Jayden offered up an idea. “Let’s burn that damn place to the ground.”
Personally, I’d love to see the Hive burn, but Carter shook his head. “No. They’ll be on high alert. Snipers in every window. We won’t get close enough to the Hive. The vampires may not be trained like ash, but they are strong and have an arsenal that would put the Marines to shame. You won’t get within five hundred feet without losing your head. Not now. They’re expecting it.”
Fuck. Not to mention our ash buddies were still inside.
I met his gaze. “Then what?”
He started to pace. “I’m guessing eighty percent of them were in the celebration of new blood and feeders. They will be cured, eventually. The other twenty percent won’t go down without major bloodshed. Lock down the humans, martial law, curfew, the whole bit. Then we go in and fight them old-school. Like the culling, give them everything we got.”
Kyle spoke up again, his eyes trained to a second laptop he had open. “Vampires have warnings going out to all the Hives now. Looks like this bitch is gonna get ugly.”
I swallowed roughly. “Did any of them get cured?” Please tell me that my father was right, that at least eighty percent were knocked out. Vampire numbers were nothing on humans, so we’d have a chance if a good lot ingested the cure.
Kyle typed a few times, and finally glanced my way. “I’ve interrupted the alerts for now. They think they’re sending it out into the world, but it’s just staying on their particular server.” He paused, seeming to be choosing his words. “Sanctum is updating me; they believe that a good percentage of the vampires, in all Hives, have partaken of the cure blood. In some places the change to human is already kicking in. Thankfully, by the time they’ve fully changed back to human, the majority will have taken the cure.”
He flicked his head across to Becca, standing in Sam’s shadow, who had barely stepped two foot from her. “Whatever you put in the cure serum to speed up the process is really working. In fact, it’s much faster than we anticipated, which is why New York is already going crazy. Their celebrations started a few hours ago, and already vampires are showing signs of humanity.”
Becca paled, stepping around Sam to see the footage better. “Crap! I’m sorry. I thought it would be better to get the cure acting straight away on them all. I thought I’d calculated the right amount of time so that no one would notice until all had time to drink.”
She looked devastated, her eyes running across the footage again and again. Stepping over, I took her hand. “This is not your fault. This is war, girl, and there are always casualties in war. We’re trying our best to free humans from the control of these assholes. We have to stay strong now, and go and do our best to save them all.”
Ryder’s cell rang then, and all of us fell silent as he answered it on speaker.
“Ryder here. Talk to me.”
Blue Eye’s voice came through loud and clear. “Red alert, Ryder. The cure is working, but as we suspected the small numbers who did not drink, or noticed early, are out on the streets trying to turn humans. Build their numbers back up.” He sounded harried, but not crazy pissed or anything.
“We saw the New York footage,” Ryder said. “We’re about to suit up and hit Portland Hive before they can get to the humans.”
“I’m on my way there too. I already have men stationed there, on standby. The other Hive cities are quiet so far, and I have people in place to handle any that get out of control. The international ones have required me to call on their local law enforcement. All have been more than willing to help. Hopefully when the dust settles, the Hives will no longer be there. I’ll check in with you over the next few hours, but for now, things are as good as we could expect. Head to Portland if you feel you must. I’ll see you there.”
He hung up before any of us could say another word, but a small sliver of hope flickered in my belly. It had worked, sort of. Most of the vampires were being cured right now, and the Special Forces were going to try and contain and cure the others.
“He’s right,” Kyle said. I could see the New York footage had changed again. There were SWAT and Special Forces all over the streets, their fatigue and camo gear distinctive. Shouts and fighting. Vampires were still trying to rip the humans to pieces, but the moment they stopped to feed, they were shot up with AT20 and the cure.
Carter was already striding toward the door. I dashed across and stopped him. “You can’t come with us, Dad. You’re a vampire. No one will tell the difference now between good and bad vamps. You’ll be targeted.”
Silver eyes swirled crazily, and I had to look away. Too easy to fall into those mesmerizing depths and I needed a clear head for this argument. “Charlie, sweetheart, I want to be cured. I want a human lifetime with your mother … and you. I want us to be a family. I’m not afraid of the cure, and if you think I’m letting you go out there without me, you’re sadly mistaken.”
Well, shit, when he put it like that…
“No, you stay here and keep Mom, Jayden, and Becca safe.”
He narrowed his eyes on me and I returned the gesture. I knew we looked similar, and I wondered how much of his virus blood had actually shaped me during my development in the womb. Like he was actually my blood father in some ways, after all.
“Sweetheart,” my mom said, interrupting our epic stare-off. “I would feel much better if Carter was there to keep an eye on you. We’ll be safe here. There are no vampires in this area, and there’s no reason for them to leave Portland. They’re trying to take their city back.”
I huffed, crossing my arms over my chest. “Fine, you can come, I guess.”
Markus snorted then, and that set off a chain reaction of chuckles from the rest of the enforcers. Even Carter cracked a smile, before hugging me again.
“Thank you for the permission, daughter.”
“Uh, and I’ll be coming too, BAFF, unless you want to throw down ash style right now.” Jayden had untangled himself from Oliver long enough to hear about him staying behind. “You and Oliver are my family. Not to mention the rest of these meatheads. I’ll be there keeping your backs safe. Don’t even try to stop me.”
I sighed again. “Can’t keep you assholes safe, nope. No one listens to Charlie.”
Jayden gave me the perfect single raised eyebrow. He was an expert at the WTF expression. “How about you stay here, girlfriend. I’d like to know you’re safe for once, instead of gallivanting around like you’re bulletproof and shit.”
