Turning his attention to the vamp, Scott barred his teeth. “Adolf. You’re a long way from Atlanta, Georgia. Did the mama’s boy get lost on the way home?”
Rothschild jerked around, snarling with his fangs ready to strike. “Morgan? What a pleasant surprise. Dead phantoms to go with dead kids. I’ll have to celebrate tonight.”
“You can invite all of your friends to Chasm of Torture and go dancing in the flames. Want to tell me where you and your cousins buried those Atlanta women before you fry?”
“Which piece?” Rothschild asked then laughed.
Scott nailed the vamp with a solid upper cut to his weak jaw and followed with a hammer fist to the throat that plowed the vamp into the clay wall. What would kill a human in seconds barely phased the monster, but it got Scott the results he wanted.
Enraged, Rothschild immediately morphed from a blond GQ-like guy to his basest form, a fanged, obsidian creature of immense strength. Vampires had several states of being. Their primal form was their most powerful, but when killed in that state, they immediately dissolved into dust and his evil soul would go to be tortured for eternity.
Clawed wings flapping, the vamp rose to the ceiling. Scott adjusted the stake, ready to drive it through the rogue para’s heart the second he attacked. Only Rothschild didn’t move in for the kill, but hovered and sneered. Shit. Scott didn’t have time for games.
“It’s a shame the phantoms intervened, tonight. I was going to spare this little one for a while. She looks tasty.” He laughed. “You and the brats are dead. And soon all of the phantoms will fall. Dominion is rising.”
Dread stabbed Scott in the gut. Were the other kids dead already?
The vamp dove for the little girl, razor claws grasping.
Faster by a hair, Scott materialized over the child, shielding her. Rothschild’s claws slipped through the military’s armor, stabbing deep into Scott’s back. He gritted his teeth against the pain as he wrapped his arms around the girl, bringing her close to his chest. She didn’t wake or respond, but continued to shudder as if in her own private hell.
What had the bastard done to her? Anger ripped inside Scott. He powered to his feet and flung the vamp backward with enough force to send him crashing through the hut’s wall, destroying it. The ceiling gave way, collapsing partially on Scott and completely burying Rothschild.
Hunched over Maddie, Scott shouldered through the crumbling debris and up into the fresh air, cradling the child. She still didn’t wake and concern wrenched inside him.
Maddie, he whispered softly into her mind. You’re safe now. I won’t let anything hurt you.
No response. He pulled her closer against his chest, trying to ease her fear.
Rothchild’s screech filled the night as he winged his way from the rubble. Dust now dulled the polished ebony of his skin and billowed with every flap of his leathery wings. He flew at Scott in a rage, determined to kill the child. Droplets of acid rapid fired from the vampire’s mouth like bullets, singeing everything they touched.
Scott shot higher into the air and twisted wildly trying to protect the little girl from the corrosive spittle. Most of it hit and burned through his protective gear, but he felt Maddie convulse in his arms and knew she’d been hit too. He dove hard for a small stream trickling along the edge of the valley and dipped beneath the surface, soaking them both. Water neutralized a vamp’s acid.
A quick glance at Maddie showed him a small burn on her left ear and right leg. She had to be in some pain, but even that didn’t wake her. She breathed. Her heart beat. Her little body shuddered, but her mind remained dark and closed as if she were protecting herself from a horror too great to face. Holding her close, a sharp pain of both grief at what he’d lost long ago, and empathy over what she’d had to suffer now cut through him. Adolf was going to pay mightily for this atrocity.
Where the hell was he anyway? He should have been after them by now. Taking to the air, Scott found the vampire scurrying off into the night.
That was too damn easy. Unease rippled down Scott’s spine.
Twisting around, Scott saw Jason, Flint, and Ryan had emerged from the bunker, each carrying a child who appeared alive and well. He flew toward the group, planning to hand Maddie off to Jason and go after Rothschild while the team raced the kids to meet the Chinook. But the distinct whine of approaching aircraft sent him rising higher into the atmosphere. Two Russian Bear-H bombers were coming right at him, bomb hatches beginning to open, looking as if they were going to unload on the JIMAS camp.
What in the hell were the Soviets up to? He blasted Jason. “Incoming bombers. Get airborne. Now.” Glancing back at the bombers, Scott realized that Rothschild had arranged this, and must have been aware of Operation Mother Hawk’s time schedule, too. Even if Soviet pilots weren’t flying the bombers, by all appearances the Soviets would have been held responsible for the death of Prime Minister Wellington’s children and the rescue team. The bombing would have been considered a deliberate act because the Soviet’s President, Vladamir Rasputin damn well knew the Wellingtons were being held at the JIMAS camp.
Jason, Flint, and Ryan with the Wellington’s strapped to their backs, shot up into the air and Scott heard one of the kids shout to his sibling. “They’re bloody GI Joe Peter Pans, Will.”
Wincing at the moniker, Scott shook his head, glad to hear the kid was all right. He prayed that Maddie hadn’t shut down so tight that she couldn’t hear the voices of those she loved. He tried again to reach into her mind, but still found a closed darkness, and in her delicate condition, he didn’t dare force past her barriers.
The Russian Bear Bombers were almost directly above them now. Blasting the team with an order to move in hyper-speed, he led the shortest route to putting the mountain between them and the explosion.
They weren’t fast enough.
He felt he was blasted to the Outer Realm into the Chasm of Torture’s raging inferno.
Chapter Two
Two months later
Atlanta, Georgia
Taking several deep breaths, Venus Delany closed her eyes and counted to ten, positive there was no way vials of radioactive bacteria were missing from her lab. Surely she had to be seeing things, or more correctly not seeing them. Or perhaps her sudden nose itch and hot flash had kept her from seeing straight.
This was not the Twilight Zone. She was in a level four lab and the security measures at New Dimensions Laboratories were practically infallible. Every vial, petri dish, or microbial/ viral sample was electronically tagged. Anyone taking anything out of the lab would set off alarms.
Reassured, she opened her eyes and counted for the third time. Nothing changed. There were six vials instead of eight.
But how? Searching her mind, she played back her memory, dismayed to discover that she couldn’t recall if there had been eight of them when she’d hurried into to the lab earlier today. She knew the count had been right last night. She and an assistant had done a routine security check. Since that time only four other people had been in and out of the lab besides Venus. The last of which was Stan Wilmur’s weasel-ass, she thought, as she recalled him shutting down his station early today. He notably hadn’t noseyed over her shoulder as he usually did before leaving.
Had he done something with the vials of bacteria? Purposely placed them in the wrong section of the Level III cabinet? A quick once over its contents—samples of hemorrhagic viruses sourced from Argentina to the Congo, hantaviruses, smallpox and several other deadly agents—showed her nothing else was missing and everything was where it was supposed to be. Had he hid them in the lab itself?
Like a lioness looking for lost cubs, Venus searched, frustrated with how the hazmat suit and helmet slowed her down and inhibited her from easing her itching nose. Her skin burned and her mind steamed as she raked her immaculate lab with a fine-tooth comb.
She wouldn’t put any underhanded trick past the cigar smoking snitch. Wilmur had been angling for her job and brown-nosing the head of New
Dimensions Laboratory, Claudette Deneauve, since he signed on six months ago. Setting Venus up for missing germs would be the next logical step on the road to getting her fired. His tattling had already resulted in her getting a dressing down for conducting more than the minimal experiments necessary to her research.
Venus had cut back on her experiments some, but still went the extra mile when her gut told her it was necessary. She just didn’t let Wilmur the Weasel catch her doing it. Many of the microorganisms she dealt with were high on the toxicity scale, so anything she determined about the germ, she wanted to make damn sure she had it right. But with the radioactive bacteria under study now, she was going an extra ten miles.
In addition to determining if the bacteria really did have a neutralizing effect on nuclear waste, she was also searching for a way to stop the bactard—her pet name for resistant bacteria—in its germy little tracks. The radioactive bacteria had been dubbed the “Unsinkable Molly,” because an agent to curtail its growth had yet to be found. Venus had risen to the challenge even though this mutated strain of Deinococcus toxicity to man was supposedly low—which was the only plus about it being missing as opposed to one the hemorrhagic viruses. In her book, there was still a lot unknown about radioactive bacteria and she slept better at night knowing that she was doing all that she could to find an inhibiting agent. Sure there were probably several microbiologists focusing on just that aspect of bacterial study, but Venus couldn’t let the “Unsinkable Molly” pass through her lab without trying herself. After two months today she thought she had a breakthrough, but only more time and test would tell if she’d rendered the radioactive bacteria latent or not.
The search left her empty handed, ready to spit nails, and desperate to claw off the inhibiting hazmat suit. For some reason her allergies were kicking her ass at the moment. Unusually whenever she was in the lab, the purified, filtered air provided an insulating barrier to seasonal or environmental allergens. And her oxygenized hazmat suit had always been heaven to her sensitive nose. But the way she was feeling right now, you’d think she’s had her face buried in cat fur.
Unable to put off then inevitable Venus, hit the emergency communicator that would connect her directly to Claudette and set off the alarm for the building to go on alert. It was time to let her boss and security know the vials of bacteria were missing. Professionally, no matter how much she believed Wilmur to be responsible for the missing vials, she couldn’t immediately start pointing fingers. Ultimately, she was in charge of the lab and it was her responsibility.
Claudette answered immediately. “What’s wrong, Delaney?”
“We have a serious problem,” Venus said without preamble. “Level Four’s security has been breached. Two vials of the radioactive bacteria from the Hanford site are missing.”
“Wait a minute? Did you say the bacteria from the Hanford site?”
“Yes. Two of the vials are missing from the lab’s safety cabinet.”
“Good God, woman you scared the hell out of me. The Hanford bacteria is not a Level 4 agent.”
Shaking her head at Claudette’s response, Venus wondered if she were in fact in the midst of some nightmare and not really at work. “Until it can be fully studied it is to be treated as—”
“Don’t tell me protocol,” Claudette cut in, angrily. “I know it. I also know nothing gets out of that lab without security knowing it. Someone has misplaced the vials in your lab.”
Venus nearly exploded. “I don’t run a sloppy lab. Things are never misplaced. But just to be sure, I searched everywhere. They’re not here. We need to notify—”
“No one. We need to notify no one until I have security check this situation out. I want you in my office immediately. Hopefully I can stop the emergency response team before we spend an arm and a leg on this folly.” Claudette hung up.
Venus blinked in shock. It was true that the radioactive bacteria didn’t have a similar antigenic relationship with any of the Level Four toxic agents, but until research provided enough data to decide how harmful it was or wasn’t, she had a responsibility to treat it like a Level Four contagion. The itch in her nose doubled as did her blood pressure. She felt as if her entire body coming to a boil as anger and discomfort made her trek through the lab’s forty-five minute decontamination process pure torture. By the time she peeled off her protective suit and dressed, Claudette’s response had Venus seeing nothing but red.
She took her frustration out on her nose, nearly using an entire box of tissues as she marched to Claudette’s office. The irritated olfactory nerve hovered at a level just below a sneeze and no matter how much she rubbed the itch didn’t go away. She found Claudette’s cabana boy secretary had already left for the day. The inner office door was ajar and Venus crossed the room to push the door open.
Claudette held up a finger, telling Venus to wait. Venus bit her lip and nearly drew blood at Claudette’s next words. “I can handle it, darling, and even if it’s necessary, that action can wait. Tonight is for us. I’ve missed you. And there’s no need to change our reservation, I won’t be but a minute more. Au revoir.” She snapped her phone shut and slung her Vitton purse onto her shoulder. Then easing up the sleeve of her red Versace suit, she glanced at her Girard-Perregaux timepiece—a six figure accessory. Venus knew because she’d Googled it after Claudette had shown everyone the Valentine’s Day present several times over. The petite blond operated on a level of svelte haute couture that Venus at six-foot could only dream about.
Despite the nose itch, she detected the scent of a cigar hovering in the air. A quick glance showed her that Wilmur the weasel wasn’t in house at the moment, but he’d been there.
“What took so long, Delaney? You’ve held me up for nearly an hour.”
Venus cocked her head. “I was in the level 4 lab. It takes at least forty minutes to exit. What are you doing about the missing vials?”
Claudette frowned and waved her hand as if that was of no account. “I’ve contacted security. No unauthorized vials have passed through the electronic sensors. So we are fairly certain the vials are still in your lab. They are going to investigate tonight and will contact you if they have any questions. I realize you’re concerned. We all are, but you’re blowing the situation out of proportion. You weren’t the only person in the lab today and it is possible that someone misplaced them, isn’t it?”
Venus sucked in air and pressed the back of her hand to her nose. “Yes, but I’m the only one who is logged in for the radioactive bacteria, Wilmur, Sandra, and Dexter were in the lab working on other projects—”
“Don’t worry. Security can handle it. None of the Level Four agents are missing, correct?”
“Correct, but—”
“And so far, all reports indicate the radioactive bacteria’s toxicity is low and the millirems of radiation well below any damaging level. It is basically harmless to humans, right?”
Harmless to humans? Venus frowned at Claudette’s odd choice of words. “Yes, but since the radioactive bacteria has been found only in the nuclear waste at the Hanford site, we aren’t completely sure what effects it might have on the environment. They limited participation in this project to high security labs for a reason—”
“I’m fully aware of all that,” Claudette said. “But we aren’t taking this further until security has investigated. I suggest you go home and take care of yourself. You look as if you need to be quarantined. Are you sick?”
Venus shook her head. “Just allergies, I think.” Although, she had to wonder over how flushed she was feeling. Then again, given they way Claudette was treating her and the situation her blood had passed the boiling point. It was all Venus could do to bite back what she really wanted to say. Unfortunately, until she had time to think and calm down, none of it was very professional.
“I’m running more than late now,” Claudette said. “If you’re still this bad off tomorrow, stay home. And God forbid there should be a next time, but if something like this happens again, only
use the emergency line for level 4 agent disasters. I suggest you review the safety and procedure manual, too.” Claudette sailed out of her office with nary a wrinkle to her Versace red suit.
Venus’s jaw hung open. Review the safety and procedure manual? Venus had helped write New Dimensions’ safety protocols. She left Claudette’s office, following the woman’s designer wake.
“I think I’ll stay here until security has checked the lab,” Venus told the woman, clearly indicating that she felt Claudette was being negligent by leaving for a date.
Claudette’s clicking red heels on the white tiled floor came to an abrupt stop.
“If you value your job, Delaney. You will go home and take something for your allergies. Not only are you an unsightly mess, but you’re likely spreading more contaminating germs than the so called breech in the lab.” Claudette swung impatiently around and marched harder down the corridor.
Venus glared at Claudette’s back. The woman needed to be taken down a spike or two, she thought, wishing she could be around when it happened.
Just then the three-inch heel on Claudette’s blood-red Jimmy Choos broke, pitching the woman off balance. She careened into the wall before bouncing to the floor. Her chignon unraveled and the distinct sound of a seam ripping echoed in the empty hall.
Venus stood there staring, mouth agape. The itch in her nosed eased.
“Now, look at what you’ve done,” Claudette cried, stomping her unbroken shoe. That heel broke, too.
“Me?” Venus gulped, half-wondering if her boss was right. Venus had no sooner had the thought then wham! Claudette had been taken down…two spikes. It wasn’t possible, though. Not for Venus at least, but maybe for one of her sisters with a great deal of focused intent. They were all Magicists—people who drew power from earth’s magnetic field. They weren’t witches who conjured spells through connection to the spirit world, though they’d often been mistaken as such in history because of their power. Magicists effected change in their surroundings by directing energy toward a certain event. But Venus had no power. She was the first non-magical person born in her family in hundreds of years.
Tales From Mysteria Falls Page 10
