James Axler – Starfall

Before anyone could reply, the ground under Dean seemed to erupt, and Ryan got a real good look at the maw full of fangs that lunged at his son’s throat. “Dean! Get back!” Ryan brought his blaster around, knowing in his heart he was already too late.

Chapter Eleven

“Hot pipe!” Dean exclaimed, dodging back from the furred fury that boiled out of the tunnel he’d uncovered in the floor. Knowing he couldn’t get clear to let his father use the 9 mm blaster, he rocked forward again and seized one of the animal’s ears in his fist, narrowly avoiding the flashing teeth that snapped at his throat.

Throwing his weight against the dog, setting his shoulder beneath its jaw so it couldn’t bite him, Dean landed on top of the animal. Then he brought the turquoise-hilted knife around in a short arc, driving it home between the ribs. Hot blood squirted over his hand, and he made sure he didn’t loosen his grip so any of the liquid could make the knife hilt slippery. He pulled the blade free, then stabbed repeat­edly until he was sure the dog was dead.

He was barely aware that his father had buried the long blade of the panga in the skull of the next dog trying to get into the room. But he heard the animal’s final yelps. He’d hit his own attacker so hard that it hadn’t had the breath left to growl or yelp or whine before it died.

“You okay?” Ryan asked, freeing his blade.

“Yeah.” Dean pulled back from the dead dog and took a deep, shuddering breath. He cleaned his blade on the an­imal’s fur. “Bastard dogs. Never thought they were down there for sure. Sounded small. Thought mebbe they were rats.”

Ryan reached into the hole and dragged out the corpse of the animal he’d killed. “You should have had somebody backing your play when you popped that bastard door. Think about what you’re doing before you get us all killed.”

“I thought I was,” Dean protested. His emotions twisted inside him, not knowing how he was supposed to feel. The adrenaline still raced through his system because he’d found something his father and J.B. had missed, and be­cause the dog had nearly taken his face off. Now he felt bad on top of it, because his father was right.

“If that had been a man in there with an automatic weapon,” Ryan said, “we’d have all been chilled.”

Dean kept the angry words from his tongue, and it made the burn behind his eyes even harder to take. “Wouldn’t have let that happen to you. I’d have chilled him. Bastard dog surprised me, jumping like that. A man, he wouldn’t have done that.” He forced himself to meet his dad’s un­flinching gaze.

“Reckon you’re right at that, Dean,” Ryan said quietly. “You stood up and took that dog out before it could get loose in here.”

“Slick,” Jak agreed, waving a hand out steadily before him. “Like water over smooth pebble. Dog never had chance.”

Dean took a long, rasping breath, smelling the stench of dog and dog turds coming from the open tunnel now. “Bastard dogs got in here somehow.”

Ryan glanced back at the hole. “We need to find out where it goes. If it’s something we can use. Looks like a dog run the coldhearts used at one time to mebbe send dogs out after anybody who holed them up in here. You feel up to finding that out?”

“Yeah,” Dean answered, though he didn’t feel so cer­tain.

“Go with,” Jak said, moving toward Dean. His leaf-bladed throwing knives gleamed in his hands.

Ryan nodded. “Not far. I don’t have any plans on mov­ing from here any too soon, but when we do, I don’t want to have to come looking.”

Dean glared down into the hole, but it was hard to see in the darkness. One thing was for certain—it wasn’t very deep, maybe two and a half feet tall at best. He took an oil lamp from the shelves at the back of the room and lit it with a self-light from the gear he carried in his pockets. When he had the wick going well, he lowered the hand-blown hurricane glass around it once more.