As it moved, X saw it kept the bone shard darts stowed in the flesh of its own body, in the meaty part just above the shoulder. From this angle, they appeared to fan out around its neck like some kind of morbid spiky collar.
About fifty feet away now, it flexed its muscles and let out a deafening guttural roar. The noise was louder than a dozen Sirens at close range, and the upgraded speakers he had installed in his helmet amplified the noise even more.
The echo continued even after the monster stopped screaming. Ears ringing, X peeked above the window frame to see the beast pulling another bony dart.
He brought up his gun and held the trigger down, riddling the monster with bullets. It stumbled back but then threw the projectile, this time at Fuego, who unleashed another rope of flame at the same moment.
X looked over into the next room as the bony missile hit the tank over Fuego’s shoulder, punching right through the thick steel. The soldier screamed at the top of his lungs and continued hurling flames at the beast.
“No!” X yelled, diving away. But it was too late. Fuego exploded in a massive fireball that burst through the opening in the wall and slammed into X and Wendig.
Flaming shrapnel punched into the walls, ceiling, and floor. X felt the burn of something in his leg and then his arm, then all across his back. He rolled on the floor to put out the fire.
His optics winked off, shrouding him in darkness for a moment. The flames provided enough light to show Wendig, lying in a fetal position and groaning.
X couldn’t hear much, just the dull ringing and then a clanking sound and, finally, a human scream—not of pain but of anger.
He pushed himself up to the window to see Rhino standing in front of the structure. A wave of dizziness dropped X back to the floor, where he took several deep breaths. He felt no loyalty to the Cazador lieutenant, but he had to help before the abomination killed them all.
Come on, Xavier. Get up or get cooked…
X pushed up from the floor a second time and then crashed back down again. He rolled onto his back to find a hunk of shrapnel in his thigh armor. Another piece had stuck in his shoulder pad, and a third was lodged in the side of his helmet, just above the visor. He wasn’t sure any of them had penetrated, but he couldn’t swear that the warm wetness in his suit was just sweat. Could be piss…
I hope it’s just piss.
The floor of the room to his left suddenly collapsed, crashing to the first floor. X had a feeling the floor under his boots was next. He managed to get up, holding steady during a wave of dizziness. His vision cleared to see Wendig reaching up.
Fuck you.
X grabbed his rifle and walked away, but hesitated when he reached the doorway. He had killed this guy’s cousin, and now he was leaving him to burn alive?
He would leave you to burn.
Right?
“Don’t make me regret this, you prick,” X said. He stumbled back over and grabbed Wendig’s hand. Planting his boots against the uneven floor, moving inches at a time, he dragged Wendig out of the room. Then he helped him up, pulled the good arm over one shoulder, and got him down the stairs.
Outside the building, the grunting and roaring continued as Rhino fought the beast with his double-headed spear.
X began to cough as he staggered down the steps with Wendig. The smoke had started to infiltrate his helmet now that his battery wasn’t working to power the filter. He stopped to fiddle with the battery, which had been knocked loose from its socket, but even when he clicked it back into position, it didn’t activate.
It was just another way for him to die, he thought as they reached the bottom of the stairwell—cooked alive in this formfitting armor oven.
Most of the lower room was on fire when X spotted Whale lying beneath the half a tree that the beast had hurled through the window.
He and Wendig moved over to help, but it took only a glance to see that the big guy wasn’t getting back up. The log had crushed Whale’s chest plate, and a branch had sheared off the bottom of his helmet and unhinged his jaw.
And yet, somehow, he was still breathing.
Wendig reached down with his good hand. He yelled in Spanish, gesturing for X to help.
“You fucking serious, man?” X said. It didn’t take a genius to see that Whale was done.
But to X’s astonishment, Whale grabbed his axe off the ground and then used the haft to push himself to his feet. Blood leaked out of his cracked chest armor and trickled from his broken jaw.
He brought the axe up, and for a fleeting moment, X backed away, thinking Whale was going to swing on him. Instead, he stumbled through the burning room and led the way outside, where Rhino and the beast dueled.
The fires in the forest and the building gave X his first close-up view of their enemy. It stood seven feet tall and had a muscular frame wider than two men.
Its taloned hands parried Rhino’s double-headed spear, deflecting the blow with a loud clang. The beast took several steps backward, turning a gray armored back with the collar of spikes.
It brought a fist down toward the top of Rhino’s helmet. Rhino raised the spear, but the shaft snapped in two, and a talon shrieked down his chest armor.
Whale staggered forward and swung his axe down on the back of the beast, lodging the blade between two of the bony spikes. It let out a roar and turned on its attacker.
“No!” Wendig shouted. He fired the handgun in his good hand, and X pointed his submachine gun at the eyes, but the weapon clicked on a jammed round.
Rhino jabbed one end of his broken spear into the monster’s neck from the side, earning himself a backhand that sent him crashing to the ground. Whale punched the monster in the face with his brass knuckles, with an audible cracking of bone. Doubling over in pain, he fell to his knees in front of the beast as it reared backward, one hand to its face.
Letting out an enraged scream, it grabbed Whale by the helmet in both hands and popped his head off like a cork from a bottle. Then it tossed the head at X as the body slumped over, squirting twin jets of blood into the air.
Wendig struggled to change the magazine in his pistol, and X grabbed the sheathed blade off his duty belt as the monster lumbered toward them.
Behind it, Rhino was getting back to his feet. He picked up one of the broken spear shafts and made a run for the creature as X and Wendig backed away.
A boom and crack sounded behind them as the house collapsed in a billowing cloud of glowing embers. Sirens, spectators to the violence, circled overhead, waiting for a chance at fresh-killed meat.
When X turned back to the monster, it had stopped to sniff the air. Rhino used the opportunity to grab the haft of the axe still jammed in its back, and wrenched it free. When it turned toward him, he jammed the other half of his broken spear into its eye.
X moved to flank the thing while Rhino brought the axe down on its chest, sinking the blade deep in its muscle. Blood welled out, covering Rhino in carmine.
The shriek that followed sent all three men reeling backward. The noise was unbearable, even now that X’s speakers were offline. He fell to his knees, gripping his helmet where his ears were to no avail.
In its rage, the creature turned and kicked Wendig, sending him skidding across the dirt and into the flooded basement of a neighboring house.
X stood and turned away from the beast, making it a few feet before it picked him up by one leg, and flung him through the air. He landed on his back near Rhino. The impact knocked the air from his lungs, but it also saved his life. If he had landed facedown, the shards of shrapnel would have been driven through his armor, suit, and flesh.