Mega 3: When Giants Collide (Mega Series) (15 page)

Tank Top started to reply then closed his mouth and turned his attention to the destruction that surrounded the B3 and Monkey Balls. All that was left out there was a sinking cutter and a fleeing one. If the ship that fled managed to get away then that left only the B3 and Monkey Balls as targets.

“I was told that the thing wouldn’t attack my ship,” Tank Top said. “That the MB gave off a signal that shielded it from the shark, telling the thing to pass us by.”

Ballantine just stared at the muscled man.

“My god, you’re stupid. How did I miss that when I first hired you?” Ballantine said finally. “How in God’s name could you believe that? You’re a professional, Jason, so think like one. Put the pieces together.”

Ballantine watched the thoughts flit across the man’s face and sighed.

“Okay, we don’t have time for you to work it all out,” he said, “this is how it is, alright? The company hired you to track me down. They let the Somalis and the cartels follow. Why? So when it all went down it would look like it was a battle between criminals. An easy explanation that maritime and governmental authorities wouldn’t think much of. None of us, including you, were meant to survive.”

“I was sent to capture you and the Thornes,” Tank Top said. “The money is in my account right now.”

“Is it? When was the last time you checked your account?” Ballantine laughed. “What the company gives, the company takes away. Even if you did manage to capture the Thornes and me, it would have made no difference. The shark was designed to devour everything, and you Jason, are part of that everything.”

Ballantine could see Tank Top make the last connection.

“They didn’t hire me and my crew because we knew you better than any other guns for hire, but because we just plain knew you,” Tank Top said. “We were your first Team and that meant we needed to be taken out as well if there was going to be a full erasure.”

“Exactly,” Ballantine said, “you were never the predator in this job, you were the prey along with the rest of us.”

“So what is Protocol Fifty-four?” Tank Top asked.

“My pre-emptive strike which included the release of that beast from its containment,” Ballantine said. “That’s all you need to know, but it was never supposed to have caught up to us so fast. Your fucking tracking device made that happen. Good job, as always, Jason.”

Tank Top’s eyes went to the bridge windows again. “So the company didn’t send the shark after us?”

“No,” Ballantine said, “I did.”

“They expected you to do that, and that’s why they extorted the ace and had the beacon placed on board,” Tank Top said.

“The ace?” Ballantine asked.

“Your traitor,” Tank Top replied. “If they knew the shark would track and kill us all, then who did they think would kill the shark? They couldn’t just let it stay free in the ocean.”

“That’s a very good question,” Ballantine said, “and one I don’t have an answer to.”

A gunshot echoed up from the ship below.

“Shit,” Tank Top slurred, “Gil and Lug.”

“Better call them off,” Ballantine said as he knelt and checked on Lake. The man was unconscious, but his pulse was strong. “There’s a world of hurt waiting for them below deck.”

***

Mike ducked around a corner as more shots rang out.

“Where the fuck are you going?” Gil shouted after him. “It’s a ship! We’ll catch up eventually!”

That’s what I’m hopin
g
, Mike thought.

He sprinted down the passageway and stopped just before he came to a set of steps. He waited until he saw Gil’s face peek around the corner before he rushed down the stairs, his shoulders up to his ears as his pursuers opened fire once again. All he had to do was get to one more passageway and he’d be fine. He hoped.

His legs moved faster than he could think and he had to slow himself down to keep from overshooting his mark. He skidded to a stop and then took one of the biggest risks of his life.

He turned around, faced the direction where Gil and Lug were coming from, put his hands behind his head, and got down on his knees. Then just waited.

Only a minute later, Gil and Lug showed themselves, their rifles to their shoulders and aimed right at Mike.

“What the fuck?” Gil asked. “You really giving up?”

He quickly looked around as he walked forward.

“There’re no doors in this passageway, nowhere up in the pipes to hide,” Gil said. “If this is an ambush, it’s a shitty one.”

“Maybe,” Mike smiled.

“What are you smiling at?” Lug said as he twitched behind Gil. “We’re going to gut shoot you and leave you to bleed right where you are.”

“Shut it, Lug,” Gil said. “We’re going to bring him up top and have Tank Top decide what to do.” He nodded at the shiny prosthetics that Mike knelt on. “Those have to be worth something to someone.”

“They’re worth everything to Mike,” Gunnar said from the two mercenaries’ side as the wall became transparent. “So how about you put your guns down and we let him keep those legs?”

Gil spun about then went flying backwards as an arc of blue electricity slammed into his chest. He hit the wall and then collapsed into a pile of unconscious tan muscle. Gunnar turned the stun rifle on Lug and smiled.

“You want to set down the rifle or do I need to knock you out too?” Gunnar asked.

Lug carefully set the rifle down and then took up the position that Mike had just stood up from.

“Good boy,” Gunnar said. “What’s your name?”

“Lug,” Lug replied, his head looking back and forth between Gunnar and Mike. “I give up. Don’t shoot.”

Mike walked over and slammed his elbow into the back of Lug’s neck. The man fell forward onto his face, just as unconscious as his semi-scorched colleague behind him.

“Did you need to do that?” Gunnar asked. “I had him covered.”

“It felt right,” Mike said as he went over to Gil and started to drag him into the hidden back entrance of the Toyshop. “Sometimes, it’s best to go with your gut feelings.”

“Easy for you to say,” Gunnar said as he set the stun rifle aside and tried to drag Lug inside as well. “Your upper body strength is a little better than mine. This would be way easier if the guy were awake and could just walk in on his own.”

“The gut gets what the gut wants,” Mike smiled as he dropped Gil and went back to help Gunnar.

As soon as both of the unconscious mercs were inside the Toyshop, Gunnar activated the controls and the wall became solid again, shielding them from sight.

“What did you do?” Carlos said as he showed up with two pairs of restraints. “You were just supposed to capture them, not kill them!”

“They aren’t dead,” Mike said, “and-”

“The gut gets what the gut wants,” Gunnar said as he took a pair of restraints from Carlos and started to truss up Lug’s hands and feet behind his back.

“What does that even mean?” Carlos asked.

“It means what it means,” Mike shrugged as he took the other set of restraints and got to work on Gil.

“God, I hate people sometimes,” Carlos huffed as he walked back into the shelves.

“Sometimes?” Gunnar called after him. “When do you not hate people?”

***

The knife pierced the man’s heart as it was shoved between his ribs. He gasped once then his eyes glassed over as he fell, dead before he hit the ship’s deck. Darby let the knife fall with the man and concentrated on spinning about and bending backwards as the machete came for her head. Her spine became an arch and her hands pressed against the deck then pushed off so her momentum brought her back up instantly.

She landed two quick shots to the machete man’s solar plexus and he gasped as the air left him. Darby moved in close and lifted the man’s arm that held the machete then brought it down on her leg, snapping it in half at the elbow. The man screamed and the machete clattered to the deck.

“On your nine!” Max yelled from his position by the railing.

The wound in his leg kept him from actively participating in the melee on the upper deck of the Monkey Balls, but he was a sniper and didn’t need to be active to be effective. He fired from a rifle he’d snagged from one of the first men the Team had killed as they scaled and boarded the ship. The man that had been rushing towards Darby spun about, his neck spewing blood.

Darby gave Max a nod, then swept the bleeding man’s legs out from under him, grabbed the pistol he held in his hand, jammed it under the man’s chin, and pulled the trigger. Brains and skull fanned out across the deck, which Shane promptly slipped in as he sprinted past Darby to go help Kinsey.

“Son of a bitch!” Shane yelled as he corrected his fall, tucked his shoulder, and rolled back up to his feet. “Watch it!”

Just as Shane reached the man that had Kinsey by the throat, she managed to jam both thumbs into the pressure points in her attacker’s armpits. He screamed, let go of Kinsey then stumbled back into Shane who wasted no time grabbing him by the head and snapping his neck.

Max fired several rounds at the two hatches where men kept trying to spill out of and join the fight. Those men thought better of it and retreated back inside, letting Max turn his attention to the shooter on the observation deck. He never got the chance to take that man down as he realized what type of rifle the man held and decided that rolling out of the way of the .300 caliber slugs was the best course of action.

“Hi,” Darren said from the shooter’s side just as he put a pistol to the man’s head and fired. “Bye.”

The man collapsed onto the observation deck and Darren put two shots in his back just to be sure, even though the man was missing most of his skull.

“Fuck!” Thorne yelled from outside the bridge just below Darren.

“You alright, Vinny?” Darren called down.

“They locked it tight,” Thorne said as he slammed his fist against the hatch to the bridge. “We’ll have to blow it if we want in there.”

“We have any explosives?” Darren asked.

Thorne looked at the channel gun in his hand.

“In a way,” Thorne said. “You think these rounds are strong enough to work?”

“Worth a try,” Darren said, “but you’ll want to be a little farther back.”

“No shit. WHAT THE FUCK?” he screamed as Darren fired two shots just past his left ear. He whipped about to see two men tumble over the railing. “Oh, thanks.”

“Any time,” Darren nodded. He tucked the pistol in his belt and picked up the .300 Win Mag sniper rifle at his feet. “This’ll come in handy.”

He moved to the railing and steadied the rifle then zeroed in on a man running towards Darby. One squeeze of the trigger and the man’s head turned to brainy mist. Darby looked over her shoulder and nodded to him, but Darren didn’t have time to respond as he switched to another target that was about to shoot Kinsey while she fought off two men with fire axes.

Another trigger squeeze then another and another.

The man that was about to shoot Kinsey screamed as the bullet entered between his ribs then pierced his heart. The two men with fire axes fell with him as blood bloomed on their chests from two more shots.

“I had it under control, ‘Ren!” Kinsey yelled up at him.

“Sure you did, ‘Sey!” Darren yelled back. “I thought I’d lend a hand anyway!”

Darby gutted a man, dropped to her knees, spun about, gutted another man, and then jumped up and jammed her knife into the soft flesh under his chin. He choked and gurgled, but still stood upright as she pulled the knife out, turned and slammed the blade home into the first gutted man’s eye socket. She tried to yank the knife free, but it was wedged too tight, so she just shoved the man away and turned back to the man still standing.

His eyes locked onto hers as blood dribbled from the corners of his mouth.

“You missed the brain,” Shane said from her side.

“I wasn’t aiming for the brain,” Darby said as she reached out and slid her fingers into the slit under the man’s chin, hooked them around his lower jaw, and then yanked as hard as she could.

The man’s lower jaw ripped from his face and Darby spun it about and jammed the jagged ends into the man’s eyes. He would have screamed if Darby had given him the chance, but she snapped his neck before a sound could come out of his mutilated mouth.

“You really scare the fuck out of me, you know that?” Shane said.

“I know,” Darby replied, “it’s part of my charm.”

They looked around and saw no more men coming at them.

“Job well done,” Shane said.

“Job is far from done,” Thorne said as he joined them and pointed his channel gun at the bridge’s hatch. “Hopefully this will finish it, though.”

He put the channel gun to his shoulder and was about to squeeze the trigger when the hatch opened and two black hands reached out, their fingers spread wide.

“Hold on!” Bokeem yelled. “Don’t shoot!”

“Why?” Thorne yelled back. “Give me one good reason!”

“Look over at your ship!” Bokeem shouted as he cautiously stepped from the bridge.