Perigee [bxb] | Bad Moon Book II

44; {Gunner}: "children"

Every day, for the past nine months, Gunner Rowley had visited the photo of his wife thumbtacked to the cork-board of his desk in his under-sized sample room. She was twenty years younger when the photo was taken—her late 90's jeans tugged up to her waist, and silken daisies in her hair. For the first time in nine months, he tore out the thumbtack and took the photo from the cork board, slipping it like a piece of precious treasure into the front pocket of his lab coat.

He cracked open a cubic cooler with withdrew the shelf of samples inside—each vial filled to the appropriate level with a fair amount of blood. Several of the samples came from the juveniles, as Ziya called them. Gunner preferred the term children. Most of them from number Six.

Nadaline. Gunner remembered the name, but only faintly. Years ago, during his regular visits with Anna.

"We settled on Nadaline."

He remembered thinking that it was a more suitable name for a drugstore medication. Then he remembered thinking, why do I care? It's going to die anyway. He knew back then that the chances of survival were about as good as a game of Russian roulette—only living was the bullet in the barrel.

He supposed Six had proven him wrong.

He found Jaylin Maxwell's vials easily—they'd been marked at the top with red pen. Three samples of dark garnet. Three of the most valuable things in the world to Ziya Faheem. He took the first in his fingers, dangling the tiny vial in front of his eyes.

His wife had been nine months pregnant last he saw her. Contact was a risky thing. Ziya had a way of finding the most brittle, precious pieces of someone's life and smashing them to dust. He stayed in touch via Marcy, but that was it. According to her off-and-on communications, they were doing well in Denmark. Maybe he wouldn't bring them back like he planned. Maybe he'd take the next flight out—escape this place and everything Ziya had turned him into. Maybe he'd meet his third child for the first time.

The vial fell from his fingers and shattered on the white tile floor. He selected a new one. The blood had bubbled in this one—just a bit on the surface.

Maybe they'd start a new life. Maybe she'd already moved on.

This time he didn't watch the vial fall. He just listened to the satisfying crash as it shattered on the floor.

Maybe he'd never make it out of here. Maybe Ziya would kill him, or maybe the kid—Jesus, the kid. The cajones he had to have to face someone like Ziya. Maybe he really would put an end to her.

Either way, Gunner Rowley would be free by the end of the night. Whether he was at the bottom of the lake, or on a plane to Denmark.

He wrenched the shelf off of its hinges, shoving the entire pallet of samples to the floor. Then Gunner stepped out of his lab, shoes bespattered with an amalgam of different blood. The lights had been turned back on—not that it mattered now. Those kids should have made it to Ziya in time.

He left red shoe prints behind and made his way down to the exhibition room. He was done hiding his tracks; by morning, they wouldn't matter. One swipe of his trusty reader and the door hissed open to the several glass cages with children inside. On any occasion, they'd greet him at the viewing window—peering through the glass with wide almond eyes, slanted frowns or giddy smiles. But tonight, Gunner was stopped in his tracks by the sight of the cells. Every single pane of glass had been painted rose-red.

He approached the nearest cell—the one belonging to a boy he'd always called Tempo, for the playful way he'd knock rhythms into the glass. Tempo greeted him every night with a series of articulate raps. Tonight, there was nothing.

The red obstructed any view of the inside, but when Gunner looked close enough, he could see the tacky congregation of the carmine paint. Not paint, blood.

Then there was a flash of black. A beastly hand struck the glass with a loud bang—hard enough to make Gunner stagger back. A face pressed into the blood, sharp white teeth clacking against the glass—claws pressing in, sliding down with a screech that put his teeth on end.

Almost like they were communicating, the sounds started up from every other cell in the room—the screams of gouged glass, the loud bangs on the walls, and then snarls—vicious, beastly sounds.

They has transitioned. Somehow, for whatever reason, the lichunds had broken free. And they wanted out.

Gunner moved quickly to the control panel on the far wall. He wrenched open the box with his fingernails and flipped every release switch one by one until each cell in the room was lifting open and buckets of deep red blood came spilling out onto the floor.

The lichunds didn't consider him. Not for a moment. They all slipped from their cells and congregated at the exit door, snorting and crooning and clawing at the metal. Tempo—being nearly twelve years old—was the oldest and the largest, but even still, only the size of black bear. The smallest was no larger than a pitbull. Each differed in size, but they all shared the same eyes. A pale, moon-washed yellow.

There wasn't an inch of floor that hadn't been paved in blood, so Gunner treaded slowly over the slick pools. He feared the lichund because he'd seen what they could do. It was only sane to fear the lichund. But if he had to choose—to die by the lichund or to face Ziya's wrath—he would give himself to the beasts now. Right now. While it was easy.

He moved past them slowly, expecting with every step to feel their teeth go into his calves. But the lichund children moved around him like water—eager to reach the door and only the door. Gunner swiped his card through the reader. The door hissed open, and the wild things moved out in a herd of black and red, leaving only bloody, wicked foot prints behind.