Tooth and Claw

by Joseph Nassise

  Duncan’s approach was more academic. He’d been trained well, and had kept his swordsmanship up-to-date, but his style couldn’t have been more different than the XO’s. His blows were effective, but he paced himself, executing picture-perfect hacks and slashes that would serve him well in a supervised martial arts exam, but which cost him valuable seconds in this real-life combat with the undead. His textbook maneuvers often meant he had to find a new angle of attack to dodge incoming claws. Textbook or not, Duncan was effective, ramming his longsword through first one ghoul neck then another. The lieutenant’s mouth was a tight line crossing his face that showed both disgust and determination.

  Once the Templars along the walls had spent their magazines and the ghouls were close enough, they, too, set their firearms aside and deployed their swords, creating a phalanx of enchanted steel that the ghouls rushed headlong into. Several actually managed to impale themselves on Templar blades, much to the soldiers’ surprise. It took a moment for some of the men to boot the offensive creatures off their weapons and assume a more traditional swordplay stance. Once the melee was underway, however, the Templars cut through the undead at a rapid, unforgiving pace.

  The melee was fought in earnest. The ghouls swiped and clawed at the Templars and the knights blocked or dodged the attacks while countering with their own long-fought skill and technique. Limbs of ghouls flew through the darkness, heads rolled like obscene playground balls on the floor.

  Then Duncan went down.

  Cade saw him hacking his way through the ghouls and felt a momentary flash of pride in the new guy. Then, a heartbeat after that, the ghoul Duncan was engaged with slipped a blow and leapt into the opening Duncan left. The ghoul slashed both hands across the Templar’s chest, spilling Duncan’s armor plates. Duncan adjusted, recovering from the attack and neatly severing the ghoul’s arms from its torso in one practiced, swift movement.

  But another ghoul lay in wait behind Duncan, and struck. Duncan roared over the melee, and pivoted toward the new attacker. He caught the ghoul in one shoulder, making the limb go limp against the monster’s body, hanging by grotesque sinews but not yet severed.

  As Duncan reared with his sword to deliver the fatal blow, Cade saw his body lock up as if he’d looked Medusa in the face. The medic took one startled step backward, then fell to the floor, motionless, sword still clutched in his hands.

  Cade rammed aside the ghoul he was fighting as he saw Duncan’s attacker start to swoop in on the defenseless man. He had no time to attack—so instead the commander used his forward momentum to smash headlong into the creature.

  The two of them tumbled into the dirt floor, a tangle of limbs. Cade kicked himself free of the beast and rolled to his feet, sword at an angle to deflect any incoming blow. But the ghoul was still struggling to regain its footing, and Cade took the opportunity to cleave its head from its body.

  The ghoul dropped soundlessly to the ground beside Duncan. Cade surveyed the scene, assessing the fight, sword raised and ready.

  Unlike their previous skirmishes, this time the Templars had the better of it. The ghouls attacked relentlessly, with no thought for their own safety, throwing themselves at the men with abandon, but the Templars had learned from their previous encounters, and now that they’d had a chance to lay a trap and had room to move, the ghouls were dropping one after another.

  The battle did not come without cost. At a quick count, Cade saw three Templars motionless on the floor—hopefully only paralyzed. Another two men were dead or would soon be, their armor torn apart and chests split, rent apart by ghoul claws. With Duncan, that gave them six casualties.

  Six more than Cade wanted, but given the math, perhaps they’d been lucky.

  Combat drew to a close. Seeing that he was no longer under immediate threat, Cade turned his attention to Duncan. He dropped to the floor and removed Duncan’s monocular. He shook Duncan’s shoulder twice.

  “Duncan. Can you hear me?”

  Duncan blinked. Cade bent over and put his ear close to Duncan’s mouth, resting a gloved hand on Duncan’s abdomen.

  He was breathing. Not well, to be sure, but air was getting in and coming out.

  Cade pulled back. “We’re getting out of here,” he said. “You’ll be all right.”

  Duncan blinked again. Cade gave him another squeeze on the shoulder before standing up.

  The Templars had won. Men stood breathing hard, swords slick with gore, checking in with one another. Finally one Templar called, “Clear!” followed by identical shouts from the others.

  Once confirmed that the battle had ended, the Templars leapt to their fallen comrades and began triage. Cade was already sure what they’d find for the most part, and activated his mic.

  “Moro, come in.”

  “Right behind you,” Moro said aloud.

  Cade turned to find Moro walking up, toting his MP5, sword slung. “Have to say, I didn’t much care to be left out of this fight.”

  “Understood,” Cade said. “Report.”

  Moro gestured with his free hand. “Two tunnels at the back, one about twice as big as the other. I went down that one a bit, nothing much to see, but I’d bet that’s the one we want. It smelled better.”

  Cade glanced at the bodies hanging from the ceiling. “Ghouls didn’t build this place. I’ll give them the tunnel digging, but not sinking this kind of hardware into the ceiling.”

  Moro lowered his voice. “What do we do with them, boss?”

  Cade grit his teeth. What, indeed?

  He moved away from the bodies toward the two tunnels Moro had found, and Moro followed close. “If we take the live ones off, we might do more damage. We don’t have the gear to treat them if we did remove them. I think we need to beat it out of here and get some damn backup ASAP.”

  Moro frowned and said, “Yeah. Agreed.”

  “Have Riley get our guys together, and let’s get out of here.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Moro jogged back to the men and began organizing them as Cade stood at the entrance of the larger of the two tunnels. He closed his eye and lifted the monocular to give his face a break; the night-vision had certainly saved their lives down here, but damn if they weren’t a heavy piece of gear. He rubbed his face and wondered if this larger tunnel would take them to surface.

  12

  They found the exit thirty minutes later. The ghouls probably could have covered that distance in ten minutes or less, but given half the team was burdened with carrying their wounded, Cade figured thirty minutes was actually pretty damn good time.

  The tunnel had crept steadily upward, and terminated in a steep earthen ramp to the surface. The mouth of the tunnel opened in a wooded area Cade estimated was less than half a click from Gales Ferry proper. Not pausing for rest, he ordered the men ahead toward the LZ, putting Moro in charge of the egress while he and Riley brought up the rear. As they walked, Cade called in his report over a satellite phone.

  He could have used his computer, but did not want to look at the preceptor’s face. Four men were still missing in addition to the six his team had to carry out, and he felt there were still ghouls out here somewhere. The adrenal thrill of the victory in the meat locker had burned off, and Cade knew one wrong tweak of Johannson’s mouth would send him into a fury he could ill afford.

  “Williams,” Preceptor Johannson said after Cade identified himself. “I hear you have casualties.”

  “Yes, sir. Six with us, and four missing. I’m going door to door to find my men. We need a burn crew and as many medics as you can call up.”

  “Is that an order, Commander?”

  Cade bit back a caustic response. “Sir, we’ve got a number of civilians over here who are dead or dying, some of them hanging from meat hooks, and an unknown number of ghouls still in the area. Call it whatever you want, but send a burn crew and medics quickly! Sir.”

  The preceptor was not quite so fast to respond now. “Hanging . . . from—”

  “Meat. Hooks.
Like cattle for slaughter. Like the Texas Chainsaw fucking Massacre, yeah.”

  “No, no, no,” Johannson said, and Cade felt his own eyes bulge in disbelief at the preceptor’s denial. “That’s, that’s simply not possible, ghouls have never exhibited that kind of behavior.”

  “Exactly. Something else is going on here.”

  “You have misidentified your opponent.”

  “Negative. We saw them up close and personal. I believe there’s more to the story.”

  “Go on.” Johannson’s voice had resumed its lazy arrogance, as if he could barely be bothered with Cade’s report.

  At that point, Cade very nearly didn’t bother with his conclusions, but there was no one else to give the information to. Not at this point. If the preceptor screwed this up, he’d happily take it up the chain of command.

  “There’s a U.S. Government black site not far from here, and our current intel suggests they’ve got quite a mortuary. Given how we observed these ghouls behaving, I think we need to check out that site immediately. Someone’s doing something they shouldn’t to create these things, and that’s our best lead.”

  Cade nearly screamed at the preceptor’s response:

  “We’ll look into it.”

  “Sir—”

  “Gather your men and return to post. The burn crew and medics are en route. I want you back here as soon as possible.”

  Cade glanced at Riley, meeting his old friend’s eyes in sheer disbelief. “After I run IC for the burn crew and get my men back.”

  “No, now. I have something else for you to do.”

  “Under the circumstances—”

  “Under the circumstances, you’ll follow orders, Commander,” Johannson snapped. “Leave one or two of your men to run incident command. I want you back at post on the first helicopter. Understood?”

  Cade grit his teeth. “And the black site?”

  “I’ll send a team. We’ll look into it. You get back to post. Johannson out.”

  The line went dead. Cade rammed the sat phone into a pocket on his BDUs.

  “What’s up, boss?” Riley asked.

  “You wouldn’t believe me if I told you.”

  Riley grinned. “I might.”

  Cade snorted an agreement, and the two men pushed on through the woods behind the team. Gripes went up the chain of command, as always—he’d bring his concerns to Riley only when it was clear doing so was in the interest of all of Echo. Until then, Cade would have to keep his own counsel on the new preceptor.

  Echo Team reached the extraction point near the river in good time. The men set up a defensive perimeter as they awaited the helicopters, which thankfully arrived only minutes later. The giant Blackhawks, two of which were outfitted for MEDEVAC duty, landed bare seconds apart from one another. Cade helped carry Duncan to one of them while another Templar shouted triage notes to the medics on board.

  Cade gripped Duncan’s shoulder. “You’ll be okay. This stuff’ll wear off, you’ll be back on duty in no time. You get me?”

  Duncan blinked rapidly. He was a little unglued, Cade could see, but not panicking. Cade couldn’t blame him. Paralysis had to be a frightening experience, no matter the cause. That, and Duncan probably knew as well as Cade there was no telling how long it might last. All either of them could do was hope.

  And maybe one of them would pray.

  Cade slipped out of the way as other casualties were loaded. From two additional choppers, burn crews disembarked, their flamethrowers at the ready. Cade assigned Olsen as the incident commander to the teams. He’d fill in the burn crews with all their available intel.

  The commander found Kirkland amid the controlled chaos of the landing and pulled him aside. “Download everything you can about that site,” he called into the soldier’s ear over the noise of the Black Hawks. “I want it all.”

  Kirkland gave him a confused look. “Already done, sir. I figured you’d want a copy. Something up?”

  “Don’t know yet. Good work.”

  “Any time, sir,” Kirkland said with a slanted smile. “What about Butterfield and—”

  “I know. Olsen’s IC, the crews will be looking for them. The rest of us . . .”

  He wasn’t sure how to say the rest without a few dozen expletives.

  “Follow orders,” he finished.

  Kirkland nodded his understanding. Cade sent him off to rejoin the cadre, which was switching places with the burn crew. The commander might follow the preceptor’s orders—he did follow them every once in awhile, when it suited his purposes—but he’d also stay put until he was satisfied the incoming teams had the area under control.

  A series of medium tactical trucks pulled up a few minutes later, their beds loaded with draped cargo. A woman in dark utilities climbed out of the lead truck and made her way unerringly to Cade, who stood apart from Moro and Nick, observing how they organized their IC. They were doing great; Gales Ferry was in good hands. With any luck, there might even be a few survivors.

  “Commander Williams?” the woman said as she marched up to him.

  Cade scanned her, not answering, knowing he didn’t need to. She was shorter than he, but squared away, someone who had seen some form of combat, Cade guessed. Whether that combat was with human or inhuman enemies was another question.

  “Captain Reyes, logistics,” she said, offering neither hand nor salute. Cade knew she and her team must have been deployed by Johannson, so Cade's guard rose immediately.

  “Do we need to rope the whole town?” Reyes said.

  “I’d say yes,” Cade replied in an insubordinate drawl.

  “Is it still hot?”

  “Most likely. Gosh, I’d like to tell you more, but I’ve been ordered back to post.”

  “Hey!” Reyes snapped back. “I’m on your side, doing my job. I’m not a big fan of our new top either, but we all have our orders, so don’t block me off like some civilian.”

  Cade eased back. Reyes might be a keeper.

  “We haven’t seen any ghouls for a while, but I’m willing to bet there are plenty more around, most likely in the tunnels we discovered. There’s at least one exit about half a klick that way, just outside of town. The other entrances we’ve seen were all in-town, but that doesn’t mean there aren’t more.”

  “Thank you, sir,” Reyes said. Then in a slightly less officious voice, she asked, “How’s your team?”

  “We took some hits.”

  “That sucks,” Reyes stated. “Sorry to hear it. Thanks for doing what you do.”

  She pivoted and went back to her truck before Cade could even think to reply. The trucks rolled out and disappeared into Gales Ferry, headed, he knew, to the main arteries into and out of town.

  One of Echo Team jogged up to him. “Commander, HQ is asking for your ETA. We need to lift off.”

  Cade nodded slowly. “We’ll get there when we get there.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  The Templar rushed back to the awaiting Black Hawks. Cade could feel more than see his team watching him, waiting to see what he would do next.

  What he did was take a deep breath, hold it, then release it. He walked to the helicopter farthest away and climbed in. He gave the pilot a sign, and the chopper lifted off the ground.

  The Black Hawk dipped and headed back toward post. Cade could make out Reyes’s trucks along one of the roads, her crew already busy setting up temporary fencing and warning signs. Per Templar procedure, the place would be marked as a biohazard to discourage any curious folks from getting too close. The outside world would never know the real fate of Gales Ferry.

  That was for the best. The world wasn’t ready for the reality, and never would be. That’s why groups like the Templars existed—so they’d never have to.

  Commander Cade Williams at last let his one good eye shut as he leaned his head against the rattling bulwark of the Black Hawk. He decided that when he got back to post and checked in, he’d take a nice long shower and grab something to eat in the mess. Then
he’d go say hello to Preceptor Johannson, in private. They’d have a friendly little chat about this new assignment he had for Cade.

  The knight commander smiled.

  He was looking forward to that talk.

  LEND A HAND?

  Reviews are the most powerful tools in my arsenal when it comes to getting attention for my books. Much as I’d like to, I don't have the financial pull or muscle of a New York publisher.

  But I do have something much more powerful and effective than that, and it’s something that those publishers would kill to get their hands on.

  A committed and loyal bunch of readers like you.

  Honest reviews of my books help bring them to the attention of other readers.

  If you’ve enjoyed this book, I would be very grateful if you could follow the links to where you obtained it and leave a short review. Every review helps a lot!

  Review Tooth and Claw

  About the Author

  Joseph Nassise is the New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of more than forty novels, including the TEMPLAR CHRONICLES series, the JEREMIAH HUNT trilogy, and the GREAT UNDEAD WAR series.

  Joe is a multiple Bram Stoker Award and International Horror Guild Award nominee and served two terms as president of the Horror Writers Association, the world's largest organization of professional horror and dark fantasy writers.

  If you want to stay up-to-date on the very latest news, you can follow Joe on Twitter @jnassise, hang out at his Facebook page, or visit his website at josephnassise.com.