The Plague Forge (Dire Earth Cycle #3)

The Plague Forge (Dire Earth Cycle #3) Page 36

“He’s right. And there must be.”

“I wonder sometimes.” She shivered again. A few minutes later, an audible click from the cap spooler said the Helios was ready to go.

Chapter Twenty-Three

Darwin, Australia

31.MAR.2285

A small waft of smoke rose from the barrel of the gun in Kelly’s hand.

So swift had the motion been that Sam had no time to react. No time to dive toward Prumble and knock him out of the way, to take the bullet herself. No time even to wince or cover her ears as the bullet exploded from the barrel of the pistol and took flight, the retort from the weapon a single deafening clap that echoed briefly off the walls of the crowded room.

No time, even, to curse Kelly’s name once and for all. All Samantha had time for was the useless acceptance of the woman’s new name, Sister Josephine, Patron Saint of Bitches That Need to Die.

Sam started to turn and saw the body topple backward, dead eyes staring straight ahead.

Not Prumble. Kip.

The frail man’s stringy gray hair folded around his head like the embrace of Death’s own hands and he hit the floor with his arms splayed outward.

Skadz reacted first, a split second before Prumble. He rushed sideways behind Sam and tackled the nearest Jacobite guard.

Prumble, God bless him, flung his clipboard like a Frisbee straight into the face of the guard on his left. The thin, hard object caught the man right in his gaping, surprised mouth, and when he coughed in reaction a spray of blood came out. He fell, gurgling. Prumble had already moved on. He surged forward and to the left, swinging one meaty arm like a cricket bat, his flat hand slamming into another soldier just below the ear and sending him, eyes closed, to his knees.

Kelly fired her gun twice more, dropping another guard, before the man closest to her slapped the weapon away and raised his own rifle.

The initial fog of battle melted away and everything around Samantha seemed to slow down. She rushed straight toward Kelly, heard a gunshot behind her that surely had been meant for her own heart. Had she not moved, she’d be dead, and the guard who fired would have done so again had Skadz not swept his legs from under him.

Kelly and her assailant were locked in a tug-of-war over the guard’s rifle. Sam closed the distance in two wide steps, lowered her shoulder, and rammed into the man’s abdomen. He grunted, and miraculously held on as Sam lifted him off his feet. When his back slammed into the vault door, though, his grip failed as quickly as his lungs lost their air. The round door might as well have been a solid wall of stone.

Sam let the guard fall. Gunshots rang out behind her. Who was shooting she had no idea, so she dove, rolled, and came up with her own weapon in hand. The former broom handle wasn’t much, but the wood had a heft to it and it ended in a mess of splinters.

There was no one left to swing it at. Bodies of Jacobite guards lay everywhere. One that had fallen against the wall was in a sitting position, his brains splayed across the surface behind him in a splatter of gray matter and dark red blood. He slowly, slowly toppled to one side, the back of his skull leaving a neat curved smear on the wall.

Skadz and Prumble were eyeing Kelly, unsure if they should attack her or thank her. She smartly lowered her gun.

“Back on our team?” Sam asked her.

“Never left. But I figured this was the right time to make it official.”

“You’re a good actress, hon.”

She smiled, a hint of sadness in the crease of her brow. “Kip sold you out. I think Grillo knew, instinctually, that he was a mole after that business over at Selby Systems. He forced Kip to turn rat or face the alternative.”

Sam eyed the man’s body, and once again recalled the sound of Grillo’s knife plunging into that captive man in Lyons. At least this had been quick.

“When you landed, Kip called for help, and Grillo asked me to personally take care of the situation.”

“Is he here? In the building?”

Kelly shook her head. “I’m not sure where he is. Is that why you came? To kill him?”

“No,” Prumble said before Sam could. “We came for the thing inside that safe.”

Her eyebrows climbed up her forehead and she turned—they all turned—to watch as Prumble approached the massive gleaming barricade that was the vault door.

A small panel inset into the wall beside the round portal opened with silent grace when Prumble tapped it, revealing a numeric keypad within. Above the keypad was a small black square that emitted a dull red glow.

With two thick fingers he held down the buttons in the bottom corners of the keypad. Five seconds passed, then he tapped in a series of numbers before holding the two corner buttons again. At the same time, he crouched slightly and leaned down so his left eye was level with the black square. The red light pulsed. There was soft beep from the panel, then a startlingly loud noise from the door itself that reverberated within the room.

Prumble gripped the oversized handle in the door’s center and pulled. The whole thing swung outward in silent, languid motion. Inside, a series of recessed lights came on, revealing a large square room with bright white walls and a dark polished floor. The contents were haphazardly arranged. From neatly aligned lockers and shelves to disheveled wooden crates and even stacks of paper on one table. Stamped council notes, Sam guessed.

She ignored all of this. Her prize lay near the back. It looked exactly as it had the last time she’d seen it. A cube-shaped bundle of gray blankets, with rope holding them in place. Inside she knew would be a wooden crate, and within that …

Something else caught her eye. A familiar color at the edge of her vision. Sam glanced up and studied the small item on an otherwise empty shelf near her prize.

Sister Haley’s notebook, the original Jacobite holy text, in a zipper-locked plastic bag. Funny, Sam thought, that half the city probably cared more about the scribbling of a drug-addled teenager than an object sent by an alien race. She snatched the bag and stuffed it into her vest, imagining Grillo’s anger and dismay when he found it had gone missing, too.

Her attention shifted back to the bundle on the ground. Confirmation was needed, she decided. Sam untied the ropes and pulled the blankets aside, then unlatched the lid of the crate and peered inside.

Nestled within lay the alien cube. Sky-blue light still coursed through its strange geometric veins. “Found it!” she called out.

“Then grab it and let’s get the bloody hell out of here,” Skadz replied.

“Our chariot awaits,” Prumble added.

She retied the ropes and pulled the ends tight. The object weighed less than she remembered, but it still required both hands to move. An ache began to seep into her biceps by the time she reached the massive round door.

The others were already turning to leave, except Kelly, who stood staring vaguely toward the floor with one finger pressed to her ear. Sam hadn’t seen it before, but there was a small headset there, skin-pink in color. “There’s a problem,” Kelly said.

Sam set the heavy parcel on the floor and waited as her friend—how good it felt to use that word again—as her friend’s eyes danced left and right. Sam started to ask but Kelly held a finger up.

“Something’s …” She started to talk, then listened more. “I don’t … something’s wrong at Aura’s Edge.”

Sam’s stomach lurched.

“What does that mean?” Prumble asked.

Kelly was shaking her head. “I can’t … too many of them talking at once. Everyone’s in a panic.”

“Sounds like a good diversion to me,” Skadz said. “Let’s move; we still need to find—”

“Oh my God,” Kelly whispered. “Subhumans. Dozens of them, maybe more. Yes, a lot more. It sounds … God, I wish some of these idiots would shut up, I can’t hear anything. It sounds like they’re rushing the barricade. Some are in as far as the Gardens.”

Sam glanced down at the object by her feet. “Did it start when I picked that up?”

Kelly frowned, shook her head. “There was chatter before that, while we were dealing with these blokes. I was ignoring it.”

“Where’d they all come from?” Skadz asked. “I mean, the Purge—”

“Ancient history,” Prumble replied. “The survivors have been encroaching on the city ever since. You’ve been outside; you’ve seen them. “

Skadz gave a grudging nod. “Spread out, though. To come in all at once and reap havoc …”

“They’ve done it before,” Sam said. “Recently. When the aura was faltering. A new breed.” Her last word hung in the air.

“We have to leave,” Kelly said. “Now. They aren’t just wreaking havoc, they’re rushing toward Nightcliff. Toward us.”

Sam stood on the second-to-last step of the stairs that led back to the lobby, right behind Kelly. She held an unfamiliar rifle in her hands, borrowed from one of the dead guards below. Skadz had mercifully offered to carry the alien artifact, at least for the time being.

“Wait here,” Kelly whispered. Then she darted out beyond the shadowed space. The stairs on which Samantha stood were concealed somewhat by the lobby’s design. Two huge mirror-image stairwells curved up and around the slightly tilted column that protected the Elevator cord, which came up from somewhere below. This stairwell was tucked under and behind the two grand ones above, and Sam felt grateful for that. Unlike earlier, the lobby seemed to be buzzing with activity. People were shouting, barking orders. Booted feet clacked on the hard floors.

Kelly stood at the corner and studied the scene beyond, then ducked back and returned.

“The look on your face,” Prumble said, “implies we are screwed.”

“We’re screwed.”

Sam winced. “Tell us.”

After a sharp, deep breath, Kelly said, “They’ve sealed off the building, a line of guards just outside. Your aircraft lifted off already, the pilot spooked apparently—”

“What the fuck?” Skadz asked, speaking to himself. “He couldn’t wait five fucking minutes? He just left her?”

“The girl is not our concern anymore, Skadz,” Prumble said.

“Like hell she isn’t. We’ll bring her with us.”

“Forget it. Arkin made his choice. I’m sure he had his reasons.”

“Maybe they found her while we were in the vault,” Sam said.

Skadz replied through clenched teeth. “That’s bullshit and you know it. I’ll find her even if you guys won’t help.”

Prumble whirled on him, their faces centimeters apart. “You heard what Kelly said. The situation has changed. We need another way out of here or we’re all dead.”

The two men stared at each other for a long moment, Skadz biting down on his lower lip. Sam could see the titanic struggle going on behind his eyes. In the end he said nothing.

“Can we just make a run for it?” Sam asked.

Kelly shook her head apologetically. “Subs are already within sight of the gate at Ryland Square. The streets are in chaos.”

Sam leaned against the wall, mind reeling. “So close already?” Assuming the lump of alien shit that Skadz now carried had somehow called them, they would have had to hitch a ride on a bullet train to get here so quickly. The animals must have started earlier, but how? What could have triggered them? Our arrival? Doubtful. She’d been here before. So had Skadz, and Prumble for that matter.

Then she recalled the tremor, the rattling deep vibration that had shot up and down the Elevator cord as if it had been twanged like a guitar string. That had been thirty minutes ago, roughly. Enough time for the single-minded monsters, at least those already lurking in the dark places near Aura’s Edge, to rush toward the source of humanity’s survival. Why now, though? She couldn’t fathom what could trigger—

Yes, she realized. She could. “All five objects are in play,” she said.

The others were all looking at her. Kelly, confused. Skadz, quizzical. Prumble, eyes thoughtful and narrow.

Sam pointed at the bundle Skadz carried. “They’ve now all been removed from their landing sites, and somehow that’s signaled the subs to come. We felt the effect when we were coming in. That must have been Skyler, or Tania. The last one, picked up.”

“If that’s true,” Skadz said, “every sub in … well, shit, I don’t know, every sub—period—is coming for this. For us.”

“Don’t forget Skyler. And Tania.”

Prumble made a hush sound. “Fascinating, but now what?”

Worry flashed across Kelly’s face. She shook it off. “Everything’s been sealed up tight, and anyone who can carry a gun is out there, watching. Shooting already from the sound of it.”

“What do we do?”

Kelly opened her mouth, closed it. She held up her hands and shook her head, out of ideas. “It’s only a matter of time before Grillo realizes I haven’t checked in, and sends someone down to check on our little ambush. He may have already … shit.”

“What now?”

Kelly ripped the tiny radio from her ear and tossed it. “That answers that. I’ve been cut off. Grillo must suspect, or at least he thinks I failed and that radio might be in your hands.”

Skadz laughed, incredulous. “We’re sitting ducks here.”

“What’s plan B?” Sam asked.

“This was plan B, Sammy.”

“Fine. Plan fucking C then. Just … a plan. Anything.”

An excruciating silence followed. Four seconds, then Prumble spoke.

“We go up,” he said.