Chapter 12 #4
I shrank further into the cutout once at least a dozen other men sprinted out of that room. They didn’t look back at me, and just followed the other man down into the shadows of the tunnel. I waited a moment before racing out in the opposite direction.
I made it all the way to an intersection before I ran into anyone else. I froze as soon as I realized there were people ahead, but at that point it was already too late. Their heads jerked toward mine. I could only imagine the vision that I gave off, a bloody, dirty mess of a woman.
I must have looked terrifying because they paused too. There were two of them.
They were both large men, although they were rather lanky.
Talyn could probably take both with his eyes closed, but I wasn’t him.
I knew that, but I wasn’t a weakling either.
I had been a soldier in my own human resistance group.
I knew how to shoot a gun, how to wield a knife, and how to use my smaller size to my advantage.
I dug my toes into the ground, readying myself for battle.
The taller of the two opened his eyes in recognition and before he could yell out to alert anyone else, I was already sprinting toward him.
It soon became clear that he hadn’t been in any sort of fight before because when he tried to step out of the way and swing a fist, he missed completely.
I grasped his arm and used my momentum to push him aside. I swung my knife up, catching him across the neck in a practiced maneuver that had won me many sparring battles in the past. He didn’t stand a chance.
By the time I was able to rush toward the shorter guy, he’d already had time to yell to whoever was nearby. I screamed like a banshee, but he didn’t fall back.
He swept his arm out and grabbed mine, but I knew how to swing out of that.
I twirled into him and ducked, using my speed to thrust most of my weight against his thumb and break his hold on me.
He cried out and I used the opportunity to slam my palm into his nose with all the force that I could muster.
I felt it break beneath my hand. He shrieked and I whirled back around, catching him in a headlock with my blade snug against his throat.
He froze and the metallic scent of his blood surrounded us.
Off in the distance, the men who had gone off to investigate Terrance’s body ran toward us. I gripped my hostage more tightly and he gasped as I pressed the knife hard enough against his skin to just pierce his flesh.
It wouldn’t kill him, but it wouldn’t tickle either.
I waited with bated breath. My prisoner did too. By the time the large group of men skidded to a halt in front of me, I’d summoned every bit of courage that still reigned within me.
I could get through this. I just had to be smart.
The leader who had spoken to me earlier stepped forward. He looked nervous and I wondered who the man I held captive was to him.
“Raiza, let’s talk about this,” he offered. I cocked my head toward him, suspicious of his intentions.
“You will tell me your name,” I demanded, and his gaze slid from my knife back to me. I angled it so that he could see that I wasn’t afraid to hurt the man beneath my blade.
“My name is Ryan,” he said quickly. By the way his voice trembled, this man was important to him.
“Who is this?” I pushed, dipping my chin toward my prisoner.
“My brother Seth,” he replied weakly.
“Ahhh, I see,” I responded. “Is it just you down here? Or are there more?”
“There’s a much bigger group that lies a bit to the south,” he replied.
“What were your intentions with me, other than all the disgusting things you were discussing over your cards and whatever it is that you were drinking?” I pushed.
Seth struggled in my arms, and I dug the knife in a bit deeper. He stilled immediately once he realized how dangerously close I was to slicing through his throat.
“Collateral!” Ryan called out. “We only planned to use you as security to ensure the aliens didn’t wipe us out.”
“That was unwise of you,” someone called out behind me.
I knew that voice and it made my heart pound in my chest.
“Should have fucking killed you when we had the chance,” Seth spat at me. He gave one last furious effort to break free and I knew it was time to end it.
I wrenched the knife across his throat without mercy. I wasn’t gentle either.
More blood bathed over me as someone approached me from behind. I let Seth’s body fall to the ground as two big hands grasped my shoulders.
“I should rip them limb from limb,” he growled.
“Talyn,” I breathed. “It’s not my blood.”
“Doesn’t matter,” he muttered, “but it does make me proud to call you mine, human.”
I lifted my head in triumph.
Ryan leered at me with a victory of his own and I took a step back. Quickly, I observed everything around him. His men had started to take several steps back. Ryan had a single hand hidden behind him and I swallowed hard.
A clicking sound echoed in the tunnel.
I knew what that was.
A grenade.
“We need to run,” I whispered hoarsely, but Talyn was already moving. His arms wrapped around my waist as he hurtled backwards. He was faster than any man, yet I didn’t know if he would be fast enough to escape the explosion that was coming.
He flew down the tunnel and I counted the seconds. I knew we wouldn’t have many. I prayed that it would be an older one, that it would take longer to detonate, but when I looked back to see Ryan’s vengeful gaze, I knew it wouldn’t be enough.
The air withdrew from the tunnel with vicious force and a ferocious fiery heat followed. It felt like the breath was sucked right out of my lungs. I stopped breathing as scalding hot air gusted around me and Talyn dove straight toward the ground, using his massive body to cover mine.
The grimace of pain that splintered his face made me want to scream. I couldn’t see around him, but the terrible flames billowed out and I shrank away from the blistering heat. He didn’t make any noise. I don’t know how he kept quiet, but the scent of burning flesh was strong.
Something else bounced near us and a second explosion followed.
I cried out beneath Talyn, wanting to take his pain, and knowing that I wouldn’t survive it. I pressed into his chest, curling my body into as small of a ball as possible.
His grip around me weakened and I screamed with fear for him. The blast compounded on itself. How many bombs did these men have? How had they survived all this time?
I didn’t want to die, but more than anything, I didn’t want Talyn to die either.
The mind goes into a strange, panicked place when death seems inevitable. I thought I’d think of all the happy moments in my life, but every waking moment was spent with Talyn on my mind.
The look in his eyes when I’d aimed my gun at him. The challenge and the open dare to take that shot.
The soft touch of his fingers on my skin. The way his arms wrapped around me when I was happy or sad.
He’d put himself in danger to rescue me even when I’d been the one to run from him.
My hesitation to love him evaporated away into a pile of burning ash.
His body started shaking over mine and I wailed in hopes that he would survive this.
The air was thin, and I struggled to breathe, coughing on smoke and dust so thick that it left a layer on my tongue and in my throat and down in the pit of my lungs.
I whimpered quietly, my ears ringing so loud that I squeezed my eyes shut in a halfhearted attempt to make it better.
“Talyn?” I whispered hoarsely. I couldn’t look up to see his face. I didn’t know if he was okay.
“Raiza,” he replied. The agony in his voice shook me to the core. “Are you hurt?”
I closed my eyes. I couldn’t handle the fact that he was in such pain, and all he was concerned about was if I was alright.
“I’m okay,” I murmured quickly, and I felt his chest collapse in a sigh of relief.
His breathing was deep and ragged. It rattled me to the core. I slowly unfurled myself, wanting to see his face and terrified to at the same time. I swallowed hard, stoking my courage as much as I could and lifting my chin.
“No. Don’t look yet. Close your eyes, Raiza,” he demanded fiercely, and I trembled beneath him. I was so worried that I attempted to anyway, but he growled in warning, which was more than enough to give me pause. “The danger has yet to pass. My flesh will heal. Yours may not.”
I shivered hard as the residual fires crackled around us. Some of them fizzled out and others did not. The scent of my own singed hair was strong, and I just focused on filling my lungs as I pressed my forehead against his chest.
Behind us, I could hear the men scurrying about in the tunnel.
A visceral hatred pumped through my veins.
I loathed them for hurting Talyn. I wished unspeakable things on them.
I wanted to tear them limb from limb myself even though I knew I didn’t have the strength for it.
When the men started talking off in the distance, I jerked in unbearable fury.
“Don’t,” Talyn warned. “Lie still.”
I didn’t want to obey him, but the pain and command in his voice gave me pause. I didn’t want to cause him any additional worry, so I did my best to lie still even though it was the most difficult thing I’d ever had to do in my life.
“Do you think he’s dead? No man would be able to survive anything like that,” Ryan muttered.
One of his men said something in return, but my ears started roaring so loud that I couldn’t make it out. Talyn tensed above me, and I worried that he was in more pain, but I stayed still because he’d asked me to.
He deserved my obedience no matter what happened next.
Without warning, Talyn lurched up. His audible gasp of pain tore at my heart, but when his arms wrapped around my waist, there was no time for me to do anything at all to comfort him.
He stood up so swiftly that it made my head spin.
He rushed to the side and threw me to the right into a breach in the wall.
I cried out as I flew backwards. My arms clutched in close to my chest at first, but then I reached to grasp any sort of handholds. I found none. I yelped with fear and at that same moment, a concussive explosion blew Talyn back too.
I watched with horror at the carnage that followed.
The blast was so strong that even Talyn’s superior flesh couldn’t withstand its power.
I screamed, but the detonation drowned me out.
I slammed against a wall behind me well out of the range of the bomb.
My heart stopped and Talyn yelled out in anger and pain somewhere where I could no longer see him.
Time stopped as an even bigger blast came next. I could hardly hear anything, but I was certain that Talyn’s shouting had been abruptly cut off.
A bloom of panic welled inside me. I tried to move, but a flare of pain of my own struck through me with vicious cruelty. The blast burned on outside and my head pulsed. I reached back, realizing I’d probably banged my head against the wall when I’d hit it.
My eyes swam with tears and my vision grew hazy. My tongue felt like a ball of cotton, and I tasted the terrible metallic tang of blood.
A pitiful croak of pain emerged from my lips and a feeling of weightlessness came over me.
The world went black.