Blades of Winter (6 page)

I put my head down, and the floor bucks under me. This is very close quarters. The grenade was only thirty feet away from me when it went off. Something lands next to me. It’s a lower leg, complete with boot. I check Li’l Bertha, but her sensors are dark. All clear. Squads 7 and 8 hustle around the corner, but I had them deployed too far away, and they’re too late to help.

“Trick, how’d you miss those fucking guys?” I have to yell this over the frantic chatter of my wounded Squad mates. I run to see how badly they’re hit.

“Alix, you’re going too fast! My scanners have trouble seeing the middle of the building. That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you.”

Raj cuts in. “Solomon, keep the comm in protocol.” Oh, right. He’s using my real name.

Trick gets back to business, “Scarlet, please report.”

“All clear. Five nicks, three heavy and two light,” meaning three of my guys are badly wounded and two are just scratched up. Squads 5, 4, and 2 took most of the incoming fire. Their SoftArmor stopped the bullets that hit their torsos but not the ones that hit their arms and legs. Squads 3 and 6 had taken cover to return fire, so the only damage they took was from ricocheting bits of glass. The rest of us whip out field dressings and help the most severely wounded guys first. My hands begin to tremble again. I hold myself together with more Kalmers.

Cyrus comms, “Raj, reinforce Alpha with yourself and Beta’s lower four.” Cyrus sends Raj to me with Beta Squad’s 5, 6, 7, and 8 guys. Squad members are numbered in order of seniority, with 1 the most senior and 8
the least. Cyrus and Patrick will cover the outside with the helicopters and Beta Squad’s four most experienced troopers.

Alpha Squad’s Med-Tech tends to my injured men while I prowl back and forth watching out for competitors. Raj and Beta Squad’s 5 through 8 charge up the stairs. Raj gives me the hairy eyeball, then looks around to take in the situation. He reassigns the Beta guys as part of my Squad, then turns back to me.

“Well, at least you’re in one piece,” he rumbles,

“Yeah, terrific. You want to take point?” I reload Li’l Bertha while we talk so I don’t have to see his face tell me what he thinks of my assault skills.

Raj answers, “No, you’re quicker in these tight spaces, but I’ll be right behind you.”

I slam the ammo pack into my gun and look up at him. “To keep me from fucking up again? Look, why don’t you just—”

Cyrus comms in, “Scarlet, cut the crap. Move out!”

Fine. I comm to Trick, “Solomon, this is Scarlet, direction.”

“Scarlet, proceed down the hall, past the conference room.” And then he adds, “Slowly!”

Slowly. This sucks. My mom is held hostage only two floors away, and Trick has got me in Super Slo-Mo. We ease our way down the hall and across the second floor. I monitor Li’l Bertha’s sensors while Raj shoulders his Bitchgun—a savage and unruly beast of a weapon. The 50-mm grenades it fires are just this side of mortar rounds. Only Vindicators like Raj get Bitchguns. They’re too big for any other type of Level. The kick would probably tear my whole upper body off. It’s the most destructive personal firearm in the world. Rah-Rah must have done really well in his large firearms skill test. The fact that he’s cleared to deploy with this game-changing monster lets me see him in a whole new light.

Patrick leads us to another set of stairs. I signal Squads
6 and 7 to wait here and cover our backs, then I take the rest forward.

“Solomon, how’s the view?”

“Like glass, Scarlet. Increase speed to the third floor. You’ve got a clear entrance, with some competition in the middle of the floor.” I run up the stairs, shoot open the door’s lock, and shove the door open. I peek around the corners to make sure it’s clear, and then I scamper through the doorway.

Raj and I lead our guys up the passageway and around the corner to a point directly above where we got ambushed downstairs. I flash my Squad the hold signal so Patrick can thoroughly scan this area.

“Scarlet, two hostiles in the interior space. Same as downstairs.” Another ambush.
Gotcha, fuckos
.

Raj hand signals to me and the Squad:
Take cover
. Then he opens fire. His Bitchgun hammers the wall down in flaming six-foot chunks. Big Raj leans forward to counteract the gun’s monstrous kick. His feet skid back a few inches every time he fires, and everything in front of him turns into dust and smoke. It’s like watching Thor defend Valhalla.

Beyond the roar of Raj’s gun, we hear a rapid series of snaps, crackles, and pops as our competitors’ ammo catches fire. Raj stops shooting, backs up to my position, and reloads from a big black canvas bag he has slung over his shoulder. We all hunker down while the dust settles. I switch to infrared and see a pile of stillwarm body parts off in the far corner of what used to be the third floor conference room.

“Solomon, direction.”

“Jesus, Scarlet, everybody all right?” We must have whited out Trick’s sensors.

“Fully vertical, Solomon. Not a nick.”

“Roger, Scarlet. Keep going. Next stairwell, straight 200.”

We duck and cover our way down the demolished hallway. Raj and I are up front while the Squad scans
the flanks and rear, watching for surprises. Things are going much better now that we’ve slowed down a bit. I’m about to comment to Raj on this fact when I remember that we got pounced on downstairs because I was being a cherry dumbass. All this thinking cramps my concentration, so I rip the fifty-fifty mix of Madrenaline and Kalmers I’ve nicknamed the Scarlet Speedball.

It’s hard to balance the uppers and downers. The Madrenaline makes me fast, but if I overdo it, my hands shake like the hips on a belly dancer. The Kalmers help me chill, although in excess they make me dizzy. In the correct proportion they allow me to function at a superhuman level, but the combination makes my head hurt, especially my teeth. That’s where the Overkaine comes in.

We approach the door to the stairway on the far side of the floor. “Solomon, direction.”

“Stand by, Scarlet, very blurry.” We stand by, then we hear some noise in the stairway. The door bursts open. It’s three of the paramilitary guys! They’re as surprised as I am, but they aren’t hopped up on synthetic adrenaline, so it’s game over for them. I punch the first one in the throat, shoot the second guy in the face, then spin around and kick the third sucker so hard that he flies backward and cracks his skull on the wall. They all hit the ground at the same time while the Squaddies rush by me and pound the shit out of them. ExOps Squad troops are serious about protecting their Levels.

My guys are still giving the baddies a giant tune-up when Trick comms, “Scarlet, retain some of those assets for interrogation.”

Oh, right, we’re supposed to harvest some intel. But by the time I call off my Squad, it’s too late. It might have been too late anyway. Those were some masterful Bruce Lee–style hits I laid out.

“Uhh, roger that, Solomon.” I’ll break it to Trick later. I look at Raj, who has a funny expression on his face. His eyes are scowling, but the corners of his mouth are twitching like he’s trying not to laugh. Maybe he likes
kung fu movies, too. I point up the stairs and say to Raj, “Shall we?”

Raj shakes his head and grins despite himself. He says, “We shall.”

We creep into the stairwell, then we hear some muted explosions and a long exchange of small-arms fire from outside.

“Solomon, this is Beta 1. Be advised, multiple hostiles exiting from the south side.” The sound of gunfire crackles through Beta 1’s radio microphone. Some of the rats are trying to jump ship.

Patrick is ready. “Beta, this is Solomon. Suppress hostiles and stand by for support.” More noise from outside as our helicopters pitch in. We don’t always bring a gunship with us, so this may have caught the kidnappers off guard.

I climb up the stairs slowly because Trick is busy coordinating the activity outside. At least I thought he was.

“Scarlet, this is Solomon. You look clear to the top floor.”

“Roger.” I launch myself up the stairs with Raj and Alpha Squad right on my six. Rapid movement now counts for more than worrying about our comms being monitored. When we reach the door, I hang back and let Raj bash the lock out with the butt of his Bitchgun.

“Solomon, this is Scarlet, direction.”

“Wait one, Scarlet.” The noise level outside dies down for a second, and then there’s a huge explosion that bounces us around like the BB in a can of spray paint. Patrick must have been evacuating a couple of our people from the blast zone. He’s right back with us after the floor stops dancing around under us.

“Scarlet, be advised you have five hostiles coming your way. Another four have exited onto the roof with the subject.”

Mom!

“Roger that, Solomon.” My jaws are clamped tight. Only my training and the drugs keep the screams inside.
I stand at the door and flash hand signals to my guys:
Five enemies approaching from front
. Raj and the Squad are set up on the steps below my door. I’m on point, at the top of the stairs, monitoring Li’l Bertha’s bad guy detector.

When I see movement in the passageway, I pull the door open, uncork a grenade, and toss it out into the hall. They’re only a few feet away, much closer than I thought. One of them yells “Grenade!” and winds his leg up to boot it back at me. I slam the door shut and brace myself between it and the stairway’s handrail. The door bucks into my back as the bad guys try to kick it open. Then the grenade blows the door completely off its hinges, and my featherweight self catapults down the stairs past Alpha Squad.

I tumble down the steps as Raj opens up with the Bitch. Imagine five Mack trucks crashing into each other at full speed. That’s almost how loud a 50-mm grenade blaster sounds in an enclosed concrete stairway. My ears are ringing as I hustle back up the stairs, and Raj steps to the side to let me pass. He needs to reload, and the Squad can mop up whoever survived that boom plate special we just served up. I lead the Squad through the shattered doorway and onto the top floor. We find a seven-hundred-square-foot area completely covered in blood, limbs, heads, and mangled torsos. One of our victims is still alive even though he’s lost both arms and his chest is blown open so wide that I can see right through it. He sits on the floor and breathes with shallow gasps. His eyes swing from one blood-gushing shoulder to the other. Then he shudders, coughs, and stops breathing.

Raj finishes reloading his gun and rejoins us. Back to work. “Solomon, this is Scarlet, direction.”

“Take a left out of the stairway, go straight to the corner, and up the maintenance stairs to the roof.”

“Hostiles?”

“I’ve got eyes on four hostiles on the roof.” A pause.
“Hurry, Scarlet, they’ve got her with them. We can’t risk it with the choppers.”

I rocket down the smoking, bloody hallway. Raj and Alpha Squad barrel along after me. They know what this means to me and that I’m done with any kind of strategy. We soar up the stairs. Raj and I hit the roof door simultaneously. The door flies open, and Raj and the Squad troops deploy into a kneeling perimeter around the doorway.

I’m so cranked up that my teeth chatter. Time moves at one-tenth its normal speed, and everything sounds murky, like I’m underwater. The four hostiles are gathered around Cleo behind some giant air conditioners. The two guys in the middle have their guns pointed at my mom. Her eyes go wide when she sees me, but she doesn’t move or cry out. ExOps’ mandatory training for agents’ family members taught her to keep quiet in exactly this situation.

Li’l Bertha goes into Sniper mode: .30-caliber slugs, fired singly, no bursts. Her gyroscopes spin up so I’ll be able to hold her steady despite all the natural and artificial chemicals zipping through me. Her sensors label the group as Hostiles 1, 2, 3, 4 and Subject. Hostiles 1 and 4 stand in the open a few feet away from my mother, so I pick them off first with shots to both eyes, both guys.
Ba-bam! Ba-bam!
They’re still falling as I charge toward Hostiles 2 and 3 to take away their cover. I’m almost all the way around the ventilators when they instinctively point their guns at me instead of my mom.

Now they die
.

I leap in the air to throw off their aim. My jump peaks at about fifteen feet. Li’l Bertha spits out shots for each of the two remaining kidnappers, one at each of their guns. Before these fuckos realize they’ve been disarmed, I land right in front of them.
Time to F.U.C.K. them up
. I smash Li’l Bertha’s barrel into Hostile 2’s neck so hard that it slashes his carotid artery open. He screams, and a quart of his blood splatters all over me. I turn to Hostile
3. His eyes are wide open, and his mouth makes a silent little circle. I rear back and smash his chin with a right-handed uppercut that crushes his jawbone into jelly. His teeth shatter, and blood squirts out of his eye sockets. His face turns dark purple, and he tips over like a fallen tree. Something gray spurts out of his nose as he lands flat on his back.

I shut off my neuroinjector’s flow of Madrenaline, and my sense of time whooshes back to normal. Mom isn’t hurt, so I check myself for wounds. I’m not shot, but my right hand is pointed the wrong way and is throbbing with pain. I’m covered in blood, guts, and eyeball goop. Little bits of bone, shards of teeth, and pieces of skin are stuck to me like glitter.

My stomach churns, I wheeze when I breathe, and suddenly I can see only in black and white. My head and my guts race to see which I do first: pass out or lose my lunch. My legs feel like rubber, so I sit down among what’s left of the dead guys and sob so hard that I can’t even throw up. My mom says my name, and even though I’m all covered in dirt and gore, she kneels down and throws her arms around me.

I don’t know what I’d do if I lost my mother, but I do know she has the best daughter in the whole fucking world.