Running my hands through my still damp hair and slicking it back from my face, I’m ready to move. One of the few advantages about being a young woman in a world that’s gone to hell? No one gave a shit as to how you look.
To my surprise, Luke is still waiting calmly outside my door. The man did not take offense easily, I give him that. He eyes me up and down but says nothing as he falls in step with me. We match stride down the long hall.
"So you really don't know what this is about?" I ask, and he answers with a shake of his head. I can't help but worry a bit. Cooper is a real stickler when it comes to us having our off duty days. He says we need the time to unwind so as not to burn out. Something serious must be up for him to call us back early.
"Did Kelly's group come back unexpected? Maybe they found something in area 19?"
"Could be," he says. "Though, I would have heard if they were back."
We walk a bit more, without saying a word. Finally, I glance at him sideways, his silence surprising me a little. We hadn't parted on the best of terms earlier, and Luke is all about getting your feelings out in the open and all that shit. It annoys me to no end.
"You don't wanna talk about what happened earlier?"
He keeps staring straight ahead as he answers woodenly.
"No point. I can always tell when you need me to back off for a bit. Soon as you start wearing that damned jacket I know I'm pushed to the side...again."
I pull up short in the middle of the hall and stare at his shadowed profile in the flickering light.
"What the hell does that mean?"
"Exactly what I said. As soon as I start getting too close, you bring Sam's ghost between us. Lucky for you I'm a patient guy, Bix."
"Bullshit! It's just a jacket for Pete's sake. Sam's ghost-what a crock of buttered shit."
"Mm-hmm." He throws over his shoulder as he keeps walking. I hurry to catch up, not done with this conversation.
"Mm-hmm? What's that supposed to mean?"
"Usually it's meant as a form of agreement..."
"I know what 'mm-hmm' means, dickwad," I growl at him and he finally stops to look at me.
"Then why you ask?"
"I meant, why you agreeing with me? Because I know you don't agree with me! You're just agreeing to agree, cause you don't want me to be mad about you disagreeing!"
His bark of laughter resonates from deep in his gut.
"What? That doesn't even make sense!"
"Oh, it makes perfect sense. I know you're just playing the dumb blonde again."
"Likeeee totally, fer sure," he says in his best Valley girl impersonation and I can't help it. I start laughing. Hearing that voice come from the 275 plus pound gorilla in front of me, it kills me. I never could stay mad at Luke for long...and dammit, he knew it.
"I love the sound of your laugh," he says quietly. I stop chuckling and glare at him sideways.
"What? I can't even say it about your laugh now?"
Fortunately, Gordon flies up the stairs towards us at that moment nearly tripping over his own damn feet, and interrupts my biting retort.
"Guys, come on." he yells, his red face almost matching his hair with his exertion. "Cooper is asking for the two of you."
We hurry our pace at the boy's words. Cooper is not someone you want to keep waiting. And to be quite honest, I welcome the interruption. I don't want to hash this over again.
"What’s going on Gordo? You know anything?"
"Only that something happened with Kelly's group. Not sure, but if it's enough to have Cooper worried..."
I get the gist. Cooper doesn't get hot under the collar about much; he’s the proverbial cool cucumber. My worry increases, and I take the stairs two at a time, eager to get to command.
***
We’re the last to arrive. I feel Cooper's bright eyes on us as soon as we enter what had once been one of the many conference rooms in the hotel. It still had the little gold 'B' sign on the door. Someone had written in black marker after the B 'ase command.' Not very elegant, but official enough. Every decision, every move we make, is talked through and planned here in this room. Sam used to say the B stood for Bullshit. He never was one to stand for authority much.
"About time," Cooper growls from behind the metal desk where he normally sat, his arms folded across his chest in impatience. We don't bother to give him an excuse; he doesn't expect one. The unspoken words say it all, "When I say five, I mean five...not fifteen." I look away guiltily from his piercing stare. John Cooper is the reason I’m still alive, and I hated displeasing him; even if it is for something as trivial as being late to a meeting.
The rest of the crew are already here; Badger, Cal and Dom, plus the regular five council members who demand to be privy to everything, including Cookie. Her beady dark eyes stare at us disapprovingly, and I feel myself shrink a little bit more. Damn, I swear that woman could shrivel a grape to a raisin with that look.
I avert my eyes, surprised to see who else is in the room. Kingsley, head of the gate guards and a couple of his people, plus the two responsible for manning the shortwave radios. What are their names again? Lois and Roy I believe. What are they doing here? They’re never usually at any of our meetings. Their jobs are to man and maintain the radios, not be involved in any sort of decision making. What’s going on? I don't have to wait long to find out.
"Sorry to call you all back on active duty, but we have an issue. As some of you may or may not know, Lois and Roy received a distress call earlier today from St. Joseph's."
Murmuring interrupts Cooper as some of us express our concern. Distress calls—never a good sign of anything. Cooper holds up his hands to silence us. He waits until the ruckus stops.
"Lois, can you tell us all what you heard?"
The pale woman stands up and her eyes dart nervously about the room. He hands flutter fretfully, like she's not sure what to do with them. She finally pushes them into the pockets of her denims and hunches her shoulders, before speaking.
"Yes, well like Cooper said, earlier this morning we received a call from someone claiming to be from the St. Joseph's group. He was...well he wasn't making much sense. He was screaming for help. Screaming that they were being attacked. I asked who he was. I've never spoken to him before. I mean I always deal with Karen or Dwayne..." She trails off and Cooper encourages her on with a wave of his hand. She takes a deep breath. "He was in shock I think...maybe...just yelling for help over and over. Then I heard some sort of crash and then screaming, and..." She trails off again and closes her eyes, like she was still hearing it in her head. Giving her head a little shake, she continues, "After the screaming stopped there was nothing. Just silence. I haven't been able to raise anyone since. No response from St. Joseph's at all."
Cooper nods at her and she sits back down, the relief evident on her face. She was starting to look a little green around the gills.
"Are you positive the call was from St. Joseph's?" Cookie's clipped accent fills the room. "It is not the first time they have tried to trick us, no?"
Typical Cookie and her 'trust no one' attitude.
"We’re positive this is no trick," Cooper responds. "But to be on the safe side, we asked Kelly's group to go check it out. They were only a couple of hours away from St. Joseph's. We relayed to them our need to know what's happened. We asked them to investigate if the call was legit and to find out if St. Joseph’s was compromised in any way. And if they did find a threat would it affect the Grand at all. That message was sent out over six hours ago. Other than our initial response from them confirming the order, we haven’t heard back from Kelly or anyone else since."
Cooper stops talking and stares at us all as the words sink in. Radio silence. A big no-no for hunters. Our very survival depends on our radios at times. We're always supposed to be in contact with home base. No radio contact for over six hours-something is definitely wrong. That's why we’re here.
"When do we leave?" I ask, as Cooper struggles to his feet, leaning heavily
on the silver tipped cane he kept by his side at all times now. It still hurts a little to see the strong, healthy man I once knew now reduced to hobbling his way around on a cane. But at least he’s still alive.
The injury had come from a run in with a leech three years ago on a hunting trip. He’d left camp for a brief minute, to take a leak of all damn things. In the dark and only half awake, the leech had taken him by surprise. He’d heard it lunge at him and swerved at the last minute before the leech could rip out his throat. Off balance though, he had fallen and the creature had attacked. Cooper had tried to roll out of the way but the things teeth had gotten a huge chunk of his calf. Seriously injured, he’d managed to hold off the snapping razors with his bare hands and call out for help. Sam had been the one to take out the leech. A blade straight through the heart.
That seemed to be the only thing that killed the bastards’ quick enough. Experimenting on cadavers had shown us that the alien parasite had two main arteries or growths, attaching to the host body's heart and brain. Shooting the host elsewhere, even cutting the throat, the creature still managed to live for a time after, even if its host died. But trauma to the heart always killed it immediately. We aren't sure why, since no one at the Grand is an expert in alien physiology, but it appeared that whatever life force these aliens possessed, it seemed to be centralized in the host heart. So we no longer wasted time elsewhere. We learned quickly, in any fight, go for the heart.
Though Sam had saved Cooper from becoming fodder, the injury had almost done him in. Infection had set in almost immediately, and the closest we had to a doctor at the Grand was a pediatric nurse. She was determined to save him. It had been touch and go with Cooper for days, but the one thing in his favor; he was a stubborn bastard. He hadn't given up. He pulled through, though he would never walk without the cane again, thanks to the leech. The thing had taken Cooper out of the field, but it hadn't taken him, and I was extremely grateful for that.
He limps around to the front of the desk and sits heavily on it, crossing his hands over the top of the cane.
"You will be leaving right away. You six will lead Kingsley and his men to St. Joseph's. No one knows the city like you hunters. Your job, to get them there quickly and in one piece. Once there, they will assess the situation and eliminate whatever threat you may find. Whatever it is, we cannot have it make its way back to the Grand, understood."
A chorus of "Yes Sir!" accompanies his words.
"Report back immediately. Whatever happened at St. Joseph's this morning ...well, we need to know where we stand." He sighs and tugs at the little chin beard that’s turned from brown to gray over the years since I've known him. "No radio contact with Kelly has me worried. It doesn't look good folks. Though I pray to God I'm wrong about the whole situation, and that the worst this means is a couple of busted radios."
I find myself hoping the same, but the knot in my belly says otherwise. Besides, God’s been pretty amiss with answering prayers lately.
"Get what you need, meet back here in twenty. Cookie already has your packs prepared. You move out soon as everyone is ready."
"No disrespect, Sir, but don't you think it would be a better idea to wait until morning?" This from Kingsley, and I can see some of my crew roll their eyes in disgust. Guards.
"We know this city like the back of our hand, Kingsley. Traveling at night gives us better cover from the ravagers, not to mention the fact that leeches seem to move slower at night. Sometimes a slower moving leech is the difference between life and death out there." I try not to make it sound condescending but I don't think I succeed. I can tell by the way Kingsley's eyes move over me in anger, but Cooper thankfully backs me up.
"Bixby is right. Plus, we don’t have a moment to lose on this...so move, all of you! Time is of the essence."
No one else questions the man as he stands once more, leaning on the cane. I wait until the others leave the room, ignoring Luke's questioning look at my dallying and Dom's usual sneer as he passes by. I even ignore Cookie's 'you are so in trouble' glare. Shit! Did she find out about the MRE packs I’d given to the kids? No time to worry about that now. I need to talk to Cooper alone.
He sighs heavily as he finally looks over at me.
"Did you just not hear me, Bix? Why are you still standing here," he says as soon as the door closes on the last back. I dive straight into what’s bothering me.
"Why are you sending the guards along on this gig? We can move much quicker without dragging those area newbs along, you know that."
"I do know that. I also know that Kingsley's men are the best sharp shooters we have, and Kingsley himself has a unique set of skills needed for this job. This will be no ordinary hunting mission. It may be a search and destroy. Hunters alone cannot handle that. So suck up any issues you have with the Guards. You're gonna have to learn to play along with the boys for the next few days."
"S&D's are our specialty. Come on, Coop, we don't need those guys along. We can do this on our own."
"For Christ's sake, Bixby, can you ever not question an order?" He glares down his nose at me and I'm shocked to see a spark of fear in his eyes. At first I think he's going to say more, but then shutters drop down over the spark and he becomes "Captain" John Cooper again. "We don't have time to lose. Kingsley will fill you in more on the way. Now move out. That's an order."
I do as he says, but not without reservation. Just as I'm about to open the door, he calls to me softly. "Bixby?" I look back over my shoulder. "Stay safe, kid."
The fear is back in his eyes and it ties my stomach in knots. Anything that can scare John Cooper is truly something to be afraid of. Even more than Cookie.
CHAPTER FIVE
The night's blanket of blackness is broken only in spots by the moons feeble attempt to fight its way through the thick cloud cover. Not a good night to be on the road. I know I told Kingsley that hunters prefer to travel at night but moonlight is still our most valuable asset. Although we move quickly in shadow, no moonlight at all makes it that much harder to see the things lying in wait for us. And there are always plenty of those.
St. Joseph's is located on the other side of the city, a good two days walk. One and a half if we really push it-no rest periods. Though I knew Luke would never let us do that. He believes no sleep makes us sloppy. So over the years we had set up safe zones, hidden all over the deserted city. One of those is our destination at the moment. A halfway point of where we need to be.
We move stealthily in the dark, in and out of shadows like we’re part of the night. The six of us can probably do this with our eyes shut, but we slow it down some for Kingsley and his men. I try not to hold a grudge against their lagging behind. Just because this is our playing field, doesn't mean they should be as sure footed. I shouldn't blame them. They’re no hunters, but they protect the Grand and its occupants every day from invasion. They do their part, so I try to keep my patience.
We would be a hell of a lot quicker if driving was an option any more, but it’s not. The invasion had occurred during rush hour traffic. The mist had rapidly obscured the city, bringing to a standstill the already congested streets. People had unwittingly stumbled from their vehicles, curious as to the glittering clouds. Those who hadn't been infected right away had soon become the prey. Bodies had littered the streets, jugulars torn out and bloating in the summer heat. The stench had been overwhelming, the smell of death rampant in the air for at least two months or more. Like any dead thing though, the bodies had eventually decomposed or been eaten away by scavengers. The occasional dried out skeleton littering the streets the only evidence they had even existed. That and their piles of rusting metal.
We tried at one point to clear the streets to make it easier to transport our supplies back to the Grand, but it had been a futile effort.
Cleared streets simply scream cargo route to those waiting to ambush us, and the thrumming engine of a moving vehicle brings the leeches in droves. Which would be okay if we could move at a decent speed. But ha
ving to crawl our way through the streets, the fucking leeches move faster than we do. So we walk.
It’s a bit of an asset, really. Cutting through abandoned apartment buildings and shopping malls sometimes cut blocks off of our travels. And you never know when you might find a surprise nugget hidden in some undiscovered cache.
I should be exhausted and dragging my feet, but the spring in my step is unmistakable. Even though I’ve been awake for almost eighteen hours now and I knew it would be at least another ten before we stop, I don't feel the least bit tired. Being out in the field always does that to me. I feel invigorated. Renewed. Like this is the only time I truly feel alive. Living on the edge appeals to me. Some understand where I'm coming from-most don't. They can't understand why I enjoy being out here so much. And I really can't give them an answer. They chalk it up to craziness. I hear the whispers, people questioning my mental stability behind my back. It doesn't bother me; I question it all the time. Maybe I am crazy. But I believe to survive in this fucking world now you have to be at least a little crazy. Hell, a whole lot crazy helps you cope even better. I look over at Gordon, and he grins at me, giving me thumbs up. He’s enjoying this as much as me. I take comfort in the fact that the kid’s probably just as crazy as I am.
Strain of Resistance (Book 1) Page 5