I skidded to a stop. When I turned back the other way, I saw another guy heading in my direction. They’d flanked me, and were closing in. I wasn’t going to make it to the ramp, and I couldn’t go back.
I put my foot on top of the nearest cage and heaved myself up. The woman inside stared as I grabbed the wire mesh above me and began to climb.
“She’s going up!”
“Load another dart, you stupid asshole!”
The crystal kicked in for real. The sweat that covered my body turned cold and sent a sick feeling into the pit of my stomach as every muscle came alive with a flood of pure chemical energy. My pulse revved as one foot slipped on the cage beneath it and I dropped, hanging from my hands for a second until I got my footing again.
A pop came from below, and something banged off the face of the cage next to me.
“Shit!”
The tower of cages swayed under my weight, but held as I scaled my way up past the first platform, toward the second, where Vamp was being held.
A gunshot boomed through the air, and a hole punched through the platform above me to my right. The people in the cages around me pushed themselves back, trying to get out of range, as I scurried past. The scaffolding shook now as the men below began to storm up the ramp, but to reach the second level they needed to traverse the whole platform first. I could get much higher, much quicker than they could as long as the crystal didn’t burn out first.
“Sam!”
Vamp had his back to the rear of his cage and was pushing against the door with his feet. The wire bowed outward, biting into his heels and drawing blood, but the latch wouldn’t give. My foot slipped again, a J-clip slashing my shin as I hauled myself up to the second platform where I pitched over the rail and rolled onto the wooden planks.
Looking down over the edge of the scaffolding, I saw a huge rendering vat through the haze of steam. It was a giant metal pit, embraced by slick, snaking pipes that kept its temperature constant. The inside was filled with a deep layer of bubbling ochre liquid littered with red-brown specks. Dark, glistening chunks were jumbled together on the surface, and among them I could make out bobbing hands and feet. Crisped skin puffed at the edges of cured, fried meat where the jutting ends of broken bones stuck out, white around a center of blackened marrow.
I pulled myself back up onto my feet as another shot went off, this time blowing a hole through the platform six inches from my foot. Two of the men had reached the base of the second ramp and were heading up to my level.
I bolted toward Vamp’s cage, reaching it just as Green-eyes appeared at the top of the ramp. Before I knew it he was on top of me, the barrel of his pistol an inch from my face.
“Sam!”
I swatted his wrist, knocking the gun aside in the same second it went off. Heat flashed against my cheek as the boom all but deafened my left ear and the smell of burned powder went up my nose. There was no time to think. It felt like electricity was coursing through my entire body, making me feel fast, powerful, and invincible, but when I kicked him in the ribs I got almost no reaction at all. I ducked under his arm and kicked him again, but he was heavy, and solid, and he didn’t even seem to care. It wasn’t like the movies. He didn’t go down. I couldn’t even move him.
I ducked down out of the way as he made another lunge for me, scooting behind him as he pitched forward. Still off balance, he tried to turn and bring the gun around behind him.
“You slippery little bitch!”
I rammed him with one shoulder before he could shoot, and he stepped backward, not realizing the ramp was so close. His ankle twisted, and he barked as it gave out underneath him. He fell back, his other foot slipping off the side of the ramp. He started to fall back, over the edge, and his gun clunked down onto the floor as he grabbed the scaffolding at the last second.
He started hauling himself back and I barreled into him with my shoulder. His hand slipped and he pitched back, grabbing at me as he fell. His fingers brushed my arm as I hooked one elbow around a metal support and he dropped down, crashing onto his back on the platform below.
“Sam!”
Vamp was in the cage just behind me. I felt along the top of the doorframe until I found the latch, then pulled the bolt free just as two more men topped the ramp.
The door crashed open and Vamp sprang out, going for one of the men without a second’s hesitation. He threw a punch and creamed him right in the eye, following up with a left hook even as the guy began to fall. He went down and Vamp turned to the other one, the one with the spiked hair, just as he raised his shotgun. Vamp saw it, took a step back.
“Vamp!”
Green-eyes’ pistol still lay on the platform where he’d dropped it. As the shotgun barrel zeroed in on Vamp’s face, I scooped it up and aimed down the sight.
It bucked in my hand as it let out an earsplitting bang. At first I thought I missed. The guy didn’t fly back or spray blood or do anything like what I thought might happen. He just kind of jerked once, like the sound of the shot had surprised him, and a little hole appeared in the middle of his chest. He stood, kind of frozen, with the shotgun still pointed at Vamp but not pulling the trigger.
The barrel listed to one side, and a big blob of blood grew from out of the hole before running down over his stomach in a dark trickle. He took a step back, and his eyelids drooped as the shotgun slipped from his hands and fell to the floor. A second later he fell down after it, crashing down onto the wooden planks.
Vamp stared as I stood there, the gun still held out in front of me. The barrel of the pistol shook as I looked down at the man’s body. Vamp stepped over it and approached me carefully.
“Sam…”
I couldn’t take my eyes away from the body.
“I killed him,” I said.
“Sam, come on,” Vamp said. “There’s more of them coming.”
I could hear them. They sounded far away, but down below I could see more men headed for the scaffolding. The captives were screaming to be let out, shaking the cages.
“Sam!” Vamp snapped. He grabbed the shotgun from the floor and shook my shoulder. The man he’d kicked had recovered, and was back on his feet. He reached back and pulled a pistol from where he’d tucked it in the waistband of his pants as several more armed men appeared at the base of the ramp behind him.
The air next to us warped suddenly, and the cage doors buckled. A point of white light appeared inside a ball of distortion and then expanded out into a hexagon-shaped portal as a figure stepped through it with his back to us. The gate collapsed, and the figure rose. I saw a length of spine running down under the smoke gray skin of his neck, and the two slowly shifting brains beneath his skull. The figure’s head turned, and I caught a flash of sunset pink.
Nix…
Vamp shook me again as something flickered in front of my face.
Sam, forgive me. I couldn’t let them do it. The message popped up on the 3i display, reeling across the air in front of me.
“Dragan,” I whispered.
Nix moved suddenly, darting out between us. Over his shoulder I saw the other two men reach the top platform, but that’s as far as they got. They both stopped short suddenly, like they’d hit an invisible barrier. My heart thumped rapid fire until the pistol, still stuck out in front of me, began to drift toward the floor as Dragan’s words continued to scroll past.
I know that you—
His connection dropped as one of the two men halted and grabbed his own throat. His feet came up off the platform, his toes dangling, as his cohort fell to his knees. He jerked, then with a meaty crackling sound his head twisted around completely. A second later his arms did the same.
“Sam,” Vamp said. He was looking at me and hadn’t seen. His voice sounded low, and thick, like he was talking in slow motion. “Sam, are you okay?”