Chapter 18 #2
"You always thought you were smarter than me," Isaac said. His voice had changed. The controlled calm was gone. "Every briefing. Every project review. You'd look at my work, and I could see it in your face. The pity. Like I was some washed-up old man."
"I never pitied you."
"Bullshit." Isaac circled left. The knife sat low in his hand, blade angled up, the grip of someone who'd been trained. "You looked at me the way Darwin looked at everyone who wasn't you. Like I was furniture. Like I filled a seat."
"That's not what happened."
"That's exactly what happened." He feinted right, and Gideon moved back.
The trees pressed in around them. The ground was uneven—roots, rocks, a slope that fell away to the left toward the access road.
"Finch saw me. Finch understood what I could do.
And when I brought him your breach, he didn't look at me like I had one foot in retirement. He looked at me like I mattered."
"Finch used you."
"Finch promoted me." Isaac lunged. The knife cut the air where Gideon's chest had been a half-second earlier. Gideon stumbled backward over a root and caught himself against a tree trunk. "He gave me your office. Your clearance. Your system. Everything you had, I got. Because I earned it."
"You earned it by planting an anomaly in my test run and watching me take the bait.
" The words came out harder than Gideon intended.
Seven years of trust. Seven years of answering Isaac's questions, explaining architecture, treating him like a colleague.
And the whole time, the man had been building a trap.
"IY-SEED-ETH9. You signed it. You couldn't even sabotage me without taking credit. You needed me to know it was you."
Isaac smiled. "I only wanted you to know that you aren’t as smart as you thought you were. That you have flaws."
"We all have them," Gideon said. "I don’t need to sabotage people or systems to earn my place."
"You’re a self-righteous piece of shit." Isaac circled again.
Closer this time. The knife caught the gray light.
"I ran that scenario six times before I pulled the trigger. Timed your response. Predicted every move you'd make. You are brilliant. I’ve never denied that. But you’re so predictable it's boring. "
"And yet here we are. I'm inside ORACLE, and you're standing in the woods with a knife."
Isaac’s eyes narrowed, and he lunged.
Gideon twisted but not far enough. The blade caught him below the ribs on his left side and punched through fabric, skin, and muscle.
His vision flashed. His knees buckled, and he grabbed Isaac's wrist with both hands.
Zadie jumped on Isaac’s back, but he flung her off him like an offensive lineman shedding the entire defense. She skidded across the dirt. When she stopped, she wiped her brow and crawled, patting the ground as if she were looking for something.
Isaac twisted the blade.
Gideon screamed. The sound tore out of him and scattered birds from the canopy overhead. His hands slipped on Isaac's wrist, and he drove his forehead into Isaac's face.
Isaac’s head snapped backward. Blood poured from his nose. His grip on the knife loosened for a second.
One second was enough.
Gideon ripped the knife free, and the pain nearly put him on the ground. Blood soaked through his shirt and down into his waistband. He could feel it running warm against his skin, too much of it, too fast.
He raised the knife.
Bang.
Isaac's eyes went wide. He stumbled forward.
Gideon drove the blade right into his throat.
Isaac’s hands came up and gripped Gideon's wrist the way Gideon had gripped his—desperate and crushing, but the chemical inside his body flooded his muscles with brute strength.
Gideon inhaled sharply and pushed the blade deeper.
Isaac's mouth opened. Blood filled it. Grip weakening, his knees folded.
Gideon held him as he went down. Not out of mercy, but because his own legs were failing, and Isaac's weight had been the only thing keeping him upright.
They hit the ground together. Isaac on his back. Gideon on top of him. The knife still buried in the man's throat.
Isaac’s lips moved, but no sound came out. Then his chest stopped rising.
Gideon flopped to his back next to Isaac and his hand went to his left side. Warm and wet. He shoved his palm against the wound, his vision graying at the edges.
"Gideon." Zadie crawled next to him.
He lifted his hand and stared at the blood for a second before pressing his hand back to his side. "That’s not good."
She pushed away his hand and bore down on his side, hard.
He groaned. "The drive—"
"I have it. I have everything," she said. "We need to get you to help." She lifted her head and glanced around. "Do you hear that?"
"I don’t hear anything." He stared at her. He wanted to tell her she was the most beautiful thing he'd ever seen. He wanted to tell her a lot of things. But his mouth wasn't cooperating.
"Silence," she said softly. "No more gunfire." She pressed harder. The pain spiked and then dulled into something distant and warm.
"Stay with me," she said. "Don’t you dare leave me."
He reached up and found her face with his bloody hand. He traced her jaw. "I'm right here," he said.
The sky was gray through the canopy. The birds had started singing again. Zadie's hands were warm on his skin, and that was enough.
That was everything.