by S T Branton
It worried me to see him like that. “Not as much as I need you to make sure Jules is safe. Besides, you’re trained in rescue, aren’t you? All I’m trained in is hitting stuff with my magic sword.”
“Right. If we see more survivors on the way out, we’ll take as many as we can.”
“Good. Thank you, Deacon. I don’t know how yet, but we’ll find you once we’ve done what we need to do. Hey, maybe you’ll see me on TV.”
“We’ll be watching.”
In the quiet that followed his terse reply, I realized there had been no more gunfire. “Hold on.”
The eyes of the serpent do not sleep. The moment they see you, they will let fly.
Heeding Marcus’s words of wisdom, I inched up out of my crouching position until I could just barely see through the blown-out window. As it turned out, the velvet black of the night provided the perfect backdrop for the streak of red light that I now understood was a laser sight. I ducked. A bullet crashed into the flooring between me and Deacon, making an oblong crater in the tile. Just ahead of me, the last refugee in the line spun around, her eyes practically popping out of her head.
“They’re shooting again!” she shrieked.
Just like that, pandemonium erupted in the room.
Chapter Seventeen
“Don’t move!” I shouted, but my words might as well have fallen on deaf ears. The panicked cacophony drowned out even the crunch of bullets biting into the floor and walls. A chunk of the wooden doorframe went sailing past my ear.
“Get down, kids! I gotcha!” Frank made himself a human shield between the window and the children still in the apartment. “Vic, you gotta do something!”
Truer words had never been spoken, at least not by him. “Get everyone into the hall!” I yelled. Then I spun to face the unidentified source of the shots, unsheathing the Gladius Solis with a flourish.
The blade surged into being. I inverted it and jammed it down into the floor, and a wave of heat exploded around me. The glowing forcefield pulsed outward. It rippled from the impact of three, four, five more gunshots. Blue sparks splashed from the surface.
Kneeling on the pockmarked tile, I closed my eyes, basking in a momentary flood of relief. The shield muted all outside noise, as if we were suddenly underwater. More blue sparks rained down onto the dome above our heads. Everything in front of me was washed in a soft golden tint.
Your talent increases, Victoria. I am most impressed.
“Thanks.” I opened my eyes and got to my feet.
“I think I’m the one who should be saying ‘thank you’.” Deacon brushed himself off and glanced at me. Some of the warmth had returned to his dark eyes. “Pretty sure I would’ve been toast without that.”
One of the refugees gazed up into my face, his expression a mixture of fear and awe. “You saved us. I can’t believe it. You saved us!” His wife and daughter huddled in each other’s arms. They were visibly trembling. Tears tracked down the daughter’s rounded cheeks. The man leaned forward and wrapped his arms around me. His voice was choked with emotion. “Thank you. Thank you.”
“My pleasure, sir. You’re not injured, are you?”
“No.” He unlatched himself from me and embraced his family. “None of us are, thanks to you.”
The little girl lifted her head, swiping long, straight locks of auburn hair out of her face. “Are you an angel?” she asked timidly. “I didn’t know angels could have swords.”
I glanced between her and the Gladius Solis. I’d never been what you might call a kid person, but I smiled at her and said, “Some of us can.”
She grinned as if I had just let her in on a cosmic secret. “Daddy! I wanna be a sword angel for Halloween!” Her parents laughed and clutched her tight.
“Everyone else is out,” Deacon said. “We’d better join them.” His words held an unspoken subtext that I heard loud and clear: The snipers were probably regrouping for their next assault.
“Excellent plan,” I told him. “You’re promoted.”
His mouth formed the smallest of wry smirks. I told myself it would have to do for now. As he led the others into the corridor to rejoin the group, I yanked the sword out of the floor and snatched an evac bag from the floor by the sofa, slinging the small duffel onto my back. On my way out, I slammed the door shut behind me, just to give those sniping pieces of shit a little extra trouble.
“Vic!” Maya called to me from the stairwell. She was pale, and her brow furrowed in consternation. It was becoming her default expression. “We might have a problem.”
“What else is new?” I asked cheerfully. A brave front was crucial to maintaining morale within our ragtag party, and I was determined to keep everyone’s spirits as high as possible. Gloom and doom wouldn’t help anyone, no matter how much the odds were stacked against us. “Whatever it is, we’ll handle it. Let’s keep moving.”
“I mean, we might have a lot of problems.” She peered over the banister. “Scratch that. We definitely have a lot of problems.”
That was when I started to hear it too: a chorus of heavy, booted footfalls tramping up the steps. “Sounds like company to me, Maya. Good thing I’m an incredible host.”
A split-second analysis of the floor layout drew me to a second exit sign, indicating an alternative route. Without wasting time on what I hoped would be an obvious explanation, I ran for it. My crew caught on fast, and they funneled our civilians straight for it. Maya led in the front, with Jules and Frank flanking on either side. Deacon brought up the rear, gun in hand. He rotated up to the lead while I kicked in the door, just in case some rogue baddies lurked behind it.
“Clear!” Deacon announced over my shoulder. “Jules, you’re with me and our friends here. Maya, you and Frank are going to Madison Square Garden with Vic.”
“Actually,” I corrected, “it’s just Maya and Frank. There’s something else I need to do.”
They all stared at me for a beat. Deacon was the first to nod. To Jules, he said, “We should move.”
“You’re not going to Madison Square?” she asked, eyeing me, doubtful and confused.
“Those were snipers back there shooting into the apartment,” I told her. “More than likely, the city’s overrun. These guys wouldn’t be safe if they stayed here, and neither is anyone in the Garden, honestly. Maya and Frank aren’t going there to hide. They’re going to try and save it.”
“Oh.”
“Don’t look at me like that,” I said. “We can do this sort of shit, remember? We might not be the only ones who can, but we’re the only ones who are here right now, so we have to step up to the plate. And we will. This, right here, is what we’ve been called to do—not just me, but all of us. Never forget it.”
Jules opened her mouth to say something else, but then she closed it again and simply gave me a short, hard hug. “Be safe, Vic. I’ll kill you if anything horrible happens.” Her eyes were bright when she pulled away, but she offered a brave smile. “Let’s go, Deacon.”
“Right behind you.” Deacon began to wave the group through the door before him. He reached out, squeezing my shoulder gently. “I better see you on the flip side, Vic Stratton.”
I grinned at him. “Oh, you will, Deacon St. Clair. You will.”
A splintering crash rocked the opposite side of the hall. The entrance to that stairwell stood open, filled up with the hulking shoulders of a huge cop looming from behind the edge of a riot shield. His tinted visor obscured his face, but I didn’t need to see it to know he was all vamped out.
“They’re comin’ in!” Frank barked. “Let me at these sons of bitches. They’ll be dog food when I’m done.”
As if on cue, Maya turned, letting out a primal roar. Deacon hurried the last of the refugees out. The door clicked shut at his back. I gripped my sword in both hands and leveled it in front of me. “Get this party started, Frank.”
The mobster fell down into a bulky crouch and launched himself across the hall at the riot cop, who lifted his shield to defle
ct all three hundred pounds of rage flying at his face. Frank’s momentum knocked him aside, and his fellow vamp police brothers broke past and streamed in around him. A phalanx of riot shields sprang up in front of me, blocking Frank from my view.
I laughed. “Cute. They think those cookie sheets can stop me.”
Maya bounded clear over my head as I rushed in to meet the advancing tide of uniformed officers. She bombed into the middle of their ranks, all gnashing teeth and wild slashing claws. The shields buckled in about three seconds. One of the riot guys went careening off down the hall, his path through the air traced by an arc of blood.
There is a violent grace in her path of destruction, Marcus said somberly. I confess, it is rather hypnotizing.
“I think that’s how she gets ‘em!” I brought my sword down in a perfect straight line, right at the center point of the middle riot shield, effectively splitting the remains of the line. “It’s sorta like what people call ‘feminine wiles,’ except instead of getting laid, the guys just die. I’d say it works pretty well for her.”
A hand reached in from the side and seized a fistful of my shirt. The powerful grip lifted me off my feet, and the barrel of a gun dug into my ribs.
“Hey, that’s fucking cold!” I bent my knees and swung my feet forward in a modified kangaroo kick, sending the guy tipping backward into a dozen of his friends like dominoes. He dropped me, and I hit the ground running.
A lot of the cops in the horde stood a good six inches over me, but they weren’t ready to block a god-sword on fire. I used the Gladius Solis reach to create some space so that I could better use the fancy footwork I liked to think I had almost perfected. The burning blade became a ribbon of golden flame, carving officers into humanoid puzzle pieces.
“Stop her!” someone roared. “For shit’s sake, you damn cretins! Leave the brute. He’s worthless!” Heeding the call, they started to close in on me, pushing through the flying ash of their former comrades.
Do not let them box you in. Space is a valuable commodity.
It was nice to have Marcus in my ear again, though I was doing pretty well on my own. His pocket coaching had gotten more reassuring, validating that my independent ideas were on the right track. Maybe it was a sign that I was beginning to grow out of some insecurities and settling into my role.
I just wished these dickheads would stop getting in my way.
The sword slashed relentlessly, each strike flowing into the next. I whirled and ducked, and when one lucky bastard managed to land a handcuff on my wrist, I sliced neatly through the chain. The hot metal cuff seared my wrist a bit, but I didn’t even feel the pain. Battle focus and adrenaline eliminated everything from my awareness except my enemies, Marcus, and my allies.
You improve with every step, Victoria. It is very good. Now, march toward the stairwell. I believe we have dallied enough in here.
“Comin’ through!” The bellow was unmistakably Frank’s. I felt the energy around me swell. Batons clattered to the floor. Guns went off into the air, their spent ammunition ricocheting. The police force was thrown into bedlam as their men were violently displaced by a bull of a man charging headlong straight through them, head down, hands raised to protect his face. His signature hat was gone, lost in the melee. The veins on his face and neck stood out like purplish mountain ridges against his waxy skin. He was sweating bullets. His clothes looked shabbier than ever.
“Hey, Vic.” Frank brushed off the shoulders of his jacket. “What do you say we blow this joint?” A cop lunged at him, and without looking, he grabbed the man by the face and twisted his neck one-handed. The corpse flew backward into the roiling throng.
I grinned. “You want to go first, or should I?”
“Ladies first, always.” Frank rolled another patrolman at the same time as he executed a clumsy half bow. Then he jerked his thumb at the tornado that was Maya, who had just reached the edge of the fight about twenty feet away. “That includes her. Don’t worry about old Frank, see? I’m puttin’ myself on cleanup duty.”
“If you say so.” I waved the beacon of the sword to get Maya’s attention before dashing through the doorway into the stairwell. A second wave of policemen crested the landing below. I took a flying leap down the first flight of steps into their midst. They made the mistake of responding by moving forward instead of back, which meant that my blade caught even more of them through various parts of their anatomy. As usual, they melted away into agonized piles of dust. I tried not to breathe too much of it in, despite the way it plumed up in my face.
What foul creatures. I see much of Lorcan in them.
“That reminds me, I need to ask you something.” I took the next set of stairs two at a time, Gladius Solis at the ready. “Not right now, though. Later when I’m not defeating hordes of the undead.”
I have almost missed your curious mind. Perhaps this is how parents feel when their child finally goes off to their first battle.
“I think that’s just you, buddy.” A sea of dark uniforms flooded the area directly in my path. Yet more riot shields formed a wall. I cocked my arm back and hurled the sword with every ounce of strength in my augmented body, watching with satisfaction as it bored through undeterred. My hand stayed locked in the throw position until the weapon busted back through, hilt first, to slap into my palm. A few drops of blood on the grip vaporized into nothingness. “Yeah, this sword is pretty fucking great.”
Kronin was a god of fine tastes, Marcus agreed. He would approve.
The remainder of the riot squad righted themselves, and in the next instant, a sheet of metal came barreling toward my head. I whipped the sword up, and the shield clattered to the floor in two neat halves. “I guess they liked that move.”
My next course of action was to punish the idiot who had just thrown away his protection by reducing him to several pieces, followed by a couple of his friends. It wasn’t practical to exterminate them all. I had a feeling they were like cockroaches, their numbers uncountable. Instead, I focused on driving my way down to the first floor. Maya was somewhere not too far above me. I could hear her throwing shit around.
They are making perfectly adequate headway. Let us proceed onto the street.
After chopping through one last contingent, I finally crashed through the back door of the apartment building at street level, into a side alley lined with dumpsters and bags of trash. “Why do we always end up here?” I muttered. “If it’s some kind of sign, I don’t appreciate it.”
I was fifty feet from the exit before the door banged open once more. “Wait!” Maya dashed toward me. She was disheveled and out of breath, her cheeks flushed with exertion and adrenaline. “You never said where you’re going. Where the hell are you going, Vic? You have to tell me these things.”
“We talked about it in the safehouse. TV is the only way we could even hope to get the truth out on a large enough scale.” I motioned toward the near street with my head. “The NBC headquarters just happen to be not too far from here. I’m going to see if they’ll let me on the air.”
“Are there still people there?” The permanent worry was still etched into Maya’s face. The whole mess was really starting to take a toll on her. I hoped it wasn’t a side effect of frequent transformation. I was willing to bet she’d have to do it at least one more time in Madison Square Garden.
“If not, it will make my life a hell of a lot easier.” I smiled. “I’ll be fine, Maya. Marcus may be from a million centuries ago, but I’m not. I can figure out how to work an expensive camera.” In truth, I wasn’t so sure about that part. I hoped the newsroom was still set up, and maybe it would just be a matter of figuring out which button to press.
A million is a slight exaggeration.
“Do you really think—what’s his name—Frank? Do you really think Frank is okay to do this?” Maya lowered her eyes. “I’m sorry. I know you have to go.”
“You guys made it through that shit show just now, didn’t you?” I picked up her hand and gave it a squee
ze. “Frank’s pretty rough around the edges, but you can depend on him. I promise. As soon as he gets out here, head for Madison Square Garden. And be ready for anything.”
Maya took a deep breath and set her jaw. “I will.” She returned the hand squeeze and let me go. “We’ll meet up again as soon as we can. Please be careful.”
“If I’ve succeeded, you’ll know.” I waved and turned toward the opening onto the main street, and for the first time in what felt like forever, I was alone.
Victoria, what is this NBC?
Well… almost.
Chapter Eighteen
“NBC is like… Okay, so you know about television, right?”
Ah, yes. The talking box with the man inside of it. I noticed a few of those prior to my transition out of the living realm.
“Close enough,” I answered. “It’s like this: there are a lot of different things that show up on there, and a big chunk of that is news, both local and international. NBC is one of the most widespread networks we’ve got, and that means anything that gets broadcast from their studios has the potential to reach incredibly far, as long as the network is still up and running. It’s a lot to hope for, but we have to try. Not like we have a ton of other stuff going on.”
That is true. The smallest of chances is still a chance, is it not?
“Exactly. There’s the optimistic centurion attitude I know and love.” I steered southwest on Columbus, moving parallel to Central Park West. The park itself was a block away, and I thought of the centaurs as I walked. Had they busted their way out onto the mean streets yet? What if they formed some sort of terrifying alliance with the satyrs? Visions of a gun-wielding satyr cavalry flashed through my head, and I quickly stomped them out. “Hey, about that question I had.”