“I was close. Ward and I were near the gate, covering the wounded soldiers’ retreat.” He, too, frowned in confusion, gazing around for the missing sniper before looking at me. “Did you see anyone else?”
I shook my head, and the scowl deepened. “Impossible.” Walking to the edge of the cliff, he peered out at the battle, then spun back. “Something was here,” he insisted. “Shooting at our forces. They must’ve run when they saw you coming, but—”
I felt the ripple of energy go through the air, and my adrenaline spiked in warning, but it was too late. Behind Martin, a head rose on a long, snaking neck, as a familiar green dragon grinned down at the unsuspecting human, eyes glowing demonically as she towered over him.
“Martin, behind you!” I shouted, just as Lilith’s jaws closed over the human’s upper body. Martin’s legs jerked as the Viper lifted him into the air and shook him like a dog with a toy.
I roared and tensed to spring at her, but from within the dragon’s jaws, three shots rang out, making the Viper recoil with a shriek. Somehow, the lieutenant had the presence of mind to fire his weapon even while halfway down a dragon’s throat. Eyes blazing, Lilith turned her head and hurled the body over the cliff. The lieutenant arced lazily into the air, seemed to hover for a split second, then plummeted out of sight, falling several hundred feet to the rocks below.
I hurled myself forward, Shifting forms as I did, and collapsed beside the Dragonkiller, swinging the huge barrel toward the Viper. Lilith roared as she turned on me, blood streaming from her nose and mouth, one eye bulging out of the socket as she lunged, desperation and rage making her fast, but not fast enough.
“Eat this, bitch,” I growled, and pulled the trigger.
The boom from the huge rifle made my eardrums explode, and the recoil knocked me back a couple feet, nearly dislocating my shoulder. Pain flared, my head, shoulders and chest feeling like they’d been kicked by a Clydesdale. But the two-foot, armor-piercing, solid length of metal hit the Viper point-blank in the chest and went out the other side, leaving a massive hole behind. For a moment, Lilith gaped at the wound in her armor, clearly stunned. Her jaws moved, probably cursing me, though I couldn’t hear anything through the painful, high-pitched ringing in my head.
Then her wings shuddered and went limp, her eyes glazed over and her body slumped, sliding a bit on the rocks before losing balance entirely. With a last defiant cry, the leader of the Vipers tumbled backward off the cliff face and disappeared. I felt, rather than heard, the moment when she hit the ground, a shudder that rippled through the air and vibrated the earth.
As I lay on my back beside a gun called the Dragonkiller, waiting for the throbbing in my ears to go away, I allowed myself a small smile. In the split second before I’d pulled the trigger, when Lilith’s jaws had been a fraction too slow to end my life, someone’s face had flashed through my mind. Oddly enough, it wasn’t the face I would have expected.
“Dammit,” I sighed, my voice sounding muffled in my own ears. “I’m turning into a walking cliché. Mist, you’d better come back alive so you can taunt me about this later.”
GARRET
I peeked around a corner and immediately ducked back as a hail of bullets shot toward me, peppering the corridor walls and sparking off the floor.
“Looks like security’s been alerted,” Tristan muttered, pressed into the wall next to me. Matthews, Ember and Mist huddled behind us as gunfire continued to ring through the corridor. “How many?”
“Two,” I answered, and raised my weapon. “Cover me.” I ducked out, firing down the hallway while Tristan and Matthews popped around the corner and did the same. The pair of guards in the corridor jerked and fell, guns clattering to the floor, and I turned to the others. “Clear, let’s go!”
As we reached another intersection, I turned the corner, and a pair of double doors loomed ahead, ominous and important looking. A squad of six human clones waited in front of them, three kneeling and three standing over their shoulders. As soon as they saw us, the three standing opened fire, while the ones kneeling Shifted forms—becoming sleek gray dragons—and charged.
I ducked behind a thick metal pipe across the hall as Tristan and Matthews jerked back around the corner. “Ember, Mist!” I barked. “Take out the vessels. The rest of us will cover you.”
The two didn’t hesitate. As the vessels drew close, a bright red dragon and a silver-white dragon bounded into the hall with a roar and pounced on the clones. As the snarls and shrieks of angry dragons filled the air, the rest of us ducked out of cover and fired into the remaining guards. I felt a bullet graze my arm, taking a chunk of skin with it, but the three human vessels fell back and slumped lifelessly against the doorframe.
I looked to where the fight between dragons still raged in the middle of the hall and raised my weapon to help, but it wasn’t necessary. Mist had one vessel pinned and was finishing it off with her jaws around its throat, and a few yards away Ember stood over two lifeless, bleeding dragon bodies, panting and glaring down at them. Her wings shook, either with fury or adrenaline, and her front talons were covered in blood. Tristan whistled softly.
Carefully, I approached the red dragon. “Ember,” I said, making sure she heard me before touching her shoulder. “Are you hurt?”
Her head came up, green eyes wide and a little glassy, and my worry for her spiked. Losing Dante was hitting her hard, and she was taking out her rage and grief on whatever she could. I wished I could comfort her, but there was no time, and we both knew it.
“No,” she whispered, and Shifted to human form. Blood stained her fingers and was spattered across her face in ribbons, but she didn’t seem to notice. “I’m fine. Let’s keep moving.”
We turned to the heavy double doors. They were locked, but Ember slid the card she’d gotten from Dante into the slot below a touch screen, and the red window above it blinked from red to green. The doors groaned as they swung back, and a billow of warm, damp air hit us in the face as we stepped inside to gaze around in horrified awe.
“Son of a bitch,” Matthews commented, craning his neck up toward the ceiling.
The stasis chamber from the email video stretched away before us, massive and towering. The vats containing the Adult clones marched in neat rows into the dark, and the dragons inside seemed even larger up close and personal. I felt a shiver go through me as I stared at the sleeping army. So many. If they woke up, it would be hell on earth.
A shot rang out behind us, and a bullet ricocheted off the doorframe about an inch from where Tristan stood. The two of us turned and fired, and a pair of guards crumpled to the floor. But footsteps echoed through the hall, a moment before an entire squad of vessels rounded the corner and raised their guns in our direction.
“Close the doors!” I shouted, firing as I leaped back. The roar of assault rifles filled the hall, and we ducked behind the metal barriers, straining to push them shut. They closed with a moan and a loud clang, and the window above the touch screen on the inside flashed red, locking automatically. Raising my gun, I fired several rounds into the screen, until the touch pad was a smoking, sparking mess of wire and broken glass.