David Golemon - Ripper

Both Everett and Collins stopped digging long enough to turn their heads to see what was happening. The sound sent chills down everyone’s spines.

“Oh, shit!” Mendenhall screamed. “Colonel, we have a problem here!”

As Jack looked on in amazement, Farbeaux emptied the rest of the magazine of 5.56 rounds into the man’s body, even striking him on the right side of his head. The attacker was finally knocked down. As Collins started to turn back to widen the hole, he saw the man that had just been hit with fifteen rounds pop up like a Jack in the Box.

“What the hell is this?” Will said as he reached for Everett’s weapon, raised it to his shoulder, and took careful aim. This time he loosed a single round as the man drew closer. This bullet hit the bloody guard right between the eyes. Mendenhall was relieved when the man fell back, and this time he didn’t move. He looked down at Henri. “You just have to know how to shoot, Colonel.”

Farbeaux wasn’t listening as he watched two men, one without an arm and the other with his lower jaw missing, stand up from behind the spreading flames.

“Okay, Colonel, I think I want to leave now.”

Collins couldn’t believe what he was seeing. Men that had been shot, filled with shrapnel from a grenade, and wounded beyond any reason for them to even be moving were growling and walking toward them.

Mendenhall stood and just nodded his head at the two men as they came on. “Okay, okay! They’re drug addled or something.”

Henri fired until another of the magazines was empty. The man without a jaw was struck in the center of his forehead and went down heavily and didn’t move. The second man stood his ground and was about to start forward once more with at least five bullet holes in his abdomen and chest, when another awful and animalistic roar filled the room once more. This time Henri, Will, and Collins actually saw the author of that sound, or rather his shadow, as he rose from behind the makeshift and now destroyed cover.

Henri saw that the man was wearing the very same clothing that Juan Guzman was wearing earlier when Farbeaux was beaten inside of the cell. He stood and then called back to Jack.

“That’s Guzman.”

Collins saw that the man was at least a foot and a half taller than he was. He had grown so much that the shirt he wore was torn in several places. And what was worse he could now see the man’s features in the flickering of the fire. His cheekbones were high and deep lined. His forehead was larger than normal and his arms hung far below his waist. Jack’s eyes went from the two men in front of them to the two corpses they had found earlier.

“Jesus, it’s got to be that crap from the barrels and the jars. They’ve changed!”

Henri looked from the monstrosities before them to one of the sealed jars that had nearly decapitated him after the explosion. He involuntarily moved a few feet farther from it as another scream of animal rage filled the old laboratory.

The beast that was once Juan Guzman, the Anaconda, quickly moved, his actions as fluent as a cat’s, and took the wounded man standing before them by the throat. He raised his own man off the floor and then they all heard his neck snap. Guzman then brought the man close to his own face and then to the complete horror of the men watching in shock, took a large bite out of the man’s face. He chewed once, twice, and then looked toward the men watching. The thing actually smiled, and then before they could react Guzman threw the dead body toward them where it landed against the rubble from the cave-in and slid down at Everett’s feet. The roar of triumph pierced their ears.

“Oh, boy, look at this,” Will said as he stood stunned and motionless.

They saw several more men rise up behind Guzman. Some were torn to pieces, others had bullet holes across their chests and shoulders. All were changed almost as much as Guzman.

“The hole’s big enough!” Mendenhall said as he turned away from the terrifying sight.

Henri saw Will dive next to Jack, pushing the dead man out of his way, and start tearing at the opening at the top of the debris. Everett dove in to help. Farbeaux fired the M-14 until the receiver clacked open and stayed that way. As he was starting to turn and join the flight, Jack jumped over him and dove for something Henri didn’t see, nor did he care what it was. As he turned his eyes away from Collins, Farbeaux saw something that made him stop. It was the clear jar of liquid he had almost been killed by earlier. He quickly reached out, took the mayonnaise-sized container, and shoved it into his shirt. He scrambled up and over to help Everett and Mendenhall.

Jack was searching for something in the dark when he heard Everett. “Jack, come on, we’re through!”

He continued looking on hands and knees. Then his hand brushed against it. He pulled the twin saddlebag to his chest, not caring that the dynamite inside was sweating. He turned toward the widened hole and started to scramble.

“Don’t wait on me, move it!” he shouted as the three beasts came on, slowly, all smiling.

As Mendenhall and then Farbeaux scrambled up and out of the old laboratory, Everett saw what Jack was carrying. His eyes widened and then he turned and went through the opening. He didn’t wait for Jack.

Collins made it to the cave-in and then saw the two changed men behind Guzman turn on each other. The brief attack was brutal, but both of them survived. They regained their focus and then followed their boss toward Collins.

“Kiss my ass!” Jack shouted, and then, grabbing one of the fallen M-14s, he tossed the twin saddlebags at the trio of monstrous attackers. He lowered his head, thinking that the nitroglycerine-covered dynamite would detonate upon impacting the floor, but all he heard was a laugh. He looked up and saw Guzman, his misshapen and distorted features looking down at the saddlebags.

“Shit!” Jack hissed as he scrambled to the top of the debris and entered the hole.

Just as Guzman turned away from the saddlebags, he laughed, an evil, cold sound, as he saw his antagonist’s legs vanish into the escape hole.

“You should have negotiated,” sounded the deep voice.

Suddenly Jack reappeared in the facing of the wall. This time it was he who was smiling.

“You’re right, here’s my offer!” he shouted as loud as he could.

Guzman’s larger-than-normal eyes widened, and just before Jack fired the M-14, the horrid-looking Anaconda raised his hands upward and jumped. Grabbing broken wooden beams, he heaved himself up and out of the laboratory a split second before the red-hot nine-millimeter round struck the saddlebags.

The explosion actually blew Collins backward into the tunnel as it started to collapse. As the excavated hole fell inward upon itself, a split second of fire, rocks, and smoke flew through the hole. The combination of dynamite, and its natural offspring, nitroglycerin, detonated with power triple what the original makers intended.

Everett quickly picked himself up and with his ringing out of control, saw Collins lying motionless and face down in the hard, compacted earth of the tunnel. He reached down and handily picked Jack up. Shaking him, not caring if he had a neck or head injury, Everett waited until he opened his dirt-caked eyes.

“Maybe a fuse next time!” Everett screamed.

“Remind me next time, will you?” Jack said, shaking himself to full wakefulness. Then he suddenly remembered. “Jesus, I think Guzman got out!”

It didn’t take the genius of Jack’s words to get Everett moving. He just turned, helping Collins to his feet, and then they started running for their lives.

The raid on the hacienda called Perdition had ended.

The nearly ten-mile flight from a horror none of the four men could ever have imagined had just started.