Age of Blood

57

Laws staggered to his feet. He took inventory. His breather was gone, as was much of his suit. His body armor remained in place over bare skin, probably the only thing that had saved him. His right arm dangled uselessly. Sometime during the fury of the last few moments it had dislocated. He could pop it back in given the correct surface, but right now he needed to be sure he wasn’t going to die. Besides his shoulder, he had a chunk torn out of his right thigh and his left side. These gushed blood. Exposed to the bacteria of sewage, there were probably enough microorganisms in the wounds to kill him. He was halfway ready to sit down and let it take him.

God, was he fucking tired.

He noticed Holmes in the gloom of the pipe, face first on the ground, water pouring around him, heading downhill toward where they believed the underground temple complex to be. Laws staggered over, reached down with his left hand and grabbed one of the shoulder straps holding on to the body armor. Using only one arm, he somehow managed to lift his team leader to a sitting position and lean him against a wall.

“Sam, you alive?” Although the light was low, there was enough of it coming from the pipe opening for Laws to check pupil dilation. They reacted, but barely.

Laws searched around. He needed to get moving, but he couldn’t do it with one arm. He stood and approached the side of the pipe wall. He reached around with his good arm and grabbed the wrist of his right hand. Then he gritted his teeth as he slammed his shoulder into the wall. The pain was exquisite, like a shiv through the spine. But the shoulder hadn’t snapped back into place.

He staggered back. He knew he had to do it again, but he wanted to do anything else except that. He pulled hard with his left hand on his right wrist, stretching the arm as far as he could. Then he ran into the wall.

A second of pain, then the ultimate relief of a pop, as the shoulder went back home.

He gasped as he brought his right hand in front of his face. It trembled a moment, then stilled. Now to find some ammunition.

He found pieces of someone’s vest. He grabbed it and pulled out a red smoke grenade and a 9mm magazine. He felt on his thigh, but he’d lost the weapon—probably eaten by one of the ’cabra. Feeling around Holmes’s thigh, he found a pistol. Laws pulled the slide back, cleared it, checked its function, then shoved it into the waistband of his UDTs. He found two more 9mm magazines and a broken HK MP5. Weighing them in his hands, it took three seconds for him to figure out that they weren’t worth it. He tossed them to the side and kept searching.

He was looking for the butt pouch Holmes had been carrying. In it were two D rings, two Palmer rigs, and 150 feet of nylon rope and some 550 cord. Without them the next step was going to be difficult. But try as he might, he couldn’t find anything even remotely like a length of rope, a ladder, or a portable escalator. A flash of childhood memory invaded his nasty reality—Donald Duck going camping drops a box on the floor, presses a button, and out pops a mansion, complete with swimming pool. Laws would be happy with a simple ladder. Hold the Jacuzzi.

Laws realized he was a little loopy. Some of his thoughts weren’t making sense. All he knew was he needed to figure out a way to get them from up in the pipe to down in the battle. Then he had a great idea.

He counted seven dead ’cabra nearby. Each chupacabra weighed more than two hundred pounds. It was hard to move them, but he was finally able to get them near the pipe opening.

He got down on his hands and knees and peered out.

A pyramid. Thugs with weapons aimed at him.

Laws jerked back just as the roof of the pipe above him was scored with a dozen rounds. He ducked, feeling chunks of concrete bite and sizzle into the exposed place on his back. He was lucky that he was in defilade. They could fire all day and couldn’t hit him. Their angle was all wrong.

He pulled the first ’cabra toward him. Adjusting his position, he got behind it and pushed it toward the opening with his legs. Five seconds later it was falling through the air. He heard it impact with a splash. The sound of water gave him hope. After he pushed the next one over, he snuck a look over the edge, hoping that everyone’s attention was on the dead ’cabra. He was right. No one fired at him and he spied the dead ’cabra floating below in what looked to be a least ten feet of water.

This time when he pushed out a ’cabra, they opened fire right away, hoping to catch him. A round sizzled past his foot, almost ripping through it.

But then he heard a different sound. A suppressed SR-25. Walker! The gunfire shifted toward the new source. But if Walker was where he should be, it was on the high ground. The suppressed rifle chatted with the cracks and pops of pistols of several different calibers. Walker was a crack shot and Laws had no doubt that every one found a home.

Laws used the time to push out four more ’cabras. But he was getting tired, too tired to push any more monsters out of the pipe. He had just about enough energy to get Holmes to where he needed to be. Boy was he going to be pissed. It was a good thing he was unconscious or he’d fight to not get dropped onto a pile of dead ’cabras. He shouldn’t worry, though. If he missed the dead monsters, he’d hit the water.

A voice rose out of the red mist in Laws’s mind, suggested he sit down and wait until help arrived. Like any decent SEAL, Laws shook it away. He got his arm underneath Holmes’s shoulder and pulled him to the edge. The extra weight made Laws’s wounds scream. His right leg threatened to give out on him. Still, he made it.

He didn’t have long. He glanced down long enough to make himself dizzy. He almost fell. Instead, he adjusted his grip on Holmes, aimed as best he could, and let go.

The leader of SEAL Team 666 fell like a dead weight. Had he been awake, he might have struggled and caused himself to spin. As it was, he fell flat, his left side impacting the uppermost ’cabra in the pile. But then he did something unexpected. He bounced and as he bounced his eyes opened. He reached the apex of the bounce, was about to scream something at Laws, then fell and hit the water.

A round chewed at the pipe between Laws’s feet. Instead of moving, he pulled his pistol out and fired. His third round took out the thug far below. How the hell had he hit the man? Laws stared at his gun as if it were magic and grinned.

Laws was about to begin firing on everyone with his magic gun when a life-sized butterfly came up from below.