by Casey Herzog
“You know what he wants,” Dante said quietly. Johanna shook her head and hugged him as they crossed into a hallway and quickly looked for the stairs down. She wasn’t going to allow anyone to take her wonderboy from her.
The healer listened uneasily as Callum pulled them into a large room away from the main passages and began to talk. He wanted them to consider accepting any deal — not because he would hand ‘the boy’ over, but because it would be a perfect moment for him to assassinate Russell. Dante didn’t know much about the enemy, but it was clear that the man they were facing wasn’t stupid. The others nodded and agreed, and the healer felt nervous they were underestimating their foe. Am I the only one who can see how this could go wrong?
“We’ll take the fire stairs once we’ve found a way to establish a meet — no more risks. I’ll find a vantage point to snipe from. One shot from the railgun is all I need, and then all hell will break loose, but we’ll be prepared. Dante will stay hidden; no need for putting any of you in unnecessary danger. We can do this.”
The group voiced agreement, but Dante shook his head and looked away. This Russell guy was no fool. He had lost his armory, his prisoners, his closest guards and even his dignity. Callum was an incredible soldier, but he was not a good judge of people. The enemy was just flushing them out in an act of desperation before they could tear apart what was left of his building.
“What’s wrong, son?” Callum asked as he approached and pulled Dante away from the rest.
“It’s a ploy, sir. You know this, surely? When we go out there, that monster is going to start killing us off. We’re not leaving alive at all. It’s a trap.”
The soldier sighed.
“How do I say this…Look. I’m aware of what this is. He needs us to stop since we’re moving too fast for his troops. He can’t even catch a whiff of us. But what we’re accomplishing is going to end eventually. We’ll come across a locked door, a dead end…anything that means we get cornered. And if that happens we all die either way. We need to find an advantage — this is it.”
The man walked away and Dante was left with a feeling of doom; fear of the inevitable began to gather within him. Nothing is going to end like they believe it is, and it’s going to cost us our lives.
Suddenly, he froze. There was another way. It wasn’t easy, but he could be the one to change the outcome of whatever was coming next. He didn’t even know if he could pull it off, but it was all he had.
A plan began to form in his head.
The gift that had been given to him was precious; but he had also been given a curse. It was something he had never wanted to use again, but on the night he’d met Callum he’d learned of its existence within his body. I can heal, but I can just as easily destroy.
With a long sigh, he made the decision that needed to be made.
When the group encounters the enemy, I’m going to summon my ability to kill Russell and his people before anything can go wrong. I’m going to end this and we’re going to escape…
…or I’ll get this wrong and die trying. Either way, as long as I draw breath the enemy is not succeeding.
I’ll make sure of it.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
…Or Die Trying
Callum began to walk towards the railing, and Dante swallowed hard. There were almost twenty other prisoners looking on, and everybody was nervous. It was happening.
Callum fired into the air once and waited for the gunshot’s echoes to fade.
“I’m ready to talk!” he yelled. His voice carried up and down the building, and several heads popped up on other floors. They refrained from pointing guns, clearly ordered by their leader not to do anything stupid until the meeting took place. Callum looked into each of their eyes through the hooded mask he’d decided to wear to keep his face concealed. They were showing him respect. They’ve been feeling invincible for way too long, I think. They needed to be knocked down a peg or two.
The man he’d been waiting for finally appeared. To his credit, he’d almost reached the group’s floor — he was only one storey below.
“Ah, of course. It had to be you, didn’t it?” He shook his head and laughed pleasantly, as if they were talking about a game of chess he’d just lost. “You’re good, I’ll give you that. You could have been one of us — no — you still could. Why not? I mean…You’re still alive and you have some sort of leverage, don’t you?”
Callum just stared.
“Let’s just finish what we started — what do you want in exchange for me to stop?”
Russell’s eye narrowed.
“How direct of you; negotiation is clearly not your forte.” He made a face. “I want the boy. You’ll obviously never believe me if I say you can leave after the exchange is done, so you can set the conditions. I can even let you hand him over outside the tower. You could keep your weapons as well; you’ll need them. It’s a good trade, I think. Your lives in exchange for a child. A child I’d value; a child I’d raise.”
Callum’s mouth tightened behind his mask.
“We’ll do the exchange on ground floor, which you’ll first empty of your thugs. Reactivate the elevator and let us arrive first. We’ll hand him over at the main door — we’ll keep our weapons and take the truck you used to transport my people…with fuel of course. Then, we’ll never see each other again, or one of us will die.”
Russell bowed mockingly, and some of his men laughed.
“Your wish is my command…and trust me, you’ll definitely be dead if I see you again, buddy.” The thug licked his lips and fought the urge to fire at the intruder from his position. Patience, Russ.
“You have ten minutes to activate the elevator and empty the ground floor. That’s all.” Callum turned from the rail and walked back to his friends. Frank was already waiting impatiently for him to arrive, but he couldn’t run. There were others still watching him.
Finally, he managed to make it to an empty room and ran inside.
It was time for the plan to take place.
The elevator doors opened and the capsule awaited them. Johanna checked inside and outside for any signs of tampering and, then, only very reluctantly waved the rest in. Callum was the first to enter, his masked face surveying the floors above and below them. There were hordes of enemies, a number that they never could have hoped to defeat without a plan.
“This is the best way,” Johanna said to Dante. “Maybe the only way.”
They didn’t all fit inside the elevator, so the lad stayed behind with the rest as his two favorite adults descended to the lobby. He could only begin to guess the level of hostility they’d face from the gang members once they descended — there could be no love shown towards a group of people who had killed their colleagues in such a long and protracted attack on their base.
Not being in that first group of soldiers to descend in the elevator was good for Dante because it helped him think about how exactly he was going to proceed. He needed to be smart and unpredictable — not even his allies could know what he was about to do until it was too late. They didn’t trust him, despite everything. He was just a clueless little boy to them.
Let’s change that perception.
It had been strange that Callum had gone down with the rest, but Dante trusted him to know what to do. There was a feeling of inevitability with his people. They either pulled off something incredible, or they all died in a final blaze of glory. It wasn’t a fifty-fifty chance, more of a twenty-eighty.
Once the elevator reached the bottom and quickly began to rise again, he felt a hollow pit in his stomach. It was certainly happening now. Nothing could save him from what was coming. What if they’re actually trying to leave me behind and I’m the only one who’s not aware? He tried to shake the feeling off, but it was too strong.
“Let’s go,” Gabriel said, a member of the community and the fitness coach back home. He pushed Dante forward softly, and the healer fought to calm himself down. It’s going to end well.
…It’s goin
g to end well…It’s…surely going to end…well?
The man with the bionic eye remained on the rail, watching the elevator lower the second group down to the ground floor. He and his soldiers were ecstatic. Their foes were brave, but they were too desperate to realize the stupidity of their decision. They’d be allowed to get out, grab a truck and leave, sure…but it wasn’t like they’d get very far. In fact, he would have them killed by missile fire within minutes.
Still, it wasn’t like he was letting them out of the building anyway.
He looked around at his soldiers and flashed a grin. Some of them smiled back, others seemed to become more agitated. They had their orders. Nobody left the place alive once the boy was secure. The leader could live, sure. Russell would have fun with him for a week or two, make him suffer. The boy could heal him and keep him alive so that the pain would feel never-ending. It was a fitting end for a formidable warrior. Nothing humiliating, but plenty of pain.
Russell counted down with his fingers as the elevator reached the bottom and began to rise back up to his floor. He was already walking towards it, his closest soldiers coming close. The Whisperer and his men were already making their way down the stairs like they deserved, the cocky bastards. Maybe it would help them learn humility when they arrived late to the party.
The elevator capsule finally arrived and he looked back at his men.
“You know the drill.”
Stepping inside, he pressed the ground floor button.
It was about to rain blood.
The healer stood by nervously, grabbing ahold of a thick steel column standing in the ground floor lobby. He looked around and seemed to see everything for the first time. It was once a beautifully designed skyscraper; a building surely used by a billionaire or large corporation. Its many comfortable armchairs and benches had been relegated to one side where Russell’s soldiers probably slept, but most of the place was intact.
They probably haven’t even ever suffered an attack here. With such a protective ring around the city, any large force would have trouble getting as far as the borders of Ayia. The only reason we got past is because we didn’t come in numbers and because Callum is just too good at infiltration. Such a shame for them that the only two people to penetrate their defenses did it so well that they’re in danger of extinction now.
The elevator came down, the excited-looking men glaring down from the capsule. Russell emerged first, his large form stepping out from the cramped cabin and turning with his arms spread wide.
“I’m glad to see you’ve come to your senses. This ridiculous violence, I…I just hate it you know?” He smiled pleasantly and pointed straight at Dante. “You,” he chuckled, “You will make all of this worth it. What happens now?”
“It’s your move first. Let’s see those keys and those soldiers backing off,” Johanna said. Callum remained silent, simply watching on.
Russell shrugged.
“My move? Okay. Let’s do this…”
Russell had still not moved into view. Somewhere above, in a particularly good hiding place, a soldier finished calibrating his scope. In his rifle was the round that would kill the enemy leader. He just needed the man to enter his field of vision.
He had changed his clothes, swapping them with Frank. There was no Callum on the ground floor lobby; the real one was the pull of a trigger away from ending Lord Russell’s bloody reign.
Suddenly, the group of enemies began to walk forward and their leader, though heavily obscured by his guards, was finally visible.
Callum breathed and prepared himself. One shot is all I need…
Russell crossed the lobby with something dangling from his hands. The small keychain rattled with each step, and he saw hope in the prisoners’ eyes as they watched him approaching.
If only they knew, he thought with pleasure. Every single last one of them was going t—
BANG
He had already been shifting on his feet by the time the high-powered projectile tore through the air past where he’d just been standing to kill the soldier walking behind him with an explosive impact. The man was thrown off his feet as his chest caved in as if a massive hammer had crashed into it.
The heat presence had barely registered, but he had seen it clearly when the gun charged an instant before firing.
“You bastards! Did you think I replaced my eye for decorative reasons? I saw your sniper from a mile away!” Russell screamed as he broke into a run. His men immediately lifted their guns behind him. He turned back as his feet powered forward and bellowed: “Stay out of this!”
Johanna was too slow to register what had happened; it had all taken place in seconds. One second she was standing and watching Russell step towards them, feeling confident he was about to be assassinated, the next the man had narrowly avoided the shot and was already charging at her with a look of fury and a hand reaching for his hip.
She managed to bring her gun up only halfway when Russell’s alien sword was torn from its sheath with an otherworldly scream; the man slashed downward through her shoulder, chest and arm in a single movement. Johanna was bisected in a split second, her wide eyes registering shock more than pain or anything else as the top half of her body fell to the cold floor.
Another woman screamed in horror, and the gunfight began. Russell’s men only half-obeyed his order and killed the prisoners who hadn’t yet made it to cover. Frank peeked out from behind a heavy sofa and fired his rifle at the enemy leader, but the man was too fast for him. Russell threw himself over the piece of furniture with a savage grin and sliced the fake Callum’s hand right off the trigger.
“I am so going to enjoy killing you after what you’ve done,” he breathed, but then he saw the man’s agonizing face under his fallen mask and understood. It wasn’t the enemy leader — he’d swapped clothes to get into position to assassinate Russell instead. With a sneer, he sunk the blade into the man’s skull and pulled it back again. Gunfire echoed from above as his would-be assassin fought off the soldiers Russell had ordered to keep watch on the upper floors. They better not take his life.
Through the chaos taking place around him, with some prisoners staying to fight and more foolish ones running outside to their certain deaths, Russell spotted the boy. A soldier was pulling him from where he stood, hugging the base of the elevator.
“This is it.”
Dante screamed and kicked as tears ran down his face. More of his people were dying, but Johanna’s death was too much for him. He stabbed a foot at the thug’s groin and the man cried out in pain.
“No! Leave me alone!” the boy wailed, and the metal in his hands began to give. It felt like nothing to him, a thick steel support squashing under his fingers like wet paper. It should have been strange to him, but his anger and loss were too great.
Dante saw Russell slamming his sword down on Frank’s head and he screamed again. The metal collapsed under his fingers and he fell forward, grabbing onto the elevator’s base.
His heart pounded and he pulled as hard as he could; he was now feeling another pair of powerful hands pulling at him. In fact, one of them was made of metal…
The emotion overwhelmed him.
Dante roared furiously as he saw Johanna’s killer pulling at his legs with a grin on his face, and only then did it happen.
The flesh half of Russell’s face went pale as he heard the screech of metal, and only then did Dante have a long enough lapse in concentration to realize what he’d just done.
The entire building rocked and the fearful shouts of men and women echoed all around him. Though he had wished to call upon his hidden curse once more, it seemed that it had come back to him on its own. In full force. Somehow, and without any effort, Dante had fully torn the elevator’s base off the floor in his fury. The boy looked up as everybody attempted to escape. He only managed a small, fearful whimper before the whole structure of the elevator shaft and its surrounding floor structures collapsed with a resounding crash…
…right on
top of him and Russell.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Way Out
The agony was intense; the fear was suffocating.
Dante Castello had never felt true pain until now — it had been a foreign concept that he’d never bothered to entertain. He’d never needed to. A metal support beam had come crashing down onto his legs and they’d been broken in several places. Others lay dead beneath the ruins of the entire first floor, which had collapsed inward like a stack of cards. He gasped as he attempted to pull himself free from the destruction, but it simply wasn’t possible.
It was chaos — there were still a small handful of prisoners alive; two of them were firing at the most loyal of Russell’s soldiers as the rest of the building began to shake and rumble. Other prisoners ran with the rest of the thugs; life was worth more than the current battle. The building was clearly giving in; more and more floors falling to pieces with every second. The destruction of the elevator shaft hadn’t been the end of it; the power released by Dante’s hands was an annihilating force still reverberating through the walls. The revving of large-capacity motorcycles ripped through the other chaotic noise, and it became clear that The Whisperer and his men were fleeing.