Studying him, she brings her foot to the center of his chest, gives the center of his rib cage a tiny little tap. “Where is he, Jordy?” she asks again.
“Got something!” the tech yells.
The microdrone crew’s van is speeding up the mountain road so fast Cole’s thrown one arm out to his side so he can brace himself against the inside of the sliding door. It’s the only way to keep from being knocked off the bench that runs the length of the cargo bay. The microdrone feeds are on three flat-screen computer monitors affixed to the bay’s only solid wall.
Scott’s riding up front with the driver.
They’ve kept the microdrone cloud as high above the mountain road as they can, searching for any light source, and now they’ve got a hit.
“It’s some kind of light source, and it’s pointing skyward,” the tech says, pointing to the screen.
Cole leans forward. “A signal?”
“Let me descend,” the tech says, “but I’m not promising I can avoid the trees.”
“I heard you the first dozen times,” Cole says.
The tech seizes the tiny control stick next to him. The microdrones operate like a swarm, bouncing off each other’s electromagnetic waves in a way that allows them to flock together and move as a unit without needing one operator for every tiny little drone. They provide hundreds of different feeds, which are processed through a central computer that amalgamates them into three different angles that are relatively easy to monitor, albeit with some occasional headache-inducing distortion.
“Uh-oh,” the tech says.
That’s when Cole sees what the light source is—the headlights of Charley’s Volvo. And they’re pointing directly skyward. Which is not good. But they’re also shifting to one side.
The entire car is slipping loose from whatever’s holding it up at a ninety-degree angle. Cole figures it’s trees. They’re probably breaking under its weight.
As the microdrones descend, the Volvo goes over sideways, landing on one side, headlights vertically stacked, blasting light onto two men with frighteningly large guns who are running directly toward the spot where Charley stands over a prone, fallen man.
One of the running men raises what looks like a shotgun.
“Give me that,” Cole says, then he gently closes his hand around the control stick.
There’s a sound like a single clap of thunder.
The demon bitch is blown sideways.
Ears ringing, Jordy lifts his head off the dirt, sees Manuel Lloya lowering his sawed-off shotgun as he races toward them up the road. Ralph Peters is next to him, armed with an AR-15 on a chest strap. They’re supposed to be guarding Milo’s workshop. But Greg Burton’s not with them, so maybe he stayed behind. The guys must have come speeding downhill on the ATVs when they heard all hell break loose. Now, they’re running directly under the spot where Frasier’s pinned to a tree trunk ten feet in the air. They don’t notice the poor son of a bitch. Maybe because he’s not screaming anymore.
Jordy goes to call out to them, to warn them this creature’s not what they think she is. But just then, the tree branches above both men explode, as if a flock of invisible birds just took flight from them all at once.
Manuel Lloya freezes, spins, and raises his shotgun to the sky. Then his body jerks in a dozen different places. His shotgun is thrust to the dirt at his feet by an invisible force. Then he hits the dirt, too, ass-first, like he just needed to take a little break. The rest of him collapses with dead weight and when his head rolls back, Jordy can see pieces of his face are missing. Ralph Peters is still on his feet, but his AR-15 hangs loosely from the sling at his chest, and he’s staring dumbfounded at the shredded flesh on his palms as he spins in place. When he turns in Jordy’s direction, one leg bends under him. As he goes down, Jordy can see that one of the man’s eyes is missing and arterial spray’s also pumping wildly from his neck.
Then Jordy’s would-be rescuers are just two bleeding corpses.
Three, if you count Frasier dangling from the tree branches overhead.
All three computer screens go dark, then they’re filled by bright-blue squares and the white words Transmission Interruption, which bathe the cargo bay in a sudden wash of blinding light. Cole thought maybe one or two of the drones might survive, but apparently they’re all shattered or have embedded themselves inside a human body. At least they’re not offering live close-ups of broken bones and spleens.
Cole releases the control stick and sits back on the bench. The two techs are doing their best not to look at him, but the screens before them are so bright now, they’re going to have to eventually, if only to protect their eyes.
“There,” he says, “that should help.”
“But now we can’t see anything,” one of the techs finally says.
“Neither can they.”
Jordy knows he shouldn’t be surprised when the demon gets to her feet.
He shouldn’t be surprised to see the lacerations along her right cheek and jaw healing right before his eyes. The wounds should be oozing blood, but instead they’re closing up, and what blood they’ve spilled is left behind in a drying smear along her jaw.
But it’s her eyes that get to him. Eyes as focused and alert as someone who’s just had their third cup of morning coffee and is ready to tackle the day. It’s not the expression of someone who was just blown sideways by a shot from one of the most powerful guns there is, a blast that turned the right shoulder on her shirt to black shreds.