Destiny: Quantic Dreams Book 3 by Elizabeth McLaughlin (dark books to read txt) 📕

can see Momma. She’s stepped back into the shadows. She’s all right.” He could be lying through his teeth for all I knew, but it was the right thing to tell me. “Can you feel anything near you that will make some noise, Mom? A rock? A stick? Anything?”

Facing away from the machine city I couldn’t see a thing, so I spread my hands out on the ground. There wasn’t much around us, the ground mostly covered with shrubs and small trees. My fingers brushed something large and solid. A stone.

“Here. Be careful.”

Marcus crawled forward to make his way behind one of the thicker tree trunks. I heard his grunt of effort as he lifted the stone and launched it as far as he could. The projectile managed a lucky hit and I heard a crack a couple hundred meters away. Fortunately, so did the androids, and the beams of light swung away from us. Marcus signaled it was safe to get to my knees and I aimed the muzzle of my gun back towards where Eliza was hiding. We had no way of signaling to her. The smallest flash of light or an audible noise would draw the androids right back to us. I had to trust her. Trust that she knew when it was safe.

For a few moments, nothing happened. Fear flooded my mind and I was certain that Eliza had been discovered. I was getting ready to bolt towards her when her silhouette moved. The androids on their patrol vehicles had finished inspecting the decoy of the stone and had turned around. For one heart-stopping moment I saw Eliza’s form lit bright by headlights and I expected the worst. Incredibly, she passed through and was almost to us when she fell. I heard the shot after I saw it, the bang ringing through the forest where we hid.

“No!” I shot forward, concern for my own safety completely abandoned. I skidded to a halt next to Eliza and bent down. “No, no, no.” The smell of blood made me flash back to the grisly scene in which we found my father’s body. Blood was spreading from her chest, soaking her shirt. Her breath was ragged, but steady. I didn’t bother to take a pulse. The light from the androids’ vehicles was still trained on us and I could hear the roar of the engines. Eliza and I were sitting ducks in the open. More shots rang out, this time coming from the direction of the forest.

“Move her!” Marcus shouted. “Now!” More shots were exchanged between the human and android adversaries. Marcus could only provide covering fire for a couple of seconds. I hooked my arms under Eliza’s armpits and dragged her back toward the tree line.

“Goddamnit woman, you’re not allowed to die on me now. Not when we’re so fucking close to making it out of here.” I puffed, each word a punctuation to my breath. We made it through to the tree line. The second we crossed into shadow Marcus dropped to the ground, hoping to disappear before the androids could pinpoint his position. I ran my hands over Eliza’s chest and torso, searching for wounds, but the only source of the blood was from her shoulder. I took my knife and sliced her shirt open above the wound site. My fingers found the wound. The entry was small. I gestured for Marcus to help me and we turned Eliza on her side. I sliced the shirt on her back too and felt for an exit wound. There was one, the flesh ragged and soaked. Contrary to what you’d think, the fact that the bullet left her body was a good thing. It meant there wasn’t a poisonous piece of metal floating around to do further damage. Marcus bent down and was getting ready to carry Eliza when I heard a deep growl behind me.

“Fuck,” I breathed. I didn’t need to turn around to know where the growl came from. I had heard it once before. “Marcus, don’t move.”

A panther. It must have been attracted by the smell of blood. We were trapped.

“How close is it?” I whispered.

“Hundred feet.” Marcus inched closer to us, moving agonizingly slowly to take his place beside his mother.

“Don’t shoot it, you’ll only piss it off if you miss.” Marcus grunted a reply. He didn’t take kindly to my suggestion that he might not hit the predator.

“Come out humans!” It was Tenzen. The panther turned and ran. I motioned for Marcus to keep his gun trained in the direction it had come from. It may have gone for now, but big game was too rare out here for it to have gone very far.

“Come on Fiona, I know you’re in there. Marcus and Eliza, too. Stand up and walk out with your hands up. Drop the weapons and kick them in my direction.” Shit. I had been too slow.

“Eliza can’t stand,” I yelled back. “She’s been hit.”

“Yes.” I could see Tenzen smirking through the brush. “I’m the one that shot her. Is she dead yet?”

I bit my lip to keep from swearing at him. He held a large rifle at his hip, dangling the muzzle toward the ground. I tapped Marcus on the shoulder. “We have to.” The two of us dropped our guns and threw them at Tenzen’s feet. Standing with our hands up, we emerged from the brush to face the android. I was tired. So tired.

“I have to say, the three of you led us a merry chase while your comrades did that little flyby.” Our comrades? That was strange. Did Tenzen think that the colony had military equipment? Is that why the androids were so cautious around us? “I have to wonder how you got in touch with them. It’s not as if we couldn’t monitor your communications.”

“Good timing, I guess.” Marcus spoke up. He stepped forward, putting himself between me and Tenzen. Behind us, I could hear Eliza moaning as she tried to speak. I could be