TWENTY-ONE

BEING AN AMERICAN born to Korean immigrants never bothered Knight. He had a traditional Korean name, Shin Dae-jung, but that’s where his connection to his Korean roots ended. He had visited Korea once, on a mission. The team flew into South Korea, crossed the demilitarized zone, saw to some nasty business involving a Sudanese terrorist being hidden, and hopped back over the border in time to share beers with some soldiers at the most laid-back military base he’d ever been to. For military personnel looking for a slow pace, South Korea was the place to be. Knight’s only other true Korean cultural experience had come at age ten, when his mother decided he needed to experience the cuisine of his homeland. The roast squid didn’t go over too well. In fact, the one time Knight truly appreciated the country of his parents’ birth was when he saw the brilliant movie The Host. He’d always been a fan of monster movies. Bold heroes. Guns blazing. Running for your life.

The real thing, he knew, was no fun at all. Having survived an encounter with the mythical Hydra reborn had taught him that much. It seemed God, or someone, thought he was due for another lesson.

Vegetation slapped his body as he careened down the mountainside. Trees whipped by in a blur. His breath pulsed in time with his rapidly beating heart.

He’d been running for two minutes straight. Flat out. Top speed. He’d learned to run as a teenager when it seemed like every jock in high school wanted to pick on the small Korean kid. They never could catch him.

But these weren’t jocks. Knight wasn’t even sure they were human. The din they were creating sounded almost chimpanzee-like, but there were no chimps in Vietnam. The only thing he knew for sure was that the things were fast. Damn fast. And relentless. They’d been steadily gaining on him since the chase started atop the mountain. He dropped his sniper rifle and shed his backpack to lose weight, but still they gained.

And now they were twenty feet back. He could hear trees shaking. Branches breaking. Feet slapping earth. And over it all, their chorus of hoots and hollers. These were the creatures from the village. And he had witnessed the carnage they could wreak on a human body. The two soldiers they’d caught were torn apart and crushed like they were nothing more than rotten vegetables. To be caught meant death.

To evade the predators he had to risk another kind of death. He placed his odds squarely against his own survival, but not trying, lying back and taking it like the Grim Reaper’s whore, just wouldn’t do.

Knight nearly tripped and fell when he saw what was left of the wall they’d so staunchly defended. A mass of earth and tree had come loose from above and crashed down on the position. He had heard the three explosions that must have brought the mountain down before he heard from Rook, so he knew they’d survived.

A glitter of sunlight from above revealed the swaying of trees. The trees, with their tall trunks and thick leaves, swayed from a weight high above.

My God, Knight thought, they’re in the trees!

Knight leaped over what was left of the ancient wall and sprinted into the clearing the team had made. The VPA soldiers were nowhere to be seen. Not yet, anyway. Hurdling fallen trees and bloody bodies, Knight hopped like a fleeing bunny through the clearing. Out in the open, the predators hunting him down would lose the use of the trees, but they’d also be out in the open. He could look them in the eye.

Upon reaching a ten-foot plot of earth that was free of fallen limbs, both tree and human, Knight chanced a look back. He nearly shouted in fear at what he saw, but maintained his composure, though he nearly lost his balance. The things behind him were . . . primal . . . and they looked at him through yellow eyes with a hatred he’d never before experienced. They ran like men, bipedal, but carried the gait of an ape, low and short. Their faces, surrounded by a blossom of orange-brown fur, were almost human—and that frightened Knight the most. One of the beasts roared at him, revealing twin two-inch canines. The hair on their backs rose like a pissed-off dog’s, bouncing wildly as they charged. With every movement, grunt, and breath, they emoted rage. Power. Death. It wasn’t an anger born of revenge for the one he’d shot. They simply hated him for existing.

Shadows swept around Knight as he reentered the forest. After his eyes readjusted, he spotted what he’d been looking for since reaching the clearing—green uniforms. A lot of them. The large Vietnamese company hadn’t gone far.

They had yet to spot him, but they were on guard. The sound of the war cries of the beasts giving chase flowed through the forest like a living thing, its source impossible to identify.

Knight broke through their ranks at full speed. He shouted in fear, eyes wide with exaggerated horror, and pointed behind him. He doubted any of them could understand English, but he shouted, “Run for your lives!”

His blatant and honest fear coupled with the fact that Knight held no weapon and took no action against them made the Vietnamese men pause. A moment later they realized his warning should have been heeded.

Men screamed as they were tackled from behind. Skulls cracked. Spines were yanked from backs. One soldier was beaten with the limb of the man standing next to him. The carnage swept through the VPA ranks as Knight continued running and the pack of hunters kept on chasing, killing everyone in their path.

A few smart men near the back of the group abandoned their mortars and fled. Knight ran with them.

The man next to Knight couldn’t have been a day over eighteen. He was in shape and fast. The men were neck and neck. Screams rang out from all around them as men on either side were taken down. Leaves and earth shot into the air. Flesh exploded. Guns fired hopelessly, popping at random and then silenced. Knight’s running partner glanced over and his eyes went wide. Evidently he’d taken Knight for one of his own. Realizing the truth, the man reached for his French MAT-49 submachine gun, which bounced on his back.

As the man brought the weapon around, Knight pulled out his handgun and took aim. The red bead of the laser-aiming module appeared on the man’s forehead a second before a single .45-caliber bullet pierced his skull and ruptured out the back. As the man fell, the whole scene took on a surreal feel. The flash and sound of the bullet leaving the gun were hidden by the weapon’s suppressor. Full of life and fury one moment, the man was still and lifeless the next. But as his body fell to the ground, another filled the void.

It lunged over the falling body, arms outstretched and claws extended. Knight dove, turned toward the creatures, whose red-rimmed eyes bore into his, and unloaded the entire clip. They fell together, landing in a heap of entwined limbs.

But only one of them stood again.