Hunter (61 page)

Locking and loading, they entered the long tunnel.

It was a labyrinth of sorts, far different from the steady certainty of the passageway above and inviting a new kind of nervous fear. But Hunter was too exhausted by battle to be nervous. His steadiness was fed by cold determination to destroy this creature; he felt nothing at all.

In fact, there was almost a recklessness in his approach now, as if he was more than willing to go face-to-face one more time in order to deliver all the damage it could endure. But only the most acute awareness of those beside him could have discerned that he moved with a lesser edge of caution.

The tunnel began to curve away, angling gradually until Hunter sensed that they were retreating along the same general direction. In the distance, flares burned to a small circle of light, and Hunter steadily followed the splashed blood trail until they saw a bright glowing dome before them.

It was the central chamber of the cave Uttered with the bones of ages. Hidden in utter darkness for centuries, the skeletons glared white in the flame. And Hunter knew that the beast had returned here to finish the battle.

The damage they had inflicted upon the creature had finally reduced its almost measureless strength. So, no, it no longer trusted its superior senses without relying upon sight. And it had circled back to this place, where it would launch a last ambitious attack. But Hunter never assumed anything. Cautious as a wolf, he moved slowly into the cathedral chamber of bleached bone.

Leading, he studied the endless expanse of dunes and crests and mounds. And with each uplifted clawed hand he saw the creature—a merciless and malignant power that knew no restraint. Only the darkness of its own mind had been its doom. And yet, despite the gigantic strength, Hunter felt no fear because it had so maliciously killed those he loved: Ghost by violence, the professor by its very existence.

Yeah, you're gonna die
. . .

"It'll probably do the same as before," he said, organizing them, "though there's no way to be certain because it's always learning. So just put as many rounds into it as you can." He paused to study their tense faces and read the evident fear. Even Takakura seemed shaken. He added, "Listen, this thing isn't unkillable. We've already hurt it. Now it's dying time."

Silent consent, and they continued.

Fanning out, they entered the cathedral. Slowly, Hunter walked past a high, heaped pile of skeletons and studied the dust, searching for any area where it might have concealed itself. But he saw nothing. Not even blood, and it disturbed him.

Nothing moves without leaving a sign ...

What was he missing?

The doubt tugged at him, distracting and alarming.

Suddenly seized by it, he paused and knelt, carefully studying everything he could see. Concentrated, he tried to read any sign of disturbance, of moment, and again saw nothing. And with each second, his alarm increased.

It's there ... It has to be ... Trust what you know ...

A cavern silent with centuries-old dust stretched out before him. He saw the smears of where they had entered and left, the faint traces of track where it had staggered through, the minute claw marks on stone. But there was nothing more.

There should at least be blood ...

Frustrated, Hunter rose and stared over the room. He trusted his skills and knew it couldn't deceive him. He had tracked this thing across an entire wildness scarred by animal life and weather. He had defeated it again and again with his knowledge and experience. No, it couldn't defeat him here. Not when he was this close.

Steadily he allowed his vision to roam, absently noticing the creeping silhouettes of Bobbi Jo, Takakura and Chaney. They were holding a close formation as they advanced in a solid line, searching. But he knew in his soul that something was wrong.

Nothing moves without leaving a sign ...

Hunter turned back to the tunnel they had just quit. There was only darkness there, and he had followed the blood trail into the cavern. He walked slowly back toward the corridor, and with each step felt a rising fear—a sharpened instinct that told him to beware. He halted twenty feet distant of the entrance, staring into the circle of blackness. Experience and instinct decided for him, and he went with it.

"It's backtracking on us," he said to the rest, not removing his eyes from the corridor.

Chaney's voice boomed from across the room. "What?"

"I said it's circling!" Hunter shouted, taking a hesitant step as he cast a careful glance at another darkened corridor. "All these passageways interconnect! It's trying to come up behind us!"

Takakura scowled. "I thought you said it came in here!"

"Oh, it came in here, all right," Hunter answered more quietly, moving to the side as he searched another tunnel, rifle leveled. "It couldn't fake that. It just didn't stay long. It went back into the tunnels to come up behind us."

"You're sure about this?" Bobbi Jo asked incredulously. "It was hurt pretty bad, Hunter. I don't think it could have gotten very far. Not bleeding like that."

"It didn't have to." He shook his head, maintaining their location by voice. "It wouldn't have taken it more than thirty seconds to backtrack into the tunnel and let us pass it by. Then it turned around and went back the way we came." He stared. "Yeah, that's what it's done. It's scared now.
Knows it's hurt. It's waiting for us to come to it. But it won't fight us again if we're together. It senses that it could lose, so it laid low while we passed it."

"We could flush it out again," Chaney said, disturbed.

"No," Hunter responded with certainty. "It won't do that this time."

"Why?"

"Because it learns from its mistakes, Chaney. It's savage, but it's not stupid. This time it'll keep moving, trying to avoid a trap. We have to cut off its lines of escape."

"Cut off its lines of escape?" Chaney answered. "Hunter, that'll mean sp
litting up! We can't split up with the thing out there! Hell, even together we might not be able to put it down!"

"It's either that or we lose it!" Hunter turned his head into the words, then calmed. "Listen," he continued, "there's only one way to corner this thing, and that's by cutting off every
line of retreat simultaneously. It's like driving a tiger. You beat the bush until you've driven it from hiding and into a kill zone! And remember: this is that thing's home ground! It may have come here on instinct, but by now it knows this cave like the back of its hand! So if we're gonna get another shot at it, we have to force it into the open!"

An uneasy stillness settled over them.

Bobbi Jo was the first to lift her rifle. "I say we go for it. We've come too far to walk away now." The entire front portion of her uniform was blackened with blood.

"We'
ll split into two teams," Hunter said. "Me and Bobbi Jo will take the passage we just quit." He nodded to Chaney. "You and Takakura take the bigger passage that runs to the right. We'll meet where they converge. Remember that we have to check all the ledges. We can't give that thing the slightest chance to come up behind us."

They nodded together.

"All right," Hunter finished, "let's move. If you can get it on the run, drive it into this room, we can kill it. It won't survive another exchange like that last one."

Bobbi Jo advanced beside Hunter as they neared the passageway. Then they were submerged once more in the enveloping blackness, walking silently. The flares revealed them but they didn't want the sounds of their own footsteps to muffle the stealthy approach of a rear attack. Within minutes they stood at the intersection of the first passage.

Perilously fatigued, Bobbi Jo wiped sweat from her face. Hunter stared as she leaned her back against a wall, recovering breath in the intense humidity and thick air of the cavern. He knew the accelerating blood loss was also draining her strength, but he didn't know what he could do for her at the moment.

"Good God, Hunter," she gasped. "This thing has got to be hurting. 'Cause we're dying."

Grim, Hunter nodded. "It's dying, Bobbi."

She swallowed hard. "How do you know?"

"I just know, darlin'."

"Tell me how," she grimaced," 'cause I could use the encouragement."

Gazing back at her, Hunter smiled. He reached out, touching a stone. He lifted his fingers away, blackened by the diseased blood of the beast.

"That's bright blood, Bobbi Jo," he said. "Somebody hit an artery, and it isn't healing like it was. We're finally wearing it out." He nodded slowly. "Yeah, it's weak. Probably dying. But we still have to finish it. And it ain't going down easy."

She stood away from the wall; the Barrett was beginning at last to wear her down, but she held it firmly. "Then ...let's finish it," she gasped. "Before it finishes us."

Hunter smiled. Nodded.

"Whatever made you so tough?" he asked softly.

She laughed tiredly.

"It must be the company I keep."

Chaney paused, hastily wiping sweat from his brow.

It was stifling work, working a slow path up the passageway. His entire uniform was drenched black with sweat and blood from a ragged and profusely bleeding cut on his forehead—the chance result, he had surmised, of the shattered stock arching from his hands when the creature had hit the Weatherby. But, although irritating, the wound was not incapacitating, so he continued.

Takakura, alertly scanning everything, stood on guard as Chaney attempted briefly to adjust his clothing, seeking to find any level of comfort. But the BDUs were so ragged and torn—stretched by perspiration and blood—that it was impossible. Chaney motioned in frustration, straightening.

"Forget it," he breathed. "It's not worth the—"

Slowly the hands extended behind Takakura, emerging with ghostlike silence from the utter darkness of a crevice. It was a terrible image: demonic claws reaching from blackness only inches from the unknowing Japanese.

Chaney raised his rifle instantly at the sight but words froze in his throat because, in the wild moment when he had seen and reacted, he didn't know whether to tell Takakura to leap away or risk a wild shot. Yet the Japanese, a true warrior, somehow realized and in the same breath had moved, diving and rolling forward.

Chaney's blast from the
Weatherby illuminated the crevice to reveal the beast, its face distorted by a hideous scream. Then Takakura fired. Light again, then in the next second a creature possessed of a prehistoric rage erupted from the dark, instantly beside them.

Its roar was a physical force, slapping Chaney in the face and chest, and then he was lost in a frantic turning, twisting battle, his rifle erupting again desperately.

Takakura, rifle flung away wildly at the creature's first swiping blow, returned a crippling wound with a flashing slash of his sword, hitting it solidly across the chest to draw a sweeping stream of blood that trailed the katana into darkness. Then it turned fully into the Japanese, who met it force to force.

Chaney shouted as Takakura leaped, hurling the full weight of his body—everything he possessed—in a stabbing lunge that drove the steel blade into the tremendous muscular chest through and through to send a foot of steel out its back.

It was a blow of artistry, of poetic movement made savage only by the definition of its delivery. Then Takakura—not wasting time or motion to appreciate the perfection of his skill—shouted and turned, viciously jerking the blade clear and spinning. And as he came around the sword again caught it, crossing his earlier blow into its chest. And yet again the Japanese hit as Chaney finally reloaded, blasting two deep furrows into its back.

Takakura leaped forward again, striking for the arm, but it recovered from Chaney's shots and leaped into the Japanese, furiously blasting the blade aside.

Its clawed right hand snatched Takakura by the neck as Chaney was hurled wildly back, somehow struck by a backhand. Then the creature ignored Chaney completely as it turned fully into Takakura, viciously driving its hand into a blow that struck the Japanese hard, disappearing into the chest of his torn uniform.

Dead ...

Chaney knew it.

Takakura, standing his ground to the last, was dead.

Knowing its incredible speed, Chaney was already on his feet and running, hurling his wounded body up the passageway with all his strength. He knew that he retained the revolver and debated turning to fire the remaining rounds, but realized it was futile. Feeling a sudden dissipation of strength as he staggered into the central chamber, the light casting monstrous shadows upon the walls, he careened forward and slid down a slope, crashing to a graveyard of bones that wrapped around him sharp and tangling, tearing at his skin with a thousand clutching claws.

Glaring back, too shocked to be astonished, he saw the creature standing imperiously on the crest of the slope. And, staring upon it, Chaney looked steadily into the glaring red eyes. Although pained, they reflected a purity of purpose—the awesome rage that had fired it to kill so relentlessly, so many times.

It was a moment of silence, each regarding the other.

Chaney rose amid the skeletons, refusing fear.