Sanctuary (19 page)

A man rose up from the wrecked truck, standing in the bed and hefting a truly enormous gun. It was a hand-held, belt-fed, .50 caliber machine gun, and he squeezed the trigger. The weapon bawled to life and he cut through lines of enemy Infected with molten lead. I couldn’t see his face; he wore a full bomb-proof suit. The enemy Infected returned fire, ricocheting harmlessly off his armor.

Croc was a ghost. He saw everything before it happened and he slipped through attacking crowds, one step ahead, an invisible scourge armed with knives.

I pressed the dead animal far enough to squeeze free, and scrambled up to help my team.

The Chemist’s Chosen came like a tribe of savages, brawny and fast. But also uncoordinated and clumsy, and for the first time I fully understood their disadvantage. They were newborns. I could dispatch handfuls easily, but there weren’t handfuls. There were dozens. And dozens. They were black, white, Asian, Latino, men, women, a seething riot all about my age. I threw them off, absorbing punches and deflecting knives, twisting away from gun barrels. Their bodies were hard and strong and they were everywhere.

Carter didn’t kill the Chemist. Carter was bodily hauled away by the madman’s Chosen, but they were paying the price. Carter was the devil, an elemental force of nature, and he eviscerated the helpless horde unable to scramble away. He ripped out throats. I tried not to watch.

“Carter, my fusty old friend,” the Chemist laughed and brushed himself off. “You’re failing again. And tonight, you pay for it.”

In one whip-like motion, he produced a pistol and fired.

His aim was true across the distance. Blood spurted from Samantha’s shoulder and she buckled in pain. Her handler shoved her off the roof and she fell, helplessly.

“Sam!” Croc cried, and he got there before I could. He caught and cradled her.

All was madness. We were losing the fight. We fought an unending and overwhelming ocean. We’d be suffocated under the sheer weight. Carter had the right idea.

Get to the Chemist. Our only hope.

But we couldn’t. Impossible. His fanatics were fearsome, and we were about to be overrun.

I was shot in the back. The vest absorbed it. Another one caught me in the stomach. My shoulder ached from the bite. Hands everywhere, weighing me down. My energy was spent. My body fought on autopilot with heavy limbs. We needed a miracle. And we got one.

“Grenades!!”

Grenades
??

Explosions! Chaos. Screaming. Unbelievably, the HRT guys swarmed in, guns blazing, brave men with wills of steel. The FBI team was heroic and inspiring, but they died too quickly. As skilled as they were, they were slow compared to their targets. Their soft bodies weren’t enhanced, and the soldiers were cut down by Chosen fighting despite ghastly wounds.

The lead FBI soldier kept absorbing gunshots until he reached me. For a moment, the world stilled and I heard only him. He was a bloody mess and he died in my arms, but not before delivering a message.

“…evacuation coming…rendezvous at the gym…go now…place…blown to hell…go…” he gurgled as he died.

“He’s right, Outlaw,” Puck shouted. “I’m scanning Anderson’s phone! You’ve gotta go! Now! Everyone out!”

Croc and Samantha were gone. I bellowed at Carter and the new guy on the truck. Puck did the same, through headsets. This could still end well. We could get out, via advanced warning, and incoming attacks might destroy the Chemist.

We retreated through the path carved by FBI warriors. I collected Anderson, who was alive but unconscious. I roared for Croc over and over, but he never answered. Puck reported his phone was moving away from the college.

Two helicopters came prowling over the campus, stub-wings freighted with death. The smaller attack helicopter pushed forward, obviously acting on coordinates and instructions provided by the HRT team, and began destroying the world with Hellfire missiles and autocannons. The military was tired of playing it safe and decided to scorch this section of earth. The noise and heat was a volcano eruption.

The transport helicopter landed, flattening the long grass with rotor wash. I slid Anderson’s body onto the deck. Carter and Russia pulled themselves in. I grabbed on as the chopper lifted off from hell and plunged back into the sky.

A medic secured Anderson and shouted into my ear, “This Special Agent Isaac Anderson? Was he shot?”

“I don’t know.” I collapsed near the open cabin door. My legs dangled freely above our landing gear and Compton.

“Puck,” I said with as much volume I could muster. “Where’s dad?”

“He’s…hang on…looks like he’s okay. Never made it to the heaviest fighting.”

I nodded. Thank God. That would have been awful. I could still beat him home. Holy moly, did I have school in the morning??

Carter stood next to me, jaw set, glaring at distant explosions on Camino’s campus. Tiny figures poured out of buildings, like ants escaping a burning colony. “You shouldn’t have gone in.”

“Think we got him?”

“No.”

Croc pulled three bullets out of my body. One from my arm, one from my shoulder, and one from my butt. During the firefight my skin thickened and muscles hardened to a tough leather texture, and the jacketed-lead slugs hadn’t deeply penetrated. They hurt coming OUT though. He removed Samantha’s too, and treated us with antiseptics, disinfectants, antivirals, and narcotics; every bottle he had.

“Only thing I’m worried about is that shoulder, mate. It’s a doozy. Can’t believe you got bit by a
tiger
!”

Thanks, Croc.

I called in sick to school. Samantha too. We laid in our bedrooms and groaned. I phoned for pizza and subs when the sleeping pills wore off and requested food be delivered straight to our rooms.

Katie texted me during lunch.

>> Where are you??

Sick day. Had a rough night.

>> Poor baby! If you’re lucky, I’ll bring you soup!

>> Miss you!!

Then, a little later…

>> Samantha isn’t at school either.

She’s taking a sick day too, here with me.
I didn’t elaborate. Typing hurt.

>> Okay

>> Wow you’re both sick

>> At the same time

>> What are you two doing?

>> Never mind I don’t want to know

>> I’m so jealous I can’t hear the teacher

I laughed. Hard. (It hurt) My texts were a little misleading, I now realized. I imagined her reading my messages and getting the wrong idea, her eyes widening, her friends wondering what’s wrong…

Nothing going on. Promise.

Don’t be jealous.

I considered typing,
We’re both recovering from gunshot wounds
, but that might require a tricky followup explanation.

>> I’m not allowed to be jealous

>> I know I’m not

>> You can do whatever you want

>> With whoever you want

>> But

>> Ugh

>> I miss you

I took a screen-shot of those texts and stared at it within the foggy delirium of hydrocodone.

She misses me!

The attack was international news. The whole world watched the Chemist throw a larger net around his portion of Los Angeles. The uprising had been fast, brutal, and efficient. His forces struck unexpectedly, overwhelming the thin border patrol, and joined with waiting reinforcements in Paramount. Like last time, he used hundreds of stalled tankers to clog the interstate, very effectively preventing outside intervention. The police and military were wholly and unreservedly defeated. During the chaos, two cargo planes landed at his airstrip with fresh supplies, most likely weapons and drugs. The size of his territory and the number of his hostages had doubled in one night.

Samantha, Croc and I met Carter the next night at the lumber yard we used for practice. We parked at the rear security fence. The mood was somber; we had whiffed on our chance to fix the planet. The grumpy giant called Russia attended. Russia didn’t speak. Russia glared behind a nose that appeared to have been broken dozens of times. His eyebrows were shockingly thick and his skin was pockmarked.

“Los Angeles got its ass kicked again,” Carter said. “But
we
didn’t.”

Samantha asked, “What do you mean? I
feel
like I got my ass kicked.”

Carter handed us each an iPad. I took it with my left hand.

“We’re all still alive,” he responded. “And we gained valuable intel. Hacker, you seeing these photos?”

A voice came buzzing out of a speaker temporarily set on the hood of Croc’s truck. “PuckDaddy has the photos.”

Carter lit a cigarette and pointed at our laptops. “Look through. The three of us wore small cameras. The photos were uploaded and I picked out the most significant. Tell me what you see.”

The photos weren’t high definition and the lighting was bad, but they were usable. Dozens of still-shots taken during the gunfight on Camino’s campus. Cameras had been affixed to their shirts, and another positioned inside the truck. I flipped through, reliving the melee with a cold knot in my stomach. I paused at photos of the Outlaw.

Croc looked up from his tablet and grinned. “Samy looking as gorgeous as
evah
! Even with tape across her yapper.”

She ignored him, and stated, “I see too many Infected.”

Carter nodded. His bald scalp dully reflected the nearby street light. “I agree.”

“He shouldn’t have this many. Where’d they come from? We only heard about a handful.”

“Keep looking, specifically at his Infected.” His plosive syllables were punctuated with blue smoke puffs. “He has too many. What else about them?”

I said, “There’s something wrong with his Infected. I noticed last night.”

“What did you notice?”

“I’m not sure. Something was…
off
. I spoke with one of them, but he couldn’t communicate well. Like he was too full of rage to process.” I snapped my fingers, remembering a detail. “He referred to himself by a weird title. I forget what…”

Puck chimed in from his speaker. “Called himself Twice Chosen, or something like that.”

“Right. That was it. The Chemist referenced it too.”

“Twice Chosen,” Carter echoed, hard eyes searching stars and memories for clues. “Twice Chosen. Twice Chosen. I don’t know what that means.”

I shrugged. “Neither did I.”

The giant called Russia wasn’t looking at the photos. He was staring at us with bored, baleful eyes. He needed a shave and a haircut. His thick arms were crossed over his barrel chest.

“Here’s what I think.” Carter tapped the screen of my iPad, scattering ash across it. “I think whatever process Martin uses to preserve his Chosen from aneurysms and insanity, I think it doesn’t completely work. I think his enhanced army is full of unsound minds. Almost like rabid dogs, living only to please their master.”

“Too right.” Croc agreed. “They went after you like a mama bear protecting cubs. You got too close to their master.”

“That’s my opinion too, Mitchell.”

“Insane or not, they’re dangerous. They made quick work of the FBI team. And who’s this guy?” I flipped back and forth through a sequence of photos showing Carter fighting off Chemist goons, and in each picture there was a man dressed all in black, attacking Chosen from behind. “I don’t remember him.”

Samantha Gear grinned. “Spooky, right? That’s Carter’s Shadow. I met him.”

“Wow. So he
does
exist. I think I saw him during the Compton showdown in March. He’s very good. I never even saw him last night.”

Carter grunted. “He’s essentially invisible when he wants to be.”

Croc turned in a circle, scanning the lumber and construction materials. “Where’s the bloke now? I wanna shake his hand.”

“He never tells me.”

Samantha held up her iPad, displaying a photo of a dozen Infected. “Carter, let’s assume that his brain preservation process isn’t perfect, and his Chosen are at least partially deranged. But that doesn’t explain where he got them. He has…jeez, I don’t know. Thirty? Forty?”

“I count around forty. A surprising number. The hacker is running facial recognition software, and comparing their faces against missing person reports. I want to know who they are. The photos aren’t high quality, so it’s difficult. He’s trying.”

The speaker buzzed. “I have a name, you know.”

I paused at a picture of the Chemist. “Carter, why does the Chemist look like this? The last time I saw him, he was healthy and jumping around. Not last night. He looks like a corpse in these photos.”

“I agree.” Samantha peered over my shoulder at the photo. “Radical change in his body and energy level.”

“I have a theory.” Carter flicked his dead cigarette away and immediately lit a new one. Russia watched him without interest. “I think he’s draining his body of blood, as often as he can, in hopes that he’s already contagious.”

We all fell silent. A contagious Chemist would be worst case scenario for peace in our future. We wouldn’t feel the repercussions for two decades, but if he was injecting hundreds or even thousands of infants then there would be mass hysteria eighteen years from now as teenagers across the globe began throwing cars and dropping dead.

“You think he’s storing the blood?”

“Doubt it. He’s a brilliant neurobiologist. I imagine he’s tinkering with the virus on a molecular level, and then injecting every infant he can get his hands on. Though after last night, I’m optimistic we’ve temporarily disrupted his machinations.”

Croc said, “If he’s contagious, then isn’t the fella almost dead? Like, any day now?”

“Possibly, but I doubt it. He doesn’t have long, but he’s creative, as evidenced by his mutated tigers. He’ll delay his death as long as possible, through any means necessary.”

“What’s this final video?” I asked. The photos ended with a silent video in slow-motion. The video was of me, fighting, as seen by the camera in the truck. The Outlaw was spellbinding, a madman shouldering aside the storm. My muscles pumped like engines, throwing destructive wrecking-ball fists and trampling others beneath my feet. I threw a guy
over
the math building. I couldn’t remember half this stuff. Russia picked up the iPad and browsed to the file with his thick fingers.