“We’ve got incoming birds,” Beckham said through the tower door to Jacobs. “Do we have anything down there left to take them out?”
Commander Jacobs stepped out and shook his head. “The aerial-defenses were either destroyed or expended during the bat attack.”
“Shit,” Ruckley muttered.
“If they breach that, the Variants coming in from the west will flood downtown and command,” Jacobs said.
“Then we need to stop those choppers,” Beckham said. “Permission to take the M72 LAW rocket launchers and a Humvee.”
Jacobs thought on it a moment, but then nodded. “Take out those birds, but be careful, Captain.”
Beckham started down a set of stairs with the weapons as Ruckley hobbled after him. He lost sight of the choppers when he reached the street under the wall. They loaded up into the Humvee and took off, Beckham navigating around a few stubborn fires and craters from the bat attacks.
After driving with the pedal pressed against the floor, the inner gate with its two watchtowers came into view beyond a screen of smoke. He estimated he was only a quarter mile from the inner gate when he saw the two choppers that had been racing across the bay again.
This time, they had made it over where Horn and Timothy were supposed to be.
Muzzle fire flashed from the birds as door gunners swept their machine guns over the walls and the two watchtowers beside the gate.
With each passing second, the gout of gunfire over the defensive positions grew thicker, and Beckham feared soon it would be too late for Horn and Timothy.
He couldn’t lose them. Not now. Not after all they had been through.
You’re not going to lose them. You’re going to save them.
“See if you can get Horn on the radio,” Beckham said to Ruckley. “Tell him to meet us at the bottom of the gate and look for our Humvee.”
“On it,” Ruckley said.
While she tried to contact Horn, tracer fire pounded the first helicopter. The pilot banked hard to strafe the machine gun nest. The turning bird gave Beckham a clear view into the troop hold that was filled with Chimeras.
The beasts positioned in the open troop hold joined in with the door gunner to rain hell on the troops stationed in the towers and along the catwalks lining the walls inside the gate. As both choppers began to lower over the gate, the Chimeras pulled out their cutlasses, to prepare for hand-to-hand combat on the walls.
Beckham drove faster, but then slammed on the brakes around the next corner. The Humvee squealed to a stop behind the wreckage of an overturned semi-trailer.
“Out!” he shouted.
Ruckley opened the passenger side, and he jumped out and opened the back door to retrieve the launchers. As he grabbed one and threw the other over his back, Chimeras leapt from the two choppers, landing in the ranks of soldiers while swinging their swords. The crack of gunfire echoed over the cries of soldiers clashing with the Chimeras.
“Horn!” Beckham shouted. “Timothy!”
He scanned the soldiers now engaged in hand-to-hand combat across the walls and towers, but didn’t see either of his friends.
“Look out!” Ruckley said.
One of the Black Hawks suddenly swooped low, forcing them to take cover behind the Humvee as the door gunner let loose a spray of fire. Bullets cracked against the hood and windshield, peppering the side of their vehicle.
Beckham hunched down with Ruckley until the torrent was over.
The bird flew away and strafed the wall again, tracer fire lancing out in a violent spray. Rounds punched into soldiers fleeing for cover. Dead bodies tumbled back off the catwalks and smacked against the ground with sickening thuds.
The other Black Hawk was turning now too, coming back in for a second attack.
“Fuck, we have to hurry,” Beckham said. “We need a distraction.”
“I’ll do it,” Ruckley said. “You take them out.”
“How?”
“I’ll drive, you fire,” she said.
Ruckley got into the driver’s seat and fired up the engine. It groaned but turned over and she drove away.
Beckham pulled out the arming pin of the LAW rocket launcher, extended the weapon, and shouldered it. One of the choppers took Ruckley’s bait and turned away from the wall, giving chase. He lost sight of her and focused on the bird.
Beckham aimed, leading the cockpit, then squeezed the trigger bar. The rocket blazed from the tube. For a fleeting second, he feared he had missed, but the shriek of tearing metal sounded, followed by a low explosion. The rocket had punched right into the top of the troop hold.
With the screech of protesting metal, the bird plummeted sideways before bursting into a fireball against the pavement.
The second Black Hawk began to turn, but instead of going after Ruckley, it started toward his location.
“Oh, shit,” Beckham said.
He ducked for cover behind the overturned trailer.
Bullets pounded the sides, piercing the thin metal. He waited for the right moment before bolting away for the wreckage of a pickup truck with flames sputtering from under its hood.
Beckham had hoped the smoke would obscure the pilot’s vision, but the door gunner continued to pound his new location. Glass rained down on him as he flattened his body to the pavement and crawled under the back bumper.
The front wheels both exploded.
He had to move or he was going to die, pinned under a burning truck.
As he prepared to make his move, the bark of a second machine gun joined the fight. He clenched up, anticipating the fire, but the bullets weren’t intended for him. He slid out from the truck and watched as the door gunner tumbled out the troop hold.
The pilot pulled away, giving Beckham a perfect shot.
“Got ya, motherfucker,” he said, drawing himself up into a kneel and firing.
The rocket speared into the tail and sheared it off. The helicopter spun, tossing Chimeras out from the hold. Some survived the fall and tried to crawl away, but a Humvee swerved around a corner and slammed into them.
Ruckley gave a thumbs-up sign out the window.
“Reed!” a deep voice yelled.
Beckham turned back to the other truck, his heart flipping when he saw it was Horn and Timothy. Singe marks and ash covered their ACUs, but they appeared uninjured.
“We have to help reinforce this gate!” Horn said.
“Ruckley, keep the Humvee ready for us!” Beckham said.
He followed Horn and Timothy back toward the semi-trailer where they had a clear view of the fighting on the catwalks and watchtowers. At least ten Thrall Variants had climbed the walls from the other side of the gate and were leaping onto the catwalks to join in the skirmish, fighting beside the remaining Chimeras.
Most of the soldiers defending the gate appeared too young or too old to be fighting. As he ran, Beckham saw a boy no older than fourteen standing next to a guy with a white beard who had to be pushing seventy. The man held up a rifle to block a cutlass. The strike knocked him to his back on the catwalk. He shielded his face with a hand, and the Chimera cocked back his blade for the killing blow.
Before Beckham could unsling his rifle, a burst of gunfire erased the creature’s face.
“Nice shot!” Horn said.
Timothy adjusted his aim and then took out a Variant prowling toward a young soldier.
Half the Variants were at the top of the walls, mixing in with the Allied soldiers on the platforms.
“Watch your zone of fire!” Beckham shouted. He shouldered his rifle and went to work, sending bullets tearing through a few beasts still climbing over the lips of the walls. Three of the Chimeras dropped to their knees and aimed toward Beckham in response to the incoming fire. Before they got off a round, Horn’s M249 slung a fusillade of fire into their augmented bodies.
Timothy helped Beckham pick off the rest of the monsters one-by-one.
Their efforts were enough to regain control over the gate, and the surviving soldi
ers finished off the last few Chimeras.
Horn jogged over to Beckham, and they shared a brief hug. After pulling away, Beckham pulled Timothy into a hug too.
“Good timing, Captain,” Timothy said.
“Good shooting.”
The sounds of distant explosions and gunfire reminded him this was just one battle of many.
“Hold your positions and keep fighting!” Beckham yelled to the surviving soldiers along the wall. “This victory proves we can win!”
Beckham led the way back to the Humvee.
“Good to see your mug,” Horn said to Ruckley.
“You smell like always,” she replied. “But yeah, good to see you.”
Timothy chuckled as they jumped into the vehicle and started to drive back toward the command post. As Ruckley steered around the wreckage of a Black Hawk, the radio crackled with a chilling report.
“Breach on the seaborne wall! Reinforce immediately!”
“Fuck, we need to move,” Beckham said.
“We’ve got hostile choppers on the hospital now, too!” another voice stated. “Requesting immediate assistance!”
Beckham tried calling back on the radio, dialing it in to reach Kate, but there was no answer.
“No, no, no,” Beckham said, slamming his fists on the Humvee’s dash.
Horn put a hand on his shoulder.
“Ruckley, take us there now,” Beckham said.
“You got it, Captain.”
The Humvee sped down the debris-littered road. Beckham reloaded his rifle and tried to remain calm, but he struggled to contain his breathing.
“It’s going to be okay,” Timothy said. “We’ll save her.”
Beckham nodded, praying his young friend was right.
***
Azrael leaned out of the passenger seat of the MH-6 Little Bird helicopter, taking in the scent of burned flesh and death. Corpses littered the streets. Blood flowed freely.
It was a shame. Many of these humans could have joined the New Gods. But their ignorant and selfish leader had sacrificed them all in a futile attempt to preserve this pathetic country. Jan Ringgold was probably cowering deep underground, stubbornly hiding while she used her people as a shield of meat.
He would find her, and she would pay for this foolishness.
But first he was headed to Doctor Kate Lovato and her team. He had used the remote sensors his Scions had found in the Houston tunnels to track them down. It was a bit premature to be coming in this far to grab the scientist, but Azrael didn’t want to give her a chance to escape. Besides, other choppers were depositing collaborators and Variants around the island, and more of his forces flooded in from the breached walls on the eastern shore.
Twenty Scions from his death squads were already waiting on the hospital rooftop. They had made quick work of the few guards there.
The Little Bird touched down in the middle of the human corpses. Azrael strode out, the rotor wash kicking up his black cloak.
One of his Scions that had waited for his arrival knelt before him. “Prophet, we are ready.”
“Rise, Abaddon,” Azrael said.
The Scion stood again, facing him with golden eyes peering out behind a black mask.
“I want Kate and her team alive, but kill everyone else,” Azrael said. “Have all our ground forces in the area secure the exits.”
“Yes, Prophet,” Abaddon said.
Abaddon turned and led the death squads into the building, rushing down the stairs. From the pre-war schematics of the hospital, Azrael knew the clinical laboratory was on the second floor. That would be the most logical place for the science team to have set up their labs.
As Azrael followed his warriors into the building, he heard the cries of the injured. These helpless, weak humans would serve no purpose other than to feed his army.
He wasn’t sure why anyone would want to protect these breathing corpses, but a group of soldiers had set up a barricade of patient examination beds just inside the hall on the third floor.
“Kill them,” Azrael said.
A group of four Scions led by Abaddon scaled the wall, their claws finding purchase just like their Variant brothers. They maneuvered above the barricade and dropped behind the beds.
Agonized screams and the ripping of flesh echoed through the hallway. When those last dying moans grew silent, the four Scions emerged. Blood dripped from their maws and talons.
Azrael continued the trek down the hallway to a doorway that would take them to the second floor. As he passed patients, some of his forces peeled off to kill and feed. Azrael had given these humans all a chance to submit, a chance to accept his mercy. But Ringgold had refused, so he and his talented hunters showed them no quarter.
Some humans tried to crawl or scramble away, one of them running in front of Azrael. He reached out and grabbed the young man by his throat, lifting him up and crushing his windpipe. Then he tossed the limp body away.
His forces dominated any stubborn heretics foolish enough to fight them in the enclosed space, lashing out with their rifles and cutlasses when the skirmishes devolved into hand-to-hand combat. They churned through the facility like a wildfire devouring dry fields of grass.
A final group of soldiers had constructed another barricade in front of what looked to be the clinical laboratory. Abaddon waved his cutlass toward them, and the Scions charged. Bullets cut into their ranks, dropping a few, but the meat of the Scion ranks crashed into the barricade.
Patient beds tumbled. Chairs splintered and broke. Human soldiers fell back, screaming as the Scions pounced on them.
Azrael strode past them as his loyal followers ripped their flesh. His stomach growled hungrily as blood spilled over the floor, but his desire to find the infamous Kate Lovato exceeded his appetite.
He was close now.
As he stepped into the doorway, he spotted a group of scientists huddling in the back of the lab.
Azrael motioned for his soldiers. Together, they broke through the windows with their swords and rifles.
The Scions flooded in and surrounded the group. One of them was standing. To no surprise, it was exactly the person he had come here to see.
“Doctor Kate Lovato,” he said. “I’ve waited a long time to meet you.”
“And I, you, Doctor Charles Morgan,” she said.
“That name is no longer mine. Call me Azrael.”
“I’ll call you a monster, because that’s what you are.” She spat at him, hitting him in the face. One of his Scions grabbed her by an arm, his claws cutting through her white coat and drawing blood. She let out a surprised cry of pain.
Azrael roared and swung his cutlass right across the neck of the soldier. The Scion let go of Kate, pressing his fingers against the flap of bleeding flesh.
“I told you, no harm comes to her!” Azrael shouted.
The creature writhed as blood poured around his claws, and Abaddon dragged the disobedient soldier away.
“You don’t have to do this,” Kate said. “I know you were once a scientist who wanted to help humanity.”
“I am helping,” Azrael replied. “I offered mankind a way to evolve.”
“This isn’t evolution. It’s madness.”
“Ironic, considering you’re responsible for what you see before you.” Azrael gestured toward his Scions. “It was your bioweapon that altered my cure. It created the Scions and the Variants. And now you are trying to fight us, to make us extinct. Why do our lives not matter?”
“Because you’re trying to destroy all of us,” Kate said. “You preach about saving humanity, but you’re destroying it, Doctor Morgan.”
“That is not my name!” In a fit of anger, he shoved her.
Her head hit the wall with a heavy thud, and she collapsed. A woman with dreadlocks yelled out in surprise, bending to help.
“It’s okay, Sammy,” Kate said to the other woman.
To Azrael’s surprise, Kate pushed herself back to her feet unaided.
“I’m
trying to elevate humanity,” Azrael growled.
Kate rubbed the back of her head. “You cannot elevate humanity by turning us all into monsters or enslaving us.”
“I gave you a choice. All of you.”
“A choice of slavery or death, like you gave them?” She indicated the Scions with a wave of her hand. “How many of your people are sacrificing their lives needlessly to satisfy some grudge you’ve carried for over a decade?”
She turned to his Scions, appealing to them. “This Prophet of yours is nothing but a fraud. He’s using you because he’s angry about what happened to him, not because he’s ushering in some great future.”
A couple of the soldiers looked at Azrael, almost as if they were uncertain who to believe. The others growled at Kate.
“Ignore the heretic,” Azrael said as calmly as he could. She was no longer worth his time. He lunged forward and grabbed Sammy this time. “You care about this woman, don’t you?”
Kate said nothing.
Azrael picked Sammy up by the neck. She kicked her legs and pulled at his fingers, her mouth opening, trying to suck down air that she couldn’t breathe.
“Tell me where President Ringgold is,” Azrael said.
Kate held up a hand. “Please, let her go.”
Azrael tightened his grip, watching his victim turn pale.
“Tell me, or I will crush her windpipe,” he said.
Kate looked conflicted, her eyes flicking between him and Sammy.
“All I want is to talk directly to your president,” Azrael said. “If you don’t tell me, I will slaughter every living soul until I meet her. You’ll be helping your people by telling me exactly where to go.”
Sammy gasped for air, blinking.
“Tell me where the president is hiding now!” he yelled.
Gunfire cut him off, the sound ringing out from the hallway. He heard the screams of humans, Chimeras, and Variants, another battle raging in the hospital.
“Tell me!” he roared.
Sammy’s eyes were bulging now.
“Let her go!” a man yelled.
“Ron, stop!” Kate said.
Extinction Cycle: Dark Age Box Set | Books 1-4 Page 127