Hazel stopped for just a moment, a headache, only slight but noticeable. Her breathing felt slowed as though she couldn’t take in enough air and there was a small pressure on her chest. She held her mouth fighting the gag reflex until a stream of vomit spilled from her lips.
"You all right?"
"I told you I was better suited for a desk job." She said wiping her mouth. "What do you know about those men in the white helicopter? Why are they after you?"
"I don't know." Varick wanted to avoid talking about this altogether.
"Those other people, the ones in the SUVs were after me. It's obvious they aren’t working together, they tried to kill each other."
"Let's keep moving."
They had checked every classroom door and window without coming up with any luck. The only option seemed to be to travel back to the gym and out the broiler but there was the high chance of facing Riddick once more, not to mention the agents. The bing of the elevator drew their attention, guns out and ready they waited, hearing the sound of the motor moving the machine along until it stopped and another bing signaled and the doors opened, empty.
"Think we should?" Varick looked to Hazel.
"The doors to the stairs are locked, it may be our only way down."
They walk on board, guns aimed. Varick pushed the first floor and a loud thud crashed on top sending them spiraling down They screamed gripping the handles in a free fall. Riddick burst through the ceiling reaching inside and the elevator stopped dropping them all. He couldn’t get his large arm through so he pounded and pounded twisting the metal until he could get a better grip.
"Get away!!" Hazel panicked.
The door opened and Hazel made a run for it losing her footing and slipping through the wide gap. The elevator was between floors and the doors to exit onto the next floor were shut.
Varick acted fast diving for her hand holding her steady. "Don’t let go!"
"Pull me up!"
Riddick grabbed the back of Varick’s shirt lifting him high, stunning him. With the slip of a hand Hazel was falling down the shaft into darkness.
Varick removed his knife stabbing at his hands until he hit the floor and the arm retreated Varick yelled down the shaft. He heard Hazel struggling. She was alive. But he couldn’t enjoy it. The monster burst through trapping him inside. Varick collected himself, the creature was big and mean, and ready to kill, yet only took an interest in him. The long dreads were more of a dead giveaway....'Riddick' Varick thought, putting the small pieces together. The chase into Greek town, the explosion, the sickness, the blood he coughed up; Riddick was standing in front of him, still remembering his hatred of him, still wanting him to pay for what he had done. Riddick smashed his fist into the walls as Varick ducked and dodged the killing blows within the cramped quarters.
The elevator door opened but there was no light. It was her only chance at escape from the shaft. She swung over and over until she gained enough ground to leap across just in time to avoid the barreling elevator with Varick and Riddick battling inside.
Tired and sweating she clutched her chest feeling that pressure, something was off, this was not from the usual exertions. She wished she had a light although her eyesight in the dark was keen.
'This must be a lab or something.' She thought as she passed the long tables lined together within the room. It sort of reminded her of her lab class in high school. She heard the shuffling of feet and she remained still. Is it the afflicted? Or did something else lurk in the dark? The stench engulfed her senses. The lining of black stringy mold fungus adorned the walls in its own spider like pattern. She felt trapped yet remained low, there was a door on the other end, if she could reach it alerting no one she would be thankful. She walked steady until she heard a dreadful screeching cry. It could only be one thing. The long-limbed women.
Hazel couldn’t tell where it was, but she didn’t want to know, she had to get out of there. She steadied her footing on the slippery ground, the black fungus coated the corners of the walls dripping from the ceiling in strings. The door refused to budge even as she pushed and pulled at the knob. There was another door across the room on the other side, success!
She ran as fast and silent as she could down the hall and once again she heard it calling. She stopped in her tracks when the jaggers crowded the other hall. Then she saw her. Long limbed and cold. She seemed to appear and reappear into a cloud of blackness getting closer and closer. She panicked slipping and falling. Her head smashing into the floor, she saw the woman approach in a cloud of black, closer and closer, the hall, the door, darkness.
Fresh air, Varick was bleeding but okay, he thought his wound was worst than it was but it was okay. A pick-up truck’s door sat ajar. Varick ran over, no keys, damn! He checked around the glove compartment. "Bingo!"
He started the car driving it to the front and exiting it. He had no idea where Hazel was but he would not leave her… He thought about it for a moment and laughed to himself. This was the perfect opportunity to split just like he always tried to do since they met, but he couldn’t bring himself to do it. He loaded his weapons and ran toward the open door when a crash through the upper window halted him and he ran to check out the commotion. Hazel picked herself off the ground, and he aided her towards the truck. The loud screech pierced the remaining windows.
"They were in there too?" He helped her into the passenger seat and picked up dust as he peeled away.
Varick drove fast hoping to get as far away as they could from SUVs, Sedans, helicopters, men in black, and mutated creatures. He looked through the rearview mirror and saw his reflection for a moment and he remembered why the sunglasses hid his eyes and he realized what those people wanted. To take him to some lab, the same as the others wanted to do to her. "The safe house isn't far."
Varick wondered if going to his family was even a good idea. "Where the hell would we go?" he muttered to himself. He stopped the car.
"What's wrong?" Hazel stared at him and he her, her eyes were getting redder, nearly catching up to his own. And like his own, the pupils were forming a cat like slit.
He removed the sunglasses. "You were right, I'm infected. I think I'm turning into something and maybe those people are after me because of it just like those other guys are coming after you."
"All the more reason to get our family and leave."
"Or not see them at all. What if they come after me while I have them with me? What if they get hurt because of me? Or worse, what if I turn into something and just kill them? I wouldn't be able to live with myself."
"You're right. But, don't you think you should at least visit them? You said you were close, right? So, go and check up on them, see if they're okay, then we leave. Maybe find out what this is and how to reverse it if possible."
"Yeah, I'll just see if they're okay, then we leave."
The drive was long yet they made it and yet a foreboding feeling crept up his spine. The gates were left wide open to the scrap yard lot, no guards stood at the tower and the place seemed eerily silent. Varick inched in slowly. The bodies strewn about and blood-soaked mud caked the corpses. The only sign of movement besides their truck were the flags representing their cause blowing in the wind.
Varick opened the door and ran out, running toward the house ahead. Blood coated the walls and the furniture. His mother lay dead amidst the others. Everything he had fought for, was gone. He dropped to his knees sobbing.
Hazel stood in silence unable to think of the right thing to say. She placed a hand on his shoulder only to be rebuffed.
"Get your hands off me!" He sank low clutching her leg in a sobbing fit.
Hazel stood unmoving eyes trailing over the carnage. A trail of blood lead to an adjacent room. She walked away leaving Varick to mourn his loss, and she pushed open the door carefully. The children lay strewn in a heap in what looked like a play room.
"I’ve fucked up my life, I’ve really fucked up my life." He sobbed.
He soon stood, wiping his face.
&
nbsp; "Varick..."
Varick rushed by her into the room stopping at the doorway, the stench of decay assaulted him but he turned over every small body hoping to find his brother. "He's not here." He gasped filled with a glimmer of hope.
"What's this?" Hazel picked up a small burner phone which sat by a note which read 'For Varick'.
"I don't know and don't care." Varick mumbled. "I need to find my brother, maybe he ran off."
The phone rang causing both of them to jump at the unexpected sound. Hazel passed it to Varick who didn't reach for it.
"Should I answer?" Hazel asked unsure. "The phone was next to your mother, and the note says it's for you."
Varick walked out the door to search the compound while Hazel opened the phone and pressed it against her ear.
"Varick... son. I know you don't know me but I'm your father." The man's voice as rich, deep, and cultured. "Someone wants you dead. I've sent my people to protect you and pick you up but I've been told you're quite hard to catch. Meet my people at the airport. I have a plane waiting to take you safely away from here." After a beat. "Your... brother is already here with me, so no need to worry, son."
Hazel remained silent, the line lingered for a while until she finally spoke. "I'll tell him."
The line went dead and Hazel went outside to find Varick searching every abandoned car, truck, van, and cabin on the site, his mind playing over the possible worse cases.
"Your brother is okay." Hazel said coming closer.
"You found him?"
She held out the phone. "Your father just called, he said someone is trying to kill you but he's protecting you, and that he has your brother with him." She sighed. "He says he wants to take you someplace safe."
"That's impossible. I never met my father, if anything this is a fucking trick, just like they tried to get you with your friend." he began to pace. "No, they killed my mother and took my brother or killed him."
"Honestly this entire thing makes no sense at all. I keep thinking there's something missing." Hazel tried to think of any possible answers but kept drawing a blank. Her head felt cloudy like she was in a functioning malaise. She plopped the small phone into his hands.
He dialed back the number. It rang over and over again until the man with the cultured voice answered. "Who the fuck are you?" Varick said full of venom.
"Your father." He replied bluntly. "It seems your lady friend kept her word."
"I want to speak to my brother."
"Certainly."
The line was silent for a moment.
"Varick!" the kid exclaimed with a smile in his voice.
"Stevie! Where are you?"
"Um...I don't know, it looks nice though."
"Stevie, I'm coming to get you, okay."
"Okay!"
"That's touching." The man took the phone again.
"If you hurt him--"
"There is no need to dish out idle threats. I would never harm this child. I have an obligation to his true parents to deliver him unspoiled."
"What the fuck are you talking about? What real parents?"
" That woman wasn't your mother and deep inside, I think you knew that."
Varick removed the phone from his ear and breathed in deep. His mind traveling back to the day Stevie was brought home. He was only eleven at the time but he remembered the shock and surprise. He didn't even know she was pregnant. "You killed her?" his voice grew weak.
"Every action comes with its consequences, son. She may not have had a total understanding of those consequences but she took a chance, anyway."
"What if I don't want to go, what if I don't want to see you? If Stevie isn't my brother, and he has his own parents to go home to then there's no need for me to see him."
"Even now I can hear the cracks in your voice you try to conceal. The child still thinks of you as his brother, the least you can do is say your goodbyes. Also, I have enemies, and they are now yours, I also know what has happened to you. You can refuse to come to me if you like, let this boy worry about you, let my enemies find you one day and kill you, leaving you alone and ignorant. But I don't think that's what you want. I refuse to say more over this phone, so destroy it and meet my people, they'll be waiting."
The line went dead and Varick tossed the phone against the nearby car, the plastic shattered to pieces.
"What are you gonna do?"
"I don't think I have a choice. He knows what happened... fuck!" he yelled on the brink of losing it. "If I was some kidnapped kid, and he found me after all this time, I don't know."
"You think he's your father?"
"I don't know. Maybe."
"If this is a trap?"
"I have no other choice but to walk into it. If he's lying, then at least I would know. Then I'll do whatever it takes to save Stevie."
"But if he's your father, and he wants to help you, then maybe you can find out what's happening to us, get some help." She thought about it. "I keep thinking of those men, the people hunting us. They were obviously two different groups."
"We know that already, they tried to kill each other."
"Yes. But only one tried to kill you. The same people who tried to use lethal force on you tried to shoot me with a taser. They tried to kill you but spare me. The other group never fired on us once and only fired at the other group after they shot at you."
"So, you're saying there's some sort of merit to this guy's story?"
"Yes. At least they don't want you dead. Yet someone else does. You're in a lot of trouble."
"You're in trouble too." he went back into the house with Hazel following behind.
"I know. But I have L---"
"Stop." Varick turned on her. "You don't have this Luc guy. You have no idea where he is, or if he's even alive, and how do you know he didn't sell your ass out back at his place?" he lifted his mother and walked by her carrying her outside. "You're all alone the same as me." He grabbed a nearby shovel and began to dig.
Hazel walked away leaving Varick alone.
He finally finished digging and sat the woman inside the grave. He shoveled the dirt on her until the grave was complete. "There. I don't give enough fucks about the others to bury, especially that fat fuck in there." he said thinking of the heavy-set Chuck.
"Didn’t like him?" Hazel had joined him once more, it was getting dark and there was no way she was going to stay inside that house which festered with the stink of corpses for too long.
"He was such a brown noser. Always kissing up to Eurich. I really wouldn’t be surprised if he helped set me up." He sighed. "Will you help me?" he asked, his tone softer than before. He wanted to apologize for his harsh words, he knew she had to have been angry because of it though she was good at hiding it. "I don't know what to say, I'm not religious."
"Me neither."
"Someone should say something." Varick looked to her. "Did she kill my mom and kidnap me?"
"Do you think she wasn't your mother?"
"I honestly don't know. There were certain instances where I had my doubts. I don't look like her...I remember when I got hurt and needed blood, she wasn't a match but then again that can happen, but I remember the doc wanting to run additional tests on me and she freaked out. Never saw her act like that before. And Stevie...I don't remember her being pregnant when she brought Stevie home."
"Wow."
"If I didn't already have these doubts, I would have told him to go fuck himself, but, I've always had them."
"Then you have to go to find out." Hazel held out her hands and looked up at the darkening sky. "Dear mother Earth, we give onto you this dead body, to feed and nourish the lands, so that you can provide lots of grass and trees and food for insects and animals because their spirits are no longer in them…. Amen."
Varick looked at her not believing that anyone could make him smile now. Yet he was.
Chapter Sixteen
Asunder
Varick moved through the house, careful not to wake the sleeping girl nearby, gat
hered what little supplies they could, stuffing food and ammo and weapons into his brother’s back pack filling the back seat of the large white van. He siphoned the gas from the other vehicles to the gas cans.
When he reentered the small trailer parked on the property the gnashing sound drew his attention to the sleeping girl on the small cot. He watched her for a long moment. 'I wonder what she’s dreaming about?' He patted her on the shoulder, reluctant to disturb her. He gave up once she remained in her slumber and went outside to open the door of the van when a figure approached fast and booming from behind and Varick barely escaped the large rusty knife that cut his face.
The glint of the weapon swung down in rapid secession and Varick dodged every single would be blow. He couldn’t see the face of his attacker but that was the least of his concern. Varick spun the attacker around before flipping and tossing him or her against the wall. But the attacker recovered fast, a kick to the groin and Varick was down with the attacker on him and the thirsty blade coming down on him. He blocked, keeping the weapon at bay.
"Hazel!" Varick called to her.
"Turn off the TV." She groaned in her sleep.
The knife inched closer to his throat, and he hollered. Gathering the strength to push it up. He took a chance and slammed his fist into his attacker’s gut and tossing him away. They both recovered fast, and both turned for a swinging kick at the same time yet Varick reached his mark faster smacking the other across the room, his hood and cloak, caught in Varick’s foot, which he allowed to fall to the floor.
"Eurich!" He shouted shocked and angry.
"You piece of shit!" The other raged. "You killed them!"
"My mother and brother were here, why would I do that!?"
"Cause you're a nigger loving piece of shit!"
Varick swung on the other connecting a blow to his jaw sending him wheeling back from the blow. The two struggled each trying to gain the advantage over the other.
"Kick his ass!" Stacey cheered her new lover on but her joy was short lived when Varick slammed the other to the ground and twisted his head until it snapped. Stacey slunk back into the car, climbing into the driver's seat, frantic and afraid. She steered the car wildly and away.
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