Crow - The Awakening (53 page)

The vampire cried out in pain and Steven saw that his arm was blackened and smoking where he had grabbed him. That pain seemed to fuel the vampire's anger and the creature turned toward him quickly, his eyes flashing. Time seemed to drag out all of a sudden and he could feel the monster of his nightmares building his energy to rush him. Steven backpedaled on the grass as everything appeared to move in extreme slow motion. He looked around, wondering what was real and what was nightmare. Was this all a dream?

As Steven felt the vampire’s energy reach a crescendo he winced, knowing he couldn’t outrun the monster. The ground below him trembled, but he only peripherally noticed that and couldn’t tell if the quaking wasn’t just his own terror. Suddenly the buzzing in his head was abruptly drowned out by the sound of jet turbines up overhead and behind him and it seemed that time caught up with Steven in a rush. The vampire hesitated and looked up. Without warning, there was a barrage of impacts around the vampire and immediately after that Steven heard the sound. It was louder than anything he had heard before. It sounded like the exceedingly deafening noise of a foghorn so loud that it made Steven grimace in pain, holding his ears. He felt it as much as heard it. The vampire was suddenly thrown back, whole the front of his clothes were being shredded to pieces by the shells that were hitting him. The ground around him erupted with more explosions as he was slammed on his back. Steven gaped in shock as he saw yet more impacts knocking the vampire back even further as another round of shells rained down from the air, looking like fiery beams of lasers in the night sky.

Looking up, Steven saw what appeared to be a large shadow in the sky that blocked out the stars and that shadow was belching flame with each burst of the foghorn sound. Holding his ears, he scrambled into a darker part of the park and emerged out of it into a parking lot. He was surprised that suddenly there were no agents there to intercept him. But he could see shadows starting to chase him from the forest and things were popping off the cars around him. He saw one as he ran by and noted that they looked like the combination of bullet and syringe. He ducked behind a car, narrowly avoiding another hail of the darts. The car's door was open and the engine was running, so without hesitating, Steven jumped in and put it in drive and pushed the accelerator down.

As he did, something big slammed onto the hood. A large black man that had extensive canines stared at him angrily through the windshield and roared. Steven felt the roar as much as heard it. The man reached back and punched the windshield, causing it to spider and push in. The plastic in the windshield prevented the man from punching a hole straight through, but the shock of it was enough to cause Steven to slam on the brakes and suddenly the man was gone. He hit the accelerator again and burst over the curb and onto the street. As he drove by he noticed the aircraft suddenly plunge to the ground, exploding in a ball of fire and lightning. He didn't slow down, however and very quickly that was far behind him. Steven swerved onto the on ramp of the highway and kept the pedal buried in the floorboard until the park was well out of sight.

"Sir, look at this." The drone pilot pointed at the screen. It was displaying various wavelengths originally intended to give him a better view of the target he was tracking. Their camera was back online after being overwhelmed by too close a proximity to the semi truck's explosion and they were able to see clearly past the canopy of trees. But in this case another person was on the screen that didn't look like any of the officers at the location or the target. "He's approaching the target, sir."

The flight officer bent down and looked at the energy profile of the man. "It looks like he's trying to sneak up on our target." Standing up, he typed on a terminal, forwarding the video to Laurence.

The reply from Laurence was almost instantaneous. "Engage and destroy that man now!" The officer blinked and turned his bluetooth earpiece down.

"You're cleared to engage that man immediately." He leaned over to the weapons operator, looking at the targeting screen. The weapons operator had already fixed on the target with the targeting camera so the pilot could get a more precise view of the scene.

"All we have is the cannon, sir." He looked confused. They were tasked to disable any vehicle their primary target may attempt to escape in and even with that the cannon was a significant overkill.

"The order is given. Take him out." The officer stood up, looking at the targeting screen as the weapons operator marked the target active and set up automatic target tracking.

The officer spoke into his phone to the commanders on the ground, "Clear for cannon fire! Clear for cannon fire! Clear for cannon fire!" He watched on the video screen as their agents moved back away from the target and nodded to the weapons operator.

The weapons operator pulled the trigger and the video showed puffs of smoke on and around the target. "Got him, sir." He was rather proud at nailing such a small target so precisely.

"No, you didn't. He's getting back up." The officer squinted, changing the spectrum on the camera to get a better view of the man. His clothing was in tatters. The weapons operator released another volley at him before he could get to his feet and he was knocked back even further.

"Sir, he's still getting up." The weapons operator was incredulous. These shells were designed to turn tanks into piles of scrap. There was no armor that man could wear that could resist them. And yet, this man was surviving, even continuing to get up.

"Keep popping him," the officer said, transfixed by the screen. He was having trouble believing his eyes as well. Nothing they targeted with that weapon survived intact. And a mere man was getting lit up and had no injuries to show for it.

The weapons operator complied, releasing volley after volley at the target, knocking him back into the trees that themselves exploded from the impact of the shells.

Suddenly the video shifted. "Pilot, regain your attitude!" the officer commanded, looking over at the pilot.

"I am, sir. Something is moving the aircraft." He was working his controls madly trying to keep the aircraft in the air, gritting his teeth.

The video streaked and jittered as if suffering from electrical interference, then suddenly they saw the ground come up almost instantaneously and the video feed went dead.

"What happened?" The officer looked at the pilot, who sat there with his hands on the controls staring at the blank screen.

"I don't know sir. My controls went completely nonresponsive." The pilot looked up. "I didn't do that."

Laurence joined their conversation over the speaker phone, "Pack up the truck and head to base. The drone is down." He cut the connection before any of them could ask anything and they were left looking at each other.

Lohet waited at the edge of the clearing, watching soldiers walk right by him as they took up intercept positions in the park. Steven was definitely there. He looked up in the trees where he expected him to be. Sirel and Penipe were up in the canopy trying to locate him and spirit him away before the soldiers could get their hands on him. It was imperative they acquire him and get away without making contact with the soldiers.

While these soldiers couldn't see him, even with their infrared vision devices, he could see them very clearly. His eyes were well adapted for dim lit situations and for him it was like being in full daylight. A couple of agents knelt down beside him, cocking their dart guns. Up in the trees he saw his crew still hunting. Penipe appeared to stop in a tree, then climb very slowly, like a predator stalking its prey. It would appear that she found Steven and he looked up in the direction she was focused on and spotted a leg hugging the trunk.

One of the soldiers was looking up as well. "Hey, I think I see movement up in the trees. IR is lighting up," the agent whispered to his partner. Lohet looked down at both of them then reached down and gave each a sharp rap on the back of their heads. They both slumped. Standing back up he watched Penipe slowly reach out. Steven appeared to jerk and suddenly he was falling out of the tree, controlling his descent and landing on the ground. Lohet could tell that the kid was exhausted, but there still appeared to be enough energy in him to keep running.

Penipe went to follow him when Lohet held up a hand. She stopped and maintained her cover up in the canopy. He couldn't risk his teammate and best chance at connecting with Steven in this volatile situation. Lohet heard yelling and gas canisters hit the ground near his feet. They exploded, filling the air with tear gas. Lohet looked up, seeing Steven stop before jumping into the gas. He was in full automatic mode, assessing the situation and making split decisions based on what he saw. However, this time he appeared boxed in. Lohet decided it was time to collect the boy and leave this place.

He stepped out of the haze of tear gas, walking toward Steven. Steven saw him and backpedaled. Lohet exploded forward and stopped just short of Steven, reaching out, careful not to damage him too badly. But rather than standing there, Steven ducked, grabbed his arm and used Lohet's body to launch himself. Suddenly, Lohet felt a sharp pain shoot up his arm from where Steven had grabbed him. He looked to see glowing embers where Steven had touched him, and noted that his sleeve had been burned through to his skin. He returned his attention to Steven as he felt the slightest tremors coming from the ground, and decided it was time to end this one way or the other. The deviant was approaching maturity and becoming a danger to everyone involved.

He didn't notice a sudden retreat of the soldiers around him while he built up energy to acquire Steven. He had no idea if the deviant was still vulnerable or not and decided to take no chances as he called out all his energy for a final massive strike. As he started forward he glanced down, spotting a circle of light on his chest. Looking up, he saw an aircraft that had been circling around in the sky suddenly approach his location. Puffs of smoke belched out of its front. Something hit him hard in the chest, and as he hit the ground he heard the characteristic foghorn sound of the weapon. He tried to get up when he saw more puffs of smoke, then explosions around him followed by the loud report of the weapon as sound caught up with the projectiles. Their impact knocked him back even further, shredding his clothing. He signaled to Sirel and was knocked back again and then again, finally being showered by splinters as the trees around him exploded from the high energy projectiles.

Sirel made it to the aircraft quickly and landed on top of it. She put both hands flat on the hull and gave it a strong charge, bolts of lightning enveloping the aircraft and exploding in the trees down below. Nothing happened. She felt the hull. It was covered with a stealth material that also resisted electrical discharges. "So that's how you want to play," she giggled. She changed her concentration and suddenly the aircraft weighed more than a large ship, easily overwhelming the thrust of the turbines as it plummeted toward the ground. She let go just before it hit, ascending rapidly as the momentum of the aircraft finished her work. As the aircraft touched the ground, the tremendous amount of static electricity it built up from her initial attack was released with great bolts of lightning as the fireball engulfed that section of the park.

Suddenly there was a massive exodus from the park as the agents piled into their vehicles and tried to pursue Steven. Sirel resisted the urge to fry them and stayed up in the sky, out of sight. She saw Lohet melt back into the shadows of the forest and went to join him there.

Lohet looked around, trying to find Steven. Migalo knocked down a couple of agents that landed lifelessly to either side of him as he bounded toward Lohet, decidedly unhappy and not minding his teeth as he snarled while he ran. He took his anger out on any soldier stupid enough to get in the way and left a string of armored body parts behind him until he made it to the shadows and joined Lohet, growling.

"Steven's got a car." He was furious. His clothes were also shredded and he picked at them, disgusted. Wearing Terran clothing was not working out well and he sorely missed his own garb. "He ran over me."

Lohet noticed blood on Migalo's fists. "How functional is it?"

"Windshield is destroyed. He'll have to find another car if he is to get very far." Migalo grinned.

Lohet looked at him for a moment, calculating their next move. "We need to get out of sight and keep an eye on these people. They may be our best chance of locating Steven."

"How are they finding him?" Migalo asked looking around as more of the park emptied with all but a few of the agents. The humans don't know Steven like they do and would not have thought to look in the trees. And yet their attacks were very direct.

“They have marked him. Sirel?” Lohet looked at her as she floated over, staying in the darkness of the shadows.

"Sorry, Lohet," she pouted. Sirel hated not anticipating Lohet's commands. Lohet looked at her, remembering that she was occupied with the aircraft and didn't have an opportunity to scan the deviant for a tracking device.

"We need to find the frequency they're using to track him. Penipe, get on that." Penipe landed softly beside him from the trees. She pulled out her computer and started scanning. But the trackers being used by the humans had all left the park so she didn't have an opportunity to find their frequency.

"They must be using satellite tracking," Penipe mused, looking up. Finding that signal would be impossible without a suitable frame of reference. She frowned, biting her lip. "We need one of their tracking devices." She looked at Lohet. "You look conspicuous, Lohet."

Lohet looked down. most of his clothing had been destroyed by the shells. The paint on his skin had also been chipped away. "True. We need to regroup at the safe house and refresh our disguises."

Penipe gasped, looking at his arm. "Lohet, you're injured!" She found it hard to believe he could even be injured. Their robustness was one reason why they were often front line soldiers against the golems.