Ways of Darkness (Wolves of the Apocalypse Book 2)

by LC Champlin

  Mikhail deserved their abuse least of all. With chills of righteous rage rolling over his chest, Nathan spun to face Red. “If you laid a finger on them—”

  “Me?” Red put a hand over his heart in mock shock. “They ain’t done nothin’. Have they, Sarge?” He looked over Nathan’s shoulder.

  A presence loomed behind, charging the air with foreboding. “No, Chief.”

  “I learned you your lesson, and you’re behavin’ real nice, so they’re reaping the grand rewards of your wisdom. Now, tell ’em what’s what, boy.”

  Just as soon as somebody told Nathan what was what. A few kennels down, movement—The padlocks that secured chains to the inside of the cages rattled. Other hostages / slaves? Nothing he could do about them right now.

  “Shut that shit down,” Red barked at the prisoners. The locks fell still.

  Nathan cleared his drought-dry throat as it tried to stick closed. “Everyone, Esau Seir and his Red Devil Goats made us an offer. We can be useful to each other.”

  Red gave a nod. “Y’all heard yer fearless leader. Hang together or hang separately. Now”—he clapped his hands as he sauntered toward the cages—“it’s up to y’all to ponder on how you can serve the greater good. That is, our greater good.” Gesture to the surrounding mercs.

  The tomahawk’s blade glinted in the spotlights as he deployed it. “You.” He pointed at Mikhail, casting a shadow like a demonic twin. “Whatcha got for me?”

  The Russian raised his eyes from the stain. Impassive. Dead. “Red. You called me a ‘Commie,’ but you are the one who sounds like a Communist.”

  Leave it to the engineer to choose the wrong time to take a stand. “Mikhail—”

  “No.” Esau held up a hand. “It looks like he’s got balls in there after all.”

  “Bullies are all the same. Call yourselves chiefs, ministers, generals, but you’re no better than barbarians pushing around people who are weaker than you. Your fear is of your prey, your sheep, turning on you.”

  With a lopsided smile behind his beard, Esau swaggered up to the chain-link gate. He dragged the tomahawk blade over the wire—clink, clink, clink. “Then you know the drill, Comrade.”

  With a shuddering sigh, Mikhail nodded. “I am a hardware engineer. You have drones, you have remote explosives. I can improve them.”

  “You know how to make perogies? Throw that in with the techy shit and you’re golden.”

  Mikhail returned to studying the blotch on the floor, a sight more absorbing than the mercenary chief.

  “Next we got you, sister,” Red drawled as he moved to loom over Josephine’s kennel.

  Straightening from her slouch against the fence, she kept her arms folded and her chin up. “Why did you take us hostage? You have the files now. Are you going to demand a ransom? I—”

  “Shut it! I let the Ruski have his soapbox, but that ran me fresh out of fucks for your questions. Now tell me, succinctly, why I should keep you this side of a shipping container.”

  A wave of fury washed over Nathan, out into his limbs. Soon, very soon, he would bury the tomahawk in this motherfucker’s skull. “Josephine, answer—”

  “Boy!” Esau rounded on Nathan, ax held out from his side, his hair glowing in the lights. “Interrupt one more time and I’ll put you down.”

  “They’re my people.”

  “They’re all big gals now; they gotta answer for themselves.”

  Biting back a fuck you, Nathan glared, shoulders back.

  “Go on, missy.” Tomahawk aligned with reporter like a judge’s gavel pointing at a condemned prisoner.

  She hissed a sigh of frustration. “I can make you look good on the news. I’m not making you a sandwich, though.”

  “Real spit-fuck-fire, this one!” Red laughed. “You’re good lookin’ too, in a yuppie kinda way. Bet you look even better naked—”

  Motherfucker!

  The tomahawk stopped Nathan mid-stride. “What did I just say? Relax, boy.” Then with a triumphant curl of his lip, Red meandered over to Albin’s cell.

  Fists balled against the tremor of adrenaline, vision tunneling onto Albin with laser focus, Nathan followed.

  “Last but not least, Hotshit’s best bud. Whatcha got for me, Blondie? You can’t lawyer your way outta this.”

  At the end of his chain, Albin remained motionless against the back wall. The attorney’s attitude represented an absolute void of emotions.

  “Well?” Snapping forward, Esau slammed the tomahawk against the gate, level with Albin’s skull.

  Nathan flinched.

  Nothing from Albin. For all the indications of life he showed, he may have died hours ago, but now remained upright through rigor mortis.

  Behind Esau, Nathan raised his brows and spread his arms slightly in encouragement.

  “In that case,” Albin grated, “my only marketable skill is brewing coffee and sweet tea.” The last word came out with the Southern pronunciation, tay. His expression never changed.

  Chapter 65

  Bread and Circuses

  War of Change - Thousand Foot Krutch

  Nathan blinked. What the fuck just happened? Had Albin really just sold himself as barista for the barbarians? And more unbelievably, Red had accepted.

  Red spun on his heel to face Nathan. “That leaves you.”

  “Chief,” Sarge barked, striding up the aisle from the rear of the kennel. “We’ve got a problem in Redwood Shores.”

  “Damn it!” Clang! Tomahawk struck kennel support. “Those rich shits wouldn’t know a good offer if it bit ’em in the ass. What’d they do now?”

  “It’s what they’re not doing.” Jaw jutting out like a bulldog’s, Sarge halted before his leader. “They’re not taking their roadblocks down. They’re also not collecting supplies for us.”

  Roadblocks and supplies? A community? Redwood Shores . . . Of course, one of the affluent Silicon Valley neighborhoods!

  “I ain’t got time for this smartass shit.” Red rolled his shoulders, ax flashing as he tossed it from hand to hand. “Deal with it.”

  “Yes, Chief.”

  “Let’s go chew the fat.” Motioning for Nathan to start toward the door to the dog-grooming hall, Red holstered the tomahawk.

  What the hell was going on? Nathan found himself moving as ordered back down the hall, through the pools of lamplight. Esau directed him into a back room, which held a wall of crate-sized kennels like those vet offices used for overnight patients.

  Keeping himself between the open door and Nathan, Red entered. “Let’s deal, boy. Sell me.”

  “All right.” Nathan’s mouth remained dry from Albin’s interview. What problems could he solve for the monster? Wait. Of course! “Redwood Shores seems to be a bother. Tell me about your problems there, and I’ll help you resolve them.” Opportunity hid in every obstacle if you put the effort into chipping the diamonds out of the stumbling block.

  “Fuck, you are a salesman, ain’t ya?” Red snorted. “Remember the Vikings? Or the warlords in them Third-World hellholes? That’s us.” He slapped the goat insignia on his shoulder. “Silicon Valley here is ripe for the taking. We gotta have bases, supply lines, that kinda shit, though.”

  “Like the Viking colonies.”

  “For us, Oakland is like the Orkneys was for the Vikings. Thanks to the People’s Republic of Cali’s gun restrictions, the shithole is a paradise for gun runners like yours truly. It bein’ an international port makes it a honey of a trafficking nest, too.” Human trafficking. “Usually we just facilitate poor immigrants in their shot at the American dream. For a price, of course.” The predatory grin flashed. “But now ransom for rich Muricans is the golden goose.

  “Oakland’s home sweet hellhole, but with the shit that’s going down right now, waltzing across the Oakland Bay Bridge or jettin’ across in a boat ain’t the cakewalk they used to be. The Valley here is new territory, too.”

  Raiders from Oakland. How unsurpr
ising. Sane people took the Oakland Bay Bridge rather than the Golden Gate to reach South San Francisco. It came with a caveat, however: don’t stop in Oakland. Ever.

  “The natives of the Valley aren’t welcoming, I gather.”

  Chuckling, Red scratched the back of his neck. “Problem is, they’re as plentiful as roaches and about as helpful.”

  “Why not spray for roaches?” It came across offhanded, but the thought made Nathan’s pulse thud into the hundreds. “It’s no fun being king over a cemetery, is that it?”

  “In the Middle East, them Jihadi camel fuckers use civilians as shields, setting up missile launchers in schools and such. Seems like ’at would work for us here, but it’s like herdin’ squirrels on crack to get them idiot Friscans to do what you want. Thinks it’s a sovereign country, does the Golden State. If the city folk was willin’ to lay down and take it, compromise that pride they got, that’d be fine.”

  Aiding and abetting Red could further Nathan’s cause of establishing a base of operations, not only for developing the data, but also for spreading order across the Bay Area. His kind of order. Proving useful to Red would also further the cause of surviving, period.

  Nathan crossed his arms to hide the hand that went to his ribs. “Make life a little safer for the people, and they will do what you want like good serfs. Look at their political constituents: the people will blindly support whoever gives them—”

  “Bread and circuses. ‘The People have abdicated our duties; for the People . . . now restrains itself and anxiously hopes for just two things: bread and circuses.’” Juvenal’s words from the mouth of a redneck?

  Red grinned in the wake of Nathan’s silence. “Long story short, you wanna make yourself a manager of the operation there, huh? A little lord? Seeing as you got skill in the management department and I ain’t got time for dealing with the human resources end of business, seems you landed yerself gainful employment with the Red Devil Goats.”

  “But why allow me?” Nathan blurted. By giving him a management position, Red also gave him the opportunity to interfere with the Goats’ plans.

  The chief’s grin cooled. “You got special qualities, let’s say. There are people who’d die to be in your position, if I hadn’t already killed ’em for fucking up.”

  Too easy, which suggested a trap. Not to antagonize the Goat and invite a butting, but—“Forgive me, but what qualities are so special?”

  Chapter 66

  Orientation

  Middle Finger - Bohnes

  Red sauntered toward the exit. “Let’s just say your nickname could be Pip, except your Mrs. Havisham don’t wear no wedding dress nor live in no haunted house.”

  Dickens’s Great Expectations? Red consistently defied expectations. “I have a benefactor?”

  “Eh, more like people what think you’re more useful in one piece. Come on, boy.” As Nathan moved toward the doorway, Red shoved him through.

  “Who is it?” Not Cheel, certainly. Another terrorist group looking for a high-value hostage?

  “Don’t be pushin’ your luck off a cliff, boy.” An order, not advice.

  They trooped back to the kennels.

  “Sarge,” Red called. “Hold off on Redwood. Hotshit here thinks he can talk the dumbasses into spreadin’ their legs.” Repulsive bastard.

  Esau’s gloved paw caught Nathan’s elbow and steered him back into the kennel area. “You’re doing real good, Nate. That lil’ roadblock on the ambulance ride here proved you had sense. A lotta people woulda tried to jump ship with the cavalry.”

  The relief of a near-miss rose. “That was a loyalty test?” A trick, but Nathan’s God-given mission to decipher the data and control the cannibals had saved him.

  Esau halted, stopping Nathan as well. “I’m gonna give it straight: I don’t cotton to this shit where I give a nice little announcement like, ‘A test of loyalty has been scheduled for 13:15 today. Bring your fake loyalty and sharpened number-two pencils.’ I know Smiley Cheel loves that fuckery, but that’s why he got blowed off a building, ain’t it.”

  “That and an RPG.”

  “Hey, Sarge, you was wrong about him.” Red waved over the bullet-headed soldier from a squad of mercenaries who guarded Albin, Josephine, and Mikhail. All three companions stood free of collars, free of injuries.

  As Esau and Sarge exchanged remarks, Nathan made eye contact with his companions. Albin’s demeanor and expression remained flat, reminiscent of a catatonic resident in the horror-movie asylums. Nathan averted his eyes to avert the pain. Josephine looked mutinous, with arms crossed and jaw jutting, while Mikhail’s affect hovered between serenity and surrender.

  “Aw right!” Esau yelled, marching to the center of the room, one hand raised. “Sarge, Buck, come ’ere. The rest of you fuckbuckets get back to business.”

  Across the room, Buck, aka the IT tech from Birk’s house, peeled from a squad of mercenaries as they filed out through the nearest doors. She skirted the civilians to approach her chief. She had a plain but handsome face, with brown eyes and an upturned nose. Her bandana hid her hair; only her coffee-brown brows revealed its color. If not for her black plate carrier and fatigues, she could pass for any twenty-something in Midtown Manhattan.

  With no one in range to beat him into the ground for moving, Nathan started toward his pack.

  “Fresh meat!” Red barked, rounding on him. “Circle up. That means all y’all,” he added when Albin and company pretended invisibility. “Hustle! You’re makin’ my meema look fast, an’ she’s eighty-three!”

  Wary, Nathan took point.

  Red clapped his hands once. “Time to get down to business. Hotshit’s gonna take the lion’s share. Ain’t that right?” He grabbed Nathan by the scalp, then shoved him back.

  Growling, Nathan recovered. The bastard would grow complacent eventually. Everyone did.

  “Now, what about the other dumbasses?” Esau addressed Buck, who looked on in boredom.

  “They’re too freaked out to do any good.” Others? Ah, the people in the kennels whom Red had silenced earlier. “We put them in a shipping container. Maybe they’ll settle down later.”

  “Guess they wanted to be hostages instead of help.” Shrug from Esau. “Let that be a lesson to y’all new recruits not to piss me off. You don’t wanna be fired from the Goats. Ain’t no benefit to bein’ unemployed here.” As he spoke, he patted the tomahawk. Would his anger over failure overrule his lust for ransom? And what of Nathan’s “benefactor”?

  “They had research backgrounds,” Buck snapped. “They were supposed to help me sort through the files.”

  “Y’all.” Esau’s finger swung to point at the newcomers in turn, a vast improvement upon the tomahawk. “My buyer’s offering a sweet pot, but if I know the specifics of them files, I can twist their arm for more. Threaten to sell them to another party, y’know? Hotshit”—thumb-jerk toward Nathan—“says him and his decrypted the files. They’ll help ya, Buck.”

  The pieces fell into place, but they felt off, as if several belonged to the wrong puzzle. “What about our other ‘jobs’?” Nathan began, slowly to avoid snapping. “Are we going to focus primarily on Birk’s files?”

  “Call ’em side gigs. A man ain’t workin’ if he’s only got the one job. Nope, y’all are gonna be figuring out how to get more greenbacks outta them files, but you’re gonna be doin’ what ya promised, too. I don’t give a rat’s ass how y’all do it, just make them files pay.”

  Esau Seir claimed a different homeland from Cheel, but he held the same goals: advantage, control, domination. The market the cannibals created grew like a vine, covering and strangling all in its path. Soon, it and its related economic sectors—pharmaceuticals, healthcare, defense, construction—would dominate the world’s interest. And its resources.

  “Then let’s not waste any more time,” Nathan agreed, not that they had a choice.

  “Buck, take Missy and Ruski. Sarge, you got Hotshit. Ambulan
ce Chaser, you’re with me.”

  Taking Albin? Nathan opened his mouth, but the tomahawk stared him into silence. It must have teleported into its master’s hand.

  “Take a breath and shut yer pie hole, boy. I’m in control here.”

  For the moment. Nathan held his tongue to keep from losing it.

  “You’re gonna be busy lil’ beavers!” the red fucker called over his shoulder as he headed toward the hall entrance. Behind him trudged Albin, showing no more emotion than the cannibals outside. The depression of defeat made true zombies.

  Buck jerked her head toward the nearest exit. “Go on.”

  Nathan started to turn—and jolted to a halt. The Sarge’s massive hand closed around the back of his assignment’s neck. Pain burst around the thumb and fingers that dug into pressure points. Nathan swung his arm up and over to break the grip as he pivoted to face Sarge.

  “Stop.” Sarge’s right hand closed to a fist at rib level.

  One, two, three—Would Sarge incapacitate the useful captive? No, but he could make life even more miserable.

  “You killed my men.”

  “You killed those DHS officers.”

  “Are you a cop lover or something? You had a DHS fuck’s wallet. Were you planning to give it to his next of kin? One of them save your life or something?” Sarge’s hand snapped out, closing on the side of Nathan’s neck.

  Nathan grunted from the pain that blossomed. Maintain eye contact. Nobody out eye-fucked him, especially not a power-hungry middleman.

  “The clusterfuck with the Army, Hotshit, was your fault because you wanted to call the shots. Understand this: the only person who calls my shots is Red Chief. You, though, take orders from all of us. Got it?”

  Eyes narrow, muscles burning to show his opinion of who called shots, Nathan hissed, “Yes.”

  “I didn’t hear you.” The last word came with a shake that rattled Nathan’s teeth.