Then the ground shakes. Not an explosion. Not the sharp concussive punch of something detonating. Something heavier and more continuous,like a weight distribution problem being solved in real time somewhere close by.
Colt's arm sweeps across my path, and we both stop. Ahead, a burning section of the upper floor releases from the building above it and descends in a slow, committed arc across the street. It hits with a sound that bypasses my ears and registers directly in my chest. A wave of heat follows, and the air pressure of something large moving fast.
Exactly where we would have been. Exactly where we were, thirty seconds ago, before going left. The silence after it has a texture.
I look at the burning beam now blocking the street.
"Okay," I say.
"Yeah," he says.
We stand there for approximately two seconds, both of us doing our own private version of processing that. Then he pulls me sideways, and we find a route around it through a gap between two collapsed sections, single-file, his hand on my shoulder now instead of my wrist, guiding without gripping. I note the difference in precision as I’ve been tracking the evolution of how he touches me since this whole thing started.
The gap opens into what was a courtyard. Enclosed on three sides by buildings in varying states of structural commitment. The fourth side is open to the next street, providing the kind of sightline that enables decision-making.
Colt stops.
I stop.
We both scan.
The courtyard has been used recently, by the evidence of it. Cleared paths through the debris, certain sections of cover positioned in ways that don't happen naturally. Someone made decisions in this space about howto move through it safely. Whether that someone is still nearby is the relevant question.
"This place hasn’t been empty long," I murmur.
"No," he says with a shake of his head.
"Survivors or something else?"
He does a careful read of the far entrance.
"Survivors arrange spaces differently than…" He pauses, "the other kind."
"The other kind being whatever made those marks in the facility walls," I observe quietly.
"Among other things," He glances at me out of the corner of his eye, "yes."
I add,among other things, to my list of things to get more information about when we're not actively navigating multiple simultaneous threats. The roar again. This time it's not directionally unclear.
South. Close enough that the sound has weight. Colt moves immediately, pulling me down and forward simultaneously, behind a section of steel beam that's lodged at an angle against what remains of a load-bearing wall.
The position puts his back against the beam and his chest against my back and his arm around my waist and his chin approximately level with the top of my head. His scent is at a concentration level that my nervous system has escalated to a five-alarm situation. His heartbeat is against my spine. Fast and controlled.
I focus on that. The steadiness of it. My own heart is doing something more complicated. The creatures move into the far end of the courtyard.
There are three of them. I look at them the way I looked at the claw marks. They move on two legs, but the gait is wrong, the weightdistribution forward in a way that suggests the spine has been modified or the center of gravity has shifted.
They’re larger than humans in every dimension. The eyes catch the firelight from the burning street behind us and reflect it back in a way that eyes aren't supposed to. Someone engineered those. I am not entirely surprised. I am significantly unsettled, however.
Colt's arm tightens around my waist, and I feel him check his rifle. A single small motion, confirming without committing.
"Three," I breathe.
"I know."
"The one on the left is favoring its right side. Injured or compensating."
A pause.
