She could barely see it at all in the sporadic lightning, but it must have adapted to see in the wastes, because the damn thing kept staring right at her.
Standing, she started to leave the rock outcropping, but the creature cried out. Ada crouched back down and put a finger to her visor—another command the monkey didn’t understand.
She pointed to the ground a second time.
The primate cried again.
Ada cursed. She had no choice.
“Fine, come on.”
She turned the flashlight, now mounted to the rifle barrel, and left the outcropping. She moved slowly through boulders, tangled roots, and debris. The monkey kept up easily, leaping from rock to rock.
At the bottom, she swept her light over the beach before advancing toward the sailboat. The hull of another vessel provided a rest stop halfway there.
She wiggled her toes, trying to keep the blood flowing. The broken toe with a missing nail, freshly wrapped, was feeling much better, and her stomach had calmed for now.
X’s note and her new friend had completely changed her outlook on life. She was determined to get back to the Vanguard Islands.
If she must die, it would be in the Sky Arena, by a Cazador spear or sword.
But she didn’t plan on that fate, either. After her journey into the wastes, she felt she could best whatever opponent she faced there.
After a few minutes’ rest behind the hull, she set off with the monkey following her on all fours. The rest of the way to the sailboat looked clear.
When she was almost there, she halted because the monkey had stopped. It was hunched down on the sand, trembling.
“What is it?” she whispered.
The monkey let out a peep, staring into the sky.
Ada swung her rifle, and the light captured a frayed leathery wing flying over the water. It swooped downward, screeching an electronic discord out of a black maw in an eyeless face.
She aimed her rifle and fired a round at center mass. The recoil knocked her back slightly. When she regained her balance, the beast had flapped away, releasing an angry wail that rose and fell like an emergency siren.
From the ruins of a resort down the beach, another creature answered the call.
She plucked a round from the bandolier and pushed it into the chamber. Again, she swept the sky until the beam found the wrinkled flesh.
The beast swooped again, changing course, talons out.
“no!” Ada yelled.
The frightened monkey bolted for the mutant vegetation bordering the beach. Evading the talons, it vanished into the brush.
Ada sighted in on the Siren, leading it slightly as she had been trained. The beast stooped, screeching.
The round punched through the monster’s wing.
Ada lit out after the monkey, reloading on the run, but the animal vanished into the dense jungle.
She dropped a round and had to leave it.
“Wait!” she called out.
The injured Siren flapped away, but several others cried out.
She jumped vines snaking over the sand and ducked skeletal branches the color of blood. Somewhere up ahead, the monkey cried.
Pulling another round, she carefully got it into the chamber. In that moment, her foot caught under a root and she went down hard. The rifle flew from her hands.
Ada pushed herself up and scrambled over to the weapon. A screech forced her to the ground again as another Siren sailed over the canopy.
But they weren’t just in the air. She could hear the beasts in the jungle. Limbs crunched and snapped as they hunted.
Fear gripped her, but she kept moving. A flash of pale, wrinkled skin darted past the beam as she picked up the rifle.
Ada advanced, slower now, playing the light back and forth over thorn bushes and twisted vines. The beam flickered.
She tapped it against the bark of the closest tree. It came on again, illuminating what looked like grayish moss clinging to a low branch. The moss suddenly moved in the glow, forming a humanoid shape that turned an eyeless face to her.
The wingless monster dropped from the tree and hit the ground running.
Ada aimed, said a prayer, and pulled the trigger.
The beast skidded to a stop a few feet away from her, squirting blood onto her boots.
Ada stepped around the carcass and kept searching the jungle, ducking branches and hopping over vines.
A squeaking stopped her in midstride.
The noise was coming from behind a tree to her right. She went around it, pointing her rifle into the brush. A hairy, curled hand of four fingers reached out from under a fallen palm frond. Big black eyes blinked at her.
“It’s okay,” she whispered.
The dark eyes widened. A high screech sounded as Ada whirled with the butt of her gun, slamming it into another eyeless face.
The Siren slumped to the ground with a broken skull.
Ada grabbed the monkey and took off running through the jungle with it clutched against her. Something grabbed her ankle, and she kicked at what proved to be a vine. Two more kicks, and she snapped it free from the ground and dragged it with her.
Shrieks echoed through the jungle. For a fleeting moment, she considered trying to hide, but they would find her eventually. Unless… She recalled what she knew about the abominations: that they evolved from humans. That males flew and females didn’t. And that they were attracted to energy.
That was it! They were drawn to her light. But she couldn’t shut it off until she got back to the beach. What she needed was a distraction.
A beetle skittered across her path, stopping to click its mandibles at her. The old Ada might have screamed, but the new Ada punted it into the air.
The monkey pressed its face against her as she ran. Branches cracked, and a wail came from above.
When she got back to the beach, she shut off her light and slung her rifle. She could flee by the glow of lightning.
She stumbled across the beach, listening to the electronic wails of the monsters. They seemed to be coming from all directions.
One swooped from the sky, and she ducked behind a boat she had passed earlier.
Then she was running again, lungs burning, toe throbbing, heart pumping. She didn’t stop until she was past the rock outcropping where her gear was stored.
Her capsized boat wasn’t far now.
In the wake of lightning, she spotted the concrete walkway where the leeches ate the frog and then the parent of the monkey. Her boat was somewhere between her and the walkway. She spotted it in the next flash of lightning.
The wails grew louder, and she counted at least five, maybe six of the monsters sailing through the air, plus the females on the ground, prowling the beaches.
She finally made it to her boat, where she set the monkey down and reloaded her rifle. Then she reached into her vest and pulled out a flare. It ignited after two strikes.
Flames burst out, spreading a red glow over the beach. She waved it back and forth and saw long, skeletal shadows moving across the sand. In the sky, the males circled like hawks.
The females inched closer, clicking their teeth. A beast with an underbite charged at Ada, giving its discordant shriek. The monkey grabbed her leg, but she held her ground, waiting until the last instant.
One by one, the other Sirens charged on land and swept down from the sky.
Reaching over the transom, she twisted the cap off the second fuel tank. Then she dropped the flare in the boat, picked up the monkey, and ran. The Sirens raced toward the flare.
She sprinted twenty paces before an explosion boomed behind her, and pained cries rang out. She used the glow of the fire to run, glancing over her shoulder once to see burning monsters flopping about like beached fish.
Ada tripped, regained her balance, and didn’t stop running until she got to the rock outcropping. Flames lit up the beach in the distance.