SOUL FINDER
THE IMMORTAL GENE TRILOGY
Author: Jacinta Maree
Book two
Copyright for Jacinta Maree 2016
Cover Art & design: Thander Lin
las-t.deviantart.com
artstation.com/artist/las-t
Book formatting: Amygdala Design
http://amygdaladesign.net/
Edited by Becky Stephens Editing
www.beckystephensediting.com
Inked Rabbit Publishing
Melbourne, VIC
US Edition: September 2016
ISBN: 978- 0- 9943839- 1- 4
ISBN- 13: 978- 1532869303
ISBN- 10: 1532869304
The characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.
Printed in USA
Dedication:
To my family and friends… please don’t judge me. Enjoy.
Nothing says run like a madman in love…
Chapter One:
I woke up to someone kissing me. It was not a romantic kiss, nothing like it. It was forced, dry and salty. In an intrusive push they crashed their face into mine, hitting my nose. Then, in rhythmic compressions, they pumped my chest. If I hadn’t known better, I would have thought this was a crappy first date. Liquid surged up my throat, squeezed out of my stomach and lungs. They turned my chin and I regurgitated mouthfuls of water out onto the sand. Before the cold tingles could fade, I was rolled over onto my stomach and my wrists quickly bound behind my back. Shit… maybe this really is a first date. The person on top of me shook with exhaustion.
Birds squawked above. My cheek pressed into the sand, making sense of the salt drying out my mouth. That’s right, I had jumped. I vaguely remember leaping off the cliff in a vain attempt to escape. The fall from the ledge was brief, followed quickly by the crash of icy water. The feeling of helplessness as I sank into the dark surge of the sea was beyond terrifying. What a time to develop a fear of water.
“Shit! Shit! Shit!” a feminine voice cursed. I blinked up at her, but her face remained hidden behind thick haze. She was just a brown blob. A swearing, frantic brownish blob. She took something out of her ear and shook it before throwing it to the ground, presumably broken. She then paced the beach back and forth, muttering and wringing her hands. My mind went back to the sight of my floating blood. I remembered feeling the heat of Diesel’s eyes burn with conflict. The word “soulless” scared me. It made me feel even less human.
Suddenly, I was pulled to my feet, the ocean to my back.
“Don’t even think about running.” She pressed something firm into my back. I stiffened at the touch of the gun. I couldn’t find the right commands to speak. I felt weak, disoriented. She marched me up the shallow bank toward the woods lining the ocean. The sand raked over my skin, scratching and irritating the areas where my skin rubbed.
“Wa-wait!” My voice scratched the back of my throat. “Don’t I get to know the name of my saviour?”
She jabbed me again with the gun, prompting me to walk faster. Apparently, she doesn’t appreciate humour. “If you can’t swim then why the hell did you jump?”
I arched an eyebrow at her tone, which hinted at concern. Or was it annoyance? I could never tell the difference between the two.
“You can quit with the gun act. I know you won’t kill me.”
A sharp pain clipped my cheek. I jerked away as she retracted her hand with the knife, putting it back in her pocket. Blood ran the curve of my jaw.
“Kill you? No, I’m not going to kill you.” I could hear the smile in her voice. Not kill but still hurt. Message received.
I looked out to the left. Far in the distance was the cliff face where I’d jumped. I hadn’t realised how much distance I created. Diesel was still there. I hope alive. I flexed my hands, testing the restraints around my wrists. Soulless or not, I have to get back to him.
“You have a bad habit of saving me.”
“You have a bad habit of putting yourself in stupid situations,” she responded.
“How long have you known?”
“That you were a Soulless? Since before the black markets.”
“How? I didn’t even know, so how could you?”
She shrugged. “I’ve got my contacts,” she said smugly.
“Contacts, huh?” I murmured, remembering the last time that word was used back at the I.O.S camp. Walter, the head researcher said he had contacted an interested buyer about me. She must have been who he was talking about. “Let me guess, you work for the Elite? I could taste the shit on you from all that ass kissing.”
“Aren’t you a charmer?” She scoffed. “You should be thanking me. If it weren’t for me, you would be dead.”
“But I’m right, aren’t I? About the Elite?”
She didn’t say anything. We crossed the sandy dunes into the bushland. The foliage thickened around my ankles. I shivered in my wet clothes.
“You do know the Elite will just screw you over the first chance they get, yeah?” Again, she didn’t say anything. I chewed my inner cheek. “How about I help you out instead? I have my own contacts. Prison contacts—” A branch whacked across my forehead, forcing me to look straight. “Ow! Damn it!”
“Just stop talking. You’re lucky I don’t paralyse you too.”
Things were moving so fast I still hadn’t had time to spit the salt out of my mouth. I licked my lips for the thousandth time. I needed water, but felt my pride was far saltier to swallow than the sea. We walked for an hour, my wrists scratched raw from her jerking me left and right over roots and around fallen trees.
“It’s Quinn, right?” I asked, recalling her name before I had jumped. Her grip tightened. “Are you going to talk or keep walking us around in circles?”
“I know where I’m going,” she insisted as she checked over her shoulder for the third time.
“Just face it, you’re lost and you’re going to get us both killed if you don’t untie me.” With a final shove, she pushed me through a line of bushes and into a clearing with a large red barn. Regrowth swallowed the driveway, creating a sea of green around a large flagpole erected in the centre, its flag long missing. Quinn walked us toward it where she spun me around and held me against the pole.
“Here.” From the back pocket of her bag, Quinn pushed a canteen bottle to my lips. It was water. Glorious water. I drank it desperately, but it was only a quarter full, not enough to quench my thirst. Once emptied she pulled out more rope and looped it around my midriff.
“What are you doing?” I wrestled against her but my entire body ached.
She tied a thicker rope around my stomach and chest, securing me to the pole.
“I’m flattered, I really am, but I’m just not interested in you that way. It’s you, not me.”
“Quit your jokes.”
“Shouldn’t we have a safe word at least?”
“I said shut it! I can move faster without you.” Her hooded guise had tipped back, revealing her short brown pixie-cut hair dirtied with sand and sweat. Despite her Asian accent, she appeared European, with large brown eyes, a straight nose and thin cracked lips.
“Oi! Wait! I’m sure we can work something out! Don’t just leave me here,” I shouted.
As she turned away, she placed her gun in its holster. “Just relax and enjoy the quiet. Oh, and try not to do anything stupid.” She waved behind her shoulder as she walked off. “I won’t always be here to save you.”
As soon as she was gone, I pulled and thrashed against the rope. The best I managed was an inch of space from the pole before giving up. It was obvi
ous I wasn’t going anywhere.
I slid down the pole onto the ground, giving my aching legs a chance to rest. Exhaustion was heavy. I sat waiting for hours, running all possible escape plans through my head. Finally, I couldn’t fight the drowsiness anymore. I decided to rest my eyes for a moment. My head burned with fatigue, however, and I quickly fell asleep.
By the time I woke, the sun was setting. I had tipped forward in my sleep, straining the muscles in my neck and shoulders. Around my wrists, the bondage rubbed and left small abrasions beneath the rope. My eyes fluttered and I groaned. Quinn still wasn’t back? She had been gone for hours.
I stirred through the groggy headache, when a twig snapping caught my attention. I looked sideways, but the strained light made it difficult to see. Another twig snapped, followed by a low moan. I craned my neck around, willing my eyes to focus. Something among the blurs of the forest stepped forward. I couldn’t see it clearly. The smears of shadows made it impossible to be sure. Alert, I scrambled to stand. My sudden movements must have caught his attention. The figure turned toward me and ran.
“Get off my property! Get off! Get off!” He charged at me, howling. Rough, large hands grabbed my collar and shook me hard, smacking my head against the pole. Despite my disorientation, I managed to kick outward, kneeing him in the groin and sending him into the ground. It only slowed him for a moment, the pain more of an instinctive response from the body than his mind acknowledging the attack. On his knees, he clawed forward, biting the air like a dog.
“Rrrrrooowl rrrrooofff! rrrrooofff!”
“Oh fuck!” I jumped over him, using the minimum room I had to swing myself around the pole where I faced three others loitering around the house.
They rocked back and forth, their clothes dirtied and torn with stains of piss and blood spotted down their front. One of them ripped his own fingernails off with his teeth, dripping blood down his chin and neck. What the hell are drifters doing out here? Most of the time drifters stuck to populated towns or died in their beds, starved to death. To see them gather like this was unusual. The only time I had seen so many drifters was back in Chinatown with Diesel.
“I’m so hungry,” one of the older drifters said as he approached with his dirty hand cupped. “Do you have any spare change?”
I shook my head despite knowing it meant nothing to him. Around his throat was a bright red collar that pinched his skin. I had almost forgotten about the drifter by my feet until he lunged up at the older man. He tackled him and pulled on his head like he was trying to rip a bucket off. The noises that erupted out of them could only be matched by brawling possums. Fingernails broke in their aggressive tearing as fists plummeted down, knocking out teeth and blood. The older man’s neck suddenly popped into a kinked L shape. As his body crashed into a dying seizure, the winning drifter pulled clamps of his hair out and stuffed it into his own mouth.
“Fucking kids. I’ll do it myself. Do it myself.”
He seemed to have forgotten about me as he munched away on the dead man’s grey hair. I eased around the pole as quietly as possible. The commotion agitated the other drifters nearby. There must have been another five that I could see, but these were female and remained leashed to the barn door. They were screaming bloody murder, each just as delusional as the next. Over my shoulder loud gun shots fired. Two of the females collapsed, shot dead. From the direction of the gunfire, Quinn stepped into view.
The loud noise startled the violent drifter again and sent him launching up my legs. The rope barred me from jumping away as he grabbed me. His palms were rough like hooves. He pulled on my hair, yanking me back.
“Shoot him! Shoot him,” I screamed as she fired two more shots.
One of the bullets skimmed across my shoulder, nipping my skin and straight into the drifter’s throat. Blood spluttered out, catching me on the cheek. The drifter’s head cracked backward, and as he gurgled, he kept throwing punches. Slowly, the blood drained from his face and he dropped to the ground. I gasped loudly.
“Well, not that I’m keeping count but that’s three out of three times I’ve saved you.”
I spun back to face Quinn, not nearly as amused as she had hoped. “I’ll beat you stupid if you don’t untie me.”
She jogged over and untied the rope from around my midriff, but didn’t loosen the rope binding my wrists. Once free, I quickly scrambled backward for some distance from the drifters. Quinn stepped toward the dead man’s body, examining him carefully.
“What are they doing all the way out here?” She pondered as she leaned in closer. “This one is collared.”
“Oh? Is he?” My voice strained with deep, enraged sarcasm. “You know, I didn’t get a chance to properly look from trying not to have my head torn off. If you’re done admiring his fashion choices, I would like to get as far away from them as possible.”
“These drifters were left here on purpose.” Quinn scanned the remaining female leashed to the barn door and then the few males who were chained to the side of the barn. Tingles swarmed where the bullet had grazed me. I glanced at the small patch of red forming on my shirt. Fuck, not another infection.
The sun had disappeared beyond the treetops, dropping everything into the shade of dusk. Quinn kept her back to me as she reached down to read the collar around the dead drifter’s throat. I glanced behind into the dense forest, noting just how easy it was to hide. How easy it was for me to disappear…
“Oh crap!” Suddenly alarmed, Quinn drew her weapon. “Shit! They’re products.” She spun back to me. “The poachers could still be here. They would have heard my gun shots.” She turned and grabbed my arm.
My body fell lopsided into her chest. I blinked dumbly at the sudden weakness in my knees. The tingles climbed my neck and into my jaw, prickling under my skin.
She pushed me back into a stand. “Quit messing around!”
From beyond our line of sight, voices rose as torch lights started herding toward us.
“I’m not…” Numbness overspilled into my jaw, deadening my tongue. My knees caved and slammed me to the ground. What the hell is happening?
She wrenched me back up. “This is not the time to throw a tantrum.”
“I…ca…n’t…” I struggled to speak. My focus blurred as dark patches spotted over Quinn’s face. Her eyes shot to the bloodstain on my shoulder, then back to her gun.
“Oh shit!”
It took a second for the realization to strike me too. The toxin! Footsteps were now running toward us. There must have been twenty of them, maybe more. Quinn’s eyes widened.
“Listen. Listen to me.” She rattled me hard, snapping my concentration back onto her. “Don’t panic. It’s not fatal but you’ve been hit with the paralysing agent. You have maybe three minutes max before you’re completely paralysed. I’ll lead them away from you. Run and hide. I’ll find you in the morning. Go, go!”
She untied my hands and shoved me hard into a run. I didn’t need to be told twice. With the strength I had left, I pumped my legs and kicked off into a sprint. I ran hard but the dying sunlight made it hard to see. There was no direct path. I ran into branches, hitting logs and rocks as I scrambled forward. My sloppy arm swung by my side as my legs strained beneath me. They started to feel alien, disconnected from my hips. They were just hitting the ground in rhematic rotations.
I didn’t think to count down from three minutes. I just ran. I ran as hard and as fast as my limited body would allow. I wasn’t going to hide and wait for her to find me. I was going to run back to Diesel. I was—whack!
My foot caught on a tree root and threw me into the dirt. The root snapped, sending a distinct crack into the forest. The distant footsteps slowed and redirected my way. A gunshot was suddenly fired. Again, the footsteps slowed and redirected back toward the noise. At least you’re good for something, Quinn.
On my stomach, I commando crawled on my elbows and paddled with the sides of my feet. Sharp twigs and rocks collected beneath me. Though I couldn’t feel it, I c
ould see small cuts appearing on my arms as I dragged myself forward. It was hopeless. My entire body was falling asleep beneath me. The sprint must have quickened the spread of toxin, allowing it to take my limbs faster. I was moving slower, my crawl almost coming to a stop.
Something heavy hit the ground within a meter of my position. I felt the vibration move the earth beneath my chest. I paused. Torch flights shot past my sprawled body, missing me by inches. I recognised the distinct squeak of a Sweeper as it walked unsuspectingly above.
Out in the open, I was as good as dead. Paralysis moved in drafts of ice, locking up my muscles. I dragged myself the two inches I needed to topple over the edge of a ditch. I was thankful I barely made a sound, not even the crunch of the dry leaves gave me away. I pressed myself as close to the ground as possible, and in my last desperate moment, threw twigs, branches and dirt over myself to camouflage.
And then I just stopped. My body slumped in its surrender. Everything went quiet. Footsteps shook the earth. The clink of metal moved away. I relaxed into the dirt, finally letting my head roll. My vision darkened when it suddenly found me. A bright light moved to my face. White pained my eyes. Something grabbed my ankle, and I was suddenly pulled from the ditch and hauled up into the air. I couldn’t scream. I couldn’t fight. My arms flopped beneath me as I swung into view. The flash of red from the robot’s camera snapped. Panic was a fleeting thought. I fell asleep, lost to the darkness.
Chapter Two:
The thump of a swinging blade woke me. My eyes snapped open, my senses tingling. A room of washed out blue came into focus. I was on the floor, my body laid out on its side. Again, the thump of a knife slammed down, hitting meat. I craned my head up and felt my shoulders pull against a tight restraint. I looked down at myself. I was bound like a calf, wrists and ankles lassoed behind my back so tightly my body arched into a C shape. Around me were large, lumpy sacks stacked up across the room. Poking out of the openings were dismembered arms and feet. The blood had curdled, discolouring the skin. It smelt so bad. I tried to sit up but my body lagged from the drug. From above, the butcher worked on a steel surgical table. Blood circled beneath the counter, dripping to the floor in puddles. Every time he swung down, the table rocked.
Soul Finder (The Immortal Gene Book 2) Page 1
