Panthera Spelaea

“Damn, he’s a big boy,” I said as I walked into the stone church. It was dark and gloomy, with weathered and broken windows and graffiti covering the interior walls. Built as a Benedictine monastery and abandoned in the early sixteenth century, the building had belonged to the Zanki family since 1760. The Liger was in a cage that barely contained his bulk, unable to turn around or raise his head. He sensed something in me, probably the scent of my cave lion, as he came forward to meet the challenge. “How did you get him in here?”

“With difficulty,” the leader said. “I’m Mitch, that’s Sven, and the guy at the window is Ole.” I nodded at the men, who went back to observing through the windows. The way they wore their gear and carried themselves told me they were no strangers to violence. Each had on camouflage uniforms with vests and carriers for ammo. Scoped rifles leaned against walls near their positions. “You’ve been inside long enough, so it’s time to let him go. The door will block to his right, and the cage door will block to his left. Hopefully, he’ll go straight ahead and take off. If he turns on you, use this,” he said as he handed me a cattle prod. “You’re the one with super healing, so you get to open the cage door. Don’t let him loose inside here, or we’ll have to put him down. The owner of the big cat rescue said he doesn’t get along well with people. His previous owner used this animal to kill those who crossed him. Makes a statement, doesn’t it?”

I couldn’t argue with his logic in giving me the most dangerous job. The Liger was ten feet long, over five feet at the shoulders, and had a huge head. He was a good match for my size, though the spray-paint job to hide the stripes on his chest, belly, and tail wouldn’t fool anyone up close. Mitch opened the door, and I released the latches on the cage door and pulled it open, bracing behind it when it reached near the doorframe. The Liger stuck its head out, looked around, then bolted out the door and ran for the trees. The last I saw him, he was running uphill.

“Good job. Help me take this cage apart.”

“What about the door?”

“Leave it open. If Mikhail is watching, closing the door would tell them someone else is here with you.” We picked the cage up and walked it away from the door, soon getting it stacked against the stone wall out of sight. He handed me a small radio and a headset. “Don’t transmit if you don’t have to. We’ve got four people in sniping positions around the island keeping an eye on the Liger. Take that window over there and use binoculars to watch for helicopters and boats. Use that window, and I hope your eyes are as good as I’ve heard.”

“Roger that.” I settled in behind the broken windowpanes and started to scan for targets. Art’s plan assumed that Mikhail’s people would be watching and would bring him out to take out my Lion. What we didn’t know was how long it would take to put a team together. The previous teams in Italy were fish food now, and we were in Croatian waters.

Mitch set a rotation to ensure we didn’t get bored and sloppy with our observations. Every fifteen minutes, we’d shift around with one person taking a break. “Boredom leads to laziness,” he told me. As the day went on, he coached me on observation skills. It was things like the importance of regular scanning, looking for objects out of place, and movement. That and stories about previous adventures broke up the monotony of the observation post as cool morning turned to a warm afternoon, then to a pleasant evening. The Liger had been exploring the island all day. He’d walked over the thousand-foot-tall mountain and was now moving along the cliffs on the opposite side. His options were limited as the entire island was just under two miles long and less than a mile wide. “Are your men going to be all right with that thing out there?”

Mitch nodded. “So far. They’re dug in pretty well into natural cover.”

“I don’t know what he pays you guys, but it isn’t enough.” There were much safer ways to make a living than being stuck in a tree with a nine-hundred-pound Liger roaming free.

“I like the way you think.” I went back to scanning the air, going back when I thought I saw a dot. Changing the magnification, I confirmed it. “Helicopter approaching from the east, about five miles,” I said over the radio.

“Eyes on it,” one of the snipers reported a few moments later. “Commercial AgustaWestland AW109, two pilots. Newer version with skids instead of wheels. I can’t see any passengers, but it can carry eight.”

The helicopter circled the island a few hundred feet up. It slowed down as it passed over the Liger along the northwest coast, then continued to circle the island until it came in for landing a few hundred feet east of us. “Stay out of sight,” Mitch said as it flared out, dust and sand kicking up around it.

The pilot shut down the engines, and the rear door opened up. A man got out, then pulled a person down to the ground next to him. My gut flipped, and my Lion raged as I saw who it was. “MELANIE!” She turned towards me, only to be pulled by the neck towards a rocky outcropping.

“JOHN! DON’T!” Her captor had a rope around her neck attached to the barrel of a sawed-off double-barrel shotgun. Melanie’s hands were both cuffed behind her back, and she had bruises and cuts on her face and knees. She’d struggled, unsuccessfully. More rope tied his hand to the stock, and his finger was on the trigger. It was both a way to control and kill her, even if we killed him first. One twitch of his trigger finger and the shotgun would blow her head clean off.

“Quiet,” Mitch said. “Hold your fire; we have a hostage.”

“That’s my little sister,” I told him. “How the hell did they know she was coming?”

“I don’t know,” Mitch said. “I’m calling it in.” He pulled out a satellite phone and started dialing.

The man holding Melanie hostage yelled out to us. “JOHN CANTWELL! COME OUT HERE NOW, OR SHE DIES!”

I looked at Mitch, who was talking to Zach back on the yacht. He handed me a pistol and jerked his head towards the door. “Don’t do anything stupid,” he told me.

“Save her before me,” I replied. I put the gun behind my back and covered it with my shirt before walking out the door.

The pilots stayed in their seats, and I didn’t see anyone else in the back of the helicopter as I walked towards it. “I’m coming. Don’t hurt her; she’s got nothing to do with this.”

“That’s close enough,” he said when I was about ten yards away. He had Melanie on her knees in front of him; with his finger on the triggers, there was no way Art’s people could take a shot. Even a headshot would kill my sister. “Are you armed?”

“Naturally,” I said.

“Toss it into those bushes, then strip off all your clothes. Toss your clothes over there too.”

I took out the pistol and tossed it away before I started to remove my clothes. “You know what I am, and you aren’t afraid of me?”

“We both know she’ll be dead before you can reach me. The only way she survives is if you do EXACTLY what I tell you.”

I was standing there in my plaid boxers; he nodded impatiently, so I dropped them and kicked them off to the side. “Now what?”

“Walk back towards the church, but don’t go in. Tell the men inside to leave their guns, equipment, and clothing and walk to the helicopter. After my boss has what he wants, they’ll be released.”

“I’ll let them know.” I turned towards the church.

“And John?” I looked back. “Bring back the satellite phone. Tell Mitch I expect to see all seven of their naked asses in the seats, and your patrol boat needs to head for the mainland at full speed.”

“I’ll pass it on.” Fuck! How the hell did they know about the three guys in the church, much less the four snipers out in the bush!

Mitch was just as shocked and passed along the information to Zach. “We’ve got no shot at freeing Melanie,” he told his boss. “I don’t know how, but they know everything we have done here. They didn’t fall for the Liger, and they even know I’m the team lead!” He listed for a while. “Understood.” He got on the radio and told the snipers to leave their gear and double-time it back to the church. He then ordered the other two to strip down and follow him to the helicopter. He tossed the satellite phone out to me. “Hit redial to get Zach. Good luck, John. You’re on your own.”

“Looks that way,” I said. I turned back towards Melanie, once again stopped a distance away.

The three security guys walked carefully across the broken ground towards the helicopter, then climbed in and buckled themselves in place. Melanie’s captor had me call Zach; he was to bring Anna and Svetlana to the island with the Eagle carcass and no one else but the pilot. The four snipers arrived at the church soon after, and were told to strip. As soon as they were seated, the pilot started the engines and took off, heading back to the east.

“Now what?”

“We wait,” the kidnapper said. “Once your mates are here, my boss and his son will arrive.”

“You’re not going to kill me first?”

He shook his head. “No, he wants to do that himself. You and your girls killed his son, after all. He wants the pleasure of watching you die before he takes your Lion and your mates.”

And that would leave the Eagle for someone else, maybe his oldest son?

I sat on the hard ground, trying to figure a way out of this that wouldn’t result in Melanie’s death too. I had nothing.