FREEFALL (A Megalith Thriller Book 1)

by D R Sanford

  “I’m getting tired of these comparisons to a life I don’t even remember.” Cullen’s ire grew, and he succumbed to the howling in his blood. “Give me something to fight with, and we’ll see what the final score is.”

  Loch smiled wider. Wrenched a blade from a beast at his side and flung it at Cullen. He followed its arc. Plucked it from the air. The makeshift sword’s weight felt wrong, but he ignored the shortcomings. All he needed was an edge sharp enough to sever Loch’s towering head from his body.

  The semi-circle mosh pit moved in, attaching themselves to the walls on either side. Other than the twenty feet of granite at his back, Cullen was surrounded by fangs, claws, and steel.

  Loch moved in confidently, testing Cullen’s defenses. Unexpectedly, the big man charged in a flurry of sword strokes, forcing Cullen to shuffle away to the right. In doing so, he’d given up the security at his rear.

  Spinning into the middle of the cleared space, Cullen slashed at the pressing mob. The horseshoe of slavering sub-humans turned into a full circle. Loch sauntered his way, the sword in his hand running figure eights in non-stop motion.

  Cullen dodged a lightning fast swing aimed at his neck, barely escaping the tip of Loch’s sword. Spotted Morrigan walking along the inside of the circle, her heavenly features marred with spite. They closed in on both sides.

  Feeling the noose tightening around him, Cullen avoided the unarmed woman and struck out at Loch. The thrust, meant to pierce Loch’s heart, was easily deflected. He heard a cry from behind and felt Morrigan’s weight hit his back. She meant to pull him down, but he used her momentum to roll Morrigan off his shoulders onto the floor.

  An audible snap accompanied her yelp of pain as Morrigan wrapped her hands below the knee on the fractured tibia.

  Steel whistled in the air. Cullen rolled out of the way but earned a crease on his forehead. His hand came away wet and red. Blood streamed over Cullen’s eyebrows. It flooded his sight, turning his vision red for a moment he couldn’t afford.

  Shaking his head, Cullen released the roar building in his throat. He struck out blindly, forming a tornado of steel and felt the satisfying crunch of metal on bone. Heard the lamentations of those who’d fallen.

  Arms grappled Cullen’s legs, nearly toppling him. Broadening his stance, Cullen swept a torn sleeve across his eyes and blinked through the haze at Morrigan trying to drag him to the floor beside her. Unable to bring himself to strike her, Cullen freed a boot and stomped on the arm that still clung to him.

  The sting of Loch’s blade slicing his left arm from shoulder to elbow called Cullen back to the fight at hand. He stumbled over bodies, moving his sword arm in defensive arcs, trying desperately to return to the light burning on the wall.

  He carved his way back to the granite face, his chest heaving from the exertion, the tattered shirt he wore wet with blood.

  “Is the little girl giving you trouble, Cúchulainn?” Loch taunted.

  “None at all,” Cullen retorted. “I do find it strange that a man of your station would resort to playground tactics, however. What landed you down here as king of the cannibals anyway?”

  Please talk, Cullen thought.

  Anything to buy some time while he healed. Having no previous experience with the limits of his restorative powers, Cullen suspected he wouldn’t be able to take much more of a beating before his body simply gave out.

  “It seems I wronged Maeve—not a difficult thing to do really—and I wound up taking a ride down the garbage chute. That’s what we called the elevator drop for disposable people,” Loch growled. “She demoted me, from the head of a noble family to lunch for Lugaid’s minions. Even now she may not know I survived. But, with a little help from Morrigan, I’ve transformed these test rats into an army that will swarm Cruacha and Maeve in her high redoubt.”

  “Good for you,” Cullen gasped. “Everyone should be entitled to their revenge, and I won’t be the one to stand between you and Maeve. If you don’t mind me asking, though, what does killing me have to do with any of that?”

  “Thought I could use some practice, and a good general knows he has to feed his troops.”

  Cullen’s fighting instincts kept him alive this long, but he regretted the absence of the primal surge and otherworldly clarity which possessed him days ago on the obstacle course.

  The slash on Cullen’s forehead clotted, stymieing the flow of blood from the wound. His arm settled to a throbbing ache.

  Morrigan slithered to Loch’s heels, a grimace contorting her face. She reached out with her good arm and hooked a dying savage in her hand. Pulling it closer, she bared her teeth and sunk them into its throat. Blood pulsed beneath her lips until the beast’s heart petered out.

  “They taste like piss,” she spat. Recovered enough to hop onto her unbroken leg, Morrigan steadied herself against Loch. Her furrowed brow centered on Cullen. “I need a better vintage.”

  Looking around, packs of savages feasted on their fallen brethren. Those unoccupied also turned salivating mouths his way.

  He imagined launching into their midst, cutting a swath in any given direction, but had no idea where it would lead. Backed into defense again, Cullen railed against his predicament.

  Anger sparked inside his brain. Newly grown hair stood on end. His left eye bulged in its socket, moving independently of its twin and identifying his most formidable threats.

  A snarl split Cullen’s lips. The two foot length of steel in his hand became an extension of his arm. He surrendered any vestige of his normal self to the mounting frenzy within. Welcomed it as his only chance of survival.

  Cullen clasped another sword from those that littered the floor. In a surge of untapped wrath, he vaulted the dead and dying, screamed an unintelligible battle cry as he closed the span between himself and the couple who sought his death.

  Loch pushed her out of the way at the last second, but Morrigan failed to escape Cullen’s attack. His outstretched blade licked the corner of her eye. Pierced it and sent her to the ground clutching the seeping orb. As he passed, Cullen relieved Loch of his hand.

  Their cries of agony resounded in the cavern.

  He crashed into bloodthirsty savages cheering along the circle’s inner edge, impaling them and curbing his momentum.

  He spun to face Loch again. Left one of the blades lodged in a ribcage. Loch stood in place, gaping at his arm that ended in a spurting stump.

  Wasting no time, Cullen drove forward.

  Slashed across Loch’s thighs, abdomen, and neck. The tall man struggled to remain standing. A vicious blow to the head with the flat of Cullen’s sword sent him toppling backward. Loch’s bowels spilled onto the ground while he choked on the blood bubbling in his lungs.

  No sign of Morrigan. She must have slunk away.

  Cullen heard the growling horde at his back. Sensed them closing in.

  —Chapter 25—

  DISAPPEAR

  Larkin barely escaped the blast of fire that churned down the tunnel. A military grade flamethrower perhaps. Could have been incendiary grenades.

  In his headlong rush to outrun the flames, Larkin tumbled into a niche in the wall. This must be how their underground attackers had closed in without any visual sign and then surprised them under the cover of darkness.

  Brilliant stealth tactics. He bet there was no sign of the alcoves until you were right on top of one. Larkin shined his light inside the narrow space and noticed that it continued on into the mountain.

  The roaring heat expelled, Larkin shut off his light and glanced out to witness a steaming lump of flesh he believed to be Cullen being dragged off in the opposite direction.

  Before he could make up his mind to follow or not, the fire team broke through the pile of charred corpses choking the tunnel and searched each body with their carbine mounted flashlights. They had no trouble with identification. Just didn’t find what they were looking for.

  One of the team took point position and led them forward, scanning back and fo
rth for any sign of normal human beings. Larkin retreated from the tunnel mouth. Let himself be swallowed by the darkness. Felt at home there.

  The lights passed by, continuing down the main shaft.

  Well practiced in stealth, Larkin cinched the carbine’s strap close to his chest to minimize sound and movement. He popped out a grommet he’d sewn into his left cuff and unraveled the steel garrote wire within. Wound the ends around wooden pegs and set out on the hunt.

  ***

  Laeg and Val found Robbie in the hallway snuggling her baby girl. She had improvised by slinging a crib sheet over her shoulder and making a cozy pocket at chest level. One could only describe the look on her face as joyful.

  Pleased with the reunion, Laeg nevertheless felt compelled to drive them to safety.

  “Hiya boys,” she said. “Smooth work down there. I’d give your performance a three on a scale of one to ten. You did make Amelia laugh, though, so I guess I could up it to a five.”

  “I’m glad we could entertain,” Laeg replied. He worked around her and peered into the room Amelia had occupied. Red stained the white walls. Robbie’s father lay in a congealing puddle of his own blood.

  “Remind me never to cross you.”

  “It wouldn’t be a good idea,” she sang while tickling the baby under her chin.

  “Can we get out of the hallway?” Val prompted. “We’re sitting ducks out here.”

  “Right you are, bud,” said Laeg. “I’d say we have to get off this floor altogether. Too many ways to get at us, what with the stairwell, elevators, and the balcony entrance.”

  He pulled the radio from his belt. “Let me check the radio for chatter. Hopefully we can get a bead on the others.”

  Val led them around the corner to where a sitting room looked out on the lobby and they had a clear view of the elevators. Robbie seated herself in a rocking chair, humming to her baby girl.

  Nothing but static on the radio. Cruacha’s defenders must have switched to another frequency. He dialed it down to channel one and the static cut out. Silence, as though someone had the transmit button depressed in a one-way conversation. Then a voice, not issuing from the radio’s speaker but in his head.

  “Hello Laeg, it’s Alex. You cannot imagine my relief to find you alive. Are the others with you?”

  “Alex,” he responded apprehensively. “Am I losing my mind, or are you talking in my mind?”

  Val looked at him sideways, apparently confident Laeg was out of his gourd.

  “In your mind, yes. And you do not have to answer me with your voice.”

  “I knew you were special, Doc, but not like this. How are you pulling it off?”

  “In basic terms, you completed the connection by finding this channel. It’s a bit of a stretch for me to connect over airwaves, though I felt I had to try. I’ve been waiting to hear from Cullen. I fear he and Larkin are in dire straits.”

  “Are they not with you? What’s going on?”

  “We had trouble up here. Cullen was injured, and more guards came up the north stairwell. He and Larkin slid down the elevator shaft in order to buy some time.”

  “Uh, how far down did they go, Doc?” Laeg’s knowledge of the facility worried him, but no need to panic as long as they didn’t descend all the way.

  “I believe your ignorance of their position confirms my worries that they retreated to the basement.”

  Laeg sighed. Felt the wind blow out of his sails.

  “That’s very bad,” Laeg said aloud. “It isn’t a basement so much as a charnel house. They just escaped the flame to drop into the fire, Alex.”

  “We didn’t know. That wasn’t part of our briefing.”

  “The lower level wasn’t part of the plan. Shite. Sorry, I don’t mean to go off on you. It’s just going to get pretty hot for us down here, and we can’t run off to collect them.”

  “I may have a solution to your immediate problem. Are Velasco and Robbie with you?”

  “Plus one.”

  “You found her child?”

  “We did, and a surprise run-in with her father to boot. That girl’s got significant daddy issues, or she did.”

  “You’re safe then?”

  “For the moment. Not much longer, though. There are too many ways for them to corner us.”

  “What’s going on?” Val cut in. “We need to move.”

  “I’m talking to Alex. He says there might be a way to get us out of here.”

  “News flash, Laeg. There’s no one talking back on that radio.”

  “Yeah, I know. He’s talking to me through… never mind. Just watch the corridor.”

  “So what’s your plan, Doc?”

  “It’s all calm up here, but teams are forming to sweep the lower floors. Nora was taken upstairs, out of our reach for the moment. I found her apartment in the southwest corner and am there now. Are you able to come this way?”

  “That’s right ahead of us. A storeroom if I remember correctly. Hold on.” Laeg addressed Val and Robbie, saying “Ready to move?”

  Val nodded. Robbie rocked out of her chair and joined them.

  “We’re on our way.”

  Val led the way past the elevators. Robbie followed, with Laeg taking up the rear. Soon they came to a left turn in the corridor and followed it to a dead end. Pausing at a steel door, Val checked their back trail, raised the shotgun, and swung the door inward.

  Racks full of diapers, formula canisters, and linens greeted them. No windows. No visible way out.

  “What now, Alex?” Laeg asked aloud.

  “I can feel you below me now. Can you all hear me?”

  Val spun around, searching for the source of Alex’s voice. Robbie simply replied, “Loud and clear.”

  “Good. As I said to Laeg, the guards have cleared this floor, and I’ve remained unnoticed. Right now, the hallway leading to Nora’s former apartment should appear to them as a blank wall. Is there a way for you to join me on the third floor?”

  “Not that I’m aware of. I don’t suppose you can extend the reach of your illusion down here, can you?”

  “Afraid not. I’m pretty taxed as it is keeping the current bubble intact.”

  “Alex, is there a wide open spot on the floor around you?” Val asked.

  “Not in this room, but in the living room, yes.”

  “Can you go there and stomp on the flooring?”

  A few seconds followed, then they heard a subdued pounding overhead, in another aisle.

  “Keep it up. I’ll be right there.” Val rushed around the corner. “You two stay put,” he called over his shoulder.

  He stood below the sound of Alex’s footfalls. Pointing the muzzle of the automatic shotgun to the ceiling, he rapped a return beat.

  “Do you hear that, Alex?”

  “I do. What are you thinking?”

  “I’m thinking you should go find a different room to stand in. Copy that?”

  “Okay, here I go.”

  “Robbie, you might want to cover up your girl’s ears.”

  Laeg grabbed some blankets off a shelf and handed them to Robbie who added the padding around Amelia’s head. They retreated into a far corner while Val switched the ammunition drum to a different selection.

  Val stepped back, knelt on the floor, and aimed at a point on the ceiling. Tapping the trigger with a short break between rounds, he blasted a hole overhead wide enough to accommodate a person.

  Light streamed in from above. Laeg and Robbie removed the hands from their ears and joined Val where he stood beneath the hole in a dissipating cloud of dust.

  Alex appeared above, a sleeve held under his nose, waving the air with his other hand.

  “That’s very resourceful of you, Velasco. Well done,” Laeg said.

  “No problem. Can you help me pull one of these racks over so we can climb up?”

  Robbie ascended first, aided by Alex from above. Val and Laeg tossed up their packs, then climbed up after her. Bracing his elbows on the floor above, Laeg
hooked a boot on the rack’s top shelf and swung it back as far as he could.

  Just in time too. Alex hurriedly pulled him out and shushed them all with a finger to his lips. They heard the door to the storage room open below. The whisper of cautious steps and the rattle of gear.

  Alex straddled the hole on hands and knees, gazing at the dust and rubble. Laeg felt a tickle in his mind, blinked his eyes, and the wreckage disappeared. Flashlight beams illuminated the low lighting. Guards passed by unaware of the gaping hole in the ceiling or the crunch of plaster and plywood underfoot.

  Minutes passed. The team left the storage room. Silence returned, and they all let out a collective sigh.

  “Now what?” Val asked.

  “Now we wait. Probably for hours until the building evacuates and all attention turns to the Grove ceremonies,” Laeg replied.

  Cullen and Larkin had to fend for themselves. He prayed they were still alive, or he’d have to answer to a very angry Lugh.

  ***

  The horde’s ranks snarled and tore at themselves in the aftermath of Loch’s death. Cullen replaced the length of sharpened sheet metal in his hand with his adversary’s full-fledged sword and turned to face the beasts.

  Still boiling over with the battle rage, Cullen was ready to dive into them and hack his way to safety. Instead, he discovered two factions battling for supremacy. Clawed hands ripped strips of flesh from their own kind.

  A small group of the shaggy minions broke off from the main pack and made for Cullen, some on all fours. The sword danced in his hands. Instinct took control, his adrenaline-fueled muscles guiding its edge with deadly precision, cutting down the left flank of attackers.

  As the rest circled their dead companions, the larger mass of sub humans swept in and crushed them by sheer numbers. Cullen stepped back, picking targets and uncertain about what to make of the change in events.

  The first few rows settled into a crouch, heads bobbing up and down like a pack of wild hyenas. It seemed they had food aplenty. Yet there was something else in their stance and the look in their eyes. Worship.