“I think you’re lying,” I said, moving away as much as I could in the cramped bed of the truck because Chuck clearly had more than a few screws loose.
“Think whatever you want, Angel,” he said, stretching out and leaning his head against the back window. “I have no reason to lie to you.”
“Why do you keep calling me Angel? That’s not my name,” I said as the truck came to a stop outside the most ordinary office building I’d ever seen. It was sort of squat with dull white paint and a few trees lining the small walkway that led to some glass doors.
“He calls all the girls ‘Angel.’ It’s his thing,” Roberto said, getting out of the cab and helping me out of the truck bed. “You know, Charlie’s Angels. He thinks it’s clever.”
“I have no idea what that is,” I said, stepping out onto the pavement and shrugging. “Is it a band or something?”
“Oh, come on,” Charlie said as he leapt from the vehicle. His boots crunched on the ground as he landed with enough force to send tremors rippling out through the pavement. “It’s a famous television show about female spies. There’s even a remake.”
“That remake is practically older than my daughter,” Roberto said with a sly smile on his lips. “Face it, Chuck. You’re old.”
Chuck shook his head as he reached back into the bed and grabbed his cigar. He stuck it between his thick lips and sighed. “Whatever,” he said, lighting it back up. “You’ll wish you look this good when you’re my age.”
“How old are you?” I asked, quirking an eyebrow at him because there was no way he was older than twenty-five. “Thirty?” I grinned. “Forty?”
“I was eighteen when I joined the army to kill Nazis in World War Two.” He sucked on the end of his cigar and walked past me. “You do the math.” He cocked his head toward me and blew a smoke ring at me. I scowled just as the front of the building exploded in a fireball that sprayed glass and debris at us. I dropped, hitting the ground hard with Roberto on top of me, shielding my body with his own.
Chuck landed hard on his back next to me, bits of glass embedded in his flesh. He lay there for a moment as flame rippled out of the building, catching the surrounding trees on fire so it felt like we were in the midst of a funeral pyre on Halloween.
He got to his feet and brushed himself off. Apparently being blown up didn’t faze him much, which was good because he pulled Roberto’s bulky body off me. I got to my feet as Roberto steadied himself, leaning hard on Chuck as blood streamed from wounds all over his body.
“I think they know we’re here,” Chuck said, sweeping his hand toward the burning bushes. “Which is unfortunate because they destroyed my cigar.” He sighed. “That cigar was cigar of the year two years ago.”
“I’m sorry for your loss,” I replied, surveying the building. If they already knew we were coming, what sort of defenses would they have in place? Besides, wouldn’t an explosion summon local authorities? Granted we were in a small town in the middle of nowhere but surely there had to be some kind of local law enforcement or at least a fire truck, right?
“Maybe that was a defensive mechanism set up by the Agency to stop Tom and Lisa?” I asked, but even as I said the words I knew they sounded foolish. I mean, there should have been fighting and stuff, right? But there wasn’t. Before we had approached the base, it had been quiet. So either they had seized control already, or they weren’t here, and judging by the explosion we’d just set off, I was pretty sure we were going with option one.
“Get down!” Chuck screamed, grabbing me and Roberto and leaping behind the truck as two huge Gatling guns burst upward from the lawn and swung toward us, bullets already spraying. We hit the asphalt hard as hot lead tore into the tiny Chevy, blowing giant holes in the metal above my head. The driver screamed, and the back tires spun, before slowing to a dull roll that carried the truck into the curb. What had happened? Was he okay?
The smell of gasoline filled my nostrils as bullets zinged by over my head. I dropped, trying to flatten myself into the pavement. That wasn’t good. It would only take one spark to blow us to kingdom come.
“Damn,” Roberto said, and I swung my head toward him. He was staring across the street. My gaze followed his to see what looked like an army of goblin sappers coming toward us, only there was some kind of spout mounted on their shoulders. A burst of flame exploded from the closest one, singing my hair as I threw myself backward against the truck.
The metal next to my head exploded in a flurry of superheated metal as a thin rivulet of gasoline caught fire. Flame raced hungrily toward us as I got to my feet and sprinted toward the goblins, bullets whizzing by my head.
“I’d definitely say they know we’re here,” Chuck said as he punted one of the goblins fifty feet in the air. It impacted a power pole and exploded in a cacophony of flame and debris. Wires tore free of the pole in a spray of sparks, the huge cables whipping back and forth like squirming snakes. The lights along the road winked out, plunging us into darkness.
Lightning burst from the top of the pole as the Gatling guns ground to a halt. The goblins stopped in their tracks and began chittering at each other.
“Hurry,” Roberto said, pointing to a manhole cover at his feet. “We won’t have very long before the backup power restarts the defenses. The default setting is for it to maintain life support, but I’m willing to bet it won’t be that way for long.”
“You did that on purpose, didn’t you?” I asked as Chuck grabbed me around the waist and hoisted me into the air like I was weightless. He sprinted toward the manhole with me under his arm as Roberto dropped into the sewer.
“Even super soldiers don’t get to be this old without learning a few tricks,” Chuck replied, no longer grinning. “You’d do well to remember that.” He leapt through the air as huge strobe lights flickered to life, lighting up the surrounding street. I’m not sure how he managed it, but we landed perfectly inside the sewer, his legs absorbing the fall like a pair of springs.
Thankfully, the tunnel wasn’t dark because a bunch of emergency lights embedded in the ceiling cast enough light to banish most of the shadows. Chuck put me down as Roberto ushered us forward, one hand wreathed in blue flame.
“Well that seems reasonable. I mean everyone needs an emergency flaming hand.” I smirked and Chuck glanced back at me, scowling.
“You’re making a joke, but you should always have a backup plan. Then have a backup to that, and that.” When I didn’t respond, Chuck shook his head. “You know you’re not the first augmented person I’ve taken down, right? You know what the key is? You people always think your specialness will overcome everything.” He turned away from me as we approached Roberto. “It won’t.”
His words rang in my ears like church bells. The truth of them was immediately clear. I was just some kid. Sure, I had a bunch of knowledge and stuff stuffed in my head, and maybe, just maybe, that would get me out of a lot of sticky situations when combined with my magical strength and speed. I swallowed. What would have happened if Roberto hadn’t been there when Chuck came after me? A shiver ran down my spine. That was a thought I didn’t want to entertain…
“You’d be dead,” Donovan said, his voice surprising me so much I jumped. “You’re just lucky he actually turned out to be somewhat trustworthy.” Donovan stepped in front of me and stared at Chuck. “But I’m not sure why you trust him. He has government goon written all over him.”
Instead of replying to the ghost, I asked the one question that had been bothering me this whole time. “Chuck, is there something worse than the Agency?”
He glanced at me like I was very dull and raised an eyebrow. “What do you mean, specifically?”
“I mean, okay Tom is bad, and Gabriella is bad, like way, way bad. I get that. The Agency seems just as bad as either of them. But then there’s you, and while I’m not sure why, I think that if they have people like you, well, maybe they have threats that are way worse than Gabriella. I guess… I’m just wondering if, well, maybe they’
re not all bad. That maybe I’m missing something.”
He stared at me for a long time before wiping his face with his hand. “Abby, Gabriella was a puppy dog compared to the real threats the Agency deals with. This,” he waved his hand at the tunnel, “this is like a vacation for me. It’s why they only sent me after you. Let me be clear, Abby. The Agency is letting you do everything. If they wanted you, they would have you.”
I glanced at Donovan who was standing there scowling. He nodded once at me. I swallowed back a burst of rage that they were orchestrating everything because ever since I’d been abducted by Stephen back in Folsom, it always seemed like the Agency could have stopped Gabriella whenever it wanted to. If that was true, why were they letting things play out?
Roberto could believe whatever he wanted, but I was reasonably sure the Agency could have taken over Gabriella’s bases if it put its mind to it. Hell, it had the flit. The flit was a demon that could take over nearly anyone, and I had no doubt in my mind it could get into supernaturals despite our natural immunity, given enough time.
“Why let me run then?” I asked as a horrible, sinking feeling skittered across the back of my lizard brain.
“They’re probably training you.” Chuck shrugged, but his eyes were strangely distant, like he was watching a long forgotten scene play out. “But don’t ask me for what. I just work here.”
21
Our trip through the grimy sewers was, thankfully, uneventful. I wasn’t sure if that was because there were no defenses down here or because Chuck had cut the power. Though, knowing the Agency, I was inclined to think it was Chuck’s doing. If not, they were far dumber than I’d been giving them credit for. Then again, they had been routed in a matter of hours by a socially awkward Asian teenager named Lisa.
Lisa was smart, sure, but it seemed crazy she could take over an Agency base so completely in so short of a time. How had she done it? And if she was that good now, how the hell were we supposed to stop her from killing us and moving on? I glanced up to see Chuck and Roberto whispering to each other, and even though I couldn’t make out their words, they seemed worried. Great, just great.
Even super soldier Chuck was concerned. He’d been at this a long time, and maybe, just maybe, this was how he got every time he infiltrated some psycho’s base and tried to take her out. Still, I doubted it. He’d taken me down without even breaking a sweat, and he was doing a lot more than sweating now.
“So… uh… what do you plan on doing after this is over?” I asked in an attempt to quell the fear rising in my gut like a serpent.
“I plan on finding a nice beach and kicking back with my daughter,” Roberto said, glancing at me. “I may even let her drink even though she’s underage.” I scowled at him and Chuck laughed.
“What about you, Chuck?” I asked, catching up to them. It was kind of funny because the two of them they were so wide, they couldn’t actually walk next to each other in the sewer tunnel. It made it so Roberto was actually standing a foot or two behind Chuck as they moved along the slime covered floor, boots squelching with every step.
Yeah, it smelled, but I’d gotten over that a few minutes ago. I wasn’t sure how, exactly, but I’d sort of willed the smell away and it’d worked. Whether that was good or bad, I wasn’t sure, but I was praying it was just a perk of whatever Gabriella had done to me.
“Well, I think I’m going to take my dog to a park where I’ll hit on the first girl who comes up to pet him. Then I’ll go find an evil warlord willing to pay me my weight in gold.” He shrugged. “Though I could be talked into taking you drinking.” He grinned mischievously at me.
“Ugh,” I replied, sticking my tongue out at him. “You’re soooooo old.”
He flexed at me, his arms bulging so they made a pair of twenty inch pythons look like a pair of garden snakes. “What?” He called. “I can’t hear you over these guns.”
Roberto shook his head as we came to the end of the tunnel. A huge stone wall blocked any further progress. In the center of the grey rock was a single red button. I wasn’t sure why, but that button gave me a bad feeling.
Without saying a word, Chuck pressed his thumb against the button, and as it depressed into the stone, my breath caught in my throat. What if it exploded, or worse, filled the tunnel with poison gas. Hell, for all I knew it could release a billion poisonous spiders.
When nothing happened, I exhaled slowly through my teeth. Blue light burst from a panel in the ceiling above Chuck’s head, scanning him from head to toe in an instant. A loud beep, beep crackled from a speaker somewhere behind me, and the wall to our left vanished to reveal a set of yellow plastic stairs that led both up and down.
“Well, that was sort of unexpected,” I said as Chuck moved toward the door, his head craned toward the opening as though he was listening for something. He glanced at me and made a shushing motion with his finger. Then he sniffed like a dog, his nostrils flaring outward.
“Gas,” he said. “It’s mostly dissipated so we should be fine, but if I had to guess, someone triggered one of the fail-safes to activate the nerve gas. I’m betting that was Tom. It seems like something he’d do.”
He took a deep breath and stepped into the corridor, vanishing down the steps and into the shadows. Roberto looked at me and was about to say something, but I waved him off. What was he going to do, try to comfort me? What would be the point? Good or bad, we were going to enter a base where everyone inside had been horribly murdered by poison. There wasn’t exactly a way to sugar coat it. The worst part was, even if Lisa hadn’t done it, she had helped Tom. How could I bring her back from something like that?
Roberto nodded and waved for me to go ahead of him. I wasn’t sure whether he was being nice or if he just wanted to keep me in between him and Chuck. Either way, it seemed like a good idea to me. I liked the idea of having the guy with the flaming hand at my back and a Nazi-punching super soldier at my front. If someone got me through that, I was in trouble. Well, more than I was already in at least.
I caught up to Chuck as he stood outside a black wrought-iron gate. It had been blasted open. The tips of the metal surrounding the misshapen hole were melted into slag. I sucked in a breath as he stepped through the hole, hands raised in front of him for balance.
Was this how Lisa and Tom had gotten inside? If it was, that seemed bad. Wouldn’t this be the first place they’d look for us? As Chuck moved, a camera descended from the far corner of the room swiveled to lock in on him.
“Chuck, if you take another step, I will bury that room under a billion tons of rubble.” Tom’s voice hissed from speakers all over the room.
“No, you won’t,” Chuck replied, not bothering to stop as he reached up and grabbed hold of the camera. He jerked downward, and the machine tore free of the ceiling with a spray of sparks. With a nonchalant shrug, he tossed it backward over his shoulder. It hit the white tile floor with a clang.
“I’m not sure that was a wise idea,” Roberto said as Chuck pushed open the door.
“There’s no main power. He doesn’t have the capability to detonate the base anymore.”
“Are you sure?” I asked, scrambling through the room as quickly as I could and meeting Chuck in a long narrow hallway. It was eerily white, from floor to ceiling, reminding me of something out of a B-grade horror movie.
“About eighty percent sure.” He shrugged and started down the hallway. “They could have rerouted the power already, but being that they have to be in here to do that, I sincerely doubt they are going to bring the base down on themselves.”
“All in all that seems totally reasonable,” I said as Roberto appeared in the hallway behind me, his flaming hand flaring in the obscenely bright light.
“I wouldn’t worry about them blowing up the place, anyway. For one, they’ll want to keep the base in one piece so they don’t have to travel five hundred miles to the next one. That’s assuming we’re worth a base to them. We might be, but we’d have to get a lot closer for them to even conside
r it.” Roberto put a hand on my shoulder and shot me a smile that made a chill crawl over my flesh.
“Sounds like we’re playing a dangerous game with a lot of assumptions,” I said, swallowing my fear and moving forward through the hallway. “Someone once told me that was a bad idea.”
“That someone sounds like a smart guy,” Chuck replied. “But I’ve known Tom since he ‘joined’ the Agency. He isn’t exactly devious, or what’s the word I’m looking for, retaliatory? Sadistic? Yeah, sadistic. He’s more coldly practical. What Roberto said is sound. Tom won’t blow this base unless he has to. Besides, there’s no doubt in my mind that the Agency is scrambling to take it back over. He’ll be a lot more worried about them than us.”
My bad feeling swelled into a hard lump in the pit of my stomach. That may have been how Tom was, but that wasn’t how Lisa was. She was smart, and she knew it, but she was vengeful too. I’d known her to carry grudges for forever and a half. Normally she didn’t do anything about them, but she was still mad at the kids who picked on her in kindergarten. Now she was in control of one of the Agency’s bases and had somehow managed to use the internal defenses to kill everyone inside. Something told me her quest for vengeance wouldn’t remain in her head this time.
I was about to say something to that effect when the emergency lights went out, pitching us into utter darkness. Something whooshed by my head, and I hit the ground as the screech of metal filled my ears. There was a loud whump, whump to my left. I rolled myself against the wall, tucking myself into the corner and moving forward on my elbows. I couldn’t see anything at all.
“Guys,” I yelled, hoping someone would respond. I’d thought about keeping quiet, but I was pretty sure whatever was attacking us could probably see in the dark. It didn’t make sense to cut the lights otherwise.
No one responded. That was scary, but I pushed my fear down and blinked a couple times, listening. Behind me, I could hear something skittering on the floor, a little tick tick that made my flesh crawl. I got to my feet and sprinted toward the end of the hallway as a blast of light behind me lit up the room for an instant. Some kind of flying creature the size of a shoebox burst into flames, veering sideways as screams erupted from its blazing form. It crashed sideways into another winged creature so that the second one spun out of control and slammed into the wall.
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