Haley didn’t require an apport – she was carried through the Anathema scrambler by virtue of a telepathic anchor that Mitsuru facilitated, and looking much the worse for wear, her insubstantial form flickering and wavering in the half-light of the supposedly abandoned factory. Whatever the scrambler had done to her, Haley was still capable of telepathically concealing them from the numerous people on the concrete factory floor, though it looked as if the effort hurt. Alex had a moment to wonder about Haley’s physical body back at the local headquarters, if it suffered when her psychic form did, or if it was as fleeting as a bad dream. Then everything got hectic, and there was no more time to worry about anything other than surviving the next few seconds.
Things didn’t start off badly. Chike blinked out of existence a few seconds after he delivered them, pausing only long enough to exchange an encouraging word with Mitsuru and give the rest of them a thumbs-up. He was meant to apport to wherever Karim was, messing with scopes and trying to account for the distortion created by using a local relay to augment his remote-viewing skills. The rifle he employed, a massive Barrett .50 caliber, was purportedly powerful enough to punch through the rusting walls of the factory, thanks to depleted-uranium-lined bullets and specialized machining, but Alex couldn’t put much stock in the sniper looking after them. Nor, to be entirely frank, could he entirely trust Mitsuru, who had a wild and distant look in her eyes that made him think she was more focused on winning the battle than bringing them home safely.
It was understandable. That was the basic idea, after all.
A heartbeat after Chike disappeared, Miss Gallow stepped out of the shadows of the World Tree on the floor below them, pulling Xia along with one hand and Michael with the other. There was a passing lull, a pause in recognition while Mitsuru telepathically urged them to move from the precarious catwalk that groaned ominously with their weight to firmer ground, then all hell broke loose. Alex watched as he stumbled forward, clutching his rifle more out of habit than any real confidence, while the trio of Auditors laid waste to everything in sight.
Miss Gallow flitted from one shadow to another, her automatic shotgun spraying buckshot at everything unlucky enough to attract her attention. Machinery ruptured and vented steam, monitors shattered, and people died, whole limbs vaporized by clouds of tiny ball bearings accelerated beyond terminal velocity. Belatedly, some Anathema attempted to return fire, but at best they found no target. More often, they contributed to the ongoing disaster by opening fire on the spot where Miss Gallow had been a moment earlier, hitting their own personnel.
Michael pushed forward, bullets ricocheting off the indigo barrier that sparkled around him. He ignored the terrified technicians, charging instead at a massed group of armed men, his tattooed skin livid with telekinetic energy. One of the Anathema employed a kinetic protocol, the ground around him fracturing with excess energy, the air between them rippling as a sheer wall of force tore through, but Michael deflected it with a gesture, sending it to shred a path across the factory floor. Michael cast out his hands, and indigo lines of energy radiated out, flaring soundlessly when they came into contact with the Anathema. Two were protected by a barrier, but the remainder were decimated, liquefied remains expelled across the stained concrete floors, in a scene of carnage too grotesque for Alex’s mind to accept as real. Michael moved on the survivors, hands radiating energy as he shattered their barrier.
Xia walked calmly forward, extending his hands out on either side as if he were checking for rain. All around him, fire blossomed, a terrifying surge of white-hot flame and superheated air that consumed all that it touched with a sound like a jet at full throttle.
Confusion took hold, amidst flame and light and the discharge of protocols, the rattle and whine of bullets, and the background chorus of screams. If it weren’t for Katya’s hand on his shoulder, Alex might have frozen, or even fallen to his knees in raw, wordless horror, but she drove him onward. Alex was unable to look away from the ongoing carnage beneath him, so he was the only one to see the beam of focused light that cut neatly through the catwalk two meters behind Katya, severed steel beams bubbling and writhing like boiling water. The beam passed directly through the catwalk and sliced the roof overhead, tracing a smooth arc as if it were a line drawn with the aid of a compass, then reversed direction and cut a diagonal across nearly the whole of the building, passing through the catwalk again at a more distant point and tearing open an enormous section of the ceiling. Alex was dazzled by the intensity of the beam, still trying to blink away the vivid afterimages when they were suddenly exposed to daylight.
It was impossible to say whether it was a deliberate attack. Of course, they were meant to be telepathically hidden, but that only held if the Anathema did not have a more powerful or capable telepath than Haley among their numbers. Then again, it was bedlam beneath them, with all sorts of weaponry and protocols employed in a manner that was at best chaotic. In the end, it made no difference.
Alex intended to cry out, but the din was so great that even he couldn’t hear himself, so there was no way to be sure that he did. He crouched instinctively as a severed I-beam fell from the punctured roof, then his point of view shifted and he found himself scrambling as the ground slid from beneath him. Something hit him in the head, with a pain that Alex heard more than he felt, a dull ringing that reverberated down to the soles of his feet, and then he was tumbling, bright moments of pain where he came into contact with the things gone too fast to identify.
The catwalk fell to the factory floor, with the majority of the roof of the old chemical plant not far behind.
***
Alistair just smiled when the perimeter guard burst into flames, screaming horrifically as they alternated between fruitlessly rolling on the ground in an attempt to extinguish themselves and frantically trying to shed burning clothing. The technicians clustered around him, monitoring machinery as it gradually cycled up to full power, glanced at him fearfully.
“Continue, continue,” Alistair said, chuckling. “It appears our guests have finally made their entrance.”
“I thought apports into this location were impossible,” Drake growled, rubbing the back of his neck, where two poorly tattooed eyes stared out blankly and unevenly. “Is the scrambler still on?”
“It is,” Alistair said, glancing at the tablet he held briefly, then casting it aside to shatter on the ground, causing the technicians to jump. “Apparently, the Auditors have devised a solution for that particular problem. How troublesome.”
“You don’t seem that upset,” Drake observed, flipping the fire selector on his M-4 to automatic.
“I’m not,” Alistair agreed. “I have scores to settle with this lot. We all do, as a matter of fact.”
“Oh.” Drake scanned the growing chaos around them through the scope of his rifle. “That’s great.”
“It will be, won’t it?” Alistair nodded with satisfaction, turning his attention to the trembling technicians. “You lot – how long until the World Tree is operational?”
They looked from one to the other, before one of them worked up the courage to speak. A striking black woman with tightly braided hair looked at him levelly across a bank of glowing dials.
“Hard to say, sir. We’ve never brought it up to full power before. If I had to estimate, I would guess that it’s a matter of minutes. Ten, fifteen – could be more, could be less.”
Alistair gave her a pleasant smile.
“Excellent. Your name?”
“Talia Banks,” the female tech answered, returning her attention to the control board, as if she had lost interest in the conversation.
“Very well, Talia. You are in charge. I need this working in ten minutes. Make it happen.” Alistair didn’t bother to see the reaction his words invoked. He motioned to his assembled troops, walking toward the source of the screaming and destruction with the crisp gait of a man who enjoys his work. “The rest of you, spread out. Stay in groups. Find the Auditors, and kill as many of them a
s possible.”
Drake and Michelle exchanged a look. Her head was still slightly but noticeably misshapen, the result of a bullet Alice Gallow had very nearly put through her head in their last encounter. Michelle had brought her barrier up in time to save her brain, but not before her skull had been shattered.
“Great,” Drake said again, spitting tobacco juice on the floor.
“Try and show some spine,” Song Li suggested, shambling by in the mildly decomposed corpse of a Malaysian man that she currently occupied – an Operator they had killed the week before, during an altercation in Brussels. Curtis followed her at a respectful distance, mindful of the stomach-turning smell. “Don’t you want revenge?”
“Shut up,” Michelle responded angrily. “They killed you last time, you bitch.”
Leigh Feld patted her on the shoulder as she passed, perfectly formed and aloof, twin white fangs barely protruding from her pouty lips, dressed in Lycra and Spandex, as if she were planning on getting in a quick workout. Martin Cole hurried after her.
“Don’t worry,” she offered airily, walking carelessly through the fire. “It will be different this time. We are different.”
Michelle and Drake waited till they all disappeared before heading out, choosing the direction with the least amount of carnage and destruction.
“Sometimes I think we are the only people here who aren’t insane,” Michelle said, shaking her pretty, if slightly malformed, head.
“I know,” Drake agreed, pausing to spit before hoisting his rifle. “Worrisome, ain’t it?”
A moment later, Michelle’s barrier protocol activated just in time to prevent them from being crushed as several tons of rusting metal came crashing down.
***
“This is going to be difficult,” Karim said thoughtfully, removing the scope from the enormous and angular length of the Barrett. It wasn’t his favorite rifle, but it was the only weapon he had that had been altered to handle the depleted uranium rounds that would allow him to penetrate the walls of the factory, along with whatever else might separate him from his target. “More so than I had imagined. It’s already a madhouse in there, and I doubt matters will grow much clearer.”
“Do you need to change positions?” Chike offered brightly, his sunny disposition apparently unshakable. It was one of the qualities that Karim had quickly come to appreciate about the apport technician, who was busy double-checking the complex wiring extending from his elaborate mess of demolition equipment. “I am prepared to move.”
“Not necessary, thank you.” Karim bent over the rifle, using only the iron sights, technically meant for use only in an emergency. Given that he would be primarily using the information he gleaned with his remote-viewing abilities to aim – information he felt, rather than saw – a scope would only provide a distraction. “Not yet, in any case.”
Chike nodded without looking up from whatever he was soldering with a pen-shaped, propane-powered tool.
“Very well. Let me know.”
“I will.” Karim allowed the information from his own expanded sensory net to merge with the flood of data relayed via telepathic link from the bank of remote viewers that Central had focused on the site, his mind struggling to realign perceptions that differed from his own in a variety of intrinsic ways. It was a mess, and after a moment of contemplation, he cast it aside, to rely only on his own impressions. They had kept him alive thus far, after all.
Moving slowly and methodically, Karim loaded the magazine with the special rounds Vladimir’s lab had prepared, trying to picture the shot in his mind. It was an act of near-total concentration, but still, there was enough awareness left for him to note with satisfaction that it would likely be the most challenging day of his career.
***
Mitsuru assumed that she hit her head during the fall, because her memories were fuzzy, and it took an indeterminate amount of time before she became aware of her surroundings. She glanced around, seeing nothing but meters of twisted beams and supports, and behind that the brief and brilliant reflections of protocols and the distant flickering of spreading fire. Her head ached and her ears offered only a dull ringing sound, and though she could see the occasional muzzle flare, there was no sound of gunfire. She put her hand to her forehead, and then studied her bloodied fingers, before pushing the information aside as of no consequence. Standing was more arduous than it should have been, but at least she hadn’t sustained any broken bones in the fall. Mitsuru was aware that she had probably suffered a concussion, but that too was of little importance, as long as she could remain standing.
What was important was her position.
Her priority was to neutralize the defense in the immediate vicinity of the World Tree so Chike could apport in to destroy it. As her faculties slowly returned, Mitsuru realized that the telepathic network had gone silent, either as a result of Haley being incapacitated, or because of her own concussion. Slowly, the sounds of the calamity around her filtered through the ringing in her ears, the crackle of flame and the discharge of protocols punctuated by the sharp sound of gun shots. Picking her way carefully through the wreckage of the catwalk and the fallen roof, Mitsuru reached for the Etheric Network, intending to download a telepathic protocol and resume communications, perhaps gather whatever of the students had survived the fall to make an attack on their target.
At first, she mistook the girl for two girls, thanks to her blurred vision.
“Auditor Aoki,” Leigh said, crouching atop a mangled girder and smiling with satisfaction. “I am so pleased to see you again.”
“I can’t say the same, vampire,” Mitsuru answered, checking for her weapons and relieved to find them intact. She was less pleased with her other finding – her connection to the Etheric Network was severed. Mitsuru wondered exactly how bad her head injury was. “I don’t suppose you would be interested in postponing our encounter? I have more pressing concerns at the moment.”
Leigh laughed as she leapt from the girder to the factory floor, landing a few meters away from Mitsuru.
“I’m sure you do.” Leigh flexed her hands, and her fingers lengthened, morphing into claws. “Too bad I don’t care. I’ve been hoping for this since the last time we tangled.”
Mitsuru pulled both guns from her holsters, and activated her ballistics protocol, comforted that at least the protocols she had already downloaded were still accessible.
“You don’t learn, do you? This time,” Mitsuru promised, “I will kill you.”
“That’s the spirit,” Leigh said, dropping into a crouch. “You look a mess already, though. I hope this won’t be over too quickly.”
Mitsuru responded with gunfire, both pistols tracking the vampire’s head. Thanks to the painful clarity imparted by the ballistics protocol, Mitsuru watched a round sever a strand of Leigh’s long blonde hair as she moved, her body blurring as she shifted, always managing to be just ahead of where Mitsuru aimed, the bullets passing through the space she had just absented.
There was no arguing with the numbers in her HUD. There wasn’t enough space between them, or enough bullets in her magazines. Mitsuru had only seconds before Leigh was within striking distance. She cast one of the guns aside, holding on to the one that had a half-full magazine, and grabbed the long knife at her belt.
Leigh disappeared, and Mitsuru ducked. Either she guessed poorly or Leigh anticipated her movements, because the vampire kicked the back of her left leg, hyperextending her knee and almost sending her to the ground. Mitsuru flexed with the impact, falling and bending backward, lunging with her knife for the vampire’s chest and stabbing her between her ribs. Leigh brought her elbow down on Mitsuru’s forehead, knocking her to the ground.
She twisted, so that her side hit the floor hard, and her vision doubled again, but Mitsuru kept moving through the pain and disorientation, dropping her gun and instead grabbing for the vampire’s leg. She absorbed a kick to the face that snapped her jaw shut and cost her a front tooth and the tip of her tongue, but Mit
suru spat blood and focused on her hold, gripping Leigh’s ankle and pulling, forcing her to shift her balance to avoid falling. Her position was too weak to actually trip the vampire, but the maneuver bought her a few seconds.
Mitsuru lashed out at the rear of Leigh’s ankle, slashing through silicon-fiber tendon clear to the bone. The vampire tumbled over, pummeling Mitsuru in the sternum with her heel until she was forced to release her hold. The space between them gave her a few more seconds, and Mitsuru began the process of activating a downloaded protocol, not sure where she found the strength to operate it twice in the same day. It would leave her drained to the point of collapse, certainly, but she could worry about that after she survived long enough to employ it.
Leigh stumbled forward, moving clumsily as her leg repaired itself, lunging for Mitsuru’s face with extended claws. Mitsuru crossed her arms in front of her face in time to ward off the blow, but Leigh’s talons cut her forearms to the bone. Mitsuru cried out involuntarily at the pain, her knife falling from her hand. The vampire’s mouth opened in what must have been a cry of rage or victory, but Mitsuru again could hear nothing aside from the terrible ringing in her ears. She was utterly focused on the tremendous mental effort required to operate the protocol.
The vampire threw herself at Mitsuru, and she rolled to avoid her, able to dodge Leigh’s strike only because her movements were still hampered by her severed tendon. Leigh’s claws embedded briefly in the concrete of the factory floor. Mitsuru scampered away, until she felt metal at her back, trapped by the wreckage. Leigh mistook her concentration for fear, and charged with renewed confidence.
Leigh came at her with claws extended, and Mitsuru took a chance and kicked between them, planting her heel into the side of the vampire’s face. The girl’s own momentum contributed to the force of the blow, knocking her to the side, but she still managed to lash out at Mitsuru’s leg, tearing gouges in the flesh of her calf, claws passing through the armor as if it weren’t there. Leigh shook her head and recovered, again lunging for Mitsuru. She caught one of the vampire’s wrists coming in, but the other impaled her left shoulder, shredding flesh and snapping bone. The vampire smiled and sunk her teeth into Mitsuru’s outstretched arm, fangs driving through her forearm.
The Far Shores (The Central Series) Page 53