Gates Read online

  It was like staring at an empty well which looked right back at you. Of course, I had my doubts about that means of assessing the situation. But again, who was I? This had the potential to be a shooting situation. I never did have to undergo whatever he had to experience. I couldn’t even ask how many had the man killed, terminated, disposed, executed, or whatever the current term was. All I could say was, “take care.”

  Henry was gone for almost an hour. The two guards were replaced by a trio. Though we kept to our cover, I maintained a distance of around fifty feet from them. Nor did I always keep them in my sight. You know the feeling that you’re being watched? That was what I wanted to avoid. I didn’t want any of them to start being overly curious and explore in our direction.

  Eventually, the professor came back. His expression clearly showed he didn’t like what he’d discovered. Henry’s jaws were tightly clenched and an intense, startling focus was in his eyes.

  “Bastards,” he whispered in a furious tone I had never heard before, even when the bizarre beings were killing humans left and right.

  I didn’t reply and merely waited for him to continue.

  “Around sixteen of them, twelve males and four females. All armed with long weapons. Three ARs, one M4, and the rest hunting rifles or shotguns. Inside the main building are six women, all tied to an iron bar with handcuffs. The structure has four small rooms, each with a bed. Though two are now being used. You get what I am saying?”

  I nodded, though I noticed Jen had her arm around my right and her grip reflexively tightened at Henry’s words. I admit I was shocked, but deep inside I was half-expecting what he said. The situation did sound clichéd, but that’s reality for you.

  Humans could be hideously cruel and bestial in desperate situations. Some, like this lot, were like vultures, living and preying on others.

  “There are others in the fields, attending to crops, though guarded by six. Two are guarding a smaller building, and the rest are in the main building. The leader appeared to be there, unless the guy I saw giving orders was but a subordinate.”

  “What do you plan to do now?” I asked. That’s sixteen armed individuals right there. I doubted if I even knew how to act in a real firefight.

  “I can’t leave them just like that, Eric. I saw a large excavation near the smaller structure which I guess is being used as quarters for their prisoners. A small backhoe is beside it. I have my suspicions about that hole, but it doesn’t matter now. And I don’t care if they were a gang, drug dealers, or upright citizens before everything happened.”

  “Sixteen, Henry.” I reminded him. “Rambo was just a movie flick.”

  “I saw that one with my buddies. Laughed our guts out. But I take care of it. It’s not as if they’re bunched together in one place. But I would need to exchange pistols with Jen. She’s got the threaded version. And I need to borrow your knife. Its blade is thicker and the balance is excellent.”

  They exchanged firearms and I gave him my knife. Henry rifled through his gear and came out with an oil filter can. He checked his M4 and ammo.

  “Oil can?” I asked.

  “Improvised sound suppressor. Tested it already. Better with subsonic ammo, but beggars can’t be choosers,” he replied grimly. "A .22 caliber pistol would have better to handle the dogs, but we make do with what we have."

  Satisfied with his preparations, he turned to me.

  “Stay here with Jen. Don’t rush forward even if you hear gunfire. If any of those assholes at the barricade start moving in your direction, wait until they get closer and shoot them. That could only mean they know your position. Don’t give them the chance to shoot you in the back. Then hightail it out of here. If they don’t do that and I’m not back in an hour, leave the area. You know the original plan and the direction of Grand Falls.”

  Those were his instructions, given in a clear, staccato manner. Then he moved through a clump of shrubs and was gone. I understood what he’d said, though it was good thing he didn’t ask me to repeat them. It would have been a lengthier, stumbling version.

  After he left, Jen and I dropped back several feet though I managed to keep the roadblock in sight. I didn’t think the three guards were expecting any problem as they just stood there in plain sight, talking and laughing. Either that or they were just nincompoops with guns.

  Minutes passed. The M4 in my hands was aimed at the guards. I had not taken a human life before, but that thought never entered my mind while lying prone in the dirt, waiting for something to happen. What I was sure of was that those guys would happily slice my throat and take Jen alive if they could. You know what that means.

  All of a sudden, successive bursts of gunfire sounded, coming from the direction of the main building, startling me. They sounded like aimed shots, not merely suppressive fire. It meant Henry had been discovered. The three at the makeshift gate stood still for a moment and looked back at the main structure. One was already unslinging his rifle as he stared where the gunfire came from.

  I was caught in a quandary. With his instructions, I was not supposed to engage the bunch at the gate unless absolutely necessary. But not doing anything would also mean three more enemies for Henry. Worse, they were in a flanking position. I just couldn’t leave things as they were.

  Instinctively, I looked down the iron sights of the weapon, lined up one of the guards, and pulled the trigger. The abrupt movement of my finger jerked the firearm upwards, and I was surprised when a volley of lead flew toward my target. I expected a single shot, not the alarming and loud staccato of the gun straining to empty itself.

  I know. Newbie move. In my defense, blame the nerves. And the fact that they were human beings. Taking a life or lives for the first time is never easy. I’d heard and read that before, but there’s nothing like the real thing. A disjunctive relationship suddenly appears between your physical action and your mind. It abruptly recoils from the awful truth that you’re about to take a life. Even as one pulls the trigger, the sound of your heartbeats pounds your senses.

  Though in all honesty, I should have checked the fire selector and squeezed, not pulled, the trigger. As a result, I massacred the leaves and branches of the trees beside the roadblock.

  I missed.

  ***

  The three guards displayed better reflexes. They immediately dropped to the ground and rolled to the sides of the barricade. I studiously kept my head down as I crawled back a few feet.

  As I changed magazines and switched the fire selector back to single shot, I could hear Jen’s pistol barking, trying to get her targets suppressed. Those guys must have known more about firefights than I did as deeper-sounding rifle shots came from their position.

  True, the replies were single shots but they came in rapidly, and there were three of them. Even Jen was forced to stop firing and take cover. The return fire was that focused.

  I hit the magazine release with the palm of my hand and the bolt slammed into the breech, but couldn’t fire back. Not only were they clearly more experienced but they also were better shots. I could hear the cracking noises as bullets played havoc with the trees near us. Some of the shots were close enough to be heard as they dangerously zipped by. They were firing on what they guessed was our location, but they were getting awfully close.

  We could also hear the furious exchange of gunfire in the background. Henry’s firing was distinctive as it came in bursts and its sound had a higher pitch. I prayed he was doing better than we were.

  Funnily, despite my nervousness, fear, and hesitancy at the beginning, the thought that we had the element of surprise was a factor which raised my confidence earlier. Now Jen and I were the ones suppressed. A sense of helplessness was added to my despair. And a long list of curses.

  I looked at Jen. She’d already changed magazines and like me, was keeping her head down, though the barrel of her weapon was still pointed to the flank she covered. Then I noticed the firing of the guards had a pattern to it. After the initial volleys, they change
d to a ripple-firing sequence, enabling them to keep a steady stream of lead on our position.

  After a minute, I sensed a change in the sequence of firing, easily discernible by the distinctive variation in the loud barks of their guns. Only two were now steadily being used, though they made up for it by an increased rate of fire.

  A situation which meant the third was hunting us.

  6

  Farmhouse Firefight

  That drew a number of whispered vulgar and colorful expressions from me, uttered in the lowest tone possible, of course. And I was now worried. We had lost whatever advantages surprise had offered us. It was obvious I’d underestimated those guys – they knew their stuff. My concern now was which flank the mover was using. I immediately crawled over to Jen and told her the new development. She nodded and suggested we move back some more.

  Crawling backward to a new position, I could catch fleeting glimpses of the two shooters taking potshots at where they guessed our position was located. They didn’t stay in one firing position; two or three shots and then they rolled to a new one. They were actually not far off the mark with their firing. They had our previous position nicely bracketed with lead.

  While Jen watched our left and I kept an eye on the right, I considered taking a chance and firing off a burst or two of my own. Then I reconsidered. The distance, between 100 and 120 feet, didn’t give me enough confidence. And I was a klutz with rifles. Firing would also reveal our new position, making it easier for the third guy to find us, and the unhappy result of his two friends aiming at definite targets.

  I momentarily weighed the option of swapping guns with Jen. She would be a better shot with the M4, but it would also mean Jen would be targeted once she started firing. I immediately shelved the idea.

  As the moments and the bullets flew by, I was really starting to be pissed off. We escaped otherworldly dangers only to be pinned down like cornered rats by animals masquerading as humans. But our position was already at the bottom of a slope. Any further backward movement would expose us to the gunmen. Considering what I had seen from the way they reacted, a slight sway of the brush would result in a volley directed at it. I didn’t think we were that good at fieldcraft and could avoid being noticed.

  I had no doubt about this group being killers and worse. What Henry left unsaid in the grim and terrible expression on his face when he returned told us volumes about the horrific acts he’d seen. He was furious when he saw the soldiers get wasted back at the university, but that was nothing compared to the Henry who decided to go against sixteen—okay, make that thirteen—armed and dangerous individuals.

  Suddenly, I noticed a movement several feet in front of my position. Somebody was trying to stealthily approach our previous spot from the side. They were crawling too, as I could see from my vantage location. The tall weeds and shrubs were swaying as he moved through them. I wouldn’t have noticed it if I was lying prone, attention directed forward, in the place we left. As it was, his progress was clearly visible.

  I slowly brought the M4 into position, tracking his progress. Then, I saw an arm through the vegetation, and instinct took over. I squeezed the trigger five times at different locations where I guessed his body would be. I didn’t notice the loud retort of the firearm. My full attention was on the dangerous predator. The intruder's arm violently jerked twice and was still. I unloaded three more shots for good measure.

  Jen immediately looked at me. I noticed I was hyperventilating and nauseated.

  “I saw somebody crawling toward the site we left,” I whispered after regaining some normalcy in my breathing. “I think I killed him.”

  She just nodded. Surprisingly, my voice didn’t break. I forced the rising bile down. It was not the moment to puke.

  Then I heard one of the guards shout.

  “Ben! Ben! You okay, man?”

  He’s dead, you assholes, I thought to myself. The firing from the front had stopped. To me, it could mean they were going to try to maneuver into flanking positions. I risked a quick look and saw I was wrong. The two bastards were still there though clearly conferring with each other.

  “Move!” I said to Jen. “Change locations to the sides.”

  It was just in time. As we settled in our new positions, the deep-throated crackle of gunfire resumed, though this time, they were hitting closer than I wanted. Most hit the area we’d just vacated. We were still trapped though I could hear that the firing in the background was a bit farther away, and the distinctive shout of Henry’s M4 had changed to single shots fired in rapid sequence.

  “You’re gonna pay for that, bastards! Painfully too! I’m going to take this here knife and…” I heard a voice cry out. The speaker then proceeded to give a detailed description of what he was going to do if they got us alive. That guy definitely had a deranged childhood. Then new gun retorts added to the barrage pummeling our cover.

  Two more, I guessed, based on the individual sound of the rifles, though one was a shotgun, if I was to go with its loud explosive retort. Though what he expected to hit at this range, I would never guess. Whatever group Henry had missed by the time firing started clearly split their forces as reinforcements. My million-dollar speculation was it was that six-man group in the fields.

  I had never felt so scared, nor so hopeless, in my life. Kept under cover by constant gunfire, not knowing what happened to Henry, and an over-arching terror of what would happen to Jen if they managed to kill me… I even couldn’t move for fear any movement of the undergrowth would give me away. I didn’t know if I was hyperventilating. I looked over at Jen and saw she had her head down to her knees. Knowing how scared I was, she must be terrified. And that foulmouthed bastard continued to harangue us with quite clear descriptions of the fun he was going to have with his knife. To top it off, he had this really mousey voice. The one everybody loved to hate.

  Pinned down under a worrying volume of fire, I thought about the unfairness of it all. A lot of good people had died fighting the horrifying monsters. Terrible deaths, to the extent one couldn’t identify the bodies. And yet, in this godforsaken piece of the wilderness, these fucking people survived, preying on their fellow humans and inflicting brutal and savage atrocities. I didn’t know who they were, but right at that moment, I earnestly believed that if anybody deserved to be ravaged and clawed to death by otherworldly beasts, it would be them.

  Fuck them, I cursed under my breath. They wouldn’t even stand and fight against even one of those blasted dogs. I imagined them facing off with one of the creatures. In my mind’s eye, I could see the gate, the blocking cars, the surrounding trees, and the buildings in the background. The image was so vivid in my imagination, and I didn’t know where the emotion came from, but when the monster in my vision leaped and tore through a terrified throat, I laughed to myself.

  Unexpectedly, I sensed the desperate hate coiling inside me as if it was gaining form and substance. Rapidly, it grew stronger. I could hardly breathe. When I forced myself to exhale, it was gone.

  Abruptly, the steady rain of lead pelting our cover stopped and was replaced by cries of alarm. I could hear Mr. Knife screaming Shoot it! Shoot it!

  He must have been the leader of the guards, I immediately concluded. Gunfire erupted, followed by several loud curses. Mystified, I forced myself to look out of our cover, making sure of minimal exposure. The guards were all standing up now, with guns pointed toward a small beast. It had appeared to their left side and was watching them.

  It didn’t attack immediately though rifle fire was being directed at it. It looked like a smaller version of those unearthly canines we saw back at the university.

  Suddenly, it rushed forward and ferociously pounced on one of the guards. As the frantic and fearful scream echoed throughout the surroundings, the tone was familiar. It was Mr. Knife.

  The sound of a human meeting a violent and terrible death is a god-awful thing to hear. It could sear your soul and haunt one forever. Unfortunately, in this instance, it was Mr. Knife
, the one who had graphically threatened to do unspeakable things to Jen and me. My reaction was, I am ashamed to admit, was unmitigated relief and vindication.

  Karma does exist, was the first thought that popped into my mind. I had no doubt his end came painfully, and the supernatural beast did appalling things to him in the abbreviated last moments of his life.

  After savaging Mr. Knife in an episode lasting barely two seconds, the beast turned its attention to the rest who stood in shock. The monster didn’t even pause momentarily to admire its handiwork. It jumped from one victim to another, its feet never touching the ground. The last guy had the belated common sense to run away. He didn’t get far.

  But now the monster started to move at a fast pace toward us. I didn’t realize the damned thing could sense us. I lit one of the gasoline bottles and waited, still keeping to cover. It went straight to my hiding place and then stopped a few feet away. My instincts didn’t hesitate, even for a moment. I threw the firebomb at the waiting beast. The angry roar of a massive fireball engulfed it as I ducked behind the tree. When I sneaked a peek, all that was left was a small mound of ash.