The Hysteria: Book 4, The Eddie McCloskey Paranormal Mystery Series (The Unearthed) (25 page)

The knifers were moving faster than I thought possible. They ran across the bodies and before they reached us they launched into the air.

They came down on us hard. Our front line stumbled back into the second line and then all was chaos. About ten people must have stepped on me but I pushed them away and got to my feet.

Something sliced my back. I felt
this
cut. It was deep. It turned me around and I fell into the wall. I whirled with the bat and landed a glancing blow on someone’s shoulder. More of them came at me. I swung wildly to keep them at bay. I caught another in the temple and forced my way out of the scrum.

The rink was overrun. They outnumbered us two-to-one and more of them were pouring in from the hallway.

The gunners fell.

Mia and two others were in the middle of the rink. They stood back-to-back and kept the knifers at bay. But they weren’t scoring any kills. It was strictly defense. In sports, they say defense wins championships. On the battlefield that isn’t true. It was only a matter of time before they were taken.

There were eight of us left. Against a horde of about seventy. It didn’t matter if there weren’t any more outside. We couldn’t hold against these numbers.

I retreated into the arcade. A half dozen knifers were slowly driving me into the corner. Once I got there, I was dead. I wanted my life to flash before my eyes so I could relive everything one last time. But it didn’t. Instead I stood there, scared shitless with a bat in my hand.

I rounded behind a pool table. They were taking their time, moving as one unit. There was no sense in exposing themselves. No reason to take any risks.

They had me.

I tried to think of all the important things I’d done in my life and all the important things I still wanted to do. I knew there were a lot but I couldn’t come up with any in that moment before death. All I could think of was Stan and Moira and how I’d never get to meet their beautiful baby girl.

I saw Manetti and Riehl join the other knifers in the rink. I wondered if Eamon had been killed or if he’d somehow escaped. I didn’t want to die not knowing the answer to that question. But it looked like I would.

The knifers were five paces from me as my back hit the wall. This was it. Lights out for Eddie. So long, you ultimately cruel world.

“Everybody get down!”

There was a glass window in the arcade that opened to the entrance of the building. Megan jumped off the barricade and shouted.

“Get down! Now!”

Her command momentarily distracted the knifers coming at me. They all swiveled their heads to the right.

Four armed men came over the top of the barricade. They had assault rifles. It was Dyer and the other shooters from the roof.

And they still had ammo.

They squeezed their triggers and mowed the knifers down. I hoped Mia had dropped to the ground to avoid the friendly fire. I took advantage of the distraction to smash one skull and push my way out. Somebody slashed my leg but I kept going.

I made it to the barricade so I was behind Dyer and his team. He tossed me a handgun and I went back to the arcade and I shot every son of a bitch in there dead. When I came back out, Dyer and the shooters were out of ammo.

There were bodies and blood everywhere. Mia and Eamon picked themselves up off the floor of the rink and joined Megan and the rest of us. Eamon was holding his flank. Blood trickled over his hand. Somehow he’d survived.

Mia was dinged up but not cut. Megan had a gash above her ear that was bleeding bad. I wondered where their sister Melanie was, and if she was already dead.

Dyer was unscathed. He dropped his rifle and unhooked a tire iron from his belt.

My back was on fire from the big slash. The cut on my leg made me limp. But I was still breathing.

The knifers were picking themselves up too. Manetti and Riehl were on the far wall. Neither of them looked like they’d been hurt in any significant way.

“It’s highway time,” I said.

Dyer shook his head. “There’s about fifty hanging back by the road.”

“Doing what?” Megan said.

“I guess waiting to see what happens in here.”

I figured Pater was back there because I didn’t see him in here. There were twelve of us, about twenty-five of them.

“We’re not out of the woods yet,” Dyer said.

“Just one more big push,” I said.

He looked at me and nodded.

We formed a line and the knifers did too and we faced each other from across the skating rink. Death was everywhere. The crush of bodies either dead or twitching on the floor between us. The metallic odor of blood in the air.

It was hell. Pure, fucking hell.

“We can take them,” Megan said.

Everyone charged.

The last full measure.

They were more tired than we were. They’d had to sprint across a parking lot and then push their way in and then crawl over the fallen and they’d had to kill with blades, not guns.

But they outnumbered us.

And we were exhausted too.

There was no grace to the violence. We swung and we jostled and we threw. Three people slipped in the blood and went down. Megan executed a vicious roundhouse to someone’s leg which forced their knee sideways. The man only had a second to scream before Megan brained him with her bat.

Manetti and Riehl hung back and let the others come at us first.

A man and a woman approached me. They were both around forty. The woman wore a dress and the man a suit.

“You kill him, honey,” the man said.

“No, babe, you kill him,” the woman said.

They were a couple. Still had their wedding rings on.

“Or how about I kill you both,” I said.

They didn’t hear me. They laughed giddily and their eyes twitched and they couldn’t keep still. They had the bloodlust.

Just like I did.

The man surged forward with a knife and I blocked with one hand and crowned him with the bat. His eyes rolled back and the strength went out of his legs.

His wife didn’t hesitate. She had a serrated knife and cut into my blocking arm. The blade tore through my forearm. I swung wildly with the bat and missed worse. She jumped out of the way with a dancer’s grace and lunged at me. I snapped my head away and the knife whizzed by my neck. I punched her in the nose, dazing her, then I batted the side of her head as hard as I could.

She went down.

She and her husband were unconscious but still alive. Before I finished them off I figured it’d be a good time to take stock.

Megan and Mia were still fighting. I turned in time to see Dyer get knifed in the back. It was a bad injury, but I couldn’t tell if it was life-threatening. I didn’t see Eamon. I turned back around.

Riehl and Manetti were coming for me.

***

Riehl had an overhand grip on a Ka-Bar. Standard military issue. He’d probably been carrying it ever since he’d joined Spec Ops. The Ka-Bar looked like a natural extension of his person, like another appendage. He stepped over a couple corpses. All two-hundred and fifty pounds of him wanted to kill me.

Manetti got on my other forty-five and formed a two-point cover on me. She was holding a Bowie knife. A gash on the middle of her forehead was bleeding down her nose.

I didn’t want to kill them. But I would try.

They had years of training and experience on me. Riehl had known combat. And it was two-on-one. If I got them separate, I might have had a fighting chance. But they were too smart for that.

“Where’s Pater?” I said.

Riehl smirked. “Out of your reach.”

“So no harm in telling me.”             

He shook his head.

They took a step closer.

“How about Melanie?” I said.

Manetti’s eyes narrowed. “You’ll see her soon.”

Translation: Melanie was dead.

They took another step. Any closer and they would have to make a move. I had the bat out in front of me. Any closer and I would have to make a move.

We stood like that. I heard the others fighting. I hoped Megan and Mia and Dyer were still alive.

Manetti and Riehl shared a look. They would close any second. I had to take the fight to them. I brought the bat up—

And someone pushed me.

I was nudged backward. I tripped on a dead body and lost hold of the bat. It hit the bloody rink and rolled away.

I scrambled to my feet and got my bearings. Riehl and Manetti hadn’t closed. They’d been just as surprised by the shove as me.

But who the hell had pushed me?

Everyone else was tied up fighting. And the push had come from in front of me. But no one else had been in front of me except Riehl and Manetti.

Who were now smiling wickedly as if they were in on some joke together. Their eyes drifted past me. I looked over my shoulder.

And saw Eamon halfway up the barricade.

He was watching the three of us and I realized what he’d done. Using his psychic link to this place, he’d pushed me so I fell. Giving Riehl and Manetti the perfect opportunity to kill me.

“When this is over, I’ll find you, asshole,” I said.

He scrambled on hands and feet over the barricade and slipped outside. Eamon Moriarty had escaped, but not before disarming me so I could be killed easily.

Good thing there were plenty of other weapons around. I didn’t need to fear getting shot now because I was holding a blade. There were no bullets left and Megan and her people knew I was okay.

The dead man sprawled next to me was still holding a carving knife. I went to grab it but my fingers recoiled at the handle.

My stomach lurched and a wave of nausea hit me. I pulled my hand back and felt a little better.

Riehl and Manetti were watching me with sly grins. They knew. Megan had known. Probably everyone else too.

I was affected.

I crab-walked back and scrambled to my feet. Riehl and Manetti resumed their steady approach, high-stepping over the corpses littering the rink.

“Now you know,” Manetti said.

I was sick.

And Riehl looked different. I couldn’t decide how. He was the same, but different. Maybe it was the eyes. They had a wild, animal intensity to them.

Manetti was different too though not in the same way. Her difference was in how she moved. More graceful now, animal-like.

Before I had wanted to defend myself.

Now I had to kill them.

I didn’t want to. But their deaths had become a biological imperative. Us versus them and self against self were on a collision course and the crash would result in death.

There were no weapons in easy reach. Well, none that I could use. The guns were out of ammo and the blades were off-limits.

I had to take on two highly-trained and exceptionally lethal federal agents unarmed.

“I’m going to kill you both,” I said.

“We’re going to enjoy watching you die,” Riehl said.

As they neared, I started to feel lightheaded. My knees went weak, like I was going to faint. Quickly, I grabbed my pack of smelling salts and whiffed. My vision immediately sharpened.

“Don’t pass out on us,” Manetti said.

I turned sideways to both of them and snuck my trailing hand into my back pocket.

A man is never defenseless.

Good thing I had an ace up my sleeve.

Riehl and Manetti came at me the same time. I did the opposite of what they expected. I closed on them so they’d worry about accidentally slashing each other.

Manetti tried to take my head off with her Bowie knife but I ducked out of the way. Riehl scored a weak cut on my shoulder but by then I’d pulled Manetti’s knockout spray out. I’d picked her pocket during our kiss in the boiler room. It was a little smaller than a key fob. I put it in her face and hit the lone button on the middle of it.

It sprayed a fine mist.

Manetti wrenched her head back but she was too late. The mist glazed her upper lip, a perfect shot right under her nose. Her eyelids fluttered and she went down.

Spinning, I brought the thing around to spray Riehl. But he chopped my elbow and then I felt a hot flash across my stomach.

Riehl completed his swing and I saw my own blood on his Ka-Bar. He wasted no time and slashed again. I jumped away and he missed by an inch.

Riehl didn’t wait for me to recover. And I didn’t expect him to. He was already stepping into his next attack. I’d learned the same mentality in krav maga. In a life-and-death situation, you end the fight as quickly as possible.

Outmatched and out of luck, I gambled. I couldn’t go toe-to-toe with this natural born killer and expect to walk away. I had to end the fight immediately. The only way to do that was to be bold. Bold would either get me killed or save my ass. At least I’d go on my own terms.

I let Riehl think he was going to score another slash. At the last second I bent backward like I was doing the limbo and heeled Riehl’s trailing knee, the one without the weight on it. There was a crunch and Riehl’s leg bent the wrong way.

He didn’t yelp but I knew he was in serious pain.

I brought the sprayer to his face but he had the presence of mind to swing the knife again. He slashed my forearm and I dropped the sprayer.

I stomped with my heel again, this time on his leading instep and the blow stunned him. I brought my foot up and connected with his balls and this time he made some noise. He brought the knife up for a killing blow but I did the opposite again. Instead of waiting to defend myself I attacked.

I snapped my head forward as hard as I could. I head-butted him in the chin and then for good measure I drove my fist into his nuts and made him sing again.

Riehl toppled backward but I wasn’t about to stop there. I ground-and-pounded him till he dropped the knife and then I kept raining blows till he couldn’t even hold his hands up anymore.

I had to kill him.

I had to.

He lost consciousness. He was mine to kill. I put my hands around his neck, thumbs to his Adam’s apple and took some deep breaths to gather my strength. I stole a quick glance around the rink.

Megan and Mia were squaring off against the one remaining knifer. Dyer was holding, but barely. A few other gunners were still vertical. Manetti was out cold.

We had done it.

Riehl was mine. I had to kill him.

But I didn’t.

Because I didn’t want to.