But she was Roy’s friend.
Friend, she thought again. He wasn’t just another man on the streets. And she wouldn’t let him end up like another one who disappeared, forgotten, neglected, no one to care about him.
She used her left hand to signal Miguel to take point at the foot of the stairs heading up to the second floor. When he took his post, she went up. Another hall greeted her, four sets of doors, all closed. She signaled for Miguel to follow. He nudged open the first door, and she burst in, her stunner at the ready.
The room lay empty, and the closet doors were open, nothing inside. They moved to the next door, which revealed yet another bare space.
Miguel’s hand wrapped around the third door handle, and he prodded the door open, leading with his stunner. He drew back, his face scrunched in disgust, and Ana pushed past to see the cause of his reaction. A cramped bathroom hosted an indomitable stench from the filth covering it. She closed the door and moved to the final room.
Her pulse pounded in her ears. They’d found no sign of Roy, nothing to explain the shadows and movement they’d seen outside. There must be something here, a clue to tell her they were headed in the right direction.
She leaned into the door, preparing to break in. A low murmur, faint and indecipherable, piqued her interest. Something was behind the door. She signaled to Miguel to listen, and he nodded.
Holding up her hand, she counted down on her fingers. They burst through, and a brilliant light blinded her.
Miguel pinched his eyes closed. Ana flicked out one of her night-vision lenses. Her pupil contracted enough for her to make out her surroundings. The source of the light was nothing more than a portable holocomputer left on, its display glowing blue, bright enough to overwhelm their night-vision lenses.
“It’s safe,” she said.
“Anything of interest?” Miguel shielded his eyes with one hand.
Ana surveyed the cramped room. “A holocomp, bedroll and blankets, some clothes. Recently used. But nothing else interesting.”
“I’m going back in the hall to keep watch. You want to check out what’s on the comp or wait to get a tech investigator on it?”
Ana hesitated. If she delved into the comp now, she risked security software shutting it down and locking her out, potentially destroying any useful data. She activated the device by waving in front of it. A biometric facial scan security request popped up. “Looks like it’s locked anyway. Unless we find the guy this comp belongs to, you and I aren’t getting in without the help of a tech specialist.”
“Got it tagged as potential evidence of whatever the hell happened here,” Miguel said. “I called this place in as a suspected crime scene.”
Ana holstered her stunner. Her pulse had slowed. Her certainty they’d find Roy deflated. “How long until they’re here?”
“They reported five minutes out almost ten minutes ago. But the current tracker shows them responding to a domestic disturbance about two blocks away. I don’t think they’re in a rush to do anything here.”
She glanced at his comm card’s display. “You already told them we didn’t find any suspects?”
“Yeah.” He shrugged. “I didn’t see a soul, and we scoured the damn place. Unless you think there’s somewhere we haven’t looked.”
“We don’t know there aren’t any suspects on the premises—we just haven’t found them yet.” Maybe they’d missed something, a clue leading them to the perps.
“Look, Ana... I know you’re desperate to find Roy, but so far we haven’t found a damn thing. We followed a car here, but we have no idea who was inside or why. Maybe it wasn’t even an enhancement or drug dealer. Maybe it was just a guy getting his jimmy rubbed off by a streetwalker, and you spooked the hell out of him sneaking up on his car.”
Ana let her arms fall to her side. Her face flushed warm with anger, emotion screaming that Miguel was wrong, Roy was abducted and in danger. But she breathed out and gave herself time for logic to sink in. “Maybe you’re right.”
“Look, I don’t mind going after your hunches. You’ve got good instincts as a cop, but we’ve got to get back to the station if we want to stay cops. Lieutenant will give us an earful if he knows how long we’ve been running around without a security drone.”
Ana trudged down the stairs. She didn’t care what the lieutenant thought while Roy was still missing and his life might be at risk. “Are we going to at least stick around until a team gets here to check things out?”
“Sure, if it’ll make you happy.”
Miguel stood near the hole in the wall on the first floor. Ana tried to wait beside him, but her mind raced among images of the enhancer they’d found dead and Roy and Lamont and a thousand gruesome scenarios evoked by her increasingly paranoid imagination.
“I’m just going to take another walk.”
Miguel arched an eyebrow. “All right, if you want.”
She strolled back from where they’d entered the house. A thought struck her, and she cursed herself for not thinking of it earlier. The hole in the wall appeared to have been made from the inside out. And if she followed the trail of destruction around the first floor, it brought her to the dining room, where the furniture lay in shambles by the wall, and back toward the stairs. None of the dusty tables or pots with dead plants near the front door appeared disturbed, though.
Maybe someone came in through the door and the fight—or whatever happened—didn’t start until they reached the dining room.
But the dust covering the front hall lay undisturbed. No footprints, no sign of recent activity. She crouched to examine the area around the stairs and traced her hand across the bottom step. Her finger caught on a tiny splinter, and she squinted. The middle of the step buckled up. Not down, like she would expect from years of wear.
Closing the one eye with the night-vision lens, she pulled a flashlight from her utility belt and examined the stairs. The boards were slightly cracked, revealing fresh yellow wood like a broken wound. The first four steps leading to the second floor all appeared similarly injured.
“Miguel!” she called.
Miguel rushed to her side, his stunner out. “What’s wrong?”
“You still got your NV lenses in?”
He nodded.
“Can you see these splinters? The busted stairs?”
He leaned in closer. “Yeah.”
“Kind of seems like something was trying to get out from under them, doesn’t?”
“You might be right. What do you think...” He trailed off and crouched beside her.
Ana walked her fingers under the lip of the first step until they hit something plastic. She pressed her index finger to it, and the first four stairs popped open like a clamshell. Sparks fell from a broken holodisplay near a stone staircase leading down into the darkness.
“The trail of destruction continues.” Ana gestured to the wires and plastic remnants of the holodisplay. “I’ll bet someone wanted out of this place, and they broke that electronic locking mechanism to get the stairs open.” She examined a couple of steel rod contraptions. “Looks like there’s a mechanical lock, too. We’re lucky it was left unsecured.”
“Christ.” Miguel shook his head. “You’re going to tell me you want to go down there, huh?”
“You know me well.” She felt reassured that Miguel was willing to entertain her feverish need to explore and find something—it was for his willingness that she considered him a great partner.
She took out her stunner and descended. Wood splinters and stone rubble covered the stairs. When they reached the bottom, a vast space expanded before them. A bevy of laboratory machines, glassware, and holocomputers buzzed on several tables on one side. An examination table, like one in a doctor’s office, lay near a set of drawers. On the opposite wall, a series of chain-link partitions sectioned off the concrete floor. They looked like dog cages.
Ana approached the partitions. One puckered open, the chain links torn and bent. Inside, a spring mattress lay in one
corner, and a plastic bucket full of refuse lay in another near a pair of broken handcuffs. She stifled a gag, and her stomach twisted into a painful knot.
These weren’t dog cages; these were for people. At once, she felt nauseous and angry, wondering what went on in this hellhole.
A slight rasp caught her attention. She and Miguel spun, their stunners playing across the cages. A pile of blankets moved. Ana jumped toward the cage entrance. She rattled the door, but it was locked.
A face appeared from under the ragged cloth, bruises across it.
Ana’s heart sank. It was Roy. Even through the grainy night-vision contact lens in her left eye, she could see the blood trickling from his nose and mouth, his eyes swollen shut. His lips trembled as if he was trying to say something. They’d found him alive, but battered. Relief intermingled with rage as Ana stared at her friend.
“Roy, it’s Ana.” She knelt and stuck an arm through the cage. “We’re here to help you.”
He dragged his body toward her, his nails scratching against the floor. His voice came out in another rasp.
“Roy...” She looked up at Miguel. “Find something we can tear this cage open with.”
“Got it.” Miguel darted to the laboratory equipment, and the noise of clattering tools echoed against the underground chamber’s walls.
A form moved in one of the other cages. Ana leveled her stunner as a woman shed her tattered blankets and shook the chain-link partition. “They’re here for us!” Her voice wailed, and Miguel ceased his racket. “They’re here and they’ll take us!” Her hair was matted, and dirt clung to her skin. Yet underneath the mess, her muscles rippled. Track marks scarred her left arm.
Ana first figured the woman for a druggie. But the muscles fit the description of an enhancer. She glanced around at the laboratory, and Miguel again scoured the drawers and tables for a tool to cut through the chain links. The air smelled ripe with body odor and neglect.
The woman’s eyes caught Ana’s. “They poke us and prod us. Poke and prod. Pick us up from the street to poke and prod.” She reached out, her fingernails scraping Ana’s skin. “Are you one of them?”
Everything began to fit in Ana’s mind, and the realizations revolted her. These people were test subjects. This laboratory was a site for human experimentation. She eyed the broken cage. Lamont and the dead enhancer must have been residents here until one led an escape.
Roy’s fingers curled around the chain-link partition. Blood bubbled out from his nose. His voice again came out quiet and weak.
Ana leaned toward him. “What, Roy? I couldn’t hear you?” She wrapped her fingers around his.
He brought his head closer to hers, his limbs trembling and the muscles in his face twitching. “They’re here. Turn around.”
Chapter 8
Ana spun, her stunner leveled. An enormous man wrapped his arm around Miguel’s neck and pressed a gun to her partner’s temple. Miguel curled his fingers around the man’s forearm but couldn’t peel away his grip. Dread filled Ana as she watched her partner struggle.
A more slender man in a suit stood next to him. Despite the pervasive darkness, he wore a pair of aviator sunglasses. In another situation, Ana might have laughed at the man’s ludicrous fashion sense, but no such sound escaped her lips. She aimed her stunner at him.
He held up a single finger, his demeanor cool and collected. “Awfully brave of you to threaten me with that thing. You can shock me if you want, but you may as well put the bullet in your partner’s head yourself.” The suit stepped toward Ana. “Hand it over.”
She said nothing, keeping the stunner aimed at the man’s chest. She wondered how fast she could stun him, then readjust her aim and take down the brute keeping Miguel hostage.
“No.”
“Daniel,” the suit said. “Go ahead, now.”
Daniel, the foreboding man holding Miguel, kicked him to the floor and pressed a boot into his back. Miguel groaned but made no move to escape. While keeping his pistol aimed at Miguel, Daniel scooped up his stunner. He squeezed it in his right hand, and it crumpled like a child’s toy. Opening his fingers, he let the mangled heavy-duty plastic weapon fall.
Ana swung her stunner and fired at Daniel. The man’s body trembled, and he lost his grip on his pistol. The weapon tumbled away.
The suit charged Ana. She readjusted her aim, but he tackled her before she could get off a shot. Her head cracked against the concrete floor, and he landed a jab across her jaw. Her vision swam, and she flailed out, one fist slamming against the suit’s face. He stumbled back as she rose to a knee. She spotted her stunner and dove for it.
Before she reached it, Daniel lifted her body and heaved her into one of the metal cages. Her body crumpled, and not even adrenaline could neutralize the pain coursing through her. She pressed one palm against the cold floor in an effort to lift herself. Her arm slipped out from under her, and she fell again.
Daniel approached, his hulking form obscuring her field of vision. Then his eyes went wide, his limbs trembling. He collapsed.
Miguel stood behind Daniel’s fallen body, the stunner still in his hands. “Ana, you okay?” He offered her a hand to help her up.
“Miguel!” Ana yelled. She pointed to the suit, recovered and pulling a pistol from his waistband.
The man fired several times. Each bullet smashed against Miguel’s torso and, wide eyed, he stepped back, then fell, the stunner clattering on the floor. His polymeric body armor would protect him from mortal injury, but she could only imagine the pain swelling in his chest from the brutal impacts.
She crawled toward the stunner. A shoe crunched her fingers. “Not going to happen,” the suit said. Miguel groaned and brought himself up. The suit pistol whipped him, and his eyes rolled back. His head hit the ground with a sickening thud.
“Get your ass up.” The suit grabbed Daniel’s shoulder. Daniel, undoubtedly an enhancer, seemed just as impervious to the stunner’s debilitating shocks as Lamont had. “Gather up your supplies and let’s move.”
Ana blinked, desperate to regain her vision. Agony crashed inside her skull like a summer thunderstorm. She tried to raise herself up by clinging to the metal cage, but she couldn’t muster the strength.
Daniel pulled her handgun from her holster and slid it into his waistband. Then he gathered boxes of lab supplies and packed them into a large canvas bag. He showed its contents to the suit. “Happy? You’ve seen this shit work, so how about my money?”
“You aren’t getting your money until everything’s delivered and this mess is cleaned up.” The suit waved a hand toward Miguel, Ana, and the cages.
“Fine.” Daniel zipped up the bag and lugged it over his shoulder. “I’m not going to go down for killing two cops, though.”
The suit stopped and trained his gun on Daniel. “You let two of your subjects escape tonight. We found one, and the second is in custody. Now, you’re foolish enough to pick up another subject and lead the cops right back here.” He shook the pistol. “We clean this mess up together or I kill you and leave you here with their bodies.”
Ana reached out, desperate to retrieve her stunner. Pain coursed through her limbs. A distant wail of sirens permeated the lab. Daniel and the suit exchanged glances.
“What about the two in the cage?” Daniel asked. “Don’t you need me to bring one? How else am I supposed to show your partner what my enhancements do?”
The suit leaned toward Daniel, his lips peeled back into a snarl. “Inject it in yourself.”
“No way.” Daniel glanced at Miguel. “How about a fresh subject? You can see the enhancements take hold in real time.”
A menacing grin spread across the suit’s face. “All right. Bring the cop. But let’s hurry.”
“And the other?”
“We only need one, right?”
Daniel nodded.
“Then torch her along with everything else.”
Ana reached out and drew herself into a crouch. The suit whipped out his handgun
and fired at her until he’d emptied his weapon. Several of the shots went wide, but enough slammed into her chest to send her flying backward. It felt as though a bull had impaled her.
Daniel stomped toward Miguel and hoisted the officer’s limp body under his arm like a child carrying a stuffed animal. He ran up the stairs, threw a small spherical object into the lab, and exited the basement with the man in the suit. The stairway door slammed shut behind them, and the physical metal locks let out an audible click.
The sirens grew louder; backup was close. Ana brought herself to her knees. Her fingers, weak and shaking, fought for purchase as she clawed at the wall to hoist herself up again. She stood, her knees trembling. She probed her chest under the bulletproof vest. Her flesh felt tender, and waves of pain rocked her body, but she was alive and, as far as she could tell, not fatally injured.
“It’s over,” the woman in the cage said. “It’s all over. We’re done. It’s over.”
Ana watched the baseball-sized sphere. It had rolled to a rest against the patient examination chair. It made no noise, gave no indication of what came next. Maybe it was a dud. She stepped forward. Pain shot up her legs with each step. She reached to the back of her head, and her fingers came away wet with blood.
“Ana.” Roy’s voice was clearer, louder than before. “Ana, you okay?”
He stood in his cage. The bruises in his face seemed to have healed. The swelling seemed to have dissipated. Was her mind playing tricks?
She hadn’t had time to consider the thought for long when the metal sphere exploded in hot tongues of flame. The bright light blinded the eye still holding a night-vision lens, and she flicked the lens out. Fire leapt to the examination table, illuminating the room in a harsh orange glow. Acrid smoke plumed and covered the ceiling.
The Black Market DNA Series: Books 1-3 Page 80
