She continued forward to a branch in the crosswalk and turned to the right. Ahead of her lay a strange machine and one of the mounted machine guns. She approached while the man operating the machine gun released the full force of the weapon against her.
The bullets proved futile and simply pinged off her as she approached like harmless distractions. She reached the machine and pounded it with a steel fist. Immediately, her radio came to life with voices.
“We have radio.”
“The machine’s down. Hall destroyed it.” That voice belonged to Butters.
“I have eyes on her, Drew. She’s on the catwalk. Hostiles are unloading a machine gun into her chest.”
“Hall, get out of there!” Drew bellowed.
Kristen didn’t respond.
“I don’t think she needs to, sir,” someone said. She assumed it was one of the snipers who no doubt had eyes on her.
“Then we’ll go in.” A shout erupted from the front of the warehouse as SWAT poured into the building and assumed defensive positions near the door.
The man with the machine gun continued to fire at her. It was shocking how little she felt it and she again wondered what was happening to her. Was someone on SWAT a mage who had cast some kind of a protection spell on her? She knew next to nothing about the humans who could wield magic, but she didn’t know how else to explain this.
She was a girl from the suburbs of Detroit. Her mom and dad were normal people—except they weren’t her mom and dad, not biologically and had been entrusted with her and told to keep her safe. They’d done so and even kept her safe enough to never have to fully reveal whatever this power was inside her. Now, it was her turn to protect their city.
She stepped forward and flipped the machine that had jammed the radios off the catwalk like it was nothing more than an empty cardboard box.
The hostile maintained the machine gun fire, so she rushed forward and thrust him from the catwalk with a single kick.
“Sir, she walked into over a hundred goddamn bullets. I don’t know what we can do to help her,” said a voice over the radios. “She’s…she’s not human!”
“I don’t give a shit what she is because she’s my damn teammate. We can cover our goddamn teammate,” Drew replied. More gunshots followed. The hostiles now focused their firepower on the SWAT members who entered the warehouse.
Perhaps, if they’d surrendered, Kristen could have been talked into sparing their lives. But instead, they insisted on killing more and more people. Even in the face of defeat, they refused to lay down their arms.
The rattle of heavy machine gunfire joined the sounds of radio chatter and assault rifles. She looked ahead of her and across the catwalk that traversed the warehouse. The woman with the mounted machine gun who had escaped her earlier was there and aimed at the SWAT team.
“No!” she shouted and sprinted forward as the weapon began to fire.
The woman smiled with gleeful malice. Kristen remembered the expression from a boy she’d been in fourth grade with. He took pleasure in ripping the legs from insects. This woman’s expression was the same—satisfaction derived from the suffering of others was a sick thing, truly.
She thought of the people she’d killed but reminded herself that she’d done it because they were intent on destroying this city and her teammates and because they’d killed Jonesy. Had they deserved to die? Maybe. But was that her role? To decide who lived and who died?
No. No, it couldn’t be. Not if she wanted to think of herself as different than this woman.
“Hey!” she hollered at the hostile. “Stop now, and you live.”
“Fuck you, fucking dragon-bitch! I might not be able to kill you but I’ll bleed your friends out like the fat fucking piggies they are. We’ll burn this place down and the whole damn city will smell like bacon.” The gang member laughed maniacally and resumed her assault on the men and women below her.
Furious, she bounded forward and pushed her new abilities to their absolute limit. She ignored what the woman had called her and how much sense it made. The catwalk shook beneath as she raced forward, running faster than she’d ever thought possible.
Despite the threats to kill her friends, she still turned the machine gun on Kristen as she approached.
Exactly like the other one, it did nothing to her. She embraced the gunfire because she knew that each shot fired at her was one not fired at her teammates below.
In the span of a few heartbeats, she was inches away from the gun.
“I said stop.” She grasped the barrel and twisted it in her hands, bending the steel up back around like it was a pipe cleaner.
“Fuck you!” The woman drew a knife and darted toward her.
She vowed to herself in that moment not to become like this woman—obsessed with murder and nothing else. Her willingness to continue to kill, even in the face of obvious defeat, was disgusting.
The thought gave her pause. She honestly didn’t want to kill her—she didn’t want to kill anyone else, not unless she had to in order to protect the people she loved.
Instead of catching her by the throat or kicking her in the chest or any number of other simple maneuvers that would now be lethal because of her steel skin, she simply punched the machine gun with all her force and repeated herself. “I said, stop!”
The blow was enough to destroy the weapon like it was made of playdough rather than metal. It was also enough to sever the catwalk from whatever supports had suspended it.
The entire structure groaned, then lurched.
“Hold on!” she shouted to the woman, but she obviously didn’t have the necessary reflexes.
When the platform lurched, she jolted off the edge and plummeted to a messy death in the middle of the SWAT team.
“Get out of here!” Kristen screamed at the people below her.
“You heard her. Go!” Drew ordered the officers around him and no one argued.
As the catwalk ripped free, Detroit’s SWAT team left the building and moved clear of the falling piece of metal with moments to spare.
She rode the twisting network of platforms, railings, and ladders to the floor. Her weight was such that when she landed, she cracked the concrete.
The catwalk followed with a thunderous crash to shatter everything and release a great plume of dust.
Calmly, she stood and walked from the building.
Chapter Twenty-Four
The team waited for Kristen when she stepped out of the warehouse. Jonesy’s absence left an enormous hole in their ranks that she felt immediately.
“Hall,” Drew said by way of greeting. His voice was shaky.
“Thanks for checking that we cleared the building,” Butters said. She didn’t think she’d ever heard the jovial southerner sound angry before. Right now, he sounded furious.
She swallowed. In all the violence, she’d forgotten about getting him and Beanpole out. While she’d told herself that was why she went back in, was it true? Once inside, all she had wanted was vengeance.
“We left through one of the other exits,” Beanpole said. “A while before you crushed every man and woman in your path.”
“Seriously, Red. We’ve all eliminated a hostile in the line of duty. It comes with the fucking territory, but fuck…there’s limits, you know?” Hernandez shook her head.
“There will be an investigation into what happened here,” Drew stated and made a visible effort to return his voice to normal. “What you’ve done—”
“Was fucking rad!” Keith interjected. He was the only one of the team who’d been substantially injured. Besides Jonesy, of course. He was dead and her team was chewing her out?
“It was not,” the team leader countered. “You used a level of violence beyond anything the police would normally allow. You killed—we don’t even know how many people you killed.”
“Those thugs killed Jonesy.” Kristen could feel her rage rising again. She clenched her fists involuntarily and realized she was still in her steel skin
but didn’t change it. “They intended to burn the whole damn city down. They didn’t act like people. They acted like a pack of rabid dogs.”
He nodded. “I know. Believe me, I do, and everyone here knows we would have lost even more people if you hadn’t…stepped up. But the fact remains that we had the enemies contained. They were all in that warehouse and we had them surrounded. You didn’t have to—”
“Save your asses?” she cut in.
Drew shrugged. He seemed conflicted but ultimately thankful for his life. “I’m only saying you’ve made a mess, Kristen. Captain Hansen will have to punish you. One death—even of a hostile—means a mountain of paperwork. This? Well, this is like the goddamn Rocky Mountains of paperwork.”
“Are you saying I shouldn’t have done it? Even after they killed Jonesy? Are you saying I should have simply let them kill Butters and Keith and you because the paperwork will be too much to deal with?”
“Fuck that!” someone yelled, an officer from another SWAT team. “Those fucking dogs killed Donnie. If you hadn’t had…uh…” The man paled when he realized he was talking to a woman with steel skin. “That is…uh, thank you, ma’am. My wife and kids will thank you too.”
“I don’t care if I’m in trouble. I did what needed to be done. I killed the people who killed one of my people.” She removed her helmet. When she did so, it turned from steel to normal.
“They didn’t all kill Jonesy,” Butters said.
“They tried to. Everyone in there was hell-bent on murder. I did what had to be done to save this town. I don’t know if any of you looked into their eyes, but I did. There was no remorse there, not in any of them. All they wanted was blood and death. I ended this conflict the only way I could.”
“Hall, that’s total horseshit.” Drew clenched his jaw. “You could have fallen back and we could have kept them bottled in there for days.”
“And how many lives would we have lost?”
“Not as many as you took.”
“Watch how you talk to her, human. You’re on the verge of setting her off again, which I don’t think any of us want.”
Drew turned to look at the person who’d interrupted. Kristen realized immediately that it was a dragon in human form. An aura poured off him and washed over her team, and they all took a slow step back. It swirled around her like water around rock. She didn’t fear these dragons any more than she had the thugs inside the building.
She looked the man in the eyes and noticed they were orange with black slits like the eyes of a snake or a crocodile.
The Dragon—Stonequest, the name on his uniform read—stood tall, unintimidated by her despite her steel skin. “Do you know who we are?”
A quick appraisal of the other three with him confirmed that none of them were people either. She wasn’t quite sure how she could tell, but she was absolutely certain these were dragons as well.
“You’re dragons. Slow ones.”
“Not merely dragons, you little runt, but Dragon SWAT.” A woman with gorgeous steel-blue eyes hissed a warning. Her eyes were framed by perfect cheekbones and extremely long, platinum-blonde hair that was tied in tight French braids. To Kristen, she looked like a princess, not a member of a SWAT team.
“Easy Heartsbane,” Stonequest said. “This one obviously doesn’t know how things work around here.”
Heartsbane only clenched her jaw at that, but she said nothing further.
Her companion continued. “Like she said, we’re Dragon SWAT. Obviously, humans could never police dragons, so that’s where we come in. We’re the law above the law. When one of us breaks the peace or catches our leaders’ attention, my team brings them in.”
“So, what will you do—breathe fire on me? In case you didn’t know, I survived a blast from a damn rocket launcher. I’m not scared of three dragons.” She stepped forward and pushed past Stonequest, still in her steel skin. “You want me? Try to take me.” She checked him with her shoulder and he took a step back to let her pass.
“She doesn’t know.” Heartsbane laughed derisively.
The two other dragons laughed as well.
“We’re not here to bring you in. You’ve done nothing wrong—at least not for a dragon.” Stonequest’s voice rolled over her like a cooling wave.
She walked on as the words sank deeper and deeper into her mind. He didn’t actually say… He couldn’t have meant that she…that Kristen Hall was… She wasn’t a dragon. Was she?
Kristen thought back to what her father had told her, about his sister working for the dragons at some kind of bioresearch lab. Her thoughts wandered to her training and how impressed everyone had been with how quickly she’d picked it all up. And she’d always been strong and fast. And then there was the matter of her steel skin. She looked at her hands. They shone in the streetlights that had come to life. But that simply meant…it meant she was a mage or something. Not that she was a dragon.
“Dragons are above ordinary police rules of engagement,” Stonequest said and raised his voice. “Those thugs killed someone you considered yours. For a dragon, that’s all the reason necessary to end a human life. An attack against someone under a dragon’s protection is a direct affront and will never be tolerated. You only did what any dragon would have done in your situation.”
Kristen stopped. “But I’m not a dragon.”
The two who hadn’t spoken shared a curious look. Heartsbane snorted and shook her head. Stonequest merely nodded. “Yes, you are. The steel skin is a sign that you are. It’s unusual, certainly—an indication that you’re different. A steel dragon, but a dragon all the same.”
“So, you are here to bring me in?” She turned to them. “Try it. I won’t go without a fight. I’ve never heard of a steel dragon and I’ll bet you’ve never fought one.” Her mind raced. Could this really be possible? Could she really be a dragon? But how could she have been one her entire life and not known it? How had she not discovered it sooner? A dragon had sent her to the academy, after all, and they’d been behind her assignment on a SWAT team. How long had they watched her?
Stonequest shook his head. “As I said, you’ve done nothing wrong. The people you killed”—he gestured to the building filled with dead thugs like they were nothing more than farm animals—“don’t matter.”
“Of course people matter!” she protested.
“Not those,” Heartsbane countered. “We heard what they tried to do to the city. They were nothing more than beasts who needed to be put down. They couldn’t have done all that themselves anyway. They must have been under the control of one of us. Monkeys don’t know how to organize—”
“Heartsbane!” Stonequest cut her tirade short. “Watch your tongue or I’ll have it out.”
She stuck her tongue out. “Oh, for fire’s sake. It would grow back in a month.”
“Then I’d have a month of quiet.”
Heartsbane regarded her leader and finally acquiesced. He focused on Kristen.
“Do you think that I… Do you think all this was my fault?” she asked.
He shook his head. “No. And we’re not supposed to talk about open investigations.” He directed a sharp look at Heartsbane. “But since she already spilled the coals, I think it’s safe to say we sensed a dragon here and assumed it was responsible for what was happening. When we arrived, though, we found you. The trail of bodies you left behind does a fairly good job of convincing me that those people weren’t under your sway.”
“Then whose sway were they under?” she asked.
“We don’t know.” Stonequest didn’t shrug so much as crack his neck. He was even bigger than Drew, and—if his powers were anything like hers—was probably far stronger than he looked. “We sensed a disturbance and came here. By the time we arrived, the only aura we could sense was yours.”
“But you said I didn’t do anything wrong. Why didn’t you pursue whoever was behind this?”
“Your aura was stronger than anything else around here. If there was another dragon—and tha
t’s still an if—he must have fled, using your own aura for cover.”
“But that doesn’t explain why you’re talking to me instead of trying to find the man, er—dragon, who tried to take this city over.”
“Whoever the snake was, he failed against an inexperienced dragon who hasn’t come into her powers yet. He’s—what’s the human expression? Small potatoes.” Heartsbane smiled way too sweetly.
“When we realized you were in there, we told our superiors and they ordered us to make contact with you. New dragons don’t simply appear out of nowhere and besides, you’ve been watched. Apparently, there was quite a betting pool on whether you were one of us or not.” Stonequest grinned and made it obvious that he had money on that bet and also which side of it he’d placed his wager on.
“I heard Damos bet an entire chest of Spanish galleons on you being human.” One of the other two dragons laughed. “She’s gonna be pissed.”
“So what do you want from me?” Kristen asked. She clenched her fists. Okay, so maybe she was a dragon. It kind of made sense. Maybe…kind of. And on top of that, she was a steel dragon. Which apparently was unusual. Which meant if these assholes wanted a fight, they’d get one.
Stonequest shook his head and held his hands up, the palms down in a soothing way. “We’ll want you to join us eventually, once you’ve come into your powers fully. When that happens, you’ll be reassigned to Dragon SWAT. Until then, you are to remain with the human SWAT team to continue learning more and improving your skills.”
“I…you can’t simply pull my life around like I’m a puppet on a string.”
He smiled indulgently. “Kristen, who do you think put you on SWAT in the first place?”
She had nothing to say to that and besides, he had raised another question in her mind.
“What did you mean by come into my powers fully?”
“This is like talking to a child,” Heartsbane protested. But before Stonequest could reprimand her, she took a few steps back and transformed.
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