by Jana Oliver
Beck checked it out. There was one main light in the brim and two under the bill. He clicked them on and off, and nodded his approval. Stripping off his Braves cap, he stashed it in the duffel bag, then put on the new one. He found it amusing when Riley got one of her own.
‘Y’all do have really fine toys,’ he admitted.
Salvatore smiled in response. ‘One of the perks of working for the Holy See.’
‘I’d never make it with you guys. I swear too much.’
A twinkle appeared in the captain’s eyes. ‘So do we when nobody important is listening.’
Beck took them down the sidewalk to the west side of the building, ignoring the curious stares of passers-by. There was a covered entrance on that side, though it was blocked off. Above it was a window, which was the best way in.
Out of habit, Beck did a one-eighty to check their surroundings. A few noisy people. He gritted his teeth as he hefted his bag and then himself on to the overhang above the entrance. His shoulder told him this was a stupid idea, sending slicing pain down to his fingertips and numbing them. He shook feeling back into them. At least the pain meds were doing some good.
The canopy shifted under his weight. ‘Be careful,’ he cautioned. ‘This thing is on its last legs.’
The hunters pulled themselves up one by one. That left Riley. He could tell she was re-evaluating this adventure.
‘Well?’ he said, keeping his voice neutral. He wanted her to make the decision, not feel she had to do this to prove something to him or the others.
With a determined expression, Riley reached up and took his right hand. He lifted her up, but he noticed she made it as easy as possible for him to keep his left shoulder from complaining. It took her a moment to regain her footing.
‘You sure this thing’s going to hold us?’ she said, concerned.
‘We’ll know soon enough.’
After carefully edging across the overhang, Beck pushed aside the remaining chunks of weather-stained plywood from the window. This is the way he and Paul had entered the last two times and, from the looks of it, it remained the local favourite.
‘I’ll take point,’ he said, mostly because he knew the place and that would put Riley in the middle of the hunters. If something bad went down, he’d have to trust them to keep her safe. If that asshat Amundson had been on the team, she’d be in the truck right now.
Beck stepped through the hole into the murky room. He knew from experience it was littered with junk and contained a million places for a demon to hide, even a fiend the size of a Three. Remembering the cap, he clicked it on. The light on the brim shot forward like a searchlight.
‘Sweeeeet,’ he said. Gotta get me one of these.
By turning right, then left, Beck was pleased to see the cap did a fair job of illuminating the area. Not as bright as a flashlight, but it kept his hands free for the pipe, and that’s what counted.
He waited until the others crawled through the window behind him.
‘Whoa, it smells in here,’ Riley said, waving a hand in front of her nose. ‘Does everyone in Atlanta use this place as a toilet?’
Beck moved forward with deliberate slowness, careful where he was putting his feet. Broken glass littered the floor.
‘Watch where ya walk, girl,’ he warned.
Dirty streams of light crept round the seams in the boarded-up windows, barely enough to do any good as the cap lights danced around the room like erratic fireflies.
Riley let loose a barely stifled shriek as something swooped down from the busted ceiling tile right over the top of her; a bird, heading for the nearest patch of sunlight. A moment later a second joined it. This time she merely ducked.
‘Sorry,’ she said. He didn’t have to look to know her face would be red with embarrassment. ‘Why is all this stuff in here?’
‘A Three went on a rampage in the buildin’. Killed a bunch of folks. The buildin’s owners couldn’t get anyone to clean the place out, so they walked away.’
‘I can see why.’
About forty feet in Beck found a mound of dirty bedding, someone’s nest in this hellhole. ‘Home sweet home,’ he murmured.
Further on from the makeshift bed was a rickety table made of discarded boxes and a plastic lawn chair. It never failed to amaze him how people tried so hard to make the best of what they had. He’d seen that when he was overseas. A woman might live in a dirt hut, but she’d be sweeping it out, trying to keep it clean. From the looks of it, the tenant hadn’t been here for a while.
Riley picked up a newspaper that sat on the table. ‘January. This year,’ she said. ‘The want ads.’
Beck’s cap light caught on a pile of something curiously white. He stepped closer. No need for that job now.
He clicked off his light and turned towards the others. ‘We got a body here.’ Then he looked directly at Riley. ‘This isn’t pretty. Ya sure ya want to see this?’
Her furrowed brows told him she was wrestling with the question.
‘If you want to back out of this, we won’t think less of you,’ the captain said quietly.
That earned him points in Beck’s book. ‘What he said.’
Riley swallowed hard. ‘It’s what a trapper does,’ she replied. ‘I’ll deal.’
She’s Paul’s daughter all right.
Beck manoeuvred back to the corpse, clicked on his cap and knelt next to the disjointed pile of bones. Strings of dried flesh hung from a few of them, but for the most part they’d been stripped clean. The skull lay about four feet to the left, the empty eye sockets staring into eternity.
The captain knelt by the bone pile then shifted one with the tip of his service revolver. ‘Gnaw marks. Large ones. Probably a Three.’ The hunter rose, shifted his gun to his left hand and then crossed himself.
‘I’ll call the city and they’ll send someone up to take care of him.’
‘Is there any way the cops can tell who he was?’ Riley asked, her voice fainter. ‘Let his family know?’
‘His clothes are gone so there’s no I.D. He’ll be a John Doe,’ Beck said. Harsh but true. ‘The cops won’t bother. They got enough live people causin’ trouble to worry about one dead one.’
Riley sucked in a breath. ‘That’s so . . . sad.’
That’s the way of it, girl. Ya make a mistake and ya die. If yer lucky, someone will be there to weep over yer grave.
Once past the corpse, Beck led the team deeper into the building where it was darker and the floor increasingly cluttered with debris. Portions of the ceiling had fallen into jumbled heaps, and broken furniture lay strewn around from when the former occupants had run for their lives. He intended to walk the length of the room, but paused by the stairs. His light picked up marks in the dust leading to the third floor, and not the kind a human made.
Beck held up his hand and the others halted. Then he pointed. ‘Best if we keep quiet from now on,’ he said for Riley’s benefit.
She nodded her understanding, clutching a Holy Water sphere tightly in one hand.
Beck began his ascent, trying not to make any noise. It was nearly impossible. Though the stairs themselves were solid, the debris on them crunched loudly underfoot.
As he emerged on the third floor, his nose picked up the stench of fresh demon crap. He didn’t bother to tell the others: they would notice it just as well as he had. A check of the stairs leading upward showed no paw marks. It was darker up here, all the windows covered by plywood: a perfect place for a Three to hide.
‘Which way?’ the captain asked in a lowered voice.
‘Left,’ Beck replied, more on gut instinct than anything. That would take them towards the front of the building. If they didn’t encounter a demon along the way, they’d head back towards the exit.
The terrain didn’t look any different than the floor below: piles of broken furniture. A desk calendar. A photo of someone’s family. A smashed coffee cup.
Riley stuck close to him instead of the others. That he hadn’t expected: B
eck figured she’d feel safer with the hunters and their guns. When she stepped on something and nearly lost her balance, he caught her arm and she righted herself. There was a murmured thank you. Despite the cold, he could see a thin trickle of sweat thread its way down the side of her face.
Harper is pushin’ her too hard. She’s not ready for this. But when was any trapper truly ready to go out on their own? What if she faced this kind of situation down the line and didn’t know how to handle it?
At a faint sound, Beck halted, raising his hand to signal to the others to hold their places. Snuffing. Growls. The sound of something moving around in the next room. He tapped his ear a couple of times and then pointed. The captain nodded.
Cautiously they inched forward, working around the rubble. They had fanned out as well, Müller and Corsini on his left, the captain on his right.
He was missing someone. Looking over his shoulder he found Riley with her back to him, staring at the far door.
‘Girl?’ he whispered.
She mimicked his hand signals perfectly – tapping her ear and then pointing to the other room.
Ah, hell.
One demon ahead, one behind. They were caught in the middle.
Chapter Twenty
Riley wiped away the sweat on her forehead with a sleeve, panic percolating through her veins. There weren’t that many demons and she had four guys with her, all pros. The hunters had guns with special bullets so this wasn’t at all like the Tabernacle.
Riley gasped instinctively as the doorway in front of her filled with a hairy slavering demon. It was one of the mature Grade Threes with a double row of teeth. Its muscles rippled under rank black fur, eyes glowing like two high-intensity lasers.
Demon voices rose, howling like Hell’s wolves.
‘We got more than two of these things,’ Beck said.
‘Agreed,’ Salvatore replied. ‘Retreat to the stairs. We’re in close quarters, so be careful with your fire, gentlemen.’ The captain cued his radio. ‘Team Angelus, this is Team Gabriel. We have made contact with multiple Hellspawn and need immediate back-up.’ He sounded so in control, as if they weren’t boxed in by ravenous demons.
Amundson’s voice came back immediately. ‘Roger, Team Gabriel. Where are you in the structure?’
‘Third floor. We’ll be moving down one floor and then towards the west exit.’
There were more laser eyes now, glinting in the semi-darkness.
‘Roger,’ Amundson replied crisply. ‘Team Angelus estimates arrival in ten minutes.’
An eternity when you were in a building full of hungry demons.
‘Push the junk in front of ya, slow ’em down,’ Beck suggested. Riley nodded and carefully replaced the Holy Water sphere in her backpack, then began to retreat, each step in slow motion as she kept her attention on the threats in front of her. Any debris in her way she shoved between her and the fiends: busted plywood, broken chairs and Lord knows what. Müller was at her side now, covering her with his weapon.
Thanks, Harper. I so needed this experience.
The two groups made the stairs at the same time. Beck headed down to the second floor, but had gone only a few steps before he thundered back up. ‘We got more below us.’
A howling chorus sprang up, like an ancient demonic battle cry, as a solid mass of furry bodies surged forward out of the darkness. Muzzle flashes lit the room. Riley cringed at the noise of gunfire, her nose rebelling at the sickening odour of demon. A few feet to her left a Three took a bullet in the chest, pitching forward on to the floor. Another joined it a moment later. Then another.
It was slow going on the stairs: the handrails were gone and Riley had to feel her way up using the dusty wall as support. Her heart beat so rapidly she felt dizzy: a panic attack would be fatal now.
She issued a warning cry as a Three launched itself down the stairs towards them, its teeth glistening in the cap lights. Beck married his steel pipe with its skull and it tumbled by them, sending up a cloud of choking dust.
‘Keep movin’!’ he urged.
The captain’s radio spewed words. ‘Nine minutes ETA for the back-up team,’ he called out, jettisoning a magazine from the gun and then ramming a full one home. ‘We need to find a defensive position, buy ourselves some time.’
‘The roof,’ Beck said. ‘It’s the best chance we got.’
Despite the snarling pack on their heels, there were no more demons as they climbed. Right before they reached the fifth floor, Müller asked permission to try to hold the things at bay while the others made their way to the roof.
‘We stay together,’ was the curt reply from his superior.
‘But, sir—’
‘No! We will not repeat Barcelona’s mistakes,’ Salvatore countered.
Barcelona? Maybe the hunters weren’t as infallible as Riley had thought.
When they reached the top floor, Beck hunted for the door to the roof. He shoved furniture around, his cap light swinging wildly as he searched.
What if he can’t find it?
‘Got it!’ he called out. Riley nearly wept with relief.
From there on the stairs became narrower, then curved to the right. A door stood in their way at the very top. Beck looked back over his shoulder, his face glistening with sweat and his breathing ragged. She knew what he was thinking: what was on that roof? More Threes? Or something worse lying in wait?
Corsini pushed past her and joined Beck. ‘We go up together,’ he said. ‘Captain’s orders.’ He offered her fellow trapper a pistol. This time Beck didn’t refuse the offer.
‘Here,’ he said, handing her the steel pipe. ‘Ya know how to take ’em down.’
She did. She’d killed a Three with a folding chair at the Tabernacle and the pipe was a much better weapon.
Beck clicked off the safety, chambered a round and then used his steel-toed boot to kick open the door. It swung on rusty hinges, screeching like a cat caught under a truck tyre.
He went through first, then Corsini.
Riley took a step up, but Müller caught her arm. ‘Wait please.’
She forced herself to stay put. Her mind began to conjure up the screams, the sound of Beck and Corsini being torn apart. Nothing. Silence behind them as well. The demons had backed off for the moment.
Why is it so quiet? ‘Beck?’ No reply. ‘Beck!’ she shouted.
‘It’s clear!’ he called down.
Thank God. Riley made sure to hustle. Müller was next. The captain was last, toting a piece of lumber. Once the door was closed, he used the wood to wedge it tight.
‘That’s not going to hold them very long,’ he admitted.
‘How many did ya see?’ Beck asked, scouting along the side of the rooftop.
‘I counted eighteen and I know there were more,’ the captain replied.
‘Why are they like this?’ Corsini demanded. He appeared the most jittery of the hunters, but then he had an unborn child to think of. ‘I thought the trappers were just –’ He caught Beck’s sudden glare and closed his mouth.
‘Makin’ up stories about all those demons workin’ together because we couldn’t cut it? Well, now ya know the truth, hunter.’
And the truth will set you free. That’d been one of Paul Blackthorne’s favourite sayings. In this case the truth had them on a roof five storeys up with no way of getting down unless they wanted to wade through a sea of ravenous Hellspawn. Somehow she doubted the Threes would take note of Hell’s mark on her palm before they ate her.
Salvatore addressed his radio. ‘Team Angelus, what is your ETA?’
‘Seven minutes,’ came the prompt reply.
‘We are on the roof. Do you copy?’
‘Roger.’
There was a pronounced thump as something threw itself against the door.
‘Here’s as good as any,’ Beck advised from a position near the front of the building. ‘Gives us a clear shot at the door.’
Salvatore agreed. ‘When the teams arrive, they’ll clear ou
t the demons and we’ll make our way down.’
These guys have a plan. There’s more coming to help us. It’ll work out.
They made a defensive position in a corner, where front and side walls met. On the captain’s suggestion Riley placed a line of Holy Water in a large semi-circle approximately fifteen feet from their position. When she ran out part way through the ward, she cannibalized the sphere in her backpack and finished the job. By the time she’d finished, the men were in position, the hunters’ backpacks on the ground in front of them, their extra ammunition laid out, ready to go.
The door took another solid blow.
Beck pulled out his phone and punched in a number. ‘Jackson? We need help here.’ He relayed the situation. ‘Don’t come into the buildin’. It’s ass deep in demons.’ Their fellow trapper must have asked about the hunters. ‘About five minutes out. If ya can give us back-up on the street, that’d be good . . . Yeah . . . Later.’
He never says goodbye. This might be the one time he wished he had.
Beck had just ended the call when the phone lit up. ‘Hello? . . . Oh, hi there.’ He listened intently, his eyes riveted on the door. ‘Thanks for the tip, dude. I owe ya. What am I doin’? I’m on top of a buildin’ full of Threes. How’s yer day goin’?’
How can you be so calm? Her knees were knocking so badly she could hardly stand.
Something made her turn, instinct perhaps. A furry muzzle peered over the top of the wall as its owner’s claws dug into the bricks for leverage. How had the thing got up here? With immense effort, it heaved itself up right behind Beck. He was still yapping away, no clue he was about to become lunch.
Before it could crawl on to the roof, Riley whacked it with the steel pipe. Teeth flew in all directions, pelting her, then the demon slid out of sight, claws scraping as it lost its hold. There were shouts from below as gravity did its job. When she checked, the body lay sprawled in the street. Bystanders pointed at it, while some took pictures with their cellphones.
Beck said his goodbyes and ended the call. Once he was paying attention again, she pointed downward with the pipe. Peering over the edge of the building, he blinked at the sight, then grinned and gave her a thumbs up. ‘Good job. Remind me not to piss ya off. Ya might think of usin’ that on me sometime.’