by Greig Beck
A muffled gunshot jerked his head upright; he felt the impact as if it had struck his own flesh. He spun and stared into the darkness, slowing his breathing, listening. Behind him, the cold landscape was as quiet as a whisper – just the soft shush of a snowdrift as it shifted under its own weight, a branch creaking as its wood contracted, the distant rustle of some nocturnal creature on the evening hunt.
He couldn’t hear Adira anymore, but sensed she was hurt. That bullet had been meant for her . . . she needed him.
Alex’s mind was torn. He stared down to where the Israeli woman probably lay. He knew he should return to help her; even though his trust in her had leaked away long ago, he still owed her . . . something. But another voice commanded him to continue onward, towards the thing that was coming nearer, the beast he had to confront.
He balled his fist and punched the tree trunk.
He took a last look up the mountainside, then turned to sprint down the slope, gathering speed with every step.
THIRTY-THREE
Matt had caught up with Sarah and for the last few minutes they’d been running side by side. His legs felt like rubber and he was worried he’d fall and break a bone. Given what was somewhere behind them, that would be a death sentence.
Sarah held the flashlight in front of her, but Matt knew they probably weren’t on the same path they’d come up on. In fact, he didn’t think they were on any sort of path anymore. He wasn’t surprised: there were no landmarks, it was dark, and they were travelling blindly at speed. Still, we haven’t fallen off a cliff ledge, so not bad, considering, he thought.
As they passed through a narrow space between two massive tree trunks, something slammed them both hard to the ground. The soft snow cushioned the fall, and before either of them could yell out in shock, hands were pressed over their mouths.
It was too dark to make out features, but Matt thought the shape of his captor’s head and shoulders were somehow familiar. Then a deep voice he recognised said, ‘Nice night for a stroll, Professor Kearns.’
The hand was removed and he was pulled to his feet.
‘Major Jack Hammerson? I don’t believe it. Thank God.’ Matt bent over, taking in deep breaths and allowing his heart rate to slow.
Hammerson’s companion had pulled Sarah to her feet, and now pushed her a little roughly towards Matt.
‘It’s colonel now,’ Hammerson said, ‘but good to see you too, Matt. Now, quickly: where are the other members of your party? Are they recoverable?’
Matt had been with HAWCs before; he knew exactly what Hammerson was asking. ‘No, sir, both dead, and we’ve got –’
A tree trunk sailed over their heads and crashed into two large trees not five feet away. The HAWCs pulled him and Sarah out of the way as the massive log bounced back to the ground, exactly where they had been standing.
‘It’s here,’ Matt said.
He looked around for Sarah, found her sprawled in the snow and quickly pulled her to her feet. Hammerson and the other HAWC were already up, guns in their hands.
Hammerson grabbed Matt and Sarah and gave them an almighty shove down the slope. ‘Head west,’ he yelled. ‘There’s a drop-off that way. I’ll be right behind you!’
Matt did as he was told, dragging Sarah with him.
*
Hammerson watched them for a second, then turned to Franks and motioned up the slope with his head. ‘See to that giant irritation, will you? I’ve got to get these two back to Logan and then intercept the Arcadian. Rendezvous at the ravine with the cops, ASAP.’
Franks grinned and blinked her lenses to infrared. ‘Roger that, boss. With pleasure.’
She took a look up the slope and sprinted off into the dark.
Hammerson made off after Matt and Sarah, running hard in the dark, adrenaline moving his muscles like pistons. He caught up to them easily and kept them going at a fast pace.
*
The snow was numbing her face but she remained as still as death. The almost imperceptible sound of the gun’s hammer drawing back had trigged an automatic trained response that had saved her life. She’d thrown herself forward, the projectile only catching the top of her shoulder. A small piece of trapezium muscle was gone, but she lived.
Through the powdery snow she could hear the crush of the ice crystals as the men circled her. She was dragged upright by her hair and punched hard in the face. She grunted from the impact and went down onto her knees. Anger boiled inside her, and she refused to let them see her pain. Adira immediately got back to her feet and her attacker went to throw another punch but this one she blocked and she struck out with one of her legs. She made contact but, frustratingly, the blow was feeble and her aim was off. One of her eyes was already swelling closed from the first blow.
The man who had blocked the strike swung his fist back into her stomach, doubling her over, and then brought his knee up into her exposed face. Through blurring vision, she saw her own brilliant red blood splash the magnificent white snow. She went down again, coughing.
She wondered why they didn’t just kill her. She now knew there were four of them, and their spoke to each other in Hebrew – they were her own countrymen. No random group of mercenaries but all soldiers, Mossad Special Op cleaners, sent to kill her. Adira spat blood and looked up as one slightly larger than the rest called a halt to the beating. Her mouth turned up in a bloody smile.
‘I knew it had to be you.’ Her words sounded mushy through her swollen lips.
She was dragged to her feet again, and held in place. She met the stare of the man; her own gaze matching it for ferocity and defiance.
‘Salamon Eitan, killing unarmed fellow countrywomen now?’
The man’s mouth turned down as he spoke. ‘I looked up to you; we all did. But you steal our vital secrets, you shoot dead our brothers . . . your brothers . . . and Captain Senesh, you are never unarmed.’
He raised his gun to her face. ‘This is my pleasure.’
Adira half smiled but her eyes radiated nothing but contempt. She stood as straight as she could manage – not feeling fear, only anger that she was about to lose something that was more important than her pointless life.
Salamon took a step back – she knew why. She closed her eyes.
‘Goodbye Alex,’ she whispered.
*
Alex crashed to a stop behind a tree – he’d found her. His jaw clenched as he saw what she was up against – four highly trained fighters; and Adira seemed to be injured.
Alex felt his heart rate begin to rise. He knew he couldn’t cover the open ground between them, through the deep snow, no matter how fast he was. Either he’d take several bullets, or Adira would. Still, his body took over, urging him to action.
The man pressing the gun to Adira’s forehead took a step back, his arm outstretched. Alex knew this was to avoid the brain spatter that would come from a close-range headshot. He needed to act now. He couldn’t go over the snow so . . .
He dived beneath its surface and churned through it like a machine. He calculated he needed to cover around eighty feet.
Alex burst from the snow ten feet short of the group, but it was enough. In the seconds before the men reacted, Adira pulled away from the gun at her head and dived and rolled.
Bullets flew, and the closest of the agents came at Alex in a Krav Maga move, hands up, one higher than the other. The first blow struck Alex between the eyes. It was rock hard and would have felled a normal man, but Alex caught the man’s forearm before he could pull it back and wrenched it with enough force to pull the shoulder from its socket. The point of his elbow continued on into the man’s windpipe. Alex held the choking soldier fast, using him as a shield against his comrades’ bullets.
One of the men was tracking Adira with his weapon, waiting for a clear shot to finish their mission. In a single move, Alex had covered the ten feet between them. He grabbed the man, batted his gun upwards and slammed him repeatedly against a tree trunk until he hung limp.
Alex dr
opped the crushed body and ducked below a spray of bullets at his back. He swivelled and kicked backwards into the shooter’s diaphragm with enough force to stop his heart.
Alex searched for the final agent, the team’s leader, and saw that Adira had grabbed one of the dropped guns and put a bullet in his leg. In the second it took the man to shift his aim from Alex to Adira, Alex was on him, grabbing at the gun and disarming him. He lifted the man’s body until his feet came out of the snow and drew his fist back. Finish it, screamed the voice in his head. The agent glared at Alex, but, like Adira moments before, showed no fear of death.
‘Don’t!’ Adira shouted.
Alex stayed the fist that was about to cannon into the man’s defiant face.
Adira walked up to him and held the gun to his head. ‘Salamon Eitan . . . my uncle sent you, yes?’
The man remained silent. The snow around him was stained red from the wound in his leg.
Adira pressed the gun into the flesh between his eyes. ‘To kill me, or to kill both of us?’
Salamon stared first at Adira, then Alex, defiance burning in his eyes. ‘Just Hunter. It was my decision to kill you. You deserve to die for the deaths of my men, your own people.’
Adira lowered the gun, and Alex let the man drop, knowing the fight was over.
Adira rubbed blood from her cheek. ‘We didn’t know the men at the river were Mossad until it was over. They attacked first.’ She shook her fist in his face. ‘Stupid.’
She tucked the gun into her belt, swaying slightly from the damage the man and his soldiers had inflicted on her. ‘Stupid!’ she yelled again, and kicked out at him, knocking him backwards. She pointed a finger into his face. ‘Your life is my gift this day. Tell my uncle . . . I know what my mission is.’
Salamon got to his feet, his fists balled, looking like he wanted to continue the fight. Then his eyes moved to Alex and he seemed to change his mind.
He spoke to Adira through gritted teeth. ‘Never come home. You are not one of us anymore.’
He turned and struggled down the slope, one of his legs dragging and leaving a furrowed trail of blood in the snow.
Adira watched him go, then slumped against the closest tree, looking tired and deflated. She turned to Alex and half-smiled. ‘You saved me again.’ She snorted softly and leaned her head back against the trunk. ‘All our lives are used up now. We need to get out.’
Alex looked down at the battered woman. She would survive, and he felt his debt was repaid.
‘No, you need to get out of here,’ he said. ‘Your fight is finished but mine is still to come. This is the last time we will see each other, Adira Senesh.’
‘Don’t, Alex. Please wait –’
But Alex was already sprinting up the slope, back towards the enemy he knew was waiting for him.
THIRTY-FOUR
Franks hid behind the trunk of a large spruce, and blinked back and forth between light sensor and thermal vision. She smiled and then whispered, ‘I love hot, naked bodies.’ About 200 feet further up the slope, an outcrop of stone showed a warm patch – something had just been leaning against it, something large.
Franks sprinted between some trees to improve her position, and flattened herself behind one of the trunks. She and the thing she was tracking had been playing cat and mouse for a while. It was leaving traces for her, moving heavily just out of her field of vision, then disappearing like smoke. She knew it was large, fast and feral, but was starting to doubt it was just a dumb animal. In fact, it was displaying all the traits of a hunter, and that made her feel this was becoming less a hunt and more a contest.
She leaned around the trunk – and something enormous rushed at her, its body heat and size making her thermal lens flare bright orange. She had time to raise her gun and deliver two rounds, then dive, before she was caught by the ankle. She screamed as the creature’s grip crushed most of her lower leg.
It dragged her from the ground, but she managed to twist in its huge hand and fire another few rounds. It spun her and slammed her to the ground. Her partially armoured suit protected her from the worst, but her head swam. The next time it lifted her, the gun that had been in her hand . . . wasn’t.
The animal’s rank stink filled her nose, and her head throbbed as it held her upside down like some giant ragdoll. She tried to hang on to a passing tree trunk, but the attempt was futile; the thing’s strength seemed to exceed hers a hundredfold. She guessed she was being hauled eastward, as she caught sight of a pale moon when the low clouds broke apart for a moment.
The giant hand swung her again, and this time she went with it, using the momentum to bend her body and reach up to her thighs and her knife sheaths. She pulled both blades free, one in each hand, and on the next swing she used the pendulum action to bring both blades together and into each side of the mighty arm that held her.
A bellow of pain roared from the monster’s mouth.
‘How’s that, motherfucker?’ Franks yelled into the darkness, and changed her lens from thermal to infrared. The colossal figure that held her immediately went from a flaring orange to nightshade green.
‘Shit!’
The creature hadn’t released its grip. It bent its head towards her and she saw its huge broad face, the heavy ridged brow, and teeth that looked as long as a tiger’s. She bared her own teeth at the grotesque features. It continued to stare at her, and she saw intelligence in those glaring black orbs, and experienced a moment of self-doubt.
She swore her defiance at it again, and it snorted and pulled away, seeming to lose interest in her. She took the opportunity to examine its torso – its anatomy was very similar to a human’s.
A single deep liver strike and Kong’s gonna bleed out, she thought.
She coiled her muscles in preparation for the strike, but the beast seemed to anticipate her move. It shook her and then slammed her into a tree. The night-vision lens in her left eye cracked but didn’t dislodge. However, she felt warmth and wetness on her face – blood.
They stopped. It had gone eerily quiet. Franks felt a sensation of . . . openness. Like they were in a clearing, or . . .
She was flung out into space.
As she fell, she looked up to see the giant figure standing on a cliff edge, watching as she plummeted to the forest below.
Aw, fuck it, she thought.
*
The creature watched the small animal fall away into the void. If it had more time it would have taken the head and carried the meat back to the caves. But it sensed too many threats on the mountain and all close to its lair. This was its territory now, and it was being invaded.
It lifted its huge head and sniffed. There was the smell of fresh blood on the air, and other strange scents. In the distance, it saw a flare of brightness and knew that its enemies were gathered there. They could not be allowed to stay. Never again would it allow those beings to push it back into the deep, dark world inside the mountain.
They would all be meat before the sun came up again.
*
Ollie Markenson crouched beside the small circle of stones, feeding twigs into the tongues of orange flame that lifted off the fire they’d started with the ball of toilet paper Parsons always carried in his pack. He half-turned to wink at the grinning men standing around him.
‘Don’t forget, when the boss asks, it was everyone’s idea.’
The cloud cover was gradually breaking up, but the overhang at the start of the long green tunnel they were huddled in didn’t benefit from the occasional moonlight. Markenson figured that if they were going to be stuck here for a while, he’d be damned if he was going to do it in the pitch dark, or risk freezing while they waited for those two bullshit FBI pricks to come back down.
He blinked away the floating retinal images of the flames that ruined his night vision and moved his hand a little closer to the warmth. ‘Hey, Pete, bring anything to cook?’ he asked Parsons. ‘I’m starving.’
There was a small cough from out of the dark and a
tiny red hole appeared in Officer Parsons’ forehead. His large body fell sideways and landed heavily.
There was another cough and Oakleigh, their youngest officer, fell across the small fire. His body didn’t put it out; instead, his cheap stuffed jacket began to melt and then ignited.
Williams’s forehead exploded outwards, covering the horrified Markenson in a spray of red.
‘What the fuck!’
The only man still alive, Markenson dived for his rifle and the cover of a boulder. As he did, a bullet caught him and mule-kicked him back onto the snow. He managed to scrabble back amongst some rocks and peered around to see where the shots had come from.
The flames were higher now, feeding on Oakleigh’s burning body, and their glow extended up and along the ravine. In their light, Markenson saw three pale ghosts come down the crevasse’s steep side. All were completely white, save for the large guns they carried and the black slits where their eyes should have been. To Markenson, they looked like a squad of futuristic robots coming to send him to his death.
He tried to lift his gun, but the bullet had smashed through the muscle and bone on his left shoulder and his arm refused to work. Shit, no.
He raised the gun with his other arm and balanced it on his knee, using his leg to aim the barrel. He held his breath and fired, but in the time it took him to rebalance the gun for a second shot, one of the white ghosts was ripping the rifle from his hands and jerking him upright.
Up close, its eyes were soulless.
THIRTY-FIVE
‘Stop right there!’ Logan shouted, pulling his weapon and flattening himself against a tree.
Two people collapsed into the snow at his feet: Matt Kearns and Sarah Sommers. The police chief reached down and pushed the woman’s hair back off her face. ‘Sarah, thank God you’re okay.’
