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

“If you don’t cooperate, your head is going to end up mounted on the Drekavac’s wall.” That monster struck me as the kind of thing that would decorate his lair with taxidermy.

“Maybe. Maybe not. I’ve still got a few tricks up my sleeve.”

“What’re you going to do, kidnap Milo again?” When Holly said that we all laughed. Well, except for Milo. It was hard to tell in the firelight but knowing him he was probably blushing.

“I’m always happy to help MHI,” Sonya suggested, innocent as could be. “Okay, I volunteer. I’ll go with you. Only I get a percentage of the bounty. Like half. Like I should for this lich too, because you wouldn’t have come here if it wasn’t for me.”

“Wow. You really are greedy,” Trip said.

“Not greedy. Just desperate.”

Earl looked toward the sky. His superior senses could hear Skippy’s chopper long before the rest of us. Our ride was almost here.

“One other thing to think about,” I said to my boss. “From what the lich said, he’s not the one who called Sonya and told her to come here. It was a trap. Somebody else had eyes on us. They might be watching us right now.”

“I was thinking the same thing. And why did they send her here? We’ll talk about it later.” Earl looked down at Sonya and sighed. “Let’s go.”

“So we have a deal then, half the bounty?”

“Not a snowball’s chance in hell of that happening. But I did promise your mom I’d try to keep you alive. Don’t make me regret it.”

Chapter 14

Skippy landed in a nearby field to pick us up. As soon as we were airborne Earl handed out assignments. Messages were sent and plans were made. I also noticed that Earl didn’t give Sonya a headset so that she couldn’t listen in. Unless she was excellent at reading lips or had supernatural hearing, she would be shit out of luck. I knew Earl liked her, but I could tell he was genuinely pissed off about her threatening Milo. That had crossed a line. I was still curious what her sob story was going to be about why she needed the money so bad, but that could wait.

We talked strategy during the first part of the helicopter ride back to Alabama, but after that I took a nap. I’d had one hell of a day. Once the adrenaline wore off, the aches and pains started. I was so exhausted I could barely keep my eyes open. Sleeping this soon after being that close to a thermobaric warhead going off probably wasn’t good for my brain, but I’d see Gretchen when we got home. She’d grind up some roadkill and leaves, make a smoothie, do some orc magic on it, and I’d be good as new. Probably.

The inside of a Russian MI-24 Hind is extremely loud and not exactly comfy, but I had a lot of practice getting sleep whenever I could squeeze it in. The trick when riding with Skippy was unplugging your headphones so you could no longer hear his heavy metal playlist. I managed to get a power nap in before waking up as we reached the MHI compound. I love flying home at night, because out the window it’s just miles and miles of pitch-black forest, until all of a sudden, boom, there’s this huge fenced-in paramilitary compound, with multiple buildings, hangars, and a world-class shooting range. It’s amazing what you can hide in the Alabama woods. Skippy put us down with his usual gentle touch at the end of the runway.

There was a contingent of masked orcs waiting there to meet us. That was Skippy’s ground crew. Thankfully they had one of their healers with them, and she took a look at my arm. She wasn’t Gretchen—Skippy’s head wife and all-around best healer ever was otherwise occupied—but I’d take an orc healer over a regular hospital any day. She growled at the cauterization Coslow had left on my arms, pronounced it “trash magic,” gave me a paste made out of smashed-up bugs and flowers to rub on the dog bite, a gag-inducing vinegar with some dirt in it to drink to “make bone crack fix” and told me to take some Ibuprofen for my headache. While she worked on me, she complained in broken English about how humans were squishy and our skulls were soft, not “strong like urks.” She might not have been Gretchen, but she certainly had learned Gretchen’s no-nonsense bedside manner.

Sonya was escorted to one of the guest rooms, and Holly discreetly woke up some of the other Hunters who were currently staying at the compound and put them on guard duty, probably with the orders to shoot Sonya if she tried anything suspicious. Earl ordered the rest of us to get some sleep and we’d reconvene tomorrow. Most of my team had homes in nearby Cazador, but they were tired enough that they just crashed in their rooms at the compound for the night.

Not me. I drove home. The old Shackleford estate was only a short distance away. I missed my wife and wanted to give my son a hug.

I was about a mile out of the compound, the headlights of my truck cutting through the dark of the winding country road, when a man walked out into the road right in front of me. I had to slam on the brakes to keep from running him down. The truck came to a halt, front bumper only inches from the legs of PUFF Adjuster Harold Coslow.

He gave me a polite nod.

I probably shouldn’t have stopped.

“What the shit, man?” I bailed out, pistol already in hand. Just because it looked like Coslow didn’t mean it was Coslow, especially out in the middle of nowhere on a country road at four in the morning. “I could’ve killed you.”

“Calm yourself, Mr. Pitt. It is pointless for you to threaten violence against me.”

“Don’t take it