Blood is on my hands. Red rivers run through canyons that make up my palm print. It pools in the crooks of my curled fingers, creating lakes of a man that used to be. Drops overflow and cascade over the backs of my knuckles where they draw together until they are strong enough to leap into the air. They fall one by one between my boots, where they hit the ground and explode as scarlet stars over broken pieces of white concrete.
Pain throbs through my face. It radiates from my nose, burning and spreading like a fire around my eyes and over my mouth. It pushes back, pounding on my brain. A second flame rages over my heart, sending ripples around my ribs and through my back.
My breaths come slow and long. Air flows in over my split lips and dry tongue. It runs down my neck to my chest, which rises, then falls. Back through my neck, the air pushes past my teeth to rejoin the muggy atmosphere. Then it repeats. Each time, the sound fills my ears and muffles the world around me.
Indistinct forms in the edges of my vision swarm about. Distant voices play at my ears. A jumble of noises threatens my small world. Then one shatters it.
“Elian!” I look up from the red art growing at my feet and to my Commander. George stands hunched, his shoulders casting shadows on his black, pocketed vest. Extra magazines stick out from those pockets, cylindrical grenades hanging next to them. Below his vest, hanging from a single point strap, is his SM90 Personal Defense Weapon.
“Remember, the rebels attacked us and split us up. Slaughtered them before we could get to them. No one survived. Right?” He says.
“Yessir. Nothing we could do,” I say. My eyes drop as he turns away.
“Grab the prisoner and load up! Mission’s over.”
I force myself to my feet. With my breaths returning to my ears, I bend down and grab my dirty black ONYX Assault Rifle by its side. I leave the bleeding knife on the concrete.
My feet carry me over shards of wall toward the VTOL waiting for me. The other members of my team have already boarded. My eyes stay fixed on the broken ground until it changes to sleek metal. As soon as my feet take the three inch step onto the metal, it lurches and we are in the air. I keep my back to the battleground until the roar of wind is shut out by the doors.
“Turn in your weapons,” George says.
When I turn around, two hooks hang at chest height. I fit my ONYX onto them. My arm drops to my side. I stare at the crimson handprint on the black weapon. Its brilliance glows in the Deep void around it.
The weapon raises into the roof, leaving me staring at a larger hand, this one a hollow silhouette outlined in red on the inside of the door. My eyes pass over the team names scribbled in the fingers and rest on the word in the center of the palm: Divers. My eyes fall shut.
“We can’t go to war and not expect casualties. The Divers are broken, but we will heal. And then we will continue this war. And we will win, just as we always do,” George says.
The other team members offer little more than grunts in response. I give nothing.
“Elian? You alright?”
“Good to go sir!” I say and adjust the knife on my chest with my gloved hands.
“Then load up, we’re supposed to be on the surface to rendezvous with the other team in twenty minutes,” George says from the open door of the VTOL.
I grab my ONYX from Drex with a quick “thanks.” The polished black weapon gleams in the white light ringing the corridor around me. I step out of the hallway and into the hangar. Dozens of crafts fill the room. On the far side, SABLE fighters line the wall, pointed at the vastness of space and the invisible barrier keeping us from it. Next to them are the larger SHADE starfighters. The two fighters take up only a third of the hangar. The rest is filled with transports; the VTOLs are distinguished by their resemblance to their namesake, the raven, wings and crooked heads included.
Through the massive opening behind the crafts, I can see the forested planet Gunsmas. The young planet appears wild from space. The only evidence of life are the plumes of smoke billowing out over much of the southern hemisphere. Nine short years was long enough for the colonists to rebel. Tumbar repaid them by sending in bombers and hiring mercenaries to quash them. But the real fire behind the rebellion has kept them going.
“Hurry up Elle, the Phantom’s not gonna defeat himself!” Tharn says from the VTOL.
“Shut up,” I say, but pick up my pace. A few moments later, I’m in the back of the craft with seven other members of my team. Five of them are dressed identical to me with light armor covering their chests and bulletproof fabric covering their limbs. Our Mechanics, Jordan and Michael, and George wear simple black clothes with armored vests. Finn, our Pilot, is in the cockpit.
“Turn in weapons and we’ll begin,” George says.
I place my rifle on the hooks and watch it vanish into the ceiling. The other five Jumpers do the same with their ONYXs. The Commander and Mechanics keep their SM90s in hand. Once all six of our rifles are stowed overhead, the doors slide shut. The engines whir to life and lift us from the ground. The soft hum running through the craft turns to a roar as we enter open space.
“I’m so ready for this. It’s been too long since we’ve hit the Phantom,” Tharn says.
“Don’t get too excited. Remember, he supplies the rebels with equipment and troops. They won’t go down easy,” Drex says.
“Yeah, but he’s also supplying us with troops this time. And we’re unstoppable.”
“We’ve been unstoppable. Don’t mistake what has happened with what will always be.”
“Yeah, yeah, I’m still excited. Killing some of his men always lifts my spirits. Or his allies, even if I don’t know why he allied himself with them.”
“Just avoid killing the man that might be able to give us insights into that realm of knowledge,” Martin, one of the other Jumpers, says.
“Avoid killing any of his team until I give the order,” George says. “Remember, we’re not supposed to know who he is. We can’t let the Phantom know that we do.”
“I totally didn’t think of that. But you can’t expect me to, it’s not like I’ve been doing covert operations against him for ten years,” Tharn says.
“Alright, that’s enough. Let’s go over the mission. Tumbar has hired us to locate and kill a rebel leader. All they have are pictures, which are terribly unuseful. I have given them to Damian to try to confirm his identity if we find him. They have a pretty good idea of where he is, but they have not confirmed. They also want us to take out an encampment on our way there. That’s the cover mission. We all know our true mission.”
“Yessir,” we all say.
“Five minutes to the surface,” Finn says over the speakers.
“When we land, we are to hand the prisoner off. That should be happening in the hangar. Elian, you get yourself cleaned up. The rest of us will take his body and clean the VTOL,” George orders. “Understood?”
I nod and scrub at my hands’ scarlet coating. The men around me mutter their confirmations. The sound bounces through our metal cage, then gives way once again to near silence. The engines alone dare speak.
Our thoughts reign for another ten minutes before the VTOL slows. The roaring engines die down to a whir to carry us into the hangar. The landing gear opens and our forward momentum stops. The craft rattles as we touch down.
“Cleaning is priority, you can retrieve your ONYXs when that’s done,” George says.
The sides of our transport slide open. The hangar is all but silent. Maintenance crews seem to have taken a break all at once, leaving the space devoid of footsteps. A single man is visible outside of our craft. A man I haven’t seen in the months I’ve called this ship home. He stands with arms crossed just beyond the edge of the wing, dark eyes staring at us. A pistol is strapped over his black tactical pants. Not even his chest seems to be moving beneath his sable tee.
“Reaper?” George asks.
The man gives the smallest of nods.
Drex yanks the prisoner up from his seated position by his collar. He drags the man to the door in front of Reaper. With a shove from two different people, the captive stumbles off the two foot drop to the hangar floor. He falls toward the ground, only to be stopped by a hand around his throat.
Reaper’s eyes stare straight into the other man’s, taking in every detail of the prisoner’s face. The silence is filled with gasps.
Just when I think the captive is about to lose consciousness, Reaper wrenches him forward by his throat and lets go. Without a word, the man turns and drags his burden by the collar, only allowing him upright once they reach the hallway. Even then, he shoves the prisoner hard, keeping him from balancing.
“The intel he can give us had better be worth it. And Reaper had better get it out of him,” Jordan says.
“He will. And if the rumors are true, it’ll hurt,” George says.
I step off the VTOL and follow the master and his victim into the hallway.
The door at the end of the hallway opens ahead of me. I ball my hands, letting the gloves covering them bunch up in my palms as I follow George through the portal and into a small room. Enclosed by metal-lined concrete, the space is unremarkable. A single table sits in the center. Three people stand around it. One of the men sports a large amount of facial hair and brown camouflage clothes. He leans on the table, a pistol by his hand. The other two stand across from me. Their bright red UDS patches pop from their black clothing. Their sidearms are holstered.
“About time you showed up,” the bearded man says. “I’m Commander Garrett. I’m told both of your teams have already been briefed, so I’m just here to give you the location of your targets and make sure you get acquainted. Let’s not waste time.”
Garrett touches the table and a three-dimensional map appears over it. “The encampment we want you to take out is located here. Some heavy firepower has come out of there. I’m told you operate from VTOL, so you’ll want to watch their surface to air missiles. Those trappers took out four bombers last week. We don’t have the manpower to assault it on our own, so I hope you are as good as I’m told.
“Once you clear that out, you are going to want to move to this section of forest. Clive Shade resides somewhere inside. He has an advanced arsenal at his disposal and countless bodies. Been a real thorn in our side. Take him and as many of his thugs out as possible and you will get paid. Clear?”
“Absolutely. We’ll get it done,” George says.
“Shouldn’t be a problem,” one of the UDS men says.
“Glad you mercs are here. I’ve lost too many of my own men in this fight. Now meet, make your plan and get out of my base,” Garrett says.
“Name’s Will,” the same UDS man says, “Commander Will. This is Christian.”
“Identity confirmed, it’s Will Crafter. Our mission is on,” George’s voice says in my ear, though his lips don’t move. His next words come from his mouth. “George. My man is Elian.”
“Great, you’ve met. Plan and go,” Garrett says.
“My team can drop in on the far side of the encampment, right on top of the missile turrets,” George says. “We’ll wait for you to approach. You move in trucks I assume, so drive them right in at the gates. Distract them while we destroy the turrets, then we’ll hit them from behind.”
“You’ll be picked apart, blown out of the sky before you drop,” Will says.
“We won’t. Trust us to do our part. You just worry about yours.”
“We won’t make it near the gate in our trucks. We’ll approach with stealth and pick them off.”
“That won’t work. In order for us to drop in, we need them distracted by you. If you don’t want to rush with your trucks, then I suggest you set up a firing line and hit them with explosives, I don’t imagine you came to war without rockets.”
“Of course we didn’t. We’ll be your distraction, but I will not sacrifice my men unnecessarily.”
“We’ll only need a minute. Make lots of noise, and damage if you can. Then feel free to attack however you see fit.”
“Sounds like a fantastic plan, now carry it out.” Garrett waves us away.
“We’ll move as soon as comms are connected,” George says and turns away. We walk back through the door.
The door slides shut behind me, sealing me in a narrow corridor with Reaper and his stumbling prey. I focus on picking at the blood on my fingertips rather than the show ahead of me. The crimson coat on my skin doesn’t fade as my thumb nail rubs at it.
Short cries drown out my banging footsteps. My eyes focus on my boots. A blotted trail of crimson passes beneath them. The cries go quiet, replaced by a silent resolve.
The steady beating of rubber soles on the floor reigns for a long minute before a hissing pulls my eyes up to search for its source. Ahead of me, the hallways ends at a junction of three doors. Two of them are closed, the left one gapes. The men ahead of me move through it. As soon as they are through, the door slides shut. A wrenching scream slips out before it seals.
I stop next to portal and take a deep breath. Without turning toward it, I slam my fist into its hard surface. Pain radiates up my arm. I lower my hand and continue forward. As I approach, the middle door slides open.
On the other side is a small, open room. One wall appears almost as though it is not physical, a slight glow emanating from it, an effect of it being capable of functioning as three-dimensional screen. At its base, the ground is raised two feet. The rest of the room is bare. Large doors stand open in the center of the two other walls.
In front of my smaller door, Mak, one of my closest friends on the ship, stands alone. Clothed in a plain tee and shorts, the sight of him is a welcome change from the uniformed combatants I have been stuck with. His dark eyes watch me.
“Elian. . .” he says.
I stare back at him. “Elle.”
“What happened Elle?” I rub my gloved hands together as Tharn speaks.
“He told us to go get those trappers,” I say.
“He actually said trappers? Like that’s actually profanity on Tumbar?” Tharn laughs. “I thought that was just a ridiculous stereotype.”
“Apparently not.”
“Enough chit chat, load up and get ready to move. Our comms are connecting. Damian will make sure everything you say goes to the right people,” George says.
“Comms online. I’ve got their location, they can’t make a move without us knowing as long as they keep their radios on them,” Finn says over the speakers. “And they’re already moving. You Jumpers should get dressed.”
“You heard him, load up and get dressed,” George says.
I step into the VTOL and take my place in the center of the left side. Drex stops on my left and Tharn on my right. Once we are all on board, the doors slide shut and the belly of the craft fills with light.
“At their pace, they’ll reach the target in fifteen minutes. You have seven to get ready,” Finn tells us.
With that, the ceiling opens. Six headsets lower, one in front of each Jumper. I grab mine from the hook, which raises again. After removing the smaller earpiece I wore into the base, I pull the headband over my skull and fit the attached earpiece into place. As soon as I press the mic to my throat, the hook lowers again. This time it holds a mask.
The face of the mask is blank, a plane with two sunken lines running down the side. Beyond the lines, the hard material wraps backward. Attached to the top is a sparkling hood-like cloth. I fit the cloth over my head and pull the mask over my face. The world goes dark and quiet as I push the veil over my ears and to my neck. Then a point of light appears in front of my eyes and flows outward like ink until I can see the inside of the VTOL and a neck-sized strip of armor that now hangs before me.
I grab the armor and place it around my neck, situating an extra wide stretch to cover the back of my head and clasping the front over a tab on the bottom of my mask. A helmet lowers from the roof. I place it on my head so the back extends down over the top of the neck armor. It tightens as it sticks to the shining fabric on my mask.
I stick out my left arm. Three pieces of armor lower from the ceiling and clasp over my shoulder, bicep and forearm. When those three are in place, I bend my elbow and a fourth piece fits over it, between the upper and forearm pieces. It crawls around my arm, covering the inside of my elbow as well. More armor lowers for my right arm.
Then it’s time for my lower body. Two thin strips of metal the length of my legs with a circular joint in the middle line themselves up with the sides of my limbs. The hooks from the ceiling press them against my pants. Once contact is made, rings extend at my ankles, thighs and on either side of my knees. I wince as they close and pull tight. More pieces of armor drop from overhead and clip onto the strips until every inch of my legs are covered. Two pieces of the same flexible metal as on my elbows cover my knees, then thicker plates cover them.
Finally my track lowers. Mounted on a thin plate of ballistic plastic, the track looks like an shining hand reaching straight back. I line my back up with the plate and feel it swing into me. It sticks and the hook retracts into the ceiling. I look at each of the other Jumpers; they all look like identical faceless golems.
“All suited up,” George says.
“Lifting off,” Finn says and the floor lurches as we leave the ground.
“Let’s go have some fun,” Tharn’s voice says over the radio.
“But be quick about it, I want to get some actual sleep tonight,” I say.
“Of course . . . Elle . . . I won’t keep you long, I just wanted to see how you were doing.” I cup my hands over my face as Mak speaks. Regret fills me as the metallic taste of blood floods my mouth. I drop my arms back to my sides.
“Not good,” I say. “I’m not good at all.”
“Losing a teammate hurts. Especially the first time.”
“Especially when you’ve avoided it for over ten years.”
Mak nods. “I’m sorry.”
I stare at the ground in silence before speaking again. “Are you and Rit around for a while?”
“Depends on when and what the interrogator gets out of your guy. We’re on call for the next mission.”
I take a long breath. “I’m going to get cleaned up.”
“Here, I got this out of your bunk. It might help,” Mak holds out a thumb-sized tablet. Before handing it to me, he runs his finger down it; a bar appears on the surface and shrinks.
“Thanks,” I say and grab it. As soon as it passes to my hands, a weight lifts off me. The armor I still wear drags me down less and my feet rest lighter on the floor as my artificial gravity lessens.
“Let me know if there is anything else we can do.”
“Yeah.” I glide heavily across the floor around Mak and toward the door opposite the one I entered through. The hatch opens just long enough for me to walk through before hissing closed. The walls on either side of me are farther apart than the ones in the last hallway had been; five men could walk side by side in this stretch. The short hallway offers a last sanctuary of peace before I must enter the world I call home.
The next door comes before I am ready. I stop before it. My eyes fix on its metallic surface and my chest rises and falls with a deep breath.
“Alright there Elle?” Tharn asks.
“Just bracing myself,” I say, clenching and unclenching my hands in their gloves. “Getting shot countless times is always a shock.”
“You should be used to it by now.”
I look away from the handprint mural in front of my face and look at him. “Sure, I’ll just fight every human instinct there is and not react as bullets slam into my body.”
“Good man.”
I shake my head and look back at the mural. The door vibrates as we fly through the open air. There is nothing to tell me what the ground below us might look like nor how far we are from the target until our forward momentum stops.
“Our friendly UDS team is still a minute or two out, so we will be making a quick stop over the forest here,” Finn says. “As soon as we receive confirmation that the attack has begun, we will make our jump.”
“Alright, we’d better finish getting ready,” George says. “We will be stopping about twenty feet away from the missile turrets. Jumpers, you will clear the area and secure the turrets. Once things have died down, Mechanics will place explosives and retrieve your excess pieces. Once they are safely back on the VTOL, you will move toward the gunfire and kill everything you can. We will provide air support as long as Finn deems it safe. Any questions?”
All of us shake our heads.
“Good, then grab your weapons and get hooked in.”
Our six ONYXs lower from the ceiling. I pick mine off the hook and fit its stock against the armor it was molded for.
“Scans of the target are in. Uploading to your displays,” Finn says.
A skeletal map fills my vision before shrinking into a small circle in the upper left corner of my mask. I study it as best I can.
“In positions. Hook up,” George says.
A thin, metallic line lowers by my side and curls next to my right foot. Jordan steps over to Tharn and Michael moves to Martin across the craft. The two men feed the lines into the tracks on the backs of the Jumpers. When the cables press against the contraption, the outstretched fingers snap shut over it and the Mechanics move on. Jordan grabs my line and pushes it against my back. My track clasps it with a ping. He pats my shoulder once and steps to Drex.
“Hooked up and ready to jump,” Jordan says when he finishes and Michael echoes a moment later.
“Partition,” George says.
“Lowering partition,” Damian–Finn’s AI and co-pilot, and our resident comms master and computer–says through the speakers. As he does, a layer of the ceiling flows toward the center of the craft and forms a wall. My view of the Jumpers on the opposite side is cut off. George stands in the only gap, against the door to the cockpit.
“Alright, looks like our UDS friends are approaching the target,” Finn says.
“We’re set to go,” George says.
“We’re hitting the gate, go now,” Will’s voice says in my ear.
“That’s it. Punch it,” George says.
“Punching,” Finn says.
The floor shudders as the roar of the engines amplifies. I sway toward Drex.
“Five,” George says.
My mask fills with my warm breath before filtering it out.
“Four.”
My fingers tighten on my ONYX.
“Three.”
My eyes fall shut.
“Two.”
I tap the side of my rifle twice with my trigger finger.
“One.”
My thumb flicks up, hitting an extended piece of the grip and completing the safety disengage sequence.
“Zero. Go!”
I rock toward Tharn as the VTOL slams to a stop. My finger slides into the trigger guard. My eyelids rise in time to see light flood in around the retreating door. I kick the coil of cord off the floor and step out after it.
A large open space greets me when I pass through the opening. I tuck my sanguine hands under my arms as I take in the crowds of people filling the massive hallway. Dozens of men walk along the floor. Some are dressed in combat gear, others in street clothes. A couple are even in pajamas.
The men near the middle step aside to allow a pair of small Crawler off-roading vehicles by. The riders of the vehicles whoop and throw insults at each other. Two agents in shorts and tees each jump on the back of a Crawler and threaten to hijack them from the drivers. Then they are too far away for me to see any more.
A single voice falls from above, rising above the rabble. “Are we ready for these War Games?”
I look up to see even more men walking on the ceiling like moving stalactites. Above me, an officer leads his combat-dressed team on a run. The voice must have come from him, because the rest of them yell a reply. “Hell yes!”
“What?” The officer asks.
“Hell yes, sir!”
“Then prove it to me. Double time.” The team picks up their pace and runs out of earshot.
I drop my eyes back to my floor and walk into the fray. The agents near me glance at the blood staining my arms and chest before moving away. A couple of them bow their heads as they pass. Not one makes eye contact with me.
When I reach the opposite side of the hallway, I turn left and walk past a black line on the wall with double arrows painted in yellow. Overhead, an agent walks down the wall in the center of the line.
Beyond the gravitational transfer point, a man passes by me a few feet from the wall. As he does, a figure in a full-body jumpsuit melts out of the wall. The figure pulls down the cloth over his face and looks at me. With a twinkle in his eyes, he raises his eyebrows and follows the other man. After a few moments of silent stalking, he taps his prey’s shoulder, causing the man to jump.
“Well it works. You walked right by me,” he says before vanishing into nothing.
“We don’t have to tell the lab coats yet right?” The other man asks.
“I think we could mess around with it a bit longer,” the air says.
I shake my head and continue down the wall. A few seconds later, I step out into an open intersection. To my right, through a smaller hallway, the sounds of the training room ring out. The steady crackle of gunfire rises above everything else.
My glove bunches in my knuckle as I squeeze the trigger, adding my own pops to the symphony of lead. My first burst is untargeted firing, then I adjust to the sight around me and begin picking victims. The first to fall to my ONYX is a dirty young man with one hand on a rifle leaning against a crumbled concrete wall. The next doesn’t even register that we are there before getting thrown off of his makeshift perch. Two more men, one facing away from us under a cracked roof and the other attempting to draw a pistol, fall before I reach the ground.
As soon as my boots touch the dirt, I drop to one knee. In my peripherals, I see Drex and Tharn do the same. All three of us reach back with our left arms and press the sides of our tracks. The lines fall free and we all stand. I fire on another man that tries to run for cover as I take my first step forward. With my next two, I search for another target. Between the six Jumpers and minigun on the VTOL that has torn apart an entire toppled building, we seem to have sent the rebels into hiding.
Once I take my third step, I stop. A rush of air presses against my back as the VTOL drops to the ground. I take three backward steps without taking my eyes off of the rubble ahead of me. Back on the craft, I scan for more fighters.
A single gunshot rings out from the roof of a leaning three-story tower. My shoulder is thrust backward. Drex lets off three rounds and the sniper tumbles over the edge of the building.
None of us move and the only gunshots we hear come from up the street, toward the gate.
George says, “Clear, step off.”
“Well that was easier than I expected,” Tharn says as we six Jumpers exit the VTOL again. “They only shot us once. That’s gotta be a new record.”
“Remember those smugglers back on that asteroid a couple years ago? They didn’t even raise a weapon,” Martin says as he rounds the VTOL.
“That’s right. But I think they were drunk, so that hardly counts.”
“Quiet. The turrets are just over that mound of rubble. We’ll take the far one,” Drex says, motioning at me and Tharn. He turns toward the other Jumpers. “You three take the close one. Let’s go.”
I raise my rifle and follow him toward the debris. The sun casts short shadows over the fractured concrete. Massive trees stretch their branches like hands over a makeshift wall at their edge. Smaller plant life has reclaimed the outer reaches of the collapsed town. Two of these green invaders have rooted themselves between the broken pieces of rubble we walk toward, shielding the turrets from view.
“Scanning thermal,” Drex says.
My vision darkens as my mask does the same scan. Ten bodies light up orange in a rough figure-eight pattern behind the bushes.
“Ten targets. They’re ready for us. Go,” Drex says and my vision returns to normal, leaving ten orange outlines. I push on the side of my magazine with my left hand and catch it when it falls free. As I slide it back into place, a holographic number on it resets to thirty.
The six of us climb the mound at once. Two large mobile missile turrets stand in the only flat, plant-free piece of ground. Crates of ammunition lay scattered about, providing cover for the rebels protecting them.
“Avoid hitting the missiles, I’d like to be out of range when they blow,” Tharn says.
“Thanks, genius,” Martin says.
Nobody fires. We press on, our ONYXs raised. I pick two men to be my targets and wait for one of them to show his face. Before either of them does, Tharn shoots. One of the closest rebels slumps over an ammo crate. After a few more steps, one of the other Jumpers drops another rebel. By the time we reach the first turret, the four men around it are all dead. My two targets are still alive.
Martin, Billy and Phil, the three Jumpers assigned to the first turret, split off and set up a triangular perimeter. Drex, Tharn and I continue on to the second turret. One of my targets rises up over his cover and right into one of my bullets. Out of the corner of my vision, I see two other rebels stand. I keep my rifle trained on my final victim. Drex lets off four rounds and both men disappear.
One of the two rebels on my right manages to miss a shot over our heads before Tharn puts a bullet in his nose. The other can’t even raise his rifle over his head. Only once he is the last one standing does my target dare show his face. He rises and points his rifle right at Tharn. Our shots are simultaneous. Tharn jerks sideways as the bullet hits him in the neck. The rebel drops behind his crate, an extra hole between his eyes.
“The hell Elle?” Tharn says, rubbing the scratch on his armor. “You couldn’t have killed him before he shot me?”
“Maybe I could’ve,” I say.
He turns his faceless head at me.
“Perimeter,” Drex says. “Area secure, Mechanics are clear.”
“On their way,” George says over the mic. “Be quick, we need to get back in the air before they figure out what happened.”
“We’ll protect you if they do,” Tharn says. “Won’t we Elle?” He places a hand on my armored shoulder.
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Read Part 2 here