They screwed it in place and took one step back before drawing to attention and saluting the niche.
Holt had selected the prayers he wanted said. There wasn’t a lot of difference between the current Book of Common Prayer and the 1928 edition, but there was enough that I was using the book.
“Oh God, whose mercies cannot be numbered, accept our prayers on behalf of the soul of thy servant departed, and grant John an entrance into the land of light and joy, in the fellowship of thy saints, through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.”
“Amen,” everyone around me said.
Goodhart had the good sense to wait until I changed, and we were back at the office before running me down.
“Jesse,” he said, hooking a thumb toward his office.
I followed him.
There was a large, black-bearded individual waiting in Goodhart’s office.
“First, meet your new FNG—Narayan Singh,” Goodhart said simply.
“Singh,” I replied, offering him my hand. We shook. “How long have you been working for QMG?”
“Ten years now,” Singh replied in a very English accent.
“He’s been with Group for ten years and you say he’s an FNG?” I asked, turning to Goodhart.
“He’s new here. He was with the London office, and you know they do things differently there,” Goodhart replied.
“No monster killing without a proper brew up first,” Singh said with a grin. “My superiors in London were properly chuffed to see me apply to work in another location.”
I had to know.
“Why?” I asked.
“The higher ups tend to get a bit miffed when you burn down historic structures in order to drive out a vampire and his minions,” Singh replied with a shrug.
“Oh, you’re going to fit in just fine,” I replied. “Weapons preference?”
“I am current on all weapons used by teams in North America,” he replied. “Although I prefer something belt-fed, honestly.”
“We’ve been short a machine gunner,” I replied. “The team should be in the ready room. Talk to Johnson. Oh, by the way, there’s a lot of Johns on the team, so we tend to last names.”
He laughed. “I did my initial service in a regiment that was drawn heavily from the Sikh community. Everyone was named Singh, so we had some workarounds for which Singh was wanted.”
Goodhart waited until the door closed behind Singh before speaking.
“How’re you doing?” he asked.
“I’ve had better weeks,” I admitted. “How upset is HQ?”
“Oh, mildly pissed,” Goodhart said, rocking a hand side to side. “They wanted to know why you didn’t use your sniper to take out the sniper shooting at you, rather than burning down a building or three.”
“I see they’re not reading reports and just jumping straight to conclusions again.” I sighed.
“Yeah, they completely ignored the line ‘we were unable to put down effective counter sniper fire since the team sniper was whacked out of her gourd on happy juice,’” Goodhart said, running a hand through his thinning hair. “I’ve explained it twice, but Carne especially has a hardon for you for some reason.”
“I told her she needed to retire,” I replied.
“Yeah, that would do it,” he said, pouring a cup of coffee and sliding it across the desk.
I waited until he’d fixed himself a cup.
“So, have y’all gotten anything from the werewolf we captured before Holt got stupid?” I asked.
“Nothing actionable yet. As for Holt, isn’t that a bit harsh, Jesse?”
“You tell me—the kid wanted to do the right thing, but he took off his armor so he could move in the back of the Tahoe,” I said. “We weren’t sure the damn werewolf was down when he bolted into the line of fire to inject it.”
“More balls than brains?” Goodhart asked.
“No,” I replied after a minute. “I’d have to talk to the shrink he’s been seeing here to be sure, but I think he still felt bad about puking while we were in the Shadow Lands. He never did quite get comfortable around firearms, so…”
“He probably felt he was letting y’all down,” Goodhart replied.
“Something like that, yeah,” I said, draining my cup. “Where’d you come up with Singh?”
He actually grinned—full on shit-eating good-ol’-boy grinned—at me.
“He’s a gift from HQ, from our cousins across the Pond,” Goodhart said, holding up a hand to stop my question. “Seriously. The building he burned to the ground? It was an outbuilding at Balmoral Castle.”
I gave him a puzzled look.
“The queen’s summer home,” Goodhart said. “Her Majesty approved the destruction, but the heir wasn’t amused, so Group thought it best to approve his transfer. When I saw his record, I requested him as a floater to fill in for injured team members, but Holt died and, well…”
“Right,” I said, looking at my watch. “I’ve got to go explain to the headshrinker why I felt burning down an apartment building was the best solution to a sniper on the roof. Again.”
“I feel your pain,” he said as I stood.
* * * * *
Chapter Twenty-Four
It was a week before we were called out again—minor hunt, a pack of chupacabra harassing a cow/calf operation between Austin and Fredericksburg. Chupacabra are not meticulous feeders—they will go after anything with a body temperature and enough blood to fill the gaping hole in their middle that serves as a stomach. Problem is, they’re nasty little buggers whose bite is downright septic. Only thing with a worse bite is a Komodo dragon, so you really don’t want to get in range of their teeth.
Naturally, Singh saw this as a challenge and caught one alive.
“What the fuck do you want to do with that?” Dalma asked, eyeing both the chupacabra and Singh.
“I thought R&D could tell us if they were a normal occurrence here, or if they’d been brought in as a distraction,” Singh answered, giving the chupacabra a shake.
It tried to turn its head and hiss at him—the big Sikh had grabbed it by the scruff of the neck, and it hung there, everything but its head immobile.
“Well,” I drawled, “if nothing else, we’ve learned one thing.”
“What’s that?” Diindiisi asked, looking up from where she was counting the heads of the rest of the pack.
“Chupacabra mothers lift their young by the scruff of the neck, and the little bastards get paralyzed when you do it,” I said. “How were you planning on transporting Mr. Fangy there, Singh?”
“I…I hadn’t thought of that,” Singh replied.
“I’ve got an old dog cage y’all can have,” said Sarah Alexopopolus, the owner of the farm, from a safe distance away. “If y’all think it’ll hold the little bastard.”
“They don’t have much bite pressure, so it shouldn’t be able to bite through the cage,” Baxter replied, walking to over where Alexopopolus stood. “They’re kinda like vampire bats in that way—they nip to get the blood flowing, then lick the wound. Their saliva has anti-coagulants and soporifics in it, which causes the animal to stand there while the chupacabra’s feeding.”
“The bites are nasty, though,” Alexopopolus said, leading Baxter into a shed.
“Oh, yeah, that’s because the little bastards’ll eat anything if they can’t get blood,” Baxter replied. “They’ve been known to be coprophagic.”
“Coprophagic?” Alexopopolus asked as they started back toward us.
“Shit eating,” Padgett shouted with a grin.
“That’d do it,” Alexopopolus replied. “Y’all get all of them?
“I think so,” Diindiisi replied, standing and pulling off a pair of rubber gloves. “Average pack size is ten, and counting the one Mr. Singh is holding, we’ve captured or killed ten. That’s not saying that there aren’t a couple more running around, but…”
“But I’ve got your phone number if any more show up,” Alexopopolus said with a grin. “And the cha
rge is waved if you show up a second time, I know.”
“You’ve done this before,” I said, watching Baxter assemble the cage.
It’d be a tight fit, but I wasn’t concerned about the comfort of the chupacabra, if I were being honest about it. Putting it in the cage was going to be a giant, industrial-sized pain in the ass.
“At least the cage opens from the top,” Baxter said when she’d finished putting it together.
“Used to show Borzois with my partner,” Alexopopolus said, watching us try to figure out how we were going to stuff thirty pounds of piss and vinegar into the cage. “Course, the dog’d just jump into the cage when I told it to.”
“Padgett, grab the barrel change gloves from the machine gun kits, would you?” I said, trying to figure out the safest way to drop Mr. Fangy in the cage.
“Sure thing, Jesse,” Padgett said, walking over to the Tahoe and rummaging in the back. “Although I’ve got something here that might work better.”
He came back over with the gloves from one of the padded suits we’d used when we caught the werebear.
“I thought we’d turned these in,” I said, pulling on the gloves.
“Yeah, well, these were, to quote supply, ‘damaged in use,’ so I hung on to them,” Padgett replied with a grin. “I figured we’d need them at some point. It’s not like we don’t encounter things with sharp, pointy teeth all the time.”
“True dat,” I said, making sure I had the gloves seated. “Singh, put Mr. Fangy there in the cage through the top. I’ll close the lid down on your arm, and on three, you let go and pull your arm out. I’ll slam the lid shut, and we’re good to go.”
I got any number of fish-eyed looks from everyone around me. Even the chupacabra had a look that said, ‘mmm, tasty idiot.’
Improvise, adapt, and overcome wasn’t just a good motto for my days in the Corps.
Singh set the chupacabra in the cage, keeping his hold on its neck. I closed the lid until it rested on his arm.
“One…two…three!”
Things went rapidly to shit—Singh released the chupacabra and slid his arm out of the cage, where his jacket sleeve hung on one of the closures for the lid. The chupacabra hissed and leapt forward, throwing its entire thirty-pound weight against the bars and rattling the entire cage. Annnddd just to complete the cluster fuck, I slammed the lid down on Singh’s arm, trapping it in the cage.
“Well, fuck,” Padgett said, dangling a hand in front of the chupacabra to keep it interested in anything but Singh.
Mr. Fangy snapped at Padgett’s hand, which was safely out of range.
“Get yourself loose,” I said to Singh as I pushed the other closures home.
Singh pulled out a knife and slit his cuff, pulling his hand clear just as the chupacabra figured out there was a food source that was both closer than Padgett’s hand and not protected by those frustrating metal bars. It gave a disgruntled squawk as I slammed the lid on its nose and slid the final closure home.
“Now I’ve seen everything,” Alexopopolus said, as the chupacabra started keening in the cage.
“That can’t be good,” Baxter said as the keening rose in pitch.
“Ms. Alexopopolus? Would you mind stepping back inside for a few minutes,” I said. I’d seen something moving over by the shed. “On second thought, why don’t you climb in the Tahoe there with Mr. Hiebert and lock the doors.”
Apparently there were more than ten chupacabra in this pack, or this was the alpha pack for the area, because chupacabra came running from all directions. It was pandemonium, set to “Ballroom Blitz” by Krokus.
Have you ever tried to fire a sub-machinegun while wearing padded, bite-proof gloves? My damn fingers wouldn’t fit inside the trigger guard, and that was only the beginning.
Diindiisi was shooting leaping chupacabra out of the air like skeet; Johnson had dropped into his Tahoe and was rolling up the windows. Singh, on the other hand, had gone medieval on the chupacabra, drawing a sword and dagger rather than bringing his Maximini to bear.
“Bole So Nihal! Sat Sri Akal!” Singh shouted joyously, wading into the pack of chupacabra.
I swear, my hand on a stack of religious texts of your choosing, chupacabra chunks went flying everywhere. The rest of the team stopped firing—unless you’re using a plus ten gun of never misses and you absolutely have to, firing into melee is a bad thing—as in you’re probably going to kill everyone downrange of your muzzle bad.
I got the damn gloves off as Singh decapitated the last of the chupacabra. He stood there, not even panting, the magnificent bastard.
“Is it safe to come out?” Ms. Alexopopolus asked through a cracked window.
“I think so,” I replied, walking over to where Singh stood, cleaning his blades.
“I’m sorry, sir,” he said.
“What are you apologizing for?” I asked. “You saved us a lot of ammo.”
“Yes, but I could have been injured, or shot,” he said.
“We’re going to have to do some time in the shoot house,” I said, “but most of the team knows not to fire into melee. What was that barbaric yawp you shouted before you waded in?”
“Bole So Nihal! Sat Sri Akal!” he repeated. “That is a jaikara.”
He could see the puzzlement written large on my face.
“A Sikh shout of victory,” he said. “Usually shouted by two or more. The first part means ‘Whoever utters what follows shall be happy, shall be fulfilled,’ and the second half means ‘Eternal is the Holy/Great Timeless Lord.’”
“Something like Hakkaa Paalle!?” Wilson asked.
“Hakkaa Paalle?” I replied.
“Cut them down! It was the battle cry of the Finnish light cavalry in service with Gustavus Adolphus,” Wilson replied, looking at the faces around him. “What? I’m reading Eric Flint between jobs.”
“Something like that, yes,” Singh replied, sheathing his sword and dagger, “and I can’t fault your choices of fiction. Although I prefer David Drake.”
Just what we needed, a discussion of the literary merits of Science Fiction authors with the client standing there.
“Ms. Alexopopolus, I think that cleared up your problem,” I said, watching Baxter and Hovis stack heads so we could add them to the count. “You apparently had more than one pack in the area.”
Mr. Fangy was still keening, but nothing else was arriving.
“I know who we need to give Mr. Fangy here to,” I said to Diindiisi.
“Sola Stellus,” everyone but Singh answered.
“Who is Sola Stellus?” Singh asked.
“Oh, you’re going to love him,” Baxter replied with a grin.
* * * * *
Chapter Twenty-Five
I got an email from Stellus, bemoaning our latest gift to him. I ignored it—R&D was where the little beast belonged, after all was said and done. As far as I knew, this was the first live chupacabra exhibiting multi-pack control behavior ever caught alive. Hell, it was the first one I’d ever heard of controlling more than one pack.
I filled out the paperwork and suggested that we might want to cut the fee we charged Ms. Alexopopolus by the cost of one good dog cage. Not that I thought the bean counters would listen, but it made me feel better to suggest it to the authorities. I figured I would check with her in a month or so, and then pay for the cage out of my own pocket. It was the right thing to do.
I wandered down into the cafeteria and found Lou Garrett sitting there, drinking coffee.
“Hey, Jesse, pull up a chair,” Garrett said as I walked in.
I grabbed coffee and sat down. Lou was in his usual film noir outfit—dark slacks, white shirt, skinny tie askew, dark suit jacket, and khaki-colored trench coat thrown over the backs of two different chairs. His fedora was taking up the third, so I moved it over with his jacket.
“You’ve ruined the Feng Shui I created,” Lou said with a laugh as I sat down.
“In the ancient words of my people, whatever,” I said, smiling back.
“Why the hell are you still here?”
“That’s a bit blunt,” Lou replied.
“I’ve been told it’s a failing of mine, along with being a major league smartass,” I replied. “But you’re avoiding the question.”
“Yeah, I am,” he replied. “Truth is, that fucking Elvis impersonator you’ve got in R&D hasn’t removed my implant yet. Claims he’s still researching how to remove it without harm.”
“But he needs data from you every day, right?” I replied.
“Something like that, yeah,” Lou said. “How’d you know?”
“Oh, that’s Sola’s modus operandi,” I replied. “He really is a top-notch researcher, but there’s always just a bit more information he needs to make sure of things.”
“Yeah, well, he’s not the one with a geas on his ass calling him home,” Lou replied, sipping from his glass.
“I’ll talk to him,” I said.
“I’d appreciate it.”
“Lou, I’m not promising anything,” I said.
“Oh, I know,” Lou replied. “But the worst thing he can do is say no.”
“You’ve never really talked to Sola,” I replied. “The worst thing he can do is make you sit there for hours listening to bad Elvis songs.”
“You know, I never thought of it that way,” Lou said, grimacing.
“Then there’s the fact that werewolves don’t age normally,” I added. “He could keep you doing that for centuries.”
“That’s just evil,” Lou replied.
“Not quite, according to Michelangelo, but its borderline behavior,” I said. “I’ll try not to piss him off too much. Although he’s not real happy with the present we gave him yesterday.”
“Do I want to know?” Lou asked.
“Live chupacabra. Live, evolved behavior chupacabra,” I said.
“Where did you get a live goat sucker?” Lou asked. “Most of the little bastards aren’t smart enough to avoid a number four beaver trap baited with warm cheese.”
Blood Moon Eclipse (The Shadow Lands Book 2) Page 19
