SNAFU: Heroes: An Anthology of Military Horror Read online

  Cade started in the bedroom, leaving the other rooms to Duncan. The younger Templar ignored the bathroom and stepped into the living room. He began poking around, though he wasn’t even sure exactly what he was looking for. What he thought they needed was another vehicle, but he didn’t have any hope of finding one of those. Still, a set of car keys would be a nice start.

  He began with the drawers below the counter in the kitchenette, reasoning that it might be a logical place to leave a spare key, but found only silverware and other assorted cooking utensils. The cabinets above the sink were all but empty but Duncan wasn’t surprised, given the pile of dirty plates in the sink.

  Not finding anything in the kitchenette he moved into the living room. He ruffled through the newspapers and half-full glasses left on the coffee table, then turned and searched the couch behind it. As he was replacing the cushions, not having found anything beneath them but some moldy pieces of food that were no longer recognizable, something outside the window caught his eye. At first he thought it was just the reflection of his flashlight in the window glass, but after a moment he realized that it was coming from outside. He moved closer, careful to keep his body from being framed in the window, and looked out into the darkness.

  At the far end of the street a church steeple rose above the surrounding rooftops and from its bell tower Duncan could see a light flashing on and off in an irregular pattern.

  Blink. Blink.

  Long blink.

  Blink. Blink. Blink.

  Morse code.

  Since he’d spotted it in mid-message, he waited for the signaler to begin anew, then quickly deciphered what it said.

  H-E-L-P U-S.

  Duncan turned and called toward the other side of the apartment.

  “Commander? I think you need to see this!”

  CHAPTER FOUR

  Cade stood beside Duncan in the shadows by the window and watched the light blink on and off in the church belfry at the end of the street. He could read Morse as easily as his companion and immediately recognized the plea for help, but something about it made him uneasy.

  He looked away from the blinking light and focused instead on the buildings up and down the street, searching the windows and rooftops for signs of the enemy, concerned that the signal might be some kind of a trap, a ruse to draw them out into the open where they could be attacked en masse and overwhelmed. Lesser demons like those they were dealing with might not always be that intelligent, Cade knew, but they were clever bastards.

  “Are you going to answer him?” Duncan whispered.

  Cade didn’t reply, just held up a hand in a signal for patience as he kept watching the street. He could feel Duncan getting impatient beside him but he ignored it for the moment, wanting to be certain they were in the clear before he made a move.

  Finally, satisfied that they weren’t under observation from a conveniently placed drone in one of the adjacent buildings, he brought up his own flashlight, pointed it in the direction of the church steeped and, using one hand cupped over the lens, sent back a message of his own.

  C-O-M-I-N-G, he said, H-O-L-D T-I-G-H-T.

  He paused, waiting to be sure the other had understood, and was getting ready to repeat his message when the signaler in the belfry replied.

  H-U-R-R-Y

  “Doing our best here, buddy,” Cade muttered beneath his breath even as he shoved his flashlight back onto the clip on his belt and turned away.

  Duncan eyed him expectantly. “Are we going to get them out of there?” he asked.

  “Remains to be seen if we can get ourselves out of here, but yes, we’re going to give it a try. Let’s go back down and rejoin the others, see if Olsen has any news for us.”

  As it turned out, Olsen did have news, though none of it good.

  “The choppers at Nurnberg are currently on lockdown due to the weather; seems they’re getting smacked by a bitch of a storm,” Olsen said. “They were surprised that we hadn’t been hit yet, actually, and said we should expect it pretty much at any minute.”

  Cade could care less about the weather. What he needed was enough men to contain this thing before it got out of hand. “Ground units?”

  Olsen shook his head. “Nurnberg’s CO basically said we’re on our own until the storm passes. Short of a direct order from the Seneschal, I doubt he’s going to budge.”

  Cade cursed beneath his breath. For just a moment he considered getting the Seneschal on the phone and having him demand that the idiot in Nurnberg send him the men he needed but in the end decided against it. While he was certain he could convince the Seneschal of the necessity of the act – he was Cade’s direct superior after all – Cade didn’t think that the Nurnberg CO would actually comply. It would be too easy to make up some weather-related excuse for why he didn’t send out his men and Cade would have simply made another enemy in the process.

  For the time being, they were going to have to make do.

  Duncan cleared his throat, not so subtly reminding Cade of the other issue they were facing. Cade then quickly filled Olsen and Riley in on what had happened upstairs and what he intended to do about it.

  “We move as a unit straight down the street to the doors of the church,” he told them. “I want the gunfire kept to a minimum. Use your blades first and only take the shot if you have to. We don’t want the noise to bring more of these things down on our heads.”

  There was a chorus of “yes sirs” from the other three members of the team.

  Cade knew that the church stood on holy ground and was therefore a natural sanctuary and boundary against the hellspawn. The only way those creatures were getting inside was to be invited across the threshold and that wasn’t bloody likely, in his view. If he could get his team inside without contact with the enemy, they’d have time to assess the situation and plan how to get the people inside, whoever they were, safely out of town.

  If being the operative word; they might not be able to see any at the moment, but it was clear the village was crawling with demons.

  Getting to the church was not going to be easy.

  Cade moved first, slipping out the door with barely a sound. He headed down the street in the direction of the church, staying low and slipping in and out of the shadows cast by the nearby buildings to mask his passage from whatever might be watching.

  One by one the others slipped out of the butcher shop and followed in his wake. They stayed close enough to be able to support each other if things went south but far enough apart that they wouldn’t get caught in a crossfire. Each man kept his attention on his area of concern, trusting the others to do the same. In that fashion they slowly made their way up the street.

  Based on what he’d seen from the second floor window, Cade guessed that they had to travel about a quarter mile down the street they were on before moving a few blocks west to reach the church. The distance didn’t bother him as much as the tightness of the buildings on either side. Side streets and alleys between the structures were few and far between; if they came into contact with the enemy they would have little choice but to fight their way through to the end of the street and that could be some distance away.

  Never one to shy away from a good fight, even Cade knew they wouldn’t last long if they got trapped in the middle and the enemy came at them in strength.

  So don’t get caught in the open, he told himself as he continued forward, his gaze constantly sweeping the area around him, searching for threats.

  They reached the end of the main road and had just turned west when the church came into view. Cade was about to point it out to the others when he thought he heard something. He sank to one knee and held up a clenched fist, the signal for the others to do the same, and then listened.

  For a moment there was nothing, just the silence of the abandoned streets shouting back at him, but then he heard it again.

  A furtive, scuttling sound.

  It seemed to be coming from somewhere across the street.

  He began s
canning the buildings opposite him, methodically covering the area at street level before working his way upward, checking every door and window, searching for movement or a shadow that was just a hair out of place, anything that might indicate the presence of the enemy lying in wait for them.

  When the sound came again, louder and clearer this time, there was no mistaking where it was coming from.

  The roof!

  Cade looked up to find that they were no longer alone.

  A strange, insectoid-looking creature stared down at them from the top of the building directly opposite his position. The demon had taken its victim’s form and twisted it into something right out of a nightmare. Additional limbs sprouted from either side of its torso, allowing it to power itself along in scorpion-like fashion and its face had morphed into a canine-like snout with rows of glistening teeth lining its jaws. Dark, coarse hair covered most of the thing’s body but left the face exposed. If it hadn’t been for the brown eyes staring at him over that gaping maw, eyes that belonged in the face of a frightened teenage boy and not the visage of some hideous monster, Cade might not have even recognized it as having once been human.

  His revulsion was so complete that he had his pistol up and pointed at the creature before he even realized it and as his finger tightened on the trigger he heard his own words echoing in his head.

  Use your blades first and only take a shot if you have to.

  So much for that idea.

  The shot rang out just as the creature scurried back from the edge of the roof and Cade wasn’t sure if he’d hit it or not. In the next moment it was clear that he hadn’t mortally injured it, however, for the night air was suddenly filled with the same shrieking cry that they’d heard earlier as the demon summoned its brethren to the scene.

  Cade didn’t waste any time trying to get in another shot but turned instead to face the others.

  “Run!” he roared.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  The men of the Echo Team responded immediately to Cade’s command, arranging themselves into a wedge-shaped formation with Olsen on point, Duncan and Riley staggered next to each other in the middle, and Cade pulling up the rear. They headed down the street at an accelerated pace designed to get them to their destination quickly without compromising their ability to defend themselves.

  Behind them, the demon continued its shrieking call.

  Cade and the others had barely covered twenty yards before demons started coming out of the woodwork. The first of the creatures to respond to the cry for help stuck its head out of a shop doorway a few dozen feet in front of the oncoming team. Before it could do anything more, Olsen snapped off a shot with economical precision that blew the top of the creature’s head clean off; the body collapsed back into the open doorway as the Templars went racing by.

  But that was just the first of many demons. Moments later all four men were firing repeatedly as demons came bounding out of every hiding place imaginable – from behind doors, out from under cars, off of nearby rooftops – each and every one of them intent on sinking teeth and claw into the bodies of their foes. The chatter of the MP5s in the hands of Olsen and Duncan was a near constant sound at that point, and was frequently interspersed with the boom of Riley’s combat shotgun and the crack of Cade’s pistol while around them the demons roared out their rage and hatred.

  For a time the Templars’ skill with their weaponry held the demons at bay and they were able to continue moving forward, but for every one of the enemy that fell two others seemed to take its place and it wasn’t long before the demons managed to surround them, forcing the squad to a halt.

  We are less than a hundred feet from the doors of the church, but it might as well be a mile, Cade thought, for all the good it will do us.

  The demons had clearly figured out where the Templars were headed, for they were concentrating more of their numbers between them and the church with every second that passed. Cade and his men kept laying down a blistering stream of fire as long as they could, but they’d been low on ammo before getting into the current firefight and it didn’t take long before their weapons ran dry.

  With the exception of Cade’s pistol, all of the firearms were outfitted with shoulder slings so as each weapon came up empty the knight using it simply let it fall by his side and drew his sword. Within moments the four men were standing in a square formation with their backs to each other, their weapons flashing in the moonlight as they hacked and slashed at their foes. Blood steamed in the cold night air and soon the ground at the Templars’ feet was littered with the bodies of the dead and dying.

  Still the demons came on.

  The four men fought with ruthless efficiency, each focused only on the foe that was directly in front of them and trusting the others to do the same, but Cade knew it couldn’t last. They were getting tired and if one of them fell, the rest were sure to follow.

  Just when Cade thought they were going to be overrun, the doors to the church in front of them burst open and three men came charging out dressed in bright yellow chemical suits like those worn by exterminators, complete with hoods and respirators. On their backs the men carried round metal tanks, reminding Cade of those worn by scuba divers. Rubber tubes ran from the top of each tank down to some kind of hand-held spraying device in the men’s hands.

  Cade was still trying to process their sudden appearance when the first of the newcomers pointed his gadget at the back of the demon closest to him and squeezed the trigger.

  A four-foot gout of flame shot from the nozzle of the device and enveloped the demon in a writhing column of fire. The other two men joined the party half-a-moment later, triggering their own makeshift flame-throwers and sending two more scorching streams of flame into the line of demons before them.

  In seconds the demons’ coordinated attack on the Templars devolved into chaos, with the infernal creatures trying to defend themselves on two fronts while doing their best to avoid being set ablaze by their already burning companions. The stench of scorched hair and fur and burning flesh filled the air, along with the shrieks and howls of the injured and the dying.

  It was exactly the break Cade was looking for.

  The demons in front of him were suddenly far more concerned with their own survival than they were in pressing the fight against him and his men. Cade took full advantage of the opportunity, shouting “On me!” over the din of battle and then forced his way forward into the fray.

  His sword rose and fell repeatedly as he hacked and slashed his way through the demon’s rapidly disintegrating defensive line. His men did the same on either side of him, scattering the demons before them like leaves in the wind until they reached their yellow-suited rescuers.

  “Head for the church!” the lead man shouted, his voice muffled by the masklike-respirator he wore as he jerked a thumb in the direction of the church behind him. “We’ve got your backs.”

  Exhausted by the melee, Cade didn’t bother to argue. He waited for his men to hustle past and then fell in behind them as they all headed straight for the thick oak doors of the church directly ahead.

  As they approached, the doors swung open and hands reached out to help them inside. Cade let himself be led through the darkness of the foyer and into the nave proper. Large candles burned in strategic positions throughout the room and by their light he could see twenty to thirty people huddled in small groups amidst the pews. They were a mixed group, mostly adults but with a few children and teenagers thrown in. Cade counted more than a few with makeshift bandages covering some kind of injury, most likely sustained while running the gauntlet to reach the sanctuary in which they currently found themselves.

  Commotion erupted behind him and Cade turned in time to see his three rescuers rush across the threshold as the heavy oak door was slammed shut, locking out the demons that had been in hot pursuit.

  The three men took a moment to catch their breath and then the leader stripped off his hood and goggles, revealing a mop of blond hair and a thickly bearded fa
ce stretched tight with tension.

  The tension was expected; the clerical collar around the younger man’s neck was not.

  Cade waited until some of the others had helped the men divest himself of the homemade napalm strapped to his back and then stepped over, offering his hand.

  “My men and I appreciate what you did for us out there, Father...?”

  The priest grasped Cade’s hand the way a drowning man would grab a life preserver but his voice was steady as he said, “Please, it’s Nils. Just Nils.”

  Cade wasn’t certain if that was a first or last name, but he supposed it didn’t really matter. Nils would do just fine. “I’m Cade. Is there somewhere you and I can talk?”

  Nils nodded and turned to one of the women standing nearby, watching the exchange. “Anna, would you get Cade’s men some water, please, and have Thomas see to their injuries. Their commander and I will be in the sacristy.”

  Father Nils led Cade into the small room to the right of the nave normally used by the priests when preparing for Mass. He shut the door behind them and turned to face Cade with weary relief.

  “Thank God you and your men have arrived, Captain. Things were difficult enough when Father Giesler first reached out for help, but now everything’s getting quite desperate. If we don’t get out of here soon...”

  Cade didn’t disagree with the man, but that was neither here nor there at the moment. “And where is Father... Giesler, is it?”