The Children of the Sun (41 page)

“I think I liked your first version better,” Theroen told her.

Two made a noise of amusement, but her attention was now focused on the building that lay down the block. It was a simple, four-story, red-brick structure with small windows and a single entrance at its front. It looked like any other building, and it was difficult to believe that within its walls, and more specifically within the confines of its subbasements, an entire army of vampire hunters was going about its daily business.

“OK, so we know the front door isn’t gonna get the job done,” Two said, shading her eyes. The exposed parts of her skin were already beginning to feel like someone had placed them under a heat lamp. She was wearing a loose-fitting pair of synthetic pants with Kevlar reinforcements, meant for motorcyclists, and a long-sleeve shirt of like material that she had found online. Theroen was in a similar outfit. The clothing would not stop a bullet, but would offer at least some protection against injury.

“Yes, we will use the roof as we planned,” Theroen said. He opened the trunk and took from it two long, tubular satchels. He tossed one to Two and slung the other over his shoulder. She did the same with hers.

“Right. Kanene said the access point was on the northwest side.”

“Then that is where we will go.”

“Do you think the lock will still be broken?” Two asked, and Theroen shrugged. He hit a button on his key fob and the rental car chirped. They weren’t worried about the vehicle – the car could remain in the lot for more than forty-eight hours without attracting any attention. By that time they would either have returned or they would be dead.

“It is possible,” Theroen said, walking toward the street. “On the one hand, you would think they would do routine sweeps of the building’s exits. On the other hand, if they had noticed anything, would it not have set them on alert?”

“I don’t even know what to think about these guys,” Two said.

They crossed the street, staying well away from the Children’s building, and stepped into an alley. It was early August, and Waukegan was suffering through a heat wave. The temperature was hovering in the mid-nineties, with no wind coming in off the nearby Lake Michigan to provide any comfort. The alley smelled like organic refuse in high rot, a kind of sickly-sweet scent with repugnant undertones. Two wrinkled her nose and glanced at Theroen, who shrugged.

There was a garbage dumpster at the end of the alley and, several feet above it, the painted iron ladder of a fire escape. Theroen put his hands on the dumpster and shoved, hauling himself upward. Once there, he reached a hand down to Two, who glanced at it in distaste.

“Remember that we do not get sick,” Theroen told her.

“Still wish I had some Purell or something,” she said, and took his hand, letting him haul her up. Once there, she wiped her hand on her pants, and Theroen rolled his eyes. Without further comment, he knelt down, cupping his hands together to make a step for Two. She put her foot in it, and he jerked upward with his shoulders, standing up at the same time. Two was propelled seven feet above his head, easily grabbing the ladder and stabilizing herself.

“Heads up,” she said, stepping onto the balcony and releasing the latch that sent the ladder down to street level. Theroen grabbed hold of it, climbed up, and hauled the ladder up behind him.

“Just in case any police officer happens to wander down the alley,” he said.

“Better safe than sorry, I guess.”

“Exactly.”

Theroen began to make his way up the various levels of the fire escape. They weren’t worried about anyone seeing them through the building’s windows. This particular business kept regular hours, and it was just before six in the evening on a Saturday. There was likely no one there to observe them. Still, they made their way quickly up to the roof and, once there, kept low in order to avoid suspicion.

They stopped at the building’s edge and sat down, their backs to the three-foot wall that ran around the perimeter. Theroen turned and looked over, briefly scanning their path, and sat back down.

“It is an easy run half-way down the block,” Theroen said. “Then there is a jump across an alley.”

“I saw it,” Two said. “Looks like … what, ten feet? Twelve?”

“I would guess twelve. Can you—”

“Come on. I’ve got your fuckin’ superhero blood all up in these veins, don’t I?”

Theroen grinned, nodded, looked again over the edge of the building. “I think that is the only major gap, and I think once we go, we should just go as fast as we can until we are on their roof. I … this is so absurd, Two. I do not know the first thing about espionage.”

“Me neither, but we’re fast and pretty quiet, and if we have to we can kill someone really quickly. I’ve got combat training from one of the best, and you’ve got awesome instincts and blood. That’s gotta count for something.”

“I certainly hope so,” Theroen said. “Nonetheless, I wish we could at least wait for the cover of darkness.”

“Me too, but we need the time. I don’t know about you, but the idea of sitting out here crisping in the sun for the next three hours and then trying to do everything before midnight doesn’t appeal to me.”

“No, we have to do it now. At the very least we must get inside and away from the sun before it saps all of our energy.”

“Right. So don’t worry about espionage for now, just worry about getting over to their roof and getting into that stairwell. That’ll be a step up from this frying pan, at least.”

“True,” Theroen said, and looked again over the edge. “It seems the coast is as clear as it’s going to get. Shall we do this?”

“Let’s go,” Two said, and without waiting for him, knowing he was faster anyway, she turned and vaulted over the edge. It was a six-foot drop to the next building’s roof below, which she could have handled even as a human – at least before the heroin had stolen her reflexes. As a vampire, she barely registered the impact. She could hear Theroen behind her, and then next to her, as they crossed the roof.

They soon came to the jump, and if Theroen had any doubt in her abilities, he didn’t show it, leaping across the alley without a glance back. Two never hesitated. She knew what she was capable of and was sure her body would be up to the task. It didn’t let her down; she landed more than four feet past the edge of the building, still moving at a dead run, trying to keep up with her lover. They crossed another roof, and then another alley, this one narrower, and landed at their destination. Somewhere below their feet was the bulk of the Children’s forces.

“Well, we are still alive,” Theroen said after they had come to a halt. “I suppose that means I can stop worrying about laser trip wires or contact mines.”

“Were you worrying about those things?” Two asked him.

“I was worrying about a lot of things.”

Two shook her head. “I can never gauge you, even with all the mind-reading stuff. You’re always so goddamned calm.”

Theroen grinned and moved toward the entrance to the stairwell. “That is a specialty of mine.”

Two stepped up next to him, and for a moment they contemplated the door’s handle without speaking. Finally she said, “This feels so anticlimactic …”

“Yes,” Theroen replied.

“You want me to do it?”

“No. It might be electrified.”

“Oh for … you’re just fucking with me now, right?”

“Maybe,” Theroen said, but before she could respond, he reached out and grasped the door’s handle. Two felt adrenaline surge through her system, but Theroen seemed none the worse for wear. He pressed in the handle and pushed open the door.

“A fine start,” he said, and he stepped inside, turned, and beckoned for her to follow.

* * *

“What do you think they do in here?” Two asked, her voice hushed. “I mean … it can’t be all vampires all the time, right?”

They were standing at one end of a long, open room filled with cubicles, each of which contained a desk, a computer, and a chair. Some had been decorated with pictures or motivational posters. It looked like any other office space in America.

“Kanene believes they run some sort of semilegitimate shipping business from this location, and that many of the daytime employees are not members of the Children. She told me that trucks move in and out of the docking area all day long.”

They had spent the previous night in a nearby apartment that Kanene had rented to enable her observation of the Children. The Ay’Araf woman, dark-skinned and muscular, had looked much the worse for wear from her endeavors. She had taken in little blood and spent a great deal of time in the sun. The result was that many of her wounds were still healing, and her skin looked parched even by human standards. Nonetheless, she had assured them that she would be participating in the coming battle.

“So during the day they run the business and then at night they wander downstairs and figure out ways to murder us?” Two asked.

“That seems to be the case,” Theroen replied. He was looking around the room, gauging the quickest path across it. This first-floor cubicle farm was an unavoidable obstacle; the stairway to the roof had not led any deeper, and the elevators were on the other side of the building. Two thought it likely that there would be another stairwell there, as well.

“I don’t think anyone’s here, baby,” Two said, and Theroen nodded.

“No. I cannot sense anything at all in this building. I imagine the floor must be very thick.”

They began to walk, moving down the long central aisle between cubes. Two tried to keep her curiosity from getting the better of her, tried to avoid looking in at all the workspaces. She didn’t want to think of these people as normal human beings living normal lives; she wanted,
needed
, to think of them as the enemy.

They had nearly reached the end of the corridor when there was a rattling noise from the direction they were heading, and a door ahead of them began to open. Acting on instinct, Two and Theroen ducked quickly into one of the open cubicles. Two leaned up against the fabric wall, trying not to make any noise, holding her breath.

“Why would you even bring your gun to your desk, anyway?” a male voice asked, and they heard the sound of two people making their way down the corridor.

“In case the bats show up,” a female voice replied.

“In the middle of the day?”

“Day, night, I don’t care. I keep my gun with me everywhere except the gym, and that’s only ‘cause they won’t let me. I want to be ready.”

“Right … so ready that you forgot and left it in a drawer.”

“Shut up.”

The two of them laughed, moving on up the corridor and turning into one of the cubicles near the end.

“Move now or they will see us on the way back,” Theroen hissed into her ear, and taking her hand, he led her out and around the corner, ducking into another cubicle that didn’t open into the central corridor. Behind them, they heard footsteps again.

“You hear about the Emperor?” the female voice asked.

“No, what’s happening?”

“Gonna pick a new Left Hand this week. I hear it’s not going to be one of the colonels.”

“Wow, for real? Think it’ll be Captain Perrault?”

The woman made a scoffing noise. “She’s already the Right Hand, dumbass. I don’t think you can be both hands.”

“Oh … right. And it’s not going to be a colonel? That doesn’t make sense.”

“Just telling you what I heard.”

“Guess we’ll see. Come on, I want to hit the cafeteria before PT.”

There was the same rattling sound they had heard before, as the door opened and the two soldiers left the room. Two let out a long, soft exhalation and glanced over at Theroen.

“Captain Perrault,” he murmured.

“That’s our girl,” Two said. “Least she’s still around.”

“I must admit, I had little doubt.”

“Yeah, me neither. No way she was going to let herself get cooked.”

Theroen stood up and Two followed him. They stepped over to the door through which the two soldiers had exited. Theroen reached out and turned the handle, opening it slowly, trying to avoid the rattling noise. He was successful, and Two doubted that anyone but another vampire would have noticed the tiny clicks coming from the mechanism’s interior. Theroen peered through the crack, looking out into the hallway.

“Clear on that side,” he murmured and, opening the door a little further, he turned his head and peered around the edge in the opposite direction.

“Anybody?” Two asked.

“No, we are safe, but we must be quick. There is a bank of elevators at this end with no cover around them. If someone else decides to come up here, we will have very little time to act.”

“Probably have to fight them, if it goes down like that.”

“Yes. I would prefer to avoid it, if at all possible. There is a door to the left of the elevators. It is not marked, but I imagine it is our stairwell.”

“OK,” Two said. “Let’s go.”

They went, one after the other, moving quickly down toward the three elevators embedded in the far wall. The hallway was otherwise mostly unremarkable; there were two doors marked with male and female symbols and a water fountain between them. At other end was an industrial-looking door with a caution sign on it and below that a decal of a forklift.