“This is a mistake, Kevin,” Conor told him. “You need us.”
“I can’t let foreign agents operate freely on US soil. I’m under direct orders from the president.”
Covington glared at Abrash.
“Better confiscate their weapons, Riley.”
The agent nodded. Peter handed over his pistol peacefully, but Jim and Michael refused to budge. A handful of Task Force 13 agents brought their own weapons to bear.
“I have the entire House Appropriations Committee on speed dial, Colonel.” Covington threatened. Abrash didn’t flinch.
“Have fun. We jammed your phones. But you can take it up with them if we live through the weekend,” he retorted. “We’ll see if they can even find our funding buried inside their monstrosity of a budget.”
Jim surrendered the pistol grudgingly. Michael followed the old man’s lead.
“What about my daughter?” Covington asked.
“When there’s a dragon flying over the major population centers of the southeast, a billionaire’s daughter is not my first priority,” the Colonel answered.
He marched out of the room. Most of his team followed behind, leaving a small contingent to guard them.
“Can I at least have the privacy of my kitchen?” Covington snapped at him. The special agent nodded.
“Shit,” Covington whispered after the feds cleared out.
“Is it really that bad?” Michael asked. “I mean, ‘not living out the weekend’ bad?”
“Could be,” McCann allowed. “Tora Bora was that bad.”
Everyone looked to Stefan, but he refused to meet their eyes.
A telephone rang.
“I thought they jammed our communications,” Gabriel wondered aloud.
Jim walked over to the wall beside the refrigerator. He caught his fingers underneath an ornate painting of his family and pulled. A secret compartment opened, revealing a hidden wall phone.
“Secret line,” Jim informed them. “Under a fake name and a false address. Only Anna and the girls know about it.”
He lifted the handset and answered.
“Hello?”
“Daddy?” the voice came back soft and scared.
“Where are you, baby?” he asked.
“Help me, Daddy,” Abby whispered at him. “I’ve only got a minute. They’re coming for me!”
“Where are you, Abby? Give me something to work with.”
“I don’t know, Daddy! I think I’m on campus somewhere. I think this is one of the frat houses… I was at a party here once, but it looked so different…” Everyone heard the scream that followed. Then the line went dead.
Jim relayed the conversation to everyone.
“We can’t just sit here,” Michael fumed.
“Hadn’t planned on it, lad,” Conor calmed him. “I didn’t fly all the way out here from Ireland just to sit under house arrest. But we need more information. We’ve got nothing to go on.”
“And we need a way out of here,” Stefan added. “Without fighting our way through Task Force 13.”
Covington set his jaw.
“I’ve got the exit covered. There are ways in and out that only I know of.”
“And there might be a few even you don’t know about,” Michael added with a smile.
“No, there aren’t.” Covington’s grin split from ear to ear. Michael’s disappeared.
“You knew?” he asked.
“Every time,” the old man replied with a wink.
“We still don’t know where we’re going or what we’re doing,” McCann reminded them.
“They’d need some kind of base of operations.” Michael thought out loud. “Somewhere you can hide a whole host of vampires. And somewhere where you could hide a dragon. Somewhere on campus.”
“Seems like that would narrow it down a bit,” the Irishman joined the discussion. “Although the dragon might have holed up somewhere else. Dragons are tricky beasts. Even one you’re supposedly controlling. If one of those gets loose, you don’t want to be around it.”
“Ok, so we’re looking for a place where they could keep vampires for a while,” McCann simplified it. “That could be almost anywhere. We need more to go on.”
“You wouldn’t even need to keep a ton of them around,” Conor replied. “Not if they’re actually magical constructs.”
“Damn, you’re right,” McCann agreed in frustration.
“What fraternity does Khalid belong to?” Peter asked quietly.
“What?” Michael responded, confused. “I’m not sure.”
“Sigma Chi,” James filled in, looking expectantly at the young man. “Why?”
“I know where they are.”
James narrowed his eyes and glanced outside.
“After I get us out of here, can you take us there?”
“Definitely.” Peter didn’t hesitate.
“This house is surrounded by soldiers and federal agents,” Conor chided them. “How are we going to get through them?”
“We’re not going through,” Michael answered, picking up on the plan. Covington winked at him. Conor looked confused, but a moment later he nodded.
“Let’s do it.”
Chapter Twenty-Nine
“These tunnels must’ve cost you a fortune.”
“They cost someone a fortune,” Covington answered the red-haired Irishman, “but not me. Brigadier General Leonard Covington ordered the first tunnels dug during the American Revolution. My great-grandfather extended the system during the Civil War. The Underground Railroad used the plantation as a massive layover – massive. Just about every escaped slave from south Georgia passed through here on the way north.”
He paused at an intersection to get his bearings, leaning on the spare cane he’d retrieved before their journey. After a moment he led them down the tunnel on the right.
“The escaped slaves actually dug out most of the additions. They said it was the happiest work they’d ever done, helping other slaves find their freedom.”
The labyrinthine passageways followed no deliberate design. They’d grown organically over the centuries. Michael noticed signs of the haphazard development everywhere. No two tunnels seemed to have been dug to the same specifications. Sometimes the same tunnel would change character as they walked it, shrinking or growing, the walls becoming smoother or coarser.
Michael had spent time in the caves before, sneaking Catherine out of the house undetected. He’d never fully explored the system, though. Miles of tunnels crisscrossed the grounds. He’d always assumed nobody else had, either.
“I’ve been down every inch of these tunnels. Beckman and I and mapped it all out when we tightened up the house security.”
“Maybe we should have fetched the map before we embarked,” Friar Stefan chided him.
“We memorized the maps and burned them.” Beckman tapped his head. “The only maps left are up here.”
“A little paranoid, aren’t we?” Gabriel laughed.
“But is it really paranoia if they actually are out to get you?” Covington grinned back at him. He turned serious again. “Wealth doesn’t bring a perfect life. I’ve seen my share of violence. And this isn’t the first time my family’s been in jeopardy. We built that panic room for a reason, you know.”
That killed the conversation. They continued carefully through the darkness. Michael frowned. He thought he recognized their route, but he deferred to Jim’s better knowledge of the tunnels. He soon knew he’d been right. The tunnel came to a dead end at a cave in, with no further path forward.
“This tunnel caved in years ago, Jim. I thought you knew.”
Jim grinned at the younger man. His eyes sparkled in the dim light.
“Of course I knew.” He reached into a gap in the rubble heap. His hand locked onto something unseen. He gave it a hard yank. They heard a loud clang followed by the whir of an electric motor.
“I collapsed it.”
Michael stared at him. Jim shrugged apologetically.
“You were exploring a bit too thoroughly,” he answered the unspoken question.
“It should be smooth sailing from here,” Beckman chimed in. “The only people who know this tunnel is still accessible are me, Jim, and Abby.” He led the way down the tunnel confidently.
He didn’t even finish his first step before the vampire creature roared in his face. A heartbeat later, cries filled the tunnel as his kindred answered him.
Beckman didn’t hesitate. He punched the creature square in the face.
It screamed at him again, then lunged forward and tried to bite him. The security chief sprang into action, side stepping to the right and raining punches up and down the creature’s torso. They did little damage, but they kept it occupied long enough for Jim to stab it through the brain stem with his cane. That put it down, but the tunnels still echoed with the cries of its companions.
“We have to move,” Conor told them. “They’ll be on us soon, and we’re unarmed.”
Jim reached down to his foot and removed the .38 Special he’d kept hidden in an ankle holster. Conor flashed him a grin.
“Not completely unarmed,” Jim grinned back at him.
Michael grinned.
“Rookies,” he noted.
“You know what I love about Americans?” the Irishman asked, as they hastened down the tunnel. “You have guns everywhere.”
“That must come in handy in your line of work,” Michael quipped.
“Too right it does,” Conor agreed.
Another of the creatures popped up in front of them. Covington stopped short and fired, filling a cerebral cavity with lead.
“We need to hurry!”
The tunnel emptied into another vast cavern. As they trotted across the dark emptiness, moans surrounded them.
“I just stepped on something crunchy!” Gabriel called out.
“Something grabbed my ankle!” Peter answered.
He kicked his leg free and flashed his light down. Hands rose up from the ground, slowly becoming arms and then full torsos.
“Someone’s raising another army to throw at us!” Conor announced. “Move!”
They ran for the far end. As they reached the next tunnel, three of the vampire creatures pulled themselves out of the ground before them. They stood astride the exit.
Covington fired. The creature on the left dropped like a sack of bricks. He fired a second shot as he ran, taking out the one on their right. He ran the final creature through with his cane as he charged over it. His momentum lifted it off the ground, slamming it through the open passageway into the tunnel beyond. More creatures lumbered and cried out from behind.
“Go!” Beckman called out, turning to face the oncoming mob. “I’ll hold them off.”
“Craig...” Covington began.
“Go, Jim. You know what to do.” Covington nodded and led the group away at a brisk jog.
“Where are we going?” Conor asked between breaths.
“You said it yourself,” Jim grinned at him. “This is America. We have guns everywhere!”
The tunnels led them to a hidden exit half a mile away from the house, well outside of Task Force 13’s perimeter. They raced up a creek bed and up the hill where they came upon a large barn. The old, rundown barn bore a surprisingly new electronic keypad on the door. Jim punched in a code and the door swung open.
Jim ran straight past two black Cadillac Escalades, a Toyota Camry, and a motorcycle. He popped open a storage cabinet. The strange contraption he fished out looked like it came from a bad black-and-white sci-fi movie.
He tossed it to Michael, who caught on quickly. The young man hefted the tank high, slinging the straps across his shoulders as he ran back for the tunnels. Fluid sloshed as he trotted across the creek bed.
Jim swung open another cabinet and handed out weapons. Rifles, pistols, and magazines made quick rounds around the motley crew. They geared up and followed Michael.
The ex-soldier took up a position just outside the tunnel just in time to see Peter run inside. A brief burst of automatic rifle fire erupted from within. A moment later, Peter emerged with Beckman slung over his shoulder. Blood and bruises covered the security chief from head to toe, but life filled his alert eyes. Michael aimed the metal rod in his hand straight into the tunnel entrance.
“Wait,” the friar called out. He stepped over and performed a quick blessing on the tank strapped to Michael’s back.
The young man nodded approvingly and depressed the trigger. The Vietnam era M9A1-7 flamethrower erupted, spewing burning death into the catacombs. The constructs erupted in howls and wails. Sizzling and boiling noises added to the symphony. Before long, the wails stopped. Michael didn’t.
When he’d emptied his tank, they raced back to the barn. Peter and the friar carried Beckman, one of his arms wrapped around each of their shoulders. Once inside, they laid him out on a couch. Jim fetched a giant first aid kit, and Stefan set in on the security guard’s wounds.
Jim led the rest around the edge of the giant room, opening cabinets and drawers. “Car keys. Civilian clothes, male and female, a good selection of sizes. Army BDUs, all sizes. Nonperishable food. First aid and field surgical supplies. Lighting. General camping equipment. Watch batteries all the way up to vehicle batteries. Pistols. Rifles. Submachine guns –”
“Whoah, you’ve got the suppressed MP-5 variants!” Michael chimed in. Covington nodded.
“A handful of suppressors for the pistols and rifles, too. A couple of sniper rifles. A few flash-bangs and regular grenades. Whiskey. About four hundred gallons of gas. Loads of ammo for everything...” He paused briefly before opening the last cabinet. “...and you already found the flamethrower.”
Peter whistled.
“You really prepared for everything, didn’t you?”
“Let’s just say I had some bad experiences in my youth,” Jim passed a sly wink at Michael. “Massive wealth doesn’t make all the problems of the world go away. Some of them just get worse.”
“How’d you get all this stuff?” Gabriel asked, incredulous.
“Well... massive wealth does solve some problems.” Covington grinned. He left the others sorting through gear as he went to check in on his security guard. His wounds wouldn’t be fatal, but they did present a problem.
“Leave me here,” Beckman told his boss. “I’ll give you an hour head start and then call for an ambulance.”
Jim grunted his assent. Michael showed up a moment later with a glass of water and a pair of pills he’d dredged up.
“Oxycodone,” he told the chief. Beckman thanked him and gulped them down.
“Something’s been bothering me ever since we saw that first construct in the tunnels,” he whispered. “If those tunnels were so secret –”
“Then how’d the constructs get down there?” Covington finished for him.
“How did the warlock even know the tunnels existed?” Michael chimed in.
“You’d damn well better believe we’re going to find out,” Covington told them grimly.
“I’ll call the security team,” Beckman decided. “The cameras should tell us something.”
Jim nodded. He fished out the Cadillac keys and unlocked the two massive SUVs with a stereo chirp.
“Pack up,” he announced to the room. “We’re leaving in ten minutes.”
“What are we taking?” Peter asked.
“That depends on where we’re going,” Michael answered.
“Take everything you can,” Jim told them. “We’re going to war.”
Chapter Thirty
“That’s got to be it,” Michael confirmed. “We should’ve looked into those boarded windows sooner.”
Like many of the local fraternities, Sigma Chi had converted a Greek revival mansion in the heart of Athens into their frat house. They sat stuck in the road, deliberately using the heavy game day traffic as an excuse to linger.
“How can you be so certain?” Conor asked them.
“Besides the
boarded windows?” Michael sniped.
“It’s game day.” Covington said it as if it explained everything.
“Of course,” Gabriel nodded.
“Still lost here,” Conor jibed them.
“It’s game day, and there’s no activity,” Michael filled in. “None. All the other fraternity and sorority houses have parties, groups outside, banners, decorations, you name it. All of them. Every game day, no exceptions. It’s what they do. Except this one.”
“See the one next door?” Peter pointed out. Conor grunted.
“You take football that seriously?” Stefan asked.
“Yes,” Michael, Peter and Gabriel answered in unison.
“Football’s a big deal here,” Covington filled in. “This is just the beginning of game day traffic. It’ll get worse all day. About an hour before kick-off, you won’t be able to get anywhere.”
They made two more stops. Jim ran inside the municipal building for about ten minutes, returning with a giant roll of paper. Then they stopped at Stefan’s hotel room. The Friar made a brief dash inside, returning with a giant bundle tucked under one arm.
“Good thing we rented the room under an alias,” Conor noted. “Otherwise Abrash would have men stationed here.”
Back at Michael’s, Jim unfurled his paper across the table. Stefan propped his long bundle up against it and joined them.
“How’d you get the building plans so fast?” Peter asked.
“Called in a favor with the planning commissioner. I’m a big donor.”
“Nice.”
“Traffic will be worst in the hour before kickoff, so that’s when we’ll hit them,” Conor decreed. “The police won’t be able to get through the traffic.”
“What about us?” Stefan asked. “We need an extraction plan.”
“I can have transportation waiting for us outside the worst of the traffic,” Covington answered. “We might have to haul ass for a bit on foot, but then we’ll be good.”
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