Chapter Eight #2
My brothers chuckle around the room, nodding in agreement as the two remaining Cartel soldiers lift their hands slowly, fingers splayed, eyes wide. They’re smart enough to know the next wrong move ends with their brains on the wall.
“Neon…” I call out, never looking away from the silver-haired controller, my voice as sharp as broken glass. “Start collectin’ evidence. Everythin’. Documents, hard drives, USBs, hell, if a paperclip looks shady, bag it.”
“On it,” Neon replies, already at the desk, his gloved hands flying over the keyboards.
Wraith nudges one of the downed men with the toe of his boot. “What about tweedle-dumb and dumber over here?”
Before I can answer, Neon’s voice cuts through the air, tight and clipped. “Ahh… Six, we’ve got a problem. Building-wide lockdown just activated. One of these assfucks hit a silent alarm.”
My jaw tightens. “How long before—” Then everything goes black.
Emergency lighting kicks in a second later, bathing the surroundings in hellish red.
Through the conference room windows, the red and orange hue of obvious gun flashes in the distance flickers from the street below, before comms static crackles not a second later.
“Were under fire!” Scout’s voice explodes through the comms. “Multiple soldiers entering the lobby. We’ve got company. ”
Gritting my teeth, I crack my neck in frustration. “How many?” I demand down the line.
“At least fifteen, heavily armed. Military gear. These aren’t building security guards, this is a fucking hit squad.”
The financial controller smiles, showing gold teeth. “Did you really think we would leave our most sensitive operations unprotected? You walked into a trap, gilipollas.”
“Maybe,” I admit, checking my ammunition. “But you walked into one with us. Fox, Wraith, grab the duffels and head into that side room.” I gesture with my head to the door behind gold- tooth guy. “The schematics say that’s where you’ll find all the Cartel’s crap. Blow the safes and take the cash—”
“You can’t do that!” Gold tooth growls, his posture stiffening.
“Sucks to watch an empire crumble right before your eyes, doesn’t it?” Wraith grins, grabs the duffels, and takes off, Fox following behind him.
I snort, trying to fight back my laugh just as the building shudders, an explosion rocking through the parking garage below us, making everyone wobble with the force. Dust and debris flutter down from the ceiling as our escape routes are being eliminated—one by one.
Gold tooth grins back at me, a soft chuckle escaping me. “Sucks to watch your escape plan crumble right before your eyes, doesn’t it?” he shoots Wraith’s words back at me.
Rolling my shoulders in annoyance, I huff, raising my gun, firing off a single round, and shooting him in the shoulder.
He screams as he drops to his knee with the force of the hit, then I fire off another round into the guard beside him, shooting him in the head before I reach for my radio.
Gold tooth snarls at me, and I glare back at him, letting him know I’m not fucking around. “Nickel, Chains, report!”
“Vehicles are compromised,” Nickel responds grimly. “They’ve got RPGs down here. We need an alternate extraction.”
“Slick, Scout, what’s your status on the roof?”
Silence.
Then Slick’s voice, strained with pain, comes through the line, “Scout’s out cold. I’m trying to keep pressure on his wound, but they had snipers waiting, Pres, and I’m… I’m hit, too, Six, but I’m okay.”
My heart sinks. Scout only just asked Tee to marry him. I can’t go home and tell her that we lost him in this fight.
“We’ll get you guys help soon. Find cover, Slick,” I call into the comms.
“Neon, how much longer?” I ask, my muscles tight as gold tooth groans on the floor.
“Almost done. But, Six, you need to see this.” I glance at his laptop screen, and my blood turns to ice. Bank records showing transfers to federal officials. Shipping manifests for human cargo. Video files with names I recognize. Senators, judges, police chiefs…
This goes deeper than we thought.
Much deeper.
“We need to get this to the press. No point sending it to the FBI like we planned. Not when the heat is already on it,” Neon says.
“If we can get out of here alive,” Wraith adds grimly, waltzing back in with duffel bags full and Fox beside him.
The sound of gunfire draws closer. They’re fighting their way up floor by floor, methodically cutting off our escape. “Neon, can you get us elevator access?”
“They’ve overridden my controls. We’re trapped up here, Pres.”
“What about the windows?” I ask, trying to think of something
Anything.
“Thirty-story drop onto concrete. Not exactly a viable exit strategy.”
I think fast, multiple options running through my mind. We’re outnumbered, outgunned, and trapped in a high-rise with no way out.
The mission has gone to hell.
Half my team is wounded.
The Cartel has reinforcements pouring in, and our window is closing fast.
“Uploads halfway. I’m almost there,” Neon continues.
“Keep goin’,” I tell him. “We stay till it’s done.”
The sounds of bullets draw closer and closer as I stand guard, waiting for the imminent attack to slam its way through those fucking doors, still trying to come up with a plan to get my men out.
“Motherfucker! I’ve hit a wall, Pres. I need a fucking high-level eye scan and voice code to access these last few documents,” Neon calls out, typing furiously.
Furrowing my brows, I glance at the dead soldiers on the floor, knowing they were the high-ranking bastards we need.
A slow, mocking laugh filters over the chaos, making its way toward us.
The sound of impending doom looms, and I glance at gold tooth while he openly mocks us, still bleeding like a stuck pig as he kneels on the floor next to his dead comrades.
“You thought you had this whole thing planned out. You thought you were smarter than the Cartel…” he pauses, “… but no one outsmarts Javier Rojas. You’re all going to die here tonight, perros mestizos! ”
Flaring my nostrils, I shake my head and storm over to the smug bastard. We don’t have any other option right now. Reaching out, I grab him by his expensive suit and hoist him to his feet, my gun jammed into his ribs.
He continues to laugh as I shove him toward Neon. “Try this fucker.”
Neon stops typing, glances up at me, and grimaces. “If he doesn’t have access, it could block me out completely.”
We snap our heads to the door as the sound of gunfire draws closer.
“And without it, you’re not getting in either. So what do we have to lose at this point?”
Gold tooth tenses, trying to pull back. “I’m not helping you.”
Moving my hand to his hair, I grip tight, forcing his head toward the scanner attached to the computer. “You don’t have a fuckin’ choice.”
Instantly, the asshole tries to fight back, spinning in my grip, his fist sliding out, punching me in the gut.
I puff out in reaction, but my trigger finger doesn’t hesitate, unloading a bullet straight into his other knee.
He yelps before dropping to the floor in front of the scanner.
“Now, put your eyes to the device, or I will cut them out of your fuckin’ face. ”
He breathes harshly out of his nose, staring at me like he wants to gut me like a fish, but his hesitation is pissing me off. So I grab his hair again and push him toward the scanner. “C’mon, play nice. I don’t want to go home to my wife any more bloody than I have to.”
He spits at my feet, curling his lip. “Tu mujer es una puta!”
Neon chuckles under his breath while I yank the assholes hair tight as fuck and slam his head into the scanner. “I know you did not just call my wife a whore! Now stay still.”
The fucker does not stay still, struggling against the scanning machine like he’s having a damn epileptic fit, so I press the muzzle of my gun into the back of his head. “I will pull this trigger, so help me God.”
He stops struggling, but begins his incessant laughter again as the scanner starts. “But you need my voice, pulling the trigger won’t help you. And I will not give you the voice code.”
A beep sounds, letting us know that the eye scan is complete, and Neon smiles, giving me the signal.
I yank the asshole’s head back and lean down to meet him, face-to-face.
“That’s fine. You’ve been very talkative, and Neon’s been recording you since we got here.
His AI program has been regenerating your voice this entire time, and his program has been sourcing the passphrase.
Suddenly, gold tooth’s voice plays through the air, sounding exactly like him. “Lucía protectora,” The AI says the passphrase clearly, and Neon smiles while he continues to type.
“Fuck yeah! We’re in action. Download finalizing,” Neon states just as those bullets start getting real fucking close.
“Neon,” I snap, ducking as a bullet ricochets off the wall near my head. “You got access to the buildin’s fire suppression system yet?”
“Yeah,” he shouts over the chaos. “Why?”
“Flood it. Every room, every floor. Give ’em a crisis they can’t ignore.”
Neon’s eyes light up. “Oh, hell yes. Give me two minutes.”
“Just finish the download and hurry the fuck up.”
Seconds later, Neon’s voice breaks through, “Upload’s done! Data’s in the cloud and in media inboxes around the globe. We’re clear, Pres!”
“Good. Now flood this shithole!”
Gold tooth’s eyes widen as I spin to face him, smile, and don’t hesitate pulling the trigger, unloading a single shot into the middle of his forehead. His body flies back, landing on the carpet with a thud next to his asshole buddies.
I spin back to Neon. “How long do we have?” I ask, but he doesn’t even get to answer me before the building groans and the fire suppression system kicks in like a damn tsunami.
Water blasts from every sprinkler head, pouring in torrents from the ceiling.
Desks, monitors, and high-end electronics sizzle and spark.
The air fills with smoke while hair clings to my face.