Right to Rule: Hunter Wars Book Five (The Hunter Wars 5)

by SD Tanner

  “Times have changed. These days it’s riskier to do nothing than it is to do something.” Regarding Logan somberly, he added, “I want to do more than an aerial recon this time, and I need you to come with me.”

  “I can’t leave the scavengers unsupervised.”

  “Leave Axel in charge.”

  Giving him a long hard stare, Logan then nodded. “Yes sir.”

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN: City that never sleeps (Gears)

  “I killed Max,” Mackenzie said miserably. “I don’t understand why, but I killed her and my baby.”

  “You were dreamin’, Mac,” he replied steadily.

  Mackenzie gave him a sharp look. “I don’t dream, Gears. I have visions of the future, and in my vision I killed Max and our baby died with her.”

  He sighed. Mackenzie did have visions, and if he saw himself murdering Max and his own child, then it did mean it was a possible future, but it didn’t mean it was going to happen. It wouldn’t be the first time Mackenzie saw a future and then managed to divert it.

  “Well you ain’t anywhere near her right now, so she’s safe from that future.”

  Mackenzie shook his head adamantly. “Nope, that’s not how it works, Gears. It means she and my baby are at risk and I have to find her to protect her.”

  He was sitting in the parking lot outside of the building where they’d left the bird. Benny had shown up in the two trucks with seven combat shooters, and they were getting ready to head into the tunnels. Saunders had shown them where the tunnels were and drawn them a number of maps outlining key locations where he thought they might find Ruler. For all his insanity, Saunders demonstrated a remarkable grasp of what Ruler had done and where he was now. According to Saunders, Ruler based himself out of a five star hotel that overlooked the Statue of Liberty. Upon his arrival, Ruler and his demon super hunters used the hunters to haul people out of their hideaways and herded them into Battery Park. From there, they’d made some sort of selection and imprisoned people in different locations. Saunders believed they were now being held in a number of tall office buildings surrounding the hotel, but he didn’t know why. Having seen Ruler’s old camp in Hopkinsville, he could hazard a guess, but this time Ruler managed to capture fifty thousand people in just a week. By holding the people prisoner in buildings around his hotel, it wouldn’t be possible to simply bomb it, and he was effectively using the people as a human shield. He couldn’t just unleash Hellfire missiles on the little shit. If he did that, he would kill many innocents and that wasn’t an option. Hiding amongst the innocents was the trick of a despot and this latest ploy frustrated him. It limited their options. As far as he was concerned, Ruler was a coward, and if this was the best the Devil could do to save his ass, then he wasn’t impressed.

  Pax was sitting on the hood of the truck with his boots on the fender. “But if you’re here, Mac, you can’t hurt her so what’s the problem?”

  Giving Pax an irritated look, Mackenzie replied, “You of all people should know it’s not as simple as that. Visions don’t mean what they look like. I saw you die, but it didn’t happen and that was in part because I went to find you. The things I do change what happens.”

  That was true. Mackenzie saw them all die in a nuclear explosion and he’d killed Ip thinking that would change the event. It didn’t stop the event from happening, but it did change the context of what happened. Ip had since told him she needed to die so she could be reborn into a new and undamaged body. In another of his visions, Mackenzie saw Pax die in the prison and had gone to find him. He didn’t save Pax, but his presence changed the context of the events. If Mackenzie had seen himself kill Max then he had to go to her. It would be the only way to change the context of the event, and possibly avoid a future where Max and his unborn child would die, even if it wasn’t by Mackenzie’s hand. He’d come to realize Mackenzie’s visions weren’t to be taken literally, but acted more like an early warning that something bad was about to happen.

  Glancing at Mackenzie and then at Pax, he said decisively, “Nah, he’s right, Pax. He has to go and find Max. If he sees danger, then there’s danger somewhere.”

  Pax shrugged and said, “She’ll still be on the ship. You’re gonna get there and she’ll be fine. The ship’s the safest place we got.”

  Mackenzie nodded at him gratefully. “If everything’s fine, I’ll come back.”

  “Don’t. Just stay there. We should be back within a week. I can’t give you the bird ‘cos we might need a fast extract, but you can take one of the trucks and two shooters with you. You should be fine.”

  Ip could control and kill hunters, so they didn’t need Mackenzie’s ability to kill hunters. He’d only brought Mackenzie along for his strange visions of the future, but if all he could see was himself killing Max, he figured he wouldn’t have his attention anyway. They helped Mackenzie and the two shooters prepare to leave, and then he got on with the task of getting them ready to move out to the Lincoln Tunnel. They’d been waiting for Benny and his team for two days and he was itching to get moving. His plan was to take Ip, Pax, TL, Benny and two combat shooters and leave the others waiting with the bird as back up. Now Mackenzie was taking one truck to head back to the base, they would be cramped in the pickup, but if they unloaded the supplies he figured they could make it work. There was no way they’d be able to drive through the tunnel. He’d contemplated walking the three miles to the tunnel, but decided it was better to have transport near it in case they need to exit the city in a hurry.

  The roads leading to the tunnel were cluttered, but being a fairly wide road they were able to navigate their way to the bank of twelve tollbooths that spread out in front of the three cavernous entrances to the tunnels.

  Knowing they might need to drive away quickly, he ordered, “Turn us around, so we’re facing away from the tunnels.”

  With the truck in position, they all climbed out of the truck and stood contemplating the tunnels. He had to admit, it didn’t look like an appealing prospect. The mouth of each tunnel was densely dark, and even from thirty feet away, he could hear movement coming from within the tunnels.

  “Let’s go.”

  Walking towards the tunnels, Pax quipped, “Someone should remember where we parked the truck.”

  Benny asked, “Which tunnel are we gonna take?”

  “Eeny Meeny Miny Moe, where did all the hunters go,” Pax chanted childishly.

  “Shaddup, Pax,” TL said grumpily.

  “Yeah, seriously, Pax. Shut the hell up.” Looking at Ip, he asked, “Honey, the hunters are your problem, so which tunnel do you want?”

  Ip speaks: It does not matter which we choose. The hunters will follow our every move.

  He thought she was being her usual cryptic self and it didn’t help him decide. Shaking his head at her, he said, “Guess we’ll go with Pax’s method.”

  Pax gave him a mocking look. “Oh, so now you want my wisdom.”

  Unable to listen to his brother’s idiocy any longer, he said decisively and for no reason, “We’ll take the one on the left.”

  Standing outside the tunnel, they pulled out their flashlights and he could hear shuffling and growling coming from deep inside. According to Saunders, each tunnel was about one and a half miles long, twenty feet wide, and thirteen feet high. It was likely that the tunnels were jammed with vehicles, hunters, rats and more than a few corpses. He wasn’t looking forward to hiking through the tunnel and as they flicked on their flashlights, they walked into the darkness and he picked up his pace. Being part-hunter, Ip had excellent night vision and she quickly pulled a hunter guard around them. Shining their flashlights around the tunnel, he saw a stretch of dusty and abandoned cars, and like the cars he’d seen on the streets, they looked bruised and battered as if thousands of feet had run over them. He suspected the hunter hordes entered the city by scrambling over the cars, which was why they looked dented and beaten. The tiles that lined the walls of the tunnel looked so old the modern strips of lighting traveling along
the corners of the ceiling seemed out of place. There was a solid metal handrail to their right that protected a walkway that traveled as far as they could see with their flashlights.

  Saunders told him the tunnel turned sharply to the right and ran under the water. In single file, with hunters to their left, ahead, and behind them, they tramped steadily through the tunnel. There were surprisingly less hunters in the tunnel than he’d anticipated. He could see them in the distance, but none seemed keen to approach them or their hunter guard. The tunnel was cold and the further they walked, the colder it got, and he could see his breath forming a misty cloud as if he was breathing out smoke. The sound of their footsteps and the continual growling of the hunters was slightly dampened by the sheer volume of the cars were parked bumper to bumper. Not a single car had a window left intact, and the further they walked, the greater the stench of vomit became. It was a depressing scene, and wanting to be back in daylight, he gritted his teeth and walked at a steady pace. Ahead of him, Ip seemed quite content as she tripped lightly through the tunnel. He supposed she was Death and being in a place so devoid of life felt natural to her. Playing his flashlight along the wall, spelled out in the tiles were the names ‘New Jersey’ and ‘New York’.

  “Half way,” Pax observed hopefully.

  He hoped so too. They were now crossing the border into New York. It took them another thirty minutes to clear the rest of the tunnel and he was relieved to step out into the bright sunlight. The tunnel opened to a large area of concrete, and there were more cars clustered around the entrance than they’d seen on the other side. He guessed more people had tried to escape New York than enter it. Standing clear of the tunnels, he looked up at the tall buildings around the area and listened for any sounds, but like New Jersey, it was utterly silent. All he could hear were the quiet grumblings of the hunter guard Ip brought out of the tunnel with her.

  TL looked around at the clutter of battered cars. “Place looks dead.”

  Sighing at TL’s continuing bad mood, he said, “Anywhere Ruler is, always looks dead. He’s the fuckin’ Devil. It’s what he does. He kills shit.” Turning to face TL, he asked, “Are you gonna be a miserable asshole for the whole mission?”

  Giving him a dirty look, TL replied, “No, sometimes I’ll be sleeping.”

  He shook his head and decided to ignore him. Their mission was dangerous enough without being distracted by his brother’s obvious problems. Pax was ignoring both of them, and he and Benny were looking at the tourist map Saunders had given them.

  Turning to face them, Pax jerked his thumb over his right shoulder. “When you ladies have finished bitchin’ at one another, we gotta go thattaway.”

  Saunders explained he believed Ruler was in a hotel in the Financial District about three miles from the Lincoln Tunnel. Being early morning and daylight, he didn’t expect any trouble from hunters, although he was well aware there would be super hunters in the area. He’d considered flying over the city, but Pax believed they’d gain greater intelligence if they walked the streets and he didn’t disagree with him. If they could discreetly walk through the area, there was a good chance they could be in and out of the city without being noticed.

  They followed a long brown brick wall to their right and he saw a green and white sign suspended over the road with an arrow pointing to the downtown city area. The four-lane road was crammed with vehicles, now dusty, dented and rusting in the cold sunlight. The windows of the cars were so dirty it was impossible to see inside the vehicles, but he wasn’t sure he wanted to. Most of the abandoned vehicles had nothing other than a sad story to tell. Desiccated bodies, old bloodstains, abandoned children’s toys, and sometimes an entire family with headshots where they’d chosen suicide over being consumed alive by shamblers and hunters. Ahead were several low and utilitarian looking bridges, and beyond those he saw the long straight stretch of road that would lead them to the Financial District. They walked onto West 36th Street in single file and favored the left hand side of the road. If necessary, they could quickly duck into a building or behind a vehicle. Everything around them was so still and silent, he could hear himself breathing. Ip had their hunter guard on the right side of the road and he thought that was a good tactic. If there was a problem, the hunters could act as a distraction while they sought cover.

  The street was an endless sea of offices, apartments, delis, parking lots, small restaurants and pizza shops. As they trudged on in single file, they passed old and new buildings, some were multi storied and others were low and squat. There was something sorrowful about walking past what was once the mainstay of people’s lives. There were dry cleaners, banks, pharmacies, coffee shops, a school, and even an old Church with a needle like steeple. Under the dirt of the cars, he could see the trademark yellow the cabs in New York were once so famous for. There were trucks that must have been filled with goods, now lying broken open with their contents long gone. The trees and large potted plants that would have once given the city a cosmopolitan feel, now looked untidy and stark in the cold winter air. They turned left onto West 14th Street and past more buses, trucks, a funeral home, and despite the deterioration, he noticed the cafes and shops were starting to look a bit smarter and upmarket. There were skeletal frames of awnings and he could almost imagine how welcoming the road must have once been.

  “Cool,” Benny said excitedly. “This must be the Village.”

  “Shaddup, Benny,” Pax said quietly, as he followed behind him. “I told you to stay quiet.”

  Pax was right to warn Benny. The silence around them was complete and he knew the sound of their voices would travel more than their footsteps. Silently agreeing with Pax, he said nothing and continued to observe the area around him, but all he saw was more of the same. A bookstore, lighting store, broken windows, dust and dirt. Continuing his steady pace, he passed another church, more buildings, offices, apartments, shops and now some had stairs leading to their entrances. It was all dilapidated and damaged and he thought it looked forlorn and abandoned. Ahead were taller apartment buildings, each with a small balcony, and he thought he saw signs scrawled on sheets hanging from some of the balconies. As the sheets fluttered in the breeze, he couldn’t quite read the words, but he figured the people who’d left the messages were long gone.

  They reached a white austere looking arch that seemed to lead nowhere and Pax said quietly, “That’s Washington Square Park.”

  The park beyond the arch didn’t look inviting. Overgrown with weeds, bushes and stark looking trees, it had an eerie feel to it and he flicked his head to indicate they should walk around it. They made their way down West Broadway and he was surprised to see the type of buildings lining the street change again. They were walking past tall glass buildings and some of the windows in these buildings were still intact. Looking at the signs on the buildings, he noticed they were a mixture of banks, insurance companies and investment houses. He snorted quietly and thought, so this is where all my money went. Peering into one of the darkened windows, he thought he saw movement and held his fist up and stopped. Turning around, he signaled for them to pull back. Quickly and quietly, they moved to a narrow alleyway between the buildings.

  “What is it?” Pax asked in a quiet whisper.

  Equally as quietly, he replied, “I thought I saw something’ moving’ in the building’.”

  In a loud voice, Benny asked, “Hunter?”

  Glaring, Pax made a clicking sound with his tongue and Benny immediately understood he was being too loud again. With an apologetic shrug, he looked shamefaced at his carelessness. As one of their original young leaders, along with Max and Mackenzie, they were all familiar with Benny’s natural exuberance.

  He was more concerned about what might be moving in the building and in his mind, he asked, do you know what that is, honey?

  Ip speaks: Here is life that much I know, but there is something wrong. It does not flow.

  Although he often felt they didn’t speak the same language, he was learning to
be patient and he thought, I dunno what that means, honey.

  Ip speaks: Life is life and bright it is. But this life is dulled and has less to give.

  That really didn’t help, he thought and he turned to Pax. “We’re gonna have to take a look. Ip says there’s something going on in there. I’ll go in with Ip. Stay here and stay alert.”

  Unloading his heavy pack, he signaled to Ip to go with him, and walked towards the back of the office building. He figured the rear of the building might offer a more protected entry than the large open foyer he’d seen at the front. Peering cautiously around the corner of the alley, he saw the building backed onto another small road. On the opposite side of the narrow street was the back of another building and everything was still and silent. Slipping around the corner of the building, he looked for a back entrance and Ip followed with her three hunters and under her control. He noticed the hunters moved with surprising stealth. He found a large double door that was slightly ajar and he supposed this must have been where they’d taken deliveries for the offices. Unlike the front of the building, this door was functional and not glamorous. He quietly eased the door open so they could both enter. Almost like they too were being cautious, Ip’s hunter guard silently followed them.

  The inside was dark, but thanks to the floor to ceiling glass walls on two sides of the building, stray shafts of light shone from multiple directions. In the murky light, he saw there were doors leading deeper into the building and he thought, honey, we need to find the stairs. Figuring the stair well was probably against the solid wall on the left side of the building, he opened the door furthest left and was rewarded with the sight of stairs leading to the levels above and below. It was gloomy, but the stairwell had small windows positioned all the way to the top of the building. Walking up the stairs, with Ip following closely behind him, he tried to minimize the sounds of his footsteps, but it wasn’t easy. He was a big and awkwardly built man, wearing hard-soled boots, carrying a heavy weapon and a lot of ammo. The generous lobby of the building was the equivalent height of two floors, and after four flights of stairs, he finally reached the first level where he found a door. Quietly, with his gun aimed, he eased the heavy door open and peered into the lighted room. Initially the sudden sunlight caught him by surprise and almost blinded him. As his vision began to recover, he was struck by the stench coming from inside the room. It was a mixture of vomit and feces that reminded him of Ruler’s last base, and as the light and smell hit him, so did the noise. The door to the floor was clearly a fire door and it had acted like a sound barrier, but the moment he opened the door, he could hear the sound of many people crying and moaning.