Big Luke

While Brandon and David were above ground in a firefight with Bob and Fadey in the chopper, I was searching for Fyoder and the weapons. At that point, I didn't know that the other team had turned on us.

I approached the grid pattern by zigzagging from one intersection to another looking for them. I came in from the North and moved South. I'd scan each room as I walked by and stop at each corner to poke my head around before moving again. I never liked hospitals. They are gross and people die in them. I was thankful that someone left the lights on, using my NVG in here would've been a nightmare. People have said that they can see ghosts by using night vision.

Speaking of nightmares. I remembered my phone call to camp earlier this morning. I talked to Brittany about this dream that she had.

"Kronos was there," she started as I sat on the hotel bed from last night. "He said that he could take Mathew away from me at anytime but would leave him alone if I joined his army."

I started to get worried. Brittany loved Mathew like I love my 1911, they were inseparable. I knew she would do anything for that little kid and that's what worried me.

I sighed into the receiver, "He's chopped into a million little pieces and can't touch Mathew." I tried to sound confident and it seemed to work slightly.

"You know what? You're probably right." If I had a nickle for every time I've heard that, I'd still be pretty broke. "But he influences lots of other people to do his dirty work. What do I do when he sends someone?"

"You know I'm always there when I can be," I said.

"What do I do when you aren't here?"

I checked the time. It was ten till seven. "I gotta go. Look, we'll talk about this when we get back."

"You better come back," her voice was stern.

"OK, see you later. Bye."

"I mean it Jon Luke," she paused for a second. "Bye," and she hung up.

Fast-forward to now in the underground hospital.

I came to a little dilemma. Continuing my zigzag pattern through the grid, I came across a set of those big hospital doors that open with the touch of a button. I was standing at an intersection peeking around the corner at the double doors. It was a left hand turn so my left shoulder was up against the wall as I peeked around it. The doors started opening and I shouldered my rifle. The bandage on my cheek made it awkward to shoot. The thing that walked through the doors was nothing I was expecting.

It was humanoid with long orange hair that was slicked back. Its face was white and expressionless. The face almost looked to be made of plastic. It didn't have any eyes only eye sockets. It was seven feet tall and muscular. It wore and orange jumpsuit that was dirty and stained. In its hands was either the coolest or craziest weapon I've ever seen.

Imagine two pump-action shotguns, one is a left handed model the other is right handed, welded together. Both guns used one wooden stock and one wooden forend. The weapon only had one trigger guard that was almost as thick as two trigger guards on a regular shotgun. Two triggers were staggered inside of the trigger guard. Each barrel was at least twenty-eight inches long and had bead sights mounted to the vented ribs. Under each barrel was at least a five shot tube making the total amount of rounds to be ten with two more in the pipes.

"Holy shit," I said just as a machine gun started ripping behind me.

I backed up a few yards back behind the wall and turned with my rifle. I saw Fyoder with his AK-74 on full auto as he peppered the thing in the jump suit. The monster didn't seemed to be phased by the rounds that were hitting it in the chest. Plenty of bullet holes littered its orange jump suit as Fyoder moved for a room on the other side of the hallway. He walked through the door just as he tanked the magazine.

The monster began switching between Fyoder and I, shooting one round into the walls in front of us. When the monster turned to shoot at Fyoder for the third time, I peeked around the corner to see the monster eject the spent shells from its Siamese pump-action shotguns. One spent shot-shell went to his right and the other flew to his left. He fired this weapon of true mass destruction from the hip. Each round of buckshot that hit the wall I was behind blew the wall apart. The hallway filled with dust and powder.

Fyoder and I waited for the shotguns to go CLICK! before we popped out from behind the walls that we were using for cover and opened fire on the monster. My rounds just flew right through the monster because the were Celestial Bronze encased. Fyoder's actually hit his target. He came prepared with regular ammunition.

Fyoder and I ran out of ammo at the same time. When we went to reload, the monster dropped the shotgun and unzipped the zipper on the front of its jumpsuit and reached under its arms into his cloths. When it pulled its hands out again, they were full with two lever action pistols, one in each hand. Judging by the size of the bore, I figured them to be forty caliber of some kind. When the monster spun the pistols in its hands, it chambered the first rounds. If I wasn't standing on the business end of the old west style weapons, I'd say they were pretty cool.

Fyoder and I dropped back behind cover as the forty calibers started crashing into the walls. I stabbed at the magazine release on the side of my receiver with my finger and caught the mag as it dropped free. I dropped the mag into my dump pouch on the lower back of of my plate carrier and slapped a new one in my M16. I tapped the bolt release and chambered a standard round. Then I held down my trigger as I aimed at the monster's chest. Now my bullets started to affect the monster.

The combination of the two assault rifles on full-auto was enough to bring the monster to one knee. I wasn't sure what this thing was but it was anything but human. A small puddle of some kind of green fluid flowed from each leg of its orange jumpsuit.

I pulled my finger out of my trigger and targeted the monsters hands which still had the lever-action pistols in them. I fired a short burst at its left hand first then the right. The hands were blown to pieces as the pistols landed on the floor. As one of the pistols hit, it went off and the round impaled itself in Fyoder's shoulder, outside his protective plate carrier. The round struck realitively high so he should have been alright for the time being.

The monster keeled over onto its face. I still had six to ten rounds in my mag so I walked up to it. I turned it over with my foot and put the remaining rounds into its white, plastic face. More green fluid spewed from its head along with pieces of its skull and chunks of its pink brain. I used my sleeve to block most of the splash from hitting me in the face.

After rolling over the body again with my foot, I walked over to Fyoder and pulled out my trauma kit. I noticed that the wooden handle that always stuck up from the back of his plate carrier was now gone and at his side. At one end of the handle was a large red ax head like a fireman's ax.

He was reloading his AK-74 as he waited for me to get closer. I looked down to pull some bandages out of my first-aid kit and when I looked up he was pointing the AK at my face. I was standing three feet from where he was sitting.

"What are you doing?" I asked.

"When you and your friends are dead, Chiron will make us the new Strike Team," he said gritting his teeth from the pain in his shoulder. "It will be a shame that you will not be able to witness the New Age."

I was furious, "Your working for Castellan?"

"As you might say 'damn straight'. We will tear apart your little camp from the inside out," he said grinning even though he was still bleeding from his shoulder. "Now, prepare to die." he pulled his trigger and I waited for his rounds to split me in half.

CLICK! I smiled, I knew that rifle was going to kill him one day. I dropped my trauma kit and went for my 1911. Fyoder un-slung his AK and picked up the ax. I was just about to pull the trigger on my 1911 but he hit the gun out of my hands with the side of the ax-head. I drew my Ka-Bar and turned it around in my hand.

"Lets rock. You son of a bitch," I said.

We backed up into the hallway and Fyoder tried an over-the-head chop with the ax. I side stepped but tripped on the dead corpse of the monster that we killed. I landed on my back which I hated doing. Fyoder tried another swing with the ax. I had to spread my legs just as the blade impaled the linoleum floor right under my crotch. For a split second I felt like Jason Statham but the feeling quickly faded as Fyoder went for my sternum with the ax. I rolled to my right and stood up.

I was standing next to him and I elbowed the Russian in the face. He stumbled and I put my knife to his throat as I tackled him. I held my knife to his throat but he managed to punch me in the jaw. I got flipped off of him and I got to my feet and so did he. He bolted for his AK and I picked up my M16 from the sling, dropping my bayonet. I hopped over the counter onto a receptionists desk. I reloaded my M16 as fast as I could and waited.

Fyoder came around the side of the desk and pointed his AK at me. He tried his trigger but it just went CLICK! He jumped out of the way as I opened fire on the wall that he was just in front of. Stood up just to see him run down the left long hallway. He was moving for the other weapon at the end of the hospital. I followed him in the right hallway.

We sprinted down our respective hallways and exchanged rounds through the lateral hallways. Apparently, he finally got his gun to shoot. I stopped as to trick Fyoder into coming after me. I stopped right at a intersection behind the wall. A receptionists desk wrapped around and radiused the corner greatly. If Fyoder was smart, he'd weave behind the desk and try to chop me head off. I waited and listened for footsteps. I heard his boots squeal on the linoleum floor and turn down the lateral hallway that I was standing next to.

Fyoder kept his feet quiet on the floor as he walked up. It was hard to judge where he was. I stepped back a few feet and shouldered my rifle. When he popped around the corner, I wanted to be ready to pull the trigger.

The first thing that came around the corner was that ax. It swung around and got stuck in the wall about a foot from my face. I sidestepped from the wall and put the reticle on Fyoder's face. He pulled the ax from the wall and knocked my M16 to the right.

He hopped over the counter and put his shoulder into me and pushed me back. My sling broke and my M16 fell to the floor, I was weaponless. We landed in a hospital room and I pushed Fyoder off of me. We stood up and faced off. He tried to roundhouse kick me in my left thigh but I caught his ankle in between my calf and the back of my thigh. I fell over and took him with me. Before I could elbow him, he stuck the handle of the ax in my chest, knocking the wind out of me.

Fyoder stood up and held the ax in his hands. We were both breathing heavily and paused momentarily. He had his back to the door of the room so I couldn't see around him. He was still bleeding but he had no intention of treating his wound. The loss of blood was starting to affect him. His eyes were glazed over and his face was pale. I was still on the floor with my hand on my stomach.

"You should just give up," he said.

"Fuck you! I'll give up when I'm dead," I replied.

"If you say so," he came back as he hoisted the ax above his head.

Just as the ax came down, a silenced sub-machine gun opened fire behind him and he was hit with a volley of rounds in the back. The rounds crawled up his back and into his neck and the back of his head which exploded in a cloud of pink mist, brain matter and skull fragments. The rounds past through and impaled themselves into the wall above my head. His now lifeless corpse dropped the ax and I had to slide back a few feet to avoid the body laying over on top of me.

Dasha was standing there holding one of her MP5k's in her hands. Smoke was still flowing out of the barrel. Evidently, the barrel was pointed at my chest. She fell to her knees and started bawling. She just shot her boyfriend to protect me. At that point, I thought that their whole team turned on us. Evidently, I was wrong again. Brandon walked in behind her with my M16, 1911 and Ka-Bar. He laid the items on the ground next to him and knelt down next to Dasha. He put his arms around her shoulders but didn't say anything. Dasha sat there in his arms crying, still staring at her dead boyfriend.

Dasha eventually pulled herself together enough to stand up. We walked out into the hallway after I gathered my M16, 1911 and Ka-Bar. That's when my heart sank.

David was walking down the hallway towards us. He wasn't holding his M110 or anything else for that matter. His hands were tied behind his back and the hood on his ghillie suit was knocked back. His weapons were being carried by two guards, both dracaenae. I raised my M16 and double-tapped the snake-women and watch them explode into dust and smoke. Then, I used my knife to cut him loose.

"Thanks," he said, picking up his weapons. "She on our side now?"

"Yeah," responded Brandon.

Then I heard the voice that belonged to someone I loathed. "Put your weapons down and turn 'round."

My grip tightened on my M16 but I set it down on the floor and slowly turned around. My step-brother, Kyle, was standing there with his jet-black FN Herstal SCAR-L pointed right at my face.

Kyle was big but only about as tall as Brandon, about five-ten. He had brown hair and two lateral scars, one on his cheek and the other was on the side of his neck. He wore black BDU's and a black plate carrier. He wore a Kevlar helmet without night vision. Even his boots and gloves were black. Him and his dad both had the same Cajun accent whereas mine was a little different.

"How you doin', Little Bro?" he asked.

"I ain't your bro. We ain't even kin!" I responded. "I told you that if I ever saw you again, I was going to kill you."

"I know," he said, obviously aloof. "Shouldn't you introduce me to your friends?"

I stomped my foot. "Brandon, David, Dasha this is my shit-bag step-brother, Kyle. I'm sure his shit-bag father is around here somewhere," I said.

"How you guys doin'?" asked Kyle.

"Been better," said David.

"That's too bad," responded Kyle, still pointing his SCAR at me. His eyes never left me as he stared down his sights. He pressed a button on the chord that ran from his radio to his headset. "I need four armed guards in the West long hallway."

Kyle and his father were mortal, so he couldn't see through the Mist like the rest of us. I don't think he knew who he was really working for or cared.

We waited around for a minute when two hellhounds, a dracaenae and a Laistrygonian giant walked around the corner. The hellhounds were perfect twins, they both had the same black fur and the same fiery eyes. The snake-woman had two bronze swords and a bronze breast plate.

"And this is where we part, Little Bro," said Kyle.

"You don't see who they are?" asked Brandon.

"Who, these guards?" he asked back. "Well that's Janine with the two combat knives, those are her two dobermans and this is Big Jimmy."

I smiled at Kyle's ignorance, he had no clue. The dracaenae, Janine I figured, poked one of her "combat knives" which was really her sword into my back and I started walking. Big Jimmy picked up my M16 and used it to herd us like cattle. The four of us walked in a line, I was on the far right, Brandon was next to me with Dasha and David next to him. Kyle didn't come with us.

I was looking down each horizontal hallway as we walked. At one point, I saw two PMC carrying a big black box that was probably three feet wide, two feet tall and two and a half feet deep. There was a laptop computer sitting, screen open, on top of the box as the two PMC walked with the contraption.

"That's got to be the other weapon," I whispered to Brandon who saw the black box as well.

"You ready to drop these guards?" he asked.

I didn't even answer, I just turned around and drew my 1911 which Kyle had forgotten about. I switched it off safety and dropped the giant before he could shoot me with my own gun. Then I double-tapped the dracaenae. Meanwhile, Brandon drew his M9 and shot the first hellhound. All at the same time, Dasha reached around and pulled my Ka-Bar out of my sheath and stabbed the other hellhound in the base of its skull. All four monsters exploded as they were hit.

"We got to get that box," I said as I picked up my M16 and reholstered my 1911.

"I'll be right back," announced David as he ran back down the hallway to grab his guns. Kyle had left and it was clear from there.

When he came back with his weapons and Dasha's MP5k, we crossed to the other side of the grid. I took point as I shouldered my M16. We hugged the inside wall as we walked down the hallway. We went all the way down to the end and found nobody.

"I guess we are going topside," I said as I moved towards one of the many shafts that lead to the abandoned trailer park above ground. "David, go grab one of those beds from the room over there," I said pointing to one of the rooms.

The rest of us covered him as he walked into the room and rolled the bed out into the hallway. I think David was a little disappointed in himself for getting caught and I couldn't blame him. The bed was slammed through the door so hard that the wheels came up off the ground.

David had trained hard to not be seen when he's in the woods. I felt that I had trained him well by using camouflage. Of course, both Brandon and David were hard on themselves when they didn't succeed at something that they had trained for, I'm not sure why.

He put the bed right under the shaft and we all helped lock the wheels into place to keep the bed from rolling out from under us.

"Ladies first," said Brandon.

Dasha climbed up onto the bed and reached for the first rung. She grabbed it with ease and hoisted herself to the second rung. She kept going until her feet met the first rung, then it was real easy from there. Next was Brandon and then David. It was awkward trying to find a way to carry my M16 as I climbed. I ended up sandwiching the rifle in between my plate carrier and my chest. It seemed to work as I climbed back up the ladder.

When I made it to the top, I pulled my M16 out from inside my plate carrier. We came up in one of the double-wides, everybody else was outside, I assumed. I walked outside to see a firefight going on. It was still pouring down rain and I ripped my eye protection off and tossed them to the side. I could always get new ones later. The opposition consisted of mostly PMC, dracaenae, and Telekhine's. It looked as if they were trying to get away in several jeeps and Humvees. I stayed in the trailers doorway as I tried to find my friends. That's when my heart sank and I got really pissed off all at the same time.

David, Dasha and Brandon were taking cover behind an eighties Chevy El Camino with an American flag paint job on it. Brandon was hit in the left shoulder, bullet wound like Fyoder had only a little closer to his lungs. Dasha was applying pressure to the wound using some bandages from his first-aid kit, which was good but Brandon should never of gotten hit in the first place.

"Have you guys radioed to KATE yet?" I asked as I started to engage the enemy with my M16.

"Yeah, already taken care of. She's on her way," responded David as he used his M110 to pick off several Tango's down range.

"Sorry, I got hit, Big Luke," said Brandon who was looking pretty pale from blood loss. Fyoder was definitely better when it came to getting shot.

"Don't worry about it, Dude. You just stay with us, alright?" I asked but it felt more like begging.

"You got it, Boss," he replied with a thumbs up.

The opposition was now loaded up and on their way out. I tried to aim for the tires but I missed. I heard KATE's engine scream behind me as she pulled into the trailer park by parallel parking right behind the El Camino.

"OK, David up front. Brandon and Dasha in the back," I said as I ran across the trailer park.

I put my M16 in the trunk while KATE flipped the front driver seat up so Brandon and Dasha could climb in the back. David got in the passenger seat and I climbed in the driver seat. I stuck the car in first and powered out of the trailer park down the same path as the Humvees. Our opposition had a good three minutes on us but that shouldn't be a problem with KATE's tremendous speed.

"Mom?" I heard Brandon say from the back seat.

"He's delusional," said Dasha. "You got any water or fluids?"

Dasha was still applying pressure to the wound with some now completely red bandages. She had this plane look on her face but her eyes were all puffy from crying earlier. The glove box opened and a clear plastic bottle of Aquafina rolled into David's lap. David handed it back to Dasha and she unscrewed the the cap. Brandon took the bottle and tried to drink but most of the water rolled onto his shirt.

We followed the tire tracks to the freeway where we saw them disappear down the road. Traffic was insane and I had to drive on the inside shoulder to make any progress in the pursuit. The torrential down pour seemed to follow us as we drove.