Irregulars - lanyon Josh - Страница 73

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Director Alonsa checked in with Agent Zardo, who reported a young man named Honesto had volunteered to have the risky surgery. He had been told the procedure would facilitate removing the toxicity in his blood. The other living sacrifices huddled in frightened groups, speaking in whispers. They were strangers to each other, scared or angry at their forced separation from the rest of the world. Only Deven and the other sunglass-wearing agents could see the remarkable weavings of arteries that entwined them all. The blood vessels tangled as they flowed between bodies.

“Night Axe might sense that,” Deven said, pointing to where all the arteries bundled and exited the heavy stone foundation wall.

“Sense what?” August pulled on his sunglasses. He frowned at the exit point. “Not much we can do at this point.”

As they waited for the results of the surgery, August volunteered to venture out in the rain and fetch watermelon from the nearest fruit stand. Deven stood to follow, but August held out his hand, holding him back.

“No, stay.” He eyed the cluster of arteries in the wall. “You know what to be on the lookout for if Night Axe comes.”

Deven nodded and sat back down on a hard bench. He lost track of time in the fluorescent-lit basement. He wondered how far August had wandered.

Agent Ortega approached Deven with a toothy grin. “It’s done,” he said. “Honesto survived. They had to cauterize the wound with an energy burn, but his bleeding is under control.”

“Can I see?” Deven asked. Ortega nodded and the two of them walked down the hallway toward the operating room.

The hairs on the back of Deven’s neck stood on end. Deven watched the arteries streaming around them for movement hinting at Night Axe’s presence, but they neither tugged nor changed direction.

A smell of rotten flesh filled his nostrils. He reached for one of his knives.

“Something’s wrong,” he told Ortega. “Get everyone in their rooms. Now!”

Ortega studied Deven’s expression for only a second before nodding and bursting into action. He shouted a flurry of Spanish and people began to move, first slowly and then in greater urgency as Agent Zardo rushed down the hall, echoing Ortega’s command.

The smell intensified and Deven glanced up. The ventilation shaft grate burst open and clanged to the floor, inches from his head. The four tzimimi shrieked into the hallway, their loose, leathery breasts flapping as they flew. One swung her obsidian-studded baton at Deven’s head. He ducked out of the way and she didn’t linger for another attempt. All four shot through the window of the door of the operating room, shattering the glass. A scream burst out of the room. It sounded like someone was thrown against the wall.

Deven ran forward and yanked open the door. One of the night spirits slashed at Deven’s face with her clawed hand. He pulled back and threw his knife upward, hitting one of her shining eyes. She fell to the floor with a crunch of breaking bones.

Deven leaped upon her, plunging his second knife between her ribs and deep into her black heart. He saw Agents Ortega and Zardo run past him, firing needle-thin shard bullets at the other night spirits.

The one beneath him cursed in Aztawi and writhed as Deven drove his blade deeper. The serpents between her legs hissed and tried to bite at him, and with his last plunge, the spirit contorted, raking her taloned foot down Deven’s spine. Her glowing skin shriveled and burned like paper around his blade.

Once her struggles stopped and she died, Deven clambered to his feet. A sharp ache pulsed from his bleeding back. But there were still three more of the monstrosities, and even though Ortega and Zardo were on the offensive, he could see they were all too late. Honesto lay shredded on the bloody hospital bed, his eyes, nose, and mouth ripped from his body to expose his bare skull underneath.

Thin bullets strafed the tzimimi. They retreated to the corner. One threw a jade glyph on the hard hospital floor and fire ignited, licking the bloody bed sheets and spreading up to burn Honesto’s fingers.

Deven quickly crushed the jade glyph beneath his bootheel and spat on the fragments. The fire gutted instantly but the odor of burnt hair lingered.

One of the tzimimi crumpled to the ground and another quickly followed. Ortega moved closer to shoot point-blank at the spirits’ bodies.

“Aim for the heart!” Deven shouted. He grabbed one of the fallen batons and flung it at the last night spirit, downing her on the bed, on top of poor Honesto.

Deven grabbed her by her grass skirt, dragging her off the patient. He drew his knife across her throat, sawing through her spine and stepping back as she gave one last cry before dying.

Deven turned to confront the other night spirits, but they were dead, shot with so many shard bullets their bodies shimmered metallic with enchanted copper and silver. Ortega’s forehead and hair were matted with blood; one of the tzimimi had struck him before dying.

Ortega moved to the beside and checked Honesto’s pulse. He quickly dropped his hand.

“He’s dead.”

The aftermath of the attack reminded Deven of Lord Jaguar’s sacrificial altar. The heavy odor of metal and blood permeated his senses, and for a moment he was transported back, kneeling at the feet of his lord, watching in silence as women, men, and children were silently led to the altar to have their throats slit.

He’d learned how tricky it was to walk through slick pools of blood in corn-husk sandals, and now he walked to Honesto’s side, treading carefully.

All of the tzimimi must have shredded the man with their claws. Deven picked up his sunglasses, which had come off in the struggle, and he saw the bulging incision where Honesto’s connection to Night Axe had been severed. The end of the vessel was charred black.

“Oh Jesus,” Director Alonsa said, stepping in the room, sounding breathless. She looked flushed, as if she’d run in from the other end of the hospital. She took in the bloodbath, shaking her head.

“Jesus! Luis,” she said. Only then did Deven notice the body slumped in the corner of the room. It was Dr. Ramos, the back of his head smashed in, pieces of obsidian blade glinting in the fluorescent lights between the matted blood and hair.

“Honesto would have lived,” Ortega said, panting. He wiped blood out of his eye. “The surgery was a success.”

“But it alerted Night Axe,” Deven said. He turned to the director. “We can’t do more. For all we know, he senses the other sacrifices have been gathered here and is on his way. We must act now.”

Director Alonsa looked to Agent Ortega. “Go upstairs and get a doctor to stitch up your head. Zardo, call a cleanup squad.” She looked helpless as she stared at the mess. She reached over and squeezed Honesto’s ankle, the only part of him that hadn’t been raked open.

She then turned to Deven and her eyes narrowed. “Where are you hurt?”

“Me?” Deven remembered the talons in his back and reached around. His white T-shirt was wet with blood. “It’s all right.”

She hesitated as if she didn’t believe him but then nodded. “Where’s Silas?”

“Outside, getting me a watermelon.” He felt embarrassed admitting it. While innocent people needed the Irregulars, one of them had been out fetching Deven a treat.

Director Alonsa led Deven out of the bloody room and firmly shut the door behind them. Pieces of glass broke from the shattered window and she quickly withdrew her hand to avoid the shards.

“Don’t let Agent August see this,” she told Deven.

“Why not?” Deven didn’t imagine August was the kind of man to be squeamish.

“The way that young man is sliced up looks too similar to how Silas’s lover died,” Director Alonsa said.

Deven visualized the mangled remnants of Honesto’s face, imagining how he’d feel if that face had belonged someone he loved.

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