Ramez Naam - Nexus

Wats slapped the plastic explosive down, hit the delayed detonator, crouched behind the heavy wooden desk.

The explosion was deafening. Dust fell on him instantly. He heaved the oak desk forward, sent it hurtling down through the hole in the floor, pulled his guns and jumped down after it.

Sam's eyes widened as the towering figure in black leapt down through the hole that the blast had opened in the ceiling above, landing on the wreckage of the massive desk that had preceded him, and the agents buried beneath it. Lee looked up, stunned, tried to bring his pistol to bear. Wats' gun roared at point-blank range, and Lee's head disintegrated in a cloud of red gore.

There was a mind there. Sam felt it. She'd felt it briefly once before. Watson Cole. The one that had gotten away.

The ex-Marine turned, firing in a tight arc in the close space of the combat. One of the agents rolled behind the fallen desk. Another brought his gun up to fire at Cole. The black man's auto shotguns pulverized him.

Another mercenary took aim at Cole. Sam threw herself at the mercenary, arms cuffed behind her back, knocked him to the ground, kicked him in the face until he went limp.

There was one more agent up, the one who'd rolled behind the wreckage of the massive desk. He came around it, tried to take Cole by surprise. Wats was there, waiting for him. The mercenary came up into the barrels of both guns. They erupted, their muzzle flashes burning him , graphene-coated pellets shredding through his armor, opening holes in his chest and groin.

One of the two agents under the wreckage of the desk was stirring, reaching for the assault rifle just out of his grasp. Wats kicked it away from him, bashed him in the face with the butt of his shotgun.

The guns fell silent. Only the screams of the dying and the sobs of the bereaved could be heard.

38

HELL ON EARTH

Garrett Nichols stared at the display in stunned silence. What the fuck had just happened?

"Radio intercept," Jane Kim said. "Bangkok Metro Police chopper en route. ETA… two minutes."

No. This was a nightmare. They couldn't let the local authorities find any evidence. Their rules of engagement were crystal clear on that.

Three men were still alive. Another's radio was offline, his state unknown.

"Bruce, get those men up. They have to get out of there."

Bruce Williams was pounding keys furiously. "Not responding. Two unconscious. One has good vitals but radio's offline, possibly damaged."

"Ninety seconds till chopper arrival," Jane Kim called out. "Aerial news drones en route as well."

"Sanitize," Becker said quietly from the screen. "Protocol Thirteen."

Nichols looked up, horrified. "Sir, we still have three men alive in there, maybe four. And civilians! I need to get them out."

"You don't have time," Becker said. The Deputy Director's face was pale. His mouth was set in a hard line. His voice was resigned. "You have local police inbound and you now have less than two minutes."

"We just need a little more time… get our men out of there, get the civilians out… There's no precedent!"

"There isn't any more time!" Becker snapped. "Those men are unconscious. The Bangkok Police are almost on top of you. You have to sanitize! You know the rules. Protocol Thirteen. Execute."

Nichols couldn't breathe. This was a bad dream – a horrible dream. Kim and Williams were staring at him, ashen-faced.

"Execute, Nichols, or I swear to god I'll have you relieved."

Nichols tapped at his keyboard, pulled up a screen he'd only ever used in war games. Entered the commands. A confirmation prompt appeared, asking for his password. He entered it. A second prompt appeared, on all their terminals. It needed a second person's password.

Kim and Williams stared at their terminals, all blood drained from their faces.

"Bruce, type in your password."

Williams blanched further. "Sir, I… I…"

"Do it, Bruce," Nichols said gently. "It's on me."

Williams trembled as he typed in his password, hit ENTER. The system accepted it. A final confirmation prompt appeared on Nichols' screen. He looked up at the feeds, the tactical display, his casualties, the men on the ground, immobile but still breathing, the sobbing civilians crawling on the floor. He hit ENTER one more time… God save his soul.

Sam crouched by a fallen agent, back to him, yanked a knife free from his belt, sawed it through the plasticuffs, came to her feet a free woman.

Wats reached Kade a second before she did. Kade was coming around. He'd been slammed in the face hard. One eye was swollen bloodily shut and a nasty cut ran from his temple to his cheek. He was groggy, but rising back to consciousness.

Wats holstered his guns, scooped Kade up in his arms. "We've got to get out of here."

Sam couldn't agree more.

"Wha'… Wats?" Kade had one eye open.

"Kade, my man. I told you to stay outta trouble."

Sam ripped a submachine gun from one of Prat-Nung's guards. The ERD weapons would be biometrically locked. This would have to do. She ejected the clip from the black-market special in her hand, checked it, rammed it back home. "Let's go."

She turned, half jogged towards the back door. Wats took one of Kade's arms over his shoulder. They came up behind her.

There was a sound from behind them. She whirled to see Wats turning. He pushed Kade to the side, brought his gun back up towards the direction they'd come.

Automatic fire boomed loud in the small space again. She felt Wats' grunt of pain as she came around him to fire at the source. The agent she'd taken down. He'd gotten his hand on the gun. His upper body exploded under a burst of armor-piercing rounds from both of them.

Wats was down on his knees. The bullets had hit him just below the navel, ripped through his abdomen and gone out the other side. He'd saved Kade by pushing him aside. Sam was lucky none of the rounds had hit her. His body had deflected them.

That was twice he'd saved her life in five minutes.

"Faarrgghhhh," the big man moaned. "Goddamn, that hurts."

Sam could feel it. On top of all the moans and fear and pain and loss and rage in the room, she could feel Wats' pain, the coldness spreading through his guts.

Fucking hell, she thought.

Kade was up on one knee, then on his feet. He grabbed one of Wats' arms and tried to drag him across the floor towards the blown doorway.

"Fuck!" Wats swore. "Leave me, you idiot. Get the hell out of here. You got shit to do, brother. Go fucking do it."

"No fucking way," Kade yelled. "Sam, help me!"

"Fuck," Sam said. She grabbed Wats' other arm, started dragging him towards the door, limping with every painful step.

Then the explosions started, and the world went to hell.

Nichols hit the final ENTER key. Displays flickered and went blank. He tried to picture it. At the back of each man's skull, four grams of CL-70 had just ignited. Their brains would have disintegrated immediately. Windows would have shattered. The apartment would instantly be a raging inferno as the incredible heat of the explosion ignited wood, paper, cloth, anything in its path. Anyone still left alive in there would have been killed by the explosion or would burn to death in seconds. God help them all. God help his own soul.

The explosions knocked Sam off her feet. She landed on her back, couldn't make sense of the world for a moment. Then she understood what had happened. Bloody hell…

The place was an inferno. Walls had exploded, beams collapsed. There was fire everywhere, smoke everywhere there wasn't fire. Where was Kade? Where was Wats? She could feel them. Pain. That way, towards the door.

She reached Wats. Kade was atop him. The marine was gurgling, dying. A giant splinter of wood had been rammed into his neck, opening up both windpipe and carotid artery. Kade was trying to apply pressure. Blood kept spurting. A burning beam fell on Sam's shoulder painfully. She heaved it off, turned back to Wats, pushed Kade's hands away, got her own on the artery, tried to close it off. Blood spurted into her face between her fingers. Wats was staring at her. Sam could feel him in her mind. He knew he was dying, knew there was no chance. She could feel his intention. He was willing her to protect Kade, to get him to safety. Willing her to give the kid a chance to do something, to make a difference in the world. He locked eyes with her, put all his effort into it, willed her to promise him. Promise!