Once again, he found himself in the neighborhood where the battle had taken place with Ruckley, Wong, and Boyd.
This time, they were not alone in the ruined neighborhood. Four other teams of soldiers swept the fields and parks nearby for more landmines. They might be able to risk the additional abandoned explosives, but the team wasn’t here just to look for them. Their secondary mission was to search for more intel, anything that the dead Chimeras might’ve left behind.
Most of the men had bitched about coming back out here, but Timothy thought about what would happen when the outpost was safe again and expanded back into the rest of Houston. Maybe it was too soon, but he imagined a future where he and Tasha grew up down here and raised a family. How horrific would it be if one of their children wandered into this park, looking for a place to play without knowing what terrible traps were waiting just beneath the soil?
Wong swept a metal detector to locate any more planted mines. Timothy, Ruckley, and Boyd covered him while he searched in silence. They hadn’t slept much. Everyone was on edge because of the attack and the potential for more mines.
It didn’t take long for the metal detector to beep.
Timothy froze, holding his breath.
Wong bent down and picked up a spent shell casing, then flipped it to Boyd. The larger man stuffed it into a bag.
“So many false positives,” Timothy said. “This is going to take forever.”
“Better it takes forever now than the split second when one of these explodes again on a patrol, or a kid,” Boyd said. “If those Variants come back, I’d rather face ’em knowing we found all these things instead of trying to tiptoe around, hoping we don’t explode.”
A shout echoed across the park from near a rusted playground.
“Mine!” a soldier called, marking his position with a small plastic flag.
An explosive ordnance disposal (EOD) team rushed over from their position and began the delicate process of setting up a controlled explosive to detonate the mine. After they ensured everyone nearby was far enough away, the EOD team detonated the mine with a resonating thud, dirt and grass chunks puffing into the air.
Wong continued waving the detector over the grass. Timothy followed cautiously, stopping when his boots slurped over a mound of what he thought was mud. He looked down to find a sticky hunk of Variant flesh.
Slowly he roved his rifle over the empty houses and tall grass around the perimeter of the park. A few birds called out, their morning songs ringing in the stillness of the early morning.
The humidity began to climb with the temperature as the sun crawled into the sky. The resulting swampy smells made breathing a nasty chore.
Over and over, the team found spent bullet casings and other pieces of metal detritus that had ended up buried here. When the detector beeped again for after what felt like the thousandth time, Timothy clenched up, bored but still on guard.
Wong handed Boyd the detector and knelt for a better look.
“Shit, I think it’s a mine.” He stood and pointed at the spot.
The EOD team took control of the area and sent Timothy, Ruckley, Boyd, and Wong back a safe distance. Outside the park, groups of soldiers stood guard, watching for any threats.
“What the hell were those things doing here last night?” Timothy muttered.
“Scouting our defenses probably,” Ruckley said.
“Or maybe on their way back from doing that,” Wong said.
“You think they were already watching Houston?” Timothy asked. “Do they know what we’re doing in Galveston?”
“Relax,” Ruckley said. She patted him on the back. “Captain Beckham will figure out what they’re planning.”
The EOD team backed away from the mine that Wong had found, clearing a wide enough space to detonate it safely.
One of the men shouted, “Fire in the hole!”
Another loud bang tossed a cloud of dirt into the air. The smell of hot metal drifted from the blast site.
“Clear,” said the same soldier.
“You heard him,” Ruckley said. “Get to work.”
Wong picked up the metal detector again and started surveying the area where they had left off. The work was slow-going and tedious, and Timothy almost resented the effort. He would rather be out on patrol, searching for new signs of Chimeras or collaborators.
Ruckley was right. There would be more.
“Something else is bothering me,” Timothy said. “Why would they send Chimeras? Why not just a group of collaborators?”
“I think you and I both know why,” she answered.
“They’re closing in for the final blow.”
Ruckley confirmed the guess with a nod. The New Gods were constantly ahead of them.
The metal detector went off again, and Timothy halted.
“What is this?” Wong asked. He handed the detector off to Boyd again, before dropping to a crouch.
Timothy looked over his shoulder at a metal cylinder nestled in the grass.
“Looks like a smoke grenade,” Boyd said.
“That ain’t a smoke grenade,” Ruckley said.
Timothy noticed their position was ten yards from the picnic shelter where they had first seen the Chimera scouts camped out.
Boyd called over the EOD team.
One of the techs squinted at it, stroking his graying beard.
“Know what it is?” Wong asked.
The man stared, then gestured for everyone to move back. “I think it’s some sort of gas grenade.”
“So what?” Boyd asked. “Tear gas isn’t the worst thing in the world.”
“We don’t know what’s in that grenade,” Ruckley said. “Could be tear gas, but we’ve never seen these monsters use nonlethal weapons. For all we know it could be some kind of chemical agent they planned to lob into base.”
Timothy shuddered. “After what we saw in Mount Katahdin, I’d bet you’re right.”
Ruckley squinted at the canister. “Maybe it contains a bioweapon. An engineered disease. God only knows.”
“Now I hope it’s just tear gas,” Wong said. “You guys are freaking me out.”
“Whatever it is, if the New Gods sent Chimeras to deliver them, it’s got to be bad,” Timothy said.
Boyd whistled. “Real fucking bad.”
“Get it secured,” Ruckley ordered. “We need to get this back to the science team.”
— 7 —
By the time Teams Ghost and Spearhead returned to base, Banff was already in a state of chaos. Late morning light bled through the dense cloud cover over the Fairmont Banff Springs hotel.
Dohi ran toward the first steel-panel gate outside the hotel. Razor wire spanned the walls, interspersed by wooden guard towers where snipers and machine gunners lay in wait. Guns pointed at them from the men along the walls.
“Spearhead and Ghost, requesting entry!” Neilson shouted into the radio.
The gate blocking the road to the hotel began to shift, snow shedding from the groaning metal. The teams ran inside, and the soldiers manning the gate quickly replaced it, shouting orders to take firing positions along the wall.
Inside the base, soldiers were already preparing snowmobiles and large transport trucks for what appeared to be a potential evacuation.
A man shoved through the heavy snow toward them. Dohi recognized him as Sergeant Prince, the man who had first welcomed him and Team Ghost to Banff.
“Neilson, get up on those walls!” Prince shouted. “Ghost, we need you inside!”
Dohi ran with Prince, Fitz, and Ace past the hotel toward a warehouse-like garage. Inside it, civilians were being loaded up into a bus and a pair of trucks as officers directed soldiers into snowplows.
“Are we fighting or retreating?” Fitz shouted over the din.
“Both,” Prince said. “Kamer will explain.”
They went to a dark corner of the garage past stacks of crates and supplies that hadn’t yet made it on the trucks. Kamer stood next to a group of fou
r officers and a few soldiers, hidden from the civilians, but several children had come over to look at their prisoner.
Corrin was on the ground, limbs bound by chains, body trembling. Blood wept from wounds across his flesh. Kamer continued barking orders.
“What the hell did you do to our prisoner?” Ace asked, interrupting him.
“What you failed to do,” Kamer said, turning slightly. “But this asshole is full of lies.”
Corrin spat a glob of blood on the concrete. When the red saliva hit, one of his fanged teeth fell out. “I told you. I hate the New Gods as much as you do. They gave me this body. They threatened my family…”
“Bullshit,” Kamer said. “Your friends came for you.”
“We don’t know that,” Fitz said. “He’s worth more to us alive than dead, General.”
“I disagree,” Kamer said, pulling out his sidearm.
Ace’s cheeks flushed scarlet as he stepped protectively between Kamer and Corrin. “I, for one believe him, and I’m not going to let you kill him.”
“You believe this monster?” Kamer flitted the barrel of his pistol toward Corrin. “This freak of nature?”
“I do,” Ace said. “He could’ve given us up in Seattle. Probably would’ve been rewarded for it. Instead, he got us out of that hellhole.”
“He brought this attack on us!”
“Sir, we need to move the civilians,” an officer said. “The enemy is getting too close.”
“Fine,” Kamer said. “Tell the drivers to go out the back.”
The pop of small arms fire echoed outside the garage. Dohi instinctively lifted his rifle, waiting for more. Distant shouting and a few voices crackled over the radios of the officers, but the gunfire waned.
“He might have more intel we can use,” Dohi said. “For that matter, we might be able to use him as a spy.”
“He probably is a damn spy!” Kamer yelled. “You spent a little time guarding this thing, and he’s already corrupted your minds.”
“I could help you fight…” Corrin said, glaring up at Kamer.
“Right…” Kamer snorted. “If this beast didn’t draw the enemy here, then who did?”
Dohi tried to come up with an answer, but the truth was, he didn’t know.
“The only logical answer is Corrin,” Kamer said.
The rattle of gunfire sounded again, this time longer. Cries came from the buses already packed full of civilians, and the people still waiting to board dropped low, covering their heads or huddling with loved ones.
“With respect, sir, right now, it doesn’t matter,” Fitz said. “What matters is we fight back.”
“That’s exactly what we’re doing out there,” Kamer said. “Fighting, and dying, all because this piece of shit brought the enemy to our doorstop.”
A loud boom echoed outside. This time when the gunfire started, it didn’t stop. Frightened screams rang out, followed by the shouts of soldiers directing people into the transport vehicles. At the back of the garage, a single big door opened, and the first bus rumbled to life.
One of the officers held his radio to his ear. “General, they’re at the gates!”
“Sergeant Prince, evacuate all of the civilians now!” Kamer shouted.
At the beginning of the war, Dohi would’ve thought the order was foolish. That sending their civilians fleeing just as an attack set in was too rash, too reactive. However, he had seen what the collaborators and Variants did to all those left behind when they conquered a base.
The snowplows and buses revved their engines, leaving the back of the garage one at a time.
Kamer lowered his pistol and shook his head at Corrin. “You’ve doomed us.”
Ace backed away, and Dohi stepped up to Fitz.
“Go with the evacuees,” Kamer said. “There are a couple of trucks waiting outside behind the garage. I promised your president I’d get you back to the Allied States, and I intend to do just that.”
Shouting sounded outside, but a blast silenced the voices. A current of loud booms rumbled the ground, the unmistakable sound of grenades.
One of the comms officers turned toward Kamer and Ghost. “They’ve breached the gates!”
“Prioritize defense of the convoys,” Kamer said. “And get the hell out of here. Ghost, take that animal with you if you want it so bad.”
The bark of gunfire sounded somewhere just outside the garage. Dohi shouldered his rifle. He started to back up with the team toward the exit as the roar of a bear sounded outside.
A dent the size of a tire appeared in the two metal doors. Then claws ripped through. The beast on the other side pried the massive garage doors apart until a monstrous face appeared.
The white fur around its yellow eyes was covered in blood, and it snarled, baring fangs each the size of a long knife. It let out a roar that hurt Dohi’s ears, but he held his stance, firing a burst of armor-piercing rounds into its nose, eyes, and skull.
The monster slumped to the floor, halfway through the gap in the doors. Four collaborators climbed over it, firing wildly into the room.
Kamer ducked, but one of his officers was too slow. Rounds riddled his body and sent him sprawling over the floor.
“Free me,” Corrin growled. “I’ll help!”
Ace and Fitz exchanged a glance, and Fitz nodded.
“What? Hell no!” said the Canadian soldier guarding Corrin. “We can’t trust—”
A bullet punched through his throat and he slumped over, gripping his neck.
More collaborators climbed over the dead bear. Ace sent a torrent of fire their way while Dohi moved toward Corrin.
“Cover me!” he shouted.
Another collaborator with an M249 made it into the garage, the heavy gunfire echoing in the enclosed space.
“Don’t make me regret this,” Dohi said to Corrin. He picked up the keys and unlocked the chains.
“I won’t forget what you’ve done,” replied the Chimera.
For a moment, Dohi feared there was a terrible threat veiled behind those words. Bullets slammed into crates around him, not giving him a chance to think.
The last of the vehicles screeched out of the back of the garage.
“Cover them!” Fitz yelled.
Kamer and his soldiers fired from behind leftover crates to give the civilians a chance to escape.
“I’m out,” Ace said.
Dohi tossed him a magazine, then covered him, firing at the collaborators who had stormed the garage. Corrin hunched down next to Dohi, watching with his golden eyes like a predator waiting to make a move.
Behind the collaborators came another shape. This one a hulking figure wearing a frayed cloak. It kept to the shadows, but Dohi didn’t need to see the face or features to know it was an Alpha.
“General,” Corrin said, his voice dripping with fear.
Not just any Alpha, Dohi realized. This was the brute that had nearly killed Beckham, Horn, and Rico at Mount Katahdin.
Dohi switched on his tac light and directed it at the monster. The beam hit it in the face, and Dohi pulled the trigger as the creature opened its crocodile-like maw to let out a shriek. The beast was so fast only one of the three bullets thunked into its meaty flesh.
The bolt of Dohi’s rifle locked back a moment later. He was completely out of ammunition.
A torrent of fire forced Dohi back down, bullets punching into the crates and walls. He pulled out his M9 and looked over his shoulder to see Kamer had fallen. Corrin rushed toward where the Canadian general had fallen.
“No! Corrin!” Ace yelled.
Corrin grabbed the limp general, dragging him out of view. Dohi had to turn back and fire on two collaborators charging his position. The Variant general was out of sight, flanking to pick them off one at a time.
Everything had turned to shit in a matter of seconds. Dohi had made a mistake letting Corrin out of his locks, and the Alpha was preparing to tear them all apart with the collaborator soldiers.
Time seemed to slow a
s rounds slammed into the crate and whizzed past Dohi.
Turning, he saw Corrin standing now with fresh blood on his chest. No doubt the blood of Kamer. The Chimera raised the rifle and aimed right at Dohi. He had known for a long time he would die in battle, but not because of a stupid mistake like this.
He watched the muzzle flare and bullets lance overhead. But none of them pounded his body. He glanced around the crate to see two collaborators thump against the ground.
A roar sounded from the Variant general. He exploded through a wall of crates and pounded into Corrin, knocking the Chimera to the ground.
Dohi looked over to see Kamer was sprawled out behind the busted crates where Corrin had dragged him to safety. Ace ran to him and lifted the general into a fireman’s carry, running toward the back of the garage.
“Come on!” Ace yelled to Dohi.
Dohi watched Corrin struggling against the larger Alpha.
Damn it, he thought.
He couldn’t leave Corrin to die like this. He aimed his pistol, waiting for a shot. More collaborators stormed in the garage.
Pulling the trigger, Dohi put a round in the general. The giant beast reared back, and he put another two into the chest. Corrin pushed himself up and ran over to Dohi as the Alpha limped away in retreat.
Together, the Chimera and Dohi ran to catch up with the rest of the team outside the garage.
Behind them, the glow of bright orange spheres of fire lit up the sky.
The hotel was burning.
The snow was coming down heavily again, nearly blotting out their vision despite the light seeping through the gray clouds. Behind the screen of snow, he saw two big trucks with snowplows fixed to the front idling at an open gate.
Thank you, Father Sky, Dohi thought. The cover the snow provided might be what saved them today.
Dohi swung his rifle up at shapes approaching from behind the trucks. But they weren’t hulking bears nor did they wear the ragged white and gray clothing of the collaborators.
Extinction Cycle: Dark Age Box Set | Books 1-4 Page 105
