Hunter Wars Omnibus Edition (Books 1 - 3)

by SD Tanner

  Sounding as puzzled as he felt, he asked, ‘What am I doin’ at the Ranch? I told Pax to burn it. How can I be here?’

  Not answering either of his questions, Ip replied, ‘I’ve been waiting for you.’

  Her voice sounded like a soft melody and he smiled. Looking at her, he remembered how he felt when he thought he’d lost her and his relief when he saw her again at the house. Then he remembered he died and wondered, is this death? What’s she doing here?

  ‘I don’t understand,’ he said simply.

  Untangling her long legs that were curled underneath her, Ip moved gracefully across the bed and closer to him, but still not touching him with any part of her body.

  Looking into his eyes, she tilted her head and said, ‘You’re dead, my love.’

  He felt his heart move hearing her call him her love, but his mind was worried about his sanity. Studying her face, he said earnestly, ‘Help me understand, honey.’

  Still not answering his question, Ip asked, ‘What do you remember?’

  He searched his memory and said, ‘Losin’ ya. Findin’ ya. That fuckin’ demon asshole. Bein’ shot. Flyin’. Feelin’ my mind slip outta my control and not bein’ able to stop it. Then I woke up here.’

  ‘Your body has died, my love,’ Ip said plainly.

  Her lack of clear answers was irritating him and he asked abruptly, ‘Are ya gonna tell me what’s goin’ on or not?’

  Rolling her eyes, she replied, ‘Aggressive, even when you’re dead.’

  Narrowing his eyes, he frowned and said, ‘I always wanted to hear ya voice, but our first conversation is gonna be a brawl if ya don’t talk sense.’

  ‘Don’t you know who you are?’ She asked.

  Feeling even more frustrated, he replied, ‘I’ve had a really bad day. Ya know, with the dyin’ and all. Ya ain’t helpin’, honey.’

  ‘What do you know about Revelations?’ She asked.

  ‘Revelations about what?’ He asked plainly.

  Rolling her eyes again, she said, ‘Revelations as in the apocalypse. When the seven seals are broken and the Four Horsemen judge mankind and decide if they live or burn in hell.’

  Not understanding how this answered any of his questions, he shrugged and said, ‘I saw a few movies about that. The special effects were pretty good.’

  Sighing, she said, ‘Those movies were based on Revelations, the last chapter of the Bible. When all the seals, but one were broken and the virus activated, bringing hell and all of its demons to earth, Jesus broke the seventh seal and the Four Horsemen were released on earth to judge mankind.’

  Not understanding what any of this had to do with him, he asked, ‘What did man do to deserve that?’

  Looking surprised by his question, she asked, ‘You mean the man that infected my body with a brain destroying virus? The woman who shot you and left you for dead? You’re asking me what man did to deserve to be judged?’

  She had a point. When they set out their mission to destroy the hunters and restore order, he and TL agreed humans could be a shabby bunch and nodding, he said dryly, ‘Yeah, that lot, but they’re not all bad.’ Reflecting on his statement, he added, ‘But a lot of ‘em could lift their game.’

  Smirking, she said, ‘That’s an understatement, my love. You, TL and I made our decision. Pax was ambivalent, but he’s always been a bit that way.’

  That surprised him. They agreed their mission over six months ago when they only just met her and she made it sound like she’d known them for much longer. Nothing she had said made any sense, but getting annoyed with her was getting him nowhere.

  Sighing, he said, ‘Ya know me and ya know you’re gonna have to start from the top.’

  With a soft laugh, she replied, ‘Revelations for dummies.’

  Smiling at her, he said honestly, ‘Been called worse.’

  Smiling back at him, she continued, ‘We were the first four seals. A horseman was released as each seal was broken. TL, the spreader of the word. You, the bringer of war. Pax, the creator of wealth. And me, the one who brings death. The fifth seal were all those who died for no reason other than cruelty. The sixth seal brought natural disasters as the earth collapsed. The seventh seal calls for judgement and we, the Horsemen, judged and believed man deserved another chance.’

  She might as well have been talking in another language and he thought it seemed a shame, after waiting all this time to hear her speak, she was completely nuts.

  Narrowing her eyes at him, she said tartly, ‘I am not completely nuts. Don’t be so rude!’

  He’d forgotten he could keep no secrets from her and smiling, he said, ‘Sorry, honey, but what ya sayin’ don’t make sense.’

  Sighing, she said, ‘No, it doesn’t if you insist on living in your human brain. It’s very small, you know.’

  ‘Now who’s bein’ rude,’ he observed casually. ‘I thought the Four Horsemen were supposed to destroy mankind for bein’ a pain in the ass.’

  ‘No, we’re supposed to judge them and decide whether to destroy or protect,’ she replied simply. ‘That’s our role in the universe.’

  Is that what they did when they set their mission, he wondered? Did we decide to protect and not destroy? It seemed like a big decision to make so casually.

  Answering his unspoken question, she replied, ‘It wasn’t casual, my love. The decision came from what we really believe. Mankind can be shabby, but there’s a lot of good in them as well. Man needs to learn to harness their good, but as you have often said, we shouldn’t write the world off just because it had a bad day.’

  ‘I haven’t written man off,’ he replied honestly. ‘Mankind is worth somethin’ and Ruler is an asshole.’

  She laughed and he decided he loved her laugh and smiling at him, she asked, ‘What did you expect the Devil to be like?’

  He raised his eyebrows at her and thought, the Devil is an asshole? Guess that makes sense, but why didn’t the Devil kill her when he could?

  Shaking her head at him, she explained, ‘He can’t kill us like humans, my love. He has to remove all of us from the universe. We can’t be killed any more than Captain Ted or Nelson or BD can be killed.’

  ‘Whatdaya mean?’ He asked incredulously. ‘BD’s already dead.’

  Shaking her head at him again, she replied, ‘Don’t be silly, they’re Archangels. BD is Raphael, Captain Ted is Michael and Nelson is Gabriel.’

  The idea that Captain Ted was an angel struck him as even funnier than the idea they could be the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse and laughing loudly, he said, ‘Now I know this is bullshit.’

  Rolling her eyes at him, she said archly, ‘Believe what you want. It’s not your fault you’re in a big body with a tiny brain.’

  ‘Gloves are off now,’ he said, still chuckling. Not wanting her to stop talking, he asked, ‘Do they know they’re angels?’

  Shrugging, she said sulkily, ‘Not right now, not while they’re in human form.’

  ‘BD’s not in any form right now,’ he observed bluntly.

  Still sounding sulky, she replied, ‘She’s still tied to earth, so she’s in limbo. I think she’s taken a shine to the black horseman. You know. Pax.’

  ‘Pax is the black horseman? Do we all have colors?’ He asked curiously.

  ‘Well the Bible gave us colors,’ Ip replied. ‘You’re red. TL is white and I’m pale.’

  He scratched his head and said, ‘So, somebody broke some seals. We’re the Four Horsemen sent to judge mankind. We got released and we decided man should live and foul-mouthed Captain Ted is an angel.’

  She nodded.

  He didn’t believe a word of it and said rudely, ‘I love ya, honey, but that’s a load of horseshit.’

  Sighing deeply, she asked, ‘How do you explain the virus, hunters, the super hunters and Ruler?’

  Snorting, he said abruptly, ‘Bad hygiene!’

  She huffed and said equally as rudely, ‘If I’m nuts, then you’re stupid.’ Narrowing her eyes, she pursed her
lips and asked, ‘If I’m nuts, how are we even having this conversation?’

  He didn’t think they were having this conversation. If he recalled rightly, someone once told him that after the body died, it took seven seconds for the brain to starve of oxygen. In that time, it was thought a person was unaware they were dead and the brain continued to think. He supposed he should be grateful he hadn’t spent his last few seconds worrying about something unimportant. At least he’d spent the time with her and he thought, I’m gonna miss you when I’m gone and said, ‘I read somewhere it takes seven seconds for your brain to stop thinkin’ after ya die.’

  Suddenly he felt the sharp pain of a stinging slap as she swiftly slapped him across the face. Glaring at him, she asked, ‘Did you feel that?’

  Rubbing his ear, he thought, Pax has a point. Who taught her to slap us around? Complaining loudly, he exclaimed, ‘Fuck! How long are these seven seconds gonna last?’

  ‘You should have used your time more wisely,’ she remarked.

  Figuring his seven seconds should be up by now, he sighed and asked, ‘So, what now? Is a bright light gonna appear? Should I go for the light?’

  Shaking her head, she laughed and said, ‘No, my love. When you’re ready, you have to go back to your body and enforce your judgement.’

  Fed up with the conversation, he said candidly, ‘I don’t believe you. If I was one of the Four Horsemen of Apocalypse, I’d know it.’

  ‘Why would you know?’ She asked curiously.

  ‘Cos I would know what I was,’ he said bluntly. ‘Be pretty damn stupid if my job was to judge mankind and I didn’t know it.’

  Sounding genuinely puzzled, she asked, ‘Why would you need to know it? Your job is to judge and you did and now you have to enforce your judgement. What difference would it make if you knew you were a horseman or not? The problem is our judgement didn’t suit the Devil’s agenda to destroy man.’

  ‘Why does the Devil want to destroy man?’ He asked curiously.

  ‘It’s not personal,’ she replied simply. ‘The Devil wants his dark light to rule. The light of the living is always bright and mankind glows a brilliant white light. Why do you think so many planets are so dark? Much light has already been lost.’

  Still disbelieving, he asked, ‘How do ya know all this and we don’t?’

  ‘My brain was destroyed by the designer virus and I have less human thoughts than you do,’ she explained. ‘The human mind puts up barriers to the universe.’

  Shrugging, he asked, ‘So what happens when our human bodies die?’

  ‘We go back to where we were,’ she replied simply.

  He smiled and asked hopefully, ‘Together?’

  ‘We’re never apart, my love,’ she answered softly. ‘We are one and we always will be.’

  He leaned in to kiss her, but he never made it. The room, his body and Ip dissolved and he felt a crushing pain in his chest. Lydia was speaking to him, ‘Stay with me, Gears.’ And she pumped his chest pushing the blood from his heart and into his body.

  CHAPTER TWENTY EIGHT: Embracin’ the weird (Gears)

  ‘Ya’d think if we was horsemen we woulda got special powers,’ Pax declared.

  ‘Maybe we did,’ he replied amiably. ‘Why don’t ya jump off the ship? See if ya can fly?’

  ‘Ya’d be real upset if I did that and died,’ Pax retorted.

  ‘Don’t know about that, Pax,’ TL said dryly. ‘But I would be relieved we’re not related by blood.’

  ‘Ya both assholes, ’Pax said rudely.

  They were sitting on the balcony of their suite. Lydia insisted he spent a week at the CDC where she could monitor his recovery and Ip refused to leave his side. They had lost twenty-three combat shooters attacking Ruler’s base at the Ranch. Added to the toll of over a thousand lost at the island, Ruler had made his presence known. He’d witnessed Ip tear Ruler’s throat out and he felt she’d done what everyone believed the little shit deserved. No one mourned his loss or his violent death. There was no one left living at the Ranch and they would never know what Ruler had really been doing out there, but having met the little shit, he had a pretty good idea.

  He was convinced Ruler would be back. Trapped in his hospital bed for a week gave him a lot of time to think and he didn’t believe the dream he had where he spoke with Ip. The whole Four Horseman thing didn’t strike him as sane and he knew they were just men, and always had been. Their lives up until the virus had been unremarkable and although life was weird now, it had nothing to do with them. They were just guys doing what they were trained to do. On top of that, he concluded, a dream is just a dream and should not be over read.

  Pax didn’t agree with him. He’d taken his dream about BD as if it was fact. He put a lot of stock by a bath full of water that he agreed probably shouldn’t have been there, but there was a plausible explanation and he wasn’t convinced by it. Pax was convinced and took both his own dream of BD, and his of Ip, as gospel truth. Yawning, he reminded himself Pax was an idiot and right now that idiot and TL were arguing.

  ‘It’s not fair, Gears,’ Pax complained. ‘There’s less women than men now and TL’s got two women!’

  ‘Share with ya brother, TL,’ he said mildly.

  TL shook his head and said, ‘No way, Mom, he breaks stuff.’

  ‘I do not,’ Pax defended himself.

  ‘From what I saw at the CDC, TL doesn’t have Lydia entirely to himself,’ he remarked, recalling the soap opera he witnessed at the CDC during his recovery.

  ‘Really?’ Pax asked delightedly.

  ‘Ted visits Lydia…a lot,’ he said, smirking at TL.

  TL shrugged and Pax pouted and said, ‘It’s ‘cos he gave her that super hunter we caught. Sonofabitch!’

  The super hunter they caught at the cookie factory was proving to be very informative. Lydia and Farrington were testing it thoroughly to learn new and more efficient ways to kill them. He was feeling reasonably confident they would have some new weapons by the time he was well enough to get back to hunter huntin’. The Major was also still at the CDC. He was not faring quite so well since Farrington happily infected him with the designer virus and had yet to resurface from the deep coma it put him in. He thought it might have been kinder to shoot the man in the head, but there really was nothing like a pissed off Pax. Mackenzie was doing well. He hadn’t spoken yet, but he was alert and alive and that was the definition of doing well once a person was infected with the designer virus. The other guy, Chris, was also awake, but he seemed to have more hunter than human in him and was being kept tied down and secured. He wondered if Ip could telepathically talk to any of them yet and made a mental note to have her work with Isaac to find out.

  ‘So where we at, Gears?’ TL asked conversationally.

  ‘I dunno, TL,’ he replied honestly. ‘We dunno if Ruler is really dead. Logically his body is dead, but I’m not confident he or the super hunters stay dead.’

  ‘Why?’ TL asked curiously. ‘You have no evidence that says they don’t and you said you weren’t sure if Ip can really see them after they’re dead.’

  ‘I know,’ he replied amiably. ‘But the world has gone to shit and there’s a lot of stuff happening now that defies logic.’

  ‘That’s true,’ Pax agreed solemnly. ‘Telepathy. Mind control. Ip seein’ dead super hunters. That Ruler guy who didn’t kill Ip when he coulda. Plus BD and the bath full of water, and then there’s Gears dream when he was dead.’

  ‘No Pax,’ he said bluntly. ‘Ip wasn’t there, I was jus’ havin’ a weird dream while I was dyin’. And I know that ‘cos there’s no way Ted’s an angel of any sort. As for BD. The bath full of water was already there. Ya just didn’t see it.’

  ‘Yeah, you had a wet dream, Pax,’ TL added.

  ‘No, I didn’t,’ Pax argued. ‘I know what a wet dream is and that wasn’t one.’

  Snorting, he said, ‘You’re bit old for wet dreams, Pax.’

  Pax looked at him like he was an idiot and said,�
� Ya never too old for ‘em, Gears.’

  ‘Shaddup both of you,’ TL said rudely. ‘I don’t need that kind of overshare.’

  Agreeing with TL, he said, ‘Dreams are just dreams, Pax. There’s enough weird stuff goin’ on without worryin’ about dreams and Ip’s visions of dead super hunters. I’m just sayin’, maybe we need to start workin’ with the weird and not assume it ain’t happenin’.’

  ‘So, what does that mean, Gears?’ TL asked curiously.

  ‘We start assumin’ the weird stuff is gonna happen,’ he replied. ‘If I work from that assumption, then Ruler will be back.’

  ‘Oh yeah, that guys comin’ back,’ Pax said confidently.

  Puzzled by Pax’s confidence, he asked, ‘Why do ya say that?’

  ‘Cos he did too well,’ Pax replied matter-of-factly. ‘He enlisted people. Rebuilt the Ranch. Infiltrated us. Killed over a thousand people. Kidnapped Ip.’

  ‘That’s true,’ he observed. ‘And he did it with almost no effort. He did what we have to work day and night to do. It was weird.’

  ‘Yeah, someone like that doan die that easy,’ Pax said somberly.

  ‘So, what?’ TL asked. ‘How does that help us? We don’t know if he’s turned up for sure and, even if he did, where he is or how to find him? You’re chasing shadows, Gears, and that’s not like you.’

  ‘I’m not sayin’ we need to do much different,’ he replied reasonably. ‘I jus’ think we need to be more aggressive.’

  ‘Oh that sounds more like you,’ TL said with a laugh. ‘But how do we do that?’

  Having thought this through at length, he said, ‘We use the tools we have. If the world wants to be weird, then we get weird with it. Ip has abilities we don’t understand and we need to use ‘em. We can kinda talk to her through Isaac and we need to pair ‘em up. We can create more people like Ip. I know the designer virus is a bit hit and miss, but people are willin’ to be infected.’

  Pax grinned and said, ‘Interestin’. Ya gonna create two different armies. One usin’ conventional fightin’ tactics and another one that fights the weird.’