by Kyla Stone
There was no justice in vengeance. But there was still justice.
“You’re going to rot in prison for the rest of your miserable life,” Gabriel said to Cerberus’s unconscious form. “Enjoy hell on earth, scumbag.”
“What the heck is happening, Alpha Team One?” one of the Patriots shouted in his comm. “We have to take out that cannon!”
Gabriel was the last remaining member of Alpha Team One. It was all up to him now. “I’m on it!”
He crouched and peeked around the front wheel of the tank. He hoped the engine block would shield him from incoming fire. Smoke and ash created a thick haze. The snow was falling harder now. Wet flakes swirled in the wind, wetting his cheeks and settling in his eyelashes. He blinked them away.
Theo’s hacked nighthawks were engaging four tanks, zipping out of range of their firepower and striking close and fast, ripping huge craters in the tanks’ armor.
But he didn’t have time to worry about that.
Atop the ramparts, the last cannon swiveled an impossible 180 degrees. Its huge, menacing barrel aimed straight at Gabriel.
22
Amelia
Amelia stared in shock at the downed chopper in the distance. Smoke poured into the snow-thickened sky as flames surged from the twisted, blackened metal.
Micah wiped melting snow from the lenses of his glasses and peered at the wreckage through his rifle scope. “Gabriel is there!”
Far across the square, Coalition soldiers were running for the downed chopper, shooting their pulse guns. Amelia couldn’t see Gabriel in the chaos. “Wait—what’s happening now?”
They watched in horror as the cannon barrel rotated a full 180 degrees toward the chopper. “It’s not supposed to be able to do that!” Micah said.
“New upgrade last week,” Hogan said. “All the guns are scheduled for upgrades; this was the first one the mech-bots actually got to.”
Silas swore. “That cannon can take out our fighters inside the walls!”
“Gabriel!” Micah cried.
Amelia’s chest constricted. She touched Micah’s shoulder. “If he’s in trouble, go help him!”
Micah hesitated. “You have to get somewhere safe! Wait inside the Capitol for us.”
“I will,” she said. “Go!”
Both Micah and Silas frowned, less than thrilled at the proposition. Neither of them wanted to leave her. He didn’t have a choice.
“You too, Hogan,” she said. “And you, Silas. I’m fine. You can fight. They need you more than I do.”
Silas nodded in weary resignation. “We’ll be back.”
“I know,” she said.
Micah, Silas, and Hogan took off running toward Gabriel and the smoking chopper.
Amelia watched them go. She kicked off her heels. The freezing ground stung her bare feet. She tucked Micah’s handgun into the bustline of her dress, grabbed a handful of the sumptuous silk, and ripped a slit up to her thighs on both sides. It didn’t look pretty, but it would allow her to run.
She retrieved the gun and checked the ammo. Six bullets. She wasn’t a great shot, even with Jericho and Silas’s training. It would have to be enough. She would make it enough.
She’d lied to the two people she cared about most in the world.
But there was no way she was sitting this one out.
She was going after Sloane.
23
Micah
“Run!” Gabriel screamed. He sprinted toward Micah, terror etched on his face.
Panic gripped Micah. He skidded, digging his heels deep in the ground, trying to stop, to turn his momentum. To flee the cannon aimed directly at the Phantom, at Gabriel.
Too late.
He threw himself to the ground.
The Phantom exploded.
Dirt and shrapnel sprayed over Micah. Several chunks of metal struck his chest. The tactical vest blocked the impact. A shard punched deep into his upper left shoulder, tearing into muscle. A couple of smaller shards ripped into his calf.
Pain knifed through his body. Still, he was alive. The warning had given him enough time to miss the brunt of the explosion.
He raised his head, eyes watering, ears ringing. “Silas! Gabriel!”
Silas lay belly-down on the snowy ground, his hands over his neck and head. He groaned and pulled himself to a sitting position. “I should’ve just stayed in bed.”
Gabriel was several yards away. He was already on his feet, rubbing his head. His face and arms were covered in small cuts, but he’d suffered no major lacerations. He was okay.
Micah let out the breath he was holding. He climbed to his feet unsteadily and seized Silas’s arm. “Come on!”
Gabriel ran up to them. “Are you hurt?”
“Not mortally.” Silas picked a shard of metal out of his forearm. “Don’t worry about us—”
A groan came from behind them. They whipped around, guns up and ready.
Hogan propped himself against the wall of the nearest building, wincing. A large chunk of razor-sharp shrapnel a foot long pierced his thigh. It sliced deep into muscle, tendons, bones.
Gabriel aimed his gun at Hogan.
‘Stop!” Micah blocked Gabriel with his body. “He’s a friend of Amelia’s. He was her guard, but he helped her.”
Gabriel lowered his gun, his gaze still suspicious.
Micah turned his attention back to Hogan’s leg. He squatted beside him. “Should we try to remove the shrapnel?”
Hogan shook his head weakly. His skin was leached of color. “It likely sliced right through my femoral artery. This hunk of metal is the only thing keeping me from bleeding out.”
“We shouldn’t try to move you, either, then,” Silas said.
“Not a great idea,” Hogan wheezed. “You should go. I’ll be—fine.”
He clearly wasn’t fine. “But—”
“Listen to him,” Gabriel snapped. “We have larger concerns. Check the Phantom.”
They stumbled to the weapon. The force of the blast had struck the ground a few yards behind it. But even without a direct hit, the Phantom looked fatally wounded. The wheels were shredded, the metal base tipped on its side, torn and twisted. The Phantom itself had been thrown several feet to the right. It was vulnerable and exposed, but appeared to still be in one piece.
Even though they knew it was useless, Micah and Gabriel tried to lift it, grunting from the exertion while Silas covered them. The thing barely budged. Even if they managed to get several helpers, they’d never be able to lift it and aim accurately enough to take out the last cannon.
Conceding defeat for the moment, they darted back behind the safety of the nearest building. Micah fought a wave of hopelessness. If they couldn’t stop the cannon, it would blast them all to smithereens. It would kill everyone he cared about. “What now?”
“Where’s Amelia?” Gabriel growled suddenly. “Why isn’t she with you?”
“She’s taking shelter inside the capitol until we come for her,” Micah said. “She wanted to go after President Sloane somewhere inside BioGen. Amelia said Sloane was the key.”
Gabriel blanched. “Cleo’s hunting Sloane for killing her mother. If Amelia gets anywhere near her…Cleo is out of her mind. She’ll kill anyone who gets in her way.”
“Go,” Micah said. His first instinct was to go after Amelia himself. The thought of Amelia in danger made him nearly crazed with worry. But Gabriel was a stronger, more skillful fighter than he was. And if Cleo or anyone else was a threat, Gabriel had a better chance at neutralizing the danger. “We’ll take care of this.”
Gabriel gripped his arm. “You have to get that last cannon down.”
“I know,” he said. “We will.”
Micah watched his brother sprint away, crouched and darting from cover to cover, his figure masked by swirling smoke and ash and falling snow. He turned to Hogan. “How do we stop that cannon? There’s got to be another way.”
“You can turn it off manually,” Hogan said between gritted t
eeth. “There’s a kill switch. But to get to it, you have to go through them.” He pointed across the square toward the plasma wall a hundred yards away. The rampart below the last cannon was a narrow tower with a metal door at its base.
At least two dozen Sanctuary soldiers guarded it, pulse guns at the ready. They fired the occasional pulse blast, but they weren’t engaged in the battle pitched all around them. Their orders were to protect that cannon with their lives.
Silas stared at them, his eyes narrowing. A slow, cunning smile split his blood-spattered face. “They all have pulse guns.”
“With blasts that leave holes in your body the size of baseballs,” Micah said. “There has to be another way.”
“There isn’t,” Hogan said.
“Pulse guns have electronic chips inside them,” Silas said.
Micah stared at him warily. “What are you thinking?”
Silas pointed at the Phantom. “We have an EMP right here.”
“But we can’t lift it or aim it.”
“We can give it a nudge. And we can aim at something—as long as it’s at ground level.”
Micah looked from the Phantom to the soldiers guarding the tower. It was a straight line of sight. And the Phantom only needed to be moved a few degrees to the right.
“Hypothetically, we could disarm all the pulse guns within the Phantom’s line of fire,” Hogan said. “One person goes in while another provides cover.”
Micah shook his head, dread filling his gut like lead. “There are still over twenty combat-trained soldiers, most with knives, and a few with regular handguns. It’s nearly impossible—”
“I’ll do it,” Silas said without hesitation.
“Silas, no!” Micah said, horrified. “It’s a death wish. It’s suicide!”
Silas pointed to where the cannon had just fired again. The side of a building several Patriots had taken cover behind was gone, a gaping, smoking crater in its place. At least seven Patriot bodies lay in the rubble.
“That cannon will win the war all by itself,” Silas said. “I can do this. I can take it down.”
A fierce, desperate pride rose within Micah. He blinked back the moisture blurring his vision. “Silas, are you in danger of becoming a hero?”
“There’s never been any danger of that.” Silas shook his head, that familiar insolent smirk curving his lips. “Are you going to help me with this beast or not?”
24
Amelia
Amelia paused at the opened door to her father’s office. Her pulse thudded in her ears. The smooth metal of Micah’s gun slipped in her damp hands. Carefully, silently, she peered between the crack of the frame and the edge of the opened door between the hinges.
President Sloane was inside. She bent over several opened drawers, their contents spread across the desktop. She held a thumb drive in her palm. Bale stood beside her, feet planted, pulse gun leveled at the doorway, ready to blast anything that moved.
“This is it!” President Sloane cried. Bale glanced at her.
This was Amelia’s chance. Maybe her only chance.
She slipped around the door and stood in the opened doorway, planting her feet the way Jericho had taught her, the muzzle of Micah’s gun aimed straight at President Sloane’s black heart.
Bale’s gaze snapped to hers. His jaw went rigid. He pointed his pulse gun at her face. “Drop the weapon now!” he barked.
Amelia kept the gun trained on the president. Her finger tightened on the trigger. “Don’t move!”
President Sloane spun and froze. Her face contorted, a dozen emotions flashing across her face before settling into an expression of mild disappointment. She smiled, but it didn’t reach her eyes. “Amelia! What in the world are you doing?”
“Drop your gun, or I shoot the president!” Amelia shouted at Bale.
“Do as she says,” Sloane said calmly. “I’m sure we’ll get this little misunderstanding ironed out in a moment.”
Bale stared at her, his beady eyes full of venom. Slowly, he lowered his pulse rifle. He took his sidearm from its holster and placed it on top of the rifle. His movements were languid and precise as a panther’s. He never took his eyes off her.
She repressed a shudder. Just like with any predator, she couldn’t show her fear.
President Sloane picked up a second thumb drive from the desk. Amelia recognized her own name written on the front in a familiar scrawl.
Her heart contracted. The gift her father had left for her. He hadn’t lied.
“I believe that’s mine.”
President Sloane slid both thumb drives into her pocket. She gave Amelia a beaming, presidential smile. “My darling, you must be mistaken. I know this has been a trying day for all of us, you especially. I think I’ve been more than accommodating. Why don’t you drop that gun, and we can discuss whatever is troubling you?”
Amelia noticed the shiny black medical cooler on the desk beside President Sloane’s elbow. “What are you doing with that? Haven’t you given yourself the vaccine already?”
“Of course,” Sloane said with a tight smile. “But you can never have too much of a stockpile. Just in case.”
“You’re running away.”
“I’m finding a safe place. As you should too, my dear. I’m heading for the underground emergency bunker beneath city hall until this nonsense is all over. Come with me. You and your mother. You’ll be safe there.”
“I’m not running. I’m not hiding. And neither are you.”
Sloane clenched her jaw, struggling to maintain her facade. But the flash of rancor in her eyes betrayed her. “Then why, pray tell, are you here, pointing a gun at your president? An act of treason, I might add.”
Sloane would order Bale to kill Amelia in a heartbeat and not feel a sliver of guilt over it. “Micah and Silas. My brother. My friend. You told me you would help them. That you would bring them here and give them the cure. Instead, you ordered your goons to hunt them down. You tried to kill them.”
President Sloane clucked her tongue. “My dear, I’m so sorry to be the one to deliver bad news, but your friends were fraternizing with known dissidents. We’ve been working to pin them down for quite some time. They did this, you know. They blew up the platform. They betrayed you, left you to die. But I swear to you, we will find them. We will bring these terrorists to justice.”
“I’ve had enough of your lies.” Behind her back, Amelia activated the hovercam, keeping the gun aimed at Sloane with her right hand. The hovercam flitted into the air somewhere behind her. She took a swift step into the office to draw Sloane’s attention to her, not the camera. “Surrender yourself now. No one else has to die.”
Sloane shook her head with a low chuckle. “I like you, Amelia. I really do. Such verve. Such passion.”
“You don’t fool me. Not anymore. You’re no different than my father. You wanted me meek and docile. You wanted to control me like a pretty, perfect little puppet. But I know the truth.”
President Sloane paused, considering her. She raised her eyebrows, trying to maintain a look of disinterested indulgence. But her mask was cracking. The right corner of her mouth twitched. The skin around her eyes was pulled taut. “What truth might that be, dear?”
“That my father isn’t the only person responsible for the Hydra virus. You’re the true mastermind behind it all.”
Sloane’s face blanched. She picked up the medical cooler and forced a brittle smile. “I’m not sure what little game you’re playing at, but this is clearly not the time.” She took a step toward Amelia.
Amelia lifted the gun. “I said don’t move.”
Sloane’s eyes slid to the right, to Bale. He still stood ten feet from Amelia, or maybe he was closer now. Eight feet? Seven? He was a hulking beast of a man, his muscles straining against his suit coat, his hands flexing, watching, waiting patiently for Amelia to make a mistake, for his chance to lunge in for the kill.
Amelia wasn’t going to make a mistake.
If she did, s
he was dead.
25
Micah
Hogan handed Micah an extra magazine. “You’ll need it. As soon as you activate the Phantom, find shelter closer to the tower and cover Silas. It’s your only shot.”
Micah turned to Hogan. “What about you? I don’t want to just leave you.”
Hogan lifted his rifle with a wince. “Don’t worry about me. I told you, I’ll be fine. I’ve got plenty of ammo still. I’ll cover you.”
Micah and Silas darted out from behind the wall. Bullets and pulse blasts sailed over their heads. They crouched on the right side of the Phantom and shoved it with all their might. It moved half an inch. Sweat broke out on Micah’s forehead. “Again.”
They heaved against it, muscles straining. The Phantom moved another inch. A bullet pinged against the end of the weapon. Its armor protected it, but every second they remained out here, they were exposed.
The third time they pushed, the Phantom’s giant barrel lined up with the tower. Micah whispered a prayer as he slammed his fist down on the power button. Please, let this work.
The Phantom hummed. An invisible wave streaked toward the soldiers, shimmering the air for the briefest moment. The light blinked green.
Micah pointed to a Humvee carcass fifty yards ahead. Silas nodded. They raced across the grounds, dodging stray bullets and fallen bodies. The soldiers guarding the tower fired at them.
Nothing happened. Their pulse guns were as useless as toys.
Micah and Silas threw themselves behind the Humvee, breathing hard.
“Silas,” Micah started, a tightness in his chest. There was too much to say and too little time. “Thank you.”
