Path of the Tiger

by J M Hemmings

  The troops reached the wreckage and searched through the mess of burning material. As the old man roamed his digital eye over this unfolding scene a mounting rage, like a steadily building head of steam in a pressurised vessel, began to heat his entire being, darkening his skin in tones of beet and crimson.

  ‘No bodies,’ one of the troops announced after a few minutes of searching.

  ‘Well what does the fucking tracker say, you cocksucking imbecile?!’ the old man snarled.

  The soldier pulled out a tablet, swiped across the screen a few times, and then shook his head, frowning.

  ‘It says they’re still right here, sir.’

  The old man’s hand quivered with silent violence inside his coat, each of his knuckles straining like a parasitic pupa trying to burst free from its skin cocoon, and it took every ounce of control he possessed to avoid blasting off revolver rounds into the gathering crowd. At this moment only violent death, delivered by his hands, could quell the fire-tornado of fury that consumed him, but that would have to be done in private, to victims who would not be missed. With a quick phone call such things could be arranged … but first he had to take control of this situation.

  ‘Lock down everything within a three-mile radius,’ he growled through gritted teeth to the soldier next to him. ‘They’re somewhere nearby; nobody, not even these beastwalker fucks, can just up and vanish into thin goddamn air. They’re here, and whoever is hiding them is going to fucking pay. Nobody, and I mean not a single living soul leaves this area until those fuckers are found. Got it?’

  The soldier nodded and saluted.

  ‘Sir yes sir!’ he barked gruffly. ‘It’s a lockdown, sir!’

  He scurried off to carry out the order, and the old man turned around and got his phone out. There was a message waiting on the screen that cheered him up, and when he opened it up and read it, the ends of his mouth curled faintly upwards into a phantom of a smile.

  The Propaganda Department has taken care of the teenagers, sir. Check out CNN, Fox News, YouTube, MSN etc in a couple minutes.

  He shoved his phone back into his pocket, nodded with silent approval and shuffled back over to the helicopter, his cane clacking arrhythmically on the street as he did, like the lone hoof of some lamed devil.

  Inside the Blackhawk, the pilot leaned over to the co-pilot and whispered under his breath.

  ‘Who is that old guy again, man?’

  The co-pilot raised an eyebrow before responding.

  ‘You’re new on the job, huh?’

  ‘First day today.’

  ‘Yeah, that figures. Well, buddy, that old guy just happens to be Mr Nathan Deveraux.’

  ‘Nathan Deveraux? Should I know who that is?’

  The co-pilot rolled his eyes and shook his head.

  ‘Shit, you really are new here. Nathan Graham Deveraux, vice-president of the Huntsmen Corporation. You wanna keep this job, you’d best not forget that.’

  ***

  ‘You, girl, pull the red catch to your left, now!’ Zakaria bellowed at Paola, unbuckling his seatbelt with hasty fingers. ‘Do it! Those choppers will turn us all to ashes in less than a minute if you don’t!’

  Paola, too traumatised and terrified to do anything but obey, pulled the red-painted lever to her left. The floor of the van dropped abruptly away, and the teens screamed as they and the unconscious tiger plummeted into the void that appeared beneath them. They did not fall very far or long, though; twelve feet below them was a large foam mattress that gently stopped their abrupt descent.

  ‘Boy!’ Zakaria shouted into the hole at Daekwon. ‘Pull your wounded friend out of the way, and the tiger if you can! We’re coming in after you!’

  Without waiting for Daekwon to respond, Zakaria grabbed Chloe. Before she could even think of resisting, he flung her like a sack of potatoes into the back, where she too fell through the hole with a shriek of fright. Daekwon had managed to haul Jun off the mattress, but the tiger was still lying there, and Chloe only barely missed landing on him. Zakaria came down a second later, hitting the edge of the mattress and turning his landing into an acrobatic roll, from which he came up on his feet.

  The teens found themselves in New York’s sewer network, or at least, that was what they guessed without being able to see much; as dark and gloomy as it was down here, the septic-feeling damp and gut-churning, pervasive stench of raw sewage made it impossible for them to imagine that they were anywhere else.

  Before anyone could say anything, a new voice – that of a woman in her thirties, from the sound of it – called out to them from the shadows.

  ‘The Huntsmen are tracking those rug rats’ phones, Zakaria. At least one a’ the lil’ shits must have a MANMO-M device. Make ‘em toss their damn phones, now!’

  ‘You heard her,’ grunted Zakaria. ‘If you have a MANMO-M device drop it now, or we all die.’

  Daekwon, like the others, was too frightened and overwhelmed to argue. He pulled out his MANMO-M phone and dropped it onto the mattress.

  ‘Anyone else?!’ Zakaria shouted sharply. ‘I am not joking!’

  Everyone else simply shook their heads.

  ‘Good. You, big boy, pick up your wounded friend … then all of you, run!’

  The moment he said this a bright light flickered on behind him, illuminating the sewer tunnel in a blaze of icy white light. Silhouetted against the massive LED lamp was the figure of a long-limbed woman with a large afro.

  ‘This way!’ she cried. ‘Hurry!’

  Daekwon scooped up Jun in both arms and took off at a quick clip, following Paola and Chloe, who needed no encouragement to bolt.

  ‘Keep running until you get to the next light!’ the woman ordered as the teens raced past her. ‘Wait for us there!’

  She sprinted in the opposite direction, towards Zakaria, who was dragging the tiger off the mattress.

  ‘Come on, come on!’ he yelled. ‘It’s going to blow any second!’

  The woman skidded to a halt next to him, and the pair of them managed to lift the tiger, after which they began as hasty a retreat as they could manage. Before they run even ten paces, though, a tremendous explosion thundered its destructive wrath through the sewer from above. A plume of billowing flame burst like an inverted mushroom cloud from the manhole, accompanied by an ear-splitting blast and a shock wave that rocked the walls and ceiling with sharp and sudden violence, causing showers of cement dust and masonry grit to rain down and pelt the fleeing figures. Shrapnel fragments spewed like dragon spittle from the opening, and Zakaria screamed and stumbled forward as a number of the white-hot projectiles buried themselves in his back. Others ricocheted off the walls, while some pieces zipped into the filthy water, hissing with wrathful vehemence as they sank.

  ‘Shit! Damn it, shit, shit!’ Zakaria snarled through clenched teeth, his good eye stark white as it protruded from its socket in the gloom. ‘Shrapnel, shit! By the Mother, it burns, shit, shit, it burns!’

  ‘Move it!’ the woman screamed, struggling under the weight of the unconscious tiger. ‘Fight through the pain and move, come on!’

  ‘This would be … a lot easier … if I changed forms,’ Zakaria growled, breathing hard from both exertion and the flame-tongue agony needling his back.

  ‘As long as you’re fine with ditching your equipment.’

  ‘I don’t give a shit about the equipment! Aargh!’

  ‘Well what are you waitin’ for?’

  Zakaria’s combat gear exploded in a confetti burst of shredded fabric, with grenades, knives and ammo pouches flying in all directions, bouncing into the water and jumping about with a haphazard clattering on the floor … and from this cloud of ripped cloth and flying ammunition, a huge silverback gorilla emerged, his meaty black hands gripping William’s tiger body exactly where Zakaria’s human hands had just been holding it. Some of the shrapnel shards were squeezed out of his back by the transformation, but others, embedded more deeply in the flesh remained, and the dense, silvery fur of his back was
soon tinted crimson with blood.

  Zakaria’s physical strength had almost tripled with the transformation, and with a growl he lunged forward, picked the tiger up and slung him over his shoulder, roaring out a howling boom of agony as the heavy body on his back drove some shrapnel shards even deeper into his flesh. Hobbling along on his hind legs and his right fist, with his left hand keeping William’s body in place over his shoulder, he and the woman were able to move along at a quick pace.

  They reached the next light, around which the teenagers had congregated. They were all gathered around Daekwon, who was still holding the limp body of Jun in his arms. Jun’s breathing was shallow and ragged, and his face had become deathly pale.

  “I don’t think he’s gon’ l-, last much longer,’ Daekwon murmured, his hands and arms shaking and his eyes bright with shock and disbelief. ‘He’s hurt bad, real bad—’

  He stopped speaking, flabbergasted, as he saw Zakaria in his gorilla form racing towards them with the tiger slung over his shoulder.

  ‘Oh my God, Mios Dio, oh hell no, hell no!’ Paola exclaimed, staggering back on jelly-weak legs.

  ‘Calm the fuck down, all of you!’ the woman roared, her sonorous voice reverberating like a detonating grenade through the sewers. ‘Y’all can shit your damn pants later, I don’t give a fuck! Right now you either do exactly what I say when I say it, or every single one of us is dead … and if I die on any a’ your stupid-ass accounts, when I see y’all in hell I’m gon’ make you fuckin’ regret ever sendin’ me there, are we clear?!’

  ‘Uh, y-, y-, yeah we good,’ Daekwon managed to stammer.

  Now that the woman was in the light, she was no longer a faceless silhouette. Instead, the teens saw in front of them an athletically built African American woman, tall and youthful, with broad shoulders, generous hips and buttocks, and lanky limbs. On an elegant, almost antelope-like neck, was perched an angular, oblong face on a skull that was long and narrow. On her countenance a number of proud features jostled for dominance: a wide machete slash of a mouth paring full lips that were painted ink black and pierced with an array of silver jewellery; large, piercing eyes in shallow sockets nestled beneath bold and dagger-straight eyebrows; and a prominent, hooked nose accessorised with both a thick silver septum ring and a gold nostril ring. The softly kinky, halo-like afro of fluorescent green hair that crowned her head was, in its sphericity, at odds with the geometric nature of her facial features, but its daring colour complemented her copious facial jewellery perfectly. Intricate tattoos crept up both sides of her neck and were splashed across the entirety of her throat, and the designs spilled out from beneath her sleeves onto the back of each of her long-fingered hands.

  Like Zakaria, she was attired in black combat gear, and the various weapons and tools that were attached to her person rattled and jingled with every step she took. Slung over her shoulder was an AK-47 assault rifle, and two pistols were holstered on her muscular thighs. Her presence was commanding enough without her foghorn voice, and the mere sight of her was enough to spur the teens into action.

  ‘Just tell us what to do and we’ll do it,’ Chloe said nervously, her eyes darting frantically between the woman and the two huge wild animals next to her.

  ‘I’m turning this light off,’ the woman grunted, ‘and after that, you follow mine. If you can’t keep up, you die … it’s that simple. Now go!’

  The woman ripped the light off the wall and flung it into the water. It sank into the murky depths, illuminating a blurry bubble of grey-brown water for a few seconds before fizzling out. For a terrifying second or two the sewer tunnel was plunged into cloying and impenetrable darkness, but then the woman turned on an LED light on her belt and took off at a sprint.

  The teenagers had no choice but to race along behind her; it was either that or wait for the killers who were pursuing them to catch up. Bringing up the rear was Zakaria, in his gorilla form, trailing blood from his cut-up back but nonetheless carrying William with intrepid determination.

  The woman sped through the foul labyrinth, swooping around corners and veering without warning into side tunnels, her pace unrelenting. Behind her the teenagers sprinted, their throats and lungs burning, but their limbs propelled relentlessly on by the biological rocket fuel of adrenalin-infused terror. Nobody spoke, nobody shouted or screamed; the only sounds were the chaotic, arrhythmic jungle-drumming slaps of frantic feet on damp stone, and hard, desperate breathing.

  ‘Almost there!’ the woman yelled as she swooped off to the side and sprang with nimble grace across a slow-moving channel of filthy water. The teenagers jumped the gap after her, with Daekwon almost missing the landing, owing to the extra weight of Jun’s body in his arms. Zakaria charged after him, landing heavily on the other side, stumbling and coming close to falling as he did. As they ran, a sound that chilled every one of them to their bones echoed through the tunnels: the shouts of soldiers.

  ‘Son of a goddamn bitch!’ the woman cursed. ‘Stay right behind me dammit, we cannot slow down, we cannot!’

  She accelerated, keeping her AK-47 shouldered and ready to fire at a moment’s notice. The teens tore along behind her, their throats and lungs feeling as if they were seconds away from the point of collapse, with the air they sucked in tasting caustic and their limbs feeling leaden and impossibly ponderous. Zakaria, also panting from exhaustion now, ran behind them, hunched over on all fours, stabilising himself with his right fist and using his left hand to make sure the huge cat stayed safely on his shoulders.

  ‘We’re here!’ the woman yelled after she swung around one last corner and skidded to an abrupt halt. ‘Up the ladder, go, go!’

  As Zakaria stumbled to a halt behind the exhausted teens, both he and the woman felt buzzing electricity snaking through their bodies like swarms of microscopic, burrowing fireflies; another beastwalker was close. Someone removed the manhole cover from above them, and Chloe was the first to scramble up the ladder.

  She was almost at the top when the grizzly bear poked his head down through the hole. Too terrified to scream, she simply let go of the rungs, dropping off the ladder like a stone. She was barely airborne, though, when the huge bear shot out his paw, hooked his claws through the back of her shirt, and pulled her up through the manhole.

  ‘Don’t you fuckin’ dare jump or scream, girl!’ the woman screeched at Paola, who was whimpering with debilitating terror and frozen in place on the ladder. ‘Get your ass up that ladder! Ignore the bear!’

  Too cowed and fear-stricken to do anything but obey, Paolo ascended the ladder with violently trembling limbs and tears streaming down her cheeks. As she neared the top rung the bear grabbed her and hauled her up through the hole. Daekwon slung Jun’s body over his shoulder and scurried up the ladder, and the bear plucked the unconscious boy off him when he neared the top. Daekwon scrambled out of the manhole and found himself in the back of a small furniture truck, occupied by the other teens and, to his astonishment, an enormous grizzly bear.

  Adding to the bizarreness of the situation, there were a couple of bathrobes and three large, very old-looking bonsai trees in the truck – the inside of which was far more spacious than the interior of the van had been – along with a variety of weapons and military equipment, a computer desk with a number of monitors on it, an office chair and some other random items that all seemed out of place. Chloe and Paola, utterly petrified and hyperventilating, pressed themselves up against the rear wall of the truck, as far from the bear as they could get in these cramped confines. The bear, however, paid no heed to the teenagers, and instead reached down into the tunnel. With a sonorous growl that rattled the whole structure of the truck and got the teens screaming with fright, he hauled the unconscious tiger up through the manhole.

  The tiger was followed by Zakaria in his gorilla form; he had been pushing the tiger up the ladder using his immense strength and dexterity, with just one arm pulling both his own weight and William’s. As soon as he was inside, he collapsed onto his stomach, almos
t crushing Jun in the process. The pale fur on his back was dark crimson, matted with blood, and he was panting with crippling exhaustion.

  Last, the woman emerged from the manhole. She scrambled through the truck and slipped through a door that led to the front, and then clambered into the driver’s seat.

  ‘Let’s go, let’s go!’ she screamed as she started up the engine. ‘Close it up, I gotta drive!’

  The grizzly rolled Zakaria effortlessly onto his side and then dragged the manhole cover over the opening, backed further into the truck and slid the floor panel into place, sealing up the hole in the floor. The woman then shifted the van into gear and pulled off, but unlike Zakaria she drove at a sedate pace, not wishing to draw any unwanted attention to the vehicle.

  ‘Are we all good in the back there?’ she called out as she pulled up to a stop at a red light.

  In a grotesque flurry of dissolving fur, withering muscles, shrivelling limbs and a shrinking head, the grizzly bear became, in the blink of an eye, a freakish human-bear hybrid monstrosity, and then in another flash of shrinking and twisting and distending, only a man was left sitting in the space where the grizzly had just been.

  The Native American man was rail-thin, with his umber skin vacuum-packed around small but granite-hard clumps of muscle, upon which fat rattlesnake veins basked, and his sinewy frame was a ghostly mockery of the seven-hundred-kilogram bear he had been a moment earlier. He wore his long hair loose, and it cascaded about his narrow, hunched shoulders like a flash-frozen spill of black ink that reached almost down to his slim hips. Naturally hairless, the only hair visible on his body was a smattering of hair around his pubic area. His serene, gentle face was almost ageless; his cheeks were hollows from which the flesh looked as if it had been gouged by the hands of a clumsy and overeager god, but no lines or wrinkles marred the corners of his downturned mouth. A pronouncedly hooked beak of nose sat low over his burnt crimson lips, and his eyes were large and protuberant, with irises of a brown that was so dark that they were almost the same colour as his pupils. Above these were thick, sharply angled eyebrows, and below them were high, proud cheekbones that strained against the glowing, youthful skin that constrained them. There was old, mellowed wisdom etched deep in the man’s keenly intelligent eyes, yet a latent terror also dwelled there, as well as the ghostly flickering of an anxiety that looked nigh on debilitating … and his spine was bent, his shoulders round and slumped, carrying the invisible weight of many violent centuries, a lost way of being that could never return, and the memories of a genocide too vast to comprehend.