Just a few moments ago as Xander was searching the premises for something to help him start the fire and get Khatib’s attention, he had wondered if where he’d seen this setup before was one of Khatib’s previous compounds. Something told him this wasn’t the first time he’d had an encounter with this terrorist devil. After Xander had taken out a couple more of Khatib’s men, he found a gas can tucked in the bed of a broken-down pickup truck. He carried it with him across the street to the front door of the compound. He looked in through the lone window, and when he saw no one, he knew they were busy with the death of his friends, and he had to hurry. He walked right in the front door into the empty main floor of the compound. The hallway in front of him led straight through to the back door that exited to the beach. Xander could still see the floodlights shining out back, and with a quick search of the main floor, on the tips of his toes, he surmised that those were the only two doors from which you could exit the main floor.
He began to spread gasoline throughout the back room in hopes of forcing everyone out the front door. When the gas was gone, he tossed the can aside. He then took out the last of his frag grenades and rigged it in a way that if the back door was opened it would instantly explode, killing anyone in the immediate vicinity. The basement door faced the front door, so with the back room on fire Xander knew this would increase the chances they would walk right into his bullets as they tried to escape. His biggest problem would be the fire prematurely setting off the grenade, leaving them another door to escape through, but that was a risk he would have to take. He wasn’t worried about it blowing up his friends as they tried to escape because he knew once Khatib noticed the smoke filling the secret room, he would only be worried about saving himself. Xander knew Khatib would simply leave Kyle and Sam there to burn. Xander lit a match he found in one of the cabinets of the small kitchen and tossed it into the back of the compound to further encourage the men to run right out the front door in avoiding the fire behind them. He turned away from the igniting flame, walked outside toward the walkway, looked up, and noticed that it would be easy to pick off the remaining terrorists he was funneling through that front door from a perch on the roof across the street. After the grenade blew, of course, he would have to come back down to get his friends and take out whoever was left who tried to make an escape via the beach. Xander had run across the walkway, grabbed the rifle from the dead man who had shot at him earlier, then scaled the outside of the dark house and took his perch.
The fire was pretty well raging now. He figured the smoke had to be about to reach the underground room. Xander steadied his scope on the front door. He had calculated the other option of going in guns blazing and taking out everyone to save his friends. He knew, however, that they would be executed before he could make it to them. With the threat of fire trapping Khatib in the room, he knew that would be the only way to stop the execution, if there was any way at all. The key factor in all of this was of course believing Khatib was dumb enough to think the fire could travel that far down a long concrete hallway. He hoped that in the frightening commotion Khatib would simply leave his friends there, alone in the room, not considering that it couldn’t reach them. Xander’s biggest concern at that point of course was the smoke. It would just as easily kill Sam and Kyle; it would just take a little longer. Ten minutes to be exact, he computed. Ten minutes from the moment he set the compound on fire, which was now about five minutes ago.
Five minutes.
Xander’s internal clock commenced as the front door of the compound finally flung open. He peered through his scope as three men came running out.
POP-POP-POP! With three squeezes of the trigger, three men lay dead. A fourth poked his head out the door, but when he saw his comrades get gunned down, he quickly pulled himself back inside before Xander could end him. Xander heard shouts from inside the house. It was dark, but because of the flames in the room behind them he could see the silhouette of a head looking out a slit in the lone barred window.
Thwock!
Xander shattered the right corner panel of the window and splattered the face that was shadowed behind it. The shadow instantly dropped out of sight within the concrete wall of the compound. This brought a few screams of panic, and finally the barrel of a gun poked through the bottom right of that same window and fired randomly in Xander’s direction. A couple of the bullets zinged off the house he was perched on top of, so Xander squeezed the trigger once more and sent a bullet directly through the visible portion of the outstretched gun. A yelp from whomever was holding the gun made its way up to Xander on his perch.
Four minutes.
Xander held his gaze through the scope of the rifle and on the front door. The orange glow of the fire cast a dim light out over the sparkling ocean beyond the compound. It was burning slower than he had expected, but it didn’t surprise him all that much because there wasn’t a lot that was flammable inside. It was mostly the few pieces of scattered furniture.
Boom!
The grenade finally triggered, and a fantastic blast blew out concrete from the back wall onto the beach. The air was thick with smoke, and another cloud of dust and dirt filled the air with the explosion. If Khatib and his men could get around the fire in the back of the compound, they would have not only cover from Xander’s gun but an escape route to boot. Xander shouldered the rifle and made his way down the side of the dark house. If the blast of the grenade took one or two more men with it, Xander figured Khatib had to be running out of resources at this point. As soon as his feet hit the ground, he sprinted across the walkway, up the canal, and back to the area of brush he had jumped in the water from earlier. He high-stepped over the bodies he had gunned down several minutes ago, and as he entered the brush he heard voices coming from the beach. In his haste he had forgotten about the men he had killed with Rambo in the shade of his smoke grenade and tripped over one of their bodies, sending him facedown into a pile of dry and crackly leaved branches. His rifle flew off his shoulder and landed somewhere toward the middle of the thick bushes and shrubs. It, too, made a loud crack that immediately followed the one Xander’s body made. The voices coming from the beach stopped immediately. He held his position below the shade of the brush, listening. He could hear the crackling of fire from the compound but not the voices he hoped would resume conversation. Then he heard someone enter the brush. It was a very distinctive crack that these dried-up branches made.
Three minutes.
Xander raised his head slowly, and he soon saw what his ears told him he would see. A man, machine gun in hand, a cloth wrap on his head, and what looked to be a white bathrobe around his body, walked right to the middle of the brush. The man was scouring the brush for the dummy who had just made a loud crashing sound. Fortunately, he was walking more toward the gun Xander lost than toward Xander himself. Xander continued to watch through the foliage, and unfortunately he now also saw something he hadn’t expected. Behind the one man stood seven more militants waiting at the brush’s edge on the beach. He scanned their fire-lit faces, but there was still no sign of Khatib.
Coward.
The man in the center of the seven snapped his fingers, then pointed, and three of the men went left and three of them went right as they began to form a circle, spreading out around the brush. Xander watched as they didn’t quite make their circle wide enough, because he was on the outside looking in. They had made their circle around the gun he dropped. What a stroke of luck it turned out to be that his rifle had fallen so far from him. It was now the focus of their attention, and Xander would easily be able to pick them off before any of them were the wiser.
Xander turned over, lowered himself back down to the dirt on his ass, and leaned back against a shrub. He closed his eyes and took a long, deep breath, focusing himself as the men closed in on what they thought was Xander. Images of his friends gasping for air in a tiny, secluded, smoke-filled room flashed in his head. The seconds were ticking away. A flashback of his father’s face as a bullet tore throu
gh his shoulder came to mind, and his grip around his utility belt tightened.
Two minutes.
It was time to end this and escape with his friends. He reached for the pistol on his right hip, but it was gone. His stomach didn’t drop, however, until he reached for the second pistol on his left hip and it too was missing. He frantically patted down the area directly around him, but he felt only broken branches and sand. He must have lost them somewhere in the shuffle. Eight armed men and Xander had no cover. Only his trusty knife, Rambo, and one smoke and one flash grenade. Xander knew he was good, but this was different. He knew he only had seconds before the man in the brush, in the middle of their gun-toting circle, found out that what they surrounded was only a gun. Xander had been in a lot of dismal situations but none this impossible. He took another deep breath and let his mind go blank.
All of a sudden he heard Sean’s voice in his head. It was something Sean had told him long ago as they were riding into a mission together.
X-man, you know what I like most about you? You’re a smart sum bitch. A lotta guys can be trained to get real good at killin’ people with a gun. But I swear, X-man, I believe you wouldn’t even need a damn weapon. Shit, I believe you just might be slick enough to make a fella do it for ya. Yes sir, slick enough to make a man shoot hisself!
Xander looked down at his only resources—smoke and flash grenades. He looked back above the brush at the tight circle the men had formed. That last sentence of Sean’s speech echoed in his head.
Slick enough to make a man shoot hisself!
One minute.
Sean, you beautiful son of a bitch, Xander thought as he popped the pin on the smoke grenade and tossed it directly in the middle of the circle of militants. He dropped to the ground, making himself as flat as a pancake. The gunmen were so on edge because of the ease at which Xander had been picking them off that they didn’t hesitate long enough to consider their position. Shots rang out into the night from multiple guns as the grenade began to hiss and a continuous stream of bright white smoke wafted upward as if going back home in the sky to live with its family of clouds. It wasn’t long before the multiple guns that at first were firing steadily started to decrease in number until finally there was only one rifle left spitting bullets.
One man left standing.
The ill-trained militants had forgotten they were all facing each other in an almost perfect circle. Xander took Rambo in his right hand and the flash grenade in his left. He rose to his feet, and white smoke continued to reach for the sky. Seven men had shot each other to death in their haste to take Xander out. One man stood at the far end of the brush closest to the compound and farthest from Xander. The gunman, at least momentarily, was too shocked to comprehend. Xander took advantage and began to sprint straight for him. Seeing Xander brought a surprised look to his face, but he quickly recovered and fumbled for his gun. Xander still had to close about thirty yards, so he popped the pin on the flash grenade with his thumb and tossed it at the gunman’s feet. The man raised his gun toward Xander, and just as he squeezed the trigger, a brilliant bang of light tossed him backward. The bullets meant for Xander sprayed harmlessly up into the air. Xander leaped into the air, one arm covering his eyes to shield them from the flash and the other reared back behind him, ready to swing his knife down toward the gunman. He brought his arm forward and connected with his target. The gunman’s flesh parted and his skull caved as Xander drove Rambo right down into the middle of his forehead. Xander stood above the blood-gushing body with madness in his eyes, his chest heaving from the adrenaline that raged inside of him.
Zero.
Xander’s internal timer went off, snapping him out of his murderous daze.
For the first time, he had missed his mark.
He reached down and pulled his knife from the dead man’s forehead and wheeled around toward the canal. He sprinted around the corner of the compound toward the open front door. As soon as he made it to the doorway, fire roared out toward him and the heat from it sent him reeling backward. He could see inside the house and through to the still open doorway to the basement where now it was obvious they were holding Kyle and Sam because the men had escaped from there when the smoke had forced them out. A thick row of flames separated the front door and that basement door, and they were roughly twenty feet apart. Without hesitation Xander took two steps back as he inhaled a deep breath and ran through the doorway, jumping toward the entrance to the basement. Flames nipped at his heels as he glided through the air and on through the open basement door. Because the doorway led downstairs, he continued to sail over each step all the way down to a bone-jarring crash into the basement wall. Pain bolted throughout his body. The slam had been as violent as a high-speed car crash. The bones in his legs and arms screamed at him to stay down, but his heart wouldn’t let him. Xander willed himself to his feet, checked his stability, and found that nothing seemed broken. However, everything was black. The smoke had completely overcome the room, and Xander would have to go in blind.
He began to feel his way along the rough concrete wall. It was hard to focus with the amount of smoke that was around him. He stumbled along, choking, until he found an opening. His breath was still knocked out of him from his crash into the wall, which only exacerbated his problems as he tried desperately not to gasp for air. Coughing wildly, he was able to find the hallway that Sam and Kyle had been forced to walk on their way to the secluded room. Xander’s lungs were burning, and he knew that if the smoke was this bad down here for very long, he was already too late.
Xander followed along the wall down the hallway. He tried to cry out for his friends, but he was so overwhelmed by the smoke that the words became trapped in his throat. His entire body yearned for oxygen, and even though there were no flames, he felt as if his insides were on fire. He was closing in on the room now, and he wasn’t sure if it was wishful thinking or not, but he sensed the smoke was dissipating. Finally, his hand ran into another wall in front of him, and as he felt around, he found it was a doorway.
“Kyle!” Xander coughed. “Sam!” He dropped to his knees and began to feel around the room. He felt nothing. “Kyle!” he shouted again. He feverishly ran his hands along the hard concrete floor, desperately searching for his friends. They made no sound, and thoughts of the worst began to creep into Xander’s mind.
I killed them. I killed my best friends. They’re dead because of me! And for what?
Xander’s hand ran across something in the smoke-blinded room. Something that was the stark opposite of the rock hard and rough concrete floor.
Bare skin.
“Sam!” Xander cried out as he ran his hands over a naked and lifeless female body. She made no movement at all. He continued to feel around. He felt a stretch of smooth skin turn into the frayed roughness of rope and when he went to pull Rambo from its sheath, it was gone. He remembered that he had it in his hands when he made the leap down into the basement. He must have lost it there. He frantically began to untie the rope. “Kyle! Talk to me, Kyle!” he yelled out, and for a moment he thought he would pass out, the dizziness from the smoke rocking him. The smoke had lessened in the room, but it was still thick enough that he couldn’t see.
Kyle didn’t answer.
They’re both dead. I made it, but I’m too late. They’re both—
Just as he got the rope untied and he was finishing that thought, a hand gripped tightly around his arm.
Kyle!
“Kyle! Hang on! I’m getting you guys out of here!” he choked out. A cough came loudly from beside him, and he knew Kyle was trying to speak. “It’s okay, you don’t have to talk. Just keep your head down!” Xander coughed wildly as he finished those words. His chest burned ravenously, and his head was spinning as he ran his hands along Kyle's arms, which were bound by the rope that secured him to the wall beside Sam. Xander shook his head to try to clear the dizziness, and as he did his survival instincts kicked in. As he ran the escape scenarios, he knew he couldn’t carry them bo
th at once. Sam showed no sign of life, so because she was clearly worse off, he would carry her first. Unless, of course—he shuddered—she didn’t have a pulse. Before he could run another scenario, however, as he untied the last of Kyle's rope, his left foot slid across an inconsistency in the middle of the concrete floor. He removed the rope from Kyle's arm, freeing him from the wall while simultaneously taking something metal between his toes. A flashing memory of being just outside Baghdad again ran through his mind. He remembered that the similar room they had come across there—the one he thought of earlier—had a trap door in the middle of the floor. An escape hatch. It hit him at that moment that that is exactly why he had yet to see Khatib.
The son of a bitch disappeared through the bottom of the building.
Xander turned and felt for the metal latch with his hands. He grabbed it, turned it counterclockwise, and pulled the concrete hatch up toward him. A rush of smokeless air puffed up through the hole, and Xander took a deep breath and held it in as he turned back toward his dying friends. His hands found Kyle first, his ankle, and Xander pulled him over to the doorway that led underneath the compound. Xander went down the thin metal ladder first and took a deep breath as he pulled Kyle down on top of him. Much to Xander’s surprise there were lights down there. Through his watery, smoke-hampered eyes he could make out a lit walkway that resembled a small version of a subway. He laid Kyle's body gently to the ground. Kyle didn’t move, but Xander couldn’t work on him yet, not until he got Sam out of that room. He shot back up the ladder, and the fresh air from the open doorway had made a clearing in the smoke inside the room. For the first time he saw Sam’s naked body slumped over in the corner. His stomach turned in anguish, and he quickly scooped up her limp frame and carried her down the ladder. He laid her down beside Kyle and quickly placed his fingers to her neck.
Xander King BoxSet Page 24
