Jay Posey - Three

Cass felt lost in the swimming darkness, her only anchors to any sort of concrete reality the floor under her feet and her hand on Wren. He was being awfully brave, she thought. She wondered how far they had left to go. It certainly felt like they should’ve made it by now.

She pinged the nearest satellite, located their position in the schematic she’d downloaded from before, ran an internal app to measure the distance. Eighty-three meters to go.

Suddenly, an electric shriek shattered the tunnel, ricocheted like sonic shrapnel; pierced her ears. Reflexively she clapped her hands over them and glanced behind. The blue orbs were there, now closing fast.

“What’d you do?” Three barked, snatching her around to face him.

“What?” she stammered. “No, nothing. I—”

He ignited the chemlight on his vest, and the ferocity on his face frightened her. He growled a wordless curse, and slid his hand down to her wrist, gripping it. Hard.

“Come on.”

He jerked her to a run. All grace and fluidity disappeared. The three of them crashed headlong into the darkness, seeing no more than five steps ahead of themselves. Wren clung desperately to Three’s back. Cass struggled to keep pace while being towed along.

She chanced a glance over her shoulder, caught a fleeting glimpse. Not three orbs now. Six pinpoints. Eyes.

The Weir were gaining.

Her heart pounded in her chest, she felt like she was falling behind, could feel Three straining to hold himself back so she could keep up. Cass wasn’t going to be the one to get them killed. She proc’d more of the quint, overdrove her adrenals, felt her nerves electrify with the surge. In two bounding steps, she was dead-even with Three, jerking her arm away from him with strength renewed.

He didn’t seem to notice or care. They sped down the tunnel. Three pointed ahead to their left.

“There!”

She cut that way, found the base of the stairs, launched up them. But Three snatched her arm again, stopping her mid-stride, spinning her back towards him. In a fluid motion, he had Wren off his back and into her arms, so quickly she barely had time to grab her son. Three wrenched the chemlight off his vest, and shoved it between her fingers.

“Go. Climb.”

He pushed her on up a stair, and from the look in his eye, she knew better than to hesitate. She took them two at a time. Two flights, three flights, she put everything she had into every step, trying to remember just how many flights she’d come down. Somewhere between the fifth and sixth flights, she heard an impact on the stairs. The Weir were climbing.

Cass pressed on, thighs burning with the effort, breath coming in great gulps. She threw a glance over the rail, saw them a few flights below, the two in front like wild dogs bounding over each other to be the first to the kill. Their blue eyes streaked in the blackness around them, dancing as they vaulted up the steps.

Wren squeezed tight on her back. She felt him bury his face to her neck, almost sensed him willing her faster, or perhaps wishing he could wake from the nightmare. His weight dragged at her. Shifting on her shoulders, it made her next step tough to judge. Her toe caught, just barely. Just enough. She went sprawling with a cry.

Cass’s chin hit hard on the metal-grated stair above her, as she rolled reflexively to her left, throwing Wren towards the wall, away from the edge. Dazed, stunned for a moment, she caught a view of the Weir circling the flights behind her. Not quite three flights now, one outpacing the other by several steps. She launched herself to her feet, and yanked Wren up on to her back. As she fled higher, the image flashed again in her mind. The Weir racing up the stairs. Two of them. Only two? Or had she missed the third?

Her foot slipped again, though she caught herself this time with a hand on the rail. She’d lost count of flights by now, and her mind was set on nothing more than reaching the top. Spots floated through her vision, and she blinked them away, terrified that another misstep would be the end of them both.

There was a commotion on the stairs below: a sharp digital shriek that escalated in pitch, a solid impact that shuddered the staircase. No time to look back. Cass flew on, a hind leaping to high places. Another flight. Another. Then, out of nowhere, the door. She’d almost forgotten it was her goal.

She slung Wren to his feet on the landing, hurried him to the heavy metal door. It was cracked open, inward. Just enough.

“Go ahead, baby, go through,” she panted.

Wren hesitated at the crack.

“Wren, go!” she pushed him, and he dug his heels in, resistant.

“It’s dark!” he cried, the first words from his mouth since he woke. “It’s still dark out!”

She ground her teeth, tried to force him through, but she couldn’t get leverage between the wall and the door. In a moment, it didn’t matter anyway. A Weir was there. On the landing.

Cass spun to confront it, expecting it to leap upon her full force. Instead, it halted, hunched but not crouched, scanning her. Cass reached behind her, felt for Wren, ensured he was there, shielded. At least there was no sign of the others. Cass just had to buy a little time. Just long enough for Three to catch up. She just didn’t know how she was going to do it.

The Weir seemed uncertain, hesitant. It glanced quickly away down the stairs, as if noticing for the first time that it was alone. This one was different from the others: larger, more muscular. Still a corpse, but one better preserved. It looked back at Cass, opened its mouth and squawked at her. A vicious howl of circuitry and menace; an electric wolf. Cass tensed.

“Come on,” she said internally, a silent plea for help. “Come on.”

The Weir flexed its hands, nails green in the chemlight. Still no sound on the stair below. Cass hoped that was a good sign. But she wasn’t fool enough to count on hope alone. She dosed again. She’d have to deal with the consequences later. If there was a later.

The Weir scanned her again. No, not her. Behind her. It was trying to get a bead on Wren. No more waiting.

Cass pounced.

Three was aware. Aware that he was aware. That was a start. Not a great one, but a start nonetheless. The left side of his face felt like it was covered in dry paint, or plaster. His neck felt strange. Definitely crumpled into a corner. A corner made of something hard. His legs wouldn’t move.

Bad sign. Broken neck, probably. He tried his fingers. They wiggled. Still had those, at least. He wondered how he would drag himself up all those stairs with just his fingers. After a thought, he tried his toes. Surprise. They wiggled too.

Oh. Something heavy, on his legs. Heavy, wet, and unpleasant. He finally opened his eyes, only just realizing he hadn’t done that yet. In the darkness, he could make out the outlines of things. Not really details, but shapes, beginnings and endings; depth, movement. The thing on his legs definitely wasn’t moving. Hazy memories started coming back now. Weir. On the steps. He’d gotten the first one no problem. The second one, that’d been a problem. The thing on his legs was the second.

The second. There had been three. Three. Another one, still alive, somewhere up above him. After the woman and the boy. The boy. Wren.

With no small amount of effort, Three rolled the Weir off him, found his blade buried through its middle. All was quiet up the stairs. Three didn’t like that at all. He forced himself to his feet, hissed at a searing in his side, between his ribs. He felt around, found something hard that hadn’t been there before. With gritted teeth he pulled at it, worked it free. Nail from the Weir. Punctured his vest. Must’ve broken off in the fall.

He left it with the Weir, and got his blade back, wiping it clean on the Weir’s ragged garment. His hands were sticky.