Welcome to the Dream (A Celeste Cross Book, #1) (21 page)

Jack hated to give up, but
he was also a strategist. He knew they had little to no chance any
more. Yaoguais were incredible. They had such speed, such agility,
and such strength. They had all the advantage when it came to
hand-to-hand combat too; as soon as a Yaoguai let part of its flesh
touch a humans, you were as good as dead. In a second, it would
paralyze you completely as it sucked every last bit of your life
force from your body.

He had half a clip left, and
he knew the rest of his team were almost out too. They were
conserving what they could, switching their guns off auto so they
could shoot a single shot at a time, but that didn't mean much.
With three Yaoguais jumping around, there were too many targets on
which to concentrate.

He saw one bound up into one
of the trees around the side of the cliff, and he tracked the
movement acutely, bringing his gun up quickly, attempting to lock
sights on it.

It jumped, twisting high,
running off the tip of one of the branches, and heading straight at
him. Jack purposely fell to the ground, pushed into his back, and
rolled. The Yaoguai landed right next to him, forked tail digging
into the ground, dirt spraying onto Jacks boots.

It was so close that he
could look right into its eyes. They were wide, unblinking, and
unquestionably not human.

Some part of Jack told him
it was over, that he couldn't get away now. As the Yaoguai pushed
towards him, he clenched his teeth and readied for the
end.

In slow motion, Jack watched
as the Yaoguai snapped to the left.

Jack looked over and saw
that the other three Yaoguais were frozen on the spot. They then
whined. Yelping, they backed off, but not into the forest – towards
the cliff behind him.

In another second, two
figures appeared from between the pines, and Jack paused long
enough not to shoot their way.

He recognized one of the
hulking forms as McDougall, and the small woman by his side had to
be Celeste.

‘
Push them up against that wall,’
McDougall's Scottish brogue echoed around the valley.

Celeste walked forward,
footsteps careful. The Yaoguai stopped moving, stiffened up, and
began to shake with fear.

That was all they needed.
Those that still had bullets quickly twisted and started shooting
at the long blue lines that connected the Yaoguais to their relics.
McDougall pressed forward, steps unusually heavy, shooting with his
rifle right at the one closest to him. In another moment, it
snapped, and the Yaoguai disappeared in a spiral of blue
light.

‘
Get to the left,’ McDougall
shouted.

Celeste jogged to the left,
watching the Yaoguais as she did, stumbling occasionally in the
dark, but regaining her footing and pushing forward. With every
step she took, the Yaoguais shifted back, until the remaining three
were pressed right up against the cliff.

Yaoguais were smart
creatures, and they always knew how to win a fight. Yet here they
were, throwing reason to the wind, and pushing themselves
voluntarily into a trap. Jack didn't pause to wonder at it though –
he shot every bullet he had at the closest energy line. When he ran
out, McDougall did the rest.

All three remaining Yaoguai
disappeared in a spiral of light.

There was a moment of
silence. Jack's ears rang from the sound of battle, and probably
from the blood that was pumping like crazy through his body. He
angled his head towards her, and stared at Celeste. He'd ditched
his night-vision goggles long ago when the light of the Yaoguai had
become too much.

He was staring at
her.

‘
Locate the relics, contain
them,’ Jack barked. Realizing that he couldn't just stand there
forever, mouth agape as he looked her way.

With a look to his side at
Peterson's team, Jack realized they had no idea what was going on.
Peterson was a large African-American who had proven himself to be
damn handy in a fight. He still had his gun in his hands as he
nodded sharply towards Celeste. ‘What is this, a new
weapon?’

‘
She’s our bloody avenging
angel,’ McDougall growled. ‘Now tell us where those relics are
before the Yaoguai come back.’

Peterson snapped a salute,
inclining his head towards the forest. ‘We've already located them.
Follow us.’

The rest of Jack's team did
just that, but as Jack was out of bullets, he hung back, walking up
to McDougall and Celeste.

‘
I know, I know, I disregarded
orders. But if I hadn't, you'd be dead,’ McDougall snapped
quickly.

Now he was closer, Jack
could see Celeste, even make out her expression in the low, silvery
light.

She looked sickened – it was
the only way to describe it.

Her gaze was locked on the
position where the three Yaoguai had been before they'd snapped
back to their relics.

She had a shaking hand
clamped over her mouth, and turned to her side sharply, as if she
would throw up.

‘
God, I killed them,’ she said,
voice muffled through her fingers.

McDougall clapped a hand on her
shoulder. ‘You did good, love.’

‘
Oh God,’ Celeste replied,
shrugging into her shoulders more, hand clapping harder over her
face.

This would be her first real
combat situation, and he didn't need to look too hard at Celeste to
realize she wasn't the kind of person who could kill. He knew all
Suzie's friends, and no doubt Celeste was a vegetarian, maybe even
a card-carrying member of some kind of animal welfare group. The
kind of person that believed every single situation could be solved
with peaceful means, and that violence should never be initiated,
even as a last resort. In a way he agreed with her; violence was
abhorrent. When you became directly responsible for the welfare and
lives of a large group of people, however, you had to be willing to
protect them by whatever means necessary. That didn't mean you used
violence first up, but it did mean you had it in your repertoire.
‘You haven't killed it,’ he assured her. ‘It's just gone back to
the relic. You can't really kill the Yaoguai.’

McDougall snorted. ‘Which is the
bane of my bloody existence.’

McDougall latched a hand to
his chest and started to rub it. Jack noted the move
quickly.

The Scotsman shrugged at him. ‘I
had a run-in.’ McDougall shrugged towards Celeste. ‘One of them
grabbed me. But it ran off.’

Presumably, it hadn't just
run off. Yaoguais didn't suddenly latch hold of their victims,
start to feast on their energy, and then get bored and nick off
into the forest for a spot of moon gazing. Oh no, Celeste must have
chased it.

She pulled her hand from her
face, but her shoulders were still shaking.

‘
Hey,’ he moved over to her,
grabbed his hands to her shoulders, and resisted the urge to pull
her in and rest a hand over her head. First, McDougall was standing
right there, and would probably snigger his arse off. Second, he
didn't know Celeste well enough to justify such an intimate
move.

Her skin was warm under the
press of his fingers, and he could confirm as he looked at her that
while she was shocked she was okay.

In another moment she
straightened, her chest pushing up as she sucked in several deep
breaths.

‘
Are you okay?’ she asked, her
gaze now steady and even.

He gave a soft
chuckle.

In all reality, he was worse off
than she was, but he nodded. ‘Thank you,’ he finally
added.

‘
I couldn't just stay in that
helicopter,’ she mumbled.

Actually, she could have
stayed in the chopper, as that was exactly what Jack had wanted her
to do. However, if she hadn't saved McDougall, and McDougall hadn't
brought her here, then the entire team would have been wiped
out.

Thanks to her, his team was
fine. A couple of scratches, bruises, cuts and a few other
injuries, but everyone was alive. No doubt, McDougall would have to
go off duty for a couple of weeks to recoup, but at least the
curmudgeonly Scotsman wouldn't be taken home in a body
bag.

Celeste stood there, and her
gaze dragged back to the spot where the three Yaoguai had
disappeared. ‘What happens now?’ she asked quietly.

Jack had no idea.

Chapter 14

Celeste Cross

No one in Jack's team had
died, and Peterson's team had been fine. Within half an hour,
various military helicopters had invaded their little clearing. At
least a half-dozen teams arrived, and they all began scouting the
forest, dealing with whatever you dealt with after a Yaoguai
attack. Celeste wasn't kept there long. She was loaded into an
entirely new chopper with a completely different team. Jack jumped
in next to her, and the second he did, the helicopter took
off.

Celeste didn't need to ask
anyone to figure out where they were going. It was time to head to
Knight Headquarters.

She was in no mood to take a
nap any more though, and her eyes were wide open the entire
ride.

Unlike Jack's team, nobody
on this helicopter gave her a second glance. Maybe they didn't know
what she had done or maybe they didn't care. Maybe news of the fact
she'd saved Squire hadn't travelled far yet.

A million questions popped
into Celeste's head as the chopper wound its way across the State.
She didn't ask any of them though; she doubted anyone would answer.
So she sat there, watching everyone and trying to think.

She couldn't deny it any
more, could she? The Yaoguais had been terrified of her. Terrified
to the point they'd lost all reason and had trembled in the corner
rather than take the opportunity to run away.

Not for the first time,
Celeste clamped a hand over her mouth, breathing between her
fingers, feeling the pressure against her jaw and lips.

She tried to tell herself
not to think too hard about it. She still didn't know enough about
the situation, and any conclusion she tried to draw now would
likely be adrenaline-fuelled, catastrophic, and completely
inaccurate. The best thing she could do at the moment was to
compose herself, try to calm down, and try to ensure she was as
prepared as she could be for whatever she would face at Knight.
However, that didn't stop her thoughts from constantly turning back
to the Yaoguais. She figured from the way the Army were treating
her that a Yaoguai never usually ran away, tail tucked between its
legs. So why would they run from her?

Celeste looked up to see
Jack glance her way. She would have preferred to have never met a
Yaoguai. She would have rather spent six lovely months getting to
know Jack. That wasn't going to happen now, and there was little
point in reminiscing over the lost opportunity. Though, she
realized with a quick kicking feeling in her gut, she was likely
going to get to know Jack regardless. He was the head of Squire,
and he dealt with the Yaoguai. Presumably, whatever would happen to
her next, would have something to do with him.

She held his gaze, and
though she didn't want to say it in front of everyone else, she
hoped he would get the impression that she trusted him, or more
importantly, that she was ready to trust him. She reminded herself
he was a decent guy, the kind of guy that would check up on you,
help you with your luggage, and crawl underneath the house and
fight through the cobwebs to turn on your hot water cylinder. He
was careful, conscientious, and diligent. She held on to that fact.
She hoped that Jack would do whatever he could to ensure her
safety.

Slowly Jack gave a smile,
and though it shook slightly, and he didn't seem to be sure of the
move, it was about the most welcome human interaction she'd ever
had.

Jack West

They touched down at Knight
Headquarters at seven o'clock the next morning.

He was tired, and so was the
rest of his team. One look at Celeste and the dark shadows pooling
under her eyes, told him she wasn't exactly fighting fit either.
That being said, she still looked entirely composed. On the flight
he'd noted she'd become steadily calmer. The fear had returned to
her at times, and she'd clutched her arms around her middle, but
she certainly hadn't crumpled to the ground in shock. He was
starting to feel envious of how composed she was, and if not
envious, then powerfully curious about how she was doing
it.

She'd said that she'd
suffered from nightmares as a kid, and she'd tried everything she
could to overcome them. Maybe all those years spent learning to get
a handle on herself had really paid off when the nightmare had
become real.

He'd started to read that
book she'd given him, but with everything that had gone on over the
last week, he'd only managed to get through the first 20 pages.
Jack liked to think he was rational, and was always wary of
supposition. He could, however, appreciate it was curious that a
woman who turned towards the dark in her dreams, chasing her
monsters down, had no trouble with them in the real world. He
wasn't going to draw any conclusions yet. He liked hard evidence,
and the only way to get that unfortunately would be to go through
Knight.