There was nothing Warner could do. The Taint started tearing into Robbie. Warner watched, utterly stunned, as the creature disembowelled his best friend right in front of his eyes.
He had no ammo. He had the Blackhawk, though. A mix of adrenaline and pure rage kicked in. “You mother-fucker!” Terry slid the knife out of its sheath, spun it in his hand and primed to launch himself towards the Taint. Go for the neck. Go in hard…
“No!” Through a froth of blood and bile, Robbie spluttered his last words. “No, mate, run! Get out! Ru…” An explosion of foaming blood poured out of the dying man’s mouth and he went limp. His feet jerked and twitched for a few seconds, and then stilled.
The Taint slowly looked up at Warner, a blood-smeared monstrosity — a creature from the worst possible nightmare imaginable. A slow smile spread over its face and it scooped out a handful of stuff that should have really stayed inside Robbie’s stomach cavity. The gurning creature held out the handful of intestines towards Terry and in a rasping, guttural voice, spoke two words, “You. Next.” The creature’s grin widened and he recoiled his sinewy arm and stuffed the blood-soaked intestines into its maw.
There was nothing more Terry could do for Robbie. The Blackhawk suddenly seemed about as useful as a penknife. And as much as he wanted to attack the creature right here, right now, he knew it was suicide to do so. A good hunter hunted. They didn’t become the prey because they got all emotional and unnecessary.
Get out.
Regroup.
Find Flynn.
And then come back in with a shit-load of guns and hunt this bastard down before it escaped beyond the boundaries of the kill house and out into the community.
He let out a scream of rage and glared at the Taint. “You and me, Binky! This ain’t over! This ain’t fucking over!” Warner took one last look at the remains of his oppo, turned, and ran…
Terry Warner crashed his way through the door of yet another dilapidated room and skidded to a halt. Damn it, the house was huge! He’d got completely turned around and had a Taint, a real Taint, looking for him that apparently regarded him as the dessert course. Outside, a full moon had risen to its apex, shining a ghostly white light through the floor-to-ceiling windows. He slumped down, breathing hard and with his back against a crumbling plaster fire surround that, a couple of centuries ago, would have been downright regal. Having it pressed against his spine meant nothing could creep up behind him. So that was a start. He ran a shaking hand through his short hair and tried to get his breathing under control. This was worse than his first ever combat mission. At least that time he’d had some real fucking bullets! This time, all he had was a useless M4 that kept doing a Bob Marley on him and jamming. He checked his leg holster — he still had the Blackhawk, but using that would mean getting up close with a Taint. Much closer than Terry wanted to be. Ever.
He pulled his head up off his chest, sniffed hard, took a deep breath and looked around. Okay. Freaking out wasn’t going to help. He could do that later at home, in Claire’s arms. Right now, he needed to survive long enough to make it out of the house in one piece.
But to do that, he needed to turn from hunted into hunter.
A soft click made every muscle in his body tense.
He brought the M4 up to his shoulder then remembered that it was nothing more than a fancy stick, thanks to a jammed trigger. He dropped the useless weapon and slid the Blackhawk out of its sheath. “Right, you bastard!” he muttered. “Ding fucking ding. Round two…”
Terry let the image of his friend being torn to pieces crash into the front of his mind. He let all the blind, white-hot anger, and all the choking rage pile up, and concentrated it into a single pinpoint of fury. ‘Use it. Control it. Focus it. Then unleash hell on the son of a bitch!’ Colby Flynn’s words came back to him. Day one. Combat tactics. Damn, that guy might be a hard-arse T.O., but he sure as hell knew his stuff.
Terry braced, ready to explode up and launch a deadly attack with the Blackhawk on the first Taint that showed its ugly face through the door…
“Whoa!” Flynn slid effortlessly into the room and, thanks to lightning reflexes, years of training and battlefield experience, and a healthy sense of self-preservation, just managed to spring back in time to avoid getting sliced and diced by Warner’s Blackhawk.
“Sir!” Warner immediately retracted the knife and spluttered an apology. “Shit! I’m sorry! I thought you were Binky! I… shit, did I miss you? Tell me I missed you! Did I miss you?”
“It’s okay, you missed. But nice backswipe.” Colby flashed a humourless grin at the man. “Bank that one, Warner. We may need it again before the night’s out.” He put a reassuring hand on the man’s shoulder. “You okay?”
“Yes, sir.” Warner’s voice trembled slightly, but his jaw muscle twitched and his stance was solid. He might have failed the VR simulation, but he’d come through his first encounter with a real Taint with added fire in his belly. “How did you find me?”
“Fella, you’re leaving a trail a blind man could follow.” Colby pointed down at the man’s boots.
“Shit. Sorry.” Warner examined the bottom of his boots. They were still wet with his friend’s blood. “Sir, Robbie—”
Colby’s voice softened. “I know, mate. I found him.” Flynn reached into his pocket and pulled out Robbie Moore’s dog tags. He looked down at them for a moment, and then held them out to Warner. “He was your oppo, Terry. You should hold onto these for him until we get out of here.”
Warner closed his hand around the tags and cleared his throat, choking back his emotions. “Thank you, sir.”
Colby sniffed sharply. “Right then.” He pressed his radio squawk button. “Yol, I’ve got Warner. He’s alive. Sound’s like we’ve got…” He paused and looked at Warner, who held up a single finger. Colby nodded. “Yeah, we’ve got a single Taint that we know of. We’re on level one, the old drawing room in the north wing. The Taint is…” Again he looked at Warner, who pointed up, held up two fingers, and then rotated his flattened hand from side to side. Colby responded with another nod and carried on talking into his radio. “We think he’s two levels up. Get the team to come in through the side entrance and meet us in the back stairwell.”
“Copy that.”
“And bring guns. Lots and lots of big, shiny guns.” Colby released the button and looked at Warner. “You and I are going to meet up with the rest of Alpha Unit. They’re going to give you a live payload for that M4–”
“This bloody thing’s defective, sir. Misfired on me. I had to use the other end to hit the Taint in the face.” Warner shrugged. “It seemed like a good thing to do. Ya know. Therapeutic.”
Colby raised an eyebrow and grinned. “Adda boy. Okay, so we’ll get you a damn gun that actually works, and then how about you and me go find Binky and blow its head off? Ya know. For Robbie. You up for that, mate?” As pep talks went, it wasn’t Colby’s finest. But he knew it would appeal to the lad and his desire to get even with the Taint.
Warner’s face hardened. “Yes, sir!”
“Good on ya. Righty-ho, let’s go and find the lads.”
“Sir?”
Colby stopped and turned. “Yes?”
Warner looked thoughtful for a moment. “When we first got briefed about Taints, the implication was they were pretty non-communicative, right?”
“Yep, they’re not known for their sparkling after-dinner conversation skills and witty repartee. Why?”