“What’s that?” Tina asks, eyebrows drawing together.
“Confidence in pill form,” I tell her, popping one.
“Maybe take two,” she says.
We walk through the halls of UWR, trying to look natural. Tina stays by my side. As a vampire, she’s already undead and can move in and out of UWR without any issues. While that’s good for her, it also means she doesn’t have a staff bracelet.
My bracelet not only allows me to move and back forth between the underworld and above ground, but it also has the ability to power down the prisoner’s collars, and set them for different security levels. I can’t in good conscience power their collars down entirely. I don’t even want to know what orgiastic havoc Mac would unleash if he went full-charm on a crowd of humans, and I’m definitely not letting Griff loose in the streets of New York City, claws out.
Luckily I can set their collars to what we call “field trip” mode. It means they won’t have their powers, but they can move outside the walls of UWR without getting zapped or setting off alarm sensors. Tina and I decided they’ve got a better shot at avoiding detection if we all make our way separately to the Central Park platform and regroup there.
Unfortunately, regrouping means that I have to tell them our choices are to go aboveground where thousands of people are dying to kill them, or wait patiently on the platform for Greg and the First Brood to figure out there are a few bodies missing at bed count.
I shiver at the thought. The prisoners would likely end up in max security, which means isolation, and possibly the death penalty, if the Triumvirate chooses that direction. Me and Tina? I shake my head. I’m never putting on a collar or a pair of manacles again. I’ll let the humans take a shot at me first.
“Alright,” I tell Tina. “You head to the Central Park extraction point and wait for the prisoners. I’ll start resetting collars.”
“Sure thing,” Tina says. “And it was nice knowing you. Or well, not really. It was just kind of okay. What flowers do you want me to plant on your grave? Forget-me-nots?”
“Is there a flower called Get-the-Hell-Away-From-Me-and-Do-What-You’re-Told?”
“No, but I like your spunk,” Tina says, tipping me a wink before she heads out the cafeteria door.
I move through the prisoners like I normally would, making small talk, settling disputes, asking after minor scuffles that have erupted between inmates. I check on the ape shifter with dietary issues, who has developed diaper rash. I give him a pass to visit the infirmary where he can get a cream for that. I reach over Griff to hand the shifter the pass, my bracelet brushing against Griff’s collar.
“Can I go, like, now?” The ape asks, squirming in his seat.
“Sure,” I tell him, happy for the opportunity. “Griff, would you mind escorting your fellow shifter to the infirmary?”
He grunts in response, and the two hulking guys (one with a noticeable load in his shorts) take their trays to the front. I slide in behind Griff and whisper, “There are no guards posted at exit 32C. Follow the blood.”
He gives no indication of having heard me, but it’ll have to do. I watch the bear shifters leave the cafeteria, and scan for my next mark. I make my way across the cafeteria casually, finding excuses to brush up against Mac, Trevor, Shauna, and Tamika, resetting their collars to field trip mode and letting them know what exit to use.
When I’m done, I take my place back at the front of the cafeteria. I’m standing between two First Brood guards when Shauna catches my eye. I swipe a hand against my nose, which is Shauna’s cue.
“Get your filthy see-through hands off me, you paranormal pervert!” she screams, launching her tray of food at Trevor. It passes cleanly through him, and splatters a table full of vampires, who instantly get to their feet. Their meals (blood bags) fly in the air at the fae table, and within two seconds, complete chaos reigns. Tater tots and Type O explode into the air. Everybody gets in on it.
Shauna makes for the exit as the guards near her table jump into the fray.
The alarm sounds, and more guards pour into the cafeteria, leaving the hallways and exits unguarded. Some prisoners realize this right away and make a dash for it. They won’t get far with their collars activated; anybody who tries to get through an exit door will get a shock strong enough to drop them in their tracks.
But not my team.
“I’ll get Greg!” I yell at a First Brood, who has whipped out her stun gun. She nods, and I make my own escape, dodging prisoners and guards alike in the halls as I shoot for exit 32C. There’s a sudden crash behind me and a familiar stench fills the hallway.
“Oh no,” I mutter. Someone just broke into the pheromone closet. I cover my nose and dash in the opposite direction as quickly as I can. From the new noises I hear behind me, I’d say the pheromones have had an immediate effect. There’s about to be some really horny prisoners, and Greg is not going to be happy with me if I live through all of this.
I turn the corner to 32C and find Tamika struggling with a fallen body that blocks the door.
“Who is it?” I ask. “Griff?”
I quickly reassess when I see the smear on the ground from where he landed. “Oh, it’s the ape shitter. Sorry, I mean shifter,” I correct myself.
“He made a break for it and got zapped in the doorway. I can’t move him by myself,” Tamika says. I grab one arm and she snags the other as we drag him out of the way.
“Did the others make it out?” I ask, but Tamika only shrugs.
“I have no idea. I just got here to find a pile of ape-man blocking the way.”
“Okay, just go,” I tell her. “Follow the scent of the blood.”
“Now that, I can do,” she says, and disappears into the dark tunnel.
12
Tina was right.
It kills me to admit it, but there’s no way this is going to work.
Not only are prisoners having sex in the halls, but First Broods have also stopped to pop out eggs left and right. The spilled pheromones are making everyone party like it’s 1999 and I have no idea who on my squad has already made it out…and who hasn’t.
I’m heading back toward the cafeteria when I run into Trevor. Or rather, right through him.
Moving through a ghost is like diving in cold water, naked as a jaybird. I’m still shivering when his voice whispers in my ear, “I think Shauna and Griff made it out.”
“What about Mac?” I ask, raising my voice to be heard above the riot alarms, and some rather intense guttural moans coming from the next hall over.
But Trevor only shrugs. “Haven’t seen him, but I’m happy to look.” He tilts his head so his collar is easily accessible. “That is, once you uncollar me. And none of that field trip mode shite.”
I hesitate a minute before reaching for the collar. “Remember,” I start to say.
“Yes, I know,” Trevor interrupts. “No double-crossing. Be true to your crew.” His collar opens and slides from his neck. I grab it right before it would’ve hit the floor. Trevor smiles. “Amazing how good that feels. Even without a physical body it still weighs me down.”
Blowing me a kiss, he glides over a harpy who has stopped to drop a clutch of eggs. “See you soon,” he promises and then disappears through a wall.
I dive down a corridor in the opposite direction, skimming past two vampires who are grinding on each other.
“Break it up,” I yell at them, but don’t bother stopping to see if they do. Tossing Trevor’s collar into a trash bin, I bust into the cafeteria to find the food fight is still on, and that Greg is bravely trying to stop it. He looks up and spots me.
“Mavis!” he says, with a huge smile. “I’m so glad you’re here!”
That smile really does light up a room. I never really understood Cassie’s attraction but…oh shit.
I shake my head. I must have inhaled some pheromones after all.
“Looks like you’ve got everything under control!” I shout at Greg, just as a hamburger hits him in the side of
the head. “Gotta go!”
I head back toward exit 32C, jumping over couples who are…well, coupling, and screeching at everyone to go back to their cells. I know Tamika made it out, and Trevor seemed to think Shauna and Griff did as well. If Mac got waylaid by being laid, well, that’s his loss.
I jump over the still-unconscious ape shitter—shifter! I remind myself—and am immediately surrounded by darkness. I shift into my cat form, my vision automatically adjusting to the dark.
It’s easy going from there, with both my cat-vision and the smell of the blood to guide me. I’m picking up the faint scent of the pheromones that are laced into the blood as well, and realize that I’m going to be more than disappointed if Mac doesn’t make it out. I shake my head as I run, trying to clear it. Maybe Themis can whip me up some pills that make me immune to Mac. That would probably be smart.
I turn a corner and see Tina at the Central Park platform, handing out flashlights to Tamika, Griff, and Shauna. I shift back into human form as I join them.
“Mac didn’t make it?” I ask.
Suddenly a terrible scream fills the subway and we all turn as one, our flashlights illuminating the tunnel. Mac is running all-out, his face a rictus of sheer terror.
Behind him is Deuce, the two-headed guard dog. And he has a massive erection. Er, actually he has two erections. Makes me wonder if Deuce was named for his two heads above, or the two below.
“Oh, shit!” Shauna says.
She bolts for the ladder, climbing toward the surface like her life depends on it.
Tamika is right behind her, followed by Griff. Tina is riding him like a horse, apparently getting over her aversion to his shifter smell.
“Wait for me!” I scream, and dive for the lowest rung. I snag it and pull myself up just as Mac’s face pushes into my backside. There are still enough pheromones in my bloodstream to kinda like it.
“Go! Go! Go!” Mac yells.
He doesn’t need to tell me twice. I mean, technically he told me three times but…
I break out of a manhole cover and into the normal Central Park subway station. Griff grabs my wrist and pulls me up by one arm, setting me on my feet next to Shauna, who is bent double, gasping for air.
“You know what helps when fleeing for your life? Wings,” she says. “Couldn’t you just turn these collars off so we can—”
“No,” I snap, peering into the manhole.
Mac’s head pops through the opening and he pulls himself up. He puts the cover back on, cutting off the sounds of a very agitated, very large and sexually charged two-headed, two-dicked dog.
“That was too close for comfort,” he says, wiping some sweat from his brow.
“Where the Hades is everyone?” Tina asks, glancing around the subway station.
She’s right. It’s eerily empty. And there’s a weird, pulsing thrum under my feet.
But I don’t have time to worry about that. I just caused a prison riot that someone turned into an orgy...and left a flustered bat-shifter to deal with it. When I get a moment, I gotta think of some sort of apology gift to send Greg. But first, I’ve got to get my team out of here, to someplace safe.
“So…what happens now?” Tamika asks.
I glance at Tina, who seems surprised we’ve made it to this point.
“My friend Mallory’s husband has a cabin upstate.” I tell them. “He’s kind of a racist bigot, and this Humans First movement made him go all out prepper.”
“Woods?” Griff asks, his voice suddenly hopeful.
“Awww, the big guy wants to hug a tree,” Shauna says.
“Yes, Griff, the woods,” I tell him. “But first, we’ve got to get out of the city. And you guys need to keep a low profile.”
Tina snorts, and I can’t help but halfway agree with her derision. Griff is the size of a bus. Mac attracts attention just by being alive. Tamika and Shauna might be able to pass as human, but the glowing collars around their necks are dead giveaways.
“C’mon, deactivate us,” Shauna whines. “I can shrink to pixie size and fly. The girls can ride on Griff’s back. It’ll be easier.”
“Yeah,” I snap. “Easier for you to escape.”
“I mean, technically they already escaped,” Tina says.
“ENOUGH!” I yell. “I am not deactivating anyone’s collar. Now you can either come with me, or take your chances out there in the real world with humans who want to kill you and a glowing circle around your neck like a neon sign that screams, ‘I’m a supe’.”
My squad exchange glances, and then collectively seem to come to a decision.
“Lead the way,” Mac says, giving me a mock bow.
I breeze past him, heading for the stairs. We emerge onto the sidewalk and I suddenly understand what the constant vibration is. The streets are packed with people, all of them carrying signs and wearing t-shirts for the Humans First movement. They’re chanting and yelling, and Tina wasn’t kidding—there actually are more than a few torches and pitchforks.
And right now one of them is pointed at us.
“Supes!” a girl yells, her eyes wild with fear.
“Maybe we should have brought scarves…” Tamika says.
At the same moment, there’s a screech from the sky above.
I’d been wondering where the harpies were and now I understand. Hundreds, maybe thousands—I really don’t take the time to count—fill the sky.
Even as I look up, the harpies above are starting to look down.
A harpy screeches, “Escaped prisoners!”
“Run!” I yell, and really, I guess that was kind of what my plan boiled down to in the end, anyway.
Luckily, we all instinctively bolt in the same direction; for the cover of the trees in the park. Except for Tina. She’s a vampire so she levitates, floating over the crowd of humans that shriek and begin to throw things at her. Her fangs erupt and she taunts them with a smile, diverting attention from the rest of us.
But the harpies have spotted the collars, and they know there’s a breakout on their hands. They’re falling from the sky like shrapnel, scouring the streets for a glimpse of the glowing collars of the inmates.
Not realizing the harpies are chasing us, the rallying humans think they’re being attacked from above. Torches flare, and pitchforks are stabbed upwards while the harpies swoop onto the crowd.
“Go back to your homes!” one of the First Brood directs. “We have the situation under control.”
“Don’t tell me what to do, supe!” a man yells, then throws a can of beer at her. He misses, but foam pours out, splashing people in the crowd.
“Hey!” A girl yells, wiping beer out of her eyes. She turns and slaps the first person she spots, a guy with a beard who apparently has no problem with violence against women. He shoves her back, and she knocks into another girl, whose very human fingers curl into claws as she goes after the person she thinks pushed her.
She’s got the wrong target, but it doesn’t matter. Fights are breaking out all over. Humans against harpies, and humans against humans.
Tina makes a dive into the crowd, and they spread for her like the Red Sea as she comes over to where we stand in a copse of trees. There’s enough chaos that we’ve escaped notice—for now.
As Tina lands in front of us, the trees and bushes around us start to grow, intertwining and lacing together into an impenetrable thicket.
“Nymph power, nice,” Shauna says, and gives Tina a fist bump. I detect a slight smile on Tina’s face.
She turns to me. “That’s two riots you’ve caused so far today.”
“Oh, oh, let’s go for three,” Tamika says.
Tina ignores her. “I can keep us hidden up to the edge of the park,” she says. “You’ll have to take over once we hit cement and blacktop, Mavis.”
I nod, and hope that I can come up with a plan by then.
Trees and shrubs grow around us in a tunnel, grass braiding itself through the gaps. The inmates’ collars can’t be seen through it, and we
’re at the edge of the park before I know it. The noise of the riot behind us is dulled, but the glow of a few fires is lighting the sky. Things are definitely nasty behind us, and I feel a little guilty about it. But then I remember the pitchfork that was pointed at me, and quickly reassess.
“Okay, now what?” Tina asks.
I scan the street. People are leaning out of apartment complexes to get a better look at the chaos, and more than a few humans will see us if we move out onto the street.
Suddenly, I see it. There’s a paneled van that’s been run halfway onto the curb. Two wheels on, two wheels off. The logo on the side announces it as the property of Down & Dirty: Supernatural Cleaning Services. The driver, a dark-haired woman around my age, is arguing with the cop at the barricade.
“I need to get through,” she tells him. “I’m in charge of clean-up when the rallies are over.”
He doesn’t look impressed. “Picking up trash is supernatural cleaning then?”
She tips her head back to study the stars above for a moment, as if asking them for the patience to deal with this fool. “The harpies don’t have outhouses. Instead they set up a big tarp that they call a doot circle. You know what that is?” She doesn’t wait for an answer. “It’s the area they aim for on the ground when it’s time to take a dump.”
“Ugh, no.” The cop looks physically disgusted at just the thought of this.
“Yeah,” the woman nods. “I was the only asshole to bid on this job and I’m kicking myself for not aiming higher.”
The cop asks her exactly what she’s getting paid, but I’m not listening any longer. I look back at my crew.
“Van. Now. Go,” I say. I’d like to think I’m keeping it short and sweet so that Griff doesn’t get confused. But the truth is that I’m winging it.
She yells “shotgun!” as we all pile in and I slip behind the driver’s seat. I’m relieved to see that the keys are in the ignition, the engine running. I hear the side door roll closed behind me and yell, “Hang on!”
Squad Goals Page 8
