by Brian Fuller
Movement to his left snapped his gun around, but it was a Michael, a female sniper.
“Follow me in,” he said as they ran. “How many did you get?”
“Two,” she said. “Blew the leg off another, but he’s still crawling around out there somewhere. They’re strung out all over, most going after Delta. I’m Ganymede, by the way.”
That was a mouthful. “Helo.”
“Yeah, everyone knows you.”
The ground slanted upward and got rockier as they went. They veered to their right up the incline, finding Shujaa stretched out next to a flat boulder. He glanced at them briefly, then took another shot, the boom like the thunder that had moved on with the storm.
“Where’s Delta?” Helo asked.
Shujaa pointed down to a small hill in front of them. “On some boulders just over there. Can’t see them from here. The Thralls keep punching in and out.”
Helo couldn’t see them either, but he could hear the frantic gunfire. “I’m going in. Ganymede, set up a little farther down. Keep them occupied. Coming to you, Delta.”
Helo charged down the hill, a hill littered with the blown-apart bodies of both Michaels and Dreads. A flash of black and red, the telltale sign of a Thrall, whipped across the hollow ahead of him.
“Uh, Helo,” Faramir said over comms. “That person in the clearing is the Sheid, unless you’re standing in a meadow holding a heart right now. And one other thing. A helicopter is coming.”
“Copy.” They were going to fly it out! Surely the Ash Angels had resources that could track it. “Tell the Medius.”
Just ahead, he could see the boulder fall, a crumble of large rocks that had settled above a slight depression. There were more bodies here, mostly Ash Angels. The hollow was, unfortunately, dim, a single shaft of light slanting down to illuminate the wide trunk of a grandfatherly pine encircled by a deep bed of pine needles.
The speedy Thrall almost got the drop on Helo. It popped up like a prairie dog from behind a solitary boulder to his right and fired its rifle as Helo shoulder-rolled the rest of the way down the hill, losing his confiscated sniper rifle in the process. And the shots kept raining around him. He had just scrambled to his feet when a bullet took him in the side, hitting body armor and a toughened angel body that could only do so much good against such a big slug.
He flopped sideways and landed on a mangled, headless Dread. His body armor warped, jamming into his side and cracking his ribs. He turned over onto his back, and the Thrall was there, raising the rifle. Two blasts from up the hill hit the thing before it could pull the trigger, one shot taking its leg, the other its head.
Before it could re-form, Helo Hallowed the ground. The body writhed. If it had still had a head, it would have screamed. Helo got up and dragged it by its body armor toward the tree and the light, his caved-in right side not doing him any favors. He had to get it into the sunlight.
“On your left!” Delta commander warned.
The other Thrall. It jogged between the branches but didn’t come for Helo, heading instead into the boulders where Delta had taken up position. Gunshots and grunts sounded. Helo deposited the Thrall in the sunny spot and extinguished the hallow, letting the light do the work. He prayed a cloud wouldn’t blot out the sun. He turned around in time to see the second Thrall on the top of the rocks staring him down with a sneer.
The Thrall was a gangly man with a long face, graying blond hair, and a wild look in his eyes—the kind of psycho vibe you would expect from a movie villain. And it was smart enough not to drop onto ground that could easily be hallowed. The Thrall raised his rifle and pointed it at Helo. Helo raised his shotgun and pointed it at it. The Thrall’s red aura brightened—using his Toughness, Helo guessed.
Helo’s Angel Fire ammo erupted in time with the Thrall’s rifle shot. Both missed. Helo ran right. He had to get on equal ground with the Thrall for his Hallowing to work.
“Shujaa, Ganymede,” Helo said. “Get down here.”
As he circled the rocks to the right, he caught another red aura coming toward him. The Thrall popped up again and unloaded, taking two errant shots before someone shot its leg and it tumbled back into the hollow of the boulders.
Helo fired in the direction of the approaching Dread, who had taken cover on a slope, just to keep him there. The Thrall’s leg had probably healed already.
A welcome blur of Ash Angel aura Sped up to Helo, then stopped. Shujaa.
“There’s one over there,” Helo pointed Shujaa toward the slope. “Take him out. I’m going up the rocks.” He tapped his comms. “Ganymede, keep your sights on the boulders.”
If the Thrall was smart, it wouldn’t come to level ground. With a sniper ready to pick him apart, the Thrall would lay low and make them come to it inside its nest of boulders. And if that’s what it wanted, that’s what it was going to get.
Helo used his Strength and jumped up, arcing up over the boulders. The Thrall was crouched, reloading, surrounded by the broken and blasted bodies of the Ash Angels it had felled. Helo blasted a gout of Angel Fire down on it as he descended. The blast knocked the Thrall down, disintegrating part of its arm and shoulder. Its gun fell away, and Helo let his own go as he hit the uneven ground.
Legs churning, the Thrall scrambled backward while its arm re-formed. It sneered and slipped over the side. Helo bounded after it, taking the eight-foot plunge to the forest floor and rolling out of it. The Thrall had decided on retreat, but a bullet from Ganymede nailed its shoulder and spun it down hard.
Helo Hallowed and the Thrall howled in pain.
It had no use of its one arm, but it got back up, face a rictus of anger and agony. Three steps later Helo knocked it to the ground with a tackle his football coach would have been proud of. He kneed it in the groin, trapped its good hand, and punched at its face until Ganymede ran up, took out her pistol, and made it so there was no face.
Helo rolled off. “Help me get it into the light.”
He and Ganymede pulled it over and dumped it next to the other headless Thrall. He extinguished his hallow. Then the fatigue settled in, too much Virtus used. It had only happened once in his time as an Ash Angel, but this was worse. He felt like he had just run the Pike’s Peak marathon twice. He sat on the ground, forearms on his knees.
Shujaa sprinted up, face wide with a smile.
“Sitrep,” Helo called out on comms, wondering if anyone was left. There were no more gunshots.
“Beta leader reports clear.”
“Alpha leader is down. This is his second. All clear.”
“Charlie reports clear. We’re all banged up, though”
Relief flooded Helo. “Delta is down. This is Helo, all clear. Faramir?”
“Helicopter’s nearly there,” he said. “Sheid still waiting.”
Helo looked up at Shujaa. He had Speed and a sniper rifle. “Shujaa, see if you can get close enough to bring it down.”
Shujaa nodded. “Yes, Angel Born.” Then he Sped away into the forest, gashing through the trees, Terissa’s fate in his hands.
Chapter 31
Truth
Helo closed his eyes for a moment. With Terissa’s heart in the hands of a Sheid, and with the forest littered with downed Dreads and crippled Ash Angels, there was no time for a victory lap. Disposing of the Thralls had to happen now. A single cloud covering the sun would see them re-formed, and he had no Strength to fight them anymore.
Ganymede extended a hand, her round Latino face beaming down at him. Helo let her pull him up.
“I’d heard the stories,” she said, “and looks like they’re true. You are one crazy Marine. So, why does that guy call you Angel Born?”
“Long story,” Helo said, then tapped his comms. “Faramir, update.”
“The copter’s landed. Sheid’s boarding.”
“Shujaa?”
“On the road. No shot yet.”
Helo took stock of the Ash Angels around him. “I need anyone who can Hallow,” he called to the entire tea
m. “Ganymede, your phone work?” She nodded. “Come to Ganymede’s position. Track her phone.”
“Helo,” Faramir said. “It’s leaving.”
“Shujaa?” Helo asked. There had to be a chance. It would be a long shot, but Shujaa was good.
“I see it,” Shujaa said. “The pilot’s a Possessed.”
Damn.
“I’ll take the shot, Helo,” Shujaa said, voice fervent. “The Possessed aren’t worthy of life. Let me take it.”
Of all the bad luck. Well, not luck. Cain had planned this operation way better than the Ash Angels had planned theirs. Cain knew putting a Possessed in the cockpit would keep them from taking out the helicopter. It was clearly a contingency plan, and one that was going to work. He couldn’t order Shujaa to break a foundational Ash Angel rule and take it down. They would have to rely on the Medius to track it.
“Stand down, Shujaa,” Helo said, deflated. “I’m contacting the Medius.”
“Yes, Angel Born,” Shujaa replied, voice thick with bitterness.
Cleanup would take forever. With the help of the hallowers, they got the Thralls’ headless bodies to a place where they could burn them without setting the forest on fire. They had corralled the Possessed back onto the bus and healed their injuries. The Medius would send a team to collect and Exorcise them soon. There were Dread hearts to extract and burn, Ash Angels to heal, weapons and brass to collect, and a tree to yank out of one mangled van. They’d have to stay in place until dawn to collect the Ash Angels who’d been blown to bits by the C4.
To top it all off, the Medius and the Archai had called a meeting he’d have to conference into in half an hour. Worse than anything, he had to face Terissa. No, Scarlet. It would help if he could think of her as Scarlet. She was terrified. Helo didn’t think he could say, “It’s going to be all right” with a straight face. It wasn’t going to be all right. He hoped they could track the helicopter, but Cain had to have thought of that. Even if they could catch up to the Sheid, stopping it was nearly impossible.
It still boggled Helo’s mind that Cain hated him so much he would expend the massive resources required to round up and destroy everyone close to him, even his ex-wife, who had hurt him worse than anyone besides Cain. Aclima had warned him of Cain’s bitter vengefulness, but Helo had underestimated the man. The only silver lining was he hadn’t been after Tela at all. Maybe she could find some peace now.
After giving orders, watching the Thralls burn, and reporting to a stunned Medius and Archai, Helo headed back to the ruined Sicarius Nox van, passing the busload of Possessed. Delta team was in charge of the poor souls, and a freshly healed Delta captain saluted him on the way past.
“Nice work, Helo,” he said. “Soon as I heard you were in charge, I knew we weren’t going to let the Dreads walk out of here.”
“Thanks for holding the line out there,” Helo said. “You got the tough job done. I owe you.”
He nodded. Birdsong was returning, the sun shining. It was better than the storm, but it couldn’t lift his heavy heart. They’d gotten Scarlet. She wasn’t strong enough to endure whatever torture Cain would put her through. He had to tell her what was going to happen, though he wasn’t sure what he could say without making it worse.
Back at the van, Faramir was stowing the drone. They had already passed the mysterious IP address on to the Medius. Now they had to wait. He looked at the tree-spiked van. What they really needed was a chainsaw.
“I still think we should have pulled back,” Faramir said. “One of these days that cowboy luck of yours is going to run out.”
Helo didn’t need to justify his actions to the one member of the team who didn’t seem to understand that the Michaels existed to wipe out Dreads. Period.
Helo marched toward the rear of the van. They had to empty it of weapons and equipment before it got towed. He yanked open the remaining rear door.
“Help me get this stuff out of here,” he said to Faramir.
There wasn’t much left, and in a couple of minutes Helo hopped out and eyeballed the tree impaling the van. How were they going to get that thing out? Strategically placed C4, perhaps? A couple of guys with the Strength Bestowal?
“Helo,” Aclima called.
She and Scarlet were coming down the driveway. Scarlet had her arms wrapped around her chest, shoulders hunched. She was crying. He couldn’t blame her. Who knew what tales she had heard about Avadan’s prison or Cain’s vengeance.
The white knit sweater she was wearing was a patchwork of soot and drying mud, and the closer she got, the more miserable she looked. Aclima watched over her sympathetically, hand on her arm, guiding her to him.
And then Scarlet was in his arms sobbing, dissolving into a chest-heaving, tear-soaked “ugly cry,” as she would have called it. Aclima mouthed, “I’ll be back,” and proceeded down the road. Helo led Scarlet to the back of the van. Faramir took one look and wandered off—at least he was sensitive enough for that.
Helo got her seated at the back, legs dangling over the bumper, then took a seat next to her and put his arm around her.
“Look,” she said. “I know you’re Helo now, but I need Trace. I need the Trace who didn’t know what I had done, who still thought I was the love of his life.”
He nodded. That was a distant memory, or perhaps an unimaginable one.
“What is going to happen to me?” she asked.
“I don’t know for sure, Terissa,” he said. What should he say? His mind spun for a moment, but he decided the truth would be best. “First thing they’ll probably do is break your bones so you can’t move. If they’re feeling particularly nasty, they’ll Desecrate the ground so you can feel it. They might torch you. But Cain will grill you for information. Just give it to him. Whatever he wants.”
“I don’t know anything,” Scarlet said. “I’ve only been an Ash Angel for four months!”
“This is about me,” he said. “He’ll ask you about our past together, about anything he can use to hurt me. Just tell him. Remember that Trace is dead. That will make it easier. And . . .” He hesitated, wondering if he should bring it up, wondering if he really wanted to know. “About you and my brother . . .”
She broke down sobbing again and buried her face in his shoulder. “I’m so sorry. I . . . I don’t know what I was thinking.”
So it was true. A part of him wanted to get up and leave, but he stayed. If he was really going to let it go, then he had to forgive and bring what comfort he could to the terrified woman at his side.
“Brandon was awesome,” Helo said. “I don’t think I ever knew a woman who didn’t like him better than they did me.”
“That’s no excuse. You were good to me,” she cried. “I was so stupid. It just dragged on and on. Every time he came back from deployment and would visit . . . well . . . hardly ever, you know? But for a long time. When he broke it off, I thought I would change, swore I would be a good wife . . .”
Helo shut his eyes. So it was worse than he had thought. But it was over. She had to believe that. He had to believe that.
He pulled her in tighter. “It’s done. You’re Scarlet now. You’re stronger and better than ever. But Cain will probably ask about it and use it against you. But you can survive this. I’ve gotten away from Cain’s little traps a couple times. You can too. And believe me, I’ll do everything I can to find you. Okay? And I’ll have help.”
She straightened and wiped her eyes, pushing her hair back into a semblance of order.
“You’re different now, you know?” she said. “I was talking to Aclima and telling her how you were always a great guy but calm and mellow. You seem so driven now. So full of purpose. It looks good on you.”
He had no reply to that. He felt like he’d had purpose in his mortal life—a college degree and a happy marriage. They just didn’t require him to run around like a madman fighting a secret war.
“But I’ve lost you, haven’t I?” she added softly.
The question stabbed him, and h
e looked away, away into a clear sky that had so recently swirled with a wicked hailstorm. He still cared for her, but he could never go back. She had lost him. He’d run from her, from all the sweet memories her infidelity had turned bitter. She had killed Trace, and he didn’t want to resurrect the man or his relationships. He was Helo now.
He opened his mouth, trying to find words that wouldn’t make her situation worse. She cut him off.
“You don’t have to say it. And I don’t blame you.” She sighed and pulled away. “I am sorry, Helo. And I mean it. I did love you. Don’t think I didn’t. Just wanted you to know it, especially since . . . well, you know.”
He couldn’t look at her. What kind of love allowed for cheating on your husband? He didn’t understand it. He didn’t want to.
He hopped off the back of the van. “I’ve got to go check on our progress before my meeting. Hang in there. I’ll come find you and let you know what they want to do. I’ll be with you at dawn.”
He didn’t look back as he walked away. Weary and worn, he angled up the driveway. The toppled trees still hadn’t been cleared. They would need equipment for that. At the top, a group of three Michaels combed the wreckage of the cabin looking for equipment and body parts. He was about to join them when he saw Aclima sitting on one of the blasted logs just inside the tree line. She had removed her body armor and disassembled her BBR, looking it over. That haircut gave her an edgy look. He smiled. She was exactly what he needed right now, someone who pointed him forward.
“This seat taken?” he said. Time to give another pickup line a try.
“No,” she said, moving the rifle stock so he could sit next to her.
“So did it hurt?” he asked as he sat down.
“What? The leg? That healed when I got the Bestowal.”
