Demons 3 Draft 1 CH 16 (Patreon)

We reach the fifth floor before the first of the guards enter the stairwell; from a floor above us. At the sixth floor, we engage the enemy. Me and Claws are at the back and we can’t help, but the soldiers don’t need it. The guards are humans, and while I notice a few of them have something strapped to their forward resembling the injection system the soldiers have, the guards don’t have the training and coordination to make the best use of their boosted body.

At the eighth floor, people enter the stairwell from below. A glace over the guard rail shows me multiple too massive arms. Hybrids. Humbert is looking over the railing and I look in his direction. He looks away to punch a guard.

“Looks like you two get to prove your worth.” He yells. “Pass the doc to whoever’s closest to you, then make sure you keep those things from decimating our rear.

I hand off Amanda to the closest soldier, a short stocky man who hasn’t said anything the entire mission. He looks unhappy at being relegated to carrying her, but he wasn’t doing anything. The stairwell is only large enough to allow three of them to fight side by side.

I have the revolver in a hand, an unfolded sword in the other.

“Oh,” Humbert yells again. “Before I forget, if you can’t keep up, we’re taking off without you and you can fly back on the back of your dog.”

I fire at the first hybrid; chest hit. It staggers back, thin pink blood leaking from the damage, but instead of seeing its internal organs, I see a cracked bone plate. The blood reminds me of the one I fought in the cage, Robert’s words that the military had multiple experiments going, his implication that I wasn’t the only one to escape them, even if he didn’t know what I am.

My next shot is at its knee, and that explodes, leaving a stump. It falls sideways and the one behind it just steps over. They are large enough only two of them fit side by side. There are four other hybrids. The other steps coming up are lighter, human guards.

I fire twice; at each of the hybrids’ knees. Keeping them from moving will block the stairwell, but they are faster and I miss, hitting one behind them, but nowhere useful. I holster the revolver and extend my skin over my right hand, destroying the glove and forming a second sword. If irradiated bullets don’t affect them, my skin will be as effective as my other sword.

When the closest two reach us, I take one and Claws the other. My skin cuts deeper than my sword, leaving lines all the way into the bones, but the hybrid is smarter than the one from the cage, trained and after the first few cuts it dodges until it finds an opening. When its fist connects, I feel it despite my skin covering that section and I trip the stairs. It tries to take advantage of me being off my feet, but that simply leaves my foot available for a kick in its stomach that sends it tumbling down the stairs.

I’m back on my feet in time for a guard to jump from a landing below us, grabbing the railing and propelling himself onto me. I see the injector on his arm, the savage look on his face, and punch him as hard as I can. Bones break and he tumbles into the well. I turn to deal with the next rushing hybrid, slowly climbing back to keep up with the soldiers.

Claws pushes me down as gunfire erupts, and he takes the hits. The wounds are small but don’t close. Irradiated bullets. I have the revolver in my hand before I consider my actions and fire the last two bullets. Two of the guard go down, gaping wounds through their chests.

A hybrid tackles me as I reload, and the revolver tumbles down the stairs and into the well. I throw it after, then pull the one pummeling Claws. We’re on the tenth landing, and only human guards remain behind us, keeping their distance. I glace at Claws as we back up the stairs; the bullet wounds are closing slowly. He calms my worry with a rumble, healthy, strong, it says, and I nod. Now isn’t the time for me to be distracted, I’m susceptible to irradiated bullets too.

The pace picks up as the soldiers finish the last of the guards in front of us. We reach the eleventh floor and hurry into the maze. I quickly look for anything to bar the door, but short of ripping off a wall, nothing is available.

“End of the corridor,” Coplar yells, “you make a left! It’s going to be the next right and—why have you stopped?”

“It’s a dead-end!” A man yells back.

“It can’t be! My map shows it goes on for a while and—”

“Well, your map’s wrong! I knew we couldn’t trust you. You and your drones, you think you’re so—”

“Shut up!” Humbert yells as the door slams open. “Coplar, get the drones out and find us a route. Everyone except for Angelo forms a wall. You stay with Coplar and keep the doc intact.”

“Some cover would really be nice about now,” Cline yells.

“Use our two sacrificial armies for that.” The soldiers move closer to me and Claws.

“They have irradiated ammunition,” Claws remarks.

“They have boost too,” Humbert replies, “if you aren’t happy about it, lodge a complaint with whoever stole them from us.”

“Boost isn’t a threat to us,” I reply, taking the man’s sidearm and emptying into the guards entering the room. I ignore Humbert’s protest as I put it back in its holster.

“I have a path!” Coplar yells.

“Angelo, you go, we follow.”

I want to rush the guards, fight, hunt, but for the moment, with the soldiers laying down cover fire around me and Claws, this is the best strategy. Someone taps my side as we back into a turn. Cline offers me a sidearm. I take it without questioning the man’s generosity.

The ground vibrates, a steady feeling under my feet. Claws senses it too and he looks around, searching, but the only thing visible are the walls, then the guards rounding the corner. I fire at them, Claws takes more hits, and it takes me more of an effort not to rush them.

“You have got to fucking be kidding me!” Coplar yells. “The walls can move! The way’s closed!”

“Find us another one!” Humbert yells back.

The gun’s slide locks as I fire the last bullet and Cline has another one for me as he fires his machine gun one-handed. We exchange guns.

“What’s the point! They’re just going to close it on us too!”

“How think are the wall!” I yell.

“How the fuck do you expect me to know that?” Coplar replies.

“Look when one moves, maybe?” Cline yells before I can formulate my reply.

“What are you thinking?” Humbert asks between short bursts.

“I’m stronger than you, and Claws is much stronger than me. He might be able to punch through and rip us an opening.”

“That’s going to cost us our largest cover,” Humbert says.

“He dies and you do too. He can’t take irradiated bullets the way he can normal ones.” The anger in my voice makes Humbert look at me, worry crossing his face before showing anger again. Does he understand that if Claws dies, the guard might not be who kills him?

“Oh, this can’t be good!” Coplar yells. “The wall moved to give up a room. It’s pretty large, but there aren’t any exits! This is not a viable option!”

“It’s the only one we get,” Humber yells back. “We can’t go back the way we came, those guard control those positions.”

“It’s kill box, Captain!”

“Yeah, and we’re going to kill anyone who enters it!”

We hurry in and Coplar is right, the guards can lock us in.

“You,” Humbert points to Claws. “Go to the other end, you two are the decoys. Get their attention, we’ll be on each side of the entrance and take them out as they enter.”

“No, Claws has to stay here in case they close this opening.”

“You’re going to—”

“Captain!”

We turn and the wall opposite the entrance slides open. Me and Claws rush it, make it three steps before a roar hits us like a demon punch.

Submit.

I stagger to a stop, force my legs not to fold in under me. I look at Claws. If the command hit me this hard, how is it affecting him?

Claws is down, smaller than I’ve ever seen him; trembling, not even trying to stand. “Claws, stand up,” I tell him. “We can take whoever that is.”

He turns his head to look at me and the terror in his eyes is such that I almost drop to my knees too. Claws is not afraid of anything or anyone. Even Protect only engendered respect, not fear.

Anger manages to move me until I’m standing in front of Claw’s prone form. I will not let whoever can do this to him hurt him any more. Guards enter the room and as much as I want to rush to fight them, the fighting the command to submit keeps me there.

Around me, gunfire erupts, but all I can do is watch the darkness, the form in it, slowly approaching. It moves slowly enough its heat adjusts to that around it, making it indistinct, except for its size. This demon is huge.

It roars again as it enters our circle of light, the command to submit mixed with amusement and disdain. Claws whimpers, and the right sleeve of my trench coat rips apart as spikes emerge. I need to protect Claws from it as much as the need to obey it impacts me.

“No.” I manage to say through gritted teeth. I think I say it. The command reverberates through my bones, the roar makes my ears ring, but I will not obey. I am not some young demon that bends to its will simply due to its age, its power. I will—

I don’t see the blow that impacts me.

I know it didn’t come from the demon, but, as my consciousness fades, I also know no human could hit me that hard. But there are no other demons next to me. None except—