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Chapter 26

Ronan

My lungs ached as I plunged my dagger into the Rager’s grotesque forehead. Black blood sputtered as his eyes rolled back in his head. He fell to the ground, unintentionally taking a second Rager down with him. This one was a female, but both of her legs had been cut off, and she was forced to crawl across the ground.

If she was alive, I was sure she would hate it. Hate herself. Hate what she’d become.

It was a relief to kill her. I was putting her out of her misery, allowing her soul to rest in peace.

Blood covered my hands and face. My clothes. My pants. It coated me like a second skin. I wanted to scrub it off, wash the darkness that tarnished my skin, but I couldn’t. The fight wasn’t over.

I was fighting based on instinct only. My mind was on my princess, but my body mechanically tore through the monsters. The Ragers. For the first time, I was the hunter.

We weren’t killing them all, just enough to clear a path towards the fence. Fallon was using it to his advantage; he would lead Ragers towards the fence and smile with grim satisfaction when they were electrocuted.

Again, I tried not to think of the people we killed as human. They weren’t. Not anymore. They were monsters through and through, unredeemable and deadly. They would not hesitate to sink their claws and teeth in our skin if the opportunity arose.

The way they had done to Calax.

With a ferocious roar, my vigor renewed, I lunged back into battle.

A demented part of me didn’t care whether I lived or died. I knew that my princess had long since succumbed to the worm. The virus. The whatever the hell it was. Logically, I knew it couldn’t be a virus, but my mind still viewed it as such. I had never been a science guy; that was more Tamson’s field.

I wondered if we could keep Addie with us. Lock her in a basement, perhaps. Or a cell.

How fucked up was that?

But, no. She wouldn’t want to live her life as a monster. She would choose death without a moment of hesitation. Hell, she would even welcome it.

Tears slid from my eyes as I fought through the Ragers, finally reaching the silver door in the gate.

“How much longer?” I called to Fallon. He stealthily moved away just as half a dozen Ragers ran towards him. Their bodies convulsed, screams tearing from their lips as they were electrocuted.

Fortunately, their sounds of anguish were nothing new. The Ragers were known to fight amongst themselves. No guards would come running to check on the noise, except the ones on rotation. And we still had twenty minutes before they were scheduled to arrive.

“Soon,” Fallon said. We were relying completely on Ryder infiltrating the plant and being able to shut down the electricity. The whole plan depended on it.

While we waited, we fought. It was a grueling battle as the time sludged on. Seconds turned into minutes...though it felt like hours. My arm ached from repeatedly slicing down Ragers. Sooner or later, we were going to get too tired to continue. Already, my body was heavy with fatigue, a leaden sensation intermingling with the ball of nerves.

Come on, Ryder.

I trusted my brother implicitly. I knew he would get this job done.

“What did the Rager say when it crossed the road?” I asked Fallon, sidestepping the claw of an incoming Rager. I couldn’t see the rest of my brothers, but I heard Asher’s grunts from within the throng. Declan was supposed to be back to back with him. Kai and Doc were fighting nearby, but their strength was waning. They wouldn’t last much longer.

Iwouldn’t last much longer.

“Come on, Sarge. What did the Rager say when it crossed the road?”

Fallon kicked his foot out, catching a monster in its stomach. It - she - staggered before righting itself. Herself.

I didn’t want to humanize them. Give them names and stories. I was content with them being nameless, faceless monsters we were tasked to kill. Disposable. Garbage. It was easier than thinking of them as humans with families and loved ones and lives that had been snuffed out. At the same time, it was becoming increasingly harder for menotto see them as humans, especially since Addie...

“Fine,” Fallon sighed. “What did the Rager say when it crossed the road?”

Before I could respond, there was a large pop. Simultaneous with the noise, every light in the facility went dark. The cackling of the electric fence died as well.

“Ryder fucking did it,” I murmured. To Fallon, I asked, “Is it off?”