This story is the finale for the Prey series Contains violence and minor profanity July 23rd, 1983. Brazil. A Corona spy satellite made its passes over the planet below. Its many cameras scanned the Earth for unusual activity. Some was found. In the Brazilian rain forests, someone appeared to be building a city of some variety. As it was, it was several partly finished buildings and a rudimentary wall. It was situated in a clearing 6 miles wide and 6 miles wide, 36 square miles. Much of it was being constructed by hand, but there was evidence of cranes, backhoes and bulldozers in the area. Down in the city, someone was assembling something. Two youths of about 19 were putting some sort of satellite-contacting device together in a clearing. They appeared normal, but had glassy eyes, glassier then most humans. They were perfectly silent, working quietly and intently. A young, but older man with light brown hair and a short beard walked over. He spoke simply and quietly. "Is it finished yet?" "Yes sir. Soon, this entire area will be invisible to satellites," one of the men said. "Excellent. Begin the startup process now." One of them began feverishly typing commands in on a console built onto the device. Soon, the crystalline head of the device glowed green, and fired up into the air. The Corona lost the city on its screens. What was once a small city being built in a remote region of Brazil was now a patch of jungle, undistinguished from the rest of the forest. The satellite didn’t care. It took its pictures and went on. "Are we in the clear, boys?" the older man who arrived when they were finishing the device asked. "It is" one said. "Mr. Lewis."
August 19th, 1998. Ratley Penitentiary. Two men moved outside the guardhouse on the road leading into the prison complex. One was armed with simply with a pistol. The other brandished a massive AR-33 machine gun. They walked up to the guardhouse, keeping their weapons out of sight. "Hello" one said. "We’d like to speak to a certain Mr. Lewis being held here." "It’s not visitors day. Come back Tuesday" the fat guard said as he leaned back in his chair. "Besides, Mr. Lewis is in solitary, last time I checked. No visitors. So why don’t you just go down to some bar and drink yourself to death, because I don’t care." "Oh, you’ll care" one said, then pulled out his pistol and shot him in the head at point blank range." "An excellent hit, Comrade Daniels" one of them said. "You’ll need to back me up with that thing while I get Lewis, Comrade Newton. You’ll go into, and start killing these weak, pitiful worms while I get Lewis, you set the bomb, and we’ll get out before we wipe out 13,000 of these rats." "Yes. Now, the plan will go into operation. Good luck, and survival of the fittest." One man went down the path, while the other lingered behind. Gunfire echoed from down the path a moment later. "Come, Daniels. We need to hurry." They walked down the path, past the devastated ruins of checkpoint, now manned by 2 corpses. Now, they were inside the walls, and they walked past the exercise yard. Then, Newton walked off, toward the exercise yard while Daniels continued on towards Cellblock F. As he entered the building, he heard screams and gunfire. He walked down the hallway, past cells full of jeering prisoners. He walked on, toward a metal wall with a fire door in it, manned by a soldier. He continued walking. "Stop where you are" the soldier commanded. "Why?" he asked. "This prisoner is NOT to see any unauthorized persons, including you, so turn back." "There’s a prisoner riot in the exercise yard. I came to warn you. Can’t you hear the gunfire." The soldier cocked his head and listened. Then, he set off down the hall, leaving the fire door unguarded. Daniels shot him in the back. Then, he took the key off his body and unlocked the fire door. It opened slowly, revealing a gray-haired man with a short beard. Those piercing eyes were the same as they were 15 years ago, despite the straining years. "Come" he said. "I’ve come to spring you." "Good, Daniels. I’ve trained you well. Much better than your brother, who betrayed us just when we needed him most" Lewis said. "I know. Now we need to go." In the bloodstained exercise yard, Newton set a bomb. It was a vacuum-oxygen bomb, the most powerful non-nuclear explosive in the world. After killing the 25 prisoners and 3 guards in the yard, he began setting the bomb. Once detonated, it would create a massive explosion that would destroy the prison complex. Two figures approached. One was Lewis. The other was his comrade Daniels. He had completed his mission. Now Newton was to complete his. "The bomb is set, Lewis. Now we must go." "An excellent course of action, Newton." They walked out of the prison. No one, surprisingly, tried to stop them. Once they were out of the area, about a half-mile past the guardhouse, Newton pressed the detonator button. A roaring holocaust consumed the prison, orbiting out from the exercise yard, consuming building after building, cremating thousands of prisoners. The wave of fire eventually reached the guardhouse where Newton and Daniels had begun their mission, smashing it to the earth without pity. The explosion subsided, leaving a pile of rubble with tiny flames flickering about them. Newton, Lewis and Daniels set out for their car. By the time police arrived, they would be long gone. "In other news today, Ratley Penitentiary was leveled today in what police are calling ‘a terrorist act’. Little is known about the bombing, except that preliminary examinations have shown that all but one of the 13,000 prisoners is dead. A man known only as Lewis, an assassin who some claim belongs to a new species, was not among the dead." Tom Daniels’s eyes widened, his muscles tensed. On the sofa in his apartment, he just about had a heart attack. Lewis had escaped. A terrorist attack of such magnitude. Only one survivor. He instinctively grabbed for the telephone, and punched in a long-memorized number. A phone rang in Ed Tate’s apartment, interrupted his commune with a pineapple pizza. He was eating and watching football, still feeling guilty about Kelly, whose life he failed to save. "Who is it?" he growled as he picked up the phone, mouth half-full of the pizza. "Ed, this is Tom. Lewis has escaped." "Lewis? What the hell?" "Lewis has escaped from prison, with the help of some other members of his group. Ratley Penitentiary had been leveled in the most hideous terrorist attack in history." "Okay, so what do I do now?" "I’m calling up the other members of the team. Get to the lab. The others will arrive soon." "Sure." Grumbling, he put his pizza in the refrigerator, turned off football, put on his shoes and got his science stuff, then set off for the Whitney University. A few minutes later, another telephone rang, at the house of Ray Peterson. His wife was gone shopping, and he was just was sitting around the house reading the paper. He had already read the comics and editorial pages, and was about to read the Local section when the phone rang. Annoyed, he picked up the phone. "Ray, this is Tom. Ratley Penitentiary has been destroyed, and Lewis has escaped. Everyone else there is dead." "Tom, if you’re making this up, I’ll tear out your eyes. What do you expect me to do?" "Get to the lab. I’ve already contacted Ed." "Fine." He wrote out a note to his wife explaining where he was going, then set off. Walter Attwood was sitting at his desk, composing a report on the recent capture of Lewis at Whitney University. He was mulling over the part on how Sloan had managed to bring Tom back to their side when the phone rang in his ear. "Walter, this is Tom. Lewis has escaped. Ratley Penitentiary has been leveled. We need you over at the lab pronto." "Tom, if this is some damn funny joke…" "It’s not. Ed and Ray are already there." "Good." After calling the other members of the group, Tom weighed calling Sloan or dropping by personally. He decided on the former. Sloan was in her condo, eating chocolate chip mint ice cream on the sofa, when the call arrived. Sighing, she picked up the phone. "Hello?" "Sloan, this is Tom." He hesitated. "Lewis has escaped from prison." Sloan just about dropped her ice cream when she heard this. "Are you sure?" "Yes. Ratley Penitentiary has been leveled, and 13,000 people are dead. No one except an extreme psychopath or a member of the new species would do that." Sloan noticed hesitancy in his voice when he said ‘new species’ about his own kind. "And?" she asked, unwilling to abandon her ice cream. "I’ve assembled the others at the lab. You are needed urgently. Come quickly. Goodbye." He hung up. Sloan wrapped her bowl of ice cream in plastic and placed it in the freezer. She hoped this would be finished quickly. Tom was the last to arrive at the bio-anthropology lab. The others were clustered around a television showing reports of the attack at Ratley Penitentiary. They were showing the names of the dead, a daunting task with 13,000+ dead to identify. They also flashed around a picture of Lewis, who they assumed escaped. Ed was the first one aware of Tom’s arrival. "What do you think Lewis will do next?" he asked. "He’ll probably lay low for awhile, until the search slackens and moves away from the area. Then, he’ll probably put his plans into action." "Which plans?" Sloan asked nervously. "He’ll probably reassemble his old network, and if I know him well enough, probably attempt revenge." "Against whom?" Attwood asked. "Me, primarily, and then the rest of you. The foremost target among you would be Sloan, having brought me back from Lewis’s thrall. I suggest setting up a massive manhunt, first at the mansion where Sloan ran his training operation." "Your advice will be considered" Peterson said. "Now what do we do?" "Get as many known assassins in the area, then hunt down Lewis himself" Tom said, his voice sounding strange. Dead. "What else could he do?" "Well, when I was training with him, he was talking of a ‘secret fortress’, and a ‘launchpad of domination.’ He passed out tidbits of information about it to students who pleased him. He revealed the full story to only two pupils." "Who?" Sloan asked. "Robert Newton, and…" "And who?" Ed asked. "Allen Daniels. My brother." The room hung in stony silence for a long time. "What now?" Newton asked Lewis. "We take revenge, then return to the fortress. There, we can put our plan into action." "What plan?" Daniels asked. "The plan will be revealed to you at the proper time. Now we must set the plan into action. Newton, you go to the bio-anthropology lab and kill anyone you find there. Daniels, you go to Sloan’s condo. When she, Tom, or both of them arrive, kill them. Brother Vs brother. This will be such fun."
"So you weren’t an only child?" Ed asked. "Why didn’t you tell us that?" "I didn’t remember. In Lewis’s training, I was brainwashed to forget much of my childhood. During training, someone I vaguely remembered from before arrived, to be trained as an assassin. Then, he was awarded some secret, about a fortress. Those memories were erased too. They recently appeared when I heard the attack on the news." "What could possibly have stimulated such a memory?" Attwood asked. "Perhaps Allen was involved in the attack. What can we do now?" "We can attempt to make him cross sides, like you did with me" Tom said. "But who knows whether that will work." "Who knows even if he’s still in the area?" Peterson asked. "Ray" Tom said firmly. "Lewis will need all the help he can get. Without his cult-murder charade or legion of assassins, he’ll keep Allen with him if Allen was even involved." Sloan remembered the time when Lewis had tricked the police into believing that Tom was a cult enforcer and Sloan was his accomplice; how they’d been forced to run and she had been charged with harboring a fugitive. Then how Tom had crossed sides once more and attacked them at Whitney; how she had brought him back and they had captured Lewis. Now Lewis was free, and possibly out for revenge. Things were going to be hectic for the next few days; she hoped her ice cream kept well. At 7:55, Sloan went home from the laboratory, while the rest of them continued in coordinating the search for Lewis.
Tom walked down the hallway, to see if Sloan had made it to her apartment safely. He was surprised to see the door hanging off its hinges, and could sense the presence of Sloan and something, darker. He pulled the gun out of his holster and walked inside. He could see a man in a dark coat standing on the micro-balcony above the main level of the room, and Sloan standing in front of him. He could also see the glint of a military-issue pistol. The man whirled to face him. The face cut through the fog of memory-wipings and long-forgotten events. Allen Daniels. His brother. "Ah, the traitor" Allen sneered, pointing the gun at him. "Can you say stalemate?" Tom asked, his gun pointing at Allen. "Can you say the humans you fight for are evolutionarily obsolete?" "No." Tom fired his gun, blasting the pistol out of Allen’s hand. Allen lunged, knocking the gun out of Tom’s hand. Tom lashed out, hitting Allen across the face. Allen kicked Tom, staggering him backward. Then Tom leapt on top of him and began punching him viciously. Allen bit Tom savagely. Tom yelled in pain as he was thrown back; Allen flipping him judo-style. Allen began punching Tom angrily, then Tom reached out and dug his fingers into Allen’s eyes. Allen roared in rage and torment, then blindly leaped through the closed window, landed on his hands and knees, then stumbled off, bleeding. "Who the hell was that?" Sloan asked. "That, Sloan, was Allen Daniels."
The people at the lab were having similar troubles. Newton had come crashing in, through a Plexiglas window and began tearing things up. Two security guards were already dead, and despite being wounded, Newton seemed hell-bent on tearing things up. Ed was hiding behind a console, wishing fervently that Newton would lose interest or Tom would show up at the right time and blow the SOB’s head off. It probably wouldn’t happen, though. A gunshot. A scream. Another gunshot. It sounded like things were getting hairy out there. Then, gunfire began filling the room, and for a brief second, Ed went deaf. Then, as he looked up, he was surprised and relieved. Three police, Tom, and Sloan were standing on the stairs with guns pointed at the smoking carcass of Newton.
"You stupid maggot" Lewis screamed as Daniels tried to explain. "We just lost Newton, and Parker and Tom are still alive! I now give you your final assignment. Find Parker and Tom, then kill them. Don’t come back until you do!" "Yes sir" Daniels said, barely seeing through bloodied eyes. Then, he left the fortified mansion that Lewis used as his training base for assassins.
"What damage did Newton do?" Attwood asked angrily. "Well, he smashed two computers, but we have all the data backed up on some computers that he didn’t get to. He screwed up our modem system pretty bad, but it’s fixable" Ed tried to explain. "Any new leads on Lewis?" Attwood asked Peterson. "We have SWAT teams closing in on the mansion, but I’ll bet a dollar to a dime that he’s already split." "Good. Adjusting to your new position well?" "Yes sir" Peterson said pridefully. He had accepted Attwood’s offer of being chief of security at the Whitney University project. A cell phone rang, and Peterson picked it up. He listened momentarily, then his eyes widened. He hung up. "Lewis killed three people and escaped. He’s now somewhere in the hills around the mansion." "Have people in the mansion, then use the remainder of the force to hunt him down" Attwood said. "We need him captured or killed, preferably captured." "You’re not going to be able to hold him for very long if you do catch him" Tom said. "He has operatives all over the world, particularly around here. His other known assassin, Allen Daniels, is still out there, somewhere. If we can progress without fear of another such attack, we need to kill him. Pronto." "An astute observation, Tom" Ed said.
Hidden in the bushes across the street from the condominium where Dr. Sloan Parker lived, Allen Daniels watched. The police presence in the area was high, and he knew where the snipers were. He could sense them. One was atop the building, another was on top of the building behind him, and several were liberally scattered all over next couple of buildings. He had the AR-33 from the prison with him, but his Glock was in Sloan’s condominium, where he couldn’t get it. For the time being. But he was a patient man. He had all the time he needed. All the time in the world.
Dr. Sloan Parker looked into a microscope at blood samples taken from Newton before Attwood hauled the body off to the private lab he had in another part of the building where he had experimented on Randall Lynch with ‘equipment not invented yet’. A DNA difference of 1.6, as usual. Excluding Kelly the girl rescued from suicide by Ed who died a few days later, that was the DNA differential of all members of this new species. She had been experimenting with the blood samples for about three days now, and was bored. She had found an interesting piece of information. A certain segment of the DNA unique to the new species responded to a certain frequency of UV light by glowing faintly. It was an interesting trait that might be useful some day. "Sloan" Ed said. She looked up from her microscope. "Yes?" she asked. "You’ve been working on that thing for three days straight. Why don’t you go home and get some rest?" "Because I’m close, or I think I’m close to finding something important in the battle with the new species. What else is going on?" "Peterson’s team has a fix on Lewis’s location. It’s in the Los Angeles dockyards. Apparently, he’s having a ship take him out, and they have attack teams moving in now." "That would be good." With Lewis back in jail, it would bring closure to a turbulent chain of events. "Any thing else?" Ed sighed. "Not much. They’re still keeping watch on your condominium so unless Daniels is insane, he won’t try anything." "Is that it?" "Well, Tom is running around town spending massive amounts of money trying to get people to give him a fix on Allen’s location. I hope he’s successful in his plan." "Okay. Now, can I get to work in peace?" "Sure. I’m turning in for the night. See you tomorrow." Ed walked out, leaving the door open as he left. Sloan returned to the microscope, examining every chromosome in the DNA, trying to find SOMETHING helpful in battling the creatures that threatened to exterminate mankind. A shadow fell over her. "Ed?" she asked, looking up from the microscope. A fist lashed out, throwing Sloan back into a table. It was Allen Daniels, massively enraged. "Ah, Dr. Parker, I see you’re persevering, working hard until late. What is it you’re working on? A cure of a disease, a vaccine for cancer? Or weapon to use against my kind, to kill us wholesale. Thwarting Darwin. I just can’t let that happen, Dr. Parker. You would understand." He lashed out again, smashing the expensive microscope. Sloan was backing up, reaching for the UV flashgun. "Go ahead" he said, pointing the pistol at her head. "Pick it up. What could that photography toy do to me?" "This" Sloan said defiance in her voice. Then she aimed it in his already-damaged eyes and pulled the trigger. Allen screamed in pain as the UV light stunned his eyes. Sloan scrambled away as he blindly groped for his gun, which he had dropped. As his eyes cleared, he grabbed the gun and fired at her. He missed, but Sloan froze. "Tom damaged my eyes, robbed me of my ability to see clearly, but I can still blow your weakling, human body to hell. Do you wish that?" "No" she said. "Good. Now, standing up against that wall." She obeyed. He brought his pistol up to fire and screamed in pain. Attwood had sneaked up behind him and stuck a knife in his back. He dropped his pistol as Sloan lunged for it. Bleeding and obviously in great pain, Allen picked up Attwood. "Do you wish to die, puny human?" Sloan grabbed the gun and fired it past Allen’s head. He threw Attwood down and turned to face her. "I wouldn’t move, Allen." "How do you know my name?" he asked, obviously put off by this recent revelation. "Tom told me. Why don’t you stay right there, and no one will die. Walter! Call security." "Yes, Sloan" he said, and stalked off to get some security people in the lab. "Now, Allen, let’s play a game of 20 Questions. Where is Lewis headed?" "I’m not going to divulge that information." "TELL ME NOW!" "Heck no. I’d sooner die then tell you." "Fine. What does Lewis want?" "He wants me to kill you and Tom, and he wanted Newton to destroy the lab. Newton failed." A pause. "I have failed." "Good. Now what else is Lewis planning on?" "I don’t know. Don’t bother me with such questions." "Where are the largest concentrations of your kind?" "I’m not going to tell you, Dr. Parker. Lewis should have killed you when he had the chance." He spat out the words with contempt. Security teams burst in, and Allen made his move. He punched Sloan in the face, knocking her backwards. Then, he snatched up his gun and began firing randomly. One security officer was killed, and another wounded. Allen ran for one of the thick windows and jumped right through it. Then, he disappeared in the night. Tom and Ed burst in. "What in the name of God happened here?" Ed asked. "Allen attacked. I had a gun on him and managed to get some interesting tidbits of information out of him. He was sent to kill Tom and me, whereas the other one was sent to destroy the lab. Both of them have failed. Lewis is up to something bigger then revenge, Allen was adamant about not telling me. It’s very important." "Also, we lost Lewis" Peterson said as he walked in. "I see" Tom said, pensively. "Is there any GOOD news?" "I found out that a certain particle of the new species’s blood will respond to UV light at a frequency of .567895. She walked over to the UV flashgun and set it on that frequency. "Close your eyes" she said to Tom, then she pointed it at him and fired. Tom began to glow florescent green, a pale light exuding from his skin before fading. "Looks like you’ve got a nice healthy glow, Tom" Ed said. Everyone laughed. "Okay" Tom said. "What now?" "I have a plan, everyone" Attwood said, coming in from the hallway. "We have an old satellite we no longer need over at NASA. If we can attach large, continuous-firing UV flashguns tuned to .567895, we can pinpoint the location of every member of the new species in the world." "Are you sure your connections will like this new plan?" Ed asked. "Yes, Mr. Tate. I think they will." Three days later, the satellite was put into orbit by the space shuttle Atlantis. Soon, it came online, and the team at the lab got a clear picture of how many of the new species lived in the world. "Oh my God" Ed said. "Holy damn" Attwood said. "What the heck" Peterson said. "Now gentlemen, we have a good estimate of how many of the new species live in the world today. Around 120 million, mostly in South America. At the current birthrate and deathrate, we’re looking at around a billion in 8 years" Attwood said. "To what degree have they infiltrated society?" Sloan asked. "In most major cities in the Western Hemisphere, there are roughly 50,000 individuals. Most of them are fairly decent people, but once the trainers like Lewis and perhaps 2,000 others get hold of them, they’re turned into emotionless killers like Lynch, Lisa, or what our friend Tom here was." "Where are the major concentrations." "Out in the northern jungles of South America, there’s what seems to be a city-full of these people. Apparently the gathering of clans for war." "War?" Sloan gulped. "Yes. There seems to be about 100,000 of them there, all assassin-types, we’d guess." "What can we do now? We can’t count on the military for help." "I know that. If we could get into the city, then we could set a large bomb and destroy it. The vacuum-oxygen bomb that destroyed Ratley Penitentiary showed what kind of devastation it could do." "Yes, but 4 people, infiltrating a fortress of 100,000 warriors, that wouldn’t work very well." "You’ll be very heavily armed, and have air support from the CIA’s Covert Squadron. If we can sow enough chaos, you should get in quite easily." "Fine. When should we go?" Tom asked. "Preferably within the next two days. It’ll take that long to arrange for weapons, provisions, transport, that sort of thing," Attwood said. "I’d get as much R&R in now, because the next week is going to be hell." "Anyone for pizza?" Ed asked helpfully. "Sure" Sloan said. "Fine" Tom said. "I guess so," Peterson said. While the others stuffed themselves full of Italian food, Attwood was at work procuring equipment for the little jaunt into the darkness of the Amazon. "I’ll need 10 M-209 rifles as well as two crates containing 20,000 rounds and 40 grenades each. Also two vacuum-oxygen bombs, maximum power. Plane tickets to Belem, and various authorizations to get into that region of the jungle, pronto" Attwood asked his mysterious female boss. "Fine, Attwood. If this is some sort of trick to get attention, I’ll have your hide" she said. "Fine, Elizabeth." "Don’t use my name. They could be tracing or doing something fishy." "Who’s they?" "The new species. Hasn’t this new satellite found that they’ve infiltrated society quite well."
"What the hell?" Lewis roared in the South American fortress. "What do you mean the satellite jammer has failed?" "It has, Mr. Lewis. For a brief split second, it was blinded by something attached to a satellite up there. They could have our location." "Define they" he ordered, enraged. "Dr. Parker, Tom, Attwood and Peterson. Those people from Whitney University." "They’d better not" Lewis growled. "But if they did, I’ll have to alert the general populace. They’ll have a nasty surprise waiting for them if they arrive." Two days later, the strike team was assembled at the Whitney University bio-anthropology lab. It was composed of Sloan, Tom, Ed, Peterson, and two Special Forces officers, Bradley and Wilkes.
"You’ve been outfitted for a two-week long battle with the new species. You’ll have 10 machine guns and a large quantity of ammunition and two vacuum-oxygen bombs, the kind they used to destroy the prison when they sprang Lewis. Use them only in the city itself, preferably in the central area" Attwood said. "You’ll take a direct flight to Belem, and a river barge to the area. Then, you’re on your own. You’ll get a few canoes, some with motors and some without. My suggestion is use the motor-less ones for the assault on the city itself. It’s well defended from military assault, but a small group can infiltrate it and destroy it, especially when the Covert Squadron will soften the target up with a little phosgene and tabun. Is everything clear?" Tom raised his hand. "What about trouble with Brazilian authorities? Won’t they object to have a group like ours tramping around armed to the teeth?" "The State Department has cleared that up. Any more questions?" No one spoke. "Good" Attwood said. "Now hop to it and good luck. A plane will be waiting at the airfield. We’ve already cleared you through Customs with all the military stuff. Hurry, your flight leaves in 10 minutes." They got a bus to the Johnson Military Airfield 10 minutes from the lab. Then, they packed the massive amounts of military gear and took their seats. Even magazines had been prearranged. Ed sat with Peterson, Bradley and Wilkes sat together, and so did Sloan and Tom. "So" Tom asked, hoping to strike up conversation. "How do you think this mission will turn out?" Sloan sighed. "Who knows? We’ll either come home as heroes or all die." "Yes, I suppose so. The city is heavily defended, but who knows. Maybe the poison gas strikes will be useful in screwing up their defenses pretty badly." "Poison gas strikes. Do you think that the Brazilian government knows about that?" "Probably not. The CIA’s squadron isn’t based in Brazil anyway. Why do you think Attwood didn’t just order the place nuked?" "President Clinton wouldn’t go for it. He might not even know about what our illustrious Dr. Walter Attwood might be up to. He might also want artifacts like pillars or statues, or perhaps files, data and software we could use to clear up the remnants of the new species." The pillar. The pillar they had found in the Mexican desert two months before, with the strange astronomical markings that matched a mysterious tattoo on Tom’s left shoulder that marked him as the leader of the new species. Perhaps he could use that to his advantage in swaying members of the new species to his side. "I wonder what members of the new species would be at the city," Sloan said, interrupting Tom’s reverie. "Definitely Lewis. Peterson’s team found out that the ship was heading for Lima, where the Trans-South America rail line could take him to the city. Sloan, I think I was wrong in saying that there wasn’t a hierarchy above Lewis. An effort at building an army such as this would require coordination. I suspect there’s a leader somewhere. Do you think I could use the tattoo that marks me as their future leader to sway some of them?" "Perhaps. But in assassin mode they’re fanatically loyal, and it might not work." In the cargo compartment of the military airplane, Allen Daniels peeked out of the satellite linkup equipment crate. It was a last-minute order sent in by Attwood, and easier to intercept and hide in. It would be such a surprise to have them open the crate and see him, and then he could kill them all and cripple the effort to stop his kind from taking over the planet. Still, the rumors from China were disturbing him… "We have a communiqué from Attwood" Bradley said. "He said it’s for Dr. Parker, Peterson, and Daniels only." The chosen ones stepped out of their seats and were directed into the hold for the secure transmission.
Allen Daniels heard footsteps, and ducked back into his crate. They entered the room and accessed a plane-board terminal. Attwood’s image appeared on the screen. "People, there’s been a new development in the battle against the news species." "What?" Tom asked. "Apparently, a similar group in China have captured a member of the new species and managed to turn him, for $10 million. Now, we have an ally in the fight. The largest concentration of them is in China anyhow. Consider their help a welcome addition." Listening from his hiding place, Allen heard the news. The rumors were true, and Yang Wu, one of the assassins had been turned, for money. A less noble motive then for his brother’s betrayal. His brother had betrayed them for what he suspected was love for Dr. Parker. It would absolutely break his heart to kill Sloan in front of him. Still, that would be dangerous. Tom would damn well tear him apart if he did that. "Well" Sloan said. "Will the Chinese team be of use in our mission to the city?" "Probably not," Attwood said resignedly. "They’ve barely gotten started. The new species’s presence in China is even stronger than the one in America." Good, Allen thought. An insurance that they wouldn’t try anything to reinforce them. "Attention travelers" a voice said on the intercom. "We are now taxiing into Belem International. Have a wonderful trip!" "Time to go" Peterson said, and they all walked out of the room. Allen Daniels hid himself even more securely. After many a dull hour dragging their equipment around the city looking for the prearranged captain, they found him and loaded the gear, including the stowaway Daniels, rather roughly. Then, they set down the Amazon. For three days they traveled, from the Amazon to the Rio Negro, and finally to their destination, a little-known tributary of the Rio Negro. "Send the signal when you need to be picked up" the captain said after unloading them. They transferred all their gear to their smaller boats and began going down the small river. For another day they traveled, and finally they arrived at the site planned for base camp. It was a ruin of a port facility, half-overgrown by the jungle. They laid out their gear, and Sloan began unpacking the satellite equipment to call in. Something funny was stowed in the box besides the transmitters. It appeared to be a black coat, the kind Tom liked to wear when he was an assassin for Lewis. As she picked up the main unit, something began to rise. It was man wearing a black coat, with an AR-33 machine gun under his coat. He had gray eyes, but they were bloodshot. The brown hair, less gray then Tom’s. It was Allen Daniels. He had stown away. "Good morning Dr. Parker. You look positively lovely for 5 days in this swamp. Too bad I’ll have to sully that by killing you." Tom felt something. Someone was here, someone who wasn’t supposed to be there. Someone evil. He could sense Sloan’s anger and fear. Soul-searing terror. He turned back and walked toward the area where they had set up base camp. "After I kill you, I’ll tell Tom how wonderful it was to work with him before I kill him, then I’ll slaughter those sheep you call your friends." "Not so fast" someone said. Tom. "Oh, traitor. Do you honestly think you could possibly stop me? You’re becoming as overconfident as those weak humans you love so much." He began to raise his AR-33, but Tom shot him. He was wearing a bulletproof vest, but the impact caused him to drop his gun. "Sloan! Get away!" Tom yelled as he charged Allen. "Don’t push me, brother. I’m more dangerous than you could ever be" Allen hissed as he rose, and charged forward. They met where there was a weakness in the floor. Mold and moss had been eating away for a long time, and it might give at extreme pressure. Tom released a massive kick into Allen’s face, knocking him backward. Allen lashed out, and thus began a battle. More savage then any Sloan had ever seen. The floor gave, and they both tumbled down into the black river. Tom grabbed onto a hanging board while Allen fell down into the river, and was swept away by the current. Sloan grabbed Tom’s hand and began pulling him back over. Ed and the others rushed in. "What happened here?" he asked. "Allen" Sloan said simply. An hour later, at a river leading through the city, someone found someone, and summoned Lewis. The man was revived. "Allen!" Lewis roared. "I told you not to come back until they were dead!" "I had almost killed Dr. Parker several times, but Tom always intervened. In the last battle, we both fell through a weakened floor panel in a ruined building somewhere nearby. He managed to grab hold of something, I fell into the river" Allen protested weakly. "So they’re here. It is time the five kings gathered for battle." He summoned the leaders of the other clans. They’re planning lasting long into the night. In the ruined port, the fire had died down. Most everyone had gone to sleep, except Tom and Sloan. Tom had disappeared somewhere, and Sloan, in her slip and a pair of jeans, her usual sleeping attire, was climbing into her sleeping bag when Tom appeared from the darkness. "Hello" Tom said. "Everyone bedded down for the night?" "Mostly. Why don’t you get some sleep? Allen is 20 miles downriver by now. He won’t make it here before morning." "I hope you’re right, Sloan. He’s very, very dangerous. When I told you that Lewis and the people he trained have committed crimes you couldn’t imagine, he was the superlative. Where exactly is everyone?" "Well, Ed is over there in the corner" she said, pointing. "Peterson is about 10 feet away, Wilkes is over by the door, and Bradley is up on the second level." "Ed doesn’t really like me very much, does he?" "Yes" she said dejectedly. "He either thinks you’re untrustworthy or he’s jealous." Ed wasn’t entirely asleep, and he heard. "I always suspected that. He kept his emotions masked, but I could sense it." He knew! How did he know? Ed didn’t like him, and he WAS jealous, but to have Tom know it! He wormed partly out of his sleeping bag, and watched. Sloan was half-in half-out of her sleeping bag, Tom kneeling in front of her. He picked up a few snippets of the conversation. "Why don’t you get to sleep? They aren’t going to come between now and dawn." "I’ll still watch for them." They looked at each other briefly, then kissed. Ed was watching. He reddened with jealousy, but regained his normal color fast. Sloan turned, and seemed to stare right at him. He quickly slipped back into his bag. Sleep was a long time coming for him. In the night, five people approached. They were wearing only loincloths, moccasins, and arrow quivers, and were armed only with small knives and bows. They sensed someone at the window of the ruined port. Their leader looked closer. He was one of those people who lived in the mysterious city. He was not evil like those, but he was one of them. The leader ordered them back. In the morning, the group ate a quick field breakfast, then gathered their equipment. Ed kept quiet about the events of the previous night. They left the motorboats at the ruin, and used the canoes. Sloan and Tom had one canoe, Ed and Peterson had one canoe, and Wilkes and Bradley had one canoe. They began paddling downriver, to where their maps showed the city was.
After three hours of paddling, they found a clearing where they could land, about 5 miles from the mysterious city of demons. They all shouldered their packs and got their guns, then set off into the jungle. After 30 minutes of walking, they had the feeling of being watched. Fifteen minutes passed in the grasp of the eerie sensation. Suddenly, Peterson fell, a blowgun dart in his back. They set off running. Ed fell next. Then Bradley. Then Wilkes. They were dragged off into the jungle. "Who the hell are they?" Sloan gasped as she and Tom were running. "Natives perhaps. Or maybe a commando team from the city. We’ll find out soon. Sloan cried out and fell, and was soon dragged off by what appeared to be an Indian. As Tom ran, a dart hit him. As he felt a narcotic sensation spread through him, he kept running. Two more darts hit him. He fired a random burst from his gun, felling what appeared to be another native. A fourth dart hit him. He stumbled, determined to escape this unknown horror. A fifth. He fell, unable to stand. He was dragged off. Sloan came to in a native camp, beside the others. Tom was conspicuously absent. What appeared to be a chief was jabbering in some weird language. Bradley was talking back. Tom was dragged in, half-asleep from the narcotic darts. Upon his arrival, the camp went into an uproar. Women hid their children, and warriors grabbed their weapons. Bradley began speaking again, more frantically. They calmed down. "What are they saying?" Ed asked, coming out of the drug-induced sleep. "Bradley is explaining to them about why we’re here, and why a member of the new species is traveling with us. The chief, or whoever he is, seems to be ranting and raving about how they raid villages, raping women and killing people. Apparently the people in the city have no manners" Wilkes explained. The chief calmed down. Then, the conversation changed and it seemed that an arrangement was being made. Then, two warriors appeared, and untied them. They stretched their aching limbs, and their gear was returned to them. Thirty natives appeared, looking normal except they had glassy eyes and didn’t smile. "Half-breeds, between the natives and members of the new species" Bradley explained. "They’re going to help us get into the city." "Good" Peterson said. "Now the odds of are .036 instead of .006." "Don’t get technical," Ed said. "We might get lucky." With a groan, Tom shook his head. "What exactly is going on here?" Bradley went into another explanatory speech. After resting for a while, the group walked the three miles to the city.
"Wow" Ed said when he saw it. The city was huge. The wall alone was gigantic, and crafted of the purest obsidian. They could see their reflection in it. The gates were made of steel and bore jade and garnet emblems of a serpent. There were small clusters of buildings on either side of the gates, but most of the buildings were inside the wall. The buildings they could see towered over the wall, but were all fairly square. A satellite dish or two peeked out from behind a few. Two towers with horizontal crescent moon-shaped structures at the tops were the tallest of them all. On the towers were bands of jade inscribed with hieroglyphics. Tom was the first to break the silence. "Well, this is all fine and good, but why don’t we get in?" "In a second" Bradley said, talking into a walkie-talkie. The tribal warriors looked uneasy. A roar filled the air, like distant thunder. Three F-16s screamed in, followed by two Apache choppers. Explosions went off in the city. Buildings began to collapse. The Apaches orbited in, and began firing rockets into the streets. The hiss of gas sounded. Screams echoed. The aircraft retreated. "That" Wilkes said proudly. "Was the CIA’s Covert Squadron." Tom loaded his machine gun, and walked into one of the nearby buildings. The sound of gunfire. The process repeated itself several times. "All clear" Tom said, voice dull. The group examined the buildings. Bradley scanned them with a funny-looking rectangular box he had. When the others had given up hope that they would ever find a secret entrance, Bradley spoke. "I found a drain big enough to admit us all, single-file." It was in one of the larger buildings, and they all began to squeeze in. Within 15 minutes, they had all gotten into the city proper. They were in the sewers, dark dank places reeking of sewage. They walked forward, looking left and right cautiously. After a while, they came to a set of stairs. The native warriors first, they walked up. A scream. The whistle of an arrow. They saw that one of the natives had killed a sewage worker. They then walked out of the sewage-processing facility, into the street. The dead littered the streets, at least 7,000 corpses attracting flies.
"They’re here" Lewis said. "The team I expected, as well as thirty half-breed native warriors." "This is worse then you said it would be" Bezos said. He was the leader of the Phoenix clan of Lima, Peru. "We’ve lost at least 10,000 of our people. You never told us that the traitor and his people would have air support." "I never knew. From my intelligence sources, they were having trouble convincing the government, even their own people, of our existence. Now, this gathering of the clans is in jeopardy. The people, most of our warriors on the planet, could be destroyed, crippling the species." "Pray that this little cadre can be destroyed, Mr. Lewis. Or they’ll be hell to pay."
The native warriors had fanned out, killing wounded survivors and basically doing guerrilla operations. "We don’t dare split up" Wilkes said. "If we did, we would be picked off one by one." "I know that" Tom said. "We need to find a large supply of flammable materials, plant the bombs, find materials useful for the battle against these people, then leave and detonate the bombs." "Good plan, Mr. Daniels" Bradley said. They looked around, and saw a large building in the center of the city, apparently the citadel. "The largest supply of useful information and flammable stuff is liable to be in the fortress," Sloan said. "Good deduction" Ed said. They stalked through the ruined section of the city, searching for enemies. They found the enemies at the gate to the citadel. There were three guards armed with grenade launchers. Ed stepped up and began firing his machine gun. Two of them were cut down, but the one man began firing grenades, destroying even more of the ruins. Some shrapnel hit Wilkes, wounding him slightly. Sloan shot the second, ending his lively grenade-launching career. Bradley relieved the corpses of their grenade launchers. The door was made of steel, and shooting it didn’t force it open. So Peterson made a clever arrangement. He pulled out several grenades, set them in front of the door, hooked all the pins to a rope, then, backing up, he pulled the string. All the pins were yanked out, and, after five seconds, they exploded, collapsing the door. They quickly filed into the building.
"They’re inside the citadel" Lewis said. "Is the trap set?" "It is, Lewis" Bezos said. "They should be having some troubles right about now." In the darkness of the hallway, something moved. Bradley signaled the group to stop, silently. He stared keenly down the hall. Suddenly, he raised his gun and fired. A scream. A man fell forward, still gripping his Uzi. The lights snapped on, revealing 12 of the new species. Gunfire began roaring. The mission was becoming difficult. Wilkes was hit in the head by a heavy-caliber bullet, literally decapitating him. The others found shelter behind fallen pillars and rubble. A fierce gun battle was going on. A large bullet spanged off a pile of loose bricks near Ed’s face, the shrapnel cutting him slightly. He looked around, and then loaded a grenade into his grenade launcher. Then, he sighted the largest group of his enemies, and fired. In a gigantic explosion, 5 of the new species were killed; arms, legs, heads, torsos flung akimbo. The new species began retreating. Tom glimpsed Allen briefly in the chaos, and began firing. He missed, only putting peppering his brother with shrapnel. When the hallway was clear, they extricated themselves from their cover and moved on, ignoring the smoking corpses.
"The trap has failed, Lewis" Bezos hissed. "May I tell you we are all in very real danger?" "They can’t get far. They just lost one of their best military operatives. Soon, all we will have to deal with are a bunch of nerds with guns." "Never underestimate these so-called ‘nerds’, Lewis" Bezos growled. "They single-handedly screwed up your network in LA, and almost got you executed."
The lights in the hallway were dimming, and Sloan suspected another trap. After they had defeated the small group near the entrance to the citadel, they had cautiously marched down through the tunnels, to what the signs labeled Storerooms. The sound of a semiautomatic loading was heard, and everyone froze. Three figures stepped out from the shadows in front of the storerooms. It was Lewis, Allen, and a 50-ish red-haired woman. Tom started, eyes going wide, then wider as he looked upon the scene. He gasped one word. "Mom?" "Yes, Tom" the woman chided viciously. "I see you’ve betrayed your own people as Lewis and Allen have claimed. Allen was always a mama’s boy anyway. You were always the rebellious little brat, and it’s carried over from your childhood to now." "Oh shut up, Mary" Lewis growled. "We have some explaining to do." "Give us one good reason why we shouldn’t blow you rats to hell right now" Tom hissed. "Oh you wouldn’t kill your own brother, teacher, and mother now would you?" Mary spoke, malice in every word. "Who knows? I could just pump you full of enough lead to give you poisoning troubles for the next century. I have no qualms about that whatsoever." He swung his M-209 up to point at them. Allen winced, Mary appeared visibly shaken, and only Lewis was calm. "How about the explaining I was prepared to do? Those words I had programmed into your subconscious, to resurrect long-buried memories, memories the pillar had been unable to free. Do you value those revelations?" "Fine, you maggot. I won’t kill you know. But I WILL kill you later" Tom growled, malice in his voice. "Fine. Torment in bowels" Lewis said, speaking those memory-revealing words. Tom’s vision blurred, the image of his three enemies replaced by a house. A basement. In the house, a young red-haired woman, his mother 20 years younger, walked up to him while he was playing chess with Allen. She led him out of Allen’s sight, then slapped him hard, then gagged him and tied him up. A brown-haired, bearded man appeared, and both of them began beating him. After they were finished, he heard his mother call the man by his name. Lewis. "You were the man in the flashbacks" Tom said, his voice hard but quiet. "You were the one who beat me mercilessly for most of my childhood. You little worm of vomit." "I’m not finished, Tom. The training." Tom saw another image, a video of the long past. He and 16 other people, mostly men but a few women, were sparring in a gym when a young man with brown hair came in with Lewis, and was duly introduced. Then, Lewis ordered them to spar. The battle was long, but Allen triumphed. "Don’t you see?" Allen chuckled. "I was always better." "Now, for the last revelation. The 6th murder." It was a scene of a lab. An unfamiliar visage, of Dr. Ann Coulter. Tom was drawing a gun. He fired three hollow-nose bullets into Dr. Coulter’s face, chest, and abdomen, killing her. "What the hell?" Tom asked. "I thought Lynch killed Coulter. What is going on?" "It was you who killed Coulter, and then I erased the memory when I sent you to kill Dr. Parker. This should hurt you more then the beatings I gave you when you were a child." Sloan was stunned. It wasn’t Lynch who killed her mentor and friend Dr. Ann Coulter. It was Tom! Her best fried, the one she loved, murdered her friend? Why? "Tom" she asked calmly. "Is this true?" "Yes. This was before you made me aware of the evil of my acts, of how I hurt people by carrying water for this rat Lewis." "Yes" she said sadly. "You know what mean now Tom" Lewis mocked, as he and Mary vanished behind a secret panel leaving only Allen to face them. "I challenge you to a duel, to avenge the defeat I dealt you so many years ago. Do you accept?" "Yes, you ass-crawling vermin" Tom said slowly, throwing down his machine gun. Allen threw down his gun, and they circled each other. Ed loaded his rifle. "Don’t Ed. This is my battle. I’ll fight it alone." As he spoke, Allen lunged. Tom turned to face him, and twisted Allen’s arm. Allen winced in pain and punched Tom in the face with his unoccupied arm. Tom reeled, still holding onto Allen, then kicked him in the groin, and began punching him repeatedly, bloodying his face. As he was being savagely beaten, Allen reached down and punched Tom in the stomach. Tom doubled over, and Allen wriggled out of his grip. Then, he wrapped his arms around Tom’s neck and flipped him. As Tom lay on the ground, Allen began stomping on him, and Ed’s trigger finger tightened slightly, just enough. Two hollow-point automatic grade bullets spat out of the gun and hit Allen in the shoulder. Allen screamed, a bull-roar of pain, and it gave Tom an opportunity. He punched Allen in the collarbone, snapping it in half. Allen screamed again, and as blood dripped down from the compound fracture, Tom moved again. He shoved his hand into the wound and tore the bone further. Allen shrieked again, in torment, then the pain forced him into unconsciousness. Tom stood up, picked up Allen’s pistol, and shot Allen three times in the back. Allen died. A duel was over. A defeat avenged. "Now" Tom said to the stunned audience. "What shall we do?" Sloan spoke first. "I think we should find the gasoline." They walked along, walking even deeper in the dark pyramid. The followed the path down, into the bowels of the forest floor. No one spoke. They came to the storerooms, but the doors were locked. Tom reached out, grabbed the door handles, and tore the doors off their hinges. Inside the room were 20 new species assassins. All had Himmler and Koch 91 assault rifles, HK91s leveled at them. "Good morning, everyone." One assassin’s finger drew back on the trigger. "Stop" Tom ordered. "I allowed Lewis to speak, so why don’t you allow us?" At the mention of Lewis, the man’s finger eased off the trigger, and the others appeared more attentive. "Have you ever heard of a city in the Mexican desert? Abandoned by our kind 51 years ago?" One of the older men spoke. "I have heard about it. I was born there. What does this have to do with anything?" "Well, there was a pillar with a pattern on it, and hieroglyphics on it, marking those who bore the pattern as the future leaders of our kind. Only two bear the mark, a dead girl whose body was found mummified there by these people and myself. And me. I bear the mark." He pushed back his shirt slightly to reveal the tattoo. "This marks me as your leader! Who stands with me?" "I do," said one member of the new species. Soon more joined about half the group. "Wait" one said. "Are you Tom Daniels?" "Yes" Tom said. "What does this have to do with anything?" "When you betrayed us, for that Parker" he spat. "You forfeited your birthright. Why should we stand with you?" "Well, because most everyone in the city is dead. My native allies are filling the city aboveground, and soon they will come down. Anyone who joins me will live. He that stands against me will die." "Well, I’m not going to die" the man said. "Because I will kill you all!" He opened fire at Tom with the gun. One of the new species leaped in front of Tom, taking the bullets. The others began firing, killing all the others. With the men not blocking their view, they found the stores of gasoline. Ed affixed one of the bombs to a drum of kerosene. "Now" Tom said. "Shall we leave?" "Yes" one of the new species said. "We shall." They ran up the stairs to the outside of the citadel, and then walked beyond, about three miles away from the citadel. Tom pressed the detonator. The vacuum-oxygen bomb, had it been aboveground, would have flattened the city, but it was below the surface, about 80 feet down. It merely caused the fortress and the surrounding land to collapse in an enormous explosion, hollowing out the city. When the fire cleared, there was a 10 square mile perfect circle of devastation. "What about the data, documents, etc?" Sloan asked, worriedly. "Who knows? Maybe they’re someplace else. There might not BE any documents to find." A piece of stone on the ground slid back, revealing a deep shaft. Someone crawled up, a member of the new species wearing a black jumpsuit and night vision glasses. He climbed out of the shaft, grabbed Sloan and dove down into the shaft. "Who was that?" Ed asked. "The Tunneler. He’s a commando that hides in the network of tunnels that are under the city" one of the new species defectors who had introduced himself as Steve Milman explained. "You want to get Dr. Parker back alive, you have to go down those tunnels as well." "I’ll go" Bradley said. "I served against the Viet Cong in the tunnels near, My Lai, or whatever it was called." "I’ll go" Ed said, not explaining why. "I’m going. If it came to a hand-to-hand fight, you guys would lose" Tom said. They others knew he was right. "Take these night-vision goggles. The tunnels are totally dark." After getting the goggles, Tom loaded an Uzi he took off a dead assassin and hooked himself up to a 10,000-foot length of cable, and jumped into the tunnels. He fell for 200 feet, then stopped and lowered himself the last 50 feet. He landed in total darkness, and switched on his goggles. The tunnels were long, and dark, and were littered with bones. He looked around, and saw a pillar, on which Sloan was tied. Standing nearby was a rail-thin man holding an M-16 full auto. "Ah, Daniels, I knew you would come. Shall we fight." Tom had now time for this ‘honorable fight’ bull. He just blew The Tunneler away, then untied Sloan. "Pull on the cable" he yelled. At around 40 miles per hour, they were both yanked up through the shaft, banging into the walls. They were pulled up onto the surface, leaving the black tunnels behind. They seemed no the worse, excluding bruises sustained in the flight up the shaft. "What happened?" Milman asked. "I blew the putz away" Tom said, dazed. "Now what do we do?" "I suggest we find someplace convenient to attach the bomb to and get our asses out of here" Peterson said. "Good idea" Sloan said, dazed. They walked along the city, no one in sight except for them. Tom could sense members of new species, but not the recent defectors nearby. Still, the signatures were there, and Tom knew they would try to pull something off. "Good afternoon, traitor or TRAITORS. Tom, I see you’ve gathered a few of my most unworthy underlings around you. More for my commando team to kill. Tom you killed your own brother and your mother died in the destruction of the citadel, as did the leaders of many of the clans. Such crimes deserve death. Ta ta, pip pip" Lewis mocked. All around them, 20 of Lewis’s assassins leaped out from hiding places in rubble, pointing AK-74 carbines at them. Tom’s allies immediately raised their weapons, as did the rest of them. "It’s a stalemate Lewis. Why don’t you give up?" Peterson growled. "Me? Give up? Are you insane? You know, if I die, if this city is destroyed, my kind will still triumph, because you will die, and you’re the only ones who can stop us." "What about the Chinese team?" "Oh, my assassins are going after them already. They will all die, as will you and your pitiful species." "Over my dead body" Tom said. "As you wish. Boys, begin slaughtering them at your leisure." "Wait!" Tom yelled. "Do you know why they rallied around me instead of Lewis?" "The tattoo that marks you as the leader of our kind, but because you betrayed us, your own kind, you forsook your birthright. Anyone who joins you is a fool." There were muted mutterings among Lewis’s team. Tom could see machine guns wavering as many of them contemplated crossing sides. "Now!" Tom yelled. Tom’s allies began machine-gunning the enemy. The assassins were cut down, but many of them began firing back. In sprays of fire and steel, they slaughtered each other. Soon, only Ed, Sloan, Tom, Peterson, Bradley, Milman, and two others were left. "You lose, Lewis. Surrender, and we might let you live." "I would die honorably" Lewis growled. "Then live a cowardly life!" The others loaded their guns menacingly, making an inordinate number of sounds. "Fine" Lewis said, hardness in his voice. "Tom, shall we talk?" Tom knew it was a trap, but he went anyway, keeping a loaded gun in his pocket. He walked forward. "About what?" "About your betrayal of me? Why did you do it?" "Because I wouldn’t do what you asked of me." "You couldn’t." "No. I choose not to." "Is it because you love Dr. Parker?" Lewis said, scorn in his voice. "Is it good with her?" "Lisa said that, before you killed her. She was a rat anyway, but who care." "For once we agree, traitor. I hated her too. Now what shall we talk about now? Oh yes, your funerary arrangements." As Lewis raised his machine gun, Tom shot through the barrel, trigger mechanism, stock, magazine and muzzle of his gun. Then, he raised his gun to aim at Lewis’s head. Lewis moved first, snatching the gun from Tom’s hand and punching him in the stomach. Tom doubled over, then kicked Lewis in the shins. Lewis, enraged, cuffed him. Tom backed up, nose bleeding. Then, he side-kicked Lewis’s head. Disoriented, Lewis backed up, and Tom began pummeling him viciously. Sloan hadn’t seen Tom this enraged. But she had seen the look in his eyes. When Tom came to her apartment, not to visit but to kill her before he betrayed Lewis, he had that look in his eyes. That merciless, cold look. A dead look. Bruised badly, Lewis uppercutted Tom, and Tom staggered back. Then, in a perfect karate swing kick, he kicked Lewis in the head, breaking his neck. Lewis fell down, dead. "Um, Tom" Ed said. "We have a problem." "What sort of problem?" "One of your bullets ricocheted, and damaged the detonating mechanism of the bomb. Right now, the detonator is counting down fast, and we only had two minutes to get out of the city before we go the way of the dinosaur." There was no need for further conversation. Everyone began running, running for the relative safety of the jungle. For what seemed to be an eternity, Tom ran for the jungle. He jumped as the bomb went off, vaulting a fallen log as the bomb went off. Tom landed in a gully filled with wet ferns. He stared into the holocaust hoping that the team survived. He also hoped that Lewis would have a good cremation. For what seemed like hours, the fires roared, and then began to subside. Soon, the fires died out entirely. Then, he went looking for survivors. The first one he found was Bradley, looking dazed sitting on a fallen pillar. How he managed to survive the inferno was beyond him. He went on, looking for the others. He saw a flash of skin under some rubble, and began digging, removing enormous hunks of stone. It was Ray Peterson, dead. He knew that Grace, his wife, would react badly to the news. They had been especially close. Then, he went on. He found what looked like Milman, with his skull crushed, and two other defectors, battered to death. In the land of death, he looked for survivors. He heard what he thought was a familiar voice under a large rock, but it turned out to be a squashed bird. Emotion ran through his mind, tormenting his very soul. If the others were dead, he would never forgive himself. Never. A hand, sticking out from under a collapsed pillar. The pillar must have weighed a ton, but he managed to pull it off. It was Sloan, barely conscious, and badly bruised. He pulled her out and propped her against a fallen tree. "Where are the others?" she asked, dazed. "Our allies in the new species are all dead. Peterson is dead. Bradley is alive, but in a state of shock. I don’t know where Ed is." "Could you please find him?" "Sure." He set off, searching for signs of life, his ability of sense the presence of others returning to him. A building sheltering a set of stairs was still standing, and Tom walked in. The stairs went down into the bowels of the jungle floor, and Tom could sense the presence of someone. Perhaps Ed, perhaps a surviving assassin. It was Ed, half-buried under a pile of bricks. He seemed alive. "Ed? Are you alive." "Yes" Ed said weakly. "Leave me. Save yourself. You deserve Sloan, not me." "Let’s not bring Sloan into this. She is alive, if it’s any consolation to you. And I am NOT leaving you. I know you don’t like me very much, but I don’t give a damn. He took Ed’s hand and began dragging him out from under the pile of bricks. "Now you follow me up the stairs." "Fine." He weakly stood. Tom was already walking up the stairs. The others were standing there, waiting. "Is Ed alive?" Sloan asked. Ed walked out from the tunnel. They all walked into the jungle, and sat by a running stream. "Well, the city’s been destroyed" Ed said. "How are we going to get back to civilization?" "First we go to the village, then to our boats, back to the ruin where we call in our boatman friend. Then, we go to Belem and back to LA" Tom said. "What now?" Sloan asked. "I know" Tom said, and kissed her. It was a new beginning. |