by Nick Thacker
A few soldiers appeared in the doorway Garza had come through. Ravenshadow. Another handful approached the temple from Ben’s doorway. They were still holding their weapons, and Ben caught sight of two giants, their faces and bodies a mangled mess of blood, walking toward the temple.
They were now trapped inside the temple with Garza, his private army surrounding them.
“Harvey,” Garza said. “I wanted you here. I waited for you. I put my experiment with your friends on hold so you could enjoy this with me. Please, if you would direct your attention to —”
Ben rushed forward, aiming for Garza. Garza’s eyes had flicked sideways toward the pillar, and Ben took the only opportunity he thought he had. A second more and the Ravenshadow forces would be inside.
Garza didn’t see the attack coming until it was too late, but he was able to turn to the side so as not to take the blow head-on. Ben nailed him in the hip, and the two went down.
He heard Julie yell from behind him. “Get to the sides!” she shouted. “Away from the doors! Go around, then toward the pillar.”
Garza landed a hard blow to Ben’s side, and Ben let out a gasp. He loosened his grip on Garza’s shirt, and the two men wrapped up in a wrestling match. Ben tried lancing out with his fists, but Garza’s training was able to easily parlay the attacks to his own advantage.
One such punch Ben tried to land left his arm outstretched, and Garza immediately smashed his elbow through Ben’s forearm. Ben cried out in pain as the bone inside bruised, and he felt his body instinctively move to the defensive. It hadn’t been broken, but he still couldn’t help but protect it from another blow.
He rolled off Garza, holding his wounded arm.
Garza kicked him, hard, in the stomach. Ben felt the air escaping his lungs. His vision started to fade.
Before he could fall to the stone floor, he started to hear the gunshots. The Ravenshadow men were in the room, firing at his team.
And before he could get his bearings, Garza ripped upward on a handful of his hair, pulling Ben’s head back. He screamed in fury and pain, but he couldn’t control his own body as he stood, propelled upward by Garza’s force.
When he was fully standing, Garza hit him again, right in the spleen, with a tight, sharp pointed fist. Ben winced and his body collapsed, but Garza was still holding his hair.
Suddenly Vicente Garza’s face was next to Ben’s ear. His breath was hot and ragged, but he was not breathing more heavily than he had been before. The skirmish had no effect on the man whatsoever.
“Harvey,” he said. “I think you are done making mistakes. I think you are finally ready to experience what it feels like to be out of control.”
He whipped Ben around and pointed his face at the pillar in the center of the room. Ben saw his team against the wall on the side of the temple. They hadn’t made it to the pillar yet. Their arms were up, the soldiers who’d rushed in quickly subduing them.
“Are you ready, Harvey?” Garza asked. “Are you ready to watch your friends suffer for your stupidity?”
Garza lifted the tiny one-button device and held it out in front of him.
He waited two seconds, then pressed the button.
Reggie and Sarah screamed, and Ben thought he heard the sounds of Julie and Archie shouting something as well.
Ben heard a deep thunk as the blade fell from its harness and began its descent toward the altar.
79
Reggie
Reggie screamed, but his own voice was drowned out by the clunk sound of the guillotine’s blade-release latch. It lifted from its enclosure, dropping the heavy, steel blade.
He had been silent during Garza’s and Ben’s interaction. Waiting, listening. He wanted to fight, but he knew there was little he could do from here.
They’d gotten lucky before. He and Sarah had listened as the terrifying countdown clock had hit ‘one second.’ He’d waited for the inevitable fall of the blade, but none came. In fact, nothing came. They’d waited, shaking, unable to do anything at all but contemplate their own fate.
At the time, Reggie had just assumed it was a final method of torture. A way Garza could exert his power over them. Make them wait until the countdown hits one, anticipating the blade’s fall. And then… nothing. It would happen later, at a time they’d least expect it.
But nothing had happened. They’d remained bound to the stone table, their wrists tied together. For hours they wondered when it would happen.
And then Ben and Julie ran into the room. Archie was there too, he’d heard. He couldn’t see any of them, but he knew there was a newcomer, a woman named Victoria.
And then Garza, and then the soldiers and the gunshots. Ben and Garza were fighting, and then Garza won.
And then he pressed the button.
Reggie looked up as the blade began to fall, and he knew what he had to do.
Reggie tried bending his knees, using whatever small amount of give he had in the straps. It was enough.
He launched himself toward Sarah, toward the space where the descending blade would land. He felt like a slow-motion Superman, one hand straight above his head as he flew. He pushed himself toward the opposite side of the table, Sarah’s wrist moving with him.
Her wrist moved away from the blade as Reggie’s moved toward it.
The blade was a foot above him now. His face was right there, right in front of it as it fell. He saw his own reflection in the blade’s polished steel, a falling mirror showing himself his own terror.
It brushed past his face, mere inches from his nose.
And continued falling, right through his right arm.
He screamed, but there was no pain. Not at first.
The blade severed his upper arm, a few inches below his shoulder. There was blood, but less than he would have thought. Maybe that comes later. Maybe it’s so clean there won’t be any.
He’d never thought about it before.
The blade stopped with a sharp click and a louder scraping sound as it impacted the stone slab beneath his arm. For a moment, everything fell silent. He heard nothing else but the sound of his own heartbeat.
He dared a glance up, a glance at the blade that was now separating him and Sarah. His face was a mix of confusion and surprise, his eyes registering shock. Is that what this is? he thought. Am I in shock?
He looked at his arm. The blade’s sinister mirror reflected what he was hoping not to see: the place where his arm should have been was a circle of red, a large white dot in the center.
And then there was blood. Lots of it. It poured out from his shoulder-circle and pooled next to his face, on his face. A disgusting amount of it. Deep crimson. He could smell it, then he could taste it.
There was screaming. Sarah? But she sounded far away.
And then, the ultimate realization: Garza was standing over him now, close enough to grab with his free hand. My only hand.
And finally he realized:
My upper body is no longer strapped down.
He pulled himself up, out of the blood and gore of his own wound, and roared out of pure adrenaline.
Garza’s eyes widened, but Reggie had already begun reaching for the man’s face. He aimed for one of those wide eyes. Grabbed one with a finger, dug in pulling the man’s head toward his face.
Garza screamed in pain, but Reggie kept pulling. Garza’s head smacked against the stone table, sideways, one of his eyes pushed sideways as Reggie’s forefinger dug into it.
And then, pop. Reggie removed his finger from the man’s eye, taking whatever he could hold on to with it.
And then Reggie collapsed.
80
Julie
“Get out!” Julie yelled, aiming her words at Ben. “Go! Now!”
The others were already on their way. Archie had grabbed Reggie and was hauling him out the doorway. He’d cut the straps binding his feet and had lifted him in a fireman’s carry over his shoulder.
Victoria and Julie had gone for Sarah, who was screaming
and frantic but otherwise fine. She had a gunshot wound between her shoulder blades, but it seemed to be healing well and was currently bandaged.
Ben had started toward Garza, but Julie interrupted his movement with her yell. He seemed confused at first, but a few gunshots from the Ravenshadow soldiers snapped him back to life.
He turned and ran, quickly moving out of the center of the room. The soldiers fired back, but Julie was already tracking their movements. She fired three quick bursts, and the two on Ben’s tail fell. Another burst and one more soldier fell.
Their luck would turn — these were well-trained mercenaries, and if it weren’t for the surprised attack on their leader at the center of the room, and the obvious chaos that ensued, they might all be dead by now. So Julie needed to get them all out of the temple and back to the forest.
The doorway was twenty paces away, and Archie and Reggie were already almost there. She ran along as well, holding Sarah on one shoulder and firing her weapon with the other. They would make it to the door a few seconds behind Ben, who was halfway there already.
But then the doorway’s light was blocked. Julie frowned, trying to make sense of what had happened. It was as if a massive stone had been rolled in front of the opening, blocking out the light.
And then that stone moved.
A giant. His body was bleeding, his face a distorted mess of flesh. He stepped through the doorway and into the temple, right in front of Archie and Reggie.
Oh, no.
The giant lifted his weapon and pointed it down at the pair. Julie wanted to fight him off, but there were three soldiers moving to her right that she was tracking in her peripheral vision, waiting for a clear shot.
The giant’s weapon raised slightly, and Julie winced, knowing what was coming next. Archie lifted his own weapon, but too slowly.
The giant fired.
Archie fell, Reggie landing on top of him.
And then the giant reared back, his head up. He stumbled backward, then out of the temple.
The Peruvians.
Julie saw a man run past the doorway, behind the giant, firing up at it as he did. The giant’s attention was pulled in the other direction, however, from where there were more rounds being fired at it. The giant fell to one knee, but began firing his machine gun toward the trees.
Julie saw Ben scoop up Reggie, then help Archie to his feet. The older man was bleeding, but Julie wasn’t sure if it was a bullet wound or something related to his fall. She didn’t care, at the moment. They were almost at the doorway, and she intended to get them all through it safely.
Outside, the giant wavered and hit the ground, now on both knees. He tried looking over his shoulder at the first Peruvian soldier, but was suddenly thrown down onto his face with the blast of an explosion.
Grenade, Julie thought. A perfect shot.
The giant’s body heaved and lurched, then fell still. Bullets still impacted the man’s body, but he never got up.
They were at the doorway now, and Julie and Victoria, carrying Sarah, stumbled through it after Ben and Reggie. Archie was close behind her, and then they were outside.
The sounds immediately shifted, now thin, distant tapping sounds from the rifles instead of heavy, dull thuds. They would chase them, but at least they had a chance at getting away. Julie had only seen ten men, and at least three of those she’d shot. The Peruvian soldiers were now behind them, firing into the temple as the Ravenshadow troops tried to escape. The situation had turned to their favor — it was much easier keeping the enemies inside the temple.
Ben reached the edge of the forest and set Reggie down on the ground. He turned to Julie. “We’ve got a problem,” he said.
Julie helped Victoria get Sarah to her feet, but by this time she was almost able to walk on her own. She quickly checked her bandage and then turned to where Ben was pointing.
Where the injured young Peruvian soldier had been with Agent Etienne Sharpe, there was now no one. The depressed spot in the foliage where they’d laid the man was still there, a slight indentation in the leaves in the shape of a man’s body.
“Where are they?” Ben asked.
“I have no idea,” Julie said, trying to catch her breath. “But we can’t worry about that now. We have to get —”
“Hey!” Julie heard a man’s voice, far off in the distance, shouting. Then she heard an engine running at a high speed. She turned to look.
It was the jeep. Plowing toward them from the middle of the valley, driven by Sharpe.
“Well, I didn’t expect that,” Ben said.
Etienne waved, then shouted again. “Let’s go!” he said. “Hurry!”
Julie helped Sarah to her feet, holding her arm as they once again exited the forest. Ben and Reggie shuffled forward, and Archie waited next to them. The jeep swung around hard, revealing the driver’s side to them, the temple and mountain behind it. Ben wasted no time, and they got everyone aboard in a few seconds. Ben and Julie had to ride on the side rails, but they held on to the upper frame of the jeep as Sharpe accelerated away.
A few bullets landed around them, smacking into trees and heavy leaves, but the soldiers were still cowering inside the temple, effectively being held off by the Peruvians, who were now hunkered down in the same natural trench the Ravenshadow men had used against the Guild Rite forces.
“Where’s the kid?” Ben yelled down at Sharpe. “He’s injured — you can’t just leave him —”
“He’s fine,” Sharpe yelled back. “He’s waiting for the rest of his friends to get back far enough.”
“To what?”
The Peruvian soldiers in the valley stood up, and Julie watched as they backpedaled away from the temple even more, allowing the Ravenshadow soldiers to sneak out of the temple a few steps. They lined the walls outside the temple, and a few began running toward the smaller rectangular building.
As they ran, Julie heard a deafening boom. She whipped her head around, trying to see the source of the blast. Her eyes were on the temple, waiting for Garza or a giant to emerge with some sort of massive new weapon they hadn’t seen before, but instead she saw something else entirely.
The temple doorway the soldiers had emerged from exploded in a fury of fire and dirt. Stones and bodies flew outward, then fell to the ground.
Julie turned again and finally saw it. The tank.
“I told you,” Sharpe said. “He was just waiting for his comrades to get out of the way.”
Julie smiled. He’s in the tank.
Sharpe continued, aiming the jeep across the vast expanse of the valley toward the road they’d come in on. “He said he was too injured to drive anything, but that he might be able to figure out how to shoot the tank. We got him in and situated. I’d say he did all right.”
“Yeah,” Ben shouted. “I’d say he did just fine.”
81
Ben
The ride back to civilization took longer than Julie would have expected, but part of the problem was that she, Ben, and one of the soldiers had to ride outside the jeep, hanging on with an arm clamped over a bar. After half an hour of driving like this, they stopped at the first sign of civilization they could find: a corner store with a single gas pump.
The owner was working when they arrived, and the Peruvian soldiers developed a rapport with the man until he was persuaded to let them borrow his own vehicle.
They put the injured man in the back of that truck and the men followed behind the jeep until they reached the town of Chachapoyas where they pulled off and headed a different direction. In the small city, Agent Etienne Sharpe was able to find a private flight using his Interpol credentials, and the team — now seven in total — split again. Reggie and Sarah, aided by a doctor they’d called on the way to town, were driven to a regional hospital where they could be examined and patched up as much as possible.
Ben had wanted to go with them, but Julie had talked him out of it. She wasn’t sure what Sharpe and Archie might add to their discussion, and they needed
to get a handle on the situation and prepare a report for Mr. and Mrs. E. Besides, Julie said, Reggie was sedated, and he probably would be for at least a day. Sarah Lindgren promised she would call when he was feeling better.
So Ben had reluctantly climbed aboard the large twin prop aircraft, bound for Lima. Due to the heavier load and the smaller plane, the flight would take about three hours.
Worse, it was loud inside, and the noise-canceling headphones they were given did little to block out the wash of the propellors. However, they each had a built-in microphone they could use to communicate during the flight.
So while it was impossible to sleep during the trip, the headphones gave them time to catch up, to exchange pieces of their stories, and helped Ben craft a narrative for what had happened over the last few days.
“Sharpe,” he said, his voice still tight and focused, not wanting to let his guard down around the man. “How long have you been part of the Guild Rite?”
Sharped looked up, thinking. “It’s been a long time. I started right out of school. I was interested in the Freemasons, and somehow ended up finding my way to a Guild Rite meeting. Never really thought about it much until the initiation.”
“It was different than you expected?”
“It was… real. Rather than some weird fraternity-style tradition, the Guild Rite vetted me. Interviewed me. Asked my about my beliefs and somehow knew the answers already. It wasn’t hard at all, just… different. I think they were looking for me. My new role at Interpol was absolutely a factor.”
“You did them favors?”
“I was part of their group. Yes. But it was never like the mafia or anything similar to that — I liked them. And they were really interested in the things I was into: history, politics, world religion. And they knew so much. It was like each of them was a library of world history, only not from the perspectives we have all heard before.”