Death Returns

by J. C. Diem

The glare of violet light blasted the doberclone to dust motes but sailed harmlessly through the spot where I’d been standing. My handy new talent had shifted me behind the robots so quickly that they hadn’t been able to detect my movement. My swords were a blur of motion again as I hacked them to death.

  Programmed by their Viltaran masters not to retreat, the remaining droids continued to attack me despite it being obvious that they were all going to die. Slicing the head off the final robot, I watched it sail over a fence into a front yard then gathered up the dropped death rays. I picked up a shirt that had been torn from a human as he’d transformed into an imp and used it as a crude carrying bag.

  Still slightly freaked out about what had just happened with the dog clone, I jogged back to my team. Higgins, Sergeant Wesley and the other team leaders had followed my suggestion and had organized the soldiers and civilians back into our original groups again. Maybe they’ll listen to my advice from now on. My thought was wry because humans always thought they knew best. I should know, I’d been one for twenty-eight years before I’d become a vampire. With a start, I realized that I would have turned forty this year. I’d lost an entire decade when we had drifted as frozen lumps through space. It was a small comfort that I would never look my age, not even if I lived to be a million. It scared me that there was a distinct possibility that I might live far longer than that.

  I was in a gloomy mood as I located Higgins and handed over the cache of weapons. “Did you kill them all?” he asked and was relieved when I nodded. “Can you tell how General Sanderson and his men are doing?”

  It was impossible to tell who was who when using my senses remotely but I could at least sense that the majority of soldiers were still alive. Six bright white dots still showed up clearly so I knew my friends were intact. “Most of them are fine. I think they’re using a similar tactic to ours.”

  The team leaders had switched to a different frequency so their orders wouldn’t get mixed up with Sanderson’s. The last thing we needed was the confusion of conflicting orders.

  Sweeping my senses back through the city, I gave a mental shudder at how many humans had already been converted into imps. Las Vegas had a far larger population than the town that had been attacked in Texas. Thousands of civilians had already been turned into monsters and hundreds more were being converted with every minute that passed. The droids were ignoring our attacks against their flanks. They were concentrating on the centre of the city where the vast bulk of people had congregated. If the Viltaran ship hadn’t been hovering right above us, I would have urged the Americans to bomb the city in a desperate attempt to contain the threat. It would be a useless venture, since the spaceship would simply zap any bombs that came its way out of the air.

  At least relief would come once the sun rose and the imps were forced to take shelter. The droids would have to search the casinos and hotels for fresh victims rather than shooting them down in the streets if they wanted them to survive. Our best tactic would be to keep chipping away at the edges then move in and destroy as many robots as possible once dawn arrived. I didn’t need to check the watch I didn’t own to know nightfall would give way to daylight in less than an hour.

  We’d worked our way from the suburban areas to a local shopping district when the sun peeked over the horizon and my time ran out. My helpfulness at stopping the droids had just come to an end for the day, unless I found protective clothing.

  Spying a motorcycle store, I crossed the road for a better look. A female mannequin wearing a full leather outfit and helmet caught my eye. I tested the door and found it securely locked.

  “Stand aside, ma’am,” a voice said from right behind me. “Let me help you with that.”

  Glancing over my shoulder, I saw one of my team members ready to lend assistance. With a shrug, I gave the soldier some room. Taking a step back, he launched a kick at the door and sent it crashing back against the wall. I cringed in anticipation of the alarm blaring in warning but none sounded. If it had, it would have drawn some nearby droids straight to us. I could easily have broken the door open myself but it was nice to be treated like a lady instead of a leper for once.

  The store was crammed with all types of clothing and accessories for those who liked to thumb their nose at death and ride motorcycles. I spent a few minutes browsing through the range of female clothing before deciding on an outfit. My reflection in the changing room mirror made me smile for a second before it withered and died. The black leather pants were tight and clung to me like a second skin. The matching jacket was a perfect fit and was tailored to make my waist look small and my bust bigger than it actually was. A picture of a dark haired angel was on the back. She held a sparkly red trident and horns sprouted from her forehead. A long tail with an arrow shaped tip was wrapped around one of her legs. It was as red as the horns and trident. A fingertip was caught between her teeth, giving the impression that she was deciding whether to be good or bad. I knew Geordie would get a kick out of it when he saw it.

  I found gloves and knee high boots to match the outfit then chose a plain black helmet with a heavily tinted visor to finish off my new look. It fit snugly enough that I might have become claustrophobic if I’d still been alive. My vision was sharp enough to see clearly through the dark visor. Now I just had to test the outfit in the sun.

  My hearing was slightly muffled but wolf whistles rang out when I stepped outside. I flipped the offending group of soldiers the bird and moved out of the shadows and into the weak dawn light. Apart from needing to squint slightly against the brightness, I felt no adverse effects of being bathed in sunlight. As long as I stayed mostly in the shadows, the leather would be thick enough to keep me from boiling down to the bone.

  Higgins gave me a grin of approval when I stepped up beside him. “I assume that’s you inside there, Natalie?”

  “It’s me,” was my muffled response.

  Rummaging around in his backpack, he held out two items. “One of the guys found these in a store that sells all kinds of weapons and accessories. He thought you might find them useful.”

  A pair of black sheaths rested in his hands. They were far plainer than the white pair I’d once owned. They’d been decorated with a lion and a dragon, to match the blades that had belonged inside them. The swords I now owned were as plain as these new sheaths so they were a good match.

  Taking his offering, I slid both samurai swords inside. They were slightly too long but I could wear them crisscrossed on my back for easy access. “They’re perfect. Tell your guy I said thanks.” One of the soldiers nearby ducked his head and studied his feet bashfully.

  “I’ll do that,” Higgins said dryly, subtly nodding at the bright red soldier who obviously wanted to remain anonymous.

  “The clones will have taken shelter by now,” I said to my temporary right hand man. “You should contact Sanderson so we can coordinate an attack against the droids. They’ll still use their death rays on us but they won’t be able to use their nanobot guns.” Not unless they wanted their newly made clones to instantly be burned to death by the sun.

  “Are you sure you don’t want to speak to him yourself?” He couldn’t see my upper lip curling at the offer so I shook my head. After changing his frequency, he spoke into his radio. “General Sanderson, do you copy?”

  “Is that you, Corporal Higgins?” Sanderson’s voice was gravelly from fatigue.

  “Yes, sir.”

  “How the hell did you make it into the city through the gas?”

  “We went under it, sir, through drainage tunnels.”

  “I bet that was Nat’s idea,” I heard Geordie say from somewhere in the background. My chest tightened at the sound of his voice. We’d only been apart for a short time yet I missed my friends already.

  “Give me a status update,” Sanderson demanded.

  “We have about ten thousand soldiers and civilians in our group and several thousand more behind us, General.” Higgins gave his report in a crisp manner, seeking no praise.
He was just doing his job and was trying to live up to the expectations of his commander.

  “What is your current location?”

  “We’re in the suburbs to the south, sir.”

  There was a rustle of paper as Sanderson consulted a map. “We’re to the north of the Strip. We haven’t been able to make much headway so far but now that the clones have gone underground we should be able to concentrate on the droids.”

  “That was our thought as well, General.”

  The pair spoke for a few more minutes about their strategy with Sergeant Wesley and the other team leaders occasionally chiming in. They rapidly came to the conclusion that we’d been following the same rough plan. Since it was working so well so far, it was decided that we would remain in our current teams and move in on the centre of the city to start taking down the automatons. By the time the rest of our troops arrived, we would have equal numbers to the droids.

  My hope that we would easily be able to wipe them out came to a halt when I sensed the Viltaran ship descending. “Hold on for a second,” I told Higgins as he was about to sign off. “The ship is moving again.”

  “What’s going on?” Sanderson asked.

  The ship didn’t quite land but it dropped down low enough for the robot army to pile inside. “We’re going to have to scrap our plan,” I told Higgins. “The droids have just boarded their mother ship and are already heading back into the clouds.” I half expected the ship to leave and find another city to torment but it stayed in position high above us. “It looks like they’re staying put, but we’re going to have to rethink our plan.”

  Sanderson cursed when he heard the report from his subordinate and I heard the rasp of his palm across his cheek again. “We’ll have to start targeting the clones instead. Can Natalie give us an idea of where they are located?”

  I shrugged at Higgins helplessly. “They’re pretty much everywhere.” The soldier’s shoulders slumped at that news. “There are still over fifty thousand Kveet imps and an additional thirty thousand human clones as well now,” I reported. “Most are underground but some are hiding in the buildings.”

  There was silence on the airwaves as Sanderson consulted with someone, probably Gregor. The general had a plan ready when he came back. “Break your people down into smaller teams of five hundred and distribute them around the centre of the city. Wait for my signal then we’ll send two thirds into the sewers and the rest into the buildings.”

  “I want to talk to-” Geordie’s strident voice was cut off before he could finish his request to speak to me. I told myself it was for the best as I trotted after Higgins. Fresh troops had just arrived and they would be sent to the front of the line to give the others a rest. Many of the humans who had joined our fight looked as if they were regretting their decision. Filthy and bedraggled, most were half asleep from exhaustion. Army medics tended those with injuries, mostly people who had been bitten or clawed by the Kveet imps. Anyone who came into close contact with the human imps tended not to survive the encounter. I doubted any of the civilians would be happy to hear that we would shortly descend into the bowels of the city and fight the imps in the dark and no doubt noisome tunnels. I was a creature of the night and even I wasn’t a fan of fighting in the cramped and lightless depths.

  ·~·

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  At night, Las Vegas was a breathtaking sight of ever changing colours from the millions of neon lights. During the day it was still impressive but far less dazzling. We jogged along the world famous strip and I craned my head back to take in the famous casinos. One in the shape of the Eiffel Tower caught my eye. I’d driven through Paris once and had seen the real thing, if only briefly as I’d driven by. Again, I had no time for sightseeing. A quick glimpse here and there was all I had time for.

  One feature I couldn’t help but notice was the fountains and mini lakes. There was far more water than I’d expected to see this close to a desert. Some of the more impressive fountains intermittently spewed jets of water high into the air and appeared to be dancing to a tune that I couldn’t hear. I spent a few moments gawping like a country bumpkin. I was glad no one could see me goggling in wonder behind the dark visor as we trotted past one casino after the other.

  Even through the visor, I smelled the smoke from a fire that had been caused by the plane crash. It had taken out the top half of a hotel, as well as one of the smaller casinos behind it. The plane had broken in half after impact and the back half was still lodged in the hotel. The upper half was buried in the casino, which was still smouldering in places. Sprinklers had stopped the fire from spreading but firefighters weren’t going to turn up to attend one disaster when their entire city was under attack.

  A few bodies lay strewn on the ground around the hotel. Some were soldiers that had fallen from the plane and the rest were civilians that had been in the wrong place at the wrong time. Smears of blood left a trail where some of the deceased had been dragged off to be eaten by human clones. Several stripped skeletons had been left behind by the Kveet imps. Higgins scanned the dead but made no move to check to see if they were still alive. Their bodies were torn, tattered and shattered from the collision. A glance was enough to know they were beyond help.

  After splitting into the groups of five hundred that Sanderson had recommended, we spread out to find access to the sewer system beneath the streets. Even with my protective layers of leather, the sun became uncomfortably hot when I moved out from beneath the shade for more than a minute. It was a big improvement from instantly melting as soon as the light touched me. I probably had the Viltarans to thank for my new resilience. Drinking their blood had strengthened all seven of us that had survived our unplanned trip to Viltar.

  Corporal Higgins had proven himself to be competent as a team leader so remained in charge of our group. He gestured for everyone to crowd around and cautioned the mixture of soldiers and civilians to use their ammunition wisely and not to shoot unless they could be fairly certain they would kill their target.

  We were standing beside a manhole without any shade nearby. The sun quickly grew unpleasantly warm on my back. I interrupted the soldier’s speech before my flesh could begin to melt. “Can we hurry this up? Some of us are allergic to the sun, you know.” A spattering of laughter rippled through our team.

  Thrown off his stride, Higgins couldn’t tell if I was joking or not since the helmet hid my face completely.

  “Your clothes are starting to give off steam,” someone told me helpfully.

  “Move,” I instructed the corporal. He shifted aside and I bent, flipped the manhole cover away with one hand and dropped through the opening. I landed in calf deep, foul water and was glad for the protection of the knee high boots.

  Moving away from the ladder, I took the helmet off and tucked it beneath my arm. It wouldn’t serve much purpose while we were beneath the ground. Cries, moans and screams echoed throughout the underground tunnel system. I barely needed to send out my senses to find the Kveet and human imps in the conduits around us. I hadn’t been exaggerating when I’d told Higgins that they were everywhere. Most were in much smaller groups than ours but some were in much larger herds. The larger groups had brought live snacks along. I tried to imagine how terrifying it would be for a fragile human to be dragged off into the sewers by a creature that looked like it had come from the depths of hell. The night I’d been captured by Silvius came back to me and I shivered. That event had been traumatic enough and he’d been human looking, until his fangs had descended.

  I counted seven small groups of Kveet imps between us and a force of nearly a thousand human imps and their two hundred or so captives. Higgins slid down the ladder and landed with a splash that narrowly missed me. He winced as a bloodcurdling shriek sounded in a distant tunnel. I felt a human life end a few seconds later.

  “I take it the clones have brought hostages into the tunnels?” the soldier asked shakily.

  “They aren’t hostages,” I corrected him. “They’re food.
” The imps wouldn’t be interested in negotiating a swap with their meals to save their own lives. They weren’t intelligent enough to even grasp the concept.

  Higgins gave me a pained look. “Do you think we have any chance of saving any of them?”

  More and more of our teammates descended the ladder, making enough noise to alert every imp within a few miles of our presence. “What do you think?” I asked him wryly. “Keep everyone here and try not to make any noise. I’m going to sneak up and take down the small groups of clones that are between us and the captives.” It would give us a far better chance of closing in on the larger group without being detected. It was doubtful we’d be able to rescue the captives but we had to at least try.

  “Give Natalie your radio,” my right hand man said to one of the soldiers. He handed it over and I slipped it into a pocket of my trendy new jacket. “Let us know when you’re in position and we’ll join you and help you to free the prisoners.”

  My helmet would be a hindrance so I tossed it to a civilian. “Can you look after this for me?”

  Fumbling the catch, she almost dropped it into the murky water and clutched it to her stomach. In her early twenties, she was short, plump and looked like I’d just handed her a treasure chest full of gold and jewels. “I’d be honoured to, ma’am!”

  With a nod at Higgins, I quietly sloshed my way down the tunnel. There were no handy walkways to keep me above the disgusting muck this time. At least my boots were tall enough to stop anything from getting inside and squishing between my toes. Been there, done that and I don’t want to do it again. I distinctly remembered chasing after the Second and his brothers in the sewers beneath a city in Africa. It had been in even worse shape than this one. Come to think of it, I’d been in far too many sewers for my liking.

  Soft cries from hungry Kveet imps floated to me as I closed in on them. Reaching an intersection, I peeked around the corner to see thirty clones standing waist deep in sewage. Huddled together, they blinked scarlet eyes sleepily. Red light illuminated the tunnel softly, ruining their night vision and helping to keep me hidden.