All these monsters, p.16
All These Monsters, page 16
“I’m going across the street for a minute,” Julian said, pointing to the French team. “You guys hang out for a sec. You can sit if you want, as long as you’re not in the way.”
I leaned against one of the bike racks as I watched him dart across the street. Edan wandered to the other side of the median. Dorsey and Gage pulled out their cigarettes.
“Man, I forgot my lighter,” Gage said, patting his pockets. “Dorsey, you have one?”
“Mine stopped working yesterday.”
“Here,” Priya said, holding a pink one out to him.
“Do you smoke?” Gage asked, taking it from her.
“No. You just never know when you might need to light something on fire, right?”
Dorsey barked out a laugh. Gage stopped with the lighter poised in front of his cigarette and gave Priya a look like perhaps he had severely underestimated her.
“You can keep it, I have plenty more.” Priya tilted her head up to the sky. It was sunny and clear. “I hope this is a boring day.”
“That is highly unlikely,” Madison said. “This part of the city has been hit often, and Grayson has ten teams just in the immediate area.” She peered at something behind me. “I wish the scrabs would take out that skyscraper, honestly. It’s super ugly.”
Nearby, a woman with a stroller spotted us, stopped dead in her tracks, and then turned and ran in the other direction.
“Wow,” I said with a laugh.
“The news has been telling people to leave if they see us in an area, because it probably means a scrab attack is coming,” Noah said, and I realized he was talking to his phone camera.
Right. We were the crazy ones who stuck around. Several other people seemed in a big hurry to leave the area, but others were ignoring us, sitting at the outdoor tables in front of cafés or pausing to text.
“That’s, like, the fifth one,” Priya giggle-whispered to Zoe. I followed their gaze to where Edan was leaning against a tree, one foot propped up on the trunk. He had his sleeves rolled up, his tattoos more visible than usual. He tugged on the wrapping of a small piece of candy, his hair failing in his eyes.
“Fifth what?” I asked.
“Girl checking him out,” Priya said. She nodded to a group of girls across the street, maybe a couple years younger than us, casting very obvious glances in his direction. Edan was pretending not to notice.
He tugged harder on his candy. Maybe he really hadn’t noticed.
“Is that . . .” I squinted at the tattoo on Edan’s right shoulder. “Is that a Hufflepuff crest?”
“Yeah, it is,” Priya said approvingly.
Laila leaned closer to me, following my gaze. “I have never found that boy more attractive than I do right now.”
“Ugh, being in Hufflepuff is embarrassing,” Zoe said. “I don’t know why you’d tattoo that on your body.”
“You shut your mouth about Hufflepuff,” Priya said. “We are lowkey the best house.”
Zoe widened her eyes like she disagreed. She took another look at Edan. “He really is super hot, though, isn’t he?”
Priya made a sound of agreement.
Edan’s hand slipped off the candy, flew backward, and he whacked himself straight in the nose. The watching girls giggled.
“And so smooth too,” I said dryly.
Archer was staring straight ahead with a frown, and Priya said something to him I couldn’t hear.
“I have a bad feeling,” he said quietly.
Behind me, tires screeched. Edan straightened. I whirled around.
Down the street, about a block away, two black vans came to a sudden stop. Grayson bolted out of the first one, recruits pouring out after him.
Grayson yelled something in French before switching to English. “RUN!” he yelled. “IF YOU’RE NOT A RECRUIT, RUN!”
21
At first, everyone in the area froze. Then they were all in motion at once—running, bumping into each other, dropping shopping bags on the ground.
“That way!” Grayson yelled to the civilians. He said something in French, and then pointed in our direction. “Go that way!”
“Oh shit,” Noah breathed.
The French team across the street ran to Grayson. Julian was halfway between him and us, shouting something to him.
There were still no scrabs. Not that I could see.
“Guys, we need—we need to be getting ready,” Noah stuttered. He grabbed his weapons pack off his back.
He was right. I grabbed my own pack and pulled out my leather armor. I strapped the first one to my left arm with shaking hands. It covered from just above my elbows all the way down to my fingers, with straps beneath to keep it in place. It was hard to secure with one hand, especially when I was trembling.
“I’ll do that one,” Zoe said, grabbing the right one. I gave her a grateful look as she quickly strapped it into place.
I pulled out my baton and unsheathed it to reveal the blade. I touched the handles of the two machetes sticking out from the harness on my back. I could grab them quickly, if I needed. I also had a Taser attached to a belt on my waist that would briefly stun the scrabs.
“Julian!” Madison yelled.
“Do you feel that?” Priya said.
Rumbling. The ground was moving beneath my feet.
Julian was still in the middle of the street. He opened his mouth like he was going to yell something.
A scrab sprang up from the earth.
Dirt and rocks flew through the air, obscuring my vision for a moment. When it cleared, all I saw was the scrab where Julian used to be. It bellowed, showing off a mouthful of fangs.
And then they were everywhere. They exploded up from the ground one by one, so many I lost count. They were all covered in dirt. One only a few yards away had bugs crawling all over its dark gray skin.
Screams sounded from every direction. I heard gunfire.
The scrab directly in front of me lunged, and Madison took a swing. Laila shot her Taser, and the scrab convulsed.
“Where did—”
“Behind—”
“HOLY SHIT!”
A body flew over my head. The recruit hit the ground, motionless.
Claws swiped through the air and I gasped as I stumbled backward. The scrab was charging me, black eyes fixed intently on my machete.
Patrick rushed at it from the side, blade pointed at its neck. The scrab threw his arm out. Patrick went flying.
I ducked as the scrab aimed its claws for my face again. I scrambled across the ground and popped up on its other side, thrusting my blade into its side as hard as I could. It screamed.
“Clara, move!” someone yelled. I darted away. A shot rang out. The scrab screamed again, blood pouring out of its neck.
“Cuidado! SCRAB!” I whirled around to see the ground starting to come apart beneath Dorsey’s feet. A member of one of the Mexican teams was yelling at him from a few yards away.
I yanked Dorsey’s shirtsleeve, pulling him out of the way just as the scrab burst up. We both stumbled, and he hit the ground. The scrab took off toward the Mexican team. The guy who had been yelling pulled a second machete from his pack. His team was immediately at his side, weapons poised.
“Thanks,” Dorsey said as I extended a hand to help him up.
I watched as the Mexican team easily took out the scrab. It hit the ground with a thud, and they turned away from it, practically in unison. They stuck close together as they ran away from it. They had clearly practiced staying together in battle.
Where was my team?
The area immediately around me had cleared out some—it looked like most of the scrabs were down the street where Grayson had been. Recruits ran in that direction. Civilians ran opposite. A lady bumped my shoulder as she went, blood dripping from the claw marks across her chest.
I spotted Edan a few yards away, spear in one hand, baton in another. He swung his baton at a scrab’s belly. He missed. It swiped at him. Edan easily ducked it. Behind him, a different scrab, this one with blood on its fangs, spat out what was left of the person it had just torn apart. My stomach turned over.
“Come on!” I yelled to Dorsey as I took off. The scrab behind Edan had its gaze on him. It lunged.
Edan noticed in the nick of time, hitting the ground and scrambling away so that the two scrabs ended up swiping at each other instead. They both spun to face Edan.
I shot forward, surprising the bloody scrab. My blade slid across its belly, and it lurched forward, front claws hitting the ground. Dorsey darted in from the side and stuck his machete into the scrab’s neck. It slumped lifeless to the ground.
The other scrab was dead too. Edan pulled his spear from its neck, his gaze catching mine.
“Thanks,” he said breathlessly. His eyes widened suddenly, and he grabbed my waist with one hand, spinning me away from something I couldn’t see. With his other hand, he thrust his spear into the air.
The scrab batted it away. It slipped from Edan’s hand and clattered to the ground. I dove forward, reaching for the Taser on my waist. I aimed and fired.
The scrab jolted. Edan grabbed his spear, darted right under the scrab, and thrust it up. He scampered away as the scrab started to fall.
“Damn, that dude is fast,” Dorsey breathed.
A crash made all three of us jump. Half a block away, two scrabs had just tipped a car over. Another scrab fell on top of it, shaking from the Taser darts in its chest. Grayson sprang forward, swinging his bladed club so hard the scrab’s feet left the ground.
Edan took off down the street, Dorsey and me at his heels. We had to dart around bodies, both human and scrab. I swallowed as I passed a dead recruit missing several limbs.
A French team was fighting a scrab not far from Grayson, and I watched as three members used their blades at once. They were also sticking together, fighting as a team. Julian hadn’t mentioned us staying together during battle.
I took a quick look around, hoping to catch a glimpse of him. That scrab had popped up so close to him. Had he been killed?
“That one!” Grayson yelled, pointing at something down the street. He was talking to us, I realized. A scrab ran down the street toward the French team, limping slightly. Edan had already taken off.
I ran behind him, skidding to a stop when he did. The scrab lumbered toward us, showing its mouthful of fangs as it roared. I gripped my baton tighter.
“You go for the belly, I’ll go for the neck,” Edan said. I nodded.
The scrab’s feet left the ground as it dove for us. I darted to one side. Edan went to the other. I thrust my blade forward. Its claws swiped my arm above my armor, and I gasped at the sudden pain. I tightened my grip on my baton, plunging it forward until it tore into the scrab’s belly. A spear went straight through its neck. It crashed into the ground face first.
Edan stood on the other side of the scrab. His eyes flicked to my arm. Blood oozed from claw marks.
“It’s just a scratch,” I said, wiping the back of my hand across the sweat on my brow. I turned to look for another scrab.
It was quiet, I realized. The roars had stopped. On the other side of the street, Grayson pulled a blade from a scrab he’d killed. There were three more in his immediate area, sprawled on the ground, blood seeping out of their wounds.
There were dead scrabs everywhere. I counted at least twenty, just on this street. And up ahead, at the intersection, I could see several more.
But there were way more human bodies. Dead recruits up and down the street, blood staining their uniforms and spilling onto the asphalt. A few yards away, a man pressed down on his badly bleeding leg, several people surrounding him to help.
“Where’s the rest of team seven?” Edan said. His voice sounded strange.
“I don’t know.”
Sirens sounded in the distance. Grayson stood amongst the bodies, both hands in his hair. He was searching for something. He finally found it, his face practically crumpling with relief. I turned to look. Madison. She was covered in blood, holding the handle of a machete that had somehow lost its blade. She tossed it aside and gave Grayson a tired thumbs-up.
“Team seven!”
I whirled around. It was Julian, in the middle of the intersection where I’d last seen him. He was OK. Blood covered his hands and arms, and his shirt was torn down the middle, like he’d narrowly escaped claws, but I didn’t see any injuries.
“I said I don’t know!” he yelled at an American team leader next to him. The man’s shoulders sagged, and he quickly walked away. “Team seven!” Julian yelled again. He didn’t see me and Edan. We started toward him.
As we entered the intersection, I saw recruits headed to him from all sides. Relief coursed through my veins as I spotted them. Priya, breathing heavily. Patrick, holding a hand to his bloody head. Noah, covered head to toe in blood and grime. Laila, gingerly touching bloody scratches on his neck. Gage, Archer, Dorsey, Madison—all alive.
Julian was counting as we approached him. His eyes finally met mine, and he let out a huge breath of air. No one had ever looked that happy to see me in my life. I would have smiled, if I hadn’t been trying to ward off a panic attack.
“Ten,” Julian said, and then counted again. “We’re missing one. Who are we missing?”
“Me.”
I turned to see Zoe trudging toward us, the knees of her pants dirty but otherwise unharmed. I wondered if she hid instead of joining the fight. She stared at the ground.
“Jesus.” Julian pressed the palms of his hand to his forehead. “You all made it.”
“You don’t have to sound so surprised,” Dorsey said dryly.
“Look at this.” Julian gestured to the bodies around us. “It’s a miracle.”
Patrick wrapped an arm around my shoulders and gave me a squeeze. “I thought you were gone for a minute there.”
“Me too.”
“I think . . .” Julian closed his eyes for a moment, like he was gathering his thoughts. “I think we’re going to have to help with these bodies. But let’s move to the side for a minute while the paramedics grab the injured.”
We followed him back to where we’d started, the median with the bikes. There was a big hole where the scooters had been. We clustered together on the other side, near the trees.
Medics ran out of ambulances and onto the street. Julian examined the cut on Patrick’s head, then inspected a wound on Laila’s arm. He stopped in front of me.
“How bad is that?” he asked quietly.
I blinked. “What?” I remembered suddenly that a scrab’s claws had caught my arm. “Oh. No, it’s fine. Just a scratch.” The pain felt dull and far away. My brain was buzzing.
He nodded, but didn’t move right away. His arm moved toward me, then dropped back to his side, like he’d thought better of it. We were surrounded by other recruits, and so far, we’d kept our relationship secret.
He took a step back. “You guys can sit,” he said to the rest of the team. “Relax a minute.” He scanned the area. “I’ll be back.” He headed in Grayson’s direction.
I sat down on the curb and examined my arm, which was starting to burn as the panic wore off. Four angry claw marks ripped into my skin. I touched the edge of my fingertips just below each one.
“That was some shit,” Dorsey said, after several minutes of silence.
Priya let out a semihysterical laugh and roughly wiped tears off her face. Gage was trying to light a cigarette, but his hands were shaking too badly. Archer reached over and took the lighter from him, flicking it to produce a flame. Gage gave him a grateful look.
“This is the darkest timeline,” Edan said. “I want a different one.”
“No way,” Noah said. “I read science fiction. The Nazis always win in the other timelines. I’ll take the monsters.”
“That’s a really good point,” Edan muttered. “Second darkest timeline.”
“Agreed.”
Silence settled over the group again, until I broke it. “We should have stuck together.” My voice was too quiet, and I could tell that Laila and Archer, on the other side of the group, hadn’t heard it. I cleared my throat. “We should have stuck together.”
“Yeah, a lot of the teams were working as a unit,” Noah said. “I think it’s a better strategy.”
“I don’t know, we all made it,” Patrick said. “Maybe we’re OK as is.”
“What’s the point of having a team if we all run off and do our own thing?” Noah asked. “Besides, like Julian said, it’s a miracle. I don’t know about you guys, but I almost died, like, three times. I think some of this is just dumb luck.”
“Same,” Edan said.
“Same,” Laila said. “I don’t know about dumb luck, though.” She touched the cross around her neck.
“I’m only alive because Clara pulled me out of the way just in time,” Dorsey said, shooting me a smile. “So I vote we stay together next time.”
“Agreed,” Madison said.
“Together, then,” Noah said. “I’ll tell Julian that’s what we want to do.”
We were quiet again.
22
GRAYSON ST. JOHN FIGHT SQUADS DEFEATED IN PARIS
Massive casualties call training methods into question.
The news reports about our first battle were not kind.
The UK squads had encountered some scrabs, as had teams in Beijing and Tokyo, and they’d suffered some casualties, but not like us. We’d taken failure to a new level.
I slipped my phone (the team phone?) into my pocket and headed for the door. The rest of the girls on team seven were still sleeping. Their alarms would go off soon, but I’d woken up early, hungry and still vibrating with terror from yesterday.
I walked down the hallway and descended the stairs to the ground floor. I could hear the murmured sounds of people talking behind closed doors, but the complex was mostly quiet, everyone still asleep or in their rooms. As I passed through the lobby, I saw some of the Australian teams outside, doing yoga on the grass.
I pulled open the door of the cafeteria. It was empty, except for Grayson. He sat on the floor in the back of the room, knees bent, his head down. Next to him were several large paper bags.
