The light on the alarm turned green and the door clicked. Raphael opened it and maneuvered Williams over the threshold. Once the door closed, he dropped the man onto the floor and locked the door behind them.

  Raphael picked the doctor's legs up and dragged him down the hall. He expected to see several rooms but there were only two doors. One led to the main lab and the other led to what had to be Williams' office.

  He kicked the door on the left open and found a utilitarian desk and chair. The tidy workspace was banked by an extensive system of filing cabinets.

  Raphael picked Williams up and set him down in the chair then opened his tote bag. He pulled out two ropes and bound Williams quickly, then shoved a gag into his mouth.

  The doctor moaned and his eyes fluttered open. His gaze widened in horror when it latched onto him.

  "I'm sure you are surprised to see me," Raphael said. "Dead men don't usually get up and walk around. Sit tight. I'll be right back."

  Williams wasn't going anywhere.

  Raphael picked up his tote and carried it into the other room. Four cold storage units lined the wall of the meticulous lab. The genetic testing equipment on the center island was state of the art.

  No doubt it was where the good doctor analyzed his findings. He walked over to the first storage door and opened it, expecting to find a regular walk-in deep freeze. Instead, Raphael discovered a nightmare.

  The freezer was bigger on the inside, than it looked on the outside. There were at least a dozen shelves filled with vials. Each vial had been labeled with a name and a short code of numbers. He didn't know what the numbers stood for, but he could guess.

  Raphael ran his fingers over the nearest shelf. None of the names were the same and all the numbers were different. His stomach clenched as he tried to calculate the number of people these vials represented. The number of lives Williams had destroyed.

  He walked deeper into the freezer. The cold seeped into his bones, making his teeth chatter. At the back of the unit, he glimpsed at least a dozen morgue storage chambers. Raphael didn't want to look inside, but he was compelled to. His fingers shook as he reached for the nearest one and opened it.

  The silver tray slid out revealing a multitude of hands piled on top of each other. The hands ranged in size and shape from infant to monster-sized. Some of them were normal looking, but others appeared to have been taken from the subjects after they'd shifted to their Other forms.

  Children. So many children.

  He tried to imagine a child going through the genetic manipulation procedure and couldn’t. Adults barely survived the pain. His hand clutched his crucifix as his brain struggled to make sense of what he was seeing.

  Raphael shoved the tray back inside and shut the door. He leaned his back against it as his stomach roiled, threatening to empty its contents.

  He glanced at the other doors. What would he find inside of them? Raphael couldn't bring himself to open them.

  He'd seen and experienced horrific things during the war, but Doctor Williams had moved the bar into an area that he could hardly comprehend.

  Numb over what he'd discovered, Raphael walked out of the freezer and opened his tote bag. He had to end this. He pulled out the explosives he'd stolen and began laying the charges. Raphael made sure that he covered ever bit of the lab before returning to Williams' office.

  "If I could kill you a thousand times, it wouldn't be nearly enough to make up for what you've done," he said. "You think we're the monsters. That we're no longer human. At least we were human once, which is more than I can say for you."

  The doctor tried to speak around the gag. There was nothing he could say that would explain his actions. The man had killed children and infants. He'd get no sympathy from him.

  Raphael picked up the last of the explosives and set them against the filing cabinets. "It ends today," he said. "This is for Michael and all the other people who lost their lives because of you."

  Williams shook his head in denial.

  Maybe once the doctor was dead, Raphael would finally find peace. He walked to the front of the building, unlocked the door, and peeked outside. The parking lot was still empty, except for the doctor's vehicle.

  He'd noted in the last few days that most people that worked at the other businesses went home at five and the ones who'd lingered, hadn't stayed any longer than six. Cleaning crews wouldn't arrive until ten.

  Raphael glanced at his watch. It was nearly eight-thirty. Still, he had to be sure. He listened carefully. He could hear Williams' heartbeat pounding in his ears. He put his head to the wall.

  Silence met him.

  The only other heartbeat he could detect was his own. Raphael raced around the building, using his unnatural speed. It was empty. They were alone.

  He walked back into Williams' office. Sweat covered the doctor's brow and his face was blotchy from straining against the ropes. Raphael checked to make sure they were still tight then he pulled out the detonator.

  "This is for you, Michael." He walked out of the building and pressed the button.

  There was a loud boom, then the whole lower half of the structure shook and went up in a ball of flames. Raphael stood in the parking lot watching the building burn.

  Watching Williams burn.

  He'd finally avenged his brother. It was over. He had stopped the monster who haunted his dreams, but there was still so much more to do.

  Raphael waited for the pain he'd been feeling to fade, but it lingered. He realized now that it would never go away. A part of him had died the day Michael had and nothing could bring it or his brother back.

  He left the Republic of Missouri armed with the list he'd gotten from Doctor Siegfried. Raphael crossed off the names of the military bases that Williams had visited before his death. That still left ten.

  He had no idea if the doctor's good work would continue without him, but he couldn't take the chance. So with nothing to live for and nothing left to lose, Raphael continued his mission.

  He made his way from base to base, crisscrossing the various republics, freeing as many soldiers as possible. No matter how many doctors he stopped, he couldn’t seem to get them all. They just kept coming.

  Most weren’t as depraved as Williams and Siegfried, but they were all just as dangerous. The only thing that kept Raphael going was the discovery that he wasn't alone in his mission.

  Some of the bases he'd come across had already been destroyed. At first, Raphael thought the military was behind the demolition, but that changed when he discovered the bodies of soldiers lying outside the blast radius.

  A quick examination revealed that the explosions hadn’t killed the men. Their bodies showed signs of animal attacks. There was only one type of animal he knew of who could do this much damage, while leaving all the meat behind.

  A Shifter.

  He burned the bodies, then continued on to the final base. When he got there, it had already been destroyed. Raphael stared at the black billowing smoke as it rose into the air. The dark plumes choked the sky.

  He picked up his list and crossed the last name off, then tossed it into the fire. What would he do now? His sense of loss was infinite. He couldn't go back to being a soldier, not after everything he'd done. And he certainly didn't have the skills to do anything else.

  Raphael watched the last building collapse, then turned away. He’d heard rumors about a boundary town not far from here that consisted mainly of Others like himself, but he doubted its existence.

  Nuria...The name was too damn close to Narnia for his liking and probably just as fictional.

  After everything he'd seen and heard, it would be insane for Others to cluster together in one place. It made them too much of a target. But what else did he have to do?

  He thought about it, but no answers were forthcoming. If he didn't like the place, he could always leave. Raphael was good at leaving. With nothing to care about, it came easily.

  Raphael shrugged. What could it hurt? He turned south toward the Republic of Arizona.

  Two days later Raphael reached the edge of Nuria. The place was not what he'd been expecting. It looked like any other small Midwestern town with its ranch houses and quaint business facades, except it had been dropped in the middle of a desert. It reminded him of the town that he and Michael had grown up in.

  The buildings stubbornly clung to the fringe, refusing to be blown away by the windstorms that regularly hit the area. As Raphael drew closer, he noticed that several of the businesses at the edge of town had been abandoned. He ducked behind one located closest to the open storefronts and observed the people.

  Some were shopping, while others aggressively hawked their wares. Everything looked normal enough. A beautiful, raven-haired woman sashayed down the sidewalk toward him. A part of Raphael that he thought long dead suddenly came to life. Maybe this town had promise after all.

  Raphael was about to step out from his hiding place, when something growled behind him. He didn't turn immediately. It wasn't smart to make any sudden moves around a predator. When he was sure that he wouldn’t be attacked, Raphael slowly pivoted to see what had gotten the drop on him.

  A dark-haired man with glowing amber eyes stood several feet away, glaring at him. He wore dark clothes, black combat boots, and had a badge pinned to the chest of his wiry body. The holster at his side held a Glock with a place for an extra clip. It was empty because he didn’t need it.

  Raphael’s gaze moved back to his face. He recognized him instantly. His shock must've shown because the man's lip curled into a mocking smile.

  The first time he'd seen Morgan Hunter, Raphael had taken a bullet for him. From his hardened expression, it looked like Morgan wanted to put a bullet in him. Raphael took a step forward.

  Morgan growled. “That’s far enough.”

  "Now Sheriff is that any way to greet the man who saved your life?"

  “That was a long time ago. What are you doing here, Vega?" he asked.

  Raphael shrugged. "Heard about your little town. Wanted to see if the rumors were true."

  Morgan tensed. "What have you heard?"

  “That the welcome mat is always out for our kind.”

  He scowled. “That’s a slight exaggeration. I wouldn’t get too comfortable here if I were you.”

  Raphael smiled.

  Morgan's scowl deepened.

  "I never do." Raphael’s gaze drifted back to the woman. She lingered by the window, tracing her finger over the pane. “But I might make an exception this time. See you around, sheriff.”

  “Count on it,” Morgan snarled.

  Dead World Prequel: Kane

  Kane Cover Copy

  When the war starts, Dr. Kane Hunter is a skilled surgeon, who cares deeply about the lives of the soldiers that come across his table. He’s taken an oath to do no harm and intends to keep it. The only bright point in his life is his fiancée, Megan Richards. He plans to marry her once the war ends.

  Not everyone is happy with his decision.

  Just when he believes things are turning in their favor, Kane is abducted and finds himself on the wrong side of an operating table. When he awakes the next day, life as he knows it is over and the nightmare is only beginning. Kane has one chance at survival, one chance to make it back to the woman he loves, but it’ll mean going along with his kidnapper’s plans. Plans that include turning the ultimate healer into the ultimate weapon.

  1

  The transport backed up to the makeshift hospital. The doors of the vehicle opened with a bang and soldiers filed out like angry fire ants, carrying stretchers loaded with casualties. They rushed the men into the waiting area and set them on the ground, then went back for more.

  A triage team met them and assessed the injured, then attempted to stabilize them long enough for the men and women to make it into surgery. They’d put the highest priority cases first and determine who had the best chance of survival.

  The split second decisions were harsh but necessary, when the bodies never stopped coming.

  Kane did a quick mental count of the new arrivals. There were at least five others stacked behind the man he treated. All were in just as bad of shape as the soldier on his operating table. He and the seven other doctors were working as fast as they could, but experience told him that they wouldn’t save all of them.

  He glanced at his bloody gloves. The war had been going on for so long that he couldn’t remember a time when he wasn’t covered in blood. Kane didn’t think he’d ever truly be clean again.

  Kane finished tying off the bleeder and checked once more to make sure he’d gotten all the shrapnel, then he looked over at Megan Richards, his surgical nurse. “Close him up and get him into recovery.” If this were a regular hospital, Kane would do it himself, but there was nothing normal about their working conditions.

  “Yes, doctor.” Megan immediately went to work.

  They’d met under the harshest of conditions. Initially he and Megan sought each other out for comfort, but over time their feelings had grown.

  Kane hadn’t been looking for love, but somehow he’d found it with her. Megan had brought light to the continual darkness and reminded him that despite their horrific surroundings that there was still good left in this world. Kane had proposed to her a couple of weeks ago and intended to marry her the second the war ended.

  He took a step back from the operating table and the room swam before his eyes. Kane grabbed onto the gurney.

  “Are you okay?” Megan asked without dropping a stitch.

  He shook his head to clear it. “I’m fine.”

  Her brown eyes softened. She didn’t believe him, but Megan wouldn’t question his response. Everyone pulled long hours. Everyone pushed themselves to their limits. Nothing would change until the war was over.

  Kane wasn’t okay, but it didn’t matter. He wouldn’t leave until he’d attended the rest of the soldiers. “I need to get changed,” he said.

  Megan nodded. “I’ll get everything prepped for the next one.”

  “Thank you.” Kane walked over to a section of the large tent that had been cordoned off with wide tarps for the medical staff. Tucked behind the fabric wall was a locker filled with fresh clothes. There was also a small sink and a portable toilet.

  Kane nudged the tarp back with his shoulder and stepped inside, then shucked his soiled clothes. He dropped them into a barrel and disposed of his gloves, then scoured his hands and face with cold soapy water.

  He couldn’t remember the last time he’d slept. Twenty-four hours ago? Thirty-six? The line of endless bodies blurred in his mind. Kane rubbed his eyes, then quickly dried his hands.

  Didn’t matter if he was tired. Didn’t matter that he was on the verge of collapse. There were men and women counting on him to do his job. He had to get back to work.

  Kane grabbed a fresh pair of scrubs and got dressed. He walked back into the operating bays, which were no more than curtained off stalls, and signaled for the triage staff to bring him the next soldier.

  The man moaned when they laid him on the operating table.

  “You’re going to be okay,” Kane said. “Hang in there.”

  The soldier nodded, then promptly passed out.

  Kane worked methodically, taking care that he didn’t overlook any of the man’s injuries. There were so many points of entry that the soldier looked like a human pincushion.

  He plucked piece after piece of shrapnel out of the man’s chest cavity. It was painstaking work, but necessary. If he missed even one, it could travel and kill the soldier later.

  He opened and closed his hands to shake off the numbness that had set in due to fatigue, then dropped the last piece of metal into the pan. It pinged when it hit the pile.

  “That’s the last of it,” he said. Kane was about to close, when the soldier’s blood pressure bottomed out. “We’re losing him,” he shouted. “Start resuscitation.” He’d told that man that he was going to be okay and Kane had meant it.

  They worked on the soldier for another five minutes.

  “Kane, he’s gone.” Megan touched his arm, giving him what comfort she could.

  He knew she was right, but Kane didn’t want to give up.

  “We have others waiting,” she said softly.

  He looked up. Megan’s face was full of compassion.

  “We have to let him go,” she said.

  Kane called a stop to their efforts. “Time of death, 4:20pm.” The date was marked and man’s name was added to a very long list that kept growing by the minute.

  Would the bloodshed never end?

  By the time Kane finished with the last of the soldiers, he was ready to drop. He’d saved two more of the men, but they’d lost three in total. Someone would notify the families and when they did, their lives would be forever altered.

  “Will I see you later?” he asked Megan.

  She shook her head. “Not tonight. I need to get some sleep.”

  “Then I’ll see you in the morning.”

  “Get some rest,” she said.

  “I will.” Kane stepped out of the hospital tent and scrubbed a hand over his face. Stubble met his palm.

  “You look like you could use a drink,” someone said.

  Kane recognized the voice instantly and grinned. “You wouldn’t happen to have one, would you?” He looked to his right and saw his cousin’s smiling face.

  He and Morgan Hunter had lived down the street from each other and had grown up together. Raised more like brothers, they’d been inseparable throughout their childhood.

  Morgan’s grin spread. “I might be able to scrounge something up. Come with me.” He gestured for Kane to follow him.

  Kane straightened with a groan. “You look like shit,” he said, though he’d never seen a better sight.

  Morgan stopped walking. “You’re not exactly winning any beauty contests yourself.”

  “At least I cut my hair,” he said.

 

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