Page 27

As relief came in from the message Vasilis sent out over the comms, I could’ve broken down into tears, but I didn’t. I kept my head high and with the scent of Drakon’s blood on my skin and Vasilis’s sweat on my clothes, I was able to command everyone else. It also helped that I had a knife in my hand, which nobody asked about.

“Uncuff them, take them to the van, as we’ve all been instructed,” I said. “I need all three of the bays to be bringing the omegas out. Single file down the hallways. We need to get them all loaded. Nobody wants to be around when the soldiers are going through withdrawal.” Directing the remaining soldiers and sargeants who hadn’t found addiction in the Rotmor blood was nice.

In the faces of the omegas, I wondered if any of them knew I was the one who saved them. I wasn’t doing it for their recognition, but I needed them to know I was saving them. I wasn’t going to take them somewhere else to be hurt.

From the front of my slacks, I pulled out the ledger of names. “We have twenty-five omegas,” I said. “I want all twenty-five of them on that truck.”

“And how many soldiers will be taking?” a man asked. “We don’t want them to cause trouble en route to the next destination.”

“Don’t worry. We’ll have forces keeping them in check,” I said.

In the ledger, I forced the map of the place in against pages to help me navigate, and the only place I needed to find now was the exit. It should’ve been easy, but I knew thinking something was easy was going to make it ten times harder.

The first bump in the road came when a man in similar clothes to what Vasilis often wore arrived at the first bay of omegas. Standing right behind me, he also had a ledger.

“Is everyone ready to leave?” he asked, glaring me down, his eyes lingering over the knife. “You better be careful with that.”

“Zito,” a surprised soldier spoke. “Council member, Zito. We’re gathering them. Some are struggling to stay on their feet. I suppose that’s what happens when they’re in bed for too long.”

It’s what happened with Vasilis once, but all they had to do was stretch it out. “Yes,” I said. “We’re taking them now. Is the truck ready?”

Zito shrugged. “I assume that’s something you’d be able to tell me. You are in commander clothing.” He reached out and plucked at the collar, as he removed his hand he looked at he trace contact of blood he’d collected. “I see Vasilis wasn’t lying when he said he was going to have all the infected soldiers culled, well, he didn’t say it, more implied.” He pulled the blood to his nose to sniff it before licking it clean. “Vile stuff.” He grinned.

“Yes,” I said. “I’m here to follow out Vasilis’s orders. As well as the Apex Drakon.”

“Of course. Speaking of, have you seen him?”

“No, maybe he’s getting the transport ready,” I suggested. “I should be checking on it. I’ll let him know you’ve asked about him. I’m not sure if he’s coming with us.”

“Please do,” he said. “I’ll make sure these omegas are sent out. I’ll just need to check them against my list beforehand.”

“Why?”

“Because I don’t want some of the soldiers sneaking in with them. We’ve got to be cautious.”

“Oh. But they’ve pledged themselves to the Syndicate,” I said. “Why would they be sneaking anywhere?”

Zito’s smile faded. “Which serpent clan are you from?” he asked. “You’re asking far too many questions to be part of any that I know, and trust.”

The immediate urge to stab him and run was vibrating on the tips of my fingers. “Orphaned,” I said. “I was taken in by the Syndicate.”

“Oh,” he snickered. “Well, some of these are not as lucky. Some of them were sold to us by families, well, technically, not sold since they were a debt paid to us with their labor.”

The omegas weren’t the only prisoners here then, it seemed. Some of the soldiers were as well. I’d never been able to get much of a read on them. They all stunk like egotistical Alpha scum, although some of them could’ve been betas. I didn’t smell an omega amongst them, so I quickly decided they weren’t for me to save.

Zito walked ahead into the large room, commanding attention and giving me space to leave.

I went straight for the exit, marked according to the map where the vehicles were parked. I recalled that much from when I arrived inside the metal cage. I was so excited to finally breath fresh air again, a relief to my lungs over this recycled crap.

There was nobody on patrol anywhere, not a single soldier had come by or stared at me like they knew me from somewhere. I made my way out of the compound and a small fleet of vehicles were all parked in a line from smallest to biggest. I was clearly a size queen in all aspects of life and walked down to the largest truck at the bottom of the lot. I tried to keep myself on alert, looking at either side, and glancing behind in case Drakon was going to show up again.

But we were finally doing it. We were escaping.

This place needed burning, maybe not to the ground, but definitely to the cieling.

The truck door was open and the keys were in the most obvious placement in the sunvisor. I wondered whose big idea it was. To think this was the extent of their security, it was laughable. If this place was run by the humans, they would’ve had secure locks on every single door, and patrols on either side. But since we were considered advanced by some, Alphas smelling omegas out, and omegas hiding behind Alpha scents, it was far from an advanced security system.

Climbing into the driver seat, I placed the knife on the dashboard and kept the ledger on my lap. “We’ve got to dismantle this entire operation,” I mumbled aloud before keying the ignition.

The door opened but nobody came out. Except someone had. On the ground, the glint of the blue pit viper slithered on up the ramp into the light. I floored the acceleration pedal, trying to catch its tail and crush it, but then I stopped halfway through, unsure if it was Vasilis. It caught me in a moment of uncertainty, right before he appeared at the door.

“Oh good, you’re here, did you see him?” he asked.

I should’ve ran him over. “He’s gone,” I said.

“Are the omegas are coming?”

“Yes.”

“We need to blow this place up,” I said.

Vasilis nodded slowly. “I’m sure we can arrange that. Are the omegas coming?”

Almost like he was summoning them, the first batch appeared in the doorway, each of them dressed in beige sacks, like dirty bedding with holes cut through the head so they weren’t naked, but they were as close to naked as they could be. I wished they could’ve been dressed, but that might’ve been asking too much. I wanted them to trust me, even though I couldn’t say who I was, or that their families had been looking for them. I wished I could’ve made this easier on them, but they just had to trust me.

“Pillows,” I demanded. “They’re gonna need pillows and comforts for the back of the truck.”

Vasilis passed my commands on to the soldiers, just in time for the second crowd of skittish omegas to appear in the doorway. A world of fear and fury in there eyes, and I had to keep on pretending I was working for the Syndicate.

It took an hour until all the omegas were checked off my list with a special notation for the one who had stabbed themself in the eye. It plucked at a sickly string in my stomach, knowing the extent they’d done to in order to free themselves from this situation.

Vasilis told me to leave once the truck was full. “I need to clean up a couple of things,” he said. “I’ll find you again once I’m done.”

Sat in the driver’s seat, I stared out of the window at him as he stepped closer to the doors of the compound. “No. Come with me.” It had been the plan. He’d even announced it over the speaker. “Vasilis, come with me. We’re leaving.”

“You want this place destroyed.” He walked back to me and stepped up to face me. “I don’t want anything to survive.”

“But your brother is gone. Just come with me.”

“I can’t. I need to destroy this place.”

He wasn’t doing this for me. He was doing this for himself, and I had to honour that. He wasn’t going to tell me, but it was buried so deep that he didn’t have to tell me. I just knew it. “Be safe.”

Through the open window, he leaned in and kissed me. “You be safe too,” he said. “Take them home. Take them and don’t look back.”

This had been the plan the entire time. I couldn’t wait around for him. I had to do what I came here to do. I had lives to save and people counting on me. I grit my teeth as not to begin crying. The hieghtened sense of emotions was strong in the air, like pollen, except we were so far into the Nevada dessert that plants didn’t grow here. This is, however, where they died.

“I’ll find you,” he said. “I promise. I’ll find you.”

Something about it felt final, like we weren’t going to find each other again, even if he knew my parents home address, he wasn’t going to get out of this place.

Once a tear formed, the floodgates opened and I drove off. I looked at the open ledger on the passenger seat, right where Vasilis was supposed to be sitting. All the names were ticked. All of them accounted for.

It was bright out. The clock on the dashboard revealed it was the middle of the afternoon. It was also scorching, but the air conditioning was already at the minimum setting. Of course it was, these serpents were cold-blooded, they didn’t need the air conditioning unit like the rest of us.

I drove for about fifteen minutes, trying not to look back in the rear-view mirror.

But after those fifteen minutes, a rumble shook the surface of the earth and in the distance, a giant plume of dust and smoke rose into the atmosphere. An explosion even in the pit of my stomach.

I kept driving. I had to keep driving. Tears turned my cheeks sticky. Passing the bar and gas station where my car was, I couldn’t stop. I knew if I stopped, I wouldn’t get back in the car, and I needed to keep going for the sake of those omegas.

“I’m going to take you all home,” I mumbled to myself, and in the grated view that looked into the back of the truck, I saw all of their faces, they were huddled together, not a single one of them uttering a word. “I’ll make sure you’re all helped out,” I continued mumbling. My family’s wealth would be useful for something.

Driving until it grew dark, my body finally gave in and as I parked up near a motel, I stepped out and my jellied legs almost had me collapsing against the side of the truck. There were vacancies at the motel, and I was suddenly realising I didn’t have a phone or wallet to do anything about it. All I had was a truck full of omegas and a worn look of guilt pained across my body.

I opened the back of the truck. It was abotut time I told them all they were free, I’d left it long enough. And the Serpentine Syndicate proabbly didn’t have anyone close by to try and make a move for them. They didn’t immediately respond to me, each of them, stared as their huddle grew tighter, and they formed a sea of beige sacks.

“I’m going to call someone, I’m going to get you all clothed and we’re all going to stay here for the night,” I said, even if I knew the math couldn’t accomodate for all of them in the limited number of avaialble rooms. “Trust me. I’m not one of them.” I tore the shirt open, as if I somehow wore proof beneath it that I was an omega. It was just my bare chest. “I’m Soren Quillen, and I’ve saved you. All of you.”