"Death Row 03 - The Avenger" - читать интересную книгу автора (Black Jaid)

A mother could do no less.

* * * * *

Sequestered within the experimental laboratory, Nellie’s wide-eyed gaze continually flicked toward the hungry-looking sub-human partitioned off from her and Dr. Riley by an invisible barrier. She had no idea what the wall was made of, for she’d never seen an invisible one, but her thoughts were too overwhelmed to even consider asking. In the grand scheme of things, the barrier was unimportant. The only thing that currently mattered, she decided, was that it worked.

Her heartbeat quickened as a female sub-human growled low in her throat, trying once again to knock the wall down with her brute strength. Eying Nellie up and down, her red-pupil eyes were dilated and her fangs dripped with saliva in anticipation of a meal. Squatting down upon her powerful thighs, she lunged into the air and toward the wall, howling as she again attempted to shoot through the barricade.

She failed. Nellie shivered.

“They are not demons, lass,” Tara murmured, her eyes unblinking as she watched the sub-human female stare at Nellie, its head cocking. “They are animals, some of them were once humans like you and me.” She turned her head to regard her daughter-in-law. “Try to remember that. It’s easier to command your fright and keep your wits intact when confronted by one if you can remember that.”

Nellie slowly nodded. She nevertheless felt chilled to the bone but she conceded the point. “For how long have you known they could breed?” she whispered.

“Two, maybe three years.” Tara sighed. “When you are virtually alone, removed from everyone that ever mattered to your life, time begins to run together after awhile.” Her voice lowered to a hush. “Pretty soon there is little difference between one year and ten years.”

Silence.

“Why am I here?” Nellie softly asked. “I recognize you, you know. I’ve never forgotten the face of the woman who gave me the journal all those years back. It was you. I know that now.”

“Yes,” Dr. Riley said on a sigh. “Yes, it was.”

“But why?” Nellie shook her head before bodily turning in her direction. “Make me understand. What could you possibly have to gain by involving me, of all people? If you thought I’d know something you didn’t because I was sired by Abdul Kan, you were gravely mistaken. My father keeps his own council, always has.”

Tara’s gaze absently trailed over Nellie’s naked breasts before flicking up to meet her face. “At first I didn’t know why I came to you. A hunch, I guess you could call it.”

Nellie shook her head, not understanding.

“The disease—the infection—is torture. Painful, unadulterated torture. But it does give a human who has not yet totally succumbed to the full force of it one distinct advantage.”

Her eyebrows slowly drew together as she regarded the elder scientist. She stilled as it occurred to her that Tara Riley was, at long last, about to tell her everything. After years of research and questioning Cyrus and whatever other gods lived out beyond this realm, in mere moments she would have her answer as to why—why this terrible thing had come to pass. Why so much suffering.

Why her mother had died.

Nellie’s heart was thumping so heavily against her breasts she felt momentarily dizzy. “And that advantage would be…?”

“A heightened sense of awareness. Heightened instincts, superhuman strength—an elevated…everything.”

Nellie’s green eyes rounded in dawning, horrific comprehension. “That’s what this is all about, isn’t it?” she whispered. The hairs at the nape of her neck were standing on end. “So much death, so much heartbreak and now the threat of our very extinction…”

“And all because some fools in the Hierarchy not satisfied with ruling the whole of the earth wanted to make sure their power never came to an end.” Tara’s intense gaze clashed with her daughter-in-law’s. “They wanted to become superhumans, Nellie, so they began experimenting on prisoners, a population few in society care little to nothing about.”

Nellie’s hand involuntarily flew up to cover her own mouth. Her father was responsible for the infection of all those prisoners—she was certain of it. No other man within the Hierarchy would have had access to so many voiceless men.

“Only thing is, the experiment broke out of control, and what they ended up with instead was a race of sub-humans—creatures that are more animal than man, creatures more powerful than they could ever hope to be.” Her smile was humorless. “Creatures that will wipe them from existence as though they never were. But they are too arrogant and ignorant to realize it.”

So many questions sprang to mind, so many horrible questions that needed answers, but all she could do was stand there in the experimental silver-walled laboratory and stare in awe at Tara Riley. Tara Riley who had fought against all odds to not succumb to the infection—the same Tara Riley who had, at least for now, won.

Suddenly she understood just why the elder scientist had faked her own death. Had the Hierarchy known she had managed to live and fight against the perverse disease, she would have become a caged lab rat—tortured through experimentation, then put to death to silence her forever when they had their answers.