David Golemon: Ripper

“Oh, damn, the bastard’s right behind me isn’t he?” Everett said just as the beast screamed in triumph and sprang at Carl’s exposed back.

Suddenly a deafening roar filled every square inch of level sixty-one. The heavy popping noise pierced through the air and almost knocked everyone standing inside to the floor with its power. As Everett dove for cover he felt the heavy impact of metal against flesh. Before he hit the floor he heard the slap and thump of something hitting the beast. The creature was struck so hard that it didn’t have time to react to the attack.

“Jesus!” Carl called out as he turned over on his back to see round after round strike the beast in the chest, legs, neck, and head, sending it reeling backward. The fifty-caliber bullets kept filling the air to the point that the echoes and the actual sounds of the rounds exploding became one and the same.

Silence filled the air and then they all heard the voice outside.

“Hah, got you! That looks like it hurt!”

Everett tried to stand on shaky legs. He looked over at Sarah who was holding the head of Henri Farbeaux in her lap. Once standing, Carl walked to the doorway and looked out. He had to smile when he saw the face of Will Mendenhall as he leaned against the large electric cart that held the still-smoking Browning fifty-caliber machine gun.

“Nice gun,” Everett said as he leaned against the sill of the vault.

“I’ve got a torpedo bomber that comes with it.”

Will stepped inside and helped the others leave their small sanctuary. It was Gloria who came up and gave Will a deep, well-meaning kiss on the lips.

“What about the reactor?” Sarah asked.

“Europa says we have someone down there restarting the cooling pumps right now, but we still have to get the hell out of here,” Everett said.

Sarah and Denise helped the unconscious Frenchman sit up.

“Carl, give us a hand,” Sarah said as she struggled with Henri’s weight.

“Do I have to?”

“There is now three minutes, seventeen seconds until core meltdown,” Europa announced just as Smith attacked the two men.

Collins quickly pushed Charlie Ellenshaw out of the way as Smith hit him full force, sending him flying once more across the reactor room. The creature laughed as it turned on Ellenshaw.

Crazy Charlie knew he had to get to Jack because he didn’t know where the fuse box for the cooling pumps was located. He hurriedly scrambled back behind the water tanks, turned, and made his way toward the spot where the colonel had landed. Instead of coming after him, Smith went for the stunned Collins fifteen feet away.

Jack opened his eyes as he took short, painful gasps of air into his damaged lungs. He felt the heavy steps of Smith as he came forward to finish the job. The drool hit Jack’s back as the beast stood over his prone body. Jack tried desperately to get his hand under his body as he knew he only had seconds before Smith stomped him to death.

“I remember you now — Jack Collins, Fifth Special Forces Group, Afghanistan, 2004,” came the horrid deep and booming voice. Smith chuckled. “You going to tell Congress about this, Collins?” the beast asked as it reached down and picked Jack up by the body armor collar and lifted him to face level.

Jack opened his eyes and spit blood into the distorted face of Smith who raised his free hand and wiped the blood away, licking his fingers as he made a yummy sound deep in his throat.

Charlie charged at the creature’s back, not firing his weapon as before for fear of hitting the colonel. He jumped onto Smith’s back and started pummeling the giant with his thin-fingered fists.

Smith shook his body vigorously until he dislodged Ellenshaw. Charlie hit the hard floor and lay still.

“He is irritating. Is that the best you can do Collins?” The fetid breath struck Jack, helping to bring him around.

“You now have one minute, fifty-one seconds to reach safe distance. Core meltdown is imminent.”

Jack heard Europa’s calm voice and smiled, wondering why he had never been able to find the culprit who had altered her voice synthesizer to that of the deceased Hollywood sex goddess.

“Drop the colonel and back away,” said a voice in back of Jack, “you ugly son of a bitch!”

Smith looked up and saw twenty men facing him. But still he smiled as he knew they would never kill him in time to stop his eventual suicide.

“Come and get him,” boomed the unnatural voice as the beast raised Jack up closer to its head and almost unhinged its jaw as it opened its mouth wide with laughter, realizing that any rescue was now too late. It wouldn’t be stopped.

Jack found his opening. He had what he had reached for in his hand as Smith opened his mouth with that irritating laugh of his. Jack had already pulled the pin on the grenade before he had been lifted free of the floor. He drew his arm back and then let the safety handle pop free. He slammed the round grenade as hard as he could into Smith’s exposed mouth. He broke teeth off as the beast realized what had happened. Smith let Jack fall free and then tried desperately to dig the grenade from his large and deformed mouth.

As Jack hit the floor he rolled away, damaging his ribs even more. He finally stopped and managed to look up.

“Fuckhead,” Jack whispered lowering his head and covering up just as the grenade detonated.

Smith’s eyes widened when he realized what was in his mouth. His fingers finally managed to lock around the object and as he tried to pull it free, it went off, sending brain matter and skull bone out in an arc that covered the two reactor vessels.

Before Collins knew it, hands were on him, turning him over. He opened his eyes into the smiling face hovering over him.

“Hello Jack.”

“Grateful Dead, I’ll be damned,” Jack whispered.

“That you will my friend. It looks like we were a bit too late to save the day here, so I guess all us grunts are damned,” Garcia said as he cocked an ear upward just as Europa sounded her final warning.

“Detonation of nuclear material will occur in one minute and forty-one seconds.”

“The fuses,” Jack said low in his throat.

“What’s that, Jack?” Garcia asked.

Suddenly the warning alarms ceased. The red and yellow reactor lights started to slow their steady pulse and Europa made her last announcement as Collins tried raising his head.

“Core temperature has now been stabilized at six hundred fifty-two degrees. Coolant flow has been restored.”

Garcia helped Collins sit up as Charlie Ellenshaw came around the number ten water tank. He was waving his hands through the air as if to cool them. He grimaced as he saw the DELTA team and even Colonel Collins looking at his burnt hands.

“I couldn’t find the damn fuse box for the pumps. And then I didn’t know that you couldn’t push the fuses back in with the switch handle in the on position. That freaking hurt!” Crazy Charlie said as he waved his charred hands through the air.

“Hmm,” Major Garcia said as he looked down at the man who had trained him ten years before. “One minute and forty seconds to spare. You’re getting old Jack; you used to be exciting.”

Collins closed his eyes and passed out.

Doctor Denise Gilliam had every bed and most desks filled with wounded men and women. Virginia, Sarah, and Gloria had volunteered to assist the doctor as she tried to bring things under some kind of control. Niles Compton was complaining more than anyone that he would like a real doctor to help him as Virginia did her best to place the temporary cast on his ankle.

Two men no one recognized stepped into the clinic. They stopped and noticed Denise Gilliam attending her patients.