Edge Walkers (24 page)

For now, she gave her guys a nod, pulled her torn tunic tight, and said, “Come on. Let’s finish this before they finish us.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

I’m done talking. You’re done as well if you don’t do something more than sit around talking. — Excerpt Interview Gideon Chant

Temple led them along a path through sodden back streets and Gideon followed Carrie, dodging puddles, keeping a watch, and still dealing with the residual spill of Temple’s emotions. It had been a long time coming. Some Walkers, for whatever reason, were harder to track and put to rest. Temple’s son had been one of those. He’d been the first taken on this world and that had shown in the worn flesh, in the damage from those years. Walkers didn’t take care of the bodies they used. They fed from them until they were dry, empty husks. But some hung on to their human shells, and Gideon had nightmares about the reasons for that. What did a Walker take from the dead?

Temple’s son had been one of those worn to the bone. Jill was another caught in that endless pretense of life. But there might be a way to end that, if Carrie was right. Except that seemed a big “if” just now.

Frowning, he watched Carrie’s back as she hurried along the wet, dark streets, the bag at her side clutched tight, her gaze shifting, seeking his at times, skittering away. The sky had darkened, the clouds dropping lower, heavy with wet that spilled in fat, cold drops that spattered onto the street and onto his shoulders. Gideon shivered and wished he could drag Carrie under his arm to shelter her.

If she still had the memories from the rings, she’d be seeing the ghosts of this city, the beauty of what had once been, the elegant streets, the vibrant life. Maybe it could be that again.

Thunder rumbled, low and nearby, although Gideon had not seen the flash of lightning. He looked at Carrie again, watched for the bright flash of her hair. He wanted her to be right—for her plan to work. But too many years of struggling for survival argued that someone needed to make sure this wouldn’t make things worse. And maybe Carrie had been through too much too fast. She was sleep deprived and half in shock and not really adapted to this world. She might not be thinking straight. Which meant they needed a backup plan. Because what if she opened her doorway and let Edge Walkers through?

Watching her long stride, he thought about how she’d gotten here—with a mistake. An accident. Except, by her reasoning, the Edge Walkers had leveraged her experiment. Just like they had his. Would they do that again with this plan? Were they smarter than anyone knew? More dangerous?

He knew Carrie didn’t have all the answers. He didn’t have them either—except for one. He’d given her his trust.

He knew enough about her to know she was rash. She jumped into things, something that had its good points, but it also frustrated the hell out of him. She liked to think she was level-headed. She’d call herself logical. He’d seen how she liked to line up facts, but he’d also seen her pound into that Walker who’d been wearing Temple’s son. There was nothing rational or reasonable about that. And he still had to ask himself the question that mattered the most—
What if the choice comes down to helping Carrie or putting Jill to rest?

He couldn’t come up with an answer.

He’d seen Temple’s face when Temple had knelt in the mud and touched the remains of his dead son. There’d been relief as well as sorrow. An ease of the grief—and the guilt. Gideon wasn’t sure he’d find the same. But he knew down to his bones he had to see the woman who’d been his wife put to rest.

He’d do anything for that.

He edged around fresh rubble, another building falling in on itself.

If he was a lucky man, he’d see Jill as Temple had seen his son—her soul freed and her body taken from the Walkers. He get out of this with his own skin, with Carrie alive. She’d be safe, but no longer here. No longer with him. That was the plan.

He hunched his shoulders against the fitful wet from the sky. That’s what she needed from him, a way home. He wasn’t going to think about what it was going to be like without her. He’d survived losing Jill, he could…ah, dammit, he couldn’t even think about going through that again. The real luck would be to keep Carrie with him.

Somehow they at least managed some luck—they made it to the quarry, to the place where Carrie had crossed. They didn’t meet other Walkers, but the rain thickened to a steady, hard fall that obliterated everything except for the splash of their feet into mud. Between deserted buildings, Gideon caught flashes of lights. He didn’t know if he was seeing Walkers or lightning. He only knew he couldn’t hear the rumble of thunder. Temple sent him an image, a warning that Walkers could trap them inside this place that connected to Carrie’s lab. Gideon swapped a look with him and wiped the rain from his eyes.

What else can we do?

Gideon looked at Carrie and she turned and stared back at him. Squinting against the darkness and the wet, he asked, “Now what?”

Before she could answer, Walkers surged out from a side street in a blinding flash. After a dozen Gideon lost count of the numbers. Temple glanced once at Carrie, and sprinted forward, charging the Walkers. Gideon took aim, but he couldn’t risk shooting Temple. He shouted to Carrie to get inside, do what she had to do. And he took off after Temple.

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

This whole thing headed south long time before we snagged that last MIA. And, no, looking back on it, that wasn’t the best idea. But it seemed the means to some kinda end. Only worry now is, that end…well, it could include this facility, this country, and the entire goddamm world. — Excerpt Debriefing Major James B. Jakes

Jakes crouched low behind a boulder, his shoulders soaked, his fingers numb with cold, and wishing he had gloves. This was the last time he ever stepped anywhere without a full kit. The Walkers in front of them had stopped, seemed to be making up their minds about something, if they had minds, that is, and Brody seemed to think they did. Half the things had their faces lifted, eyes sparking bright. Blue-white light danced out from the tears in their skin, from between the rags hanging off the skinny bodies. The other half had faces down, wandered around, seeming aimless, but Jakes thought of bloodhounds casting out and around for a scent.

He and Shoup had taken positions downwind from the fitful breeze that kept kicking up and dying, pushing splatters of rain into swirling whirlwinds didn’t live long enough to become anything more. The air hung still right now, the rain had let up into a misting drizzle. He and Shoup had cover and the high-ground. They should be sitting pretty. Jakes didn’t trust any of it—not the tactics he’d had drilled into him over the years and not these things walking around in human skin. They shouldn’t exist and they did. They looked like regular folk, but weren’t. And he was just damn glad you could kill ‘em. But if Brody was right these things were stressing the walls between worlds. That had to stop. And he still didn’t know if Zeigler was a rescue to make or a monster to put down.

Lifting a hand, he looked over to Shoup, gave the signal for the guy to flank the group in front of them. He wanted coverage. He wanted Zeigler to look up, goddammit.

The guy stood in the center of the other Walkers, his head bent and his body swaying. Jakes knew the look of shock on a man. Zeigler, if he still was Zeigler, had been through some bad crap. It was tempting to do what Gideon had urged and put all these bastards into a real grave. But that wasn’t the job.

Mouth pressed tight, Jakes looked over to Shoup, gave the signal.

Shoup lobbed out a grenade, took out three of the Walkers on the far side. Bodies blew apart, and the force of the blast flowed around Jakes, shook the ground and his chest. Ozone sizzled and the sky tore open in a black jagged line that Jakes was starting to hate. He shut out the sight, focused on a target, took out that one and shifted his aim to the next. Wind whipped at him, dragged, only it wasn’t wind, more like invisible hands grabbing at his insides, trying to pull him into that black tear in the sky that he could see out of the corner of his eye and didn’t want to look into.

He saw Zeigler getting dragged into it, yelled at Shoup for cover him.

Vaulting over the boulder, Jakes make it to Zeigler, tackled the man. They needed to get the hell away from here because the Rift overhead wasn’t just sucking up Walkers that had been blown out of bodies. Balls of light sparked in the Rift, seemed to hang on the edge of that black tear like they were about to fall through and into this mess. Shoup lobbed his other grenade—his last—into that gap of nothing. Light flashed and Jakes pushed Zeigler to the ground, covered the guy. And then…nothing.

No shock wave, no debris raining down. Jakes heard the explosion start—that first hard muffled boom—and the world seemed to zip itself closed.

Pushing up, Jakes glanced over to Shoup. “What the hell?”

Shoup grinned. “Brody. That’s what she said. Implosion closes those fuckers. She’s thinking a big boom could maybe shut the door for good.”

“Wonderful. A scientist who wants to blow things up in an even bigger way. That always ends so well.” Reaching down, Jakes dragged Zeigler to his feet. One glance at the guy and bile rose to Jake’s throat.

Zeigler didn’t have eyes anymore. He had empty, blackened sockets.

“Christ on a cross,” Jakes muttered,. Rain was falling again, a steady beat on the empty streets. Jakes pulled out a bandanna and wrapped it around the shrunken holes where Zeigler’s eyes had been. No wonder the guy had been staggering. Behind him, Shoup’s boots crunched on the gravel.

“He safe?” Shoup asked, sounding uneasy and unhappy.

Jakes glanced at him and saw Shoup still had his weapon up and the safety off. Not a bad idea, except Jakes knew himself to be in the line of fire—not that that would matter to Shoup. Jakes stepped back and Zeigler swayed.

“Zeigler?” Jakes didn’t expect an answer and he didn’t get one. The guy looked torn up, wet and dragging, had dried blood on the front of him, but no real telling if that had come from him or someone else. Jakes motioned to Shoup. “Pat him down.”

With a nod, Shoup moved in. He kept on hand on his weapon and did the check one-handed. Edging back, Shoup shook his head and held up his palm. “Not packing and not bleeding. Least not right now.”

Jakes nodded. He still didn’t like this. “Zeigler?” he said again. He shook the man’s arm. Zeigler moved with the hard shake like a rag doll, his body pliant—no resistance, no sign of a brain that still worked. His clothes flung off wet from the rain.

“Maybe we outta…” Shoup let the words fade and mimed a pistol shot to the head with his hand. Mouth pressed tight, Jakes wanted to do just that. But he had an obligation to get this guy—and Brody—back home.

“Take point. Let’s get…” He cut off the words. The hair had lifted on the back of his arms and the back of his neck. He could hear the static now. Behind them a scrabble of loose rock fell in skittering beats.

“Company coming,” Shoup said. He’d heard it, too.

Jakes checked his weapon—low on rounds, nothing in his pockets to reload. Grabbing Zeigler’s arm, Jakes muttered, “Shoup—time to haul ass, and I mean his.”

#

Carrie bit back the shout of Gideon’s name. She took a step after him, splashed into cold mud and stopped, her breath harsh in her throat, panic thrumming, and a hot flare of anger slicing through her.
Dammit, Gideon!
She wanted to go after him and Temple, but that would throw away the chance they’d just given her.

Hands clenched, she glanced once at the building behind her before she looked back to where Gideon and Temple had disappeared into the drenching rain. Thunder rumbled, low and deep, and the sky opened to pour out even more wet. Turning, cursing Gideon, Temple, herself, and this world in general, she stumbled into the building and stopped just inside the doorway.

Dragging in a breath, she pushed the wet hair from her eyes and wiped the rain from her face with a quick dash. Goosebumps lifted on her skin, put there by the dry breeze in the room, by the static charge of the shimmering image in front of her. The image of her lab wavered, flexed, and for an instant it faded into nothing before it came back.

It hadn’t been doing that before.

The image flickered again. She could see indistinct figures on the other side—they were doing something with the equipment. Maybe they were trying to power it down.

Dammit, no.

She hadn’t made it this far to see the doorway home shut down and all of them cut off from what might be the only means to stop the Edge Walkers for good.

Swallowing hard, she strode toward the fading image, winced as the movement stabbed fresh pain into the gash the Walker had dug into her chest. She stopped inches from the sight of her lab and glanced at the shifting edges of the images. Had the doorway shrunk since the last time she’d seen it? Putting out a hand, she pushed on the image. It pushed back, solid as any wall. Swearing, she stood back and shut her eyes.

Think of Temple.

That’s what Gideon had said she should do to try and access the memories the rings had given her. She pulled in a breath, tried to slow her thudding, rapid heart, and concentrated on building up the image of Temple in her mind.

Talk, dark, a face that could be carved from stone, those warm eyes. Memories formed and burst in her mind so fast it took her breath. She staggered back a step.

More images crowded into her head, and then she saw it—a quick flash of the device as it should be set up. Walkers surged into her mind’s view after that. She pulled open her eyes, put up her hands to fend them off—but the Walkers had only been in Temple’s memories. No…not his memories. In his thoughts right now. Heart pounding hard in her throat, she gasped. She’d seen the world for an instant from Temple’s eyes. He was alive, and relief flooded her, along with more worry. Where was Gideon? Both of them were in trouble—deep, deep trouble. She could only help them by getting this door open for an escape.