"I'm going to head over to where the rippers were, to make sure it's clear," I said.
"Why don't the rest of you take the buildings together, just to be safe. Colleen goes with you and I'll go with Jo."
Dark nodded. Having an even keener sense of smell than Cormac, he knew what was going on. Whatever it was, it was right where Cormac and I were heading.
It didn't take long after we left for the smell to hit me. I wondered how Cormac could breathe, with his stronger senses. I pulled my shirt up over my nose and mouth but it did little to help.
It didn't matter what I saw, I needed to keep it together. I didn't have the luxury of being able to fall apart. No one did, not anymore. In this world, if you fell apart you got ripped apart, eaten for breakfast. These times were only for the strong. Darwin would've had a ball if he were alive.
We walked into the area where I knew the rippers had gathered. They were gone but the remnants of their recent, and not so recent, meals were scattered throughout the courtyard.
Please don't let them be human parts, please. I took a step forward into the carnage and the first thing I noticed in the blood and gore was a baby's hand. The wrist was still there, but not much more.
All thoughts of being tough and a bad ass died right there. Tears streamed down my face as I dry heaved, grateful that nerves had kept me from eating too much today.
I felt Cormac's hand on my back and I stood up quickly, embarrassed.
"It's okay," he said as I stepped away. "It's a natural reaction."
"I don't see you throwing up." I wiped a sleeve across my face, not exactly an elegant gesture, but neither was the scene.
"No. But I've seen a lot of battlefields. I've got too many layers of scar tissue, built up over the years." He wasn't gloating; it was a matter of fact statement. "Trust me, you'll get there. Few hundred years and you won't be fazed either."
"Few hundred? Is that the current pace of desensitization?" I asked, making a joke because this was a laugh or cry moment.
"In good times, it takes a little longer, but peace never lasts long anywhere. When a country crumples, it's never a pretty situation," he said and walked around the courtyard, looking from body part to body part.
I stood, and tried to move around the area that was the size of a soccer field without stepping in blood. It was impossible, so I settled for not stepping on flesh or shredded clothes.
"How many do you think were killed here?"
"At a glance, it's impossible to say accurately, but at least a hundred."
I scanned the area, looking for something I'd recognize of Sabrina's, but dreaded finding it. I opened my mouth to say we needed to get Dark, but then I stopped. Dark, in wolf form, would be able to smell if a part of Sabrina was here, and I decided I'd rather not know. If she were dead, maybe it was better to be uncertain than find a piece of her mutilated flesh.
"So many limbs," Cormac said, in a cold scientific manner, while I was barely holding it together.
I took a deep breath before I told him my thought. "They like feeding on the torso and the brain, and they were fed plenty enough that they could be choosey." I gagged on the stench again.
"Some of these are fresh," Cormac said and I saw him actually touch a hand, sticking up from a pile they had made.
"What are you doing?" I asked. Sometimes the way Cormac could shut down his feelings scared me and this was a perfect example.
He looked over from his squatting position near the pile. "I'm trying to get a read on how long ago they left."
"Jo?" It was Colleen's voice in the distance.
"I'll be there in a second, Colleen. Wait there!" I frantically started to make my way toward her voice.
"Jo, what are you doing?" Cormac asked.
"I don't want her to see this. She's so young and she's seen so much. I can't let her see this too. I just can't."
I didn't know why but Cormac had a sad look in his eyes as I rushed as quickly as I could across the field. I had to shield Colleen from this.
But it was too late. There she was at one of the openings to the courtyard. I expected crying and screaming but her eyes just sort of glazed over.
"Are you okay?" I asked as I neared her.
"Yeah. Did you find her?" Colleen asked as I watched her start to move through the mutilated body parts and blood. "If you didn't, Dark can, I'm sure."
I walked closer to her and put a hand on her arm. "You don't have to act tough."
"I'm not. I've seen scenes like this before." She pulled away from me and went back to looking through the courtyard. "Not as many, maybe, but when it's your family it packs more of a punch. Most of the humans in the casino have seen stuff like this. What do you think was happening while you all were making your way back from New York?
"No one even saw it coming. There was no chance to hide or even fight. The humans aren't just pissed off about what happened to the world, they're pissed off at watching their loved ones get ripped apart in front of them."
It took a minute to find words again and even when I did, I could only think of one. "Sorry," I said.
She turned back to me and now I could see the unshed tears she was holding back. She was tough, but not as tough as she wanted everyone to think.
"I know. I also know enough to realize it was the only option. Burrom told me the whole story. They'll get over it. They just need time." She turned back and started walking through again.
"What did you find inside the buildings?" Cormac asked.
"Nothing much, just a couple of used food cans and garbage. There was a room that looked like it might have been a holding cell, but we couldn't tell for sure," Colleen said.
"There was something strange about one of the rooms," Dark added as he walked into the courtyard.
"What?" I asked.
"Hard to describe. You should go look," Dark said. "I picked up Sabrina's scent in there."
"Dark, can you switch?" Cormac asked. What he didn't say was check and see if you catch her scent out here with the rest of the dead, but he didn't have to. We all knew what Cormac wanted.
"Sure," he said as he started to unbutton his shirt.
Dark explained where the strange room was and I was happy to leave the blood and gore behind. I didn't care what we found, it would be better than staying in the courtyard another second.
We headed toward the inner building that was dead center of the development. The door was wide open when we got there and the lock didn't look broken. When they had taken over this place, it must have been occupied and I wondered if some of the body parts lying in the courtyard now were among its original inhabitants.
We climbed to the second floor and headed down the hallway. There were only two doors and we took the one on the right, as Dark instructed.
It was already cracked a couple of inches and I nudged it open the rest of the way with the toe of my boot. It was a decent sized room, maybe twenty by twenty, with a tiled floor but its walls and ceiling were blotchy with black marks everywhere. It looked like it had been used as an office with a desk in the center and a couch off to the side.
"What is this? It looks like burn marks but why would they be shiny?" I said, as I got closer to one spot.
"Don't touch anything."
"Wasn't planning on it."
"Dark was right. Sabrina was in here. I can smell her scent strongly," Cormac said, circling around the room.
"Cormac? Jo?" Crash's voice sounded from the hallway and then he was at the door. He paused for just a moment to take in the scene and then continued. "Dark's picked up their trail."
When Crash turned and left, neither of us hesitated to follow. This might be our only chance of getting Sabrina back. If we let the trail grow cold again, we might never find her.
"I'll send two guys to get the Hummers and they can catch up with us after they get them," Crash said. "We're going to need the supplies they carry if this takes a while."
"Did they go on foot?" I asked as we ran down the st
airs behind him, heading out to where the rest of the group was.
"Dark thinks so," Crash replied.
"Tell your guys not to give away our location when they catch up with us," Cormac said.
"I'll be in communication with them the whole time. They'll keep their distance. They're trained. These men were the elite of the military before this, give them a little respect."
"I give respect when it's earned. Not before."
Crash ignored Cormac and walked toward the group.
"Must you always prove that you've got the biggest dick in the room?" I asked Cormac under my breath as we walked after him.
"I wonder what made you choose that particular wording?" he asked in mock wonder.
Crash's three snipers were preparing to leave the group as we approached and Rogo stepped over.
"I need a word with you," he said to Cormac. I watched Cormac go off to the side with Rogo and nod his head at something he said. He headed back quickly leaving Rogo standing in the same spot.
"What's going on?" I asked Cormac but my eyes still on Rogo who was pulling off his shirt. I turned back to Cormac when Rogo started undoing his pants.
"He's leaving."
"To where?"
"Back to the casino."
A loud roar filled the air and I saw Rogo in his wolf form. The guy was an ass but I couldn't deny his wolf form was superb. Seeing him like this made it clear why he was alpha. His wolf eyes looked directly at me and his lips curled back over massive fangs.
Then Cormac looked at him and took a single step in his direction. I couldn't see Cormac's face with his back to me, but I saw Rogo bow his head quickly, losing his aggressive stance and taking off in the direction of the casino.
Cormac turned back to me. "It's better that he's going," he said. "If this trail leads to the senator, I'm not sure he wouldn't end up fighting against us. I still want him alive right now."
I stored that information away for later. If Rogo did end up knowing something about my mother, I had resigned myself to killing him. Now I knew I wasn't going to get too much grief from Cormac if it happened.
The senator was a much larger problem. I was about to issue another word of warning to the group but then I really looked at them, maybe seeing them for the first time. Dark was in wolf form and didn't look like he was planning on shifting back, his clothes packed away. Colleen had her hands out in front of her, streaks of electricity bouncing back and forth between her fingers.
Crash looked almost as stone faced as Cormac did. I knew he'd do anything he had to do to get his kid back, including running a knife through me, if needed.
The two new additions also looked like they could hold their own. Evan was flexing his hands out, sharp claws extending and retracting back into his fingers as he did so. Sharon, who was stunning to the point it was hard not to look at her with her caramel colored skin and waist length black hair, was impossible to keep track of. Colleen had said she was like a ninja and that was probably an understatement. Sometimes you saw her and then she just disappeared. You'd look around and find her right back in the same place as before. It was slightly unsettling. Katie was hoping around, unfazed by the disaster. I swear the girl had to have a stash of antidepressants, somewhere. There was no point in warning her.
These people didn't need warnings, they had seen as much as me, maybe more. Who was I to lecture anyone on the risks?
Chapter Twenty-Five
We followed their trail five miles north. The early dawn light was streaked across the sky when it became obvious that they had headed in a straight line to route fifteen. We gave up following on foot and piled into the Hummers that caught up to us quickly. Cormac, Evan and Dark, the three who could see the best, kept a vigilant eye on the road ahead, hoping to spot them before they saw us.
I never thought I'd be able to sleep, crammed in the back of a truck surrounded by people who should be my enemy, but I leaned against the door and was out.
When I awoke, my head and upper body were leaning against Cormac. The sun hung right above us and we were still on the road.
"Where are we?" I asked as I straightened up and looked out the side window. When I turned forward, my breath caught in my throat. It was the tornado wall. It couldn't have been anything else. It looked like a wall of sand from where we were, reaching miles and miles high.
"We're about ten miles outside the border of the senator's territory," Cormac said by my side.
"It could be worse," I said in a voice loud enough that Crash's men could hear over the sound of the car. Holy shit, we're completely fucked, was a more accurate description of my inner monologue.
"They must have crossed into the senator's territory by now," Crash said.
I looked at Cormac, silently asking if we believed him, and he nodded in response.
Both trucks pulled over before we got much further, everyone knowing instinctively it was time to regroup. I stepped out of the truck, taking a swig of water and not the whiskey I craved. I'd need all my wits about me for this, and contrary to popular belief, I didn't have to drink.
Crash nodded his head over to the side and I followed him as he ducked behind the back of one of the trucks and out of sight. I stepped around the truck, knowing in my gut what was coming.
"I've got to leave."
"I figured." I let out a long breath.
"That cluster of buildings up there is a border town. Find a guy called Lizard Man. He can get you across."
"What are we going to find on the other side?"
"It's not much different to here, but the senator has spies everywhere." He leaned over and peeked around the truck. "I can't have the rest of the guys see me helping you again. Trust me, it's better for us to split now. Once we cross over, if you want any element of surprise then you don't want these guys with you. I think some of them might already be feeding information back to the senator."
A noise caught both of our attention and he started walking in the opposite direction. "Good luck," he mouthed to me, right before he moved out of sight.
I walked around the opposite corner of the truck and saw Cormac waiting there, not looking too happy.
"It was business."
"I know, I was listening."
"Do you not want to go? But then…" I didn't need to finish what I was thinking. Trap or not, we might not be able to find them if we didn't continue. "I think we have to."
"I agree."
We walked back over to where the group was forming. The few people that had moved out of sight for a moment, to handle needs, were filing back. Crash was already explaining to the group that he and his men were parting ways with us at the entrance of the border town.
They drove us the last short distance and parted ways with barely a goodbye. We walked into the small town that was as much rubble as anything else and I was amazed at the tenacity of the human spirit. People walked here and there, and even in the midst of so much destruction, it still felt like a community.
They passed by us as we walked into their city, and except for a few skeptical, worried glances, they left us alone. When I heard the click clack of horse hooves approaching, I knew they were heading for us. This is why nobody bothered us. They had alerted some sort of vigilante police force that was keeping the peace.
A man and a woman, both on dark brown horses, turned the corner and came into view. They both cradled rifles in their arms but they weren't pointed at us, not yet anyway.
"What can we do for you folks?" the woman asked.
They weren't in uniform but they had yellow stars made of fabric sewn to their shirts. I relaxed after hearing her question and seeing their still at ease postures. These people weren't looking for trouble. They were trying to keep it out.
"We're looking for the Lizard Man," I said.
The couple didn't reply right away as they spoke to each other.
"Why?" the woman asked.
"Safe passage, that's all. We mean him no harm."
I wasn't sure why
this seemed funny to the two of them but they laughed for a couple of seconds and then gave us directions to where we could find him. They left with a quick warning not to disturb the peace.
Walking through the town streets was strange. The deeper we got in, the more activity there was. There even appeared to be a school, or maybe a daycare. A couple of adults watched about ten kids playing in a field with an intact swing set.
Further down at the next intersection, a few make shift tables were set up with vendors and people bartering for food. I pulled an energy bar from my pack as my stomach started growling at the smells. One table was laden down with vegetables and the other with breads. How were they doing so well here? There were no farms around, so I wondered where their food source was coming from. We didn't have fresh vegetables and we had more resources than it looked like they had. We all looked at each other in bafflement.
Every so often, a changed would walk by and I'd have to stop myself from gawking. It would be easier if they had all turned into something similar, but there didn't seem to be anything uniform about the mutations.
The one approaching us was covered in what looked like alligator skin and had yellow eyes; another flew overhead with fluffy white down wings, looking like a cherub. It was going to take me a long time to adjust to this.
"That's it," I said. It was a small yellow ranch house on the outskirts of the main town. It was surprisingly intact, compared to the rest of the buildings. It made me wonder if Lizard Man was a VIP of the town, or just among the lucky who had always resided here and whose house managed to fare better.
We kept Dark to the back of the group, if not completely out of sight as he was still in werewolf form. Then it was left to Cormac and I to bicker over who knocked.
"No one is going to answer the door for you," I said to him.
"Why wouldn't they?"
"Because you've had your scary face plastered on for the last two days."
A couple grunts in agreement came from our group.
"Now, will you back off and let me do it?" I asked.
"You should. If he's one of the changed, he'll like her more," Colleen offered.
Shattered (Alchemy Series Book #3) Page 17