The squad was, as he’d guessed, ready and waiting. They covered his retreat, firing to either side of him and parting to let him through behind them to give him time to reload.
The four stood inside the doorway of the living quarters, allowing the snakes to come forward, then stepped back as a unit, four paces into the hallway, so that the snakes would have to bunch up tight to come toward them.
After that, it was little more than a shooting gallery.
There didn’t seem to be enough intelligence in the creatures for them to form a coherent strategy. They kept coming on, even as the squad blew heads and tongues and fangs to globs of flesh and dripping goop. The stink was even stronger now, causing Banks’ eyes to water and making his head swim as if he’d taken too much liquor. The enclosed space was concentrating the effect.
“Back up again, lads,” he shouted. “To the kitchen doorway and cleaner air.”
There were only four snakes left by the time they reached the doorway and they immediately felt the benefit of cleaner air. Two went down quickly, blasted to dripping gore. A third proved tougher to handle, and slid out a tongue that grabbed McCally by the leg and coiled tight like the grip of an octopus tentacle, trying to tug the man off his feet. Wiggins stepped to one side, put the barrel of his weapon against the thing’s right eye, and fired three times. The snake went down, but McCally had to take some time to untangle himself from the still-coiled tongue around his calf. With two men momentarily out of the action, the last of the snakes, the biggest specimen they’d seen, made a lunge forward. It was so long that its tail was still outside the main door even as it came into the kitchen. Its head was almost as wide as the doorway itself, two red eyes fixed straight at Banks as it reared to strike.
The snake’s mouth opened, and Banks tasted hot vinegar and oil again as he raised his weapon. At the same moment, Hynd stepped under the rearing head, put his rifle under its jaw, and fired. Banks put a shot into each eye for good measure but the thing was dead already as it fell to join the others in the carnage on the floor.
Banks’ ears rang for long seconds after the firing, but he made out Wiggins’ shout clear enough.
“Is that all of these buggers?”
“Go and check. Take Cally and have a keek out the main door,” he shouted back. “Shout if there’s any more of the fuckers. And don’t do anything stupid.”
“You know me, Cap,”
“Aye. That’s the problem, Wiggo.”
McCally and Wiggins left, stepping gingerly over the oozing bodies.
“Sarge, tell the wanker he can come out now. I’ll go check on Giraldo.”
Banks headed for the bedroom. As he reached the open door and stepped inside, he heard Wiggins shout from out in the corridor.
“Cap? You have to see this shite.”
But Banks couldn’t reply. His breath had caught in his throat at the sight of the thing on the bed where he’d left the guide.
It lay in a thick coil in the center on top of the sheets, a snake almost as big as the largest one they’d seen so far. A wide, flat head turned so that it looked straight at Banks.
It had Giraldo’s eyes.
The head dipped and rose again, and a thick purple tongue slid wetly between the fangs that were starting to emerge from bloody gums. It made a rasping noise, deep in its throat, then repeated the sound, this time with its mouth open wider and the forked tongue moving rapidly. He realized it was trying to speak, and he finally recognized the single word being formed.
Promise.
He stepped forward, weapon raised.
“Aye, I did, man. I’m so sorry.”
He put the weapon to the middle of the wide head, between the eyes. Giraldo, what little bit was left of him, looked up, and pressed his head tight against the barrel. Banks nodded, and fired twice.
He had already turned away as the coiled body slithered from the bed onto the floor and lay still.
- 16 -
He met Hynd and Buller standing in the kitchen doorway. They stood looking down at a body at their feet. When Banks had gone into the bedroom, there had been a huge dead snake there. Now there was a naked dead man, one with the back of his head blown out and blood, still wet, running red around the body.
“This is fucking weird, even for us, Cap,” Hynd said.
“It’s their leader,” Buller added, and at first Banks didn’t understand, until he bent and had a closer look at the dead man. There was no doubt about it. Despite the bullet wounds, Banks saw it was the tall one who’d led the occupants of the temple complex in their earlier capture.
“How did he get here?” Hynd said.
“I think they probably swam,” Banks replied.
McCally spoke from out in the hallway.
“They’re all like that, Sarge,” he said. “All the fucking snakes are now dead people, men and women both. How the fuck does that work?”
“I’ll be buggered if I know, lad, but I’d feel better if we got these bodies out of here.” He turned to Buller. “Where do you keep the gasoline?”
Ten minutes later, they stood in the docking area watching the bodies burn. They’d dragged each one out individually, then piled them in a pyre on the deck by the waterside. Banks had them put Giraldo, now man again for the last time, on the top, then they doused the whole lot in gasoline and set it alight. They had to stand back as the pyre went up with a whoosh and surge that threatened to singe their eyebrows.
Nobody felt like speaking, and they all stood in silence. The burning went fast and furious, the bodies being rendered to ash and bone in a matter of minutes. When the flames finally started to die down, Wiggins stepped forward and kicked at the pile. It tumbled over into the river with a distinct hiss, and dispersed quickly, leaving only an oily scum on the surface to show for the lives of the dead. Even that was quickly dispersed, and soon the only sign they had ever been was a burned scar on the deck where the pyre had been.
Banks headed back inside, not for the beer, but for a drop of something harder. He fetched the bottle he’d seen earlier from the office, took it through to the mess area, and poured them all, even Buller, a finger of Scotch.
“To Giraldo, the poor auld bugger,” he said, and knocked the whisky back in one. He took a pack of cigarettes from the table, lit a smoke, and stashed the rest of the packet and lighter in his pocket before turning to Buller.
“The choppers will be here inside the hour,” he said. “We can all go home, right now, and be back in Scotland with a breakfast fry up and a pot of tea before you know it.”
Buller finished his own drink before replying.
“We’re not going back without the gold. Don’t you see? It’s even easier now. You’ve killed most of them. I never saw more than 20 at the temple, and you put that many down here tonight. The place will be empty. All we’ve got to do is waltz in, make sure everything’s quiet, and sit on it. All that gold we saw is ours for the taking.”
“If we get a vote, I’d rather have the fry up,” Wiggins said.
Buller smiled again, that same eminently punchable smirk that Banks was coming to loathe.
“This isn’t a fucking democracy,” he said, addressing Banks. “You’ve got your orders. I’m in charge here.”
“Look around you,” Wiggins replied. “You couldn’t manage a fuck in a brothel.”
“That’s enough, Wiggo,” Banks said. “The man’s right on one thing, we’ve got our orders. Go and be a soldier. You and Cally walk the perimeter and make sure there’s no more buggering snakes about. The sarge and I will babysit the wanker for a bit.”