The Black Tide (Outcast 3)

I slipped around the corner and rose to the ceiling, where the shadows were thicker and there was less chance of guards—hidden or not—sensing my presence.

The entrance into the nursery tunnel was packed with sensors. Two guards stood on either side of the gateway, their expressions bored and stances relaxed. I hesitated, and then sped through the gate, pressing myself flat against the rooftop in an effort to avoid the biggest mass of sensors that lined either side of the tunnel.

No alarm sounded. Relief flowed through me, but it was a fleeting thing. The goddess Rhea might have favored my mission so far, but even she could only extend so much good fortune before the axe fell.

This tunnel, unlike the others, ran straight, and I sped along it, my fear and trepidation increasing the deeper I got.

In the distance, light flared. It wasn’t the puddled yellow lighting that was everywhere else, but rather a bright light that held a bluish tinge. I knew that light. It was the same one they’d used in all the nurseries at my own bunker.

Please, please, don’t let these nurseries be occupied....

The tunnel opened into a small antechamber. There were four metal doors leading off this, and above each was a simple number. There was no indication of what might lie beyond any of them, and all the windows were opaque. There were no cameras, either, and nothing to suggest this place was, in any way, being monitored.

Which was decidedly odd—and rather unnerving. Luck was a fickle thing at the best of times, and Jonas and I had certainly had our fair share of it over the last few days. I couldn't help feeling it was about to run out, and I could only hope that was born of fear and pessimism rather than instinct.

I halted in the shadows and listened for any indication that there was someone nearby. If they were breeding déchet, then there would have to be technicians and doctors here, at the very least, even if the place looked and felt empty.

After a moment, I heard a faint rasp—someone breathing a little too heavily. It came from the darkness hugging the right edge of the antechamber. I reformed my right hand then raised the dart gun and fired.

I waited, my gaze on the antechamber and the doors rather than the shadows. After a minute or so, there was a soft thump as the guard collapsed. Tension knotted my particles as I waited for some kind of reaction, but the silence stretched on, empty of both life and threat.

It shouldn’t have been this easy to raid this place. Not after Sal’s death and the loss of Winter Halo. Even Dream couldn’t be so sure of this place’s location and invisibility that she’d kept security at a minimum rather than ramp it up.

I released the shadows that hid me and regained form as I dropped to the ground. But as I stepped into the light and started to create a light shield, the door to my left slid open and a man stepped out. His gaze swept past me then abruptly returned. “What the hell are you doing here, soldier? This is a restricted area.”

Though he was frowning, his expression was more annoyed than suspicious.

I quickly hid the dart gun behind my back. “I know, but I was ordered to bring this pack down to you. We retrieved it from the rift this morning.”

“This is well outside usual protocol.” His frown deepened as he motioned me forward. “Who gave you the order?”

“Martin.”

“He hasn’t the authority to issue such an order. Give me that pack immediately.”

I stopped and held it out. As he took it, I surreptitiously fired. He must have felt it, because he immediately looked down, but thankfully the dart was hidden within the folds of his coat.

He opened the pack and pulled out the geo-locator. “Why the hell would Martin have sent this down here?”

I shrugged. “I’m just doing what I’m told. If you want answers, you’d best talk to him.”

“And I will. You’re dismissed, soldier.”

He started walking back toward the room, but stumbled and would have fallen had not a second man—this one wearing a white medical coat—caught him as he exited the room.

“What the fuck?” he said. “Soldier, help me get him back into the lab, will you?”

I did. Once I was sure there was no one else in the room, I darted the second man. When he collapsed to the floor, I looked around.

There were no intrauterine devices and no cots in this lab, but my gut nevertheless twisted. It might not be a nursery, but I’d seen the equipment like this before and knew it to be a creations lab—the place where the DNA of tiny embryos was sliced and diced. I walked over to one of the many cryonic cylinders and unlatched the lid. Inside was a veritable test tube forest, all of them cells that could never be allowed to become anything more.

I closed my eyes for a second, the need to destroy the DNA within these tubes before they could become life warring with the knowledge that my main task here had to be uncovering how far along the creation scale these people were. The guards I'd ambushed certainly suggested they'd at least been partially successful in altering life, if not creating it, but lizard men who couldn't breathe without assistance weren't what Dream and her cohorts had been after. They wanted to erase the stain of humanity and shifter from this world. They wanted it to belong to the wraiths and vampires—the two races they now saw themselves as, thanks to rift intervention and at least one of them being a rare vampire survivor. And to do that, they needed a fighting force that could walk without fear in daylight.

But a creations lab generally wasn’t a part of that process as far as I was aware. It was about life—or rather, the manipulation of it. I owed my existence to a lab such as this, but I'd been one of the lucky ones. I'd survived into adulthood, when hundreds, if not thousands, of others had not.

This place—and these cells—had to be destroyed. Had to be. But I had no doubt alarms would sound the minute I took any direct action to either destroy or otherwise interfere with the cylinders. I needed to uncover what other horrors might lie in the remaining laboratories before I decided what action—if any—I took next.