“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. “ThisProphet 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.
Ron rushed Azrael, his hand outstretched for Sammy. Before he could even touch her, Abaddon’s cutlass came down, separating the man’s head from his torso.
“RON!” another woman in a white coat yelled.
Sammy’s movements became weaker and slower.
“Is no one going to tell me?” he asked.
The other
