40. Chapter Forty
Chapter Forty
Shade
The comms office goes silent the second the Pass comes down.
Every screen fills with static. Camera two goes black. Camera four tilts toward a sky white with drifting grit, while the thermal overlay stutters through the debris cloud and the sudden bloom of heat flooding the ruined path through the mountain.
For several breaths, no one speaks. The room only listens to the feeds crackle and the distant aftershocks shiver through the stone under our boots.
Then reports start hitting the room through the radios in clipped bursts.
"The Pass is down."
"Enemy units disappeared from view."
"The route into Blackreach is buried."
One of the junior officers steps closer to the main screen, his headset hanging crooked over one ear and his eyes fixed on the broken mountain. He stares at the display with wide, unblinking eyes.
"The Pass is gone," he says, his voice rough with disbelief. "They can’t get through to Blackreach now."
Another officer turns toward him, and the junior officer lets out a breath that is almost a laugh.
"They can’t reach the sanctuary. We’ve won!"
The words hit the room harder than the blast did.
A cheer breaks loose. Someone slams both palms on a desk while another soldier curses around a giddy laugh.
Then the bond wrenches tight in my chest, and I press the heel of my palm against my sternum with a wince.
It's Halley.
She knows.
Maybe she doesn't grasp every detail yet, but she knows the Pass is gone and the road that could have taken her back to Dazz, Ember, and Flicker is buried under rock because of Pack Scorch.
We kept her out of it on purpose. At first, I could defend that choice. If Halley knew we meant to destroy the Pass, she would have argued and pleaded for another option because she still had hope.
Once Blaze and Viper set the explosives, that excuse got thinner.
We could have told her then. I should have found her, looked her in the eye, and said we were going to block the path into Blackreach.
She would've had some time to grieve and come to terms with it.
Instead, Knox and I said nothing because telling her meant the last few days we had left with our Omega would be spent with her upset with us. It was purely selfish.
"Shade?"
Jason’s voice pulls me back to the room.
When I look at him, his face has gone pale. He came here for those Omegas too. Dazz, Ember, and Flicker are now unreachable beyond the mountain.
I don't give him an apology. There's no time, and any words I offer would sound weak and insincere.
Rock and rubble continue to cascade into the ruined gap on the main display. Down on the lower road, our line pulls back into position after the blast, reloading and re-forming while the dust clears.
"Keep scanning for heat signatures," I say, shrugging out of my headset. "Recalibrate the western drone first. The angle’s useless."
Jason turns in his seat. "What is it?"
I move to the main screen and bring up the thermal layer in full. The image still jumps and glitches around the edges, but the heat from the blast is fading, and the drone begins to separate the collapsed stone from bodies.
Then the heat signatures start to move.
Fresh enemy units.
They are moving in from the western approach, replacing the soldiers who were crushed under the avalanche of rock.
I enlarge the feed, and the screen resolves into hundreds of Human heat signatures regrouping outside the collapse.
The cheering stops piece by piece until the only sounds left are the feeds crackling, chairs scraping, and the low hiss of open comms.
One of the officers steps closer to the screen. "Why are they still coming? The Pass is gone, and there is no way through now."
"We have their attention now, and they won't stop until every one of us is dead," I say coldly.
I need them to swiftly get over their shock and get back to work. They need to understand that even though we saved Blackreach, the enemy will not stop their attack.
Before, the Humans might've seen the hundreds of souls in this fortress as a minor inconvenience to their plans. The last, futile stand of Demi-humans. Something to be effortlessly swatted away on their march into Blackreach.
Now, we've enraged them, and the Humans are going to make us pay in blood.
"Tell artillery to prepare for the next wave."
Jason pushes his chair closer to the console, sliding his headset back into place, and whatever grief he's experiencing is shoved to the side like a good soldier. "Recalibrate the northern drone. Push the eastern feed to the wall. Advise support team four to move into position."
The stunned soldiers of Jason's communication team slowly drag themselves out of celebration and back into the war.
Jason glances up at me. "You’re going to her now, aren’t you?"
I nod and turn from the screens before Jason can say anything else. The comms room is already moving around me, voices lowering into clipped reports.
By the time I reach the corridor, the fortress is shaking again. The enemy has started shelling Blackgate in earnest once more, and the impacts are landing high enough to bring chunks of the old structure down.
Dust rolls past in a pale sheet, stinging my eyes and catching in the back of my throat. A medic team pushes by with a stretcher, and I flatten myself to the stone to let them pass.
The woman on it is not a soldier. She is a Beta from the laundry, one of the women who keeps this fortress clothed and clean. Blood soaks through the apron still tied around her waist, and gray dust coats her hair where part of the ceiling must have come down on her.
I know her mate. He is probably somewhere below us in the courtyard right now, strapping on armor and preparing to join the team of Beta soldiers who will act as support to the Alpha front line, with no idea his mate is being carried toward Everlyn.
I reach the stairwell.
I take the steps two at a time, one hand skimming the wall when another impact hits lower on the mountain and sends a tremor so strong it cracks the stone under my fingertips.
Blackreach is sealed behind us now, and Blackgate is the only target left. We're about to take the full force of the Human army, and no one in this fortress is safe.
I shove through the battlement door into the pale fallout.
I see them instantly.
Halley stands near the parapet, rigid in full combat kit, staring at the collapse with a blank expression. Knox is three paces from her, radio to his mouth, firing orders at the units still holding the road. While she looks fragile and lost, he looks carved out of iron and ash.
I cross the distance fast.
"Knox."
He turns before I reach him. "Status."
"The collapse was total, but as predicted, they've redirected to Blackgate." I keep my voice clipped and loud enough to cut through the noise. "Thermal picks up multiple regrouping clusters both flanks of the debris field. The next push is coming," I say.
The mountain is still unstable, but the enemy is already probing around the collapse. In classic Human tactics, they take the hit, count the dead, and keep coming.
Knox stares down at me, the scar over his nose stark against his hard features.
He hears what I'm saying. This is the moment. We have to get Halley to the front lines now.
"No. Not yet, we still have time."
A burst of gunfire cracks from the slope below. Someone from the courtyard is shouting for more ammunition to be loaded into a truck and sent down the mountain. Good. They're going to need it. It's hard to process that this is only a vanguard, an advance force before the full enemy army arrives.
Knox is wrong. If we're going to do this, it has to be now before their numbers are too great.
Knox is distracted by another report crackling over the radio. I step past him and approach Halley. She hasn't moved, and her gloves are taut with the force of her grip on the parapet. I catch her wrist and pull her hand free before she grinds her bones to powder.
"Baby girl, look at me."
She does.
Those big purple eyes meet mine, and I see the pain in her before I feel a renewed stab of grief through the bond. She's doing a good job of suppressing her emotions, but it's not enough to hide from her Beta.
"It's time, Halley," I say.
Her throat works. "The Pass is gone."
"I know, sweetheart."
"That was my way back to them."
"I know that too." I slide my hand down and lace my fingers through hers, forcing something solid into her grip. "You can hate us later for not telling you. Right now I need you moving."
Knox ends his transmission and steps in close enough that all three of us stand shoulder to shoulder. He looks down at Halley with a hardness I haven't seen since the last time we were on a battlefield.
"Specialist Shade," he says.
He only says my name, but after years under his command, I hear his order clearly enough. He wants me to give him the numbers. The facts. A reason why now is the time we send our most precious person into battle.
"We have a window to get her down there before the next wave," I say. "Let her try one Command now, while the vanguard is still scattered. Then we use what we learn when the main army arrives."
Knox’s gaze fixes on me.
"Try one Command," he repeats.
I chose those words on purpose.
He needs a plan before he can send Halley into danger. He needs a target, a purpose, a reason that can stand up against the newly mated Alpha clawing at his control. If I call this what it is, he will hear risk. If I call it a test, he can turn fear into strategy.
So I give him that.
"One controlled attempt," I say. "Range, effect, reaction time. We get answers now, or we face the main assault blind."
His jaw locks.
I know he hates this. Every instinct in him wants Halley behind stone walls and armed guards, far from the front line. Mine does too.
But the Pass is gone, the next wave is already forming, and sheltering her will not save her if Blackgate falls.
Another impact lands at the rear of the fortress, and I duck as stone shrapnel scatters around us. I wrap an arm around Halley's waist to shelter her as best I can, and she instantly melts into my side, my sweet Omega seeking the comfort of familiar touch.
Knox is still hesitating, wavering between being her mate and her Prime Alpha.
"You know we can't keep her sheltered from this.
We talked about it, so get your head out of your instincts," I say firmly, unable to stop myself from anxiously checking that her helmet is strapped on correctly.
"Now that the Pass is gone, the next attack is coming for the fortress.
They mean to destroy us as fast as possible.
If our line breaks, we lose. We all die.
Game over. I'm telling you that this is it.
This is our moment, so don't fail us now, Prime. "
It's harsh, but he has to hear it.
Halley is in danger no matter what. Every single soul in this fortress is on the verge of death.
His jaw flexes.
Below, a voice over the radio shouts for reinforcements at the lower bend. Another answers with casualty numbers I do not like at all. The front line is taking a hammering already.
Small bursts of Blaze and Viper ricochet down the bond as their control slips, giving us a taste of the violence we're about to walk into.
Knox watches Halley for a heartbeat, a brief flash of affection sweeping across his stony features, before he straightens and nods.
Yes.
It's time.
Knox turns and grabs the nearest runner by the shoulder as the man rushes past. "Recall Prime Alpha Zero from the front line. He is taking command of the fortress. Now."
The runner nods and tears off.
Knox meets my eyes for a second and clenches his jaw.
"Let's join the fight."