Ancestor (53 page)

A slashing pain seared up the back of his left leg.

Magnus rolled to his back, cocked his right leg and kicked with all his power. He felt his foot smash against solid muscle, against skin and bone. The creature roared with anger and pain. In a single motion, Magnus sat up and slid his feet beneath him, leaving him with knees bent, fingers on the floor, weight on his toes. The big animal recovered from the kick, reared back and charged up the final five stairs. Magnus shot forward, ducking under the jaws and driving his shoulder into the monster’s throat. The impact shuddered through him, far worse than any hit he’d suffered in the CFL, but enough to keep the creature’s body trapped in the narrow stairwell. Sliding off the impact, Magnus moved to the right and locked his thick arms around the ancestor’s barrel-like neck, left arm underneath, right arm over the top. Its big body thrashed against the stairwell walls, blocking the way for the others.

Magnus let loose his own savage, primitive roar and squeezed with all his power. The muscular monster thrashed its head back and forth, trying to bring its jaws around for the killing bite, but the stairwell kept it from turning. Magnus timed a thrash left, a pause, a thrash right, a pause, then slid his left hand farther up and jabbed his thumb into the monster’s right eye. He pushed the thumb in deep and hooked it, using the inside of the orbital bone like a handle. The giant head pulled away, jaws snapping
clack-clack-clack
, trying to back up, but its pack mates blocked the stairs behind it.

In the split second it took the creature to realize it couldn’t retreat, Magnus’s right hand drew his knife. Left thumb still deep in the animal’s eye socket, Magnus drove the Ka-Bar blade into its throat.

“You
killed Danté!” Spit flying from his mouth, his face a warped mask of psychotic fury, Magnus twisted the knife, pulled it out, struck again.

Blood gushed across the floor, across his legs, so thick he heard it splatter against stone even over the crackling flames and the roars of this bastard’s brethren.

“You
all
killed Danté! You hear that, Colding? I’ll kill this thing and then I’m coming for
you!
You murdered my brother!”

The ancestor weakened, and then it shot backward down the stairs. But the things couldn’t move that way. Magnus had a moment of confusion before he realized the others had yanked it away. Some of them started biting it, tearing off great chunks as blood and bits of flesh splashed the stairs, the walls and the ceiling. Only
some
of them, though, because another scrambled past both the eaters and the eaten.

Magnus stepped forward to meet it. They could only come up the stairwell one at a time, and he would kill them all.

Hand to hand.

One by one.

Sara climbed through the trapdoor. Just two rungs behind, Colding had stopped, unable to look away from the battle. He couldn’t believe his eyes. Magnus turned his body just before a huge head shot out of the stairwell, white teeth clacking on empty air. Magnus kicked out, the sole of his left shoe pinning the monster’s head against the corner of the stairwell. Before it could adjust its body to push back, Magnus drove a knife in an over-handed arc, burying it in the creature’s left eye. Magnus screamed, pulled the blade out, then rotated in an underhand windup that drove the bloody blade deep into the monster’s neck. The creature kept fighting even as its blood shot across the already slick floor.

“No,” Colding said quietly. “You don’t get to live.”

He put his feet on the outside of the metal ladder’s poles, then slid down to the bottom. He grabbed a piece of fallen rafter and held it like a torch, the burning end hissing and crackling with flames.

“This is for Jian and Doc.”

Colding reared back and hurled the burning wood. It spun three times in the air before the flaming end hit the left side of Magnus’s face. The big man screamed, then fell to his back. Colding hurried up the ladder.

A monster walked out of the stairwell and closed in on Magnus.

MAGNUS’S HANDS PRESSED at the seared cheek. Even as his skin bubbled and he howled in pain, he knew he had to move. He sat up fast,
trying to bring his feet underneath him, but before he could a wide mouth and long teeth snapped for his face. Magnus brought up his hands and hooked his thumbs inside the skin at the sides of the creature’s jaws. Five hundred and ten pounds drove him to his back. He locked his arms straight out, fingers digging in from the outside to grab big handfuls of coarse fur. The jaws
cracked
shut less than an inch from his nose. Sharp claws dug into his massive chest.

He was trying to bring his heels up to hook-kick at the eyes when another creature came from his right, teeth snapping down on his arm, his shoulder, punching into his chest, through his lungs.

His eyes went wide and his body stiffened. The creature
shook
him, snapping bones, rending flesh. Hot blood in his face, again, but this time
his
blood.

Movement from his left. A third creature, mouth open wide, blocking the fire’s flickering light. Three-foot-wide jaws smashed shut with crushing power. Teeth punched down through his right temple and up through his left cheekbone, sliding together somewhere in his brain.

COLDING KICKED SHUT the turret’s trapdoor. Sara ran into his arms and—finally—he held her close again. Sobs racked her body. He squeezed her tight. Her body molded to his, and he felt his soul breathe a deep, clutching sigh of relief. He kissed her smoke-streaked forehead.

“Take it easy,” he said just loud enough to be heard over the roaring fire. Still holding her, he took a quick look around. Fire danced across most of the roof, ten-foot flames pouring up and around the remaining slate shingles. He heard a heavy, wooden crack from inside the church, followed by the sound of something smashing to the ground amid roaring flames. Then came the horrible, deep roar-howls of the ancestors trapped beneath.

The flames had spread almost to the tower. The turret’s stone walls wouldn’t burn, but they wouldn’t have to—heat billowed up like a concussive force, the round tower funneling it like a chimney.

He rubbed Sara’s back. “Come on, Sara. We’ve got to get out of here.”

“Oh, let her cry,” came a voice from behind him. He turned to see Tim Feely, defeated, resting heavily on his crutch. “Just let her cry, Colding. There’s no way out of here. Even if we could get out of this turret, look what’s waiting for us.”

Colding shuffled Sara a few steps to the left so he could look over the edge. Dozens of ancestors circled the turret’s base. Some were trying
unsuccessfully to climb the black rock. Others were actually
biting
it, chipping their long teeth as they tried to tear the foundation out from under them. Every few seconds another ancestor ran out of the open double doors. Some were on fire, trailing smoke, their black-and-white hides adding the stench of burnt fur to the ghost town’s carnage.

Tim was right. It was over.

“Shhh,” Colding said softly as he petted Sara’s head. “Everything will be okay.”

Tim started to laugh—the sick, demented laugh of someone who’s given up all hope. But over his laughter, over the sound of the raging fire, over the sound of the roaring, hungry ancestors, Colding heard something else.

The gurgling growl of Ted Nugent.

Clayton Detweiler grimaced as he worked the clutch with his broken leg. Pain dominated his thoughts, but he pushed it away, focusing on the task at hand. He’d been hurt worse.

“Got somethin’ for ya, ya little shits.” His left hand held the wheel, his right held the Uzi. “Time to whack ’em and stack ’em.”

The Nuge shot around the burning lodge, pivoted on thick tank treads, then rolled toward the church. The ancestors surrounding the turret turned as one and sprinted toward him.

BABY MCBUTTER SAW the strange, noisy animal come roaring toward her brethren. It had been sitting still earlier, still and quiet, and it hadn’t smelled like food—but now it did. And it smelled like something else.

It smelled like the stick.

Baby McButter lifted her sail three times, signaling alarm, but some of her brethren didn’t notice. Those were the ones too hungry to worry about any danger.

CLAYTON STOPPED THE Nuge near the well. He slid over to the passenger side and stood on his good right leg, pushing his upper body out of the top hatch.

“You hungry?” he shouted to the oncoming horde. “Uncle Clayton’s got a snack for ya!”

He opened up with the Uzi, firing short, controlled bursts just like Chuck Heston had taught him. The first burst hit the lead ancestor dead-center, dropping it in midstride. Clayton bagged two more, clearly killing one and blowing the left leg off the second. It fell to the snow-covered ground, writhing in pain.

He slid back inside and pulled the hatch shut, then gunned the engine and drove straight for the wounded ancestor. Clayton Detweiler smiled when the tank tread crushed through the creature’s chest, leaving two twitching halves behind.

He drove the Nuge to the bell tower and stopped. Popping in a fresh magazine, he again stuck his head out the roof hatch. A big bastard scrambled around the curved tower, claws digging in for traction. Son of a bitch had to be over 550 pounds if it was an ounce.

“Aw, fuck ya,” Clayton said, and held the trigger tight. Twenty-five rounds ripped out in less than three seconds. The creature’s skull disintegrated in a cloud of brain and bone and blood. It fell forward, momentum sliding the dead body over the snow until the mangled head mashed up against Ted Nugent’s front right tread.

Clayton reloaded with a full magazine and looked for a new target. The monsters now kept their distance, keeping to the shadows or behind smaller fires where the intense heat distorted their visages into shimmering, demonic ghosts. Most of the creatures stayed a good twenty yards back, feasting on the corpses of their fallen pack mates with a savage, shaking desperation.

Clayton looked up the church tower. Peering down over the edge were the joyous, shouting faces of Colding, Sara and Tim.

Colding watched Clayton crawl out of the roof hatch. The old man’s face wrinkled with agony, but he moved as quickly as he could and climbed into the rear section. Colding would have never thought Clayton Detweiler beautiful, but seeing him riding up in that lift bucket, an Uzi dangling from a strap around his neck, he could have been Miss America, Miss Universe and the Playmate of the Year all rolled into one fabulous farting package.

The bucket reached the turret. Colding reached out and grabbed Clayton’s shoulder. “You’re one mean old bastard! You saved us!”

Clayton pushed his hand away, then gave Colding the Uzi. “I’m fuckin’ done. Where’s Gary?”

“I saw him last night,” Sara said. “He took off on his snowmobile. The monsters were chasing him, but … I don’t know if he got away.”

Clayton sagged. Colding stepped into the bucket and slid under the man’s arm, keeping him up. Sara got in next, then helped the crutch-wielding Tim do the same. Four people made for a tight fit. Colding worked the simple controls, lowering the bucket to the Bv.

Ancestors darted around but didn’t make themselves an easy target. Some lurked just inside the tree line, some hid behind burning wreckage. They were smart enough to block roads, smart enough to use protective cover. He couldn’t assume they would behave like animals at all.

Sara scrambled out of the bucket and into the Bv’s open rear section, then hopped over the side and ran for the driver’s door. Colding helped Tim out of the lift bucket, across to the front section and down into the rear hatch. Clayton crawled out of the bucket on his own, but the old man’s left leg looked bad. His snow pants stuck out at a strange angle, anchored by one bloody point. A compound fracture. Colding watched him slide through the rear hatch, trying to imagine just how tough Clayton Detweiler had been to hold that pain in check long enough to rescue them all.

Movement, rustling. The ancestors, getting closer.

Colding dropped to the ground and ran to the passenger-side door. He climbed in and stuck his head out the front hatch, just as he’d seen Clayton do.

An ancestor rushed the Bv from the right. Colding brought up the Uzi and ripped off a hurried burst. Some of the bullets went wide, but at least two hit the thing in the chest. It stopped, skidding slightly, twitching like a kid just stung by a bee. Colding ripped off two more bursts as the thing scrambled off. He wasn’t sure if he hit it or not.

Clayton reached up and handed Colding a fresh magazine. “Last one,” he said. “Don’t waste it.”

One full magazine, a second maybe half empty … about forty-five rounds total.

“Hold tight,” Sara said. She drove the Nuge away from the church inferno. The town square looked like a war zone cluttered with twisted metal wreckage, every building burning bright.

Colding felt a tug on the bottom of his tattered parka. He looked down.
Tim handed up a green canvas bag. Colding looked in the bag with several quick peeks, not taking his eyes off the surroundings for more than a second at a time. Two, no, three pounds of Demex. About two dozen detonators. His heart leaped when he saw four magazines, but it sank again when he realized they were for Magnus’s MP5, which was somewhere in the burning church.

Sara pointed the Bv northeast. With his head sticking out of the hatch, buffeted by the wind, the town roaring with flames and the Bv’s diesel happily gurgling away, Colding had to scream to be heard.

“Sara, where are you going?”

“The harbor! Gary’s boat might still be there. And this thing is low on fuel. We probably can’t reach the mansion, so the harbor it is.”

She didn’t wait for an answer, she just drove. She managed to avoid most of the Sikorski’s wreckage. The pieces she couldn’t avoid, she simply ran over. The Nuge bounced along as it rolled over twisted metal and through small fires.

Sara drove out of the town and onto the road, thick snow-covered woods on either side, the harbor maybe a mile away.