“Something new that Morgan’s and Sharpe’s teams are field-testing to use on civilians who get in the way. Rubber bullet with a tiny shatter-tip that injects victims with a sedative capable of knocking them out and impairing their memory of the incident.”
“Impairing memory,” I repeated, and took the gun. I hated guns, but the new rounds were impressive. As impressive as our a-c rounds and their ability to make a flesh wound fatal through the injection of an anticoagulant. “It’s a roofie bullet?”
Wyatt snickered. “Yeah, basically. Like I said, it’s being field-tested, but I’d rather send you in with that than with something that could kill.” They were still our allies.
I tucked the gun into the front of my jeans and covered it with the hem of my T-shirt. “Guess we should do this thing. Time’s wasting.”
“Be careful.”
“You know me.”
“Be careful anyway.”
Familiar banter that should have been easy was slightly strained by what had happened at the cabin. I shook it off and assumed the position. Phin drew up behind me, his warm chest to my back. Locked arms around my waist and held me closer. His heartbeat thrummed, faster than mine.
A cyclone of air swirled dust and grit, and then we were shooting up, rocketed by the strength of Phin’s wings. My legs dangled, helpless, and I struggled to keep from kicking. The parking area disappeared, replaced by the low tops of trees. Very low tops. Leaves and pine needles rustled beneath us as Phin flew hard and fast toward our destination. The wind beat against my face, cool and crisp here in the mountains.
It was nothing like the other two times I’d been flown by a Coni. This time I felt free, as if I were soaring through the air on my own wings, heedless of the world and its stresses. Was this what it felt like when Phin flew as an osprey? Was he going anywhere close to his maximum speed? I wanted to ask, but sound roared in my ears and would have stolen my voice.
Up and down, cresting one peak and swooping down the other side, he flew us onward. I imagined unsuspecting campers below suddenly looking up and seeing two people coasting above the treetops. I laughed. Phin made an indeterminate sound that rumbled from his chest into my back.
“It’s coming,” he said all too soon, mouth very close to my ear. “Prepare yourself, and I will say when.”
I closed my eyes and tugged on a visual of the first sublevel. The carefully described storage closet at the south end of the corridor. Two rows of metal shelving inside, full of supplies. An empty area near the door, kept clear so carts could be brought in to load supplies. Pale yellow tiled floor, gray walls, plaster ceiling. I held on to that, then cast my line for loneliness. With the tension still palpable between me and Wyatt, it was easy to find. My tap to the Break sparked and fizzled, ready. And still we flew.
“Now,” Phin said.
I pushed my energy toward him deliberately this time, caught it around him like a net, and pulled us both into the Break. Behind my eyes, a steady throbbing began, the lightest start of a headache. We shattered apart like a shotgun pellet, invisible pieces hurtling toward the image in my mind. Faster, faster. The throb increased to a slight pounding as we moved through solid walls. Almost there.
A tang of astringent cleaning products announced our expulsion from the Break. My knees wobbled, and I would have fallen without Phin. Warmth trickled down to my lip from my nose. The pounding remained, flashing colorful lights behind my eyelids. I shuddered; Phin pulled me tighter to him.
“Are you all right?” he asked.
“Woozy. I just need a second.” Two deep breaths later, I blinked my eyes open. The room didn’t tilt. Nausea was ebbing again. My wrist-ache was tolerable. I tapped Phin’s arm and he let go. The nosebleed had already stopped, and I swiped at the remnants. The occasional tiny tremor still stole through my guts, but for the most part, I was fine. Not too bad for my first long-distance transport.
We’d landed exactly in front of the storage room door. It had a simple aluminum knob. Yellow light spilled through beneath in a narrow line. I pressed my ear against the smooth metal.
“The hallway is empty,” Phin whispered. Excellent hearing was a species perk. “I hear muffled voices to our left, about twenty feet away, behind a door. Unless the rooms are soundproof, no one else is on this level.”
“Terrific.” I turned the knob, grateful it didn’t squeal. Neither did the hinges. With my heart in my throat, I led Phin along our predetermined path. Right and down three doors to the stairwell. Each step seemed to ring loudly, even though my sneakers were mostly silent on the clean linoleum. The astringent odor followed us into the stairwell, its door as squeak-free as the other.
We descended past sublevel 1—marked by a simple white plaque next to the landing door—and made our way to sublevel 2. Same plaque, new problem.
“Shit,” I muttered. A numbered keypad was fixed below the plaque, and the door looked mechanized. Tighter security around the beasties. “I don’t suppose you know how to override one of these?”
“I’m sorry, I don’t.”
“Then let’s hope no one’s standing on the other side of the door.” I grabbed his right hand with my left; he gave the gentlest squeeze and said, “I hear no one close by.”
Good enough. I oriented, then dragged us both into the Break, through the door, and back out the other side. The throb became a relentless pounding, a single hammer knocking at the front of my skull. But Phin was right—the room in front of us was empty of human beings. The same couldn’t be said for other things.
It looked like a dog pound from Hell. Cell after cell lined the walls both left and right. Cement blocks made up the floors, ceilings, and partitions, with thick iron bars for doors. The things inside them snuffled, shifted, snorted, and growled. A maelstrom of odors wafted toward us, cloying and intoxicating and thick. Phin made a soft gagging sound. I gave the hand I was still holding a gentle squeeze. I didn’t envy him his sense of smell.
Four metal gurneys, each one bolted to the floor, took up the majority of the room’s center. Each one had overhead lights, rolling trays full of equipment, and individual drains in the floor. I stared, struck by just how similar it was to the morgue in which I’d first woken up, three weeks ago. Really similar, because one of the gurneys wasn’t empty. A white sheet covered a lone figure, its actual shape or species impossible to guess.
“Should we check each cage?” Phin asked.
“Only if you want to have nightmares tonight.”
I’d seen some of the abominations Thackery had created—a small child with oily black skin and a prickly dorsal fin down its spine; the living corpse of a house cat with fangs longer than my thumb. I’d heard wings flapping, animals growling, monsters hissing, and skin squelching.
Near us, something gurgled. I glanced at a cage and just as quickly looked away. All I’d seen were its snakelike yellow eyes, swimming in madness.
I approached the gurney, drawn by morbid fascination, and lifted the sheet. A familiar face lay beneath it— one I’d seen many weeks ago in Tovin’s underground lab. Once a teenage boy, half his body had been turned to stone, rendering it immobile and useless. Seeing him there, dead, his human side cold and gray, churned my insides into a mass of quivering anger. We hadn’t been able to save him.
“Fucking hell,” I said, then spun in a complete circle. “Token?” My voice bounced. Something growled, while another something made a high-pitched hissing noise. “Token?”
“Master?”
I cringed, then followed the sound of the call. All the way to the last cage, past glimpses of red skin, scales, shiny teeth, and swiping claws. Token bounced to the front of his cage and wrapped bandaged hands around the bars. His face was a puzzle of cuts and bruises, a horrible reflection of the patterns on his bare chest and arms. I knew they’d torture him for information, but for some reason I couldn’t understand, seeing it made me sick.
“You came,” he said. “Knew you would, knew it.”
He was getting loud. I shushed him. “I need to ask you an important question. Will you answer me?”
“Token answer, yes.”
“Do you remember the place you used to live? With your old master, the human man named Thackery?”
“Yes. Took me away, told me to hunt and kill.”
Yeah, I remembered that part. “Token, if I take you to the place where he left you, do you think you can find your way back? Can you smell a path to your old home?”
His brown, too-human eyes widened. Narrowed as his brow furrowed. “Can try, yes. For new master, yes.” He shifted his attention behind me, and those haunting eyes widened to comical proportions. “Angel.”
