by SD Tanner
“Well, I dunno, Pax,” TL answered. “Maybe it’s ‘cos this mission is just one more fuck up.”
Gears climbed out of the limousine. “That’s enough. This mission ain’t finished and we got innocents to take care of. Cut the bullshit and focus. We’ll deal with our shit when we get back to the base.” As he spoke, Gears continued to stride across the road to meet Benny and he climbed out of the limousine to join him.
Peering back into the limo through the open door, he said, “Stay here, baby. I’ll be back.”
Ip had walked across the road with Gears while TL stayed with the limo. He joined them in the middle of the road and Benny said, “We got about three hundred people out, but we had to leave some of them in that room ‘cos they were dead or not able to move.” With a worried look, he asked, “Should I have stayed and got more people? I mean, there were floors and floors of people in there, but I just couldn’t see how we could get anymore out and still leave the city before it gets dark. I couldn’t take the people who couldn’t move, but it didn’t seem right.”
He felt for Benny. It must have been tough to leave people behind, and shaking his head as, he batted Benny on the shoulder. “You did good and you had to call it. We’ll come back for the rest. I promise.”
While they were talking Mike walked over. “We gotta keep moving. We can’t be in the city after dark.”
Gears nodded. “We’re about two miles from the tunnel and two hours from nightfall. We need to be through the tunnels by then and have people secured for the night. It’s gonna be tight.”
“We could use the limo to ferry the people who can’t move too fast,” he suggested.
“Good idea.”
He turned to Mike and Benny. “Let’s get the injured into the limo and start movin’ ‘em. The limo can come back and keep picking people up.”
“What about the bird?” TL asked through his radio.
“Can’t get through to ‘em by radio yet and it’s too hard to land here anyway. Plus we can’t afford to lose it,” Gears replied.
It was disorganized and a far cry from their original plan to quietly slip in and out of the city. Ruler was now missing, and they had three hundred battered survivors to get through a dark tunnel they knew had hunters in it. He supposed Gears was right, he needed to focus on the mission and not BD. They headed down 7th Avenue, but made slow progress. Many of the survivors were already exhausted, some injured, and all were thirsty and hungry. There was no food or water to be found along the way, and he knew they would just have to survive without either. He’d taken the rear position with TL, and Gears was in lead with Ip. The two combat shooters were already at the tunnel protecting the people who’d been driven there. Mike was driving the limo to and fro, ferrying as many people as he could to the tunnel, and Benny was travelling with him as his gunner. It took them nearly an hour to walk the two miles, and when they reached the tunnels, he saw about a hundred survivors waiting for them.
Catching up with Gears, he asked, “What’s the plan?
Eyeing TL warily, and obviously prepared for another angry outburst, he replied, “We’re gonna need to walk ‘em through the tunnels in groups of fifty, or Ip won’t be able to keep ‘em safe from the hunters.”
TL didn’t disappoint his brother and voiced his objection loudly. “Are you fucking nuts, Gears. They’ll never make it in time. It’ll be dark in an hour or so, and people will be stuck on this side of the tunnel with nowhere to run.”
He watched as Gears and TL squared up to one another and decided he needed to step in. Shouldering himself between his two warring brothers, he said, “It really ain’t my job to be the sensible one, but cut the crap both of you. You’re wastin’ time. We need to get Hatch with the bird and start ferrying people by air. There’s enough room to land the bird here. We’ll take the first batch through, and either radio Hatch if we can get through to him or send word on foot.”
Gears broke off his glaring eye contact with TL. “Send through the most able first. The sooner we can make contact with Hatch the better. Pax, you stay here with the shooters, and TL you come with me and you can sort the bird one way or another.”
He nodded. “Take BD with you now. I want her safe, and don’t tell me that ain’t fair, ‘cos I don’t give a shit.”
Gears shrugged. “Nah, that makes perfect sense. I don’t want you gettin’ distracted by her when you should be workin’.”
Mike helped them organize the fifty most able of the survivors and he watched them all walk into the tunnels. He had no doubt they’d make it through the tunnel safely and he turned to look at the remaining survivors. Most were now exhausted and sitting or lying around the stretch of road that led into the tunnels, looking tense and tired. He walked over to two women who were huddled together, sitting with their backs resting against one of the abandoned cars, with their arms around one another’s shoulders.
He had no food or water left and hunkered down beside them. “How ya doin’?”
The women had looked to be in their fifties, but close up he realized they were probably more like thirty. Both were dirty and he could smell the acrid stench of sweat on both of them. Their jeans and shirts were heavily soiled, and crouching closer to them, he detected the strong smell of feces and urine. Their hair was so matted he couldn’t tell what color it was, and with their filthy and drawn faces, the women looked like they’d been through hell, which he supposed they had.
The woman sitting to his left looked at him and he saw she had deep brown eyes. She drew her friend closer. “We’re okay, thanks.” Looking intently at her, he saw she still had a spark about her when she said, “My name is Marion and this is Jules.”
Jules seemed to be deeply withdrawn and didn’t even look up when her name was mentioned. He tilted his head to try and see her face, but she seemed to pull further into herself and he nodded to Marion. “You takin’ care of her?”
“Yeah, I didn’t know her before we were captured, but we’ve been chained up together for five days.” With a downturned mouth, she added, “She was doing good until a day or so ago.”
Wishing he could offer the women more than just words, he asked, “Can you tell me what happened?”
“There’s not much to tell. I was in the East Village when tens of thousands of hunters came running through the streets. Before they attacked us we were getting by. We lived in small groups and teamed up to get supplies. We didn’t always get along, but we found a way to survive. New York was a busy city. For a long time there was plenty we could forage, and later on we sent teams out of the city to scavenge what we needed. A lot of people were gradually leaving the city, but it was hard to let it go. It’s our home.”
Marion sighed deeply and continued. “I thought we were doing pretty well. We’d cleared whole buildings, so it was safe at night. We even had access to doctors and medical supplies. Food was scarce, but we got by. We grew vegetables on the rooftops and we captured rainwater. It was working. We were coping and hoping eventually some sort of order would be restored.”
He was impressed by their obvious resilience. “What happened when the hunters came?”
She looked unseeingly into the distance. “They weren’t normal hunters. They came in the daylight and they were smart. They broke down doors. They climbed walls and balconies. They climbed on top of one another to reach higher floors. They did things we’d never seen them do before, and once they got into the buildings, there was no stopping them. They killed some people, but mostly they dragged us into the streets where there were more of them. We were surrounded by hunters and there were soldiers, but they weren’t like real soldiers. They were dressed in uniforms and had guns, but they didn’t point them at us. They didn’t need to and they seemed to be controlling the hunters somehow. And they had blue eyes. I mean completely blue. Like the woman you have with you.”
He realized she was talking about Ip. “Yeah, she’s got the same abilities, but she’s with us.”
Marion nodded. “I
can see that. She’s not the same. We were made to walk to Battery Park and they kept us there for a day until they started to process us. It was terrible. We had no food or water, and people were hurt and just left in the park to suffer. A few groups tried to escape, but they caught them and dragged them back.” Drawing a shuddering breath, she said in horror, “They let the hunters eat them alive and said anyone who tried to leave would be fed to the hunters. I don’t know how they did it, but they didn’t die until there was nothing left. Even when they should have been dead, they just kept screaming.”
He nodded grimly. “Yeah, we’ve heard they can do that.”
Marion continued. “We were all assessed somehow, and the youngest and the healthiest seemed to be singled out, but I don’t know where they went. Most of us were marched to the buildings, and anyone who was too injured or old or couldn’t move was fed to the hunters. I wanted to run, but I didn’t want to be eaten alive, so I did as I was told. I didn’t know what they were going to do. If I had known I might have run. When we got to the buildings, the soldiers…’
He didn’t like hearing the demons called soldiers. “Not soldiers, Marion. They’re demons.”
Marion nodded. “Oh yeah, they’re demons. They used the hunters to chain us together. Once a day they came by with small amounts of food and water, and sometimes they would come in and take some of us away. We were there for maybe five days, but I’m not really sure. Initially we talked to one another. You know, said who we were and tried to work out how to escape, but it was hopeless. I thought we were all going to die in there. Being chained like that was torture.”
He nodded understandingly. “Yeah, bein’ chained like that is torture. You must still be in pain.”
Marion nodded again. “I think I’ve lost feeling in my arms and knees, but I’m guessing this is going to hurt a lot more later.”
“Yeah, it probably will,” he reluctantly agreed. Realizing she probably didn’t know more than she’d just told him, and not wanting make her anymore tired than she already was, he touched her leg gently. “Try and get some rest. You’ve still gotta find the energy to get through the tunnel.”
Standing, he saw Mike nearby and walked over to him. “We need to work out who can walk and who needs to be airlifted.”
Although he looked exhausted, Mike nodded. “Okay. Let’s make an assessment and move the ones who can walk into a group.”
By the time they’d organized people into groups, he heard the pucker sound of the bird coming over the water. Looking up, he grinned as Hatch landed the bird in a small clearing on the road. Ip skipped out of the bird, ran over to him, and stopping just a few feet in front of him, she smiled at him.
Eyeing her warily, he thought, bad mood over?
Ip speaks: Do not annoy. You are happy too. Your true wife came back for you.
At the memory of BD, he suddenly smiled and winked at her. “Yeah, I ain’t forgotten that, but Gears is right, we got work to do. Your next group are ready to go.”
Gears had climbed out of the bird and tramped over to them. “I need you to start loadin’ people into the bird. We’ll take the rest of ‘em through the tunnel, but make it snappy, Pax. We’re runnin’ outta time. TL has gone to find Saunders. I’m hopin’ he’ll know somewhere nearby they can hole up for the night.”
“Whatdaya mean ya can take the rest of ‘em? I thought Ip could only keep fifty of ‘em safe.”
Gears shook his head, and sounding exasperated, he said, “There ain’t no hunters left in the tunnel, Pax. Ip collected ‘em as she went through and then she walked ‘em off a pier and into the water. You’ve gotta learn to keep up with the changin’ dynamic.”
The thought of hunters walking off a short pier made him chuckle. “Don’t show off, Gears. You didn’t think of that either.”
Giving him a tired grin, Gears replied, “No, I didn’t.”
He and Mike began to help the injured and slow moving people onto the bird, and Hatch flew them the short distance to the other side of the tunnel. They worked as quickly as they could, and looking at the horizon to the west, he saw the sun was moving lower. He worried they’d have enough time to move everyone. With Hatch ferrying people by air, they got lucky, and the large group of people still able to walk quickly cleared the tunnel. He was with the last group airlifted out, but even he could see it was becoming dangerously dark. When they landed, he saw Gears and TL were moving people into a building near the tunnel. It looked like a small three story office block and he hoped Ip had cleared it of hunters. It didn’t really matter, the day was rapidly becoming night, and there was no way they could protect so many vulnerable people once the hunters were out.
Hatch landed the bird, and with the combat shooters, he quickly hustled the people into the building. Then Hatch took off again to park the bird on the roof where it would be secure for the night. Inside the building, Gears and TL moved people to the second floor. There was a door that led to the stairs, and he assumed they would need to secure it for the night. While he helped a man with an injured leg through the door, he looked across the room and saw it was an open plan area with several offices at one end. The survivors were sitting on or around the desks, and everyone looked worn and weary. He walked over to where Gears was standing and talking to Saunders, Mike, Benny and TL.
“Small groups, like mice,” Saunders said conspiratorially. “A little here. A little there. The Devil’s maggots can’t find all the mice in their holes.” With a worried look, he added ominously, “But if the Dark Overlord knows we’re here then all is lost.”
“Don’t you worry about that little shit,” Gears said firmly. “We’ll be back for some payback. I jus’ need you to keep ‘em protected while we get the shooters and supplies sent. It’ll only take a day or so. We’ll head back at first light and send a fleet with supplies and shooters. They’ll be here by the day after tomorrow. Just stay here. Don’t move ‘em about.” He looked around at the shattered looking survivors. “You can’t move ‘em, ‘cos they can’t move.”
Following his gaze, he asked, “Are we gonna head back to base?”
“Yeah. Like TL says, we need a plan to take back the city, and we dunno where Ruler is anymore, but let’s assume he ain’t planning to leave.”
“Where’s his demon army?” TL asked.
Gears shrugged, “I dunno.”
Seeing him walk in, BD had wandered over to stand next to him. “I know where they are.”
He put his arm around her shoulders. “How do you know that, baby? And where are they?”
She leaned into his embrace and he felt a flush of happiness. “I was with Hull. He said they were going to take control of Staten Island. He and Ruler planned to set up there as well.”
“Do you know where Hull’s Army went?” BD looked up at him with a confused expression. “The men dressed like us.”
“You mean the demons that control the hunters?”
“Yeah, those assholes.”
“Hull took them all to the island with the hunters. They’re there now.”
Mike looked at them in horror. “There’s as many people there as there was in the city.”
“Shit, we just got lucky,” TL said dourly. “The only reason we got in and out of the city alive is because Ruler’s demon army aren’t even in the city.”
Squeezing her shoulder, he realized TL was right. They hadn’t even seen the face of their enemy, and now Ruler was dead, he would possess a new body and his face would be a mystery. They could walk right past Ruler and not know it was him. Their mission hadn’t gone well and they really had just gotten lucky. Maybe TL was right and they really did need to lift their game.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE: A man worth his weight (Mackenzie)
She clutched her swollen belly protectively. “No, Mac!”
He bared his teeth and lunged at her, grabbing her by her hair and yanking her head backwards, exposing her throat. Savoring the sight of her neck with an almost sexual pleasure, he bent his head and
wrapped his teeth around her windpipe, biting deeply. Once his teeth had her throat tightly gripped, he pulled his head back sharply, tearing her flesh. Blood filled his mouth, and a morsel of flesh slid over his teeth, which he chewed it briefly before swallowing it whole. It felt odd as it slipped down his throat, but he liked it and wanted more. Max had been screaming, but with her throat shredded, the sound slowed to a wet gurgle. She continued to push against his chest, but she was already growing weaker, and he sensed she was going into shock. Not wanting her to die before he had his fill, he lunged his head downward again, this time aiming for her soft breasts.
Before he could see any more of his future, the passing buildings penetrated his vision, and he was sitting in the passenger seat of the truck on his way back to the base. The combat shooter who was driving the truck glanced across at him with a concerned look. “You okay?”
Rubbing his hand over his eyes, he muttered, “Yeah…thanks.”
“You were growling. It was weird. I’ve heard about you. You’re the guy who can see the future.”
He frowned at the comment, thinking he had more important things to worry about than the curiosity of a combat shooter. Looking at the driver, he vaguely remembered he’d introduced himself as Brett. “I don’t wanna talk about it.”
The woman sitting in the seat behind the driver leaned forward and he instinctively turned his head toward the movement. She leant with one elbow on the driver’s backrest and the other on his. “Can you really see the future?”
“Shut up, Leanne. The man said he didn’t want to talk about it. You should be watching out for trouble, not gossiping.”
Leanne gave Brett a dirty look. “Ever since he got promoted to lead shooter, he’s been a real ass.” Turning to face Brett, she added contemptuously, “You’re not that good Brett. You only got promoted ‘cos everyone else has gone to the island.”
Now sounding flustered, Brett replied, “Shut up, Leanne, and do as you’re ordered.”
