Chapter 1 #2
“Because I can’t give you a higher dose.
” A yawn caught Trille, but his hands didn’t pause—repacking the crash kit, checking the supply of alcohol wipes, rechecking other stock, squirting sanitizer into the hollow of one callused palm and scrubbing hard.
“Fucking roulette, even if you do seem to burn it off like nothing.”
“Yeah.” Nobody talked about the inevitable terminus of those chemical games. Then again, she did her squad’s physical fighters the courtesy of pretending they were immortal as well. Both sides of their agreement were achingly polite. “I’m a medical miracle.”
“Fifty percent accurate, sweetheart, and it ain’t the medical part.
” The medic gave his trademark easy, lopsided grin, though his hazel eyes were bloodshot even if he’d been napping during Bern’s shift.
Running scenarios was almost as stressful for those watching over her vacated, vulnerable body as for Cass herself.
She was, after all, chasing dreams, and because of her oddities there was no way of telling precisely when those would strike. Her brainwaves during sleep weren’t at all normal; Trille kept muttering about getting their hands on a real goddamn EEG.
“That was a lovely compliment.” Cass managed a weary smile, and took a few more moderate swallows of distilled water.
It was luxurious to sit still, to be fully awake, to know she was physically, consciously safe.
“Now you just have to try that in a bar, instead of telling some random woman about the last cow birth you attended.”
“I’ll keep practicing.” He glanced over his shoulder as Bern slammed the RV’s side door open, climbing in with hard stomping steps.
“What the fuck was that?” Bernadotte demanded. “Was it the big one?”
“Nope.” They had only been at this campground three days, not enough time for that creature to track her down again—and thankfully, not a single member of the squad had ever accused her of imagining it.
“Just another unmitigated failure. This time I went in to try and save you. Real action-movie shit, I could hear the music.”
And she had. Big thumping bass, swelling guitar, the entire enchilada. That was the trouble with dreams; lines blurred, expectation became event, and her very presence in a scenario could warp it into a garden-variety nightmare.
Or worse.
Bern immediately swung into goddammit Cass mode. “You were supposed to run the one with Steve getting behind the—”
“I did. Same thing as happened every other time, he gets his innards blown out and the spiders start… start…” Cass stopped, contemplated the almost-empty plastic bottle. At least her hands weren’t shaking. Much. “So I backed up the scene and put myself in.”
Trille stiffened, his chin rising. “Both of which you’re not supposed to do.” He said it quickly so Bern didn’t have the chance to start, since that would inevitably let their de facto leader gain momentum for a good old-fashioned scolding.
“Figured it was worth the risk. But I ended up disemboweled.” Her belly was still tender, and if she lifted the T-shirt she’d see angry red marks, her body attempting to make the vision real. “Apparently if I go with you it triggers one of those noseless blue-eyed bastards showing up.”
And those were bad news, whether with four arms or two.
They—and often their weird, tentacle-infested canines—arrived in most scenarios Cass inserted herself into, no matter the squad’s other target.
Unholy fast, unbelievably strong, and utterly bent on one thing—killing her—they nevertheless would pause to take out the rest of her friends in record time.
Like a hot knife through butter, even with all the hardware Bern and Grik could lift from military bases or acquire through just as illegal though far less regimented channels.
“Fuck.” Bern drew the word out, half-turning to stare at the curtained window over the kitchenette’s mini-sink as if it showed a pleasant vista instead of a campground at night.
His brawny shoulders sagged for a moment, the desert-taupe Army surplus tank top clinging to a chest broader than Trille’s but not nearly so furry.
“We can’t take this one, Cass. I’m sorry. ”
“It’s going to kill people, Bern.” She pulled her bare knees up and hugged them; she’d tried sleeping in pajamas or boxers, but a T-shirt and panties won every time.
“Us included,” he pointed out.
“I can find a way.” She was failing at her job, Cass knew. The old anxiety nipped at her—either that, or the upper injected to fight off the sedative. The sensation was too close to tell. “I know I can. Please, Bern.”
“No. You’ve been working it for a solid month, and don’t you dare think I’ve missed how you can’t get to sleep without Trille slipping you something even on non-scenario nights.
” He didn’t bother looking at her, probably because he could sense she was about to deploy ethical logic as well as puppy-eyes.
“We’ll hit a bank in the next town big enough and head back south. ”
“South’s too hot,” she pointed out. There were other groups working in California, Arizona, and Nevada, though none with their closure rate; maybe the others’ lack of success kept her group’s small-fry asses from being noticed by whatever organization the bogeys clearly possessed.
“And we’d have to pass Shasta again. We came up here for reasons, Frank. ” Good ones.
Bern’s glower was becoming truly ferocious. “We could go east. Way east.”
“Where someone’s busy vanishing people like me rather than just messily murdering them.
” She was outright scowling as well, Cass realized.
The other side of the Continental Divide wasn’t anywhere she wanted to be, even if there were far less bogeys in those cities and the bodies of people with strange talents never showed up once their living selves dropped off-radar.
Which could, as she inevitably pointed out, just mean they were consumed—some of the bogeys had a distinct taste for human flesh. “Sure, that’s a great idea. Tip-top.”
“Nobody’s gonna vanish or murder you.” A muscle in Bern’s cheek flickered twice. He wasn’t quite into tooth-grinding territory yet, but it was awful close. “Not while we’re around.”
“I can find a good scenario.” She had to at least try.
Who else would deal with the bogeys infesting Salem?
The rest of the waking world didn’t want to know, even if there were other hunters around—six teams in southern California alone, though personnel turnover was sky-high due to constant casualties.
Cali was too hot for Bern’s crew at the moment, due to multiple warrants and the big kahuna seeming to zero in on her within days instead of weeks.
Moving that much was a hassle. “Just give me some time.”
“We’re down to beans and bones in the budget, Cass.
” It was Bern’s just the facts tone, which she hated even more than the maybe you’re crazy he used to slip into before he learned better.
At least there hadn’t been an outcropping of that in a while.
“You’re offline until we find a good bank, then you’re strictly recon. That’s final.”
“God damn it.” A slight sound was the plastic bottle crumpling in her grip; the remaining liquid sloshed. “I don’t want to rob fucking banks, I want to keep those things from killing more—”
“You think we don’t?” Bern finally turned to glare at her, drawing himself up to full parade-ground height despite the low ceiling.
“Any one of us? Just because we’re not fuckin’ psychic, you think we’re here for shits and giggles?
You wanna tell Rico that, or Seymour? You wanna sit there and tell Trey he’s just here to fuck around? ”
“Don’t drag me into this,” Trille moved as if he wanted to leave, but Bern was in the way. “Calm down, both of you.” Normally it was Cass’s job to defuse any shouting matches; things were going pear-shaped in a hurry if he was stepping in.
“I didn’t mean it that way, and you know it.” Cass’s chin set defiantly. She itched all over now, and that was definitely the upper fighting off the sedative. “Go fuck yourself, Frank.”
“Yeah, well, if I could it’d be a damn sight better than hanging around with these assholes.
” Maybe Bern realized he shouldn’t push her further, because he chose de-escalation instead of battering at her with sheer volume.
Which showed real personal growth. “We’ll have other jobs, kiddo.
There’s no goddamn shortage, so keep your bra on. Trille, is she clear?”
“Clear as I can make her,” the medic mumbled, gratefully. “We’ve got some protein shakes left, get out of the way so I can bring her one.”
Bern hesitated, watching Cass. She sighed, letting go of her knees to rub at goose-pimpled arms, but she didn’t look away.
“After the bank job,” he said, finally. “Take a week off with some good food, at least one tequila party, then you can run the scenario again. Maybe it just needs time. Like that bloodsucker thing in Salinas.”
Cass nodded, though every day they let a bogey infestation keep operating meant it had more chances to hurt and kill civilians.
It was unfair to think Bern and the others didn’t feel just as bad as she did.
In fact, they probably felt more helpless, since without her providing the way through a scenario the casualty rate hovered at about eighty percent.
Hunting actual, literal monsters was a dangerous, dirty, losing battle. She was a secret weapon, sure—but one of inconsistent utility.
“All right.” Cass dropped her gaze to their leader’s fatigue-clad shins. His boots were still tightly laced, and his worry was palpable even without her stupid, useless sensitivity to other people’s emotional states. “I’m staying up. Go get some shut-eye.”
Maybe he wanted to say more. But in the end he left, Trille badgered her into drinking a chalky-tasting protein shake, and all Cass had to do was get through the hours until dawn.
It had already been a long goddamn night.