SNAFU: Hunters

by James A. Moore

  He fired three times on approach, eschewing the Groucho technique he’d learned as a Tennessee police officer in favor of a thirty-mile-per-hour sprint and superhuman strength to keep the recoil-suppressing weapon aimed true. The fin-stabilized microgrenades auto-aimed toward the identified targets, skimming past the makeshift defilade and exploding downward and sideways. Men screamed. A pair of legs kicked out from behind a cracked marble pillar, the IFF fading from red to black as a pool of blood spread across the filthy tile.

  He grunted as a round rocked his shoulder back, the gel under the dragon skin hardening to dissipate the energy before turning soft again. Behind him, al-Azwar’s NATO-issue REC7 chattered, spitting ceramic composite ‘bonk killer’ rounds with unerring accuracy.

  Matt’s visor automatically dimmed over the continuous muzzle-flash as Platt fired full auto and swept inside, following the bullets through the doorway with a roar that carried over the intercom. Matt and al-Azwar came in behind, al-Azwar keeping their targets pinned down with tight, controlled bursts while Matt killed them with the directional grenades.

  Seconds later the room fell quiet, the FoF indicating no living targets.

  “Here!” al-Azwar cried, flipping up a metal access hatch with her boot. Without waiting she stepped in and dropped out of sight, carbine pointed down as she fell through the hole.

  Platt and Rowley whirled as a pair of men ran in, gaped wide-eyed at the carnage then fled in panic. Matt stepped up and looked inside the hole. A series of rebar handles led into the darkness, which in the UV spectrum resolved into a ladder descending several stories to a concrete floor. IR signatures showed faint signs of passage, but the tunnels glowed too warm for much more.

  Platt nodded at the hole. “You first.”

  Matt stepped inside, pressing his boots against the walls to slow his descent enough not to break his legs when he hit the ground. Above him, Platt stepped in and grabbed a rung.

  Platt hissed as his fingers separated from his hand in a flash of silver. He turned, groping for his carbine left-handed. Another flash and his helmet toppled down the shaft, his head still inside, neck spurting steaming red blood. A block of plastic bricks followed Platt’s dead body down the hole, a red light blinking in the darkness.

  Matt fired a burst up the shaft and pulled his feet back, falling the last twenty feet before impacting hard on the concrete floor. He leapt. With a spin he just managed to pull himself behind a metal door before the room erupted.

  Heat washed over him in a deafening, blinding white, crushing him between the wall and the door. His armor crackled, the HUD went dark. He held his breath for as long as he could, then gasped in air that seared his throat, scorched his lungs. Gagging, he stumbled to his knees and tore off his helmet. His hair shriveled in the fading heat, and he kept his eyes squeezed tight.

  A moment passed, and a breeze tickled his skin as more air rushed back into the room. He gasped in a breath, cleaner now, and opened his eyes.

  Flecks of blackened skin fell from his hands, the only part of his body exposed to the explosion. He flexed his fingers as the skin knitted over and through the damaged tissue – he’d have to cut it away later to let blemish-free skin grow. If there was a later.

  Dust and smoke obscured his vision, but from his vantage point he could just make out the pile of demolished concrete that had once made up the shaft, and next to it the smoldering remains of one of Platt’s boots, a chunk of bone sticking out of the ruined meat. Matt stood and looked down at the bandoleer of drum magazines for the AA-12. The smoking leather had protected the munitions just enough. Had they detonated, he’d be a dead man.

  He rounded the corner, weapon up, and left the room, his useless helmet lying next to Platt’s boot. “Hurya, do you copy?”

  Static burst through his ear bud, intermingled with what might have been al-Azwar’s voice.

  “I’m on your six. Platt’s dead.”

  “–ay again, Rowley.” Karle’s deep voice reverberated through his ears. “Y– king up.”

  “Karle, Platt’s dead, hostile unknown. We’re underground.” He rounded a corner and snarled at the uselessness of his IR; the floor and walls glowed a uniform red, an afterimage from the explosion, or perhaps from a subterranean heat source. “al-Azwar, I’m on your six, copy.”

  The indecipherable noise that followed left him no idea whether or not they’d understood, or if Hurya had heard him at all.

  * * *

  Bullets pinged off of the bus-gate as Conor leapt through the holes left by the trio of AGM-176 Griffin missiles, the drone-capable, candy-ass little brothers of Hellfire missiles designed to limit collateral damage. His ears filled with the melodious sounds of rifle shots and screaming panic, and in his mind his katana sang of unending bloodshed as he drew it from its sheath.

  He ignored the scattering civilians, and the whispers’ nagging encouragement to cut them down. They didn’t tell him anything he didn’t already know, and there were bigger, more challenging prizes to pursue.

  Karle and Washington took position behind the gate and fired short, controlled bursts from their M4s, letting the IFF targeting system guide the electronically-controlled flechette rounds to their targets. They couldn’t shoot around corners, but in Conor’s opinion, 300-meter shots without bothering to aim just scoured all the joy out of combat.

  Conor leapt, taut muscle launching him twenty feet in the air and straight at the bonk charging their position.

  Smaller than Pointy, the nine-foot monstrosity wore full body armor, matte black carbon fiber over enormous metal plates, and wielded a battered stop sign like an axe. A mane of black hair flowed down her back from a topknot that gave her a vaguely Mongolian look, though she bore the extended brow and thick facial structure of bonks everywhere. Enormous claws extended from her left hand, the gleaming metal bolted to or through the bone and stretching half a meter from her fingertips.

  Conor swung, two-handed, but without purchase he couldn’t put enough force into the blow to threaten such a creature. She didn’t take the feint. Faster than he believed possible, Scratchy sidestepped and swung. He twisted to take the blow on his hip as the stop sign swatted him from the air. He took the landing on his left hand, cartwheeled, and came up swinging.

  The monofilament blade sparked against the sign inches from his head, skittering up the handle to bite into the reflective sheet metal. Scratchy twisted, tearing the blade from Conor’s hands, and swiped low with her claws.

  Laughing, Conor stepped into the swipe, using her elbow for a foothold to spin-kick her in the face. The steel toe caught her in the temple, the shock of metal on thick bone reverberating up Conor’s left leg as the blow arrested his momentum. The reinforced steel in his boot crumpled with the impact, crushing his toes.

  Scratchy dropped the sign and stumbled back, shaking her head like a dog.

  Conor dove into a roll, grabbing the hilt of his blade on the way by. The metal shrieked as he wrenched the sword free. He spun, weapon up, and gave her a nod of respect.

  “C’mon, lassie. You’ve got some fight in you.”

  Scratchy swept up the sign and advanced, makeshift axe and claw whirring almost too fast for his augmented eyes to follow. Metal clanged against metal as he backpedaled, limping, sword flashing to deflect the blows before either crushed or sliced him to pieces.

  His back hit the wall. Scratchy swung.

  * * *

  Hurya al-Azwar closed her eyes, but heard only the soft trickle of water in the distance, the echo washing it out to white noise in the sewer tunnels. She muttered a soft prayer of thanks that sanitation services had long-since failed in this part of the city, and only the ghosts of odors remained to haunt her senses. All said, the sewers smelled much better than the mall above.

  Her COMMs produced nothing but occasional static, like her GPS and the IFF linked through the network of Dragonflies, though because of intervening metal or deliberate jamming she couldn’t say. Pointy – despite Conor’s childishne
ss, a lack of known identity had ensured that the name stuck throughout operational planning – had vanished down the twisting corridors, and the heat from the walls kept her from tracking him with IR vision.

  The tunnels had rocked a few minutes earlier, in what she’d hoped had been a deliberate explosion set by Platt or Rowley, and since then her world had condensed to long, dark corridors rendered bright by augmented eyes, dripping water, and the desiccated memories of ancient shit.

  She waited. Rats squeaked in the distance, their feet scrabbling across the stone-and-mortar hallways, too far and too quiet for human ears to hear.

  Something Pointy’s size couldn’t move through these corridors without making noise, and her augmented ears could pick up a pin dropping at ten meters. A scrape of boot on the floor, a shoulder brushing against the wall. If he moved, she’d hear it, and she’d have him.

  A bead of sweat trickled down the back of her neck, tickling from her hairline until it hit the collar of her undershirt, the white cotton soaked under her armor in the oppressive heat. She tightened her grip on the carbine, textured handle proof against her sweaty palms, and took one careful step, rocking from the ball of her foot to her toes. Silent, she regulated her breathing to the barest motion, letting not even that betray her presence.

  Her ears pricked at a soft scrape. She turned, rotating soundlessly on the balls of her feet, breath held. It came again, closer, from a hall on the left. She lifted the REC7 and crept two careful steps back. The FoF highlighed a potential target, blue for an unconfirmed type. Another step back, and–

  She jerked up, too late. The giant shape landed on her, thick, sinuous muscle crushing her arms to her chest. Pain exploded in her trigger finger as it snapped sideways in the guard. Hot runnels of fluid streamed to the floor as serrated barbs sank deep into her flesh. She stomped with the strength of a dozen men, driving her heel down onto the foot below.

  Pointy only squeezed harder. Her ribs, fused as part of augmentation, cracked. Slamming her head back, she hit thick muscle instead of teeth or nose. She gasped in a breath, but her lungs wouldn’t inflate. Held in the air, she found no purchase. The grip tightened, and the fire in her chest strangled hope. Bones shifted, her infrared vision blurred.

  Her fingers walked along the black leather of her belt to the loop holding the grenades. She fumbled for the pin, the spoon, any part of it, something she could drop and kick behind them, shred the monster from the back.

  She groaned out the last of her air.

  Her finger touched metal.

  Blood and organs vomited from her mouth as her ribcage collapsed, the hot, meaty taste her last sensation before the world went black.

  * * *

  Conor spun right as the wall next to him disappeared in a puff of concrete dust, Scratchy’s claws reducing the brick facade to chunks and powder. He slashed downward, and the sword’s psychic scream pumped energy into his exhausted muscles. It drank deep, pulling blood and life from the bonk’s thigh, cutting through muscle and bone with an ease that technology couldn’t account for.

  What ICAP didn’t know wouldn’t hurt them.

  He danced away in a hot arterial spray, Scratchy’s muscles already knitting in ropy, purple masses. One mass formed a lump-like, writhing tentacle. Conor smiled. First Generation Regenerates had their own set of problems, so he decided to have some fun.

  She charged, a limping rhinoceros’s trundling attack, brute force and sharp steel at forty miles an hour.

  Eschewing the sword, he drew his 9mm pistol and fired, emptying the fifteen-round magazine into her face and arms in a series of little red holes and streaks of shredded tissue. Small caliber rounds wouldn’t do anything but annoy a bonk of her size, but it would tax her system just enough for his next–

  –she slammed into him, carrying him to the ground in a gridiron tackle that blasted the air from his lungs, but he kept his blade pointed out and maintained his grip. She bit down on his shoulder. The armor absorbed the brunt of her iron hard teeth. The increase in pressure didn’t restrict his movements any more than her arms already had.

  Fabric tore. The pressure increased.

  He let her squeeze, and worked the katana back and forth across her exposed wrist. Even without leverage the razor-sharp blade sliced through the meat without effort. His teeth clenched against the growing pain in his shoulder; Conor worked the katana up and down in a rough sawing motion, the best he could manage with his arms pinned to his side.

  She grabbed his thigh with her claws and squeezed. The bone gave way with a burning rush of endorphins and heat, and Conor fought to remain conscious through the unbearable, itching agony. He slid the blade up, and then down.

  Up. Down.

  Muscle parted. Metal scraped against bone. Scratchy dragged her teeth free then slammed her head into Flynn’s helmet, again and again, stars exploding across his vision. Something cracked, and cracked further, then white supernovas streaked through his skull. Still he sawed.

  Her grip slackened against the blade, just enough to free his arm. Conor pulled a combat knife from his belt and jammed it between metal plates, through carbon fiber and meat into the junction between her leg and groin. He propped the pommel against the metal plate on his abdomen and used her leverage to shove it farther in. Hot, sticky fluid gushed over his hand.

  Her squeeze became a squirming, frantic push, but he straightened his good leg to lift against her weight, jamming the blade deeper until it met bone, and then a little further. As the knife sank between the ball and socket he twisted with every ounce of his augmented strength. The joint popped free.

  Roaring, she let go and rolled off of him.

  He stood.

  Tearing off his helmet and letting it drop to the ground, he whirled, blade slicing through the air and her mid-spine without slowing. Her claws tore into the asphalt, desperately scrabbling across the pavement, limp legs trailing behind.

  Conor hobbled after her, unable to put much weight on his left leg. The sword bit down, slicing armor and meat once, twice, three times, tracing deep gashes across her shoulders and upper arms. Purple masses writhed across the wounds as she dragged herself away from him, legs twitching as her spine began to knit.

  She rose to all fours.

  He cut across the back of her knee, severing tendons and ligaments, the wound welling black under the sodium-vapor sky. As she fell he drove the blade into one kidney, leaning in to punch it through to her armor on the other side. He pulled it out and did the other.

  She swung, an ineffectual batting with her claws that he hopped way from. He took several of her fingers. They fell to the ground in a gush, and as she reared to her knees he took her right ear. The contrast highlighted the difference between first and second-generation regenerates: his thigh itched as muscle and bone knitted under his armor, but it still wouldn’t take his weight. She healed much faster, but the unstable flesh molded and twisted her body into something less than human.

  He stabbed her again, avoiding her heart to target her right lung. Once. Twice. Then her stomach, just to the left of her spine.

  No reason to keep you down too long, darling.

  She fell back to her hands and knees. He took the time to slice the side of her neck, just enough to prick the artery. Blood gushed in erratic spurts across the decaying asphalt, and she collapsed to her face, shaking, as the wound slithered and squirmed.

  Her whole body shuddered, and a mad, keening growl erupted from her throat.

  “There it is.”

  The whispers slithered through his mind, calling to their sister, entwining her, embracing her in an unending maelstrom of madness and carnage. She thrashed on the ground, a half-ton child in a temper-tantrum, denied her favorite toys.

  He glanced up long enough to see Washington and Karle advancing toward the mall without taking fire, then looked back down at Scratchy’s transformation. First-generation bonks made for the best bonk-outs. Tee-hee.

  Tentacles oozed from her shoulder, and a
mouth gnashed with serrated teeth from the wound in her neck. He limped back with too much theater for the benefit of the Dragonflies and took shelter in the shadows by the wall, his smirk hidden in the shadows.

  Scratchy erupted in a mountain of writhing flesh, suckered tentacles and ropy masses of muscle almost obscuring her humanoid form. Her scream couldn’t come from human lungs, an animalistic rage purer and more potent than the worst that men could devise.

  And better than most, Conor Flynn knew what men could devise.

  Karle and Washington turned and opened fire as the bonked-out mountain of flesh charged them. His voice admirably calm, Karle called for air support and then addressed Conor. “Flynn, you alive?”

  He coughed for effect. “Barely. Be a minute.”

  “Well, step on it. We’ve got company.”

  “Aye, sir.” From the shadows, Flynn smiled, and watched.

  Washington drew a pair of combat knives and took the charge head-on. He disappeared in an avalanche of psychotic, ravening meat. Blood fountained up from the hideous abomination, though from his squad-mate or the monster Conor couldn’t tell.

  He tried his leg. An electric jolt shot up his spine, but it held his weight and didn’t get any worse. Satisfied, he limped right, around the side of the building. Karle bellowed in the distance, and staccato gunfire echoed across the parking lot. Conor found a manhole, popped it up with his foot, and cocked his head.

  Far beneath him, a bloody mess stained the ground, just hotter than the walls and floor. In what little streetlight hit the bottom he could just make out the remains of an ICAP uniform, too small to be Rowley or Platt. Organs and steaming chunks of viscera spilled out of the helmet, a viscous glob of jellied entrails that crisscrossed al-Azwar’s unmoving chest in a pattern his mind had to and wouldn’t recognize. The eldritch symbol lanced through his head, seeking a foothold he would never allow it to find. He snuffed it out and opened eyes he hadn’t realized he’d closed.