Chapter 31 #2
She froze. The light pinned her there, merciless and blinding, and then a voice broke from behind it.
“Holy shit, that’s Emma Thompson! The terrorist! Arrest her!”
“We’re still in Canadian waters, you cannot arrest her,” Campbell barked back.
Someone cursed. The beam quivered but didn’t move off Emma’s face.
And then, the Coast Guard vessel drifted closer.
Closing the tiny sliver of water that still technically separated their jurisdiction from ours.
They didn’t care about the border. They didn’t care about the deal between Canada and the US.
“Target acquired,” someone barked. “Move in. Take her!”
Hands reached for the rail. A hook clanged. Two officers leaned forward, ready to board, ready to grab her, sovereign boundary be damned.
Emma’s breath hitched, and that was all it took.
I moved on pure instinct.
The cold inside me surged to life in a single violent sweep, coiling up my spine like a storm snapping awake, and before thought could catch up, my inked haze poured out of me—black and alive—racing across the river like smoke that had learned how to burn.
The air convulsed as the power hit, pressure folding in on itself, and the Coast Guard ship shuddered under the force, metal warping with a tortured groan before the hull finally gave.
Lights burst in a sharp, staccato chain, glass spraying into the night like someone had thrown a handful of stars across the water.
A shockwave rolled after it—deep, bone-rattling—churning the river beneath us as if the current itself recoiled.
With one flick of my hand, the whole ship had imploded, with only one cold, singular thought in my mind: no survivors.
I couldn’t risk anyone calling in another patrol on Emma. The math was lethal but simple: her over every other fucking soul. Always.
The blast had hit the river like a living pulse, waves slamming our boat sideways, spray exploding over us, turning the night into noise and motion and metal echoing on metal.
And then…nothing.
Silence stretched over the water, broken only by the hiss of settling debris and the crackle of flame along the horizon.
For a heartbeat, everything held still: the world, the current, even Emma’s breathing.
Then she exhaled, a shaky sound wrapped in sarcasm.
“Well,” she said, her tone bone-dry, “I’m sure that didn’t alert absolutely every living thing within a fifty-mile radius.”
My pulse was still thrumming with what I’d unleashed. The haze coiled tight beneath my skin, restless, waiting for permission to strike again.
Finally, I said, “At least there will be no one left to report it.”
Emma turned slightly, only enough for me to see the flicker in her expression, fury, disbelief, and something looking a lot like gratitude.
She hadn’t even finished drawing breath for her next remark when the night split open again.
New engines roared behind us, high, fast, angry. Headlights carved wild arcs across the water, cutting through the smoke and mist left from the blast.
Not one boat. Many.
Speedboats, bearing red strobes and the maple leaf insignia glinting on their bows.
Perfect.
I’d just blown the US Coast Guard to hell, and now the Canadians were coming for us.
“Told you that wasn’t one of your more brilliant moments,” Emma muttered, the familiar sarcasm barely hiding the tremor in her voice.
“We need to get out of here,” I hissed through my teeth. “Now.”
“Really?” she shot back, her hand snapping up as her power flared invisibly across her skin. “Because I was just thinking this would be a great time to take up knitting.”
I tapped the comm in my ear—the damn thing Emma had insisted we all wear—and barked at the team behind us. “Stay back. Do not follow us. That’s an order.”
Across the water, the second boat reacted immediately. Four silhouettes jerked in acknowledgment, their craft throttling down, slowing enough to break formation. Good.
If the Canadians boarded anyone tonight, it wouldn’t be them.
Meanwhile, our own dinghy convulsed beneath us—wood groaning, planks twisting, the whole frame shuddering like it was being wrung out from the inside. The shape rippled, warped, and then…
In a single breath, the old craft collapsed in on itself and snapped back into place as something entirely new: a rubber motorboat. Black, sleek, and glistening under the moonlight, like it had been pulled straight out of a covert ops catalog.
The engine coughed once, then roared to life without fuel, the deep hum vibrating through the flexible hull beneath our knees.
We were thrown forward instantly. All four of us dropped low, clinging to the slick rubber sides as the boat shot across the water, curtesy of Emma.
Behind us, gunfire erupted, the bullets tearing into the water around us, each impact snapping like a whip.
“Motherfuckers!”
The current fought us, the boat bouncing hard with every wave, but Emma kept her focus on the horizon.
I heard the wet thud of impact and saw Campbell jerk forward at the bow, mouth open in a silent scream before a second shot hit him square in the chest.
The force sent him toppling over the side, vanishing into the black water with barely a splash.
“Fuck!” Johnson reached out to grab him, but the next burst caught him mid-movement. His body twisted, momentum carrying him overboard after Campbell. They were gone before the ripples even reached us.
“Emma, get the fuck down!” I barked, already lunging toward the controls. My hands locked around the throttle, knuckles white as I forced the boat into a tighter line.
The engine’s roar climbed higher, straining against the river’s pull. Ahead, the water shimmered—subtle at first, like heat distortion—but the closer we got, the stronger it became. The air itself vibrated, humming against my skin, thick with static and power.
The border.
The bubble.
The roar behind us built into a wall of sound, engines screaming, gunfire cracking off the water.
“No translation!” I shouted.
Emma didn’t answer, but the shimmer ahead thickened, no longer distortion but a solid curtain of pressure, humming with power.
We hit the border at full speed and broke through.
The boat lurched violently, skidding across rougher water on the other side.
I barely had time to adjust our course before a single bullet struck the motor.
The whole thing detonated not even a second later.
The explosion ripped through the stern, fire and pressure slamming into us. The boat lifted, tilted, then flipped.
Sound warped into a low, metallic groan, and for a heartbeat, gravity felt wrong. My vision fractured, and colors were bending in ways that shouldn’t exist.
Emma’s eyes were wide, her mouth open in a shout I couldn’t hear.
I reached for her, our fingers grazing skin…and then the river took us.