by P. T. Hylton
The Savage Night
The Vampire World Book 2
PT Hylton
Jonathan Benecke
Copyright © 2018 P.T. Hylton & Jonathan Benecke
All rights reserved.
This is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to actual persons living or dead, businesses, events, or locales is purely coincidental.
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Contents
What Came Before
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Epilogue
Dear Reader
What Came Before
ALEX GODDARD is a member of the Ground Mission Team, an elite task force that supplies the airship New Haven with resources recovered from the vampire-infested Earth’s surface. New Haven believes it is the last human city, and they’ve remained alive for one hundred fifty years by staying in the sky, circumnavigating the Earth to remain in sunlight.
But some aboard New Haven believe it’s time for a change. They are convinced that humans should resettle the surface. They are led by DANIEL FLEMMING, a charismatic young city councilman from the wrong part of town. He and his followers force a public vote on the matter of Resettlement. When Resettlement passes, the city council steps in, voiding the results of the vote. They believe Resettlement is too dangerous, even if it is the will of the people.
Meanwhile, a malfunction in the control unit of New Haven’s nuclear reactor sends Alex and the GMT scrambling on a search for parts. After a few failed missions, including one that cost them the life of recon expert Simmons, the team learns the parts they need are in NORAD, an ancient facility in the Rocky Mountains.
Alex and her crew race down to NORAD, leaving their injured field commander Captain Brickman behind, but their ship is shot down near their destination. Continuing on foot, they desperately race to reach the facility before sundown. While they’re ultimately successful, Drew is killed by vampires hiding in the snow and Wesley is badly injured.
Meanwhile, on New Haven, Fleming makes his move. He blows up the city council chambers, leaving himself as the sole remaining member of the council. He then takes control of the city, arresting General Craig, the leader of the GMT and the police force. He also arrests Captain Brickman, but offers him a deal: he will allow CB to rescue Alex and the GMT if the captain agrees to help with the Resettlement efforts. CB has no choice but to take the offer.
In the Rocky Mountains, Alex and the GMT are shocked to find NORAD occupied. There’s a whole city in the mountain, a place the residents call Agartha. They have the parts the GMT needs to repair New Haven, and Jaden, Agartha’s apparent leader, gladly offers to let Alex take the parts with no strings attached.
Jaden then reveals the truth about Agartha. There are one hundred vampires among its population. And he’s one of them.
1
Hope Briar hurried through the door of the Ground Mission Team headquarters, cursing with each step. She’d waited five years for this meeting, and now she was going to be late.
In her defense, she hadn’t expected Captain Brickman to call her in the middle of the night while she was working a double in Sparrow’s Ridge. Now, here she was, still in her badge’s uniform, headed to her first meeting with the GMT.
Her footsteps echoed loudly as she hurried across the hangar to the briefing room. When she reached it, she was unsurprised to see all three of her fellow GMT recruits already seated and waiting.
They were badges, just like her. And while they currently spent their days enforcing the law in the last human city, they all dreamed of getting the call to join the GMT.
Was it possible the time had finally come? And if it had, what did that mean for the current GMT? Where were Alex, Drew, Wesley, Owl, and Firefly?
Hope found a seat and sank into it, nodding a greeting to the other three. There were usually five backup GMT members at any given time, but Wesley had recently been called up to replace Simmons. That left the four of them.
The Barton brothers, Ed and Patrick, had been Sparrows Ridge legends since childhood for their eagerness to pick fights with anyone at any time. Then there was Chuck Williams, a thoughtful badge who worked in the Hub.
“Okay, I’ve had it with this oppressive silence,” Patrick Barton said. “Who’s got a guess as to why they called us down here in the middle of the damn night?”
“There’s no need to guess,” Hope pointed out. “Calling all four of us at once? Something happened to the team.”
Patrick and Ed nodded, as if that confirmed their suspicions, but Chuck shifted uncomfortably in his seat at Hope’s words.
It had been a crazy few days in New Haven. First there had been the vote for Resettlement, a vote that had passed only to be vetoed by the city council. Then there had been the freak explosion that had killed every member of the council except Fleming, the one council member who happened to be pro-Resettlement.
It didn’t take a genius to figure out that the explosion hadn’t been an accident.
“So what happened to the team?” Ed asked. “I’ll bet they made a move against Fleming. They’re probably sitting in jail down at the Hub right now.”
Patrick shook his head. “No way. You think the soft desk jockeys they have stationed at the Hub could take down the GMT? Not a chance.” He glanced at Chuck. “No offense.”
“None taken,” Chuck answered. “And you’re right. If the GMT made a move against Fleming, we’d be talking about civil war.”
Hope grimaced. Not that long ago, the GMT had been above politics. It didn’t matter who you supported for city council or what your political leanings were. The GMT was about gathering the resources people needed to survive, end of story.
That had all changed when Fleming took control of New Haven. There was no such thing as politically neutral anymore. Add to that the fact that Fleming’s central issue was resettling the Earth, and that put the GMT in the dead center of the political discussion.
“My guess is they’re just trying to get everyone in line with the new chain of command,” Patrick said. “Things are changing fast, and they have to make sure we’re on board.”
Ed raised an eyebrow. “In the middle of the night?”
Chuck rubbed his chin thoughtfully. “When Captain Brickman radioed me, he asked if I was comfortable flying the backup ship. On the way in, I noticed the main GMT ship isn’t in the hangar.”
That comment sobered the group, and they waited in silence for another two minutes until the briefing room door swung open. Captain Brickman and another man marched through the door. It took Hope a m
oment to identify the second man as Brian McElroy, the head of research and development for the GMT.
The recruits leapt to their feet and stood at attention. Brian shut the door behind him as CB moved to the front of the room.
CB motioned for them to sit. “Take it easy. We have a lot to discuss.”
A twinge of worry tingled the base of Hope’s spine at the sight of these two clearly weary men. Brian looked pretty rough, but CB looked twice as bad. His usually crisp uniform was a wrinkled mess, and he had heavy bags under his eyes. His right arm was in a cast. CB usually maintained the image of military excellence and discipline, but that day he was falling far short of the ideal.
When he spoke, Hope heard the edge in his voice.
“All right, let’s get to it. In seven hours, the four of you will be deployed on your first mission as members of the Ground Mission Team.”
He let that hang in the air a moment before continuing.
The energy in the room changed at CB’s words. Before, the recruits had suspected they were about to join the team, but now they knew. A strange combination of fear, excitement, and trepidation hung in the air.
CB continued, “And it’s going to be one hell of a first mission.” He tapped the screen in front of him, and the wall behind him came to life, displaying an aerial photograph. “This is an area formerly known as El Paso County, Colorado, in the United States. It was the home of NORAD, a military mountain facility our team believed could have the nuclear reactor components necessary to repair New Haven and keep her in the sky. The GMT was deployed to retrieve these parts yesterday morning. Their ship was shot down as they were landing.”
The recruits glanced at each other as they realized the implication of these words.
Hope raised a tentative hand. “Shot down, sir? By whom?”
CB met her gaze. “I’ll be honest with you. We don’t know. We also don’t know their current status. We believe…” CB paused, then corrected himself. “We think there’s a chance the team could have made it to the NORAD facility, and it’s possible they survived the night. Your mission will be to locate the downed ship and track the team from the crash site. We’re going to find them and bring them home.”
He gestured to Brian. “This is Brian McElroy. If you don’t know him, you’re going to want to rectify that situation. He and his team create the gear that keeps us alive down there. He’ll be outfitting all of you prior to departure. Questions?”
After a long moment, Chuck raised a hand. “Sir, I don’t know a polite way to ask this, so I’m just going to spit it out. With the city council gone and General Craig locked up, who does the team report to? Above you, I mean.”
CB’s answer was almost a growl. “Councilman Fleming is currently heading up all government functions. That means he’s our commander of operations.” He turned away from Chuck and looked at the rest of the group, clearly wanting to move on from the question. “What else?”
“Chances of hostile encounters down there?” Hope asked.
“It’ll be daylight. That said, a vampire broke my arm in the middle of the day. I’ve seen plenty worse than that happen too. We’ll have to be ready for anything.” He scanned their faces before continuing. “Look, I can tell you’re a little freaked out, and I don’t blame you. Things on New Haven haven’t exactly been normal lately. Now we’re asking you to go save a team shot down by an unknown enemy.” He paused a moment. “I can’t promise you things will go smoothly down there, but I can tell you this. You are the right people for this mission. Otherwise, you wouldn’t be here. You’ve never been to the surface before, but you’ve trained your asses off to get this far. If you’re committed to the GMT, then I promise I will be committed to you, too. The Ground Mission Team has been through this before. I lost a team, the whole damn lot of them. We rebuilt from scratch and built that group into the best fighting unit New Haven had ever seen.”
He motioned to the aerial map.
“I believe our GMT brothers and sisters are alive down there. But even if they’re not, the GMT is alive and well in this room. Now gear up. We leave in seven hours.”
“Haven’t you figured it out yet?” Jaden asked. “We’re vampires. The defenders of Agartha are the last one hundred true vampires, and we’re going to save humanity.”
For a long moment, Alex couldn’t move. She could barely think, aware only of Jaden’s words echoing around in her skull like a bullet.
Two words in particular: We’re vampires.
With each reverberation of the statement, another image flashed in her mind. Ancient humans, running in fear as vampires—vampires like Jaden!—hunted them down and slaughtered them. The people of New Haven, confined to a prison in the sky because of the bloodthirsty bastards. Drew being dragged up a wall of ice, and the gut-wrenching crack as a vampire snapped his neck.
And Simmons. This last memory came back so strong, it was almost like she was experiencing that horrific moment again. The man she loved trying to fly up to her, then vampires swarming all over him, dragging him down into the darkness.
“I can see you need a moment,” Jaden said, a bemused smile on his face.
The control room they were standing in seemed different suddenly. Everything around her took on a new and ominous aura. The monitors showed areas around the city. Why? So the vampires could watch them? And what about the man sitting in front of the monitors? What about all the humans in the city? Where they just livestock? Sacks of blood waiting for the vampires to feed on them?
Owl must have sensed the tension rising in Alex, because she looked pointedly at her and gave her head the slightest of shakes.
“Listen to your friend,” Jaden said. “Look, I get it. You’ve been training for years to kill vampires.”
“Yes,” Alex said. Her voice sounded distant in her own ears.
“And how’s that going for you?” He took a step forward. “Maybe it’s time you consider―”
Alex’s pistol was in her hand before she even realized she’d drawn it. “That’s close enough.”
“Alex, don’t,” Owl said.
“It’s okay,” Jaden said, his smile even wider than before. “This is…interesting.”
“Interesting?” Alex asked, not hiding the annoyance in her voice. “Is that what you call it?”
“Yes. I sometimes forget that humans have such a limited capacity to deal with the unexpected.”
Alex wasn’t sure what to make of that. Something about the way this vampire talked made her feel like she was a child being addressed by an elderly relative. It wasn’t condescending exactly. More like he found her entertaining.
Owl’s gaze flickered past Alex, and Alex realized someone must have entered the control room through the door behind her.
Then something slammed into her, and she was knocked to the ground. She lay sprawled on the floor for only a moment.
In an instant, she was back on her feet, spinning toward her attacker. It was one of the other vampires she’d seen with Jaden at the doors of the city.
She raised her pistol, but the vampire was already in motion. He moved so fast, her eyes had trouble tracking him. One moment he was standing across the room from her, and the next he stood directly in front of her. The gun twisted in her hand, and suddenly he was holding it.
She blinked hard, trying to process what had just happened. Struggling to control her temper, she considered the situation. She and Owl were trapped in a room with two vampires, one of whom had just attacked her.
She didn’t know if she could take out these vampires, but she was definitely losing the fight with her temper.
“It’s okay, Robert,” Jaden said with a chuckle. “We were just talking.”
The other vampire frowned. “She was pointing a gun at you. I wasn’t about to let her shoot you. You get cranky when you get shot, and none of us want to deal with that tonight.”
The conversation was the only opening Alex needed. Taking half a step forward, she drove her knee into Rober
t’s groin. As he doubled over in pain, she stepped back, giving herself enough space to draw her sword.
This was over, Alex knew. A millisecond from now there would be one less vampire in the world.
She swung her sword, bringing it down on Robert’s neck. Only, instead of the steel sinking into flesh, it whooshed through empty air. Before she processed the fact that she had somehow missed a target two feet in front of her, something powerful slammed into the blade near the hilt, and her sword went clattering to the floor.
Robert grabbed her wrist with a firm hand and snarled.
“Alex, calm down,” Jaden said. “You’re not in any danger here.”
She struggled to control her breathing. If she was going to have any chance of taking Robert down, she needed to adjust her strategy.
“Not that this isn’t entertaining,” Jaden said, “but you have to realize you can’t win a fight against a vampire.”
“I can’t?” Alex asked. “I’ve left a pretty big pile of vampire corpses that would disagree with you.”
“That may be, but those were not―”
Alex spun, twisting and pulling away from Robert until he was left holding her coat. She almost smiled. He’d fallen for the same trick twice. Robert might have been fast as all hell, but if she got Jaden talking, she could catch him off guard. She knew this nugget of information was important. Against enemies like these, any advantage was a precious commodity.