Gil Mason/Gunwood USA Box Set

by Gordon Carroll

  Sarah felt her mind unhinge — too much, too fast — guilt, shame, loss, grief — and now this — this — too much.

  Lining the sight of her gun perfectly between the eyes of the dead man, her finger squeezed back ever so slowly; the hammer of the weapon in perfect mechanical sync with the trigger as if it were some finely honed clockwork.

  New light splashed into the room as the sun breeched the buildings to the east that had blocked its golden warmth. A splinter of sunshine reflected off a metal bracket slashing her eyes, making her flinch. Sarah quickly recovered, the hammer a hairs breadth from releasing.

  “Gaaaaaaa…” Croaked the dead man, blood dribbled over his bottom lip and joined the gory stream that ran from his throat. He seemed to be trying to form words, to ask or beg some favor from her.

  The hammer stretched back and back and…

  “Sarah, stop!”

  The command held such strength and the voice sounded so familiar that it broke through to her. Sarah blinked her eyes several times quickly. She felt woozy, almost drunk. She shook her head and looked up to see Chuck standing in the doorway, his gun out but down at his side.

  “It’s okay, Kiddo,” said Chuck. “This guy ain’t gonna hurt anybody.”

  Hurt anybody? No, of course not. A dead man couldn’t hurt anyone. She turned back to the body. Reality and unreality overlapped and that panicked feeling tripped up from her stomach, past her throat, reaching for her sanity with greedy fingers.

  “Just, just lower the gun, Sarah.”

  It isn’t right. Nothing here is right. Dead men can’t talk. And where’s Buttons? Where’s my sweet doggy Buttons? But Chuck’s voice she remembered and held onto, using it to find her way back.

  She took a deep breath, gave her head a final hard shake and looked back to Chuck, the gun suddenly feeling too heavy to hold. It dropped to her side, bouncing against her thigh.

  “Chuck.”

  “Yeah, Chuck. That’s right, kiddo. You okay?”

  She nodded numbly. “Yes. I’m okay.”

  “I’ve got rescue on the way.”

  Confusion. “Rescue?”

  Chuck walked up to her, hitching a thumb toward the victim. “This poor sucker ain’t got a chance, but we have to go through the motions.”

  Sarah looked back at the dead man and saw him smile at Chuck. He seemed to be trying to lift his right hand but it only twitched in his lap like a broken bird.

  Not dead. He’s not dead. It began to sink in to her that she wasn’t thinking quite right.

  “Any sign of who did this?”

  “No. Just him. But there’s evidence in the other rooms.”

  “Evidence?”

  The long wail of the fire engine’s siren reached them, growing in power until it shut off outside. Sarah nodded, not wanting to compete with the big rig or its smaller sibling the Rescue Unit. Firemen and EMTs came trudging through the rooms.

  “They’re messing up our crime scene,” said Sarah.

  “Can’t be helped. They’ve got to get this guy to the hospital.”

  Sarah felt a little better when she saw the reaction on the firemen’s faces. It took a lot to shake them, but they were certainly shaken.

  Chuck called for backup on the radio, giving orders for the first car on scene to seal off the area with crime scene tape and for the detectives to be called out. Then he turned back to Sarah. “You said there’s evidence?”

  Sarah nodded, still feeling strange but getting it back together. “Yes. In here.” She led him to the hand.

  “Wow. That’s horrible, kiddo. I mean killing a guy is one thing, but this…”

  “It gets worse,” said Sarah.

  “Worse?”

  “Much.” She walked into the first room, over to the ladder and the sheetrock. “Take a look.”

  Chuck pursed his lips. “What?”

  Sarah had kept her eyes averted. She felt better but didn’t want to take a chance. “Right there, by the ladder.”

  “I see some blood…”

  Sarah steeled herself and pointed to where the evidence lay. Only it wasn’t there. Her eyes drew down, catching both sides of the medical tape and making her vision blur maddeningly. She shook her head and refocused. Nothing. A splotch of blood and nothing more.

  “It was right…” and then she saw it. There, in the plaster dust that coated everything. A footprint. Or — to be more exact — a paw print.

  4

  Dominic Elkins

  * * *

  The Battle

  * * *

  Dominic had two grenades. They were M-67 fragmentation grenades; 6.5 ounces of Composition B, housed in a half inch spherical steel body, with a kill radius of five meters. He wished he had more. Taking a deep breath he let his rifle hang by its tactical strap and pulled the pins on both frags. He tossed one to the left and one to the right then ducked back behind the door.

  The sound, horrendous, echoed crazily in the confined space. Smoke and debris blasted through the doorway filling the room with thick billowing clouds of gray-black smoke. A fishhook shaped twist of hot metal ripped through the material of the wall Dominic hunched against and sliced through his Kevlar coated ceramic plated body armor, sinking deep into the muscle tissue that covered his left scapula. The pain — so bright and sharp — almost too much to bear. He clenched his teeth and bore it anyway.

  Flipping the selector switch to three round burst mode he stayed low and swung around the edge of the doorway. Maybe thirty or so men were staggering or kneeling or rolling on the floor, holding their ears and trying to gain their feet. Dominic sprayed them with bullets, hitting as many as he could see through the smoke. With a muzzle velocity of two thousand-nine hundred feet per second, the carnage was horrific. A few from the far sides started returning fire. Holes pocked the walls around him and chipped up sharp shards of tile that slashed at his ankles and shins, even through his trousers and boots. His hearing, muted from the grenades, allowed only a high-pitched whine, to ring inside his skull continuously.

  A bullet ripped through his thigh and another swept past his face, incredibly close. The remainder of the enemy were getting their bearings back. This called for precision shooting. He snugged the rifle in close to his shoulder and flipped the selector back to single fire. He took them out one at a time. Chest shots mainly, but a few head-shots as they came available. Dominic walked to the left first, cranking off round after round. Bodies would jerk and then fall in that loose way that dead flesh falls when life is suddenly and irrevocably stolen from it. The Taliban wore no helmets—no body armor — not even flak vests — and the perfectly manufactured American 5.56 rounds slid through their meat effortlessly — fragmenting and tumbling as they passed through bone and muscle, sending dozens of pieces of jagged metal through their systems, bringing instant or near instant death.

  The bolt of Dominic’s M4 locked back. He dropped the magazine and slapped in another thirty rounder and continued firing as he walked. He saw a man on his knees; blood flowing from both ears, swaying in concussive shock. Dominic shot him in the eye. Another appeared, weaving through the smoke, arm outstretched, a pistol in his hand. Dominic shot him three times; twice in the chest, once in the face. The chest shots sent up puffs of dust, the face shot took off the right side of his jaw and most of the cheek. The man spun, hitting the wall and sliding down, leaving a red smear in his wake.

  Something hit Dominic hard in the back and he fell forward, swinging back with his elbow instinctively. Dominic was a good striker and ground fighter and his elbow connected with the man that had attacked him, high on the temple. The terrorist landed on top and Dominic instantly wrapped the man’s waist with his legs and pulled him in close.

  Something stabbed him in the shoulder and he saw the man’s hand pull back, a knife dripping blood gripped in white knuckles. Dominic shifted to the side, wedged a foot against the man’s chest and pushed hard, opening enough room for him to turn the M4 with one hand and send a copper-jacketed slug
into the terrorist’s throat. Before the man could collapse, Dominic pumped five more rounds into his torso.

  Tile shattered next to his face and Dominic saw a group of men charging him from down the hall. How many were there? They were shooting at him and screaming; only the narrowness of the hallway, limiting how many could shoot at the same time, saved him from instant death.

  Flipping the selector switch back to burst-mode he stayed on his back and opened up; firing past his boots at the hoard coming at him. He had less than twenty rounds in the magazine and at a cyclic rate of seven hundred to nine hundred and fifty rounds a minute he would be empty in seconds with no time for a reload. Not that it really mattered; it was his last magazine. He would fire what he had and then they would be on him.

  Time for hand-to-hand.

  The weakness he felt from blood loss slackened as adrenaline flooded his system. His mind and body were preparing for the final fight. His forward hand grew warm as the bullets sprayed from the barrel in a continuous burst. He saw the front row go down, trampled by those directly behind them as they charged ahead only to meet an equally deadly line of bullets.

  A few more of those grenades just now would be nice. But then the bolt locked back and the ear-numbing clatter of automatic fire ceased. The mob climbed and tripped over their dead comrades to get at him.

  Dominic struggled to his feet as bullets whipped past. He debated on whether to use his rifle as a blunt force weapon or to go with his K-Bar knife. Too tight for butt strokes so he pulled out his knife in a reverse grip, blade along wrist, and tried to quell the dizziness and tunnel vision that accompanied high stress.

  He tried to calm himself; to go as loose as he could so he could produce as much energy and power as his already drained muscles could muster. And then they were on him; shooting through the smoke and darkness, their bullets whizzing past, insanely loud. He slipped to the side, blocking a punch with one hand and sinking his knife to the hilt in the armpit of the man attacking him. Hot blood showered his fist and wrist. He jerked it free, spun around low and slashed diagonally across the next man’s inner thigh, opening the femoral artery. Continuing the spin he came up and back down, again diagonally, but this time high in a downward arc, burying it deep into the notch where throat meets shoulder.

  Before he could free the blade, a bullet creased his side and a grenade landed in the throng of the crowd. The blast knocked Dominic off his feet and peppered him with shrapnel. His air was gone. His hearing was gone. He was paralyzed. He blinked his eyes and tried to move his head, tried to move his fingers; nothing — nothing but pain and confusion and shock and concussion. And then there was a man standing over him, screaming in his face. He couldn’t hear him and could only discern a crude outline of the man’s face in the darkness. Death reached for him. He didn’t want to let it take him, he wanted to fight. His spirit was willing but his flesh was weak. The mechanics just didn’t work. Somewhere between the brain and the muscles the signal jammed up. He only hoped that somehow his men might have a chance; that his actions might have given them enough of a respite for them to break free. Also that he might not be judged too harshly for what he had had to do on the rooftop. He didn’t believe the Marine Corps would ever forgive him, even in death, but he hoped at least, that God would.

  The man grabbed him by the vest and screamed into his face. Dominic tried to head-butt him, but his neck wasn’t working any better than anything else. The spinning of the world began to steady and his hearing garbled its way back to a semblance of understanding as the concussive effects of the grenade blast wore off. Even his vision cleared up. He took in a lungful of air and saw that the man standing over him was Lance Corporal Wade Dempsey. And the words were beginning to make sense.

  “…we can handle it now, Sarge. We got ‘em on the run; they’re as good as dead.”

  Dominic couldn’t muster the strength to speak; he could barely nod his head. Wade lifted him off the ground and slung him over his shoulder in the traditional firemen’s carry. Dominic felt the blood flow out of his body and onto the young Marine. Every step, every turn, every bump pushed Dominic closer to death’s door. It felt so near; reaching for him with bony fingers.

  Tired, weak and in pain he would not give up. He continued to fight.

  Because that’s what Marine’s do.

  5

  Sarah Hampton

  * * *

  The Cat

  * * *

  Later she would think that if she had had just a little more time she might have recovered enough to handle what happened next; to handle the way her mind skipped from those prints in the dust to the image of the Tabby jumping at her from under the box — and the way it sounded — “it sounded hungry.”

  But there was no time.

  Sarah jerked her head from side to side, searching the hiding places of the room. She pushed past Chuck as if he wasn’t there. “Where are you?”

  “Who?” Chuck wore a startled expression on his face.

  “It took the evidence,” she said as she grabbed hold of a box of electrical outlets and threw them off a workbench. The parts exploded onto the floor with a loud crash.

  “Who took what evidence?”

  “Not who — it! It took the evidence. It took it and I’m going to get it back.” Heaving, she toppled the three slats of sheetrock that leaned against the wall. They struck with a slap that echoed through the building.

  “Hey,” cried Chuck. “Take it easy, kiddo.”

  She ignored him, tears running down her cheeks and wetting the tape holding her splint in place. She gritted her teeth so hard they made grinding, crunching noises inside her head. “WHERE ARE YOU?” She swung her gun about wildly, almost hitting her sergeant in the face.

  “Hey, come on now, you’ve got to take it easy here.”

  A bellow of rage tore past her lips. “WHERE ARE YOU?” Rational thinking vanished and she gave herself over to a red haze that bore her along at insane speed. The evidence. Nothing else mattered. She kicked over a sawhorse, sending tools clanking across the cement and dust billowing into the air.

  Now the firemen were peeking in the doorway at her. Well let them look, they didn’t matter. Only the cat mattered, the cat and the evidence.

  She reached for a tarp that partially covered an open tool chest and jerked back her hand, four narrow slices raked across her knuckles and up to her wrist. Tiny beads of blood welled as she stared at the new wound.

  The cat bounded from the chest, hitting the floor on the run; clenched between its teeth, the egg roll shape of the not-so-dead-man’s penis.

  Sarah grinned, although she couldn’t feel her lips. She brought up the gun.

  The front door sprang open and two men, pushing a gurney, started into the room. The cat veered and streaked for the door.

  No hesitation. Sarah fired, the gunshots sounding like bombs exploding in the confined space. BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! She blasted at the fleeing feline, chipping ragged divots out of the concrete and sending bullets and shrapnel scattering across the room. People were screaming now, Chuck and the firemen, but she didn’t hear them as her bullets chewed up a trail inches behind the racing cat. The Tabby took two final bounds then leapt up on one of the ducking gurney pusher’s shoulders. A bullet punched through the wall a fraction of an inch from the man’s face and he fell to the floor as if killed. The cat jumped off his shoulder and out the door.

  Chuck tried to stop her. Vaguely, she felt him grab at her arm, but she jerked away, pointing the gun at him. He backed off, his hands up in surrender, eyes wide in shock. She turned and shoved the gurney out of her way. Both of the men were still on the floor and neither of them tried to stop her.

  Outside she saw the cat running toward a squatting green dumpster twenty yards away. She fired, the cat staggered, dropping its prize. She shot twice more, missing both times but spraying the orange and white Tabby with asphalt. Its ears flattened like a cheetah’s in full run, and its lips drew back baring needle sharp teeth. It
hissed and slashed a paw through the air at her, a useless gesture. Sarah stood well out of range.

  She took careful aim, squeezed the trigger, but the slide had locked back; the weapon empty. She dropped the magazine and popped in a new one, releasing the slide and chambering a new round. Her breathing heaved in and out past her teeth.

  The cat landed on top of the dumpster, scaling the closed section with the deftness of a professional mountain climber, the hunk of meat back between its jaws.

  Five bullets plunked into the metal front of the dumpster, then two more just to the side of the cat as it made it over the backside and squirmed into a drainage runoff.

  “No!” Sarah shrieked, chasing after it. When she reached the small hole, she could see only a tiny section of light from the other end. The drainage chute ran under Colorado Boulevard. Shining her flashlight into the hole, she saw the cat as it reached the other side.

  Sarah stood up, and through breaks in the flow of cars that zoomed past, she spotted it. Closing her eyes, she started shooting. She had almost finished her second magazine when Chuck slammed into her. He hit her hard and it took her breath away. When she fell, her head cracked against the cement that housed the small drainage hole and she saw bright sparks flash behind her eyes like miniature suns, reminding her of the beautiful stars that had greeted her when she first arrived at the scene. It hurt really bad. Someone jerked the gun from her fingers and she felt a nail snap. It didn’t matter though. Nothing mattered, now.

  She had lost the evidence.

  6

  Dominic Elkins

  * * *

  Guilt