Ramez Naam - Nexus

Suk was at the other end of the room now, maybe forty feet away. He was pointing the gun at Kade. His hands were shaking.

"What are you?"

Kade tried pushing at his thoughts, got nowhere. He was too far, too far.

"You're a devil! A devil!"

Suk fired, missed at that range. Kade felt a bullet embed itself in the floor near him. He scrambled back with one leg and both hands. Suk fired again, missed again.

Kade looked around for anything to hide behind, anything to use as a weapon. The thug's submachine gun was against the wall. He crawled for it as fast as he could, rough pain shooting up from his insides with every motion. It was so far away. Everything hurt so goddamn much. Suk's hands were steady now.

"You go to hell!" the Thai man yelled at him, taking careful aim.

The outside door burst in. Sam stood in the doorway. Suk saw her, dragged his gun around, fired on her. Sam rolled, flinging something at him as she did. Something sharp cut Suk across the left arm. He moved forward, gun trained on Sam. Fired, missed.

Kade got his fingers around the submachine gun. Suk was at thirty feet. The Thai man fired again, but missed Sam.

Kade brought the gun around, pulled the trigger. The recoil knocked him back, pinned him into the wall, brought agony to his broken rib. The shots went wild, too far to the left. Suk turned back towards him, fired. Kade felt a searing pain in his left arm, kept the trigger down, tried to bring the muzzle around to bear on Suk. Suk fired again, missed. Kade's bullets tracked from Kade's left to right, took Suk across his gun arm and then into his chest, knocked him off his feet. The gun clicked. Empty. Silence ruled again. Then sirens, sirens from outside.

• • • •

There was silence in the C&C onboard the Boca Raton . Nichols couldn't believe what had just happened. A dozen agents dead, at least that many civilians, many of whom were still alive when they'd initiated Protocol Thirteen.

Nichols looked down at his lap, shaking his head.

Then Jane Kim spoke up. "Sir?"

Nichols looked up. "What is it, Jane?"

"Sir… Canary is still up, sir. And Blackbird… most of her channels went dead, but we still have a GPS feed from her phone. And… it's moved, sir. She's outside of the building."

Nichols looked at the bank of screens. It was true. The feeds had collapsed from the twelve members of the assault team, but not from Lane. And from Cataranes, most of them had died, but died after recording a location just outside the building. Her phone was still uploading GPS data even now. As he watched, it moved again, from the alleyway into the building that Lane was in. Their positions converged. She was moving.

There. On the video feed from Lane, that had been a flicker of Sam. Unmistakably so.

Shu directed as Feng drove. Traffic control was hers. Police routing was hers. Street cameras were hers. The Opal barreled down the street at a hundred and sixty kilometers per hour. The streets were nearly empty in the pre-dawn gloom. Every light was green for them. Bangkok Metro Police vehicles rushed by on parallel tracks, never to see them.

She knew the position of Lane's phone to the meter. It was no longer in the conflagration. It was less than ten meters away from the burning apartment, but that was all the difference in the world. She only hoped the boy was with his phone.

This was foolishness, she knew. She should just let the boy die. But she wasn't going to, not if she could help it.

Here, Shu told Feng. They crashed a pedestrian barrier, entered the alleyways, barely wide enough for the Opal to drive down, forbidden to motorized vehicles.

Here again, she sent him.

Feng expertly skid-braked the Opal, turned into the perpendicular alley. Lane was climbing, gaining elevation.

Here, she repeated.

Feng brought the Opal to a skidding halt. Lane was about to reach the rooftop of the building directly in front of them. She could feel his mind at this range. He was still alive, wounded, in pain. She reached out to him and the Cataranes girl, told them help was coming. From here it was up to Feng.

And there were two more minds running Nexus on the first floor, both fading into oblivion. How interesting…

Sam picked up the submachine gun from where Kade had dropped it, ejected the banana clip and reversed it, slammed the full one home.

"You OK?" she asked.

She could feel his mind. The Nexus was frazzled from the shocks she'd taken, but not as badly as a few days ago. She could still feel Kade through the static. He had the combat adrenaline in him. He'd just killed a man for the first time. That was going to stick in his head for quite a while, along with everything else about tonight.

Kade nodded, tried to get up, collapsed immediately as his leg gave out again. Pain radiated from him. His lungs were burning. Ribs were cracked, sent horrible pain as he tried to move. His leg wouldn't take any weight. He shook his head, coughing feebly. Blood came up when he did.

Sam bent to pick him up. They had to get out of here.

There was a noise at the door. Another thug appeared in the entrance. Sam yanked the gun up, fired a burst. There was a curse and the thug disappeared back out the doorway.

There was another door at the other end of the room. "Come on, Kade." She picked him up, heaved him over her shoulder. Agony flared out from him. She ignored it, limped and ran towards the other door. Fuck, that hurt. She got to the door, kicked it open with her good leg, turned and fired another burst at the door the thugs had appeared in for good measure, then smashed the door beside her open with her shoulder.

The door led into a stairwell. Sam tightened her grip on Kade, jerked her body up, felt Kade groan, moved up one painful step at a time. The door at the first landing was locked.

She fired a burst into the lock, slammed the door open with her shoulder to confuse them, kept climbing.

She was at the second landing when she heard them enter the stairwell. She froze. Kade moaned. She shushed him with her mind. The men on the first landing were talking in Thai. Three of them. Maybe four. They were moving carefully. She heard clips being checked, replaced. The voices went away.

She counted to five, then continued up.

A voice yelled out. Fuck, one of them had stayed behind. Shots came up the center shaft of the stairwell. Sam threw caution to the wind, threw pain to the wind, sprinted up the stairs, felt muscles in her damaged leg protest painfully on each step, didn't fucking care. Pain racked Kade's body from his broken ribs with every step. She ignored it. She had no choice.

The thugs were all yelling now. They were running after her. They were top-heavy, strong as five men, but pathetically weak in the legs in comparison. Their oversized muscles sapped their cardio ability. Sam was smaller of heart and lung, but built for speed. Even with Kade on her shoulder, she was faster.

She passed the third landing, the fourth, the fifth, got to the rooftop access, blew off the lock, rammed it open. God, she'd kill for grenades right now. She looked around for cover. There was a giant rooftop air-conditioning unit on the far corner. Sam sprinted for it, dropped Kade behind it with a thud and a staggering surge of pain, crouched down out of view herself, checked her ammo. Almost empty. She flipped it to single shot. She had to conserve the ammo she had left.

KADE… CATARANES… WE ARE HERE… STAY ALIVE… FENG IS COMING TO YOU.

Su-Yong Shu's voice boomed huge in Sam's head. Kade gasped out loud. Holy fuck, what was that woman?

Automatic fire burst from the other side of the roof. Bullets penetrated the AC unit. A spray of metal pieces shot out, lacerating her arms, her legs, her chest. Kade moaned in fresh pain. The thugs kept shooting, firing now on one side of the unit, sending sharp shrapnel out where Sam crouched. She rolled towards Kade. Supports inside the AC unit gave, and the damaged side slumped down. Sam slouched lower, pulled Kade with her. The thugs were eating away at their cover.