Page 162 of Legacy Elite

Then my back end stops working. No pain, no warning — the message goes out and nothing arrives, and I go down at speed and slide through wet grass on my shoulder.

I get up. I make thirty feet and go down again, harder.

This time I don't get up.

They come through the grass behind me and they aren't hurrying.

Somebody says, "Again."

The third one goes into my shoulder.

The smells go first. One second there's grass and diesel and blood, and then there's nothing at all. Then the voices stretch out and start arriving from further away than the men are.

A loop comes over my head.

My mouth closes on a hand without me deciding anything, and I feel bone go, and somebody swears and drags him backwards.

That's the last thing my body does for me.

Another loop. Then a third, from a direction I can't turn toward, and the tension comes on and my head goes down into the grass and stays there.

Something heavy and soft comes over the top of me and the light goes green.

I push. One front leg still works. I make about six inches.

Above me, muffled, "How much has she had?"

"Three."

"Give her the fourth."

It goes into my neck.

After that my body stops arguing.

Wet grass. Green light. My own breathing, very loud. My mouth full of something warm that isn't mine.

Boots come through the grass and stop by my head. Somebody crouches. Two fingers press into the side of my neck and stay there a while.

"She's down."

Somebody further off. "Alive?"

The fingers move an inch and press again.

"Yes."

Freya got out.

Somebody starts counting to three, and the ground moves, and the green light shifts, and I can't hold on to any of it.

Chapter twenty-four

Torres

Luke’s rooms are big enough that five grown men can spend an entire morning in them without anybody admitting that’s what we’re doing.

I’ve been here since breakfast. So has Declan. Soren showed up before seven and hasn’t left. Renzo’s been in and out twice.