Steve McHugh - Born of Hatred

I followed the trail down the right hand corridor until it finished by the door to a meeting room. I tried to look through the glass into the room, but the blinds had been pulled down hiding whatever was inside.

I gripped the door handle and turned it slightly, pushing open the door slowly, in case a nasty surprise waited for me. When nothing jumped out to attack me, I opened the door fully and stepped inside the room, closing the door behind me with a soft click. The room itself contained a large meeting table, a dozen chairs and some book shelves. A large plasma screen TV sat on the wall at one end, but someone had knocked it and it hung from only one of its hinges.

The blood trail continued around to the far side of the table. I followed it only to discover Tommy lying on his side, hands tied behind his back. I rushed toward him and noticed his t-shirt was slick with blood and he had gashes on his arms. I wiped away the blood on his neck and found a weak pulse. I exhaled and realised that I hadn't taken a breath since I'd found him.

His hands were bound with a sorcerer's bracelet, probably the same one that had been put on him when Reid had attacked him in his home. I tore it from his wrist and flung it across the room, wanting to put as much distance between him and it as possible.

"Tommy," I whispered. "You hear me?"

Tommy made a sound that might have a yes, but quite frankly I was just happy he was able to talk at all. He looked like he'd had the shit kicked out of him, his face was swollen and puffy, and his jaw and nose were misshaped where they'd been broken. The burn marks on his face suggested it had been silver knuckles that had done the job.

"You won't have access to your wolf," I said. "Don't try to move."

"Ka… Kasey," his voice was hoarse and croaky; the pain it took for him to talk easy to hear.

"I'm going to find her," I told him. "I'm going to get you both out of here, but I need you to stay in here for now. Okay?"

I didn't get a response as Tommy had slipped into unconsciousness. The security system blocked him from changing, but it didn't take away everything his werewolf nature gave him. The re-emergence of his werewolf healing would hopefully mean he'd be able to escape from the building, under his own power.

"You just stay safe," I said. "I'm going to go find Kasey." I didn't know if he could hear me, but on the off chance he could, I wanted to calm him as much as possible.

I left the room as quietly as possible and quickly searched the remaining offices on that side of the floor, but found only a few ransacked rooms.

Once I was certain there was nothing to find there, I made my way to the opposite side of the floor and Olivia's office. The meeting room I reached first was empty, but I could hear the gentle sobs coming from the one directly next to Olivia's office well before I'd reached the door, which was ajar.

I pushed it open and made my way inside the room. The window's blinds were pulled shut and there was paper all over the floor, but other than the fact that is was slightly larger, it was identical to the one where I'd found Tommy.

I found Kasey huddled between two book cases; her knees pulled up to her chin and her eyes closed tight.

"Kasey," I whispered and for a second I wasn't sure if she'd heard me, but then she opened her eyes and almost flung herself at me.

"Whoa," I said as I caught her. "Are you okay?"

Kasey held me tightly. Her eyes were puffy from crying and she had a slight cut on her lip. It took all of my will power not to run directly into Olivia's office and attack Peter.

"Where's my dad? That man kept hitting him."

"He's going to be fine, but I need you to go to the room he's in and sit with him until your mum gets the security back on. Then you two need to get out of here, you may have to help him."

Kasey shook her head. " He'll hear me, he'll hurt me. He said he would if I did anything to annoy him."

"He won't do anything to you, I promise. But I do need you to go to your dad, it'll be safer there."

A realisation appeared to dawn on her. "Is my mum really here?"

"She's getting the security shut down, but she's going to be a little while. I'm going to make sure that the lich doesn't hurt anyone else. But I can't have you here. I don't want you to get hurt."

"Okay, I'll…" The next sound out of her mouth was a scream as I was picked up by the back of my neck and flung through the hallway window, crashing to the floor outside.

Covered in bits of broken glass, I felt the blood trickle down the back of my arm. I'd apparently caught myself on a shard. Hopefully it wasn't too deep, but I didn't have time to look as the lich picked me up and threw me back into the meeting room, using a second window as my entry point. I hit the meeting table, skidded over it and landed roughly on the floor.

I'd managed to get back to my knees when the lich's fist crashed into my jaw, knocking me back to the ground. I spat blood onto the carpet and tried to get back up again, but a kick to the ribs ended that dream. I rolled onto my side and tried to protect myself, but Peter was already walking away, picking up the sword and dagger that had come loose when I'd been thrown through the window.

"Did you really think you could kill me with these?" he asked, unsheathing the sword and throwing the scabbard through the broken window and into the corridor. He ran the sword's blade across his hand, drawing blood, which he licked from his palm with a smile on his face, and then he threw the sword out into the corridor. He showed me the palm, healed within moments of his licking it.

"Stupid little sorcerer."

Kasey began to cry, and Peter's smashed his hands onto the table, breaking it in half. Pieces of wood hit the dagger and skirted it across the floor to the far side of the room. "Will you shut the fuck up?"

Kasey tried to stifle her sobs, but they came out anyway.

"Do I need to hurt you and give you something to cry about?" he snapped, pushing one half of the table away and walking toward the upset girl. But before he could reach her, he suddenly doubled up in pain and dropped to his knees, using the remains of the table to steady himself.

I immediately grabbed Kasey and rolled us away from danger, stopping by the far wall.

"Bastards," Peter snapped, getting back to his feet and steadying himself against the wall. "They killed three of my ghouls," he shrieked.

"Good."

Peter launched himself at me, grabbing me by the throat, lifting me off the floor, slamming me into the nearest wall and holding me there. " You killed one of my ghouls. How did you do that?"

"Trade secret," I said, as his grip suddenly loosened and he screamed in pain again.

"Looks like you've lost another," I said and pushed his arm away. "With the one I killed, that's all of them."

"Now, now," Peter said with an evil smile. "That's only five, and I get to make six. You didn't think I'd leave my sixth ghoul unmade did you? I was just waiting for the right time to wake her up."

I wondered. The four police officers and Vicky had made up the five I'd known about. And they were all dead now.

"Vicky's slut of a girlfriend," he said. "How do you think we got into the building? She was just lying there on that doctor's slab until I woke her up. She's down there now, just in case anyone thought to disable the security to this place."

The realisation I'd been in the room with that young woman's body, talking about her murder, while the whole time she'd been a ticking bomb, was a horrific thought. Even worse was the thought that Doctor Grayson might have been down there with her when Peter finally woke her up.

"She'll be dead, too, soon enough," I told him.

Peter punched me in the solar-plexus, driving every ounce of air from my lungs and dumping me on the floor as I fought to breathe. He turned his attention back to Kasey, who scampered along the side of the room, toward the office door. I took advantage of his distraction to grab the dagger and drive it into his leg.