The Savage World Box Set: A Post-Apocalyptic Adventure Series: The Vampire World Saga Books 1-3

by P. T. Hylton

  Patrick pulled aside the manhole cover and disappeared downward, Chuck right behind him. Wesley and Owl ran down theirs as well.

  Alex was about to start down her manhole when she glanced at the hole in the pavement. Part of the street had collapsed, forming a ramp down into the storm drain. “Ed, follow me.”

  She ran to the top of the ramp and started downward. The scene below was chaos. Vampires darted around, confused, dodging the thin beams of sunlight that made their way down from the street. Others were struggling to free themselves from the rubble under which they were pinned.

  All that was to be expected, but there was one thing Alex hadn’t expected, and it took her a moment to process what was happening. Dark figures were pouring into the room from the tunnels, attacking the vampires.

  Ferals, she realized. The Ferals were attacking.

  She saw two figures standing on the raised walkway, dressed differently from everyone else. Rather than the Resettlement outfits, they wore clothing Alex had seen on the vampires working in Agartha.

  These had to be Mark and Aaron.

  The vampires who’d turned Firefly and so many others. The vampires who’d caused all this trouble, who’d forced Firefly to kill Robert. The same vampires who’d killed Drew outside Agartha on that evening that felt so long ago now.

  She jumped from the ramp onto the walkway. Then she raised her pistol in a two-hand grip, took aim at the taller of the two vampires, and fired.

  23

  As the world exploded around him, Firefly struggled to his feet. It was incredible how fast his limbs were healing after being impaled mere hours before. He might have taken time to marvel at this occurrence if the ceiling wasn’t caving in.

  They were under assault from all sides, it seemed. First Jaden had lobbed a grenade into the middle of the room, hacked at a couple vampires, and run back out again. Then Mark and Aaron had ordered him and eleven others to stay and protect them. Another huge explosion had rocked his already throbbing head. Then Ferals had poured in from all sides, and—most shockingly of all—the GMT had dropped in from above.

  Firefly leaped into action, his body moving without thought, his injuries forgotten. His masters were in danger, and he would tear his own body to shreds if it meant obeying his orders of protecting them.

  Instinctively, he grabbed the weapon off the vampire who’d been killed by Jaden’s grenade and raised it, preparing to fire at the nearest threat. It was Patrick, that obnoxious shotgun-toting GMT member, scurrying through one of the manholes above and down the ladder. Firefly gritted his teeth as he took aim, knowing he had no choice but to fire on the man.

  But then something strange happened. Out of his periphery, he saw a Feral rushing in the general direction of Mark and Aaron. The urge to destroy this Feral was just as strong as the urge to destroy Patrick. Both posed a serious threat to his masters, and each needed to be eliminated.

  The order he’d been given had been to protect his masters, he realized. Mark and Aaron hadn’t instructed him to focus on any target in particular. And in the gray area of that order, he found something he’d never expected: he found free will.

  He spun toward the Feral and fired, putting a round through the creature’s head. No sooner had the first Feral fallen than he saw five more charging down the tunnel behind it.

  To his right, he saw Owl and Wesley climbing down another ladder, and he felt the urgent tug of his body wanting to destroy them. But he quickly realized that if he kept his focus on the Ferals and imagined how much damage they could do to Mark and Aaron if they reached them, he could overcome the urge to go after the GMT members.

  He truly believed the Ferals posed just as great a threat to his masters as the GMT, and that made all the difference.

  As he took down two other Ferals, he saw some of his soldiers going after the GMT members. He had to find a way to stop them without disobeying orders.

  “Resettlers, listen up!” he shouted. “We’ve been ordered to protect our masters, and our masters are in danger from the Ferals. Protect Mark and Aaron! Kill the Ferals!”

  The soldiers looked at Firefly, some of them seemingly surprised by the order. A few of them nodded, understanding what he was trying to do. But all of them turned their attention on the Ferals and fought back the wave pouring through every tunnel.

  Alex steadied her pistol and fired again, sending a second slug into the tall vampire’s chest. He staggered backwards, struggling to maintain his balance, but after a moment he toppled onto his ass.

  As he fell, she risked a look around. Firefly and the remaining Resettlers were focused on the Ferals pouring into the room. That was the good news. The bad news was that most of her team was as well. They were all fighting to keep the seemingly endless tide of Ferals from making it into the room and destroying them all.

  “Mark!” she heard the other vampire master cry out.

  It was always good to know who you were killing. Alex turned back to Mark. He was still on the ground, which was a good sign, but there was no way in hell she was going to assume he was dead until she’d removed his head from his shoulders.

  As she raced toward him, she saw something in her periphery: a Feral leaping at her.

  She spun, raising her pistol and putting a quick two rounds in the creature’s head. Her shots were effective, killing the Feral, but that didn’t stop its forward momentum.

  The Feral’s corpse slammed into her chest. She tumbled backward, going over the railing and tumbling off the raised platform where the vampire masters stood. She hit the ground below hard, the heavy, rancid creature landing on top of her.

  There was one rule that applied to fights of every scale, from sparring matches in the GMT training facility to massive battles with undead hordes in the storm drains under the ancient city of Denver: you never wanted to find yourself lying on your back.

  She struggled to get out from under the dead Feral. To her right, she saw an especially large Feral loping toward her, its teeth bared.

  A gun nearby fired three times and the running Feral went down. Owl lowered her pistol and held out a hand to Alex.

  “Guess I’m good for more than just flying the ship after all,” the pilot said with a smile.

  “I never doubted it for a minute,” Alex replied, taking her friend’s hand. Owl pulled, and Alex managed to wriggle out from under the dead Feral.

  When she got to her feet, she looked around and took in the chaotic scene. Firefly’s vampires were still focused on fighting the Ferals, but more and more of the mindless creatures were making it into the room now.

  She looked to her right and saw the last vampire guarding the tunnel go down, overwhelmed by five Ferals piling on top of her. The eight Ferals behind them pushed past, their eyes fixed on Alex and Owl.

  “Shit, heads up, Owl.” Alex raised her pistol with one hand and drew her sword with the other. She knew eight Ferals would be too much for the two of them, but there was no way she was going down without taking as many of those bastards with her as possible.

  The sound of automatic fire came from her left, and three of the Ferals went down in a hail of bullets. Then a shotgun blast took out two more.

  Alex turned and saw Patrick, Ed, Wesley, and Chuck all converging on the spot where they stood.

  “Circle up!” Chuck shouted. “I want every quadrant covered!”

  The four of them stood back-to-back, unleashing death to any Ferals who approached from any direction.

  A wave of pride ran through Alex, but she pushed it aside. There was no time. If they survived this, she would let them know how amazing they were. But there was a lot that needed to be done before that could happen.

  She glanced up at the platform where the masters stood. She couldn’t see either of them from her location. “Cover me, Owl.”

  “You got it.”

  She dashed up the steps, and as she reached the top, she saw Mark lying where he’d fallen after she shot him. Aaron, however, was nowhere to be seen.
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  She heard a snarl from behind her.

  “Alex, look out!” Owl shouted.

  Alex turned just in time to see Aaron flying at her.

  She raised her pistol and squeezed off two shots. The vampire moved with uncanny speed, dodging the first shot completely and moving out of the way of the second far enough that it just barely grazed his arm.

  And still Aaron came.

  From below, a Feral leaped up at her, but it fell before Alex had even fully registered it, a bullet hole in its head. She’d have to remember to thank Owl for that one later.

  Alex trained her pistol on Aaron again, but before she could fire, he was on top of her. He lashed out, knocking the gun from her hand. She let it go, shifting her sword to a two-handed grip.

  Aaron let out an animalistic snarl and drew back his hand.

  If he’d thrown a simple punch, his quickness probably would have allowed him to land the blow, but drawing back his hand telegraphed the motion to Alex. He struck hard, clearly trying to quite literally knock her head off, but Alex was ready.

  She sidestepped and the strike went wide, missing her completely. He was momentarily off-balance, and Alex was not going to let an advantage like that slip by.

  She brought her sword up, swinging at his neck.

  Even off balance, he could dodge. But not far enough. The sword clipped his neck, slicing a half inch into the skin.

  The vampire’s eyes widened, and his hand went to the wound, a look of shock on his face. The shock quickly dissolved, replaced by an expression of pure fury.

  “Kill this woman!” Aaron bellowed.

  At the sound of the order, every vampire in the room turned toward Alex.

  Firefly was engaged in a vicious fight with a Feral when the order came. Thankfully, he was pulling the trigger and firing a bullet into the Feral’s brain when Aaron’s words hit his ears. Otherwise, he surely would have turned to Alex, the danger from the Feral forgotten, and attempted to shoot her even as the creature right in front of him tore him to shreds.

  “Kill this woman!”

  Firefly raised his weapon as the Feral he’d been fighting fell, and he raced across the room, every fiber of his being suddenly dedicated to getting a clear shot at his friend Alex Goddard.

  But Alex was no dummy. It was clear she instantly understood what Aaron’s order meant. By the time Firefly turned toward her, she was already in motion, putting Aaron between herself and the ten remaining vampire soldiers who had a biological imperative to kill her.

  “Protect Alex!” Chuck shouted.

  The GMT shifted their focus from the Ferals still rushing into the room to the vampires targeting their captain. Not that it mattered. Firefly knew the GMT members could pepper the soldiers with bullets all they wanted, but unless they struck a killing shot, the vampires would ignore their injuries and follow their orders.

  Up on the platform, Alex was avoiding the vampires’ attacks. Between their master and the Ferals flooding the room, the Resettlers couldn’t get off a decent shot.

  From his place down below, Firefly saw a look of fiery resolve on Alex’s face, and something deep inside him smiled. She wasn’t giving up. In fact, quite the opposite. Aaron had succeeded in severely pissing her off. She’d try to end this quickly, he knew.

  She drew back her sword and thrust it forward. Aaron raised a hand to protect himself, and the blade sank straight through his palm.

  Firefly saw the struggle on both their faces. Aaron attempted to grip the blade with his other hand even as Alex pushed, driving the tip closer to his chest. She pressed hard, gaining ground centimeter by centimeter.

  Then Aaron lashed out with his foot, kicking her square in the chest. She managed to keep her grip on her sword as she flew backward, and the blade sliced Aaron’s hand in half. He cried out, staring at the wide slit that had appeared in his hand.

  Alex flew backward ten feet and hit the concrete wall, then slid to the ground.

  Firefly immediately took aim. He finally had a clear shot at her.

  She struggled to her knees, fighting for every breath.

  He told himself he would not fire. He forbade himself from shooting. He put everything he had into stopping himself from pulling that trigger. The world around him seemed to fade. All that was left was him and his weapon. He fought the urge to fire like a man riding a rocket. He felt thick blood trickle from his ears and his nose, but he pushed that aside, too. All that mattered was that he didn’t shoot Alex.

  For a wonderful moment, he thought he might win. But then he realized he was already pulling the trigger.

  “No!” someone shouted.

  As he fired, he saw movement out of the corner of his eye.

  Chuck dove in front of Alex. Firefly’s bullet slammed into him, and he collapsed to the ground.

  As the bullet hit Chuck, Aaron charged at Alex, his teeth bared. He looked almost feral.

  She gasped, struggling for breath, her friend and teammate fallen by her side. This would be over in a moment, she knew. The vampire charging at her was damn fast, even during the day.

  Time seemed to stop for Alex, and she pushed aside her grief for her friend and the way her lungs were screaming for oxygen. She thought of Simmons and the tender way he used to hold her at night, his body pressed against hers. She thought of Drew and his boyish enthusiasm and the way he’d turn even the direst situation into a game. She thought of Beth and the potential within her to be a great GMT member. She thought of CB and the way he’d fought his way back after losing his entire team to Ferals in a single night, only to inspire and lead an entire generation of GMT hopefuls.

  But most of all, she thought of the people of New Haven. That was what she was fighting for. The very future of humanity. If Mark and Aaron won today, she didn’t know exactly when they’d do, but she figured they’d probably target Agartha first. Once they’d brought that city down, they’d turn their attention to New Haven. And when they had those two cities, they’d have every human on Earth in their grasp.

  All this flashed through her mind in an instant.

  She set her jaw with grim determination and sprung to her feet, bringing up her sword as she stood. Then she swung, aiming not for where Aaron was, but where he’d be in a moment.

  Her blade sang as it flashed through the air, and it struck its target, slicing cleanly through Aaron’s neck. The vampire master’s head separated from his body and flew through the air, hitting the wall behind Alex with a thud, that terrifying snarl still frozen on his face.

  As the vampire master’s body fell, Alex went down on one knee, still gasping for breath.

  She looked around, and she saw the expressions of the faces of the vampires in the room change, much of the tension leaving them. Firefly wiped at the inky black blood leaking from his nose with the back of his hand.

  “Resettlers!” Firefly shouted. “Take out the Ferals!”

  “Firefly,” Wesley called. “West tunnel!” He nodded toward a tunnel that had been left unprotected when the vampires turned their focus on Alex; it seemed to be the main spot the Ferals were getting in.

  Patrick and Ed moved up to the platform, trying to position themselves to better protect Alex. Wesley and Owl stayed on the steps leading up to the platform, laying down heavy fire from above while Firefly and his team attacked the west tunnel.

  They fought together, vampire and GMT, all focused on the same goal.

  Alex struggled back to her feet and drew a painful breath. She stumbled over to Chuck.

  He was still breathing, but he was bleeding badly from a massive wound on the inside of his left shoulder. The bullet had gone all the way though. He was still conscious, but he looked pale and not entirely alert.

  The blood seemed to be driving the Ferals into an even greater frenzy. Alex knew that any Feral in the area who wasn’t already headed their way soon would be.

  Ed reached the platform, scooped Chuck off the ground and threw him over his shoulder. “Alex, can you make it on
your own?”

  She drew in a painful breath and took a step toward him. “You think I’m going to puss out on you, Ed?” They had to get out of here fast. The daylight wouldn’t last much longer and they needed to be gone before it was. “GMT! Let’s move out!”

  As she was turning toward the ramp leading to street level, a figure stepped into her path.

  Mark.

  There were two holes in his shirt where she’d shot him, but the flesh underneath was almost healed. From the looks of things, her bullets had missed his heart by mere inches.

  He smiled joylessly as he stared at Alex. Then he opened his mouth and bellowed a command. “Everyone! Listen to me!”

  That was as far as he got before the upper half of his head disappeared, and a splatter of brain matter and bone hit the wall next to him.

  Patrick chambered another round as smoke trailed out of his shotgun barrel. “Nah. I only listen to Alex.”

  All around the room, the Resettlers staggered, as if they’d just been released from heavy weights attached to their arms and legs.

  “We’re free,” Firefly said, his voice filled with wonder. “We’re really free.” He shook his head, clearing it, then grabbed the radio off his belt. “Resettlers! Quit chasing Jaden and get back here! The GMT needs our help.”

  Alex started up the ramp leading to the street, then hesitated, looking back at Firefly. Their eyes met and neither said anything for a long moment. They’d been through so much together. They’d been teammates, friends, rivals, enemies, and allies. And in the end, they’d saved each other.

  Finally, Firefly spoke. “Alex, go! We got this!”

  Alex nodded quickly, turned, and charged up the ramp into the dying evening light.

  The GMT raced to the transport truck half a block away. When they reached it, Alex hopped into the passenger seat and turned to Owl. “Get us to the away ship, fast.”