The Hybrid Series | Book 4 | Damned

by Stead, Nick

  “What is it?” she asked.

  “Slayer.” I took another deep breath, taking in the man’s scent oozing from his pores and mixing with the tang of cheap aftershave. “He’s close.”

  “Time we were heading back then. We don’t want to lose the element of surprise.”

  I growled, but I knew she was right. My revenge would have to wait.

  Bushes lined the road leading up to the Slayers’ base. Finding it had been easy. Zee knew the way, probably because he’d tangled with the Slayers in this area before, whenever he’d had need to come ashore. Getting into it was going to be trickier.

  We crouched behind the natural cover, taking stock of the situation. My muscles twitched with the need for action, my belly full of sheep and my heart burning with the need for revenge. I was already back in my hybrid form, craving the coming fight like an addiction. My self-control was crumbling. The rage would not simply die down this time. It would only fade with the death of the man I’d sworn to kill, and all I could do was channel it into battle and ride that molten wave until it carried me to him. For I would find him that night, one way or another. I promised myself that.

  My senses honed in on the guards stationed round the military style building. There were over a dozen of them patrolling behind the perimeter fence, the base larger than any others I’d seen. They might not need as many of their people to protect the tiny villages, but I guessed they’d taken advantage of the lack of suspicious civilians to perform their experiments on a wider scale. I suspected they might use it for training new recruits as well. Not that there were likely to be many new recruits in this sparsely populated area, but they may well bring in newer members from elsewhere. So far I’d only come across one training facility in England. If there weren’t many about then the new recruits may well have to travel to these places before being let loose with guns.

  It looked like Lady Sarah had been right about them being free to use more firepower, the guards all carrying bigger firearms than those we’d faced before. I still don’t know enough about guns to tell you what model exactly, but they certainly looked impressive, and I had a feeling they were the semi-automatic type capable of firing several bursts. The guards were also equipped with full army uniform, including helmets and what looked to be body armour. This was going to be a hard fight.

  “What now? Take out as many by stealth as we can before they raise the alarm?” I asked, thinking back to the last time I’d attacked a base with Leon when his tactic had been to sweep through, killing them one by one until they were all dead or dying. Except that hadn’t quite worked. Little had we known they’d been expecting us and we’d been walking into a trap, one which had nearly cost us our lives.

  “No,” Zee said. “I want to draw them out into the open, where we’re less likely to be hit.”

  He outlined his plan and we all agreed on it, then we each moved into position, including Varin. Only Selina stayed back and out of sight, where she could work her magic without fear of being interrupted or becoming a prime target. I guess you could say she was to be our magical support in this battle. She had the tools she needed to work her craft, but the backpack full of other supplies we’d left stashed away in the cave. All except the torch which Zee now carried in one of his coat pockets.

  The rest of us crept closer under the cover of the hedgerow and the darkness of the night itself. We were lucky to have more clouds obscuring the moon, and in such a rural area there were no streetlamps lining the road, only those around the building. The soldiers looked to have some kind of night vision goggles and we were well aware of their security cameras keeping watch, but for all their technology it wouldn’t save them. Not if all went to plan.

  Avoiding their eyes as best I could, I stalked towards the edge of the light and the fencing. I didn’t need to go undetected for long – just until I was closer to them than any prey should be comfortable with. Close enough to make them uneasy, if not out of their minds with terror.

  “We use their fear against them,” Zee had explained, his words replaying in my head as I crept into place. So be it.

  I let out the most chilling, bloodcurdling howl I could muster, pouring all my anger and hatred for the Slayers into that cry, and all of my darkest desires. It was more than just the howling of a wolf; it was the wordless promise of a killer, the bloodthirsty scream of a monster, and the roar of fury itself. How could any creature not feel fear at that sound?

  The surrounding fields exploded into a flurry of movement as Mother Nature recoiled from the dread things threatening her order. From the smallest of insects to larger mammals like badgers and foxes, they burst from their dens and sprinted for their lives, desperate to get as far from us as possible. It only added to the rising terror of the humans playing soldier.

  As one, they turned in my direction and raised their guns with various shouts and cries. A spray of bullets found their way through the fence and to the place I’d been standing, but I was ready for it and already bounding away. They didn’t have time to adjust their aim, not at the speed I moved. All they could do was fire a burst and pray, even as they watched my shadowy form darting to safety.

  “We have contact!” one of them screamed into his radio. “Repeat, we have contact! Send all available units out, NOW!”

  From the other side of the compound, Varin sounded his own challenge, a baying worse than any flesh and blood hound. Three of the Slayers stayed on me, firing another burst to make sure I kept my distance. The others peeled off to attack the barghest, who also took flight. Not because the bullets were any threat to him but to add to the confusion and keep their adrenaline pumping. And from the sound of their racing hearts and the scent of their sweat, it was working.

  I carried on running, narrowly escaping being hit now. They were tracking my movement with their night vision technology and they were no longer firing blindly in the vague hope of hitting something. If I slowed, I’d almost certainly be wounded, if not killed outright. My three adversaries knew it, too. They just had to keep the pressure on while they waited for back-up, never once giving me chance to attack. But the others hunting for Varin didn’t seem so confident. It was likely their night vision goggles didn’t work on the spirit creature, especially if they were using the thermal imaging kind, and that had to be all the more unnerving. Between each squeeze of the trigger came the sound of their growing fear. Their hearts were pounding faster still with the realisation they were up against something immune to their physical weapons. Phase one of Zee’s plan seemed to be working.

  “We leave their electricity on until they start sending out reinforcements. Let them see their people dying out here.”

  And so Selina waited for his signal before working the spell to cut their power. She waited for the killing to begin.

  It was the vampires who spilt the first blood. Leaping over the fence while our enemies were still focused on me and Varin, they struck faster than any living creature, snapping necks and crushing skulls so swiftly and silently that their targets never knew what hit them. Bodies began to drop and the shouts of the living grew more frantic.

  There were more calls for back-up as the Slayers wheeled around, trying to find a target. The three harrying me finally shifted their attention elsewhere, and the moment their backs were turned I made my move.

  The time for stealth was over. I charged back into the fight, not caring if they heard my paw-like hands and feet crashing over the ground as I ran. My sights were fixed on the man closest to me and nothing was going to divert me from my course, short of a bullet to the head or the heart. He was doomed and he didn’t even realise it.

  With a fearsome snarl, I threw myself onto the fence and began to climb. It looked like it should have been electrified, but no shock went through me. Selina must have been able to interfere with the current without taking out the power for everything else. I was glad she’d thought on, the pain of electrical burns not something I wanted to suffer again if I could help it.

&nb
sp; I reached the top and dropped on my prey, landing on him with such force that his head smashed against the ground. His helmet had failed him. He went limp and lifeless beneath me, knocked out.

  Unconscious prey were even less fun than muted prey so I gave him a quick death, grabbing his head in my hands and ripping it off his shoulders with a meaty tearing sound and the pop of bone wrenched from its socket. I held the head up to the nearest camera, then tossed it at the artificial eye and rose with another challenging roar.

  Guns were starting to click empty. I lunged for a man fumbling to reload while his comrade covered him. Two of the bullets grazed my side but I was in the grip of the bloodlust now and the pain didn’t even slow me. My victim had just slid the clip back into place when I reached him, grabbing hold of one of his arms and twisting the limb into an unnatural position. I was rewarded with the sickening crack of breaking bone and screams of agony, and the man fell to his knees, clutching his ruined limb. Varin was back in the fray and the shadow beast bounded forward to finish him off.

  His comrade turned out to be a woman, still firing at me. Her aim was good and if I’d moved any slower, she’d have probably hit her mark. As it was, she only succeeded in clipping my ear and the top of my head, but it was a close call. Luckily her bullets ran out just before I pounced.

  We didn’t hit the ground with the same impact as the first Slayer I’d attacked. She was still very much awake and struggling beneath me, one hand reaching for her knife while the other held the gun up to protect her face. My jaws closed round the metal with a stab of pain as fangs jarred against the hard surface. I drew back with an angry growl.

  Next thing I knew, there was the sound of her blade sliding from its sheath and a rush of movement. It stabbed through the air and towards my chest, but again my supernatural speed saved me, my hand catching her wrist and stopping it short of its target. This time I squeezed, crushing bone and flesh and drawing more screams from my victim.

  White splinters erupted around the wound like a grisly bracelet and the knife fell from her hand, her fingers no longer able to grip it. All she had left was the gun she’d never get chance to reload, yet still she fought, attempting to use it as a club to fend me off with. I grabbed hold of that too and tore it from her grip. Tossing it away, I snapped at her again and this time got a mouthful of her good arm, tastier and more satisfying than the weapon she’d shoved in the way. My muzzle clamped around the limb, fangs sliding through the tougher material of her armour and scratching the skin beneath as I half chewed, half pulled it from her shoulder. And again I deliberately looked up at the nearest camera, snarling my defiance before throwing the body part at it.

  Around me the gunfire was beginning to die down, the vampires using a combination of both their physical strength, and telekinesis. Lady Sarah now had the power to make heads explode with the force of her will, but it was a power she had to use sparingly or it’d drain all her energy. She only dispatched a couple of the guards in that spectacularly bloody fashion, making use of it to take them out whilst physically crushing another Slayer’s head in her hands. Blood, brains and bone fragments splattered everything caught in its gruesome radius, including one of the cameras.

  “We turn fear to blind panic. And when they come pouring out of their shelter, they will forget all their strategies and tactics for dealing with an attack. They will forget to work as a team and to look out for one another. They will even forget how to aim in their desperation. They will start making the kind of mistakes that cost lives, and then we will have victory.”

  That seemed to be taking longer than usual and I was starting to think I’d been lucky in all my brushes with the Slayers to have faced their lowest level recruits. People given the least training, sent out as little more than cannon fodder to keep the pressure on and prevent us making a comeback, but ultimately viewed as expendable by their leaders. The Slayers on this base were much more resilient and better equipped. They’d faced real horror and learnt to adapt, not give in to terror at the first sign of an enemy much faster and stronger than they’d anticipated. They weren’t a handful of vigilantes given handguns and sent out to patrol the streets with the drive of nothing more than petty vengeance for lost loved ones. These were real soldiers.

  Yet for all their training, at the end of the day they were still human. They were still prone to the same fears as everyone else when faced with large predatory beasts ripping people apart before their very eyes. Those same primal instincts which had driven so many others to run before us resided in this elite force, screaming the very same message at them. And there was only so much they could take before their nerve failed them, and the urge to run became too strong.

  Sure enough, reinforcements were beginning to appear just as Zee had predicted, and my senses told me we’d succeeded in putting them in a heightened state of fear. But there was still some courage there. It wasn’t the same fearlessness I’d encountered in Will, but they hadn’t yet given over to total panic either.

  The woman beneath me still lived, but not for long if no one stopped the bleeding. She was weakening, her will to fight ripped away with her severed arm. And even if there had still been some fight in her, her other arm was just as useless with the damage I’d done to her wrist. She was no longer a threat.

  I rose from my prey and turned towards the entrance of the base, watching the reinforcements coming towards us with my burning amber eyes. My bloodlust wanted to charge at them as they began to stream from the building like ants from a nest, but that was not Zee’s plan. The vampires had already melted back into the shadows and Varin was nowhere to be seen. Running into battle alone would be beyond reckless, and as if to drive home that point for me, the first men through the doors let loose another burst of gunfire. I’d lingered a moment too long. Pain erupted in my chest and shoulder, my collarbone searing with agony. I was hit, and this was more than a mere flesh wound to fuel the rage. This was real damage to slow and weaken. The kind that could get me killed if I didn’t heal it, fast.

  A yelp tore from my throat. The pain was enough to crush my reckless impulses and force me to flee again. That was when Selina’s spell took effect, frying circuits and shutting down systems. Lights winked out, plunging us all into darkness. The magic also took out their night vision goggles, and it probably saved my life.

  I tasted blood in my mouth as I staggered away. Breathing was a struggle and I thought they might have punctured one of my lungs. More gunfire sounded behind me and bullets sprayed in my general direction, but I was lucky to avoid being hit a second time. The shots ceased less than a minute later, the humans realising they were just wasting bullets.

  I was able to make it back to the fence where I collapsed to my knees, too weak to climb over again. Dizziness threatened to drag me right down to the ground and from there into unconsciousness. But I fought it, calling on the transformation until blood began to clot, tissue fused together and fractured bone slid back into place, the bullets pushed out of the holes they’d made which closed up behind them. There was enough damage that I was forced to become almost fully wolf, but once it was healed I reversed the changes, wanting to keep the advantages of my humanoid body, combined with the power of my lupine jaws. Selina’s spell made all that possible, and moments later I rose back to my feet, strong as ever.

  Zee had been hoping the Slayers would be in enough of a panic already to make the mistake of chasing us into the darkness. He wanted to draw them away from a position of defence and push them into making the mistake of attempting to go on the offensive, where we would lead them into becoming too spread out, allowing us to pick them off one by one. To that end we continued to run in and out of the base’s perimeter, harrying their soldiers and taking a few more lives, but not engaging them in open combat. Their hearts pounded faster still for our efforts, yet they refused to budge. The plan was no longer working.

  With our enhanced senses, regrouping wasn’t a problem. I could see the vampires beckoning for me so I ascended
the fence a second time and slunk over, hoping Zee had a back-up plan. There were a lot of bullets between us and our prey, and sooner or later it was all too likely at least one would find its way into our hearts or brains. I’d been lucky not to take another bullet to the heart already. I didn’t really want to be shot in the chest again.

  The vampires were already having a whispered argument when I reached them. Varin sat beside them, passive until he was given another command.

  “This is becoming too dangerous,” Lady Sarah said. “We should stop and move on. There are plenty of other areas of coast suited to our needs.”

  “No! We can’t give up now,” Zee argued. “If the Slayers guess what we’re up to, they’ll take steps to make it even harder for us to escape the country. We have to see this through.”

  “Well what would you have us do? These humans are well armed and well trained. For all we know, they have their own spellcasters in there as well. We could all die trying to take this base, or end up captured again to be experimented on. This is a fool’s quest and I will have no part in it.”

  “We can’t let them live now they know we’re here. We have to press our advantage while their technology is down and they can’t call in any more of their people to help.”

  “I hate to say it but Lady Sarah has a point this time,” I said. “I nearly died back there. If we can’t get them into a state of blind panic, they’re going to pick us off eventually, limited visibility or not.”

  Lady Sarah raised an eyebrow. “Even the wolf talks sense this time. We cannot win this, Zeerin.”

  The pirate shook his head, stubbornness etched into his features. “We just need to change strategy, that’s all.”

  “If you have a plan that isn’t going to result in certain death I’m all for it,” I replied. “Ideally we need a way to kill them all without having to get back in range of their guns, but unless Selina has any spells with that kind of power, I don’t see how it can be done. Your telekinesis isn’t strong enough to take so many out at a safe distance from what I’ve seen, unless either of you has been holding out on us. We don’t have anything in our arsenal to combat their ranged weapons, other than Varin, but even he can’t take them all on. Not if they do have a spellcaster of their own.”