novelraw Chapter 426: A Little Late
Chapter 426: A Little Late
The first breath of outside air hit Zubair like opening an oven in winter.
It wasn’t hot enough to burn, but it carried a stale, baked taste that clung to the back of his throat and made everything taste... off.
After hours in recycled underground air, the sky felt huge and wrong. Wrong enough to make both him and his creature to wrinkle their noses.
The hatch refused to close behind them given the fact that it was not much more than soft metal clinging to what it used to be.
Zubair didn’t turn around. The facility was dead. Whatever remained under their feet belonged to rust and pathogen now. He didn’t bother to hold back the smirk on his face... the Director and the others fought so hard against disease...
Only to be completely conquered by it.
He looked briefly at the creature called Aerenyx. He didn’t know what it meant for him... whether he would lose himself completely to the creature inside of him or not.
But if it meant power like that...
Was it really a bad thing?
Shaking his head, he snapped himself out of his thoughts and returned his attention to the situation at hand.
Region T’s surface didn’t look like it had been bombed. It looked like someone had pressed a pause button, freezing everything in place.
Cars sat at warped angles along the cracked street, some with doors ripped open, others neatly parked as if their owners had simply stepped out for a minute and never returned. Sun-faded signs hung crooked over storefronts advertising supplies no one could buy anymore.
But no matter where he looked, there wasn’t a single person. No movement. No nothing.
Only the feeling of being watched from countless angles.
Sera stepped forward first, as she always did when there was a new world to look at. Luci padded close to her thigh, his fur bristling just enough to show he felt the wrongness too. Somehow, some way, he managed to find Sera even after everything that happened.
Like not even disease dared to touch the dire wolf.
Aerenyx moved at Sera’s other side, his posture loose and amused, like the world had finally become interesting again.
Alexei and Lachlan fell in behind them, and Zubair naturally drifted to Sera’s left flank.
He always ended up there when there was open space. It put him between whatever came from the street and the center of his pack. His creature stretched under his ribs, tasting the air like it wanted to bite it.
The sky is too large. Too exposed. We are too exposed. Burn the world down to something manageable.
’Can’t burn the world,’ Zubair thought back. ’Focus on what we can reach.’
The heat inside him sulked but quieted. The creature liked solvable problems. Open air was not one of them.
They moved down the street at an unhurried pace.
It wasn’t a march and it wasn’t a stalk.
It was something in between, a predator’s walk that said they had nowhere specific to be and all the time in the world to get there. It also said nothing that tried to stop them was going to do it twice.
Most of the windows they passed were dark. A few had curtains drawn tight, fabric stiff with dust and time. On one porch, a chair was tipped over beside a cup that had fossilized into whatever liquid it once held. On another, a child’s toy truck sat half off the step, frozen mid-fall.
Lachlan’s eyes flicked toward a second-story window with a sliver of movement behind the blinds. "They’re in there," he muttered. "Holding their breath."
Alexei’s gaze followed, cold and precise. "Watching to see if we pass by or pull them out."
Zubair listened. Not for voices, not for footsteps. For breathing. The quiet wasn’t empty. It was packed with people trying to reduce themselves to silence. The weight of that many held breaths made the street feel crowded even when it was bare.
His creature bristled. Prey that hides thinks it can choose when to be seen. Light them up. Make them honest.
’No burning houses full of kids just because you’re bored,’ Zubair replied. ’We’re not here to cleanse anything.’
The creature crackled in annoyance, but it didn’t push harder. It cared about Sera’s opinion almost as much, if not more, than his.
Scaring her was one thing it would never suggest.
Sera stopped at the first intersection and tilted her head. She didn’t look up at the sky, or down at the ground. She listened to the street like it was whispering to her. Luci’s ears pricked forward, jaws parting in a silent huff of air.
"There are soldiers here," Sera said. "Not far."
Zubair heard them a second later... the boots on pavement. Five sets. Trained rhythm, not a panicked run. Somewhere one street over, a patrol moved with the steady pace of people who still believed their orders meant something.
Aerenyx smiled faintly, eyes drifting in that direction. "Of course there are soldiers," he murmured. "You don’t build a cage this big and leave the door unattended. That would let all the little mice run away."
They turned toward the sound, Sera making the choice without asking.
The men adjusted around her in a small, automatic shift, tightening into a loose diamond with her at the heart. Aerenyx didn’t move out of the formation. He fit himself into it without hesitation, like he’d been walking with them for years.
Zubair’s creature hated that. He walks like he belongs. He hasn’t earned that right yet.
’Then we wait until he proves he doesn’t,’ Zubair answered. ’If Sera doesn’t object, then we will not object.’
Region T’s sky sat low and gray, with clouds thick enough that the light couldn’t decide what it wanted to be. It wasn’t day and it wasn’t night, just a washed-out in-between that made the edges of buildings blur.
They reached the corner and saw the patrol.
Five soldiers in ash-colored armor moved down the cross street, rifles slung but ready. Their masks and filters were intact and their visors polarized against exposure.
These weren’t scavengers or deserters. These were active, disciplined CDC ground forces, still running a playbook that belonged to a different world.
They saw Sera first and then they stopped.
Rifles rose in near-perfect unison. Their formation tightened into a shallow arc, between the group and the more distant buildings where civilians hid. They’d been trained to be a wall, and Zubair could see that they were trying to remember just how to do that.
"Hands where we can see them!" the lead soldier called. His voice was tense but not hysterical. "You’re in a controlled zone. Identify yourselves."
Zubair felt fire curl around his fingers, not quite visible yet, but waiting for his call. His heart didn’t speed up. His breathing didn’t change. The threat wasn’t immediate, but it was real. Guns were still guns, even if they hadn’t done much against them lately.
Sera didn’t lift her hands.
She didn’t posture either.
She simply looked at them.
Aerenyx stepped just enough into her peripheral orbit that his arm brushed against hers. He didn’t move like he was shielding her. He moved like he wanted to be next to her when things got interesting.
"You’re going to want to drop those," Aerenyx said lightly.
The lead soldier flinched, just slightly. "If you advance, we are authorized to fire. All civilians should be contained in their homes. We are in lockdown. If you chose to go against the rules laid out, we will take action."
Lachlan chuckled under his breath. "They always say that like it makes a difference."
Alexei’s eyes never left the rifles as he casually shrugged his shoulders. "It works... until it doesn’t."
Zubair watched Sera’s reaction more than he watched the men.
Her shoulders were loose, her posture casual, but her focus was sharp. She looked at the soldiers the same way she looked at new terrain—assessing stability, edges, possible fractures.
"Is that the reason why the street is empty?" she asked.
The question wasn’t what the lead expected. His aim wavered for a fraction of a second. "Ma’am, that’s not—"
"Is it?" she repeated, her face remaining somewhat impassive.
"I’ve explained it before. You are all supposed to be in shelter," he said. "Quarantine protocol. You shouldn’t be out here either. If you’ve come from beyond the wall then you are contaminated. We have orders to bring any survivors in for processing."
Zubair’s creature hissed. Processing. Listen. They still use lab words.
’Yes,’ Zubair thought. ’They do.’
Aerenyx’s grin widened just enough to show teeth. "You’re a little late for processing," he said. "Your Director is a puddle... and not an attractive one at that."