Prologue
We are no more than skin, blood, and bone. When you take that away, nothing is left.
Nothing? I don’t believe that.
What do you believe?
I believe that beneath the blood and bone, there’s a soul.
We’d thought ourselves strong and capable, fierce enough to rage against the death that threatened, powerful enough to conquer it and to save those we loved. To save what so many before us had spilled their blood and broken skin and bone for: to keep our country standing.
We were Americans, after all. Mutts, the junkyard dogs of the world, the unwanted and enslaved brought together by a common bond. Originally forged under the heavy hand of tyranny, we evolved, grew stronger, fought for our freedom and eventually our survival.
And this ... this was only a virus, the Vaal fever, born from the third world. It wouldn’t, couldn’t touch us. We wouldn’t allow it.
Nothing could touch us, not truly, not the heart of us. Many had tried and all had failed. As a country, we always persevered. Against wars, terrorism, or disease, each and every time we came out fighting, evolving from disparate strangers merely occupying the same landmass to a strong and united front, standing tall against any threat. Shoulder to shoulder, our hearts as one, we stood ready to fight to the end to save our proud country and everything the United States of America stood for.
But we never imagined that the ultimate threat would be our neighbors, our friends, and worst of all, our families. We weren’t prepared, not for this, not for an enemy who wore your wife’s face, who had your daughter’s eyes, your son’s dimples ...
No, we weren’t prepared to fight against an enemy we loved.
We were shadows now, those of us who remained, the ones who were strong enough to do what needed to be done. But every ugly, dirty deed, every bone broken, every drop of blood spilled, every life taken—they all changed us.
The world was broken now and so were we, all of us haunted by the lives we once lived, by the people we once were, by the losses we’d taken. We were damned to suffer through the savage lives we were now forced to live.
We had all become our own worst enemy, a foe much worse than the death that had failed to take us all. Now the only threat, the only war left to fight, was the one waged inside each and every one of us.
The Vaal fever might have killed our fellow man, but it was we who had destroyed ourselves.
Chapter One
Eagle
My boots stomped heavily over the earth, my lungs burning liquid fire in my chest as I headed back toward the gate. Correction, as I headed back toward what was left of the gate thanks to her—my wildcat. I shouldn’t have bothered chasing her; I was never going to catch her on foot, and I’d only accomplished looking like a damn fool for trying.
I still wasn’t sure what it was about her that had gotten under my skin. I wasn’t normally the type to bother with anyone, never mind a woman. Maybe it was her independent nature, her unwillingness to be tamed by me or anyone else. Who the fuck knew?
“E, man?” Daniel panted as he jogged up beside me. “Jeffers and Liv want to see you.”
Frowning at Daniel—a skinny, ugly, useless son of a bitch, even more useless than a woman without a pussy—I shoved him out of my way and walked on.
No one got away from me. No one, nothing, not fucking ever.
“E!” Daniel hurried to catch up with me. “Liv, man, she’s pissed.”
“So fucking what!” I yelled.
Again I pushed him, backward this time, causing him to fall flat on his ass. Instinctively he raised his arms, shielding his face from me. I was well known for my temper, even better known for the many fights I’d fought in Purgatory. Daniel was right to fear me. Almost everyone did.
But not Wildcat ...
And definitely not Liv.
“I’m sorry, man,” Daniel said quickly. “I was just—”
“Following orders.” I sneered at him. “I fucking get it.”
Staring down at him, I felt the urge to rip into him, to tear his scrawny arms from his body and force him to eat his own flesh for breakfast. Gritting my teeth, I looked away and took a deep breath that didn’t do a damn thing to calm me down.
