And that was exactly why Sawyer forced himself to turn away. He quickly swept away any trace he'd been there then hurried out of the tower. He knew he shouldn't have stopped to help when he heard the gunshots, and he wouldn't have if he'd known who it was.
Sawyer huffed. Yes, he would have helped. He just would have been more careful.
Stefan was never supposed to know he was still alive. It was easier that way, for both of them. Stefan wasn't ready to see what he'd been turned into, and Sawyer definitely wasn't ready for Stefan to see him.
He never would be.
It was best if Stefan just continued to believe he was dead. Inside, Sawyer felt as if he was. The only thing that filled him was an overwhelming rage and the need for revenge for what had been done to him. He'd take out every mech he came across until he killed them all or they killed him.
Considering he was now a product of their genetic enhancements, using those enhancements against the mechs had a certain irony to it. It also satisfied something deep inside of Sawyer each time he destroyed one of those merciless bastards.
Sawyer could hear Stefan shouting his name as he raced down to the ground floor. It caused a pang of regret in his chest. Sawyer pushed it aside and hurried down the stairs. He bypassed the ground level and went straight down to the basement as quickly as he could.
He had no doubt Stefan would come searching for him, and he needed to be gone long before that happened. Stefan couldn't see him like this. Sawyer's heart couldn't take seeing the horror in his former lover's face, and he knew he would. There was no way he wouldn't. Sawyer was no longer the handsome man Stefan had fallen in love with.
He was a monster.
A mech-created monster.
Once in the basement, Sawyer made his way to the far left wall. It was the farthest wall from the building where Stefan was. He slammed his fist into the wall until the concrete crumbled beneath his power, creating a hole into the basement of the next building. Several more punches made a hole big enough for him to climb through.
Sawyer quickly climbed through then made his way to the next wall, and then the next. He knew Stefan and whoever he was with would be coming for him soon, and he needed to not be there when they did.
Once he had moved through several buildings, Sawyer climbed up to the first floor. It wasn't hard to figure out he was in some sort of office building. There were a lot of individual rooms with desks and chairs. Even a conference room. The remains of computer parts and other items that had iron in them littered the floor.
He moved to the shattered front windows and peered out into the street. It would be dark soon. The mechs didn't usually hunt at night. They preferred the daytime. Sawyer had never been able to figure out why that was.
He needed to deliver his cargo to the nearest settlement as quickly as possible. Sawyer pulled the mask up over the lower half of his face then the hood up over his hair. It was a pain in the ass to wear this stuff in the summertime, but they were in late fall now. The weather had cooled down enough for him to be marginally comfortable. Come winter, he'd wish for more.
Sawyer kept to the shadows cast by the buildings as he made his way back to where he'd left the people he'd liberated from cryostasis. Most of them had been put under due to the virus that had wiped out half of the human race. He was lucky in the fact that he'd discovered a ready supply of the cure in a lab at the Cheyenne Mountain Complex.
He never quite figured out why the mechs hadn't totally destroyed the lab. It would have made sense if they had. It was easier to decimate the human population if they couldn't get the cure.
But maybe that was the answer. They wanted iron, including the iron in blood. If the humans were dead, they couldn't harvest the iron. If the blood was tainted with the virus, maybe they couldn't harvest it or maybe it wasn't pure enough. That was another question Sawyer didn't have an answer to.
Sawyer moved quickly through the streets. Even though darkness was coming soon, there was still enough light to be spotted if there were any mechs in the area. He always found it odd that mechs preferred to hunt during daylight when they hunted using iron signatures. He would think they would glow bright day or night.
When he reached the building where he'd stashed the people he'd freed from stasis, he searched the street for any signs of hostiles—human or mech—then walked inside. He'd only been able to save three, but that was better than not being able to save any of them.
He shoved the pile of junk he'd propped against the door to the supply closet where he'd hidden them out of the way then pulled the door open. Three frightened people sat huddled in the corner.
"Time to go."
"Where are we going?" the oldest male in the group asked. He'd introduced himself as Ralph Henderson. The young man was his son, Tim. The young woman's name was Fay Conway.
"There's a settlement a couple of hours south of here. It's just outside of Castle Rock. They'll take good care of you."
"We're in Denver, right?" Ralph asked.
Sawyer nodded.
"Castle Rock is more than a couple of hours from Denver, especially if we're on foot." The older man glanced at Tim and Fay. Both looked to be in their late teens or early twenties. "I'm not sure they can make it that far."
"They'll make it." If Sawyer had to carry them the entire way. Rescuing people from the mechs was the easy part as far as he was concerned. Teaching them the ways of the new world was someone else's responsibility.
Sawyer actually did have a plan. These weren't the first people he'd rescued. After he escaped the mechs, and then healed from his injuries, he'd made it his mission to rescue as many people as he could and kill every mech he saw.
He helped everyone to their feet then cautiously looked out into the lobby. The area still seemed secure, so he turned back. "Remember, make as little sound as you possibly can and do everything I tell you to do, even if it seems odd. If those machines you saw catch you, they will kill you."
