Steel for 5 (Mags & Nats Book 3)

by Stephanie Fazio

  “No!”

  The cloaked Mag remained, his body expanding until it made a watery barrier between me and where I needed to be.

  “Bri!”

  Kaira’s voice wasn’t just in my ear. My friends were coming through the door. Relief slammed into me with so much force tears leaked from my eyes.

  “Keep that thing busy,” I told them, gesturing at the water Mag. “I’m going after Lilly.”

  “Allow me,” the coxswain said, rolling up his sleeves and putting out his hands. All at once, the floor-to-ceiling human wall of water began to churn. The coxswain could control water, and his magic must have been different enough from the cloaked Super Mag that it wasn’t cancelled out. The two of them battled for control of the water.

  “Watch the babies,” Yutika cried. She pointed to the water, which was getting dangerously close to a row of cribs.

  “Jesus, this bastard’s strong,” the coxswain gasped.

  He was spinning his hands in a circle, making the water Mag transform into a waterspout that was slamming itself into the wall and bursting over and over again.

  “I can’t Whisper to that Mag,” Michael said, his voice barely audible over the rush of swirling water. “His mind’s not normal.”

  I took my chances and ran, hoping the others could keep the Mag’s attention long enough for me to chase Felix down.

  Someone screamed out a warning.

  I skidded to a stop as the middle of the floor opened up again. A dozen Mags in cloaks stepped off the platform and started for us.

  CHAPTER 40

  Adozen hellions were blocking my path to Lilly.

  “They’re all Super Mags,” Diego called as the cloaked figures surrounded the group of my friends. The Seven were here, in addition to the Mag half of the crew team. I didn’t have a chance to ask where Sir Zachary and the rest of our group had gone.

  We were surrounded.

  The room teemed with magic. I was aware of the infant Steels wailing in their cribs, but I couldn’t see anything beyond the Super Mags’ cloaks.

  “Come on, pendejos,” Diego growled. “Come and get it.”

  The cloaked Mags all lifted their hands at once. The movement was so coordinated it threw me off guard. I braced for an attack, but instead of coming for us, they lowered their hoods.

  Yutika let out a muffled cry. I gasped.

  “Joder,” Diego cursed.

  Fuck, indeed.

  We were surrounded by monsters.

  They were the size of adults, but they didn’t look human. Their skin was scaly and gray, more corpse-like than any living creature I’d ever seen. Their hair was patchy and spotted with blood. Their unfocused eyes were so bloodshot it was almost impossible to see their pupils. And their pointed teeth carved long, blood gashes at the corners of their white lips.

  “Agent S,” Diego whispered.

  I didn’t have a chance to ask him what he meant. The…creatures…attacked.

  The Mag with the barbed metal tail reappeared and joined the fight. The tail lashed back and forth, searching for a target. It missed Michael’s head by inches, striking the wall and shearing right through the metal.

  “Mine,” Diego growled, flying up to the height of the Mag’s head and levelling a kick at his hideous face.

  The rest of us chose our own opponents, and the fight was on.

  I punched, kicked, and headbutted every one of the evil creatures I could get near. I smashed my fist into one of them that kept dissolving into puffs of smoke and then reappearing on the other side of the room. I finally connected with him while he was in solid form.

  The Mag struck the wall head-first and slumped into unconsciousness. His hood fell all the way back, exposing his wrinkled and bloody skin. I noticed there was a few-inch-long tube sticking out from the base of his neck.

  “My magic isn’t working on them,” Michael said helplessly, thrusting Yutika out of the way when one of our enemies dove right for her.

  “Mine works,” Kaira said, “but they don’t give a shit what we look like. They’re going to kill us either way.”

  Graysen was managing to keep one of them back with a metal rod, but he was quickly losing the fight. So were the rest of my friends. A.J. and the crew guys had retreated until their backs were against the wall and there was nowhere else for them to go.

  “Bri, they’ve got too much magic,” Diego panted, shooting into the air to avoid something heinous that spewed out of one of the Mag’s mouths. “We can’t fight them.”

  “Watch me,” I snarled, crouching down in a fighting pose.

  I lunged at the nearest Super Mag. I hit him hard enough to make a human-sized dent in the wall. He bounced right off as his body began to expand like a balloon. He grew and grew until he was easily twelve feet high and six feet wide. The Super Mag roared in pain wherever my blows landed, but with his sheer size, I couldn’t do much damage. If this creature got any bigger, he’d reach the cribs that A.J. had carefully relocated to the far side of the room.

  “Get the babies out of here,” I yelled to anyone who could move.

  “Get them where?” Diego shouted back.

  The giant balloon Mag had grown so much he was now blocking the door out of here.

  Double shit.

  “Get me up to his head,” I shouted to Diego, as the monstrous figure continued to grow and grow.

  Diego wrapped an arm around my waist, and then we were in the air.

  As I stared into a bloodshot eye that was almost as big as my fist, I was reminded of the monster movies Brent and I watched as kids. Thick blood dribbled around the creature’s pointed fangs. Resisting the urge to shudder, I pulled back my fist and punched the enormous Mag. My fist got him square in the eye.

  “Ugh!”

  Blood and goopy eye matter splattered across my titanium skin. The Mag screeched and began to deflate.

  “Ew,” Diego complained.

  I was about to tell him to take me to the Super Mag who had just torn Graysen’s metal rod out of his hands, when the whole room began to shake.

  I looked around. The magic didn’t seem to be coming from the cloaked Super Mags. What was left of the deflating balloon Mag burst apart in a spray of blood and guts as a rhinoceros with golden eyes obliterated it.

  Diego cursed and flew us higher.

  “It’s Charlotte,” I yelled, wresting myself free from Diego’s grip and falling back to the floor.

  Charlotte-the-rhino turned her enormous head from side to side, spearing the cloaked Mags on the end of her horn and flinging them into the walls.

  A.J. zoomed the babies’ cribs around the Super Mags and straight out the door.

  One of the cloaked figures rose out of a crouch and came at Charlotte from behind, a giant scythe-like weapon extending from his misshapen hand.

  “Charlotte!”

  Before I could get to her, fire engulfed the cloaked man and his weapon.

  Sir Zachary raced through his own fire, completely untouched by the flames that were engulfing the Super Mag. He tilted his head back and barked fire up at our enemies.

  “Coolest dog ever,” Diego said, staring at Sir Zachary in amazement.

  “Bri, Diego, come on!”

  Kaira and Graysen were gesturing frantically from the door. The rest of our group was already piling onto the elevator.

  “Not without Lilly,” I said, leaping over the charred bodies of the mutated Mags without feeling a shred of pity. These monstrous Super Mags would have killed me without batting an eye. And they had tried to keep me from Lilly.

  “No time,” Michael said. “The foreman told Emory—”

  Whatever he was about to say was drowned out by a deafening alarm.

  CHAPTER 41

  Blue lights pulsed from bulbs in the ceiling. And then, as quickly as it had started, the alarm ended. There was a gentle hiss as cloudy white smoke came out of nearly-invisible vents in the walls and floor.

  Diego swore. He yanked off his shirt and threw it
at me.

  “Cover your face!” He made a frantic gesture. “It’s MRP gas.”

  The rest of my friends had their noses and mouths buried in their collars as they crowded onto the elevator.

  A.J. was shouting at me to hurry up.

  “Not without Lilly!”

  I ignored the way my heart had begun to race. Weakness was stealing over my body.

  I felt woozy…like I’d had a few too many of A.J.’s peach-pomegranate martinis. Those things were delicious.

  “You look awesome without a shirt,” I told Diego. The words came out sounding like one. My tongue felt fat and dry. I tried to take a step forward, but my feet gave out and I sank onto the floor.

  It was a really comfy floor. And I was really tired.

  “Oh no, you don’t.”

  I made a grumbly sound when Diego lifted me up and cradled me in his arms.

  I knew there was something I was supposed to do…someone I needed to find…but I couldn’t remember. Diego smelled good, and he felt even better.

  My eyes rolled back in my head as the floor became the ceiling, and I was flying down an elevator shaft. My friends were there, but they were all blurry.

  “Sir Zachary!” A.J. shrieked. His voice was right in my ear, even though I didn’t see him next to me.

  “I’ll come back for him,” Graysen’s voice replied. “As soon as I get Kaira out.”

  My foggy brain remembered that MRP couldn’t hurt Nats, since they didn’t have any magic.

  “Why…you…okay?” I asked Diego. Whatever was happening to me and the rest of my Mag friends wasn’t bothering him.

  “High tolerance,” he replied. “Keep my shirt over your face.”

  I noticed my dangling arm was no longer titanium. No matter how hard I tried to call on my magic, my skin remained normal.

  Tendrils of panic wrapped around me when I couldn’t sense my magic.

  “Diego—” I gasped.

  “I’ve got you, cariño. Trust me.”

  I didn’t want to, but it wasn’t like I had a choice. I was dead weight in his arms.

  The elevator containing the rest of the Seven reached the bottom floor just after Diego and me. The Nat members of the crew team came running from a different direction. With my double-vision, it seemed like there were a lot more of them.

  As my head bounced against Diego’s chest, I was dimly aware that the Nats in our group were each carrying an unconscious Mag. I felt the cold stirrings of dread when I remembered that our team had more Mags than Nats, and I couldn’t see anyone carrying Yutika, A.J., or Michael.

  “Help,” I began, but I couldn’t get the rest out. My lips had frozen. It was taking all of my concentration just to stay awake.

  Diego followed the direction of my unfocused gaze. His grip tightened around me.

  “Please,” I managed.

  I could see Michael on the elevator platform on his hands and knees, retching as he tried to lift Yutika.

  Diego said something in Spanish, and then he lowered me to the ground behind an overturned cart.

  “Stay,” he ordered me.

  Like I could do anything else, I tried to say, but the witty retort got stuck somewhere between my brain and throat.

  Diego went to Yutika, tossed her over his shoulder like a bag of potatoes, and flew down the tunnel that led back to the train platform.

  I thought I saw dozens of the cloaked Super Mags moving silently to and from the elevator, but I wasn’t sure if there really were that many or if I was just seeing triple.

  Five times Diego came back to carry A.J., Charlotte, Emory, Sir Zachary, and the coxswain. On his last trip to the elevator, Adam went with him. It took both of them to heave Michael down the tunnel, each of them supporting half of the bigger man’s body.

  When I was the only one left, I finally lost my battle to stay awake. My last thought was that I was going to have one hell of a hangover tomorrow. And then my world went black.

  CHAPTER 42

  What time is it?” I groaned, trying to bully my eyelids into opening.

  “Seven,” Diego’s voice replied.

  “AM or PM?”

  Was I blind? Oh god—I was blind!

  My eyelids peeled back, showing a room that was familiar but not my own.

  Okay, not blind. Phew.

  Diego chuckled. “PM.”

  I sat up, the last of my grogginess fading away. A delicious smell was coming from the other room, and it helped bring me the rest of the way back to full consciousness.

  I was in Diego’s apartment. The lamp next to the bed threw off a warm glow. That, combined with the rain drumming on the windowpanes, made for a cozy setting. All I was missing was a fire and smores.

  “How did I get here?” I asked.

  “You flew.” Diego stirred something on the stove, wiped his hands on his jeans, and came to sit on the mattress beside me. “Well, technically, I flew. You just hung on for the ride.”

  “Are you calling me a parasite?” I grumbled.

  “A very sexy parasite,” he corrected.

  I could live with that.

  Diego’s hair was wet, and he smelled more like his shower gel than his usual cinnamon. I wondered if I’d be able to taste cinnamon if I leaned forward and brushed my lips against his.

  “Holy shit.” I sat up so fast my head swam. Images and memories blasted into my mind at full force.

  Lilly…Felix Remwald taking her away…those zombie Super Mags…the MRP gas that downed all the Mags in our group….

  “Relax, cariño,” Diego said, scooting down onto his side and pulling me with him. We were face-to-face and sharing a pillow. “Everyone else got on the underground train. They were at capacity with the last batch of slaves Kaira and Graysen loaded up, so I told them I’d take you back.”

  “Lilly?” I asked, already knowing the answer but needing the confirmation.

  Diego shook his head. “I didn’t see Felix again, and those zombie Super Mags were all over the place. We barely got away.”

  The smell of food wafting over from the kitchen no longer smelled good to me. Acid churned in my stomach.

  “She’s safe,” Diego assured me, reaching up to push a strand of hair behind my ear. “Felix knows how important she is. He’s going to keep her as leverage.”

  “And that’s supposed to make me feel better?!”

  Diego lifted a shoulder. “We’re the only ones who know he’s still alive. He isn’t going to want a secret he’s kept for fifteen years to get out, which means he won’t let anything happen to her.”

  “I have to go back.” I was here while my niece was still stuck in the mine.

  “Whoa, mi pequeña diabla.” Diego pressed me back onto the bed. “You need to call your friends and tell them I didn’t murder you, since I vaguely remember A.J. threatening me before he passed out.”

  I reached for my earpiece and mike, but both were gone. They must have fallen off during the flight from California back to Boston. I dug my phone out of my pocket. Incredibly, it had survived the trip. I called Kaira.

  She picked up on the first ring.

  “Are you okay?” she demanded.

  “Yeah, you?” I switched to face time, and Kaira’s haggard but unharmed face filled my screen.

  “We’re fine,” she assured me. “The 7.5, Charlotte, Emory, crew team…all good. We got three train-loads of slaves back to Boston. It was everyone we could find on Level 5, but we didn’t have time to search any of the other levels before everything with Felix. And then with the MRP gas….” Kaira faltered. “Bri, I’m so sorry about Lilly.”

  My fists tangled in Diego’s quilt as I thought about how close I’d come, only to have my niece wrenched away from me again.

  “I’m sorry,” Michael’s voice said from somewhere nearby. “If I’d known the foreman was going to do that, I would have stopped him. I was hoping the foreman would bring us to Felix, but then I got distracted by the fact that I couldn’t Whisper to those Super Mags
.”

  “It wasn’t your fault,” I told him, my throat thick with a sense of failure and loss.

  More voices on the other end of the line assured him of the same.

  “Mag cops are trying to locate the kids’ families,” Kaira told me. “It’s not easy because all of their records were destroyed and they never met their parents, but we’ll figure something out.”

  I nodded, trying to be grateful. Objectively, we’d saved dozens of children from a horrific fate. I should be glad.

  Instead, all I could think about was Lilly’s wide, terrified eyes as Felix disappeared with her.

  There was more chatter on Kaira’s end of the line. Kaira balanced her phone against the wall so I could see everyone’s faces. The rest of the Seven crowded in around her.

  “Sweetums!” A.J. cried, shoving his face right in front of the camera.

  “I’m so glad everyone’s okay,” I said. “I have to—”

  “We know what you’re going to say,” Yutika said, cutting me off. “So, I’ll save us all some time by telling you no, you’re not going back alone, and yes we’re going to save Lilly ASAP…together.”

  “I have some ideas for how we can get her back,” Graysen said.

  “And there are other issues we need to discuss,” A.J. added. “Because I, for one, have no desire to die at the hands of a Synthetic.”

  “Synthetic?” I asked.

  “That’s what we’re calling them,” Kaira clarified. “Those freaky creations that have tubes hanging out of their skulls and don’t respond to Michael’s Whispering.”

  I shivered, remembering their bloody skin and pointed teeth.

  I put my phone on speaker so Diego didn’t have to strain to hear everything. After what he’d done for all of my friends, I figured he deserved to hear what they were saying.

  “Tell her what Emory saw in the foreman’s memory,” Smith told Michael.

  My friends moved aside to give Michael more access to the camera.

  “Emory learned that the foreman—Eugene Forrager—came across Agent S while he was scavenging the rubble of a crashed plane. He knew the Remwalds from various anti-Nat rallies they’d been to, and thought Felix might be able to use the Agent S because of his alchemy.”