Chapter 5: "I can't fit in."
Gershwin May had come to, awoken from what felt like the umpteenth time of involuntary and voluntary slumber. Each time, the mental strain was getting to her and it was giving her fatigue even after being well-rested, and not having a single tear and wear on her body. Just how much more could she take?
She turned to the sound of steps coming down the stairs. Cody was not here, and Caits was still defenseless. While she should have counted on their hideout being secret, she should not depend on it. Without Cody, she was left to defend the two of them, and getting hurt was not an option. She rushed over to Caits' side, wrapping and covering her with her quilt, and hid to the corner away from the entrance point, hoping for a sneak attack, if anything.
But she couldn't lie to herself: she wanted to run more than defend Caits or herself. She was so tired, so exhausted from something she couldn't control. It was a sigh of almost orgasmic relief when it turned out to be Cody himself that came down the stairs.
She rushed to his side and hugged him, digging her face into his warm body, speaking:
"I was so scared... I can't take this anymore..."
"What was that...?"
Andjela could not understand what had happened that led her to her escape. It was an extremely lucky turn of events that those trees had somehow just been old enough that they decayed and fell right at that opportune moment, and for the snow to have accumulated enough for it to fall. She had not planned any of it to happen, and yet it all did. Everything had just worked out in her favour that it was almost unnatural.
She was perched on a branch atop a tree, still visible to ground level eyes but who would be out in this weather in the first place. She tried her luck in the hopes that the Anomaly target would not follow. It was so against her: to be so terrifically trained to be meticulous and well-planned, only to have relied on
"luck" to escape. It felt shameful. She trembled in anger, in confusion, trying to wonder what had she done wrong, when a bullet had passed right by her, scraping off the bark just beside her head.
It was the search team she was tailing from before. They could not find their Targets to give a damn, but at least she knew they had eyes to see a full-grown woman on a tree.
"Почему ты в меня стреляют? | Why are you shooting at me?"
"Get down from there. Now."
"Не понимаю. | I don't understand."
"Now."
Got down she did, nimble as she was like a squirrel racing to get its hibernation's worth. She was going to feign innocence, but perhaps they fired on her because of her army-grade winter gear. She was out of cover, and out of luck. So much for that.
"Who do you work for?" the leader spoke.
Andjela sighed, annoyed, really, and replied: "You still haven't answered my question of why you shot at me."
"I ask the questions here. You are wearing UN grade uniform but we do not remember you being assigned with us on this expedition. State who you work for."
Andjela was done for. She forgot how many strikes she got for disobedience, and how many strings had to be pulled just for her. Perhaps this was the last straw, and this was going to be it for her. Orders will be relayed back to this ad hoc firing squad to take her out. Agents were made to be anonymous, all records gone. She will not be missed. She could only hope for an escape of the miraculous kind.
Unless...
It was nigh impossible to escape their fire range and accuracy, nothing could prepare her for this. But if luck was on her side before, it might be with her still now. It was inane, childish, ridiculous. But... could it be?
Her left calf tensed, and she jumped to the left. Bullets were fired, but not a single shot hit her. Somehow, almost as if staged, with blind luck, she weaved and dodged each bullet perfectly, something statistically impossible in her circumstances. She continued to jump, flip, and pirouette until they all had to reload. She eyed the closest one to her and unfortunately, the soldier's rifle misfired, and the bullet jammed and exploded in his face. Andjela rolled to his side, and his pistol lock, unlocked, gave her her own weapon.
Never done before, she laid on her back, and fired wildly in a cone in front of her. Bullets curved and managed to his the right spots. The entire team was dead. If it wasn't her own special skills that saved her, it was something else. This was too much to be luck.
Was she becoming the thing she was hunting?
The leader's walkie-talkie sounded, asking for their current status. She picked it up.
"They're all dead."
"What? Who's this?"
"You know me as Andjela Ivanovic, United Nations Agent Programme... But now I go by the name
Destiny"
Maria was right about military control being sent to instate control and order while search and rescue was being conducted on the devastated Pub Street. With the police force as much gone as the popular tourist spot, a higher power needs to step in to make sure everything and everyone gets sorted and progress can be made without much hindrance.
It was the kind of leisure Dara and Thy were not afforded. Where was their rescue when they needed it? Where was the help they needed now when all was lost for them? It was so unfair. They were lost, jealous, and angry. If they couldn't get any help, why should any of the people who got so much more from life? The twins' lives might as well had ended years ago, but they pulled through, only barely. It would have been simple to just go over and take down everything, sink it all to the ground. But they wanted to send fear. They wanted everyone to see what they could not possibly defeat, what they could not handle, what they could not escape.
Pub Street was only ten minutes away, but it was still a way's away. They devised a modus operandi so ingenious, they scared themselves.
Thy gathered himself in the plot of land outside his home, the wreckage of their most recent rampage still present. The ground shifted beneath his feet, and large stones and earth collected into each other. The end result was an enormous Stone Golem, with bulky arms and legs, and hardened rock that was almost bullet- and shatter-proof. Dara's mind reached inside his head and now she shared a consciousness with it. She could see what it could see, but she did not need to control it. It took orders from Dara well, raising his hand, but it behaved like a tamed animal, waiting for cues for action. In the spur of the moment, she felt a presence foreign to her. Four new minds, with inquisitive, malevolent thoughts.
The search team had no idea that they were found, and the next second, they bled from their eyes and ears. The search team had barely started their work and they were gone already.
The Stone Golem marched towards the militarized zone. Heavy footsteps marked its entrance, and people watched, screamed, and ran away from it. People trapped in cars were trampled, and the juggernaut of stone kept rolling. Soldiers held their position and fired onto the thing. Nothing. The Stone Golem wreaked havoc, conventional weapons ineffective against them. Because Dara could see what the Stone Golem could see, she was in a sense also present in Pub Street. She held hands with Thy, and together, they shared its consciousness. Stone Soldiers crawled up from the ground, so humanlike but lacking in certain features that made them so eerie. They marched slowly, but their sheer numbers outnumbered everyone in Pub Street and the surrounding areas of Pub Street. It was now a full-on fight between the two Cambodian Anomalies, and the Humans.
Viccar was watching the news coverage, and he thought to share this videofeed to Ms. Jordan's computer. They were watching the same horrible thing:
A newsreporter was barely standing as the ground shook beneath her. Behind her was the Stone Golem visibly destroying everything in its path, from the constructions, to army vehicles. Nothing was stopping it. Stone Soldiers around it were grabbing people and ripping them apart, and beating them to a pulp.
A man was screaming into the camera, and the UN's instantaneous translator translated his screams:
"That Maria Jordan bitch is a liar! This is no earthquake! This is a full on monster invasion! We are under attack! We need help!" The camera turned violently to the face of a Stone Soldier. Its fist rammed through the screen. The footage was cut.
Viccar slammed the door open.
'Siem Reap is under attack, we assume by the twins. The search team barely got to do anything and they were taken down. The search team in Russia looking for our three Targets are not responding, and there was a voice on their end. It's Russia's own Agent, Andjela Ivanovic. She said she's now going by the name Destiny.'
After a slew of bad news, he gave the one good news he thought might be helpful.
'We found the Three Targets however. Satellite-imagining and tracing back old records showed us a Soviet-era bunker, the only one in the large region. They must be there. There is internet connection there that we can hack and access.'
'Perhaps, ma'am: we could talk to them.'
