muzzle. Its breath was rancid, like roadkill that had been left to decay in the sun.
Its eyes narrowed as it sniffed the air. “Yes,” it said. “You are the one Koenig has been searching for. You are the Betrayer.”
Colt’s chest heaved as adrenaline washed over him. Euphoria. Power. The crucial need to protect the people around him. He struck the Thule in its injured eye, and it staggered but didn’t fall. Its tail pounded the ground, breaking the floorboards.
The Thule picked up four chairs and hurled them at Colt, who covered his face with his arms. Wood shattered upon impact, and when it was over Colt stood there, dumbfounded. He should have felt pain. He should have been knocked over. It didn’t make sense.
A grotesque smile spread across the alien’s lips. “My name will be praised after I kill you.”
Faster than Colt could react, it reached out and took his throat with one hand while two others wrapped around his shoulders. Another tried to rake across his face, but Colt grabbed it by the wrist and twisted. There was a pop, and the Thule howled as its hand went limp.
Enraged, it hefted Colt off the ground, but Colt struck the nerve cluster under its arm, and it dropped him. It lashed out with its claws, but Colt sidestepped, grabbed a chair, and smashed it over the Thule’s head. Wood splintered, and Colt rammed what was left of the chair leg through the alien’s gullet. It cried out in pain as it fell.
Colt looked at Oz, lying still on the floor, and emotion washed over him. “Are you dead?” Colt asked.
Oz opened one eye. “What do you think, McAlister?”
: :
CHAPTER 39 : :
Colt led Oz and Danielle back down the stairs and through the foyer to a set of glass doors, where they caught up with the rest of Phantom Squad. But they all stopped short when they saw a Tracker standing in the parking lot.
Covered in what looked like reclaimed metal from German panzer tanks, it was thick and lumbering, with a gun turret in place of a head and two spotlights mounted to its chest. One arm was an actual cannon, the other a claw that it used to pick up a car and throw it at the school.
“Get down!” The wall shook and glass cracked as Colt shielded Danielle.
“That thing has to be thirty feet tall.” Pierce reached as though he was going to push the door open, but Oz pulled him back.
“What are you doing?”
“I want to get a closer look,” Pierce said. “Besides, it’s not like it can see us. It doesn’t have any eyes.”
“It doesn’t need eyes,” Oz said. “It has sensors.”
“What are those?” Grey asked as three armored vehicles with mechanical legs instead of tires skittered toward the Tracker. Soldiers manning .50-caliber machine guns mounted to the top of each vehicle opened fire on the Tracker.
“Class 1 Armored Walkers,” Oz said. “But the only one I’ve seen was a prototype.”
The Tracker tried to stomp on the nearest Walker, but the Walker was too fast. It dodged out of the way and crawled up the Tracker’s leg and onto its back and then its shoulder. The other Walkers followed suit, and the Tracker lashed out in vain with its clawed hand.
Colt spotted a yellow school bus on the other side of the parking lot. “Does anybody know how to hotwire a car?” he asked.
“Is that a trick question?” Oz said. He followed Colt’s gaze until he saw the bus. “You can’t be serious.”
“I don’t see anything else big enough to carry all of us.”
Oz shook his head. “Yeah, I can hotwire a bus.”
“Good, because this might be our only chance.” Colt burst out the door and into the parking lot, weaving between the vehicles.
“Here comes another one!” Pierce shouted.
A tremor shook the ground, and when Colt looked up he saw a second Tracker. It had an actual head with glowing eyes, and instead of a claw or a cannon it had articulated hands with five fingers. And it was heading right for them.
“Run!” Colt shouted. He could feel his heart pounding in his chest as he jumped up on the trunk of a Toyota Camry, leapt onto the roof, and then jumped back down to the asphalt.
The bus was only a hundred yards away, but the Tracker was closing in fast.
“Hurry!” Colt shouted. He looked back over his shoulder and saw a tentacle shoot out from the Tracker’s palm and lash around Pierce, hefting him