Domination (A C.H.A.O.S. Novel) - By Jon Lewis Page 0,47

and saw the alien as it writhed on the ground, kicking and moaning.

“Where are these things coming from?” Oz shouted.

“Doesn’t matter, as long as we exterminate them,” Pierce said. “You know what they say—the only good alien is a dead alien.”

“I told you never to say that again,” Colt said, watching for Glyph’s reaction from the corner of his eye.

“Whatever.”

Please, tell them to stop shooting.

It was Jonas, and somehow he was using mindspeak. Are you a . . . Colt couldn’t even finish the sentence. Had Jonas been a Thule all this time, or had a shapeshifter killed the real Jonas and replaced him?

They aren’t the enemy, they’re just frightened, Jonas said.

A claw with razor talons raked across his mask, and Colt lashed out with the butt of his rifle, catching the alien on the side of the head. It fell in a motionless heap, green blood issuing from its earhole.

A swarm of Thule brought Glyph to the ground, and angry claws fought to remove his armor. One of the aliens grabbed Ethan’s assault rifle and snapped it in half. Stacy was backed against a tree as three Thule closed in, their mouths agape and forked tongues licking the air.

Pierce stood over one of the Thule, his boot on its neck and the barrel of his gun pointed at its head. “You’re even uglier up close than you are in pictures,” Pierce said as the alien writhed, all six hands lashing against his armor.

“No!” Colt shouted.

Pierce turned his head to look at Colt, and the Thule’s tail wrapped around his rifle before it ripped it out of Pierce’s hands and flung it into the trees.

“I’m going to kill you!” Pierce pulled out his handgun as the alien morphed into a boy who couldn’t have been much older than eight years old.

“Please, mister. Don’t shoot me.”

As Jonas watched, his face contorted with rage. His skin bubbled like water on a stove. Bones cracked. His eyes turned gold and his teeth became pointed. His armor broke at the seams, falling away as his chest expanded and his shoulders widened. The boy they knew was gone and all that remained was a Thule.

Jonas threw his head back and screamed, the sound echoing across the frozen landscape as he charged at Pierce. His tail undulated and his hands flexed as he raised his arms to strike. Pierce fired his gun, but the bullets bounced off Jonas’s scaled hide as though they were nothing more than beanbags.

“I always knew you were a freak!”

Jonas knocked the gun from his hand and wrapped his fingers around Pierce’s neck. With a cry he lifted Pierce off the ground, his eyes filled with madness as Pierce kicked and scrapped, trying to break free.

“That’s just about enough of that.” A tall man wearing a wide-brimmed hat and a brown jacket with a gold star stepped out from the tree line. His voice was calm, but he was carrying a shotgun with blue sparks dancing across the barrel like miniature bolts of lightning.

“I’m not going to tell you again, Jonas.”

As Jonas turned to look at the man, his top lip curled back in a snarl. “But, Sheriff, he was going to kill Ezekiel.”

“He didn’t, though, so why don’t you do as I say? Put the boy down and let’s talk.”

“Jonas . . . is that you?” A second man emerged from the shadows, this one short and heavyset.

“Dad?”

: :

CHAPTER 33 : :

Sheriff Sutherland didn’t say a word as he drove through the winding country roads that led to the heart of Sanctuary, West Virginia.

According to the clock on the dashboard, it was just after 2:00 a.m. Colt sat in the back of the squad car with Danielle while a trail of sheriff ‘s deputies followed with the rest of Phantom Squad, including Jonas, who had transformed back into his human form. He’d wanted to drive into town with his dad, but the sheriff wouldn’t allow it.

Danielle’s eyes were dilated, her breathing shallow, and she was biting her fingernails.

“It’s going to be okay,” Colt said as he reached over and took her hand, but when he saw the sheriff staring back at them in the rearview mirror, he wasn’t sure.

Thud. Thud. Thud.

They drove over a bridge that spanned a wide river where the water rushed over rocks before it disappeared around the bend. Trees with naked branches sprouted from the banks, and in the distance they could see a church steeple silhouetted against the half moon. They passed an elementary school and