Apollo

by Madison Stevens

  Cassia had only gotten louder in her mind when she entered the gate.

  Something landed hard on the roof of the car, and a chill swept through her.

  Jenna slammed on the breaks. The creature rolled off the top and landed on his feet before them.

  “What the fuck is that?” Val shook as she spoke.

  The pale humanoid monstrosity hissed at them. His eyes were not quite right, feral, and glowed brightly, without the beauty she’d seen in Apollo’s eyes. The sight chilled her to the bone. Jenna hit the gas, but the monster only jumped onto the hood of the car.

  He stared down at them and licked his lips. He raised his hands, which were tipped with elongated nails, almost claws really.

  Jenna slammed on the breaks again and again, he rolled off on to his feet.

  Her heart kicked up into her throat as something jumped onto the back of the car.

  “We’re surrounded,” Val whispered.

  She screamed when gunshots again sprayed the area near car. The women grabbed one another and ducked. It was the only thing they could do.

  The gunfire halted, and the monster dropped off the car, landing on the ground with a thud. After several seconds, she was pretty sure it was dead.

  “Jenna?” someone called out.

  They sat up. Jenna climbed out of the car.

  Major Carter stood there, a pistol in hand.

  “Uncle Dave,” she said and wrapped her arms around the older man. His face was pale, and Val wondered if he had been shot.

  “My own damn men,” he mumbled into her hair.

  Val noticed that not all of them had jumped ship, given that several were close by and hadn’t opened fire on Major Carter, Jenna or Val.

  “Sir!” they called out, hurrying toward Major Carter. “Orders, sir?”

  “It will be fine,” Jenna said and hugged him.

  “No,” he said and shook his head. “It won’t be.”

  His words echoed in Val’s head, and she knew he was right.

  “Here,” he said and thrust his gun into her hand. The men surrounded him as he collapsed to the ground.

  “Uncle!” Jenna shouted.

  The older man held up a hand to stop her. “They need you. They could use another sharpshooter.”

  His eyes closed, and he slumped to the ground.

  Val could tell that she didn’t want to do this.

  Jenna stood tall and looked at a soldier standing next to her. “Corporal, you take him to the clinic, and don’t stop until you find Doctor Miller.”

  The man nodded, and it was clear he was loyal. These men would follow Major Carter to the ends of the earth.

  “The rest of you need to spread out,” she shouted. “We’ve got to take out as many of these traitors as we can.”

  The soldiers all exchanged glances. For a second Val wondered if they would balk at taking orders from Jenna, but given the insane situation, she was gratified when they all nodded.

  “We’ll make ‘em pay for Major Carter,” a younger soldier said.

  Val stared at the men. From a distance, they would never be able to tell who was on their side.

  “Your shirt sleeves,” Val said loudly. “Roll up the left one. Shoot any bastard without it that way.”

  They hesitated for a moment, as if she was asking them to tear off their arms, before they nodded and rolled up their left sleeves.

  Val turned to road and froze.

  “Val?”

  Chapter Fifteen

  Apollo gulped in deep breaths of air as she ran to him. She was safe. That was all that mattered. She was there in his arms and not dead on the side of the road.

  “What’s the assessment?” Rem cut in.

  His reunion was far less warm with Jenna.

  He glanced around, a faint frown on his face. The grinning playboy was completely gone now, replaced by the alpha.

  “The guards at the front have turned,” Jenna said. “There’s a fire at the school. My uncle is down.” Her voice shook.

  “Glycons?” Rem stared at her.

  She pointed to the ground.

  “Others?” he asked.

  Apollo frowned. “Others?”

  “What’s a Glycon?” Val asked.

  “You’ve seen some of those pale mutant hybrids? More beast than man?” Apollo asked.

  She nodded.

  “Those are Glycons. Horatius Group killers.”

  Rem shrugged. “There might be others.”

  Jenna shook her head, and Apollo let out a sigh.

  “The children?” Val asked.

  He looked down into her pale eyes and nodded.

  “Safe,” he said. “They are hidden away with Sol. Titus was going to the school. Lucius and Marius sent in a call that they were by the hospital. We should make our way to the gate and take these things out.”

  They nodded. He pulled a gun out of his pants and placed it into Val’s hands.

  “Have you ever used a gun before?” he asked.

  Her eyes were wild with fear as she shook her head.

  “Martial arts,” she said quietly.

  He nodded but pushed the gun back into her hands when she tried to give it back.

  “Keep it just in case,” he said. “You won’t be able to beat the Glycons hand-to-hand.”

  She swallowed and nodded once, her blue eyes clouded by fear.

  Apollo watched as she clutched the gun to her chest.

  * * *

  The road was quiet as they made their way to the front gate. She knew what was ahead, and yet it didn’t seem to ease the fears that hammered at her chest. Even far from the fire, the acrid smell of smoke assaulted her nose.

  Val glanced over to Apollo. His attention was all around them, and she was glad for it.

  They neared the front and bile rose in her throat. Hate and fear filled the air. The emotions, mixed with the copper scent of blood, made her stomach roll.

  “They are close,” Rem said, his gun at the ready.

  Val noticed how he kept Jenna on the inside near the center.

  A harsh growl cut through the air, and they froze.

  “How many?” Apollo asked.

  Rem shook his head. “Three, maybe more.”

  “Too many,” Apollo said and looked over to the other man.

  Apollo stepped in front of her and gripped her shoulders hard.

  “If any of them come at you, fire. Fire until you don’t have anything left. Don’t try to fight these things,” he said quickly. “You won’t be fast enough. If you get cornered, you run as fast as you can.”

  Val stared at him for a long moment before wrapping her arms around his neck and kissing him hard.

  “I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I’m so sorry,” she said again. The words burned as they came out.

  He shook his head. “Don’t think about that,” he said. “We survive, and then we deal with the rest.”

  Her heart thumped. If they survived this, she was never leaving his side again.

  Val jumped when Jenna racked the slide of her gun.

  “They are here,” Jenna whispered.

  Val looked into the line of the trees and swallowed.

  A scream ripped through the air, and for a moment, she wondered if it was her.

  She watched in horror as one of the Glycons ran from the trees, with two teens just ahead, sprinting.

  “Fuck,” Rem cursed and leveled his gun.

  “You’ll shoot them,” Jenna said. She lined up her own shot.

  The other Glycons in the line let out a scream and charged. Jenna turned her gun from the boys and aimed at the threat in front.

  Val swallowed and watched as the Glycon got closer to the boys with each passing second. Her breath hitched in her throat as the running teens came into more detail: Dean and Peter. She had to help them. There had to be something she could do.

  Val cursed and ran toward the boys.

  “Val!” Apollo screamed after her, but she couldn’t stop. They needed her. />
  “Peter,” she shouted. “Duck!”

  Peter dove over Dean and covered him with his body. Val opened fire, the sound of the shots ringing through the air. One of her bullets had to hit the bastard. No matter how fast they were, they weren’t bulletproof.

  The bullets whizzed past the angry man-beast, but his attention was now fully fixed on her. Val fired until the gun clicked, seemingly empty. She turned to run but found another Glycon stalking her from that direction. She glanced between the two and cursed.

  This was it. From what Apollo had said, there was no way she’d be able to use her martial arts, and outrunning them at this point seemed useless. She almost laughed. Apparently, the Horatius Group would get her in the end.

  She sucked in a breath as their rotten hatred passed over her. Bestial, primal, terrifying. She closed her eyes.

  A gunshot cracked through the air, and she opened her eyes.

  Apollo stood just on the other side of the Glycon as it fell.

  He shook as he made his way to her. It had been close, closer than he ever wanted to think about.

  Apollo raised his gun and aimed for the other Glycon that had been chasing the boys. It let out a piercing growl and lowered its shoulder, as if about to charge.

  He fired, and the monster went down with a thud.

  “Don’t ever do that again,” he yelled at her. “Some fights you can’t win.”

  She wasn’t listening to him. Val was already running to the boys.

  Apollo looked back at Rem and Jenna. There were still three Glycons left, but they had the situation under control.

  He chased after Val.

  Before she even reached the boys, he could see that things weren’t right. Peter hadn’t moved from his spot on the ground, and Dean still hadn’t sat up.

  The smell that reached him first. Death.

  “No,” he heard Val whisper. She dropped to the ground.

  Her sobs wracked her whole body as she wrapped her arms around Peter.

  It was too late. The vision of the Dean, dead in the grass, burned into his brain.

  Apollo neared the scene, and he swallowed hard. The boy had been cut multiple times. Running like he had only made the blood pump more.

  “We need to get back,” he said, the harsh words almost like acid in his mouth.

  Val stared up at him. Tears streamed down her face.

  “He’s gone,” she whispered.

  Apollo nodded. He would mourn later and had a feeling there were more dead than he cared to think of at the moment. The important thing now was to make sure more of their people weren’t killed.

  “Rem and Jenna need us,” he said quietly.

  Peter turned toward him. His face had lost all color. No emotion registered on his face as he stood, but Apollo couldn’t think about that at the moment.

  Val followed, and they moved toward the road.

  “Remus!” someone shouted in the distance as they made their way toward them.

  Apollo frowned as Rem looked around.

  “It’s time, Remus,” another man shouted. “Your brother is waiting.”

  Apollo clenched the gun in his hands as they neared the street.

  Two men came into view, not Glycon but not quite hybrid as well, definitely more bestial than human, their eyes glowing. They lacked the pale coloring and white hair of Romulus. Apollo grimaced at the idea that they perhaps had overcome both the Pale Man’s disadvantages and the simple mindless brutality of the Glycons.

  Apollo watched as Rem eyed the men.

  “He certainly took his time, Nero,” Rem said.

  Jenna inched closer to him as more Glycons stalked forward. Out of bullets, she tossed the gun to the side.

  The other man laughed at their situation. They were clearly outnumbered.

  “Oh, now, Remus, you know how he is,” the man said.

  Rem gave a bitter laugh. “I do.”

  The second man offered him a wide smile.

  “Bring the snack, and let’s go,” he said.

  Rem looked over to Jenna, who was shaking, her eyes wide with fear.

  “Eh, not my type,” he said and moved ahead of her a little.

  “Good,” Nero said and nodded to the door. “Let the pets have her, and let’s go.”

  “No,” Val whispered.

  Apollo could hardly believe it himself. All this time, and he had been right. Rem smiled and flirted, but the bastard had been with the Horatius Group all the time. He would kill the fucker. He would gut him for his part in all of this. He raised his gun. He couldn’t let that asshole get away.

  Gunfire suddenly ripped through the air from multiple directions, and Apollo pushed Peter and Val to the ground, wincing as a bullet struck his leg.

  He watched in horror as a Glycon made a grab for Jenna.

  Rem shot the creature in the head and yanked her away. He strolled through the bullets and stopped five feet from their position.

  “I’m sorry,” Rem whispered to Jenna and pulled her in for a hard kiss.

  When he pulled away, he shoved her hard toward their position on the ground.

  In the distance, several soldiers popped up above a sedan they were using as cover to fire a few shots at the Glycons and other soldiers near the gate. For some reason, they all had their left sleeves rolled up.

  “Move out!” the beast named Nero shouted as Rem crossed over to their side of the field.

  They loaded into cars with some of Carter’s men and slammed back out the gate in their stolen cars, still under fire from the apparently loyal soldiers.

  Apollo tried to keep his eyes open, but the wound on his leg had lost too much blood. His eyes slipped closed, and he sighed as familiar shouts surrounded them.

  * * *

  A machine beeped in the distance, and Apollo really wished they would just shut it off. All he wanted was a few more minutes of sleep.

  Pain tore through him as he tried to move, and the horror of what had happened slowly made its way back into his mind.

  “I just can’t do this,” he heard a woman say.

  His eyes blinked open, and he stared at Val, who sat quietly beside him. Her eyes were trained on something else.

  Apollo looked around and found Rachel trying to talk with the nurse.

  “Paige,” Rachel said frantically. “We can’t lose you right now. There are so many who need your help.”

  The pretty nurse shook her pale face.

  “This is just too much,” she said, raising her hands. “I tried, but I can’t be here if it’s like this. I’m sorry, but I don’t want to die.”

  The room grew quiet as she walked to the door without anything further to say.

  Rachel scanned the room and paused when her eyes met his.

  “Good,” she said with a smile. “You’re awake.” It didn’t quite reach her eyes, and he knew things were worse than he could have ever thought.

  Val took over his line of sight as she leaned in toward his face.

  “Hey,” she whispered.

  “Hey,” he said. His voice hurt, and he noticed that his face did as well when he frowned. A hand came up to touch the chip. Except, instead of the chip, he found a bandage.

  “We took it out,” Rachel said.

  Apollo frowned again, despite the pain.

  “How?” he asked.

  Rachel pointed over to Val.

  Val leaned back and sighed. “It was the government,” she said quietly. “At least from what I can tell from some tracing. They were behind the hacks and even something in town.”

  “Something in town?”

  “I don’t know everything. The people in town were acting weird, and it has something to do with a signal that was interfering with their televisions. Some of the frequencies are linked to some of the things going on with your systems, and those all led back to some government servers.”

  Apollo shook his head. It was too much to take in.

  “Carter?” he asked, not seeing Jenna around. “Jenna
said he went down.”

  “He’s not doing well,” Rachel said. “The stress was too much. We think it was a heart attack. It looks like it’d been coming for a while.”

  His eyes found Val again. “Peter?”

  She glanced over to the corner and shook her head. “He’s here, but that’s about it.”

  Apollo swallowed and wasn’t really sure if he wanted to know the next answer. “How many did we lose?”

  It was Titus, standing in the corner, who spoke this time. “Three of the younger hybrids, eleven adults and five of Carter’s men.”

  He shook inside. So many. They had lost more than he would have guessed.

  A sudden rush of rage filled him. Rem. That bastard Rem had been involved. He’d pay.

  “Rest,” Rachel said, cutting into his thoughts. “He needs the chance to get well.”

  Titus nodded and turned toward the door.

  Apollo waited until the others in the room had filtered out. All but Val that is. She sat quietly by his bed.

  “So you stayed,” he said to her.

  She leaned down and placed her face next to his.

  “I should have never left,” she whispered.

  At this point it didn’t matter. What happened before seemed so very small, especially when he’d been so close to losing her. The thought of it made his stomach turn.

  His eyes grew heavy as he stared at her.

  “Just stay with me,” he whispered. It was the only thing that echoed in his mind. She would be the light in his time of darkness.

  Chapter Sixteen

  Tears leaked from Val’s eyes as they silently walked back from the graves. All those funerals at the same time had nearly done her in, the emotion being overwhelming, but there hadn’t been much of a choice. With so many dead and needing to be buried, the best they could do was have a mass service. Her heart still ached at the loss of Dean. He was just a child who never had a chance at full life, dead at the hands of monsters created by the Horatius Group, humans with the morals of monsters.

  Her eyes sought Peter throughout the whole service. His face was the same as when Dean had died. She wasn’t sure he would ever recover. If he did, he might not ever be able to forgive himself. She knew his guilt. Even if he never spoke the words, his feelings came across loud and clear to her. He needed them to help him through this, and she wanted to be there for him.