Adrenaline Heat

by Carolyn Reilly

  As Luna opened the driver side door, he noticed movement from the corner of his eyes. His adrenaline spiked instantly. Fry was sneaking up on her from behind.

  Where the hell had he come from? Oliver wrenched the glove compartment open and grabbed his backup pistol with his uninjured hand.

  On the other side of the car, Luna yelped.

  Fry had wrapped his arm around her and pulled her backward in a choke hold.

  Unable to take aim from inside the car, Oliver jumped outside, and his legs almost buckled. “Fry, let go of her. I’m armed.”

  Luna gasped as Fry only tightened his arm around her neck.

  Oliver took aim. The fact that he had to use his left hand didn’t deter him. He’d been trained to fire a weapon with both hands. But the sudden movements had made him dizzy again. His vision played tricks on him, and his legs still felt like heated rubber.

  Smiling, Fry hid behind Luna, effectively using her as a shield as he slowly walked her backward. “I came here to get Lexi out of harm’s way when I heard the terrible news of the Fronter attack. Imagine my shock to find her gone.” Sarcasm dripped from his voice. “Where is she?”

  Oliver huffed. If Fry came for Lexi, it was only because he needed her for his research somehow.

  Prying at Fry’s arm with both hands, Luna croaked. “We don’t know where she is. We’ve been looking for her too. But shouldn’t you be missing?” She was trying to stall the scientist.

  Inching around the car, Oliver tried to get a better angle.

  Fry hissed at Luna. “Careful. You’re not in a position to get smart with me now.” His mouth pulled into a sneer as he eyed Oliver’s slow movements. “And your supersoldier husband over there doesn’t look like he’s feeling too well.” Fry continued walking her backward with him, always making sure to hide behind her like the coward he was. Arching an eyebrow at Oliver, he added. “Am I right?”

  Unfortunately, the adrenaline that shot through Oliver’s veins was probably the only thing that kept him upright at that moment. His vision gradually cleared, but his arms and legs were still shaking, and he had to lean against the SUV for support. Cursing himself for letting Luna stay at the hospital, he could only watch as Fry disappeared with her behind a white catering truck that pulled up.

  A big guy jumped from the driver seat and trained his firearm at Oliver while Fry shoved Luna in the back of the truck before he climbed into the truck’s cabin. The armed driver got behind the wheel, and the vehicle whizzed by Oliver.

  Another burst of adrenaline hit his bloodstream. He finally started to get some control over his limbs again. He rounded the SUV’s back and scooted into the driver seat, starting the engine. He still didn’t trust his vision, so he touched the auto-drive icon, and the SUV pulled from the curb.

  Oliver followed Fry up onto the highway heading east of GovCorp until the truck’s driver suddenly swerved to the shoulder and started firing at him. He’d missed Oliver but managed to shoot out the front wheels.

  Inspecting the damage, Oliver tried to remain calm, reminding himself that Luna wore her tracker bracelet and that Fry wasn’t out to kill but to get answers—at least he hoped so. If Fry or his associate so much as broke one of Luna’s nails, they were dead.

  He pulled his phone from his bloody, ruined suit pants and activated the tracker app to make sure it still worked. When he saw the green dot blinking actively, he exhaled and speed-dialed Max who answered on the second ring. “Oliver. Lexi is with Dr. Bergmann now. Where are you guys?”

  Oliver leaned his head against the SUVs doorframe. “Max, I need your help.”

  After Max arrived twenty grueling minutes later, they followed Luna’s signal until they reached GovCorp City’s waste incineration plant. The building itself was small, but giant landfills rose up to its right. Stopping the car for a moment, Max opened the window and sent out two Committee drones to distract the plant’s security drones that hovered above the building. As soon as they were clear, he pulled up onto the plant’s parking lot and got out of the truck.

  They left the vehicle, and both pulled their weapons.

  Oliver’s body finally seemed to be fully functioning again. But the excess adrenaline coursing through his bloodstream urged him on to find Luna. Following the tracker signal, he rushed by a fleet of yellow front-end loaders toward one of the landfills, ignoring the vile aroma emanating from the heaps of trash.

  An image of Luna’s body crumbled between broken dolls and toys on a mound of garbage flashed through his mind, pushing his heart rate into overdrive. He sprinted toward the landfill, but as he passed the plants entrance, the signal stopped blinking. But after a careful three-sixty, he still couldn’t see anyone other than Max a few steps behind him.

  Icy fingers clawed at Oliver’s throat as his eyes zoomed in on Luna’s tracker bracelet on the dirty concrete. He lifted the delicate silver chain and held it up for Max to see. “She must be here somewhere.”

  He sprinted toward the main entrance, but as expected, the doors were locked.

  Keeping an eye on the security cameras, they continued to circle the building until they finally found an unlocked side entrance. The instant they stepped inside, bullets started flying.

  Diving behind a giant metal container filled with garbage, they returned fire at their two opponents. Both were clad in black, and from the way they handled themselves and fired, they weren’t security guards. Oliver guessed mercenaries.

  Oliver slowly circled the container to find a better shooting angle while Max rapid-fired at the men to keep them engaged. One of their opponents apparently had the same idea, but Oliver fired a split second earlier, and the man dropped to the ground, the last bullet he fired hitting the container’s wall about an inch from Oliver’s head.

  Their second opponent crumbled to the ground with a loud thud, and Max lowered his weapon, signaling all clear. They went inside and searched the building until they saw a faint flicker behind the glass insert of an office door. Oliver tested the handle, but the door was locked. All out of patience, he aimed his SIG and shot the lock open.

  Oliver and Max entered, sweeping left and right, but they were alone in the small room. The flickering came from the screen saver on a giant monitor mounted on the wall.

  Desperate to find Luna, Oliver headed toward a door on the other side of the room as Max sucked in a breath.

  “Oliver, look at that.”

  Oliver stopped in his tracks and turned around. Behind him, a bluish-green hologram of a giant, muscle-packed soldier flickered as the soldier slowly turned around his own axis. On the wall monitor above, a DNA sequence ran next to a video of a beast of a soldier running on a treadmill at high speed wearing a full metal exoskeleton. “What the hell?”

  Max pulled out his phone. “Go and look for Luna. I’ll record this and inform Derek. I’ll be right behind you.”

  After a few minutes, Max had caught up with Oliver, and they’d searched the building for almost half an hour to no avail. “She’s not here.” Disappointment and fear for her balled up in his stomach.

  Max threw him a sympathetic look. “What do you want to do now? Maybe we should head back to the Committee. Brainstorm with Derek.”

  Oliver ran a hand over his face. Of course, GovCorp’s tracker in Luna’s shoulder. He’d entirely forgotten about it. Cursing, he pulled out his phone.

  Max threw him a questioning look. “What?”

  Waiting for Derek to answer he said, “Luna has another tracker.”

  Derek answered the phone, and after Oliver brought him up to speed, Derek promised to talk to IT and send search drones over to the incinerator plant. A few seconds later, Oliver’s phone beeped again with the access codes for the search drone feeds.

  There was nothing they could do now but wait, so they decided to head back to the office with the DNA sequence. Max wanted to try to access the computer and maybe clone some data. Back at the office, Oliver dropped into a chair and rested his head in his hands. Under differe
nt circumstances, Oliver would have been more concerned about what they saw on the holo screen, but at that moment, he only had one goal. Finding Luna.

  Max slapped his shoulder in passing as he made his way to the computer. “Don’t worry. We won’t stop until we find her.”

  Oliver huffed. “Just a few hours ago, my greatest concern was having to listen to Lewis’s speech.” He shook his head. “If I’d have known how this evening was going to end—”

  Max interrupted him. “You didn’t, okay? Nobody could have known what the Fronters had in store for you tonight.”

  The drone Derek had sent arrived about twenty minutes later and started scanning the premises. But, except for the waste incinerator and Oliver and Max’s bodies, it didn’t pick up any thermal signatures or other signs of life.

  Devastation spread through Oliver’s limbs. “Where the hell could Fry have taken her?”

  Max threw him a sympathetic look. “I’m sorry, man. She’s not here. We should head back to headquarters. Maybe IT can find a way to access that other tracker you mentioned.”

  Oliver felt like shaking Max. He couldn’t just abandon the search for Luna. But his teammate was right, they’d been all over the place, and the longer they wasted their time here, the farther Fry could take her away from him.

  With a dry nod, he led the way back to Max’s truck.

  They had almost reached the exit as the drone finally sent more signatures. Right next to their own. “Shit. We got company.”

  They hardly managed to draw their weapons before two armed men stormed around the corner. Oliver dropped to his haunches and managed to shoot one of the men in the chest. The guy stumbled backward, hit the wall behind him, and slumped to the concrete floor.

  More gunshots rang out. Max groaned and hit the ground with a loud thud.

  Furious, Oliver fired at Max’s opponent until the man crumpled on top of the other mercenary.

  As Oliver crouched down next to Max, blood oozed from the side of his teammate’s head. The wound was a graze, but it was close enough to Max’s temple to be dangerous. A quick look at the drone feed revealed more heat signatures approaching rapidly. “We need to go. Can you hold a SIG?”

  Max slowly nodded and extended his hand.

  Oliver picked up Max’s weapon from the floor and handed it to him. Then he helped his teammate up and steadied him with his right arm around his waist until they reached the SUV.

  Back at Committee headquarters, Oliver watched Bergmann taking care of Max’s head injury while the video they’d recorded at the incineration plant was running on the big monitor in the scientist’s lab. The gash wasn’t as bad as it looked, but Max had suffered a concussion.

  After Bergmann finished treating him, Derek addressed Max. “You don’t have to stay. You can go and lie down.”

  Max straightened in his chair. “I’m okay.” He smirked. “As long as I don’t have to move my head.”

  Derek nodded. “All right, then.”

  Bergmann stowed away his medical supplies and joined them in front of the monitor. “I talked to Luna’s sister. She’s stable, and I think I’ll be able to help her with her condition. When I examined her, she told me something rather interesting. She said she’d overheard a phone call of Fry’s when he was in her room. To her, it sounded as if Fry tried to pressure someone to fund him directly. The name Mercer fell again. According to her, Fry told him that it was time to take matters into their own hands, even if it meant getting them a little dirtier than they already were. He said Lewis was the captain of a sinking ship. But that he, Fry, had the key to the life rafts.” Bergmann pointed to the video of the holo soldiers. “And I’m guessing this is what he referred to.”

  Suddenly, Oliver remembered something the scientist who’d drowned on Barbados mentioned during his drunken conversation with Luna. “Does anyone know what to make of VR Mercenary Incorporated?”

  Max furrowed his brow. “Three or four years ago, they had this underground VR game in Central Asia. Allegedly, they’d hacked real people’s brains somehow and used them as avatars. Players could remotely control them, using them pretty much in any way they wanted, but mostly as thieves or assassins. People paid a crazy amount of credits to play, but the whole thing turned out to be a giant hoax. Rumor has it the developer and the previous owner of the gaming platform were sent to labor camps at the Chinese border.”

  Bergmann stepped closer to the monitor, studying the DNA sequence. “So, they claimed to have hacked their avatars’ brains?”

  Max pulled up a shoulder. “Yeah, but apparently those avatars were only actors.”

  Bergmann started tapping his notepad, deep in thought. “What was that dead scientist’s name again?”

  Stepping closer, Oliver asked. “The drowned one?”

  Bergmann nodded impatiently. “Yes. Yes.”

  “Richard Esterhalt.”

  Bergmann hacked away on his keyboard and scrolled through some pages. “Richard Esterhalt. Neurogenetics and neurorobotics.” Concern laced his gaze.

  Oliver’s brow furrowed. “Do you think they’ve managed to create the real deal? Like remote-controlled GVs?” His gaze flicked to the video that now featured another muscled mountain of a soldier in an exoskeleton.

  Derek sat down next to Max. “I’ll pass the info on to IT. Maybe it’ll help them find a lead on the black auction.”

  Oliver’s jaw hardened. They still hadn’t heard back from IT regarding Luna’s tracker.

  Derek’s eyes flicked to him. “Don’t worry. Luna’s tracker is our sole priority right now.”

  Pacing the room, Oliver tried to keep all sorts of horror scenarios from hijacking his mind. He hated being unable to help Luna.

  Derek’s phone rang, and he held up a finger to Oliver before he put the call on speakerphone. The IT guy had finally been able to hack Luna’s tracker. They had a very faint signal, but it was traceable.

  Max rose from his chair and stepped behind Oliver. “I’ll go with you.”

  Derek shook his head. “Max, I don’t think that’s a good idea with your concussion.”

  As much as Oliver would’ve liked Max to back him up, he agreed.

  Brow deeply furrowed, Derek put a hand on Oliver’s back. “I know he’s not your first choice, but Tyler Garrett is on the compound. And you need backup.”

  Oliver pinched the bridge of his nose. He couldn’t seem to shake the guy off. Tyler as a partner was a risk. But on the other hand, Derek was right. Although he could feel his injuries healing, Oliver wasn’t anywhere near the top of his game. “Okay.”

  As Oliver stepped into the Committee’s parking lot, Tyler already waited, leaning against the driver side door of one of the black Committee SUVs. As soon as he spotted Oliver, he got behind the wheel and started the engine.

  Oliver took the passenger seat. “Thanks for helping me save Luna.”

  Pulling through the compound’s gate, Tyler threw Oliver a sideways glance. “I just found out how she played you. Are you sure this isn’t a trap?”

  Anger crawled up Oliver’s spine. “If you do anything, anything at all, that puts her life at risk, I swear I’ll kill you.”

  Tyler held Oliver’s stare for a few seconds before he concentrated on the road again. “I can respect that.”

  The tracker’s signal led them right back to the incineration plant. What the hell was going on here? The thought that Fry might have cut the tracker out of Luna’s shoulder sent lava through Oliver’s veins.

  High in the sky, the Committee drones Max and Oliver had left at the incineration plant earlier were still circling the plant’s premises. Oliver pulled out his phone and checked the feed, switching from thermal to camera mode. He couldn’t believe his eyes as he saw Fry walking into the plant’s annex. Earlier, Max and Oliver had searched that smaller building too, but they’d come up empty. He turned to Tyler, pointing at the annex. “Drive down there.”

  As soon as they reached the annex’s entrance and the SUV slowed down,
Oliver jumped out of the vehicle, weapon drawn.

  The entrance door slid open, and Fry’s associate who’d driven the catering truck pulled his gun on them. But he was a second too late.

  Tyler shot the gun right out of his hands, aiming at the man’s chest next.

  Heat spread through Oliver’s veins. He trained his own weapon at Tyler. “Remember what I said earlier? We might need this guy alive.”

  “I’m trying to help,” Tyler pressed through his teeth.

  “If you kill him, he won’t talk.”

  “I won’t.” Tyler hissed. “Now go get your fake wife. For the record, this still smells like a setup to me.”

  Oliver threw Tyler one last warning look before he jogged after Fry who hastened through a connecting door into the main building. According to the floor plan next to the door, he went straight to the incinerator hall.

  A certain degree of relief spread through Oliver as he saw that the incinerator was now off and nothing had been burned there lately. He scanned the incinerator’s surroundings but didn’t see Fry or any other person. But as he rounded the giant oven, something white gleamed behind it. He inched closer and realized that the wall behind the incinerator was a massive sliding door that wasn’t all the way closed. He grabbed the latch and the whole wall slid silently to the left. Oliver sucked in a breath. The white truck Fry had used to kidnap Luna was parked in the hall behind it. It sat snug between two rows of storage shelving. As Oliver approached, the vehicle swayed and Fry walked down the back ramp using Luna as a shield again. Holding a semiautomatic to her head, he yelled, “Back off, or she’ll be dead.”

  But this time, Oliver’s head was clear, and Fry’s reflexes were no match to those of a GV. Without hesitation, he aimed at Fry’s head and pulled the trigger.

  Blood sprayed, and the scientist’s weapon clattered onto the truck’s ramp. Fry’s body followed, taking Luna down with him in the process.