by Lincoln Cole
No sounds reached him at all. It brought a heavy and pervasive silence. If Naomi hid at this plant, then she definitely didn’t occupy this building.
What would Naomi do with Arthur? That question had nagged at Garfield since he set off on the drive out here. Naomi hadn’t exactly become one of Garfield’s favorite people, but she also didn’t stand among his enemies, either. She worked for the Council—at least, she used to.
If she held Arthur hostage, or if she had killed him, then she had crossed a lot of lines that she might not cross back from easily. If that were the case, then Garfield might have no choice except to kill her.
Satisfied his eyes had adjusted as much as they could, Garfield moved forward into the dark building. Though he had a flashlight, he didn’t want to use it and give away his position. He had trained to work in situations like this, and unless his enemy had night-vision goggles, he felt satisfied he could maintain the upper hand.
With his breathing controlled, he moved across the cement flooring, using a light tread to make as little noise as possible, and listening and watching for any sign that someone else lurked nearby. This old complex had several buildings, and Arthur could be in any one of them, so the further he could get in his exploration without Naomi or the bishop knowing of his presence, the better.
He had almost completely cleared the upper floor of this building when he heard movement from down below him. On the second-floor railing, he slid out of sight, held the shotgun ready at his side, and waited.
A few seconds later, footsteps clacked against a metal ladder. Then came more shuffling and a grunt as someone climbed out of a hatch in the flooring, and then a flashlight beam lit up the area.
The beep of a walkie-talkie chimed.
“It’s clear,” a man’s voice said as the flashlight beam continued its sweep. Garfield heard the muffled sound of someone talking on the other end of the line, but he couldn’t make out any of the words. “Probably just a rabbit or something tripping a sensor. Those things are way too sensitive.”
More murmuring on the other end.
“Yeah, I know. I’ll sweep the perimeter. Back in ten.”
The flashlight continued to wave when the guard headed toward to the doorway leading outside. He went to the opposite door that Garfield had come in through. The Hunter kept perfectly still until he heard the door open and then close once more, and then he crept out of his hiding place.
“Guess I came to the right place,” Garfield muttered, turning back toward the hatch that the guard had come up through. He had an idea of where he might find Arthur and Naomi.
GARFIELD MOVED SILENTLY through the manmade underground tunnel beneath the facility, following the pipes deeper into the complex. He held his shotgun with one hand and ran his other along the wall to keep his bearings in the near absence of light.
Though he couldn’t see anything, he trusted his other senses to alert him of any danger in the area ahead. The man he’d seen up above had carried a flashlight instead of wearing goggles, which meant Garfield could still use the darkness to his advantage.
Occasionally, a sound echoed from the tunnels ahead of him—a murmured voice bouncing off the walls—and he used it to guide him in the correct direction. Gradually, the words grew in volume and clarity until he came near enough to their source that he could see their light.
“This is taking too long,” a man said. He sounded in his mid-to-late fifties and gruff. “We should go in there and get them.”
“They have no way out,” a woman said. He recognized it as Naomi’s voice. “The tunnels remain locked down on their side. I’ll not risk any of my men on a suicide mission. They have no food or water, so we can just wait it out and, eventually, they will surrender and come out.”
“So you’ve said.”
“It would make it easier to get them to surrender if we talked to them. We can see who’s come and figure out what they want. Maybe we can strike a deal and send them on their way.”
“No. It doesn’t matter who they are; they came here for me. They need to die.”
Naomi made a sucking sound with her teeth, something she did when displeased with a response. “Fine. But, if we won’t talk to them, we’ll do this my way.”
“I’m paying you a fortune to handle this situation.”
“Not enough to risk lives when not necessary. They’ve been in there for a long time, and it won’t take long until they beg us to let them out. A while longer and they’ll feel ready to do anything we tell them.”
The two speakers stood around the corner, about twenty feet ahead of Garfield, though he doubted the two talkers had come alone. The sound of movement made him think that at least five or six people waited up ahead, and maybe more.
The man Naomi spoke to was probably the bishop, Garfield realized. He assumed they talked about Arthur, and somehow, they’d managed to force him into a locked area of some sort. From the sounds of it, he’d been stuck in there for quite a while, too.
Hopefully not too long that Arthur wouldn’t be any help, though. A lot of guys stood up ahead, armed to the teeth. And knowing Naomi, those guards would prove well trained. If this were to be a successful rescue mission, then he would need Arthur’s help.
Soft shoes paced across the floor.
“We don’t have time for this,” the bishop said, after a moment. “I need to get back to my children.”
“I told you to go.”
“And leave you here alone? So you can let them escape?”
“I won’t. You have my word.”
He laughed sardonically. “What value is your word?”
“If you don’t trust me, then why have me here?”
“Remember who is in charge.”
“I know full well how important all of this is to you.”
“I can’t leave and run the risk of them getting out and trailing me. Leave your men here to take care of it. If you come with me, I have confidence in their loyalty.”
A suitable suggestion, Garfield reckoned. It would make his job a lot easier.
“No,” Naomi said, though her voice sounded less confident now. “I’m not in the habit of abandoning things halfway. It won’t take long now. Once they get desperate enough, they will either turn themselves in or try to force past us. And then we can leave.”
After Naomi finished speaking, the two of them fell silent. Garfield listened for movement, and then decided that closer to five people stood up ahead. Also, a few would have gone out on patrol or would guard other exits, which meant maybe upwards of seven armed soldiers in total.
Not great odds.
Garfield steadied his breathing and peeked around the corner. A spotlight aimed at a closed doorway gave them their light source. No doubt Arthur had become trapped behind there, which explained why he hadn’t checked in with Frieda.
Six people, Garfield counted. Four guards in positions facing toward the closed door, as well as Naomi and the bishop. Naomi’s mercenaries had huddled behind boxes and crates to give them cover; though, at this point, three of them had sat down. They had waited here for a long time, and the boredom had got to them.
Naomi looked disheveled and tired as she sat on one of the pipes. The other man, Garfield didn’t recognize, and he took him to be the bishop. This older man wore robes and had a priest’s collar around his neck. With his shaved head, he seemed decidedly unpleasant to look at.
Had he been the one speaking? The speaker had mentioned children in his conversation with Naomi and that he needed to get back to them, which didn’t make sense. Bishops weren’t allowed to marry or have families unless they left the Church. Maybe it was someone else.
Naomi, a woman in her early-forties, appeared fit but with a few extra pounds tacked on. Pretty and charismatic, she had a round face and almond-colored eyes.
The priest frowned as he studied Naomi. His eyes narrowed, and his look changed to one considerably darker.
“You know who it is in there, don’t you?”
When he spoke, Garfield recognized the voice as that which had talked to Naomi earlier.
What children?
“What?” she asked, taking a guarded step away from him.
“You’re manipulating me,” the man said. “You know who is trapped in there, and you don’t want to go in and kill him. Do you?”
“What are you talking about?” Naomi asked. “Of course I don’t know who it is. How would I know?”
Though she made a convincing liar, Garfield had known her long enough to tell when she wasn’t being honest. This became one of those times.
Apparently, the bishop could tell too.
“You’re ready to end our alliance, then?”
A moment passed. Naomi’s expression changed when she realized he wouldn’t believe her any longer.
“What alliance?” she asked, an edge of anger in her voice. “You didn’t give me a lot of options in the situation, did you?”
“I paid you handsomely.”
“I never wanted your damned money,” she said with venom in her tone. “And I sure as hell won’t kill Arthur Vangeest and whoever came with him. I don’t want that blood on my hands.”
The bishop studied her for a moment, and then nodded.
“Very well. Then, I must kill you too.”
“Is that right? Quite a feat, considering we outnumber you five to one. These are my men, after all. Or, did you forget?”
“Oh?” he said. “Are they your men? It must have slipped my mind.”
Suddenly, three of the guards swiveled their guns toward the fourth. That unlucky man still stood watching the doorway, oblivious to the drama. The tunnels filled with the concussive blasts of gunshots when those three opened fire on him.
He tried to respond and bring his gun to bear but too late. They caught him off-guard and unprepared.
The poor guy staggered back into the wall, and his gun fell to the ground. Slowly, he slid to the floor, leaving a trail of blood from multiple wounds along the tunnel above him.
Naomi reacted quickly, reaching for a gun strapped to her hip, but before she could draw it, all three guards swung back to put her in their crosshairs. She stopped moving, and ever so slowly, took her hand off the grip of her pistol.
“Your men,” the bishop said, smiling at her. “My demons.”
“Bastard,” she said, barely above a whisper.
“People have called me a lot of things in my life. One of them is overly cautious. A great many people warned me about you, and that when the time came, you wouldn’t feel willing to do the necessary.”
“You’ve planned this since the beginning.”
“Prepared, yes. Planned, no. Your talents offered far too much value for me to want to scrub you out of existence like this. I had hoped the rumors would prove wrong. I hoped I wouldn’t have to kill you.”
“Not much choice now, huh?”
His smile grew even wider. “My dear, we always have a choice.” He turned to face the three possessed guards. “Tie her up and kill Arthur and his friend. Don’t hurt her, though. We will need the vessel in perfect condition when we take her to Jeremy.”
Naomi’s eyes widened, and Garfield guessed what would happen next. He had no clue who Jeremy was, or what the bishop meant, but something would go down imminently. No way in hell would Naomi let them take her alive to become a vessel for some demon.
Once more, she reached for her gun. That gave Garfield his cue to act. He took a deep breath, stepped around the corner, and readied his shotgun.
The closest guard stood only ten feet away, and he remained wholly focused on Naomi, who stood in front of him. He didn’t even have the slightest clue that someone occupied the hallway behind him until Garfield spoke.
“Hey, dumbass,” Garfield hollered, aiming his shotgun.
The guy glanced over his shoulder, a look of shock on his face. He swung his gun around, but entirely too slowly.
Garfield pulled the trigger, and buckshot hit the man right in the chest. It threw him backward, toward his friends like he’d gotten hit with a sledgehammer. He slammed into the pipes running along the wall and tumbled sideways, landing in a heap behind them.
The rifles had sounded loud, but this seemed like a jet-engine had mated with a stick of dynamite in the tunnel. It roared painfully in the narrow space for a few long seconds before, finally, dissipating and leaving his ears ringing.
Garfield didn’t wait, pumping another round into the chamber and aiming at the second guard. This one proved faster on the reaction, diving to the side to get cover behind some crates. He moved fast and with super-human agility. A demon.
Garfield fired anyway, but couldn’t be sure if he managed to clip the demon in the leg, or if his shot had missed completely.
The other guard ignored the distraction and fired at Naomi, but she had moved as soon as Garfield had shown up in the hall. She ripped her gun free and ran toward nearby boxes, firing blindly at the guard as she went for cover.
A shot clipped her, and she stumbled, but then she managed to return a clear shot of her own. That bullet landed, but if the demon even noticed the wound, it didn’t let on.
Garfield moved forward, chambering another round, but by now, the other guard hiding behind the box had recovered from the initial engagement. He fired a hail of bullets from his assault rifle, forcing Garfield to rush back and duck around the corner once more.
Garfield waited until the rifle ran dry, and then leaned back around the corner. Naomi lay on the ground, though he couldn’t tell if she had died or just lay injured. The guard that had shot at her turned around to face him, and the other one that had fired at him now reloaded another clip.
“Sayanora, sucker,” Garfield shouted, aiming his shotgun at that guard and pulling the trigger.
It clicked.
A misfire.
He tried to pump it, but the unfired shell jammed inside the action and locked it up.
Garfield stared at it with a feeling of utter betrayal. “I meant to clean it,” he murmured.
When he looked up, the possessed mercenaries came toward him. The closer one had almost finished loading another clip into his rifle. His eyes looked blank, and he grinned as he came toward Garfield.
Not enough time to draw his pistol against both of them. Garfield cursed, turned, and ran back down the hallway from whence he’d come. They fired at him, but he got out of their line of sight, and the shots hit the wall behind him.
The shooting stopped, and the bishop shouted at the two remaining guards, “You! After him. You, stay here.”
Garfield ignored them all and kept running, heading back toward the next level and higher ground. Along the way, he drew his pistol, hoping like hell that it would serve him better than the shotgun had.
If not, then he would end up in a world of hurt, and his only chance lay in him relying on Arthur to come to his aid. He didn’t have to worry whether or not Arthur had heard the gunshots, though.
“Pretty sure he knows I’m here.”
THE SOUND OF THE WEAPONS would have proved impossible to miss even if the door had twice its thickness. Arthur sat up, hearing blasts echo from outside the door. The metal muted the sound, but it remained distinctive. One, in particular, sounded extremely loud, and Arthur guessed that it came from a shotgun.
“What was that?” Niccolo leaned forward, little more than a shape in the darkness, and Arthur could practically feel the priest’s discomfort at the situation.
“That,” Arthur said, “gives us our signal that the time has come to leave.”
“Frieda?”
“Maybe, but we can’t know for sure. Either way, we need to move now.”
Arthur stood, sliding his dart gun out of his belt. Part of him—a large part, if he were honest—wished he had something heftier with him when he opened that door. It seemed like one thing to train with a weapon like this and theorize its usefulness, but something entirely different to stand in this situation and only have a measly tranquilizer
to defend him.
These non-lethal guns felt too light and flimsy for his taste, and the fact that he only had three shots would make a huge test of his patience. It made him feel naked and weak, something he had definitely not grown used to.
He needed more shots, at least.
“Your gun,” Arthur said. “Give it to me.”
He reached out and grabbed Niccolo by the shoulder. A second later, he felt the second gun pressed into his hand.
“Here.”
“All right. Stay behind me.”
“No problem.”
More gunshots came from outside, though Arthur found it impossible to tell how far away or how many people had fired. The twisted and imaginative part of his mind could imagine the guards standing out there, firing off shots to draw him out. It could mean a trap or a distraction.
He didn’t have time to worry about that, though. If they had laid a trap, then he would walk right into it, but if he didn’t act on this, then he might pass up their only chance to make it out of here alive.
Arthur grabbed hold of the door handle and hesitated.
“This will look bright,” he said.
“Okay. I understand.”
“No,” Arthur said. “You don’t. I mean extremely bright. Blinding.”
This time, Niccolo didn’t respond. Arthur closed his eyes, steadied his breathing, and threw open the door.
His warning to Niccolo didn’t even begin to do justice to the intensity of the light. Even with his eyelids closed as tightly as possible, the illumination felt painful and disorienting. That was the idea, after all. They had been trapped in here for hours, and his adversaries had aimed a huge spotlight directly at the door. His eyes struggled to adjust, and for the moment, he stood completely blind.
Shouts and curses came from further down the hallway, as well as more gunshots. Arthur held up his tranquilizer gun and opened his eyes, but could only see blurry shapes and bright spots ahead of him in the tunnel.
“The door!” the bishop shouted, though Arthur couldn’t tell which blur belonged to him.