Chapter Eight

Eight

Fatigue pulled at Renee, the sedate pace of the SUV that Will had rented weaving through the turns of the industrial park seeming to make it all the worse. Worried the linguist wouldn’t be able to keep Jackson from her room, she’d driven all night, making good time on empty roads. It was only now when the sun was well up that she’d begun to see more than the occasional car. If it were a weekday, the interstate would have been a nightmare. But as it was, she had the road almost to herself after leaving the expressway.

August was lying across the back, claiming it was more comfortable with his scraped-up wings. His slow breathing told her he was still asleep under the car blanket she’d bought at the first gas station they’d stopped at. That felt like a lifetime ago, and she wistfully glanced at her empty mega mug-o-coffee in the console and the crumpled wrappers of fast food and protein bars. The fries had been a big hit, almost enough to convince him to try a burger.

“August?” she said softly as she pulled into a wood flooring factory that matched the address Will had given her. She was pretty sure it was the right place. There was a wide swath of flattened grass, and the bedraggled plants lining the building in an unimaginative row had been trampled. It wasn’t the expected shiny building with security, but it was in the middle of basically nowhere, allowing more dangerous levels of protection. “I think we’re here.”

He woke with a whistle and click, his dark eyes meeting hers widening as his nictitating membrane slid away.

“Forgot where I am,” he said as he stretched and shifted, careful to keep under the blanket. He was silent as she turned into the parking spot beside the faded blue parking lines. “Tayler worked from here? It’s a…What is it?”

She followed his gaze to the faded sign. “A factory to make wood flooring, I guess. But that’s probably not what’s inside.” Renee gathered the spent wrappers, her stomach rumbling as she thought of the fast-food place she’d passed just off the expressway. A breakfast burrito and coffee would have been nice, she thought as she opened the last protein bar.

“You use trees for flooring?” August popped his finger knuckles in shock. “How does that even happen?”

She broke the bar and handed half to August. “You cut them into sheets so they are thin and flat, and then…fasten them down.”

August cautiously took the bar between two fingers. “You walk on wood?” he said, then took a nibble.

She smiled as his eyes met hers. He liked it. “In the nicer places,” she said. “Homes and some businesses. You won’t find it in a military installation.” She thought a moment, then added, “Actually, the gym has a wood floor.”

“That is wood?” he said, then reached for the wrapper, eyes squinting to read the small print of what was in the bar. “It’s so hard.”

“I’m pretty sure this is the right place.” Renee put the last bite in her mouth and wiped her fingers on her jeans. Her new phone sat on the dash. She had texted Will her new number but had yet to actually talk to him. “If they wanted to keep this place a secret, putting it in a big shiny building wouldn’t work. What does your spider sense tell you?”

August cautiously nibbled the bar. “Spiders have sense?”

She smiled. “Sorry. It’s a metaphor. Can you feel Mikail’s creation spark?”

August pulled the blanket up higher over his head and wiggled himself almost into the front seat. “No. Maybe if closer.” He squinted at the building, then expanded his gaze, taking in the abandoned factories in the distance. “We can go in. I spider sense no one inside.”

“Right.” She reached for the door, her muscles protesting after being still for so long. “Let me check it out first anyway,” she said as she brushed the fry crumbs off her and got out. “There might be cameras or motion sensors. If we’re lucky, Jackson turned them all off.”

But she didn’t see any cameras as she dropped her new phone into her pocket and shut the door without slamming it. A sudden urge for the bathroom took her, and she quashed it. The interstate was far enough away that no one would notice them. It was quiet, and she worked the last of the protein bar out of her teeth as she went up the walk to the front door. The building was set apart from the rest of the industrial park. Empty parking lots and build to suit signs were to both sides, making it a lonely place in the morning sun.

Her feet scuffed as she stopped at the glass front door, hand over her eyes to peer in at an empty office. Nothing but a copier in the corner and a bare desk by the only window. A dried-up spider plant sat on the dusty sill, and the office chair was across the room beside a plastic trash can. A gray fire door with employees only painted on it went to the left, and an open, wood-paneled door at the back presumably led deeper into the facility.

Renee shook her sleeve down to cover her hand before trying the door. Locked.

She sighed, then spun at the thump of the car door closing. August stood by the SUV, the blanket billowing as he shifted it to cover his head. “What are you doing!” she whispered loudly.

“I can open the door,” he said as he hustled up the walk. That was, until he saw the crushed bushes and jerked to a halt, hand outstretched as if in pain. Sighing, he reluctantly continued on.

“How?” she said as he came up beside her, her eyes widening when he grasped the handle and simply…broke it off.

“Dude!” she exclaimed, shocked at the reminder of how strong he was as he set it on the cement walk by the door. He never showed it. Hollow bones did not make one weak, apparently.

“I’m too far from the labyrinth to snap inside to open it,” he said, and Renee glanced at the empty buildings. He was taking a huge risk coming here, making himself vulnerable to find his kin. “We spider sense if Mikail is or was here, then call Will.”

“Sounds good,” she said as his long fingers went into the broken fixture and manually shifted the internal lever to open it.

August bolted inside when the door shifted, his blanket furling dramatically. Renee followed, giving Will’s rented car a last look before easing the door shut behind her.

The hush of August’s bare feet seemed loud against the empty walls and scratched floor. It was dim, and his eyes had unnictitated in the light from the single window. She jumped at August’s whistle-click. Then he made another, louder this time. Clearly it was a hail, though he had said that no one was here. For a long moment he listened, and then he sighed, his wings drooping until their hem brushed the floor. Clearly disappointed, he let the blanket fall from his head to pool about his shoulders.

Renee came deeper into the room, peeking past the panel door to the dirt-caked, narrow hallway and more offices. “It looks cleared out,” she said, nose wrinkling at what was probably fingerprint dust on just about everything: the desk, the doors, the walls beside the doors…Small numbered dots were scattered about where things had been removed, more evidence of Jackson’s crew.

August’s head snapped up. “This way,” he said, fixated on the fire door.

She lurched to follow, pulse quickening. “Do you feel a creation spark?” she asked, and he shook his head as they passed from the front office into the manufacturing floor.

“No.” The fire door slammed behind them, and they both jumped. “But they were here,” he said as he looked up at the tall ceilings and the high windows letting in the light. “All of them. I can…spider sense their pain.”

A worried smile found her. He’d gotten the metaphor perfectly. But it quickly faded as they wove past silent, dusty machines and open floors. The place seemed to have been fallow a long time, and she had to hustle to keep up as August strode forward, his wings and blanket furling to make him look like an avenging demon.

Until he stopped short at a blank wall.

“Well?” she said, glancing right and left.

August spun to look behind them, arm reaching to yank a length of pipe off the nearby forklift. Focused, he raised it high over his head and brought it down against the wall.

“August!” she cried out, covering her face as the painted, dusty concrete cracked and flaked, bits of sharp rock flinging everywhere. He shifted, bringing the pipe down at a new angle, continuing to hammer against the wall in an ever-expanding circle until he punched entirely through. The blanket fell away, and he moved closer, spreading his wings for balance as he jabbed the butt end of the pipe against the edges, widening it from shoulder to knee until he was satisfied and let the pipe hit the concrete floor with a shocking clang.

“Wait,” she said, but he’d already stepped through into the dark.

Renee peered in after him, then followed, breath held against the dust.

It was dark, and she shifted from the opening to let some light in. Slowly her eyes adjusted, and she put a hand to her mouth in worry. It was an ugly room with observation lights hanging from the ceiling over a surgery table. The straps made it obvious that it hadn’t been used for anything good.

Uneasy, she felt her way to the door and flicked on the light.

August clicked in annoyance as his eyes nictitated to an eerie red. He stood over the table, wings held apart from his body in a show of anger. Fingerprint dust said Jackson had been here. There were lots of empty plugs in the wall and scrapes on the floor to show where things had been removed. What had been left was singularly unremarkable. Mikail was gone—if he had ever been here.

“I am so sorry,” Renee whispered. “We will find a way to prove it was her and make her accountable for this. We will find him.”

August yanked one of the restraining straps, bringing it closer as his eyes unnictitated. “Mikail,” he said softly. “He was alive. See?”

She felt sick as she imagined being under these lights, restrained while someone cut off her hand. Or worse. “God, August,” she rasped. “We will make her accountable.”

“He was here! See?” he said again, shaking the strap. “Mikail wrote his name.”

Surprise stiffened through her and she came closer. “I don’t see anything.”

“I do,” he said, wings clamped tight to his back. “It has been washed off, but he wrote his name with his blood…” His eyes shifted from the strap to her. “You don’t see it,” he whispered, thoughts distant. “Humans can’t see it,” he said again, jolting into motion as he dropped the strap and headed for the room’s only door.

“August?” Renee followed, pulling up short as she stepped into a pitch-dark hallway. “Wait for me,” she called, but he was lost to the shadows. She stumbled forward, following the sound of his bare feet on the floor, her hands outstretched in the hopes of finding another light switch. “August?” she called again, gasping when her shin and gut found an abandoned gurney. “Ow!”

The lights came on with a shocking snap. Squinting, she spotted him at the end of the hall beside a control panel, and she hustled to join him, passing open doors to more offices. “Can you feel them?” she said as he stiff-armed a pair of swinging doors and vanished into a new dark.

“Damn it, will you wait for me?” she called as she followed, only to jerk to a halt.

Foreboding washed over her, heady and thick. She could see nothing, and still the feeling of wrongness seeped into her, hitting her like fear, but deeper, almost on a psychological level.

“Where are you?” she whispered as she turned to the sound of his breathing. Hand outstretched, she inched forward, relief almost painful when she found the wall and then a door, and then, blessedly, a light switch. “Lights coming on,” she warned him, then flicked it up.

Her eyes widened, even as they struggled to adapt to the sudden flash of electric light. It was a long hall, cells to either side consisting of three cement-block walls and one glass that faced the walkway. August was in the first.

“My God,” she whispered, hand holding her middle. They were clearly isolation cells, all empty. “I’m so sorry,” she said as she came to the door, but she wouldn’t go in. “This is barbaric.”

“Mikail is alive,” he said, his voice breathy with a hint of a whistle.

“Are you sure?”

He continued to stare at the blank wall. “If he was dead, his creation spark would be here. I feel nothing. And here…” He reached above his head and touched the wall. “Mikail says that they are trying to keep him alive. That Raphael’s heart stopped while under their mistreatment and they started it again.”

Renee’s lips parted. “I can’t see anything.”

“Is residue.” August didn’t turn from the wall, reading words she couldn’t even see. “They cleaned the wall, but the residue is there.”

A residue that Jackson never bothered to check for, she thought, touching her new phone.

“Mikail says that after twelve of them were taken away, the humans gave him blok fruit. He knew the portal was open, but he thinks we are at war because Han and Raphael didn’t come back. He was the only one left. He thinks he’s a war hostage.”

He was alive a few weeks ago, she thought as August moved to stand before another wall. Damn that woman and whoever was backing her. Hancock? Monroe? “Is there more?”

August’s long-fingered hand traced words she couldn’t see. “Jumbled mess,” he said softly. “New words overlap old words.”

She came closer, reluctant to enter the cell. “Does he say who held them?”

His eyes rose to a high corner. “He names them, but he doesn’t speak English, so they are only descriptive. Angry Female, Shy Male, Large Male, and Males One, Two, Three…Six.” His wing hem curled in anger. “Angry Female is the team leader. He says she isn’t here often after Han and Raphael leave.”

“Tayler,” she almost spit.

“Probably.” He studied the wall, his attention shifting from side to side. “He learned some English by listening, but not names.” August’s wing knuckles rose high over his head. “I see words, but what I understand is small.”

“That’s okay.” Shaking, she leaned against the doorframe. August had his back to her, his hand running under nothing she could see.

“Shy Male brings food,” he said. “Large Male makes him move with…a fall-down noise. Angry Female shouts many times. Makes needless pain.” His voice became thready. “There was a…show-and-tell? A man in a uniform looked at everyone, and picked three to stay. The rest left. Then Han and Raphael leave. Mikail think they are all prisoners.”

“Does it say where Mikail is now?” Renee felt ill, a hand to her middle.

“No. Maybe when Jackson asked for fifteen, they gave him twelve hoping he would stop asking.”

Renee’s lips pressed as she remembered Tayler’s anger when the twelve went home. She’d thought the woman had been hiding guilt, not…malice?

“Something happened,” August read aloud, voice distant. “Angry Female is gone, but they pack fast, as if Puck is coming to fight a war. They don’t give him food for a long time, and he thinks they want to see how long he can survive without it. He says, ‘These are not people. They are monsters. If anyone reads this—’?”

Renee’s expression blanked at his sudden silence. “What does he say?”

August’s wings shifted uneasily. “?‘Tell Noel humans are predators, like the Nix.’?”

Renee bowed her head. They hadn’t made a very good first impression. Or second. Or third, for that matter. Her stomach hurt, and worry was making her feel sick. I am so not cut out for this.

“I need to call Will,” she whispered. “He might be able to make sense of this.”

August stiffened. “I will fast look at the other rooms. Then we go.”

Renee nodded as she stepped back into the hall out of his way, head down as she took out her phone. Crap on a cracker, I really need to find a bathroom.

“Will, it’s me,” she said when the connection clicked open.

“Raphael,” August said from the cell across the hall, his voice intent as he touched the floor. “She leaves her name.”

Tayler, there’s no cell foul enough for you. “Listen,” she said when Will took a breath to say something. “August found a hall of holding cells and a surgical suite. There’s a good chance Mikail is still alive, but they moved him.”

“Good to get your expert opinion on that,” Jackson interrupted, his voice holding an obvious anger.

She flushed, glancing at August as he came out of Raphael’s cell. Damn it, not again.

“Hi. Hey. Just the person I wanted to talk to.” Wincing, she followed August down the row of cells, hesitating as he gave each one a cursory look. “Don’t get mad at Will. I made him do it.”

“Hi?” Jackson said acerbically. “You go AWOL with a Neighbor—again—and you say hi? What the hell are you doing at that lab?”

Her back stiffened in resolve. “Investigating,” she said bluntly. “We found a room—”

“The surgery suite and cells at the back of the building,” he interrupted. “We found them, too. Stay where you are. I’m sending a chopper. How the hell did you get a car?”

“Chopper. Good.” Worry plinked through her, and she wrapped an arm around her middle as August continued on. What had taken her all night to drive would be hours in a chopper.

“Do you have any idea the trouble you are in? That you put me in?” he said. “I’ll be lucky to keep you out of a real cell and me clear of a dishonorable discharge. I trusted you.”

“No, you locked me in my room,” she said, refusing to feel guilty. “Your guys never wanded the cell walls with a black light, did they,” she said, and Jackson’s breath to ream her out hesitated. “There’s Neighbor writing everywhere,” she continued. “It’s in blood, and though someone washed it off, August can see and read the residue. We have proof that Han, Raphael, and Mikail were here. Mikail saw Tayler’s contact. Someone in a uniform. If we find him, we have the person responsible.”

“Son of a bitch…” Jackson swore softly. “Just…stay there,” he said again, the anger beginning to fade from his voice, replaced with intent. “I’ll be there in three hours.”

Three hours, she thought, gazing at the wall as if she could see through it to their rented SUV. That wasn’t much time, especially if they had put an APB on their rental. “Sure,” she said flatly, and she heard him snapping his fingers for someone’s attention.

“Renee, I’m begging you to sit there and wait. I’ll have someone there in three hours.”

“Yes, you’re welcome,” she said sourly. “You know, if you would have brought August in the first place, we wouldn’t be having this conversation.”

“You are unbelievable,” he said, but in the background, she heard him writing something down, and a faint “Yes, sir,” followed by clicking shoes. “Has anyone seen August?”

“Yeah. We rented a convertible and drove all the way with the top down,” she said dryly. “No. No one has seen him. Jackson, you can be as angry at me as you want, but if not for August, you would have no chance to find out who gave Tayler the orders.”

Jackson was silent, then almost whispered, “We are going to talk about how you got out of your room and off the installation. You, me, August, and Noel. And then I’m throwing you into the deepest hole I can find.”

“Don’t threaten me, Jackson,” she said loudly as her bravado began to collapse. She wasn’t a secret agent or special ops. She was a biologist. And August and I got further in half an hour than they did in six. “Right now, it’s just me and August out on an ill-advised walkabout looking for his missing kin, and I’d like to keep it that way. Noel doesn’t even have to know about it unless you force Will into seeking asylum at the embassy and he has to tell her why. Just send someone out here to pick us up,” she said, wishing her voice hadn’t gotten squeaky. Hearing it, August turned and started back.

Jackson was silent, but she could hear hallway sounds in the background and his breathing—fast as if he was in transit to a chopper. Her grip on her phone tightened. “August asked for your help, and you said no,” she said, her eyes locked to August’s as he halted before her. “Don’t get pissy with me because I said yes. It would have been easier and safer if you had escorted him out here instead of me.”

“It would have, eh?” he said, angry.

“But now we’re here,” she said, “and if you’re lucky, Will and I will pick it all apart and give you a transcript of what Mikail wrote so you don’t have to take pictures and ask Noel,” she added, antsy as she and August began to make their way back to the surgical room.

“I could not let August go out there,” Jackson said. “Tayler might have still been on-site. Do you know how dangerous she is? Renee…” he started, and her jaw clenched. “Someone here is working with her, and if I don’t find out who, anything I do is going to be twisted back against me. Gorman is talking, but he doesn’t know everything. We’ll be lucky if Tayler’s accomplice doesn’t kill him and anyone else who threatens Tayler’s lie before the week’s end.”

Renee took a slow breath, worry settling deep in her gut. Threaten Tayler’s lie, as in finding Mikail and exposing her? “Well, it’s a good thing she’s not here,” Renee said, her shoes making a hissing whisper as she scuffed to a halt in the dark surgical room. Three hours? she thought, her nose wrinkling at a rank smell. “Maybe we should start back. You could meet us halfway at a burger joint. This place is foul.”

“Stay there,” he said bitterly, and the phone clicked off.

She grimaced in annoyance as she lowered her phone. No one had seen them. She had done the right thing. So why do I feel as if I made a mistake?

“Good God,” a high voice said from the shadows beside the hole in the wall. “I thought he’d never hang up.”

Renee jerked, her back hitting the surgical table. In a smooth move, August stepped close, his wings lifted in threat.

“Lights, full!” the woman said, and Renee cowered as the enormous lights over the surgery table thumped on. August cried out, wings rising to shade himself as his eyes flashed red behind his nictitating membrane.

“Aww, shit,” Renee whispered, her gaze fixed to the two figures standing to either side of the hole August had hammered into existence. Blinking the glare away, she felt her lip curl: Tayler and Monroe, the latter pointing a handgun at them.

“Dr. Caisson,” the lieutenant general said, his posture a weird mix of tense confidence. “Make one move to that phone, and I will shoot you both dead.” His gaze flicked to August as he pulled himself straight, hands gripping his wing hem. “Easy, August. Let go of your wing, or I will shoot Dr. Caisson.”

“How did I not feel you?” the angry mer rasped, and Monroe patted his wire-decked vest.

“Neural inhibitor.” Monroe flicked his gun’s muzzle, motioning for them to move from the table. “Dr. Tayler put it together after she realized Neighbors were sensitive to brain activity. I don’t actually enjoy hurting them, Dr. Caisson, but you have to admit that it is the fastest way from point A to point B.”

August’s wing knuckles cracked together over his head. His wings flashed open, and he lunged forward.

“August, no!” Renee cried…and then she gasped, her hand extended as he collapsed into a little ball and slid to Monroe’s feet. “What did you do to him?” she demanded, enraged as Tayler gleefully aimed what looked like a bullhorn at him. Renee could hear nothing, but that obviously wasn’t the case with August.

“Stop! He’s down!” she exclaimed as he began to convulse.

She ran to him, skidding to a halt at the loud pop of Monroe’s gun firing into the air.

“Tayler, knock it off. I need him fit for travel, not drooling,” Monroe said, and the woman flicked a switch on the side of the bulky-looking transceiver.

Immediately August sagged, his breath whistling as he sucked in the air.

“They really aren’t that durable for all their strength,” Tayler said as August tried to get up and failed. “But we’re learning.”

Renee’s pulse hammered. “Learning what?” she said bitterly, afraid to move.

Monroe holstered his gun and strode forward. “How to kill them, of course.”