Chaos Station 01 - Chaos Station

by Kelly Jensen

  Felix signaled Elias and Nessa to hold, checked the catwalks, and advanced toward the edge of his shadow. The guard wasn’t so out of it that she didn’t catch a flicker of movement at the end. She turned, mouth opening, and Felix moved. He slapped his glove across her mouth, knowing the web of steel wire wouldn’t effectively cut sound, and dug his stunner into her side. She jerked once with the discharge and slumped. Watching her slide down the crates, Felix suppressed the shiver that wanted to crawl across the back of his shoulders and advance down his spine. He and his crew had had to fight their way out of a few scrapes, but they didn’t go looking for trouble, not usually. What surprised him more, though, was how ready he’d been to silence the guard. How instinctive his action had been.

  Five years retired, but still a soldier.

  Nessa knelt next to him and pushed a hypo against the guard’s neck. The instrument hissed quietly. “She’ll be out for at least six hours.”

  They would be long gone by then.

  From here Felix could see the lower level of offices more clearly. Zed’s ping came from behind the one with a long stretch of frosted panes. A conference room. Two guards were posted outside the entrance.

  “Shit.”

  Ducking back, Felix consulted the schematic.

  “Time for our second diversion.”

  He sent the signal. A second later the back half of the warehouse went dark. A smoke alarm wailed. Shouts rose up and boots thundered across the catwalks overhead, the sound rolling toward the darkness. One guard left his post. Felix ran forward, stunner extended, taking the shot as soon as he got close enough for the charge to strike the remaining guard. The acrid stench of burnt skin competed with the sharp odor of adrenaline, the tang of fresh blood. He’d managed to open a wound on the guy’s shoulder. Swallowing an instinctive reaction to the smell of carnage, Felix turned his attention to the door lock. He had it open in seconds. Ness and Elias followed him into the room, Elias dragging the body of the guard.

  Zed slammed the door closed behind them. “You’re right on time.”

  Felix scanned his lover’s face and body, looking for obvious damage. When he found none, he exhaled...and then closed his eyes as his head spun. Not now, Felix. Not now. He opened his eyes. “Yep. What’s the deal?”

  “Agrius isn’t interested in my wallet of unhooked creds.”

  “What, they want you and your millions? Say it ain’t so,” Elias said.

  Zed spared him a tired smile. “Go figure.”

  “And they left you in here without coffee and doughnuts,” Felix said.

  “They’re not the best hosts.” Emma leaned against the far wall of the conference room, away from the windows and door. She looked more battered than the day before, more haunted. The humor from last night had left her eyes, and her mouth seemed set into a permanent line.

  “Getting you out of here, Em,” Felix said, which would be nothing Zed hadn’t already told her.

  Emma shared a look with Zed, and Felix caught a hint of words not exchanged. He’d ask for the transcript later.

  “Okay, we have two plays here,” Zed said. “We’re in a defensible position right now, but given the amount of illegal ordnance I’ve already seen, the conference table will only last a couple of rounds before their bullets find us.”

  “So, they’re not using rubber rounds.”

  “We should have brought the laser carbines,” Elias said.

  Nessa waved her hands. “Because they would have been so easy to conceal on the way here.”

  “I don’t suppose you have a bio-lock key?” Felix asked.

  Zed shook his head. “What’s our closest exit?”

  “Our ingress point. Door number two. Three switchbacks through four rows of crates. I left it unlocked.”

  “Let’s go.”

  “We have two weapons they don’t.” Emma’s gaze slid toward Zed.

  Ever the doctor, Nessa scowled at the idea. “You can’t. If either of you black out on us, we can’t help you.”

  Emma stepped out of her boot, dipped her hand inside and pulled out a small packet.

  Felix glanced at Zed. “No strip search?”

  “Ask me that without smiling.”

  “I’m not smiling!”

  “What’s that?” Nessa asked, indicating the packet.

  “Anti-seizure meds.” Emma held up a pill. “Capsule will melt in time if you take one before you start.”

  “Jesus, Emma. Tell me you haven’t been pushing it like that.”

  She shrugged, which was answer enough.

  Voices rose outside the door.

  “Shit.” A general sentiment uttered by more than one, shared by everyone.

  “Now or never.” Emma palmed the capsule and tossed it toward her mouth.

  She threw the bag at Zed, who caught it and stuffed it in his pocket, unopened, and turned to face the door. When it opened, she exploded into action, pulling the first body into the room and throwing it aside before reaching for the next. Elias caught the first, a woman. She hung limply from his arms, head dangling at an impossible angle, and for an absurd moment, Felix wondered if they’d be playing pass the parcel with a series of dead bodies until they left the room.

  Gunfire erupted outside and Emma ducked back away from the door. Two men pushed through. Zed caught one around the neck but did not immediately throttle the dude. Instead, he pushed him back toward Felix. Only after Felix caught his prize did it register that Zed was moving slower than Emma. He hadn’t stepped into his Zone.

  Because he wouldn’t or couldn’t?

  Felix grappled with his target. An explosion by his ear left a hole in the conference room wall. Felix ducked as more projectiles tore a line through the opaque plasmix. He dropped down, rolled to the side and delivered a stunning kick to the face following him. Bone crunched and blood sprayed out from the broken nose. The guy fell sideways with a mournful howl.

  Quiet rolled through the warehouse and, for a moment, hope glittered more brightly than the pinpricks of light through the conference room wall. Was that it? Had they finished the fight? Hope flared as Emma pushed through the door, leaving it wide open. Felix heard the sound of a struggle outside, but no more weapons fire.

  Elias ran forward and shouted, “Clear.” He waved Nessa to his side.

  Zed grabbed Felix’s arm, hauling him up off the floor. Together they ran through the door after Elias and Nessa. A body lay between them and the container corridor. Emma stepped over it and ducked as a bullet pinged the container next to her. Felix looked up and caught sight of a figure running along a catwalk.

  “Look out overhead!” Felix grabbed Zed’s sleeve and ran for the exit corridor. “This way.”

  Elias and Nessa slid into the space behind them, Emma squashed in last. Elias flinched away from the soldier, pushing Nessa behind him in a protective gesture. Felix caught Nessa’s hand and Zed pulled them both along as he took point, navigating the increasingly narrow lane. They spilled out into a small square bordered by stacked crates and containers.

  Where the fuck was the door?

  “Shit, we took the wrong path!” Felix batted frantically at his bracelet.

  The square became an arena as cartel slithered through gaps on all sides.

  Zed raised the pistol he’d wrenched from a limp hand in the conference room and fired two shots. Abandoning his map, Felix threw himself into defense. He pulled his stunner from his belt and dove at the nearest Agrius, discharging the stun before he connected. Electricity jumped the small space in an arc, blackening the shirt of the man in front of him. The man flinched and turned, his upraised weapon tracking across the square. Felix slammed into his chest, knocking him back. He thrust his stunner into the guy’s ribs and fired again. Shuddering, the man fell back and dropped his weapon. Felix picked it up, cursed and threw it aside. Bio-mapped. Zed might have found the only useable pistol in the place.

  A bullet punched a serious dent in the container in front of him.

  �
�We’re fish in a fucking barrel,” Elias called out.

  “So are they,” Zed answered, turning his opponent around to catch a shot for him.

  Blood and fiber blossomed from the man’s chest in a startling puff. Zed dropped the body and reached for another. Nessa yelled, clutched her left arm and staggered into a space between the containers. Felix ducked in after her. Gripping her arm, she leaned into a wall while she fumbled with her pockets.

  “How bad is it?” he asked.

  “Nicked my arm. I need to wrap something around it to stop the bleeding.”

  Felix looked around, senselessly, then tugged his shirt over his head. The SFT was probably dead, but the fabric would still absorb blood. “This?”

  She extended a bloodied hand toward it. “Thanks. Can you wrap it ’round for me?”

  His glove wasn’t as suited to tying knots as it was mechanical tasks. “Here, hold this.” He pushed one end of the fabric into her right hand and had her hold it while he wrapped and tied. “There.” He put his good hand on her shoulder in a restraining motion. “Stay here.”

  “Get out of my way. It’s not serious.”

  Nessa barreled forward, her intent clear. She paused only to pick up an abandoned pistol, tossing it aside when she discovered the bio-mapped grip.

  Felix turned at a sound behind him and found himself bare-handed in a knife fight. He evaded the first slash and caught the offending arm on the back swing. He let his opponent’s momentum turn them until he had a good grip, then he reversed the direction, snapping his arm up and back. A sickening crack joined the loud scuffle.

  The guy wasn’t put off by a dislocated shoulder. He still came at Felix, pushing him back. They fell into the side of a container, which rang with a hollow clang. Felix scrambled up and ducked around the corner, reaching for the knife in his boot. The floor disappeared beneath him and Felix fell sideways. His left hand caught on the edge of the dislodged flooring grate, his glove saving him from an unknown drop.

  A boot slammed down over the web of metal. Needle-thin spikes dug into his flesh. Mangled casing scraped across his knuckles. Yelling with the pain, Felix tried to swing his good hand up to the ledge. The boot ground down, pressing more metal into his left hand. Pain sliced through his fingers. Felix twisted back and forth, trying simultaneously to bring his right arm up and wrench his left hand free. He couldn’t do both. He had to calm down, stow the panic bubbling up from his gut, nudge aside the dark fear crawling along his spine. He wasn’t fighting stin, they weren’t trying to take his hand; he wasn’t in the mines...

  Felix hauled in a breath, held it, let it out and reached again for the knife in his boot. He caught the short handle with trembling fingers and slid it out. Adjusting his grip, Felix pushed away the nightmare of pain in his broken hand and took another deep breath. Then he swung his right hand up, knife angled toward the boot pinning him to the ledge.

  “Better not be a fucking steel toe.”

  His knife sank through toughened plasmix, flesh and bone. The owner of the boot howled and lifted his foot. Left hand released, right hand kicked sideways, Felix fell backward into the hole. He landed on his back, the impact pushing the air from his chest. He flopped weakly and tried to roll, but the matter of drawing oxygen into his evacuated lungs took precedence. His arms flailed, the left crashing against the floor with a snap. He felt the release on his bracelet give, the smooth ring falling loose from his wrist. Then the pain of snarling metal teeth bit into his tortured hand, digging and scraping, competing with the weight in the center of his chest.

  Air, he needed air...

  Felix struggled to breathe until the square of light above him faded to gray.

  Chapter Nineteen

  Fuck, do they ever end?

  Zed’s elbow slammed into a cartel member who’d gotten too close for the pistol, the crack of bone and cartilage almost commonplace. A fresh shower of blood sprayed across his cheek. Zed ignored it in favor of picking another target. Fatigue pulled at his limbs and he’d lost track of who was fighting who.

  “Zone, Major!”

  How many times had he heard that voice raised, just like that, on a battlefield? He glanced at Emma. “Can’t.”

  Her flat eyes narrowed and she turned her attention back to her opponent.

  He hadn’t fought like this, without Zoning, for years. But he couldn’t slip into that altered state. Emma was teetering on a knife’s edge. She’d held the Zone for far longer than Zed had ever been able to manage, and she was courting a hard crash. Or maybe something worse.

  The heel of his opponent’s palm cracked into his jaw, sending him reeling backward. Refocusing, Zed pushed forward and reached for an arm. Try that move with a broken wrist, fucker. He snagged the asshole’s hand and twisted, hard.

  “Enough!” someone thundered.

  A gun went off and fire blazed across Zed’s upper right arm. He staggered back, his hand flying up to cover the wound, his stolen pistol slipping out of his grasp. He’d been grazed often enough to know the feeling of a bullet kissing his skin intimately. He picked out the shooter immediately, unsurprised to see blue-suited Julian standing at the edge of the impromptu arena, gun raised. Another half-dozen men and women, armed with various weapons—legal, illegal, messy and just plain deadly—lined up beside him. They had to be dredging the bottom of the barrel for thugs now—these guys seemed more like paper-pushers than the sort to get involved with the action. When the boss needed cannon fodder, Zed figured even the geekiest techs would be called to pick up a gun.

  Zed held Julian’s gaze, swearing silently as the bastard’s lips curved into a smile. He had them beat—he knew it, they knew it. Slowly, keeping their guard up, the Agrius fighters backed off. Emma vibrated in place, as if staying still was simply impossible. Out of the corner of his eye, Zed watched the crew of the Chaos heave air into their lungs. Elias, Nessa...battered but upright.

  No sign of Flick.

  Panic slid into Zed’s chest, but he couldn’t let it take over, no matter how thoroughly it squeezed his lungs and set his heart to racing. He resisted the urge to scan the floor and search for his friend. Taking his eyes off Julian would be a bad idea, no matter how loudly his gut—and heart—screamed.

  “Should’ve killed you as soon as you walked in the door,” Julian growled. His eyes narrowed. “I won’t make that mistake again. At least you saved me the trouble of hunting down Idowu and his crew.”

  Zed tensed, waiting for the bullet. Julian wasn’t looking at him, though. His eyes were on Elias.

  Shit.

  Zed reached for the Zone. Calm settled over him, beating back the panic and hopelessness that threatened. He burst into movement as the gun fired. He wasn’t faster than a bullet, but he could try. Just like when they’d come across the civilians stranded in the transport as the stin approached. He’d known ten extra people wouldn’t fit into the skipper, but they had to try. That had been a success. This?

  He knew Idowu would die. But Julian wouldn’t walk away. Cold comfort to the remainder of the crew.

  In less than a breath, Zed had yanked the weapon from Julian’s hands, twisted the man around and snapped his neck. The body fell to his feet and Zed moved on to the nearest thug. He dispatched him in much the same manner, and then the next. The third threw up his arms in surrender as Zed approached. He didn’t stop—the mission to get Ingesson out of danger was paramount, and allowing any of the enemy to live when he didn’t have adequate means to contain them was unsafe.

  He stepped forward and the light glinted off the kid’s blond hair. Green eyes stared at him, wide and afraid, and Zed blinked. He wasn’t standing in a warehouse anymore. He wasn’t thirty-one years old, or a soldier, or fighting for his life. He was back at the Academy, staring at Felix Ingesson, aged twelve. Terror radiated from the boy’s expression, his eyes, his tense muscles, and Zed knew he’d failed. He’d promised to protect Flick, a promise that hadn’t even lasted three weeks before he’d fucking failed. He hadn’t ev
en known Flick had been missing until late in the afternoon. Panicked hours of searching hadn’t yielded any clues, not until someone, by chance, caught a soft sob from a footlocker in an unoccupied dorm room.

  “Don’t kill me,” Flick whimpered.

  Zed took a step forward, wanting to give in to the urge to rain kisses upon Flick’s blond hair, his forehead, his cheeks and lips. In apology, in promise. “I would never hurt you,” he whispered.

  “Zed!”

  The shout tugged Zed sideways, back into the present. The cacophony that followed a battle hummed through the warehouse—moans, whispered pleas, anguished cries. Zed blinked rapidly, trying to clear his muddied brain and stave off the headache creeping through his temples. The man in front of him backed away, his hands up and his expression full of fear. A quick survey of the survivors told him that no one else was going to fight—they’d dropped their weapons too easily and looked too uncertain to pick them up again. In the absence of leadership, it seemed none of them knew what to do.

  “Stay the fuck away from us,” Zed growled at the blond. It wasn’t Flick; how had he thought it was?

  Where was Flick?

  Zed pressed fingers to his temple, as though doing so would hold his brains together as he shouted Flick’s name.

  “Zed.”

  He recognized the voice that time—Nessa. After spotting her through the bodies, he started in her direction, his steps staggered and uneven. She was kneeling beside a crumpled figure. It took Zed a moment to realize it wasn’t Elias who lay so still.

  No, it was Emma.

  “Fuck.” Zed’s voice caught and he stumbled forward to grab a limp arm. “Em. Em, come on.”

  “She...” Elias swallowed, his voice devoid of any of its usual levity. “She fucking passed through me and then she was suddenly there, in front of me, solid and...”

  Zed shook her, as if the movement would jolt her awake—even though the open, sightless eyes and the hole in her forehead told him that nothing would ever awaken her again. His breath hitched and his fingers tightened on her sleeve. He’d promised her he would look out for her, that he’d be there for her and any of their teammates—and he’d failed, letting his demons hold him down when his team was battling their own. My fault.