Chapter 17: DISTANT THUNDER
The first refugee collapsed twenty feet from the perimeter.
Tom phased through the wall, urgent. "Four people. Coming from the east. One can barely walk."
I grabbed Miles. We ran.
Four mutants. Burned. Beaten. Terrified. The woman in front had wings—half-feathered, half-scorched. The man supporting her had scales that were cracked and bleeding. Behind them, two younger people—teenagers maybe—moved on pure adrenaline.
The woman's legs gave out. Miles caught her.
"Inside," he snapped. "Now. Ruth, clear the medical area. Danny, I need hot water. Tom, get blankets."
Everyone scattered. We carried the four inside. Ruth appeared with her security team—not threatening, but alert. If they'd been followed, we needed to know.
Miles worked fast. Burns covered the winged woman's back. The scaled man had a broken arm. Both teenagers had bruises, cuts, evidence of beatings.
"Who did this?" Ruth asked. Direct. Necessary.
The winged woman looked up. Eyes hollow. "Humans. They came at night. Masks. Baseball bats. Called us freaks." She coughed. "Called us monsters."
"Where?"
"Two towns south. Maybe thirty miles. There were seven of us. Three didn't—" Her voice broke.
Three dead. Three mutants murdered by a mob.
Miles continued working. "Sofia, I need you to monitor them. Make sure there's no panic attacks or shock beyond physical. Marcus, get me actual medical supplies. The good stuff. I'm not rationing this."
I nodded and retrieved our best antiseptic, our actual bandages—not torn cloth. Miles had been saving these for emergencies.
This qualified.
The scaled man spoke through gritted teeth as Miles set his arm. "Police did nothing. We called them. They showed up, looked at the damage, told us to move along. Said we'd provoked it by being visible."
"Visible how?" I asked.
"Existing. That's all. Just existing where humans could see us."
Ruth's jaw was tight. I knew that look. She was calculating. Assessing. Preparing.
The teenagers hadn't spoken. The girl had wings—small, useless, sprouting from her shoulders. Eight years old maybe. She hadn't made a sound since arriving.
I sat near her. Not close. Didn't crowd. Just present.
"You're safe here," I said quietly. "No one's going to hurt you."
She didn't respond. Just stared at nothing. Shock. Trauma. The kind that didn't heal quickly.
Miles finished bandaging the worst injuries. "They'll live. Need rest. Food. Time. The psychological damage is—" He glanced at the child. "That'll take longer."
"How did you find us?" I asked the winged woman.
"Heard rumors. Mutants talking about a place upstate. Settlement. Safe. We didn't believe it but—" She gestured weakly. "Nowhere else to go."
"You're here now. You're safe."
"For how long?"
Fair question. I didn't have a good answer.
That night, I called a security meeting. Ruth, Tom, Miles, and three others with military or combat experience—James for his strength, Eva for her reflexes, and a newer arrival named David who'd been a cop before his mutation manifested.
"This wasn't random," Ruth said immediately. "Organized. Planned. Multiple attackers with weapons."
"Agreed," David confirmed. "I've seen mob violence. This sounds coordinated. Someone organized them."
"Which means there's a group," I said. "Anti-mutant organization. Operating in the region."
Tom shifted nervously. "How close?"
"Thirty miles. Close enough to be a problem."
Ruth unrolled a map—salvaged from somewhere, marked with our territory. "If they're operating south, and refugees are fleeing north, eventually they'll follow the trail. Right to us."
"We need defenses," James said. His rock skin made him hard to kill, but not invincible. "Real ones. Walls. Weapons. Training."
"We have walls," I pointed out. "Partial anyway."
"Chain-link fence and salvaged sheet metal. That stops curious animals. Not determined humans with guns."
He was right.
I looked at Ruth. "What do we need?"
"Full perimeter wall. Ten feet minimum. Watch towers at corners. Actual weapons—not improvised pipes and kitchen knives. Training regimen for everyone combat-capable. Patrol schedule. Early warning systems."
"That's—that's a lot."
"That's survival."
Miles interjected. "We also need escape routes. If they come with superior force, we can't fight. We evacuate. Women and children first, then elderly, then combat personnel as rear guard."
"I'm not abandoning New Haven," Ruth said flatly.
"I'm not asking you to. I'm saying we need the option. Tactical retreat versus suicide stand."
They argued. Tactics. Strategy. What was defensible, what wasn't. I listened and made notes.
Finally: "We do both. Strengthen defenses and plan evacuation routes. Ruth leads defense preparation. Miles leads evacuation planning. Tom, I need you scouting. Find out who these people are. Where they meet. How many. What they're planning."
"You want me to spy on humans?"
"I want intelligence. Can you do it?"
He swallowed. "Yes. I can phase through walls, watch without being seen. It's—risky. But I can do it."
"Carefully. Don't get caught. Information only."
The meeting broke up. Everyone had assignments. Everyone looked worried.
I found the child later—the one with wings. She was curled in a corner, not sleeping. Just staring.
I sat nearby. Didn't talk. Didn't push. Just stayed.
Eventually, she fell asleep. Her wings twitched. Nightmares probably.
I made a silent promise. No one would hurt her here. Whatever it took—walls, weapons, violence if necessary—no one would hurt her.
Ruth found me watching over the sleeping child.
"You can't save everyone," she said quietly.
"I can try."
"That's going to break you eventually."
"Probably."
She sighed. "Come on. Perimeter needs fortifying. If you're going to be stupidly idealistic, at least be practically prepared."
I followed her out. Behind us, the child slept. Tomorrow we'd build walls.
Tonight, I'd make sure she was safe.
Four new refugees. Three dead we couldn't save. A mob thirty miles south.
The peace had lasted two weeks.
I'd known it couldn't last forever.
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