Extinction Agenda by Marcus Pelegrimas Read Free Book Online Page B

believe that’s how it is.” His next words slid out of him like the cigarette smoke curling from his nostrils. “If you’d sign up with us in an official capacity, then you would of course be assigned a rank and could command specialized troops to help you in any number of missions that you would design.”
    “Why are you so intent on getting us to sign up?” Cole asked. “Do you get some sort of bonus?”
    “Honestly, I’d be able to command this entire team more efficiently. I’d also be able to explain to my superiors why I’m bringing along civilians on highly classified military operations. Funny how the brass tends to get real picky about procedure when the rest of the world is sliding into hell, but if we turn to anarchy, then the whole game’s over.”
    “So you are a recognized branch of the military,” Paige said.
    Despite the attack helicopters, campers stuffed full of high-tech equipment, Marines and Army personnel behind him, Adderson somehow managed to keep a straight face when he told her, “I’m not able to confirm or deny that.”
    Shaking her head, Paige said, “He wants to be able to tell us where to go and what to do, Cole. More than that, he wants to study our weapons and probably us as well. Didn’t you have your chance when you had Cole on the operating table?”
    “He was taken from our facility before we could make an incision.”
    Those words alone were enough to make Cole’s gut clench. More specifically, the memory of what was wrapped around his gut made him clench. The Nymar tendrils were still there, but he’d learned to deal with the cinching pain reflexively tightening around him. He felt better after some rest, but it was still easier if he just didn’t think about the part of him that had been infected by the vampire spore.
    “And speaking of that procedure,” Paige said, “you guys never did get around to making good on your promise of fixing him up.”
    “That’s all right,” Cole said. “Forget it.”
    “Which is exactly what he told our medics when they approached him to undergo the next proposed operation,” Adderson pointed out while holding his cigarette between two fingers and watching the tip smolder.
    She looked back and forth between them and finally flapped her hands against her sides. “All right. Fine. You’re the one that called us out here, Major. What’s on your mind?”
    “I asked about the Class Ones because we seem to have lost track of them,” Adderson said.
    After somehow walking away from being encased in stone, the Full Blood named Esteban had kept himself busy by returning to Colorado and tearing apart two small towns and three correctional facilities in his quest to find more storehouses left behind by Jonah Lancroft. All he’d managed to do back then was create several dozen Half Breeds to keep the humans busy and level the town of Canon City.
    “We need a better way to get to those bastards,” Adderson said. “Do you have any ideas?”
    Although Paige only paused for a few seconds, Adderson bristled as if she’d turned her back to him and walked away. Finally, she said, “There was a weapon called the Blood Blade. It could cut through a Full Blood well enough. We’ve been working on a way to coat a bullet with melted fragments of it.”
    “Similar to what’s inside those Snapper rounds?”
    “That’s right. We’ve had some success, but haven’t had a chance to test them in the field.”
    “With all the wolves running around, you haven’t had a chance to test them?” Adderson asked.
    “Things have been messy lately,” she replied.
    That was an understatement. Even with the werewolves running loose, the Skinners had been thrown into disarray with the emergence of the splinter group called the Vigilant. Professing to subscribe to the beliefs of Jonah Lancroft—known for capturing specimens, chopping them apart over the course of months or years, and mixing up toxins that killed almost as many civilians as monsters