Chapter 21
Chapter twenty-one
Dane
A blur of color flies between me and the scientist. The gun disappears from his hand, and then he flies off his feet, crashing hard against the wall and collapsing unconscious to the floor.
“There you are!” Tinsley exclaims, breathless, from where the scientist had been standing. “Okay, stay right there.” She starts to turn, then whips back. “Oh, you can have this.” She clicks the safety on the gun and tosses it to me. She’s gone before I catch it.
“Did some of your friends already escape?” Alice appears beside me.
Tucking the gun in the back of my jeans, I sit at the nearest computer and set up an upload of all their files to my private cloud of GE data.
It’ll keep running during our escape until it’s done, or someone notices and stops it early.
“No. She wasn’t one of the members in the room,” I reply absently, finishing up and then turning off the monitor.
If she wasn’t in one of the rooms, was she somewhere else on the island without a camera view? More likely, Reid brought her. I have no clue how he found me, but it’s a relief to know I had another rescue team if Alice hadn’t been here.
Are Rae and the others with him?
“See?” Tinsley’s voice returns. “He’s already gotten himself out. I saved him from being shot, though.”
I turn just as Reid drops someone on the ground. “Good. Activate your gift and carry her,” he directs at me, pointing to the girl. His gaze flicks to Alice. A small tightening appears around his mouth, but he returns his attention to me.
Annoyance pricks my temper at the demand. “Why the fuck—”
Wait. Is that the portal chick?
I notice the bleeding wound from hip to shoulder across her front. “You took her out?”
Reid doesn’t answer.
Her chest rises imperceptibly. She’s alive.
“You didn’t kill her?” I ask next, realizing she could wake up and portal away back to Charles.
“Be my guest,” Reid states flatly, and I scowl at him.
I can’t kill her when she’s unconscious like this. It’s one thing if she’s coming after us or trying to hurt one of us, but lying defenseless on the floor?
Reid nods, as if he expected I’d refuse. “Keep her gift inert so she doesn’t escape on us.”
Kneeling by her side, I call my gift forward. “Put her on my back, then.”
Tinsley helps Reid place her over my back. I grab the gun and shift it to my front, then wrap my arms under her legs. “Why didn’t you kill her during your fight?” I grumble, standing and adjusting to her weight.
“We failed to kill the board members last night,” he says. I’d figured as much, but it confirms that the other teams not here were also unsuccessful. “We can use her gift against them next time.”
I doubt we’ll convince her to do it willingly. But I leave it at that. Aiden can decide what he wants to do when he sees her. “Since my hands are full now, go into the room there and unhook everyone. Turn off the machines first so we don’t alert anyone walking by when they get detached.”
Alice opens the door to the large room of Guild members in narrow hospital beds, and Tinsley races through. “On it!”
Machine after machine powers down as she speeds through the room too fast to see clearly.
“Hurray! We’re saved!” Gabriel cheers from his bed, his voice weak and strained.
Before I can check on him, Fabian groans. Fuck. He’s going to need to eat something. “You didn’t happen to bring any food, did you?” I ask Reid, who shakes his head.
Damn.
“She’s got something in her pockets,” Alice speaks up. I check over my shoulder, and she pokes at Bea.
“See what it is,” I tell her. She pinches something and pulls it out.
A candy bar. “Let me see it.” I hold my hand out, careful to keep myself angled where Bea won’t slip off.
Carrying her around like this is going to be annoying as fuck.
“At least go and check if this place has any gift-blocking crap,” I tell Reid while Alice hands me the bar.
“I don’t care if it’s a cuff, collar, or something else. ”
Reid’s mouth turns down, his eyes locked on Tinsley’s quick movements. “I’ll see what I can find.” He teleports away, and I walk to Fabian’s side.
“Ungh, Dane. I’m gonna be sick.”
“I know, buddy. I need you to hold on a bit longer until we can get out of here.” I remove his straps with one hand, helping him sit up. He yanks off the rest, IVs included, and his stomach sounds like a cavern of thunder. “Here’s a candy bar to take the edge off.”
He grabs it from my palm with more speed than one would expect from a man his size, ripping the plastic off and devouring a third of it in one bite. Fabian stares at Bea on my back as he chews. “Who’s she?”
“The GE agent who can open portals and got us all in this mess.”
He grunts and focuses back on the candy bar.
“No. No, no, no. Not again.”
I snap my head around at Gabe’s voice. “What’s wrong?
” He’s staring at the ceiling, his head shaking back and forth as he continues to mumble to himself.
His body tenses as if struck by lightning.
“Hey!” I run and find Zedd jerking violently at his restraints, his gaze caught on Gabriel, and a gag in his mouth.
I reach for Gabe’s restraints first, but Zedd’s muffled voice raises and brings my attention to him. Once he has it, he motions with his head for me to go to him. Trusting that he knows Gabriel best, I jog to him instead and untie the gag first.
“Hurry,” he urges, stilling his arms while I work them free and then flying upright to undo the strap on his ankle opposite the one I’m doing.
The second he’s free, he throws himself off the bed and flies to Gabe’s side in a few long strides. Rather than touch the straps, Zedd takes Gabe’s face in his hands and leans over him. “Look at me. At me, disaster. Eyes on me,” he commands.
I move to the other side of Gabe, remembering the seizure he’d had after helping Raegan. “I can mute his gift.”
“That won’t do anything. This is a side effect of his gift, but it’s not active. He’s stuck in someone’s memory,” he replies curtly.
Gabriel’s body is shaking now, a full-blown case of tremors rocking through him. He sucks in a breath, blinking rapidly. The distant look in his stare fades, and recognition takes its place as he finally sees Zedd. A shaky smile stretches his lips. “They took my drugs, Zedd. I can’t—”
“You can,” Zedd cuts him off. He starts removing the restraints on his side, so I do the same on mine. He helps Gabe sit up slowly, then grips the back of his neck. “I know you can. So, let’s give them hell for it.”
“I do love a little mayhem in the morning,” Gabe teases weakly, his upbeat demeanor poking through the exhaustion.
Tinsley speeds to my side. “Everyone’s unhooked and free,” she reports, smiling breathlessly. “Where’s Reid?”
I heft Bea further up my back again, trying not to get queasy at the slickness of her blood that’s now soaked the back of my shirt. “Looking for something to block her gift. I needed my hands to help you, but I guess you didn’t need it.”
The rest of the Guild members are all on their feet, either stretching and looking around or leaning on the beds for support. Fabian’s rummaging through the cabinets on the wall—looking for food most likely—and Alice stands awkwardly to the side, watching everyone with a nervous expression.
“What’s going on?” a man questions behind me.
Gabe stumbles over to the scientist. “Hey there, doc.” He waves with a worn smile, his face glistening with sweat as he moves. “Whaddya have here that can help me out? Where’s your medicine cabinet? The good stuff, though. The things you keep locked away.”
The GE worker lifts something in his hand.
Gabe grabs his wrist.
His thumb depresses, and a blaring alarm rings through the room. I’ll bet it continues throughout the entire building, if not the whole damn island.
Considering the shape the Guild members are in, we’re fucked.
Gabe’s smile stretches, and I think he chuckles. When he speaks next, his voice is raised to carry over the siren. “I hope you don’t have any traumatic memories, or this isn’t going to go well for the both of us.”
The scientist flinches. Again. And again. He starts to scream. Red bleeds through his white lab coat at his arm, and a scrape appears at his temple.
Gabe continues, “Oh, dear. Your brother did that?”
There’s a snapping sound, and the scientist falls to the ground. But Gabe doesn’t release his wrist.
“Oh! Ooooh, that had to hurt. The first time and this time, I mean. Leg breaks are hard, you know?”
“We have to go.” Reid’s suddenly at my side, clicking a bracelet around Bea’s dangling wrist. “All the GE agents are heading this way.”
“Let them come.” Zedd steps up beside me, his arms crossed and staring intensely at Gabriel. “Is there an intercom?”
I set Bea down on the nearest bed with a grunt and roll my shoulders. “The phones have access. Why?”
“Show me.”
I nod, leading the way to the previous room as I hear Gabriel still talking to the scientist.
“So, all your past fun times aside, where are your drugs? Or mine? I know they're somewhere, and I’m not letting you go until I have them.”
I give Zedd the rundown of the phone intercom button, expecting it to work like any other.
“Let me know when most or all the agents are in the building. I’ll use my gift to put them to sleep through the intercom. Find something everyone can use to plug their ears before that happens. Using your hands or fingers alone won’t work.”
Dragging the office chair back, I sit and turn to Reid. “I’ll keep an eye on the agents.”
“I’ll find the ear plugs,” Tinsley volunteers, disappearing the next second.
“We’ll block the doors to hold out until they’re all in,” Reid adds, then leaves the small attached office.
There’s a window the size of the wall into the room, so we can keep an eye on things in there while we wait. Zedd closes the door from the hallway into this room, and I help him drag the dead scientists behind it.
Once that’s secure, I check my upload and confirm it’s complete, then flip to the cameras in a grid view. Armed agents are swarming into the building from different doors.
Something drops on the desk. “Here you go!” Tinsley chirps, gone again before I can see her.
A small pile of cotton balls litter the desk. I pinch one and look at Zedd. “Will these work?”
He nods, once again focused on Gabriel, who’s pressing buttons on a safe in the corner. The scientist he’d been with is on the floor in a pool of blood.
Damn. Maybe I underestimated Gabe as a fighter.
The door handle jiggles, then something slams against it.
My heart jackhammers, and I reach for the gun at my waist. The cool metal grip in my hand adds a small comfort. I release the mag, count the bullets, then click it back in place.
Seven.
That’s not going to get me very far. There are at least three dozen agents, including the last stragglers running inside.
“Get ready,” I warn Zedd, tracking the last agent coming this way. Moving to the doorway, I poke my head in to check with Reid, tapping my ear. He gives the OK, and I sink back to my seat and stuff my own ears. The final agent clears the door, and I don’t see anyone else outside. “Now.”
Zedd holds the intercom button and starts singing.
His words and tone are muted, and I try not to focus on them just in case. Instead, I train my gaze on the cameras. Someone yawns. Someone else rubs their eyes. The fists swinging at the doors slow, then stop altogether.
And one by one, they slump down or just fall, eyes closed.
A tap at my shoulder brings me back to Zedd. He motions to pull the cotton ball from my ear, and I do. “That’s it?” I question, disbelief coloring my tone.
He shrugs. “It has its weaknesses. Friendly fire is one of them. Enemies knowing how to block it is another.” Zedd gives me a look, and I nod.
We won’t tell anyone. He’s part of the Guild now. His secret is our secret.
We stroll back into the room with the others. Gabe’s lying back on one of the beds, belting one of Zedd’s songs until the man himself sits at the edge of the bed. Gabriel tosses his cotton balls away and sits up. “I thought if I couldn’t listen to your voice, I’d sing one of your songs instead.”
“You found them?” Zedd asks, and he grins, holding up his bag of pills.
“I’m starting to feel so much better. But I also think I could use a long nap. How far in my future do I get one of those?”
“I’ll drop everyone off at the meeting point, then destroy this place,” Reid speaks up. “Cibrina’s already moved members to a safe location now that Charles knows we won’t be joining him and the mission failed.”
“Did any other teams make it back?” Fabian asks, and Reid nods.
“Elias’s team is the only one that returned. They’re helping Cibrina move everyone.”
There are only four teams here. Add in Reid’s, Elias’s, and mine, that means we’re still missing three teams—twelve members. Hopefully, they’re in the same location as Aiden.
I grab Reid’s arm. “I need to get to Rae and the others. The last three teams could be with them, too. Where are they?”
His expression darkens. “With Charles.”
Fuck.
“Stay with Cibrina. I’ll get Raegan and the rest of the captured members,” Reid argues before I’ve even said anything.
“Like fuck,” I snap. “I’m helping rescue them, too. Drop the others off, but I’m coming with you.”
“You’re a liability,” he counters, his voice flat.
I grab him by the shirt and yank him close. “Think whatever the fuck you want about me, but I have to be there. Use me as a bargaining chip for Raegan’s life if you have to. Whatever it takes to make sure she gets out of there safe.”
Reid’s gaze pierces mine, holding steady for who-the-fuck-knows what’s going on in his head. Finally, he nods. “Alright.”
“Then, let’s go.”