“Listen, whether you take it willingly or I hold you down and secure it to your body somehow, you’re going to take it. I’m not going through the experience of almost losing you again. I just—I just—just take the jacket and quit arguing with me.”
“Okay,” I acquiesced, “but I’m not happy about it.” My arms slid into the sleeves of the jacket, which was entirely too big and not tailored for my body. I felt like I was a small child wearing one of her father’s old t-shirts.
“You can yell at me later. It’s show time.” Without warning, he jumped from the rooftop, sailing effortlessly to the next one.
Not to be outdone, I ran after him, easily catching up to him as we proceeded to run side-by-side toward one of the most important fights of our lives.
*****
“Are you ready, Paige?” Dr. Morton asked, touching her shoulder soothingly.
Chase squeezed her hand, searching her blank face for any clue that would reveal what was going on in her mind, as all emotion had fled from her expression ever since she heard the words, ‘there’s no hope’. Three words, harmless when standing by themselves, yet earthshattering when used together, had singlehandedly rendered her a blank slate. Too overcome with grief to cry, too devastated to scream, the substance of what she’d been told rested in her brain until it grew numb, leaving room for nothing but silence.
“Paige,” Chase spoke. She turned her head slowly to face him with empty eyes. “Paige, I’m sorry, but it’s time to say goodbye.”
She nodded, acknowledging his words, her gaze resting on her father’s lifeless form in the hospital bed. “Okay,” she said. “Send him home to take care of my mom.”
Dr. Morton nodded as she strode empathetically to the ventilator, switched it off, and then walked out of the room. In silence, Paige and Chase sat next to each other, watching Paul’s vital signs growing weaker and weaker until, three minutes later, he was gone. Somber, Paige stood up, tears pouring down her face as though she’d finally given them permission to fall.
“Paige,” Chase said, extending his arm to her.
She pushed him away, instead choosing to close the door to Paul’s room, purposely keeping her back to him. Her body shook and she broke down and emitted an ear-piercing wail, the likes of which Chase had never heard before. Devastated, Paige dropped to the floor. Chase rushed to her side and hugged her trembling body tightly against his own.
“He’s gone,” she cried, at last permitting herself to express her emotions. “He’s gone, Chase.”
“I know, I know,” he answered her, holding her tightly, a tear forming in his eye.
“He promised he’d never leave me, that he’d always be there for me.”
“And he will, just not in the way you thought he would be.”
“Will you promise me something, Chase?”
“Anything.”
“Promise me you will never leave me.”
*****
I landed in an alleyway adjacent to where we’d last heard the gunshots moments earlier. A second later, Ian’s boots struck the asphalt behind me. Vigilant, we did our best to traverse the alley quietly to avoid drawing attention to ourselves as we made our way through the darkness toward the roadway. Once there, we scanned the street, looking for any signs of life or clues to the gunfight that had just taken place.
“It’s too quiet,” Ian said. “I don’t like quiet. When things are quiet, it means some serious shit is about to go down.”
“Clearly, it’s not going down here,” I said, my eyes struggling to find movement in the darkness. “Let’s move.”
We walked out into the street, eyeing each of the buildings and their hidden secrets suspiciously. The air smelled of gunpowder and a familiar metallic smell that my brain quickly identified as blood. Yes, it was blood, a smell I’d grown accustomed to after having spilled enough of my own. At that moment, I found myself thankful for the darkness concealing the gore that I was sure stained the street beneath our feet.
A scream pierced the night nearby, startling both of us. “It’s coming from the next block over,” I said, running in the direction of the cry for help. We rounded the corner that led to the next street. Ahead of us, we could make out several dark figures standing in the roadway. Though we knew they had to be Brooks’ soldiers, the darkness concealed their identities. Off to our left, surrounding a warehouse directly across the street from where the scream had originated, stood even more of them, just over a dozen in all.
“Tell me where he is or I’ll shoot the girl,” a monotonic, disembodied voice ordered through the darkness. As I drew nearer, I could make out a woman sitting on the sidewalk, her hands bound behind her back, a gun pointed at her head.
“Why don’t you just shoot me now and save your breath?” the woman bravely answered his challenge.
“In due time.” The soldier paused, giving the other rebels hiding out in the warehouse an opportunity to answer his question. “Well, since they refuse to answer,” he continued several seconds later, “I’ll ask you, then. In the name of our commander-in-chief, I am giving you and your ilk one more chance to answer my question or face the penalty of treason. Where is your leader Marshall Leitner?”
“Okay, let me answer you a different way,” the woman captive said. “Since you clearly misunderstood the intent of the silence your question received from me the first time you asked it, I’ll paraphrase. Go. To. Hell.”
As swiftly as she finished speaking, the butt of the soldier’s gun struck her jaw. A stomach-churning cracking sound preceded the woman slumping to the sidewalk, after which two other soldiers lifted her back up to her unsteady feet.
“The captive has been uncooperative and, along with others in her group, has committed acts of high treason against our president. Collectively, they are harboring a terrorist and have conspired to withhold information that is both vital to his capture and to the safety and security of our people. Therefore, by order of the president, I am obligated to carry out punishment as I see fit.”
The woman’s captor nodded at the soldiers positioned around the warehouse, who sprang into action, programmed to act as soon as their brains recognized the signal. A handful of soldiers guarded each exit of the warehouse, guns drawn, while the rest of them retrieved a small, round object from their utility belts. In unison, they each threw the spherical anomalies through the windows of the building. Moments later, the structure lit up from the inside out.
Fire.
The rounded objects must have been fire bombs. Fire bombs that were being used to burn down the warehouse with the rebels still inside.
“Stop!” the woman screamed in the soldier’s grasp, struggling to break free. “Let them out. Please, I’ll tell you whatever you want to know.”
“Too late,” the lead soldier answered her. “You had your chance, now you must face your sentence. Don’t worry, you won’t outlive them by long.”
“I’ll find a way inside the warehouse, you free the girl,” Ian yelled.
“What? No. No way are you going in there. Ian, it’s suicide. Anyone who was in that warehouse at the time those bombs went off couldn’t still be alive.”
“It’s worth finding out for certain.” Ian sped up before I could protest, and I watched in horror as he surprised a soldier guarding the front door by snatching the helmet from the man’s head and knocking him to the ground before disappearing inside the warehouse.
The woman in the soldiers’ clutches looked up at me, fear overcoming her face. Luckily, her captors had failed to notice me until I was too close for them to take evasive action. Capitalizing on their surprise, I struck one of them in the chest with my boot, knocking him off balance.
“Duck,” I commanded the woman, who complied without question. When she was out of harm’s way, I locked my arm around the arm of the soldier holding her captive and twisted it, which made him loosen his grip on her. She collapsed to the ground, bewildered, while the soldier flailed his body erratically, attempting to break my
hold as though an outside force was controlling him. With his arm still firmly in my grasp, I spun around and angled myself into a position that would enable me to throw him over my back. Perhaps sensing what I was about to do, he struggled to break free, but I had too much determination and an iron grip. I wrapped my free arm around his head, overpowered him, and threw him over my back, successfully loosening his helmet in the process. He landed on the pavement as the helmet fell from his head to the ground. It rolled on the pavement in front of him, making a half circle before coming to rest.
“Look out!” the woman yelled.
Two arms gripped me around the waist from behind, strong and unyielding. I elbowed my attacker, striking him in the neck. He coughed and gagged, his grip on me faltering enough to allow me to turn my body around and force the helmet from his head. His eyes, blank and lifeless at first, quickly reanimated as though his soul had returned to its shell.
“Thank you,” I called back to the woman. She nodded her blue-streaked hair apprehensively, unsure what to think or say or probably whether she could fully trust me and my intentions for saving her. I couldn’t say I blamed her.
The sound of glass breaking from a blown-out window brought my attention back to the warehouse, now fully engulfed in flames. Ian. Where was Ian? Around the entrances and exits to the warehouse, soldiers gathered with guns drawn.
“How many are in there?” I asked the woman. She stood paralyzed in the roadway, trembling. “Hey.” I snapped my fingers in her face, bringing her back to me. “How many people are in the warehouse?”
“Uh,” she stammered. “Five. There were five of us, counting me.”
“So four in the warehouse, then?”
She nodded. The nightmarish trance returned to her face as she again succumbed to the horrific scene of flames dancing around the warehouse where her friends were trapped.
“Block the exits, don’t let any of them out,” the soldiers’ commander ordered them. Forgetting about the woman he’d held captive, the commander had joined the other soldiers around the warehouse to orchestrate the ultimate punishment for the rebels’ betrayal.
Enraged, I charged at their leader, who turned to face me as though he had been expecting me. “An attack against a soldier is an act of treason, punishable by death,” he said mechanically.
“Yeah?” I asked. “How long did it take Brooks to program that into you? Or is he feeding those lines to you as we speak?”
He reached for the gun in the holster at his side, but I was quicker than him and landed a blow to his stomach before he could do any damage. The gun dropped to the ground in a perfect position for me to pick it up and aim it at his head. He held his hands up, his blank stare seemingly searching through a hidden database for a way out of this unforeseen predicament.
The smoke and flames at the front of the warehouse were not nearly as prevalent, and I guessed that would be the place where Ian would bring any survivors he found—if he returned at all. I shrugged the thought out of my brain, unable to fathom him not being able to make it out of there and succumbing to the flames. Worried, I eyed the commanding soldier, hoping that he would no longer be a threat, and turned to run toward the group of soldiers blocking the front exit.
“Drop your weapons,” I ordered. But they continued to stare blankly at the empty doorway ahead, their guns aimed, ready. “Well, I guess we’ll have to do this the hard way.” I kicked the gun out of the hands of the first soldier I came to, immediately springing both him and two others to life, leaving three remaining to guard the doorway. I threw the disabled soldier to the ground, quickly jumping into the air as the other two began firing at me.
“Stop or face the consequences of your betrayal,” one of them commanded in a gruff voice.
“But this is so much more fun,” I said, landing a blow to the soldier’s shoulder, which sent him sprawling to the pavement. A sharp blow to my head knocked me back, and it was all I could do to catch myself from falling. Looking up, I saw my assailant charging me, gun raised, ready to strike me again. In response, I ducked down and wrapped my arms around the waist of the soldier, throwing him over my back. His gun fell from his hands and struck the ground with a metallic clang. I sprang to my feet, snatched it up from the ground, and slid it across the pavement in the direction of the woman and the two former soldiers, still standing around in shock.
“Take the gun,” I shouted at them. Without pause, the woman ran across the road and grabbed it, instinctively holding it out in front of her as she backed away from the scene ahead of her. Three down, three more to go. Glancing back at the doorway, my heart sank to see there were still no signs of life. “Come on, Ian,” I pleaded, hoping he would hear my voice in his ear bud and let me know he was okay. Silence, nothing but awful silence.
With my fist clenched tightly, I punched one of the three soldiers, causing him to stumble backwards. Like before, the soldiers seemed to come to life. But unlike before, only two of the three responded this time, leaving the third one to stand guard. I grabbed the gun belonging to the other soldier, a woman twice my size, and wrestled it out of her hands. It inadvertently fired a shot into the sky, temporarily deafening me, before I was finally able to pry it from her. As with the first gun, I sent this firearm skidding across the pavement in the direction of the rebels. Angered, the woman ran at me at full speed like a bull to a matador. When she drew closer, I stuck my foot out in her path, causing her to trip. On her way down, I ripped her helmet off her head, releasing a head of thick blonde hair, styled in a messy braid.
After regaining his footing, the other soldier ran at me, ready to strike me with his gun. I prepared myself to spring over him, but he was ready for me and, catching my leg with his hand, he slammed me down to the ground. He then knocked my gun out of my reach, and I could only watch helplessly as it landed inches away from my outstretched hand. In a flash, the soldier was on top of me, pressing his arm into my neck, one of the most vulnerable and exposed areas of my body.
“Don’t you know it’s not polite to hit a lady?” I asked him, freeing my foot and kicking him off me. “Good thing for you, I’m no lady.” As I struggled to get to my feet, he jumped on my legs and pinned me back down to the ground. “You don’t give up easily, do you?” In response, he landed a couple of punches to my chest as he reached for his gun, which I promptly swiped away and threw into the darkness.
Behind me, I heard a gun cock. When I looked back, I saw the soldier guarding the door stiffen, his gun aimed at a distinct figure in the doorway. “Ian!” I shouted, trying to get to my feet. With the soldier holding me down, it would take some time to free myself. Time I didn’t have. Frantically, I tried kicking my legs in the hopes of being able to break free. Although the soldier loosened his grip on me, it still wasn’t enough. “Ian, look out!” I called right as the soldier near the door fired the first shot. Ian ducked back inside, barely dodging the bullet.
A loud crack emanated from above the doorway. I looked up in horror to see the second floor of the warehouse beginning to buckle. Soon it would fall in, blocking the exit in the best of circumstances, or crushing Ian and the others under concrete and flame in the worst. With the soldier still on top of me, rapidly landing blows to my body, I couldn’t move to get to my feet, and could only inch my way forward. It wouldn’t be enough for me to get to the soldier guarding the doorway before he fired another shot at Ian, but it would be enough to get me closer to the gun I dropped.
He fired another shot, and then another immediately thereafter. With the smoke growing thicker, Ian must be getting desperate. The structural integrity of the building had to be fading fast. I needed to do something and I needed to do it now. In pain, I inched myself toward the gun. My fingers scraped its metal exterior and moved it closer to me until I was able to capture it in my hand. Ahead of me, yet another shot pierced the night air. Now, Celaine, now.
With an unsteady hand, I took aim at the soldier and fired.
Chapter Fifteen
Tru
st
When I looked up, I saw the soldier lying on the ground, motionless. Not only had the bullet—my bullet—hit him, but it had mortally wounded him. I had killed someone. My body grew stiff, cold. A chilling numbness overtook me. Though I knew it may happen eventually given everything we’ve been through, nothing could possibly prepare a person for the shock of actually being responsible for taking another human life.
Ian emerged from the doorway followed by four others, three men and a woman. He’d managed to get to them all, and I took solace in the fact that at least there were no lives lost there. A momentary rush of relief replaced the guilt for a moment. But only for a moment.
With the other soldier still on top of me, I summoned up strength that had lain dormant within me, twisted my body around, and struck my assailant in his head. He rolled off me, rattled and unmoving. I got to my feet and ran over to the man I’d shot. And as I kneeled down to the ground, I saw a pool of blood emerging from underneath his body. Though I knew it was a long shot, I searched his neck for any signs of a pulse. Nothing. Desperate, I placed my ear near his mouth, hoping to hear or feel breath. Still nothing. Tears streamed down my face; my body trembled. In front of me was a man who had committed evil acts unwillingly, whose body had been used as nothing more than a flesh and blood robot. An unwitting pawn who had a life, a family, and no idea what he was doing or that today was going to be his last day of life.
“Celaine,” Ian called my name, resting his hand on my shoulder. I clutched his hand as I stood up to face him and pulled him toward me in the tightest embrace I’d ever given to anyone.
“Ian,” I sobbed, the tears blinding me. He smelled of soot, reminding me of the life I could have lost tonight. “I shot him.”
“I know,” he said softly. “We’re in a war. It’s inevitable that snap decisions are going to have to be made. They may be painful, life changing. But they’re only bad decisions if they are committed out of hatred. What you did saved lives. It was for the benefit of those who are fighting for countless others who don’t have a voice.”
Redemption (Enigma Black Trilogy Book #3) Page 10
