New Regime (Rune Alexander Book 5) Page 25

  It took her a second to understand they wanted the blood leaking from her eyes.

  “No,” she said.

  “No,” they agreed, still reaching.

  Shit. She scooted closer and took their hands.

  They clutched at her fingers, and she winced at the pain. Had she been human, her bones would have broken.

  And then she saw something in their eyes, something that drove the truth home with a sledgehammer.

  Or maybe it was a lack of something.

  She knew at that instant the children could not survive.

  “Can we hold them?” Levi asked. “Hug them?”

  Rune closed her eyes. “Yes,” she whispered. “For a minute.”

  Levi reached eagerly for the child closest to him. “Hey, sweetheart,” he murmured.

  “What now?” Denim asked. “Can we raise them?”

  Rune said nothing.

  Her chest hurt so she pushed her palm to it, trying to shove away the pain. “God,” she cried, finally.

  Denim frowned. “Rune? What—”

  The berserker’s rage sounded at the exact same moment Levi’s baby attacked. The door flew open, and an Annex army began to stomp into the room.

  She caught a glimpse of Strad and Jack fighting the ops, trying to get through them to her, and then, she put her attention back on her children.

  Chaos.

  Always, chaos.

  And blood.

  The children had Levi in a death grip. The one he’d been reaching for had her fangs buried in his chest. The other one had latched onto his side, just under his ribs.

  They shot out their claws to hold him still as they drank.

  “Rune,” Denim screamed, the horror in his voice drowning out the sucking sounds the children were making. “Help.”

  She gave herself the tiniest, tiniest second to doubt, and then she shot out her own claws and went toward the children.

  Maybe she was doing the right thing. Maybe she was doing the only thing she could do.

  Levi slumped to the floor, and Denim sobbed as he dragged his brother away. They both left Rune to deal with the horror.

  The monsters.

  The children.

  They were the only babies she’d ever have.

  And she had to kill them.

  The ops parted to let Denim struggle through, not offering a hand to help him. They crowded the doorways, weapons aimed and ready.

  The babies turned on Rune. They grew steadily, likely from consuming their father’s blood, and morphed into young women as she watched. Hair snaked over their bodies, covering them like tents. Their claws elongated, growing into slicers longer than Rune’s.

  Their blue stares held hunger. Nothing more.

  They hung their heads low, and growled.

  But first, they smiled.

  Rune shuddered.

  In those smiles was everything she might have been.

  Everything she could have been.

  And none of it was good. Madness, hunger, death.

  Could she destroy beings that had come from her? That were part of her?

  “Not children,” she said. “Not really.”

  And they grew.

  The berserker came through then, with Jack, Denim, and Raze at his back. The room was vast, but when the crew forced their way past the line of Annex soldiers, it became tiny.

  Rune took a deep breath. “I’m sorry,” she said, and went after the newborns.

  Chapter Fifty-Six

  She whirled, slashing her claws through the air, hoping she could give the monstrous infants a quick death.

  They were untrainable, and they were uncontrollable.

  Their newness, their infancy, should have made them relatively easy to take down. There was a learning curve to magic, after all.

  The hard part for her was committing the act—but she went after them with the intent to kill, shutting herself off to the emotions trying to cloud her mind.

  Her children were unintentional enemies.

  “Rune,” Eugene yelled. “We need them.”

  So the Annex guards weren’t there to take out the babies. No. Eugene wanted to study them. Wanted to bottle the magic. And maybe he wanted to grow his own monstrous army.

  The Annex ops were there to try to prevent Rune from hurting the babies.

  Once again the berserker roared his rage, but she had no time to see what was keeping him from her.

  She sent her claws through the chest of the monster closest to her, dragging them through the delicate bit of flesh, slicing through its heart, before lifting her left hand to do the same to the other child.

  The children screamed.

  Their screams weren’t merely the screams of pain, or even rage. They were the screams of the birds, only a hundred times more potent.

  Rune realized even as she fell to the floor, her hands over her ears, that they’d plucked that out of Levi’s head when they’d fed.

  They’d taken his memories and turned them into abilities.

  “Rune,” the berserker yelled.

  She looked up then, looked up because she needed help. She needed Strad, and she needed her crew.

  She’d thought the hardest part in killing the twins would be her emotional connection to them.

  She’d been wrong.

  And Strad wasn’t coming to help.

  He stabbed at an invisible field with his spear, his face screwed up in a desperate grimace as he tried to break through.

  And though sparks flew as he beat savagely at the unseen wall, it didn’t give.

  The babies had surrounded themselves—and Rune—with a circle of magic too strong to breech.

  Rune was on her own.

  The suffocating magic grew stronger, trying to get a grip on her lungs, her brain. Panic began to take hold.

  I can’t breathe.

  I don’t need to.

  Shut it the fuck out.

  At least Levi and Denim had gotten out. There was always a bright side.

  She lowered her hands and climbed to her feet, forcing herself to function through the dominating bird screams and the suffocating magic. The infants mouths were open, their eyes unchanging as they released the sounds that would have wreaked havoc upon a normal enemy.

  The Annex ops clutched their weapons and fled.

  Her crew stayed, their loyalty and love stronger than the children’s crippling screams.

  Only the berserker was able to remain upright. Even Raze had fallen to his knees, his hands over his ears, trying unsuccessfully to shut out the horror inside those screams.

  “Shut up,” Rune screamed, and she thrust her claws through the open mouth of the girl on the left.

  A mouth she could barely reach.

  The twins’ bodies had lengthened in their latest, strangest growth spurt. They swayed on legs too long and thin to resemble anything remotely normal. Their torsos were short and thick. Large, heavy heads wobbled on necks like mushroom stems, too weak to hold the weight.

  They no longer looked human.

  She could only hold on to the hope that they would have a weak spot. Every being had a weak spot. Even Damascus. Surely the children would be no different.

  She just had to find it.

  One of the twins struck before Rune was aware she was going to, her speed faster than even Rune’s.

  The child drove her claws into Rune’s chest.

  Rune screamed in agony as she clutched at the razor-sharp claws, her own retracting as she tried to dislodge the monster from her heart.

  But she couldn’t. Her legs gave out and she fell as paralysis hit her. The child’s claws had changed to obsidian.

  But then…

  The girl fell with her.

  In seconds, they both understood exactly what the weakness of the mutated Others was.

  Levi’s injuries hadn’t affected the girls.

  Rune’s did.

  She was their weak spot.

  The child yanked her claws from Rune�
�s chest, crying out in pain.

  The twins were Rune’s.

  And she’d have to destroy herself to destroy them.

  But first…

  She sped to the invisible wall the girls had thrown up, glad it was there. It would protect the crew she loved.

  “Berserker,” she whispered. “Turn away. Turn away from me.”

  “No,” he said. “Rune, no.”

  But he knew what she would do. She would protect the world, if she could.

  She would destroy the evil. For that was why she existed.

  Her father’s words were true.

  “Turn away, baby,” she told him.

  He shook his head, his face pale, his scar a stark reminder of the violence they lived. “I can’t be without you now.”

  How would she feed him if she died?

  And Levi and Denim. She’d addicted them only to leave them?

  But if she left the twins of magic alive, they would not be stopped by Annex ops. They would kill the world.

  Her crew gathered beside Strad. Lex had appeared, her blind eyes dancing crazily, her face wet with tears. Someone had pulled Levi back inside and he lay against the wall, still but watchful.

  A movement at the door drew her attention, and for a millisecond she forgot the babies waiting behind her.

  Owen stood inside the doorway, his fists clenched.

  He was always going to dwell a little on the fringe. Alone.

  And his eyes, his eyes…

  His eyes were terrible.

  “The monsters are creeping up behind you,” Lex said. “But they don’t know what to do.”

  “That’s okay, Lex,” Rune said. “I do.”

  “Wait,” Raze said, his voice so low and harsh she could barely hear him. “Wait a minute.”

  Ellie ran into the room, his hand on his chest. “What,” he cried. “No. Rune?”

  He ran into the field with such a force it knocked the breath from him. He staggered back and fell to his knees. “Rune,” he begged, when he could breathe again. “You said you wouldn’t leave me here alone.”

  She couldn’t stand their pain.

  “Go to Levi,” she told Ellie.

  Jack’s one visible eye swam with tears. He said nothing.

  Bill Rice and Elizabeth stood in the doorway then, watching her, their hands clasped.

  Her people.

  She processed it all in seconds. Mere seconds.

  Then she turned away. Turned toward the girls.

  Death waited, and Rune was ready.

  She’d always been ready.

  The children stood huddled together, watching her, unsure. Their doubt made them seem once again vulnerable, human.

  But they changed as she walked to them.

  It was either fight or die, and they wanted to survive. They’d plucked a huge bag of tricks from Levi’s blood, and they were made up of Rune Alexander.

  They’d fight.

  She was grateful that along with their abilities they hadn’t been cursed with love.

  The thought made her throw one last glance at the berserker.

  His spear lay forgotten on the floor as he stood outside the impenetrable circle, watching her with a fierceness that said he would not look away. He would not.

  No matter what he had to witness.

  “I’ll never leave you, Rune.”

  “Not even if I want you to?”

  “Not even then.”

  She dropped her fangs.

  The girls mimicked her.

  Once upon a time she’d not only been ready to die—she’d wanted to die.

  She drew that remembered despair to her. She pictured the parents who’d adopted her. She remembered Amy. She opened the part of her mind behind which she’d hidden her shame, her guilt.

  She thought of Jeremy, of Llodra.

  She thought of life without the berserker and Ellie and her crew.

  And then, she remembered Z. His life, his death, his absence.

  Z.

  And she killed the monsters in the only way she could.

  By killing herself.

  Chapter Fifty-Seven

  She put the fingertips of both hands to her body—one hand to her throat and one to her heart—and without another hesitation she shot out her built-in shivs with more force than she’d ever used, having time for a barely there realization that it fucking hurt, and then, then there was nothing.

  But suddenly, there was.

  There were sounds of stomping feet and yells of rage and screams. Flashes of light through her eyelids.

  It was a symphony of confusion and she couldn’t make sense of it.

  Surely she was dead.

  “Z?” she asked.

  I’m here, sweet thing. Always.

  For an instant she was back in the field of zombies, lying there as the infection did its best to wipe her out, with strange voices inside her mind.

  “I know you. How did I forget?”

  How, indeed.

  “The fuck are you?” she muttered. Or thought she did.

  The world tilted.

  She remembered finally how to open her eyes. Ellie peered down at her, his face pale but calm—and she knew from experience it was the calm of extreme crisis. He’d crumble later, when he had time.

  She smiled.

  He did not return that smile.

  “The babies are dead?” she tried to ask him, but the words didn’t form because her voice was…air.

  Then Strad was there, but he didn’t take her from Ellie.

  “What is she?”

  She was confused for a moment but then figured she’d misheard. He’d asked “How is she?”

  Hadn’t he?

  The world tilted again.

  “You’re strong,” Ellis whispered. He never took his gaze off her. Not once. “You’re so strong.”

  “Hurry,” Strad yelled. “Hurry the fuck up.”

  Her eyesight was dimming. She wanted to grab Strad, to hold on to him, but she couldn’t move her arms.

  She was fading. Whatever was inside her, the spark, the life, was fading.

  She couldn’t feel anything.

  Paralyzed.

  She hadn’t beheaded herself—she’d paralyzed herself. And that fucking sucked.

  “God, Rune,” Ellie cried. “God!”

  Annex ops ran and tripped and talked in low, fast voices.

  Eugene was there—she heard him shouting orders. “Careful,” he yelled, his animation unfamiliar.

  “We’re all here, Rune. We’re all right beside you.”

  “She can’t,” Jack mumbled. “She can’t.”

  “Shut up, Jack,” Raze growled.

  “Rune,” Lex cried. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”

  For what?

  “I’m okay,” Levi told her, though she couldn’t ask. His words reassured her.

  But she kept fading. Layers of cotton nestled her in their warm fluffiness. There was no pain. Not then.

  Voices were dim. Not real.

  “No,” Strad roared, his explosion of horror so abrupt and dismayed it brought her back, somewhat.

  Two Annex ops were pushing a cot toward her. Likely the children. The dead, monstrous children.

  But then she understood Strad’s cry of horror.

  She understood what he hadn’t wanted her to see.

  A leg hung off the gurney, a leg as familiar to her as her own.

  Because it was her own.

  She’d managed to decapitate herself after all.

  It just hadn’t killed her.

  Oh.

  Oh no.

  She was a brain in a jar.

  A brain in a jar.

  She couldn’t speak, couldn’t think. Couldn’t cry out. A numbing darkness descended, and when she next woke up…

  She had her body. She had her body.

  “Fuck me,” she screamed, and lifted her hand to stare at it with overwhelming relief. Her throat hurt, but she ignored it. She’d pierced it with
her claws. Of course it hurt.

  Ellie bent over her. “Rune? Rune!”

  His eyes were bloodshot in the midst of his drained, pale face, and his hair, normally so neat and clean, clung in limp strands to his cheeks.

  She frowned. “What’s wrong, baby?”

  He gaped at her, then put his hand over his mouth and started giggling, his eyes too wide. “What’s wrong, she says. What’s wrong?”

  Strad appeared behind Ellie and lowered him gently into a bedside chair.

  And then, he turned to face her.

  “You’re back.” His voice was so raw it hurt her to hear it.

  She was in one of the Annex hospital wards. A sheet covered her body. A bag of blood hung on a pole. The sight was familiar and strangely comforting.

  Owen stood against the wall, watching her. When she looked at him, he blinked once, slowly, then left the room without a word.

  “I dreamed…” But then she shook her head, grimacing at the pain in her neck, her throat, and didn’t say what she’d dreamed. “The babies?”

  “Dead,” Strad said, caressing her cheek with the back of his hand. Over and over and over. “They didn’t survive your…what you did. Eugene had them cremated. If not for him…” Then it was his turn to cut off his words.

  She owed Eugene, then.

  “As soon as you cut yourself,” he finally continued, “the field dropped and we were able to get inside.” He tightened his lips into a hard line but not before she saw the trembling there.

  And that scared her more than anything.

  “What happened to me?” she asked. “It wasn’t a dream, was it?”

  The berserker shook his head. “No, sweetheart.”

  “How…” She ran her hand over her body. “How am I okay?”

  “You can’t die, Rune. You can never die.”

  She ignored his words. She had to. “Did I decapitate myself? Did I shred my heart?”

  He swallowed, looked away, then forced himself to meet her stare. “Yes,” he whispered.

  Her eyes were dry. So dry. “How did you fix me?”

  “Eugene had Annex doctors wrap you in something I’d never heard of. Some sort of…flesh bandages. It’s been a month. Your body reattached.”

  She’d been lying there for an entire month, reattaching parts she’d deliberately severed.

  She wasn’t dead.

  “The babies?” she asked again.

  “They’re dead,” Strad answered. Again.