The Vigilante Book 1

Chapter 5

Looks like your hunch was right. Hrmph. Who is this man giving me information? Can I trust him? I certainly don't trust the people Dale works for. His companions seem alright, Braxton has no love for the military anymore, obviously. And Myral...well I'm not sure about her.

I had never seen death before. The hangar we entered held my fill of it for a lifetime.

Corpses littered the floor. Freshly killed members of the Canadian military team. Their uniforms were covered in bullet holes and unknown scorch marks. Not a single enemy lay dead in sight. Whoever had murdered these soldiers had gotten away unscathed.

The grime and ash covered floor was covered in a sticky mess of fresh blood that clung to my shoes with an unholy force.

"Who would do this?" I asked.

"Lets be ready for anything!" Dale said, pulling a handgun out of his suit jacket and handing it to me, "Just in case," he said.

Dale's normally bureaucratic demeanor had changed drastically. The look in his eyes showed he was now a soldier and I could tell that he was serious about my life. This was a scene he had witnessed before many times, and he didn't want to lose anyone else.

"Yeah," I replied, taking it as he pulled another out of his coat for himself.

Braxton strapped his case to his back and readied his assault rifle as Myral pulled a snub-nosed revolver from her lab coat.

The smell of scorched flesh was almost too much to bear as if the blood on the ground and the hollow dead eyes of the slain soldier weren't bad enough already.

We continued on past the bodies and towards the sounds of gunfire. Further down the dark and unpowered cavern, a small light emerged. Another. Then several more.

"Muzzle flashes," Braxton said as Dale held up his fist for us to stop.

"Thame with me, you two on the right," the agent commanded.

Our associates followed their orders and headed down the appropriate side while Dale and I took the other.

"If someone fires at you, you shoot to kill," Dale told me.

"I've never shot a gun before,"

"Flip that thumb switch to turn the safety off. Then point and pull the trigger,"

"Dale I've never killed someone before,"

"Well I hope this isn't your day to start. Now let's go!"

We sprinted down the passage and slid into cover, just behind two pinned Canadian soldier. They appeared to be the last survivors of their team.

"F-B-I!" Dale said to them.

"Finally!" A woman's accented voice came from one of the soldiers.

"You two fall back, we have them!" Dale commanded.

"Understood sir," the other soldier replied.

The two troops broke cover and dove back to us. As soon as they moved a deafening volley of bullets came from across the dark chasm. The man dove and got to us but a bullet struck the woman in her leg and sent her tumbling down. I jumped and ran to her to help.

"Thame! Damnit!" Dale yelled, crouching and firing with experienced precision on the enemy forces as Braxton and Myral began to do the same from their nearby cover.