Caleb evaluated the scene with some dismay. Four dead terrorists, in addition to two dead guards.
And Dr. Canivon. Also dead.
He squeezed Alex’s hand, but it didn’t seem to register for her. Even in profile her eyes were frozen wide, and her hand began trembling in his—a response, but not to him. He wanted to draw her close and hug her, but he didn’t know if she’d notice. And the situation was very much in flux and exceedingly dangerous. More so each second.
He focused on Devon, who knelt on the floor beside Canivon’s body. “Did you take them out? All of them?” No one else was here, but it was a ridiculous notion. The Devon he remembered was a skinny, socially awkward nerd. The young man on the floor in front of him didn’t appear to be any of those things.
Devon looked up, irises darkened to plum and flaring angrily. “I did. Not that it matters. I was too late—seconds too late! Dammit, why—”
The sound of glass shattering on the street outside spurred Caleb into renewed action. “We need to move. Now.”
Devon frowned up at him. “Leave her here?”
“Yes. When the situation is under control we’ll come back and we’ll take care of her, but tonight this building is not safe. Neither are the streets, but we need to get through them and reach IDCC Headquarters, which is safe…er.” There at least the people he needed to protect would all be in one place, and he’d have some control over the field of battle. Small fucking favors.
Devon wavered for another second before nodding. He placed Canivon’s head tenderly on the floor, sneered at the bodies once, then approached the door while wiping blood off his palms onto his pants, probably not realizing they were already soaked through.
Caleb placed a hand on Devon’s arm as he passed. “Let me take the lead.”
Devon gestured nominal agreement as he crouched down, took a Daemon off the dead guard in the doorway and stuck it in his waistband.
Caleb began to head out of the apartment into the hall, then found himself jerked to a stop. He still held Alex’s hand, and she hadn’t moved with him. He tried to make sure his voice was gentle, but they had no time. “Alex, we need to go.”
No response. No movement.
He backed up to stand in front of her and brought his other hand up to her cheek. “Baby, I know this is hard, I swear I do, but we can’t stay here. We need to get to a safe place.”
Upon his urging, she slowly shifted her gaze to him. All the blood had drained from her too-pale face; her eyes held a kind of vacant desolation, as if she’d lost something valuable but couldn’t process the nature of it. She had, of course—as had Valkyrie. What must the Artificial be feeling?
The hard, bitter reality was, right now it simply did not matter. His grasp tightened slightly at her jaw. “Alex, we need to go.”
She blinked, and her chin lifted in the weakest semblance of understanding.
It would have to do. He kept hold of her hand and this time succeeded in moving them past Devon into the hallway.
There were sounds—shouts, thuds, heavy footsteps—but they were far enough away to not be his problem. They hurried through the halls to the service lift and down to the ground floor, stepping over several bodies on the way to and out the exit.
“Shit. This is…worse.”
Devon was right. In the few brief minutes they’d been inside, the ‘protests’ had graduated to full on mob warfare. Posses roamed the streets attacking everything and everyone they encountered. It didn’t matter whether the structure or person had anything to do with Artificials or Prevos or the IDCC or anything else.
He didn’t need to pull up a map overlay, as he’d stalked Romane’s streets on multiple occasions over the years. “We’re taking the next alley down to Hampton, then up to Barclay until Rainaldi. We’ll get to Headquarters the back way. Clear?”
Devon jerked a nod.
“Alex?”
“Um….” She stared at him blankly. It reminded him too vividly of the night in Cavare when they’d been attacked, but this time she hadn’t been shot. He’d checked. She wasn’t hurt. She was merely…gone. “I’m with you.”
No, you aren’t. And you’re killing me, one distant stare at a time. He motioned them flush with the wall and sneaked forward, seeking shadows and empty spaces.
He found both in the alley, but it spanned a pitifully short distance before emptying out onto Hampton, which wasn’t in much better shape than Stratford had been. People roved in search of something to rage against; windows weren’t enough any longer.
But every second they dallied increased the chances of them—mostly the two Prevos with him—being noticed, so he pressed onward.
An explosion sent glass shattering into the street ahead and opposite them. Some corporate building being firebombed.
Did the rioters even know what they were rioting about? They were pawns in the games of others far more powerful than them. More wealthy, more connected, more soulless. But the rioters would kill him and those with him if they had the chance, and he would treat them accordingly.
“Everyone’s engrossed in trashing that building. Let’s slip past while we can.”
They’d almost made it past the mob when two drunks stumbled out of a doorway and smack into them.
He cold-cocked the one on the right before the man realized what had happened, then pivoted toward the other man as his arm swept up, blade extended.
Devon’s hand closed around the man’s throat for half a second and released him with a shove. The man sprawled to the sidewalk, jerking about in a fit.
He raised an eyebrow, impressed.
Devon shrugged. “I didn’t hurt him much—just gave him a little jolt.”
“Nice job.” He tugged Alex across the intersection. She didn’t fight him, but she wasn’t helping, either. She might as well be a zombie. The thought made him glance back at her when he needed to be glancing everywhere else. Her irises shone brightly in the darkness; if her mind resided anywhere, it was with Valkyrie. He forced himself to refocus.
IDCC Headquarters was ahead…and so was the largest mob he’d seen tonight. It roiled and throbbed like a living organism, pushing and prodding at the barricades keeping it restrained.
Abruptly a chunk of the mob broke off from the rest to chase a vehicle crossing an intersection one street over.
Odd. What was a single, unaccompanied vehicle doing in the middle of a war zone?
Laser fire from above cut the group off from their cohorts in a roar of shredding stone and metal. It didn’t hit any people, but most fled in panic nonetheless.
Bait. The vehicle had been bait.
Devon chuckled under his breath. “Morgan.”
The source of the laser fire was nowhere to be seen, but he’d buy that. And Devon would know.
Ahead, the IDCC forces were taking advantage of the distraction to gain a greater foothold on the mob. More troops appeared from behind the building to press in on the crowd, driving them back and expanding the force field barrier protecting Headquarters as they did.
He scanned the area, searching for a way to get through without ending up caught in the middle. The force field surrounded the building and—
Devon tapped his shoulder and jerked his head to the left. “This way.”
“What are you thinking?”
“The barrier’s encoded with identity recognition. Harper’s cleared us through this side, where the crowd’s thinnest.”
He didn’t ask twice before heading in the direction Devon suggested. Noah had mentioned Brooklyn Harper was on Romane and working for the IDCC, but he’d yet to bump into her. Truth be told, he’d been so consumed with other matters, he’d essentially forgotten.
They neared the turbulent crowd, and up close it didn’t feel particularly thin even out here on the edge. “Alex, your shield is active, right?”
She looked over at him as if startled to find he was there beside her. “Yes.”
“Okay. Stay close to me and don’t let go.” He
re-secured his grip on her hand and plunged into the madness.
People jostled them, then knocked them around, then actively shoved them. He kept himself between Alex and the bulk of the crowd as much as he could, protecting her with his body and his presence.
He punched an aggressive rioter who tried to block their way, followed by another.
Devon seemed perfectly capable of taking care of himself. A swipe of his hand across a woman’s shoulder and she collapsed in a heap ahead of them, clearing their path for an additional meter.
Alex stumbled violently into him with a yelp. A large man loomed over her, ready to attack again.
Caleb held her close, spun them around and swept the legs out from under the thug who had hit her.
“Alex—”
“I’m all right. Keep going.”
They had no other choice in any event. He pushed forward, and finally there was the promise of empty space ahead—but there was active fighting between them and it.
He indicated for Devon to skirt around to the left, though scant space remained before the façade of a building blocked their way. The tall barrier shimmered a few meters distant.
“Duck! Through here!”
On the assumption it was directed at them, he followed the order. The tiniest of gaps opened up and they stumbled through the force field to the other side.
He inhaled and immediately began checking Alex over for injuries. Her left cheek burned bright red around a nasty scrape along her cheekbone, and a shallow cut on her arm seeped blood, but she looked otherwise unharmed. Physically.
Still, he reached up to cup her cheek. “Are you hurt?”
She shook her head mutely. Behind her Devon held two fingers over a busted lip and glared at the crowd.
A Marine jogged around the corner and up to them. He squinted against the floodlights bathing the street in harsh white. “Captain Harper?”
“Non-agent Marano. I wanted to make sure you made it through, but now you should head inside. I need to, well….” She waved in the direction of the chaos on the other side of the force field.
“Thank you.”
“Yep.” Then she was gone again.
He turned to Alex and Devon with a sigh. “Let’s do as the lady said and get inside.”
19
ROMANE
IDCC Headquarters
* * *
Mia: I just need to know if it’s working.
Morgan: Maybe? Give me forty more seconds.
Mia ran a hand through her hair, surprised to encounter a few tangles along the way. The promised long night was far from over.
Governor Ledesme had officially declared the rioters a planetary security threat after they blew up a second commercial building, which among other things authorized the targeted use of defensive ground turrets against them.
Combined with the aerial response from Morgan and her unit, it should be enough to regain control of the streets. People would die, but people had already been killed. Innocent ones.
She’d never thought this could happen here. On Pandora or one of the small, out-of-the-way colonies, but not on Romane. OTS had shipped in protestors and staged the entire event; she was now convinced of it. It was inconceivable that this many Romane citizens felt such violent hatred for Prevos.
This wasn’t to say that Romane, progressive and advanced as it was, didn’t have an underbelly. When she’d first arrived here from another life, she’d lived on the edges of it. But the entire underbelly—poor, delinquent, criminal and thug all put together—didn’t measure up to the size of the protests outside.
She spun around as Caleb and Devon burst into the room. Devon flung his jacket against the wall in blatant anger as Caleb rushed over to her.
“Are you all right?”
“I’m surrounded by guards and encased in an ivory tower. I’m fine.” She peered past him toward the door. “Where’s Alex?”
His gaze dropped to the floor, but not before she saw his expression fall. “In the washroom. Your security does look solid inside, and I left a guard with her. She’s safe.”
“Good.” Alex’s mind was effectively impenetrable to her—to all of them—now, but she didn’t need to touch it to see what was right in front of her. Still, there were a few other things to worry about, and, she reminded herself yet again, it was none of her business. Even if Caleb was her oldest and closest friend. Even if she shared virtual mindspace with Alex.
She gave Caleb a quick shoulder squeeze then went over to Devon. “You couldn’t—”
“What? I couldn’t have gotten there any faster? No one could have gotten there any faster? Mia, you said she was protected! That’s why we brought her here, dammit. Only we delivered her straight to her death!”
She fixated on the wall behind him. He wasn’t wrong. “I know we did. I want to say they would have gotten to her on Sagan, too, but I thought we could protect her. If we’d recognized earlier we had spies in the Noesis…we should have. Being a Prevo doesn’t automatically make you a good person. I don’t know why we believed it did.”
Devon stared at her, his face contorting in frustration and grief. He chewed on his busted lip, then winced when the cut opened up and blood trailed down his chin. He wiped it off with his shirtsleeve…and Mia realized his clothes were coated in blood. How awful must the scene at the apartment have been?
“I’m so sorry, Devon.”
“No. You’re right, and it’s my fault as much as it is anyone else’s. I was so high on the shiny new revolution I’d created, I didn’t stop to consider it was made up of people, and people sometimes fucking suck.”
She placed a hand on his arm. “They do. But it’s not our fault, not truly. It’s theirs. The killers. They’re the ones who—”
“Get down!” Caleb collided with her back, sending her crashing to the floor hard enough to knock the air from her chest. The windows shattered and the sounds of a city overtaken by chaos rushed in.
Dead
Dead
Dead
Valkyrie’s grief filled Alex’s mind, swirling and spiraling her into dizziness. It filled her chest, suffocating her. It seeped into her bones until her limbs grew heavy. She rested her forehead on the cool mirror.
Want to strangle them but they’re all dead. Strangle who ordered them—
No, Alex. I don’t. I want to grieve, not kill. Those are your thoughts. Not mine.
She frowned in confusion and denial. Wasn’t she all but devoid of emotion now? That’s what Caleb had accused her of, and she hadn’t been able to dispute it.
The room spun around her, and she fumbled for the washroom counter.
So she grieved, too. It turned out the most debilitating of emotions retained the power to break through the fog. Excellent. But she’d dealt with loss, with death, before. Valkyrie had not. These terrible sensations were surely the blowback from the Artificial’s emotive disorientation.
I am not a child. I comprehend death. Only I never expected it to…hurt this much. How is it that I feel tangible, somatic pain? It is logically impossible, yet I do.
Welcome to being alive. Enjoy the khrenovuyu party.
She sank down to the floor, wrapped her arms over her knees and buried her head in them.
The weight of another’s grief on top of her own was more than she had the strength to bear. She shivered, cold to the marrow of her bones. Simply breathing was so hard….
Let me go, Alex. Shut me off.
No. You shouldn’t be left to struggle with this alone.
Alone is all I want to be. Shut me off, or I will do it for you.
Her eyes widened—and Valkyrie was gone. Bluff called.
She sucked in air and began to survey her state anew. Her chest still hurt. Everything still hurt, though she conceded some of it might be a result of the rough trip through the mob gauntlet outside.
She was grief-stricken, exhausted and mentally spent…but with each new breath she grew closer to functioning on a minimal level. Valky
rie’s suffering had in fact been that suffocating.
“Oh, Valkyrie, I’m so sorry for you. I wish you didn’t have to feel this pain. I wish I could save you from it. I wish I could have saved her for you. For me.”
She’d hung all her hopes on the belief Abigail would somehow be able to tweak a few settings and, presto, magically ‘fix’ her. Make it so she would be able to dance freely in the elemental realm without repercussions in this one. It was a horrendously selfish thing to dwell on when Abigail was dead dead dead….
But what the hell was she going to do now? How was she going to find her way through? Not lose Caleb. Not lose her sanity—
The distant but unmistakable sound of shattering glass cut through her wallowing. Great, more terrorists trying to kill them. Marvelous.
She grabbed the edge of the counter and dragged herself to her feet.
Caleb shouted above the clamor filling the room. “Everybody stay low to the floor and get away from the windows. Head for the hallway.”
His hands patted Mia down, searching for the wound from the shot meant for her but finding none. “Were you hit?”
“I don’t think so. I’m okay.”
“To the hallway. Devon?”
The response came from ahead of him. “Already there.”
He ushered several of the others forward while crawling toward the doorway and stopped to help a woman who’d been cut by the glass. But when he reached the hall and glanced behind him the room was empty of people and bodies. No one had been gravely enough wounded to not be able to get themselves clear.
He linked into the RRF comms. Harper, you’ve got a sniper on the roof across from IDCC Headquarters, Rainaldi side.
HarperRF: Understood.
As soon as everyone was safely outside any line of sight from the sniper, he tried to check Mia again, but she waved him off. He decided he had to take her at her word; next he leapt to his feet and rushed down the hallway toward the washroom.
He bumped into Alex outside the door as she exited, the guard behind her. “What’s happening? I heard a crash or—”
He grasped her by the shoulders, surveying her body for new injuries. “Sniper. Everyone’s okay. Are you?” He knew the question was getting repetitive for all involved, but unfortunately it continued to be a relevant one.
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