Chapter 39
CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
Nobody spoke on the way back. Rowan shook with distress the closer they drew to home; Justin set his jaw. This was an enemy he couldn’t fight, so he simply offered his strength, sitting in the back seat, Brew doing his best to shield her from the other side.
When they took the offramp, he reached over the back and brought out the emergency kit.
“Everyone arm up,” he said, and began handing out the guns. Rowan accepted a Glock, and the small sounds of checking mags and chambering rounds resounded through tense silence. Next came the commlinks, fitted in everyone’s ear
“Well,” Yoshi said from the front passenger seat. “The place still seems to be standing. I don’t see any smoking craters.”
“It may only look safe,” Delgado supplied.
“You’re paranoid,” Zeke piped up.
“It doesn’t mean they’re not out to get us.”
“Can we have a little less chatter?” Henderson turned to the right, flicking the headlights off. Delgado felt a sudden flare of gratefulness—the old man had believed Rowan without question. “I’m going to use the access road. I hope nobody wore heels.”
“I left mine at home,” Brew cracked, and Catherine giggled, a nervous, forlorn sound.
Delgado felt Rowan stiffen. “Can’t you feel that?” she whispered.
“What?” His mouth, close to her ear.
She shivered. “Exactly. It’s too quiet.”
“No psychic chatter,” Brew supplied helpfully. “We’re too far out to feel it, Rowan.”
“We’re too late.” She was cheesy-pale in the darkness. Del felt the waves of trembling gripping her, the shortness of breath, and wished he could push her into fearlessness.
Instead, he sank into the link, feeling her headache and nausea as if it were his own. Christ, no wonder she thinks something’s wrong. He took the pain for her, took it and took it until she went limp, curling into him.
A small thread of nasty satisfaction, then. She hated him, but he could still comfort her.
“General?” Brew, with the quiet tone he used very seldom.
“Brew?”
“I’m getting it, too.”
“Could just be static from her.” Zeke shifted in his seat.
“It’s not.” Delgado heard his own clipped tone and realized something was bothering him too. “The lights,” he said. “The lights should be on. There’s no glow.”
He was right. If not for the almost-full moon, Henderson would have been unable to drive without headlights.
“I know,” Henderson said. “But thanks anyway.”
“What could take the grid and the backups out?” Catherine shivered. “I hope nobody’s stuck on the transports.”
“If they are, they’re relatively safe,” Delgado pointed out. “It takes time to crack a transport line.”
“What do you think’s happened?” Cath turned around to look at Delgado. “Rowan?”
“I don’t know,” she said miserably, breath hitching. Henderson cut the ignition, rolling to a stop, then slipping the van into park without touching the brakes.
“Hear that?” The entire van went silent.
A faint noise filtered through. Delgado’s skin went cold, then roughened. “Choppers,” he said against Rowan’s temple, inhaled the clean scent of her hair. “Christ.”
“What?” Cath was still twisted in her seat, looking at Rowan, who slumped into Delgado’s side. The gun in Rowan’s hand, pointed at the floor with fingers locked outside the trigger guard just in case.
“What else?” Henderson said quietly. “Sigma.”
“How?” Yoshi shifted slightly, uncomfortable without his computer. “And what are we going to do?”
“Go in or go to ground,” Delgado said. “That’s the question.”
“Something terrible’s happened,” Rowan whispered. “If there’s someone alive in there…”
Silence. The entire group waited.
“We’ll recon,” Henderson said heavily. “If it’s an attack, we’ll be needed for covering an exit to get the noncoms out. And if it isn’t, if it’s just a power failure, they’ll need Rowan to calm everyone down.”
“It’s not a power failure.” A terrible certainty colored Rowan’s voice.
The thudding of helicopters faded, before returning louder than ever. “Sweeps,” Delgado said. “It’s got to be Sigma.”
“All right.” Henderson had decided, and now it was time to do. “Del, you cover Rowan. Rowan, you sense anyone, point ‘em out to Del and let him take care of it. Rest of you, let’s go in quick and quiet. It’s maximum prejudice.”
Catherine swore, but nobody else said anything. Don’t worry. Del laid the words in Rowan’s mind—as gently as he could.
That’s like telling me not to breathe. No matter how much her body rebelled against the nearness of Sigma’s presence, her mental tone was strong and clear. He pressed a kiss against her temple; nobody else would see in the darkness.
Zeke carefully, slowly, slid the handle of the door up. There was a slight click. “Anyone out there?”
“No,” Rowan whispered back. “I don’t feel anyone. Not close, anyway.”
“Okay.” He tapped his commlink, eased the door open. Chill air poured into the vehicle. For such a large man, he moved lightly, sliding out, kneeling, and sweeping the opposite side of the road.
Cath went next. Henderson climbed out through the side door. Then Yoshi opened his door and almost-vanished. Brew exited, and Del gave Rowan a gentle push.
Go on, angel. Don’t worry, I’m here. He followed as she moved slowly, boots shushing on the wet pavement, to the side and crouched, pale hair glimmering in the moonlight.
That hair of hers is going to make things difficult.
Cath handed Rowan a scarf, which she knotted around her head with no comment.
They went around both sides of the van, across the drainage ditch, boots slipping in slush-snow. Delgado steadied Rowan when she slipped on frost-rimed grass. His heart sped up, not quite racing but not resting either.
There was an empty field; they slid over in waves, taking care to move in an unpredictable pattern, Rowan like an automaton. All her attention was taken with fighting off the urge to throw up or scream at the tearing, jagged pain in her head, the twisting nausea.
Why do Sigs affect her that way? What is it about them? Just the danger? It wasn’t the first time he’d wondered. Is it the migmeters or something else?
Slowly, they crept to the easternmost edge of Headquarters. Every building, every light that should have been showing paths over the quad or the basketball court was out. Delgado sensed no ripple of emotion. It was as if everyone had left and the last person had shut off the lights.
They skirted the east main building, started for the cover of a short laurel hedge. It was a gamble—crossfire from the buildings could pin them down for mop-up. Henderson was obviously trusting Rowan’s acuity.
Henderson froze. Delgado went to one knee, instinctively grabbing Rowan’s wrist. She let out a short, sharp sound.
They hit the ground, Zeke’s leather jacket creaking. All save Rowan, whose knees had locked.
A small flicker of light showed in the north building.
Flashlight. Something’s not right.
“Trap!” Rowan might have thought she was screaming, but all that came out was a choked whisper. “Go back! Go back!”
The sound of the choppers got louder. Henderson was already scrambling backward, cutting for the edge of the south building that would shield them from being seen and also let them access the transport net through a hatch—Delgado knew this, because it was what he would do.
Cath ran after him, followed by Zeke, who moved sideways, a gun in each hand. Brew and Yoshi were twin shadows.
Del curled up to his feet. He yanked on Rowan’s arm, felt her stumble. She was trying to do something, as if lifting a massive weight with her mind. Pushing, with all her strength.
There was a sharp cry from the north building, and Rowan let out a soft sound of pain.
“Leave them!” he whisper-yelled at her, yanking her along savagely. She stumbled again, he righted her, and something zinged across the quad.
Del didn’t hesitate. He pushed her hard along the escape path and almost returned fire before Henderson hissed a sharp command. Rowan stumbled around the side of the building, almost fell into Zeke’s arms. The massive man grabbed Del’s shirt and hauled him in just as more bullets chewed the air.
“Let them think we’re unarmed,” Henderson said, brief and clipped.
Delgado swallowed the instant flare of rage. He wanted to sink his hands in the throat of the man who had shot at her, wanted to hold him down and use a knife, wanted to—
Justin! I need you. She was fighting something huge, little hitching sounds of effort as she wrestled.
He threw every spare ounce of power he had into the link, his hand clamped around her arm and Zeke dragging from the other side. The scarf came free; her pale hair trailed on a faint chill breeze as the sound of choppers roared overhead.
Henderson reached the hatch, knelt, and keyed in the security code. Miracle of miracles, it opened, a round slice of metal. The old man covered them as Catherine scrambled down into darkness. So did Yoshi, followed by Brew, Del pushed Rowan at Zeke.
“Get her down!” he said, and glanced up just as the choppers roared overhead.
Rowan half-fell into the access hatch, and he knew she was safe. Zeke followed, then Henderson.
Glaring white poured down, blinding him. Delgado dropped into a crouch, then rolled as bullets dug into the frozen earth. Clumsy, sloppy. I’d take that kid to the range and make him practice.
He felt Rowan’s instinctive horrified cry and her talent coiling, striking like a snake. The light above yawed, and Del saw Henderson vanish down the hole.
“Come on, Del!” Henderson’s voice crackled over the commlink.
“Go,” Del said. The chopper veered off, but another one was coming. He could see what they couldn’t, a line of dark shapes on the quad, lit by the backwash of glare from four choppers sweeping in from the west. “I’ll cover you. Get to an exit.”
“Del, get your ass down here. That’s an order!”
“Hurry up, old man. Get Rowan out.” Del’s night-eyes had just begun to come back after the assault of searchlight. The chopper that had spotted them veered crazily toward the field.
Justin! Her mental cry was sharp and despairing. Every cell in his body wanted to turn back, go down the hole. But a quick calculation of the numbers told him the Sigs would pour down after them, and it would become a desperate fight in the dark.
Go, angel. I’ll see you soon. He kicked the access hatch shut, sent a round into the keypad, and took a deep breath. The Sigs were almost around the corner—even he could sense them now.
Justin! Stop it, come on!
“Can’t even if I wanted to, angel,” he muttered, bending almost double and running for the building. “Go. For God’s sake, old man, get her out.”
He reached the back door just as the first Sig took the corner, spraying the area around the hatch with gunfire. Del slipped into the darkness, leaving the door open slightly, gun held ready.
The stench was something he recognized. No wonder Rowan hadn’t sensed anything. He glanced back at the hallway, lit by a soft red glowstick clutched in someone’s hand.
Someone’s dead, limp hand.
Corpses.
His gorge rose briefly, pointlessly. An assault like this took phenomenal resources to crack the shields, dampers, and countermeasures. Why hadn’t anyone been alerted? Why hadn’t the fail-safes gone off, and all team leaders been alerted?
Traitor. Someone must have shut down the grids. Either that or Sigma had sent a fucking army.
“General,” he said into the commlink, “I’m inside the south building. Looks like an abattoir. Everyone’s iced.”
“What?”
“Someone blew the safety grid from inside, sir, I bet you dollars to doughnuts.” He pitched his voice low. “I’m going to do a sweep, see if I can pick any—”
Thwish. A spear of ice buried in his back.
What the—
He reached with his free hand. A slim metal wand tipped with something very sharp.
The tranquilizer dart came free, and he stared at it for a moment, his entire body suddenly numb.
NO! Rowan’s horrified scream.
“Tranquilizer… dart… Get… her…” Delgado said, and passed out.