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CHAPTER 25
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Hellboy had lost his backup in the heat of the battle and felt a little guilt about it. He hoped Abe was able to defend himself from the attacks, especially since the agents had retreated to the corridors, leaving the demons to fend for their lives. Concentrating in fighting the last three werewolves coming back to attack him, he managed to kill one with the Samaritan's good help. Two beautiful shots aimed too the creature heart. Unfortunately to him, that seemed to enrage the others werewolves coming at him, attacking him more viciously after seeing their comrade's death.
'That is not good' He thought 'two rabid werewolves, no one around to cover my ass… Not good it all' He decided to join the agents strategy and avoid large spaces, forcing the werewolves to walk and attack in line. Somewhere from his left he heard the gun shots coming closer and closer and added another priority to his staying alive list: avoid friend fire.
After he had shot the Samaritan's last bullets, he ran to the first door he could find, which happens to be BPRD's kitchen back entrance. The only thing stopping him from crying in frustration was the sudden though that, if John was by any reason seeing his movements from Manning's office, that wouldn't be a manly thing to do. Not having any way out, he came in, closing the door and moved forward while looking around desperately, trying to find something to use as a weapon.
He found nothing but food, bacon to be exact. Taking a bite at a particular cold piece of bacon he considered his situation. Empting his pockets at a working table situated at his front, he found a cigar, his faithful lighter and a small bomb… 'Finally something I can use it…" Thought, there was a small problem with the bomb since it didn't have enough power to kill the werewolves knocking at the barricaded door. Another desperately once over through the kitchen revealed him the industrial ovens situated at the right wall.
Knowing it was only a matter of time until the werewolves find him; he turned the oven on max, programmed his bomb to explode in 10 seconds and got the hell out of that rat trap through the kitchen's front door. He had just reached a second corridor when he heard his little parting gift. The explosion literally destroyed everything around the kitchen including the energy installations of the first floor, plus a few surrounding corridors.
He was recovering and laughing hard at the explosion when Manning said in his communicator "That was a stupid thing to do son". But that didn't erase the satisfied smile from his face.
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After a few seconds, Manning could see the byproducts of Hellboy's juvenile act and it reminded him of an old lesson from Nikita Khrushchev 'Bombs do not choose. They will hit everything'. And indeed they did.
Hellboy's explosion surprised the agents, plunging the floor in the darkness, bringing down a part of the ceiling and a few offices and quarters around the kitchen and knocking a few groups and agents out; but it also provoked the strong sound wave and the smoke that rendered useless the werewolves smell and hearing senses, plus activated the fire sprinklers, liberating Abe's serum earlier then programmed by John.
And all the sudden it was Manning's time to laugh.
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John didn't know exactly what had happened, one minute he was with his group hunting in a corridor and the next there was no more corridor or group. He tried to move but a large piece of the ceiling was holding him down.
When the emergencies lights went on, he was having trouble to breathe properly with all the dust and smoke in the air. Thanks to the red lights flashing he saw the huge werewolf coming to him, for him. It was the biggest one he had seen so far and, given his present conditions trapped under debris, he could easily say that he was 'Fucked up, seriously fucked up'.
Seeing the huge werewolf coming, he gave a cursory look in order to find any discarded weapon on the floor, managing to find a forgotten sig not so distant from him. His movement didn't go unnoticed to the predator, which showed him his fangs and growled low promising severe punishment at any movement from him.
When the threat didn't discourage John, the werewolf jumped over the debris that was holding him down, pressuring wounds the young man didn't even know existed. John cried and his hands shot involuntarily to grab and aim the gun at his attacker, but a sharp claw got his arm, sending the offending gun flying away in to the dark.
The fire sprinklers went on that precisely moment and, to the trapped agent, it looked like a gentle rain falling in the BPRD's corridors, adding a little more dramatic element to the scene. "I got to stop reading romances." He said close to unconsciousness. With heavy eyes he heard a few chuckles coming from the slowly changing beast, yellow eyes morphing to Dominic's blues.
I didn't take long for the blond man smile down at John and caress John's soft face. His melodic "Hello John. I told you we would be meeting again." Were the last words John heard that night.
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Abe was running through the second floor, trying to feel his way to the werewolf he was hunting. His telepath abilities couldn't particular distinguished the human minds he was bumping from the werewolf's and he was about to conclude that it was a futile quest when Manning offered him advice: "Many non-operative agents had came down to the second level Sapiens and no werewolves had been seen around, so it's safe to assume the werewolf has disguised itself using its human form."
"Right. We don't who or where it is, but we know what he's aiming for." Abe said while looking around at the sea of passing agents.
"We also can assume that Sanders gave them detailed information about the HQ, now, if you intended to plant a bomb and got top results from the explosion, where would you plant it?" Manning's voice pondered over the communicator.
"The power plant at the third floor. Not only it would increase the bomb's potential, but it will also hit the gas unities stored in there." Running to the first elevator he could find, Abe was sure he would find the werewolf.
He was inside the elevator when a shockwave hit him. "What the hell… Have the agents decided to blow up the whole floor upstairs?"
It took the Director a few minutes to answer his question "No, only a very stupid red demon. Hellboy planted a small bomb in one of the kitchen's industrial ovens, destroying a good part of that area to kill two werewolves that were hunting him!" Manning furious explained.
A few seconds later, Abe heard the older man say "That stupid, stubborn, dimwit… lucky son of a bitch! The red menace gave us just what we might need to win this!" Realizing that Abe was listening to his words and probably getting the happy gratitude in his voice, he cleared his throat and told the amphibious "You tell him I said that Abe and I put and end to your late night's escapades."
It was Abe's time to clear his throat and, cursing himself mentally at his poor skills on infiltration techniques, he promised "I never heard anything, sir"
"Good" The conversation met its end when the elevator opened its doors to reveal the third floor to Abe's eyes.
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CHAPTER 26
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Unlike the other floors, the third floor was a restricted area where only a hand full of agents was allowed. It was a heavily secured place since, not only the power plant could be bombed, which intensity would be increase by the underground gas storage facilities, but because the water supply in there could be easily poisoned, killing the all the agents in the building. So, there was one single elevator leading to the third floor and a dozen of people working in there, mostly to supervise and repair the power plant and the water supply.
The first time Abe visited this place, he was accompanying the Professor and the curiosity about the BPRD's facility got him hooked up: it had been an exhausting visit since the Professor wanted to be sure about the power plant capacity in order to initiate a few experiments on the labs and Abe had been extremely impressed by the third floor's sight. But it wasn't the structure that got his attention, neither the power plant built inside the reservoir wall or the complicated series of storage unities he could see at his right; no, those had nothing to compare with the beautiful lake he could see from the elevator doors.
When the Professor saw him completely in love by the lake's sight, he had explained how the water from the underground springs fed the lake, crossed the hydroelectric water turbines, generating the energy feeding the entire building. Abe never heard a word of what he was saying since his attention was focused at the large quantity of water in front of him, murmuring and calling for him.
When Abe got out of the elevator, he still felt like the water was calling him home, which seemed to soften the dread he had be feeling since he first discovered the werewolf's intent. He didn't need to use his gift to figure that the bomber was aiming for the main generator and, consequently, the methane produced by the reservoir power plant. Those targets were easily accessible from the main generator room
But he was afraid to use his gun inside the powerhouse and risk an unwanted explosion and ended up opting to use the long silver dagger that Hellboy had given him as a Christmas gift long time ago. Dagger at hand, he ventured inside the power plant and tried to determine the werewolf's location with his mind. He felt his enemy excitement at finding the generator as well the undercurrent frustration on not being able to find the locations of the natural gas storage unities. He had to move fast.
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On lab W-05, Dr. Pratt and Isis had been locked themselves working non stop to complete the prototype of the ultrasonic weapon, so far they had just managed to produce an ultrasonic wave powerful enough to incapacitate the werewolves acute hearing system, but they couldn't exactly find a mean to produce and broadcast the sound.
That's what they had to report to when the Director contacted them, looking for good news on the weapon development while the werewolves upstairs – forced to change back to human form thanks to Abe's serum - were being unrelentingly hunted and killed.
It was Manning's extremely concerned about the werewolf at loose on the third floor and possible existing infiltrators among the BPRD's agents, that forced him to look for faster results from lab-05, especially since identify every single human on the BPRD's floors would take too long. Abe had already demonstrated his own difficult in identifying them using his mind abilities and the Director was seeking for a third choice, which means Dr. Pratt's weapon.
When Manning explained the good scientist his problem in a way that had Dr Pratt scared for his own well being, the trembling man offered to transmit the ultrasonic sound through BPRD's building by using the same internal communication system that broadcasted the alarms.
"You can do that?" Manning pressed.
"Yes sir, but the efficacy of the wave will be directly proportional to werewolf's distance of the sound source."
"So what the hell are you waiting for? Broadcast it as loud as it's need it to be, NOW! " That got Pratt moving to his computer to execute the direct order he just had received.
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Abe entered the powerhouse and crossed the internal corridor that would take him to the main generator. In his hunt for the werewolf he felt the presence of other minds – probably BPRD's techniques – the ones responsible to maintain and supervise the engines of the power plant. He felt some of those minds moving to the same point he was heading, diminishing his chances in identify and kill the werewolf. Abe moved faster to the stairs leading to the generator, taking two steps at time and reaching the corridor he was looking for.
The hydraulic turbine and the electric generator were in a room located at the center of dam wall; the two combined formed the power plant generator and reached easily 5 times a regular human height, but only a part of it could be seen at the generator room since the hydraulic turbines with its blades remained submerse in the penstock.
Before opening the door, Abe reconsidered his choice on weapon, the dagger not offering the reassurance he was looking for. 'Besides', he thought it, 'the werewolf won't know that I can't use this gun.' Searching around, he quickly located a fully dressed woman planting the bomb in one of the generator's wall, her long black hair cascading over her shoulders.
"It's too late. The bomb is already planted and the timer set" she told him without turning to face him "You'll do better if you ran away"
Abe heard the smile on her voice "Well, I can always disarm it, as I've done innumerous times before it."
"You could, but you still have to fight me to get in here"
"I could just shoot you in the head, silver bullets are wonderful things don't you think?"
"And risk detonating the bomb or causing an explosion?" She countered smiling "I don't think so…" And with that she turned to face him.
"I only need one shot. But you're dead one way or another; you are pretty expendable, aren't you?" When that hit a nerve, he prodded and twisted his finger at the found wound "What's the matter? Having troubles in being at the hierarchy's end? It must hurt being the one chosen to carry the obviously suicide mission…"
Her face was distorted with anger and Abe could see her changing involuntarily to the wolf's form "I'm young, but don't confuse me with the omegas we brought to feast on your colleagues!" She transformed and quickly ran to attack Abe.
He couldn't fire at her direction at risk of hitting the bomb so he waited until she was closed to sidestep to his right and, pulling the silver dagger from his belt with his left hand, slashed her in the back. She growled in pain and moved to a second round, trying to bite his arm.
This time Abe could fire the gun in his right hand, hitting her over the left frontal leg. The shot slow her down, but it didn't stop her. Abe suddenly saw himself raising his arms to protect his neck, body falling backwards with the force of the impact. She caught his arm and his brain soon registered the pain caused by the bite.
He didn't quite understood why she suddenly left his arm and howled in pain as if deadly hit by an unseen force. After inspecting the part of his right arm where he had been bitten, he rolled to his right putting more space between them and stood up with the dagger at his left hand. Breathing hard, he moved to attack her when Manning reminded him about the bomb.
"What about her?" He asked still recuperating his breath.
"She has been taken care of. MOVE!"
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Manning saw Abe ran to the generator wall in the bomb's direction, crouching over the small black device. "It's a simple device, it won't take long to defuse it" Abe said. "I can see the wire that leads to the primer and the reactor wire… now… where is the one that…"
"Are you quite finished with it, Abe?' Manning asked incensed by Abe's babbling over the bomb.
"…Finally! The wire that feeds the ignition timer, cutting it… Ok! We're good to go." He heard a sigh of relief coming from Manning's communicator.
"Fine! I have other things to deal with. Stay where you are until the guards find you and then help them escort our guest to the closest cell you can find."
Abe relaxed a little, basking at the peaceful moment he was living, only to have his thoughts directed at their new prisoner's unconscious figure.
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CHAPTER 27
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When the sunrise came, its rays never shone in the BPRD's first floor. It was again a chilly winter morning and the survivors of the werewolves' attack had much work to do before finally allow themselves a minute of rest.
Lights had been fixed only a few minutes ago and they were now searching for corpses and at the same time looking for injured ones among the debris. Not only the ceiling had collapsed in some areas, but some walls had been blow up probably by desperate agents' grenades. It was rare, but every now and then they would find a naked corpse – a werewolf corpse – shot at its head and heart, no matter the condition it was found, and compare it to the missing cadets' photos.
That work was gruesome and taxing but the other one – collecting the injured agents – was a lot worse. Anyone injured was submit to a body search in order to establish if he or she had been bitted; anyone bitted was taken to the second floor infirmary ward, where they would receive treatment and stay under observation until further orders.
The active agents could only imagine what would happen once the ones at the second infirmary ward transformed and changed; what Director Manning would do to them when that happened. They felt even worse because, seeing the catastrophic results caused by the attack; they couldn't stop considering that final solution a necessary evil.
"One is left with the horrible feeling now that war settles nothing; that to win a war is as disastrous as to lose one."
"What did you said Blue?" Hellboy asked him, still searching the bodies.
The two friends had been looking for John since the young man had failed to answer his 9omm.. Was hours ago. They still had neither trace nor sign of him. Hellboy refused to admit out loud that his concerns for John were increasing at every single corpse he found, but couldn't seemed to control the numbness that was spreading over his heart and reaching his arms and hands; like his heart beats were irrevocably accelerating towards an inevitable crash.
"Agatha Christie once said that and looking at the destruction, the victims and the price we paid; I believe I agree with her: it doesn't feel like we won at all."
Hellboy offered no comment on the subject, it wasn't needed nor wanted. He just continued his search and he would have keep it for many hours more if Manning's voice hadn't interrupted their quest in such an abrupt and disturbing way "Hellboy, I found John."
'I found John' and nothing else, that simple statement would have drive Hellboy and Abe across the world, but still didn't help to easy their feelings. Tom Manning knew this perfectly well, but he also acknowledged that offering any other piece of information would send the two demons running into a suicide mission and he didn't want that, not before talking to them.
It was one of the rare moments when Manning couldn't allow himself to be baited or angered by Hellboy. He had no other way but to assume the special position that was once filled by the Professor and lately was occupied by John and no one else. He had done it before and he would do it again, but it wasn't natural and he much preferred to fill the local bastard roll.
When the demons arrived at the Watch Tower demanding answers on John status and location, Manning had decided on what and how to do it. The Director was standing with his back to them with his poker face and refused to answer or explain anything until they saw a particular security video. Only then, they would get their answers. Hellboy was reaching his limits fast, concern from John wiping away any shred of control he still had in him. He moved to grab Manning by his clothes when the Director started to displaying the mentioned video at the room's main widescreen.
The quality of the film had been compromised by the lack of light, but the tunnels outside BPRD's front doors could be easily recognized. They saw a brunet agent being carried away by another one; the men crossed the tunnels to the elevator shaft's direction and, after a few seconds, two other agents joined them – a male and a female judging by their shadows.
The elevator doors opened ant they got in. There wasn't much light to identify the agents and Hellboy opened his mouth to ask Manning the reason for that particular show. He was again stopped from asking questions when another video came on – this one filmed from the better illuminated elevator. He saw the agents come in and turn their faces the elevators camera. Hellboy's blood froze the moment he saw John unconscious and being taken from the BPRD's building by the non-identified agents.
The Director waited patiently for the reaction; he appreciated the calm that preceded the storm and wasn't disappointed when it finally presented itself in form of raging fists. Hellboy stopped at the room's center, looking at John's frozen picture.
"What do you plan to do Red?" Blue tried it.
"That is pretty simple Blue. First I'll find out where your enemy is then I'll get at them and killed them as painfully as I can, bring John back here and forgot this day ever existed." And with that he left the Watch Tower.
"Pretty simple indeed, my friend..." Blue considered following him through the BPRD's corridors.
It was a short journey from the Watch Tower to the contention cell where the female werewolf was being kept, but the security check points were innumerous. One could easily conclude that Manning was taking no risks. It was kind hard to determine what those risks were: the female werewolf escape or an agent going lone ranger and decide to kill her. No matter the reason, the prisoner was kept in a highly security cell, that only four people had access to.
With Hellboy dead set in rescue John that was probably the smartest thing to do, because he currently had no limits to hold him down. There where no boundaries, no rules, only the desire of no longer loose someone dear; there was only despair and determination. And this time, this time humanity wasn't hanging on the balance.
But Abe knew perfectly well what price Hellboy would pay if he was left to interrogate the prisoner and he was sure that, neither the Professor, neither John, would ever forgiven him if he allowed Hellboy to cross the thin line that separate them from the things they hunt for living. It took him time, but ultimately he convinced Red to let him go and get the information they need to rescue John. So, when he walked into the cell holding the werewolf, Abe had many interests in mind.
She was strapped in a chair, facing the cell's door and couldn't change to her wolf form thanks to the perpetual dose of the rose serum she was receiving. Abe considered briefly if Manning intended to supply the serum to the bitten agents when she stooped his thoughts.
"You are wasting time" She said to him in the way of greeting.
"You are awake. I didn't expect you to be awake." He offered back.
"I can hear your heart beat accelerating, you know? That means you're lying."
Abe smiled a little before continuing "Your world is fairly simple, isn't it? You hunt, you eat; you get angered, you extract revenge. My heart beats faster, I'm lying. Well, I'm a little more complex than that." He felt a flicker of annoyance coming from her. "But tell me, in your world, what it means when you're left behind by your pack?"
"Again with this? They didn't desert me! They just don't know I'm alive!" She countered as images of her pack and her alpha flashing through her mind; Dominic telling her how important her part on the BPRD's demise was.
"Really? The building didn't blow up; they sure know you had failed. Maybe that's exactly the problem, Dominic know you failed him!"
"How do you know his name?" She looked surprised.
"Let me tell you something, honey, I know that werewolves work in packs and not individually. You've been ostracized." He said smiling and that hurt her more than any physical blow Abe could inflict. Being ostracized meant death to a pack member. Abe felt her despair and went for the kill "Especially now that you revealed his name to me." Abe answered her.
"I did not! I never told you anything" She protested urgently when he turned away as if leaving the cell, desperate about no being able to come back to the pack, even if it meant to not to return to the cathedral and its crypts.
Abe smiled at the female's thoughts "You see, I really don't need you to actually say it out loud for me, all you have to do is think just the way you're doing now. Thank you for your cooperation, dear." He said gently leaving the cell; there was much do to, before telling this information do Red.