44. Chapter Forty-Four
Chapter Forty-Four
Halley
The barricade makes a worrying creaking sound as rivets pop. Another few Humans slide over the top and crumple at our boots.
The snipers on the cliffs overhead have transitioned to lobbing grenades down into the heaving mass below.
Over the cacophony of explosions, I finally hear what Knox is shouting.
"Fall back!"
Alpha soldiers peel away from the primary barricade in controlled waves, firing as they move, wiping the sticky mix of their own blood and the blood of the enemy from their eyes.
The Betas manning the heavy gun quickly dismantle the important elements to render it useless, but they have to abandon it. It's too heavy to carry during a swift extraction.
Viper tightens his grip on my arm and hauls me up the road, tucked securely against his heaving side.
We're moving to the next fallback position. Barricades are staggered up the climb so each new wall can catch the survivors as we retreat. It will force the enemy to work for every stage they capture up the road to the fortress.
This retreat feels like my fault.
I asked our soldiers to trust me. Knox asked them to trust me. And I failed them.
Now the first barricade is being abandoned, and more soldiers have to give ground and die buying time because I gave them hope and did nothing with it.
"Stay close, we're moving," Knox shouts over the din because our bond is no longer transmitting thoughts between us in the chaos.
Knox doesn’t need to explain the formation. He just starts moving, and the rest of us fall into line like we’ve done this a thousand times. After all the training we did, it feels like we have.
The barricade makes one final groan and buckles with a deafening boom. The Humans waste no time, and they come spilling forth.
"Three coming center," Shade says.
I lean left, spot them between Viper and Knox, and fire twice. One drops and Viper catches the second with a kick to the head before I can line him up. Knox takes the third with a fist to the throat without even turning fully toward him.
"Stay closer," Viper says, and his hand lands briefly at my back, steering me tighter into the pocket between him and Shade.
We keep backing up, fighting to stay alive and together.
"Right side," Shade calls.
I fire, and another body drops.
Viper catches a stray bullet in his side, his blood misting over my face, but he doesn't stop for a second. The next punch he lands caves in his target's face.
If I make it through this, and it's not looking likely, I'll have nightmares about that for the rest of my life.
We move together so cleanly it feels less like reacting and more like muscle memory.
None of it feels forced. Months of training and the bond between us have worn these movements into me so deeply they come without thought.
I know how to move in combat with these soldiers. They taught my body again and again. I didn't understand at the time why we needed to practice fighting side-by-side, but I get it now. We're a team, a squad, a Pack, and we move as one.
Finally, Viper pulls me behind the next steel barrier and shoves me into a low crouch.
I do my best to shake off the crushing weight of my failure and prop the barrel of my rifle on top of the barrier and start lining up shots.
I make myself focus only on shooting, because if I don't, I'll spiral, and the last thing anyone needs now, in the ultimate fight for our lives, is a panicking Omega.
Crack.
A head explodes.
Crack. Crack. Crack.
I'm transported back to my youth, shooting empty cans stacked on a log with my old, stolen rifle. I almost wish I could be back there — feeling the warmth of those innocent, lazy days with the sun sinking into my skin and the sweat pin-pricked on my brow.
"What do we do now?" I ask, squinting down my gun sights.
"We fight," Shade replies from my left. There is a nasty gash on his cheekbone, and it's healing sluggishly from his exhaustion. A twist of anxiety clenches in my belly because Shade's body can't take much more damage.
Viper plants himself on my right, his broad shoulders blocking any stray bullets coming toward Shade or me.
Knox stays close by as if he's afraid if he drifts away, his Pack won't be there when he comes back. He stands with one boot braced against the barricade, shouting into his radio. "Second rank up. Tighten the gap. Keep them off the steel."
An Alpha crashes into the barricade beside me, half his shoulder torn open and healing gradually. Knox grabs the back of his vest, yanks him into place, and points downhill. "You won't bleed out from that, so shoot."
The Alpha bares his teeth and obeys, staying behind the barricade while the thick bleeding slows, not once pausing to catch his breath under the watchful eyes of his Prime Alpha.
An arm hooks over the steel in front of me. Viper fires once, and the hand disappears in a spray of blood.
I take another three shots, one slicing through an elbow, making my target drop with a scream.
"Pretty girl," Viper says without looking away from the road, "I taught you better than that."
"What?"
"Higher. I want you making headshots only."
I raise my muzzle higher. Viper taught me to shoot like an executioner, not like the amateur in a summer field I once was. The next shot I take is clean and exact, and makes my big Alpha nod in approval.
Shade calls to me, too busy grappling with his current victim and stabbing them in the face to take the shot himself. "Blue jacket. Left side."
I quickly find the target Shade called and line him up in my sights. He's aiming up at the cliffs where the Beta soldiers are still throwing what must be the last of our grenades into the incoming army.
I fire, and the man's body jerks backward into the crowd.
"That's my girl," Shade says, already shooting past me to take out the man who filled the space my target just left.
The bodies on the other side of this barricade are already starting to stack up, making it easier for more and more Humans to climb over the wall.
Viper slams the butt of his rifle into the man’s face, shoves him backward, and shoots the next two before they can climb over him.
Blood runs down Viper’s arm from a tear in his sleeve. He doesn’t seem to notice.
I do.
"You’re hit, take a moment to rest," I implore, dragging him beside me so he's protected from the stray bullets still flying.
"Every battle-worthy Alpha can fight with a gunshot or two," he grunts. "I’m fine."
I feel so helpless. My mates are being shot and stabbed, and there is nothing I can do.
Shade takes up Viper's post using his pistol instead of his rifle to give him better maneuverability, saying in between shots, "Two? More like two dozen."
Viper gives him a flat look. "What am I supposed to do, cry about it?"
Shade scrunches his nose. "Not particularly. You're an ugly crier."
Despite everything, a breath of something almost like a laugh catches in my chest.
The barricade starts making a familiar groaning sound as it buckles under the weight of the piled dead and surging waves of Humans.
Knox turns just enough to find me over his shoulder. His face is streaked with blood and dust, his eyes bright with command and, for perhaps the first time, genuine fear.
"We have to retreat again," he says almost to himself, as if he's trying to work through his strategy out loud.
It's too soon to retreat to the next barricade. We need to hold them off for as long as possible, but their numbers are just too great.
Knox scrubs at the scar on his nose, squares his jaw, and issues the retreat order into his radio.
He then starts bellowing again, "Retreat!"
Noticing that our forces are retreating once more, a surge of Humans pushes forward, as if emboldened and hungry for the ground we're forfeiting.
They start spilling over the top of the wall faster, and the fight quickly turns primal.
One Alpha, blood still slick down the side of his face from a half-healed head wound, catches a Human by the front of his vest, slices his neck open, and flings him backward with enough force to bowl through the men behind him.
Another, his glowing green eyes reminding me of Viper, takes three rounds to the stomach, folds for half a breath, then surges forward and buries his knife in a face.
He keeps going while blood runs down his legs and the torn flesh in his abdomen drags itself closed into a wet, ugly puckered pink scar.
They're fighting like animals with their backs to a cliff.
This is what the last gasps of the Demi-human race look like.
I wonder if the Humans seeing Alphas behave so primal justifies their crusade. If they hate us so much because the only time they encounter Demi-humans is when an Alpha is tearing their friend in two with a vicious smile.
"Don’t slow down," Shade shouts from my left, his voice rough from smoke and strain as he slams what looks like his last magazine into his pistol.
I backpedal uphill, boots slipping on a loose rock while the Humans pour after us.
Behind them, the second barricade gives with a wrenching boom.
Our soldiers pick up the pace, firing as they retreat, but the enemy is coming harder now that the physical barrier is gone. The road clogs, and every step uphill feels like we're in the middle of a closing trap.
They're going to catch us before we can get behind the next barricade.
"Fuck!" Shade curses beside me.
He stops running and almost drops his pistol as he clamps one hand over his thigh. Blood pours through his fingers and the torn fabric high on his leg, running straight into his boot.
"Shade!" I shout.
"I’m fine," he says, waving me off with his pistol hand. "Keep going, Halley."
He tries to put weight on the injured leg, and his knee folds.
Knox catches him before he hits the ground, hauling Shade’s arm over his shoulder and locking one hand around the back of his vest. Shade’s face has gone pale beneath the blood and dirt, but he still lifts his pistol with a shaking hand.
The wound should be closing any second now. The bond should be helping him knit back together the way it always has since our Pack connection began to form, but his body is exhausted, and the torn flesh only pumps out more crimson.
The bullet has hit a vital vein, and he’s bleeding faster than he’s healing.
If we don’t get him off this road, he’s going to die here.
"Leave me," Shade grits out. "I'm slowing you down."
Knox doesn’t even look at him or acknowledge his plea.
Viper appears between them and the enemy, firing into the horde without stopping. "No one is leaving anyone, idiot. Shut up and move."
I fire past Viper’s shoulder as Knox drags Shade uphill, but we’re moving too slowly now, and the rest of our forces are already pulling ahead.
Soldiers are diving for cover behind the barricade in ragged waves.
We’re falling behind.
Shade leaves bloody footprints as Knox drags him along. His head dips, and his pistol lowers another inch.
"Stop," I shout.
Knox keeps moving. "We can’t."
"He’ll bleed out before we reach cover."
That gets through to him.
Knox drops to one knee and lowers Shade onto the road without gentleness because there isn’t time for it. Viper places himself between the Pack and the Humans, firing into the bodies spilling after us.
I hit the ground beside Shade and wrench at my sleeve. The fabric tears under my fist, and I quickly wrap it high around his thigh, above the wound. Blood coats my fingers before I get the first knot tied.
"Halley," Shade pants, trying to push himself up. "Get out of here, go."
"Not a chance. Stay down."
I knot the torn sleeve again, jam my combat knife under the fabric, and twist until it is taut. Shade’s scream rips through the gunfire. His whole body locks, and his face drains until it is sheet-white.
"I’m sorry," I breathe, but I keep turning the knife until the fabric bites deep and the blood flow slows.
Shade sucks in air through clenched teeth. His hand closes around my wrist, weak but deliberate.
"Move," he says. "Now."
Knox is already reaching for him. He hauls Shade up and throws him over his shoulder, one arm locking across the backs of Shade’s legs to keep him there. Shade groans, his pistol hanging loose in his hand, but he doesn’t tell Knox to put him down again.
Viper fires twice, then pivots toward me. "Run."
I run.
The next barricade waits up the road, and it's so close I can see the faces of our soldiers as they give us covering fire. Knox powers ahead with Shade over his shoulder. Viper stays between me and the enemy, forcing me onward with his body while I fire past him whenever I get a clear line.
Then a thin whistle cuts through the gunfire.
Knox’s head snaps up.
"Viper!" he roars. "Shield her!"
Viper hits me from the side so hard my boots leave the ground. One arm locks around my ribs, the other cradles the back of my head as he turns and curls over me.
There isn't time to ask why.
The world detonates.