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Agent Walker fumed. She sat behind the wheel of the SUV they had hurriedly rented in Zurich, fresh after teleporting in. Well, not so fresh. The Loralite stone was located in a small cave adjacent to the Rhine Falls—another rock outcropping unknown to the world except to Rabiya. Ran wondered how much Loralite there was blossoming ever upward from the earth.
They’d gotten soaked by freezing spray on the hike from the waterfalls to Zurich and their clothes were still stiff, despite running the heat nonstop for the ninety-minute drive south to Engelberg. That whole episode had earned Rabiya a cussing out from Walker. Ran enjoyed that; she liked seeing the older woman miserable.
Of course, Kopano had called the waterfall “refreshing.” Always so positive. It made Ran grind her teeth, except when his cheer also annoyed Walker.
It struck Ran that Walker thought this whole Rabiya thing was just a wild-goose chase, that the girl was simply using them to get away from her controlling father. Ran wasn’t entirely convinced of the girl’s intentions either. But she certainly didn’t mind seeing Walker made to sweat a little.
When they hit the roadblock heading to Engelberg, though, that’s when Walker started to believe. What kind of public-safety patrol wore body armor?
“By whose authority are you keeping us from passing?” Walker asked the guy manning the barricade.
He squinted at her. “Lady, by whose authority are you asking me questions? Get outta here.”
“Why does he sound American?” Kopano, sitting in the passenger seat, murmured so only the people in the car could hear.
“These men are Blackstone,” Rabiya whispered. “We must get through them if you want to get to Einar.”
The guards suddenly jerked away from their car. There were loud noises coming from up the road. Ran knew that sound.
Gunfire.
“Seriously, lady,” the guard said, turning back to Walker even as he unbuckled a buzzing walkie-talkie from his belt. “Turn around before something bad happens to you.”
“Okay, okay,” Walker said meekly. She rolled up her window and put the car in reverse. “Ran?”
“Yes?”
“I’m going to need you to blow up that barricade.”
Ran picked up a stone from a small pile that she’d collected at the waterfall. She charged it with her Legacy, the crimson glow lighting the interior of the car and reflecting in her eyes.
“As you wish.”
Nigel’s first reaction when Einar’s artificial calm broke was to cackle. The bloody ponce. Delivering his addled revolutionary speech into a cell phone camera like some John Smith knockoff and then he goes and gets his lights turned out by Caleb.
It was the most wonderful thing Nigel had ever seen.
There wasn’t enough time to savor the moment. Einar’s henchwoman—he’d called her Duanphen—was nearly back to their busted-ass ship, dragging Bea by her arm.
“Oi, world’s least-chill Buddhist!” Nigel shouted, his words carrying sharply into Duanphen’s ears so that her shoulders bunched and she flinched. “Bring back my evil mother!”
Duanphen spun to face him. Nigel lashed out with his telekinesis, mustering as much force as he could. He shoved her to the ground and Bea with her.
He saved their lives. Because that’s when the cross fire started.
Sydal’s men shot first, covering their boss’s retreat into his idiotic flying saucer. A pair of bullets struck the mercenary nearest to Nigel, thudding into his body armor and knocking him off his feet. Too close.
The mercenaries fired back, their blasters sending sizzling bolts of energy towards Sydal’s men. One dropped, his black suit scorched through. The rest were protected by a sudden flash of silver light that manifested a waist-high wall of rock. That would be Daniela, using her Legacy.
With the advantage of cover, Sydal’s men returned fire and sent the Blackstone mercenaries scrambling for the nearby fountain. Nigel felt something like a beesting on his shoulder and glanced down. He’d been grazed.
Taylor tackled him to the ground. Only seconds had passed since he knocked down Duanphen and Bea, but that seemed like an eternity when guns were blazing.
“This is a damn shit show,” he said to Taylor.
“I’ve been in way too many shoot-outs lately,” Taylor replied. “What do we do?”
Nigel glanced across the field. Duanphen and Bea were still down. The Garde had her head perked up, waiting for a break in the shooting to move. Bea lay there cowering with her hands over her head.
He sighed. “Gotta save my bloody mum. She’s probably Satan herself, but I can’t let these muppets take her.”
“You don’t need to explain,” Taylor replied. “I’ll take down the shooters.”
“You get that tracker in your arm working?”
“Yeah,” Taylor replied. “Help is on the way, hopefully.”
“Good on ya,” Nigel said. He squeezed her arm. “Right, then. Don’t die, love.”
“You neither.”
As the shooting started, Isabela grabbed Caleb around the neck and pulled him off the unconscious Einar. They fell backwards and Isabela wrapped her legs around Caleb’s torso, squeezing him tight. She was choking him.
“Look what you did, babaca!” she yelled. “We had them. We had them!”
Caleb’s duplicates reached down and pried Isabela’s arm out from under his chin. Then, a dagger of blaster fire created a hole in one of their chests, the clone vanishing into thin air. Caleb and Isabela both ended up scrambling for cover behind Daniela’s newly formed wall. Isabela used her telekinesis to pull Einar’s limp body with them.
“I can’t believe you’re on his side,” Caleb said to her.
“I’m not! I mean—” Isabela punched the ground. “I don’t know!”
“You were just choking me.”
“I’m sorry,” Isabela replied. She reached out and touched Caleb’s cheek. “I thought you were going to kill him.”
“I’m not the killer,” Caleb snapped. “He’s—he almost murdered Nigel.”
“He thought Nigel worked for the Foundation,” Isabela replied. “You don’t know how deep their corruption goes. That little slug you’re here protecting, he doesn’t care about us, Caleb. At least Einar, at least he’s one of us—”
Caleb looked around. Their wall was getting pelted by blaster fire by the Blackstone mercenaries, but it was holding. Sydal’s guards were returning fire. Melanie crouched nearby still holding that briefcase, her eyes panicked. Daniela was next to her.
Sydal was gone. He had fled back i
nto the ship.
“We can’t let them kill each other,” Caleb said.
“Why not?” Isabela replied.
Before Caleb could respond, a loud roar pierced the air.
Five was back.
He landed feetfirst on one of Sydal’s guards, crunching him up against Daniela’s wall. The burly Loric looked down, saw that Einar was beat-up and unconscious, and his face curled. Two blaster beams fired by the mercenaries struck Five in the chest but did nothing except leave scorch marks on his steel-plated skin.
The last of Sydal’s guards tried to get his gun pointed at Five, but was far too slow. Five used his telekinesis to bend the gun into a pretzel around the man’s hand, then punched him with enough force to knock three of his teeth out.
Five looked at Isabela.
“Where’s Sydal?”
She pointed inside the saucer.
“Good.” He pointed at Einar. “Watch him.”
Five stalked towards the entrance ramp.
Three Calebs stood in his way.
Taylor scrambled on her belly from her exposed position to where the rest of the mercenaries were taking cover. While these guys were obviously used to being under fire, they had less experience operating without a commanding officer. Taylor thought the XO was still alive after Five landed on him, but he was in no shape to lead.
“Jesus Christ!” one of them shouted. “Someone secure the asset!”
One of the soldiers leaped out of cover, firing wildly at Sydal’s guards, and then grabbed Taylor by her coat and hustled them both behind the fountain. Bullets whizzed by overhead, chipping away at the granite basin. A few of them returned fire while the others bickered.
“We need to get the XO! Check if he’s still alive!”
“No! He would want us to protect Barnaby. If she gets taken . . .”
“Hell with her, I’m not fighting that goddamn Lori—”
With her telekinesis, Taylor pulled the trigger on one of the blasters, firing it into the legs of the men shooting at Sydal’s guards. They screamed and collapsed as their body armor melted into their knees.
Taylor felt a pang of guilt. She’d fought alongside these guys, maybe even saved their lives before.
