The men began to circle one another. Aussie, keeping a worried eye on his opponent, held his wounded arm close as blood coursed down its length and to the floor. Again, he swung the knife in a pattern of figure eights. Savage smiled. Some habits were hard to die.
And then the men collided, blades striking.
As the fight waged on, Savage seemed to pick up steam rather than lose it. His motions were deft and with purpose. The two blades warring against each other seemed to favor Savage as he pushed Aussie near the edge of the tier. They were running out of room.
Aussie sized Savage for an opening, attempted to circle, and found what seemed to be an opportunity. He tried to cut the man with a sweeping horizontal arc across Savage’s abdomen before Savage would realize that he had been gutted. But Savage grabbed the attacker’s wrist, forced the man’s arm over his head exposing the armpit, and drove the sharpened point of the nine-inch blade deep until the pommels of the knife would go no farther.
Aussie’s eyes widened at the approach of oncoming darkness, his mouth widening in shock of his own mortality.
The large man fell to his knees, and then leaned forward against Savage’s legs. Savage stood a brief moment before stepping back, allowing the Australian to fall forward, dead, the knife deeply imbedded.
Butcher Boy’s face seemed without reaction, stiff and detached. Until he raised his weapon and directed the mouth of the barrel to Savage’s knees. Savage took a quick peek over his shoulder. Alyssa was gone.
Good girl. He then faced off with Butcher Boy who now had his finger on the trigger.
Savage smiled. He had done his job.
Alyssa stood at the edge of one of the drainage holes. It was as black as black could get but she didn’t have a choice but to believe in John Savage.
She waited for the opportune time. At least that was what she kept telling herself. But the truth was she was deeply concerned about Savage. The man was sacrificing himself on her behalf.
For a long moment she watched them fight, watched Savage toy with Aussie and drive him back toward the edge of the tier. And then she watched the crippling blow across Aussie’s arm, rendering it useless. No matter what, she considered, the odds favored Savage greatly, but only until the moment Butcher Boy would intervene with strafing shots to Savage. It didn’t matter how well he fought because in the end he would ultimately lose, which was something she couldn’t bear to witness.
She looked into the hole, then at Hall and Butcher Boy, who were thoroughly engrossed, and took the initiative by leaping in.
The drop was a quick journey as Savage claimed, the fall only ten feet before she struck water. But the river wasn’t deep, perhaps four feet. Upon impact with the muddy bottom, she hit her ankle hard, twisting it. She clenched her teeth against the pain and squeezed tears from her eyes.
After wading a few feet forward, she saw the lamp Savage had cast away wedged between the gatherings of stones. She picked it up and examined the bulb. Everything worked fine.
She then turned the lamp to the hole she fell through, could hear the clanging of metal striking metal.
And then the fall of a terrible silence.
The fight was over.
Goodbye, John Savage.
In water that was blissfully cool, Alyssa Moore struggled along with the current on a bad ankle that was growing worse with every step she took.
John Savage waited for the strike of the bullet, to see nothing but ensuing darkness. But Butcher Boy made his way forward with the MP-7 directed right at him.
“We need him alive,” said Hall.
“Shut up!” Butcher Boy came forward with true anger. His eyes bulged, the muscles in the back of his jaw worked, the Y-vein in the center of his forehead throbbed with the beat of his quickening heart. The man was in an absolute rage.
Savage closed his eyes and waited.
From the depths of the chamber the Megalania Prisca launched itself from the shadows and snatched Butcher Boy into its jaws. Bones collapsed beneath the pressure, his rack of ribs sounding off in audible snaps and clicks. When the creature shook his head like a dog toying with a doll, Butcher’s Boy’s weapon went airborne.
The creature then swung its tail in an arc, the tail missing Savage and Hall but clipping the crypt of Eve, sending the egg-shaped pod off its pad and skyward with such force that when it landed the pod exploded into ceramic-like shards that skated across the floor. The body of Eve was limp, a doll-like creature twisted into odd shapes amidst the chalky substance.
Hall was beside himself, his hands to his face, the material worth of Eve forever lost.
As Hall lamented, Butcher Boy was screaming at the top of his lungs before blood gushed from his mouth. With feeble attempts he slapped at the creature’s snout but the Prisca hung on, intending to have its prey die within its grasp.
Savage backed away, taking glances at the hole while trying to keep a keen eye on the creature, a difficult task. When he reached the edge he did not hesitate. He brought his shoulders together, hands in front of him, and took the leap.
His last sight before disappearing was of Obsidian Hall hunkering down by the remaining pod, thinking how much he deserved everything he got.
With that thought on his mind he splashed down.
The water was cool.
But where was Alyssa?
Butcher Boy was as limp as a dead body could be with his arms and legs flaying randomly about as the creature shook the life out of him. Hall was crazed with fear but not so crazed that his penchant to fulfill his personal needs outweighed his underlying panic.
To his left, not too far where the pod of Eve had stood before the creature sent it flying, was the KA-BAR Aussie dropped when Savage bested him in battle. Timing the precise moment, he scooted across the tier, grabbed the knife, and then scooted back behind the cover of Adam.
The creature was tearing Butcher Boy apart, blood running everywhere. So much blood, in fact, Hall had to wonder where it all came from. Certainly the human body couldn’t hold that much, right?
Holding the knife in both hands with the point of the blade downward, he knew time was limited. Peeking over the pod at the Prisca, who was still busy with Butcher Boy, he looked right at Adam.
“Sorry, boy, but I got to go.” With the KA-BAR, Obsidian Hall reached into the pod to feed his penchant.
CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
Alyssa worked herself onto a nearby bank where she lay back, exhausted. When she found the power to pull herself into a sitting position, she held the lamp high. She was in a cavern that had been formed by the tributary remnant of the Gihon River, which flowed beneath the temple. Within fifty years, perhaps less, it would completely dry up. But the tributary had eroded the earth beneath the temple to the point where the temple’s foundation served as the cavern’s ceiling. There was no support with the exception of the dirt walls along the temple’s perimeter. Eventually the weight of the temple’s center would be too much for the edges to support it and someday the temple would collapse. Eden would be lost forever.
She checked her pocket and sighed with relief that she kept her father’s papers, albeit they were in rough shape, the papers sopping wet. As far as she was concerned, she had made this journey alongside her father, never once believing that he abandoned her. Now to punch this home and get out of here, she thought.
She struggled on, her ankle throbbing, the pain becoming unbearable. She sat down, knowing that it was an unwise decision. Just beyond the edge of light something glittered, a spangle of a reflection, a quick wink of something obviously metal. She slid across the dirt on her backside to the source, her teeth grinding in pain. And then she saw it. Her heart raced in her chest, realizing that the water was the key sustenance of life. Where there was water, there was life.