s found me.” He held out his hand. “Now toss me your machete.”
Angélica hesitated.
The were-jaguar sniffed in her direction, huffing several times. She took a step back and came down on a bone that rolled under her boot. She stumbled into the wall behind her, wincing when something hard poked into her hip. She reached behind her. A hard lump in her pocket made her gasp.
Pedro’s gun!
She’d forgotten she had it. As much as she hated to harm her mom’s favorite animal, if this sucker was even remotely real—she prayed not—it needed to be immobilized.
“How do we know it didn’t follow me in here?” she asked.
“Der Beschwörer is right,” Gertrude said. The sound of her voice attracted the were-jaguar’s focus again, its growling growing louder. “The beast wants him. I lured it with his blood.”
“Give me your machete,” Quint ordered. “I know what I need to do.”
“You’re not going to sacrifice yourself.”
“Trust me, Angélica.”
Switching her machete to her left hand, she pulled the gun out of her pocket and pointed it toward the were-jaguar. “Let me take a shot at it first.”
“Bullets won’t stop it,” Gertrude said.
She might not be able to stop it, but she could blind the creature. “Hey!” she called out to it, trying to make it turn back toward her.
The were-jaguar lowered its head and hunched its shoulders, prowling toward Gertrude.
“Whatever you’re going to do,” Gertrude’s voice was high, her eyes wide, “do it fast.”
The beast stalked closer.
“Angélica,” Quint shouted. “The machete. Now!”
The were-jaguar closed in on Gertrude, pressing her into the wall. She waved her broken bones in front of the huge beast’s bared teeth.
Jamming her blade into its leather sheath, she tossed the machete to Quint. He caught it and pulled the blade free.
The were-jaguar rose onto its hind legs, placing its huge finger-like paws on each side of Gertrude’s head. It scratched one set of claws down the rock, the grating sound making the hairs rise on Angélica’s arms.
Gertrude cried out, flinching.
Angélica edged toward the girl and the were-jaguar. “Stab it with the bones,” she commanded, taking aim with the 9mm.
Why wasn’t Gertrude defending herself? If she would just jam the damned broken femur into the beast’s chest.
It rubbed its snout against Gertrude’s temple. She closed her eyes and squeaked like a mouse caught in a trap.
Angélica heard the were-jaguar sniff. “Why is it smelling her?” she said.
“It’s checking out her scent. Assessing its prey.” Quint hurled a skull at the beast.
The skull thudded against the side of the were-jaguar’s head. It grunted, its golden eyes turning to focus on Quint.
“Over here, you son of a bitch.” Quint held out his left arm and sliced the machete blade over his skin.
Angélica winced. “What are you doing?”
“Giving it something else to sniff.” He smeared his blood all over his arm with the flat side of the blade and then waved the knife in the air.
The were-jaguar lifted its nose, smelling.
“That’s right.” Quint backed toward the wall. “Come to papa.”
Angélica looked at Gertrude. The girl’s snake eyes bulged. Her chest heaved.
The were-jaguar sniffed the air again, licking its chops.
“It’s dinner time, you bastard.” Quint leaned against the wall, his hand gripping the edge of the hole. He shut off his flashlight and stuffed it into his side pocket.
Holding the gun steady on the were-jaguar, Angélica glanced between Quint and Gertrude. Neither of them moved as they waited to see if the beast would take the bait.
For a moment, logic clouded her thoughts. What was she doing here with this gun? This was all a dream. An incense-induced delusion. A figment of her …
The were-jaguar spun back to Gertrude and snarled in her face, drool dripping.
The girl screamed. The piercing shrill blasted the remaining rationalizations from Angélica’s head.
The beast swung with incredible speed, claws extended.
Then silence.
At first, Angélica thought Gertrude had ducked, avoiding the beast’s sharp claws, but then her body folded, collapsing to the floor like a pair of loose coveralls. The flashlight she’d been holding rolled across the floor, lighting the corner next to the beast.
It took Angélica a moment to fully grasp the grisly scene.
The were-jaguar flicked its paw. Something clunked onto the floor, rolling into the spotlighted corner.
“Shit,” Quint whispered.
Angélica couldn’t pull her gaze from the sight of Gertrude’s head, which was shriveling and turning brown before her eyes. The gun in Angélica’s hand lowered along with her jaw.
“Oh my God!” she cried, the events of the last few seconds finally registering. “Quint.”
“I know.”
“She’s dead.”
“I know!”
“Why is her head shrink—”
“Get out of here!” he shouted.
The were-jaguar dropped onto all fours again and stalked toward him.
Quint wiped his bloody arm along the rim of the hole and then went down on one knee, backing into the shadows with his arm held out as bait.
When the were-jaguar hesitated, sniffing in Angélica’s direction, Quint banged the machete on the floor. “Eyes on me!” he yelled.
Growling echoed throughout the catacomb. The beast crouched, locking Quint in its sights.
“Angélica, run!” He disappeared into the dark hole.
After one last check on Angélica, the were-jaguar lunged toward where Quint had been seconds before, slinking low to crawl inside.
Angélica pulled the trigger, aiming for its hindquarter.
The 9mm bucked in her hand, the bullet bouncing off the edge of the hole where the beast had been a split second before. It ricocheted into the ceiling and then veered into a pile of bones. Pieces of rock rained down around her. The ringing in her ears muffled the clatter of
stones on the floor.
She shielded her head with her arm and squinted at the hole in the wall.
Quint and the were-jaguar were gone.
“No!” she cried, stumbling over bones, almost falling into the hole. She dropped onto her knees in front of it, aiming her flashlight inside, listening. Her still-muffled hearing made it hard to pick up any sounds. She pushed inside the hole, pausing again, holding her breath. Amidst the beast’s grunts and snarls echoing along the rock walls, she thought she heard a rhythmic clanging.
She knew that sound. It was her machete hitting rock.
Stuffing the gun in her pocket, she followed the were-jaguar into the shadows.
* * *
Quint’s arm throbbed along with his knees. He could hear the beast’s snorts and huffs as it squeezed through the tunnel behind him. Its claws clicked on the rock floor, its snarls made his pulse pound. He didn’t dare look back, afraid of what he’d see if he wasted a split second.
He moved in darkness, no time to pull out his flashlight and check his path. His knuckles and the heels of his palms burned from scraping along the rock in his blind haste. This damned dream-vision had morphed into one long nightmare with heart-stopping sound effects.
The rancid smell of the beast was thick in the enclosed space, making him cough and gag while he scrambled through the blackness. His eyes burned from sweat.
The tunnel spread wider the farther he crawled, his shoulders bouncing off the walls less and less. When he felt a breath of musty air on his face he scurried faster, figuring there had to be an opening up ahead.
He crawled on his hands and knees until the sounds of the tunnel changed, his ears picking up a difference in his surroundings. He stopped and reached upward for the ceiling. His hand touched only air. Had he reached another catacomb?
He kept his head lowered while rising to his feet. The smell in here wasn’t much better than the tunnel, reminding him of the stench inside of the …
A rattle began in the darkness. Something bumped against the toe of his boot.
His breath caught.
The rattling sound doubled, and then tripled.
From the tunnel behind him, he could hear the clicking of claws on rock coming closer.
Fumbling with his pocket, he pulled out his flashlight and flicked it on.
Rattlesnakes!
He shone his light around, groaning.
Snakes dotted the floor and more slithered out of a foot-wide hole across the room. They slid between rocks that must have made up the wall that used to block the tunnel’s access to the feeding tank. The same thing that had happened to the wall in the mine appeared to have happened here. Was this the were-jaguar’s doing? Had it stopped by here earlier looking for dinner?
Stepping carefully away from the nearest forked-tongued rattler, he lifted the beam and directed the light around the walls of a familiar-looking stone room. On the opposite wall, a shoulder-wide hole was located ten to twelve feet above the floor. How he knew the place suddenly clicked in his head. Angélica had taken several pictures when she’d been dangling from that hole in the wall.
He was under the Chakmo’ol Temple.
This was the feeding tank Marianne had told him about earlier in his vision.
“Son of a fucking bitch,” he whispered. He’d jumped out of the frying pan and into the snake-filled fire. This was the last damned time he agreed to participate in one of Teodoro’s ceremonies.
He placed his flashlight on the floor to his right pointing toward the opposite wall, and then stepped around a small pile of bones over to the corner where only one snake hung out. He lined up the machete next to its coils like a golf putter and flung it across the room. It landed with a hiss and a rattle, which set off several other snakes.
Over the snake commotion, Quint heard several huffs.
The party-crasher had arrived.
The were-jaguar stuck its nose out from the shadows, its nostrils flaring. It crept out further, head lowered, upper lip wrinkled in a snarl.
Quint held still in the corner, the machete raised between him and the beast. Sweat trickled down his neck. Any time this nightmare wanted to hit the brakes would be good with him.
The were-jaguar eased from the hole. It swung its massive head in Quint’s direction and bared its teeth even more.
“Fuck you and your big-ass teeth,” Quint said, stepping away from the wall. There was no more running. Time to kill or be killed—preferably the former, but if he were a betting man …
The thing rose up onto its back feet, towering over him by almost a foot. The snakes near it hissed and retreated without even bothering to shake their rattles. Even they knew better than to mess with this monster.
The yellow eyes narrowed. A glimpse of intelligence in their depths gave Quint pause. If this was his vision, couldn’t he control what happened next?
“I summoned you,” he told the beast.
It cocked its head, as if listening.
“I summoned you,” he said again, with more confidence. “You are here because of me.”
Could he un-summon it somehow? How did this fit in with the overall plan he was supposed to share with the crew when he woke up from this delirium?
The were-jaguar lifted its snout, its nostrils flaring again. A growl rumbled from its chest. It dropped to all fours and turned, hunching low while facing the hole it’d come through.
Angélica eased out of the shadows, Pedro’s Glock 9mm pistol leading the way.
A cannon ball hit bottom in Quint’s stomach. His nightmare was pulse-pounding enough without having to watch the beast tear into her.
“What are you doing?” he said between gritted teeth. “I told you to run the other way, dammit.”
“Have you forgotten who you’re talking to, Parker?” she said with a calm, level voice. “I don’t run from my problems.” Using two hands, she held the short barrel steady on the beast. “If we both rush it, we might be able to disable it enough to allow us to make an escape.”
The were-jaguar took a step away from Angélica, its back paw coming down on a rattlesnake. The serpent locked its jaws onto the beast’s leg. With a kick of the were-jaguar’s massive paw, the snake went flying, splatting against the wall.
“I’m going to shoot it in the eye,” Angélica said, squeezing one eye closed as she centered her aim.
The beast’s mouth opened wide, a deafening roar echoing throughout the room.
Quint inched toward Angélica, ready to dive in front of her if the were-jaguar lunged. “I don’t think it liked that idea, sweetheart.”
“I don’t give a shit what it likes or not. It came looking for trouble at the wrong dig site. We need to end this shit here and now before anyone else gets hurt.”
“What do you think I was trying to do by luring it in here? Tell it bedtime stories?”
“It sounded to me like you were sharing a heartwarming moment of self-awareness with it.”
The were-jaguar’s back haunches dropped. Was it readying to spring?
Quint reached for her. “You’re real fun—”
The were-jaguar lunged.
Angélica got off two shots before she dove toward Quint, continuing to shoot toward the beast as she flew through the air. Explosions rang out in the rock-walled room, rattling Quint’s back teeth.
He dropped the machete and tried to catch her, but he stumbled on some of the stone rubble that littered the floor. They crashed to the floor with him breaking her fall.
The were-jaguar disappeared into the hole.
Disoriented by the gun’s deafening blast, Quint tried to sit upright, but Angélica’s weight held him down. He felt as if he had Pedro’s helicopter headset on again, muffling all sounds. His shoulder and lower back ached from the stones he’d landed on when they’d fallen.
“Are you okay?” he shouted to Angélica.
She pushed up onto the heels of her palms, nodding down at him.
“Damn it, woman! You are going to be the
death of …” His voice trailed off.
The were-jaguar loomed over them, one eye bloodied. Its teeth were bared, its single yellow eye locked onto Angélica.
“Look out!” Quint yelled as it lunged again.
He managed to shove Angélica aside in time, but his raised forearm ended up in the beast’s mouth. The were-jaguar bit down, sending a white-hot bolt of pain shooting up into his shoulder. Quint roared in pain, feeling its teeth puncture his skin as he struggled under the beast’s weight.
A rebel yell filled the chamber. Over the beast’s shoulder, Quint watched Angélica plunge the machete into its back.
The were-jaguar’s bite loosened enough for Quint to pull free. He bucked and kicked at the beast, sending it rolling off of him.
It scrambled back onto all fours, snarling at Angélica. The dark hair that bristled on its neck made it look even more massive.
She glanced down as she stepped back, snagging a nearby rattlesnake by the tail. She whipped it at the beast.
The were-jaguar knocked the snake out of mid-air. With the machete still buried in its shoulder, the thing took a step toward her, licking its now-bloodied chops.
Quint clambered to his feet, holding his injured arm against his chest. He could barely feel the pain through the rush of adrenaline fueling him as he stumbled toward Angélica.
She grabbed another snake by the tail, throwing it at the were-jaguar’s face.
The snake bounced off, slithering out of the way.
The beast rose onto its back feet, looming over her. Angélica shielded her head with her arm, her back against the wall.
A roar reverberated through the chamber. The beast shook its head, slobber flying.
Quint stumbled toward them.
It raised its paw, claws extending.
Quint slid in front of Angélica, blocking her from the beast’s swing.
But the swing never came.
The were-jaguar staggered backward, clawing at its own throat. It crashed onto the floor, writhing on its back as it shredded at its own neck.
“What’s wrong with it?” Angélica clutched his good arm.
“It looks like it’s choking on something.”
A wisp of smoke rose from its gaping jaws. More smoke escaped from its ears and eyes. Its fur began to ripple as it convulsed.