James Axler - Janus Trap

Brigid’s voice came over Grant’s auditory receiver after a moment. “I’m just getting in position now,” she said. “Going to give our guests a little light show.”

Grant knew what that meant, and he pulled a pair of sunglasses from the inside pocket of his coat as Brigid spoke, following up by inserting tiny earplugs into his ears.

“Count us in, Baptiste,” Kane said in a low voice over the Commtact as he got into place above them.

Brigid Baptiste was hunkered down in the shadows of the towering crates, close to one of the high walls of the boathouse. She had placed a pair of dark lenses over her own eyes and wore earplugs to muffle sound, just as Grant did. Her head was steady as she watched the group of frogmen swarming around the main area of the building, shooting the few remaining guards as they approached the recliner where Ohio Blue cowered. Swiftly, Brigid assessed the floorboards between her and her target—they were rough in places, and a little warped here and there with damp, but they were basically flat and smooth enough for her purpose.

She drew her arm back, rolling the three silver spheres in her hand for a moment, assessing their weight as she gave one last look at the scene. Then, her arm arced forward, low to the floor, and she released the three globes as her arm continued its fluid sweep ahead. Released, the tiny silver spheres rolled along the floorboards, bumping across the rough chinks in the wood as they rushed toward the recliner.

As the spheres rolled steadily across the floor, Brigid engaged her Commtact once again. “Three, two, one,” she whispered, narrowing her eyes and turning her head away from what she knew was about to happen.

For a moment, nothing did. The three spheres rolled to the open area beside the recliner, their momentum dwindling. Two of the intruders in scuba gear had spotted them, and one shouted a query as he stepped ahead and placed his foot in the path of the first sphere. “What the fu—”

His words were lost in the explosion of sound and light that followed as the flash-bangs detonated.

Atop the crate tower, Kane surged forward, his Sin Eater held low. Even through the polymer lenses of his darkened glasses, the dazzling explosive burned into his retinas, and he blinked the pattern away as he leaped from the high crate and out into the open.

A moment later, Kane dropped into the open area of the boathouse, the Sin Eater blasting a lethal arc of 9 mm steel before him. He landed amid the frogmen with a heavy thump of boot soles against wooden floorboards, then swiftly recovered into a fighter’s crouch as he began targeting the men in scuba gear. The sound of the Sin Eater seemed dulled by the ringing in his ears that the flash-bang had wrought, but his earplugs had helped protect him from the worst of it.

The flash-bang was a miniature explosive device, designed purely to shock and startle an opponent. The explosive was all sound and light, but the charge itself was so tiny as to be worthless as a demolition device. The flash-bang was standard equipment for Kane and his team, who often saw a benefit to using nonlethal force to restrain or completely halt an enemy.

The divers were all pulling at their masks in their sudden blindness, and several fired shots at random as they struggled to recover. To one side of the recliner, Ohio Blue was sitting on her backside, an enticing sweep of bare leg visible where her dress had fallen about her. Her blue-gloved hand was held over her eyes and her shoulders heaved as though she was crying.

Off to Kane’s left, Brigid was securing the area, her TP-9 raised as she checked every nook and cranny before moving closer to the main action. A few of Ohio’s guards were still alive, but they seemed to be wounded almost to a man. Tough to stand toe to toe with an enemy who could shrug off bullets, Kane realized.

Like a charging rhino, Grant joined Kane from his hiding place among the crates, fists swinging at the closest two frogmen as they staggered about blindly. His blows connected with solid finality, and the two men fell to the floor.

Kane turned to Grant and nodded his approval. “Not exactly subtle,” he shouted to be heard over the earplugs he assumed that the other man still wore.

Pulling the handblaster from another frogman and throwing it aside, Grant lifted the man off his feet and tossed him against the nearest stack of crates with bone-jarring force. “Their vests shrug off bullets, right?” Grant explained. “What was I supposed to do?”

Kane aimed a stream of bullets at another frogman’s head, blasting his faceplate to splinters. “Aim for the head?” he suggested.

Grant’s leg kicked out, slamming into the gut of a blinded diver, knocking him backward with a shriek. “Sure. Now you tell me.”

Brigid joined them then, looking around as Kane and Grant made short work of the final few intruders. She crouched beside Ohio Blue, placing a steadying arm around the woman’s shoulders. “Can you hear me?” she shouted, close to the woman’s left ear.

Ohio nodded, looking in the direction of Brigid’s voice with vacant, bloodshot eyes.

“We’re getting out of here,” Brigid explained as she helped the trader to her feet.

There was a noise from the far end of the boathouse, and all three Cerberus warriors spun to see the front of the building—the wall where the exit door was located—cave in as a heavily armored vehicle crashed through it.

As the dust began to clear, the vehicle stood revealed. It was a square block on caterpillar tracks. Four abbreviated arms stretched out to either side of the vehicle, two on each side in a stack array, each containing three large missiles along its length. The muzzle of a gun stood out low in the rounded nose of the vehicle, swiveling left to right as it searched for a target.

Men swarmed in through the hole in the wall that had been created by the tank, armed with rifles, pistols and shotguns blasting the few remaining guards who were hidden among the crates.

“We’re going to need another exit,” Grant growled as he powered the Sin Eater back into his grip and, in unison with Kane, started taking shots at the approaching gunmen. The shots hit their targets but did nothing more than make the approaching gunmen slow for a moment. Like the frogmen, this team was wearing protective armor.

“Baptiste,” Kane shouted over the furious sounds of gunfire all around, “you studied the maps—any ideas?”

Brigid looked around the boathouse, and her eyes stopped as she came to the sunken area that dominated its center. Letting go of the stunned trader at her side, Brigid dashed across to the safety rail that surrounded it and peered into the lower area. There, bobbing in the choppy waters of the Tennessee River, was a long powerboat, painted blue and shaped like a dart. Perfect.

Brigid turned back to Kane and Grant, calling them over. “Come quick and bring Ms. Blue,” she instructed.

Bullets thudded all about them as Grant, Kane and Ohio Blue made their way toward the area where Brigid waited. Kane kicked over the recliner as he passed, using it for a shield while they retreated from the approaching gunmen.

At the far end of the boathouse, Kane could see the odd-looking tank trundling slowly forward, knocking against one of the towers of crates before shunting it aside.

“Oh, this had better be good,” Kane muttered.

When Kane turned he saw that Ohio Blue was at Brigid’s side, trotting down the short staircase that led to the sunken dock. Grant waited at the head of the stairs, blasting at targets with his Sin Eater, providing what cover he could for Kane.

“Keep moving,” Kane told him as he passed.

Grant drilled a line of bullets into the edge of the lowest crate in a nearby stack. Under the relentless attack, the crate began to sag, its structural integrity ruined, and then the whole tower swayed for a few seconds before it slowly toppled to the floor of the vast boathouse, blocking the way for the approaching gunmen.