Grave Mistakes (The Grave Diggers Book 3)

by Chris Fritschi

  “Are they a problem?” asked Marc as he squinted into the distance.

  “No,” said Fernandez. “They’re small time locals. They’d piss themselves if they knew we were here.”

  Tate blinked his eyes as he adjusted to the relative gloom of the dense jungle. He stopped near a tree whose trunk was crowded with bushy ferns. Slivers of dust filled light did little to define the jumble of shapes surrounding Tate as he sat down on a thick root.

  “Was I right?” asked Tate.

  “Yes,” said Ota.

  Tate saw two eyes appear out of the shadows between the tree and ferns. If not for that Ota would have been completely invisible. With the barest rustle, Ota stepped out of his snipers hide and sat next to Tate while cradling his Dragunov.

  “The sniper is behind the mound of tall grass, third from the left,” said Ota. “Another one showed up just as you came here.”

  Tate took off his boonie hat and mopped the sweat off his forehead with a sigh. “Could you make out any details?”

  “One’s a male. The shooter, unknown,” said Ota easily. “The sniper was well hidden and the new guy was obscured by the brush.”

  “The good news is the sniper didn’t shoot us on sight. Maybe they’re locals, or a hunting party. We’ll know more if they follow us. For now, at least, I don’t think they’re a threat.”

  “Because they didn’t shoot you?” asked Ota. “A lion doesn’t kill when its stomach is full, but it’s no less dangerous.”

  Tate put his boonie hat back on as he stood up. “Most people just say, ’I think you’re wrong’,” said Tate.

  Ota only shrugged his shoulders and smiled.

  “Yeah, I get it,” scoffed Tate. “You like not being most people.”

  * * *

  The team could hear the rain before it hit. A distant, hiss that quickly grew louder like a hundred jets of steam. Wesson instinctively hunched her shoulders beneath her poncho in anticipation of the downpour seconds before it swept over them.

  In minutes the ground was saturated creating pools of water with rivulets criss-crossing the ground. Thick, sticky mud caked over their boots weighing down each step until their legs were burning with exertion.

  They were nearing the bottom of a hill which opened to a flat plane, several feet wide, that snaked its way across their path.

  “Rosse,” called out Wesson. “hold up.”

  Happy for the reprieve, Rosse stopped, resting his hands on his knees as he caught a breather.

  “Wesson?” asked Tate, joining them at the front of the line.

  “That’s an arroyo just ahead,” said Wesson, pulling back the hood of her poncho.

  It didn’t look special to Tate, but Wesson could track and read terrain better than anyone he’d known in special forces.

  “What’s a yo-yo,” asked Rosse.

  The rain plastered Wesson’s brown hair to her head and streamed off her face as she tilted her head for a moment then seemed to nod to herself. “If we’re crossing,” said Wesson, “we have to go fast.”

  “Everyone get going, now!” shouted Tate.

  Rosse looked puzzled but took off across the plane with the rest of the team close behind. Wesson led them up a small rise where she stopped, looking back.

  “Hear it now?” said Wesson.

  Tate pulled back the hood of his poncho, listening. Inside the sizzle of the rain, he heard the a low rumble growing louder.

  “Good call,” said Tate with a smile.

  Suddenly the arroyo disappeared under a surge of muddy water. The flash flood churned and frothed with surprising power, carrying heavy branches and uprooted plants in its wake.

  “Don’t you love nature?” asked Monkhouse.

  “Give me a prison riot any day,” grumped Rosse.

  * * *

  The storm wasn’t improving and they were forced to turn around as soon as they found a safe place to cross the water.

  Weighing their options, Tate knew taking the Moth was out of the question, now. The wind had picked up and was driving the rain down hard. They could hunker down and wait out the storm, but if this wasn’t a typical blow there was no telling how long it would last. What he really wanted was to get Nathan on the sat-phone and chew him up. He said the satellite’s reentry time was only an estimate and could be off by several hours. It’s been more than several hours, thought Tate. The team was only provisioned for a few days and he didn’t like the idea of rationing food against the demands the jungle puts on the body.

  His thoughts were broken as the ground lit up in a brilliant, bolt of lightening, but the light didn’t disappear.

  “Wow!” exclaimed Fulton, looking up.

  The clouds above them pulsed and glowed with an unnatural light that radiated from within. As they all watched, a bright, fiery streak of light broke from the clouds slashing a trail sparks behind it.

  “That’s the satellite!” said Fulton.

  “It ain’t the tooth fairy,” quipped Rosse.

  “Who needs this,” said Monkhouse holding Nathan’s tracker, “when you have a big, flaming ‘X’ marks the spot. Finding that database just got a lot easier.”

  As they watched, the ball of light flared sharply and split into two bright, incandescent fingers falling away in different directions until both were lost behind the canopy of trees.

  “You were saying?” said Rosse.

  “What happened?” asked Fulton.

  “The satellite,” sighed Kaiden “just became plural.”

  * * *

  After roughing out separate search grids for the two pieces of the satellite, Tate split teams, Rosse and Monkhouse would go with him and Wesson took Fulton and Ota.

  For reasons of her own, which she rarely shared, Kaiden chose to go with Wesson. Tate shrugged his shoulders, avoiding the futility of trying to understand Kaiden.

  Wesson’s destination was closer and Tate had instructed her to join up with him after she located her half of the satellite.

  The rain hadn’t let up and, in fact, had gotten heavier, driving even the most hearty wildlife into shelter.

  Tate didn’t like splitting up the team, especially when, somewhere in the jungle, were two the men he’d spotted, earlier. Neither he, or Ota had seen them since, which he hoped was a good sign.

  * * *

  The wind swept up the side of the low hill they were cresting blowing rain in their faces. Squinting against the pelting drops, Tate saw a dark smudge raising up in the distance.

  “What’s that?” asked Monkhouse. “Smoke?”

  Tate took a plastic covered map out of his pocket, fighting the wind as it snapped and pulled it in his hands. “There’s a small village over there,” said Tate. “Looks like our part of Vulcan 4 crashed there and started a fire.”

  “That satellite’s got an entire jungle to crash into,” chuckled Monkhouse, “and it smashes into the only village for miles around. I guess if there isn’t a trailer park to wipe out, the next best thing is a village.”

  Forty minutes later they stopped inside a thicket of trees. From there Tate, Monkhouse and Rosse scanned what they could see of the small village. Rural buildings sprawled out, in an open plain, from left to right. Rusted, tin roofs sat on white, blue and amber painted cinder block homes of different sizes and configuration.

  The cluster of homes straddled a single, hard packed, dirt road that continued out into the jungle on either end of the village. Wisps of smoke curled up through the rain from somewhere among a huddle of buildings near the center of the village, but there were no signs of flames, or people.

  “We go in,” said Tate. “Eyes open and call out if you have a contact.”

  Any chance of hearing the telltale growl of a Vix was drowned out in the downpour and when the wind gusted, the rain came down in such thick sheets it was like looking through fog. You wouldn’t see a Vix until it was about to grab you.

  “Does it matter that I don’t wanna go in there?” asked Rosse as he pushed a 40mm shel
l in the grenade launcher of his HK 556L.

  “Nope,” said Tate.

  “How about if I don’t like it either,” said Monkhouse, who was feeling his nerves begin to tingle. There was a lot to be said traveling in the company of six armed teammates, but his confidence had been draining away soon after the team split up.

  “I don’t see the problem,” said Tate. “Almost every village we’ve been to we’ve been ambushed by the locals, or attacked by flesh eating nightmares from Hell.”

  “You don’t see a problem with that?” asked Monkhouse incredulously.

  “No,” grinned Tate. Now that you know what’s coming, you won’t be surprised when it happens.”

  CHAPTER TEN

  IT JUST GOT WORSE

  The wind swept rain blew in a mix of fat, heavy drops and fine mist, obscuring sight and sound, both which Tate depended on to detect danger before it was on him. And it could come from any direction.

  Adrenaline trickled through his body, urging Tate’s breathing and heart rate to race faster. His mouth felt dry and his mind began jumping from thought to thought.

  Tate recognized what was happening and fought it back. He forced his mind to ignore the buzzing hum coursing through his body. Using a technique he’d learned in the Army Rangers, he forced himself to divide his breathing into four second actions. Inhale, hold, exhale, hold and repeat. Instantly, he could feel the constriction in his chest loosen up and his breathing came easier.

  Are you done, you frecken lightweight? All right. Lets do this.

  Leaving his concealment behind, he angled his approach to the village away from the entrance and headed into a cluster of dense trees and plants that hugged a string of buildings near the middle-edge of the village.

  A few feet into the trees he signaled everyone to stop. They all crouched as Tate watched and waited. Everything around them was moving, making it impossible to tell if the source was the wind or something much more dangerous.

  Monkhouse was battling his mounting anxiety as he tried to look in every direction at once, convinced, in the next second, a Vix would charge the moment he looked away. He almost jumped when Rosse elbowed him, signaling they were moving out.

  Tate repeated the start and stop movement as the dense foliage squeezed between two homes, sharply ending at the edge of the main road. The rain drummed against the nearby corrugated, sheet metal roofs drowning out all other sound. Water pooled over the toes of their boots as the rain came off the roofs in an endless waterfall.

  There was something. A sound out of rhythm with the storm. Tate tilted his head, listening until he caught it. The sound came and went from the empty window above Rosse’s head. Tate held his palm towards his men, pointed to himself and then the window. Cautiously, he raised up to peer through the window. He could smell it before his eyes adjusted to the dark. The pungent, feted stench of rotted meat told him more than his sight.

  A shadow moved within the gloom and bumped into a table. With a rattling hiss, the shadow clawed at the table a few seconds, then went still. A moment later the scene repeated itself, the Vix bumping the table and attacking it. Tate wondered how long, how many times this had repeated over and over again; months? Years?

  Instead of pity, Tate felt loathing. He didn’t see a person who once had loved and been loved, with hopes and family. He saw an inert thing, like the guts of a bomb, dormant, unremarkable, that is, until someone sparked the trigger unleashing terror, agony and death.

  Rosse and Monkhouse watched, expectantly, as Tate lowered to a squat. The slowness of his movements mutely warned of danger and the need of silence.

  With his eyes fixed on the window, Tate reached down to his belt and unsheathed his tomahawk. The all black tool had been with him though several tours of duty and countless ops. The handle was an incredibly tough kevlar, synthetic blend making it harder and more durable than hickory wood, yet lightweight with a sure grip. The head of the axe was high carbon steel with a classic curved blade. The other end of the head was a blunt spike, able to punch through sheet steel or body armor. Tate knew his tomahawk, its heft and balance like the back of his hand.

  Grasping it by the head, he drew it out of the sheath then nodded readiness to Rosse and Monkhouse who nodded back, unsure what to expect. Using the handle, he tapped at the windowsill then flipped the tomahawk, catching the handle, the spike of the axe poised and ready.

  An instant later a withered arm shot out of the darkened window, whipping blindly in the air, the naked, jagged bones of its fingers scrabbling open and closed.

  To the others astonishment, Tate grabbed the arm and pulled. The Vix’s head came into the light with a growl. The image was frozen in Monkhouse’s mind. Long, black hair hung in dull, matted clumps from a leathery skull. The stretched skin pulled back the lips in a permanent snarl, exposing cracked teeth that snapped at Tate’s hand.

  Tate swung and buried the spike into its skull. The Vix went limp. With a yank, Tate freed his axe and shoved the thing back through the window.

  “Ready for the main event?” said Tate, slipping the tomahawk back into its sheath. He pulled his rifle around and checked the safety then turned back towards the village.

  “Why does it have to be an event?” whispered Monkhouse to Rosse.

  The main road was just beyond their cluster of trees. Two wide gullies paralleled either side to slow down erosion from the frequent rains, but the storm and turned them into churning sluices.

  Tate’s attention was on the smoldering building across the road. The fire had left the front of the house a charred skeleton, the metal roof torn and bent from a powerful impact of the satellite. That’s where the satellite came down, thought Tate. A low wall of stacked rocks created a courtyard around the front of the house with a sun faded, brown car inside. Tate tried to peer into the blackened mouth of the hole burned into the house, but from his distance it was impossible to make out anything. Even the storm wouldn’t have been enough to deafen the noise of the satellite slamming into the house. If that hadn’t attracted any Vix, there was a good chance the fire would.

  “We cross the road single file,” instructed Tate to Rosse and Monkhouse. “Heads on a swivel. Once on the other side you two take up position on the road side of that rock wall. I’m going to the car.”

  “Rock wall,” said Rosse. “Got it.”

  “What happens next?” asked Monkhouse.

  “Rosse, you’ll give me overwatch, said Tate. “Anything hostile shows itself from that house, you put a grenade in its face. Monkhouse, you cover our six. Copy?”

  “Copy,” said both men.

  Slowly, Tate leaned out of the brush and looked up and down the road. At best he could make out the dark forms of the further buildings, but nothing more. Rosse and Monkhouse stood and followed Tate as he stepped into the open. He jumped the first gully and fast walked across the road. With Rosse and Monkhouse following, Tate jumped the next gully then reached the low wall of the courtyard. Vaulting over that he sprinted the forty feet and hunkered down next to the car. Tate looked back and saw Rosse peering over the wall. They exchanged thumbs up then Tate turned his attention back to the blackened cavity of the house. The storm had turned the courtyard into a shallow pool of mud. Mud caked logs had washed away from a stack of firewood and littered the courtyard adding another obstacle Tate would have to maneuver around.

  He badly wanted to see what might be in there. He could imagine digging around for the buried piece of satellite as Vix charged him, out of the darkness. There’d be no help from Rosse who wouldn’t risk shooting blindly into the shadows.

  Tate estimated it was another forty feet from his position to the house. Another building, ahead and to the right, sat just outside the low wall. Its single open window looking into the courtyard offered no cover for Tate to make his approach.

  As he began to formulate his path of least exposure to the house, the wind suddenly gusted. Tate clapped a hand on his boonie hat before it could fly off and he looked down as o
ne of the nearby muddy logs sluggishly tumbled against the tire of the car. Something about it was odd. It didn’t fit what his mind was telling him he was looking at. He realized it was an arm.

  His mind instantly ejected everything he thought he knew about his situation and a new realization slammed though his head.

  Those weren’t logs of firewood sunken in the mud. They were dead Vix. A lot of them, and somebody with serious firepower had wiped them all out. Tate’s instincts redlined as he understood he had just walked into a kill zone and the moment he stepped out of cover he’d be another muddy corpse. He only needed this unknown threat to take their eyes off of him a second, or two; just long enough for Tate to reach the wall with Rosse and Monkhouse.

  “Rosse!” yelled Tate. “Put a grenade in that house NOW!”

  Rosse’s head rose up as he aimed the grenade launcher when the stone wall, in front of him, was hammered with gunfire. Dust and sparks flew off the stone. Rosse flinched as he pulled the trigger and the grenade spiraled over the house, exploding somewhere in the trees.

  Staying behind the cover of the car, Tate blind fired at the house, hoping to buy Rosse another shot at their attackers. Instantly, the car bucked as bullets thunked into the body of the car.

  Monkhouse rolled onto his chest and looked at Rosse with wide eyes. “Holy crap,” blurted Monkhouse as red tracers sizzled overhead. “What do we do?”

  “Shoot back, ya moron!” yelled Rosse, hoping Monkhouse didn’t hear the quiver in his voice.

  Monkhouse peeked over the wall and glimpsed the front of the house. The inside of the house pulsed with light as gunfire lanced in his direction. He ducked down as the rock wall shuttered, bullets smacking into the stone, spraying hot splinters of lead and shards of rock.

  Fear squeezed Monkhouse's heart, certain the instant he aimed over the wall his face would be turned to pulp. He laid his gun over the top of the wall, about to blind fire when Rosse kicked him in the side.