by Michael Todd
“I got you.” Turner chuckled.
The guys moved through the bushes carefully, trying to make as little noise as possible. As they reached a small clearing in the brush, they heard a huge cracking sound. Brock raised a fist, and the team halted.
A large uprooted tree flew straight for them, trailing creepers and dirt. They all dropped to the ground as it soared over their heads and came crashing down somewhere behind them.
In front of them was a monstrous beast, all cracked black scales and bulging fangs. He huffed and snorted, daring them to come into his territory.
Brock swirled his arms. “Line up, and let’s send this bad boy back to hell!”
The men fell into formation and leveled their automatic weapons. Brock gripped his pistol so tightly his knuckles went white. The demon was hideous. “Steady.”
As soon as the beast took one step, they started to blast him. He wailed as he charged them, swinging his arms at the guys even as bullets tore into his chest and shoulders. The team scattered as he broke their ranks. Turner and a few men broke off to try and flank the beast. Brock wasn’t so lucky. He backpedaled away from the demon, but the beast’s fist caught his ankles and flipped him to the ground.
Brock’s weapon went flying into the bush, and he was suddenly alone with a snarling nightmare.
Bullets slammed into the beast and knocked him back. Turner grabbed Brock and pulled him to his feet, then shoved a Desert Eagle pistol into his hand.
Brock leveled the hand cannon at the demon and shook his head. “Okay, one more time. And this time, aim for his fucking head.”
Brock and Turner blasted the beast from the front while the rest of the team flanked him. Every time Brock pulled the trigger, a huge hole opened up in the demon’s hide. The beast growled and tried to leap at Brock again, but Brock’s gunfire took the top of his scaly head off. He fought the special bullets valiantly, stumbling first at Brock and then at the flanking team, but he finally fell to the ground. Turner saluted. “Timmmbeerrrr!”
As soon as the beast hit the ground, it exploded into dust that blew all over Turner. Brock and the others laughed as he spat the ash from his mouth. The radio on Brock’s shoulder crackled, and their commander’s voice came over loud. “Hey! Stop playing in the jungle and come back to base. It’s urgent.”
Brock lifted an eyebrow and clicked the button. “Yes, sir, on our way.”
Brock found his pistol in the bushes and they all turned to walk back, Turner kicking the dirt. “Fucking playing in the jungle. Let’s see him take on a panther and a giant ass demon.”
One of the other guys chuckled. “And a fucking demon monkey. That shit was wild.”
12
Joshua, Timothy, and Calvin stood at the gate to the base. Behind them was a barren desert, before them was a cold structure they had once called home. All of the lights in the armory were off, no cars parked in the garage, and the defenses had been disabled.
Calvin put his arm around Joshua. “Well, this was a nice place to lay my head, at least for a while.”
Joshua nodded with a half-smile. “It was. Next time we move, though, it would be nice if it wasn’t because we were attacked by demons.
Calvin chuckled. “Amen, brother. How about you, Timothy? You happy to be moving on to our next place of residence?”
Timothy shrugged. “I guess. Doesn’t make much difference to me as long as it’s comfortable. I spend a lot of time on my own at these spots.”
“You got Stephanie and Korbin now,” Calvin replied.
“Oh, yeah. Still, it is what it is, I suppose,” Timothy lamented.
Calvin slapped him on the back. “Why do you look so sad then?”
Timothy glanced at Calvin and back at the ground. “They had to shut down my servers for the trip.”
Calvin laughed loudly. “Yeah, man, that’s usually how it works. It’ll be even better at the new spot. Korbin says you’re getting twice the room.”
Timothy perked up a bit. “Hell, yeah, and it better be more impressive. They promised me godlike internet speed. I better not get over there and find out it moves at a glacial pace.”
Calvin smirked. “Look, the big rig is on its way there now.”
The three guys stared into the distance as the rig turned down the road. Timothy held his keys up and smiled. “At least I got a fun ride to get there in.”
The guys piled into Timothy’s Jeep, no top, no sides. They headed out of the base for the last time and made a quick right turn onto the main two-lane highway. Timothy looked in his rearview mirror and sighed. “Why do we always have to live so far away from everything? Now I’m even farther from good shopping.”
The guys chuckled and shook their head. A loud roar blasted over them, and they watched as fighter planes flew overhead. Timothy rolled his eyes. “They better cap that noise near our new place, sister. Girl needs her beauty sleep.”
The mountain sat looming high into the clouds. Jagged rocks covered in ice and snow glistened in the late evening light. The wind blew hard, shifting the powder back and forth, but no one was there to see it. The mountain was far too dangerous for even the most avid of climbers, and only saw action once or twice a year. The rest of the time, avalanches sat perched at the ready, waiting for a shift in the ground.
The only sounds piercing the air were the shudder of the trees in the wind and the random chirp of a bird flying through on its way somewhere else. The ground was untouched, white and sparkling, but the quiet was a dangerous façade. At any moment, that silence could be filled.
As the breeze began to dull a bit, the snow began to shift. Small balls rolled down over the ledges, plunging to the deeper swells at the base of the mountain. The sound of ice cracking echoed across the valley and into the distance. From above, the falling snow began to compound, growing larger and larger as the avalanche began to slide.
Brock’s team saluted the guard at the base and presented their ID to the guards. They were covered in dirt and sweat, and a plume of ashes floated along behind Turner. They took their weapons back to their barrack tents and dusted Turner off outside. The guys laughed as he coughed and choked.
Brock leaned forward and whispered in Turner’s ear. “You owe me Mr. Fung’s buffet.”
Turner groaned. “Can’t this be payment enough? My cinder-covered embarrassment?”
Brock shook his head. “Nope. That’s just an added bonus. A karmic cycle completed because you, my friend, are just too cocky.”
Turner bucked playfully at Brock. “I’ll show you cocky.”
The team stowed their gear and straightened up as much as possible, then headed to the main building where their commander was waiting for them. Brock stepped to the door with the others behind him and glanced back. “Remember, let me do the damned talking. You morons always seem to get us in some sort of trouble.”
They all chuckled quietly as Brock straightened his jacket and knocked on the door. The commander opened the door immediately, and all of the soldiers came to attention. “At ease, boys. Follow me. We’re going to get comfortable in one of the meeting rooms. Too many of you assholes for one small office.”
They all followed him down the hall and to the third door on the right. They sat down around the table and waited for the commander to close the door and begin. He dropped a large file folder on the desk in front of him and stared from man to man, getting a feeling for where they were.
After a few less than comfortable moments, he cleared his throat. “Boys, you’re my best men. Fuck, you’re probably the military’s best men. You’ve been through hell and back and come out in one piece on the other side. I’d venture to say you’re as good if not better than our mercenary squads out there. The Damned can be tricky if they don’t get the right demon, no offense to whoever is infected on this team.”
Brock glanced back and forth down the line. “We’re all Damned, sir.”
The commander lifted an eyebrow. “I forget that. You act so damned normal. Either way, you
’re the best of the best. I have an operation being offered to your team and only your team. You were requested specifically, and I can tell they’re really hoping you take the job.”
The guys waited for more information. The commander shook his head and chuckled. “The thing is so stupid. I’m sure you’re going to die doing it. So knowing how much you do for the rest of the teams, you need to think long and hard. It’s a volunteer mission only. No one will be looked negatively upon if they decide not to go. You’ll simply stand by and wait for word your teammates haven’t returned and then join another command.”
Brock narrowed his eyes. “What is the assignment? I can’t imagine it being that much worse than anything we’ve done before. Is it another incursion?”
The commander scoffed. “When you find out, you’ll wish it was an incursion. After those six locations in Europe were hit by the demons, the government and their consorts decided we’re living on borrowed time. We’re getting beaten up little by little, and before we know it, we’ll be hanging out on a limb. We don’t want to get to the place where we’re stuck between a rock and a hard place. We don’t want to have to surrender to the demons to keep some of humanity intact. Now, I’m not saying that’s gonna happen right now, but we’re getting closer every day. The government thinks we need to be more aggressive with our approach.”
Turner looked at the others to make sure he wasn’t the only one who didn’t understand. “What does that mean, sir? What’s the mission?”
The commander shook his head. “Boys, your end goal is to go to hell.”
Several of the guys chuckled. Turner chimed in. “If it’s all the same to you, I think we’d rather end up in heaven, sir.”
The commander smiled. “I’m sorry, boys, but no.”
They all fell quiet, and a sense of unease permeated the room. Brock broke the silence. “What exactly are you saying?”
The commander slid the file across to Brock. “I’ve read the operation every which way you can read it. I didn’t believe it at first, but then I remembered what kind of war we were in. The file says that your goal is literally to storm the gates of hell.”
No one said a word. They all sat there absolutely stunned. Sure, many of them had joked about it before, but no one had actually thought it would be a reality.
Brock’s demon laughed loudly in his ear. Oh, this just takes the cake, sweetie pie. There is no way in hell, literally, no way I am marching back into that place.
Brock ignored his demon and narrowed his eyes. “With whom would we be storming these gates, sir?”
The commander pulled the file back from Brock and shook his head. “This is top level secret, but I don’t expect you boys to go marching into hell without knowing who you’ll be working with and for. It’s not a military member, I know that for sure. It’s actually a woman, let me see. Her name is here somewhere.”
Brock and Turner exchanged a glance. Turner mouthed, “You think?”
They looked back at the commander and asked in unison, “Katie?”
The commander flipped through several pages and then found the name. He looked up, surprised. “Yes. How did you know that?”
Turner snorted laughter. Two of the guys high-fived each other. Brock took a moment to look at each team member. One by one, they nodded. Brock swallowed and looked at the commander. “Hell, sign us up!”
The guys all cheered and stood up, talking loudly to each other. The commander was dumbfounded, but pulled out a stack of forms and plopped them on the table. “Okay. Just fill out one of these forms each. It’s liability waivers, next of kin, that sort of thing. I’ll put my John Hancock on it and send it off to the general.”
The guys rushed the stack, pushing each other out of the way to get to the forms. The commander just shook his head. He had never seen any soldier excitedly signing up for certain death. He looked at Brock, who was calmly sitting in his seat waiting for the others to finish up. Brock couldn’t hide his smile. He shrugged his shoulders at the commander.
The commander threw his hands up. “You men are some of the most ballsy idiots I’ve ever met. Either you’ve finally lost your minds, or you really think you have a chance at this ridiculous assignment. Whichever one it is, this Katie lady must be one hell of a leader to get you guys to jump on it like this.”
Turner handed Brock a form and winked at the commander. “Sir, when you find a badass like Katie, you want to be part of whatever she’s working on. She wouldn’t take us to hell if she thought we wouldn’t come back.”
The commander scowled. “Hey, it’s your flesh that’s gonna melt off, not mine. Just know if you don’t come back, I’m going to be damned pissed. You’re my finest men, and it’s gonna be hard to replace you.”
Brock handed the commander his paper and shook his hand. “Sir, I can almost promise you we will be coming back. We may be beaten up, a little sunburned, and possibly even grumpier than normal, but we’ll be back. Besides, we can’t let these other idiots fight the demons. You won’t have any teams left.”
The commander collected the rest of the forms and sighed, resigned. “Hell, you’re probably damn right.”
13
One of the lead Research and Development doctors stood in the center of his messy lab, his bright red hair sticking out in all directions. He turned, hitting his head on one of the lamps and grabbing it to stop it from swinging. At six feet tall when all the other doctors were short, he was at a bit of an architectural disadvantage in the building. He cursed and rubbed the bump on his head.
His assistant stopped in the middle of picking a gadget out of a box and lifted her eyebrow at Doctor Thorough. “What’s wrong? You look more pale than usual.”
“Just trying to run through the list of things I know we’ll need to take with us to hell. This is a bit more confusing than I expected it to be when they tasked me with it.”
Doctor Thorough was a genius, one of the top researchers in the program. His mannerisms, though, weren’t quite up to the neat standards of everyone else. He was very focused on the technical side of things, which was a good thing, but it left him little brainpower to deal with cleaning, people, or anything else that wasn’t research.
His assistant, Alice was all about the work the doctor did on a regular basis but was finding herself a bit out of her element on this latest assignment. “You better get your head straight, and for the tenth time, do not forget the sunscreen. There may not be sun per se, but you burn close to an oven, so hell might crisp you. I don’t want to bring you back here in an urn.”
The doctor was too busy mumbling to himself to pay attention. Alice sighed as she went through one of the boxes. “Sign up for research in the military, they told me. It’ll be a huge bonus on your resumé. Right. See new places and meet new people. New places like, I don’t know, hell. And new people like, I presume, the Devil himself.”
She tossed an empty toolbox into the large metal trash can and picked up a small box with all kinds of wires sticking out from it. There was a dial on top, but she knew better than to mess with one of the doctor’s gadgets without knowing what it was. She put it down in the “I don’t know” pile and grumbled. “Those recruiters were as bad as my friends said they would be.”
The doctor glanced up. “Oh, yeah? How so?”
“Well, I heard the stories about recruiters lying to the low-level bullet sponges. Tell them it’ll be easy, they won’t get deployed, they will have great opportunities outside of the military, and so forth. I thought sitting down with the head of the department for a job-style interview would make me an exception. Nope. They said, ‘Oh, Alice, you don’t have to worry about being on the front line in R&D.’ Pfft. Yeah, right. They should have said, ‘Unless you work for a nutso doctor with just a tad bit too much enthusiasm for science and adventure.’ Then I might have stopped for a minute and really thought about it.”
At that point, Alice was on a rant, and the doctor knew it was no use trying to stop her. She was in one of those mo
ods and had been since the doctor volunteered them to go straight to hell, literally.
She continued. “I mean, what am I supposed to say? The military owns me now. I know it was a volunteer situation, but what kind of pussy would I be if I backed down? A live pussy. That’s right. I should have just said, ‘Nope,’ and turned and walked gracefully from the room. I couldn’t send you in there by yourself, though. You would get mesmerized by some type of lava rocks you’ve never seen before and turn to a cinder in five seconds. You’re brilliant, don’t get me wrong, but you have the curiosity of a cat.”
The doctor chuckled under his breath. Alice clanged a box closed. “Spend my days studying in a library or looking into a microscope in some lab somewhere? Oh, no. How about we take a little field trip to hell?” To emphasize her point, she dropped a large book on her desk, causing several stacks of paper to blow to the floor.
Dr. Thorough pushed his glasses higher on his nose. He sighed and gave her a comforting smile. “If you had looked a little further into the notes of what the other R&D teams have been doing, you would see that some of them are on the front lines all the time. They don’t have a nice office with a perfect set of tools and air conditioning. They fight for their lives every day. Instead of microscopes, their lab techs carry M16’s. The only reason you aren’t there all the time with them is that our theoretical work doesn’t require it. In fact, it’s almost the opposite.”
He picked up some of the papers from the floor and tried not to smile at her pout. “Alice, all these tools and analyzers we’ve been theorizing with should tell us more about the other dimension. All the work we’ve been sweating and pouring our lives into is actually going to get a chance to be tested. That’s more than most theoretical scientists ever get to say. Most of their work is numbers-based and usually isn’t even tested until long after they’ve died. We get to see everything in action live and in person. It’s historic. Really.”