Page 83 of Coming Home

“Shit! What the hell did Elliot do this time? Ears in,” Painter yelled, passing earpieces to each of us.

“Cover the rear exit,” Silas barked through the earpiece.

“Which building?” I asked calmly.

“To our one o’clock, Tucker told me.”

As they exited the car and began sweeping the area heading towards the rear exit, I hung back just enough to cover their asses. My gun was to the ready as I looked high and low for any signs of trouble.

“Run,” I yelled, seeing movement on the partially collapsed building and the glimmer of light off a rifle. “Sniper on the roof.”

Bullets rained down, targeting Tucker and Painter. I stayed behind and waited for my shot. One bullet was all I needed when my opportunity came.

“Sniper terminated,” I informed them before walking to the door.

Tucker waited just inside the door while Painter scouted ahead.

“Thanks, man,” he said. “You really had our backs back there.”

“That’s my job,” I reminded him. “Come on.”

We caught up to Painter. It had been radio silent since I alerted them to the sniper.

“What’s going on?” Tucker whispered to him.

Painter signaled for us to be quiet and get down. Instead, I moved into a safe position to cover them both.

“Delta is in position.”

“Gamma in position.”

“Charlie has eyes in the sky.”

Painter motioned for us to move.

The wing we were in appeared to be deserted, but the closer we got to the collapsed section, the more signs we saw of recent activity.

Finally, at the end of a hallway, just before the collapse, we stumbled into a lab that wasn’t entirely abandoned.

“Blood,” I said as we entered the room.

There were cages lining one wall with people in them.

“You’re safe now,” Painter told them as Tucker ran to open the cages.

With the prisoners free, Tucker sat down at a computer and began hacking into their system for any information he could find.

My eyes darted around the room and over each of the prisoners.

“Where’s the damn blood coming from?” I finally asked. My sensitive wolf nose had picked it up before we even entered the room.

A teenage boy, white with fright, slowly pointed to a table near the collapsed side of the room. I quickly realized this room had been significantly larger before the collapse. What had we done?

I heard a moan and moved in to investigate. On a table, partially buried in debris, was a woman. She was gasping for breath and grabbed my arm when I got close. She was shaking uncontrollably and when she opened her mouth to speak, blood trickled out.

“Painter, Tucker, over here,” I yelled. “Help me get her out.”

We worked together to pull her our of the pile of collapsed ceiling on top of her. It was there that I found the problem. She was very large with child and her pants were soaked in blood.

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