Authors: Kenneth Cran
Then, Jovaravich noticed that the animal’s paws were smeared with blood, and he wondered if the cat had injured itself when it jumped on him. He followed the trail of blood across the floor, past his boots to his outstretched legs. Then Jovaravich, who still couldn’t breath and was growing faint, looked down and saw something sprawled across his lap. In the haze of his mind, he tried to make sense of it as darkness and unconsciousness began creeping in. He died without knowing that with a single swipe of its paw, the Smilodon had disemboweled him.
With the luger clutched tight in his fist, Radchek sprinted through the black tunnel. Now the only light was behind him and his body blocked it, casting the space before him in pitch dark.
He had no idea where the tunnel ended. Likely, he’d find it by smashing into it. That was of little consequence, though, as a monster prowled somewhere not far behind.
Wheezing in panicked breaths, Radchek thought he heard the unmistakable fall of four paws in a full run coming up from behind. The close tunnel walls jumbled the sounds into an indistinct cornucopia and it was impossible to decipher what was what, or
where.
He didn’t want to think that the cats had compromised the cellblock and had somehow found their way into the tunnel. Maybe, in the darkness, they were
ahead
of him. Maybe they were watching and waiting for him to come to them.
He splashed through a carpet of puddles, and the sudden change in footing tripped him up. He landed hard, his face skidding across gravel and mud, scraping it raw. The luger flew from his hand and landed somewhere in the tunnel. His face stinging and his body aching, Radchek rolled onto his side and strained to see if anything was behind him. He didn’t need to see. The sound of a guttural growl was enough.
Stifling panic, Radchek got to his knees and felt around for the pistol. His gloved hands found gravel and puddles, but nothing else. And then, something grabbed his foot and raised it into the air. He gasped and screamed as he was pulled backward in the darkness. He clawed for a handhold. Instead, he found the pistol.
The abrupt sound of cracking bone was followed straight away by a blood-curdling scream as Radchek lost a foot. The pain was horrendous; he dug his fingernails into the gravel floor, then pulled his leg away. Tears streamed as he rolled onto his back. Even with its pale white coat, the beast remained unseen. It didn’t matter. In the narrow tunnel, Radchek raised the luger and fired. The muzzle flash lit the tunnel in short bursts and the cat screeched as bullets hit their mark. Radchek could see, in each millisecond of light, the cat drop his severed foot and wrench with bullet hits. Relishing the sound of the beast’s pain, he managed to stand and hobble down the tunnel.
Unconscious, Talia laid pressed up against the cell on the dank floor. Reaching through the bars, Barkov rifled through her coat, searched for something with which to pick the lock. He found nothing. Grasping the bars of the door, he shook them with all his might but it did no good. Crumbling or not, the cell couldn’t be forced open, not by one man. He paced through the confining space, searched floor to ceiling then back again.
There was a thump on the floor and Barkov turned and saw the trap door jiggle. He pressed his face between the bars, watched and waited. Fingers popped through the thin opening between floor and hatch, and then the trap door flew open. Slithering out onto his belly, a sobbing Radchek wailed in pain, his pale face drenched in mud, sweat and blood. He rolled over on his back, pulled his legs out of the hole, then kicked the door closed. The force on his foot sent Radchek screaming again, his body convulsing as his breath came in spastic waves. Barkov watched him with interest. As Radchek pulled himself across the floor, though, the colonel saw why he was screaming. Half of Rachek’s foot, from the rise of his arch to his toes, was missing. A dark red blotch, ragged and dripping, jutted from what was left of his boot.
Then, Barkov saw the pistol in the captain’s hand. “Captain Radchek?” he said with mock sincerity. “My God, what happened?”
Radchek was too focused on his own pain. He knew Talia was a doctor and that was what motivated him now. He needed her help and fast.
Crawling out from behind the desk and the little office recess, he got a clear view of the cellblock and the long hallway stretching into the darkness. He saw Talia lying on the floor against Barkov’s cell and all at once his pain grew in leaps and bounds. He howled in frustration.
A familiar sound came from somewhere under the floor, and both men looked toward the trap door. Down in the tunnel, the wounded cat roared and the floor and walls vibrated. Barkov turned back to Radchek. “I think it’s coming to finish the job. Hand me that pistol and I’ll kill it from here.”
Through the dizzying ache and growing nausea, Radchek maintained his wits. He saw the open cell Nick had been locked up in earlier. Using the bars as handholds, he picked himself up from the floor and leaned against a concrete column.
The steel door started shaking, as if being tested from below. Radchek inched away, maintaining focus on the hatch in the floor. The trap door sprung open and the hulking form of a Smilodon vaulted out. Radchek darted into the open cell and closed the door just as the beast flung its body at him. Outstretched paws swiped at him through the bars. Radchek moved to the furthest corner of the cell, the luger pointed straight at the animal’s head. He did not fire.
“Shoot it,” Barkov yelled, and the sound of his voice drew the beast’s attention. It spun around and roared at him, revealing the long curvature of scimitar tusks. Seeing the animal close-up and for the first time, colonel Aleksei Barkov felt fear in a way he never had before. Backing away from the bars, he tripped over his own feet and fell hard on the cement floor. His wrists bore the brunt of his weight and sprained on impact. The cat, meanwhile, had soon forgotten him when it turned. Something else had grabbed its attention.
Lying on the floor was Talia’s unconscious body.
Opening her eyes, Talia saw hazy black bars less than an inch from her face. Her head throbbed, and there was sharp pain across her face and forehead. She tried to remember what happened, and it gradually came back to her. The colonel had grabbed her and smashed her up against his cell door. She was foolish for trusting him, for being kind and giving him water. As an adult, she hadn’t had much interaction with people outside the Chukchi, who were themselves not untrustworthy, and she cursed her gullibility.
As her eyes focused, she saw through the bars and was surprised to find the colonel on the floor of his cell. He was holding and rubbing his wrists as if they were injured, but that wasn’t the most curious thing. Indeed, the most curious thing was his face; specifically, his eyes. They were frozen in a kind of trance, centered on something beyond her, something, in fact,
behind
her.
Just as Talia was about to move, she felt heat against her cheek. The scent was rank, like hot sour milk, and it burned her nose. She wanted to look, but instinct told her not to. A raspy breathing and a deep growl inches from her ear came next, and Talia realized what the colonel was staring at. She clenched her eyes shut, stifled a scream and held her breath.
The Smilodon sniffed her hair, nudged her shoulder and pushed against her body with a pan-sized paw. Talia felt the beast bite down on her shoulder, but it barely pinched her flesh. Instead, it grabbed onto her coat and began dragging her away. The urge to get up and run was all consuming, but what would that accomplish? She couldn’t outrun it, and there was nowhere to go anyway. She was too terrified to open her eyes. The cat hadn’t killed her, not yet, at least, and she wondered why it was now dragging her away. On his first encounter with them, Leonid had said the cats had dragged the still living Chukchi elder away. But in all of their subsequent observations, they never once saw the cats spare their prey. The thought that it was taking her someplace safe to feed sent a shiver of dread through her.
They don’t eat people
, she kept telling herself.
They don’t eat people
. She hoped Leonid had been right. Through the insanity and fear of being in its maw, she decided to wait and see what happened.
And then, Talia felt her body dangling in space. Opening her eyes just a sliver, she saw the black hole of the tunnel entrance looming below. The Smilodon released its grip on her and she tumbled head first into the darkness.
Radchek and Barkov watched as the cat turned and roared at them before slipping through the trap door and into the tunnel. Getting to his feet, the colonel stepped up to the bars and eyed the opening in the floor, waiting for the beast to return. It didn’t.
He glanced over at Radchek. “Where are the others, captain?” he said.
In the opposite cell, it was all Radchek could do to stay conscious. “Just keep quiet, colonel,” he said. The pain in his foot sent bolts of fire racing up his leg, and he wished he had some morphine, or even vodka. The initial blood loss was terrific, but now it was subsiding as the wound started to clot. In the dank, moldy gulag, Radchek knew that unless he got medical attention fast, infection would set in.
“Where is the American?” said Barkov.
“Don’t know,” Radchek said with clenched teeth
“
Did they get him?”
“
I don’t know, colonel.” Radchek eased himself down on the damp mattress, then gasped and sighed.
“You should have shot it.”
“I
did
shoot it,” he said, and then raised the luger so Barkov could see it. “This is a pistol, remember? The bullets would have bounced off its skull. Besides, the woman was already dead. No thanks to you.”
“She was unconscious, that’s all,” said the colonel, as if that made it better.
“Doesn’t matter now,” Radchek said, and then winced as pain shot from foot to head. “She’ll be dead soon enough.” He closed his eyes and tried to steady his breathing.
“What do we do now?” Barkov said in a sarcastic voice.
“Colonel, please,” Radchek strained. “I just lost my foot.”
38
Under the tank, Nick watched as four sets of furry white legs circled him. On occasion, the Smilodon’s jutted their heads underneath to roar, then pulled back in frustration. They could not reach him and had, for the past 15 minutes or so, been livid about it. Two of the cats had blood on their muzzles, which meant Ormskovo didn’t make it to safety. Nick was saddened by that, felt a twinge of guilt even, but as a soldier is supposed to do, he suppressed those emotions and refocused. The reality was, he wasn’t in much better shape than Ormskovo, and
he
was dead. Nick had no idea how long they were going to circle, or even if they had planned to leave. They were no longer bound by darkness, although Nick became conscious of the fact that they waited for the clouds to return before they launched their attack. Maybe they’d leave once the sun came out again. He could only hope. At least he had that.
There was space between the tank’s road wheels and Nick could see out through them and the holes in the camouflage net. Beyond, the yard was as calm and undisturbed as before. Had the captain and private made it to the guns? With everything as quiet as it was, he had serious doubts that they had.
A Smilodon slipped its head underneath again and opened its jaws as far as the ground would allow. It hissed, then roared, then hissed again.
“
That’s it, buddy,” Nick taunted. ”Try sticking your big fat head under here. Asshole cat.” It’s tusks scraped the frozen earth as it pulled out and circled some more. “Hey, you fellas like Bing Crosby?” he called out. The sound of his voice sent the cats into a frenzy and they circled, looking for some foothold that they may have missed.
“IIIIIIII’m dreaming of a whiiiiiiiiiite Christmas,”
Nick sang out.
“Just like the ones I used to knoooooow-”
Cut off by a quartet of roars, Nick smiled and shook his fist. “That’s it. Sing along with me.
Where the treeeeetoooops glisten, and chiiiiildren listen, to hear sleigh bells in the snow.”
To Nick’s joy, they stomped the snow, jammed their heads under to roar, and then pulled out. The cycle repeated itself over and over again.
He was going to belt out another song when some distant movement caught his attention. Squinting, he tried to see out into the yard, but one of the cats plopped down right in his sight line, blocking it.