Bash and I exchange a look of pure horror.
A searing heat suddenly fills the air, followed by a sharp cracking sound. I whip around to see Malachi activating Aurora’s Avidian, his hands glowing as he works to shatter the wall on the opposite side.
Dante and Nasha start doing the same on our side, andBash and I immediately start shouting at the imprisoned Avids. “Back up! Get away from the walls!”
The acrylic explodes in a shower of fragments. Dozens of people surge through the openings, pushing and trampling each other in their desperate bid for freedom.
“Wait! Go this way to get out!” I try to direct them, but it’s useless. Sheer panic has taken hold as they scatter like frightened animals through every available door.
“Don’t bother,” Malachi says, stepping over the debris. “They’ll figure it out. We need to keep moving.”
I follow him through the wreckage toward the next door when suddenly the room wobbles and static images splinter through my vision like broken glass. Not now. The Viridian woman better not be pulling me into another vision right now.
I take a sharp breath and force myself to focus on the door ahead. The room steadies, reality snapping back into place.
Before we can reach the door, it explodes outward in a shower of metal and debris. Marco’s security floods through the opening.
It took longer than I anticipated for them to try to stop us. Either they were scrambling to respond, or we’re trapped in this narrow corridor exactly where they want us.
The next few minutes dissolve into a complete blur of bodies and chaos. I don’t have to think about how to fight or what moves to make. My training takes over, muscle memory guiding every strike.
Malachi slams into someone with brutal force, and they crash through the shattered wall to my left, grappling on the ground among the glass. Bash and Cade are locked in similar combat to my right, a tangle of violence.
I eliminate the target in front of me and surge into the next room where at least a dozen more security guards charge toward us. I press the side of my mask and breathe in Aurora’sessence, feeling her power flow through me like liquid lightning.
Fire erupts from my hands, shooting across the room in deadly arcs. Somehow, it feels only right to use her power to destroy these men—a final gift from the friend they helped murder.
Heat blazes behind me as the others channel the same devastating force.
My comms crackle and die from all the electrical interference, dissolving into meaningless static. I know the others can handle themselves—I have to find the real targets. Marco and Orin.
I spot a set of stairs where the security forces emerged, and sprint up them, taking the steps three at a time. I’m down to my last Avidian, one healing vial left. Everything else has been spent in the carnage below.
At the top, I yank open a heavy door and freeze. I’m standing in a security surveillance room, and my blood turns to ice.
Dozens of screens line the walls, displaying live footage from every corner of this nightmare facility. But it’s worse than that. I can see the gutter zone above us, the pantry hatch in the pizza place, even areas of the city I recognize. They’ve been watching everything. Everyone.
They knew we were coming long before we ever suspected. Even if Alex hadn’t betrayed us, they would have seen us coming with this surveillance network. We walked straight into their trap.
“If it isn’t my favorite parasite.”
Orin’s voice sends ice through my veins. I jolt forward as his hands seize me from behind, ripping my mask away and hurling it across the room where it shatters against the wall.
“You’re sicker than I thought. What do you think you’redoing down here, playing God? No, that’s your father. You’re his trusted lackey, doing whatever daddy says like a good boy,” I spit, and he fists a handful of my hair so hard my eyes start to water as he tips my head back. His beard is wiry and rough against my cheek as he leans down close to my face.
“This is going to be more fun than I thought,” he says.
I try to kick him, thrashing in his grip, but he’s so much bigger than me, so much stronger.
“You can’t hurt me anymore, Orin. I’ve already lived through your torture once, and I can do it again with a fucking smile on my face,” I screech.
He grabs my cheeks with his free hand, squeezing until I feel the inside of my cheek split against my teeth. He takes a step forward, forcing me to stumble with him, his hot body pressed hard against my back as he holds me in place, my neck bent at an uncomfortable angle from his grip on my hair.
“Oh, torturing you will be fun, pet, but not as fun as making you watch this,” he hisses, and my eyes snap to the security screens, scanning them row by row.
Cade is on the ground, unmoving. Nasha’s body lies not far from his.
No, they’re not dead. They’re okay, I tell myself, not ready to accept what reality might be.
