“Sir?” Murray asked.
In a situation like this, most people would remain with their family. That was the logical thing to do. Jamie readjusted his weight on the stairs, bracing his assault rifle against his shoulder.
“I’m heading back down,” Jamie said.
To his credit, Murray didn’t ask Jamie what the fuck he thought he was doing, but the expression on the other man’s face spoke well enough for him.
“All right.”
Murray started down the stairs, but Jamie shook his head. “Your job is to protect the senator and his family.”
Murray was too much of a professional to point out that Jamie was part of that family. Instead, he lifted one hand to snap off a perfect salute before hauling ass up the stairs. Jamie hurried down to the next landing, tilting his head to the side as he listened to the sporadic gunfire happening below. From the sounds of it, the people they’d left in the lobby were being overrun, and Jamie only had less than a minute before he came face-to-face with the enemy.
He decided to shorten that timeframe.
The stairwell was a bottleneck with inadequate cover. It would be easier to hold the line with his enhanced strength, but the metahuman wielding their null power was still within range somewhere. So Jamie did what any good Recon Marine would do.
He improvised.
Jamie quickly and silently descended to the ground-floor landing. Three security personnel lay near the doorway, and Jamie knew the dead when he saw them. One was still alive, somehow finding the wherewithal to fire at the enemy with shaky shots, but it was a losing battle judging by the spreading pool of blood underneath her body.
Jamie knelt and took the gun from her hand when it clicked empty, placing her own over the hole in her gut. The gesture was meaningless, because they both knew she wouldn’t make it out alive, not without immediate medevac.
“Kick their ass, sir,” she slurred, blood trickling past her lips.
Jamie nodded, watching as she closed her eyes. He set aside her gun and pried another hand grenade off his utility belt as he straightened up. Jamie ran the risk of wounding one of theirs with friendly fire with this decision, but he didn’t think anyone on their side was still alive in the lobby. Declan’s people and the Sons of Adam weren’t taking prisoners in this fight. With that in mind, Jamie primed the charge and set it for a smaller than usual blast before he sent it spinning through the doorway at an angle.
The explosion shook the building, black smoke blowing back through the open door into the stairwell. Jamie was grateful for his tactical goggles and face mask that filtered out the smoke as he advanced. He stayed close to the wall, stepping over bodies of fallen security personnel and Boston PD. In some cases, it was severed limbs as those within the immediate blast range had been blown apart.
That didn’t mean everyone was taken care of.
Two figures rushed toward him through the smoke. Jamie got off a few sustained shots, but both were wearing body armor and didn’t go down. Jamie met them head-on, slamming the butt of his assault rifle into a fighter’s face before ramming his elbow into the other man’s gut. Hands grabbed at him, but Jamie twisted in their grip, reaching around to grab one of the fighter’s shoulder as he snaked one foot around to slam his heel down on the guy’s instep. With a swift twist of his body, Jamie drove the man to the ground, lashing out with his other foot as he went to smash it into the other fighter’s groin.
The guy went down with a yell. Jamie worked fast, sliding his combat knife free to slice the throat of the man in his hands while he rammed his boot in the other guy’s face, hard enough to shatter his nose. Without his enhanced strength, it took more effort for Jamie to break bone on the first try, but he got the job done. Grabbing his weapon as he stood, Jamie put a bullet in the guy still breathing, making sure he wouldn’t be for very much longer.
The smoke was clearing just a little, sucked outside through the shattered plas-glass walls lining the front of the lobby. It was still thick enough to hide the enemy. Three more came at him before he could get a shot off and Jamie resorted to fighting with his back literally against the wall. Close-quarters combat required fast, lethal fighting, and Jamie didn’t pull his punches. The damage he inflicted wasn’t as bad as it would be with his enhanced strength, but it didn’t matter.
Jabbing the side of his hand into one fighter’s throat, Jamie spun and grabbed the head of another to slam it into the wall. Someone grabbed him from behind, yanking hard to pull him off balance. Jamie strained against the hold, sliding his hand over his hip to grab his combat knife again. His assault rifle hung from his side, hiding the motion. He twisted, moving backward to throw the enemy off balance as he stabbed the blade between the top edge of the man’s tactical vest and arm protection, cutting deep into the shoulder and the brachial artery there. Blood immediately poured from the wound as the man collapsed against the wall and staggered sideways.
Jamie yanked his knife free and someone grabbed his elbow, wrenching his arm around. Jamie followed the motion so his elbow wouldn’t break, feeling the strain in his arm in a way he wouldn’t if he had his power. Stepping into the pull, he swung his free arm around in a rapid series of punches that enabled him to get free, but doing so put his back to the room and not the wall. Someone jumped on him from behind, wrapping their arm around his neck in a chokehold.
The sudden lack of air only made Jamie fight harder. He twisted one leg behind him to wrap a foot around the guy’s ankle and trip him up. They both lost their balance and slammed to the ground, the impact jarring the man’s hold enough that Jamie could wrench free of the chokehold, gasping for air.
He didn’t get far.
Someone slammed their foot down onto his torso. His tactical body armor took most of the impact, but the blow still resonated through his ribcage. Jamie grabbed their foot and twisted his leg hard to put pressure on his knee. The man lost his balance and fell to the floor, his free leg snapping out. His boot caught Jamie across the face, the blow hard enough to rattle all the teeth in his head. As he blinked spots from his eyes, four more combatants rushed to join the fight.
Seven against one was never easy to win against, and the fact that they weren’t filling his body with bullets was worrisome. Snarling behind his face mask, Jamie fought against the hands that grabbed at him, trying to pin him down and get control. The man he was lying on managed to get his arm around Jamie’s throat again, cutting off his air supply in seconds.
Weakness brought about by lack of oxygen meant it was easier for the people he was fighting to incapacitate him. Jamie lost his rifle and his guns, his knives and his grenades. Being stripped of his weapons after being stripped of his enhanced strength and durability made his stomach twist into a heavy knot. Rarely was he without power, and losing it was never easy.
But he wasn’t dead yet, and the reason a bullet wasn’t rattling around his skull appeared soon after the group dragged him out of the damaged front of the building and put him on his knees. Jamie’s arms were stretched out and pulled back in a stress position he felt in his joints and his spine. Heavy hands pressed hard on his shoulders, boots digging into his calves to keep him in place. The cold muzzle of a gun scraped over the exposed skin on the back of his neck between his hard helmet and tactical vest. Jamie went still, trying to calm his breathing.
I’m not dying here, Jamie promised himself.
He still had a ring to offer up and a question that needed asking. No way was he making any of his friends and family bury him today when he still had a future he wanted to build with the man he loved.
The wreckage of the SUV still burned on the street to his right, bracketed by bullet-ridden vehicles. The faint roar of the combat jet up above changed pitch as it streaked away from the building, its shadow passing over where Jamie knelt on the pavement.
“Packages are secured,” Annabelle reported over the comms.
Jamie’s relief that his family had escaped alive was short-lived. Walking toward him through
the hazy smoke was a man he’d never met in person, but whose life he’d ruined just the same.
Declan Wolcott was dressed for war even if his face was uncovered beneath the helmet he wore, though Jamie doubted it was completely bare. He wouldn’t be surprised if Declan wore nanotech strips on his face, technology that could blur a person’s facial recognition points in video. The ex-Army Ranger and former owner of North Star International was a hard man to read, but the tight grip he had on his tactical handgun was telling.
“Declan,” Jamie drawled, because he didn’t have it in him to be silent on his knees.
“I owe you a bullet for my wife,” Declan replied harshly.
Jamie thought about Valerie Hayes and everything she’d done to the people brought to her biotech lab. Of the bodies they’d unearthed over the course of days on that Montana property and the way he knew, intimately, how all of them had suffered and died.
“Pretty sure I used three to kill her, but who’s counting?”
Declan’s face twisted with rage, brown eyes full of incandescent rage Jamie had no problem facing. He took the punch to the jaw because he had no other choice, but he did it with a smile on his face that Declan got to see after the other man pried off his face mask. Jamie smiled bloodily at him, ignoring the pain lancing through his jaw and the coppery tang in his mouth.
“Found them,” Katie announced over comms on the general channel for everyone to hear. “We need to shut down the subway.”
Ice slipped down Jamie’s spine at her words, but he wasn’t in any position to respond to the chatter happening over comms. Instead, he strained his thoughts against the mental link Katie had running through his mind.
They’re on a train? he asked.
Park Street Station, near Boston Common. Looks like they weren’t going after the senator after all. We’re— Katie broke off, the mental link fading for a second before roaring back in full force through her telepathy. Apollo, what the fuck is happening over there?
Take down the suicide bombers, Viper.
Jamie hoped that wasn’t the last order he’d ever give her, but he couldn’t worry about the panicked voices echoing through his mind. He had a more immediate problem he needed to deal with.
Declan crouched down to be at eye-level with him, shoving the muzzle of his gun beneath Jamie’s jaw. The pressure forced his head back, prompting Jamie to concede that maybe he had just given out his last order. It was a distinct possibility at this point.
The gun pointed at the back of his head disappeared, but Jamie had no doubt it was still being aimed at him. Two bullets were more than enough to do the job Declan seemed desperate to complete. Jamie had a distant, idle thought wondering if this was how it would all end—on his knees, taking one last bullet.
If Declan thought he’d beg for his life, Jamie would spit in his fucking face.
“I hear you turned down the Pavluhkins, Jamie,” Declan spit out.
No doubt anymore that their identities had been leaked to the enemy. Either by the Pavluhkins or rogue members of the CIA, Jamie knew it was only a matter of time before the truth got out in the public sphere.
“I don’t waste my time with shitty deals,” Jamie said coldly.
“You think you can walk away clean? He has what he needs to take you down and place all the blame on you. Do you really want to risk your family’s reputation that way? Or your team’s? Is everyone back at Boston Common worth your pride?”
Jamie stared up Declan, swallowing against the pressure of the gun against his jaw. Right now, his family was safe. As for the suicide bombers—
I have them under control, Katie told him, sounding tense. They can’t detonate anything right now. They’re lucky I’m even letting them breathe after this shit.
Leave it to his team to get the job done. Jamie’s pride in them would never fade. “In what future do I ever put myself first over everyone else?”
Declan’s mouth twisted in a parody of a smile, lips peeling back from his teeth as he pulled a remote detonator out of his pocket. Further proof that Stanislav’s offer was nothing more than a lie.
Viper, get our people out of the subway! Get out of the bombers’ minds! Jamie shouted at her, hoping she would hear him in time.
Thoughts were quicker than actions, but in this one instant, Katie’s telepathy had no recourse against the ideological drive of a man determined to win through the sacrifice of others. They were too far away from Boston Common to hear the bombs go off, but Jamie knew what it was like when Splice went off in a crowd.
He’d lived through it, after all.
“Should’ve stayed on the winning side,” Declan sneered.
Later, when he could look back and reflect on that moment, Jamie would question his decision to stand firm in the face of Stanislav’s offer with so many lives at stake. The second-guessing would run rampant through his brain, and there would be no escaping the self-recriminations that would plague his thoughts, as they always did, after times like this in the field.
In the heat of the moment, Jamie held his ground.
The crack of a gun going off split the air, a mere second before Declan’s howl of a scream was torn out of his lungs. Warm blood spattered over Jamie’s face as a bullet slammed through Declan’s wrist, shattering the bones there. Jamie threw his body to the side, jerking his head out of the line of fire.
He was almost not quick enough.
The burn of the bullet grazing Jamie’s jaw and cheek from an upward angle seared through him, the noise of the gun going off so close to his ear deafening him. The hands holding onto him went lax in surprise for a split second, and Jamie took advantage of their mistake. He twisted on his knees, yanking one arm free in time to grab the wrist of the man holding the gun behind him and redirect it away from him. The shooter wasn’t in any condition to fight back as he fell to his own knees, blood pouring out of a wound in his hip area that his protective gear hadn’t quite covered.
Declan scrambled to his feet and ran, shouting out orders as several mercenaries threw themselves between his path and the bullets chasing him down. Jamie saw him dive for cover behind an SUV, yelling loudly for a pickup. Several vehicles on either side of the street revved their engines and drove into the fray.
“You can fuck right the hell off with your bullshit!” Kyle snarled as he appeared in the apartment building’s shattered entrance through a curl of hazy smoke.
Annabelle stood at his right, aiming in the opposite direction to cover them. Every shot Kyle took found its target with deadly accuracy. Jamie didn’t have to fight to get free so much as step over dead bodies, as the mercenaries who’d been holding him down died beneath Kyle’s assault. Jamie grabbed his face mask off the ground, but didn’t know where his weapons had gone, so he stole one from the nearest body. He held it close as he got to his feet and ran for cover.
Kyle covered Jamie’s retreat, laying down suppressive fire against the mercenaries still shooting at them as the rest scattered before the police showed up. Over his shoulder, Jamie caught a glimpse of Declan throwing himself into the safety of an armored SUV that barely stopped to pick him up. Its tires squealed as the driver peeled out of there, several mercenaries firing out the windows at them.
Annabelle stepped in front of Jamie to shield him as he ducked inside, returning fire and giving him a chance to recover.
“Are you all right, Apollo?” Annabelle asked.
“I’m good. Where’d you come from, Reaper?” Jamie asked as he wiped blood off his face from the bullet graze.
“Hitched a ride on the combat jet. Why the fuck didn’t you stay with your family?” Kyle growled.
“You sound angry.”
Kyle never took his eyes off the street, assault rifle like an extension of his body. “Can’t fucking imagine why. It’s not like I got down here and saw you almost get your head blown off.”
Jamie winced. “Sorry?”
Kyle aimed at an SUV speeding away behind the one Declan was in and fired off a
shot that must have hit the gas tank. Half the cars on the world’s many roads were electric while the other half ran on biofuel. The latter was still oil based, and the SUV went up in a fire. One or two people bailed out of the vehicle, bodies on fire, and Kyle put them out of their misery with a couple more shots.
“Tell that to Viper and the rest of the team when we get back to Boston Common.”
Jamie knew he was going to have a member of his team attached to his side for the remainder of their time in the field. He had no doubt Katie had relayed to the rest of the team what happened during his showdown with Declan, and Kyle wouldn’t be shy about sharing his eyewitness account of Jamie’s predicament.
“Speakin’ of the team,” Annabelle said. “We should head back.”
Kyle lowered his gun a fraction of an inch, but didn’t take his eyes off the rapidly emptying street. “Yeah.”
The flat tone of his voice told Jamie he wasn’t going to like what they’d return to. But there was no getting through it until they got through it.
Jamie didn’t hesitate. “Let’s go.”
15
An Act of Mercy
The sun went down Thursday night at 1731, but Jamie never saw it set.
With the fight winding down, the MDF turned its attention to quarantine and containment of those citizens who were affected by the Splice chemical bombs. Washington Street was barricaded off with the help of another telekinetic called into the field.
The Boston subway, known locally as the T, had closed off the stations before and after the Park Street Station on both the Green and Red lines. Boston PD and other MDF agents had barricaded the tunnels on the tracks after donning positive pressure personnel suits, standing guard against the people who had run from the terror on the street to a grave down below.
In the Blood (Metahuman Files Book 4) Page 26