The Mulligan Planet (9 page)

I stood up straight and looked
at the carnage that surrounded me when something else caught my eye
at the end of the tunnel. Eight more hunters, I was pretty sure
this was the end. I stood my ground and adjusted my collar,
straightening up for my death, that was until the huge guy who
served me from the cafeteria came barrelling through them, not
into, through the hunters. His arm acting like a hot knife while
the hunters played the role of butter, he looked up as he flung his
arm down, splattering the floor with blood, “That’s one you owe me
Prince!” we shared a laugh as I closed the distance between us but
he stopped as a bullet tore through his head, turning his smile to
confused pain as he fell to the floor, I ripped the knife from my
back and sent it into his killers throat that was revealed behind
him in the fall that seemed to last hours. “Kate! Help me, now!” I
ran and slid on my knees to his side, his big blue eyes locked on
the ceiling, I could hear Kate’s footsteps approaching. I didn’t
even know his name, why was this death so significant to me? I’ve
seen thousands die, at that point I’d watched fleeing people shot
in the back not thirty seconds prior, why did this man’s death mean
so much? Kate had reached me and was dragging me back, I watched
his wound heal over and his eyes shut, another part of being a
vampire, in death we have a healing process, a sign that the body
is firing off a final signal, like an arm jerk. I pulled myself to
my feet, “Let’s get upstairs.” My words came out cold as we ran for
the stairs. Gunfire resounded through the stairwell, deafening in
the highly acoustic environment, but we forced ourselves to leap up
the stairs. I smashed through the third floor door revealing a
familiar corridor; we went left toward the sound of a shotgun
discharging where we reached a corner and stopped, I peeked around,
twelve hunters firing into a room which I recognised as the
cafeteria, a large, black crate overflowing with ammunition sat
behind them. We were screwed, no way could Kate and I take them
head on, I looked over to her, blood dripping from a gash on the
side of her head, her face showing only rage, no fear, no sadness,
just pure anger, I cupped her head in my hand and brushed some of
the blood away, “You ok?” she nodded, “I’m fine, one of them got a
lucky shot, what’s the situation?” I frowned, partly because I was
pretty sure I was about to die, for the second time in the past
five minutes, and partly because I was worried about her, how she
was going to cope with this
if
we got out, “There’s twelve
of them, one loaded ammo crate behind them, they aren’t running out
any time soon, and I’m all out.” She checked the pistol in her
hands, “I’ve got one round, swap with me.” Before I could make a
confused face she’d pushed me out of the way, and was checking
around the corner herself, “There’s a grenade visible through the
slit in the crate, if I can hit it we’ll be home free.” I was
concerned, “And if you miss?” she turned and smiled at me, “Then
I’ve had one Hell of a life, how about you?”

She didn’t give me a chance to
respond; she popped around the corner, took a deep breath and
pulled the trigger. I grabbed her arm and pulled her back to me,
the explosion rattling around my brain which was quickly combined
with immense amounts of gun fire, I’d figured the explosion hadn’t
done much damage and now they were going to kill us, but they never
came, the bullets hitting the wall ahead of us and just about
everywhere else, I covered Kate’s ears and she covered mine, I felt
a warm sensation as her hands touched my face, ‘is this what real
love feels like?’ I let myself brew on that until the shooting
stopped, and came to the realisation that it wasn’t, my ears were
bleeding, the way she took care of me as I took care of her felt
good though. We waited another few seconds before going around the
corner, the crate was torn to bits, the clean hall I first walked
through was now coated in fresh blood and bullet holes. The hunter
that had been closest to the box was missing the majority of his
lower half while the rest were riddled with bullet wounds in their
charred and burning mesh of armour and flesh, we stepped over the
corpses and into the cafeteria, Minks was dirty, his hands covered
in a thick layer of blood, “Thanks for the assist sir, we sent
someone down to give you a hand before they showed up, you see him
on your way up?” I shook my head, “He saved my life… he got shot
down before I could get to him. Where’s Steve and Wolf? Anyone else
make it here?” he ran his hand through his hair, “Wolf is locking
down the courtyard main entrance, I’ve got about fifty out the
back, Steve and Mike included, Steve isn’t looking too good. Come
on.” We walked past the counter and into a massive kitchen, people
scattered in small groups, some crying while others seemed to be
strategising, and at the back on a bench laid Steve, Mike holding
his hands down on a blood soaked stomach, tears welled up in his
eyes, “You stay awake, you don’t get to leave me here.” I ran to
his side, “Steve… what happened to him?” Mike looked up at me, “One
of those fuckers got him, but he’s going to be alright,” He turned
his tearful eyes to Steve, “Aren’t you mate? You don’t get let off
that easy, we got a job to do.” Steve looked up at me and smiled,
“You’re a good man John, take care of this guy for me?” I pushed a
now sobbing Mikael aside and pulled Steven up by the collar, “No.”
I sunk my teeth into his neck, he struggled against me while other
hands tried to rip me off him, I could feel the blood rushing from
his body, his struggling easing off as he fell asleep, he’d already
lost a lot of blood from the wound, I let the hands pull me off and
watched as Steve’s pale body hit the bench, hard hands slammed me
into the wall and the face of Jason Minks obscured my view, “That
was NOT your call to make!” I pushed him off me, “He’ll live now,
when we get this place back he’s going to need the infirmary for a
few days, he won’t be waking up any time soon, you know, the effect
of almost dying!” Jason took a further step back and leaned on the
bench next to Steve while Kate and Mike wandered off to one of the
groups that were working on ideas to fight back. No-one agreed with
what I did but me. I’d made those decisions before, they’d learn to
live with it I told myself, ‘one day they’ll thank me.’

Everyone was walking and
talking, I couldn’t stand it, if no-one wanted to talk to me there
was no point in me being there. I slipped back into the cafeteria
and started searching the hunter’s bodies, I found a carbine rifle
with a half full clip on one of the bodies and a .44 magnum locked
in another’s hand. Slinging the rifle over my shoulder and holding
the hand cannon I began to stalk the halls, searching for a sign
that would lead me to the courtyard, I had no idea where I was, I
wanted something to show me where to go, then it hit me, “OLHUD,
activate,” the map lit up in the corner like last time, I must’ve
somehow turned it off when I got out of the car and not noticed,
“Locate Wolfgang.” The map took up my entire field of vision and a
green dot flashed at the far right corner, maybe three hundred
metres away, “Set a way-point and open commlink with him.” There
was a crackle in my ears which was quickly enveloped by gun fire,
“Wolf! Can you hear me?” I started running toward the green arrow
now in front of me, “Affirmative, where are you?” I took a left
turn, one hundred metres out, “Just coming from the cafeteria, not
far, Kate, Jason and co, other than Gabe, are holed up there.” I
leaned around a corner and could see Wolf on the other side of the
hallway, hiding behind an overturned table with someone next to him
out of view, at which point the way point disappeared, “I have eyes
on you, can you and the rest make it here?” I saw him fire over the
top of the makeshift barricade, “No other survivors, only me and
Gabriel made it out, barely, there’s thirty at the end of this
hall,” Gabe fired one shot over the wall, “Nice, twenty nine, an
assist from you might see this area clear.” I looked at the way I
came, clear, “Yeah, I’m coming over.” I sprinted to them and hugged
the corner next to the table, “How much have you got?” Wolf threw
his AK over the table, “Empty, what about you Gabriel.” He clicked
his rifle’s magazine out, “Fourteen. I’ll be alright with that.” I
nodded and handed Wolf the magnum and unslung the carbine, Wolf
admired his new gun, “Very nice, well, let’s get to it.” Gabe
blind-fired over the top, “I never stopped, twenty eight.” I peeked
around the corner to see a hunter drop to his knees, another ran
over to drag him back, but before his hands touched him I’d sprayed
the wall with his blood and was lining up another target. “OLHUD,
how many hunters left in the facility.” A beep went off in my ears
then a soft voice poured out, “Please scan target group.” Wolf
fired the magnum down the hall, “Lucy! Transfer target visual to
John Prince, tag as hunter mark three.” An image of a hunter popped
into view and was quickly replaced by multiple sequences of
security camera footage which shut off after a few seconds, “Eighty
seven hunter mark threes in facility, three hundred and thirty two
of five thousand and twelve base personnel remain, two hundred and
five vampires, one hundred and six have had extensive military
training.” I fired around the corner and hit a wall, four thousand,
six hundred and eighty people dead. In one night the population of
a small town had been eradicated, how do you keep this quiet? What
of the families? Then another horrific thought went through my
mind, “Lucy, of those ninety nine untrained, how many are
children?” There was a pause as the machine calculated, I caught
Wolf looking at me sadly and shook his head at me, “You don’t want
to do that to yourse-” Lucy’s voice drained out his, “Fifty seven.”
Bullets hit the stainless steel table protecting Gabe and Wolf who
popped up and squeezed the trigger five more times, “Fuck off you
bastards!” the hammer clicked uselessly as he kept pulling the
trigger, a bullet tore through his shoulder, then his hip, he
dropped behind the table and threw Gabriel at me.

He picked up the table and moved
forward with it as a shield, his fresh wounds dripping, “Come on!
You want another kill!? Fight for it!” Gabriel reloaded, “I have
six bullets left, there’s…” he peeked around the corner, “eleven
left, let’s finish this.” He slipped around the corner, I was
really considering just running, getting shot hurts… a lot, but
then I thought about the dead, these were women and children not
just soldiers who knew the risk. I ran around the corner, Gabe had
killed three more and was tailing a still highly mobile Wolf, I
fired past the table and caught one of the hunters in the gut,
their gunfire dying down significantly, Wolf roaring as he carried
the table down the hall, occasionally it ground along the floor, I
got off another shot and another body dropped lifelessly. The
remaining were retreating only to realise that they were at the end
of the hall, their last turn just passed by Wolf who, pushing their
dead comrades with his table shield, was mere feet from them. Their
screams echoing through the halls, I had no sympathy for them
though, death will always beget death. When I reached Wolf and Gabe
we nodded at each other, took a step back and slammed into the
table, silencing their screams.

We’d taken a few minutes to sit
and take it in, an alert from Lucy had been sent out informing us
that the hunters were eradicated other than the five who were
currently being tortured for information. The eyes of the dead
flashing through my mind every time I closed mine, the screams
ringing through my ears. I couldn’t move, the idea of that many
people dying, “What are we going to do Wolf?” he pulled the bullet
out of his shoulder and let it roll across the floor, leaving a
dark red trail in its wake, “We move. We’ll do this mission on
Friday then we’ll probably transfer to the base in Antarctica until
we can find somewhere else.” His voice empty and cold, Gabriel
kicked his gun across the floor, “This truly went balls up didn’t
it?” I nodded as I wiped some of the blood off on my pants, “It
really did. I haven’t seen this many people die at one time… ever.
I mean, I’ve seen a lot die, but never so fast, not so close.” We
sat there for a while, Wolf and I got word about several more
deaths, some who were wounded, others who couldn’t handle what they
saw and lost and decided to end it themselves. Twenty three minutes
had passed from the first breach to the interrogation of the last
hunter which had revealed that they’d brought their entire force
from a few kilometres up the road; they had found the base months
ago and had been mobilising. After an hour or so someone from the
command centre came for Wolf, Gabe and myself to guide us to a
large room in the heart of the base that was filled with buzzing
men and women operating computer systems, occasionally mumbling
something or leaving the room in tears. The guide showed us to a
smaller back room similar to the one I woke up in. Jason, Mike,
Kate, Anton and Gregorvich were in the room sitting around a large
oval table. Anton, who had a large split in his forehead, gestured
to the three remaining chairs, “Could you shut the door on your way
out Louis,” I heard the door close as I sat, “Now, Gregorvich got
in about ten minutes after the attack, he managed to get some
information.” He pointed at Greg who took this as his cue, “There
was a garage,” he threw some pictures to the centre of the table,
“A large truck-van like vehicle; that one almost looks military,
and a two seated black convertible.” I grabbed the picture of the
truck, blood smearing it under my fingers, it looked like an
armoured bank truck but slightly longer with a smoother, more
stylish front, “I’ll take Gregorvich with me in the convertible,
Kate and Wolf, I need you with Minks and the team in the truck.
I’ll need a suitcase with enough explosives to open the front door
but more importantly to make a lot of smoke, remote detonated would
be preferable,” I felt woozy, I shook my head slightly, “then you
guys bring the truck around, bring the C4 and weapons. I’ll need
Mike to lace the base of the building with the explosives, Alpha
can cover him, the rest of us will move through the building,” I
felt blood dripping down my back, I coughed into my hand as blood
bubbled in my throat, that prick with the knife must’ve gotten me
in the lung, “We’ll all meet on the roof for a helo extract.” I
slipped back into the chair and tried to keep my breathing
regular.