Tears drip from the eyes of the broken boy, and I slide him in behind a bunker as my eyes scour the landscape. I can see Angelica’s body limply lying on the ground, but Ty is nowhere to be found. The guns he called in are big enough to snuff out our smaller arsenal. We’re supposed to have the better weapons.
Hale fires rapidly into the crowd, and I start firing as well until I see Angelica stirring. She stands to her feet, and the bullets rattle off her to shatter into pieces. Suddenly trucks, hummers, cars, boulders, and men lift into the air before shredding into.
Oh fuck.
“Grayson! Go now! She’ll kill everyone if you don’t stop her,” I scream, and he dives over the bunker to start charging toward her.
The dust is too thick to see through when her tantrum gets worse, and I can’t feel anything different. I’m almost terrified Grayson isn’t going to be able to bring her down from her first savage, and then I see Hale firing into a new group of attackers just before the suspended objects in the air slam to the ground.
Oh thank goodness. He’s got her.
I take off running toward the new attackers while firing into the masses, and suddenly there are new guns firing electrical bursts toward us. I feel the slice before I see the burst of electrical energy, and I scream out as one lashes through the missing invincibility on my body. I feel the burning slithers as it zaps through me, and then I feel a cool body pressing against mine as it shields me from the attack.
“I’ve got her. Get them,” Brazen screams to Hale as he absorbs the shocks that don’t affect his body.
“I can’t do much with out some fucking meds,” Hale blares as he dives through the massacre to pull Brazen off me.
“I can still fight, just take out those damn electric guns,” I growl.
Hale fires into the cannons hoisted over the shoulders as we weave and dodge their attacks. They’ve got fucking tanks rolling in, and we’re in hummers. What the fuck!
“There’s too damn many. We have to fall back,” Brazen screams out as he fires rapidly into a pin-size area of one of the tanks.
The machine goes awry as if he managed to shoot the man on the inside, and Hale scoops me up to save me from the electrical currents surging toward me. The burning strikes me against my side, and it draws blood this time as it rips through me.
“Damn it. They fucking know too much about her,” Brazen growls as he fires more.
Hale shields me from the new hailing shards of energy, and then there’s more coming before we can even free ourselves from the next ambush. Before we know it, we’re surrounded.
“Fuck,” Hale screeches.
“I’ll hold them back. Just get everyone out of here. We can fight them better from Seminole,” I say demandingly.
“Araya, you can’t. If you start trying to mess with this many sober, you’ll fucking blow everyone to hell,” Hale gripes. “I’ll do it. Just bring me down.”
“Hale, there’s no olophine,” I rebut.
His eyes soften as we kneel behind one of the armored vehicles for cover, and his lips graze mine before he pulls up to kiss my forehead.
“All I need is you. Just don’t let me hurt anyone I don’t want to hurt.”
He takes off before I can argue further, and Brazen tugs at my hand as Hale steps out to cast his first explosion. Screams erupt behind us as we start pushing everyone back, and I throw my hands up to sling the front line of our men out of the path of a missile diving in for murder.
Brazen dives through a hummer and emerges to throw me a mask while pulling one on for himself. I can see Angelica and following Grayson away from the fight, and I sigh out in relief to know her savage is hypnotized by his presence. I pray he gets her far enough away, and then I feel a bullet graze my side to remind me I used my second gift to render my invincibility unusable now.
“Damn it, Araya,” Brazen scolds as he inspects my wound. “You shouldn’t have used your gift. You didn’t put on a fucking vest.”
“Worry about everyone else. I have to help Hale,” I blare, and then my eyes fall to a body lying too still on the ground.
Clay!
I slide on the ground and roll until I reach him in the small dip between the armored vehicles.
“Blood. Give me blood,” I scream to Brazen, and he launches several packs down to me.
“Damn it, Clay Jude. Wake up,” I cry out as I pour the blood into his mouth.
He gasps for air as his face starts to heal, and I look upon the tragic state of his body. The blood pours from his veins with merciless intent as it beads into the dry sand. The metallic taste of spilled blood from everyone rattles around in the air, and prayer is almost false hope for so many.
