Dead Awakenings (25 page)

“Do me a favor, Evaine, if possible,” Aron said.

“What’s that?”

“Try to keep one of the doctors alive this time. Luca and Victor get so amped up in there that we rarely get anyone out alive but the newborns. The couple of times we have managed not to kill all the doctors, they haven’t made it to the house before succumbing to their injuries. If we could take one alive and relatively unharmed, it would be great.”

“I’ll do my best.”

Aron took out two yellow bottles of Isis and handed one to her. She gulped it down; she needed all the help she could get.

Luca and Victor came back for them ten minutes later. “It’s just like when we left yesterday,” Victor said. “The only difference is that the trucks are gone and so are the dogs. They’re packing up; they must think that we aren’t coming this time.”

“Which is good. It means we have the element of surprise,” Luca said.

Ronan finished with his pack, and Raze and Kade picked up the other two packs. The group started off down the road. Luca, Evaine, and Victor followed behind. They had gone about a quarter of a mile when they reached a fenced lot. In the middle was a large abandoned building. It looked as if someone had started construction and then stopped. The bottom had been mostly completed up to the third floor. Everything above was open, covered only with ripped plastic.

They approached a corner of the lot on the closest side to the road, where the rest of the group waited for them. Evaine had difficulty being quiet while walking. The ground was littered with wooden two by fours, nails, small pieces of metal and other building materials she didn’t recognize. The group got into formation with Luca and Victor in the front. Luca was busy with getting everything ready. She could feel his intensity. His feeding had amped him up.

She decided to test her ability since her practice sessions hadn’t gone so well when he’d been away. She located a two by four and gave it a little shove. It flew five feet and landed with a loud thud. Everyone turned.

“Sorry,” she mouthed.

“Let’s go.” There was no smile on Luca’s face, no joking, only focus. Luca and Victor headed off to the hole they’d cut earlier in the fencing. Quietly, they shimmied through, trying not to snag on the loose wire. They crouched on the other side. Evaine could feel the breeze on her face, but heard nothing. It was as if the world was on pause, waiting to see what would happen. She made her way through the fence, and Luca tensed.

“Wait.”
A silent communication passed between Luca and Victor. Victor nodded. Luca turned and communicated with Quinten, who nodded and communicated the plan to everyone else.

Evaine waited as Luca and Victor crept silently further into the yard. She could feel Luca as he got farther away from her. There was a muffled thud and a small cry, then silence. Her hearing and eyesight sharpened. Next to the building two figures stood at a side door, under a floodlight. Victor opened the door and looked inside as Luca continued to scan the surrounding area. Evaine could barely contain her anxiety, then she heard Luca.

“It’s clear now; tell everyone to come on.”

Slowly they moved into the yard. She passed the first security guard on the ground; his neck was at an odd angle. It made her wince. The next guy wasn’t so lucky, a knife protruded from his chest. The smell hit Evaine in a wave. It was all she could do to keep herself from falling on the dead man and devouring him. She knew she had to resist, but she took a step toward him anyway. Immediately she heard Luca’s voice in her head.

“Stop!”
He was several yards away, but she knew he could feel her just the same. She bared her teeth at him, and he stepped closer. All of her senses were completely heightened now.
“This is why I told you to eat before you came, but you refused. Now come to me.”

Hunger and reason fought inside her. She wanted to give into the hunger, but this was a person, she reminded herself. A dead person, but still a person. A human. She looked at the man again and almost stepped toward him, but at the last second she walked to Luca instead. Uncertainty emanated off of him.

“I’m fine. I can control it.” She glared at him hard until he nodded his head. She hated lying to him, and she was pretty sure he knew she wasn’t fine. She stepped to the side, away from Luca’s prying eyes, and waited to enter the building.

Raze and Kade peeled off from the group and took weapons out, guarding the door just outside of the area where the floodlight lit. Victor held the door open. When Raze and Kade were in place Victor went through, followed by Luca. Evaine came next and finally the rest of the group. They walked down the unfinished hallway, a sick feeling surfacing in the pit of her stomach. She was reminded of the night that Luca had come and taken her out of a similar building. A small itch of panic scratched up her neck. Luca slowed down and turned to her. She shook her head and told him to keep going, afraid that if she didn’t keep moving she might go into a full-blown rage and freak out on everyone.

They rounded a corner and came to a stairwell. She gave the door a small mental pull; there was no one on the other side. Taking the stairs down as far as they would go she again pulled a door open. The group stepped out into the hall; it split in both directions. The sound of water dripping down pipes could be heard from above. The smell of stale air filled her nose. Trash littered the hallway, as if squatters had once lived in the unfinished building. Victor, Luca, and Evaine went right. The rest of the group went left.

* * *

Tristan waited by the fence, scanning for movement. He had stopped his car a half mile away and waited ten minutes before getting out and walking down the dirt road to the abandoned building
.
He hadn’t expected to drive all the way to Boston. But nothing was stopping him now.

Following the chain link around the perimeter, he found a cut in the links big enough to fit through. What the heck were they doing in there? Tristan’s blood chilled at the next thought. They were making more like Evaine. The anger rose inside of him. He had to stop Luca and get Evaine back.

A cry rang out. Two men burst from the building into the yard and two more men stepped out of the shadows and attacked. Tristan bolted down the side of the fence, glad he hadn’t made a run for the door. He had to find another way in. Yells of pain and a gunshot from the fight only fueled Tristan’s adrenaline. A hundred yards away he slowed to catch his breath. He really had let himself go these past few months. It showed in the weakness he felt in his legs and the burning in his chest. Tristan searched for another hole in the fence, no longer able to hear the fighting over the pounding of his own heartbeat. He came to a downed section of fencing and hesitated for a minute. He stepped over the chain link and ran for a broken window on the bottom level of the building.

* * *

Evaine, Victor, and Luca continued down the hall until it branched off. To the left lights flooded out into the hallway. Victor headed down first. Several voices and screams drifted down from the lit room. The newborns were awake. Victor charged his energy, and the lights overhead flickered momentarily. Halfway down the hall two men walked out of a room carrying a screaming newborn in a strait jacket. They struggled with her so violently that they didn’t even see Evaine or the other two.

Luca backed up, shielding Evaine, as Victor let out a kinetic blast. The men fell to the floor in a heap, but the newborn was unfazed. She charged Victor. The guards got to their feet as Luca ran straight at them. Without even thinking Evaine lifted the newborn into the air and pinned her to the wall. Luca continued right by her to the two guards and was on them in an instant. He snapped the neck of the first before the other man could even get to his feet. The second man was behind Luca. Evaine let out a yell but it didn’t matter, Victor was on it. Knife in hand he quickly plunged the blade into the second man’s neck. Evaine heard the crunch and smelled the blood before the dead man hit the floor.

The newborn thrashed against Evaine’s mental hold, yelling obscenities at the top of her lungs. Luca walked up to her, trying to communicate. She stopped and glanced over at the dead men. Luca shook his head, and she began again with her string of profanity.

“Put her in that room and lock the door.”
Luca motioned to a door across from where Evaine stood. Evaine dragged the girl down the hall, opened the door with her hand, and pushed her inside with her ability. They could hear the voices from the room more clearly now. There were five, maybe six people inside. Victor walked forward as quietly as possible and took a look around. He motioned to Luca, who in turn told Evaine.

“
Three guards, one doctor, and two newborns. Victor will blast everyone; he and I will enter the room. You stay in the doorway till we assess what’s going on. Help if you feel you need to. Otherwise, stay out of the way.”

His impersonal nature hurt for a moment, then she remembered he was on pins and needles. Not just because of the mission, but because she was here. She tried to send him a calming thought to sooth his fears, but he shook his head and she stopped.

Victor was first through the door. She heard a shout and then a moment of silence. Luca ran in as Evaine headed in. Everyone was on the floor, including the two newborns. The guards were the first on their feet. Luca charged them, caught the first in the chest, and knocked him back down, but the second was on him from behind, wrapping his arm around Luca’s neck. Evaine wanted to help, but she was afraid of hurting Luca. Everything moved so fast she was unsure of what to do. Victor struggled with the third guard, who was almost as large as he was. His knife had rolled across the floor, and he was engaged in hand-to-hand combat. She wasn’t sure who was winning.

Out of the corner of her eye Evaine saw a woman in a lab coat coming toward her. Before Evaine could react the woman stabbed her in the arm with a syringe. Evaine roared in pain. Picking her up, Evaine pinned the woman to a chair, pushing the chair deep into the corner. Pulling the syringe from her arm she threw it on the floor.

“What the hell did you do that for?” Evaine growled between clenched teeth.

The woman didn’t speak. Evaine kept waiting for a feeling of numbness or drowsiness to overcome her, but nothing happened. The woman’s face was oddly familiar, but in the chaos Evaine couldn’t place it.

Within a minute Victor and Luca had subdued the other two guards, dragging the bodies into the corner. It was over so quickly that Evaine was still on a high from it all.

It took her a moment to realize the newborns were missing. She looked around the large makeshift hospital room. She’d seen them when she had first come in, but now they were gone. As Evaine’s eyes traveled over the surfaces of the equipment and the hospital beds with the straps, memories of being held captive flooded her mind. Her rage built quickly. These people had done this to her. They had done this to all of them.

Luca was able to coax one of the newborns out from under the bed. He was talking to him when Quinten and Aron arrived. Soon followed by Trey and Ronan.

Evaine’s rage cooled at the sight of them. She watched as Luca got a female newborn to come out from her hiding spot as well.

“Nice work.” Victor squeezed Evaine’s shoulder where the syringe had stuck her. “We’ve never been able to get one alive before. And since they didn’t have time to destroy the computers, hopefully Ronan will get some information off them.”

The woman pinned in the chair looked terrified and defiant. Her lips clamped together hard as if she were trying to keep words from popping out of them.

“She stabbed me with that syringe on the floor,” Evaine told Aron. He picked it up and looked at it.

“That’s weird, it’s empty. She must have been using it as a weapon.” He threw it back down. “We found the docking bay. There was a moving van in it. Looks like they were on their way out. It’s full of supplies and medical stuff.”

“The computers are mostly gone,” Ronan said. “There isn’t much left. I can gather some small amounts of data. Vitals, when they were unconscious, how long, but that’s about it.”

“I wish there was a way to find them quicker.” Aron looked around. “I thought Karen said there were three.”

“One’s in a room down the hall. She’s raging so I shut her in,” Evaine said.

Luca was staring at her hard. She was about to ask him what was wrong when she noticed a newborn staring at her as well. She peered at him. His shaggy blond surfer cut hair was starting to whiten. His glasses were gone, but he still had his good looks and his lanky, toned physique. Jeff.

She walked across the room to them, jealousy oozing out of every one of Luca’s pores. She stood in front of Jeff. He stared at her, a look of shock on his face.

“Evaine. We thought you were dead or something.”

“Well, you got the dead part right at least,” she said. “How did you get here?”

“I don’t remember.”

“But you recognize me?”

“Yes.” Jeff stepped up and hugged her. “I can’t believe you’re here.”

“
I
can’t believe you’re here.” She patted him lightly while staring at Luca.

“There has to be a connection.” Luca’s voice was gruff. “We need to find it, and when we do, we’ll be able to find the connection for all of us.”

“Hey have you seen my glasses?” Jeff asked.

“You don’t need them, but—”

Evaine looked around for the glasses while stepping over to Luca. She was about to say something, when she had a feeling of déjà vu.

Everyone else was busy doing something; no one had covered the doorway. Evaine turned to see a man standing there. The bright lights in the hall caused him to be backlit and she couldn’t see his face. She got a sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach. The man raised his hand and then took a step into the room. As everything came into focus, she couldn’t believe what she was seeing.

Tristan stood pointing a gun at Luca. Before she could make a move he fired the gun. Evaine gave Tristan a mental shove. Instinctively she stepped to the right. He fell and hit the ground, but she knew it was too late. The explosion that hit her in the upper left chest area was like fire. She collapsed to the floor in a heap. Tristan lay across the room, horror-struck.