“She waiting for you in T18?”
“That’s right! You don’t wanna stop me from coming back home with flowers, do you?”
“As a matter of fact, yes!”
“Well, shit, that’s darn rude of you!”
The man laughed again.
Keo flicked the fire selector on the MP5SD to full-auto and took a breath.
The squeaking noises had picked back up again from his right. He could hear it coming from his left, too. They were getting closer, but not rushing it. They didn’t have to, and they knew it.
Dammit. If it wasn’t for shitty luck…
He’d found Gillian again, after so long of not being sure if she was even still alive. But there she was, on the riverbank, looking back at him. Beautiful. He couldn’t see the green of her eyes over the distance, but he imagined them sparkling at the sight of him. Hopefully he didn’t still look like he had just been tear gassed the night before. He wondered how he was going to explain all the other scars to her. The one along the left side of his face, in particular, was going to be a doozy.
“Remember those assholes from the cabin? Well, they had a leader, and he was determined to slice my face open.”
Yeah, that should work.
He sighed again and slid up the length of the cold machine behind him and counted down to five. But this time, he would go the full five. No more surprising himself by going at three. Nossirree Bob—
Pop-pop-pop!
Automatic rifle fire, and it wasn’t coming from inside the warehouse, either.
What the hell?
More than one firing at the same time, too, he was sure of it.
Pop-pop-pop! Pop-pop-pop!
A dozen. Maybe even more than that. There was a full-fledged gun battle going on outside the warehouse at this very moment.
Then, suddenly, the brap-brap-brap! of a machine gun raining death, the loud roar of the weapon drowning out everything else.
Jesus fucking Christ.
That was the M60. Which meant…
“It’s a trap!” the same voice that had been trying to cajole him out of hiding shouted. “Everyone get the fuck out of here! It’s a trap!”
The man hadn’t finished screaming “trap” when the shriek of bullets punching through the warehouse’s metal walls flooded the cavernous room. The ping-ping-ping! of bullets ricocheting off machinery around him, followed by screaming, then the very clear squawking of handheld radios blasting away with panicked voices.
Keo blocked out all the sounds—hard to do, with the M60 drowning the air in an unending tide—and focused on the back door in front of him. What were the chances there were still people on the other side? Now, with the hellacious gunfire pummeling everything in its path out in front of the warehouse? Would the ones out back rush to assist or flee? Or stand their ground? That would depend on how well-trained these guys were.
Whatever was out back—if anything—it was definitely better than being stuck in here among the flying bullets and the shrieks of people dying behind him.
“Ambush!” someone else was shouting. “It’s an ambush!”
Screw it.
Keo didn’t bother counting. He pushed off his hiding spot and ran forward and fired at the door. It took half of his magazine to demolish the door lever. That was way too many bullets, but it couldn’t be helped because he had to make sure—
He kicked the door and it swung wide open, harsh sunlight blinding him momentarily.
Keo waited for gunfire as he exposed himself, but either the men who had tracked him into the warehouse were already dead or too busy fighting for their lives against the machine gun at the front, or they weren’t paying him any attention.
He lunged out, thankful to be outside and breathing fresh air again. Hell, to be breathing at all. He was surrounded by grass that went up almost to his waist, and Keo began swimming through it and toward the wall of trees on the other end. He wasted a half second to consider taking a peek at the battle out front but decided he’d rather not be anywhere close to whoever was letting loose with the machine gun, or the poor saps on the wrong end of it.
The brap-brap-brap seemed unending, crushing everything else that might have made a sound, including the returning pop-pop-pop of assault rifle fire.
Give it up, boys, he wanted to tell them. That’s an M60. You’re not going to win against that monster.
Keo slipped into the woods, immediately feeling the drastic change in temperature as the high canopies blocked out most of the sun. That, more than anything, alarmed him, but he kept moving because the opposite direction was untenable at the moment.
Even safe beyond the tree lines, he could still hear the barrage of gunfire from behind him, until suddenly…it just stopped.
The M60 had gone quiet.
Maybe he was wrong after all. Maybe Tobias’s men had managed to knock down the gunner—
Then it was back, louder and more ferocious than before, if that was even possible.
Or not.
It had to be Steve’s people attacking. Maybe even the same guys back on the bridge, or they could have had more than one machine gun. It wouldn’t surprise him, given the armaments the soldiers he’d met in Louisiana had been lugging around. The ones at Beaufont Lake had been armed with an M240, a more modern squad automatic weapon than the M60, but just as dangerous in the right hands. They also had what seemed like an unlimited number of military-grade M4s and the ammo to endlessly feed them.
The shooting continued nonstop behind him, but it had lessened in volume the further he waded into the woods. Keo might have felt sorry for the poor saps back at the warehouse if they hadn’t been trying to kill him.
Sucks to be you, boys.
He kept moving, not really sure where he was going, just knowing that he didn’t want to be anywhere close to the gun battle when the winners started spreading out and looking for survivors. Even if that was Steve’s people back there, the fact that they had laid down a hellacious amount of lead meant they weren’t very concerned about his safety. For all he knew, Steve might have sent him out here for the express purpose of drawing Tobias out.
Shit. Had Steve just dangled him out there as bait? So he could then charge in with his men and waste Tobias’s people? If those were Tobias’s men back there. For all Keo knew, they could have been more of the “stragglers” that annoyed Steve and just happened to have picked on the wrong victim.
There was no denying that those other shooters had shown up pretty fast, right about the time Keo found himself besieged inside the warehouse. So they were around the area, waiting for a sign, because they likely hadn’t heard the sniper shooting earlier. Keo hadn’t heard the gunshots, and he was the one being shot at. Anyone at the bridge, or the wooded area around it (or wherever the hell Steve’s men had been hiding) wouldn’t have heard a whimper. But those gunshots in the warehouse, on the other hand…
He stopped in his tracks.
The shooting behind him had ceased entirely, leaving a quiet lull that, even more than the sound of the M60 firing away, gave him goose bumps.
It was over, and Keo didn’t have to think very hard about who had won.
What now? Carry on or go back to T18?
Did he even have much of a choice? Whatever Steve’s game, walking back after that carnage was probably not going to end very favorably for him. No. The smart move here was to keep going, then decide what to do later when he had more intel.
He pushed on, even though he didn’t have a clue where he was going and there wasn’t anything resembling a trail for him to latch onto. It didn’t take long for him to get flashbacks to another time and another place when he had spent way too many days inside a wooded area much like this one. Back then, he was being chased by a madman with a small army.
The more things changed…
He was thinking about Pollard, about Norris and Allie, when he stepped on a twig and it snapped! under one of his boots.
Keo paused and looked down just a sp
lit second before the wire sprung out from the ground, scattering dried leaves that had been camouflaging it, and slipped around his right leg. The razor-thin steel line dug into his ankle as it tightened and he was shot into the air like a rocket. The sky above him flipped until he was staring at the ground and Keo found himself hanging upside down from a tree.
He’d stepped right into a snare trap!
He scrambled for the MP5SD, but it was on the ground below him. He still had the Glock, and Keo was reaching for it when something hard and metallic pressed into the back of his neck, the rifle barrel cold against his exposed skin.
“Draw it, and you’re a dead man,” a voice said behind him.
Keo took his hand away from the Glock.
The figure scrambled around him in a wide circle, giving him plenty of space in case Keo had any ideas about grabbing for his weapon. He was a short man (or maybe he was actually tall, since it was a little difficult to tell proper height while hanging upside down) wearing green and brown hunting clothes, boots, and green and black camo paint on his face. Brown eyes peered out at Keo.
“This must be a Texas thing,” Keo said.
“Shut up,” the man said. He took out a radio with one hand and keyed it. “I got him. The guy from the warehouse.”
“Bring him in,” a woman answered through the radio. “He’s got a lot to answer for.”
“Maybe I should just shoot him.”
The man was holding a large rifle with one hand. Like his face, the weapon was covered in a camo pattern. He cocked his head slightly to one side, one eye focused on Keo from behind his rifle’s scope despite the short distance. At this range, the bullet would probably take off half of Keo’s head. If one didn’t do the job, and given the magazine under the weapon, the man would easily be able to try again with a second trigger pull.
“Whoa, whoa,” Keo said. “Let’s talk this over.”
“Shut the fuck up,” the man said.
“No, bring him in,” the woman said through the radio. “Tobias’s orders.”
The man hesitated.
“Did you hear me?” the woman asked.
“Whatever you say,” the man said, and put the radio away. He took a step back before slinging his rifle and producing a knife from a sheath along his hip. “This must be your lucky day, Chinaman.”
Not quite, but hey, the day’s still young.
Because Keo had heard it clearly. The woman on the radio had definitely said the name “Tobias.”
Keo didn’t need to look at his watch swinging underneath him to know what time it was. Despite the thick canopies on the other side of his boots, there was still at least five hours of sunlight left.
Five hours to kill Tobias and return to T18.
He’d done more with less time.
CHAPTER 10
His captor was in his late twenties and maybe just a year or two younger than Keo himself. He learned this useless fact while they were moving through the woods when the man wiped the camo off his face with a rag that he then stuffed into his back pocket. The wiring that had snared Keo was now binding his hands in front of him, the thin piece of steel digging into his wrists, just deep enough to hurt but not draw blood.
Keo walked up front, moving slowly because he had no idea where he was going and a part of him was afraid of stepping into another trap. From the looks of the man keeping a decent distance behind him, rifle no doubt pointed right at Keo’s back, he had been out here for some time setting up plenty of snares. The damn thing had been strong enough to hold him suspended, so either the man was looking for big game or he was hunting humans. The only other option was that he was hoping to catch something that used to be human, but that didn’t really make much sense in the daylight.
They were definitely moving deeper into the woods because the canopies were getting thicker and the temperature was continuing to fall around him. Keo kept sneaking a look at the darker parts of his surroundings, the places where shadows lingered, and imagined black eyes watching him back. He might have shivered and hoped his captor didn’t notice.
“What’re they for?” Keo asked.
“What?” the man said. He moved quietly, almost like a cat. No wonder Keo had never known he was hiding nearby.
“The snare. What was it for?”
There was no response, just the crunch-crunch of shoes over brittle grass. Keo couldn’t see the man’s face, so he didn’t know if he didn’t want to answer or if he just didn’t feel like talking.
“Humans?” Keo said anyway. “Or things that used to be humans? Is that it? You trying to snag yourself a ghoul?”
“Ghoul?” the man said.
“The creatures.”
“You call them ghouls, too?”
‘Too’? Keo thought. Curiouser and curiouser.
“So do you, apparently,” he said.
There was no response that time.
“Where are we going?” Keo asked.
“You’ll know when we get there.”
“What if I walk right into a hole and fall down or something?”
“I guess you better watch your step, then.”
Keo smiled. “I’m Keo, by the way.”
“Good for you.”
“You got a name?”
“Yes.”
“Wanna share?”
“Nope.”
“Don’t be that way. I have to call you something.”
Silence.
Keo sighed. “This is how misunderstandings get started, you know.”
“There’s no misunderstanding,” the man said. “You set us up.”
“I didn’t set anyone up. You ambushed me. The sniper—”
“Bullshit.” Then, “Turn left here.”
Keo turned left, though there were still no trails, old footsteps, or anything that would indicate this was a well-traveled route. So what exactly was his captor using to tell directions? Or maybe the guy was making it up as he went. That seemed unlikely, though.
“He’s out there with his men,” Jack had told him.
“Where exactly?” he had asked.
“If we knew, you think we’d need you to go out there to find him for us?” Jack had laughed. “They’re all over those woods on the other side of the river. We could never pin them down. I wouldn’t be surprised if they had some hillbilly survivalists among them.”
Hillbilly survivalists. Like the one behind him right now? His no-name captor didn’t really sound like someone who had spent most of his life in the wilderness. Or the hills. Or wherever the hell Texas hillbillies came from. Not that Keo would know the difference anyway. He didn’t meet many hillbillies growing up in San Diego and had managed to avoid them in the years since. Though, he had crossed paths with a few in the French countryside that might fit the description—
Focus.
Keo figured he had until they reached wherever they were going to get out of this jam. If he met Tobias with his hands bound and weaponless, he was likely as good as dead. The man walking behind him had made it pretty clear they thought he was responsible for the ambush at the warehouse. Even the woman on the radio had indicated the same thing.
“Bring him in. He’s got a lot to answer for,” she had said.
As if he were the one who had tried to pick off some poor sap with a sniper rifle and not the other way around. As if he had run into the warehouse so Steve’s men could then corral his pursuers and blast away with an M60. Of course, he had a feeling they weren’t going to believe him when he tried to sell that story. Never mind that it was the God’s honest truth.
Just his luck. The first time he had truth on his side, and it wasn’t going to do him a lick of good.
“What’s he like?” Keo asked.
He didn’t expect an answer, but his captor said, “Who?”
I guess he feels like talking after all.
“Tobias,” Keo said.
“You’ll find out soon enough.”
“Give me a hint.”
“Keep wal
king.”
“One more question…”
“Shut up.”
“You a hillbilly?”
“What?” the man said. Keo grinned at the insulted tone. “What did you just call me, Chinaman?”
“Hillbilly. I was told there were Texas hillbillies all over these woods. I was just wondering if you were one of them.”
“Fuck you.”
“Whoa whoa, let’s keep it civil, okay? I’m not saying there’s anything wrong with being a hillbilly. Even a Texas one. No judgments here, pal.”
“Man, I’m getting real sick of the sound of your voice.”
His captor had picked up his pace. Keo knew that from the slight increase in the sound of the man’s footsteps. He was getting closer…
“It was a genuine question,” Keo said.
“Shut your mouth.”
“Is Tobias a hillbilly, too?”
“I said, shut up.”
He sounded much closer that time. Much closer.
“Can I ask you a question?” Keo said.
“No.”
“Is it true that hillbillies inbreed?”
Keo was waiting for it, and when it finally came—the cold touch of the rifle’s barrel starting to poke him viciously in the back of the neck—he dropped down, spun around, and swept his right leg from front to back in a wide arc. His captor went down and squeezed the trigger at the same time. The gunshot exploded, scattering birds in the vicinity, the buzz! of the bullet passing over Keo’s head.
The man landed on his butt with an oomph!, but somehow still managed to cling onto the rifle. Keo lunged forward and drove his knee into the man’s face, slamming the back of his head into the ground. The gun fired again, the second shot buzzing past Keo’s right shoulder this time and shattering a tree branch behind him.
Before the man could pull the trigger a third time, Keo leaped on top of him, driving both knees into his chest. His captor let out a surprised grunt as Keo captured the rifle’s barrel with his bound palms and wrenched it free. He tossed it, then lifted himself slightly before dropping back down with his entire weight. Another loud grunt, the man’s eyes flaring, his lips twisting in intense concentration—
Purge of Babylon (Book 6): The Isles of Elysium Page 10