THE FLENSE: China: (Part 2 of THE FLENSE serial) by Saul Tanpepper

Author:Saul Tanpepper [Tanpepper, Saul]
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Tags: Suspense & Thrillers
Publisher: Brinestone Press
Published: 2015-08-19T04:00:00+00:00

Chapter Twenty Six

The loose gravel slipped from beneath Angel's feet and she stumbled, hitting the packed ground hard with her hip and skinning the palm of her hand. She sat on the worn walking path for a moment to catch her breath, the grass on either side brushing against her shoulders. Sunlight dappled the valley and distant hills, blending golden and green and gray. Shadows raced across the face of the land like the spirit armies of the ancient khans. And in the middle of it all stood the factory, an imposing concrete fortress whose silent walls dared her to be breached.

She was shaking from hunger, yet she was not hungry. The horror of the village bombing, witnessed in the stark black and white of night and confirmed by the undeniable light of day, had stolen away her appetite. She didn't think she would ever be hungry again. How many innocent lives had been lost? How many people had died to keep a secret? The factory below her seemed to taunt her with its stony arrogance.

She pushed herself off the ground and began to walk again, but her hip hurt and her head swam. She staggered and almost fell again. Whiteness crowded her vision. A dull throbbing roar pressed against her ears, and she thought she might be sick. She lowered herself once more for another rest, placing her head between her knees and taking long deep breaths until the dizziness subsided.

The break gave her another opportunity to question what she hoped to accomplish by going down there. Did she think she might find a way in? What good would it do to walk around the outside of the building? What could she possibly hope to learn?

She lay back on the trail and sucked in long, deep breaths through her mouth. The cold hurt her teeth and the glare of the brilliant sky burned her eyelids. She felt an urgency to move again, but it was a distant sort of thing, seeming as far away as the clouds streaming swiftly by high above. The winds violently shredded the shapes the clouds took and reformed them. She realized that this was how she felt, numb on the surface, yet unsettled and full of static charge.

The sound of a door slamming shut brought her immediately back to herself, and she jerked upright onto her elbows. Two men were circling the factory, walking close to the side in shadow and heading away from her. They wore faded jeans and dark windbreakers. One had a rifle strapped across his back, the other a holster on his hip. In their gloved hands, they carried shallow trays, from which a sort of white steam fell and quickly dissipated.

Dry ice?

There was no door on this side of the building, just a tall mound of construction debris about fifteen feet away.

Where did they come from?

Angel watched them until they disappeared around the corner. With the loss of so many workers, she had assumed that the factory would be empty, but the appearance of the men told her that was incorrect.

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