Psion Omega (Psion series Book 5)

by Jacob Gowans

  Brickert screamed as the staples pierced his flesh.

  The camera turned on him again, surrounding him in light. Brickert’s com was ripped from his ear and plugged into the camera. They’re going to broadcast this. His chin hit his chest as he was unable to support his head any longer. Through his blurred vision, he read the sign, even as his own blood continued to drip down his face onto the paper like dark red raindrops. Ice flooded his veins when he read the words:

  Remove the bombs or he dies.

  Brickert was a dead man. His team would never remove the bombs. They would never negotiate with these animals.

  3. Fallen

  Sunday, April 27, 2087

  INSIDE A LARGE executive office on the top floor of the First Continental American Bank tower in Detroit, Sammy stood at a large window, a pair of binoculars pressed to his eyes. The view of the city was gorgeous, so were the plush decorations of sleek, modern design. The skyscraper neighbored the Joswang Tower. He let the binoculars hang around his neck and checked the time in the upper corner of his com’s holo-screen.

  0238

  His eyes grew blurrier the longer he stared, and it took several seconds of rubbing to make the blurriness go away. Then he yawned and rubbed his head. His hair had grown long in the last few months, now reaching past his ears. Jeffie seemed to like it that way, so he didn’t cut it. Sammy brought his night-vision binoculars back to his eyes. So far, so good.

  Rain poured down from the skies, splattering the large windows which he, Kawai, Li, Jeffie, and Nikotai stared through as they observed the street around the Joswang Tower. Part of Sammy wished he could be with the teams planting the bombs. It felt odd being away from the danger. He didn’t like leaving his friends to do the dirty work, but they wanted him in control of the mission, ready to move in only if needed.

  They were too protective over him, even insisting that he wear their best armor despite being out of the action. It was the same flexible, woven bulletproof mesh Psion Alphas wore in combat. Only two other suits had been salvaged from Capitol Island. Anna wore one, and Al the other.

  Brickert was doing an excellent job of coordinating between Sammy and the teams. I told him he’d make a good team leader, Sammy thought. Lorenzo Winters, one of the resistance men who’d accompanied Sammy to the Hive, had led Albatross Team in San Francisco, but had broken his foot a week before the trip to Detroit. Sammy had tapped Brickert to replace him.

  If this mission goes well, maybe Brickert will lead Albatross Team in Dallas. Dallas was the site of the third cloning facility they planned to bomb.

  Using his binoculars, Sammy checked the street around the lobby entrances to make sure his team had no unwanted visitors. When the explosives detonated in the upper floors, they wanted to keep casualties to zero. Though they had made every effort to limit damage to only the floors where the Hybrids were grown, nothing was certain when dealing with bombs and buildings.

  After the all-clear came for the three teams to plant the explosives, Sammy waited for the next update. Some strange sounds came from the coms of Brickert’s team followed by hissing like static.

  “Albatross, check your com. Everything okay? I’m getting some white noise.”

  There was no answer except the strange crackling sounds.

  “Albatross,” Sammy said to Brickert again, “I’m picking up some interference from your coms. Please respond.”

  No answer. Jeffie cast Sammy a nervous glance.

  “What do you want to do, Sammy?” Li asked. “Send someone to check on them?”

  Sammy’s mind flew through his options. It would be almost impossible for someone to catch Brickert’s team unaware. No reason Brickert couldn’t warn Sammy if a problem occurred. Then what’s causing the static? And why isn’t Brickert responding?

  “CHAR—!” Brickert’s voice yelled over the com.

  “Albatross?” Sammy asked. “Report to me now!”

  The only answer Sammy heard was a muffled booming sound like a cough or a distant drum. He heard other sounds, too, but couldn’t tell what they were.

  “Sammy?” Li asked. “What are your orders?”

  “Go,” Sammy finally said. “You, too, Kawai.”

  Without another word the two Psions ran for the elevator. Nikotai and Jeffie went back to watching the street. Sammy eyed the zipline guns stowed in the pack in the corner of the office. Back in February, when they had started training for these urban missions, Sammy and his team practiced using the guns for speedy escapes from the office towers.

  “Albatross,” Sammy said, “if you can hear me, Li and Kawai are coming over to check on you. If your com starts working, report in as soon as—”

  “Help us!” Brickert said in a wheezing voice. “Attack … on the … security center!”

  “Each leader send half your team to Albatross Team’s position now!” Sammy ordered. “I’m coming in, too. You four hold tight and keep your shields up.”

  “Gas,” Brickert’s voice cut through his own coughs and gags. “They’ve got gas.”

  Sammy looked at Jeffie and Nikotai. “You two stay put. I need you to be my eyes in the sky. Nikotai, snipe any enemy who tries to enter from the street. Keep me informed. You’re in charge.”

  “Be careful,” Nikotai told him.

  Jeffie gave Sammy a nod. With his hands spread apart, Sammy blasted the large glass window multiple times in rapid succession until it wobbled and then shattered into thousands of pieces. The difference in the air pressure sucked the glass out into the night where the pieces fell like tiny twinkling stars. He wasted no time in setting up the zipline gun, anchoring it into the wall and floor at three points. Then he aimed the zipline and fired it into the roof of the neighboring building. He tugged firmly on the line, testing its strength and elasticity. Satisfied he wouldn’t plunge to his death between the towers, Sammy grabbed the handles and triggered the release. Pressurized air shot him forward until he dangled across downtown Detroit at speeds nearing sixty kilometers per hour.

  Once he knew his momentum would carry him to the rooftop of the Joswang building, Sammy released his hold of the zipline and flew onto the roof. Loose gravel awaited him below. He used his Anomaly Fourteen to fire several blasts from his feet, powerful pushes of energy that slowed his fall and allowed him to set foot on the rocky floor at a run. Across the way was a door to the rooftop. He sprinted to it, fired three shots at the lock, and kicked it open. A deafening BANG assaulted his ears as the door crashed into the wall.

  “Sammy, they’ve taken Brickert in elevator 13,” Al reported. “We barely missed it.”

  “Was he alive?” Sammy asked. There was a catch in his voice as he spoke the words. The thought of Brickert dying.…

  “Yes, but wounded.”

  “If they took him to the elevator, it must mean they’re going down.”

  “How do you know?” Al asked.

  “Because that’s where they took me.” Flashes of his own elevator ride with Stripe and other Aegis flashed before Sammy’s eyes. “Are there any Thirteens left on the main floor? Are the others okay?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Find out! If you see a Thirteen, kill it and cut off its finger. I’m going to need it.”

  “We have to be out of the building, Sammy. The explosives are in place. Nine minutes to detonation. We agreed on this.”

  “Get everyone out. You’re honcho inside the building. Nikotai is now mission leader. As far as everyone else is concerned, I’m on a solo rescue mission. Contact Rosmir and have him bring the ambulance around to the lobby doors. Got it?”

  “Be careful.”

  Sammy reached the top floor of the Joswang building. It wasn’t a penthouse suite like the fox’s N Tower in Orlando. It was a fitness center with a large pool, racquetball and basketball courts, and a dozen other amenities. Sammy sprinted across it and came to the stairs next to the elevators. The stair door wasn’t locked. He pushed it open and hurled himself over the railing.

&nb
sp; Down he fell. Every few floors he used foot blasts against the walls of the stairs to slow himself to a manageable speed. With his Anomaly Eleven, Sammy’s brain calculated everything, from his speed and acceleration to the amount of blast energy he needed to control his fall.

  “Sammy,” Nikotai reported, “the Thirteens are broadcasting a feed using Brickert’s com. They’ve got him. He looks really—”

  “Patch it through to mine,” Sammy ordered.

  The holo-screen on Sammy’s com came alive, displaying the live feed from Brickert’s com. When Sammy saw his best friend slumped over on a chair with a sign stuck to his chest—copious amounts of blood dripping from his nose and mouth, a dull, lifeless expression on his face—he wondered if his friend was already dead.

  Not Brickert. I can’t lose Brickert.

  He read the sign. Saw Brickert stir, the faint rise and fall of his chest.

  You chose the wrong hostage.

  Sammy ground his teeth together so hard they squeaked. His jaw began to ache as his pulse quickened, his blood roaring through his veins. I will kill you all. The rage inside threatened to transform him into something darker, baser, and deadlier.

  When he reached the ground floor of the Joswang building, he left the stairwell and ran for the security center. “Al!” he shouted. “I need that finger now!”

  Al came out of the security center. His clothes were covered in blood and he cradled something in his hands. “It’s not good, Sammy,” he said. “Hefani is … Natalia’s unresponsive. Strawberry’s in shock.”

  “Just give me the finger!” Sammy screamed in a primal, rage-filled tone.

  “Here! Here! Go.”

  Sammy took it and ran to elevator 13. He jammed the button repeatedly until the door dinged. Once he was inside, he pressed the digit against the scanner and watched as the panel opened. Two choices: black and red. In the elevator in Rio, there had been a third choice: white.

  I’ve seen black. Black is where they keep the anomalies for questioning.

  He watched the feed coming in live from their location. The Thirteen couldn’t seem to hold the camera very steady. Sammy noted the furniture, torn and shredded.

  He’s in their living quarters. Like at the Hive. He saw them again as clearly as he saw his own reflection in the elevator doors. Their eyes, their clothes, their lust for blood.

  Sammy mashed the red button with the severed finger, and the elevator began its descent. Images filled his mind as he sank deeper into the earth. He saw himself destroying them. It would be a massacre. He wanted to smell their blood. Every blow they had landed on his friend would be paid for with a life.

  No, no. That’s not me.

  On the com screen, Brickert muttered something. His words came out thick and wet. Slick red liquid trickled from his mouth. Then he coughed. It sounded like he was choking. Sammy watched closely as his friend spat out something long and white.

  His front tooth.

  Rage so strong and violent passed through Sammy that he shook—crackling with a lively, dark energy that needed to be expended. A brief vision passed before his eyes of himself tearing apart thylacines in the jungles of the Amazon. He remembered the guilt after seeing what he’d done, after losing control over his mind and body. He had let the anomaly take over. The Thirteen.

  Sammy closed his eyes. Letting it out would make him nearly invincible. Keeping it reined in could mean his death. But each dance he had with the darkness inside—the Anomaly Thirteen—the darkness grew stronger, louder, harder to ignore. He thought of Trapper, how he had changed from being Commander Byron’s best friend to something twisted and unrecognizable.

  A whimper came through his com’s earpiece. He opened his eyes and saw a Thirteen holding a knife to Brickert’s face.

  “Please …” Brickert moaned.

  They’re going to carve his face.

  “DON’T TOUCH HIM!” Sammy roared into his com.

  The elevator came to a stop. The Thirteen on screen paused at the sound of Sammy’s voice coming through Brickert’s com. The doors opened with a soft ping. Sammy walked out of the elevator with his arms held high above his head. The stench of the floor assaulted his nose. Two Thirteens appeared down the length of the corridor, in the doorway of the large common room where Brickert was held, weapons aimed at Sammy’s chest.

  Fully automatic assault rifles. One hundred twenty rounds per magazine. Nine hundred RPM.

  The red-melt-to-black uniforms met him halfway down the hall, their guns still trained on his heart. “You better be here to give us the detonators,” one said. “Or you are never gonna see the sun again. And your fellow Fourteen … he hasn’t even begun to know pain yet.”

  “Burn in hell.” As they reached out to pat him down, Sammy attacked first, blasting them in the chest with his most powerful hand blasts. As the Thirteens flew backward, they opened fire.

  Sammy used his right hand to shield while performing a small blast jump. With his left hand, he used a strong push blast to support his body while running along the right wall, his body now parallel to the floor. The Thirteens adjusted their shots, but Sammy anticipated this and jumped again, turning his body another 90 degrees until he was running on the ceiling. The Thirteens followed him with their bullets. Sammy turned again, switched hands, and continued running along the left wall. All the while his computer-like brain kept count of the number of bullets each gun had fired.

  One hundred five … one hundred twelve, one hundred twenty.

  Sammy dropped down to the floor and used his left hand to shield the bullets coming from the Thirteen who’d been more conservative with his ammo. With his right, he pulled his syshée from its holster and fired five bullets into the other Thirteen. The Thirteen had just finished reloading when the barbs hit him in the chest and gut. He hit his knees and sprayed his clip wildly around the hall. Sammy fired again, this time making a headshot.

  The other Thirteen didn’t have time to watch his comrade die. He backed away, still firing at Sammy, who used his shields as he pursued.

  It’s like taking candy from a baby, a dark voice sang in Sammy’s head.

  Sammy hummed as he fired a shot into the Thirteen’s kneecap. The Thirteen staggered, but stayed standing. Sammy aimed again and shot, this time hitting the other knee. The Thirteen’s weight nearly brought him down to his knees, but the remarkable ability of the anomaly allowed him to stand, his face in a twisted grimace of effort and fury. Sammy crossed the distance between them, easily blasting away the last of the Thirteens bullets.

  “You’re out,” he told the Thirteen.

  The Thirteen shrieked and hissed at him. His face was so screwed up with hate that his scars looked like wrinkles. He lunged as soon as Sammy drew near enough, but Sammy caught his head and twisted hard until he felt a snap. As the Thirteen slumped to the floor with a twitch, the door ahead to the common room closed and locked.

  Sammy checked the time. Six minutes until the bombs go off.

  Urgently, Sammy tried the door handle and found it would not give. His holo-screen showed him the feed from the camera on the other side of the door, and he watched as the Thirteens lined up around the room, their guns aimed and waiting for him to enter. Using super-heated blasts from his left thumb, Sammy melted the three hinges on the door. The stench of liquid steel and burnt flesh smelled like melted sugar and vanilla. He looked at his thumb and noted the raw, peeling flesh, but the pain was not as severe as he’d expected.

  Third degree burns. May need a skin graft. The thought hardly bothered him.

  He knocked on the door with his syshée. One of the Thirteens on the other side stepped close. “Who is it?” she asked in a sweet, girlish voice.

  “I’m here to negotiate the release of the prisoner in exchange for the bomb codes. I have the detonator. I will give it to you with the code to deactivate the weapons.”

  Through the door and over the screen, he heard and watched them communicate in their bizarre language of body jerks and shriek
s. After about thirty seconds, she returned. “Slide the detonator under the door.”

  “Release the prisoner first.”

  “Slide it under the door or he gets a bullet in the skull.”

  Via the holo-screen on his com, Sammy saw a Thirteen put a gun to Brickert’s head. Brickert made no sign that he felt the nuzzle press against his temple. Sammy set the detonator on the floor and eased it slowly under the door with his foot. The girlish Thirteen bent down by the door to pick it up.

  Sammy watched her over the camera. Just before she stood, he blasted the door with both hands using maximum power. The door, no longer held in place by its hinges, flew inward, crushed the Thirteen, and slammed into three more behind her. As he walked in the room, Sammy glanced at his com.

  Five minutes.

  Bullets greeted him like flies to a cut of meat. For the moment, Brickert was forgotten by the animals. They all wanted the new guy. One of the Thirteens screeched to the others, and in all the noise, Sammy heard one say, “Berhane! Berhane!”

  He smiled at the idea that they were aware of who he was, that word had spread about him. He felt powerful and larger than himself.

  At a glance, he counted ten Thirteens in the room with him. Four had been knocked down by the door, but besides the girl nearest to it no permanent damage had been done. He chose the angle that would give him maximum shielding ability from as many enemies as possible. In his left hand, he held the syshée with twenty-two rounds left in the magazine. Even with his weapons—his Anomaly Fourteen and Eleven—he could not beat so many enemies. Not without help.

  Release me. Use me. Then you can put me away again and forget about me.

  Sammy had no choice. He exhaled and embraced the darkness, the rage, the cold. Energy surged into his limbs. The pain in his thumbs vanished. His fear melted.

  His first shot found its mark in the forehead of one of the Thirteens who’d been hit by the door. The second missed. The Thirteens fanned out at once, quickly attempting to surround him. Sammy didn’t care this time. He only wanted their attention on him and away from Brickert. He let them move around the room, his body tensed, coiled, ready to spring when the time was right. Though the camera had been set down, it was still on, broadcasting the events in the room. Sammy positioned his body so that he could see behind himself by watching the camera feed on his com screen. Without moving, he could see around himself in almost 360 degrees.