But they couldn’t reach Tate before a soldier charged the younger operator. Tate swung his rifle at the soldier like a club. The man ducked, then smashed his own rifle into Tate’s jaw. The blow was enough to stagger Tate.
“No!” O’Neil said.
He saw it all happen in slow motion.
Other soldiers fought to hold their position. Muzzle-fire flashed in the dark as rounds blazed into the beasts surrounding O’Neil and Loeb. O’Neil tried to break free from the crush of monsters, even as he egged them on, pushing them to attack, to kill, to stop the Russians.
None of it made a difference.
The Russian attacking Tate aimed his rifle straight at the operator’s face. In that moment, O’Neil saw everything clearly. The blood covering Tate’s body. The grim determination set in the operator’s expression. The trigger finger of the Russian pulling back. The bone giving way from the point-blank shot.
Then Tate teetering as if he might still be alive. Might have somehow resisted the deadly shot. He started to twist, turning back toward O’Neil and Loeb.
Half of his face was missing, from the jaw up to the eye. All gone from the blast.
There was no coming back from that.
The rest of Tate’s jaw fell open, slack. His remaining eye rolled up into the back of his head, and he crumpled.
“No!” O’Neil bellowed.
A new fire roared up through O’Neil’s chest. Not from the angry Skulls. Not from whatever Russian Hybrids remained around base.
This anger was all his own.
He threw his arms out, knocking over two Skulls near him. Gave him just enough room to coil his muscles. Then jump.
His claws thunked straight into the neck of the Russian who had killed Tate. He drove the man backward as the warm blood sloshed over his claws, and they crashed into a crate. Behind him, he heard Loeb land on the concrete, then the click of his claws against metal as he picked up a rifle.
“You killed my brother,” O’Neil said, baring his fangs in front of the Russian’s face.
He thought he smelled urine as the man’s eyes filled with fear. He lifted the man, his agonized muscles screaming with pain, then threw the bastard into another sailor trying to seek cover behind an oil drum.
Loeb took a knee near an oil drum, firing at the scattering Russians. Skulls continued to fall around him as the desperate soldiers and sailors sprayed wildly into the pack of beasts. A couple of the creatures shot past Loeb and O’Neil, rushing the last group of sailors and soldiers left.
Those assholes were no match for the wrath flowing through O’Neil and Loeb, then passing into the Skulls. They swarmed over what was left of the Russian resistance, and as soon as the last Russian stopped firing, his body pinned to the ground by the beasts, the monsters began to feed.
All around him, O’Neil heard the snap of ripping flesh and the wet slurp of body parts slopping over the concrete.
He barely had time to think of what had become of Tate. What the man had sacrificed. He wanted to break down and yell and curse. But there would only be time to mourn the dead if he lived through the next few moments. Because this was his chance to save the living.
The path to the water near the stern of the ship was clear. The only thing left in their way was a few dead bodies and the weight of the mission they carried on their shoulders.
O’Neil raced ahead. Loeb followed, talons pounding against the pavement, just barely keeping up with him. Each still had their explosive charges. He prayed these things would work. That these wouldn’t be duds like the others that the Hunters had placed.
Because he would not be able to live with himself knowing Tate had died for nothing.
If he lived at all.
O’Neil sucked in a deep breath, then dove into the water.
-37-
O’Neil’s plates and bony armor dragged him down immediately. He fought against his own body sabotaging his swimming efforts, paddling at the water, kicking as hard as he could toward the looming silhouette of the freighter.
Underwater life hidden in the murk clicked and hummed and buzzed. Already fish and crabs picked apart the Skulls that had tumbled into the water. Saw more of those bodies that the Russians had discarded by tying them to concrete anchors. He was surrounded by an underwater forest of death, each sight more horrific than the last as he fought through the water toward the propeller.
Suddenly he heard bullets slicing through the water. Trails of bubbles tore through the murk. The sailors on that ship must’ve seen them dive in, and after what had happened to the other two freighters, they had to have some idea of what he and Loeb planned to do.
Those trails of bubbles speared all around him as the incoming fire grew more frantic. Deeper, he saw Skulls. Some still struggled as they sank, slowly drowning but reaching toward him, trying their best to swim up at him.
Death was all around him.
But he compartmentalized each of those threats and the fear trickling through him.
He could not control the gunfire or the Skulls or whatever horrific scenes were still unraveling on the shore.
All he could control was his own actions. He kicked hard.
Even his body seemed determined to stop him. He was only a few yards from the ship’s propeller, but exhaustion wormed its way into his mind, telling him he didn’t have the power or energy to continue. Pain scorched through his muscles and screamed through his nerves. And the weight of his body never let up, daring him to stop clawing his way through the water, daring him to see what would happen if he gave in.
He kept kicking and fighting and pushing through the water until he could see the metal hull of the ship more clearly. Saw the massive propellers. Should the Russians start the engines at that moment, he would be turned into chum for the underwater creatures surrounding him in the blackness.
But he pushed that out of his mind, locking his claws onto the edge of a prop blade, finally able to pull himself toward the stern. He turned back to see Loeb frantically swimming toward the props. Bullets continued to harpoon past him. A few Skulls plummeted into the water, their mouths open in perpetual shrieks, bubbles escaping their nostrils and mouths. Their claws flailed wildly in the murk.
O’Neil’s lungs started to burn, his mind screaming at him to suck down air. His muscles were burning through what little oxygen he had in his body too quickly.
He thought back to that fifty-meter underwater swim during BUD/S. Felt that same sensation now that everything rode on his ability to fight against the fading of his consciousness.
He fumbled with the explosive, his fingers growing numb. Managed to place it against the hull of the boat. He patted it, securing it with the adhesive the mercs had placed on one side of it. When it didn’t fall away after he removed his hand, he figured his job was almost done.
Just needed that second explosive in place to be sure.
Loeb continued to paddle toward him, but his strokes looked weaker.
O’Neil noticed a dark cloud left in the water from Loeb’s side. He was bleeding.
Worry crept its way into O’Neil’s mind shoving past the burning desire to shoot up toward the surface and fill his lungs with precious air. He reached out toward Loeb. His claws met Loeb’s and he dragged the other SEAL through the water toward the prop.
Loeb’s eyes were bulging, his mouth opening like his body was about to override his brain and gulp down water instead of air. He was in bad shape. No condition to finish what they had started. O’Neil quickly took the explosive from him and pressed it hard against the hull near his own. Then he pointed up toward the water’s surface where bullets and Skulls continued to rain down.