Twisted Metal Heart - Eve Langlais Page 0,33

if he did? It might be even more dangerous.

Don’t be afraid.

Easy for this metal parts to say. The fleshy part of him could still be hurt.

He stepped into the room and eyed each side. The light on his goggles could only penetrate so far. He knew these hangars were about two hundred paces across. Tiny when you had almost fifty people with their junk and everything living in it. Massive when you were all alone in the ominous dark.

He stepped farther into the bunker, the silence pressing on him, the weight of it making him tense his jaw. I am not afraid of the dark.

A lie. He hated it. Had since his parents stuffed him in that little compartment, the one where he could breathe only through the tiny hole drilled into it. The reinforced box ensured no one knew he was inside. It didn’t prevent him from hearing his father die.

He heard the cry of pain and shock every time the darkness got too heavy and closed in.

He lifted his chin. He wouldn’t let it defeat him. His steps sounded loud as he crossed, the thump-clump muffled instead of echoing as he’d expect. The hairs on the back of his neck rose to fine, quivering points.

He glanced behind him and saw only a wall of darkness. Literally. The door to the room had disappeared because something covered it. Something that made no sound and didn’t show even the glint of eyes, teeth, or limb.

Now was not the time to remember the story of ghosts that liked to eat the unwary.

He ran for the main hangar door. He might not be able to open the large door, but he could certainly manage the smaller portal set inside it.

Not a single sound joined that of his pounding feet, and yet his gut knew danger reared behind him. Coiled over him like a serpent, ready to pounce and sink its teeth. Or coil around and crush him. He’d seen that happen once. Poor Uncle Leroy. Went for a piss without his gun.

Titan, however, had a weapon. He pulled it with his flesh hand and aimed over his shoulder. The missile didn’t make any kind of noticeable impact.

He’d just about reached the door, which had a pile of bodies in front of it. A taunting pile of bones with skulls balancing at the top.

Indicating no exit or meant to skew hope?

He ran for them, knowing if this hangar followed the design of others, then the door was hidden behind the pile. The bones scattered as he plowed into them, sending them in all directions, the dried sticks making a racket that would draw attention. Who cared about the noise when it revealed the portal he sought was welded shut.

“Are you fucking kidding me?” he yelled, slamming his fist against it.

He whirled and perused the darkness, a gloom even the goggles couldn’t penetrate. He couldn’t fight a shadow, but when it enveloped him, he tried. He choked, the miasma of darkness clinging to his flesh, and he opened his mouth to scream, only the shadow slipped inside his mouth, down his throat, choking him.

Idiot. Close your mouth.

Why bother? It was too late.

We don’t give up.

His metal leg was the one to pivot and flip him around, and he hammered at the welds, his bionic fist smashing into the seams over and over. He didn’t expect it to actually do anything until the door tweaked and a sliver of light entered.

Hissssss.

Less the sound of the living fizzling and more that of something sizzling. The pressure on him eased as the darkness that sought to kill him retreated.

“You don’t like that, do you?” he muttered.

Encouraged, he kept striking the door, bending it and then prying at it, noticing how the gloom at his back kept reaching for him and turning to mist. He wrenched an opening large enough to slip through and tumbled into daylight. The thick scrub he landed face first in was the most welcome thing he’d ever seen. He rolled onto his back and would have smiled if he didn’t see the darkness oozing from the opening he’d created, hitting the light and turning into white fog.

Whatever that thing was, it didn’t like daylight. No surprise. Many of New Earth’s most dangerous denizens were strongest at night.

He coughed, and smoke burst from his lips. Rolling to his hands and knees, he heaved and choked as the mist that had entered him was expelled and dissipated. Hopefully leaving no lasting effect.

Getting to his feet,