Meet Abby Banks VOLUMES: 1-3

by J. A. Cipriano

  I fired into them, and while I was sure I got a couple, it didn’t seem to matter. It was like shooting into an anthill with a BB gun. There were just too many. The soldiers surged back into the compound as Flash lay helplessly on the ground, trying desperately to crawl away. So she was still alive, but why? Gunfire tore up the forest around me, bullets spitting through the trees and showering me with debris as I buried my face in the dirt.

  “Dammit,” I growled, trying to figure out how I was going to rescue the mercenary when one of the towers exploded into rubble. Flame leapt out across the compound, scorching the air and singing the sky as the structure toppled to earth in a wash of black smoke.

  “Don’t go get her, Abby. It’s a trap.” Bang’s voice growled in my ear. “That’s what they do. They left her alive so we will try and save her. Then they will mow us down as we try.” It was weird because I could hear him, but the boom had been so loud there was a high-pitched ringing overshadowing everything he said.

  “So what’s the plan?” I asked, dropping a soldier in the other tower with one well-laced shot as the gunner lined up on something far away from me. Thanks to Bang’s attack, the gunfire wasn’t focused on me anymore. I wasn’t sure how long it would last, but I was going to take advantage of it.

  “Kill them all first. Then we go get her,” Bang replied just as another rocket slammed into the other guard tower, turning it into a smoking pile of debris.

  For some reason, his plan appealed to me even though it involved killing a whole bunch of people. I wasn’t quite sure what that said about me, but it probably wasn’t good. I pushed the thought out of my brain as I lined up another shot and exhaled. My bullet made the soldier’s head evaporate in a fine red mist, but I didn’t watch him fall. I’d already moved onto my second target.

  The man turning the Gatling gun toward me never saw it coming. One moment, he was about to fill the forest I occupied with lead, the next? The next moment the entire section of wall he stood atop was reduced to smoking rubble as a trio of rockets slammed into the structure.

  The castle’s perimeter buckled inward under the stress as steel beams bent awkwardly under the weight of the concrete walls. That was when I realized what Bang was doing. Sure, he’d knocked out the two closest guard towers, but now he was systematically targeting what looked like the supports of the wall. Between the damaged towers and blown out supports, the wall was starting to give under its own weight.

  “Abby, head in and get Flash. I’ll cover you,” Bang said as another trio of rockets hit the wall on the other side of the gate. I was on my feet as the blast ripped out across the battlefield. A horrible screech shattered the silence following the explosion as the gate twisted itself in half, part of it staying upright and the other half crashing to the ground in a squeal of ruptured metal.

  “Please tell me you aren’t going to cover me with rockets,” I murmured as I slid down the hill as quickly as I could while trying to avoid tripping and braining myself on a branch.

  “I said I’d cover you,” Bang growled as machinegun fire erupted from the forest, tearing into the entire front part of the structure and forcing the remaining soldiers to duck for cover. “Beggars can’t be choosers.”

  It probably wouldn’t be long before more came. Then again, Bang had hit them with over ten rockets. Maybe they were mustering something even better? I didn’t have time to contemplate it as I broke from the jungle and sprinted toward Flash.

  Thankfully, no one shot me. I was only partially worried about it since my suit seemed to be able to ward off most gunshots, but the last few times red lights had lit up inside my HUD. It made me wonder if my suit was reaching its limits.

  Flash lay sprawled on the ground in front of me, hands gripping her thigh as blood oozed between her fingers. Her face was tight and drawn with pain as I stopped beside her.

  “Happy to see me?” I asked, grabbing her under the armpits and hoisting her up. She screamed in pain as I hobbled backward, carrying her so her feet were dragging on the sandy earth.

  “Been better,” she snapped. “Now give me a weapon.”

  I hesitated before deciding Flash could probably keep us from getting shot. I might be bulletproof, but I was pretty sure she wasn’t so lucky. The wound in her leg was testament to that. I don’t know how I managed to unsling my sniper rifle while continuing to haul her backward, but it was done before I realized I was doing it.

  The gun barked in her hands as we met the tree line though I wasn’t quite sure how she would have managed to hit anything while being dragged across bumpy ground. I wasn’t even sure I could make a shot like that, and I had expert sniper skills downloaded into my brain.

  I set her down, and she shot me a look I didn’t understand. I ignored it and tore a bandage from the first aid kit in my suit, using it to apply a quick tourniquet to the wound. “Good luck,” I murmured and she nodded at me as I dropped my remaining sniper rounds into her open palm.

  “Go get them,” she said as I stared at the gates. They were only a few hundred feet away but it looked much longer.

  “Roger,” I said and sprinted back into the killing zone.

  24

  I hit the gate of the Israeli compound less like a thief in the night and more like a jackhammer to the face. My muscles pounded as I leapt over rubble strewn entryway, weaving between superheated steel and flames as I let loose a burst of machinegun fire. I wasn’t trying to hit anything, but I wasn’t trying to miss either.

  Soldiers dove for cover as I crossed the final barrier and flung a grenade to either side. I didn’t even stop my forward motion as they detonated. The echo of it within the walls was loud enough to wake the dead. Ahead of me, a silver dome stood shiny and gleaming. I smirked. I’d fix that.

  I unslung my rocket launcher and let a projectile fly just as a throng of soldiers came rushing toward me. I flung the spent weapon at them as the dome’s front face exploded inward like a broken tea kettle.

  The soldiers slid to a stop, firing their weapons as I sprayed them with my machinegun while screaming in coherently. When the slide on my weapon came back empty, I flung it at them because they weren’t Supermen. It tagged one in the face, and he slumped backward to the dirt as his comrades continued firing.

  My suit elicited a shrill scream of angry beeping, my HUD flashing like a crimson death ray in front of my eyes as I plowed into them. I grabbed a weapon from one while stepping inward and twisting my body to tear it from his grasp and simultaneously use him as a shield. Slugs slammed into him as I spun in a tight arc, firing the stolen weapon.

  I dropped the empty weapon and scooped up another. Soldiers were lying in a bleeding ring around me as I looked for more. Not seeing any, I ran for the blown out dome because it was only structure within the walls visible from the surface. Something about it made me think subterranean base, but I didn’t care. I was going to kill everyone in there if I had to. Why? Because I wanted to save my father, and by extension, the director, but also because those bastards had shot Flash. She hadn’t even done anything except stand there and deliver Stephen like a goddamned present.

  Gunfire lit up the earth around me, and I threw myself to the side, rolling in a sort of broken mannequin way that made my joints cry out in pain. I came up on my feet, and ran around in a sort of zig zag pattern to avoid the bullets raining down on me from the wall.

  Then a rocket slammed into the spot and the shooting stopped. Thank god for backup. It made everything easier.

  My knife slid into my hand as I jumped through the hole I’d torn in the metal dome with a rocket and landed on the steel floor inside. It was dark inside and emergency lights flickered overhead, barely illuminating a path off in another direction. Toward the emergency exit maybe?

  I decided to follow them in the opposite direction, hoping it would take me toward someone. I was not wrong. I happened upon a room full of soldiers who looked surprised to see me there.

  “Boo!” I screamed at the top of my lungs like a cr
azy person. I leapt and hit the leader in the chest with my knees, driving him to the ground beneath the force of my weight. I dropped down, putting my blade to his throat as pain flashed across his young features. His brown eyes opened wide as he stared at me in disbelief, his comrades backing away with guns pointed at me.

  “Drop your weapons or I gut him like a fish!” I snarled, hoping it sounded scarier to them than it did to me because, to me, it sounded panicked.

  “This is insane, she’s just a girl,” one of them said. The comment kind of pissed me off. What did it matter that I was just a girl?

  “I’ve never even gutted a fish before, but I’m willing to learn,” I muttered, jerking the soldier beneath me to his feet and slinging him in front of me like a shield. I wasn’t quite sure why they let me. I’d have shot me in the back. It was a sobering thought. “Now, tell me where to find Graham or it’s going to get very bloody in here.” I grinned, showing my teeth and some of them actually cringed away.

  “Over there.” One of them pointed toward a corridor across the room, and I nodded.

  “Thanks.” I shoved the soldier into them, knocking them down like bowling pins. Before they could recover, I was already through the corridor, my heart hammering and my chest heaving from exertion. I had been trained for this but that didn’t mean going full steam for minutes at a time wasn’t tiring.

  The hallway was surprisingly well lit, but that was probably because there were soldiers standing at the end with giant spotlights shining toward me. A third soldier was seated in the middle of the overbearingly blinding lights. Unfortunately, this one was behind a mounted gun that reminded me of the ones the snow troopers used during the battle of Hoth in Empire Strikes Back. That could also have been because they were dressed entirely in white body armor with cowls.

  “I bet you can’t even hit me!” I cried, hoping they had as bad of aim as the storm troopers from the movie did. Not one to take any chances, I tucked myself into a corner anyway and flung my knife at the gunner. The weapon made it all of eighteen inches before evaporating in a hiss of ozone. My eyes widened in surprise as the soldier at the gun pulled back the slide on his weapon and a shell clattered to the floor. He began swiveling it toward me and a horrible thought occurred to me. He had really good aim.

  I launched myself forward and collided straight into some sort of invisible wall. I stumbled backward, my vision woozy as laughter broke out from the soldiers.

  “She totally didn’t even see the glass. See, I told you that polish was sweet!” someone behind me said and a chill ran down my spine. I whirled as a gargantuan man grabbed me by my throat and slammed me backward into the invisible wall hard enough to rattle my insides.

  He was bare-chested and well-muscled, reminding me of a younger, dark-skinned Chuck. I kicked him in the groin and his stupid eyes bugged out of his head. He dropped me just as a laser zipped by my ear, searing a hole in the wall. The smell of melted glass filled my ears as I hit the ground on the balls of my feet and drove my knee back into the stumbling soldier’s crotch, you know, for good measure.

  Then I grabbed him by his hair and flung him at the snow trooper. The man impacted the invisible wall with an earth shattering crash. Shards of death rained down around us as soldiers filled the corridor behind me. Damn, I shouldn’t have left them alive. The one I’d nearly knifed stood in back, looking like he didn’t want to deal with me anymore. Well, I’m glad I made an impression.

  I snagged a huge shard of glass and flung it at one of the spot lights trained on me. It impacted with a smack, though the light didn’t go out. I grinned and tore forward, leaping through the air in an arc that carried me through the air. I wasn’t sure if there were more invisible walls or not, but I didn’t want to take any chances.

  Thankfully, I didn’t slam into any more glass like some kind of deranged hummingbird as I sailed gracefully through the air. I hit the ground on the balls of my feet and lashed out with a hard sidekick that hit the snow trooper nearest to me in the chest. He wobbled backward, arms swinging out for balance. His fingers closed around the light, and he yanked it down as he fell. It shattered across the ground as the gunner came to his feet, knives glittering in each hand as he swung at me.

  I ducked and threw myself inside his guard while lashing out with my fist. I caught him on the inside of the knee, and he grunted in pain, one knife slipping from his hand. I caught the blade as I sidled by him like the ballerina of death I was and came up in front of the last guard who struggled to pull his sidearm out of his holster. My knife flashed in front of his eyes, and he staggered backward before falling to the ground on his butt.

  The moment he hit the steel floor, the corridor filled with gunfire. I dropped as bullets zinged over my head, pinging off the metal all around me as I rolled over the broken glass toward the door in back.

  It was a bad idea.

  I fell down three flights of stairs because no one had told me the first step was a doozy. When I came to a stop, my vision swam. It was all I could do to lay there and not cry from pain. Everything inside me hurt, and while I was pretty sure nothing inside me had actually broken, I knew I’d have some pretty crazy bruising. No wonder most medieval knights died from being bashed to death rather than being cut open.

  I grumbled, getting to my feet and looking around the empty, sterile room. There was a steel table in the center along with a couple steel chairs. Some overhead lights were embedded into the ceiling lighting it up in a way that reminded me of the inside of a sterile lab. The smell of antiseptic filled my nose as I tried to jog forward but the motion made my stomach slosh so I slowed to a walk to give myself more time I knew I didn’t have. It wouldn’t be long before those soldiers came down here, guns blazing.

  The room felt angry and oppressive as I moved toward the table. Toward the end, it looked like it split off into a forked hallway so that’s where I headed even though every footstep closer made sweat bead on my forehead. Was it getting hotter as I moved? No, the temperature displayed on my HUD hadn’t changed, so what was going on?

  “You’re feeling the heat of my gaze,” lisped a low male voice from behind me. I spun around, my heart thudding in my chest as I did so, but saw nothing.

  “Where are you?” I asked, scanning the room in every variety of way I could think of and still seeing nothing.

  Something smacked into my chin, launching me upward into the air. The pain of it rattled my brain, but my body must have remembered what it was doing because I flipped around and landed in a crouch on the floor.

  “I’d heard you could take a punch,” the voice said from every direction at once.

  “Show yourself and I’ll show you how well I can give a punch too,” I growled, whipping my gaze around for some sign of anything. And where were the soldiers? They should have been coming down here by now… but I hadn’t heard so much as a footstep. Why not?

  “Okay.” Arms wrapped around my stomach so tightly, it was like being encircled by steel cables. I thrashed, trying to get ahold of the invisible appendages bear hugging my diaphragm. No good. I kicked outward, but that didn’t work either. My body lifted from the ground as I was slammed backward onto my shoulders.

  My vision went blurry, and my HUD flashed red as I slumped uselessly to the ground. Then a disembodied black boot appeared on my chest, pinning me to the ground. The rest of him slowly appeared. He was dressed from head to toe in a suit that reminded me of the one Flash had used to bend the light around herself. Was that how he’d stayed hidden? But hers had reacted to my body heat scan… was his somehow cloaking his heat?

  He dropped his weight onto his foot and pain shot through me. My HUD blazed fire engine red as I struggled to pull in a breath. Then he flung me across the room like I was weightless. I smashed into the wall and agony exploded from my back as my breath burst from me. My body slowly slumped to the ground as I tried to figure out how he’d thrown me like that. Did his suit enhance his strength too?

  I barely even felt it as he hau
led me to my feet and hoisted me over his shoulder. Then he moved forward, carrying me toward the table. He tossed me on it and I smacked into the steel with enough force to make the sound of it rang in my ears.

  “First thing first,” he said, annoyance filling his voice, as he ran one finger across my abdomen. “We have to get you out of these clothes.”

  I kicked him in the stomach. His breath shot from his mouth as he staggered backward, trying to regain his balance. I took my chance and rolled off the table. I hit the ground hard enough that the force of it reverberated through my body. I would have cried out if I could have, but unfortunately, all I could do was pull myself to my feet, using the table for balance.

  I wasn’t quite sure what was going on, but I sure as hell didn’t want this guy taking away my superspy suit. When I turned my gaze back toward him, he was coming toward me.

  I swung at him, one hard as hell haymaker aimed at his stupid head. He ducked, his other arm coming up under mine and pulling me into his body. Before he could throw me, I elbowed him in the side of the head. The blow seemed to stagger him, which was good. I took the opportunity to tackle him to the floor. His head smacked against the steel with an audible thump as I reared back and punched him in the jaw. Once. Twice. Three times. My fourth punch missed as he slid out from under me like an eel, using a movement eerily similar to the one Flash had used when I’d fought her in the forest.

  Unfortunately, instead of sending me flying, he somehow slipped onto my back and sat down, pulling my legs up behind me. My abdomen screamed in pain as he wrenched my legs backward.

  “I’m not a huge fan of Boston,” he huffed. “But I do like their crabs.” He pulled harder, and I screamed in pain. “Just tap out, Abby. Give up, and I’ll let go.”