"We're in position, Captain," Owens radioed.
"Confirmed. Hold until I say otherwise."
"Yes, sir." He lowered the radio from his mouth and looked at the people around him, most of whom were nervously scanning the area with weapons ready. They were standing just inside the inner blast door that had been added to the base design when it was repurposed from an Endbringer shelter years ago, which was currently closed, blocking off the main entrance with another foot of laminated armor. The primary access hall ran dead straight towards the center of the base from that position, wide enough to get a vehicle into, splitting off into a number of side corridors along its length. A hundred yards away, on the other side of two security doors, was the flight of stairs that led to the next level.
On either side of where they were standing were storage rooms full of equipment such as medical kits, tool bags, and the like, which were mostly the standard issue shelter gear, which sometimes came in handy. It was all neatly racked on shelving and he'd had two three-man teams thoroughly search each room, one on each side. When they were sure the rooms were empty the doors had been closed and locked. Those doors weren't particularly sturdy, but anything that could get through them quickly would make enough noise that they'd notice.
They'd shot out every camera they'd come across on the way here, and planned on doing the same for the others they encountered.
Their goal was to sweep the level one corridor at a time, in a pattern designed not to allow anyone to hide then slip in behind them. Each door would be sealed as they passed it, which would help in that regard. It was going to be both time consuming and nerve-racking, but he was fairly confident that they could do it. Most of the corridors led to dead ends in storage bays, living quarters, infrastructure rooms, and one large set they were leaving for last, the vehicle bay. That had the hidden exit to the parking garage that was their main surreptitious entry point from outside, the main doors they were standing near being disguised from the other side as the wall of a building by virtue of being covered with a layer of bricks. It wouldn't stop them being opened from the inside if it became necessary, but without knowing where the door was, no one would ever notice it.
He idly wondered how on earth Coil had managed to make such an elaborate construction right in the center of the city, practically under the noses of the PRT and the city administration. Whatever else he was, and he was many things none of which were very nice, the man was a genius at this very specific skill-set.
Owens mused on whether he was still actually alive…
"We're in position as well. Go."
"Sir," the sergeant responded crisply. "We're moving." Clipping the radio to his vest, he scanned his squad. "Move out, Abrahams, McMicheal, take point. Trevino, Riggs, watch our six." All four mercenaries nodded, moving to the appropriate positions. They began slowly moving forward, weapons raised, one of each of the leading and following men wearing the night-vision equipment.
The next ten minutes were slow and tedious, but uneventful. They sent half their number down each side corridor while the remainder guarded the end, rotating the groups so everyone did each job to keep them alert. Each room encountered was swept, locked, and marked. Nothing out of the ordinary was found. Owens was beginning to wonder if this meant that the enemy was laying low, one step ahead of them, or simply no longer present.
Sighing inwardly and wincing yet again at the horrible smell, which was still there albeit much fainter and kept jumping out at him when his attention wandered, he went back to carefully scanning his surroundings, looking up, down, and to the sides.
He was rather wishing for the boredom of a few days ago by now.
{We've captured three mercenaries so far, Metis, plus the medical staff,} Raptaur's voice said in Lisa's earpiece. She could easily tell it was the Varga talking, the subtle differences between him and Taylor showed through the filtering effect to her ears and power, although she doubted that anyone else without long association with the demon would notice. When he wasn't trying to hide it, though, it was pretty obvious and more than a little creepy at first. {Saurial is entertaining Mr Calvert at the moment, while I'm keeping an eye on his men. They've just started searching for the intruders.} He sounded very amused and pleased with himself as he detailed the current status in the bunker.
{Good, that sounds like you've got them off balance,} she chuckled.
{Oh, so very much, yes,} he replied with deep satisfaction. {This is a lot of fun. Not for them, admittedly, but we can't please everyone.}
{No, there's always someone who will find fault with anything you do,} she agreed, thinking of PHO with inner amusement. Internet forums were full of that sort of person. {We're about to deploy the PRT and Protectorate to your location. Armsmaster and Director Piggot are just discussing the best method of entry with Legend right now. We'll hold off until you give the word.}
{All right. That will give us time to whittle the numbers down a little more and get them to waste their firepower. Once they're sufficiently separated we'll let you know and you can come in and round them up.} He paused, then laughed again. {It's entirely possibly that Calvert will actually thank you for it. He isn't enjoying this nearly as much as you might hope for. Rude of him considering how much effort we're putting in.}
Snickering, she glanced at Amy, who had a hand over her muzzle trying to suppress a laugh. Both of them could imagine what might be happening, and both were fairly sure they were understating it.
{Don't drive him completely insane, we need to question him.}
{That… should be possible,} he replied a little doubtfully. {Ianthe may need to work up some form of tranquilizer, though. Something a bit stronger than normal.}
Grinning, Lisa shook her head. {OK. I'll let the others know. Speak soon.}
{We'll be in touch.} The demon dropped the link. Turning to her friend Lisa shrugged.
{Sounds like we're missing a good party,} she sighed in a deliberately sad manner.
Slinging an arm over her shoulders, Amy smiled. {We're still invited and I think there will be plenty to go around. Saurial won't keep all the good stuff for herself.}
{I hope not,} Lisa replied with a smirk, before going over to report to the gathered forces who were loading a number of PRT trucks with last-minute equipment requirements.
"No, you can't go that way, sir, the road is blocked and the entire area is currently quarantined," John said in as reasonable a tone as he could manage at the moment. He looked at his two companions, all three of them dressed in the DWU fluorescent jackets and the respirators that Saurial and her sister had made for them. Each jacket was emblazoned with 'DWU Crowd Control' in large black letters on the back, and they each had an ID badge clipped to the front. He'd been quite happy to volunteer for this extra job, the money was good, it helped his friends and the city, not to mention Danny, and it got him out in the fresh air.
Well, that last part was definitely not entirely correct, he thought with a grimace. The air around here was anything but fresh, even with the respirators. In fact, going so far as to call it 'Air' might be pushing it. He could almost taste the stink. It was slowly ebbing as the wind blew away whatever satanic chemical had caused the problem, and he didn't even like to think what it would be like closer to the point it had been released, but here and now it was still one of the most unpleasant things he'd ever encountered. Certainly the worst smelling thing he'd run into by a long way.
"But I need to get past to buy a lottery ticket," the man, a slightly unkempt but otherwise well dressed guy in his mid thirties, said through the cloth he had clamped over his nose and mouth. "It's the draw later today and I have to get one from my lucky shop. It's the only place I trust."
"Sir, the shop is closed," John repeated patiently, for at least the fourth time. "Like I said, the entire area is quarantined until this incident is over, and was evacuated over an hour ago. You can't buy a lottery ticket there. Why don't you go over to Eighth Street and Schooner Avenue, there's a shop there that sells them." He pointed in the opposite direction. "It's about half a mile that way, then take a right at the library."
"I know, but I've never won with a ticket from there," the man insisted, sidling closer to the temporary barriers that had been strung across the street, all of which were bright yellow and black striped, and labeled with 'Road Closed' signs. "Come on, man, let me through."
John sighed again, glancing again at the other two DWU people, who were watching with a certain degree of amusement engendered by the fact that this was happening to someone else. "Thanks, you bastards," he muttered in a low voice, getting a couple of smirks back. "Sir," he said more loudly. "Please understand. The shop is closed. There's no one there. I can't let you through, my job is to keep you on that side of the barrier, since it's not safe to go this way. Can you just turn around and go somewhere else?"
"This is bullshit," the guy suddenly shouted, pushing closer. John put up a hand warningly, stepping back and reaching for the collapsible baton he had on his belt, but not pulling it out. He was mindful of Danny's words and had no intention of starting anything, but didn't want to get steamrollered by the man. Admittedly he was twice the guy's size, but he'd been in enough bar fights to know that wasn't always the important thing. The rather wild look in the eyes of the idiot glaring at him showed he was pretty intent on getting to his favorite shop and he seemed to be hard of understanding.
Half-tempted to let the asshole past and see what happened when he found a locked door, John said firmly, "I'm sorry, but I can't let you through. Get back into your car and try the other place. Please."
"I need that ticket!" the man shouted, lunging past him at the plastic and metal barrier. John tried to redirect him but the guy twisted and kicked out with one boot, catching him right in the shin with a solid hit.
"OW! Fucker, that hurt!" Limping a little John turned around and grabbed for the idiot, as did one of the other DWU workers, while the remaining one was now radioing the nearest BBPD car to provide backup. "Stop, you fuckwit." By now the man was trying to climb over the barrier, which not being particularly structural, folded up under him and dropped him to the ground. Swearing loudly and not in a remotely good mood the man rolled a couple of times, got up, and violently kicked the barrier section that was lying on the ground.
"I need my ticket!" he shrieked, kicking it again, then noticing John heading towards him with a grim expression. "Oppressive tool of the state!" he yelled, turning to run to the place he really, truly, couldn't buy a ticket from.
The larger man approached him warily, thinking that this was definitely getting out of hand. Possibly the smell was doing something? Or maybe he was just an idiot, he decided as the guy pulled a small pistol from his pocket and brandished it in his general direction. "Back off, I'll shoot!" the man shouted.
"Over a lottery ticket you can't actually buy?" John asked incredulously. His colleagues had both pulled out batons and extended them and were moving to the sides, leaving enough room that none of them would hit each other. "This is getting stupid, man. Put the gun away and calm down." He could hear a faint siren coming this way and just wanted to de-escalate something that had abruptly turned serious.
'Only in Brockton,' he thought wearily.
"It's a triple rollover, you fucker!" the almost incoherent man screamed at him, red-faced. He raised the pistol higher and pulled the trigger. John hit the deck as he spotted the man's finger moving and could almost swear he felt the bullet go over his back on the way down.
"Jesus, you're crazy," he shouted, before rolling to the side as the man aimed at him. Kicking out, he caught the edge of the fallen section of barrier with his foot and managed to spin it at the assailant, who stumbled when it smacked into his ankle. Lunging to his feet he ripped the baton off his belt, extended it with a practiced flick, and whacked the man's hand hard enough to crack a bone. The gun flew off into the gutter while the man screeched in pain, then took a swing at him with the other hand.
John and both the other DWU men jumped him and wrestled him to the ground, not particularly gently, as they'd completely lost their patience with the fool. "Police brutality!" their attacker screamed at the top of his voice. "Let me go! You can't do this! Don't you know who I am?"
"This isn't police brutality, it's the ordinary civilian sort," John grunted, trying to hold the man down without breaking anything. It was difficult, he was writhing around like a lunatic. "Stop struggling or you'll dislocate your shoulder."
There was a meaty crunch and the guy froze, then yodeled in agony.
"...Like that."
At least he was holding still now, so that was good. Looking over his shoulder as the siren, which had been rapidly approaching, suddenly stopped very close, John waved at the BBPD officers who were climbing out of the car that had parked just next to the barrier. "Got another one, Sandy," he called to the tough-looking woman who walked over and peered down at them. "Lottery ticket this time."
"Jesus." The officer shook her head, pulling her cuffs off her belt, while her partner radioed the call in. "That's a new one. At least this one isn't a looter."
"Gun's over there in the gutter," one of the other DWU people said, pointing. The other cop retrieved it with a gloved hand, holding it up and sniffing the barrel. "Fired one shot, he missed all of us. The round went that way somewhere." Slipping the gun into an evidence bag, the officer sealed it and made a note on it.
Carefully lifting the now-sobbing man to his feet, mindful of his dislocated arm, John and the others took him to the car where he was mirandized and locked into the back. While her partner called for medical backup, Sandy took their statements. "Thanks for helping out, you guys," she said when she was done. "Being shot at wasn't in the briefing as far as I know."
"Hey, this is Brockton Bay," one of John's colleagues commented with a shrug. "It happens. We've got really good medical too."
She grinned, then got back into the car and started it. "See you soon, I expect," she called as she did a u-turn and drove off. John shook his head, knowing this was probably true, then went over to the fallen barrier and set it up again.
"You ever think people around here are nuts?" he asked rhetorically. His friends both nodded. "Lottery ticket. Christ. What a dick."
Oh well. It was money in the bank and he'd missed, so no harm done.
At the front of the squad, Abrahams suddenly held up a hand, causing them all to stop dead. "What is it?" Owens asked in a low voice.
"I heard something move ahead of us," the man said, pointing his weapon at the cross-corridor on the left. Owens thought for a moment, recalling that this one led to a series of bunk rooms that were currently unused, and at the end a storage room.
"What was it?" he asked.
"No idea. Sort of a scraping sound." Abrahams was staring at the corridor, as were the others. His partner was adjusting his night vision set, using the thermal mode to carefully scan the entire area. "Must be close to us, I think, but sounds carry in here."
That was certainly true, the echos they got from the concrete walls tended to make things sound very strange.
About to order half his group to check it out while the others covered them, Owens jumped a little when a hoarse shout came from the rear of the group. "Fuck, where'd Riggs go?"
Everyone turned around as one, weapons coming up to their shoulders. Trevino was staring around in bewilderment, while the other man who had been keeping an eye to the rear was notable by his complete absence.
"Oh, shit," Owens growled. "Not again."
Three of the men fanned out, looking around carefully, while the rest kept watching them with their guns ready. "Nothing here, sergeant. Not a trace of Riggs. Do we go back and look for him?"
"Ah, Captain?" The voice over the radio was hesitant.
"What is it, Kowalski?" the captain replied after a moment as everyone listened.
"This score counter thing just went to 'Mercenaries 43, me 4.'"
"Jesus Christ!" Their leader sounded very put out. "Who was it?"
"Riggs, Captain," Owens transmitted a little reluctantly. "We heard a sound and everyone was getting ready to investigate, when he disappeared."
"Damn it. Find these fuckers!"
"We're working on it, sir,"
The radio went quiet again. Owens massaged his forehead, then turned to his squad. "Abrahams, take four men and check out that corridor."
There was a long silence.
"Abrahams?"
"Um… It's 42 to five now." Kowalski sounded very nervous.
Rather a large amount of swearing came from the captain, followed by a lot of shouting, the gist of which was to stop fucking around and start shooting at things. When he finally fell silent, Owens rubbed his closed eyes.
The low, inhuman snicker that came from a different corridor on the right up ahead, combined with several of the emergency lights going out, made the eight remaining mercenaries bunch up and point their weapons in every direction, while sweating ferociously despite the cool ambient temperature…
Laying the latest capture down, the Varga grinned. He was really enjoying himself, as was his host, who was coming up with new ways to play with space in the other end of the base at a surprising and gratifying rate. Her ability with the math involved impressed him and pleased him in equal quantities. The way she was leveraging fractal dimensions and matter creation to do things that most mages he'd encountered over the past however many eons would need massive amounts of power to achieve with illusions and the like was frankly astounding.
"Best brain I could ever have hoped for," he commented.
'Thanks, Varga. I couldn't ask for a better demon either,' she giggled. 'Oops. Hang on, this is going to be good. I need to concentrate to get it right, presentation is everything after all.'
"That it is," he chuckled, watching through her eyes with pride. "Very well done. I love the décor, very Lovecraftian."
'Thanks. That's sort of the point. You too, by the way. You left them with only one night vision gadget for a reason, I guess?'
"Anticipation is as important as presentation in this sort of thing," he replied, smiling to himself, before teleporting back to the ceiling over the diminished mercenary group. They were just about ready for phase two now. After which, he needed to go and annoy the other group while this one thought about life for a bit.
This really was a huge amount of fun.
Trying to watch every possible direction at the same time, the squad very cautiously approached the corridor that had emitted a horrible laugh, one that hadn't sounded at all human. They took up stations on either side of it, four men each, taking turns to quickly peer in then duck back. All the emergency lights bar the one just past that junction were out and they could see that several more further towards the middle of the base seemed to be rapidly dying. There was an odd raspy scraping sound right at the threshold of hearing coming from somewhere quite close, but none of them could either pinpoint it or work out quite what it was.
The eight men, faced with something quite outside their otherwise very experienced combat training, looked at each other in the dimly lit and shadow-filled environment. Owens was thinking that this reminded him way too much of some of the more unpleasant video games he'd played when he was younger. They communicated with hand signals for a moment. He pointed at Trevino, then waved a hand at three more of the men, before indicating the corridor which concealed something nasty.
The man, a fairly recent recruit to their group, stared at him, then the entrance to the corridor. He didn't look happy about it.
"Get in there and flush whoever it is out, Trevino," Owens hissed. "We'll cover you. Use the laser."
"No, sir."
"What?"
"No, sir. I won't take point."
Owens glared at the man. "Why not?"
"Look at me, sir." Trevino pointed at his face.
"What the hell are you talking about?" They were almost whispering, but with considerable force.
"I'm black."
"So?" Owens raised an eyebrow.
"I've seen this movie, I know what happens to the black guy. Fuck that. Someone else can take point. I'll cover them." Trevino seemed pretty insistent. Rolling his eyes, Owens sighed heavily.
"Fine. McMicheal, you take point. Get in there and shoot something."
"Ah… I'm Irish?"
"No you're not, your great grandfather was Irish, and the Irish guy never gets shot first anyway. Fucking get in there." Owens was losing his patience. "And don't try telling me you have a red shirt on either." With a beleaguered look, McMicheal armed his laser projector, which emitted a faint whine, then took a couple of deep breaths. Spinning around he charged into the darkness, firing the energy weapon ahead of him with a series of lethal-sounding sizzling cracks, each shot punching a two inch hole six inches deep into the concrete and leaving glazed super-hot rock behind. The three other mercenaries Owens had picked out followed him, not firing but ready to at any moment.
Owens and his remaining men waited, two watching the main corridor in both directions, the others the side passage. The energy discharges stopped as the men reached the end of the hallway, which in this case led to a large storage room. They heard the sound of a door slamming open, then silence for a few seconds.
Then all hell broke loose. Energy weapons went off, at least two of the P-90's opened up on full auto, and ten seconds later there was a loud explosion as someone used a concussion grenade. Dust floated down from the ceiling as the four men left behind ducked instinctively, wondering what the fuck was happening.
"Holy crap!" one of the mercs shouted. Several metallic crashes sounded, echoing around the corridors, followed by two more grenades detonating. There was a lot of yelling, some more firing, then it all went quiet.
"Do you think they got the intruder, sergeant?" Trevino said in a low voice.
"I don't know," Owens replied, aiming his weapon into the corridor while feeling shaken. "Maybe."
"Afraid not," a voice said from behind them. Everyone froze in place, a thrill of terror going through all of them at the same time. There was something extremely wrong about that voice.
"What was that?" the man who had asked the question said, deliberately calmly and not turning.
"Me."
"Oh. That's fine, then."
There was another pause.
"Are you going to turn around?"
"Wasn't planning on it, no."
"Hmm." The horrible voice sounded thoughtful. "All right. Would if help if I counted to ten with my eyes shut?"
"Not really."
Owens, to his shame, found himself frozen in place, something gibbering inside the back of his mind and telling him that if he didn't look nothing bad would happen. Just like when he was six and he knew how to avoid the thing under his bed grabbing his leg.
"You people are no fun. I think I'm going to go see if your captain wants to play." The voice sighed. "I don't know, you spend ages getting ready then you find no one else wants to join in. Hardly worth the effort, sometimes."
The voice trailed off into the distance. Silence fell once more. They all listened very carefully, trembling a little, in a manner they would later vigorously insist was down to adrenaline. Eventually, Owens managed to speak.
"Are you still there?"
There was no answer.
"Think it's gone?" Trevino, who was still staring at the wall, asked the question in a hopeful manner.
"I think so."
"Should we look?"
"Probably."
"Anyone going to mention this to the captain?"
There were four utterances to the negative. Owens relaxed a little, very slowly. Eventually he risked a look over his shoulder, then around him. Nothing was there. "It's gone."
"Thank fuck for that." All three of his remaining men sighed in relief.
"Come on, let's see what happened," Owens finally said, feeling that he should be more ashamed of himself than he actually was. That voice… Nothing good would have come of turning around to see what made it, that much he felt sure of.
The four of them, sticking much closer to each other than they normally would or was really normal, shuffled down the corridor to the room their fellows had entered what now seemed like quite a long time ago.
Sure that they'd just find body parts, assuming that anything was actually left in the first place, Owens pushed the door wider with the muzzle of his weapon, then looked around. The room was a mess, shelving tipped over, a small fire burning in what had once been a year's supply of toilet rolls, and a lot of expended brass all over the floor.
To his great surprise, all four of his men were also present. McMicheal was sitting on the floor rubbing his head, looking like something had hit him and dazed him. The other three were scattered around the place, all of them appearing somewhat tattered. Their body armor was scratched and torn, one man was missing a boot, and one of the P-90s seemed to have literally been bitten in half.
"What the fuck was it?" Owens asked as his dazed compatriots slowly heaved themselves to their feet.
"What?" McMicheal said loudly, poking his ear. Apparently three grenades and a shitload of shooting wasn't good for the hearing in an enclosed space.
"What. Was. It?" Owens asked loudly and clearly, motioning to the wreckage lit by the three remaining battery powered fittings in the ceiling, the other two having been shot out. There was little point being quiet now, he felt, since the enemy definitely knew they were there, and didn't actually seem bothered by it.
"No fucking clue, all we saw was something dark moving really quick," the man said, appearing to regain some of his sense and looking around rapidly. "It was running across the ceiling, for god's sake! Big, much bigger than a man. And the teeth… Oh, god, the teeth."
"Teeth?" Owens looked at him with bewilderment.
"So many teeth," McMicheal moaned. One of the other mercenaries nodded, not looking down from peering at the roof with his weapon aimed. The other two were rapidly reloading their guns with spare magazines. Owens and his part of the squad looked around, then at each other.
"Teeth..." Owens had a horrible feeling he knew what that meant. "I think… I think it's the Family."
"Oh, fuck me," one of the men groaned. "Not them. How did they get in here? What do they want?"
None of them had a good answer. "Better call it in," Owens said with a grimace. Captain Smith wasn't going to be happy.
As he reached for his radio, it crackled to life. "Kowalski here," the thing said. "Might have a problem."
"Which is?" The captain answered immediately, fury audible in his voice.
Owens could swear he heard the other man swallow.
"This score board…?"
"What about it?"
"It's saying 'Level 2' now…"
Owens exchanged glances with his men. That couldn't be a good thing.
When they left the room and found that all the remaining emergency lights were now dark, he realized that was an understatement yet again. The way the last few lights behind them went out moments later only underscored that.
Now in pitch darkness, every one of them nearly crapped themselves when that ghastly voice suddenly said, sounding eager, "Me again. Dark down here, isn't it?"
Frantically fumbling for their flashlights, all eight men started to retreat with alacrity. In other words, they ran like bastards. Low, amused laughter followed them as they headed for the next level, knowing that they had four blast doors to open before they could find reinforcements.
'If I survive this, I never want to see Brockton Bay or an underground base as long as I live,' Owens thought frantically as he ran, firing back over his shoulder. He suspected that his colleagues probably thought much the same.
Thomas kept running, intermittently firing behind himself. He dropped another grenade, the blast of which thumped into his back with a hard shock, but otherwise appeared to do nothing helpful. It certainly didn't have any effect on whatever the hell was trailing him, the awful cries still getting louder and closer. He was sweating, yet felt chilled to the bone, his legs were like cooked pasta, but he didn't dare slow down or even look. Mainly because he was pretty sure that if he saw what was chasing him it would be the end.
The lights overhead seemed to be changing color, shifting more and more towards red, while he could swear that the corridor itself was not only now going uphill noticeably, but was slowly narrowing while the roof was lowering. The walls were no longer institutional gray, they were almost black, and out of the corner of his eye he was virtually certain that they looked much closer to rock than poured concrete. He didn't stop to check, though.
Panting, he tossed his last grenade over his shoulder, the detonation almost too close. Yelping at fragments of casing that pinged off his body armor, he tried to run faster. His submachine gun was now empty but he couldn't spare the time to swap magazines. He managed to pull the depleted one loose but fumbled it, the plastic and metal clattering to the ground.
Abruptly, the slow slope up became a slope down instead, with enough lack of warning that he stumbled and nearly went flat on the ground. Putting his hands out he managed to recover and get back to his feet, resuming his running. It was easier now that he was going downhill and he thanked his luck even at the same time as he was wondering how the hell this could possibly be happening.
The walls were definitely made of huge blocks of dark stone now, and he could hear water dripping somewhere over the sound of his boots on the floor. The cries of the thing behind him had faded a little, making him wonder if he was pulling ahead.
A couple of minutes passed in frantic exertion. His heart was pounding in his ears to the point he could hear it easily, almost as loud as his footsteps. Spots were moving in the corners of his vision and he knew he was close to collapse.
It took a little while before he consciously noticed that the corridor was starting to bend again, rather than being arrow-straight. Ahead of him he could see it turned right, sharply enough that he couldn't see around it. Following the curve he kept going, no longer wondering how this was happening and merely accepting that it was.
The passageway, now no more than half the width and height it had started as, twisted back and forth for some considerable distance. He'd completely lost track of how long he'd been running, but he must have covered at least a couple of miles or more. The creature following him was getting closer again as he slowed from exhaustion. The sound of dripping water was getting louder as well, somehow giving the impression something was amiss with it. He couldn't explain even to himself why.
The ceiling lights were the only thing he recognized by this point. The steady dim glow every thirty feet was still the same as it had been outside his office, standing out due to the sheer prosaic appearance of it. Risking a glance over his shoulder, he saw far back at the last corner a horribly distorted shadow on the wall and floor.
The cry of "Tekeli-li" came to his ears, the shadow moving and twisting as the thing followed. Swallowing down a mouthful of saliva, he tried to find a fresh burst of speed. He really didn't want to see what was there.
'This is impossible,' he thought dazedly as he pelted through tunnels he was totally certain couldn't exist beneath Brockton Bay. 'How is Saurial doing this? Some sort of illusion?' Stumbling into the wall showed that it was entirely solid and real. 'They're not supposed to have powers like this. What's going on? And what the fuck is that thing?'
Thomas had no answer, but he was pretty sure that meeting it to find out would be unwise.
So he kept going.
The tunnel he was now running through, almost on his last legs, wound back and forth. After another thirty seconds or so, it rounded one last corner then straightened out, still sloping gently downwards. He suspected that he must be several hundred yards underground by now based on the slope. In the distance, he could see something glinting at him, something vaguely familiar. Hoping that it might either be an exit, or some place he could hide and rearm, he found hidden reserves and sped up.
The shock of finding himself suddenly leaving the tunnel and running across fine pale sand towards a glass-smooth and completely black lake was enough to make him stumble. Going to his knees he slid in the sand, then scrambled to his feet again, staring at the water in front of him. Yet again, it was something that couldn't possibly exist anywhere near the city he was under. The calm water, depth unknown and unknowable, stretched out into the darkness past the limits of the final light behind him.
He looked frantically around, finding that the shoreline he was standing on curved in both directions around what gave the impression of an inlet to some vast underground reservoir. Turning on the spot, he saw that the tunnel exited through a vertical stone wall, which seemed to have more darker patches on it to the sides. Reaching up he flicked the night-sight he was still wearing to image intensifier mode, the green illumination of the enhanced scene allowing him to see that the darker spots were openings in the stonework.
Desperate, he ran towards one of them, finding when he got there it was a doorway into a room carved into the rock, going back some twenty feet and being about thirty feet wide. Diving into it, he pressed himself against the wall well to the side of the doorway, listening carefully.
All he could now here was water dripping from the roof of the impossible cavern he was inside, presumably falling into the equally impossible lake. The sound of the terrible beast that had chased him had stopped.
After a considerable period of time, during which nothing happened, Thomas slid down the wall at his back and sat on the cold floor, staring at the doorway. Dim light from the tunnel reflecting from the water gave just enough light to make it out, while his head lamp, which had been slowly dying as the battery expired, cast shadows on the walls. Without the night vision monocular it would have been only enough to avoid walking into anything.
Breathing heavily but no longer feeling like he was going to pass out, he mechanically fitted a new magazine to his weapon and cocked it. Inventorying his equipment he found that he'd somehow lost one of the pistols, and two of the fifty round magazines for the submachine gun, all of which must have fallen out of their various pockets during his headlong flight from the creature. He had no grenades left, but the rest of the explosives were in his pack, for all the good that would do him.
The battery in his head light was close to depleted although it should have been good for several hours. Possibly he'd forgotten to charge it. The other flashlight worked fine when he tried it, though, so he had that at least. Turning it off, not wanting to attract attention, he put it in his pocket. Resting his head on his knees he tried to make sense of what was going on.
A while later, which was as near as he could say since he'd entirely lost track of time, he jerked rigidly to attention, listening carefully.
"Tekeli-li"
The call was faint, but it was coming closer. He squeezed his P-90 close to his chest, wondering what to do. He couldn't go back into that tunnel because that was where the thing was coming from. With all his gear on he couldn't swim for it, not to mention he had no idea if anything horrible was in the water, or whether he could actually escape that way in the first place.
"Tekeli-li"
It was closer and louder. What to do? Stand and fight? Run and hide? Shoot himself to get it over with?
"Tekeli-li"
The call was now accompanied by a low slithering sound, one that made his guts clench in repugnance. The sound suggested slime and noisome things that lived under rocks, only far larger and far hungrier.
"Tekeli-li"
It was too late now to run, the thing must have been very close. Thomas shuffled into the corner of the cave-like room, pressing his back into the cold rock behind him and aiming the gun at the doorway. A pallid illumination was growing outside on the impossible subterranean beach, a light like something that lived deep under the ocean and glided silently after its prey. A horribly virulent green that was at the same time somehow pale red, it glimmered off the damp walls around him.
"Tekeli-li"
The thing was right outside the entrance. He thought he could see hints of movement now, low down on the sand, the ends of what looked like tentacles writhing around only a couple of dozen feet away.
"Tekeli-li"
"AHHHH!" he screamed, opening fire as whatever it was moved into the doorway. Flashes of orange light strobed across the walls as high velocity projectiles tore up the sand outside and pinged around the room. The noise was unbelievable, completely disorientating, while at least one hard impact on his body armor made him dimly realize he'd collected a bounced round the hard way. Not paying any attention to the momentary pain of the hit, he emptied the magazine, ripped it loose, slapped another one in, and kept shooting.
When that one was empty he switched to the last of them, swapping them fast enough that his trainers back in boot camp would have been seriously impressed. At the rate the gun chewed through ammunition it only took seconds before the firing pin clicked down on an empty chamber.
Dropping the smoking weapon, he grabbed for one of his pistols.
"Tekeli-li"
The shadows outside twisted and shook, an utter abomination of un-nature resolving out of the dark and appearing in the entrance to the room he was trapped in. The gun slipped from nerveless fingers as he stared, wide-eyed and pale, at the mass of tentacles, eyes, and teeth that slid across the ground towards him. Unable to even move, he gaped in horror as one tentacle reached out and touched him…
"Tag. You're it."
The creature giggled in the voice of a young girl, one clearly originating in the depths of hell, then turned and scuttled off, disappearing out the doorway.
It had been about a foot tall.
Thomas watched it go, trying to make sense of things and utterly failing.
A few seconds later, his mind finally had enough and he slid gently to the floor, blessed unconsciousness taking him.
Taylor grinned to herself, watching her quarry fall over. That had been really funny, and the look on his face! 'He's not going to forget this, I guarantee it,' she snickered.
"No, I suspect not. Well done, genuinely worthy of a true demon." The Varga sounded very proud of her.
'Thank you. OK, now for the next phase.'
Both of them laughed, before she applied a healing unit to him to make sure he was undamaged, then carefully picked the dead weight of the unconscious super-villain up and walked off humming happily to herself.
Emily looked around at the assembled PRT troops, and the Parahumans who were mixed in with them. Her group was going to assault the hidden main entrance to the base, with another one geared up to enter through the parking garage entrance. The tunnel exits were sealed so no one was going to make it out that way. Ianthe was going in the front with this group, while Metis was with the parking garage team.
"Saurial says give them ten minutes then go for it, Director," Ianthe called, listening on her earpiece. "They've taken out seven of the mercs and she has Coil trapped. They can't access any of the heavy weapons other than a pair of 40mm grenade launchers and a fifty caliber machine-gun, but they still have their laser emitters and a fair amount of smaller caliber stuff." The violet lizard listened some more as everyone watched her, then smirked. "She says that they're more than a little rattled and are starting to shoot at shadows. Raptaur has been amusing herself playing with them to get them to waste ammo and snagging one here and there to confuse the issue."
With a well-hidden shudder at the image of being hunted around a network of tunnels by the huge reptilian cape, Emily nodded. "Thank you, Ianthe. OK, people, we're almost up. As Raptaur put it during the Merchant assault, don't get killed. Take as many of them intact as you can, and make sure we get Coil! Everyone to your positions and wait for the command."
There was an immediate rush of heavily armed troops, while the various capes headed off towards their assigned starting points. Legend was standing in front of the wall they knew concealed the main doors to the old Endbringer shelter, talking to Dragon and Armsmaster, who were looking at a portable scanner screen.
With a minor pang of regret that she couldn't go in with them and meet Thomas face to face, Emily turned and went up the steps into the back of the mobile command truck, sitting in one of the seats and leaning forward to watch the banks of monitors that showed camera views from dozens of viewpoints, ranging from aerial shots from Dragon's drones overhead to cameras mounted on the helmets of various PRT personnel.
"Well, Calvert, let's see you get out of this one," she muttered, wishing that the smell would go away so she could face drinking some coffee, which she desperately needed right now. Glancing at the countdown timer on the wall above the monitors, she patiently waited along with over a hundred other people for the endgame to start.