Seething at the way she was being spoken to, it took Valery a moment to gather herself before she responded. Liberty reveled in the time it took her to reign in her temper. “Scouts say they counted five pairs of tracks outside the wall. I already have a group of Dread mindless tracking them now.”
“Not good enough,” Liberty said, fixing Valery with a stare that he knew would chill her to the bone. “I want you to go. Make sure this Taylor bends the knee to our rule or dies. The last thing we need is her to join with the Guardians, or even worse, the Elite families who still resist.”
“Why should I chase them when my skill set is better used to experiment on—”
Liberty extended an arm toward Valery, lifting her up in a mass of black smoke-like tentacles that extended from his hand. His grip was firm around her throat without being crushing. “Do you feel you need to voice your opinion? Do you think you know what is best for the Dread given your experience and long tenure as one of us?” Liberty’s tone dripped with sarcasm, and the effect was not lost on Valery.
“No, no, Commander Echo. I will leave right away.”
Liberty held her a moment longer before releasing her to the ground. “Good, see that you do. I want a report as soon as you’ve found them. Tracking will be unnecessary, it’s clear where they are going.”
***
“Where are we going?”
Frank was carrying his assault rifle like a baby. The stock was cradled in his left elbow while the barrel pointed outward toward Taylor and Cidney.
“We’re going to the Vault,” Taylor said. “Stop carrying your firearm like a newborn. You’re going to murder someone with that thing.”
“Oh it’s okay,” Frank said, swinging the gun the way a child would with a toy.
Taylor dodged the barrel’s line of sight, scowling.
“It’s empty. I spent the last few bullets trying to kill that thing. Whatever the Dread transformed Dr. Spear into, I mean.”
A moment of silence passed between the two while they both thought back to their encounter with Valery in the Ark. “So the Vault, huh?” Frank asked, pursing his lips. “Let’s see, last known communication from anyone human outside the Ark was over a year ago and it’s an outpost based in Olympia, Washington.”
“Yep,” Taylor said.
“Sounds like a long shot.”
Taylor chose not to address the comment. She had thought the same of the Vault before yet what better option did they have? Roam the wilderness until they may or may not find help? That was no plan at all.
Taylor rubbed her arms. It was cold. Not quite freezing but hypothermia was no joking matter. Vibrant greens and browns of the trees and rough rocky terrain opened the world to them in every direction. If circumstances weren’t so dire at the moment Taylor could even imagine herself enjoying the beauty of the wilderness. No walls to hedge her in, no snapping teeth to remind her of the danger around them.
“Do you think they’re going to be okay?” Cidney asked. “I mean, look at them.”
Taylor appraised the two members of their party to which Cidney was referring. Once Jason had woken from whatever trancelike state Valery had entrapped him, the captain left to scout ahead. Since then the man she had at one time called her “Operator” had been sullen and kept to himself. Jason followed slowly, bringing up the rear of their group.
Likewise, the last member of their party still seemed to be in shock. Melissa also followed behind, not as far as Jason but far enough to say without saying, “I want to be left alone.”
“Maybe someone should talk to them,” Cidney suggested, raising an eyebrow in Taylor’s direction. “By someone I mean you.”
“Yes,” Taylor said with a heavy breath, “that was understood with your look. I’m…I’m not that great with people, if you haven’t noticed.”
“If you are going to lead us, then you have to get better,” Cidney said matter-of-factly. Her voice reminded Taylor of a high school teacher she once had. “Heroes—er, heroines have to help in more ways than just fighting.”
“I’m no heroine, Cid,” Taylor said, already slowing her stride to fall back and speak with Melissa. “I think the world maybe all out of those at the moment.”
***
Melissa’s eyes were bloodshot, her arms wrapped tightly around her in a feeble attempt to fend off the cold. The blood on her clothes had dried to a dull red.
“Are you sure you’re not hurt?” Taylor asked, falling in step with the woman. “I know we already checked you—”
“I’m fine,” Melissa said as if it were an automatic reaction to the question. It was clear to anyone looking at the young woman she was anything but.
“Listen,” Taylor started, “I know what happened back there must have been horrible for you. If there’s anything I can do, let me know.”
“Pete was such a great guy,” Melissa said sadly. “I thought for sure he would make the transition like you did. What went wrong?”
“That…that thing with Valery, that was Pete?” Taylor asked, trying to piece together Melissa’s broken thoughts. “I’m sorry, I didn’t know.”
Taylor tried to remember anything she knew of the man. He was vain, always had the loudest voice in the conversation, and passed off his duties whenever he could. Melissa didn’t need to hear that now.
“He was infected the last time we held the gates,” Melissa said. “Dr. Spear said if I could manage to sneak him inside the Ark we could give him the same serum she gave you. Why didn’t it work?”
“I don’t know,” Taylor said, wishing she had something better to say almost as much as she wished she was anywhere else besides engaged in the current conversation. “Trust me, if I had answers I’d give them to you. I’m still dealing with my own change. I don’t think I’m anyone special. I don’t know why it changed me the way it did. I’m no different than anyone else.”
“You are someone special,” Melissa said, looking at Taylor for the first time. “You are different on some level. There wasn’t enough light, enough good, in Pete to make the change like you did.”
Taylor’s level of comfort was evaporating by the minute. What was she supposed to say now? That she was in fact better than Melissa’s dead boyfriend? “Well like I said, if there is anything I can do for you…”
Melissa gave Taylor a tired nod, a glimpse of gratefulness across her face.
Taylor flashed Melissa a smile of her own and turned toward her next assignment, Jason.
Unlike Melissa, Jason was in an extremely talkative mood. His brain was working on overdrive trying to figure out how the Dread were evolving and what it meant for them.
“So somehow the Dread is an entity able to pick and choose which hosts to evolve to the next level,” Jason said, vigorously scratching at his hair for no apparent reason. “Or maybe that’s wrong too. Maybe it depends on the person, like in your case, Taylor. You had more light than dark in you, so with the added push of the serum you were able to highlight the good. So the Dread has enough ‘mindless’ for a lack of better term, and now it’s promoting generals and captains, along with enslaving the rest of humanity. There are other people out there too, Taylor. Other individuals with powers fighting back.”
“Wow, wow, wow,” Taylor said, stepping to the side with both arms out, palms forward in a pushing motion. “Slow down there, I can barely understand what you’re saying, you’re talking so fast. Start from the beginning. How do you know all of this?”
“She told me, I saw it all in a flash when she grabbed me and looked into my eyes,” Jason said, widening his eyes to a maddening degree. “I think Valery wanted me to know. I don’t know why.”
Taylor’s expression must have been obvious because Jason followed up his own statement with a disclaimer. He was talking so fast it all came out as one long word. “I’m not crazy, don’t worry I’m not crazy. I’ve just seen so much. All my questions were answered in a split second.”
“And you’re sure you are feeling okay?” Taylor as
ked. She looked over her friend for any sign of a wound or blood. “You weren’t injured when she lifted you off the ground?”
“No, I’d already be turned if I had been infected. I told you they want slaves now, to build their new world. I—”
Before Jason could finish his next crazed thought he was silenced by the sound of running footsteps crashing though the brush.
“Stay here,” Taylor ordered, already racing to the front of their group, ready to meet whatever was coming with a fight.
***
The noise was getting louder. Someone or something was eager to meet the group of survivors.
Taylor brushed past Melissa and joined Frank and Cidney at the head of the party. Frank had his empty rifle pointed forward, Cidney was intently searching the trees around them for signs of whatever was making the noise.
“I thought you said your rifle was out of bullets,” Taylor said out of the side of her mouth. Her eyes never left the forest in front of her.
“It is, but whatever is coming doesn’t know that, and it makes me feel better.”
A figure came into view. Captain Martin was running at a dead sprint. He reached the group with a heaving chest and sweat gathering across his body.
“Take it easy,” Taylor said, still not taking here eyes from the forest around them. “Grab your breath.”
“An—encampment—humans—ahead.” The captain interlaced his fingers and placed his arms above his head. “I don’t think they’re friendly. Lots of automatic weapons, supplies, and they have vehicles.”
The idea that humans could have been so close to the Ark was shocking to Taylor. The thought of somehow getting her hands on a vehicle for the group was too perfect to imagine. It would cut down their journey from weeks to days.
“They’re human for sure? How do you know they’re not the Dread’s mindless or—”
“Lieutenants,” Jason said, reaching the group along with Melissa. All eyes turned to him. “What? That’s what they call themselves. The evolved Dread are lieutenants. You used the correct term of ‘mindless’ for the generic foot soldiers we’ve been dealing with up until this point.”
“There are no visible signs,” the captain said. “They moved like us. The fact they’re carrying guns leads me to believe they’re still human.”
“Why do you think they wouldn’t be friendly?” Frank asked.
“I heard them talking about rounding up humans as slaves to sell to the Dread. They have empty cages big enough to hold dozens of people. They even have a man chained to a chair right now.”
Taylor’s stomach lurched. The idea of any human willingly working against their own kind was sickening. In her mind the survivors of the world would try and unite as one. They would realize their own extinction event and push back against the darkness. This was a naive thought, she realized. Of course there would be those out to side with the most powerful force, even if it meant enslaving their own.
“I ran back as fast as I could to warn you,” the captain said, wiping a hand across his face and spitting on the ground next to him. “We can still go around.”
The group stood quiet. Even Jason for all his manic diarrhea of the mouth had nothing to say.
It was Frank who finally voiced what they were all thinking. “If they have supplies, I think we have to try something. I’m not sure what. It hasn’t even been a full twenty-four hours since we escaped the Ark and I’m dying of thirst.”
“We could try and forage for food and water,” the captain said, “but they have weapons. If we get in another fight with the Dread, you’re the only one that can muster any kind of offensive worth a damn.”
“I think we have to try something, for the reasons you two listed as well as the possibility of getting a vehicle,” Taylor said, her brain already functioning overtime on some kind of plan. “A working vehicle that could carry all of us would practically guarantee us passage to the Vault.”
“What do we do?” Cidney asked from her spot in the group. “We can’t kill them in an ambush and take their things.”
“Neither can we walk up and introduce ourselves. That would be crazy,” Frank said, looking at Taylor with a worried glance. “Why are you staring at me like that?”
“Because I think you just came up with our plan,” Taylor said with a wolfish grin.
Chapter 5
“Tell me why I have to be the one to walk up to them again?” Frank asked with a hard swallow. “I’m the tech guy remember? I’m good with end of times type philosophy. Even helped construct the serum that gave you your powers. I’m not a soldier.”
“I know,” Taylor said standing in a group of trees outside the encampment. “But you’re smart, and you’ll know what to say if things get bad. The captain and I will be watching you the entire time. If it goes south, we’ll jump in.”
The fear in Frank’s eyes almost made Taylor call a halt to the plan there and then. Yet it was the best plan. Taylor and the captain were the only two with combat experience who were at the moment reliable and ready. Although Jason had a brief stint with firearms during their escape from Los Angeles and inside the Ark guarding the perimeter, something was off about him. Taylor couldn’t put her finger on it yet. Something told her she couldn’t throw him into this scenario when there were already so many unknowns.
“I think we need a safe word,” Frank said, looking through thick branches toward two men who stood guard at the camp’s entrance.
“What?”
“You know, like if I want you guys to come and get me I’ll work something into my conversation with them. When I say the word you guys bring the cavalry.”
“Frank, I’ll be able to hear you the whole time,” Taylor said. It was the look in his eyes that made her submit. “Okay, okay you can have a safe word. What do you want it to be?”
“It has to be something that I wouldn’t use in any conversation, something so bizarre, so foreign to my own vernacular that I wouldn’t let this word slip,” Frank mused. His shoulders were already relaxing at the thought of having some kind of safety net he was in control of. “Diet.”
“You want ‘diet’ to be your safe word?” Taylor wasn’t sure whether to laugh or be angered at the level of ridiculousness that was taking place.
“Yes,” Frank said with a serious face. “If you hear me say that word, you come running, or flying. Wait, can you fly?”
“More like levitate, but that’s not important right now,” Taylor said. “You’ll be fine. Remember what we talked about. Walk up slowly with your hands where they can see them. And who knows? Maybe the captain’s wrong. Maybe they’re friendlies after all.”
“You don’t think that at all. You’re just saying that to make me feel better,” Frank said, already putting his hands into the air. He began walking forward toward the two men at the camp entrance.
Both guards were bearded with heavy jackets, beanies, and automatic assault rifles. Taylor felt another twinge of regret at sending Frank into the lion’s den.
“Hey there, friends,” Frank said when the pair of men caught sight of him. As one, they raised their weapons.
“Wow, wow, wow,” Frank sputtered. “I come in peace. I don’t have any weapons. I’m not all drugged out like the Dread either. I’m looking for some other humans.”
The two armed men looked to one another before they scanned the woods behind Frank. Taylor ducked behind a thick tree trunk just in time.
“How many people are with you?” one of the guards asked gruffly.
“I’m alone, all alone, it’s only me,” Frank said, clearing his throat. “I need help. You guys can help me right? You’re human too?”
Both guards broke out in rough laughter. The same man who had spoken before did so again. “We’re human all right, boy. Born human and plan on dying human. We can’t help you. Where did you come from anyway?”
Taylor chanced another look. Satisfied that Frank was in fact alone the guards lowered the weapons. Taylor searched the grounds for any
other sign of the third guard the captain said he had seen in the camp. He was nowhere to be found.
“I—uh, I was with some people in a base a few miles back. We were overrun by the Dread. I escaped. Please can you help me?” Frank asked.
“What a shame,” the other man finally said in a thick French accent. He took a few steps toward Frank. “Escaped only to be captured and sold back again. Now don’t make this hard, boy. The Dread wants their slaves intact and ready to work.”
“You need to go on a diet,” Frank said, taking a step backward.
“What?” The man paused his advance to cock his head to one side.
“A diet. If I were you I’d go on a diet. I hate diets. Diet!” Frank yelled the last word like a raving madman, it was unnecessary. Taylor was already sprinting to his side.
The guards’ expressions went from puzzlement to terror when Taylor lifted them straight up into the air. They were able to get a few wild shots off as they rocketed ten stories into the sky. Taylor let them fall, screaming. After a pair of sickening thuds, she scanned the area for the third guard.
Running boots to her left caught her attention. Taylor twisted around in time to see a large man holding a handgun already drawing a bead on her. She would have tried to throw him to the side had she not seen Captain Martin right behind the man. In a second the captain caught up with the guard. He grabbed him from behind, one hand on the guard’s chin, the other on the top of his head. With a violent twist the captain snapped the man’s neck. The guard’s lifeless body hit the ground in a heap.
The captain nodded toward Taylor and Frank. “I took a look deeper inside the camp. There were only these three guards and the prisoner. We’re in the clear.”
“You did great,” Taylor said to Frank, who was still breathing hard.
“Thanks. That safe word was perfect right?”
“We should move fast,” Taylor said with a roll of her eyes. “We need to get in and out before the rest of their group comes back from wherever they are.”
All The Broken People (The Dread Series Book 2) Page 4