In the Blood (Metahuman Files Book 4)

by Hailey Turner

  Kyle scanned the area and caught sight of an abandoned motorcycle, its rider lying prone in the street. He signaled Katie to follow even as she tapped into the general comms to contact the pilot again.

  “Still got eyes on the target?” she asked.

  “Copy that, Viper. Still got eyes,” the pilot responded. “Relaying coordinates now.”

  Kyle let Katie deal with figuring out the route they needed to go while he spared a moment to check on the fallen civilian who’d taken a bullet to the side and bled out on the street. Shaking his head, Kyle turned his attention to the motorcycle and hauled it up to a standing position. The engine was on standby, access to the controls still open. At least they wouldn’t have to waste time hacking the damn thing, though knowing Katie, it would probably take her less than a minute.

  He slung a leg over the body of the motorcycle, settling into the seat. It could carry two, and Katie scrambled behind him, thrusting one arm over his shoulder to point in the direction they faced.

  “Cillian is heading for Interstate 93. We can’t let them get in the tunnels if they’re carrying a bomb,” she said.

  Kyle tapped the side of his tactical goggles, a map of Boston overlaying his sight. A route lined up, courtesy of the agents back at headquarters monitoring them in the field. He revved the engine and the motorcycle shot forward. Kyle kept half his attention on the street traffic he could see up ahead and the hovering shape of the combat jet in the partly cloudy sky tracking Cillian’s attempted escape route.

  I need him alive long enough to do a deep scan on his mind, Katie said, bypassing their comms because what she was tacitly approving wasn’t sanctioned by the director. After that, he’s all yours.

  The government would prefer Cillian alive for interrogation purposes and a trial. The United States was still one of the last few holdouts in the world who administered capital punishment for certain crimes, but that didn’t mean a criminal would die soon after sentencing. The appeals process could take years, decades even, and the thought of Cillian rotting away in solitary might comfort someone else, but not Kyle.

  Solitary meant Cillian would still be alive. After what the bastard had done to his brother and Sean, Kyle wasn’t willing to let a jury and judge try the fucker in a farce of a trial just so the mediacrats could gain ratings.

  Kyle had chosen his code name as Reaper all those years ago for a reason.

  13

  Fire At Will

  “Find us some cover, right fucking now!” Jamie snarled.

  Larson slammed his foot on the gas pedal and the SUV shot forward. Jamie tapped into the direct comms line linking the commanders of various departments and agencies overseeing the rally security.

  “This is Captain Jamie Callahan. Evacuate Boston Common and the surrounding area. Check everyone in the crowd for explosives. A Splice chemical bomb just went off on Washington Street. Get containment started in that area and warn everyone in the city to shelter in place.”

  Jamie didn’t bother responding to the chatter that erupted on the line, mind running through his options at top speed as Larson drove into the parking garage tower at the corner and rammed through the flimsy pay gate.

  “Orders, sir?” Larson asked.

  “You are not going back out there,” Burwell snapped, one hand cupping his ear as he listened in on a comms channel Jamie didn’t have access to.

  “Shut the fuck up.”

  Jamie ignored them both in favor of switching over to a different channel to call into MDF headquarters. “Apollo to base, do you copy, over?”

  Jamie was vaguely aware of Burwell’s mouth dropping open in the rearview mirror, but Jamie didn’t care about the surprise he was dumping on everyone with him who didn’t already know the truth. The director might not approve of the number of laws and regulations Jamie was currently breaking, but he didn’t care.

  “Apollo, this is base, we copy. Status, over,” Nazari answered immediately.

  “Declan, Cillian, and the Sons of Adam are making their move. We have Splice bombs going off on the ground. I need all the backup you can field.”

  “Understood. All agents within the vicinity not already at Boston Common performing undercover security work will be activated. I’ll inform our contacts with the first responders that we’re deploying Alpha Team and others. Base out.”

  The line cut out in Jamie’s ears.

  Larson yanked on the steering wheel and guided the SUV into a handicapped spot. “Valdez, Yamane, deal with the security cameras.”

  Two of the security personnel jumped out of the SUV and scattered. Jamie ignored them as they took out the nearby security cameras. He undid his seatbelt and shrugged out of his suit jacket in seconds.

  Jamie shoved open his door and got out, hurrying to the rear of the vehicle. Larson must have opened the trunk door from the driver’s seat, because it was already lifting upward. Inside was a heavy-looking, biolocked military-grade travel crate, along with a stack of other rifles secured together in a portable travel locker. Jamie pressed his palm to the scanner, allowing it to read his print. The crate beeped and unlocked. Jamie opened the lid and started to undress.

  “Apollo to Alpha Team, do you copy, over?” he said as everyone started to exit the two SUVs.

  “Viper to Apollo, Alpha Team and Gamma Team copy, over,” Katie responded.

  Jamie hauled out his combat uniform, already stripped of his civilian clothes and prepared to gear up in the required ninety seconds he’d learned to when with the Recon Marines. “Splice bombs are going off in Boston. Require backup for containment purposes ASAP. Send me who you can spare from your priority mission.”

  “ETA five minutes, Apollo. We still don’t know the exact location of Inferno and Wraith. Has base been updated on the new development?”

  “Base knows. The director is mobilizing all agents in Boston to assist.” Jamie calculated the distance between an unknown location in the Seaport District and Boston Common, and came up with the most logical direction he needed to go. “Senator Callahan’s campaign rally is a likely target.”

  “I’ll drop half the team at your location and I’ll take the rest to find our missing teammates.”

  “Understood. Track my location. I’m with a group of security personnel.”

  “Copy that. Viper out.”

  Jamie yanked his hard helmet on and snapped his facemask into place, activating the voice modulator. After being so prominent in the media lately and here in Boston, he needed the cover it provided. The HUD on his tactical goggles came online as he lifted the AKR-75 assault rifle out of the crate. He undid the biolock with a read of his print on the grip before pulling on his gloves.

  “Larson,” Jamie said.

  “Yes, sir,” came the other man’s immediate response.

  “My team is on their way. I’m not going to ask you to come with me.”

  “It’s a good thing we’re volunteering then, isn’t it, sir?”

  Jamie smiled tightly as he slammed a magazine home into the rifle. “We’re heading back to Boston Common. The Sons of Adam may have their people embedded in the rally crowd and the protesters marching through the street. Whether or not they’ll use another vehicle to set off a Splice bomb is unknown. They used suicide vests back in London, so there’s a good chance they might use those here as well.”

  “Understood. I’ll relay that to our people back at the rally.”

  Jamie turned around, geared up and ready to roll, finding that the security personnel employed by his family who didn’t know the truth had taken the revelation of his identity in stride and claimed a weapon for themselves. The Secret Service special agents were a little slower on the uptake.

  “You’re a metahuman?” Burwell asked slowly, staring at him in shock.

  “I never needed your protection,” Jamie replied. “I’m not asking you to follow me. Stay here if you want. It’s not going to be pretty out there.”

  Running headfirst into the fray and risking death by Spli
ce wasn’t something Jamie would ever force anyone to endure. Those who joined the MDF knew the risk. For everyone else, it was an academic realization until it became their reality. Jamie didn’t know how many Splice bombs Cillian had at his disposal, but even just the one was deadly. He would never think negatively of anyone who chose to stay behind.

  This fight, this kind of life, wasn’t for everyone.

  Burwell stared at Jamie in silence for a few seconds before taking a step back and drawing free his handgun. “I’m going.”

  Jamie chambered a round and jerked his head at the exit. “Then move out.”

  They weren’t his team, but for now, they were all he had until the others arrived. Thirteen men and women fell in around him, keeping up with his double-time pace. They came out on Washington Street, past the intersection from earlier. Dozens of protesters were running away from the carnage of the Splice bomb up ahead while others wandered around in a daze. Farther up the street, he could hear gunfire, even if he couldn’t see it through the fire and smoke from the destroyed van.

  Jamie narrowed his eyes, assessing the situation. The map on the HUD reoriented. Boston Common was one block west of their current location, with a lot of innocent people and the enemy between him and his family.

  “We’re heading back to Boston Common,” Jamie ordered, already turning around.

  “Shouldn’t we stop and help out the wounded?” someone asked.

  “Most of those people who aren’t already dead will die soon enough. They were hit by Splice. We aren’t enough to affect a decent quarantine zone. We need the Boston PD for that.”

  They didn’t have the manpower to corral those contaminated by Splice. If it came down to it, the last resort wasn’t one Jamie wanted to use, but he had a feeling that would be the only option to contain this mess. Killing those who tried to escape never sat well with anyone, but if they let everyone leave, they risked more of the population dying by Splice.

  There was never an easy answer to these situations.

  They retreated to the intersection and turned right onto Winter Street. They managed to make it three-quarters of the way down the block, almost to Tremont Street, impeded by people who didn’t know where to run, when a half a dozen cops came careening around the corner up ahead, yelling for backup. The cops dodged behind a couple of squad cars near the three-way intersection, guns raised and pointed in the direction they’d come from. Jamie pulled up short as a couple of mercenaries with faces covered by balaclavas ran onto the street, firing their rifles indiscriminately. His attention was split between them and the blue dot that blinked into existence over the Boston map on his HUD, the color that nice shade which meant friendly.

  “Take cover,” Jamie ordered those with him as he ducked behind a parked car and raised his weapon, bracing it against his shoulder. “MDF! Lower your weapons and surrender!”

  He pitched his voice loud enough to be heard over the people screaming as bullets ripped through the air. The cops fired back at the mercenaries, but their service sidearms didn’t have the capacity or the reach of a semi-automatic rifle.

  The sound of gunfire, people screaming in shock and in pain, and Jamie’s weapon going off in his ears were all drowned out by the roar of a combat jet dropping out of the sky overhead. The burst of wind from the engines as it settled hard into a hover position above the street pushed against Jamie as he took his finger off the trigger of his weapon. His hard helmet helped protect his ears from the sound of the combat jet’s autocannon going off, tearing through the mercenaries in an unforgiving and bloody way.

  Jamie looked up as the Hermes combat jet’s ramp opened in midair. Annabelle flew out first, streaking up into the sky.

  “Takin’ overwatch and gettin’ eyes on the field,” she announced over comms.

  “Copy that, Icarus,” Jamie said.

  Madison, Donovan, and Trevor flung themselves off the edge of the ramp, falling two stories to the ground but landing in such a controlled way he knew Trevor had used his telekinesis for the jump. The whine of the combat jet’s engines changed pitch as it launched back into the sky, banking hard and heading east.

  Donovan scanned the area with his enhanced sight before saying, “Any of the people you had working security have an MRAP onsite?”

  Jamie stepped out from behind cover and went to meet his team in the street. “A few, but they were stationed closer to where the speech was happening.”

  “Well, we got one coming this way and it’s running over anyone in its path, so I’m gonna take a wild guess and say it’s not friendly.”

  “Can confirm it’s probably not one of ours,” Annabelle added from her position in the sky. “Whoever is drivin’ it keeps swervin’ to hit people.”

  “How much you wanna bet Declan had stuff like that hidden away off grid that no one knew about? Taking a little off the top of his PMC’s inventory, I bet,” Madison asked.

  “That’s a losing bet. I’m not taking it,” Trevor said. “Apollo, where do you want me? Offense or defense?”

  As their only telekinetic, Jamie would have liked to keep Trevor with them, but he knew what had happened behind them and what still needed to be contained.

  “Splice bomb detonated over on Washington Street. We need to get those people under containment,” Jamie said.

  “I’m on it.”

  Jamie looked over at the Secret Service and security personnel. “Larson? Burwell?”

  “Yes, sir?” the two men replied in near unison.

  “I need four of your people to go with Bones and watch his six.”

  Larson and Burwell didn’t waste any time picking out the people to go with Trevor. The handful of fighters given new orders followed after Trevor when he peeled away from the main group and double-timed it down the street. He had the arduous task of raising shields around the contaminated area and rounding up everyone who might have been hit by Splice. It was a better option than using bullets.

  “I’m gonna see if I can’t stop that MRAP,” Madison said before sprinting ahead.

  “It’s blast-resistant!” Donovan shouted as he ran after her.

  “Let’s test that theory!”

  Jamie shook his head before picking up the pace, weapon braced against his torso. The flurry of footsteps behind him told him Larson, Burwell, and the remaining members of their groups were hot on his heels.

  “This street is clear, so see if you can’t funnel everyone this way. We need to get them clear of Boston Common,” Jamie said over comms.

  “Copy that,” his team answered.

  Jamie swerved toward the cops still taking cover behind the squad cars. “We’ll try to funnel whoever we can down the street and out of the line of fire, but I need you to hold position here to provide them with some cover.”

  “We can do that, Apollo,” the woman said with a stiff nod.

  Jamie left them to it and headed for Tremont Street, where the trickle of people running toward them was growing to a surge. Jamie’s enhanced strength enabled him to stay upright as he pushed forward, stepping on discarded protest signs.

  Tremont Street had been cordoned off, but the police had opened it up when the first Splice bomb went off. The police could hold the line against vehicle-driven bombs, but Jamie was more worried about the possibility of suicide bombers.

  “Tank, I need you to keep looking for anyone carrying a bomb,” Jamie said as he approached the three-way intersection.

  “You mean like back in London?” Donovan asked.

  “Affirmative, but I wouldn’t put it past either Declan or Cillian to try something new.”

  “Fuckers.”

  Jamie didn’t respond to the general statement, attention drawn somewhere else. The remote gunner station situated on top of the Cougar XE MRAP driving down the street was directing sustained fire from a machine gun at innocent civilians scrambling to get out of range. Already, bodies lay strewn in the street as if Boston were a warzone. People scattered, running in every direction, with man
y rushing for safety by heading underground at the Park Street Station near the corner of Boston Common. Police officers kept firing on the MRAP, but nothing short of a powerful explosive over a blast measurement of thirty kilograms of TNT would even leave a dent in the damn thing.

  “Nova,” Jamie said over comms as he ran toward the target. “Get me some cover.”

  “On it,” Madison replied.

  Madison’s ability to create energy blasts came in handy in situations like this. While what she threw at the MRAP might not be enough to immediately disable it, right now, Jamie just needed a distraction.

  The MRAP picked up speed, targeting a small group of people who were carrying a wounded person and trying to get her to safety. Two cops had come up behind them, shooting at the MRAP as it barreled down on them. The remote gunner station swiveled around, but didn’t target the group as the driver chased them down, aiming for others in the crowd instead.

  Moments before they would have been crushed under the tactical vehicle’s heavy frame, the group of people abruptly rose into the air as if they weighed nothing, floating out of reach as the MRAP drove over where they’d just been. Annabelle flew over the crowd, taking those she’d rescued with her and depositing them past where Jamie stood.

  With the civilians out of the line of fire, Madison didn’t hesitate in throwing one of her bombs at the MRAP, aiming for the reinforced windshields instead of rolling it underneath the tactical vehicle where the heaviest armor plating was located. A fireball erupted over the front of the MRAP, doing little damage except maybe scratching the paint. She’d gone for a lower charge in the blast because it was meant as a distraction rather than a full-on attempt to disable it.

  The driver sped through the crackling ball of dissipating energy and smoke that resulted from the explosion. Jamie was right in its sights when it got clear, the remote gunner station swiveling around to the front as he leapt onto the hood. The vehicle jerked to the left as the driver tried to toss Jamie off the MRAP, but he went to his knees and managed to hold on as he stayed below the machine gun’s line of fire.