Several other soldiers came in, led by another high-ranking officer. Christina recognized him as detective Garrett, whom James had mentioned. Dante turned to him and smiled slightly.
“Ah detective,” Dante said, “good work. When this is all over, you’ll be rewarded for your efforts.” The detective nodded slightly.
“Sir,” the detective said, “what are your orders for my men?” The detective motioned to the group of six soldiers behind him, all who were heavily armored and carrying high velocity rifles. Dante thought for a moment before answering.
“You’re an elite unit; guard the girl as our last line of defense," Dante said. “The hunter will be targeting her for rescue. If all else fails and it doesn’t look like we can stop him, kill her." The detective nodded in compliance, as did the men behind him. The detective turned to the men behind him.
“You heard him,” detective Garrett said, “I want all of you to surround her; follow your training.” The men turned and walked towards her, surrounding her. The detective stood in front of them, his right hand staying motionless on his firearm. He looked at the other soldiers that were already in the room. “The rest of you not in my unit stay on that wall.” He motioned to the wall across from them in the office. The guards complied silently, standing in front of the bookcase that covered the wall opposite of Christina.
Dante had left the room for a moment with the others, but soon returned alone. He continually checked the rounds in his pistols. He ejected one cartridge, examined it and then returned it. He did the same with the others. Medea came into the room, examining the office with her eyes.
“The others want to know where they should position themselves,” Medea said. "You were always the more strategically minded.”
“It really doesn’t matter,” Dante said, “as long as they close enough to this room that they can reach it in a short amount of time. I want to face him first, but they can join in when they see fit.” He pointed at the window in the back of the office. "He can’t enter this window; it’s six inches of bulletproof glass. The entire building is bullet proof glass, steel, or concrete. It’s one of the few structures on this side of Capitol District that doesn’t have all the windows shattered from that fusion cell explosion earlier.”
“So all we can do now is wait,” Medea said.
“Yes, wait for him to come. Then we’ll intercept him, and stop him. He can’t handle all of us at once, not on our terms. You have extra pistols, don’t you? We’ll need them. Neither of us can fight with telekinesis like the others can, so we’ll have to use the guns. These smaller, high velocity rounds Lucien made have the same effect as the high velocity rifles, but can be fired in a standard pistol. The only problem is that the pistol can only handle two or three clips before it jams the gun, or melts it.”
Medea nodded at his instructions, and turned to go check her own supplies. Dante checked his pistols once more and, satisfied, placed them in his holsters. His gray suit jacket was folded on the desk. Callahan still sat there quietly. Christina glared at both Dante and Medea. Dante glanced over at her, seeing the look on her face. He grinned slightly at her.
“I’m sure you hate me. I mean, I would if I were you,” he said. He stood still for a moment, and then walked towards her.
“Why are you like this; why are all of you like this?” Christina asked. He seemed to be taken aback by the question. He thought for a moment.
“We’re like this because of you, because of all of you. We’re the consequence. At least, that’s what we’re told. I really don’t care about that. All of us are different, and we have different motivations.”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, Wolfgang wants to be the strongest, the most powerful. That’s pretty easy to see. His sister, Damaine, wants to be like him. She’s his shadow, his partner. They’re twins, and really they’re two halves of the same mind. I have a connection in the mind’s eye that is hard to explain. I have a theory that if one of them died, the other would, too.” He chuckled for a moment.
“Medea and Lucien, they believed Father, I mean really believed him. That is, until recently. I think they’re starting to see what is really going on. What the real rules of this game are.”
“Ares, well, he knows the rules, and has known the game for a long time. He knows and accepts it. More than that. He delights in it. He doesn’t have rage, hate or anger. He is a sadist in every definition of the word. He just wants to cause others pain.” Dante stopped, thinking about his words.
“What about you?” Christina said.
“Me? I just want to survive. I’m alive, and that’s served me so far. Please don’t take this personally, because I’ve actually enjoyed seeing what James has been capable of. Unfortunately for him, for all of you, Father will be awakened tomorrow, and his plan will go into action. First they’ll crush the rebellion. Then he’ll take humanity to a place they’ve never been before. It has been set in motion and is destined to happen. I’ve seen all of it, and you all have no hope.” Christina couldn’t help herself, but she started to chuckle slightly at him. She smirked, despite her swollen lip.
“What’s so funny?” He looked at her condescendingly.
“He’ll come here,” Christina said, “and he won’t die. Do you know why?” Her pause was short, “Because freeing everyone from this city is what he was meant to do. You talk about this plan having been set in motion. Well, he was the plan set in motion so long ago to stop all of it.” Dante smiled slightly at her statement.
“Ah fate,” he said, “let me tell you something about fate. It was fate that led Father to the xenos. It was fate that gave him his calling. That’s what he told us.”
“You don’t believe that, do you?”
“In fate, providence. In God?” Dante said, “no, of course not. What kind of lunatic would believe there is a greater being that cares about all of you at all? If God does exist, He has a cruel sense of humor. Belief in God is a relic from an age when people still had hope to cling to. Now all you have is bitterness, violence. Death.” He held up a small data screen he’d pulled from his pocket.
“We found this on your person. I don’t know where you got this, but this is forbidden literature in this city. Father went through great effort to erase all ties to your past.”
“If there’s no God, then how do you explain James?” Christina said, cutting Dante short. “Every bit of planning all of you have done has been countered, undone. It wasn’t God that allowed Civic Protection to kill so many people under your rule. It was Father. It was Michael. It was all of you. It was God who allowed so many of us to be saved from your corruption. It was God that protected James when he was just an infant from the soldiers who were sent to his home to kill him. It was God that allowed James to not only survive a building collapsing around him, but also giving him the strength and power to defeat all of you.
“That’s not the God I read about in your forbidden book,” Christina said, “the God I read about would do anything to help us, to save us. It was God who did find a way to save us despite all the evil that you do, and that Father has done. God found a way to turn your evil into something good. Destroying a building full of good people, creating a creature that could turn anyone into a soldier. The evil you meant for that, turned into the good that is James.” Her face was resolute, defiance in her eyes. “With all the things you and your kind have done to try to crush us, there is still a resistance. There is still hope. How can you explain that?”
“Tonight that resistance will die, along with your hope,” Dante said. “I’m sorry.” His face had a grimace on it as he turned to walk out of the room.
81
In the sky there were no stars, no clouds, just the flat blackness that enveloped the night sky. James was looking up, staring into the darkness. He focused on it, seeing the xeno in his mind stirring. It wanted to be free. He shook his head to himself as he looked forward.
He could see the spire of the capital, standing higher than all the other buildings in the night horizon.
The building he stood on wasn’t as tall as the capital, but it was high enough. It was also very long and narrow. The roof was a dark concrete, with ducts and air systems standing all over the place. James was about six buildings from his destination, and he knew the fallen and a lot of soldiers were waiting for him. He didn’t feel fear though; just a focus on what he needed to do.
He started running forward on the roof, remembering how he could use his abilities to make himself run much faster than a normal human. He felt the wind blowing on his face, and he leapt from the edge, jumping nearly twenty meters in the air and landing on the ledge of the next building. Without stopping he kept going and willed the xeno to cover his body as the Hunter. The metal pulsed in excitement, ripples visible even on his jacket. Even his hands morphed into the armored claws. Parts of this rooftop were uneven from the rest, like giant steps made out of concrete. He jumped down them with ease, almost feeling like a blur. He finally reached the edge of the building, and jumped off. He folded his arms and legs as he dove through the air, and in two seconds he spread them as he opened up his wings.
He was flying through the air at a downward slope, his velocity steadily increasing. He quickly shifted his wings to make a right turn around a building. The turn was so sharp that he had to run his armored feet along the side of the structure for a moment to push off. He finished the turn and made it around the building, at which he repeated turning left as he flew towards the next structure. He dodged the next three just the same, weaving back and forth between the buildings.
He finally reached the capital and was about ten floors from the ground level in the air. He scanned the building with his mind’s eye, seeing into its structure, searching for Christina. He hadn’t been able to sense her since the fallen had taken her captive.
The entire building was an entire blank space in his mind’s eye. He knew they were hiding their presence, as well as everything else in the capital. The streets below were quiet, blocked off and empty due to Civic Protection. He was quickly approaching a window on the tenth floor, and he could tell that this wasn’t an ordinary glass window. It was thick, probably bullet proof. He realized they were expecting him to enter somewhere below, where there wasn’t such armor.
As he approached the window, he tightened his fist. He focused his mind on it like he had done with his legs. If I can focus hard enough, he thought, I can break the glass. He felt his power build in his fist, beginning at the tips of his fingers and pulsing through his knuckles and wrist. His body was already stronger, but now he was able to test it. As he reached the window, he plowed his fist into the glass. His fist broke a two foot circular hole through it. He grabbed the edges of the window where it had broken, and pulled with all his might while bracing himself on the wall of the building with his other arm. There were some pops from bolts and screws as he tore the window off and held it in one hand. He then released it, letting it fall to the ground below him.
He swung inside, entering a small office. It was dark on this floor. He walked quickly to the door. It was locked. He took one step back and kicked down the door.
No more sneaking around, he thought as he ran down the hallway towards the elevators. As he arrived, he grabbed both doors with his clawed hands. He forced them open, hearing the creaks in the metal and the grinding of gears as the doors fought to remain closed. Once they were open wide enough, he jumped into the shaft. He grabbed a metal beam on the wall of the shaft, and started climbing up it. The elevator had been disabled, but he knew where he was headed. Now we’ll all see if they can stop me.
82
Dante had remained in the mayor’s office, but was outside where he could be away from Christina. She knew she’d gotten to him, and he was now deep in thought. The double doors to the office had remained open, although she couldn’t see into the lobby from the corner where she sat, handcuffed. Medea walked quickly up to Dante right outside. It was easy to hear her speak.
“We have a problem,” she said, “surveillance picked up our enemy when he flew near the building, but then they lost him.” Dante turned to her, surprised.
“What do you mean they lost him?”
“They found a shattered window on the pavement on one side of the building; it was one pane of the armored windows that covers this entire building. He was able to break right through. From the outside they found an office on the tenth floor missing a window.” Dante smiled slightly, impressed.
“Looks like he’s already here, keep an eye open.”
“Everyone was already on full alert; they have been since we started this.” They looked at each other for a moment, and then at Christina. Then Dante looked at detective Garrett, nodding at him silently. The detective nodded back, understanding. Dante and Medea started to leave the lobby. Callahan, who’d been silent the whole time, looked up in confusion. Dante closed the double doors to the office as he left.
“Why did they leave?” Callahan asked. There was fear in his voice. The detective said nothing, but instead stared intently at Christina. There was a quiet dread until they heard a loud shot ring out from the hallway. They then heard muffled shouts, and suddenly there was a large crash on the double doors. The doors buckled slightly inwards, despite their thickness and weight. A second later there was another bang, which dented the doors further, to the point where they buckled inwards into the office.
One of the metal doors was hanging off the bottom hinge, slanted downward towards the floor. The other door had buckled in completely and was on the carpet. James walked in, his mouth and nose covered with the cloth-like metal, as the Hunter. Detective Garrett raised his pistol at Christina’s head, while his small elite group of soldiers followed in suit. The other attachment of soldiers lined against the other wall aimed their weapons on James. He stood there quietly for a moment, watching them all.
“You men know your orders,” detective Garrett said, “let’s do it.” Without hesitation, he turned his pistol away from Christina and toward James' direction. So did his troops. They all fired at once, but only for a short time. Christina then realized they were aiming for the soldiers behind James, against the other wall. The four men fell to the floor dead. James turned and looked at Garrett and the other six soldiers, slightly confused. The detective holstered his pistol, and walked around Christina, unlocking her cuffs. As soon as she was up, she and James rushed to each other and embraced. He put a hand on her cheek as he stared at her.
“I knew you’d come,” she said.
“I’ll always find you,” James said as he held her face for a moment. They released each other and turned to Garrett. Christina suddenly had an epiphany.
“You’re the mole,” she said to the detective, “you’re the one who’s been giving me information.” He nodded as he approached them.
“For decades I’ve been a member of a small group that has dedicated our lives to ensuring James’ safety.” Garrett looked at James calmly. “There were only three of us left, until Dr. Shepherd died. I believe you met the last one of us, and he’s the most unusual one.” James nodded, remembering Bill, who was one of the fallen who’d obviously defected. Callahan sat there silently. His quivering could be heard, though they ignored him.
They moved toward the broken doorway. There were several unconscious guards on the floor of the lobby that led to some more offices and the elevator. James was moving them towards a hallway with stairs. Then Garret stopped him.
“No,” Garrett said, “there’s another stairwell over this direction. It’s closed, but there’s nothing wrong with it.” James nodded. They quickly walked down the hallway.
“Did you know my mother?” James said as they walked quickly.
“Yes I did. You have no idea what she has done, what she sacrificed for you, James.”
“Did you know about the underground f
acility with Dr. Shepherd?"
“What underground facility?” a voice from behind them said as they reached the doorway of the staircase. It was Dante, who stood alone in the middle of the hallway. He looked at Garrett and glared. “So you’re the real traitor.” He raised his gun, aimed at the detective, and fired. James could see it coming, however, and he pulled the man out of the way just in time. They could feel the force of the shot, and it tore a hole in the wall a foot in diameter. Dante stared for a moment in surprise. "Wow, these pack quite a punch.” He smiled as he held up his two pistols at them. James stepped forward.
“Your fight is with me," James said. He walked slowly and deliberately towards Dante. Dante stared at him, and smiled.
“I’d hoped I would get to know you,” Dante said. Garrett and the others quickly moved to the stairs, exiting through the doorway. Dante saw them leaving, but let them go. “It’s a long way down to the floor,” Dante said, “do you think they’ll make it before one of us stops them?”
“I’ll always be between you and them,” James said. Dante nodded. He raised his pistols towards James slowly.
“We’ll see,” Dante said. After he spoke, he held his pistols up and began charging towards James. James had his claws grow an extra six inches as he charged as well. Dante began firing, each round tearing through the air with the equivalent force and velocity of a tank round. James dodged them, using his mind’s eye to predict the trajectory of each round as he watched Dante’s aim.
His back was arching, and he was weaving left and right as he ran towards Dante. The walls of the hallway behind him were being torn apart from the rounds. James moved quickly to his right, kicking off the wall and clawing into the ceiling for a moment, and then the opposite wall. They were close now. He was just in reach to pierce Dante when he felt a force come from his left. A powerful telekinetic blast knocked James into the wall, throwing him through it.
City of Twilight Part II: The Fallen (The Vanguard Chronicles Book 2) Page 16
