“Hmmm…” Management swiveled his head back to the monitors. “Every alarm in the facility has gone off.” He growled low in his mighty chest and made a series of clicks with his forked tongue. The computer system understood the dragon language, and all the monitors began to flick rapidly between different scenes, far faster than my eyes could track. About half of them turned to rapidly scrolling text. Management seemed to have no trouble devouring all of the input simultaneously. “Interesting. The exterior views are showing extreme weather conditions. There is monitoring equipment atop my hotel. It indicates that we are experiencing a hurricane. From the humans’ reactions, there seems to be a disturbance upon the roof.”

“Julie’s up there!”

“Your mate, yes. Congratulations on your new egg. The elevator has been unlocked.” I ran for it, leaping over priceless trash. Management called after me. “We will continue this talk later. Make haste, Mr. Pitt. Destiny awaits you.”

Chapter 18

Chapter 18

The elevator that had seemed so fast earlier now felt like riding a lethargic turtle. “Come on. Come on. Come on.” With my wife possibly in danger, the elevator could have been going fifty and I’d still be ticked. The unmarked super-basement floors zipped by and the digital counter began showing numbers again. I readied Abomination and pulled the charging handle back a bit to confirm that I had a round chambered.

Management spoke over the intercom. “Mr. Pitt. Something peculiar is happening. My secondary lines into the building are failing. They are being severed. It is as if—”

The lights went out.

“Management?” Nothing.

The elevator stopped moving. “Shit.” The background hum of machinery died. The elevator creaked and whined as it settled. It was pitch black in the car. Turning on the eyeball-melting flashlight mounted on Abomination in this tiny space would’ve blinded me, which was why I kept a little crook-neck LED flashlight jammed through some of the MOLLE straps on my armor. I flicked it on. There was nothing to see, but the light helped me stay calm.

It was stupid, but I tried the buttons anyway and got nothing. I was trapped in a stupid elevator while my wife was at the top, probably in danger. I kicked a furious dent into the wall and shouted something incoherent.

Other than the creaking of the elevator and my breathing, the car was quiet. My flashlight gave me a little bit of light. I realized that the temperature was dropping. Not again.

“Have you found her?”

The sound made me jump. The Asian kid that I’d originally taken for a rival Hunter had appeared out of nowhere and was standing in the opposite corner of the elevator car. “Don’t do that!”

He just looked at me funny. “For some reason, you’re the only one I can talk to easily.”

“Just another perk of being me,” I muttered.

“Everybody else, I have to shout and then bad things happen.”