Invasion
As Jamie reached Sabin, Cadence switched their primary vision setting to her so she could get the information as quickly as possible. She assumed everyone else on the team likely did the same thing. Since they both spoke French, however, it took a bit longer for Cadence to understand the message.
“Holland is on her way,” Aaron explained, his translating slightly faster than the IAC.
“Where did you learn to speak such fluent French?” she asked, her smile showing that she was impressed.
“France,” he replied smartly. “I lived here for a while. A long time ago.”
That made sense with what he’d told her earlier about Eifel. She couldn’t help but blurt out, “How old are you anyway?” as she continued to survey the crowd. She had been wanting to ask for a long time but never had. This might not be the best time or place, but she really wanted to know.
“That’s a little rude,” he teased. He had his hand resting on her shoulder now, continuing with the façade that they were a couple. The time for kissing had passed, unfortunately, the moment Sebastian showed up.
“It just boggles my mind that you look like you’re in college, and you’re like, a hundred and fifty,” she commented, her eyes continuing to fly through the faces in the crowd.
“That’s a good guess. Let’s go with that,” he replied, giving her shoulder a gentle squeeze.
Why wouldn’t he just tell her? The idea that he was probably older than 150 since he hadn’t been offended by her guess made Cadence’s eyes widen.
But there was no time to discuss it at the moment. Suddenly, she realized her heart rate was increasing. She started to have an unusual sensation in the pit of her stomach, almost as if her insides were itching. Cadence had never felt anything like this before, but she knew what it meant. “Aaron,” she said, grabbing his arm, “She’s coming all right.” The feeling that doom was about to walk in the door had her pulse racing. “And she’s bringing Armageddon with her.”
“What?” he asked.
But she didn’t have time to answer. There was a brilliant flash of white light and the front doors of the club came crashing open, a chilling wind blowing in so furiously, club goers were knocked to the ground and strewn about like flower petals in a storm. The music abruptly stopped, the lights flickered, and then, there she was, standing in the entryway to the dance floor, the crowd parting in haste to make way. Her flowing white dress illuminated in the lights from the dance floor lending a sense of irony as she resembled an angel, long red tresses billowing in the wind. “You want me? Here I am. Come get me!” She turned and looked straight at Cadence, her long, bony finger beckoning in her direction.
The crowd stood petrified with fear as Holland’s legion filled the area around her. There must have been at least fifty of them, if not more. Cadence glanced back at Aaron. Bad intel, once again.
“We got this.” Cadence blasted to the entire team.
“You sure?” Aaron whispered next to her. He looked concerned, which should’ve concerned her.
But thoughts of Drew came to her mind, and anger flooded her system. Cadence nodded, pulling the Berettas from behind her back. She knew they were grossly outnumbered, but the Vampires had no weapons while they had semi-automatic rifles. Perhaps more importantly, they had Cadence, and she was pissed.
Unfortunately, the Vampires had chosen to take this fight out in public where there was a pretty good chance dozens of humans would be injured or killed. Even as this thought crossed her mind, the Vampires began to shriek, something Cadence took as a sign they were about to attack. Their faces contorted, exposing their spike-like teeth, their talon-clad fingers ready to slice through anyone they came into contact with.
As the Vampires charged into the crowd, the humans began to panic. The Compliant Vampires were suddenly forced to choose a side, predator or prey. Many of them instinctively chose to go along with the rest of their Passel and Cadence turned her head slightly to see a man sinking his teeth into his date. She trained her weapon on him and fired. Though it was too late for the woman who now had a gaping hole in her neck, at least this particular villain would not have a second victim.
Elsewhere, the previously clubbing humans were screaming, trampling each other, trying to find the closest exit. The Vampires were fighting through the crowd, spreading out, attempting to get to the Hunters. The Hunters and Guardians were limited to using their Berettas because the Glocks might kill the humans. Nevertheless, the room was illuminated in bursts of silver-blue light as the LSI searched out target after target.
Cadence had only one objective, and she didn’t have time for the stairs. Placing one hand on the railing, she swept her legs over the railing and felt a rush of air as she bounded toward the floor. The two story drop seemed like nothing. She was like a child jumping off the bottom step of a stairwell. A quick glance told her that Aaron was shaking his head in disbelief and calculating whether or not he could follow. She grinned at him and, after a second’s hesitation, he bounded after her, though his landing was a bit rougher.
Through her IAC, she saw Eliza belting for the staircase.
Trusting her aim, Cadence replaced one of the Berettas in its holster and pulled a Glock out of her right hip holster. The hell with protocol at this point; she could take out more Vampires faster with the handgun. She was heading toward Holland, but she was picking off Vampires right and left as she went.
Stormy was also proving why it was worth it to have her difficult ass around. Christian and Jamie had been assigned to cover her, though Jamie had been stuck in the back with Sebastian when the altercation had first started. He had rushed through the crowd as quickly as possible, considering he was swimming upstream, to get back to his station. Yet, neither one of them were able to add much protection for Stormy as she engaged Vampire after Vampire either at close proximity or with her guns. All they could do to assist was try to take out some of her peripheral attackers before she had the opportunity.
Cadence couldn’t pay too much attention to the others as she made her way toward Holland, but it was nice to know Stormy was there.
Chantal and Genevieve had also joined the engagement, procuring weapons from members of the French team. They appeared to work well together and were managing to take out quite a few bloodsuckers. Sabin was fighting her way toward them, the three of them obviously preferring to work together.
Cadence smiled. They were making her job easier.
She was going to take out Holland.
