As bullets thudded into the wood hiding him, Roxi curled into a tight ball as he wrapped his body around her. Wood splinters showered down on them as Luke felt spikes of pain bite into his neck, scalp, and the back of his legs. Either they had higher powered weaponry or were firing enough shots to dissolve the wood under their assault.
Shot after shot rang out in a nonstop deluge of hot metal and explosive concussions. He had no idea how long they huddled there. It could have been a minute or an hour, but the gunfire never seemed to stop. Instead, it only seemed to get louder. Under him, Roxi’s body shuddered and quaked, an occasional scream punctuating her crying.
Luke’s ears roared. After a while, he could no longer tell what was happening around him. All he knew was he had to keep his body between the vampires and Roxi. He grunted as something slammed into his back below his shoulder blade.
Clenching his jaw, his ears popped, providing a slight relief to the pressure of sound around him. He thought he could hear shots coming from both sides of the cavern. They’d been surrounded. They would be no escape today.
“Luke!”
The sound barely registered in his brain.
“Luke!”
Someone shook his leg. When he didn’t respond, they tried again.
“Fuck you, you toothy bastards!” someone shouted, then fired an automatic weapon.
Luke twisted his around and freed his face from the thatch of Roxi’s hair. Blinking his eyes clear, he saw the shadow of someone on one knee shouting and shooting over the table from just a few feet away.
“Jean-Paul?” Luke’s voice felt harsh and raw in his throat.
Jean-Paul ducked down, laughing, and shoved another magazine into his gun before popping back up to return fire at the vampires. Luke blinked hard to flush the acrid smoke of gunpowder from his eyes. It wasn’t a hallucination. Jean-Paul and his team had finally arrived.
Keeping his head low, Luke sat up, wincing as needles of pain twisted in his legs. The table behind him was nearly shredded, with gaps missing in places. The table Jean-Paul had flipped over was still in decent shape. Luke leaned over and squeezed Roxi’s shoulder, moving the hair covering her ear.
“Roxi, we need to move. This spot isn’t safe anymore.”
She bobbed her head and tried to rise to her hands and knees but slipped back to the ground, her limbs trembling. Luke helped her up and together they crawled behind Jean-Paul to crouch in the shadow of that table. Carefully, Luke unslung his shotgun and propped it against the oak protecting him.
“Roxi? Do you think you can reload for me?”
Nodding, she fished her gun around and handed it to Luke. He took it and rolled up, taking aim toward the end of the cavern where the vampires had been. Finding targets, he fired off the full magazine, then set it down, picking up his shotgun to empty it. Roxi had the other reloaded in time to replace it.
Periodically, a pluck of pain from the back of his legs would momentarily distract him. Round after round he poured toward the end of the cavern. The expelled smoke of so many shots drifted about the cave like an acrid, foggy miasma. The constant flash of muzzle flair happened so quickly and frequently from nearly all parts of the firefight as to almost be a strobe light.
Setting his gun down and picking up the other, he chuckled, a touch of hysteria in it. “Worst dance club ever,” he mumbled.
“What?” Jean-Paul ducked down and reloaded.
Luke shook his head and fired off his gun. He was getting punch drunk and a bit giddy. Roxi kept reloading, and he kept emptying the shotgun, aiming toward any movement along the back wall where the vamps were trying to secure a beachhead to push out further. If Jean-Paul hadn’t made his timely arrival, Luke and his friends would likely be hamburger by now.
They had to be low on ammo. He’d dropped his belt for Roxi to use several rounds ago. He was having trouble finding moving targets through the haze of smoke. Finally, Jean-Paul bellowed a cease fire order out into the cavern. The thick fog and stench of gunpowder reminded him of his times in the trenches of Flanders and France during WWI.
As his mind drifted along with the shifting eddies of the smoke, he waited for the usual waves of a panic attack to surge over him. When they remained in the background, merely the ripples of a puddle, he furrowed his brow in confusion and wonder. It would probably come later once he was out of the immediate danger of combat.
He tried to pop his ears. The whine of his tinnitus and the silence of the cease fire were nearly as loud as the recent barrage of gun fire. Roxi, thanks to the rhythm and purpose of reloading Luke’s shotguns, knelt next to Luke, poking her head over the edge of the table.
“Do you see any vampires, Jean-Paul?” Luke asked.
“I don’t know,” he whispered. “It’s hard to see anything in this mess.”
“Do you feel anything, dōšagīh?” Roxi asked, squeezing his arm.
“It’s hard to tell. There are probably live vampires smeared all over the floor and walls.” He squinted and looked for any signs of movement. “You?”
“I’m having the same issue. My mind is in sensory overload and I can’t distinguish anything at this point.” She reached over and plucked something from his hair.
“Ow.” He cringed. “What was that?”
“You’re covered in slivers from the table. I’ve been pulling them out in between reloads. Didn’t you feel it?”
“No. I was a bit occupied,” he whispered.
“Luke. My people are going to sweep from the back of the room to our position. We’ll help you sort through the carnage.”
“Shit! Sam.” He popped up and looked where she’d gone down. He didn’t see her anywhere, or Pablo. “Sam! Pablo!”
He fumbled for his radio but when he brought it up, it was nothing but shards of plastic held together by a few wires. Roxi handed him hers.
“Come in, this is Luke. Can I get a status check on Sam and Pablo?”
“This is Delilah. She’s back here with Pablo. He carried her out. They’re pretty shot up—”
“Use your CB handles…” Sam’s voice sounded thin and weak from the background.
“As you can hear, Spartacus, Bandit is alive and conscious.”
Relief washed over Luke, his body trembling from the release. If he’d been standing, he’d have probably collapsed. Roxi, probably sensing his distress, slipped an arm around his waist.
“Roxi and I are OK.”
“Horse girl,” Sam called in the background.
Luke chuckled—even shot, Sam’s good humor shone through. Even if it was a coping mechanism at the moment.
“You stay there and organize our people. We’ll coordinate with Jean-Paul up here,” Luke replied.
“No, Sam…sorry, Bandit, I’m not going to…no…” Delilah sighed in exasperation. “Fine. Tell Frenchy Le Beefcake to take care of you two and keep you alive.”
Jean-Paul narrowed his eyes and raised an eyebrow. “Frenchy Le Beefcake?”
“Sam likes giving people radio handles, ostensibly to protect our anonymity, but mostly because it amuses her.” Using the table, Luke pushed himself to a standing position then helped Roxi up.
When Jean-Paul’s people made it to them, Luke and Roxi followed Jean-Paul around the tables. His people sorted through the mess of bodies strewn about the cavern floor, staking any vampires they came across. When they found a wounded werewolf, they hustled them back to a safe place where they’d set up their de facto field hospital. The dead were set aside so they wouldn’t be resting in the growing pool of vampire sludge.
Luke stared at the growing pile. So many. Too many. Roxi slid her hand into his and squeezed tightly. A hollow pit opened in his stomach as numbness seeped into his veins and spread around his body. The bloody face of Agatha, who he’d rescued from Cassius over two years ago. James, who’d been shot and evacuated from the freighter before that. Jepson from the Coast Pack, who’d helped rescue them on Mt. Hood.
“Dōšagīh, don’t get lost. We have work to do,” Roxi said quietly, wiping a tear from his cheek with her thumb.
He nodded, weakly at first but more firmly as he went. “Right. Right.” He turned away from the pile of his dead packmates and pulled his rudis from its scabbard. “We should grab a couple vamps for ourselves, Roxi.”
“Alright.” She pulled hers and they went looking for bodies with enough heart left that they could use them to refresh their bodies and heal their wounds—the physical ones, at least.
He let Roxi take the first as he protected her. When they found another, Luke took it. The slash in his arm sealed, and the aches and pains and muscle weariness lessened. They only found one more each. Jean-Paul’s werewolves were extremely thorough in their staking duties.
“Has anyone seen the body of Robert Beaufort?” Jean-Paul called out.
Nobody replied with an affirmative.
“Do you think we got him?” Roxi asked.
“I don’t know. I want confirmation,” Luke replied.
As if to answer, a handful of bodies tumbled away as someone crawled out from under them and out of the cavern and down the central tunnel the vampires had emerged from earlier. Either he’d been trapped under the bodies in the counter attack or he’d created a shield of vampire flesh to hide under until it was safe enough to flee.
“That’s him!” someone shouted.
Without thinking, Luke took off after Le Mousquetaire.
“Luke!” Roxi yelled.
Behind him, he heard the pounding of foot on stone and the harsh breathing of someone chasing him. As he neared a corner, he glanced over his shoulder. It was Roxi. He slowed for a moment and moved to the side, letting her catch up before returning to a speed they could both keep up.
Despite draining two vampires, cuts and the slivers Roxi hadn’t removed twinged and burned as he forced his muscles to contract and release in his dash after Le Mousquetaire.
Ahead, he could barely see the vampire lord of Paris running hard and making wide turns through the rough stone of the illuminated caverns. They weren’t gaining on him, but neither was he increasing his lead. It was too late now, but Luke hoped they didn’t run into any other vampires. Every side cave became one more opportunity to get lost or ambushed.
When they made yet another turn, Luke caught a pale smudge behind them. Sparing a moment for a glance, he saw the giant form of Brutus loping after them, along with a wolf he didn’t recognize. He was glad the dog had made it through safely. It was for the best that they’d sent him with Delilah’s group when he refused to stay behind.
“We have company,” Luke gasped out between breaths.
“Danger?” Roxi asked.
“No. Allies.”
After a few more turns, their luck ended when a vampire leapt out at them. Seeing a flash of metal, Luke made a rolling dive to avoid whatever it was and kicked out with a leg. The shattering of bone and a pained scream told him he’d made contact. Roxi slid to a halt and staked it through the heart, then tore off after Le Mousquetaire. Now it was Luke’s turn to catch up to her.
“Luke… Do you feel that?”
“Shit. Yeah.” A surge of vampires moved toward them from ahead and to the left.
“Do we keep ahead of it or address it?” She swiped sweat from her forehead.
He took a moment to think about it then cursed. “No. We should address it. If they’re fresh, we can’t try to outrun them.”
He slowed down, waiting for Brutus and the wolf to catch up then focused his concentration on the incoming vampires. They were close. He spared a last glance for Le Mousquetaire as he disappeared down a side tunnel heading to the right.
“It’s up ahead.” Luke slowed to a walk, his lungs heaving.
The tunnel made a slight bend to the left. About half way around the bend, they found a tunnel entrance taking off to the left. Luke held up a hand to halt his little party.
“Wait here with Roxi, Brutus.” He looked at the werewolf and spoke in French. “I’m assuming Jean-Paul sent you?”
The wolf’s tongue lolled out, and it nodded.
“Good. Listen to Roxi while I’m gone.”
The wolf nodded again.
“Be careful,” Roxi whispered.
“Hey. It’s me.” Luke gave her lopsided grin.
Rolling her eyes, she shook her head. “You ran into vampire caverns without backup.”
That was true. Not the most careful of moves. He shrugged and jogged into the cavern. Soon, the light spilling in from the main tunnel disappeared. Running his hand along the side of the wall, Luke felt the ground with his boots. The fangers were getting closer.
He blinked. A stray beam from a flashlight moved across the tunnel. A few more joined it. There must be a side tunnel or a sharp turn ahead that they were approaching. A few voices drifted his way. Stopping, he brought his hand down and felt something hard and round in his pocket. A feral grin spread across his face.
He switched his gladius to his left hand and pulled out one of the frag grenades they’d liberated earlier. Now seemed a good time to return it to its owners.
While keeping the spoon firmly bolstered against his palm, he hooked the pin with his left index finger and pulled it. He couldn’t tell how high the ceiling was here because he didn’t want to lob it and have it ricochet off the ceiling and fall short. Taking a couple side steps away from the wall and toward the left side of the tunnel, he got into position. Then, thinking better of it, flipped his gladius around and sheathed it on his left hip.
Waiting, he tried to make a rough guestimate of how far the tunnel was from his spot. The light beams grew strong as did the sound of the vamps’ voices. As soon as he saw the first vampire turn the corner, he coiled his body. They still hadn’t noticed him. More vampires streamed around the corner.
Luke cocked back his arm and took a couple side steps forward and hurled the grenade side-armed. The spoon pinged away as the grenade left his hand. After a second, the dark swallowed the grenade. Overcoming the urge to watch, he turned and sprinted back the way he’d come. He slid to a halt and dove behind the wall, pulling Roxi with him. Brutus and the wolf lunged after them just in time.
The grenade detonated sending screams, dust, and pebbles rolling out the entrance to the tunnel. Luke was glad he hadn’t stopped to watch. The confined space of the tunnel had contained and pushed the explosion both ways. He’d likely have blown out his eardrums or worse if he’d stayed to gloat.
Roxi grinned and tipped her lips up. “Beautiful music.”
He kissed her quickly but firmly. “We should see if we can find Le Mousquetaire’s trail.
Brutus gave a low woof and snuffled around the floor then jogged down the tunnel and stopped, looking back to see if anyone was a following him.
“We know what tunnel he went down. We can run hard to make up some time, then we have Brutus’s snoot if we need to pick a turn.” Roxi jogged after Brutus.
“Sounds like a good plan to me.” Luke put one foot in front of the other and caught up Roxi and Brutus, the werewolf following on his tail.