Prologue Hella
Hella
“Get it out!” Beast gestures for the pliers, and I dump the backpack on the ground, fishing out the set.
Three pliers stolen, a Zippo, someone's half packet of cigarettes, and a stack of cash.
Another bullet tears through the iron gate.
“Hurry up!” I spin around, lifting my hand with the gun and scanning the area. We have four minutes left.
Four minutes.
I'm not feeling optimistic.
“Hella!” Beast's voice snaps me back, and I dive into the hole he's torn open before we're both off again, our feet pounding dirt and dodging falling trees.
More bullets scream past, missing the shoulder they grazed earlier. Never thought I'd say it but thank fuck for the Schyronide in my system numbing most of the pain.
Beast stumbles beside me, his breathing ragged.
“Left!” I grab Beast's arm, yanking him behind a thick trunk as gunfire peppers the spot we just left. Bark explodes next to my head.
Jesus fuck. I guess this is what you get for escaping a fucked up system that doesn't want you to leave.
We sprint through underbrush, branches whipping our faces. Our only shot of losing these fuckers is finding the highway that runs through here, but all this running has my lungs burning and my muscles on fire.
Flipside is we die, so I can cry about the pain later.
“There!” Beast points to where trees thin out ahead, moonlight glinting off metal guardrails.
We burst through the treeline onto asphalt and spot an old Chevy abandoned on the shoulder.
My heart pounds harder—finally some fucking luck.
“Cover me!” I sprint toward the car, Beast close behind. More shots crack through the night. One hits the pavement near my feet, sending up sparks.
We reach the car, and Beast goes for the driver's door. Hell the fuck no. I shove him aside.
He glares at me. “The fuck you doing?”
“You can't hot-wire shit.” I slam my elbow into the window, shattering the glass. Locks pop up, and I slip in, ripping open the steering column.
Beast slides into the passenger seat as I strip wires with my teeth. “Hurry up, they're coming!”
“Shut up and let me focus.” My hands shake as I touch the right wires together, again and again until the engine coughs once, twice, then roars to life.
Headlights sweep across us as a Vanguard vehicle screams around the bend.
“Go go go!” Beast yells.
I slam it into drive and stomp the gas. Tires shriek against the pavement as we fishtail onto the highway.
We’re out.
No.
We’re actually out.
Adrenaline spreads through my veins. Never thought I'd ever see the ass end of that place.
“Where we going?” I finally break the silence between us, looking between the road and Beast. This was going to be different for him, since he'd never seen the world outside Vanguard.
He swallows, reaching into his back pocket and pulling out a photo. “You know where Tāwaha is?”
I snatch the photo from his fingers. “You mean as in the North Island?”
He nods once, eyes on the road, as if he looks at me too long, the universe will revoke this shit. “That’s where he is.”
Why the fuck did he say he like that…
I scan the photo. It’s creased and old, with faded ink at the corners. A guy with Beast’s jaw stands in front of a line of bikes outside farmhouse with WOODSMEN MOTORCYCLE CLUB carved across the front.
There's an address scribbled into the corner.
Tāwaha, Aotearoa.
“You sure this is real?” I ask, unsure.
“No.” He drags his palm over his mouth. “But it's not Vanguard. That’s enough.”
Fair.
We drive.
Hours blur into gray road and yellow lines and the occasional suicidal rabbit sprinting across our path. The South Island scenery stretches out long and empty, cold air leaking through the broken window and numbing my cut-up forearm.
Beast dozes in five-minute hits, head landing on the window before jolting awake like he’s expecting a siren or an alarm or someone screaming his number.
Same.
Every parked car we pass could be Vanguard.
Every truck climbing up behind us sits in my rearview a little too long.
My brain runs profiles without permission. Distance. Speed. Headlight spread.
“Don’t go through major cities until we hit the North,” Beast mutters, eyes half-closed but still fucking monitoring me. “We stay on the back roads.”
“Yeah, okay, boss,” I say, but listen.
We snake past towns instead of into them. Stick to lonely petrol stations where the attendants don’t look twice at bloody kids and dead eyes.
By the time we hit Picton, my spine’s one long knot and the sky’s sliding from black into washed-out blue. Even the port looks half-asleep, lights smeared across the water, and the air tastes like salt and rust, cold enough to bite.
“Ferry,” Beast says, pointing at the hulking shape docked ahead like I can’t fucking see it.
I snort. “You sure that’s not Vanguard’s new toy?”
He smirks, first real one since we crawled through that hole. “If it is, they got lazy with branding.”
We crawl into the queue of cars. Normal people. Normal fucking lives. A family in a minivan in front of us, kids pressing their faces to the back window, staring at us like we’re zoo animals. They’re not wrong.
“Don’t stare back,” I mutter.
“I’m not.” He waves at the kid anyway. Little shit lights up like it’s Christmas.
Tickets are a problem until they’re not. Beast palms the Vanguard cash roll he lifted on the way out, and the woman at the booth barely looks up as she takes our money and prints passes. Just another car. Just another pair of lost boys turned men.
We drive into the belly of the ferry and follow directions, parking between a ute with a dog in the back and some suit’s shiny company car.
"You ready to see civilians?" I tease, knowing he's probably freaking out right now.
"Fuck you." he shoves open his door and I follow.
We climb out and head upstairs, following the pack of passengers. Stale coffee and cafeteria grease smells a lot like freedom.
People shiver into jackets, clutch takeaway cups, complain about the early sailing and the cold and whatever tiny shit feels like a crisis when you’ve never had your blood hosed off concrete.
We push past them and step out onto the viewing deck.
Wind slams into us. Real, violent. Marlborough Sounds stretch out ahead, green hills rising straight out of the water, mist clinging to their edges. The Strait is a little temperamental, like it can’t decide if it wants to be beautiful or dangerous.
Beast walks up to the railing and plants his hands on it, knuckles pale.
For a second, with the wind flattening his shirt against muscle and his hair whipping around his face, he looks…
young. His age. Twenty-one. Not Vanguard’s Beast. Just a guy seeing something for the first time that isn’t a target or a training schedule.
I step beside him, shoulders brushing. He doesn’t move away.
“It’s fucking big,” he says.
I huff. “That’s what she said.”
He laughs, loud and raw, and a couple of tourists glance over like we’ve ruined their nice little sunrise moment. Good. I want to piss all over their peace.
Pulling away from the dock, the ferry grunts, and groans as we slide out into the Sounds. It doesn’t take long for the hills to close in and the water to turn glossy. It’s quiet except for the hum of the engines and the wind ripping every useless thought out of my head.
Beast leans forward, eyes tracking the water.
“One day,” he says, voice lower, rougher. “I’m gonna get married right here.”
I snort, because what the actual fuck. “Where? On this floating tin can?”
He shakes his head. “Middle of the Cook Strait. Between islands. Nowhere and everywhere. No one can get to us out here.”
Marriage. Him dropping that word like it’s not loaded. Like we’re not statistically more likely to die drunk and alone in some ditch.
“You planning on shackling some poor bitch to you on the high seas?” I ask.
He smirks sideways at me, wind lifting the corner of his mouth. “Yeah.”
“She better like pretty boys with ugly monsters,” I say, bumping his shoulder with mine. “Or she’s gonna have a bad time.”
His jaw ticks, like I’ve just poked something that lives under his skin. He doesn’t look away from the water when he says, “What if she’s a monster too?”
My chest pulls tight. Old Vanguard words circle like vultures. Subject will engage in intimate contact only with approved targets.
“Then your odds go up,” I say. “Monsters are hard to kill.”
He hums low, like he’s agreeing with more than I said.
We fall quiet again as the Sounds open onto open water. With each sway, it gets rougher. Once we hit the Strait, the ferry's riding up and down over swells that make a kid behind us cry.
Spray hits my face, cold and clean. Headlands fall away until it’s just us and water and sky.
Middle of nowhere.
Middle of everything, if you’re Beast.
“Think they’ll chase us this far?” he asks after a while, like he’s just tossing it out there, but his fingers are white on the rail.
“Vanguard?” I watch the horizon, then the doors, then the security cameras tucked under the overhang. “If they do, they’ll be waiting on land. Easier to contain. Less witnesses.”
He nods slowly. “You planning contingencies in case they show?”
“Always.” I tap my temple. “It’s a fucking circus up here.”
His mouth kicks up again. “Good. I’d hate to be the only one losing my mind.”
Three hours between the south and the north. Three hours of pretending we’re just two young guys skipping town. Three hours of counting every unfamiliar face, mapping exits, corners, blind spots.
I memorize the way the stairwells twist, how long it takes to get from the deck to the car bay. How many seconds it would take me to cut the angle to the nearest guard and steal his swipe card.
Old habits aren’t habits. They’re wiring.
When the call comes over the intercom telling everyone to head back to their vehicles, my muscles clench so hard it hurts.