Through The Veil (31 page)

“No, and I don’t know what it means. I should have been
able to reach them since we crossed, but I haven’t felt a thing from them. It’s
possible that
Shar
and Savannah have had to shut down
the connection for some reason, especially if something is happening at the
lab.”

Marcus rubbed at his chest. The pain in her mental voice
battered at him. None of them were saying what they thought it meant—not yet.
But the thought they were too late pressed at all of them. He could feel it
over all their mental links. They pushed on, regardless. No one wanted to
abandon this mission without knowing for sure.

They cleared the boulders and could see the building below.
A battle was taking place. Smoke rose from one side of the complex where the
building had been almost completely obliterated. A group of about twenty
soldiers, clad in pure black, all heavily armed and armored, appeared out of
the tree line. They approached the building, gunfire echoing over the valley as
they ran. But as bodies fell inside and through the broken windows, it appeared
that attacking soldiers had the upper hand.

They couldn’t tell anything else about them because their
faces were painted. Were these good guys or bad guys?

“What do we—”
Lori’s question cut off as a
cacophonous crash sounded out over the scene. A huge military truck barreled
out one side of the facility.

Over the roar of the engine, they could hear the guy in
charge of the attacking men yell instructions to his team. “Stop that truck!
Remember, no one makes it out of this fucking place alive.”

Fire opened on the cab of the truck. The driver swerved to
avoid the hail of gunfire, but he turned too late. Even from their vantage
point, they could see the spray of blood coating the inside of the cab. The
truck hit a tree and two other men bolted out the passenger door. Soldiers
swarmed, threw the men to the ground, and immediately executed them.

“I don’t have a good feeling about this,”
Griff
said.

Marcus agreed as they watched the drama play out below them.
“Lori, do you have any idea who they may be?”

She shook her head, horror etched in the lines of her face.
“He
said they’d kill everyone. We have to get the Others out of there, now.”

The man issuing orders below motioned to several of his men.
“Go search the truck.” He entered the building at a run, the rest of his troops
following behind.

“
Griff
, fly over to the other
side and see if you can figure out what’s happening there,”
Marcus
instructed.
“Brooklyn, fly above and search the edges of the forest to make
sure there aren’t any other surprises in the woods. Lori and I will see what we
can find out about what happened to the Others. Be careful. Do what you can to
keep your wings from being seen. Both of you stay in constant contact.”
He
hated to send them flying, knowing that could expose their wings, but they
needed every advantage they could get. Otherwise they’d have no chance against
twenty plus men armed with assault rifles.

Griff
and Brooklyn took off into
the air.

The men in black continued to scramble, but the resistance
from the facility appeared to have died down with the killings at the truck.
The men on the outside of the building continued to hold their weapons at the
ready. Several of them jumped into the back of the truck. One immediately
opened the flap and yelled out, “Someone get Jonah back out here. Savannah is
in here as well as two males. But they all need medical attention, stat.”

Lori’s muscles tensed, but Marcus placed a restraining hand
on her shoulder. They couldn’t go running down there without a plan or else
they would just end up dead, too. But that choice was taken away when the
distinct sound of a gun hammer cocking sounded directly behind them.
Oh,
fuck.

“Don’t move another muscle,” a voice growled. “Keep your hands
where I can see them and turn around slowly.”

“Marcus?”
Lori asked.

“It’s okay.”
He nudged her shoulder to turn her
with him.
“Just do what he says.”

When they turned, they found two grim-looking men dressed
all in black, their faces darkened with paint. One was as tall as him with a
shock of flaming red hair sticking out below his hat while the other was more
squat and compact. Both were heavily muscled and armed. They were obviously
part of the group attacking the compound below. But the question remained, were
they the good guys or more bad guys?

Red nodded to his friend. The second guy, the shorter of the
two, came over and began searching for weapons. He started with Lori, and
Marcus growled when he touched her. The guy’s eyes widened nervously and he
immediately backed off.
 

Red sighed. “Go ahead,” he sneered at his partner. “I’m the
one with the gun. Remember? I promise I won’t let him do anything to you.” To
Marcus he said, “Calm down. No one wants to get hurt here now, do they? Nervous
men make mistakes and you’re making my partner nervous.”

“It’s fine, Marcus,”
Lori soothed him.
“He’s
being professional.”

Marcus wrestled with his self-control. He couldn’t stand for
someone else to touch her.

The guy finished with Lori but he didn’t find the
ley
line knife from
Griff
that
she had in her boot. He then turned to Marcus, yanking the backpack off and
pulling at his wings. Aw, fuck. He’d been so concerned about Lori, it hadn’t
even occurred to him that they would find his wings when they searched him.

Lori’s eyes widened as she realized the same thing.

“What’s happening?”
Griff
and Brooklyn both demanded at the same time.

“Part of the attacking group got a jump on us, and
they’re about to find there’s more to me than meets the eye.”

“I’m on my way,”
Brooklyn said.

“No, we have this under control,”
Marcus told
Brooklyn.
“Three Others are in the truck out front.
Griff
,
Shar
is still missing. Find her and, Brooklyn,
provide back up for him. We’ll all meet at the truck.”

While Marcus had been handling
Griff
and Brooklyn, Lori instructed him,
“Be ready.”

She swayed like she was going to fall toward the man
reaching toward Marcus’s back. When she touched him, the fabric of his uniform
extended to entwine his hands, wrapping around his legs, and covering his head.

Even with her warning, it took Marcus a split second to get
over his shock and he had a pretty good idea what she’d planned. Luckily he
recovered faster than the man with the gun and dove for it before the guy had a
chance to use it. Within a minute, they had both men disarmed and temporarily
restrained with the limbs of a tree, rather than just the clothing which had
returned to normal when Lori released it.

“Now what?” Lori asked.

“Well, I guess we decide if these guys are worth keeping
alive or not.” Of course the threat wasn’t valid. They didn’t plan to kill
anyone unless they had to, but the two men didn’t need to know that.

Both men’s eyes were wide with obvious fear as they watched
them, but they seemed especially leery of Lori. Interesting. Maybe they could
use this to their advantage.

Marcus stood in front of Red and crossed his arms in menace.
“What exactly are you doing down there?” He nodded to the laboratory. “What’s
the purpose of your mission?”

Both men ignored him, although they were terrified of Lori
if their expressions were anything to judge by. What the hell?

“What’s going on, Lori?”

“I’m not sure, but I have an idea. Hang on, let me
check.”
She came to stand in front of Red. “My friend asked you a
question.”

She reached forward to grab his face. He reared his head
back and blanched deathly white, stammering, “Plea…please, don’t touch me. I’ll
do whatever you ask.”

She withdrew her hand, her lips pressed together tight.
“Looks like the ES has been more successful teaching their level of bigotry
while I was held captive.”

“I’m going to die now, aren’t I? I touched you.” The man who
had searched Lori asked in a trembling voice.

“Oh, good grief. Are you shitting me?” Marcus tossed up his
hands in disbelief and more than a little anger. “What the fuck are they
telling you people over here?”

Lori laid a calming hand on his arm.
“It’s okay. It’s
what they’re taught and they don’t have anyone left to show them that what
they’re being told is wrong. Right now, we have to use this to our advantage.”

“No harm will come to you if you just answer his questions,”
Lori told them. “What are you doing here? Who do you work for? What’s your
objective?”

“We don’t know anything. We were just hired to help with
perimeter security for the operation below. No questions allowed, those were
our instructions. We were paid a ton, but we have to keep our mouths shut and
just do our job. No one said anything about dealing with Others. This isn’t
what I signed up for.”

“Who hired you?” Marcus asked.

“The guy in charge, Jonah is his name.”

Marcus remembered hearing that name down at the truck. “He’s
down there now, right? Do you know what the rest of the plan is for today?”

“We’re here to recover some cargo and then the place is
wired to blow. It should be happening pretty soon.”

Crap.
“Brooklyn,
Griff
, the
building’s set to blow, but I have no idea how soon. If you can, get to the
truck and secure the Others. We have to get out of here.”

“I think I know where
Shar
is,”
Griff
reported.
“Give me five minutes.”

“Hurry,
Griff
.”
Marcus
ignored the sinking feeling in his stomach.
“Brooklyn, report in.”

Silence met their mental connection and Marcus looked
worriedly at Lori, but she was busy. While he’d been discussing things with the
Warriors, she’d been making their two prisoners strip. She threw a pair of
pants at him. “Put these on while I tie these guys up a bit more securely.”

He nodded. Imagining the men’s reactions to his wings, he
decided it would be best to keep those under cover if he possibly could. He
scrambled to put the uniform on over his clothes, while Lori did the same.
She’d secured the men with rope from their packs and tied gags around their
mouths.

“You ready?” he asked her.

“Almost. Just one more thing.” She approached the man who’d
been worried because he touched her. “You’ve been brainwashed by an arrogant,
moronic, and power-hungry government. I promise you, you didn’t
catch
anything from me and never will from any Others, either. Our gifts are just
that…a gift and something the government is afraid of because they don’t
understand it. What happened eighteen years ago had nothing to do with the
Others. Our gifts will not cause your death. But you’re safe. I touched you and
nothing happened. In fact, I spared your life. Remember that the next time you’re
faced with someone who is different from you.”

Pride surged through him. She was so strong. To maintain her
empathy in the face of such horrible bigotry humbled him. He was so lucky to
have her in his life and all he wanted to do was get her away from this kind of
malicious hatred. Marcus touched her shoulder to get her attention. “Come on,
baby, we have to go.”

As they left, neither man met their gazes. He had no idea
whether her words had any effect, but maybe over time something about what she
said would sink in. Right now they had to concentrate on getting the Others out
of this hate-filled world.

They crept down the side of the mountain as carefully and
quietly as they could and didn’t run into any other problems on their short
trek. Once at the bottom of the hill, Lori pulled Marcus to a halt behind the
tree.

Two men stood guard at the back of the truck and another man
came barreling out of the building. From his attitude, that had to be Jonah,
the leader and the one who would want to know Savannah’s location.

It was hard to tell from the shadows of the trees, but he
appeared tall and fit. He had dirty blond hair and beard, and a dominate
bearing to him. Like the rest of his men, he wore all black…black cargo pants,
boots, T-shirt and long sleeve jacket. He halted at the truck and scanned the
forest, looking right where they stood.

Marcus’s breath stuttered in his chest.

For a moment, Jonah scowled in their direction, tilted his
head as if trying to puzzle something out, but then he shook it as if to shake
off the notion and hopped up into the back of the truck.

“We have to get into that truck,”
Lori intoned,
desperation seeping into her mental voice.

“I know. We will, but right now it’s too risky. There
are too many armed men standing around it. Also, Brooklyn isn’t answering my
call.
Griff
, how do you stand? Do you know where
Brooklyn is?”

“Brooklyn provided a distraction for me. She’s probably
just busy leading them away. I found a redhead that I’m pretty sure is
Shar
, but she’s in bad shape. I’m trying to figure out how
to get her out without hurting her more.”

“Do you need help?”

“No, there are too many soldiers floating around here.
It’s too risky. Just have that truck ready to go when I get there.”

“Okay, can do,”
Marcus responded.

“Marcus.”
Lori’s mental voice sounded intense.
“A diversion is what we need here. I can draw their attention away so you can
sneak into the cab to hotwire the truck.”