“He’ll let the game continue playing out,” Emerald added. “And come after us again when the rest of the field is cleared.”

  “How long do you think that’ll take?” I asked.

  A few gunshots rang out from the other side of the city. “Not long,” she replied once their echo faded.

  “Then we better get to it,” I said, pulling Kat's leg out from where it was bent and pinned beneath him. I unpinned his comm badge from his chest before placing my hand atop one of his and saying my final silent farewell to a man, a friend, I already missed.

  CHAPTER 28

  We made our way back to the industrial zone outside of the city center by cutting a wide swath around the building housing the sniper. Constantly on the lookout for random killers or a fresh group of Coil’s forces, it took longer than I wanted for us to reach the industrial section of the settlement. From the glow of chaos energy emanating from the veins in the back of my hand, I estimated my strength at less than twenty percent. I had barely survived our encounter with the gorathi the night before. I was worried I didn't have enough energy left to recover Matt in a battle with the creatures. We had no idea how many there were or even where they had taken him.

  Or why they had taken him.

  No matter what, I couldn’t leave him with those things. Just the thought that he might already be just as dead as Kat—that it was already too late to save him—filled me with such terror I could barely put one foot in front of the other. One way or another, I had to hold onto the hope he still lived. And if he did, I was ready to eat anything Ixitat or Emerald could catch to fuel my sigils. I'd even eat it raw if that’s what it took to give me the energy I needed to fight my way to him.

  To those ends, Ixy had gone hunting earlier, vanishing into the thick vegetation surrounding the factories and offices we had passed by earlier. When she returned, she dropped a webbed bundle of dead wildlife at my feet. Fortunately, we could take time to cook the meat. Emerald skinned the animals while Druck and Veneel collected kindling for a fire. I used excite to light it, quickly cooking and devouring my fill while the others kept watch. The food helped jump start production of my chaos energy, giving me a little more confidence about our chances.

  As expected, Coil didn’t make another move against us, choosing instead to deal with the few killers who wandered into the city, even though most of the contestants seemed to be staying away from it, not wanting to deal with the creatures that were here. If Shaq hadn’t come back to me, despite his promise to Coil, I don’t know how we would have picked up the demons' trail.

  Shaq sniffed them out as we wandered through the industrial area, guiding us toward one of the factories. Just as ominous as all of the other brutalist printed stone structures, the dark, ivy and moss covered monolith looked so heavy it seemed to be sinking into the earth. In fact, its main entryway was half-buried beneath the ground. When we got close enough, I spotted the torn up grass and dirt left behind by the demons’ passing. They had crawled through the narrow opening between the earth and stone slab door frame, presumably with Matt in tow.

  “Maybe I should wait out here. Stand guard,” Druck said, eyeing the dark opening and the displaced dirt around it.

  “Don’t be a baby,” Emerald said. “It’s just pitch black and terrifying in there.” She laughed lightly, fearlessly approaching the entrance. “How many of the creatures do you think are in there?”

  “Hundreds, I bet,” Druck replied. “Maybe thousands. And one of the big ones. A queen.”

  “You want to make a bet on which one of us kills more of them?”

  “Nah, that’s a stupid thing to bet on. Ben’s going to win.”

  Emerald glanced at me. “We’ll give him a handicap. What do you think is fair?”

  “Ten to one at least,” Veneel said.

  “Agreed,” Shaq buzzed.

  “Wait a second,” I complained. “Matt’s in danger. He may be dead. And you’re actually going to bet on who can kill the most gorathi?”

  “Yeah, why not?” Emerald replied. “I mean, we could go in there scared instead of focusing on winning. Your choice.”

  I nodded, accepting her logic. “Ten to one sounds fair.”

  “What are the stakes?” Druck asked.

  “If any of you boys win, I’ll sleep with you,” Emerald said.

  “No offense,” I replied. “But I don’t really want that.”

  She started with a pout and I thought she was going to ask me if I thought she was beautiful again. Then she started laughing. “Oh you. Always playing hard to get. It’s so attractive.”

  “And you’re not Niflin,” Veneel said. “I’m not interested in humans.”

  “I’m in on the action,” Druck said.

  “Forget it,” Emerald replied. “It’s off the table. I figured either Ben or I would win.”

  “What? You just—”

  “How about we stick to electro?” I suggested.

  “No offense boss, " Druck said, "but I don’t think any of us except you have any electro.”

  “I pay you.”

  “If you want to call it that.”

  “Well, if you lose, I’ll front you a loan so you can pay the winner.”

  “I don’t have any electro either,” Veneel said.

  “Me neither,” Emerald added.

  “Noness,” Ixitat agreed.

  “Bragging rights then?” I suggested.

  “It’ll have to do,” Emerald replied. The others all agreed.

  “Can we go in after my friend now?” I said, exasperated.

  “I’ll take point,” Emerald said, pausing after dropping to her hands and knees to crawl through the hole. “Ooh, what’s this?” Picking something up from the ground in front of the hole, she jumped to her feet and brought it over to me.

  A small medal the size of my thumbnail, it had four starbursts on its matte black surface, hanging from a red bar.

  “I’ve never seen that before,” I said, staring at it.

  “I have,” Druck said. “It’s Quasar’s Royal Marine medal of valor. She and her unit earned it defending a colony settlement not entirely unlike this one from some pirates. I don’t remember how long ago. But there’s no way she lost it. She dropped it here on purpose, maybe hoping Shaq or I would come along and recognize it.”

  “Kind of a longshot, don’t you think?” Emerald asked.

  “Except we did just come along and recognize it,” he shot back. “You can call me an idiot all you want. Zar isn’t a fool.”

  “Since when are you two friends?” I asked.

  “Since we were captured by Admiral Bitch,” he replied. “Shared trauma brings people closer, you know.”

  “I hope that means she’s still inside,” I said, slipping the medal into my pocket for safekeeping until we found her. And was certain we would. One way or another. “And that the demons didn’t get her.”

  “And that she isn’t wounded,” Druck added.

  “There’s only one way to find out,” Emerald said. “Last one in loses five points.” She laughed and rushed back to the entrance, diving headfirst into the darkness.

  CHAPTER 29

  “Emerald?” I called out to her, crouching in front of the entrance to the factory when I heard her land with a heavy thump. “Are you okay?”

  “It was a little further down than I thought,” she replied, laughing. “I’m fine. Probably don’t go in headfirst.”

  I glanced back at Druck, who shook his head and rolled his eyes. “You should have let Ixy go first. She can see in the dark.”

  “What fun would that be?” Emerald quipped.

  “Ixy, can you go next?”

  “Yesss,” she replied. I stepped out of the way to let her pass. She knelt and slipped into the darkness. “Clearsss,” she announced after a brief pause.

  I went in next, holding up my hands to provide a little bit of blue light in the darkness. From what I had seen on the outside, the factory didn’t have any windows. If it did, they were covered by vines or dirt. Once Druck entered, he turned on the LED integrated into his rifle, the beam shooting forward through the pitch. Veneel did the same with Kat’s rifle, providing even more illumination. Not that I was certain adding light was a good thing. The gorathi were sure to notice it.

  If they were here.

  The factory’s lobby was small and simple, as hard and cold as the outer design. Only the height of the ceiling, nearly thirty feet above us, gave it any sort of grandiosity. A small desk had been printed as part of the stone floor, a rusted metal chair sitting behind it. A filthy, moss-covered computer terminal rested on top. Just ahead, a sliding door—stuck half open and off-angle in its mount, claw marks obvious along the edges—led into another room in the rear. Covered in the same grime and growth that spread across the floor, a simple archway scanner reminding me of an airport metal detector hung from the ceiling, aimed at the doorway.

  Here, there was little light filtering in from outside. None of it reached the doorways to the rooms beyond.

  Ixitat scurried forward to the hatch, leaning her front half through. “Clearsss,” she said again before forging ahead. We stayed behind her in a square room with a wide entrance and a smaller door on each flank. The right hand door was in the same condition as the one we had just passed through, the claw marks scored deeper into the metal.

  “I guess gorathi are smart enough to open doors,” Druck said softly.

  “I bet they’re smarter than you,” Emerald replied. “It wouldn’t take much.”

  “Funny,” Druck answered flatly.

  Ixitat approached the open door, pausing ahead of it and reaching out with one of her pedipalps, brushing it over the door. “Bensss.” I joined her there, putting my hand near her feeler to get a better look at what she had discovered. “Bloodsss.”

  Not the dark bluish color of demon blood. Dried human blood. Quasar? Or Matt? The sight of it made me sick to my stomach. “One of them is definitely hurt.”

  “Maybe not too bad,” Druck said hopefully. “Could be a flesh wound. Or maybe they cut their hand on the door. Some of those edges look sharp enough.”

  “The blood isn’t on the edges,” I replied. “But you’re right. That doesn’t mean the injury is bad.”

  “None of the legends speak of the gorathi leaving anyone alive,” Veneel said. “Why would they take your friend?”

  “I have no idea. Just because Coil saw Matt in their possession doesn’t mean he was the only one they grabbed. Ixy, let’s keep moving.”

  She continued through the doorway. I stayed right behind her as we entered a long corridor that seemed to wrap around the main factory floor. Druck's and Veneel’s lights remained steadily aimed at the ceiling just in front of Ixitat, providing enough illumination to navigate without tripping over anything but not enough to completely telegraph our approach. Drops of blood had splattered the floor along the passageway every fifteen feet or so.

  Reaching the corner of the hallway, Ixitat stopped again, shifting aside so I could get a look at the dead killer. Propped against the wall, his mouth open in terror, his entrails had been ripped out by the demons. He hadn’t been dead very long. He didn’t yet smell like day-old road kill.

  “He’s still warm,” Emerald said, crouching beside me and putting her hand just above his spilled guts. “Twenty minutes at most, I’d say.”

  “Great,” Druck remarked. “It means those ugly mothers are close. They could be watching us right now.”

  “We didn’t expect to get to Matt without a fight,” I replied. “I wonder what this guy was even doing here.”

  “Probably trying to hide,” Emerald answered. “I bet he didn’t know this place was a danger zone.”

  “The claw marks in the dirt weren’t a clue?”

  “Obviously not bright enough to win the game. No big loss.”

  “Let’s keep going.”

  Ixy moved into the pitch-black hallway ahead of us. “Clearsss,” she said as I stepped up behind her, the light from Druck’s rifle crossing next to my shoulder and over Ixitat’s head, allowing the rest of us to see what lay ahead. The hallway ran the entire length of the factory's inner floor, at least a kilometer in length. A single door stood open near the middle on the left side. A handful of unevenly spaced doors, all of them closed, were on the right.

  We started forward, making it halfway down the hallway before a sharp clang echoed from somewhere deeper in the factory. We froze in our tracks.Emerald raised her blaster, and I spread my fingers to activate my construct, ready to jump into action.

  A light scratching noise reached my ears. It sounded like it was coming from the open door just ahead, to our right. The demons were in the main part of the factory in unknown numbers and they were on the move, no doubt coming our way.

  The scratching quickly increased in volume and intensity. Soft hisses joined with it, sending a chill down my spine. “Ixy, clear the line of fire,” I said softly.

  “Yess,” she replied, leaping to the ceiling and sticking there. Within moments she was upside down above my head, clinging to the smooth stone. The others spread out behind me, each with a clear shooting lane.

  “Similar to before,” I said to them. “I’ll put up a barrier on the bottom half, you kill them on the top half.”

  “Copy that,” Druck said. “Bring it on.”

  “And may the best woman win,” Emerald added.

  “Who are you calling a woman?” Druck replied.

  “Stay focused,” I ordered.

  The intensity of the hissing and scratching ratcheted up another notch, the noise approaching the open door. Druck and Veneel both shined their lights directly on it, ready to cut down the first demons to burst into the passageway. I could feel the chaos energy pulsing through my veins, restored somewhat by my latest meal. Let them come. I would kill every last one of them to get Matt back.

  Without warning, the hissing stopped, the entire factory falling suddenly, eerily silent. The tension remained thick as I held my breath, waiting for the din to resume as though we had reached the retreat of the tide before the tsunami's approach. Why had the demons gone quiet? Why weren’t they attacking?

  A howling scream echoed through the passageway, so loud and raw it instantly unnerved me, more so than the demon horde gathered nearby. It had come from behind us, and I spun around, the scraping of clawed feet slapping the stone as something barreled toward us at full speed from the factory entrance.

  “The door’s too small for a queen to fit through,” Emerald just barely had time to say before the footsteps reached the corner and started toward us.

  Except there was nothing there.

  “What the—” Druck managed to get out before something shoved him aside and slammed into Veneel, dragging the Niflin to the ground. Veneel screamed and tried to bring his rifle to bear on the thing, which couldn’t adjust to the environment quickly enough to stay hidden.

  With the same general shape as the other gorathi, it fell between the demons and their queen in size, sharing the same general shape. Its hide was tough to make out as the pigmentation along it shifted with the changing volume of light, but I could see it was thick and boney, with plenty of angles and uneven surfaces like a stealth fighter. It vanished again in less than a second, its Predator camouflage making it nearly invisible save for a faint outline as it sank its claws into the chest of the stricken Niflin.

  Veneel cried out as he jabbed the muzzle of his rifle toward the thing, only to fire into the ceiling as I pushed the creature off him, sending it reeling back down the corridor. Druck swung his weapon toward it and opened fire, plasma bolts zipping down the hallway and into the wall, the new monster gone as quickly as it had come.

  Not gone. Invisible. It could be crouched right in front of us and we wouldn’t be able to spot it.

  “Veneel?” I said, turning my attention to him. His eyes were open, and they looked away from his disembowelment to meet my gaze.

  “Master?” he croaked.

  I knelt beside him, putting my hand on his shoulder, making sure I contacted bare skin. “You’re going to be okay,” I said as I activated calmed-to-death. “It’ll be fine.”

  He was dead before I finished talking.

  “Boss, I don’t see it,” Druck said, swinging his rifle all across the passageway.

  “Shaq, can you smell it?” I asked.

  “Nuh-uh,” he buzzed.

  “As long as the little ones are quiet, it means papa bear’s still around,” Emerald said.

  “Because it would attack them too?” I asked. “I hope not.”

  “This place just gets worse and worse. I’m ready to go home now.”

  “Me too,” I agreed. “I saw it when the light changed too quickly for it to adjust right away. Druck, you need to turn off your light, wait a second, and then turn it back on again.”

  “Are you crazy? It’ll do the same thing to me that it just did to VD.”

  “It’s the only way to bring it out of hiding.”

  “Can’t you fireball it or something?”

  “What am I going to excite to light on fire? You?”

  “You excite me,” Emerald remarked.

  “What about lighting up the invisible ugly?” Druck suggested.

  “I can’t target something I can’t see."

  “Maybe you should take the rifle then. At least if you get gored you’ll heal.”

  “Oh for hell’s sake,” Emerald snapped, holstering her blaster and snatching the rifle from Druck’s hands. She turned off the LED for him, waiting nearly two full seconds before switching it back on.

  The creature loomed over both of them, arm drew back as it prepared to slash them both at once. I pulled them away from the creature while activating combine, just barely dragging them out of harm’s way as I merged the demon’s feet with the floor. Even though it vanished from sight again, it couldn’t move.

  Druck and Emerald sprawled together on the floor in a tangle while the demon expressed its displeasure with its new situation, screaming loudly and scraping at the walls with nearly invisible claws. While I couldn’t see the bulk of the creature, the spot where the floor had fused with it remained distorted, giving away its position.