Suicide Squad (2 page)

She rubbed her eyes and reached for another liter of water.

“It’s almost dawn. I say we get started. Sooner we get there, the less stressed I’ll be.”

* * *

They drove through as much of the jungle as they could, then walked the rest of the way, reaching the mountain in just under seven hours. June felt the hairs on her left arm tingle as if electrified. The sensation vanished a moment later.

“Let’s go this way,” she said, pointing left. They looked at her curiously, and she added, “Just a feeling.”

* * *

The cave entrance was an hour away. It was plainly visible, almost glowing under the intense sun. There was no way she could have missed it. She pulled the Rover to a stop and checked her watch.

“Six hours to spare. This may turn out to be a good day after all.”

Manuel and Luis followed her to the mouth of the cave.

“Please. Come with me,” she insisted. Luis’s smile was filled with understanding but he still shook his head no.

“We will walk with you through the outer tunnel, but when we reach the cave of teeth we must leave you to your own fortunes. But we do so praying for your safe return.”

“I know better than to try to argue with you, Luis,” she said, “and I thank you for all your help.”

“That is easy for us to do, Dr. Moone. You showed great courage coming here to confront your nightmares. Few would have, or could have.”

“Considering my dreams, I don’t think there was anything else I could do.”

“We want to remind you, Doctor,” Manuel said, “the teeth of the cave look fierce, but they are not. They exist to lead man to truths we cannot see on our own. But on your journey, should you continue past them, you will be beyond their power to protect.”

“Like I said, I don’t have much of a choice.”

The outer limestone tunnel was a natural jewel box, a brightly glowing rainbow of colors caught in the moving beams of their helmet lights.

They crouched to crawl under a curtain of low-hanging limestone soda straws, then wiggled through an obstacle course of stalagmite and stalactite columns that had slowly grown, then finally merged over the past million years or more.

The tunnel opened to a small cavern, tall enough, nevertheless, to let them stand. They stretched, ignored the loud sound of cracking bones, and shone their lights on the far wall.

As one, they let out a gasp.

The cave of teeth, staggering in their immensity, filled the cavern, as if waiting for the three of them to step between the yard-long fangs so the jaws could snap shut and grind their bones to meal.

Of course she knew the fangs were just stalagmites and stalactites, growing up from the ground and down from the ceiling, and still millennia away from merging and being rechristened as columns. Yet now, under their lights, the limestone drippings looked like the hungry fangs of some demon vampire, momentarily frightening, even to those who knew better.

“We must leave you now,” Manuel said, his voice barely above a whisper, but still echoing through the tunnels. “Or better, you can come back with us,” he suggested.

June gave him a warm hug.

“I can’t,” she said. “I can’t live with those dreams, and I sure as hell don’t want to die because of them.”

“But they are just dreams. I have not known you to fear phantoms.”

“Yet they feel like so much more, and I have to find out why. I know it’s irrational, but I feel a compulsion that’s both unavoidable and inescapable.”

“Then be careful, Dr. Moone.”

“Hey, like you said—just a dream. All goes well, I’ll see you in a few hours.”

Luis nodded and returned her smile. “We will be waiting. And we will pray for you, June Moone.”

They sat down with their backs to the limestone walls and watched as their friend and employer disappeared into the distance.

* * *

For the next mile or so the cave floor was relatively easy for a professional caver to navigate. Low-hanging stalactites forced June to crawl for several hundred feet or more, but the tunnel eventually opened to a new, larger chamber.

She wanted to stop and just stare at each subsequent room. All of them were crowded with unimaginable natural wonders unseen for millennia, if ever. She walked past stunning grottos unlike any she had ever explored, alive with pristine formations untouched by man.

She glanced at her watch. It was after three in the afternoon, and she had no clue how much further her ultimate destination was, or even if she’d recognize it when she got there.

She continued on, promising herself to take more time for sightseeing on her return trek. After she found whatever she was supposed to find so she could save her life.

June had never been superstitious—not even during her teenage years, when she was the most liable to give in to irrational fears. So why was she so consumed by threats made to her by some slutted-up dream Enchantress?

Sadly, all she could come up with was that these dreams felt… different.

* * *

The tunnel ended just over two miles further along. Without warning, she found herself facing a blank wall, with no side tunnels that would allow her to continue.

Is this the wrong cave?
she wondered, feeling the beginning of panic.
Have I wasted all this time?
June quickly took control of her fears.
It’s not even four yet. I can get back to Manuel and Luis in less than an hour, then find another tunnel. That still gives me eight hours.

This is doable.

This has got to be doable. Nothing can stop me now. Nothing will stop me.

As she started to turn back, the ground gave way beneath her. She scrambled, trying to grab a rock or anything for support, but instead she found herself falling into a widening shaft.

June stopped falling with a jolt when her chest reached the top of the hole. The chute was too narrow for all of her to slip through. She was stuck.

Better than falling God knows how far
, she thought.
But now what?

She couldn’t see into the hole, with her own body blocking the view, but she dangled her feet, trying to find the ground below. There was nothing. The ground might be a foot away or a mile.

She didn’t want to squirm, for fear it would open up the hole.

Falling to my death isn’t a good idea
, she thought—then, again,
What now?
She wasn’t going to fail when she was this close to…
Whatever the hell is waiting for me.

Both her arms were still free. She slowly dug one hand into the chest-level ground, seeking support. Very carefully she drilled her other hand as close as possible to her hip and legs, then into the hole. Her rope was looped around her belt. If she could reach it, she might be able to tie it to some nearby formation, and pull herself free.

Her fingers felt the cord, and she slowly wrapped them around it.

Good.
She got a firm grip. Perfect. Next step, bring it into the open. She inhaled and slowly lifted her arm.

The ground around her began to shift. She stopped.

Slow, June… much slower. You do not want to fall.
She waited a few minutes, pushed back her fears, then she once again lifted her arm up out of the hole.

There was the top of the rope.

She was almost home free.

Then the hole gave way, and she plunged into the blackness.

June was certain her head was going to explode. She held her temples between thumb and forefinger and gently massaged them to ease her pain. It wouldn’t go away. She slowly opened her eyes. Her helmet light was still working, and she saw…

Skulls?

There were hundreds of them. Human and cave bear skulls, cemented together by crystalline deposits. How long had they been here, she wondered, but then she was hit by more important questions.

Where is here?

How long have I been here?

And how the hell did I get here?
At that she remembered falling.
I’m alive. So it wasn’t a long drop.

She must have been unconscious, but for how long, she wondered. A haze still obscured her vision to some degree.

She forced herself to her feet, and felt the blood drain from her face and upper body. Her hands were cold and wet. She steadied herself until the chill faded and she could take a few steps without her legs buckling. Moving closer, she studied the skulls, frightening yet riveting.

Wickedly beautiful.

The haze dissipated, and she saw an immense altar carved from the cave walls. It was bear-shaped; a large urn was held in each paw. One was shaped like a man. The other a woman.

She was drawn to the female urn and compelled to pick it up. Then for some reason she didn’t quite understand, she broke its wax seal and removed its lid.

That released the black.

Shadowy wisps flowed from the jar and spread through the chamber. Her helmet light showed trails of black fog dissipating behind it like a comet’s burning trail, as its—head?—drifted toward the back of the cave. Then, in the pitch, she saw eyes.

Frightening eyes.

Animalistic eyes.

Glowing. Staring at June.

The eyes belonged to a person, barely visible until she aimed her helmet light. It was a frail woman, only partially of flesh and bone. June looked closer and saw that she was also made of smoke, and fog, and mist.

June knew who she was.

Enchantress.

She heard the woman speak, but she wasn’t certain if the voice was spoken aloud, or echoing somewhere in her mind.

“We’ve both been waiting our entire lives for this, haven’t we, June?” Enchantress asked. “Do you remember me?”

“Yes,” June replied aloud. “From my dreams.”

The black fog that was Enchantress drifted toward her, then reached out and held June’s face in amorphous, cold hands.

“I am more than a dream, June. I am your destiny—and you are mine.”

June pulled free and tried to run, making it to a tunnel, but the shadowy wisps followed and grabbed her legs, pulling them out from under her, forcing her to fall hard to the ground.

She struggled, kicking the cloudy wisps, but her feet slammed through them, like the intangible trails of smoke they were. She cried out as she fought.

“Let go of me.” But they wouldn’t. They pulled her back over the stone path. She turned, twisted, and tried to escape again, but they refused to let go.

“Stop fighting us, June.” Still Enchantress’s voice was coming from the smoke. “This has been your destiny since before you were born.”

Then they were back in the chamber, and Enchantress was waiting for her. The wisps dragged June next to the witch, then dissipated back into the dark.

“It is so exciting,” Enchantress continued, as if she had not been interrupted. “Worlds are going to open up for both of us, and now that I have brought you here, you must let me in.”

June didn’t respond, nor did she try to resist as Enchantress’s face nearly touched her own.

“I must be whole again,” the shadowy figure said as the smoky tendrils entered her prisoner’s nose and mouth.

June Moone inhaled, and the two were one.

It was expected to be a peaceful night.

There hadn’t been any riots for more than a week. No newbie had been ushered into the exercise yard to wait for his hazing to begin. No crazy somehow conjured a shiv that he knew belonged in the gut of yet another of the certifiably insane. Even the unseasonably mild weather was cooperating. So, atypical as it was, this was turning out to be a very good night indeed.

Until explosions tore up the exercise yard. Guards positioned in Arkham Asylum’s observation towers vainly searched for the source, but all they could see were patients, drugged out of their minds, numbly wandering the unexpected war zone—uncertain if the explosions were actually happening or were just some new and ridiculous hallucination, an all-too-familiar by-product of their high dosage meds.

They learned the truth the hard way.

Paramilitary thugs in gas masks and protective armor descended on ropes dropped from helicopters hovering unseen in the shadowy clouds. Even as they descended, they targeted the helpless guards, effortlessly turning them into instant corpses.

The few defenders who managed to survive ran for cover. Entering the hospital, they ducked behind overturned beds. Inmates were still strapped into them, and they were screeching for help that wouldn’t be coming.

“Shut up, you idiot,” one of the guards hissed to a patient hanging from the bed, his straps starting to fray. At the top of his voice he was singing songs from an old Broadway show. “I said shut up,” the guard grated. “Believe me, you don’t want to let those killers know where we are.”

“I did, I do,” the inmate said in a voice that was barely coherent. “You think if they see me, maybe they’ll take me with them? I’d like them to take me to a restaurant. You know, one that serves hamburgers and French fries and has ketchup in bottles—not in those little paper thingies that don’t hold much. You think they’ll take me to a restaurant?”

“They’ll put a bullet in your head, you idiot,” the guard muttered, still keeping his voice down. “And mine too, if you don’t shut up.”

“Bullet in the head? That sounds good, too, but I’d reallyreallyreally prefer a restaurant.”

Finally the guard smashed his elbow into the inmate’s head, knocking him unconscious. He then closed his eyes for a moment and prayed that the thugs—whoever the hell they were—hadn’t heard the exchange. After a few moments, he opened his eyes again.

One of the soldiers was there, staring at him, a gun pressed to the guard’s heart.

Mercifully, he never heard it fire.

* * *

The thugs moved quickly though cautiously through the halls, taking down anything that stepped in their way, not distinguishing between guards or asylum prisoners.

One of them, the commander, unhooked a radio from his belt.

“She’s here somewhere,” he said. “Fan out.” On the move again, he held his automatic in front of him. Straight up, not turned at a ninety-degree angle. Almost looks cool in the movies, he mused, but it’s a great way to break your wrist. Then he said, “And don’t forget, Frost and the boss want her breathing.”