The one on my left came in first. He swung both his claws at me in some sort of double scythe-like attack that might have connected had I not shuffled forward and brought my right fist into his ugly nose. His skull imploded like a rotten egg, and he flipped backward to land on what was left of his head.
The second ugly bastard didn’t even pause in his attack when I destroyed his friend, and I parried his jab attack with my left forearm before kicking the side of my bare foot into his knee. His joint shattered like a dropped glass, and I grabbed him by the throat as he fell so that I could slam his skull down into the hard stone of the temple. Blood exploded out of his mouth, nose, and eyeballs as soon as the back of his head connected with the stone, and I tossed his twitching carcass away as I came back up from my crouched position.
“Now,” I said as I turned back to Persephone, “about the way out of here?”
“Yahhh.” She pointed to the cylinder again as she beat her wings. “Urrr eeee!”
“She wants us to hurry,” Eve said, and then the three of us glanced back at the door when the terminal made another cracking noise.
We sprinted across the temple floor and up the dais stairs. I made it up first and checked inside the top part of the overturned stone cylinder. It looked like the tubes connected to it using some sort of grommet-like lid that I saw on the ground behind the cylinder. Most of the tubes from the ceiling were still attached to it, and I saw blood leaking from the bottom in a slow trickle.
“Up!” Persephone shouted as she grabbed onto the top part of the cylinder. She stuck her ass out as if she was doing a deadlift, beat her wings, and tried to lift, but the thing didn’t move until Eve and I both grabbed with her.
“Push!” I growled as the three of us slowly pulled the thing off its side. I could have done it with both of my hands, but having just the one was hampering me, and we almost lost control of the heavy stone container before we got it right side up.
“Innn!” Persephone demanded as she pointed up to the top of the cylinder. It was four meters tall, and I still had no idea how climbing inside of the thing was going to help us, but then we heard a loud crack from the far doorway, and I knew we had no choice but to trust in Persephone.
“Go,” I told Eve as I lowered my right hand to her knee. She placed her hand on my shoulder, put her boot on my palm, and then looked into my eye for a quick moment. She didn’t weigh much, so I easily lifted her over my head with one hand while she walked her palms up the side of the stone cylinder for balance.
Then she pulled herself up to the edge and turned to look back down.
“Hurry!” Eve said, and I coiled my legs under me. I felt incredibly tired, but that didn’t matter. I forced my legs to obey me, and I exhaled as I leapt as high as I could.
I had thought that I might barely be able to grab the side of the cylinder, but I had jumped a bit higher than I expected, and I managed to hook my elbow over the top of the stone lip, and Eve helped me pull myself the rest of the way up.
“Innn! Innn!” Persephone shouted as she ran toward the lid on the ground. She lifted it easily in both arms and her wings began to beat frantically as she turned around to look at us.
Then the doors flew open with a crack that sounded like a gunshot, and what looked like a hundred of the ugly fuckers ran inside of the temple.
Eve and I dropped down into the dark cylinder. It was a tight fit, but we wrapped our arms around each other and looked up as Persephone set the lid on top of the cylinder.
“Wait!” I shouted as I realized that she wasn’t going to get into the cylinder. “Don’t you need to come with us?”
“Me! Me!” The platinum-haired woman tapped on her temple and then made a movement with her hand with thumb and pinky finger spread out. She didn’t wait for us to confirm we knew what she was talking about. Instead, she grabbed onto the lid again and slid it the rest of the way so that it covered us.
Then we were in darkness. All I could hear was the screams, but they sounded like they were a kilometer away. All I could feel was Eve’s heart beating frantically against my chest. All I could smell was the coppery fragrance of blood.
Then that scent started to grow stronger as the red liquid began to pour from the tubes at the top.
“Adam,” Eve whispered as she clung to me.
“Think about being back on Persephone,” I said. “The ship. Think about being back on the ship. I think that is what she wanted.”
“I will,” she said. “If it does not work, and we--”
“It will work,” I growled as I felt the blood began to fill the tank around my shins.
“But if it does not. I must tell you something.”
“It will work. Don’t--”
“Please listen!” she hissed.
“Yeah?”
“I love you,” she said, and the screams sounded like they were right outside our stone prison.
“I know,” I replied.
“No,” she said. “Words cannot express it. When you saved my life, I did not think anything else would be able to bring me as much joy, but then you made love to me, and I knew I was wrong. Then you married me. Adam, you have made my life complete in more ways than I ever thought possible, and this is all because of me. They control my cells. What if they do this--”
“They aren’t going to,” I growled as I licked my tiger-tongue across her face. “I’ll fight them. If that bitch isn’t dead, she’ll know that she can’t come after both of us.”
“But what if they--”
“No!” I growled. “You are mine, Eve. Not theirs.”
“Yes,” she whispered, and I could feel her sobs cause her body to shudder.
The blood was up to my waist now, but that was closer to her chest. I had no idea how we would be taken from this nightmare, but I lifted Eve up so that her face was even with mine.
Then I held her as close as I could until the blood filled the cylinder.
I couldn’t breathe. I couldn’t think. It was just the blood and the screaming.
And Eve.
Chapter 4
I gasped and sat up as air filled my lungs. The light was bright in the room, and I hissed as I covered my face. I was human, and my left hand covered my eyes. It was a bit comforting to know that I had my hand back, but I realized that I was naked.
“Where am--”
“He’s awake!” Kasta shouted, and I felt her hands wrap around me. “Eve said you would wake up soon, so I called everyone else on the--”
“Where is she?” I asked as I forced my eyes open. I was in the infirmary aboard Persephone, but Eve wasn’t in the bed next to me.
“She just woke up and walked out--”
“How long?” I asked as I pulled Kasta’s arms from around my shoulder and reached for the IV drip needle in my arm.
“She walked out fifty-two seconds ago. Said that she loved me and to tell you that--”
“Wait here!” I shouted as I sprang out of the bed.
“Hey! What’s going on?” I heard her call out as I stumbled out of the room and slammed my shoulder into the hallway wall. My head was spinning, and I tried to figure out where Eve would have gone.
It only took me a split second to guess at how she would try to kill herself.
“No, no, no, no,” I chanted as I ran naked down the hallway toward the hold.
I was still a bit discombobulated as I sprinted, and I bounced my right shoulder off the right wall, and then my left shoulder off the left wall before I was able to run straight. I heard some voices talking on a cross hallway that I ran by, and I heard Sivaha shout my name.
I didn’t stop running.
I plowed into the hold and turned toward the bay door, Eve was almost to the button that would open the side docking door airlock, but that was across the entire hold, and I didn’t think I could make it there before she could step inside.
“Eve!” I screamed as I slammed my bare feet into the metal floor. She was still naked, and the motion of her head turning around to see me caused her long black hair to swirl around her alabaster body. The pause in her step was all I needed, and I reached forward to pull her away from the button.
Then my entire body froze in mid run.