by Skyler Andra
“I warned you, Knoxe.” The warden’s eyes narrowed. “No more shit.”
An invisible hand clamped on the back of my neck and squeezed. “I’ll deal with it, sir.”
I had to get my team under control. They didn’t understand the shit storm we were in. Tor, Pascal and Nomical were not becoming between me and my goal to kill Styx. Earning the bounty points from Styx’s contract would help get my team and I closer to getting out of here. God, that’d be the big fucking cherry on top. But there was a good chance that avenging my friend might land me an additional sentence for murder. A necessary sacrifice.
“You better.” Vartros slid a report from one side of his desk to directly in front of him. “Or one of you, Eduardo, Devon, or yourself will be cellbound.”
Fuck. That was absolutely not happening. Period. Cellbound was code for stripped of leadership duties, refused missions, and living out the remainder of one’s sentence stuck inside the walls of the prison.
The warden studied the report with my name on the back of it. “What’s the status of your disciplinary course?”
Fuck. The mandatory course I’d had to study to improve my leadership, get a handle on unruly members like Tor—now Nomical as well—had fallen by the wayside because of the pressure to find Styx. Every day, he got further away from me, and I couldn’t catch up. Killing that bastard was more important to me than some stupid program I’d been assigned to because of Tor and Eduardo and his damn gang.
“I’m four modules in, sir.” Not even a quarter through it when I should have been at least halfway by now.
“Four?” His lips pressed into a fine line. “You should get up to date and soon.”
A rush of adrenaline hit. This management crap was hard work. Authority versus Responsibility. Human Resources. Autocratic, Democratic, and Laissez-Faire. I wanted to scream.
“If you’re struggling, I can get you some tutoring,” suggested the warden.
No. No fucking way. I didn’t need a tutor. Losers got tutored. “Thank you, sir, but I’ll get it done.”
Vartros shifted my report across the table. A copy for me. A damn reminder of my failure to live up to expectations and obligations. “Another thing, Knoxe.”
Fuck, what was it now? Another new team member? Scrubbing the toilets? Garbage collection duty? I just wanted to get to the laboratory, collect the results of Nomical’s test, and determine what she’d found yesterday. If it was a fresh lead on Styx, then I didn’t have time for prison politics or disciplinary action. I’d deal with all of that once I had Styx.
The warden laced his fingers together and rested his elbows on the desk. “I’ve put another team on the contract to find Styx.”
“Sir, please.” I splayed my hands wide. “You know how much this means to me.”
“Yes, I do. And I’m starting to worry that this is too personal. That your vengeance is making you blind to things a more objective set of eyes might see.”
I leaned over the desk, leaving a full set of my fingerprints on the glass. “Sir, no.”
He raised a hand. No amount of protesting was going to solve this. “Knoxe, please. The other team has followed two leads that you overlooked. Vital clues to Styx’s whereabouts.”
My heart stung with the piercing of Vartros’ betrayal. How could he do this to me? When he knew how much it meant? Worse still, he’d probably put Devon’s team on the contract. Fucking Devon. The warden was starting shit over this.
“My team and I have a fresh lead, sir.” My voice came out strained and tight. “Nomical found something. She collected a sample and submitted it to the lab.” I sounded like a child, fighting to get my toy back when it was confiscated for bad behavior.
The warden’s expression hardened. “Don’t fail.” He waved me out of the office.
“Yes, sir.” I snatched up the report, tucking it under my arm, and marching back to the laboratory. Time was ticking. I had to find Styx.
My whole body shuddered with an uncontrollable rage. If Devon and his crew found Styx I don’t know what I’d do. Lose my shit most likely. Along with the opportunity to kill Styx.
Machines flickered and beeped behind the counter. Marc, in a crisp white lab coat tried to manage them all, injecting a substance into one machine, then pressing a button on the next, and removing a small cup from another. I wanted to throw one of the machines across the room.
But before I could, a sentry stomped forward, wavering a baton at me. “Stand back,” he warned. Must have seen how pissed I was.
I did as I was told.
Marc glanced at me as he dripped liquid onto a glass plate, covered it with another, and put it under a microscope.
“Got our results yet, Marc?” I asked the technician with barely restrained rage.
I didn’t know him well, just knew he was in here for falsifying results back at the Shadows.
“Your report’s on the counter.” He didn’t look up from the microscope he peered into.
“Thanks.” I dug through the pile of reports, found mine, then flicked through it. The goo was a combination of mothman spit and vampire blood.
Fuck. Why didn’t I see this sooner? No wonder we couldn’t find Styx and his coven. They were using mothman spit to open portals. Probably back to the home world they shared. I jogged—near sprinted to the training room. Mothmen were crossing over. Vamps were using them as a cover. This was a hundred percent Styx behavior.
I lifted my wristwatch and pressed the side button so I could speak through my team’s dedicated comms channel. “Assemble at the watchtower in five.”
The watchtower was code for the evidence gathering room where teams scoured the media, social media and police reports for any strange occurrences, to stay alert about the presence of gantii and their potential locations.
I carried the lab results under my arm with my other report and met my assembled team. They waited for me in one of the Plexiglas-walled rooms. When I entered, they went silent and stood.
“Thanks for coming. Sit,” I ordered, and they each took a seat. Nomical at one of the three computers, Tor in front of the television, Pascal at the radio, and Raze by the scrying crystal.
I sat on the edge of the long metal desk.
I stared at Nomical until she squirmed. Tor shifted in his seat, his arms straight at his side. Pascal’s gaze was glued to the ground as usual. Damn Raze was the only smart one of the lot.
“Yesterday cannot happen again.” I jabbed a finger on the cold steel. “No more shit with those guys. I’ve already got the warden breathing down my neck. Got it?”
Tor saluted me. “Yes, boss. You got it, boss.” Smartass.
“Got it,” Nomical muttered.
Pascal just nodded and Raze grunted.
“I fucking mean it. Vartros has given Devon the Styx contract. And if you screw up once more, I’m cellbound.”
“Fuck.” Tor shook his head.
Okay. I’d beat that topic enough for one day. Time for some good news. “Results are in from the lab. Thanks to Nomical, we have a clue.”
Nomical’s eyes brightened. Hers was a keen observation, and a useful talent to have around if we want to track that bastard Styx.
I dropped the report on the table, and Tor grabbed it. “A mothman? And vamps. Fuck.” Tor shook his head. “Damn portal jumpers.”
Yep. Mothman were immune to the draining effects of vampires thanks to genetic evolution. Typically, they lived far from the vamp covens, and didn’t work together.
Nomical read something else she’d picked up from then table. When I realized I’d accidentally let go of the report the warden gave me, every blood cell in my body rushed to my cheeks.
“Uhh.” I snatched it out of her hands. “That’s mine.”
Her large blue eyes pinned me. “I can help you, if you need it. I’m good with study.”
Fuck. She was the last person I wanted to know I was struggling.
Burning up inside, I sat at the computer beside her because it was the o
nly spare seat. “Let’s scan the news for any indication of them. Raze you check the reports from the last two days. Tor check the local newspapers. Pascal you check the radio. Nomical and I will review social media.”
She sighed.
I grabbed the edge of her chair, dragging it closer to mine, and she gasped. “Watch and learn.”
A low heat rose up in my chest from the smell of her. Fruity like shampoo and sweet like candy. I had to rub from my jaw to chin to shake the sensation away and concentration. She was alluring and distracting. Things I didn’t need when I had to get my shit together to find Styx.
I opened up a program designed for the Guardians and typed in mothman and vampire. “We use this program to search for strange media report.”
She nodded, her eyes scanning the list of posts that the program filtered.
St Mary’s Catholic Primary School is shut down for the afternoon—a Facebook post from the school. I glanced at Nomical and her deep focus on the screen. The blue background reflected in her eyes, making them brighter, and I softened a little. Damn she was pretty.
Concentrate. God, I hadn’t been laid in over a year and I blamed the hormones.
I cleared my throat. “This is a good start.” I pressed a few keys, clicking through more status updates, all with plenty of comments and shares.
My kid’s classes were cancelled due to large bug attack.
St Mary’s staff denying there’s a bug attack.
“’My son was attacked at school and the principle is denying it!’” Nomical read the third aloud. “Over a thousand comments, shares, and posts about the incident. Word spreads fast.”
It sure did. Damn, we had a problem. What the hell was a mothman doing there anyway?
“We have to catch it before it creates more panic.” I jumped to my feet. “Team, collect your weapons. Grab extra Vitamin D and bullets ultraviolet light. Be ready in ten.”
In the vamp and mothman world, lit by a dim moon, they relied on darkness for nourishment. Ultraviolet light and Vitamin D were particularly toxic to them.
“We’re going to St Mary’s Catholic Primary School.”
***
Half an hour later, we pulled up on a side street, a few hundred yards from our destination. The school was smack in the heart of town, with apartment buildings on one side and commercial premises on the other. Basically, a shitload of witnesses all with social media accounts if things got out of hand.
A shot of adrenaline hit my blood, pumping through my chest as I jumped out of my car. I cracked my fingers and crossed to the trunk. They sometimes got stiff when I clutched the wheel too tight.
My team and I grabbed spare stakes, Vitamin D bullets, blades, and gin and tonic bombs from the compartments built into my trunk. All gantii were allergic to the gin and tonic mix.
“Pascal,” I called to him. “Scan for the mothman.”
Like earlier in the cemetery, Pascal projected different tones across the street, into the school. “It’s five hundred feet to the west.”
He rubbed the back of his head and winced.
“Good.” I tightened my hand on my gun. “Clear this place out.” We didn’t need any witnesses or victims.
Pascal struck a different tone. The sound he generated and propelled into the school, acted as a repellant to clear people out. Usually it gave them an urgent need to run away. His magical frequencies didn’t affect the Guardians because we had a layer of special material sewn into the chest of our uniforms, which absorbed the tone and nullified it.
I checked my watch, counting the seconds as they ticked away. C’mon!
By the two-minute mark, three people rushed out of the administration building at the front of the school, holding their chests, their faces contorted. At five minutes, teachers hurried children out onto the pavement outside the front of the school. My muscles twitched. I was desperate to raid the place and take this fucker out. Eventually a crowd of about two hundred congregated on the front sidewalk.
Pascal did a final check with his sonic powers. “All clear.”
Good. Time for us to enter and raise some hell.
Nomical stepped up and ran a dark painted finger over a stake secured in her belt. “I’ve never seen a mothman before.”
“They’re tall, hairy and ugly. That’s all you need to know.” She frowned, and pain stabbed me in the chest like I’d been the one struck by a stake.
I didn’t want to be a prick, but I couldn’t help it. I didn’t want her to get close. Didn’t want her to think I’d go easy on her because she was a girl. We were all warriors on this team. This job required a certain skill and a strong will, and if she wasn’t cut out for it, I didn’t want her. I wouldn’t be able to survive her death, too.
Twirling a stake in each hand, I watched my team. Raze’s hands clawed and his lips peeled back as if ready to tear someone’s throat out. Tor cracked his knuckles, eager for a fight. Pascal stroked his tuning fork and striking tool. And Nomical had one hand gripping the top of a stake so tight her knuckles whitened. She rolled her stiff and high shoulders, as if trying to shake off her fear.
God, we couldn’t afford any more screw ups. Our reputation suffered for letting Styx escape and Jaz die. The warden had put his trust in me. I couldn’t let him down.
“Pascal, you’re up.” I twisted my stakes again. The motion helped me focus and prepare. “Tell me this thing is still here.”
He repeated his little party trick, chiming his tuning fork and tone bar. His head rocked back and forth as if listening to music. “West,” he said. “Three hundred feet. In the maintenance shed.”
“Move out,” I commanded, taking the lead with Raze by my side, Pascal, Tor, and Nomical behind me.
I jumped over the locked gates and marched across the carpark outside the administration building. Nomical struggled, and Tor lifted her over.
“Thanks.” She flashed him a smile and a streak of jealousy burned through me.
What the fuck Knoxe? I didn’t have time for that crap. I had a monster to take down, a vamp to catch for killing my best mate.
We passed the staff rooms and turned a corner, bypassing a set of double story classrooms.
“That was amazing, Pascal.” Nomical said from my left flank. “What can’t you do?”
“Fuck whilst listening to Drake,” Tor joked.
Pascal started to hum. Fuck. Not this again. We didn’t need this right now. The mention of the singer and his God-awful music set Pascal off. I spun on my heel, and Tor almost collided with me. Behind him, Pascal rocked back and forward.
Nomical touched the top of his arm and whispered, “It’s alright, Pascal.”
“Look what you did, dickhead,” I growled at Tor. “Get your act together. We’re about to hunt a mothman, for fuck’s sake.”
Tor’s eyes blazed greener. “I’m just trying to acclimatize him. Jaz said it helped.”
“There’s a time and a place.” After the shit he’d pulled, the mistake he’d made, trying to show off, cost us Jaz’s life, I wasn’t going to put up with it any longer. I was not losing another man…or woman…
The others stared at me like I’d lost my shit, but I didn’t care.
“Knoxe,” Raze growled, putting a rough and calloused hand on my shoulder.
But I avoided his gaze.
A part of me wanted to grab Pascal and soothe him. But I couldn’t. I didn’t have any heart left to give when I felt dead inside.
Nomical watched us all, probably trying to determine the team dynamics. News flash. There wasn’t any. We were a broken unit barely holding on, and I didn’t know what to do to keep us together.
“Aww, I’m sorry man.” Tor threw an arm over Pascal’s shoulder and hugged him. “Beethoven’s symphony number nine.”
At this, Pascal calmed, humming the music and slowing his rocking.
“You all right, buddy?” Tor squeezed and shook Pascal at the same time, and he nodded.
“Good,” I said, scanning the gym bu
ilding ahead and the maintenance shed squeezed between it and what looked like the border’s residence facility. “Let’s split up. Raze, you’re with me, and we’ll sneak past the gym and attack if from the East. Tor you’re with Nomical. Keep heading due West. Pascal you’re my backup from the South. Got it?
“Keep in contact on the coms,” I said, jerking my head at Raze, and we left the others, tackling the school from the opposite direction.
It was an understatement to say a lot rode on capturing this gantii. I just hoped we could get through this without another screw up.
Chapter 19
Astra
Thank God Knoxe hadn’t noticed this time. The other day he’d chewed my ass for turning up for a mission with two stakes and my rune blaster missing. Right after I’d replaced them, locked them away in my locker, they went missing again.
Dammit. Someone in my team was playing with me. Trying to piss me off. Mission accomplished. I hadn’t worked out who it was yet. Tor gave me the distinct impression of being a prankster, and I had my eye on him. But something about this felt sinister, like the thief wanted me to fail. All fingers pointed to Knoxe. Once I had proof, there was going to be hell to pay.
Tor led the way through the school grounds. “This way, Supergirl.”
Sticking close, I tucked one of my stakes under my arm then flexed and unflexed my fingers.
Sporting fields and basketball courts to the left. Homes to the right. I couldn’t see the rear. But if the mothman escaped we were screwed. We’d never find him here.
The Guardians were a unit, familiar with each other, accustomed to working together, playing together, functioning and battling together. A collection of pieces that fit. Even if they were jumbled at the moment, once they’d been great. They still had potential.
And I was the newcomer, a wild card who’d have to learn her place in the unit and how she fit in. My stomach crunched. I was an intruder. Unwelcome. Unwanted. Uninvited. Knoxe was gunning for me. My heart stung. I was completely alone here and I missed my life at the Shadows even more. My friends. My family. My old room.