Black Dawn

“No!” she screamed, and struggled to get free. She lost the shotgun in the process, but it didn’t matter now; the only thing that mattered was she had to make him understand that they had to go back. She kept screaming as the walls flashed by at nightmare speed, and there was a sound around them that drowned out even her own anguished cries, something brutal and triumphant and terrible. There were draug, too. She could see them coming for them, but Myrnin fired his shotgun one-handed to clear the way and never stopped, never faltered. “No, go back!”

Then they were outside, and Michael and Eve were in the truck’s driver and passenger seats. Claire saw them in a tear-streaked blur as Myrnin passed them, opened the back door, and flung her bodily inside. He entered, slammed the door shut, and shouted, “Go! Now!”

“Where’s Shane?” Eve asked. She’d turned, staring, and the dawning horror in her eyes was nothing to the blackened fury and terror inside Claire. She grabbed for the door, but Myrnin held her still.

“He’s gone,” Myrnin said, never taking those dark eyes away from Claire’s face. “Shane is gone.”

Michael’s face was grim and ashen. “We can’t just—”

“He’s dead,” Myrnin said, and it was as cold and cutting a thing as she’d ever heard him say. “He’s dead and you will kill us all if you don’t get us out, now. Do you want to see what your pretty Eve will look like in their pools as they strip her down to the bones? Because I promise you, Magnus will make you watch.”

Michael flinched, and hesitated, and then …

Then he put the truck in reverse and no matter how Claire tried to scream, fight, stop him, he drove away.

And left Shane behind.

CHAPTER SEVEN SHANE

When the draug’s liquid surrounded me, flowed over me like syrup, everything just … whited out for a few seconds. And then it went black.

And then I just … woke up.

It surprised me how easily I got away.

One second I was trapped in that sticky, thick, stinging liquid—death by drowning in jellyfish—and the next I was clawing my way free, up, and finding the edges of the bubble that held me prisoner. I got my hand out, then my elbow, and then my face broke the surface and I gasped for air as I slithered completely free. I was slimed and disgusting, and I was stung all over, but that didn’t matter. I slipped in the thick draug residue and tried to follow Claire down—but part of it split off and came back for me.

I went up instead, taking the steps two and three at a time. Outpacing it.

I made it back to the second floor and then kept going, because the door I’d braced was shuddering and there was liquid flowing around the edges. The draug were very angry.

Top floor.

I hit the exit door hard and stumbled out onto the decking. This area was mostly offices, locked doors, and I needed to get to the main stairs in the center. I needed to find Claire and Michael and Eve and get the hell out of here, now, before the draug caught up to me again … but the thought did cross my mind that if they were after me, maybe that would give everybody else a chance to get clear of them.

That would be okay, if so. Not that I wouldn’t rather live, if it came down to it.

There didn’t seem to be any draug sliming their way toward me, which was a temporary blessing. My clothes were soaked, and the stinging just got worse, as if I was rolling in a million tiny shards of glass. I could see the pink wash of blood spreading through the damp fabric of my shirt. I needed to get clean and dry, fast; whatever bits of draug were still on me were trying to feed, and I had no idea what that would mean. What if they got inside me? I had a vision of chest-bursting alien parasites that made me want to puke up the taste of rotting slime.

For a fraction of a second, that felt so real it was terrifying. They’re eating me. Eating me alive. And then a kind of strange calm settled in, because I was okay, I was alive, I was going to make it. I just knew it.

Because I was Shane Collins, and the fact that I was still alive was an ongoing miracle anyway.

But the clothes had to come off.

I kicked open an office door and found a locker that held extra coveralls. I stripped down to the skin, toweled off with a sports flag pinned to the wall (finally, a good use for a TPU souvenir), and put on the coveralls. They were a thick orange paper with reflective white strips on the sleeves, back and legs, and they just barely fit me. If I did a lot of bending, it was going to get interesting, but ripped pants were the least of my worries. The stinging died down to a dull, constant ache, and I found a pair of heavy work boots that were only a little small. I left them untied.

Then I tried for the main stairs.

No good. The draug were in the way. They had resumed their human disguises, and all of them were moving purposefully toward the front exit—where the truck was parked, probably still waiting for me because I knew Claire wasn’t going to leave without me. Michael and Eve wouldn’t want to, either, but Myrnin? That plasma-sucking asshat would dump me in a hot second, and I knew it.

“Over my dead body,” I whispered, but very, very quietly, because that was all too likely right now. So I couldn’t go down.

That left up, to the roof.

The stairs I’d taken to get here had no up, but there were things on the top of the building—air conditioners, at least—that people needed to repair, so there had to be access somewhere. I found an evacuation plan beside the silent, dead elevator, and it showed roof access on the other fire stairs. I headed that way, moving as quietly as I could. The draug didn’t seem really interested in me now, but that could change at any time. I needed to get to Claire, to make sure she was okay. She’d run downstairs, and maybe she’d gotten away, but what if she’d run into another trap? What if they had her?

I found the roof door. No locks, but it was alarmed, according to the big red sign. Great; pushing it meant that I was giving the draug a big neon sign that said IDIOT ESCAPEE HERE. Not much I could do about it, though; it was either sound the alarm and hope to find an escape, or stay here and hope I could play keep-away with things that vampires found horrifying and wrong.

I pressed the exit latch on the door. The alarm sounded a shrill, monotonous drone that hit me like an ice pick through the ear, and I ran for it. The shoes felt weird on my feet, molded to some other guy’s balance; the wintery chill and damp quickly soaked into the thick paper jumpsuit, and I had a mad second’s worry that it was just going to dissolve around me, like tissue, leaving me running around naked in work boots on a roof while the draug pointed and laughed before eating me.

Something was eating me. For a white-hot second, I felt the sting, but that wasn’t right. I’d changed clothes, I’d wiped down. There might be draug residue, but it wouldn’t be enough to hurt me.

I was okay.

Overhead, thunder boomed and lightning danced in the clouds.

I made it to the edge of the roof and peered over. There was no railing; this wasn’t some terrace or balcony—it was just tar, gravel, and a sharp drop for three floors, straight down to a parking lot.

And a big, square, gray armored truck that was still sitting right where we’d left it. Of course they were okay. I believed it, I knew it. Just like I knew they wouldn’t leave me behind.

Stinging. A breathtaking wave of it, again, flashing over me and then fading into a wave of calm. Everything is okay. Look, they’re here. They’re waiting for me. We’re okay.

I saw the driver’s side door open and Michael step out on the running board. Even in all that gray, dim light, his fierce grin glowed right along with his blond hair. “What’s with the prisonwear?” he shouted up.

“You know me. I’ve spent so much time behind bars I miss the fashions.” I looked at the drop. It didn’t get