The Tyrant, the bio-organic weapon into which the Umbrella Corporation had poured years of painstaking work, truly was the perfect marriage of human cells and bio-organic virus. Its killing efficiency was extreme, and its own defenses were formidable.
Pistols, rifles, submachine guns, grenades, grenade launchers, flamethrowers — in anticipation of a strike from Bella, the Murad family had quietly stockpiled a great deal. Now they threw all of it at the Tyrants. You couldn't call it wasted, exactly; it just fell far short of what they'd hoped.
These men had earned the word fierce. Each of them pulled out every trick he had, and they'd put real thought into it — at the end they even rolled out three forklifts, pinning a Tyrant into a corner from three directions, trying to use raw mechanical force to trap it before massing their fire to gun it down.
Forget forklifts — even a tank would get flipped over in a Tyrant's hands.
The savage Tyrant braced both arms, shrugged off the hail of bullets, heaved the forklifts aside, and blew apart Murad Krasniqi's own younger brother with a single punch.
Where there were men who fought to the death, there were naturally cowards clinging to life. Thinking themselves clever, they waited until most of the crew was busy drawing the Tyrants' attention, then tried to slip quietly off the field — with the result that every last one of them was run down and killed.
"Hey, buddy — remember me? I'm here to get you out." While the Tyrants held everyone's attention, Bella tracked down the veteran operative Bryan Mills and his wife, locked in the basement. She saw no sign of demons or vampires anywhere on-site, and wasn't quite sure what that meant — but she decided to get the old agent and his wife clear first.
"Kim's at the embassy — you can find your people there. And whatever you do, best not mention my name." Bella escorted the two of them out of the Albanians' stronghold. She was something of a minor celebrity these days; if her involvement got out, it would be an enormous headache.
The old agent's face was grave. "I know what's at stake. Don't worry. Thank you for saving my wife, my daughter, and me. I owe you my life."
Bella sent the couple on their way. Tonight was going to be busy. The Paris bloodbath last time clearly hadn't put the fear into this bunch, so tonight she'd have to kill more of them. She had to wipe these human traffickers out, root and branch.
The fighting ended around three in the morning. The Murad family had gone so far as to break out heavy machine guns, and their reward for it was shredding the Tyrants' coats. But a fifth-generation Tyrant wouldn't lose control even without its Power Limiter coat. Once Bella's side gave the order to withdraw, the t-Virus in the two Tyrants lapsed back into dormancy, and they were sealed once more into their containment pods and carried off.
Bella strode into a courtyard that looked coated in a layer of blood, ignoring the countless corpses in their gruesome poses, and walked up to Murad Krasniqi, one of his legs shattered.
She dragged over a chair and sat down directly in front of the old man.
"Know who I am? From the look in your eyes, I'd say you do. Come on — tell me what's really going on behind all this."
Murad's face was a mask of sinister malice. Even with his leg broken, he held his head high, as if trafficking women were some noble and sacred calling.
"I know you. And I'm not afraid of you." Murad glared at her, unblinking. "I also know you've got a little sister — two years old. Go ahead, I'm not afraid to die. My family will avenge me. And they'll take very good care of your family too."
Bella was honestly a little stunned by how vicious the man was. He was in this state and still threatening her?
This had gone past being merely stubborn to the bitter end. This man's heart was nothing but malice. In a way, people like this were no different from demons. At least demons made their position plain — we're evil, we're cunning, we were born this way, nothing to be done about it. But these creatures wearing human skin? As far as Bella was concerned, they were worse than demons.
She pulled out a tablet and gestured for Murad to look at the screen.
On it, columns of soldiers and police in Albanian uniforms were storming a village town nestled in a mountain valley. Everyone inside — burly, powerful men and headscarfed old women clutching submachine guns alike — fought back like mad, but their numbers were too few, and in the end the regular army crushed them.
"You—!" Murad's eyes bored into her, murderous.
Bella extended a hand and pointed at him. "I donated a shipment of weapons and gear to the Albanian military, and slipped a little pocket money to a few key people — and your Albanian brothers sold you out just like that. Do you know what your Murad family is actually worth? Even I was surprised. Only five million. The Murad family you're so proud of — the one that's actually worth nothing — is finished."
In truth, the Albanian regulars had found far more cash, gold bars, and jewels stashed in the Murad compound. Bella knew all about it. She'd simply handed those people an excuse to turn on each other, dog-eat-dog.
Watching the old man's face go ashen, she gave a cold laugh. "You thought I couldn't touch you if you kept your mouth shut? How childish."
Having thoroughly shattered Murad's convictions, Bella reached out with her right hand and slammed her palm into the old man's chest.
The old man felt himself suddenly turn weightless — and in the next instant he saw a body identical to his own crumple to the ground.
His mouth hung open, but he found he couldn't make a single sound.
Bella reached out once more and forcibly read his memories.
A minute later, Murad's spirit was ground to dust in her grip, and she put two extra rounds each through the heart and the brain of his corpse.
Bella's expression was dark. She was in a foul mood.
There had been someone backing Murad too. He didn't know the man's name — only that he was Russian, and very rich. The gunmen who'd sniped at Bella were this Russian's people.
A mysterious figure hidden in the shadows? Drawing on Edward Cullen's experience, Bella judged the odds were high that this Russian had come from the future.
A day later, the vampire Alice Cullen dug up further news for her.
That news left Bella incandescent with rage. She set aside the hunt for the Russian tycoon for the moment and prepared to throw everything into wiping out the vampires.
"I really am sorry. Personally, I'd never want something like this to happen — you're a good friend. But… the Cullen family can't keep digging into this. We have to think about where our kind stands. I'm sorry, Bella."
The female vampire apologized again and again, keeping herself very humble.
Bella wasn't about to take her anger out on a friend. Calm as she usually was, this time it still took her a long few breaths to swallow down the rage.
"It's fine — this has nothing to do with you, and nothing to do with the Cullen family. I honestly had no idea those vampires thought so highly of me." She ground the words out through clenched teeth.
Round and round it went, and somehow the whole thing had circled back to the start.
What did those vampires want? Simple. Out of the vampires' "good intentions," they wanted her to join their camp.
It was much like Song Jiang taking a liking to Qin Ming in Water Margin: I admire you, so I want you as my brother, my friend — whether you like it or not.
The vampires had set their eyes on Bella's body and her potential. They meant to kill her, and then, through the Embrace, turn her into a vampire.