Mixed memories of being taken by Samantha’s father and then her recent torture from the immortals swirled within her, but Leisha didn’t have time to reflect on them. “All right. Let’s hope Samantha is in here.” She turned and opened the doors.
She hadn’t heard anyone in the lobby from the outside, but she still held her gun in front of her, making a quick perusal of their surroundings. The receiving area looked the same as any she had seen at wild forest reserves. Except this building is way too big to pull off the cover of a forest reserve. The power was off, but backup lights kept the place dimly lit. Then there was the problem of the place appearing to be deserted. The front door wasn’t even locked, and it was the middle of the night.
Leisha motioned for everyone to follow as she headed toward the reception desk. “Rinwa, can you figure out what floor Samantha might be on?”
Her daughter sat in front of the computer and typed away while the others kept an eye out.
“The best I can find are numbers for test subjects,” Rinwa announced after several minutes. “There are three floors of subjects. First one begins at level twelve.”
They moved swiftly to the elevators and Liam jumped ahead. “I’ve never pushed the button to an elevator,” he said eagerly.
Rinwa and Tafari burst out with guffaws while Leisha felt a moment of guilt. Has the poor boy never ridden in an elevator? She smiled at him and nodded for him to push it.
A ding chimed almost immediately and they stood in front of the doors with the up arrow pinging above them. When the doors slid open, Leisha blinked at the empty space before them.
“Where’s the car?” Rinwa stepped closer to peek up the elevator shaft.
Liam turned to Leisha, the corners of his mouth downturned. “Do you smell that?”
“Yes,” she confirmed. “Smells like there was a fire. A large one.”
Gesturing to the door on their right, Tafari smiled at Leisha. “At least this place has stairs.”
She returned his grin and walked over to the stairs. She could smell some charred remains in the stairwell, but the scent wasn’t as strong.
“This certainly doesn’t bode well,” she commented as they began their ascent.
“You’re saying it that way so I won’t make another Star Wars comment,” Liam joked.
Leisha could see he was trying to lighten the mood and she reached over to ruffle his hair. “Yep. You guessed it, but then again, it’s easy for you since you can read my mind.”
He giggled with genuine amusement before sobering as he looked up. “Even though I can hear hearts beating above us, I still can’t read their minds.”
“You probably need to be closer.”
The boy didn’t reply but continued up the stairs with the rest of the group.
Their footfalls echoed softly, but in the absolute silence of the deserted building they felt like drum beats to Leisha. The scent of smoke, burned plastic, and charred flesh grew stronger and stronger with each floor. By the time they reached level twelve, it stung all the way to her sinuses.
Tafari was the one to lead as they explored the floor. From what Leisha saw, the place had the look of a regular hospital, some sections partitioned by curtains to give the illusion of privacy to patients. The air was muggy from, Leisha assumed, the overhead sprinklers.
“Guess the fire didn’t spread here,” Rinwa commented. “It must have started on a higher level.”
Tafari grunted his agreement.
Leisha angled her ear to the side. “Maybe that’s why there are people alive here.”
Tafari spun and met her gaze with wide eyes. “Where?”
Liam pointed to the left and they moved down the hallway. More smells assaulted Leisha as they walked. Body odor, urine, and feces were the strongest. Liam put the collar of his shirt over his nose.
The patients were clustered at the end of the corridor. Some of the curtains were drawn to hide them, but most were out in the open, laying on their hospital beds. They were all men, and the majority of them were unconscious. The ones who were awake didn’t even stir when the small group entered their line of vision.
“Oh, gross!” Rinwa put her hand over her nose.
Tafari moved slowly toward the first of the men. “These people were left for dead.” He peered at one man who had his eyes open. “Sir, can you hear me?” He waved his hand in front of the man’s face.
The man didn’t move, his brown eyes as dull as his unwashed hair.
“What are we supposed to do about them?” Rinwa asked. “It’s not like we can fit them all in the car and drive them to a hospital.”
Liam gestured back the way they came. “There are medical supplies over there. We could try to revive them, but I don’t think it will help.”
Looking over at her son, she studied his unreadable expression. “Why not?”
“Because their brains are muddled.” The boy’s eyes were full of old sorrow. “I think I can’t read their minds because they’re so close to death.”
Leisha leaned over and pulled him into her arms. “I’m sorry you have to see this, Liam.”
He hugged her back, but when she pulled away, she was surprised to find his expression amused. “I’m okay, Leisha. Trust me, I’ve seen much worse.”
Her brows furrowed together at the cryptic comment, but didn’t say anything
“I can get flashes of thoughts from the man on the end.” Liam continued, pointing to one of the drawn curtains, one of the last beds in the row.
Following his direction, Leisha and Tafari walked over and pulled the partition back.
The man in that bed was in just as bad of shape as the others. His hair was gray and his face lined. He looked like he was sleeping fitfully but didn’t have the strength to actually thrash about. Leisha thought there was something familiar about him, but couldn’t decide if they’d met before.
Tafari reached out and gently shook his shoulder. “Sir? Can you hear me?”
The old man’s eyes jolted open. He looked panicked until his gaze rested on Leisha. Then his body relaxed a fraction, as if all the fight just melted out of his body. “You,” he rasped.
Leisha studied his arctic blue eyes. They were cloudy, as if he had glaucoma. Yet there was something about them . . . She gasped at the realization. “You can’t be Mason, can you?”
A small smile twitched at his lips. “Glad you know me. I’d hate to think you forgot about the man whose daughter you took.” He wheezed at the end of the sentence.
“But, how did this happen?” she asked.
Liam appeared suddenly and helped Mason drink a sip of water from a bottle. Leisha wanted to ask the boy where he’d gotten it, but Mason started talking again.
“It was your blood. It’s damned us all.”
Leisha and Tafari glanced behind them at the other men. “You mean these people aged drastically as well?” her husband asked.
Mason nodded slightly. “At first, we were invincible. The feeling of power, of immortality . . . we loved it.” He reached for Liam and the boy helped him drink some more. He cleared his throat loudly before continuing. “We were the super soldiers that I created. We served our country, knowing we were the ultimate elite.
“But after a few short years, we started to get sick. Many of my men went off the deep end and attacked at random. We had to put them down. But the rest of us, we just lost our energy. We stopped sleeping, couldn’t bring ourselves to eat.” He touched shaking fingers to his face. “And as you can see, we were depleted of life in general.”
“Interesting,” Liam said, his head tilted to the side. “So Leisha’s blood gave you extra powers for a while, but the price was that it took all of your life span to accomplish it.”
The dying man waved an arm. “I know I could fix this if I had time to study it, but my protégé will have to carry on the work.”
Leisha raised an eyebrow. “If I have anything to say about it, there won’t be any more work . . . or experiments.”
He ignored her comment. “Is my Samantha here? Have you brought her to me?”
“No, we didn’t bring her to you,” Leisha stated harshly. “But we are here to get her.”
If possible, Mason’s skin paled. “What do you mean, get her? Why would she be here?”
“She was captured, along with a horde of vampires, and brought to this facility,” Tafari answered.
The old man’s eyes brimmed with tears. “She might still be alive. I have to believe that she survived.”
“Survived what?”
“The vampires broke out about a week ago.” He coughed a little, and motioned for Liam to give him more water. It looked as if he continued to age right before Leisha’s eyes. “They slaughtered most of the staff until the security team bombed the floor they were on.” Mason cleared phlegm out of his throat loudly. “Those idiots. They ended up killing anyone that was on the floors above as well. But I heard a bunch of the vamps escaped anyway. Any human survivors have been sent to Quantico for debriefing while that trash roams the planet once again.”
Liam gave him a considering look. “You don’t seem to mind that you and your men were left here to die alone.”
Mason managed a half shrug. “We’re dead anyway. It’s only a matter of time. Now that they’re not feeding us, it will happen sooner. Most of us want that.”
“It’s a pretty nasty stench that you’re having your last moments in,” Rinwa said. Leisha looked over to see that her daughter had a bunch of supplies in her arms.
“So that’s what you’ve been up to?” Leisha asked.
Rinwa grimaced. “I got most of what he was saying while I explored. Sounds like we’re going to need some supplies if we’re going to try and track Samantha in the wilderness.”
“We will need a lot more than just food,” Tafari stated.
Mason rasped out, once again capturing their attention. “Tell Samantha . . . tell her that I’ve always loved her. I know she thinks my intentions were bad, but I was only trying to protect her.”
Leisha leveled him with a glare. “What would you call what you did to me?”
The dying man didn’t flinch as he returned her gaze. “My duty. Serving my country. However you want to term it, I don’t regret anything I’ve done to you or your kind, only that Samantha got mixed up in it.”
Before Leisha could spit out a severe retort, Liam touched Mason’s shoulder. “We’ll tell her. I promise she will know how much you loved her.”
“Thank you, boy.” Mason’s body suddenly tensed and he gasped for breath. After several choking rasps, he went slack and his eyes drifted closed.
“Now what?” Rinwa asked.
Sighing, Leisha glanced at her husband. “Let’s check out the next two floors and then get out of here.”
Tafari’s lips thinned. “You want us to leave these men here like this?”
“I’m with Leisha on this one,” Rinwa interjected. “They want to die, and it’s not like we can really do anything for them anyway.”
Face drooping, Tafari nodded and moved toward the stairwell. Leisha thought he suddenly looked as weary as she felt.
The floor threatened to collapse on the next level.
Tafari motioned for them to stop before they’d gotten more than a few feet into the hallway. “Can either of you sense anyone alive here or up higher?”
Leisha and Liam both shook their heads grimly.
“Then I do not think it wise for us to continue. We must get back into the city for supplies and get out into the forest as soon as possible.”
“I agree that we should comb the area,” Rinwa said as they made their way down the stairs. “But how do we know they didn’t just head into Anchorage and are lying low there?”
“Because Samantha hasn’t made contact with me,” Leisha answered. “We have several online chats to get in touch with each other and I’ve watched them daily. Mason said that the vampires broke out days ago. If she had gone to Anchorage, she would have notified me of what’s going on.”
Rinwa mulled the words over before shrugging. “So what’s the plan?”
“We need to get some really good phones—preferably GPS enabled,” Leisha said. “Then I’ll go after them and send you the coordinates as soon as I find them.”
“But vampires have heightened senses.” Tafari’s tone was laced with concern.
Reaching over, Leisha touched his face affectionately. “Yes, I’m more sensitive to the cold, but it won’t hurt me.”
“It won’t harm us, either,” Rinwa stated. “We’re immortals, remember? We heal even faster than you do.”
“But you can’t move as fast as us,” Liam countered. “Leisha’s plan is a good one.”
Rinwa pursed her lips before nodding. “Like Leisha said, the key to this operation is getting some good phones that will work wherever we go. You two go in different directions, and Tafari and I will take the car in the other. That way we’ll cover more ground in a better time frame. Whoever finds them first can call the others and we can all rendezvous at their location.”
“Let’s hope the stores around here open early,” Leisha said as they exited the building. “I want to get started as soon as possible. Who knows what shape poor Samantha might be in?”
Chapter 24
Samantha was sick of eating meat. She knew it was her only hope of survival, but she was seriously considering becoming a vegetarian if they ever got out of this wretched wilderness.
She rested her head against Nik’s back as he carried her, piggyback style. Her stomach felt heavy as the vampire moved at an accelerated speed. It wasn’t his usual “blur” speed because the snow and ice slowed him down, but it was still fast enough for Samantha to want to throw up.
Nik paused and sniffed the air, growling. It didn’t faze Samantha anymore. She’d gotten used to him doing strange things like that. She assumed it was probably just from being in the wilderness. And she had to assume that the cold wasn’t helping. Once they got to a city, or even a small village, she was sure the little nuances of his strange behavior would disappear.
“We should stop soon,” she said to his back. “It will be sunrise in less than an hour.”
“We’re so close.” Nik’s voice had deepened over the last few days, making everything he said sound like a rumble.
Her head shot up and she stared at him with hopeful eyes. “Close? You mean to a city or something?”
When he nodded, Samantha almost told him to keep going. But then she looked up at the sky. While it was still dark, the shadows weren’t as black, lightening enough to let her know the sun would be up very soon. The thought of sleeping in a warm, comfy bed and eating real food called to her, but Samantha knew what the sun could do to Nik.
“We can wait another day.” Her voice didn’t sound sure. She cleared her throat and spoke louder. “We’ve survived this long. One more day out here won’t kill us.”
Nik glanced back at her, his hazel eyes considering. He opened his mouth to speak, but something else caught his attention. He sniffed in the direction in front of them and started growling again. Only this time he didn’t stop. His body tensed and he slid Samantha down his back to the ground. While her feet didn’t hurt anymore, she also had a hard time staying upright on her own. But Nik stayed close enough for her to cling onto. His hands were out to his sides, and his body slightly crouched.
“What’s out there?” she whispered. Her heart hammered in her chest until it was almost painful.
He didn’t answer, but snarled at something approaching from the distance.
Squinting her eyes, Samantha thought it looked like a car, but they didn’t have their lights on, so she couldn’t be sure. Then the echo of an engine sounded in the
distance and confirmed what she thought.
“Is it the people from the government?” She shuddered at the thought of going back and being forced to see those drug-induced visions again. Slowly freezing to death was a much better option.
Still, the vampire didn’t answer, still behaving like a threatened dog.
The large vehicle’s headlights suddenly blared on, blinding her and Nik in the process.
Nik’s arm was around her waist as he howled, almost as if warning the car to not come any closer. Samantha wasn’t sure if she could keep breathing as her throat began closing up.
When the SUV stopped, Samantha burrowed into Nik, ready for him to grab her and flee. She could only see silhouettes behind the glaring lights, but noted that there were only two people. One of them was murmuring into a phone or a walkie-talkie, probably calling for backup.
The other one took a few steps closer and called out. “Samantha?” The voice was resonant and deep, and very familiar. “Are you all right?”
It couldn’t be . . . could it? “Tafari? Is that really you?”
“Yes. We have been looking for you.”
Half sighing, half sobbing in relief, Samantha laughed. “I’ve never been happier to hear your voice!” She let go of Nik and attempted to walk forward, but the vampire grabbed her and pulled her behind him again.
She realized that he was still growling, the vibrations low in his throat and barely making any noise. “Nik, what’s the matter? It’s Tafari and . . . I’m guessing either Leisha or Rinwa. We’re saved! Let’s go before the sun comes up.”
But he didn’t budge, his eyes trained on the two people several yards ahead. It was as if he didn’t even hear her. The expression on his face was a strange mixture of fierce protection and deadly intent.
Tafari was walking over to them. Nik’s growling suddenly rose, bouncing off of the trees surrounding them. The immortal halted in the beam of the headlights. “Samantha, is that your friend, Nikita?”
“Yes,” she answered. “I’m not sure what’s wrong.” She reached her hand out and lightly stroked the vampire’s arm, but he shied away and pulled her behind him again. “He’s been acting weird lately. I wonder if they did some experiments on him at the compound.”
Deliverance Page 18
