You can’t save everyone, Madi.
No, but I could save someone.
I grabbed my drink and walked through the crowd, beelining to her. I didn’t know for sure she was a prostitute, but she had the look. I stopped next to her and handed her the drink.
She smiled at me and took a sip. “Thank you.”
I pulled my hood back and my mask down, freeing my dreadlocks and face for her to see. She was a statuesque blonde; in any other part of the world she would have been a model or a movie star.
“You’re welcome. I’m Madi, what’s your name?” I asked.
“You’re American?”
Clearly, my accent wasn’t native, but at least I could speak to them and understand them. “As apple pie. You?” I asked.
“I’m from Georgia,” she said taking another sip. I was taller than her, so I leaned one hand against the wall next to her. I wasn’t trying to be a creep, I just needed to mimic the body language so whoever was her controller would notice.
“Is that here in Russia?”
Her eyes flashed angry but her face didn’t change. I must have hit a nerve. She was smart enough not to let it show. “No, we were part of the USSR, but no more. I was... traveling and I came here for work.”
The crowd behind me finally noticed the black woman chatting up the blonde in the corner. A wave of silence flowed through the bar.
“You should go. They won’t like you here, and you don’t want to end up... you’re too pretty. Please go,” she said.
“That’s sweet,” I said. “But, I’m actually here to attract attention. Who’s your boss?” I asked.
“Boss?”
“The guy you give your money to at the end of the night,” I said.
She looked down, her feet twisting slightly on the floor from embarrassment.
“Fredek, he’s the fat one in the corner,” she said with a slight nod.
“Does Fredek drive a nice car?” I asked.
She looked up at me with confusion. “Yes... a Mercedes I think.”
I laughed. That was funny. Everyone always thought of Mercedes as nice, but they were the Cadillacs of Europe, big, showy and expensive, just not as luxurious as people thought. However, it would do.
I leaned against the wall next to her, sliding my hand up her other arm and pulling her close to me.
“What are you doing?” her eyes went wide. “You don’t understand, they will kill you,” she said.
“They will try.”
Power flared through me as I sensed their approach, my eyes went bright blue and I saw the reflection of the Wraith in her eyes. A pre-fight rush ran through me as I felt Spice’s anticipation.
Suddenly, a meaty hand grabbed my shoulder. Thick, stubby fingers squeezed into my collarbone with aluminum can crushing intensity, spinning me around to face him. He was big, six-six, with enough fat on him to feed a whole polar bear family for a month.
“You’re in the wrong place, hussy,” he said. His vodka breath was intense, like a wall of alcohol hitting me in the face.
“No, I’m right where I want to be,” I said with a grin. “You’re just too fat and stupid to realize it.”
His eyes went wide and he doubled down with his hand, trying to grind my shoulder. I reached up and placed a thumb between the knuckles on his index and middle finger. Slipping my fingers under his palm I pushed down on my thumb and pulled on his little finger at the same time. He tried to resist and I made a show of slowly bending his arm until it hit the physical limit. His legs buckled, pain and outrage flashed across his face and he tried to hit me with his other hand. I snapped my free hand up into his elbow and cracked it backward. The bone snapped. In the suddenly silent bar it was almost as loud as his wail.
I spun, dragged him with me and slammed him face first into the wall, shaking the building. He slid down leaving a bloody smear all the way to the floor. Stepping over him I reached into his pocket and pulled the keys to his Mercedes.
The rush hit me as he expired. There was nothing quite like it, and I had to say, I loved it. Especially when it was a well deserving dirt bag.
“She has superpowers,” someone yelled. Guns, knives, and a pipe appeared, and the rest of the patrons charged me.
I ducked the first blow, slamming my open palm into the solar plexus of the first man. He dropped to his knees, gasping for breath. I spun and hit the next with a back kick that sent him into the three behind him like a bowling ball knocking down pins.
I finished the first one off by snapping his neck. He dropped lifeless to the ground and that made the rest pause. Then they were running all over each other, not to attack but to get out. Only four remained. Three had guns but the fourth… he wore a stained pair of jeans and an old t-shirt that used to be white. He was skinny and covered in tattoos. If I had to guess, Russian mob. However, everything I knew about the mob was confined to movies.
I made sure there was no one behind me and I ran for the first guy. He fired three times, each round missing. I knocked his gun up, kicked him in the balls and brought an elbow down on the top of his head as he fell. The crack of his skull splitting open was unmistakable.
I spun, pulling the Makarov pistol from his dead hand and firing at the next two, dropping each with a shot between the eyes.
The skinny guy slow clapped.
“Impressive. Too bad you’re a woman,” he said with a toothy grin.
I checked the slide, it was back so I tossed the gun as I walked toward him.
Don’t move a muscle,” he said simply
Something happened. Something washed over me, forcing my legs to stop and my body to go slack.
“See, no woman can resist Ocharovaniye. I’m simply too charming,” he said. His voice made me want to puke, and his smell was only slightly better. I struggled to speak for a moment then I decided on a course of action as he approached me.
I fortified myself, focusing on moving, keeping my head cool and calm, using my mind to overcome his affects. It had to be mind control of some kind. What had Epic said about telepathy? It was electromagnetic?
I pulled in as much power as I could, letting my Wraith persona consume me. The shadows deepened around me and my eyes glowed with a bright nimbus. Then I engaged my shadow step.
I vanished, traveling through the shadows in a heartbeat of cold and shock, like having a bucket of ice water thrown on me. I appeared behind him, able to move. I spun, bringing my leg up to hook his neck with the inside of my knee, I reached up and grabbed my shin and pulled. He gasped, slapping my thigh, trying to get me to let go.
“Newsflash, you’re the opposite of charming, pig,” I said as I snapped his neck.
He dropped to the ground with a thump. A massive rush hit me—the kind reserved for those with super powers. It was staggering. He must have been far more powerful than I thought to generate that kind of energy.
I stumbled toward the girl from Georgia, half enjoying it and half wishing Spice would stop hitting me with the euphoric high every time I fed her.
“What’s your name?” I said, slurring my speech a little.
“Natela,” she said, staring past me at the carnage I had wrought. I grabbed her hand and dragged her out of the place.
“Where is his car?” The high was passing and I shook my head, trying to clear my thoughts.
“There,” she pointed. We went across the street to where the silver AMG was parked. A push of the button popped the doors and I went for the driver’s side, pushing her toward the other.
“I can’t,” she said, shaking her head and looking back at the bar.
“Why not?” I asked.
She shook her head again. Her mind reeled at what had happened. She was well conditioned, through pain and torture, to stay. Despite freedom knocking on her door step.
“Natela, I need a guide and you need a ride. Get in,” I ordered her.
She got in.
I slid behind the wheel, adjusted the seat, started the engine with a roar, and burn
ed rubber for a good hundred feet until we were well away from the bar.
“Oh my god, oh my god,” she said. “Is it over?” she asked me then looked out the back window. “No, they’ll come for me, they’ll kill me. Take me back,” she cried out.
“Natela, we have a saying in America, ‘better dead than red.’ So shut your trap, put on your seatbelt, and breathe. Because you are free. And in about twenty hours you will be back in your own country, got it?”
She sat back, put on her seatbelt, and cried.
Saving someone was better than saving no one, but damn if it wasn’t a pain in the ass sometimes.
CHAPTER 18
The building I was looking for ended up being part of some kind of secured industrial park. Tall walls, checkpoints, and razor wire surrounded it.
“What is this place?” I asked my guide.
“I know men who work here, it’s a factory, though I don’t know what they build,” she said. Natela looked like she would bolt at any moment. Fear and anxiety warred in her and she really needed to relax.
“Nat, chill. It’s okay. I’m going to go in there and take a look. You stay here. Once I’m done, I have some money for you and you can take this car and be back in Georgia in a few days, okay?”
She nodded. “Oh-okay. Are you sure?”
I smiled. “Yes, first of all, there is no one left alive to report you missing. And second, if anyone comes to the bar to figure out what happened, the last thing they’re going to be thinking about is what happened to you.”
I patted her on the leg. “Now, stay.” Once I was reasonably sure she would, I popped open the Gull-Wing door and stepped out. Slinging my bag over my shoulder I headed for the closest part of the fence.
A factory, huh?
I fished out my phone and dialed Lockhearts number.
“Hey,” she said as a greeting.
“I found it. A factory of some kind. If I get eyes on the alien, you can come?” I asked.
“Yep. I talked to my government rep and he said something about ‘pursuit of justice’ doctrine. Russia isn’t signed up on it, but it will be enough to stop an international incident,” she said.
“Oh good. Any idea what this factory is?” I asked her. The fence was eight feet tall, concrete topped with razor wire. I tossed the bag over the top then ran after it, kicking off the ground, then the wall, propelling myself up and over the razor wire. I hit the ground on the other side with a crunch, landing right next to my bag.
“It could be anything. I’m looking at sat photo’s of the place right now. The last couple of days have been busy, they’re moving something big out of there. We might have missed our window,” she said. The disappointment in her voice was obvious.
“Nothing we can do about the past. If we’ve missed him then we’ll just find him again. Let me know if you think of anything.”
“Good lu—”
I hung up the phone, turned off the volume, and sealed it in my cargo pocket. It only took me a moment to run silently over to the main building and find a crevice to hide in while I equipped my gear.
Once I was outfitted I folded the bag up and stuffed it in my jacket pocket. It was time to work for a living.
Scaling the side of the building—seven stories of wood and concrete—was relatively easy. I leaped from handhold to handhold, finding easy purchase with the gloves and boots Lockheart provided. A minute later I was on the roof, bounding over the side walls to land on the tar and gravel.
I glanced back down the way I came and heaved a sigh. I knew I must have been powered up because I wasn’t even breathing hard.
Once I was sure no one had seen me I headed for the entrance. The door itself was a standard emergency exit, thick metal with an alarm. I wasn’t overly concerned with an alarm, but I also didn’t want to make my presence known just yet.
Easy enough to circumvent. I pulled out my Ka-bar tactical knife and jammed it through the center of the door like I was opening a can. Wrenching it free I leaned over and looked through the hole. I could just make out a stairwell on the other side.
I reached up and broke the little light above the door. Kneeling down I looked through the hole again then triggered my shadow step and I was on the other side.
The stairs were the concrete kind found in mass produced buildings. Cheap and easy to make, silent to traverse. I was on the seventh floor in a moment. The metal door leading to the main floor wasn’t locked and I slowly pushed it open. It was the middle of the night—I didn’t expect there to be anyone around.
The floor looked like it was an open design, with cubicles throughout and a core of offices around the center. The windows were painted black to keep the light out. Office of the year.
I slipped in, staying lower than the cubicle walls. I heard nothing; no tap tap of keyboards or idle gossip.
Was it possible I had the wrong place?
Or was Lockheart right that we had missed our window?
I made my way to the center offices, figuring anything of value would be there. The doors were the cheap kind and nothing here struck me as secure. There were eight offices; I picked one at random and went in. I called Krisan as I closed the door with my foot .
“Epic has me in the loop. What do you need?”
“They have computers here but no people. I want to plug the phone in and see what you can see,” I told her. I reached over and hit the power button on the computer.
Nothing.
“What’s wrong?” Krisan asked.
I hit the button again.
“Make sure it’s plugged in,” she said. I crawled under the table and looked for a cord—nothing.
Something was very wrong.
Then I felt it, a slight vibration in the floor I hadn’t noticed it before. The vibration grew stronger and then I could hear it: a low growl that sent a chill up my spine.
I knew that growl.
“Madi... you need to get out of there,” Krisan said as she heard me swear.
“Too late.”
I hung up the phone. Standing up I walked out of the office and saw what was causing the vibrations.
“Spice, if you want me to make it, I need you to power up to the max,” I said.
“Oh boy. This is gonna be good,” she said from next to me.
I cracked my knuckles one by one before reaching up and pulling the blade from my back.
One, two, three, four, five, six... six of them.
There had to be more. I glanced left and right looking for more of the monsters they made in Belize, but I only saw six of the giant wolf creatures as they formed a semi circle. One knocked a cube flat and slowly closed in on me.
“Do you think they were waiting for you?” Spice asked.
“Seems like it.”
They were between me and the stairs, and there were probably more in the stairwell.
“I’m guessing the top floor was just for show. Either they were waiting for me, or someone else to spring their trap,” I told Spice as I moved sideways, attempting to keep them all in front of me.
These were formidable beasts. Poor humans who were infected with a retro virus that transmogrified them into human-alien hybrid killing machines. Strong, fast, damn near indestructible... from the outside.
However, the last time I’d fought them I was warring with Spice. She had been denying me full power in the hopes that I would transform into one of these things and go on a killing spree. We had developed a much better understanding.
As one they roared, shaking the room. I stepped forward, triggering their charge instinct. They came crashing through the cubes, smashing walls, desks, and chairs aside like bulldozers as they came for me.
“You ready for a feast?” I asked her with a grin.
“You’re far less worried than last time...,” she said skeptically.
She was right. I wasn’t worried.
Just as they reached out to tear me to shreds, I vanished. Six beasts collided in a heap on the spot I had occupied and I
appeared behind them. Spinning and jumping on the back of the closest one, I whipped the sword around and jammed it into the ear of the creature, slicing through it’s brain and killing it instantly.
I rolled off of it and stabbed the next one in the same spot. In seconds, they were down to four. I ran for the windows, leaping over broken chairs and screaming in feigned terror. Their animal instincts kicked in and they couldn’t help but chase me, oblivious to the two that weren’t moving.
They charged after me. I hit the window with a thump. The prospect of their meal being trapped encouraged them. I spun around to face them and braced myself.
The first one leaped the last few feet. I shadow stepped and he hit the glass, exploding through the window out into air of the seventh story.
Appearing directly behind them, I turned and ran right after them, using my superpowered speed I grabbed a handful of fur from the last one and jerked as hard as I could, straining my muscles to the max and puling him up short before he fell. Once momentum started to go my way I swung him around and flung him back into the office. My arms felt like they were going to fall out, but I had pared them down. Three were on the ground floor, probably fine, and only this one was here.
He shook his head, confused for a moment, then snarled at me.
“Here kitty-kitty,” I said as I limbered up my sword arm by whipping it back and forth. It was amazing how useful this thing had proved to be.
He clawed at the carpeted floor, ripping it to shreds before roaring and coming right back at me.
I shuffled backward as he charged. He leaped and I fell back, hitting him in the chest with both feet and sending him flying over me. I rolled back up and charged right after him as he hit the wall, spine first, with brick shattering force. I was on top of him before he could recover and I jammed the blade into his open, snarling, maw, and then his brain.
His head jerked, snapping the sword in half as his death spasms shook him uncontrollably. I leaped off, out of the way of those claws.
The Wraith: Danger Close (Superhero by Night Book 4) Page 11
