All Hell Breaks Loose

by Sharon Hannaford

  The man swallowed convulsively, trying to form a reply. His Adam’s apple bobbed within a hair’s breadth of Nex’s vicious tip. He gave up trying to speak and simply pointed at another door set into an alcove on the far left of the lab. It had the requisite keypad and retinal scanner to one side of the door. She surged to her feet.

  “Secure the lab rat,” she ordered James. She watched the man’s eye bulge in panic as an invisible force suddenly held him in place. “It’d be easier to find something to tie him up with,” she commented to the Magus.

  “I’ve got this.” James waved her off and started opening cupboards at random.

  Gabi joined the Vampires at the last door. Fergus moved slightly so as to shield Gabi, and Julius blew the door. Not being glass, it wasn’t quite as spectacular as the front doors. The solid steel simply buckled and swung open with a groan, and Gabi cocked her head so that she had a view inside the room. Jason King lounged behind a large, ornate wooden desk, looking far too confident for a man trapped by a team of Vampires. Marcello and Fergus stepped towards the door, Charlie shifting to cover Gabi, and Alexander doing the same to Julius. As Marcello slipped in through the doorway, intent on the man in the business suit, Gabi suddenly became aware of a tingling in the air, and the faintest smell of ozone.

  “NO,” she yelled, lunging around Charlie to grab at the Italian Vampire.

  She was an instant too late. The world slowed to a crawl. Fergus spun to look at her questioningly, Julius made a grab for her, and Marcello suddenly stopped, looking down at himself, as several thin trickles of smoke drifted up from burnt, horizontal lines running across his body. They all glanced to Marcello the moment they smelt the burning flesh. The Italian gave a small, regretful smile, and then his body fell to the ground. It had been neatly dissected into pieces. Almost before the pieces hit the tiled floor, they began to turn to ash.

  “No,” Gabi whispered the word, disbelieving—her mind not comprehending the loss of the man she thought of as a friend and comrade. A Vampire, all but indestructible, gone in a heartbeat. The feeling of ancient grief erupting from Julius bowed her head, but just as fast, the sound of a chuckle snapped her head back up. Jason King had risen to his feet and was walking around from behind his desk.

  “I have to admit, I wasn’t entirely sure that would work on Vampires. It was designed as protection from the wolves, actually, in case of a revolt,” he drawled.

  He was dressed impeccably in a tailored charcoal suit and pale blue shirt. Gabi had referred to his build as pudgy, but that wasn’t true by human standards. He was a little soft, but he obviously watched his weight and probably hit the gym daily. Many women would have swooned over him, even without his money and power, but Gabi could see the minute marks that told a tale of numerous surgical improvements. The face Mr King sported now was not the face he’d been born to wear. “But it seems to be very effective. Don’t you think?” he asked coolly, leaning back against the front of his desk and contemplating the scattering of ash and bits of clothing that only moments ago had been Marcello. Rage surged through her, matched only by the fury she could feel burning away the grief inside Julius.

  “Mr Jason Sweeney, I presume?” Gabi sauntered forward, keeping her eyes away from Marcello’s remains, as she tried to regroup.

  Jason’s eyes narrowed in annoyance, and the mirth disappeared from his face. “I prefer Jason King,” he corrected her. “I wouldn’t step any closer if I were you, Miss Bradford. I know you’re not entirely human, but I’m sure you’re not tougher than a Vampire.” The tiniest glitch in the tone of his voice gave away his uncertainty. He was playing it cool with the Vampires, but he wasn’t sure about her. Closer now, Gabi could sense the current in front of her. An inspection of the walls on either side of the door revealed tiny, lens-covered holes spaced a foot apart along the entire length of both.

  “Laser technology. A wonderful thing,” Jason said effusively, noting the direction of her gaze. “Lasers cut through absolutely anything. And with such precision. I even have my own special design that is invisible to those who normally see ultraviolet and infrared light. Engineering geniuses are hard to find, but so worth the effort. Wouldn’t you agree?”

  A roar of pain-laced fury erupted from Fergus as he took a threatening step towards the pompous ass. The man flinched involuntarily, his face losing a little of its colour, but he didn’t change his stance or back away. Julius and Gabi both put restraining hands on Fergus. Gabi could feel a thread of communication flowing between the two Vampires, and for just a second, Fergus’s grief was as clear to her as Julius’s.

  “What exactly do you think you’re playing at, asshole?” Gabi demanded. “Do you think that if we can’t get to you through your front door, we’ll just give up and walk away? Or maybe you’re going to keep us talking long enough for the sun to come up, and then you’ll blow the roof off the building, letting the sun get the Vampires.” As she spoke, she was assessing every item she could see in the room beyond, as well as the distance between the laser beams across the door. His back-up generator had to be in the room with him. He might be insane, but he wasn’t stupid. The laser beams at the door were set about a foot apart, so she could easily throw a dagger between them, but she wasn’t sure if there were any other lasers in the room. As a second resort, she had the Werewolf sedative darts. She was fairly sure they wouldn’t kill him. Well, that’s what she’d claim afterwards. Once they knew where all the lasers were, they could come in from a side wall or the roof.

  “Oh, on the contrary, Miss Bradford,” Jason replied smoothly, “I don’t want to harm any more of your precious Vampire friends. This first one was unfortunately unavoidable, as I have no doubt you wouldn’t have heeded my warning not to enter. I had to get you to stop and hear me out.” Jason King seemed to be oblivious to the fact that lying had a scent of its own. Apparently none of his pet Werewolves had bothered to educate him. It was clear that the man was desperately making things up as he went, trying to work out how to get out of the mess he was currently in. He was a glib and accomplished liar by human standards and thought that was going to save him. Either that or he was expecting rescue at any moment.

  Gabi didn’t know exactly how things were going with the rest of the raid, but no emergency alarm had been raised, so they had to at least be holding their own.

  “Well, we’re here, and we have ears, Mr Sweeney,” she said, still partially shielded from his view by Fergus and Charlie. “Dazzle us with your brilliance.” In an extremely quiet undertone she said, “Daggers, anyone got daggers?”

  Fergus and Charlie immediately shifted stances to stand to attention, their backs to her with their hands behind their back. Between them they held five daggers. Not even Gabi had seen them draw the knives. She kept her face blank as Jason began to wax lyrical about his vision for the future of mankind. His voice turned passionate, and the stench of lies evaporated as he started using words like ‘new dawn’ and ‘uprising of the powerful’. ‘Loopy,’ she thought, as she smoothly took a dagger from Fergus and hurled it directly at Jason’s right shoulder, careful to avoid the lasers across the door.

  Chapter 24

  Her suspicions were confirmed as the dagger suddenly sizzled and split in two before it reached its mark. One of the shards spun off harmlessly to the side, but the hilt with a piece of the steel blade still attached careened towards Jason and clipped the side of his face, opening up a deep laceration.

  “You bitch,” he spat, furious. His eyes flashed as his hand flew to cover the cut. He retreated behind his desk and pulled out a white hankie. His hand came away covered with blood, and she felt the Vampires all breathe in deeply, as though tasting the scent of it. She wondered if it was hunger or if the blood spoke to them on a level beyond what she could scent.

  “Really, Mr Sweeney,” she drawled, “is that the best you can come up with? Even your little Shape-shifter girlfriend did better than that.” She took spiteful pleasure in the irritated twitch of his jaw muscles every
time she called him by his birth name.

  “Is that what she told you she was?” he retorted, maliciousness glinting in his eye as he dabbed the cut with the hankie. “She was nothing but a whore. A whore with some very useful abilities and information, but a whore nonetheless.”

  Gabi wondered if he expected them to jump to the defence of the woman who’d put all their lives in danger. “I won’t disagree with you on that,” Gabi said. “She’s also a traitor to her species, as well as to the Werewolf community.” She’d taken a step closer to the doorway, until she was almost level with Fergus and Charlie. She casually took a dagger from Charlie’s fingers. Jason was making himself a much smaller target now that he was behind the desk, but she still had a clear shot at his upper body. As long as she didn’t hit the heart, he should survive. “And I can assure you Ms Adams has been dealt with accordingly.”

  “What have you done to her?” Jason asked. There was no concern in his voice, only mild curiosity.

  Gabi ignored the question and flung the second dagger. This time Jason ducked behind the desk, but far too slowly to have done him any good if she’d been aiming for him. The dagger once again made it past the first level of laser beams untouched and was bisected by another beam to the left. The pieces clunked into a bookcase six feet to the left of Jason’s desk. The Vampires realised what she was up to and joined in, flinging daggers in precise arcs, gradually working out the pattern of the beams. It was soon clear that the beams were concentrated in the three or four feet in front of the door. It was a veritable spiderweb of laser beams. Almost impenetrable. Almost. Jason King sat back in his chair, watching them with a smug grin on his face.

  “Well, there is one other solution,” Gabi mused, stepping back. “Lex, bring me one of those assault rifles that the lab rat was attempting to use. And some extra ammunition, it may take me a few tries.”

  No one on the team betrayed her bluff, and Alexander followed orders without comment.

  “Wait, wait, wait,” Jason wheedled hastily. “Let’s just talk about this. I have a lot to offer a shrewd business man, as I’ve heard the Master of the City is. I’m assuming one of you would be able to get me a direct number to call him and lay out my very lucrative offer.” He smiled confidently, sure that the talk of big money would protect him a while longer. The fact that he didn’t even have the sense to realise that the Master of the City was standing a few feet away from him made Gabi want to laugh out loud. She might have if it weren’t for the weight of the grief: hers and Julius’s. Alexander deposited a compact rifle into her hand, and she settled it against her shoulder, aiming down the scope as if she handled a weapon of that calibre every day.

  “Do you know what we do, Mr Sweeney?” she asked mildly as she levelled his smarmy face in the rifle’s sights. It took him almost a full second to dive behind his desk. “The SMV?”

  “You, you protect non-humans,” he said, his voice suddenly excited.

  Gabi tensed, glancing at Julius to see if he’d noticed the change in the man’s attitude. It wasn’t a good sign. Julius nodded, he sensed the same thing. The team began surreptitiously checking around them, looking for the next booby trap or assault. Gabi kept Jason busy.

  “Exactly, Mr Sweeney,” she agreed, not bothering to correct his misassumption. “And you’ve been dabbling in things you have no right to dabble in. No one walks away from the crimes you have committed without punishment, Mr Sweeney.”

  The team could hear a drawer opening behind the desk. Fergus and Charlie had eased back from the doorway, Julius had an arm out ready to grab Gabi, and Alexander was moving to cover them both. Jason suddenly jumped up, brandishing a syringe in his hand. The team froze, waiting for his next move. The syringe was one of the pressured ones, shaped something like a handgun.

  Gabi sighed as though bored with the whole situation. “Mr Sweeney, let’s cut the dramatics. You’re not getting out of this without paying your dues. You’ll eventually need food and water,” she reminded him.

  He turned wildly elated eyes on them all. “In here is the final formula,” he whispered. “The one we’ve been working on for months. Your friend Kyle gave us the final link we needed. This is the first batch.” His face lost a little of its glee. “We haven’t had a chance to test it yet, but I just know it’s what we’ve been working so hard to create.” He looked at them, suddenly imploring. “You don’t know how tough it’s been. Trying to create the perfect Werewolf soldier. Isolate the lycanthropy strengths and eradicate the weaknesses. It’s such a complicated virus; even Dr Wilson has never seen anything like it.”

  Gabi actually was getting bored now. “Your new virus is never going to see the light of day, Mr Sweeney, nor is any of the research your lab rat compiled. Just give it up, and take your punishment like a man,” she growled.

  A gamut of emotions ran across the man’s face, and they could all see the moment he came to a decision. He looked at them in a kind of wonder and turned the syringe towards himself. Gabi actually raised her hand in a futile attempt to stop him. Without hesitating, he pushed the point of the syringe against his neck and depressed the trigger. The syringe deployed with a quiet hiss, and the contents quickly drained from the chamber into Jason’s body. He threw down the syringe and stared at the team with maniacal delight.

  “So now I am one of you,” he crowed. “No longer human. Now you have to protect me too; I’m part of the Community.”

  “Yes, Mr Sweeney, now you are one of us,” Gabi said quietly. “Now you are subject to our laws and our judiciary. As a Hunter of the Societas Malus Venatori, I find you guilty of heinous crimes against your own kind as well as against human kind. You just signed your own death warrant.”

  The shock on his face was actually comical. His mouth opened and shut like a fish as he tried to form coherent words. He didn’t even try to move out of the way as Gabi dropped the rifle and took a handgun from Alexander’s hand. She moved two inches to the right and took aim.

  “Lea,” Julius said softly, a cool hand on her forearm. “Are you sure this is what you want to do?”

  She paused a moment, considering his reasoning words.

  “You are already at odds with the Council, this could make things worse.”

  Jason was still frozen to the spot, his breath coming in shallow gasps, his face white. Gabi wasn’t sure if it was fear of death or the lycanthropy virus taking hold. She knew he was right, no matter how she justified her actions, the Council wouldn’t like that she’d made herself judge, jury and executioner. The gun in her hand never wavered as she weighed her options. Other people’s lives flashed in front of her: Derek’s, Trish’s, the poor teenage boy lying cold and unmourned in the storage room. For just a millisecond her eyes flicked to the ground, to Marcello’s clothing and boots, a gold locket glinting under a light covering of ash. Tears prickled behind her eyes, and then she squeezed the trigger.

  The bullet travelled straight and true, not touching a single laser on its path. A dark red spot blossomed on Jason King’s forehead, and his expression never changed. His lifeless body, in its designer suit, crumpled to the ground.

  There was silence around her.

  “The Council would’ve found another excuse to spare his life,” she stated, her tone flat. It would’ve been more fitting if the man had suffered before he died. He’d deserved that much. Julius’s grip tightened on her arm for just a moment. Solidarity. Whatever happened with the Council, he would be there for her. For the first time in many years, she felt like she just might need someone else’s strength to lean on. She dropped her right arm and covered Julius’s hand with her own. She wanted nothing more than to turn to him, bury her face in his chest, and let him carry her away from the scene. She cleared her throat, swiping at a stray tear as she reached down and swapped the handgun for the rifle.

  “Fergus, you’re taller than me,” she said, handing him the rifle. “See that red box thing in the corner with the gauges?”

  Fergus grunted his agreement.
>
  “I think that’s the power generator. Blow it up.”

  Fergus raised the assault rifle to his shoulder and took aim. It was clear he wasn’t a regular marksman, but when he opened fire, the bullets struck their mark unerringly. The faint whirring noise that had barely been noticeable suddenly cut off, and a moment later, electrical sparks spat and crackled around the device. All the emergency lights went dark. Gabi tossed a butterfly sword into the room. It flew unimpeded to land near Jason’s body. She walked forward to kneel at Marcello’s remains. She carefully plucked the gold locket out of the shreds of clothing and gently dusted the ash from it. She rose and turned back to the Vampires. Before she could say anything, there was an ear-splitting explosion in the room. Whatever fuel had been powering the generator had been ignited by the sparks. It spilled from the ruptured tank already alight, pouring over the carpet in a liquid flame.

  “Fuck,” Gabi cursed. “Let’s get the hell out of here.”

  She tucked the locket into a pocket and joined the Vampires in a quick retreat. They found James and the trussed up lab rat waiting anxiously in the laboratory. Charlie grabbed the human, slinging him over his shoulder like a sack of grain, and they all hurried back through the building, retracing their steps in complete darkness. Gabi hung back to guide James around and over the bodies of the wolf-men when they neared the front of the building. They swarmed out of the ruined doors and into the fresh night air. A waxing moon hung brightly above them, as they came to a halt and turned to look back. Smoke was already drifting from the roof at the rear, and tiny explosions could be heard going off intermittently as the lab caught fire as well.

  Julius sent Fergus and Charlie off to find out how the rest of the raid was going. Distant shouts and hubbub could be heard from the far side of the compound. Alexander was sent to source more fuel to ignite the front of the building where the wolf-men lay; the place needed to be burnt to the ground before rescue vehicles arrived on the scene. Gabi sent James and his prisoner towards the front gate where the capture vans would be waiting.