Show No Fear (The Dyian Series Book 2)

by Brandy Isaacs

  He carefully snipped away at her shirt, starting with the collar. When the wound was exposed, Xander's brow wrinkled and Sydney couldn't tell if it was in sympathy or anger. Maybe both. "Luckily it just went through the muscle here. The trapezius muscle. It didn’t hit anything important," he said.

  "That's definitely a good thing," Hacker agreed. "If we had to dig the bullet out it would have made things a lot worse for you."

  "Yay me," she muttered.

  By the time her shirt was cut off, Shay, ET, and Zak had returned. Hacker rummaged through the first aid kit for supplies. Everyone was perfectly silent as Hacker got ready to fix her up. Sydney began to feel like she was in a real operating room nightmare—like she was about to have surgery but no one knew she was awake.

  "I'm sorry I don't have gloves," Hacker told her. "This kit doesn't have any either. But, I can assure you, I have no communicable diseases."

  "Well, you know I do," Sydney gave him a flat look. She didn't know how much he knew, but she assumed he knew enough.

  Hacker smiled again. "Nothing that is transferable by blood it sounds like."

  "I don't know," Zak smirked. "When is the last time you got tested, Xander?"

  "Shut the fuck up!" Xander scowled at him over his shoulder.

  But when he turned back around he had a small smile on his face. The mood needed lightening and Sydney would have smiled too if her shoulder hadn't began throbbing again. When Hacker began cleaning up her wound, she wished she would pass out again. The pain consumed her entire body until it was the only thing she knew. Syd gritted her teeth and her breaths hissed in and out and flexed her feet up and down trying to divert the need to move from her upper body to the lower. Xander held her hand and she squeezed it until she was sure she was going to break his bones.

  "I wish I had something to numb the pain, but I'm afraid I don't," Hacker told her while he threaded the needle with thread that Shay had disinfected with alcohol.

  "Just hurry the fuck up," Syd groaned.

  When the needle pierced her skin the first time she was surprised that she could feel that particular prick of pain at the epicenter of the volcano of agony that was her entire shoulder. "Oh, fuck," she gagged. "I'm gonna throw up."

  Xander held a bucket to the edge of the table and propped her on her side while Shay brushed her hair out of her face. When she was done, she gasped for breath. "Sorry about that."

  "No need to be sorry," Xander smiled at her.

  "Ready?" Hacker asked her.

  "Yeah."

  By the time he was done with stitching up the front and back, her teeth were rattling and she was shaking like a leaf. Now that the immediate and urgent situation was handled, the weight of the room shifted. She wanted to know who the hell Hacker was. And, she knew they wanted to know what had happened to her. But her whole body felt so weak and hollow she wasn’t even sure she would make it up the stairs. "I would love to catch up, but I really need to sleep." A combination of blood loss and exhaustion was making it near impossible to keep her eyes open. "But I don't know how I'm going to sleep this hurts so bad." She considered chugging more whiskey, but her stomach turned at the thought.

  "Here, this will help."

  She actually managed to laugh when she saw Zak was holding out a joint to her. "I'm so grateful you are a pothead."

  "Pot meet kettle," he laughed.

  Pain eased by the weed, she made her way upstairs with Xander's help. In Zak’s house, they had a chance to relax. The property wasn’t in his name and the likelihood of Moreno knowing about it was slim enough they could rest. Cleaned up and in fresh clothes, she drifted off to sleep and hoped that once she woke up someone would have fixed everything and she didn't have to worry about aliens or drug dealers anymore.

  Xander

  Xander watched Sydney sleep running his fingers through her hair. He relieved to see, touch, and smell her again. He missed her coconut scented shampoo and promised himself he would find out what kind it was and buy her some the first chance he got. Eventually, he fell asleep dreaming he was washing Sydney's hair with blood. He didn't know how long they had been out, but it only felt like minutes when a knocking at the door woke them both up. They were tangled around each other with Syd's face against his neck and his nose buried in her hair. "What?" he grumbled, feeling sick and unsettled by the dream he had been having.

  "Hacker needs us," Shay called. "Get up."

  "Alright!"

  Sydney leaned back and when she saw him her face split into a surprised smile. "For a minute I thought I had dreamed I was back."

  "Nope," he sighed against her hair. "You're here. You're safe."

  "You don't actually know that," she threw cold water on their conversation.

  "At this moment, you are safe. Here with me."

  "So are you," she smiled.

  "Can we just ignore Shay and stay in bed?"

  "No!" Shay yelled from the hall.

  "Fucking perv!" he called back to her.

  "Who the hell is that guy?" Syd asked carefully sliding out of bed.

  "Let's just go over the whole story together. It's a long one."

  They had only had about four hours of sleep and he could feel it in the graininess of his eyes and the shakiness in his muscles. He was grateful to see that Shay had made coffee and he poured himself and Sydney a cup. He grimaced as the obvious pain she was in. She held her left arm against her body with her right. "We need to get you some painkillers, and a sling." He sat her coffee in front of her and got them both cream and sugar.

  "Probably a good idea," she agreed.

  "We need to find you some antibiotics too," Hacker nodded.

  "Eh, I'll give some people a call and see what I can do." Xander wondered which of his old biker friends would help him out. Rabbit certainly wouldn't now that he considered his debt paid. If he had time he would stop by The Pit and see if Sherry or Jameson could help.

  "OK," Shay sat down next to Syd. "Tell us what happened last night. We'll get caught up."

  "Has anyone checked on Darren and Jake?" Sydney asked suddenly.

  "Who?" Xander sat his cup down.

  "The berserkers. The ones that came with me."

  "Oh!"

  Zak leaned against the wall next to Shay. "I took them some oatmeal down earlier. They were asleep." He looked at her for a moment. "Tell me why we are housing those things?"

  "I have control over them. They helped me..." She shrugged her good shoulder as if she didn't know what else to say.

  "We'll deal with them later," Xander held up a hand. "Syd, tell us what happened."

  She took a deep breath and started relating the story of how she and the berserkers escaped the office building. As she talked Xander watched her face. She had changed in the months that he had known her. Besides the obvious, she also seemed more grounded. More confident. He hated that she had to go through any of this, but he was glad that she was handling it so well. She could have so easily shut down, ran, or completely lost it. He didn't know how the hell any of them were holding it together as well as they were.

  Then again, he thought, who else is better suited to dealing with fucked up situations? He looked around the table. ET grew up in a world controlled by a psycho drug dealer. Shay was the product of hippie parents who took in the whole world with a progressive and open mind. Zak had the shit beat out of him most of his childhood by a father that despised who he couldn't help being. Syd had to adapt to survive extraordinary circumstances. And he couldn't even begin to guess what he, himself, had went through before he got the benefit of being raised by Heather and Richard. Who else but a bunch of potheads would be willing to be open-minded about the possibility of alien parasites and government conspiracies?

  By the time Sydney was done telling her story, he was so angry he had to convince himself to let go of his mug before it shattered in his fist. "Who the hell is this Boss guy anyway? Have you heard of him?" he asked Hacker.

  "Maybe," he shrugged. “There are m
ultiple players in the drug game here. He’s probably one of them.”

  "So," Sydney looked up. "Who the hell are you?" she asked Hacker.

  Xander, Shay, and Hacker filled her in. "So, you're saying," she sighed. "That you are in the same boat we are? Your life upside down because of aliens, drug dealers, and secret government agencies?"

  "More or less. I don't know if I have crossed paths with the drug dealers at any point though."

  "Why the hell should I—we—trust you?"

  "Because, if I was lying I could have killed you already."

  Xander scowled at him. "It's true. He could have shot me, or any of us at the country club."

  "I still don't understand why you were even there," Sydney narrowed her eyes at him.

  "I got there two days ago. I figured, if the trucks were registered there then they would come back. I didn't have much else to go on...Besides, it was a good place to sleep."

  "And what happened? Why wouldn't you let me follow the guy?" Xander asked him.

  Hacker sighed, still sounding as tired as he had been yesterday. "I hid in the woods. I didn't want to get caught by anyone during the day or on any security cameras. I found this little shack. It looked like was used to house maintenance equipment. It looked safe and warm enough, so I used a couple of the tarps in there to make a bed and I slept. Luckily, I've always been a light sleeper. And considering I was cold and uncomfortable, I was sleeping even lighter than usual. I woke up to the sounds of...well...yowling is the only way I can describe it. It was like a lion was hurt or something."

  "It was barely sunrise and still pretty dark, otherwise, I think the guy would have seen me. It didn't take long before I figured out the sound was a berserker. And, common sense told me to get the hell out of there. There wasn't anything else around there and I just knew they were heading towards me. I managed to slip out and ducked into some bushes behind the shack. I couldn't actually see the people, but I could tell there were two. One making those awful sounds, and one grunting and sounding like they were struggling."

  "I heard chains rattling from inside. I had seen them the night before, but had assumed they were just to secure equipment or something...Anyway...there was rattling, then I heard the door shut and I could see a shadow moving away, back towards the path. Inside the shack, the berserker had gotten quieter. It was just making these whining sounds. Like a dying animal." Hacker shuddered and he stared at something far away.

  "What happened?" Xander asked him to get him to keep moving.

  He jumped as if he had forgotten they were all there. "About the time I convinced myself to go back to the shed to see what was in there...something...arrived."

  Xander's heart was pounding even though he knew what Hacker had seen. "A bright light?"

  "Yeah," Hacker let out a gust of air and nodded. "My ears popped and everything went silent. Then everything kind of...exploded. The next thing I knew I was waking up in front of the shed. Somehow, I got from the bushes behind the shack to the path in front of it. And the berserker was gone."

  "What do you think happened?" Sydney asked, her voice sounded as haunted as Hacker's.

  "I don't...know."

  "And that's the scariest thing, right?" Sydney almost laughed. "Knowing something happened to you. That you 'lost time.' You were moving, thinking, doing something but all of it is gone."

  "Yeah, that's fucked up," Zak agreed. "But don't forget the rest."

  "What?" Sydney tilted her head.

  "Someone, or something, took that berserker from the shed."

  Chapter Forty-Two

  Sydney took a deep breath. "Yeah, that's not so good."

  "Do you have any idea if the person who brought the berserker there was human?" Xander asked Hacker.

  "I don't know for sure. But he didn't seem like a berserker."

  "Which means," Sydney began. "That he was either human, or like my friends in the basement."

  "Can anyone else do what you can do?" Hacker asked her.

  "The fuck if I know," Sydney shook her head.

  Everyone was silent for a while but, eventually, Zak broke the silence. "So, either someone else can do what you are doing? Or the government is...kidnapping berserkers and leaving them in the woods...for what? Pick up?"

  Xander laid his head on the table and Sydney put a hand on his knee. His voice was muffled from under his arms. "I guess we know what happened to the supposed arrests now."

  "Fuck," Shay moaned.

  "Why would the government be...giving the Dyians back? Or whatever?" Sydney tried to stop from sounding whiny in her confusion.

  "And why would the aliens want them back?" Shay asked, even though she didn't really expect an answer.

  "Wait!" Sydney sat up straighter. "What if there are more than one kind of alien?"

  "Oh, fuck," Zak groaned.

  "Trust me, I know. But I was thinking about this before. In light of everything else, I kind of forgot. But it just seems unlikely that there is only one kind. Plus, whatever took me from the cabin...seemed different. That was so intentional. Nothing we have seen from berserkers has been that...coordinated. And the Dyian I saw—the one Doc had—that one wasn't much more than an animal. At the time, I thought it was just because it had been through who-knows-what, but that seems less likely now. Plus, whatever took me, caused this to happen," she held up her hands with her fingers bent into claws. "If it was Dyians that took me, why would they give me a weapon to fight their own kind?"

  "Jesus Christ," Zak joined Xander in burying his head on the table.

  Sydney felt like she was drowning. She was sure she was right, but she didn't know what the hell it meant. "It makes sense, but it also doesn’t make sense."

  "As much as I hate to say it, that rings true," Hacker sighed.

  "Apparently, whatever took me...wants me to do something? I just don't know what." Sydney wanted to throw up. Her shoulder was throbbing, her head hurt, and she was still exhausted. On top of all that, she was being used as some kind of pawn. "Why me?"

  Of course no one had an answer for her.

  "What do we know?" Shay finally asked.

  "We know I can control the berserkers once I can scratch them. We know a drug kingpin is going to be coming after me and my friends for revenge...and to use me for horrible things."

  Hacker ran a hand through his thinning hair. "We know the government is covering up the alien stuff."

  ET finally joined the conversation. "We know the berserkers seem to be converging on Chicago."

  "That's right," Hacker nodded. "We've been going over reports. I think Robards was right, the Dyians are drawn to their parent. The reports and sightings have increased in the Chicago area and decreased elsewhere."

  "Um," Xander looked at Sydney, almost smiling. "Do you have kids I don't know about?"

  Hacker didn't look like he found any humor in the situation. "Have you spawned any Dyians of your own?"

  Xander almost laughed at the absurd question and Sydney grimaced, uncomfortable and grossed out. "Not that I know of. I don’t even know how it happens."

  "But, I think your theory is right. They seem to be gathering, increasing, in areas where you are or have been"

  Syd was exasperated. "But why me? I thought they 'spawned' to where their parent is? I'm pretty sure that I haven't 'birthed' any new Dyians."

  "I think that is true to some extent. But what if it's more than to a 'parent' they are drawn to a 'home.'"

  "So, Chicago is their home?" Xander asked.

  "It would appear so."

  "Then," Syd said, her voice tight. "Why are they honing in on me? I thought the Dyian in me was…gone."

  Hacker shrugged. "I'm really not sure why they seem to be looking for you. Maybe they are just looking for others like themselves and you are the one they can sense. Smell. However you want to think of it. Maybe the Dyian in you is still around. Or part of it."

  "But, I think Moreno was responsible for the spawning of the ones that are out there n
ow. Why aren't they looking for their real 'mom?'" Sydney wondered, choosing to not think about the Dyian still being in her brain.

  "Moreno might have had a mature Dyian. He might not have. You didn't see it, right?" He continued without waiting for an answer. "Either way, I don't think the ones on the loose can find their 'mom.' I think they can find you."

  "Because I’m out in the open?"

  "Maybe."

  "Maybe?" Xander asked.

  "It could just be you," Hacker directed the answer to Sydney.

  “Again, why me?” Sydney asked.

  “You seem to be different. You were amongst the first hosts here in the States, yet you are not only alive, you are functioning. Very well it would seem.”

  She leaned back in her chair and sat her empty cup on the table. “Yeah.”

  “Tell me,” Hacker leaned forward. “Why do you think that is?”

  “That I'm not a berserker? I really have no idea.”

  “What happened when you were gone?”

  “Well,” Sydney turned back to Hacker. “I honestly don’t know what happened when I was gone. I have to be honest and call it what it was. I was abducted. By aliens.” Sydney’s stomach swirled. She still had a hard time coming to terms with saying “aliens.” “I still can’t believe I can say something like that and not completely doubt my sanity.”

  “Tell me about,” Hacker smiled at her.

  “I just know that when I was…taken…I left really sick. I had headaches, nosebleeds, hallucinations, just to start with. Plus, I hurt myself in the cabin. My knee was hurt. And, I could barely hear. But, when I came out, something took me. When I woke up by the lake again everything was healed. I was pretty much fine.”

  “No nosebleeds or headaches or hallucinations since?”

  “Nope.” Sydney thought of the orbs that seemed to flutter around whenever something strange happened. She hesitated before telling the whole group. She didn’t know Hacker and even if the others trusted him, she was skeptical. She promised herself she would tell Xander and Shay later—in private.

  "How did you figure out how to control the berserkers?" Hacker asked.