Page 177 of Nothing Special X: The Last Stand

A hard slap cracked through the feed.

Xander yelped.

Free cursed under his breath.

Green balled his fists as murder flashed in Ruxs’ eyes.

Curtis spat. Then laughed again. “I guess you want closed.”

God ground his teeth until pain shot through his jaw.

He glared at Ruxs and Green wanting to blame them.

“Tech,” God hissed into the comms.

“I know,” he answered tightly.

“Tell Curtis to shut the fuck up and stay that way.”

A beat passed.

“Curtis, you’re pissing off more than these guys. Shut the fuck up.” Tech said, low and sharp.

Curtis muttered something God couldn’t make out.

Tech growled, “I mean it.”

Another minute dragged by.

Maybe two.

Time became a living thing.

Then Free’s screens lit up on the other side of the room.

They all rushed over and zeroed in on the map blooming from dark gray into grid lines, before a fixed location marked in red appeared on the larger screen.

It was in an industrial district on the outskirts of the city. Another screen showed what Tech could see through his glasses.

Concrete floor. Rust-stained support columns. High, broken windows blackened by dirt.

Xander on the floor with his hands bound behind him, breathing too fast, face pale, and eyes bloodshot and wet. Curtis beside him, lip split, blood at the corner of his mouth and on the concrete near his knee. Free sat near Tech’s other side, wrists zip-tied, eyes locked with cold hate on the man standing over them.

Tech’s viewpoint tilted slightly as he kept his head down.

Fox’s serious face appeared on the third screen. He stood in his ranch office in a black T-shirt and cap, eyes moving fast across the feed. Behind him, shelves, maps, and old tactical photographs blurred in the background.

“Got ’em,” Fox said. “Location is an abandoned freight warehouse off Alameda corridor. Sending coordinates to your phones now.”

Cassidy snatched his phone as it buzzed.

Fox’s gaze cut to God. “Do you want me to call authorities?”

God shook his head once. “No.”

Day glanced at him, then back at the feed.

God kept his voice controlled. “Not yet. They hear sirens, they might panic. If LAPD sends a negotiator who doesn’t know what the fuck they’re doing, they may decide they’ve already lost and start shooting. I don’t wanna give ’em a reason to accelerate.”