The Beyond: Dystopian Survival Fiction (The Breeder Files Book 4) by Eliza Green (most popular novels TXT) 📗

He said, ‘All clear.’

She sighed with relief, but sucked in a new breath when Dom disappeared through the open door. She lunged after him, needing to be his eyes and ears in case this was the trap Carissa had said it was.

She emerged into the bright courtyard. Opposite the stairwell was a large, white building made almost entirely of white panels, intermixed with glass ones. She shielded her eyes against its brightness, still reflective enough to bother her. Dom moved forward.

She hissed at him to wait, but he didn’t listen.

Sheila appeared at her side and tugged on her sleeve.

‘He doesn’t get to have all the fun,’ she said. ‘Come on.’

They raced ahead, not waiting for the others. Dom had stopped at the door to the Learning Centre. He was rattling it, but it wouldn’t budge.

‘Wait!’ one of the soldiers shouted.

Commotion behind her turned her around. The eight Breeders and four young women were running in the direction of the city limits.

Dom said, ‘Let them go. I’m not making them stay.’ He tried the door using his strong arm and grunted. ‘It’s locked.’

His strength wasn’t enough to open it.

Dom looked back and clicked his fingers. ‘Bring the prisoner here.’

One of the soldiers pushed the Copy guard ahead. He stumbled forward, almost hitting the door.

‘Open it,’ Dom barked at him.

‘I don’t have access to every building.’

‘I don’t care. Try it.’

With a sigh, the guard offered his wrist. Dom yanked it closer to the panel next to the glass doors. The panel flashed red.

That’s when Anya saw a flash of movement inside the building. A head bobbed up from behind a counter.

Dom was too busy pressing the Copy’s wrist to the door a second time to notice. Something clicked and the door released suddenly.

‘Dom, wait!’

The words had left her throat, but it was too late. Dom had flung the doors open and was marching inside. New Copies appeared like apparitions from behind counters.

She heard Dom say, ‘Oh shit...’

Someone fired at him. Anya saw red. She charged into the lobby with her gun pointed at any Copy in uniform she saw.

Chaos erupted behind her. She heard the others scramble to take cover.

A whistle followed, then Jacob called out, ‘Rover, come here!’

Anya focused on the scene ahead of her. She scanned the faces of the Copies quickly, looking for one she recognised, one she might be able to reason with. She saw only one repeated four times.

The Collective must be using copies of Copies as shields.

One attacker struck a young boy soldier on the head. The boy went down with a thud. Dom grappled with the gun of a second Copy. Anya fired her Electro Gun at a different one, not wanting to hit Dom. He held the attacker off with his strong arm. Electricity bounced around the space and set her teeth on edge.

She hit one of the Copies. It went down. She hit another. A shot came from somewhere else and whizzed past her head. She ducked. It hit a fifth Copy who had been hiding down a corridor.

‘Sorry,’ said Sheila. ‘Had to act fast.’

Anya straightened up. All five attackers had been incapacitated.

Outside, one of the wolves growled. She looked out to see the others fighting against a second wave of Copies. She rushed outside and added her efforts to take the new threat down. But when she fired, nothing happened. She checked her Electro Gun; it was out of charge.

Anya tossed it away and patted her waistband for her revolver. She couldn’t feel it. It must have fallen out. Cursing, she ran back inside the Learning Centre, plucked up a discarded weapon, checked the charge and made to leave. The sight of someone down one corridor stopped her cold. Dom’s Copy guard had her revolver and was pointing it at the head of one of the soldiers.

Nobody else had noticed him threatening the boy.

‘Step away from him,’ she said, holding her gun to the side.

‘Let me go and you can have him,’ said the prisoner.

His eyes shifted, like he was nervous.

‘There’s nothing out there for you. Where will you go?’

The Copy’s eyes shifted again. ‘To find the Collective.’

‘I thought the group was here.’

He shook his head. ‘The Ten wouldn’t risk staying with the barrier down. They just wanted you to think that. I know how they think.’

She didn’t understand. ‘Why attack us then, if they’re not here?’

‘It was the Collective’s idea. If you thought we were protecting something of value, you would not give up. The Collective wants you to find what it cannot.’

‘Again, that doesn’t explain the show of force. If you needed us here, why try to stop us a second time?’

‘Call it a survival instinct. Originals are disease ridden. We are simply keeping that disease from our doors.’

‘Even though the Collective wants us here?’

The Copy sneered. ‘The Ten aren’t susceptible to your filthy biological germs like we are.’

The guard backed up into a corridor. He shoved the soldier towards Anya. She put her hands up to stop the boy’s momentum. By the time she looked up again, the Copy had disappeared inside a room at the end of the corridor.

She raced after him and jerked the handle down. What she saw sent a chill down her spine. On one wall was an array of screens. In the middle of the room were close to one hundred Copies, all standing, all deactivated.

She searched the room for the Copy guard. A door at the far end opened and closed. She cursed and closed the door with a tight shiver.

Back in the lobby, the fight was under control. Nobody had been injured.

An out-of-breath Dom strode over to her, eyes wild. ‘Where did you go?’

‘The