I laughed and in the same movement, flipped him so I ended up on top of him. I pinned his hands to the ground on either side of his head with my own hands. “I think that it would be the other way around,” I said as I lowered my lips to one of his ears.
Avian laughed and growled at the same time. He lifted his head to fiercely take my lips.
FOURTEEN
A fresh blanket of snow covered everything in the morning, three inches deep. Thankfully, West had thought to keep clearing the snow from the solar tank’s panels throughout the night. By the time we packed up the tents and had eaten, they were charged enough to get the vehicle going.
One hour.
That was all that separated us from the place where I was born and altered.
Avian took my hand in his when I stiffened and the air caught in my throat.
“It’ll be okay,” West said, looking over at me. I didn’t miss the mixed emotions still behind his eyes. But there was one that was unmistakable: support.
I could always use another friend in this dismembered world. I was grateful for the peace we were beginning to form between us.
“This is the turnoff,” Dr. Evans said after thirty minutes. I was impressed he even saw it. Two log posts jutted up from the ground, unremarkable, roughly six feet tall. One of them had two rusty metal letters nailed into it: NB.
NovaTor Biotics.
We had driven down a small, two-lane highway into the middle of nowhere and it looked as if our turnoff went further into nowhere toward a barren low mountain.
“You certainly wouldn’t have unwanted visitors out here,” Bill said, correcting the wheel when the dirt road gave a violent jerk to the right.
“That was the point,” Dr. Evans said, his voice muted from the glass box. “Everything we worked on at NovaTor Biotics was highly classified. We didn’t like to be disturbed.”
As we rolled through the snow into the wilderness, I felt something in my heart sink. There were very little resources out here. Little food to find or water to drink. There was no way my sister was within a hundred miles of NovaTor. She was still human enough to have to do what she had to in order to survive.
“She’s not going to be here, is she?” West said. I looked over to see him observing the scarce terrain as well.
I didn’t answer him. And thankfully, Dr. Evans didn’t either.
At first it was difficult to distinguish what was the rocky side of the mountain and what might be building. Everything was covered in snow, which didn’t help, but I could see square edges and flat lines that indicated there was something there.
The closer we rolled, the more I could pick out the rock colored walls and occasional windows.
West had once told me of the size of this building.
I had underestimated him.
The bit I could see was larger than the largest of warehouse stores I’d raided. And I had little doubt there was more that extended back into the mountain.
West swore under his breath as Bill slowed to a stop fifty yards from the building. “This is too bizarre being back.”
He opened the door and climbed out, me right behind him. I shielded my eyes from the sun as I looked up at the facility.
I once again had the feeling of memories dancing just under a watery surface. I could tell they were there, but they were just down far enough that I couldn’t make them out clearly. Even though I had only been outside of the building once in all my life, there was something familiar about seeing it.
“Welcome home,” Dr. Evans said as he climbed out of the tank.
I shook my head. “This was never home.”
Avian slipped his hand into mine and then I was there.
“This is where it all began,” Avian said. There was awe and fascination in his voice, accompanied with disgust.
No one said anything because nothing was needed.
I took three steps toward the building when Dr. Evans called my name.
“This is, indeed, where it all began,” he said when I turned back to him. “While there were very few people who lived in the surrounding area, there were over one hundred employees who worked for and lived at NovaTor. I’m afraid you might find many of its residents still occupying the building.”
“Right,” I said, nodding and turning my eyes back to the building. “I’d like all you humans to get back into the tank while I get this over with.”
“Come on, Eve,” West said with a sigh. “Seriously? It’s been, like, eight days since I’ve killed a Bane.”
Everyone except Dr. Evans laughed.
“Fine,” I said, shaking my head. “You ready?”
West, Avian, and Bill all held up deadly firearms.
They should have been afraid. Who knew how many Bane were inside that building. If even one touched them, it was game over. Especially being this far from the Extractor.
But they had confidence in me.
Maybe it was time for me to start trusting in their confidence.
“Get ready,” I said, turning back to the building.
Come out, I thought. My eyes squinted as I concentrated. Come meet your queen and your end.
Thirty seconds later, the main front door burst open and three bodies piled through. They climbed to their feet as another fifteen filed out the door as well.
They moved towards us, now controlled and calm. The sun gleamed off their mechanical parts, which considering this lot, was most of their entire bodies. They were all very advanced.
There was a mix of doctor looking individuals, men of science. Others had military looking clothing clinging in shreds to their skeletal forms.
“Fire at will,” I said.
My team unloaded at the approaching bodies and they dropped without hesitation or fight. More and more bodies started filing out of the building and dropped when they were clear of the entrance.
I caught a glimpse of a familiar face two seconds before a bullet took her down to the ground.
The woman.
The one who had taken care of me, the one who had been in charge of my education and made sure I was where I needed to be when I needed to be there.
The woman I had never known the name of.
Now it really didn’t matter.
But it still seemed a shame I had never thought to ask it as a child.
By this point, I hadn’t realized that the shots had died out and there were no more Bane filing out of the building. There were eighty-one bodies lying before us.
“You okay?” Avian asked, nudging me in the arm with his elbow.
“Yeah,” I said, snapping out of it. “We good to go in now?” I asked Dr. Evans.
“If you’re sure you drew all of them out,” he replied.
I nodded. “I’m sure.” I walked toward the building and the rest of the team followed me.
We carefully stepped around the bodies and toward the front doors. Sparing just a moment to take a deep breath, I crossed the threshold.
We entered into a simple lobby. There was one solid wall that was completely white and rose to the height of two stories. In big, blue letters, there were the words NOVATOR BIOTICS. In front of that was a desk. To one side of the desk, there was a hall that stretched back as far as I could see. On the other side of the desk there were two sets of elevators. And tucked way back in the corner was a door with a sign for stairs.
Bill swore, sweeping the space with his rifle, even though I knew it would be clear. “This place gives me the creeps.”
I couldn’t help but nod in agreement. It wasn’t just knowing that the end of the world had begun here. It was that there were bullet holes everywhere. There were papers scattered across the floor, traces of glass littered every flat surface. There were dark stains on the floor that could have been nothing but blood.