Toward the west, back into the city, other beasts pushed out of broken doorways or scaled the sides of restaurants and hotels, using their claws to climb the war-ravaged structures.
“Five minutes until those charges explode back in the lab,” Reynolds said. “That means five minutes before the Russians get even more pissed off than they already are. We need to get away from the port.”
“We’ve got to go through the city, Chief,” O’Neil called back. “I don’t see another way.”
“I’m afraid you’re right,” Reynolds said. “Follow us.”
Alpha’s MRAP tore off, turning around again on the highway, sideswiping an abandoned town car and clipping the mirrors off a blackened SUV. Van pressed his foot all the way to the floor and twisted hard on the big wheel of the MRAP. The engine rumbled with a fierce, throaty growl as they barreled after Alpha.
Already Skulls from both the base and the ship were catching up to them. A few grabbed hold of the rear of the vehicle, punching at the rear door, even as their claws broke against the bulletproof glass. Several of the prisoners yelled and curled up next to each other. They trembled with each aggressive attack from the suicidal Skulls.
“It’s going to be all right,” Tate bellowed. “Those pieces of shit can’t break through. Just hold tight!”
His words did nothing to calm the prisoners.
They started straight into the winding streets of Tangier. The MRAPs weren’t built for the narrow confines of the stone, concrete, and rammed earth structures of the historic town center, the medina. They broke through clothing lines still dangling between buildings. Stands filled with rotten fruit and spices, abandoned and mixed together by the winds, exploded when they hit them. Wood and stone shrapnel sprayed from the storefronts they squeezed past.
A cart with the skeleton of a donkey still attached to it crunched under their heavy tires.
“Three minutes until that explosion,” Reynolds called. “Bastards should’ve been paying more attention to their own base and not us.”
“Can’t wait for the fireworks,” Loeb said.
A pause over the comms.
Then Reynolds called, “Hostiles ahead!”
Skulls pounced from a three-story restaurant, lunging from between the tattered curtains fluttering from open windows. A handful landed in front of their MRAPs. The big tires smashed them with the grinding crunch of splintering bones. Two managed to get on top of Alpha’s MRAP, and O’Neil could hear at least a couple pounding on the roof of their own. Claws scraped against the metal hull followed by a steady thump like the creatures were trying to beat their way inside.
Alpha’s MRAP charged through an arched tunnel covering the street. The roof of the MRAP ground against the top of the tunnel, smashing the Skulls up there and sending chunks of broken bricks flying. Van sent their MRAP right in after the other, cleaning their own roof of Skulls with a series of sickening thuds.
The monsters on the back of the vehicle continued battering the door and window, stubborn as ever. Their screams and shrieks permeated the engine noise and troop hold.
“Just two more minutes,” Reynolds said.
Behind them, headlights lanced through the darkness. O’Neil saw the front hood of one of the UAZs. The smaller, lighter Russian vehicles appeared to be more adept at navigating the narrow, dusty roads through the medina.
“I’ve got eyes on an aggressor vehicle,” O’Neil said.
He pushed himself from his seat, groaning with the effort, pain echoing in his ribs, then moved toward the rear of the vehicle. As the MRAP shook and bucked, Van doing his best to navigate the narrow confines of the riads, canopied storefronts, and restaurants, O’Neil spotted a soldier rising from the top hatch of the pursuing UAZ.
“Oh, shit,” Tate said, seeing the guy too. “He’s got an RPG.”
The MRAPs were built to withstand a blast from an IED. They should be able to take a beating from an RPG or two. But O’Neil didn’t trust Russian engineering any more than he trusted a feral Skull to watch his back.
He pushed open the rear hatch window. One of the Skulls on the back of the vehicle reached in. Its claws grasped for O’Neil. He twisted his gun barrel at the beast and fired a quick burst.
Rounds chiseled straight through the beast’s open mouth and jaw. Its head flung back in a pop of bone fragments and splashing blood. The monster rolled off the back of the Typhoon and under the UAZ.
O’Neil roved his aim up at the Russian soldier with the RPG launcher. He braced his rifle against his shoulder, doing his best to hold it steady as the Typhoon bucked and swerved. Every time it ran over another market stand filled with pottery or colorful lamps or rugs, his aim bobbed, making it difficult to get a bead on the man with the RPG.
His first burst made the soldier duck. But the bullets sparked off the top of the UAZ and against its windshield.
The soldier pushed himself back up and aimed the RPG at the Typhoon. O’Neil fired, desperate. But the Typhoon’s constant jostling threw his aim off. His shots went wide or glanced off the UAZ harmlessly.
But the soldier with the RPG never ducked back inside.
A loud whoomph sounded, followed by a stream of smoke from the RPG launcher. The rocket propelled grenade shot toward them.
O’Neil braced himself. “Incoming!”
He prepared for the rush of fire and smoke, the pressure wave that would pound his body, the shrapnel that would fly from the blast.
Instead, the RPG round slammed into a building beside them. A shower of rocks and glass pelted the side of the MRAP. Dust rolled toward them in a blinding cloud.
But they had been lucky.
He wasn’t sure they would get lucky again.
The soldier disappeared into the cabin of the UAZ. O’Neil fired at the windshield, aiming at the driver. Rounds blasted into the glass, but the windshield held.
“I got this,” Tate said, sidling up at the window. In his hand, he held a grenade.
O’Neil leaned back from the hatch, and Tate let the grenade fly. It bounced against the ground, then exploded right in front of the UAZ. A geyser of sand and dust burst up from the blast, sending a spray of rocky shrapnel into the buildings on either side of the narrow roadway.
For a moment, O’Neil thought maybe they had ended the chase. That the car had been ruptured by the blast. It would clog that narrow roadway, blocking the rest of the vehicles from continuing the chase.
But then the vehicle burst straight out of the smoke and dust. The soldier with the RPG launcher had returned to the top hatch, another round loaded and ready to fly.
O’Neil swung up his rifle. He flicked the selector to automatic and fired. Bullets chiseled up the windshield and the roof of the vehicle. Then a few punched into the man. He fell backward, his top half stuck out the hatch. The RPG launcher slid off the roof of the UAZ, disappearing behind it.
“Fucking A,” Tate said, as the UAZ swerved, hitting its hood against the side of restaurant, plowing through the chairs and tables on the small seating area on the street.
The UAZ started to course correct, but already Van was putting more distance between them and the smaller vehicle. O’Neil plucked another grenade from his vest, then pitched it at the enemy vehicle. The blast boomed in front of the UAZ. Part of an already weakened riad wall gave way. Stones and bricks fell into the street.
Another obstacle for the car.
Maybe this was finally their chance to leave their pursuers behind. And with just a minute left until those charges exploded back at the port, they might actually complete this mission, ending the horrific experiments turning people into half-Skull hybrid monsters.