Smoke cleared. Lance Martell lowered his pistol and peered around the corner, trying to see as much as possible without exposing his head. The troop of black-suited enemies lay sprawled around the exquisite lobby. Curls of smoke wafted from their bodies.
“Clear,” Lance said.
Vida moved around him and darted into the room. Her lean figure bolted behind the fountain and disappeared into its shadow. Behind her, Samir jogged up, and Lance joined him. They darted across the length of the long room. Lance spotted two security cameras up ahead and took both out with well-placed shots.
He and Samir slid into the opposite wall back-first and poised themselves to shoot around the next corner, which led into a dark hallway.
“Still clear behind us,” Scott’s voice came over the earpiece, full of static.
“Keep it that way,” Lance said.
“Good grief,” Vida muttered, somewhere out of sight. “What’s taking these jocks so long to fall? I must’ve emptied half my rifle into one before he went down.”
“Not sure,” Lance said. “But make sure you’re reloaded before the next wave.”
“As if you need to remind me.”
Samir glanced at a device strapped to his wrist. “Scanners showing three life forms in the room at the end of this hallway. One of them has much weaker stats than the others. It’s got to be her.”
Lance ground his teeth. “Only two guards?”
“That’s all I’m picking up. But the tracker’s been on the fritz since we got on board. They might have some kind of scrambler.”
“That would explain why we lost contact with Abel,” Lance murmured. “We could be walking straight into a trap.”
“What do you want to do? That’s where they’ve got her.”
Lance fell into brief thought. “There have to be more than two guards. Someone took my daughter, and tried to take all my children off-planet for a specific reason, and I refuse to believe their incredibly well-funded security measures stop here. We need to draw them out.”
Samir cast his gaze around the room before nodding. “Yep. We’d be able to pick ‘em off like fish in a funnel.”
“It’s fish in a barrel, Samir,” Vida said. “Even I know that one.”
“Whatever.”
“Guys,” Lance said. “Evie’s life is at stake here.”
Vida poked her head over the fountain’s rim. “You’d better come up with a plan quick, then. Our lockdown of this deck won’t last forever. They’ve got their engineers working on it by now.”
“I know, I know…” Lance grasped his gun pommel with both hands and thought hard.
They had been on board for a total of six minutes and eighteen seconds, according to his watch. The longer they stayed, the more danger they attracted… and the longer Abel had to sit alone and unguarded in space. If they had played their cards right, the enemy wouldn’t even think to look for an escape vessel. They would be too preoccupied with the infiltrators.
He thought about their enemy. He knew Carmen DiVazzo had it out for him. That memory was a dark one. She had to be the one behind the kids’ kidnapping in the first place—probably the one responsible for Ruth’s disappearance, too. DiVazzo was rich, dangerous, and if he had to guess, a whole lot of psycho. He could be getting in over his head here.
But he also knew DiVazzo was only twenty-four. Her abilities, if not her resources, were limited. That left the possibility for rashness and flawed decisions on her part. He could win this, but the longer Evie was in her hands, the worse.
He would have to step it up a few notches.
“I have a plan,” Lance said. “We’ll take the triple-X formation.”
Vida scoffed. “Will that even work here?”
“Yeah, with a hallway full of potential ambushers?” Samir added. “I don’t think you should risk it.”
“My daughter’s in there,” Lance said. “I’m willing to risk anything.”
“Maybe that’s what DiVazzo is counting on,” Vida said.
“Either way, she won’t be expecting a move like this. It’s our only option.”
“Hm. Seeing as we’re pushing our limits, I’d say it’s the best option we’ve got for now,” Samir said. “If we had more time, maybe we could choose something less risky, but given the current situation…. I’ll go with you. Vida, you’ll be X three.”
“Got it,” she said.
“I’m X one,” Lance said. “You know where to go.”
“Yup,” Samir said. “Good luck.”
They nodded at each other and Samir disappeared to the right, ducking behind a large potted tree. Lance heard clicking noises from behind the leaves. He sucked in a breath and reached to his belt, unclipping a small, grenade-like device. He fingered it.
Just don’t let Evie be affected by this, he thought.
The top popped open at the touch of a button. A blinking blue light appeared. Lance hesitated just a moment, and then stepped into full view of the hallway. At once, twelve or thirteen red lights appeared.
Thought so, Lance thought, and threw the device.
He hurled himself to the side just as a dozen different guns went off. He rolled out of the way and heard the great buzzing as the short-range EMP bomb exploded, sending electric waves in all directions. A second later, a crackly sensation swept over him, making all the hair on his exposed skin stand on end.
The anti-EMP shield installed in his body armor and weapons, however, remained intact. Behind him, Samir had jumped out and chucked a floodlight bot into the hallway. The tiny robot clanked on the floor and drilled itself down, then shot a beam of blinding light straight down the corridor and into the eyes of their opponents.
Lance leaped to his feet and, guns still drawn, ran straight back to the mouth of the hallway. Every inch of it was now visible, including the small platoon of warriors who lay twitching in various positions all along the shining tile floor.
He lost no time bolting toward them. Vida was at his side in an instant, a much larger rocket launcher-type weapon her grasp. They both scanned the bodies as they passed.
“What the…” Vida muttered, slowing. “An EMP took them down? Why not just their weapons?”
Something clicked in Lance’s head. “Bio-metal. She must be enhancing her own soldiers with it. I didn’t think she’d be stupid enough to use it on her own people.”
“Unlucky for them,” Vida said.
A door loomed. Samir was only a few steps behind them, having hung back just long enough to kick at one of the fallen soldiers to see if they were really dead. All the soldiers seemed to be down for good. Lance felt a brief flash of regret, but then remembered they had taken Evie. And who knows what they had done to her.
Lance readied himself as they neared the door, feeling the rush of adrenaline and controlled panic surging through him.
“Hey… what’s going on…?” Samir huffed behind them. “My scanner’s working again and…”
“And what?” Lance put his hand on the knob and turned.
“Lance, wait! The door’s rigged—!”
But the door was already open. A bright flash erupted on the other side, accompanied by the sound of a gunshot volley.
Another trap.
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