Timothy nodded, then crept up the stairs.
“Boss, they got a hostage,” Horn said. He paused and added, “Make that two.”
Beckham’s stomach sank.
“They’re headed this way,” Horn said.
“We know you’re hiding in there!” boomed a voice. “You shoot, and we shoot your people.”
“You’re out numbered and surrounded!” Beckham shouted back. “Put down your weapons and let the hostages go.”
“Not a chance, asshole!” replied the raider.
Beckham looked at Horn who snorted and yelled back, “Which one of you wants to turn into a spray of pink mist first? You got one minute to decide.”
Brash and garish, Beckham expected no less from Horn. He gave his friend a nod, and then slunk to the building’s single open window in the back, concealed from the raiders’ view, and slipped his rifle out.
Beckham pulled himself through after, landing hard on his blade. Slowly, he made his way to the cover of the woods.
“We want passage off this island,” one of the raiders called out. “Give us a boat and we will let your people go.”
“That’s what you want?” Horn said.
Beckham was almost behind them now. He paused a second, glassing the duo with his optics. He recognized the hostages instantly.
Donna and Bo. The teenager was taller than his captor, but he wasn’t fighting back.
Beckham saw why.
The raider had a pistol pressed to Bo’s temple.
“Radio your army friends and tell them we’re free to go,” said the captor. “Do it, or I’m going to off this kid and his bitch mom.”
Bo moved, which earned him a pistol whip to the face.
Donna screamed, “Leave him alone!”
Beckham moved faster, knowing he had just moments to save them. He was about twenty meters away now, and the raiders still hadn’t noticed him. These grunts weren’t that bright, but whoever had coordinated this attack likely had military or police training.
The attack was far more coordinated than others and made him worry again it was part of something on a much wider scope.
“All right, boys, I’m coming out,” Horn bellowed, keeping the raiders’ attention on him. He took a step out of the doorway and raised one hand. His rifle swung down slightly on the other, giving the impression he was going to let it go.
Beckham snuck behind a bush and got into position.
“Go on now,” one of the raiders said. “Drop it all the way to the ground.”
Bo kicked at the raider hard enough the impact of his boot on bone echoed. The raider’s handgun wavered, pointing upward, as he reached down to his shin. The timing could not have been better.
Beckham took his shot. The man crumpled, and the second raider looked nervously around, trying to figure out where the shot had come from.
Horn started to swing up his rifle, and the other raider pushed Donna aside and fired at Horn. The big man dove to the ground and scrambled away.
By the time Beckham had his rifle on the raider, he had grabbed Donna again.
“Shit,” Beckham whispered.
“I’ll kill the bitch!” the raider shouted. “I’ll fucking kill her!”
He turned his gun on Bo and fired a shot, but Bo leapt behind a tree. Beckham lined up the sights on the raider, but he couldn’t get a clear shot with Donna still in his grips.
Instead, Beckham moved away from his position and charged. He propelled himself forward from the bushes, feeling the springy bounce of his prosthetic blade. The raider took three wild shots at Horn and then at Bo as Beckham hit him from behind.
The guy sprawled forward, releasing Donna. Beckham used his helmet to slam the guy in the nose. A sickening crack sounded.
The second head butt did the trick.
The raider went limp in the dirt, knocked out cold.
Bo held a gun that he must have grabbed from the dead raider. He aimed it at the unconscious man, but Beckham slapped the gun away as he pulled the trigger.
The bullet lanced into the dirt next to the raider’s head.
“Hey!” Bo shouted.
“We need him alive,” Beckham said.
“But he was going to kill me and my mom,” Bo shot back.
“He will get what’s coming to him, but first we need to find out who he is, and who the other raiders are.”
Beckham moved in front of Bo, not giving him the chance to fire on the downed raider. “Lower the gun,” he said.
Bo spat on the ground but did as ordered. He moved over to his mom and wrapped her in his arms.
“You okay, mom?”
Beckham studied her in the green hue of his night vision, checking for injuries. She was shivering, her bottom lip trembling, but she managed a nod.
Bo looked down at the raider again before helping her to the building.
“Bravo 1, this is Bravo 7,” Beckham said into his headset. “We found the last two raiders. Bringing one back.”
“Copy,” Ruckley replied.
Beckham pulled zip-ties from his vest and bent down to the crumpled raider.
Horn trotted over and picked the guy up over his shoulder. The civilians flowed from the building, fanning out around them.
“Stay close,” Beckham said. “We’re going back to the bunker.”
He took point with Ginger and Spark on either side. Having the dogs with him was a comfort, much like having Apollo back in the day.
Beckham kept his optics trained on the terrain. They might have eliminated all the raiders in this pack, but he didn’t know if there were more out there.
Timothy walked up alongside Beckham carrying the pistol his father had given him on his sixteenth birthday. Before Jake had given it to his son, Beckham had helped him carve an engraving on the barrel that read, Never Stop Fighting.
The young boy had already used the gun to kill a raider in the forest when Beckham and Horn had discovered the boy, and so far he seemed to be taking his first kill pretty well.
But having him up here was no good in his emotional state.
“Timothy, fall back and watch the kids, okay?” Beckham said.
“Sure,” Timothy said. The teen dropped back to the center of the pack.
Horn was on rearguard, making sure they weren’t being followed. He and Beckham were both used to skulking through the darkness with a team of trained operatives. But now they might as well have been shepherding a herd of cattle through the woods and praying the wolves around them somehow didn’t notice.
Fifteen minutes later, Beckham spotted the entrance to the bunker. Several Rangers stood sentry, and he motioned for the group of civilians to come out of hiding.
Ruckley met him on the sidewalk, returning from her own search.
“Good to see you, Captain,” she said. Her tone didn’t mask the frustration of Horn and Beckham going AWOL earlier.
“I’m sorry about taking off,” he said. “I didn’t mean to put you and your team—”
“All that matters is everyone’s okay,” she said.
But everyone wasn’t okay, Beckham thought.
He looked over his shoulder and saw Timothy a safe distance back.
“Where’s Jake?” Beckham asked Ruckley in a whisper.
“Who?”
“The man we found on the stairs. Is he out—”
“We moved his body out of view, don’t worry.”
Beckham exhaled, unable to hide his emotions.
“I’m sorry for your loss,” Ruckley said. She walked away and began handing out orders to her soldiers. The Rangers helped the injured into the bunker.
“I’ll meet you inside,” Beckham said to Kate.
“But dad,” Javier protested.
“Please go with your mother,” Beckham said.
Kate led Javier inside with Horn and his girls.
Beckham walked over to Timothy. The teenager’s face went white like he knew what was coming, even though Beckham hadn’t uttered a single word.
“No,” Timothy said. “No…please…”
He moved away from Beckham and in through the doorway.
“Wait up,” Beckham called out.
Timothy pushed the group and made his way into the hallway. Beckham ran after him, nearly tripping. The boy made it down the stairs and into the bunker before he finally caught up with him.
In the first section, medics and a couple of nurses from Peaks Island were treating those who had already made it to the bunker.
“Where’s my dad?” Timothy said, in a voice shy of a shout. He searched the beds, and then stopped near a large olive canvas curtain separating the triage into sections. Beckham put a hand on his shoulder.
“I’m sorry, Timothy, but your dad didn’t make it,” Beckham said. “He died saving you and the others.”
“No,” Timothy choked. He pulled back the curtain to reveal another section filled with cots covered with white sheets. All anonymous victims of the raiders, masked by those sheets, with only the point of a nose tenting it up at one end or their feet at the other.
Beckham put a hand on Timothy’s arm, but the boy pulled away and set off through the space.
“No, no, no,” he murmured, turning back to Beckham. “Which one is he?”
“You shouldn’t see this,” Beckham said.
Kate joined them in the room and helped Beckham sort through the dead. They found Jake at the back of the room, while Timothy was still searching the other cots.
He looked up and caught Beckham’s gaze, then hurried over to his side.
Beckham held the sheet down.
“I want to see him,” Timothy said.
Kate and Beckham exchanged a glance, and then Beckham pulled back the covering.
“Noooooo,” Timothy moaned. He nearly collapsed over his father, wrapping his arms around his dad’s shoulders, tears streaming down his face.
Kate rubbed his back in the way she used to comfort Javier when he was scared at night. Beckham placed a hand on Timothy’s shoulder.
“Your dad was a great man,” he said.
Timothy nodded, keeping his head on his dad’s chest.
Beckham had seen so many of his brothers-in-arms perish fighting the Variants, but this was something even more heartbreaking. To see Timothy suddenly alone in this world, losing the man that had been his anchor, that had helped see him through since before Operation Liberty during the first months of the war eight years ago.
How many other children were orphans because of these raiders?
Beckham’s sadness erupted into anger.
He managed it by clenching his jaw, and stayed there beside Timothy, seething with rage but doing his best to comfort the teen.
A transmission over the headset Beckham still wore made him flinch. Lieutenant Niven’s voice came over the channel. “We’ve picked up the enemy’s trail, and we’re going after them,” he said.
Beckham looked at Kate. Even though she couldn’t hear the transmission she must have recognized the gaze in his eyes. With a nod she gave him permission to do what he did best—hunt and kill monsters.
— 9 —
Fitz broke through the final row of corn and stopped at the edge to look at the dense forest of oak trees. The canopy of leaves blew in the wind, masking the distant sound of gunfire.
Rain drops bit his face as he kept moving.
He had run all the way from the center of Turkey River after the SOS came in over the comms about a Variant attack, covering nearly three miles in the past thirty-two minutes.
It wasn’t a record pace by any means, but with his gear, and the threat of mines, he couldn’t run much faster, especially without letting his guard down.
Leaving Cedric didn’t help matters, and Fitz wasn’t sure he would be where they left him when they returned. But there was no way in hell he would bring the guy back out here.
Lincoln kept up with Fitz, but Ace fell behind, stopping every few minutes to breathe.
“Go on,” he called out, hands on his knees. He raised one of them, waving to proceed without him. “I’ll…catch up.”
Fitz and Lincoln didn’t waste time. They kept moving into the dense forest, following the sound of gunfire, and the ethereal screeches of dying monsters.
A half mile later, they came up on a hill that blocked their view of the forest. Fitz balled his hand, and slowly moved up the slope, leaves crunching under his blades.
Ace finally caught up behind them, panting like a wild boar.
“Holy shit,” Fitz said, staring at the scene of carnage.
Rico and Mendez stood in the middle of it, surrounded by a red halo of dead beasts.
“Come on!” Fitz said.
He hurried down the hill and set off across an area of holes seeping the Variants’ noxious, rotten odor, but stronger, like it had been distilled and hyper-concentrated.
“You okay?” Fitz whispered.
Rico and Mendez both nodded but kept their rifles up, still roving the barrels for contacts. Lincoln and Ace joined them, weapons also up.
“Where’s Dohi?” Fitz asked, keeping his voice low.
Rico simply pointed at the ground.
Fitz crept to the edge of a gaping hole and peered over the edge. The full brunt of the carrion smell made his eyes water.
Moonlight illuminated a patch of the tunnel covered in webs of strange tissue stretching across the soil. He bent down for a better look.
A Variant the color of an earthworm came bursting from the tunnel, knocking Fitz backward. Vessels bulged under its skin, ropey muscles tensing.
Fitz brought up his rifle and shot it in the head.
The beast fell limply to the floor of the tunnel, landing with a thud.
The other team members huddled around, all of them looking down.
Fitz tried Dohi on the comms. Nothing came back but static.
He pushed his NVGs away from his eyes and flicked on the tactical light mounted to the bottom of his gun barrel. The others did the same, angling the light into the tunnel. The drop to the bottom appeared to be about ten feet.
“We’re going in there, aren’t we?” Lincoln said.
Fitz nodded.
“Shit.”
Fitz and Rico helped lower Ace down first. Then Rico dropped in with Mendez and Fitz following. Lincoln came last, his boots smacking against the mud-filled tunnel floor.
Maybe it was an illusion, but the red vines and webbing looked like they were actually pulsating. Fitz moved quietly, taking it all in.
The tunnel appeared to have a diameter of about ten feet and seemed to travel north, winding so he couldn’t see the end. The southern end was blocked by piles of fallen soil and rock. While the walls and ceiling were curved, the floor seemed to be pounded nearly flat.
What in the hell kind of twisted Variant engineering was this?
He had seen tunnels, especially in Europe. The worm Variants had burrowed under the cities. But as far as he knew, they’d never made it across the Atlantic. And from his experience, they didn’t leave behind this webbing.
No, this was something entirely different.
The only tunnels he had seen in the states were manmade. This…this was beyond anything he experienced.
A wail broke the silence, and a Variant came bounding into the tunnel. Five tactical lights hit the beast as it moved, digging claws into the red tendrils stretching over the walls and ceiling like a spider web.
It practically galloped toward them on the ceiling, using the tendrils to move.
“Ace, take it down,” Fitz ordered.
“I got this ugly son of a…” Ace said, his voice silenced by the boom of his shotgun.
Bits of the tendrils flew away with the shot as the Variant leapt away unharmed. He pumped the weapon and fired again. This time the buckshot found a home in its skull, erasing all former human features in a fine pink mist.
The corpse slammed against the muddy floor, kicking up wet muck.
An angry roar echoed through the tun
nel from seemingly all directions. The team turned to search for the source.
Ace bumped into Mendez.
“Watch it big guy,” Mendez said.
“Get out of my way, dude,” Ace shot back.
“Take it easy,” Fitz said. “Watch your zones.”
That smell of rotten fruit seemed to waft off the red webs covering the walls as their beams flitted through the black. He had no idea what it was, but it sure as hell looked like something Kate would be interested in seeing in the lab.
Right now, though, lab samples could wait; Dohi could not.
The roars faded away, leaving them in silence.
Fitz waited another moment before giving the advance sign.
They followed the winding tunnel, darkness swallowing them except for the patches illuminated with their beams. Every surface was covered with the same gruesome webbing. The hairs on the back of Fitz’s neck stood straight, almost as if they were passing through an electric current.
Variant shrieks echoed, but sounded distant, like they were moving away from the team. The monotony of the massive tunnel was interrupted for the first time with an intersection. The team halted, the faint echo of their movement fading away into silence. Fitz heard something dripping to the right.
“Which way?” Rico whispered.
A human scream to the right provided their answer.
Ace took point, and the team moved in behind the large man and his shotgun.
The tunnel they entered next looked like it had been dug by a group of human-sized moles. It was wide enough for them to walk through three abreast and tall enough no one had to duck down. The red vines were even more dense, covering every surface, even the ground.
Now Fitz was almost certain some of those webs were pulsing. He caught Rico and Mendez studying the webbing, but Ace’s shotgun never strayed from pointing straight ahead.
The tunnel curved back and forth slightly, bending just enough to prevent them from seeing what lay beyond each turn. The squawks and growls carried through the narrow passage, but the echo made it difficult to determine distance.
Whatever this strange place was, there was no doubt that they had uncovered how the Variants entered this outpost. The sensor systems wouldn’t have caught anything invading the place from underground.
Extinction Shadow Page 11