It was enough to make him fight past the pain. He surged up and charged at the four Russians, yelling louder than a starving Skull.
“Bastards!” he cried, ramming his shoulders into one. He hit the guy with enough force to knock the man off his feet.
The man fell backward into a lab bench. Glassware toppled and rolled off, beakers and flasks breaking against the floor. O’Neil raised his foot then slammed it down hard on the man’s face. Again and again, he smashed his heel into the man’s nose and mouth. Cartilage cracked and snapped, bone busting under O’Neil’s assault.
But before he could finish his attack, before he could turn the guy’s face into a pulp, rough hands wrapped around his arms and wrist, sending waves of pain through his damaged limbs.
The Russian soldiers yelled at him and rammed their elbows and fists into his body. Something else in his arm snapped. Pain rocketed through him. A crack split up his back.
A boot landed on his ankle. Another crunch. Another wave of pain. His stomach twisted from the assault. Bile burned up through his throat from the intense agony. A thousand fires scorched through every inch of his body.
He took hit after hit until he was spitting blood and teeth. Two of the Russians picked him up, hoisting him from under his shoulders. They spit curses at him while they hauled him past the cages. He caught sight of Loeb and Tate again, both still lying motionless.
“Help them, Hassan,” he said.
The Moroccan was shaking in pure terror, but he managed a nod.
O’Neil fought against the pain wracking his body. Saw that his ankle was twisted beyond its anatomical limits. He felt his body starting to give out, weakness overtaking him. He still hurt, but everything felt… distant.
Was he going into shock? Or was this just a nightmare he was starting to wake up from?
He prayed for the latter, but a ruthless voice told him it was the former.
More screams erupted from elsewhere in the facility. But O’Neil was finding it harder and harder to remember where he was or what in the hell was going on.
All he knew was that he was in immense pain.
Until he was thrown up onto an operating table. A man in a white lab coat speckled with blood adjusted the surgical lights above the table, shining them over O’Neil’s face. His face was pocked with old scars. A gray and black beard covered his chin.
The doctor yelled some command at the soldiers. They grumbled, then twisted O’Neil from his back to his stomach. All those injuries, those broken bones seemed to react at once when they did. Another round of agony hammered through O’Neil’s body.
He let out a yell that shook throughout the OR. Tasted more blood on his tongue.
Then he heard the doctor mumbling to himself, along with the clink of metal tools as the doctor’s fingers probed the devices on a surgical tray nearby.
“Aha,” the doctor said. He picked up what appeared to be a small drill with what looked to O’Neil like a propeller on the end. The doctor pulled the trigger of the instrument, and that small propeller started spinning, letting out a low whine.
Looking at another man in a white coat, the doctor said something else in Russian.
“What are you doing?” O’Neil asked, struggling through the pain.
The other man nodded and moved to a toolbox, sifting through until he pulled out a small plastic device. It looked like a thin wafer trailing wires like tentacles.
The doctor nodded, then pointed at what looked to be a refrigerator. Again, the assistant did the doctor’s bidding, looking through the refrigerator before pulling out a plastic syringe.
Beckoning the assistant with one hand, the doctor tested his drill again, the blade spinning at the end, letting out that ear-splitting whine. He held O’Neil still with one hand as the assistant disappeared behind him.
A sharp jab stabbed through the back of O’Neil’s neck, followed by the rush of cold liquid. He couldn’t help but shiver, his whole body seeming to drop in temperature with that injection. Then as the cold started to fade, a fiery pain spread from the back of his neck up into his brain and down his spine.
O’Neil pushed himself up with his elbows, trying to get his feet over the edge of the operating table. He started to yell again as the doctor roared at two of the soldiers waiting at the edge of the OR. They hurried over, pressing down on O’Neil’s arms, using their weight to hold him in place.
Then he heard that drill again. Felt it press against the base of his skull.
This time, his scream didn’t last for longer than a second before the pain took him.
-28-
A slap woke O’Neil. He tried to pry his eyes open, but exhaustion and pain pulled him back toward unconsciousness.
Another slap.
“Wake up, Sleeping Beauty,” a strongly accented Russian voice said.
A jolt of adrenaline poured through O’Neil with the crushing reality of where he was.
Tangier.
The port.
In the Russians’ custody.
He had been injected with something, then operated on.
For what reason, he didn’t know.
Now he was in a dark room with a single light overhead. He heard feet behind him. Smelled rotten meat. Death.
This had to be another sick dream. Another crazed nightmare swirling from the agony of his half-destroyed body.
Pain still throbbed up and down his arms. He could barely move his fingers.
Then he realized, even when he tried to lift his arms it wasn’t just because of the injuries. Metal cuffs held them together in front of him. Ropes wrapped around his chest and pressed his spine against a pole behind him.
“Where am I?” he asked. His tongue thick in his mouth.
“You do not worry about where you are. Only who is here with you.”
Then he heard it. The tap of talons on the floor.
A monster emerged from the shadows. It held its hands tucked against its chest, claws arcing from its bony fingers. Bloodshot eyes stared at him from behind a skeletal mask. Crooked horns protruded around its brow, and stringy, black hair hung between them. Long talons bulged from its toes, and spikes pushed up out of its overgrown vertebrae.
The beast looked at O’Neil and snarled, prowling toward him.
He wanted to fight back, but he was completely tied up. No weapons. No way to stop this monster.
What were these sick people doing? Why did they capture him only to feed him to this Skull?
The beast lunged.
O’Neil yelled, ready to face his death.
The monster snapped back, its claws raking just a couple feet from O’Neil’s face.
He realized then that there was a metal collar around its neck, just barely peeking out from the remnants of its shirt and the bony shoulder plates bulwarking its frame. That collar was attached to a chain behind it.
“What do you want from me?” O’Neil asked.
He heard the people behind him shuffling around. Then another voice. The clinking of the chain.
The beast took another step forward, testing the extra length of chain it had been given.
“Focus on the monster,” the voice behind him said. “Focus on the beast. Only you can make it stop.”
“The fuck are you talking about?” O’Neil roared. “Tell me!”
The beast fought at its collar, its claws battering the metal. Then it snapped at O’Neil. Spittle flew from its jagged teeth. Over and over, it sliced at the air.
The chain kept growing longer. The beast inched closer. O’Neil tried to shrink into himself as those claws came soaring toward him.
One claw sliced just inches from his chest. He tried to lift his feet to kick the beast backward.
But his ankles were secured to the pole, too.
He was going to be eaten alive, and there wasn’t a damn thing he could do about it.