Gabriel's Sacrifice (The Scrapman Trilogy Book 2) (26 page)

And even now, three weeks later, with his back pressed against the wall of Dad's former quarters, bullets splintering the doorframe beside him, Coda found the option of opting out hadn't gone very far.

Safe at the bottleneck, Coda had a small arsenal there at the peak of the stairs. His first shot had already claimed the life of a man halfway up the flight. He toppled backward, the smash of his flesh upon the floor, followed by this exchange of tedious gunfire. Coda would be dying in that room. It was inevitable–his job now to take as many with him as possible. That’s what Dad would have done … what Dad would have wanted him to do.

At least three bodies now adorned the bottom of the staircase. And this wasn’t even close to being over. A bullet whizzed past him, joining the others puncturing the ceiling toward the far wall. They were sloppy shots.

“Wait!” a voice shouted. “Hold your fire!” Whoever it was wasn’t speaking to Coda, rather those downstairs. “Who do we have up there?” The Jackal asked for his name.

Coda let it go unanswered.

“Fine,” he said. “I’ll start. My name is Caleb. I used to hunt demons for you guys. I’m a friend of Jackson.”

Caleb
. The name rang a bell…he was only slightly older than Coda. The two of them got along during those times.

“Jackson and I would meet every week. But then he stopped showing up; and Jackson told me, if three weeks ever passed with no word from him, well…to send in the boys.” A few Jackals hooted around him.

So, what? This is some kind of…insurance?

“So what happened to Jackson? Can you tell me?”

“He’s dead!” Coda barked.

“And who killed him?”

“I don’t know,” he answered. “We found them on the roof of that corrugate factory.”

“Who’s
them
?”

“Jackson…Kevin…Kyle…and James Maddox.”

That was far closer than he would have liked, actually had to use the shield to keep the blonde alive. But she saw him–knew he was there, his mission a failure as far as stealth was concerned.

Victoria
... Victoria was her name.

Mohammad wasn't exactly sure how safe she was with the one whom once referred to himself as
Saint
John. And right now the three were armed with only the bluntness of a baseball bat.

He watched them in the emerald city, shifting the hologram horizontal to better his view, and zoomed in. Mohammad's revenge had cost many their lives–a cause and effect he’d been too blind to anticipate while planning it.

The hunter's presence served a purpose; and without him his encampment collapsed like the removal of a vital Jenga block, falling quickly to the outsiders.

But new life was still growing, which was why he’d had yet to hear Gabriel’s voice inside his head–a most unnerving experience indeed.

Upon Mohammad's creation, Gabriel inserted an implant into his brain that would receive the Traveler's words like a remote eardrum. That way Gabriel could speak to him, unbeknownst to others, while Mohammad was anywhere in the city. The same was true of the hologram he was currently observing, data transmitted to an optical implant that only he and Gabriel were able to detect.

He didn't miss the factory, never found himself longing to wander its dusty aisles, nor wishing to return to that row of pigeons; and upon leaving it, there was no lingering sensation that he’d be forgetting something–as indifferent to the industrial setting as it was to him.

He'd been given a new home now; and despite the fact it was entirely alien, it seemed to suit him better than the factory ever did.

"Like me, it, too, has had many names," Gabriel told him as he first stepped aboard. "Still, my favorite has always been Garuda." He’d found Gabriel like a statue before him, standing at the center of an impossible room. “I have disposed of the hunter’s remains,” he announced, the blanket previously covering the body draped over the Traveler’s large forearm. ”Would be odd for them to find him in two places, I would imagine.”

But Mohammad was only half listening, his eyes surveying the details of his surroundings. Gabriel took a moment to inspect the area as well, possibly trying to witness it from a fresh perspective.

“This will be your home now, Mohammad … until I have to leave.”

The black walls of the room curved together like a dome, passages beyond leading elsewhere. Illuminated switches and buttons adorned the enclosure at several locations, glistening in emeralds off Gabriel’s ivory flesh, while the room itself seemed to hum with life.

“It’s a ship,” Mohammad announced. “It’s your ship.”

Gabriel nodded. “It is the heart of our mission, the place where both you and Alice were created.”

Questions upon questions began to flood his mind, but he’d kept each at bay. There would be more than enough time for him to gather each answer. Years he would have to pick at the Traveler’s brain … and he wouldn’t even need a scalpel.

Speaking of which, what really happened at Roswell? Never did buy that weather balloon business.

All in good time.

“It was essential that all those who saw your face before your death no longer remained living. And that even surpassed your need for vengeance.”

“What do you mean?”

“I need you to become a member of that society again, to find a place in it, to build favorable relationships with people–most importantly the man you saw in the image.”

“The one with Alice?”

“Yes.” He nodded. “Alice is not aware of our existence, you see. And it is imperative that we remain hidden. The man protecting her is Miles, and his life is just as important as hers. You will protect Alice by protecting him.”

“He looks like a guy perfectly capable of protecting himself,” Mohammad interjected.

“A fine specimen,” Gabriel agreed. “Only he’s undergone a trauma that manifests itself time and again in … a variety of questionable decisions. Now that you’re no longer detained by the hunter, your new job is to make sure he doesn’t get himself killed.”

So with his objectives clear, Mohammad continued to walk the darkened passages of Garuda, free to roam the ship to the extent of the Western corridor. There the freedom of his travel ended, a portion of the Garuda he was firmly instructed not to cross. But the thing was an intertwining labyrinth; and he'd already gotten turned around numerous times–enough so that he needed to call upon the schematics, his display of holographic bread crumbs. So, for fear of being lost forever, Mohammad would never leave his quarters without the wrist device.

From the main deck to his quarters was where Mohammad could most often be found. Seeming retro-fitted to suit his needs, it was obvious the room was designed with Earth in mind. The shower was one he could use with ease, the mattress something similar to memory foam, its softness like heaven beneath the weight of his body.

And as the most exotic of fruits would come to fill a metal bowl on his table, the Garuda was capable of creating synthetic forms of the most delectable meats.

Bootcamp was over. He'd graduated. And these, quite literally, were the fruits of his labor.

Learning soon that nothing spoke trust more than a man willing to share his meal, he reached into the bowl and plucked a juicy, red item from it; then, pocketing the fruit, Mohammad headed for the main deck.

His boots upon the floor sent a hollowness through the air at times, like someone rapping a knuckle on a steel beam. But the ship was soft in places as well, its texture changing to almost an organic between platforms. Like walking the black intestines of a massive creature, its walls encompassed him with a peculiar sheen, reminding him of the gloss upon Gabriel’s eyes.

Gabriel.

Although the Traveler did venture into his head every now and again, Mohammad hadn't seen Gabriel in the flesh for over a week–surely another indication that his training was over.

He stepped out onto the main deck as the walls gave way to form the huge room. This was the only place one could come and go from the ship. On no wall within the Garuda could a hyper-wall be written, only through this main portal could he reach his destination. It rippled like liquid metal as he triggered the console to its right, the emerald city jumping into focus.

Mohammad shifted the hologram, sweeping along the streets of the outskirts until he came upon the junkyard. Two violet bodies were alive within it–the last hybrid and her healthy, human male. And just beyond them, Mohammad found the hills to which Radia once aspired. She would have crossed by the junkyard on her way to them. Maybe ... maybe she would have found her true safety there. Maybe, somehow, Alice had drawn her in that direction.

Mohammad would be visiting those two shortly. But first ... first there was something he wanted to check. He slid the hologram back to the inner-city, selected his new destination, and stepped out before the hyper-wall. Like the livened waters of a noon lake, soft waves began to traverse its surface. It was ready. And with his body, he pierced it, the liquid metal allowing him through, the warmth of it across his skin.

◊ ◊ ◊ ◊ ◊

John had run up to the roof, searching for pools of gutter water to give himself a rinse, after Victoria scavenged through the apartment in search of new clothes for him. She'd found enough that he'd be able to discard most of his eye-watering attire. The very thought of it made her gag.

Victoria waited with Hazel in the building, keeping the child calm.

"You should have a rest, Hazel," she tried to persuade. "Take a little nap."

But the girl disagreed, shaking her head. "Gray Bunny isn't safe," Hazel murmured. "She's still with the bad men."

"Well, Gray Bunny is very brave; and she would want you to be brave, too." Victoria lowered Hazel onto her lap, running her fingers through the girl's hair. "I'll be right here." However heavy, it took several minutes before Hazel's eyes finally shut, and her body seemed to sink deeper into the cushions of the couch. "Good girl," Victoria whispered, leaving a comforting hand on her shoulder.

The complex seemed deserted, but Victoria wasn't certain if any Jackals were coming to try and sniff them out.

Everyone was dead ... even Coda, who'd practically sacrificed himself so that they might escape. No way did he make it out alive; and his gesture weighed heavily on her, the thought if his young, angular face in the darkness ... just like his father. She needed to survive this. To die now would be an insult to the gift he'd given them.

John then slipped in through the front door, new clothes upon his broad-shouldered frame. Victoria pressed a finger to her lips, motioning toward Hazel; and he nodded. She pulled the girl to her chest and carried her off to the bedroom, laying her onto a bed, surrounded in a nest of pillows. Victoria pulled the covers over her, then left the door slightly ajar. She returned to the living room, free to discuss their sudden and violent change in circumstances.

"I tried to get him to free you, John," she said. "But after finding James hanging ... the kid just went off the deep end for awhile."

"The deep end?" John straightened. "Is that what you call it?"

"Now, I remember you doing worse things to men in that room, John, far worse than neglect."

"You sayin' I deserved it, a couple months to rot inside a cell?!"

She shushed him, jerking her head toward the bedroom. "No, you didn't deserve it," she whispered, "but at least you're still alive, and your daughter."

He shook his head. "Out of respect for the warm and fuzzies you had for Maddox, I'm gonna pretend I wasn't fucking elated to hear someone hung him off a roof."

His response enraged her; and it was all she could do to keep from leaping to scratch out his eyes. But he only seemed to draw more power from the emotion present on her face, grinning without remorse of his tongue.

"His son is the reason why you're still alive, Asshole."

"Then he died a better man than his father." A viper of words, he spoke venom with glee, massaging his wrists where the cuffs turned the skin milky. He'd swiped the keys she'd dropped for the gun–on them was attached the tiny, silver spire to release them.

"I'm sure even James would agree with you on that," she retorted. "Look, if the two of us are going to work together, let's make an agreement that we won't mention him anymore, deal?"

"Fine by me."

She let out a sigh, partially enjoying the brevity of awkward silence. "So …" she broke it, "what have you heard about that day, the day we lost the men at the building?"

"What little I could make out through the pit walls," he answered. "And a few words when people would toss food in for me, like a fucking animal."

"So what do you know?"

"They found Maddox hanging by his neck, Jackson and the twins dead on the roof."

"And?"

"That's it."

Victoria shook her head. "Jackson and the twins had their hands cut off."

His eyes narrowed. "Right hands?"

She nodded. "And on each of their bodies was a red handprint, each with a number."

"Sounds like the bogeyman."

"And the building ... where they were found ... the same building where they killed the last hybrid." She leaned closer, fixing his blue eyes with her own. "Every single person who was there that day is dead now, John."

"Got ourselves a vigilante, then," he observed, "someone who was there that day, someone they didn't see."

"I just can't figure out why they would've gone all the way back there without telling anyone."
Why James would’ve gone without telling me.

"James was a hunter; he was proud," John pointed out. "Maybe whoever did this challenged him somehow, never known him to back out of a challenge."

"Maybe," she nodded, "only I think it's more complicated than that."

John leaned back in his chair, allowing her time to elaborate.

"Why didn't we get shot today, John? Why are we even sitting here, having this conversation?"

"Huh?"

"Every single gun misfired when you came out. What are the chances of that?"

"Wait. Wait." He raised his hands. "Are you talking about divine intervention?"