Page 17 of Wrong Squad, Right Mess

“You’re going on your own?” Kenyon asked, always the one with the biggest heart. Even if Corsa was a fool and an asshole, he didn’t want the kid running headfirst to his own death. “There’s too many monsters between here and there. It’d be tight with just us, but by yourself? There’s no way.”

Corsa yanked the vest off and threw it to the floor in what had to be the worst toddler-like hissy fit I’d seen in a while, at least from an adult. “I’m going to do what needs to be done, and then I’ll get all the credit for it. Don’t expect me to save your asses when the Guild finds out—you’ve fucked around, you can find out.” With that, Corsa walked out.

I let him go. Sure, I could have knocked him out, could have let Shear force him to come with us, but we had enough problems.

He was an adult—he could make his own choices. Hell, maybe he deserved whatever was coming his way.

Instead, I turned toward the woman and focused. “Okay, let’s get this sorted. We don’t have much time.”

By the time the last kid walked through the portal, it was flickering wildly. We had a matter of minutes before it collapsed entirely, before we’d be trapped in here, too. The trip had been fast, but not as fast as I’d have liked. It turned out a bunch of frightened kids made everything more difficult, but we hadn’t lost even one.

“Is he almost back?” I asked of Shear.

“I don’t know. He’s got me blocked. I could try to force through the block…”

“But that could distract him if he’s fighting. Fucking idiot—if he was nearby we could have still helped if he wasn’t acting like a fuckwit.” I dragged my gloved fingers through my hair. I hated waiting, hated having to sit there and see what would happen. Each minute ticked by with no response, no sound, no sign of him.

“Anything?” I knew my tone was unfair—far too harsh, and Shear hadn’t done anything wrong—but I couldn’t stop the stress inside me.

Shear shook his head, and a spark of energy came from the portal, a final warning.

“If we don’t go now, we aren’t going to make it,” Kenyon warned.

I cursed again, then turned. “All right, let’s go.”

Kenyon went first, followed by Shear, then Ingram after one quick glance my way. I waited another few seconds, each taking forever, but nothing changed. No signs of life, nothing to suggest that he had made it there, let alone was almost back.

The portal started to collapse, the top disappearing first, like a rain of glass. When I couldn’t wait any longer, I stepped through, cutting it so close that the power from the portal closing burned the back of my leg.

I glanced back at where the portal had stood, the emptiness now, the city in ruins behind it, and shook my head.

What a fucking waste…

Chapter Ten

Yun

Hearing the story play out, I didn’t doubt a moment of it. Sure, months ago, when I’d first met them, if Carter had told me this, I’d have laughed at him.

It just seemed too convenient, the idea that they weren’t bad people, that they’d simply gotten caught up in a bad situation. They weren’t cowards—they were heroes!

However, after the months together, after seeing them risk themselves for the three earlier, I didn’t doubt them anymore.

Besides, I was the last person to defend the Guild, not after all I’d seen them brush under the rug. They’d turned every problem with an esper into my problem, because that was easier for PR to spin. A weak guide who didn’t understand their job was a far easier story to sell to the public than the idea that espers could be dangerous.

“So Corsa was caught inside and that’s how he ended up corrupted?” I asked, piecing it all together.

“Seems that way. It’s at least sort of our fault, I guess, what happened. If we hadn’t let him go—”

I shook my head. “You can’t blame yourself for that. Corsa sounds like he was an asshole even when he was still an esper. It’s not a shock he’s worse after corruption, but that was all his choice. And the Guild threw you under the bus when you got back?”

Ingram spoke up this time rather than Carter. “We were public enemy number one. The Guild put out the story—quietly, of course—that our squad had run from our mission out of fear. No mention of the daycare, of the kids, none of it.”

“But there were witnesses of what really happened.”

“The Guild has the right people in the right places to make sure that even if anyone wanted to talk, the story never played. It didn’t take much for that one rumor to blow up, and suddenly everyone has a tale of their own. The time we didn’t save someone because they were already fucking dead became, ‘Reject Squad left my father to die because he didn’t pay them off.’”

I squeezed my hands into fists, wishing I could do something, anything. “But you know the truth. Why didn’t you guys speak up?”