Perfect Weapon

by Jade Kerrion

  "I did this for a better country, for a country free from the tyranny of a government that abuses genetic derivatives. I am changing the future, for all of us."

  "You are destroying it."

  Thomas's eyes widened. "Are you defending a government that has persecuted you and others like you?"

  "No, but you're no better than the government you're trying to destroy." A chill settled deep in the pit of Danyael's stomach and crept outward; its unstoppable cold heralded death. He spared a glance at Jessica, slumped on the ground. Her hand was still pressed against the crimson stain, but it no longer trembled visibly. Almost there... "You considered yourself a patriot. You wanted to be a hero, but when you attacked people in their homes, you became just something else for them to be afraid of. You cannot change the world for the better through terror."

  Thomas sneered. "You know what I see when I look at you? A bitch for the government that betrayed you once and will betray you again, given half a chance. They treat you like dirt and still, you return to them, begging them to fuck you again." He glanced over his shoulder. "Give me a knife."

  Someone put a blade into his hand.

  Thomas's lips curled into a thin smile. "Hold his head still."

  Fingers curled into Danyael's hair and yanked his head back. An arm wrapped around his throat, cutting off most of his air. Hard hands pressed down on both sides of his forehead, immobilizing him. Danyael stared unflinchingly into Thomas's brown eyes as the man closed the distance, twirling the blade in his hand.

  "The world is going to know what you are, and when I'm done with you, when we're all done with you, we'll just leave you here and let the government pick up the pieces. They'll send you back to prison, right back where we found you. And this time, Danyael, no one is going to save you."

  The tip of the blade, razor sharp, parted the skin on Danyael's forehead. The pain, at first sharply localized, blended and merged with the raw agony pulsing through him. Danyael closed his eyes as blood trickled down his forehead. The blade moved slowly and carefully, mercilessly carving a path on his skin.

  He bit down on his lower lip. Miriya...

  It's going to be all right, Danyael. I've got you. Draw strength from me. Take whatever you need from me.

  Jessica spoke up, her young voice strong, determined. Do it, now.

  Danyael's eyes opened. Rivulets of blood flowed down his face, over his eyelashes, and along the slash of his cheekbones.

  Thomas stepped back and lowered the knife. His smile became a grin and his eyes glittered. Danyael recoiled from the malice and hatred coiling through the hard flash of Thomas's emotions. Thomas patted Danyael's cheek lightly with the flat of the blade. "Before we're finished, you will wish we'd left you to rot in prison."

  Behind Thomas, Jessica pushed slowly to her feet.

  Danyael met Thomas's gaze steadily. "You will wish you left me there too." With a final, desperate surge of strength, he pulled free from the grip of those holding him, lunged forward, and slammed the heel of his hand into Thomas's jaw, snapping Thomas's head back.

  Empathy, churning with anguish, transferred though physical contact. Thomas's eyes flared wide as suicidal madness took hold, leeching into his mind, consuming his heart.

  Jessica threw her head back, her blue eyes sparkling as the combined telepathic energy of the council's enforcers poured into her. She threw her hands up, and her power punched out a psi-blast so powerful that even Danyael's psychic shields trembled in its wake. As one, members of Sakti screamed as their psychic shields shattered, fragile as glass.

  Jessica spread her hands out, lowering them in a graceful motion. The sky shimmered, wavering in and out of focus as a telekinetic dome took shape. Large and flawless, it enclosed all the Sakti forces. The young girl looked at Danyael, her smile serene, and she nodded.

  Danyael stared down at his hands. Life or death. I choose death.

  Danyael flung his psychic shields aside. Death, like a demon released, slithered out. The alpha empath dropped to his knees as emotional agony clawed through him, tearing through wounds that had never fully healed. Everything he had once had and had hoped to have again, he sacrificed to protect the people he loved and defend a government that despised him. He paid more than he could afford and gave more than he possessed. He knew could never get it back.

  He screamed, coiling over his stomach to contain the rending pain. Others echoed, their screams resonating with insanity. When Danyael sobbed, brokenhearted, others wept with the passion of madness. Danyael had known suicidal despair all his life. When it sang to him in the night, he listened but was not lured by its seductive melody. No one else possessed the strength of Danyael's emotional defenses, and when the song, fueled by the unchecked power of an alpha empath, whispered through their unshielded minds, they listened and obeyed.

  The dying began.

  Thomas was the first to die. He slashed his wrists and his jugular with the knife that he had used to disfigure Danyael and then plunged the blade repeatedly into his own heart until his hands fell lifelessly from its hilt. Thomas's body hit the ground.

  It's done. Danyael's gaze drifted upward. Jessica stood wide-eyed and silent in the midst of the madness, her mind protected from Danyael's empathic powers by the combined telepathic strength of the council enforcers. She's safe, thank God. Through the tears and blood that mingled on his face, Danyael smiled and reached out to her.

  Trembling slightly, she slipped her hand into his and sat next to him. She shrank into as small a space as she could manage, huddling against him, as if for protection.

  Danyael's empathic powers soared, its song reaching a dazzling climax. All around them, the screams of the dying played in perfect counterpoint.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  Miriya's voice whispered through Danyael's mind, soft and tremulous. Danyael? Danyael, it's over. Raise your psychic shields, so that we can bring the dome down.

  Slumped face down on the ground, Danyael slowly pushed up on his elbows. Despite his hazy vision, he saw death all around. He braced himself for the rush of guilt, but beyond an initial flash of sorrow, he felt little. He was drained, empty; he was wrung out by his own pain, too numb to feel.

  How much time had passed? Danyael wasn't certain. He raised his psychic shields. Next to him, Jessica sighed in relief. She tugged her hand free of his and stood up. She lifted her face to the unmoving air and closed her eyes. The sky, a clear blue, shimmered as the telekinetic dome dissolved. Jessica then left him, running across the blood-soaked grass toward a path that led off the island.

  Danyael's drifting gaze rested briefly on Scar. The super soldier's body lay prone several feet away, many of his injuries self-inflicted. Scar had been injured but alive when Danyael had lowered his psychic shields. He had killed his protector too. Danyael exhaled, the sound somewhere between a sob and a sigh. He dropped his head back to the ground. How many had died because of him? Conservatively, he estimated close to five hundred. If killing twelve men in self-defense had sent him to ADX for life, what was the sentence for killing five hundred deliberately? Forty life sentences? He chuckled, the sound soft and bitter. Come on, Zara. I'm ready whenever you are.

  ~*~

  From her perch high in a tree, Zara saw joy dance across Miriya's face.

  "Oh my God, he did it. Danyael did it!" Miriya's grin was dazzling.

  The relief Zara felt was dampened by the awful sense of the inevitable. Danyael had driven hundreds of people to suicide with no more effort than dropping both psychic shields. He possessed too much power, too much deadly power, to be allowed to live free.

  She could spare him his inevitable imprisonment by killing him. It was the best solution, the only solution. For Danyael's sake, she had to see it through.

  "How is he?" Zara asked quietly.

  "Exhausted and in terrible pain, but he's alive. He's going to make it." The grin split Miriya's face again as she shimmied down the tree, scraping skin in the process. She ran toward him.

&n
bsp; Zara steeled herself against the ache deep in her chest. Her daughter would never know her father. I'm so sorry, baby. He would have loved you. I know you would have loved him. She unlocked her black case and assembled her sniper rifle. She would give Miriya a few minutes with Danyael---the alpha telepath deserved at least that much after everything she had done for him---and then give Danyael the mercy he craved, the mercy he deserved.

  Zara raised the rifle to her shoulder, watching through her scope as Miriya approached Danyael. Her finger tightened on the trigger.

  ~*~

  Surrounded by his enforcers, Alex Saunders watched events unfold from his vantage point on the Mount Vernon Trail. He released the breath he had been holding. Unbelievably, they had won. Danyael had won---

  Alex stiffened suddenly, his brown eyes glazed from a precognitive vision. He shouted a warning through the council's psychic channels. The assault group! Save Danyael.

  ~*~

  Through her scope, Zara saw Miriya look sharply over her shoulder at something along the Mount Vernon Trail. Alarm flared in her green eyes. The telepath threw herself through the air. Her small body jolted twice and then collapsed beside Danyael.

  Miriya's presence in Zara's mind vanished.

  Zara's mouth dropped open. Miriya? Miriya, talk to me.

  ~*~

  From behind him, Danyael heard a voice scream his name. He turned his head.

  Two feet away from him, a petite blond woman crumpled to the ground. Slowly blood trickled out of her mouth.

  His breath caught. "Miriya?" He dragged himself to her and saw the bullet wounds in her back. Had she taken the bullets meant for him? No, he couldn't let her die. She was the only one who could save Lucien. His healing powers, weakened in a body driven past exhaustion, trickled out. He had to save her---

  A bullet pierced his back, and then another. His body jerked from the impact. The chill of impending death raced hard on the heels of the explosive pain. His fingers tightened briefly around Miriya's, and then his grip slacked. His eyes closed. His healing powers faded; he had nothing left to give.

  ~*~

  Through the scope of her sniper rifle, Zara saw crimson bloom across the back of Danyael's shirt.

  Shock punched the air out of her lungs. Minutes earlier, she had been ready to kill him, but in that moment, she knew that she could never have pulled the trigger.

  She was too full of selfish hope for a future, their future, to permit him to die. She leapt from the tree, landed in a battle crouch, and pushed to an adrenaline-fueled sprint. Her heart and her mind in unison screamed only one name. Danyael!

  ~*~

  The assault group! Save Danyael!

  Shock ricocheted through the council enforcers, but the impossible task had fallen to the only person close enough to protect Danyael.

  Through binoculars, Galahad had watched with horror as Miriya leapt to shield the empath and took the bullets intended for him.

  Galahad shot to his feet and raced south along the wooded trail. Nothing could save Miriya, but perhaps he could still save Zara. She was out there, and like Miriya, Zara would step into an impossible fight to save Danyael's life. He needed to save her. He could not let the two women he loved die to save the man he hated.

  He burst into a small clearing. A sniper was poised on the top of the Military Assault Group's black armored personnel carrier, his rifle aimed at the island. Ten other soldiers, including the general, clustered around the vehicle, apparently ready to depart.

  Weapons swung in his direction. He leapt high, somersaulted, and landed on top of the vehicle. The startled sniper looked up. Galahad kicked the sniper off the vehicle and used the momentum to throw himself into a backflip. Two bullets whizzed past him, one passing so close that he could feel the subtle heat of its wake against his skin.

  He coiled into a battle crouch and launched himself at the assault group. His blades flashed, drawing blood. Pain stabbed into his mind, briefly driving him to his knees, but he brushed off the telepathic assault. He attacked, his fist skimming under the man's chin. The blade between Galahad's fingers sliced through the telepath's jugular.

  The pressure against his mind vanished as the telepath, his face pale and stricken with horror, sank to his knees, his hands pressed against his injury. With brutal efficiency, Galahad disabled the remnants of the Mutant Assault Group, fatally injuring many of them, and then turned to its leader.

  The general made no apparent move to defend himself. His smile was cool, knowing.

  For Miriya, and for Zara. Galahad poised to strike.

  "Hold, Galahad." A man in a crisp U.S. Army uniform, accompanied by a small team of enforcers, stepped into the clearing. He looked at the general and nodded briskly. "General Howard."

  "General Lysander," Kieran Howard's tone was mocking. "What brings you out here so early?"

  General Lysander, the director of the National Security Agency, shrugged. "Just a small matter of national security." The nonchalance in his tone vanished. "General Howard, I'm placing you under arrest on charges of conspiring with the terrorist group Sakti."

  ~*~

  "No, damn it!"

  Danyael's eyes flashed open, the physical agony sharp and scalding as Zara pulled him onto his back and cradled him in her arms.

  She shook her head. "Not like this."

  "Go..." he whispered. Blood swelled up in his throat. "Shields will fall when I die. Go..."

  She looked up. "Help's coming."

  He followed her gaze and saw several people running toward him. "No." He tried to push away from her, but his body no longer obeyed him.

  "Danyael, keep your eyes on me," she ordered, her voice calm.

  He shook his head, the motion so weak that it was scarcely visible. "Kill me, please. Can't go back..."

  Shadows blocked out the sun. Alex Saunders's voice boomed through his spinning head. "Heal him now."

  Someone knelt beside him and placed her hands against his chest. A soft voice, laced with urgency, crooned, "Let me in, Danyael, it's all right. I can still help you. Let me in."

  He refused.

  "He's fighting me. If he doesn't let me in, I can't heal him."

  "Break his shields," Alex ordered.

  The physical pain consuming him faded into irrelevance as pressure mounted against his mind. His fingers clawed at the ground as he fought to breathe. He had to keep the telepaths from smashing his psychic shields. He had to keep the psychic healer out of his mind and his body, until he died. He had to hold out for a few more seconds.

  "We need more telepaths," someone called out. "We can't get through."

  Alex's voice was sharp. "Jessica!"

  Danyael's gaze flashed to Jessica Richardson. The teenager chewed on her lower lip and wrung her fingers. "No," he pleaded.

  "I'm so sorry, Danyael," she whispered back.

  Her power flicked out like a whip, coiling around his mind. Her grip tightened. The pressure soared. Danyael screamed.

  Jessica wiped away the tears from her eyes as her mind bore down inexorably. Danyael's psychic shield cracked. No...please, God, no. Don't let me live.

  The combined power of several telepaths merged, driving down like a sledgehammer on the sliver of weakness in his psychic shield. It shattered.

  Danyael threw his head back, his mouth open in a silent scream. Anguish stole his voice. More than his shields shattered. The impact stunned his mind and broke his will to resist.

  The healer's powers surged through his broken mind and into his damaged body, its warmth driving away the chill, a soothing balm against the physical pain.

  As his body healed, his spirit suffocated. Zara's face was hazy through the tears in his eyes. She had betrayed him. Again.

  Once more, he would pay the price for his blind faith in Zara Itani.

  ~*~

  Zara blinked back the tears from her eyes. She cradled Danyael's head with one hand, and with the other she stroked his cheek. She looked into his dark eyes and saw far t
oo much pain, too much hurt. His lips moved, but no sound emerged. For a moment, his struggle reflected in his eyes, and then he seemed to stop fighting. His erratic breath evened, his racing heartbeat calmed. His eyes fluttered and closed. He had slipped into unconsciousness.

  The blood pumping out of his bullet wounds halted. If she looked under his shirt, she would see the injuries close, flesh sealing over the wounds. The sliced skin on his forehead, their deep cuts spelling out the word "whore," repaired, leaving no scars.

  The psychic healer sat back on her heels and looked up at Alex. "He'll make it. I don't know if I can do more for him. His leg injury is old, and the wounds are surrounded by scar tissue. We could cut the wounds open and remove the scar tissue, but I can't heal through them."

  "Leave them for now. And Miriya?" His strong voice caught.

  The healer shook her head. "I can't bring people back from the dead. Danyael could have saved her within moments of her death, but now it's too late." She looked down at Danyael, sighing softly. "He's in a lot of psychic pain from absorbing others' injuries. He's not going to wake for a while."

  "Good," Zara said. "That gives us time to finish this." She pulled out both Glocks and set the barrel of one against the tender underside of Danyael's chin. The other she pointed at Alex Saunders. "I have twitchy fingers," she warned the wide-eyed telepaths. "You'll take me down with a psi-blast, but I promise, you'll kill Danyael and Alex in the process."

  Alex's voice was calm. "Zara, what are you doing?"

  "Keeping a promise. Danyael asked me to kill him, to keep him from being sent back to ADX. He seemed to believe the latter was a foregone conclusion, but it occurs to me that it doesn't have to be. We both know Danyael never deserved to be there in the first place. Your decision to send him there led to this. Unmake that decision. Danyael is not going back to ADX. It's up to you whether his next location is a hospital bed or a slab in a morgue."

  Alex spread his hands. "He is not going back to ADX; I give you my word. He's not going to prison, any prison. We owe him too much."