by TR Cameron
Her head lolled back in the chair, and her exposed neck caused his artifact to twist again and whisper in his mind.
Kill her. Do it now.
He pushed the impulse aside.
The witch soon recovered her senses and raised her head with a soft smile as she stretched her arms high. “The power…” She breathed a slow, heady breath. “It’s delicious.”
Vincente nodded. “Remember the responsibility that accompanies it, Sarah.”
Her grin slowly stretched wider. “The artifact has told me of the attempts to layer persuasion and obedience upon its magic. Perhaps you were aware of this?” He stilled his expression, and she waved airily. “No matter. Rest assured that I possess the strength to resist them. Before my sojourn in the World in Between, I might have been swayed. Now, it is but a minor whisper, easily ignored.”
She stood and suddenly leaned toward him. He slid his chair back several inches but otherwise, did not react. She grinned, and the expression was entirely wrong on her gaunt and scarred face. “We will achieve our goals. Have no doubt. I look forward to our next task.”
She walked from the room with a confidence she had lacked when she entered and closed the door lightly behind her. He crossed and clicked the lock, then cast a barrier to secure it and leaned against the frame.
Somehow, when she says, “our goals,” I don’t think she’s referring to the operation Dreven has tasked us with.
He sighed.
As if things weren’t messed up enough already.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Things had been quiet enough that the team was well-rested, for once. They had deliberately chosen not to take any bounty gigs while they got their figurative feet back under them. However, it was time for more action lest they lose their edge. Diana had pushed the randomize button on the training ground in the rear of the Two Worlds Security office the night before and looked forward to practicing with her team.
She arrived before the others and put the coffee on, then went into the back. The computer system and autonomous forklifts had done their work, and there was now a trio of hallways rather than the single one that had been there when she left. It would be the first time using the space for Kayleigh, Sloan, and Anik, and she was excited to see what they’d bring to the table. Those three would play the opposing force for the initial round, and Kayleigh had already promised unexpected surprises. After the laser grenade that Bryant had snuck in on a previous run, she had no doubt the tech had something evil up her sleeve.
The others arrived shortly after—Kayleigh and Cara together, and the men singly. The early arrivals traded jokes while they waited for the full complement to arrive. Anik was the last one in, still several minutes ahead of the announced meeting time. Each took a long look at the entrances to the course upon entering, no doubt seeking any advantage, however small, exactly as she had. Sadly, the hallways turned almost immediately and so preserved their secrets.
They geared up quickly, strapped the detectors on, and ensured that their batteries were properly charged. Taunts were exchanged, and the trio of defenders melted away into the labyrinth, one departing down each hallway. Diana watched until they made the turns that hid them from view, then drew her team together with a wave. “I have only two things to say before we go in. First, keep your eyes peeled. Kayleigh brings a new dimension to the game. Second, since we’re likely to face challenges that could cost us a victory, Tony’s lead on the initial run. I certainly don’t want the blame if we lose.”
Cara laughed and he shook his head. The detective clapped his hands briskly. “All right, then. It’s up to me to maintain the honor of BAM Pittsburgh against these heathen rebels.” He checked his watch. “Another three minutes before we can go in. Any useful ideas, troops?”
Diana rolled her eyes. “Shoot them before they shoot us.”
“Look out for tripwires,” Cara countered.
She raised an eyebrow. “Try not to break any ribs.”
The other woman laughed. “Avoid patches of ice.”
Tony intervened. “Okay, people, behave. Honestly, I don’t know why a leader of my vision and talent would have hired either of you.” They chuckled. “But we’ll have to make do. Diana, you’re lead. Cara, middle. I’ll bring up the rear. At any intersections, it’s straight, left, right. The same rules apply for entering a room.”
It was a standard deployment, one that played to their strengths. Cara was every bit as good at taking point as she was, but Diana’s ability to detect magical threats made her the better choice. Tony had the least combat experience among them, so it was logical for him to trail the others. He finished the impromptu briefing by asking, “Questions?”
Cara raised her hand. He groaned. “Yes, you, the annoying one in the front row.”
“Mister Ryan, sir, what if we encounter scary strangers along the way?”
Tony grinned. “Like the boss said, shoot them before they shoot you.”
The head-start time expired, and they lined up at the right entrance farthest from where Kayleigh had disappeared into the stacked crates. Sloan and Anik were also unknown quantities, but the tech was Diana’s biggest concern. The way her eyes had lit up when she learned she’d train with them was downright alarming, in retrospect.
She definitely has some clever tricks waiting for us.
Diana crept forward and scanned in a zig-zag pattern from floor to ceiling and back again. She paused at every corner as they moved deeper. After several turns, a short hallway expanded into a room beyond. No egress was visible from where she stopped the team. “What do you think, Tony?”
“Standard entrance. Since we can’t see another exit, we’ll commit to clearing the room before we move on.”
“Affirmative. On zero.” She tapped her glasses to initiate a ten-second countdown. They weren’t using any AR functionality other than the timer. Diana worried about becoming overdependent on any tech and tried to balance things whenever it was practical to do so. The lack of them almost proved to be the team’s undoing.
She had barely shifted her weight to break into a run when a strange glint made her stumble and hiss, “Hold.” Instinctively, she fell to one knee to kill her momentum. She’d already scanned the doorway for traps and found it clear, but her lean forward had given her the necessary angle to see the tiny device. Most laser tripwires would have been set into the walls of the hallway. These were cleverly positioned inside the room and had a ninety-degree bend to send the beam across the entrance.
Oh, clever girl. Wench.
Diana searched carefully around the opening and discovered another pair that sliced through the space at a diagonal. She shook her head.
“Kayleigh’s damn good, y’all. We have a small area to crawl through here.” She pointed at the lower left corner. “We’ll be seriously exposed when we do it. It doesn’t seem like our normal beam blockers will reach far enough to beat these things, so we don’t have much choice.”
Tony laughed. “We could go for coffee. They’ll come out eventually, right?”
“We could send Tony in first,” Cara suggested. “Use him as a shield.”
“I think we’ll stick with crawling through. Those were good ideas, though, really.” Diana lowered herself onto her stomach and crawled forward. She risked a look into the room and found it both small and empty. “No enemies visible. I’m going in.” She wriggled through the opening and grunted as she rolled away. Immediately, she scrambled to her feet and traversed her rifle in a circle in case any unexpected opponents appeared. None did. “Come on in.”
Cara was next while Diana watched the room’s forward exit, which was offset from their entrance point by several crate-widths. Tony joined them last. His bigger frame presented a challenge, but he contorted himself surprisingly well and made it through. He was breathing hard when he stood. “Tricky.”
Diana looked up and saw the laser grenade fastened above the doorway with a wireless receiver attached to accept a signal from the tripwires a
nd shook her head. “She’s good at everything she does, apparently.”
Cara grinned cheekily. “Thanks. That means a lot coming from you.” Her boss rolled her eyes and she chuckled. “Oh—you didn’t mean me? I’m wounded.”
Diana was already looking down the exit hall but spared a moment to raise a finger at her second in command. “There’s a dogleg ahead. It could be a wonderful place for an ambush. Grenades would be useful.”
Tony tutted and shook his head with a smirk. “You can’t blow every problem up, boss.”
“Name one that you can’t.”
He didn’t reply, and she paced carefully down the passage. When she reached the dogleg, she pushed out with her rifle ready. Again, no one laid in wait. She paused to let the adrenaline settle before she continued. After another set of turns, the hall took on a configuration she hadn’t seen before that was half as high as usual.
“This is ugly, y’all.” The others advanced into the corridor behind her and groaned in agreement.
Tony urged her on. “You’re the shortest, so this is all you.”
“You can bite my—” She left the line unfinished as she contemplated the chokepoint and smiled when she remembered her first exercise in the field. It had been paintballs back then. This was the perfect place for another laser grenade.
Good thinking, people.
However, it was possible that they hadn’t considered all the ramifications of that choice, and she was ready to help them do so. She turned to Cara and handed off her rifle. “Hold this for me.”
The other woman grinned. “My pleasure.”
Diana crawled into the low space. The passage was five crates long—or about ten feet—before it appeared to return to normal height. She was halfway in when the anticipated projectile bounced into her line of sight from the corner ahead and skipped along the floor toward her. Her right hand happened to be the one in front, so she raised it and flicked her fingers to boomerang the device back. It reversed course and banked off the wall in the direction from which it had come. It seemed her grenade-billiards skills proved adequate to the occasion. The grenade detonated with an odd electronic shriek, followed by the buzz of a fatal hit and a deep, “Dammit,” yelled from down the hall. Diana grinned and continued her advance, then stood and stuck her head around the corner for a quick look.
Anik sat on the floor with a stormy scowl on his face. All his sensors lit up to show that he was well and truly “dead.” He looked at her smile and shook his head. “Not cool, boss.”
She shrugged and tried to make her tone instructive rather than of celebratory. “It’s a brave new world, Anik. You gotta keep magic in mind.” He sighed and nodded.
Cara joined them and shot the downed man with her laser rifle. He gazed at her with a question on his face. “You could have been faking,” she said cheerfully. “It’s always best to be sure.”
Tony fired immediately, and when they turned to stare at him, said, “What? She’s right.”
The team reassembled and moved forward. They advanced through the labyrinth—which was far more twisted than previous designs had been—and finally reached a place where the hallway forked. Diana looked cautiously down each path, but neither seemed immediately preferable. She growled softly and selected the one on the left. Her mental prediction had been that the two courses would intersect again, but an opening appeared ahead instead. The doorway was half-blocked by a lowered crate.
Damn, this is a wicked map.
“So, this is ugly, part two.”
The others stepped up behind her and agreed. Tony quipped “Very dangerous. You go first.”
“Thanks bunches, tough guy.” Diana decided that boldness would be her best option and hurtled forward to slide at the last instant to pass under the barrier and careen into the chamber. She pushed onto her feet and dodged to the side the instant she was past the obstacle. Her eyes scanned the room and found it mostly empty—except for a bulwark in the corner made of stacked crates, a rifle barrel that protruded over it, and an odd glitter on the ceiling. The barrel of the weapon aimed at a shiny object mounted above, and it took her a moment to realize it was a prism.
There was no time to react as the enemy fired and the laser beam refracted in all directions. Diana’s arm was hit first and then her leg as she scrambled away. The next shot led to a kill, and she groaned. A ruckus ensued from the hallway as more fire was exchanged, rapidly followed by the sound of another pair of deaths. Cara slipped under the obstruction with her weapon already searching for a target but met the same fate as Diana.
Kayleigh emerged from her small fortress, her grin wide and triumphant. She peered smugly at the fallen agents. “What’s it like being dead?”
Cara rolled onto her back and stared at her foe. “Boss, I think we need a set of shock gear for this one.”
The tech looked confused, and Diana laughed. “For sure. Snipers and techs receive the special treatment from here on out.”
Tony called from the hallway, “I’m dead again. Does anyone care?”
Diana rose with a laugh. “Maybe you should be more careful, Tony. You seem to get killed a lot.” She turned to Kayleigh with a grin of her own. “The best part about training? There’s always a round two where you seek revenge on those who have wronged you.” She flicked the fingers of her left hand, and a small telekinetic yank tweaked Kayleigh’s ponytail. The tech’s eyes widened, and Diana laughed again. “You’re not the only one with tricks.”
My pretty, this little party’s only beginning.
Chapter Twenty-Four
The summons to meet at the bar had been unexpected. It wasn’t one of the normal nights for the group to get together as far as Sloan knew. Kayleigh had marked the place as a location of interest in the system, so whenever GPS showed a drone or police car camera nearby, the computers recorded the feeds and flagged them for her attention. She hadn’t identified anything out of the ordinary, either.
The normal late-afternoon crowd filled the seats—old folks who’d come to the tavern for years and newcomers from the gentrified neighborhoods that surrounded it looking for something different.
Well, this place is certainly that.
He waved at the bartender and strode to the back, where Mur and Teddy awaited him in the office. There were no others present.
Uh oh. What’s up with that?
Teddy flashed him a smile, and Mur waved his paw of a hand at a chair beside him. Sloan sat and noticed a sheen of sweat on the bald man’s head.
He’s nervous about something. What?
His talent gave him no insight, as usual. It never seemed to work when he wanted it to. Sloan looked at Teddy, but the other man avoided eye contact. Mur cleared his throat. “This job we’re doing at the library… It turns out that for you, it might be the proverbial golden egg.”
Sloan performed the mental shift fully into his cover persona and forced an expression of excitement onto his face. “That’s awesome, Mur. Thanks for thinking of me.”
Teddy laughed nervously, and Mur glared at him until he subsided. The big man was all in black today in a button-down over work pants of some kind. It was a more formal look for him compared to the jeans and garish shirts he normally wore.
It must be something important.
He returned his gaze to Sloan’s. “The thing is, the folks we’re working with asked about you personally.”
He frowned. “Why? Who are they? How do they know me?”
Mur turned his hands over, the palms up on the table. “Exactly my question when I heard. It turns out that your effort to take out the police that first night impressed one of the boys enough that he mentioned it to the wrong ears. PD is interested in you, and this group is interested in the PD.”
Sloan blinked.
It’s probably nonsense. He’s trying to make me nervous. But it is possible if one of them felt jealous or slighted by my addition to the gang. Either way, it means trouble.
He shook his head. “I guess I need to be m
ore careful.”
The big man shrugged. “What’s done is done. The important part is that someone above has taken an interest. That means you could help the rest of us or hurt the rest of us. I wanted to be sure you remembered that Teddy and I made this introduction possible for you.” Mur’s words sounded oddly formal.
“No worries, there, guys. I’m a team player all the way. You gave me a chance, and I’m loyal.”
They both smiled. Teddy said, “Right answer. I knew we could count on you.”
Mur looked less convinced but his expression remained stoically unperturbed.
He’s waiting to see what happens before committing either way. That’s a survivor move.
“Let’s hit the road.”
They piled into a rusted pickup. Teddy slid into the half-sized back seat, Mur revved the engine, and they lurched into traffic. The ride needed new shocks, at least, and fresh brakes, judging by the near-misses at every stoplight. They rode through several neighborhoods before turning into an otherwise unremarkable strip mall. Mur led them into a small antique store on the end. A senior citizen with a long mane of straight gray hair sat in a tall chair behind the counter. She waved at them, and Mur reached across to take her hand with a warm smile. His gentle charm was completely unexpected. “Moira, always lovely to see you.”
Her answer was colored by a thick accent that sounded like Welsh to his ears, but he wouldn’t have bet a lot of money on that guess. “Murray. Causing trouble, are you?”
He laughed. “No more than usual, my dear. Have you heard anything I should know?”
