Fallocaust (The Fallocaust Series) (20 page)

He was alive, Killian was alive. He wouldn’t be well with that slop getting pumped into him but he was still breathing. That was all that mattered, he would get better. I would do whatever it takes, just still be alive.
I let myself picture him in my arms, I could almost smell his scent. I knew I had to concentrate right now but my heart was overpowering my mind. I just wanted him in my arms, the moment I had him in my arms he would be safe forever. Even if all he wanted to do was have me follow him for the rest of his life, I’d do it. Whatever made him happy, that’s all I wanted.
My heart was filled with such a unimaginable joy I practically flew to the east side of the building. I didn’t give a fuck about cameras, I had enough fire power on me that I could take down anyone who saw me. Anyways, I had the stupid Dek’ko coat on.
I tied the burlap sack to one of the hooks on my belt and tucked my pistol into my pants.
I focused my eyes ahead making sure my face remained expressionless as I quickly walked towards the east side of the building. I saw the camera pass overhead but I knew better than to look. Though I did feel a bit on edge, expecting at any moment for a shot to be fired at my head. So far so good.
I had never liked Dek’ko. They were shady fucks just like King Silas and his chimera family. All of these suppose rules they had about eating arian were obviously bullshit.

If they thought the Raven was out of control now, just wait. They’re going to pay for the shit they just put me through. Dek’ko and every fuck involved.

I started walking down the offloading ramp, down to the sub level of the factory. I felt around until I found a loop inside the coat and hooked my trigger scope through it, that would give me easier access to my gun with the coat on.

I took a second to take a deep breath and focus myself... before I took out the detonator and pushed it.

I covered my ears as a deafeningly loud explosion rocked the entire building. Then I quickly grabbed onto the concrete ledge on the left side of the ramp and hoisted myself up. I leaned up against the building and watched the debris land all around the dumpsters. There were a few pretty big pieces of the building in the mix. I think I might have taken off a good chunk of the wall and whatever was on the other side of it.

That made me feel better, I could almost feel their terror. It was a nice explosion, I always liked the burning smells that came after.

With a sardonic and fulfilling smirk I watched the debris fall onto the parking lot, hearing pieces of flesh hit the concrete like wet clothing being thrown against the wall. It was a very unique sound. Now his brats had a sick mom and a dead father, welcome to the greywastes kids.

I stayed still and silent, and listened for any sounds coming from the door.
Sure enough, like I had planned. The door flew open, several factory workers spilled out to see what the noise was. They ran yelling at each other in a panic, up the ramp and towards the dumpsters, they didn’t even notice me. These would be the lucky ones, if there were any other ones inside, they had about thirty seconds of life left.
After waiting the longest minute of my life I jumped down, grabbing the door before it shut. I walked inside. Quietly I closed the door behind me and turned around.
The smell hit me first, but it was the scene in front of me that made me almost throw up.
So many of them. Rows and rows of deformed skeletons, brown, black, white, all colours. All packed into small open pods that wrapped around them like claws. Wires bowing overhead, connecting to loud machines that held in them technology I had never seen before.

The humans were silent in their open prisons. Silenced by two large tubes shoved own their throats and blinded with clear tape taped over their eyes, though some only had empty black sockets.

What was most disturbing though were their abdomens. Distended and discoloured, their thin malnourished skin stretched over it like a piece of sinew over a sausage. There were even a few of them whose skin had obviously split under the pressure, you could see puss and blood leaking out of the swollen stomach, falling through the metal grate below. I could hear water running underneath.
If the condemned were making any noise, it was drowned out by the machines, though they were obviously alive. They stood under their own steam but that seemed to be all they could do. They just stood inside the pods, with the tubes shoved in their throats and other little devices connected to them. The sound was almost deafening to me, so many electronics and motors running in the room. It was a sensory hell hole.
I walked through the rows and rows of bodies, trying to look for Killian. Most of these humans had their heads shaved and were stick thin, I knew Killian would stand out.

“What was the noise? Did the boiler blow again?” a voice said behind me.

I turned around.
A woman with tied back blond hair, dressed in one of the lab coats looked at me, she was holding a clipboard. Her face turned ten shades paler as she saw me. I knew my cover was blown.
I did the only thing I could, as she turned and ran away I ripped my M16 from the inside coat loop and shot her several times in the back.
The machines that were powering the living meat were loud enough I hoped it would drown out the noise but as I turned to look for others I heard a gun shot and felt a searing pain in my arm.
I looked up and shot him. He was hanging off of the railing of a metal catwalk that led to a mezzanine, it looked like the pods were controlled from up there. I could see another worker in the corner. I knew I was injured but it wasn’t bad because I hadn’t died yet, and that was good enough for me.

I couldn’t see a door on the second level mezzanine, I knew the bitch was trapped. I had to make this quick, I didn’t know if there were cameras in this disgusting area and if there was... well, shit would be getting real busy real quick.

I ran up the stairs two by two. The bitch screamed and brandished a knife at me. She was cowering against what looked like a computer system, way more powerful looking than any of the old PCs I’ve found.
“Stop! STOP!” she shrieked. “What do you want?”
Suddenly a loud alarm started sounding and red lights started flashing above us. I felt a swell of anxiety and rage. I didn’t know if this alarm was for me, or if it was for the explosion. I had to believe it was for the explosion.
“Where is the blond kid?” I snarled. She cowered and cried but didn’t answer. I looked towards the doors leading to the inside of the factory. No one yet, but I didn’t have time to dick around.
I held up my M16 and quickly blew a couple rounds into her head. She fell back against the side of the computer table, leaving a nice splatter of brains and blood behind her.
I jumped off of the railing of the metal mezzanine and onto the tops of one of the pods. I looked around quickly for any other workers, and for Killian, before jumping off.

I sprinted towards the door.

There wasn’t anything to block the door with so I did the next best thing. I grabbed a brick of C4 and stuck it onto the door frame; before quickly syncing it.

That was the best I could do, I would detonate again if I had to.
With the alarm blaring over head, my brain was racing, my thoughts were so cluster fucked I could barely concentrate. The sounds, the smells and the intensity all around me was fucking up my sensory system, I felt almost dazed.
First things first. I looked around frantically running up and down each row of swollen distorted skeletons. I had to find Killian.
My mind froze when I saw him, or time might have stopped, I’m not sure. As I stepped up to him, the alarms around me were muted, the room melted away, it was just me and him. I looked past how awful his frail body looked and just stared at him for the briefest of moments.

There he was. A shadow of his former self, his small body beaten and bruised, still flaked with blood and ash. I didn’t know how his thin legs were supporting his body, he looked like he was made of paper.

But he was alive.
My heart was in my throat, but with it came a chill that enveloped my body. I reached out and touched his bruised face and held it in my hand. He was boiling hot.
His eyes were taped shut,  but he still had his eyes, though they were bruised black. The rest of his face wasn’t any better.

The corners of his mouth were split open, to make room for the two huge tubes that were shoved down his throat. The tubes were sticking out of his mouth, leading up to the top of the mechanical torture machine.
He was skinny, and frail, which broke my heart considering I hadn’t been there long enough to make him that way. He had been that thin before hand, kid didn’t even take care of himself.

I grabbed onto the tubes leading down Killian’s throat. I let out a breath, almost glad his eyes were taped shut. I was going to lose my shit any moment now. I had no idea how the fuck I was suppose to remove him from this machine, I just hoped I didn’t kill him now. Fuck, with my damn luck...
I started pulling the tube out of his stomach, trying desperately to listen for anyone coming through those doors. He was far from the C4 but I didn’t think we were far enough. I just hope the other explosion was distraction enough for them.
The two tubes popped out of his throat, one of them leaking some disgusting shit, the other one just had a clear fluid. I was hoping he would start coughing or something but he was limp as a ragdoll in my arms. I tore the tape off of his eyes,  but they were half open and glassy, not focused at all.
“Killian? Killian?” I said quickly, he swayed forward and I caught him. The greasy shit was leaking down his mouth, his whole fucking stomach looked full of it. I knew he had to throw that crap up. His stomach wasn’t as distended as the other ones but it was still swollen.
I brought him down to his knees and grabbed the back of his head with one of my hands and with the other I jammed my pointer and middle finger down his throat. I started to try and make him throw up.
It woke him up at least, he started to struggle and a few moments later he keeled over and started puking violently. Streams of the greasy yellow white shit poured out of his mouth and through the metal grate onto the flowing water below it. I banged on his back with my palm, his whole body was heaving so badly I was expecting his eye balls to pop out. I held him steady, keeping my eye on the door for anyone coming through.
“Reaver?” he suddenly croaked and started sob through his gagging. He weakly lifted his head up.
“I’m here, I got you,” I said, trying to steady my voice. I kneeled in front of him and put my hands on either side of his face.
I looked into those blue eyes, even though they were half blood shot and bruised, they were still beautiful.
“Hi,” Killian said weakly.

I gave him a reassuring smile. “Hi,” I whispered back, trying to look as brave and in control as I could.

My damn hands were shaking. I had never made eye contact with him before.
I was about to say more when Killian’s eyes widened, he looked past me. I turned around to see a guy in a lab coat walking through the doors.
“Hey!” he called angrily.
Two more of them appeared behind him. I swore, they were all fucking carrying assault rifles. I put Killian’s feet on the ground and grabbed the detonator and pressed it.
As the C4 exploded, I clutched Killian to my chest covering his ears as much as I could. The blast was deafening and violent. As I held the boy, I tried to hold my head down, I could feel debris smack into my head, and an intense heat that made me clench my teeth and groan.
Grey chunks of concrete and metal whizzed past my face, all cloaked with a thick black smoke. I shut my eyes tight and endured the pain, holding Killian as close to me as I could. I was holding him, like I had wanted. I wouldn’t let him go.

We wouldn’t die now, no way we would die now.
I felt a loud ringing in my ears, and I think for a few moments I lost consciousness. When my mind thrusted me mercilessly back to reality, the alarm had gone quiet but the red lights were still flashing through the thick dark smoke. I could smell burning, burning flesh and gun powder mostly.

I loosened my grip on Killian and drew him away from me, he had tears in his eyes and he was trembling badly. He looked awful but otherwise okay.

I picked him up and started running towards the exit door. The smoke was a wall of darkness and I could hear moaning coming from the captured meat, twisting and crawling around from their disturbed pods like maggots spilling from a corpse.

Killian started to cough into my jacket. I could feel the smoke building up in my chest as well. I tried my best to look through the smoke, which thankfully was getting thinner the closer to the exit we got.
When I finally kicked the door open it was an overwhelming relief. I filled my fire scorched lungs of the cold, greywaste air and looked around.
I held him tight and ran up the ramp, I took a quick look around and made a dash for the fence.

I could see large pillars of oily black clouds rise from the dumpsters. I could hear people shouting too, but they were far enough away I didn’t care.

With what felt like hell burning inside my chest, I ran up the hill towards the quad. The legionnaire delivery boy or whoever he was was still half hanging onto it.

With twitching hands I turned the key, and felt a wave of relief as it roared to life. I quickly cranked the throttle and got the hell out of there. Leaving the inferno and the chaos behind me to burn and spread its terror, not just to the dead factory workers, but their families too; and the fucks in Skyfall who ran Dek’ko.

It was like my own personal Fallocaust.

I wrapped my left arm over Killian’s stomach and held him up right. My mind switched back from the inferno to him when I realized just how limp he was. But there wasn’t much I could do about that. I wasn’t feeling that great either. We had to get to Aras now, and fast.

As I sped down the steep hill I had just went up only a short while before I tried to ignore the hot dizzy feeling that was starting to coat my body. I was sure it was just exhaustion.

We road on, it was hard to control the quad with only one hand but Killian was limp in my arms. I could see the greasy white shit dripping onto the seat of the quad, I didn’t know if he had puked it all up or not. I didn’t want to have to make him again. He just had to hold on until we got to Aras. I pushed the quad as hard as it could go, it would be more noise than I was comfortable making, but I just didn’t care anymore.