Avalanche: Book Five in the Secret World Chronicle

by Lackey, Mercedes

  “Thank Christ you two are here! He got out, and there’s an attack on the Facility! You—you have to get him back in his cell, and fast!”

  “She’s right! He’s already killed the guards and the QRF, or near enough.” The male tech looked Sera up and down for a moment, but his eyes were glazed over with fear, and apparently he didn’t register much beyond the fact that John and Sera looked like they knew what they were doing.

  “He’s out of control! If we don’t get him locked back up, he’s going to kill us all!”

  “Where is he?” Sera demanded, her voice as cold as her sword was hot. “Where is Zachary Marlowe?”

  “Marlowe? You mean Subject 0013—” The female tech stopped midsentence, her eyes going wide. They went even wider when Sera planted the tip of her sword between the tech’s feet. “Y—you—you’re not with security!”

  “Thanks for catchin’ up with the rest of class. Now answer her.” John had very slowly but pointedly aimed his rifle at the male tech, who was still sitting on the floor; the man looked even more dazed than before with this latest revelation.

  The woman gulped, seemed to think about trying to be brave, then thought better of it. “He’s back behind the containment door. Third right on this hallway, then the second left.”

  “And?” Sera’s eyes had gone golden, with wisps of flame trailing from the corners.

  “…you’ll need this keycard to get past the door. That’s all, I swear!” Her fingers scrambled to detach a slip of hard plastic from her coat’s breast pocket, holding it out like a talisman against danger.

  Sera snatched the keycard from the woman’s outstretched, trembling hand, and passed it to John. “If you value that shriveled atomy you refer to as your soul,” she said, her voice taking on some of that curiously multitoned quality John remembered from their first meetings, “You will cease this so-called ‘work,’ and find a way to atone for the evil you have perpetrated within it.”

  The woman could only gulp as her eyes filled with tears, finally looking at her own feet, unable to meet Sera’s gaze any longer.

  The man finally snapped out of his daze. “Jesus-fuck, Karen! Let’s get the hell out of here!” He nearly jumped to his feet, almost tripped again, and then looped his arm under the woman’s, dragging her through the door to the stairwell.

  “Darlin’, you can be downright scary when you need to be.” John grinned, then thrust his chin towards the direction they needed to go. “Shall we?”

  Sera was already two steps ahead of him. If Zachary were not what we need…those two would be more than simply afraid right now, she replied. What they do here…well, you know. Except they do it to children who never gave their consent, as you did in the beginning.

  I know, darlin’. I know. Those two are goin’ to have to be lookin’ over their backs for the rest of their lives now, an’ they know it. Might just be corrective for ’em. But they’re not our problem right now. Mission first, John sent to her, adding a light mental caress at the end of it. He felt some of the fire leave her, and her resolve set in.

  They set off again; John stayed on the right-hand side of the hall, Sera on the left and slightly back from him. That way, he could cover the corridor that much more effectively with his rifle, and she had her spears that she could use to back him up with. They followed the path that the female technician had told them about; sure enough, they came to a set of doors that stood out from what they had seen so far. They were heavy and thick; blast doors, like the sort of thing that you would see in nuclear missile silos. They were meant to withstand a lot of abuse, and still keep on ticking.

  “Glad we don’t have to cut through these bad boys. It’d take too damned long.” With his left hand, John retrieved the keycard they had been given and swiped it across an RFID reader. John could hear hydraulics and gears working even over the Klaxons as the door worked to open itself. As soon as there was a crack of light between the edge of the blast doors and the hallway beyond, John could hear the sounds of shouting, screaming, and fighting. And a tremendous amount of gunfire. Whatever that kid is doin’, he’s puttin’ up a helluva fight.

  The entire building rocked again with a second explosion, this time one clearly coming from above this level. A new set of alarms went off. What the hell? Did somethin’ get knocked loose in the first blast? John wasn’t looking forward to having to try to swim out of this joint. For now, the battle-sense he shared with Sera was quiet; whatever was happening above wasn’t going to be immediately fatal to them—at least he hoped not. The Futures were finicky, and as much as he enjoyed the advantage and edge they brought, he didn’t like relying on them as a crutch.

  The blast door swung partway open, and stuck. The motors for the door whined and then went silent. Whatever was going on above must have warped the doorframe. The gap was just large enough for Sera to fit through, with her wings tucked in close; John had a much easier time squeezing by, bringing his rifle up as soon as he was past the edge of the door. The sounds of fighting were much louder now.

  “Don’t think we need much of a clue on where to go, darlin’.”

  The couple had a few more turns and twists to go down before they were close enough to the fighting to see it. Along the way they found different scenes of wreckage: destroyed labs, medical bays, offices, security stations. Each was its own microcosm of carnage, telling a piece of larger story. There were more than a few bodies, as well. If this was the work of Zachary Marlowe, it was frighteningly violent.

  But John only had to reflect for a moment on the carnage he had inflicted on the day of his escape; that had been all fire and ash. This…was visceral, and bloody. No time, old man.

  Finally, they arrived at the main corridor. The sounds of gunfire and shouted commands were deafening. The very top of the ceiling had a layer of smoke over it, and the strained HVAC system was working overtime to compensate and keep fresh air pumped in. The space in front of them was jam-packed with men. They carried riot shields, assault rifles, shotguns, net-launcher guns and grenade launchers. And…bizarrely, all their gear was a blinding white. Well, except for the blood splashes.

  Security, darlin’. Zach’s on the other side of them…I can feel it. Let’s even the odds.

  The security personnel were all jammed together; their focus was in the complete opposite direction from John and Sera. John didn’t mind in the least. He lined up his first target, base of the neck and under the helmet, then depressed the trigger on his carbine. The suppressed round hit right on target, the hypersonic crack of the rifle and the impact with flesh lost in the cacophony, sending up a red mist that dusted the first man’s nearest companions. He worked his way down the back of the line, putting a double tap into the upper neck or head of his targets; some he had to smoke-check with an extra round or two while they were on the ground. He was a damned good shot, but even still, nothing was certain in a gunfight; it was better to spend the rounds to make sure a target was out of action than to get surprised later. Towards the end, the security guards started to catch on that they were in the middle of a death sandwich, and tried to react, fight back somehow. John expended the last of his magazine putting them down; ten dead for sure, with at least two more on their way out and definitely out of the fight. Now it was time for Sera to go to work. She manifested her spear alongside her sword, and she waded in.

  By this time, more of the guards had figured out they were being taken from behind. They turned to face Sera, who had sheathed herself in flame and leapfrogged past John, her sword and spear so hot they were white approaching plasma. The guards had ballistic shields, rated to withstand rifle fire. If they had counted on those to protect them, they were sadly mistaken. Sera sliced the tops off, and took out three of the tightly packed guards with blows from the butt of her spear. They went down like hammered cattle.

  Before any of the other security guards could turn their weapons on Sera, John sent a blast of flame from his right hand, centered on her. It blossomed around her, engulfing th
e guards nearest to his wife. She could see perfectly well in his flames, which could not hurt her; the guards, meanwhile, were panicked and screaming in pain. He slung his rifle, manifesting his fire-claymore as he charged after his wife.

  Sera, as usual, was doing her best to be “non-lethal”—but that did not mean pain-free. She was using the butt of her spear and the pommel of her sword to knock out those who appeared to be having second thoughts about what they were doing, but for those who were showing no sign of mercy…well…neither did she. For every step she took forward, a man went down, either unconscious or dead. Unlike the hardened Thulian armor, the Kevlar vests and shields offered no more resistance to her fiery weapons than butter.

  John was right behind her; he wasn’t being bloodthirsty, but where he struck, it was usually a killing blow. It was the quickest and easiest way for him to protect himself and Sera, and these men had made their choices already so far as he was concerned. Slicing through barrels and weapon receivers as easily as armor and flesh, he cleaved his way through the opposition, his back to Sera’s at all times as they mowed through the guards. It was almost like a dance, with he and Sera being the only ones in time with the steps.

  Sera performed a wide, low sweep with her sword and spear; John leapt over both, executing a back edge cut with each pass. They went until John had gone around in a complete circle, with several sweeps of Sera’s weapons. When they finished, all of the security guards around them were dead, dying, or incapacitated. Neither of them were breathing hard. There was still a chaotic knot of action happening immediately in front of them, however.

  At the heart of it was something—someone—dressed in what looked like a uniform coverall, torn in places and splattered liberally with blood. It was the same style as the one John had worn when he was a part of the Program; instead of green, this one was light blue, like a hospital patient’s. It had to be young Marlowe…there couldn’t be that many people down here who were green-skinned and teal-haired. John could tell immediately that the boy had already been through Program experimentation; where his arms were visible, he shared the exact same scars that John had. The fruits of that awful labor were readily apparent. Zachary moved fast; in an instant, John gauged that the boy was slightly faster than himself; the rare speedsters out there, where being fast or reacting quickly was their primary power, were the only things faster. And he was plainly as strong as John, if not somewhat stronger; the enhancements under his skin bulged with his exertions, standing out with each swipe and thrust and jab.

  The kid was a brawler. When John and Sera first saw him, he was busy finishing off three security guards. He didn’t have any finesse or real technique to his fighting; no training, even. Whatever they had tried to impart to him in the Program, he had either rejected, or it just hadn’t taken. It didn’t seem that the kid needed it, either.

  The security guards were good. They didn’t take turns or hang back, trying to take Zachary on one at a time. All three of them rushed him together. One had a stun wand of a model that John had never seen before; it was actually arcing electricity in loud pops and snaps, and looked lethal. The second guard had a pump-action shotgun tricked out with a tactical light and a red dot, while the third carried only a pistol. The guard with the shotgun fired three blasts in quick succession, only a handful of paces away from Zach…but none of the shots seemed to find him, instead hitting the walls and floor around him; the closest took a bite out of Zach’s coveralls, but didn’t find flesh. Even with as fast as the kid was, that should have been impossible; it looked like the shotgun had been lined up dead on him. This wasn’t like the movies, where a shotgun has a spread five feet wide two inches from the barrel. Zach was next to the guard almost instantly, just after the guard had racked the pump on his weapon. The teen grabbed the barrel of the gun, wrenching it violently to his left; the longarm bucked in his grasp as it discharged harmlessly into the wall.

  By now the guard with the stun baton was in range; he swung in quick, short arcs, aiming for Zach’s head and torso. Still holding onto the shotgun, Zach ducked and twisted out of the way; the guard holding the shotgun was tugged off balance by the movements, losing his footing and almost falling to the floor. Some of the strikes from the wand came close enough to singe and burn holes in Zach’s clothing, but he didn’t seem to notice. Like a lightning strike, his right hand shot out, grabbing the weapon arm of the guard with the stun wand; the man screamed as Zach’s hand squeezed, crunching the bones like they were dried twigs. With a swift jerk, he carried the crippled guard’s arm and stun wand into the man with the shotgun; the other man seized with a spasm as the electricity surged into him, causing him to collapse to the floor. It took John a second to realize that it was only the arm from the guard with the stun arm he had pulled towards his comrade; the teen had torn the guard’s arm off at the elbow.

  The third and final guard, who was behind the other two, began firing with his pistol. His rounds tore through the guard with the missing arm, who was staring at the stump of his right arm with a befuddled expression—probably from shock—before one of the rounds entered his temple and sent him to the floor, dead. John’s heart skipped a beat; the shots surely would hit Zach. Unless he had a healing factor, or he and Sera could somehow heal the kid…he was as good as dead.

  The guard with the pistol emptied his entire magazine in one quick fusillade, the slide locking back once it was finished. The guard stood there stock-still for a moment…then he frantically began to reload. Zach was advancing on him, completely unharmed. Not a single round had struck him. Incongruously, John saw that there was a small drift of leaves at Zach’s feet, quickly wilting and turning brown. The guard managed to jam the magazine home and drop the slide just as Zach reached him; the teen slapped the pistol to the side at the last second before it fired. The guard on the ground with the shotgun had seemingly recovered during the barrage, and had taken aim at Zachary’s back as he was walking towards the last standing guard. The round from the pistol slammed into the shotgun guard’s unarmored throat with a wet smack, and the guard’s eyes bulged in pain; his aim wavered for a moment before he finally pulled the trigger. Zachary twisted to the side at the last moment, and the blast caught the guard with the pistol full in the chest. The guard fell backwards, landing hard on his shoulders; the ballistic vest he was wearing had protected him, but his wind was gone.

  Zachary glanced back at the guard behind him; he was gurgling blood, too focused on the losing battle of keeping the wound covered with his hands to be a threat. He returned to the guard in front of him; the man was groaning, trying to force air back into his lungs. Zach took his time, coming to a rest standing next to the man’s helmeted head. He waited until the guard regained his breath, opening his eyes.

  “Please! No! Please, just no! No, no, no, NO!” Zachary lifted one foot, then brought it down savagely on the guard’s helmet; the crunch was horrible, and John didn’t want to think about whether it was the guard’s helmet or his skull…or both. For a second, John saw the teen’s face sag; his chest was heaving, and he didn’t look like the unholy terror he had been moments ago, but like a scared kid who only wanted to wake up from a nightmare he was trapped in.

  Then Sera’s fires flared, and he looked up, suddenly seeing them for the first time. There was no hesitation; he charged, first going for Sera. Both of them sensed the attack before it came…but there was something else coming through their battle-sense. Normally, things were clear; intention, action, inevitability all played out in a pattern that they could anticipate. With Zachary…there was some sort of background vibration to it all, that became more intense as he neared. John interposed himself between Zachary and Sera; his speed and strength were more on par with the teen’s. He instantly extinguished his claymore, deciding to meet the charge bare-handed. They didn’t want to hurt Zach, after all.

  It became immediately apparent that Zach had no such reservations; he attacked wildly, each strike meant to cripple or kill John. His face betrayed
a storm of internal fury; his teeth were bared and his eyes were wild with murderous intentions. John parried each blow, using every ounce of his speed and strength to keep the teen at bay. Several times, even with his enhancements and battle-sense, the teen’s attacks came close enough to rip through John’s uniform, drawing blood with shallow grazes, and twice it was only Sera’s intervention with a deflection of the butt of her spear, or a blinding flash of a fiery wing between them that saved him from something near-lethal.

  Damn, if the kid isn’t fast! John thought. But that speed came at a price; Zachary was going full-out, but the effort was draining him. He was winded, and soon his attacks became sloppier, more desperate.

  Darlin’, we don’t have time for this. Once he’s worn down—

  I will intervene.

  It didn’t take long before Zachary was completely out of steam; there was terror mixed with the rage and John feared that the teen was going to do something even crazier now that he recognized he couldn’t continue to defend himself.

  Sera launched herself at the young meta; without spear or sword, wrapping him in arms and wings from behind, pinning his arms to his side. “Peace,” she said into his right ear. “Be still.” And at the same time, waves of calm washed over John—and presumably Zachary as well. “We are here for you, not against you.”

  The exhausted teen continued to struggle for a few seconds, slowly becoming still. The odd buzzing that John and Sera had felt through their battle-sense faded, then stopped completely. Zachary was quiet for several long moments before finally speaking.

  “Who are you?”

  “I am the Seraphym,” she replied. “You do not know me; you have been held here, in this little hell, ever since your parents gave you over to these…monsters. You do not know what has been happening out there, in the world, but terrible things are happening there that drove us to find you. This is my beloved, John. He knows what you have lived through, because he has lived through the same.”