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I nod. “It was unpleasant.” Gunshots fifteen stories above us make me look up to the hotel roof. “Who’s up there?” Each staccato bang spells potential injury or death to one of our own.
“Rev,” he answers. “He chased Raptor and Lazarus up there.”
“Alone?” My voice is sharp. I am worried for Rev.
“I think so.”
Brawn and I take off running toward the hotel tower. While I calculate the quickest way to the top, the swarm of blackbirds lifts off. They rise as a unit into a velvet sky swirling with smoke. It could be my imagination, but it seems like there’s one huge bird in the center of the swarm, its wingspan impossibly wide.
The chopper pursues the mass as it flies over the Mississippi. Gunshots still sound from the roof.
“I need to get up there!” I’m desperately searching for the nearest door to the casino complex. I wish I had studied the floorplan and not only the layout of the streets and buildings of the warehouse district. “Which way?”
“I’ll get you up there,” Brawn says as we barrel toward the building.
“What?” I come to a stop on the sidewalk. There is a door ten meters from us. “How?”
“Like this.” He lifts the vaporizer over his head and hands it to me.
I take it from him, careful not to contact his hand, since my gloves are still off.
The second I sling it over my neck and shoulder, my feet leave the ground. Feeling top-heavy, I list to one side, and suddenly, I’m upside down. The modified gun dangles as the sidewalk grows further and further away.
Beneath me is Brawn. His hands are up like he’s keeping a ceiling from falling in on himself.
“What the?” I curse in Ukrainian and try to right myself, but there is nothing to push against. This must be Brawn’s telekinesis. I saw him practice on a steer at the soldiers’ ranch. The steer did not flip upside down. Am I more top heavy than a steer?
He’s using his Gift on me. I am not a fan.
“Hang on!” Brawn calls. “Almost there!”
As if there is anything to hold on to. I’m so far up that if he drops me, I will instantly perish. But he has not dropped me so far. With difficulty, I put my trust in my brother.
And nearly as soon as it started, I’m dropped onto the rooftop. My shoulder dislocates with a jolt of pain. Looking around, I get my bearings.
Across an expanse from me, Rev is sprawled on the gravel roof surface. Kneeling over him is a man with flame-red hair. He’s holding a gun to Rev’s chin.
“Death is my servant!” the man shouts at Rev. This must be Lazarus. “I control death, and I’m going to control you!”
“We’ll see about that,” I say, and I advance on his back, fast and quiet as I can.
He hears me coming and cocks his head, but he’s too late.
I grasp the exposed back of his neck with my bare hand, and he falls limp to the rooftop.
And then I see Rev, and my stomach bottoms out.
He’s in a pool of blood so large I doubt he has any left in his body.
I open my comm and start shouting for Doc, but even as I do, I know it’s too late. Rev’s face is gray-white. His eyes are open, sightless.
He is gone.
Chapter 21
Rev
I’m above it all.
