Hotbloods, Coldbloods, and the Creatures In Between

Prologue: Victoria

"What can you see? Where are they taking us?" The little voice asked.

"Us?" I murmured. "You're not going anywhere. None of you are." Streetlights flashed through the small, triple paned, bulletproof windows at the top of transit vehicle. The driver hit a pothole and the back of my head slammed into the barely padded, steel wall. The three guards assigned to escort me jumped when my chains rattled. I pass one a curious glance. "You're afraid of me?" I ask him. He raises his chin and looks forward in a desperate attempt to appear stoic. "I'm sorry." I reply to his silence and my voice turns to a whisper, "I don't want to scare anyone."

"He just wants to make it through the night." Another voice says, decisively male. Old, and confident. "I've seen the look of fear on a man when he's worried he's going to die. I've made that face."

"Because you're dead." I whisper to the old and confident voice.

"Crazy bitch." Another guard mumbles under his breath and fingers the trigger of his assault rifle.

"He's in a panic. He's going to die first." The old and confident voice says.

"No one's going to die," I whisper back, and the guard grips his rifle firmly, pulling it close to his chest.

The four of us in the back of the transit shift towards the front as it slows to a quick stop. "They're here, Vikki. They're here for you." The little voice says. My heart pounds as I count the seconds, waiting for the transit to accelerate. To start moving again. The transit walls were steel, wrapped in layer upon layer of foam, so thick that the ride had been silent; the road noise all but completely eliminated. Until the sound of exploding bullets pierce the transit's sound barrier and my guards release their buckles then stand. Their eyes race from side to side, up and down the walls, like cats listening for mice.

The one in a panic drops his weapon and climbs on the bench he was sitting on, and looks out the window, his warm breath quickly fogs the glass. His eyes widen and he takes a deep breath before turning to tell the rest of us to get down. Before I can lay flat on the bench, a large metal spear rips through the side of the transit and skewers the guard. He gasps, reaches for the spear, as if he could persuade it to release him. A threatening hiss fills the transit; a purple, mist seeps from the end and sides of the perforated spear.

"Gas masks!" The other guard shouts and reaches under his bench. The guard I had scared, shook as he pressed the oxygen mask to my face, snapping the elastic around my head to secure it. He reaches for his throat, before his eyes roll into the back of his head and seizures to the floor with a violent thump. He saved my life instead of his own.

The last remaining guard passes his comrades a sympathetic glance only for a moment and washes away the fear that he'll meet a similar fate. A series of explosions erupt outside the transit, followed by a blinding flash, leaves me disoriented. Once I blink away the trauma, the back of the transit is open; the door hangs off mutilated hinges stained black by the explosives. The last guard drops to his knees, and then onto his face, as blood seeps out of the bullet hole in his neck.

"Victoria Patten. You are hard. To. Find." A voice says. I know this voice. I loathe this voice.

"Bradley." I gasp, as the boy barely old enough to be called a man, steps through the smoke and into view. His face is scared, where a creature cut through the side of his nose, underneath his right eye, and down his cheek. An ugly scar to match his ugly soul. "What are you doing?"

"I'm taking you with me." He says as he drops the empty clip from his pistol with a clatter.

"You're mad. I'd rather be locked in a concrete cell under the watchful eye of our government. Where you can't buy your way to me." I rest my back against the steel wall.

"He's going to take us! Don't let him take us!" The little voice cries desperately. I listen for the calming, confident voice, but I hear nothing. Even he is scared.

"I'm staying here." I say calmly as I try to block out the multiplying cries of terror. My hands grip my chains. They're going to have to break my arms and drag me out.

"Well, I can't." Bradley says. "I just killed four government agents and I'm on a schedule."

"Four?" I turn to Bradley just in time to see him pull his pistol's slide back with a click, load a bullet into the barrel and aim it at the guard that saved my life from the gas. The knockout gas. "Five." His body jolts from the impact and I can feel his soul part with his body in a violent farewell. I hear his cries in the distance and it breaks me of my composure. "Leave." I growl, tears rolling off my cheeks.

"Schedule." Bradley sings as two of his fellow, hired mercenaries enter the transit and pull me to my feet by the chains I hold tightly to my chest.

The voices I hear are busy, they whisper, thenshout, then scream, as their power surges through me. Like a plugged sink,overflowing with water, I let it consume me.