Chapter 8
Chapter
Eight
Laughter.
The sound filled his mind, and Josiah snapped his head around to try to find the source.
There.
Under a canopy that did little to protect them all from the searing heat of the desert sun.
It was his team. Laughing at something Pun had to say. The man was always telling a joke, making the most ridiculous puns, hence the nickname. They needed that out there, though. Needed someone to brighten up their days with a little bit of humor.
Walking toward his team, Josiah startled when he saw that he was already there.
What the hell?
Picking up the pace, he hurried toward the small group of men, himself included, ignoring everything else happening around him.
For some reason, it seemed important to get to them quickly.
He had to stop it from happening.
Had no idea what it was, but somehow it felt vitally important that he put a stop to it.
When he reached the men, still laughing at some joke Pun had made, he saw that the men were all removing their body armor. They believed they were safe. They were on the military base, so why wouldn't they be safe?
“No!” Josiah yelled.
They couldn’t take those vests off. Couldn’t.
Doing so would have deadly consequences.
As he watched, none of the men reacted to his screamed warning. They were acting like they couldn’t see or hear him at all. But that didn't make any sense because he could both see and hear them.
They were close enough to touch.
Reaching out his hand toward Ham, standing the closest, he was shocked when his hand passed right through the man.
“Ham,” he pleaded. “I'm right here, man, you have to listen to me. Keep your vest on. Don’t take it off. That Kevlar will be the only thing that’s going to save your life.”
As he spoke, the horrifying details came rushing back. The assault that was about to come. The bullets that would fly through the air, piercing the men standing around him. All except himself. Because for a reason he could no longer remember, he hadn't taken off his body armor when the others did.
A cruel twist of fate.
This should have been where he died. His blood seeping into the sand along with the blood of his team. His brothers in every way that mattered.
But he wouldn't die out here. He’d survive, and have to live with the horrors of watching his team being slaughtered.
“Please,” he begged, already knowing no one could hear him because this wasn't really happening. He was trapped in a dream. A nightmare. Forced to watch his team die all over again.
How many times would he have to watch this play out?
Hadn't he already suffered enough?
His own screams joined the pain-filled ones of his team as the roar of gunfire filled the air.
He watched in horror as the men dropped around him one by one.
He watched himself go down, too, only those bullets wouldn't pierce his lungs, his heart, he was protected by a fluke.
One that doomed him to live out the rest of his life when he wanted to be dead.
Once he’d watched himself fall to the ground, Josiah tore his gaze away from the pools of red staining the sand. Turning his head in the direction that the bullets had come from, he saw them.
Men.
Half a dozen of them.
If they hadn't had a traitor to allow them access to the base, they never would have been able to kill so many.
Most of those men had escaped that day. When the other men and women on the base responded, the shooters had fled.
Two had died in the return fire, but four of them had escaped in a vehicle, one that the traitor had set up for them.
He heard its engine roar to life, and when it took off across the sand, he took off after it.
Time lost all meaning, the world disappeared around him, it was just him, the Hummer, and the sand.
Nothing else.
It wasn't getting away. Not this time.
Those men had to pay.
They had to suffer for stealing his brothers from him, for not killing him, too. They had to die horrible, slow, agonizing deaths. Maybe that would soothe some of the roughest edges of his rage.
Somehow, despite knowing that a person could not run faster than a vehicle, couldn’t even keep pace with it, he began to gain on the Hummer. And as it pulled up outside a rocky cave entrance deep in the desert, he got close enough to grab one of the men.
Startled, the man swung his weapon at Josiah, but he merely huffed a mirthless chuckle, grabbed the weapon, and slammed it into his raised knee, snapping it in half.
“That’s not going to help you, not this time,” he told the man who was staring at him with wide, defiant eyes.
Slamming his fist into the man’s head, dropping him to the ground, he turned on the others. They fired off shot after shot at him, but he merely laughed as the body armor he wore repelled every one of those bullets.
Then he was on them, slamming his hand into four more heads, and one by one the four men dropped.
The weapons they’d used to kill his team, innocent men who put their lives on the line every single day to rid the world of filth like them, were next. He snapped them all like they were nothing, and then he took the offending pieces of metal and used them to bind the wrists of the men.
He wanted them to watch as he killed them. Wanted the anticipation of knowing what was going to happen to them to sink in as they watched helplessly, with no way to escape their fate. It had been sealed the moment they made a deal with a traitor to attack the base and kill his brothers.
Sliding out his K-BAR, he admired the sharp blade, and with a wicked grin, he pounced on the first of the men. They’d slipped away before, disappeared back into the shadows, lived when they should have died.
Today, they were going to die the deaths that should have been theirs.
The man he approached yelled something, but Josiah couldn’t make out the words through the bloodlust pumping through his veins.
The first swipe of the knife through flesh did little to satiate it, so he sliced again and again.
Blood was everywhere, splattering him, staining the ground around him, covering the body of one of his team’s killers, but it wasn't enough.
More.
He needed more.
More blood to be shed to get justice for his team.
Turning on the next of the cowering men, he tossed his knife aside.
This time he wanted to use his bare hands.
Curling his fingers into fists, he pounded them into the man before him.
Each strike was rewarded with a grunt of pain, and they fueled him, urging him on, and by the time the body before him was no longer recognizable as a human being, he was breathless, but riding the high of vengeance.
Time to move on to man number three. Josiah’s weapon appeared in his hand as he stared down at the next on his kill list. The man cowered, begged, tried to get away, but there was nowhere for him to go.
Opening fire felt so good.
Bullets pinged into their target until it was riddled with holes, and blood soaked the earth.
Wasn't enough.
Never enough.
It all had to go.
All had to die.
It was the only way.
The only way.
One more of his team’s killers still breathed, and that wasn't acceptable. Tossing his weapon onto the ground to join his knife, he advanced on the man. This one he intended to rip to pieces with his own two hands. With rage lending him strength he’d never normally have, he knew he could do it.
Placing his hands on the man’s leg, he yanked and was rewarded with the sound of tearing flesh and the most delightful howl of pain as the leg ripped from the man’s body. His other leg came next, and then both of his arms.
Pleas fell from the man’s lips, but nothing was going to deter him.
Didn't they know he was more monster than man now? It was part of the reason he pushed everyone out of his life, he was too full of a fury that could never be quenched. He was a danger to the people he loved, and it was all these men’s fault.
Placing his hands on either side of the man’s head, Josiah looked him dead in the eye as he yanked it from the man’s neck.
This was what he had to do.
He had to slaughter everyone and everything that had taken so much from him. That was the only way he was ever going to find any measure of peace, no matter how small it might be.
So when a voice called his name, a voice that was too sweet, too innocent to have anything to do with the death and destruction that had stolen the lives of his teammates, he turned on it.
Lost in a red haze of fury, he didn't think.
Just reached out and grabbed whoever had made the soft sound and wrapped his hands around its neck.
May 15th
12:28 A.M.
The whimpers were so riddled with pain that they woke her from a deep sleep.
Blinking open sleepy eyes, Chelsea’s gaze zeroed immediately in on the figure on the floor.
Despite there being a couch in the master suite, as well as a king-size bed, she was sure they could have avoided each other in, Josiah had decided he would sleep on the floor.
The only way she had agreed without an argument was if he let her gather every spare blanket and pillow in the house and make him a little nest of sorts.
His own cozy little place to sleep that was as comfortable as she could make it without him being in a bed.
When she’d fallen asleep, he’d still been awake. He wasn't making a noise, and he wasn't on his phone or anything, but she could tell he was still alert. Maybe watching over her until she succumbed to sleep.
Which she’d done all of an hour ago, she realized as she glanced at the glowing clock on the nightstand. How long Josiah had been asleep she had no idea, less than an hour, but long enough for him to start dreaming.
Throwing back the covers, she swung her legs over the side of the bed and stood. Josiah wasn't just dreaming he was having nightmares. The closer she got, she could see he wasn't just moaning and groaning in his sleep, he was thrashing about as well.
Dreaming about losing his team?