Monster Hunter Bloodlines - eARC by Larry Correia (read a book .txt) 📕

I’d been using to spy on Gutterres shattered. The dog popped right back up, but I grabbed a whiskey bottle and smashed it over its head. The first hit made a meaty clunk that deformed its head. The next broke the bottle and cut my hand. It didn’t even leave me a convenient stabby bit like in the movies.

The bartender was crawling away. Her shotgun was lying in the broken glass. The dog was getting back up, so I scooped up her weapon and turned, just in time to jam the twin barrels into its open mouth. “Choke on this.” I gave it the second barrel and blasted fiery magic dog goo all over the wall. The now headless thing dissolved through the floor.

Glancing back toward the stage, I saw that Sonya and Gutterres were gone. The room had filled with the weird fog and a lot of wounded, dismembered, and freaked-out people. Sadly, but expectedly, the blue light had coalesced in the center of the dance floor and the fog had begun to spin around it again. Evil hat guy was coming back.

I picked up my pistol but kept the shotgun too, because you should never turn down a free shotgun. I thumbed the lever and popped the action open. The two spent shells auto-ejected. “More ammo?” I asked the bartender.

She pointed one shaking hand at a cardboard box beneath the counter. I reached in and grabbed two rounds of double aught, dropped them in, and closed the action . . . but since the monsters were still re-forming, I spent that valuable time shoving the rest of the shells into my pockets. Since I was on my own, I’d probably need everything I could get my hands on because the other professional Hunter was nowhere to be seen. Thanks for the backup, Gutterres.

By this point, the assorted tough guys had realized that this was not normal, and most of them were beating feet, except for the unlucky few who’d just lost their feet. On the bright side, everybody running away meant there would be fewer people for it to massacre.

The monster rose to its full height. It had even regained its hat, and worse, had two fresh hounds with him.

“You must be the Drekavac,” I said.

“A title, rather than my true name.” It seemed content to stop slashing people for a moment to talk. “You are a Hunter. We have no quarrel. Once a pact has been broken, it is my obligation to punish the transgressors.” The thing had an ominous voice, as bone-chilling as its clinging fog. “Leave in peace, or fight and die.”

For me, Plan A when dealing with monsters was kill it. But since this one just kept coming back to life, I’d try Plan B. Diplomacy. “Wait a minute. Stricken won the auction. He’s the contract holder. He asked me to take care of the problem for him. So your work here is done. You can float on back to the scary hat store.”

“You have your contract. I have mine. They are not the same. She must be judged.” The Drekavac looked toward the stage. “Except our thief has fled. Good. I enjoy a challenge.”

Which was when the bouncer came back into the room, except now the big man was carrying an old-school, M60 belt-fed machine gun that had been stashed in back. The bouncer hadn’t fled. He had been gathering hardware.

“Get the fuck outta my bar, devil man!”

I hit the deck as the machine gun opened up and hosed down the monsters with hot lead. The bouncer bellowed as he raked the muzzle back and forth, machine gun in one hand, belt in the other, Rambo style. The Drekavac exploded. The monster dogs exploded. The floor around them exploded. The wall behind them exploded. I stuck my fingers in my ears as he kept on hammering the place with what was probably an extremely illegal Vietnam War bring-back. The fog moved like a living thing, rolling out the front door and into the parking lot. A hundred rounds and ten very loud seconds later, the bouncer shouted, “And stay out!”

Through the broken window and Swiss cheese wall I saw two bullet bikes fleeing the parking lot. The first had a female rider, the second, a male. That had to be Sonya and Gutterres. They took off fast, cutting through the mist.

Only it appeared the monster had a method of transportation as well, and it had re-formed ready to ride, because all of a sudden there was a terrible, gurgling roar, followed by a terrible, ear-splitting screech as a giant shadow flew down the road after Sonya.

I went after them.

Chapter 8

The parking lot was nuts. There were several wounded, and people were trying to help them, mostly with improvised tourniquets from the look of things. The rest were running for their cars or hopping on bikes to get away. Anybody who had an outstanding warrant was fleeing before the cops get organized, and from the look of things, that was nearly half of them.

I couldn’t stick around, but I could still help out a little. When I reached my vehicle, I grabbed the med bag and threw it to one of the helpers who looked like they actually had a clue about first aid. “Here. It’s got real TQs and bandages in it.” Then I got in the company truck, put the borrowed sawed-off on the seat next to me, and drove off in the direction Sonya, Gutterres, and the Drekavac had gone. They were already out of sight, but I put the hammer down and hoped for the best.

Every MHI team draws from the same fleet of company vehicles. I’d taken the last thing in Boone’s garage, which had been a Ford pickup truck. Though it had a big engine, it was a tall, four-wheel drive, with a winch and a snorkel on it, so this wasn’t exactly a speedy vehicle. I was downright lumbering compared to the bullet bikes they’d been on. I had