Blood Rules (24 page)

Everyone but me changed into their full were-forms—teeth lengthening, flashing; bodies exploding into wider, more lethal states—then charged ahead to back up Gabriel, rushing the sentinels. Suddenly my friends flew backward, hitting that psychokinetic wall. But the next second, they were right back up again, engaging the angel-beings, getting closer and closer to them with every preter-fueled rush forward.

Then Gabriel changed strategy, beginning to speed round the angel-beings, as if trying to confuse them. The distraction allowed Pucci to barge forward first, slashing out with his antlers just before kicking, trying to stomp one of his foes to death. Hana faked out her own sentinel and pummeled at it with her front hooves. The oldster attempted to crush his prey with his pincers and sting it with his tail.

The change jabbed within me, but I didn't let myself lose my own control—I had to think.

No.

I had to
go
.

I picked up Chaplin, then darted ahead.

Faster . . .

Faster—

Just as I got to the group, I sprang into the air, over their heads, landing on the other side, hoping there weren't any more sentinels to block me.

Nothing.

I zipped ahead to where the asylum door gate stood, wondering if it would be locked, even without the power on....

Chaplin stiffened in my arms, expecting impact as I accelerated. Ten feet away, I jumped and spun so my back would take the brunt of the contact, and—

A fireworks display burst through my head and limbs, and I wasn't sure if it was because my body was falling to pieces or because I'd made it through and was only momentarily stunned.

When I felt myself rolling over the ground, I realized that I was still intact.

Panting, I crouched, shaking my head out, what fur I had at this half-stage ruffling. The gates yawned behind me, blasted open from the force of my body, and, next to them, men aimed guns, screaming in Text.

“WTF is tht?”

“Git it!”

Then they were trying to fire, but they must've been using weapons that'd been knocked out by the power blaster. The darkness had to affect them, too, making them flail with no rhyme or reason.

Chaplin laugh-barked, like he was mocking them.

I didn't need my smart-ass dog to start something, so I swatted him on the butt and jetted off, toward a set of doors where a line of white-coated men blocked the entrance.

I don't know what they processed when they heard me coming. There was a wan light coming from their ungloved arms—their fritzed computer screens—but that was all they had to go by except for the subdued glow of my eyes.

A couple of employees weenied out, flattening themselves to the ground. A few of them targeted taserwhips at me, but those didn't work, either.

Chaplin and I hurdled them, but I was faster than my dog, and I flew at the doors, willing to take the hard knock of hitting the barriers first.

But I didn't even break them because their so-called secure locks had been victims of the power blaster, too.

After skidding on the ground, Chaplin and I were back up, pounding ahead like kamikazes.

G
abriel knew that Mariah had made it inside the asylum only because he didn't feel her anymore.

The brick walls and distance blocked their link, and the new emptiness felt like a hole that'd been scooped out of him. But the emptiness only made his vampire that much meaner. It left room for hunger.

As one of the angels, a boy with a peace sign burned into his forehead, readied himself to spring, appetite munched on Gabriel. Out of the corner of his red vision, he saw three of the other sentinels engaging Hana, Pucci, and the oldster; the kids had gotten out some blades and the steel was sparking against the were-mammals' hooves and the oldster's emerging exoskeleton.

Gabriel leveled a glare at his own challenger. He doubted these kids were anything more than human, just like the first version of Shredders that the government had obviously discarded for this next generation. But
these
fighters were psychically enhanced. Still, Gabriel hadn't felt any of them reach into his thoughts. These Shredders were only mind movers, not readers, and they weren't from any heaven, either.

You're no angel,
he thought as he stared at the boy, who wisely avoided Gabriel's gaze, glaring instead at the space between his eyes.

Angels. Gabriel had once believed in them, but seeing this boy here . . . It made him think that sentinels were only a cheap imitation if there was a real thing.

As expected, the boy blasted out at Gabriel with his mind. Prepared as Gabriel had been, it still made him stumble back a couple of steps before he regrouped, then launched himself at the angel, fangs and claws ready to rip.

But the sentinel had already reached back for his chest puncher, whipping it forward and targeting.

Mariah,
Gabriel thought during that split second between now and when the angel would pull the trigger. Mariah was in that asylum, alone with Chaplin, needing Gabriel to keep these sentinels occupied.

Unless there were more in the asylum . . .

Gabriel kicked the chest puncher so hard that it flipped out of the sentinel's hands, hanging in the air for what seemed like an endless second—one in which the angel boy focused his wide gaze on the weapon.

Before the boy could mentally manipulate the puncher back into his hands, Gabriel used his lightning speed to snatch it and aim at the boy's chest.

All Gabriel saw before he pulled the trigger was the peace symbol on the boy's forehead.

There was a kicking metallic sound, then the puncher flying out, clamping to the boy's chest, pulling him open, digging into him and extracting his heart in a splash of blood and cartilage, then a burst of flame as the puncher decimated his heart.

Gabriel tossed the chest puncher away and bared his fangs at all the others, who'd halted their fighting during the sudden conflagration. His were-friends were even gaping at him, just like the sentinels, looking as if he were their worst fear.

Red streaked the angels' white clothing. Blood. And even through the burning stenches, it wafted to Gabriel like smoke from a drug. He wanted some, needed to taste it.

The sentinels must've seen the raging appetite claim him, because, all together, they used their minds to blast out at him.

Gabriel was hurled backward, landing on his ass.

He laughed. He wasn't sure why. He just knew that no one else was laughing with him.

Then he smelled the blood, and he stood, slowly, his hunger screaming.

Blood. All he wanted was the water from these sentinels, who would carve him up just as surely as Stamp had intended to. And now that Gabriel really thought about it, there was
nothing
wrong with spilling blood. All his codes, his rules about overcoming his vampire . . .

They were nothing when the world really came at you.

He saw it all so clearly now. And he could also see that the remaining angels were reaching behind them to pull out their chest punchers. It was fascinating how they moved as one, as if they all knew they were about to die and instinctively agreed that they had to do something about it.

The oldster, who was all monster except for the facial details that remained and marked him as a man trapped under a hard face, struck out with his tail, stinging a girl angel, lifting her off the ground as she yelled and dropped her chest puncher while jerking because of the poison that'd been plunged into her. At the same time, Hana turned around, then flipped onto her front hooves to kick back with her rear legs at the second angel girl. Pucci slashed at his boy with those huge, pointed antlers.

Hana's girl flew backward with the thrust of the were–mule deer's kick, and Gabriel smelled the blood before the body got to him. Hissing, he jumped up, catching the angel girl in his mouth and falling to the ground where he pinned her. He ripped out her throat and gulped down her blood.

Blood.

Such good blood—different blood, with a tinge of something sweet and familiar—and he was drinking it for such good reason.

Finally
a good enough reason . . .

As he gorged, he heard the were-creatures behind him, taking care of the final sentinel. Hana kicked again, sending the boy toward Gabriel.

More . . . blood . . .

Without lifting his head from the girl, he reached out, catching the angel and slamming him down right next to the girl he still fed from.

With just one twist, Gabriel broke the boy's neck.

He kept drinking, the girl's blood nearly gagging him because he was taking so much in. It made him just as drunk as he used to get as a human, when he'd nullified the pain of losing his family to the mosquito epidemic with booze. But this was different. Unlike the alcohol, this made him stronger, not weaker.

Mariah was right,
he thought as he gulped and gulped. She'd had the right idea all along about being a monster.

He could hear the others panting around him as he kept drinking, sucking, loving every gush. And when he finally couldn't take in any more, he looked up, finding the were-creatures with their heads cocked.

Animals every one of them.

Hana bent to the boy with the broken neck, sniffing at him. It was the full were-creature inside her, not the mule deer, that wanted blood. Pucci got down beside her, sniffing, too.

Even the oldster dipped a pincer in the blood.

As the were-creatures tested the red, then dove into their prey, Gabriel felt something tremble inside him—a recognition.

He let his food roll off his lap.

But just as he was wondering what'd just happened, he heard the barking of dogs.

By the time he got to his feet, his gaze was the thickest of reds, and he could barely see through it to a pack of beastly, big, yellow-eyed canines as they sprinted along the walkway.

Logic screamed at Gabriel.
Get them before they get to Mariah.

As if in a waking dream, he ran at the dogs, leaving the others behind. The beasts caught air as they jumped at him, teeth bared, and Gabriel punched through their chests, one by one, throwing each bad guy away as he went to the next.

When he was done, he stood there, listening for any more.

But there was nothing, unless you counted the continued panting of the Badlanders.

Gabriel turned to them, only to find them still cocking their heads, their hooves and pincers shining with liquid. Unlike him, they were in control, as if they hadn't expected to react any other way tonight. They'd even disposed of the bodies by throwing them over the wall.

He didn't feel like the savior who'd helped them back in the nowheres. He was them.

One by one, the Badlanders stood and, as if they'd only taken part in what was natural, sped off down the wall path, securing it against any other threats while leaving Gabriel behind to catch up.

O
nce I was inside the depths of the asylum, a barrage of sensation had attacked my half-turned were-facilities.

The darkness dotted by the pale, blank, nearly useless glows from arm screens; whimpers and panicked words from confused men and women all round me as they grasped at the walls, trying to find their way; the burned hardware stench lying just below fright-induced sweat that covered delicious skin.

Juices rushed my mouth, and I panted.

Food. Blood. Hungry, always hungry.

Chaplin nipped me on the leg.
Cure,
he said.
This may be your only chance for one.

I started repeating it all in my mind.
Cure. Go get it....

I mentally accessed our blueprints of the asylum. I'd run through them a million times in my mind, and Chaplin had them even more down pat. He led me past the whimpering workers sitting against the walls, some of them trying to speak into comm units and arm computers; past the deadened cameras that weren't functional enough to record us; past unlocked doors and offices and straight into the first cell block.

The lab was supposed to be just beyond.

I could see everything as blurs, and I strained, wanting a better view. But my patience paid off when I saw the first monster in its cell, where emergency bars—some coated with silver, some barbed—had obviously crashed down to take the place of the former laser fields.

A preter with tentacles was spurting some waterlike stuff out, as if to test those barriers, and the liquid splatted into the corridor. The creature hadn't been fast enough to escape before the bars had crashed down, but there was a door with a lock in each barricade. The creature raised its tentacles, as if about ready to stick one of its wavy fingers in to pick that lock.

I glanced across the way at another stunned monster, and this one had gotten outside the bars before they'd fallen, although it was refusing to leave. The only way I could describe it was as one of those stone fertility statues you'd see in a book about ancient cultures. A tall, rotund creature with pendulous breasts and a featureless face, just standing in the corridor as if it didn't know which way to go now that it'd been sprung. Another monster was just behind it, but Chaplin barked, consuming my attention, and I translated the best I could through teeth that were lengthening a bit more every minute.

“You're free,” I said to the stone thing. “Run!”

But it just kept hesitating, and, once again, I saw why humans had never needed to deal with massive monster attacks.

Maybe the stone creature couldn't talk without a mouth—at least not in any way I could understand—so I went to the monster behind it, a half-man/half-serpent. A chimera?