Rush (34 page)

The air is dusty and stale. Information feeds to my brain in a stream, some from my own senses—sights, sounds, smells—and some from the voice of the Committee in my head. We’re in Detroit in an abandoned office building that was once beautifully crafted and full of life. The Committee tells me there’s a small nest of Drau here, hiding in the vandalized, decaying ruins. It’s night. The place is wreathed in shadows.

I look around, getting my bearings. We’re in the building’s lobby: high ceiling, marble columns, arches. The ceiling above my head is patterned in tiny mosaic tiles. The far end of the lobby has some yellow police tape dangling in an open archway, the adjacent marble stained black like there was a fire here at some point. I take note of that, thinking that we might be moving through some unstable territory.

I glance at my con. It’s framed in green. In the corner is the small map with the five green triangles. The rest of the con’s screen shows a live feed of the lobby we’re standing in. We need to go down. There’s no voice in my head telling me that, no indication on my con. I just know. Like Jackson knew, every time. Internal Drau alert system.

Closing my eyes, I try and find him in my thoughts. He isn’t there. I feel lost without him. Afraid. I have four people relying on me to get them through this alive, and I don’t know that I can even get myself through.

But thinking that way won’t help at all. So I lock my emotions away and face the moment, this moment, only this one. I’ll face the next one when I have to.

“Stairs,” I murmur, and take the lead, thinking as I do that we’ve been dropped really close. No daylong jog to get to the target like there was in the caves. Not even an hour-long one like there was in Vegas. I don’t need to wonder why. I
know
. There’s no time for the usual protocols. The situation here is urgent.

The staircase is open and it must have been beautiful once. Now, it’s littered with dust and debris, the banisters cracked and broken. I check my con. It shows the stairwell going down into darkness. I follow its lead and take my team into the bowels of the building.

We pass abandoned offices, piled waist high with garbage, glass doors papered over with newsprint. I wait for the sensation that tells me the Drau are near. I reach for it, but find nothing.

We inch along in the darkness. My fear is bitter on my tongue, and the weight of the four other lives depending on me nearly bows me in half.

Wrong. Something’s wrong.

I raise one hand, halting our progress, then pull my weapon cylinder free, holding it up so the others can see. I hear a faint swish that tells me at least one of them followed my lead, but I don’t look back to make certain.

Careful where I step, I lead them forward, fighting the urge to turn and run. I take a slow look around, trying to spot the source of my unease. I see nothing. Only darkness and shadows. Funny that I find that comforting. It’s light we have to be afraid of now.

Behind me, one of them isn’t as careful. I hear the snap of wood breaking under the weight of their foot. The sound is painfully loud in the silence.

My heart drums a frantic rhythm. My breath comes in rapid pants. I shake my head as the horrific feeling I recognize from Vegas and the caves washes over me.
Enemy
. The word is a litany in my brain, a poison in my veins, amping up my fear, my pulse, my panic.

Not going there. Not sinking into that mire.

I force my anxiety under control and keep going and going. Closer to the things that want me dead. The things that will take my brain, keep my body alive, use my genetic material to create an army that will help destroy mankind.

Not on my watch. Not happening on my watch.

But the fear inside me burns me now, like alcohol in an open wound.

Trap. Get out. Miki, get out!

Jackson’s voice echoes in my thoughts at the same second I’m already screaming, “Get out!”

I spin and shove the girl behind me, little blond Kendra with her angel’s face. “Run,” I snarl, even though I know it’s too late.

Light flares with painful intensity. I blink, knowing I’ve already failed them, my team, the four lives depending on my decisions. Was this how Jackson felt? No wonder he wanted out. The weight of my responsibility chokes me.

The shriek of metal flays my thoughts. It’s the Drau, bending girders, breaking doors. “Get out! Luka, get them out!” I scream, my weapon cylinder in my hand. I fire, spin, fire again. From the corners of my eyes, I catch movement and I hear the sounds of scrambling; then there’s a dark flash that tells me Luka didn’t listen. He’s there, at my back, firing at the bright shapes that flit all around us.

Lights stream past like a subway car rushing through a station. Part of me, the part that’s calm and in control, takes stock. My team is at my back. We’re in a tight formation in a fairly narrow hallway, firing at the masses of Drau that come at us. Too many for five people. We take some down and they just keep coming, like locusts or a swarm of killer bees.

I step back, pushing my team back in the direction of the stairs. The Drau flash, leaving bright streaks interrupted by milliseconds of darkness. I shoot, step back, shoot again, and finally, finally, we’re at the base of the stairs and the Drau are in front of me. I hazard a frantic look up the stairs. There’s nothing there. No lights. No Drau.

I’ve had no practice at this. I’ve been on exactly two missions, pretty much flailing my way through both of them, and now I’m the one in charge, the one everyone’s depending on to get them out alive.

“Luka.” I’m breathing so hard I can barely speak, but I force the words out, making my tone hard and firm. “This is an order. When I say, I need you to get everyone up those stairs. Get them out of the building. Everyone out. You included. Not up for negotiation.”

The Drau are holding back, and that makes me more afraid than when they were streaking toward us. They’re regrouping. Reformatting. Getting together a fresh plan. So far, the only reason we’ve done as well as we have is because the hallway was too narrow for them to completely surround us.

I feel it then. The flicker of warning.

“Luka,” I snarl. “Now.”

I switch my weapon cylinder to my left hand, noting as I do that it melds and conforms to the slightly different shape. With my right hand, I reach back and grab the hilt of the kendo sword. The feel of the grip in my hand is familiar and comforting. This is something I know, something I can control.

I hear the sounds of footsteps on the stairs. Luka doing as I said. They’re getting away. They’re going to be okay. All I have to do is hold off the Drau, kill enough of them that the damned Committee is satisfied and pulls the others out.

Darts of light shoot past me: the Drau trying to get my team. With a
kiai
shout I surge forward, my blade cutting a clean sweep. The Drau in front of me freezes, then falls in two parts, the right half going to the right, the left half going to the left. I cleaved it clean in half. The sight sickens me. There’s no joy in killing a living thing.

Them or me. I have to remember that.

Panting, I spin and take the next and the next. Shards of light hit me, penetrating with a deep, burning pain. I gasp. I cry out. But I don’t fall. I shoot my weapon cylinder. I slash with my blade.

Pain and rage and all the hurts that are part of me surge to the fore, feeding my skill, making me a killing machine. But there are too many. They come too fast. I hack. I shoot. I step back. My foot slips on the stair and I stumble, terror icing my soul.

Footsteps behind me. Before I can turn, a surge of black pulses forward, taking out a Drau that was almost on me.

Jackson
. My heart lightens. But when I toss a glance to my left, I see that it’s Luka beside me, watching my back. He grabs my elbow, steadying me, and I find my footing again. I’m afraid, so afraid, and I can’t tell him that, can’t let him see it.

“I told you to go.”

“We can’t leave the building until the mission’s done.”

“Can’t or won’t?”

“Can’t. Physically impossible.” One more piece of information I didn’t know. I have so much to learn. I hope I live long enough to find it all out. “The others are watching the front doors, guarding our escape route,” Luka finishes.

There isn’t time to say more. A fresh wave of Drau come at us.

I hack until my arm feels like it will fall off, all my competition kendo finesse dissolving into a wretched, desperate attack. I point and shoot until I’m inured to the cries of those who are swallowed by the dark surge.

Them or me. That’s my mantra. Them or Luka, and it’s my job to keep him safe. My job to get us all out.

I’m dripping sweat as I turn a full circle and find that they’re gone. All of them, gone.

I search for the certainty that we’re about to be pulled. It isn’t there. There’s only silence and the harsh drum of my own heartbeat.

“Do we jump in thirty?” Luka asks between rapid gasps.

I shake my head. “No. There’s something wrong.” I reach back and thrust my sword down into its sheath. I check my con. “Up!”

We run, not aiming for quiet or stealth, our feet pounding on the stairs. We skid around the corner into the dim lobby. The rest of our team looks up from where they’re stationed with weapons trained at the double doors.

One thing I’ve learned about the new girls already. They follow orders and they don’t try to steal points. Neither of them hung back when I told them to go. Good to know. The idea of one of my own team not caring if she knifes the others in the back wouldn’t sit well with me.

“Trouble?” I ask.

“Nothing,” Lien says, shaking her head. “But my gut’s telling me it’s coming.”

I nod in agreement.

Then I hear it. The harsh sounds of a scuffle. A tortured human cry. My head tips back and I look up. All I see is the ceiling, but my certainty is pure and clear. We aren’t the only team in the building. And the Drau we took out weren’t the only enemy.

The place is riddled with Drau, on every level. What we encountered below was just the tip of the iceberg. I’ve been on only two missions before this, but I know that the game has changed. This is different, and it’s anything but good.

Another cry, more chilling than the last.

I look at my team and find them all watching me, waiting for guidance. “We go up,” I say, feeling sick just saying it. Knowing I might be dooming them. “There are other teams up there.”

“We’ve always worked alone,” Tyrone says. He looks at Lien. “You ever worked with another team before?”

Lien shakes her head, her face a pale oval in the dim light.

Tyrone and Luka exchange a look.

“Next stage of the Drau invasion?” I ask. The threat ramping up, just like the Committee said. A shudder shakes my spine from my tailbone to my shoulder blades.

“Not a nice thought,” Kendra whispers.

“Understatement of the century,” Luka says.

“We go up,” I say again. “I want to see everyone’s cons first.”

They hold out their wrists. Kendra’s and Lien’s are green. Tyrone’s is green with just a hint of yellow. Luka’s is yellow-green.

“Yours,” he says, when I’m done.

“What?”

“Let me see yours.” His tone brooks no argument. I hold out my wrist. Mostly yellow with just a touch of green.

He frowns, but he doesn’t say anything.

“The second you go orange, you fall back,” I say, looking at each of them in turn, remembering what Jackson told me about Richelle and what she ought to have done the night the Drau killed her. “We all get pulled
together
at the end of this. I’m not leaving anyone behind. I don’t know what’s waiting for us up there, and I don’t know if we’ll get separated. But my standing order is that if you go orange, it’s defensive position all the way. You hang back. You stay alive—” A horrific cry carries down from above us, making the little hairs on my forearms stand on end. “You stay alive,” I repeat.

And then we’re going up, our feet carrying us toward the death cries that float down from the floors above.

THE DRAU RUSH AT US FROM ALL SIDES, FLASHES OF LIGHT and deadly threat. So many of them, like locusts swarming a field. There’s no grace to my movements anymore, no vestige of smooth kendo footwork. There’s only the leaden weight of my arm as I hack and slash, the sweat dripping in my eyes and down my back. The fear chewing at my soul. Cries echo all around me, and from the corner of my eye, I see someone from another team drop and lie still.

Panting, I aim and shoot at any glowing thing that moves as I sidestep toward the fallen body. I am in the midst of pandemonium. Screams. Howls of agony. The smell of blood and burning flesh. Pressing my back to the wall, I squat and lay my fingers on the side of the girl’s throat. I don’t see her chest moving. I don’t feel a pulse. Without looking down at her, my gaze scanning back and forth for any threat, I grab her shoulder and roll her onto her back. Her arm flops down and I glance at her con. Red, like Richelle’s was red. She’s gone.

I want to mourn even though I didn’t know her at all. I don’t dare take my eyes from any possible threat to look down at her face. I don’t know what she looks like. I never will. But I mourn her nonetheless. I mourn all of them. We’ve been here for hours, or maybe it’s been days, moving floor to floor, clearing out the Drau, gathering remnants of the other teams.