Chapter 25
Moments later, the shooting started. Then, explosions along the road outside the hospital. The Overlord's minions had arrived to retrieve their master.
Weaver instructed Dai and Anthony to take the fish-head to the psych ward while the rest of them lined up behind the barricade on the road and started returning fire. One of the Beserkers handed Grace a rifle and she nodded gratefully, kneeling beside them. As she peered over an old car at vehicles exploding in the distance, she noticed the mech's machine gun fire appeared to be sporadic, hitting nowhere near the barricade.
"Mechs must be hungover!" Crazy Lee announced from behind a barrier of filing cabinets. "They can't hit crap!"
"They don't want to risk hurting their Overlord," Hal guessed, shouting over the loud gunfire.
"Draw your fire! Conserve your ammo!" Weaver ordered.
Grace withdrew her weapon, breathing heavily as she watched the mech in the distance continue to fire randomly.
"There must be some reason they're shooting," mused Tom, ducking behind the car next to Weaver.
"All this noise is to keep our attention on them," Weaver explained.
"While they sneak in the back door?" Tom asked him.
Weaver nodded, worry lines appearing on his forehead.
Tom patted him on the shoulder. "I'll check it out." He looked back towards his kids. Grace was already starting to follow him. "Stay here. I won't be long."
"You can't go alone, I'll cover you," Grace insisted.
With no time to argue, Tom agreed, beckoning her over. They stayed low whilst their comrades drew away the enemy fire.
Grace followed her dad as they ran towards what appeared to be a storage warehouse on the other side of the hospital. For the most part, it seemed to house wooden pallets, boxes, and sacks of materials and old equipment. A perfect place big enough for skitters and mechs to hide before making their move.
No sooner had they entered the warehouse, had a mech burst through the wall and shone its lights on them. Tom pulled Grace out of the machine's line of fire as they ran for cover behind the pallets. The creature missed them, hitting the pallets and causing bits of wood debris to fly into the air as they ran for the nearest exit. They fired a few rounds off before the mech could reload.
The mechanical beast knocked down pallets and shelving racks on its destructive path as it followed them down a narrow corridor. Panting, Grace turned back to see the mech focus its lights on her father.
"Dad!"
Just as she pushed him out of the way, the mech opened fire, hitting some nearby gas canisters and causing explosions that lit up the room. Grace and Tom picked themselves up quickly and hid behind a wall.
The whole building echoed with the mech's familiar stomps and groaning sounds. Grace's heart raced as she peered behind the wall, the mech getting closer and closer. She glanced around for something - anything - to stop it. Then she noticed some more canisters next to the mech.
She nudged her dad, drawing his attention to them, and he nodded. He looked around their hiding spot before grabbing a candle lit lantern from the wall and indicated to his daughter. She understood. In one swift movement, he threw the lantern as hard as he could at the mech, causing it to light on fire. Then Grace shot at the canisters and they took cover behind the wall as an explosion rocked the warehouse.
Tom shielded his daughter as they fell against the wall and a flood of fire blew past them. The force caused Grace to scrape her head against the metal framing on the wall as she curled up as small as she could, comforted by the human shield her dad had formed around her.
When she opened her eyes, it was dark and smoky. Her lungs irritated, she let out a few coughs as Tom helped her up.
"You okay?"
"Yeah," she croaked. "The mech?"
"Pretty burned up. We did it. Let's hope that serves as a warning to the rest of them."
"I hope so," she spluttered, her forehead stinging from the impact with the wall.
"Let's get back to Weaver and your brothers."
Tom took her hand and led her back towards the barricade. The explosion seemed to work; things had certainly quietened by the time they got back and Grace knelt down beside Hal.
"What the hell was that?" Hal asked her before noticing the cut on her head. "You okay?"
"Yeah. What's the situation out here?"
"Been quiet since the explosion. Maybe it scared them off?"
"Or they're coming up with another plan," murmured Grace, scanning the road for enemy movement. She could hardly see a thing through the snowy haze and smoking debris, until…
"Tom Mason!"
Popping their heads above the barricade, they could see Karen emerging from the fog, waving a white flag.
"What the hell?" blurted Grace. "What is she doing?"
"Tom, are you there?"
"What do you want, Karen?" Tom barked in return.
"Things have spun a little out of control here, Tom." She stood firmly in the centre of the road - either she was confident she wouldn't be harmed, or she didn't care. "Let's all take a deep breath and talk this out."
"Start talking!" Tom hollered back, still hunched behind the barricade.
"Your prisoner, my master - let him loose and you're all free to leave!"
"And if we don't?"
"Things can only get worse, Tom, and none of us wants that to happen."
There was a brief silence. Grace could see Tom and Weaver muttering to each other, and then Tom announced he was going out there to talk to Karen.
"Is that wise?" Grace asked him.
"She wants to talk. If she didn't they'd still be firing on us right now. Obviously, this Overlord is too valuable to them."
Grace and Hal offered to go with him. Walking either side of him, they approached Karen in the middle of the road. Grace felt the eyes of the enemy on her, knowing their weapons must be poised and ready to blast them away just in case.
Karen's empty gaze settled on Hal, and she actually smiled.
"Hal, I'm glad you're okay. I was worried Ben hurt you."
Grace held back from rolling her eyes, the way Karen described Ben made him out to be the monster, rather than herself. Hal seemed just as unconvinced.
"Really, Karen? Worried?" he scoffed.
"Yes. Very worried."
"You gonna make another speech about how the aliens forced you to attack Grace and kidnap Ben, and how horrified you were by it all?"
"My master wanted to take a more aggressive approach. As difficult as this may be for you to understand, I am still trying to protect you."
"You can't have Ben," Tom affirmed.
"Yes. That's clear now," said Karen, turning her attention to Tom. "Hand over my master, and your lives will be spared."
"And we're supposed to just take your word on that?" Grace snorted. "You're a liar, you've proved that."
"I didn't lie about everything," Karen replied, sending a shiver down Grace's spine.
"Pull your forces back," Tom negotiated. "Once we're clear of the hospital, we'll release him."
"How do I know you won't kill him the moment he's out of our sight?"
"You'll have to trust us," Hal replied bitterly, an icy glare shadowing his face.
Karen paused a beat, her lip curling. "Trusting you is problematic."
"You don't have a choice," Grace snapped, before the three of them turned around and headed back across no man's land.
"If you won't listen to me, talk to him!" Karen called after them smugly. "You've spoken with him when we were aboard his ship!"
Grace almost stopped in her tracks, shooting a concerned look at Tom. Tom slowed his pace, but didn't stop. The first Overlord Grace met, back on the ship, the one that locked her in a cage and used her as bait for her father. Now he was their prisoner. Grace was starting to realise just how significant their new guest was. They would have to be careful how they played this. Even if Grace's first thought was that of revenge - that's not why her father brought him here.
She was curious what his and Weaver's next move was going to be as she and Hal followed them through the hospital. Despite his limp, the old man was steaming ahead, firing on all cylinders. Grace was actually having a hard time keeping up as Jamil popped up beside her.
"GTO's fixed, captain," the young engineer informed him, jogging up to his side.
"Good work, Jamil," Weaver said, barely even turning his head. "Hal, as soon as we're done here, I want you and Maggie to go check out that old access tunnel we found in the east wing, see if it comes out beyond the alien position."
"If we go through that tunnel, we'll have to leave our vehicles and most of our gear behind," Hal pointed out as he followed at the back of the group.
"Beats dying in here," Weaver retorted bleakly.
Luckily, Tom was usually the voice of optimism. "Let's hope we can think of something better than that."
"Amen," Grace murmured, her eyes adjusting to the emergency lighting as they advanced through the dark corridors. "Captain, have Matt and Doctor Glass come back from the basement yet?" She bet Matt's face would be a picture upon hearing they had an Overlord locked up in the psych ward. Anne's too.
"They're in the basement?" Tom asked, glancing back at Grace.
"They went to commandeer supplies from the basement in the west wing," explained Weaver.
"I'd feel a lot more comfortable if they were inside our perimeter."
"I need you up here," Weaver told him sternly. "Grace can go."
Grace nodded, about to break off from the group when she heard Jamil speak up.
"I'll go too."
"Fine," said Weaver. "Let's move, people!"
"On our way," Jamil replied, falling back with Grace.
"Alright, be safe," Tom called after them before racing off in the other direction with Hal.
Grace smiled at Jamil as they walked at a quick pace towards the west wing. "You didn't have to volunteer. I got this."
"That's okay," he grinned at her, his dreadlocks rolling across his shoulder as he walked swiftly. "Besides, I'm worried about Lourdes. I thought they'd be done by now."
Grace had to agree. They must have heard all of the commotion outside. Surely they would have come up by now to see what was happening. Grace opened the door to the stairwell and suddenly, their absence made sense.
Alarmingly, the west side of the hospital had collapsed. Debris littered the floor of the basement; light fixtures and wires hung loose from the ceiling, sparking and flickering. Grace looked back at Jamil, horrified. All this time, Anne, Matt, and Lourdes could have been buried under rubble. They could be trapped, or worse. They could already be dead.