Duck. Spin left. Roll. Uppercut. Knox’s barked commands echoed through my mind. Bee had made her connection.
The sorcerer flanking Mark pulled the trigger.
I dropped and spun left, feeling the bullet wing my shoulder as the sorcerer tried to adjust his aim on the fly. I rolled forward, stopping at his feet, then straightening and slamming the heel of my right hand under his chin before he could react.
His head snapped back. The force of my blow lifted him about a foot off the ground.
Calhoun spun, his gun only a couple of inches away from the side of my head. Again, he was smart, not touching me with the weapon. I couldn’t actually siphon his magic through something he was holding, but it was never a surprise when one of the Five developed a new ability.
The sorcerer fell, slamming down on his back. The other members of the tactical team stepped over and around him, spreading out before me.
“The only possible way you make it through this situation, Calhoun, is by putting a bullet in my brain. Here.” I turned my head so that I could look Mark directly in the eye. “Let’s make it easier. Impossible to miss. As long as your gun doesn’t backfire.”
“My gun never backfires.” His tone was tense but determined.
“I know.”
Bee’s magic churned around me, then brushed through the assembled sorcerers. The three unknowns, one still on the ground but shaking his head, muttered disconcertedly.
Calhoun, Flynn, and Jackson aren’t protected against me, Socks.
I smiled at Mark, tightlipped. Acknowledging in silence that I understood he and the others had made a deliberate choice when they’d been tasked to stand against the Five. Against me.
Calhoun grimaced. Then with a quick shift of his gun, he put bullets in the heads of the three new team members. The two still standing fell before any of them could react.
Three people died because my team was still loyal to me. Murdered to save my life. The toll on my soul was endless, even if I wasn’t the one pulling the trigger.
“Flank Amp5,” Calhoun barked.
Flynn and Jackson stepped back, briefly pressing their shoulders to mine.
“Some clothing might have been a good idea, Amp5.” Becca Jackson flashed her teeth at me, the gleam of her sorcerer magic edging her eyes. “You look a little chilly.”
Taking point, Calhoun stepped over the fallen, gun raised. Together, we stepped over the inactive ward, crossing into the stairwell. The door was wedged open. Once there, Jackson removed her gloves, reached over and tore the screen off the digital reader. She reached inside, ripping through the innards of the tech, gathering it all in one hand. Then with an intense pulse of her magic, she shorted out the system. In this section, at least.
A demolitions expert at work.
Calhoun glanced over at me. “We’ll get you out of the building. There are emergency vehicles parked about five klicks east of the compound.” He glanced over at Flynn.
The weapons specialist nodded. “My first year here, I had to drive out and check on them once a week, making sure they were in operating condition, keeping the supply depot stocked. Scut work. Until I got assigned to you, Socks. I can get you there.”
“No,” I said.
Calhoun shoved his face in mine. “You will listen to me, Amp5. I will get you out of here. And then we’ll be even.”
I laughed quietly as I reached up to touch his face. Allowing myself the momentary contact and the hint of his anger and frustration that came with it. His stubble was rough under my fingertips. “We were already even, Mark. But they’ll kill the others if I leave without them.”
“They’re not going to destroy their entire program.”
“Program?” I asked mockingly.
“Yes,” he spat. “You think we’re idiots? We get what’s going on here, with you five. No names, the separate quarters. You think we haven’t noticed that you never set foot out of the compound without an armed guard?”
“Sometimes that guard is us,” Becca Jackson said. “And we ain’t there to stop someone from getting to you. We’re there so you don’t get away. Even soldiers can read between the lines.”
“Does anyone have an extra gun?” I asked.
Don Flynn pressed a handgun into my hand. The magic coating it tickled against my skin. “It’s warded against backfire. Not certain how it’ll stand up to your magic, though.”
“Thank you.” I met Mark’s steady gaze. “Thank you. I’ll meet you at the off-site depot.”
“You’re not going without us,” Calhoun said.
“This isn’t your fight. You don’t want to witness this part. Tek5 is going to bring it all down. You don’t want to get caught in the backlash of her vengeance.”
“Fine. We’ll get the others out and leave you to your rampage.”
“And then we’ll be even?” I asked teasingly.
A rare smile ghosted across Mark’s face, gone before I’d fully registered it. Then he turned his back on me, heading for the stairs.
I followed. I couldn’t force them to leave ahead of me. But I also had no way of guaranteeing their safety. That was how it had always been between us, how it would always be if they stayed with me.
The steps I’d already been forced to take, along with Zans’s desire for revenge, ensured that I’d be hunted for the rest of my life — if I made it out of the compound alive. So I was going to make it worth it.
Chapter 5
Tucked between the last three remaining members of my extraction team, I made my way down the concrete stairs. Becca Jackson continued to short out cameras and digital displays as we passed, but after we made it into the airlock at the third level, neither Calhoun’s badge nor the one I’d stolen from the sorcerer on the medical level would open the second set of doors. The only doors that led to the quarters of the Five.
Jackson set to work on the locking mechanism, trying to access and reprogram it, rather than short it out. I pressed my ear to the sealed door, visualizing the long hall that lay behind it. White-painted concrete walls and floors. Six steel doors — one for each of us, and a spare. Why there were six rooms for the five of us, we’d never known.
My guess had always been that there were once plans for us to be the Six, not just five. Though what magic the sixth of our generation would have wielded, I couldn’t even guess.
The other four could have been dying just on the other side of the airlock. Separated from each other, unable to fully access their magic, and gassed … poisoned … murdered … as they tried to break out of their rooms. Because of me.
I’d always been the responsible one, the rational one. Trained to lead, to inspire confidence and commitment. Designed at a cellular level through to conception and birth to be the epicenter, the core … the heart of the Five.
I stepped back from the door, giving the tech and demolitions specialist space to work. Jackson didn’t need me screwing up her process with any wild magic called forth by an irrational emotional response.
Mark Calhoun was watching me. I cut my gaze toward him then looked deliberately away. He turned his focus to the door behind us, covering our rear.
The airlock door sighed, then shifted open an inch. I surged forward. Bracing my left palm on the frame, I attempted to wrench the door farther open with my right. Pressing against me, Calhoun and Flynn grabbed the door below and above me. Between the three of us, we muscled it open.
The hall was dark.
It was never dark.
A terrible pit yawned open in my stomach.
“Masks,” Mark snapped, placing a tiny breathing apparatus over his mouth and nose. The other two mimicked him, placing masks on their faces as well.
I strode forward, pausing before the first door to the right. Bee’s door. Jackson pressed a spare mask into my hand. I took it but didn’t put it on. Then she mumbled a single word as she tossed a trio of small stones down the hall. Three miniature spotlights bloomed from each stone, leaving strange pits of shadow sporadicall
y along the walls.
“Nul5?” Calhoun asked. “Amp5, which door leads to the nullifier?”
I shook my head, realizing that I’d been oddly frozen in place. Getting Fish out first made perfect sense. Once freed, he and Jackson could work separately to free the others.
The airlock door shuddered, then slid back into place behind me.
“Shit,” Becca muttered. “That was fast. They’ve got the new whiz kid in the booth.”
I didn’t know who she was talking about, but I inferred that the appearance of new staff since the roof incident in LA hadn’t been limited to just the medical wing.
“Socks!” Mark snapped. “Nul5?”
“Last door on the right.”
Jackson surged forward, racing down the corridor and practically attacking the locking mechanism at the side of the far door. Calhoun and Flynn covered the airlock door.
The hall dead-ended. And I knew from experience that there were triple-thick, magic-and-steel-lined walls between each of the rooms. Our handlers were careful about keeping us separated, or at least maintaining their ability to separate us. But they’d been underestimating our capacity to foil their restraints since we were all in our early teens. Though whenever any of us had managed to sneak out of our rooms and into Fish’s, they would eventually figure out a new way to thwart us from doing so again for weeks or months at a time.
I brushed the screen next to Bee’s door, attempting to trigger the interior camera. The tech didn’t obey my touch.
A slight breeze stirred my hair. It was long enough now to tickle my eyelashes when I looked up. The sensation was so novel that I had actually lifted my face to it before I realized they’d switched on the gas.
I placed the mask Jackson had given me over my mouth and nose, banging on Bee’s door even though I knew it was too thick for her to hear me. Magic stirred lazily through the second-highest blood tattoo on my spine.
Socks? You here?
“I am. I’m here, Bee. Tell the others.”
The connection is spotty.
“Are they gassing you, Bee? Bee?”
She didn’t answer.
Jackson got Nul5’s door partially open. Fish wrenched it the rest of the way, then practically shoved Becca aside as he charged from his room. His gaze met mine — furious but under control — as Jackson shoved a breathing apparatus into his hand. He nodded as he put it on, then stepped across the hall, laying his hand across the locking mechanism for Tek5’s door.
Fish was wearing his armor but wasn’t carrying any weapons. We weren’t allowed weapons on level three or in our rooms. But then, we were the weapons. I still wanted to collect my blades, though. And some sort of clothing would be a good idea.
I already had the perfect outfit in mind.
The mask was keeping my lungs clear, but my eyes were starting to sting from whatever they were pumping into the hall. Nul5 was still focused on Zans’s door, his magic pulsing along the hall. The lock mechanism sparked, then died.
“Clear!” he shouted, moving to the side of the door. His command reverberated through my mind, helped along by Bee.
The door to Tek5’s room bulged out, then buckled inwardly. It tore loose from the frame, crumpling in on itself until it was a large ball of metal. Zans stepped into the hall, her hand extended forward. She was also dressed in her flexible armor. So they’d had a heads-up. The crumpled door moved with Zans, just a step ahead.
“Show-off,” Fish groused.
Cla5’s door slid open. Jackson whooped.
“Down in front!” Zans shouted. She launched the twisted ball of steel down the corridor. It picked up speed, zooming toward the airlock door.
Calhoun and Flynn spun out of the way, shields of magic snapping up around them.
The crumpled door hit the airlock dead center. Zans continued to stride forward, coughing from the gas she’d inhaled. She battered the airlock over and over. It dented, then crumpled, then tore away from its frame.
Fish darted into Knox’s room, exiting with Cla5 over his shoulder.
I cried out before I could stop myself, lunging forward as Nul5 laid the clairvoyant on the floor.
Fish moved toward Bee’s door before Knox’s limp head had even rolled to the side. I dropped to my knees, sliding the last few inches to place my hand on Knox’s chest. He wasn’t breathing.
Fish tore through the locking mechanism on Bee’s door, nullifying magic and electronics alike.
I shoved both hands up Knox’s shirt, placing my palms on his chest. He was still dressed in his sweats. The gas had either hit him earlier, or he had less resistance to it than the rest of us. Or he’d been swamped with visions and unable to fully function, locked away from everyone else. I gathered my magic under my hands, readying a huge pulse of amplification. I was hoping to shock his heart with it, hoping to force his magic to revive him. It was intrusive and desperate. But none of us was a healer — a deliberate oversight on the part of the Collective.
Coughing, Fish got Bee’s door open, diving through the opening as Jackson moved to my door. Zans had disappeared into the airlock, likely busting her way — our way — up and down the stairwell.
I hit Knox with all the magic I’d gathered, slamming a massive dose of amplification into his chest. He convulsed.
I hit him again.
And again.
His head snapped back with the last blast, body straining upward, teeth and jaw clenched on a scream. The white of his magic flooded through his eyes.
He reared upward, though I tried to hold him down. He grabbed my upper arms hard enough to bruise them, silently screaming.
“I’m sorry,” I whispered. “I’m sorry.”
A shudder ran through him, and he let me settle him back to the floor.
“Socks,” he whispered. “Left, left.” But he wasn’t talking to me. Well, he was talking to me. Except it was the future me that only he could see in his mind’s eye.
“Quit playing around, Amp5,” Fish snarled.
I glanced up the hall. Nul5 was carrying Bee from her room.
The telepath was dressed in her armor. So everyone but Knox and me had some extra protection from the magical assault we were about to face. I realized it was possible they’d gassed Knox first, right after I’d gotten out of the med bay. Taking out the clairvoyant before he could see the decision being made to sacrifice the Five made sense.
Jackson got the door to my room open, darting toward the airlock as soon as she did. I disentangled myself from Knox, who was breathing but had closed his eyes. I pressed my breathing apparatus over his nose and mouth as Flynn stepped over to help him up.
“Go ahead of me,” I said. “Reconnoiter in the stairwell.”
Flynn nodded, moving quickly with Knox propped up on his shoulder.
With the airlock open, the gas was likely diffusing into the stairwell, but I kept low anyway as I stepped into my room. I ignored the armor hanging in my closet, barely giving anything else a second glance. Instead, I crossed to the bed and pulled out the roll of fabric I’d hidden under it. The gift Sasha Piper had given me.
I unrolled the green cotton-and-spandex sundress, quickly tugging it on over my head. It fell to a few inches above my knees.
It felt like freedom.
My eyes were watering as I pulled on panties. I grabbed socks and my tactical boots but didn’t linger to put them on.
I had no other personal possessions to take with me.
And even if I had, I would have gladly left every single other thing behind.
The others were clustered at the landing at level three. Knox and Bee were both on their feet. A hushed but angry argument was in progress between Fish and Calhoun. But everyone turned at my approach, eyeing me as I sat at their collective feet to tug on and lace up my boots.
“What the fuck is that?” Fish snarled.
I ignored him.
“Where is your armor?”
I shrugged. “This is what I’m wearing.”
&nbs
p; “We trust you to get us out of here, Amp5. We trust you to make this right.”
Allowing his anger to wash over me, I cinched my laces tightly, then gained my feet to level a heavy stare at him.
He snapped his mouth shut, looking away from me.
“Out of bounds, Fish,” Knox murmured.
“I got that, thanks.”
“Calhoun, Flynn, and Jackson are heading straight up and out,” I said. “The five of us will be following Zans down to the bottom. Level five. We’ll back her mission, then retreat.”
Calhoun was already shaking his head. A slow grin spread over Fish’s face. This plan was obviously what they’d been fighting about.
“Jackson, do you have any extra respirators?”
“One more.” Jackson handed that last mask to Zans. “But the magic threaded through the filter will probably only last another twenty or thirty minutes.”
“If we aren’t out in thirty minutes,” I said, “we’re already dead.”
Zans spun away with a laugh, heading down the stairs with Fish right behind her.
Calhoun opened his mouth to protest.
“Wait,” I said, interrupting him. “Bee? Knox? Heading out with the rest of the team, readying our passage … if you feel …”
Knox gave me a withering look, turning away to head down the stairs. Bee snorted, crossing her arms.
“I’d like you to reconsider,” Mark said quietly.
Jackson and Flynn stepped away.
I eyed the sandy-haired sorcerer. Then I offered him a tight-lipped smile. “I don’t regret one minute of being in your bed, Mark.”
Bee exhaled, surprised. Then she started coughing, waving me off when I glanced at her in concern.
“Come with me, then,” Mark said. “Forget this folly of making the Collective pay.”
“I owe them this. The others.”
“You don’t. You’ve … your whole life has already been theirs. Choose your next steps unhindered.”
I smiled more genuinely. “I am. I already did. Thank you.”
“Then we’re coming with you.”
“You’ll slow us down. We’ll worry about accidentally hurting you. And when you die … it will hurt me.”
The Amplifier Protocol (Amplifier 0) Page 8