by PM Kavanaugh
“Yes!” Anika laughed. “Besides, you know sharing’s against the rules. If you’re still hungry, go get your own.”
While Mari was gone, Anika pushed the noodles around on her plate. Her plan to practice away her fear of a live kill seemed to be working. During her session in the target chamber, she had programmed scenarios that mimicked yesterday’s mission to try and overcome her feelings of resistance. When the order to shoot had come through her ear comm, she had pulled the trigger without hesitation. Still, she wondered—and worried—if her willingness to fire was because she’d known, deep inside, the kill wasn’t real.
“I decided to move onto dessert.” Mari set down two plates loaded with colorful confections.
“None for me, thanks,” Anika said.
“These aren’t for you!” Mari replied, taking a bite out of a chocolate-and-pink layer cake. “What’s wrong, though? I’ve never seen you pass up dessert, especially chocolate. Don’t tell me you’ve used up all your sugar and fat credits.”
She had, but that wasn’t the only reason she’d turned down Mari’s offer. She had too much on her mind. “Can I ask you something?”
“Sure.” A small puff of powdered sugar escaped through Mari’s lips. “Sorry.” She waved away the sugary motes.
“Without giving away any details,” Anika said, still mindful of the electronic eyes and ears stationed around the room, “have any of your missions required a live kill?”
Mari swallowed. “Yeah, both of them.”
“How did you...” Anika took a breath and decided on another approach. “Did it feel different than in our sims workshops?”
“I guess.” Mari shrugged. “Like you said, it’s different in the field.” She picked up her second dessert, a round marble of dark chocolate. “Sure you don’t want some?”
Anika shook her head. Her appetite had vanished. How could her friend be so casual about killing someone? “How did it feel? After you fired?”
“I thought it might bother me, you know?” Mari’s eyebrows quirked upward. “So I pretended the target was a sick-ass child abuser. Like my father and my uncle.” Her cheeks flushed an angry red as she spit out the last words. “As soon as I thought of that, I pulled the trigger.” Mari pushed away the unfinished desserts. “Guess my eyes were bigger than my stomach.”
“Sorry if I...” Anika shook her head. “I shouldn’t have asked.”
“What about you?”
“I...haven’t done one. Yet.”
“Hmm.” Mari studied Anika, who tensed under her friend’s watchful gaze. Don’t ask. Please don’t ask. “Well, you will. Just like I’m going to execute a perfect rappel, right?”
Anika forced a smile. “Damn right.”
Chapter 5
The flashing light on Anika’s handheld indicated a new message. “I’m here. U coming?” The photo showed Mari standing next to the rappelling wall, already geared up. Time received: 0450 hours.
Anika groaned. “Now you’re all fired up about practicing?” she said to the empty room. Her voice was a sleep-deprived rasp. “OMW,” she typed, followed by a vulgar hand gesture. On second thought, she deleted the gesture, hit send, and eased herself out of bed.
As a Level 1, she had her own apartment outside U.N.I.T, and could usually sleep in an extra hour. But she had promised to meet Mari back at the rappelling walls for a few runs before her own weapons practice, so she’d slept on premise again last night.
She felt heavy-eyed and sore-muscled—the discomforts reminded her of recruit training. She didn’t miss those days. After a quick shower with a freezing-cold finish to chase away the remnants of sleep, she dressed and headed out.
She rounded the final turn of the corridor leading to the training facility, then stopped, immobilized with surprise. Was she still asleep? She blinked twice. Half a dozen operatives, in assault gear, were grouped together at the facility’s entrance. Along the side wall, two medics checked the controls on idling gurneys and inspected their medical field kits. Standing at the head of the assault team, his dark blond hair slicked back into a low tail, was the man Anika had spent a restless night dreaming about.
Conflicting emotions, like jabs in a fistfight, pummeled her. Joy that he was back, relief that he was safe, anger that he hadn’t contacted her.
Where have you been? she wanted to shout. When did you get back? Why didn’t you come find me?
But her emotions—and her questions—would have to wait until they were alone.
She dashed forward.
As she drew close to the group, Gianni’s gaze met hers. Some emotion shimmered in his chocolate brown eyes. Desire? Remorse? It vanished before she could decide. In its place, a look of intense focus etched lines into the corners of his eyes and mouth.
“What’s...hap...pening?” Her breath erupted in bursts. And not because of the running.
“Two hostiles from the Belgrade mission escaped the interrogation quarters,” Gianni said. “They took out the guards, stole weapons. We tracked them to the training facility.”
Anxiety spiked inside her. “Mari’s in there. We’re supposed to meet at the rappelling walls. She sent me a message a few minutes ago.”
Gianni checked his handheld. “I see one heat signature near the walls.”
“It must be her. I want to go in.” Gianni glanced at her still-casted wrist. “I’ve been training with my left-hand,” she said. “I can help.” His gaze returned to her face. No warmth there. Only a cool appraisal. Anika stiffened, her spine titanium alloy. “You promised advanced training, remember?” she said, referring to the last time they had seen each other. They had been standing on the tarmac near the evac plane after the North Korean embassy mission. “This is advanced.”
That got a reaction from him. A spark of shared memory flickered in his eyes.
He turned to the sharp-featured female operative on his right. She was about Anika’s height and build. Anika recognized her from the Belgrade mission—it was Yosh Takagi. Hers was the shot that had killed the hostile when Anika hesitated.
“Takagi, stand down,” Gianni said. “Give Anika your gear and weapon.”
Takagi’s dark eyes narrowed. “I covered for her in Belgrade. Took out her target when she didn’t.”
“You didn’t cover for me,” Anika fired back. “I fell and broke my wrist.”
Takagi snorted in reply.
“I gave you an order, Takagi.” Gianni’s voice was low and dangerous, a storm cloud hovering overhead.
Takagi stepped back. “Yes, sir.” She stripped off her body armor and tossed it at Anika, who instinctively caught it with her dominant hand.
She felt the catch all the way up to her shoulder. Blocking out the pain, she took the laser and ear comm from Takagi. The dismissed operative strode off, her body rigid with controlled fury. Anika ran the checks on the weapon to confirm it was fully charged. She donned the protective gear, gripped the laser in her left hand, and disengaged the safety.
“Except for Mari in the rappelling section, all bodies are clustered together in one of the small training rooms along the eastern wall,” Gianni said to the assembled group. “Most likely, the hostiles have corralled the operatives who were inside and are holding them as hostages, waiting for an assault. Let’s give it to them. Those of you with lasers, set them to maximum force.”
“Not stun?” Anika asked.
“We’re not risking our people’s lives. Understood?” His gaze was as hard as his words.
Anika adjusted the laser’s setting.
“Say it,” Gianni said.
His words scraped like a turbo sander. “Understood.”
“We’ll handle the hostiles and the hostages,” he told her. “You go to the rappelling walls. Find Mari and wait there until I give the all-clear.”
Anika gave a final tug to her body armor and focused on the doors of the facility. “Yes, sir.”
“One more thing.” Gianni stepped closer to her, his voice low. “If you get a chance to
fire, don’t hesitate. Take the shot.”
Anika’s eyebrows drew together. Why was he saying this? Did he suspect the truth of what had happened in Belgrade? Regardless of what he suspected, resolve steeled her. She was determined to save Mari, whatever it took.
She firmed her grip on the laser. “I will.”
Gianni disengaged the locks to the facility. “Move out.”
The team surged forward and turned right as soon as it entered the hangar-like room. Typically abuzz with the breaths, punches, thumps, and thuds of bodies and exercise equipment, the space was now eerily quiet and empty—except for one body in workout gear that lay prone on the ground, facedown, a dark pool of blood spreading out from his chest. The medics glided a gurney toward him. Anika prayed they weren’t too late, but didn’t stay to find out. She had to find Mari. Crouching low, out of sight of the acrylic walls that fronted the series of small training rooms on the other side of the vast space, she broke away to the left, and headed for the far wall.
When she had cleared the open space, she straightened and ran full speed past the target chambers toward the back of the facility and the rappelling walls. As she neared the place where she and Mari had been practicing yesterday, her pulse kicked up a notch. A rappelling rope lay in a jumbled heap at the base of the wall. No sign of her friend. She did a visual sweep of the area. Gianni had said he saw movement here, but that was minutes ago. Maybe Mari had been discovered and herded in with the other hostages.
She engaged her ear comm and turned toward the front of the facility. “Mari’s not here. Should I head back? Do you copy?”
No answer.
That’s when she heard it. A muffled squeak. From behind her, near the auto-lift in the corner. She spun back, laser pointing in the direction of the sound.
In the auto-lift’s doorway stood her friend. Behind her, a foot taller and twenty pounds heavier, was a man. Anika recognized him as one of the hostiles captured in Belgrade. The man’s hands gripped Mari’s ponytail, pulling her head back. The other held a syringe against the side of her neck.
Gianni had said there was only one heat signature back here. Apparently, he’d been wrong.
Anika winced at her friend’s swollen eye and split lip. Mari’s right shoulder drooped unnaturally. At least she had put up a fight.
The man bore his own signs of abuse. But most of his bruises, an ugly mix of black, purple, and green, looked old. Interrogation, Anika thought.
Don’t hesitate, Gianni had said. Take the shot. But she didn’t have a clear shot, not with Mari in the way.
“Let her go,” Anika said, voice firm, left arm steady. “We’ve breached the facility and are freeing the others now. It’s over.” She hadn’t heard any sounds coming from the front of the facility. Had the other hostiles surrendered? Given up without a fight?
“Give me code to auto-lift,” the man said in broken English. “Your friend won’t tell me. If you don’t, I’ll pump syringe into her. It’s full of synthetic used to make me talk.”
From this distance, Anika couldn’t tell if the syringe was full or empty. If full, that large a dose could likely kill a woman Mari’s size. Even if empty, air injected directly into her jugular vein could cause an embolism resulting in death by stroke or cardiac arrest.
“Why do you need the auto-lift?” Anika asked.
“Emergency exit at top.”
Anika shook her head. “There is no exit.”
“Don’t lie. I overheard guards talking. How they use it when they want to leave this shithole for few hours.”
Was there an exit? Anika had never heard of one. But then, she didn’t know everything about this place. “I’m telling you, there’s no exit. The only way out of this place is through the front door. And you’ll never get there alive.”
The hostile released Mari’s hair and clamped his forearm around her neck. Squeezed. A breath wheezed from Mari’s mouth and the color seeped from her face.
Anika’s stomach roiled, as if a street cat was trying to claw its way out. I don’t want to shoot you. But I will, if that’s the only way to save Mari.
“Okay, okay,” she said, still pointing her laser. Stall. “I’ll give you the code. But it only works with print recognition. You’ll need this.” She pointed her free thumb up in the air.
The man relaxed his hold and Mari gasped in and out. “I’ll use her thumb.”
Mari started making one-handed signals, out of sight of the man’s line of vision.
Anika couldn’t drop her gaze and study the signals without calling attention to them. Limited to only her peripheral vision, she struggled to decipher what Mari was trying to tell her.
“She’s only a recruit,” Anika said. “You need the print of a higher level operative. Like me.” Not true, but he didn’t know that. “Let her go. I’ll ride up with you and input the code. If you’re right, and there’s an exit door, it will be coded, too.”
She needed to buy time. Once we get to the top, she thought, and he sees for himself there’s no exit, then ride back down, Gianni will be here. Even though she hadn’t heard anything through her comm device, he had to be tracking what was happening back here. He had to be.
The man backed into the auto-lift. He dragged Mari with him. As they moved farther away from her, Anika could see Mari’s signals better, but the angle of her friend’s hand still made them hard to interpret. Thumb and forefinger moving toward each other? Fist opening to splayed fingers? Two signals. Over and over.
“Okay, we all ride up together,” the man said. “And if there’s no exit, I make one.”
Make an exit? How?
Mari signed faster. Thumb and forefinger. Fist and splayed fingers.
Her meaning suddenly became clear. Mini-grenade. The hostile had one. But how? They were secured in munitions lockers, nowhere near the interrogation rooms. Unless they’d been used as part of a negotiating tactic?
Gianni had been right. She had to take the hostile out. The cat in her stomach was now a frantic jumble of claws and teeth.
Anika trained her gaze on the man’s upper chest, where the “V” neckline of his T-shirt came to a point. Though uncomfortably close to the top of Mari’s head, it was a decent-sized target area. She took two steps closer, waiting for the right moment. With her other hand, she crossed her second finger over her forefinger and, with tiny movements, flicked them left and right. Twice. She hoped Mari understood. Get ready.
“Come,” the hostile said. “Get in.”
Mari’s first two fingers extended, thumb pointing out. Her head dipped. Her body sagged. She dropped her thumb and swept her hand forward. Shoot!
Anika fired. The laser hit the man’s forehead above his right eye. Not where she had intended, but it did the job. His arms jerked sideways and Mari scrambled free. His body fell back against the lift wall and slumped to the floor.
Anika stared at his face, skin paling beneath his dark complexion, jaw slackening, eyes unstaring. It would haunt her dreams. Her first live kill.
Mari walked toward her.
“You okay?” Anika asked.
Mari nodded, the color beginning to return to her face. “You?”
Anika bent forward, resting her hands on her knees, and gulped in some deep breaths. “Good hand signaling. Sorry it took me so long to figure out.”
“Good shot,” Mari said.
“Excellent shot.” Gianni’s voice came from behind her.
Anika spun around. He stood two meters away, a team member on either side.
“I was aiming for his upper chest,” Anika admitted.
“My assessment stands,” Gianni replied. “You did well.” He glanced at Mari. “You both did.”
“He caught me after my first rappel,” Mari said. “I was so focused on landing I didn’t see him until he was on me.”
Anika looked at Gianni. “I thought your handheld showed only one heat signature back here.”
“If the hostile had a tight hold on Mari, they would read as one.
” He directed his attention to Mari. “How are your injuries?”
“Nothing the medics in Clinic can’t fix.”
“Good. Report there. Your mission that was canceled is back on. Confirm when you’ll be field ready.”
Anika watched her friend’s face pale again.
“I’d like to join the mission,” Anika said.
“You’re being assigned to a different one,” Gianni replied.
Anika brows lifted. “I am? When?”
“You’ll be briefed tomorrow. Report in at oh-six-hundred-hours.” Gianni turned his gaze to Mari. “You should go now. Get checked out.”
“I’ll come find you later,” Anika said.
Mari nodded, her good eye clouded with worry, and walked away.
One of the medics appeared with a gurney. The team members who had accompanied Gianni moved toward the body.
“Be careful,” Anika said. “He’s carrying a mini-grenade.”
They found the explosive in the man’s pant pocket. A dark plum-shaped object of destruction. His body was lifted onto the gurney and the group moved off, toward the front of the facility.
Anika watched them go. A tiny alarm of suspicion vibrated inside her. “How did he get his hands on a mini-grenade? It doesn’t make sense.” She looked at Gianni.
His gaze was neutral, giving nothing away.
Which raised her suspicions even more.
Chapter 6
“What happened with the others?” Anika asked.
“The operatives are all fine,” Gianni replied. “The hostiles surrendered.”
“Without a fight?”
“They have families in Novi Sad. We promised not to harm them, if they gave themselves up.”
“I wish I had known that about my hostile. Maybe he would have given up, too.”
“But then you wouldn’t have shot him.”
The vibration intensified. Something wasn’t right. “You sound as if that would’ve been a bad thing.”
“You would have avoided your first live kill. Again.”
“That’s what this was about?” Her hands clenched into fists as she realized what he was saying. “This whole thing was a set-up? You let the hostiles out on purpose? To make me kill someone?”
