Chapter 25
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
The sudden change in sound drew Luke’s attention.
Until now, the rhythm outside the server room had been steady. A blow against steel. The strained groan of the lock. Another blow. Something slammed into the corridor. A shout followed.
Then came the unmistakable clash of steel.
Luke tightened his grip on the metal brace he’d torn from the archive bay. Someone was fighting outside the door. Reinforcements, perhaps. Or another enemy who wanted the same ugly prize and had decided to cut through the competition first.
Either way, Luke couldn’t count on whoever won being there to help him.
The console flickered.
LOCAL DATA ARCHIVE ERROR.
LOCAL ROUTING OFFLINE.
ROOFTOP RECEIVER ACTIVE: INDEPENDENT MODE.
Luke stared at the final warning. “Rooftop. Of course.”
The servers had stored the tracking data and fed information to the receiver, but the local shutdown had triggered some kind of independent operation. The archive was destroyed. The basement system was no longer routing information.
The receiver itself was still active somewhere above him.
A new prompt appeared.
REMOTE DISCONNECT AVAILABLE.
Luke dropped the metal brace long enough to pull Hale’s keycard from his pocket. He swiped it through the console reader.
AUTHORIZATION ACCEPTED.
“Finally.”
He selected the remote disconnect. For one heartbeat, the screen went dark.
Then red text appeared.
REMOTE DISCONNECT FAILED.
MANUAL CORE REMOVAL REQUIRED.
Luke read the message twice, hoping the words might become less irritating the second time.
They didn’t.
If he wanted to finish destroying the tracking system, he would have to reach the roof and remove the receiver’s core by hand.
The server-room door screamed beneath another impact.
Luke turned as the lock housing split and the steel door lurched inward several inches before catching against the damaged frame.
Barely.
A voice carried through the opening. “Get him alive if you can.”
Luke retrieved the metal brace he had dropped beside the console. It wasn’t much of a weapon, but it had a sharp edge and enough weight to do damage if he struck the right place.
Something shrieked overhead. The door tilted inward as its upper hinge tore loose, dragging the warped lock free of the frame.
Two attackers spilled through the opening.
The first stumbled beneath the force he had been using against the door. The second raised his weapon before his boots had fully found the grated floor.
Luke moved toward them. He drove the end of the metal brace beneath the first man’s chin. The attacker choked, his weapon firing into the ceiling. The blast punched through a cable tray and sent sparks raining across the aisle.
Luke shoved him into the second man.
Both staggered.
Then Connal charged through the broken doorway behind them.
He came in with blood streaking one cheek, his hair loose around his face and his sword already moving.
He looked furious.
Luke had never seen anything so perfect in his life.
Connal severed the second attacker’s weapon with one strike and drove the hilt of his sword into the man’s throat with the next.
The first man twisted toward Luke.
Luke saw the movement.
So did Connal.
Luke dropped. Connal’s blade passed over him and opened the attacker from shoulder to hip. The body collapsed onto the grated floor beside Luke.
For half a breath, the room held only the roar of the backup fans and Connal standing over him with a bloodied sword.
Their eyes met.
Connal’s gaze swept over Luke’s face, throat, ribs, and bleeding hand, taking inventory with ruthless speed.
Luke lifted his injured hand. “It looks worse than it is.”
Connal’s mouth tightened.
Luke wanted to grin.
Another attacker forced his way through the broken doorway. Luke rolled left. Connal moved right.
The attacker’s strike passed through the space Luke had occupied. Luke kicked the man’s knee sideways, destroying his balance. Connal seized the opening and drove him into the doorframe.
Avaneel darted from Zer’s hair as he entered the server room, flying above the fight to take shelter among the cable trays. Zer appeared behind the attacker and finished him with a knife between the ribs.
“Romantic,” Luke said, breathless.
Connal’s eyes flashed. “You are impossible.”
“Pfft. I’ve been busy.”
“Yes.” Connal turned as two more attackers pushed toward the breach. “I noticed.”
The fight spilled fully into the server room.
Keir entered next, dragging another man through the ruined doorway by the back of his coat. He threw him into a server rack hard enough to dent the panel.
Asterius followed with Tyson protected behind him. One hand held his sword while the other gripped Tyson’s arm, steering him around the strikes crossing the narrow entrance.
The room had not been designed for this many bodies.
Server racks created narrow lanes, cable trays hung low overhead, and the grated floor caught at boot heels.
Cold air blasted upward in hard currents while the emergency lights strobed white, flattening faces and breaking every movement into pieces.
Luke caught the edge of a rack and pulled himself upright.
Connal moved beside him, close enough to protect his flank without blocking his movement. Luke understood what that meant. Connal trusted him to fight at his side instead of trying to shield him from danger.
An attacker lunged from the next aisle, his blade angled toward Connal’s exposed side. Luke brought the metal brace across the man’s forearm, knocking the weapon away from Connal.
Connal turned and struck before the man could recover.
Luke ducked beneath a swinging arm and drove his elbow into the ribs of another man trying to reach the console. When the attacker folded, Luke hit him again and shoved him toward Asterius.
Asterius caught him with a grin. “Thank you.”
“Don’t make it weird.”
Asterius broke the man’s nose with his forehead. “Too late.”
Movement flashed near the doorway. One of the reinforcements had found a clear angle on Tyson’s unprotected back. He raised his weapon.
“Tyson!” Avaneel shouted from above.
The fight swallowed her tiny voice.
She folded her wings and dove, striking the attacker’s face an instant before he fired, then raking her small claws across his cheek. He jerked away from her, and the blast scorched the cable tray instead of Tyson.
Tyson spun at the sound.
Keir reached the attacker before he could recover and drove him away from the doorway. Avaneel shot back toward the ceiling, narrowly avoiding the man’s grasping hand.
Tyson stared after her. “Thank you.”
She landed safely on top of the nearest rack and gave him a solemn nod.
Tyson took position near the ruined door, pale but focused, using a fallen metal access panel as a shield. He didn’t fight like a warrior, but he watched the room like someone who understood how quickly one missed detail could become fatal.
Twice, he warned Keir before reinforcements could flank them through the corridor. When a wounded attacker reached for the abandoned ram, Tyson kicked it beyond his grasp.
Keir held the threshold beside him, calmly preventing the adjoining corridors from swallowing them with more enemies.
Connal and Luke moved deeper into the server room.
The strike team kept trying to reach the console. Their attention cut past the warriors and the bodies on the floor toward the back row where the screen still glowed.
They didn’t know Luke had already destroyed the archive.
The same warnings remained on the console.
Connal followed Luke’s gaze. “Is it destroyed?”
“The part down here is.” Luke pulled him aside as spellfire tore through the rack behind them. Heat washed across his face, carrying the sharp stink of melted plastic. “There’s another component on the roof. The receiver switched to independent power.”
Connal’s jaw tightened. “It can still find us?”
“Yes.”
An attacker came around the rack before Luke could say more. Connal drove his shoulder into him, forcing him into the next aisle.
“Then we go to the roof.”
Luke looked toward the reinforcements pressing through the ruined doorway. “We have to get out of this room first.”
Connal’s expression hardened. “Stay close.”
“I thought we established that I can fight.”
“We established that you do not follow orders.”
“Fair.”
Connal turned toward the doorway.
Another wave of attackers had reached the server room. Keir held the ruined threshold while Tyson guarded his back with the metal panel. Beyond them, Asterius and Zer fought in the corridor, preventing the reinforcements from entering all at once.
Connal assessed the fight. “Follow me.”
“That sounds suspiciously like an order.”
“It is.”
An attacker swung at Connal’s head before Luke could argue. Luke dropped beneath the strike, caught the man by the belt, and pulled him off balance. Connal stepped into the opening and drove the hilt of his sword into the man’s temple.
The attacker crumpled.
Connal caught Luke by the shoulder and moved him forward.
Not away from the fight.
Through it.
Luke stayed close as Connal opened a path between the racks. An enemy came around the end of the next row with a short blade. Connal engaged him high, forcing the weapon away from Luke.
Luke drove his shoulder into the man’s hips.
The attacker hit the grated floor hard enough to rattle the nearest rack. Connal hauled him up by the collar and threw him into Zer’s path.
Zer sighed as he buried a knife in the man’s chest. “You bring me the nicest gifts.”
“Focus,” Connal ordered.
“I am exceptionally focused.”
Magic flared behind them.
“Down!” Luke shouted.
They dropped together as spellfire struck the rack above their heads. The metal brace fell from Luke’s injured hand and disappeared beneath the lowest server shelf. Heat rolled over them as ruptured panels filled the air with the stink of melted plastic.
Connal came up first. His blade cut across the shooter’s thigh before the attacker could fire again.
Luke moved with him.