and you… you don't move!' He was breathing hard. 'Do you realize what you just did? You have no idea!'
Anna cradled Croix's head and found a thready pulse at his neck. 'Patrick,' she said, 'tell me-'
The youth exploded with ferocity. 'Don't you talk to me like you know me!' He came closer, aiming the pistol squarely at her head. 'I didn't want any part of this! I didn't want to come here!' He gestured to the radio clipped to Croix's tac vest. 'Give me that! Slide it over!'
She did as he told her. 'What are you trying to do?' she asked, feeling for a read on D-Bar's emotions. He was confused and angry, fearful and brimming with energy, all at once. With the gun on her, she knew that any move she made would cause him to shoot.
D-Bar grabbed the radio and stuffed it into a pocket. 'You're so stupid,' he retorted. 'You really think you were lucky? They don't make mistakes!'
Anna felt sick inside. 'You've betrayed us.'
'Us?' D-Bar shouted the word at her. 'You're not one of us! You never were, you're just a tool, that's all you ever were. Juggernaut used you, I used you…'
'For what?' she demanded.
But he went on as if she had never spoken, the gun's muzzle drifting back and forth. 'I didn't know… I didn't see it! I thought we could win, but we can't. Kept trying to tell myself it was a game… But it's not.' He shot her a wild glare. 'The files, Kelso. You never saw what was in those files, did you? Not the whole thing. Not all the things they've done…' He blinked, and in the depths of his throat D-Bar made a noise that was almost a moan. 'All the things. What they're capable of. We can't fight them.' Then the hacker shook off the moment and straightened.
'Juggernaut, the New Sons, L'Ombre… Sarif and Caidin and the rest, all on the losing side! It's like a raindrop fighting the ocean, there's no way to win!'
On the breeze, Anna thought she heard the hum of rotors coming closer; but she kept her eyes on the hacker. 'When did they turn you?'
'On the zep.' He gave a brittle, bitter laugh. 'Or maybe before, but I just didn't want to admit it. They'd tried once or twice. Always laughed it off. But that's because I never understood. Not until you brought us the flash drive. Then I got it. I got it all.' D-Bar's eyes flared with hate once again. 'Why couldn't you have lost that thing? I didn't want to know all this! I wish I never knew!' He shot a look up into the air, then back at her. 'I called them. And they made me a better offer. Juggernaut's days are numbered. The Illuminati have already taken all the people they need. They're going to win.' He shook his head, grim faced. 'I want to be on their side.' 'The jet was an ambush.' Anna thought it through. 'But they never expected us to go after the van, not like this…' Saxon's face rose in her mind and her breath caught in her throat. 'Are the others…?'
'You fucked it all up!' D-Bar was about to go on, but the hum of rotor noise grew loud and Anna looked up, shielding her eyes as a black shape angled in to land on the bridge. She saw the spinning discs of lifter rings and a compact armored fuselage with no markings of any kind.
A man dropped from the open compartment behind the black helicopter's cockpit and strode toward them, glancing around, taking the measure of the situation. He reminded Anna of Saxon in manner, sharing the same wolfish stride, the same trained economy of motion in everything he did. Muscular cyberarms made of dull steel bones and bunches of dark crimson muscles caught the streetlights. He cradled an assault rifle in a deceptively casual carry across his torso.
'This isn't what you promised,' he called, irritation flaring. 'You've made a very poor start to our working relationship, Mr. Couture. Do you have any idea how much effort went into this operation?'
'It was Kelso!' shouted the hacker. 'She killed your man, Namir, not me!'
'That remains to be seen,' said the Tyrant leader, sparing Anna a passing look. 'What matters now is that we employ a contingency.' He frowned. 'We need to reassess the situation and deal with this mess. Yelena?'
Anna felt the air shift behind her and she half turned. The woman from the apartment was suddenly there, right at her back, looming over her.
Anna tried to scramble to her feet, but a gloved fist backhanded her and she spun away, new pain cascading through her skull.
She blinked as Namir nodded toward Croix. 'Leave him for the gendarmerie. Secure the woman.'
In one fluid move, the assassin bent down and snapped the unconscious Frenchman's neck; then she stalked toward Anna on her slender, silent machine legs.
'Wh-what about me?' D-Bar managed, trying to keep the fear from his voice as he watched Federova drag Anna to her feet. 'We had an agreement…'
'Contingent on your continued value to the group,' Namir replied coldly. 'Care to prove that?'
Before the hacker could reply, a hiss of static rattled from the radio in his pocket, and he gathered it up. Then there was a voice, wracked with pain 'Kelso…'
Namir stormed forward and snatched the radio from D-Bar's hand, meeting Federova's gaze. 'The jet…'
'Kelso, do you read me?' said the voice. 'This is Saxon! We've been set up!'
'You… said they'd be gone,' D-Bar replied.
'Be quiet,' Namir told him, looking into the distance for a moment. Then he turned his attention to Anna and raised the radio to his lips. 'Ah,
Benjamin,' he began, 'I'm afraid it's worse than you think.'
'Saxon, no-!' Federova's hand shot out like a striking cobra and clamped tight around Anna's throat, silencing her.
'Namir.' Saxon moved away as fast as he could, dropping into the shadows cast behind a dormant runway service robot. 'You're getting sloppy, mate. I'm still breathing.'
'I admire your tenacity, Ben.' The reply resonated through the bones of his skull, making his teeth itch. 'It's one of the things that drew me to you. I'm only sorry I couldn't find a way to make better use of it.'
'You're welcome to try and kill me again,' Saxon retorted. 'Let's have a face-to-face and talk about it over a pint, yeah?'
There was a long pause before Namir came back on. 'Be realistic, Ben. You don't have a play here. Even if you make it outside the airport perimeter, where can you go? Geneva belongs to our people. By dawn, all this mess you've made will be glossed over and done with.'
Saxon listened to the other man's words, feeling for a lie beneath them. He'd heard Anna Kelso's voice, just for a moment, so he knew she was still alive. But there was something else, something in Namir's manner, the same thing he'd heard when the mission in Detroit had been disrupted. The van… the bomb… If it had gone right, Namir's tone would have told the tale.
He decided to take a chance. 'I'm not the one who just blew his objective. Taggart will be spooked. He won't show. You'll never get to him.'
Namir's reply was all the confirmation he needed. 'I beg to differ. Our friend in the Humanity Front has more courage than you credit him for. Believe me, he will speak tomorrow. We'll make certain of it. Too much has been invested in this for an irritant like you to derail things now.'
Flashlight beams danced on the ground nearby, and Saxon shifted, stealthily making his way around the rear of the robot garage. Across a service road, he could see a chain-link fence and the shapes of cargo warehouses beyond. He sprinted from shadow to shadow.
Namir's voice dogged him all the way. 'I have the woman, Kelso. Your fellow fugitive. I want your full and complete attention, Ben, or she dies. And it won't be quick. I'll give her to Barrett to toy with, do you understand?'
'Kill her,' Saxon bit out the bluff, ice forming in his gut. 'She's nothing to me.'
Namir chuckled. 'You really are a very poor liar. You won't let Kelso perish, not while there's a chance to save her. Let me tell you how I know that.'
Saxon gripped a section of the fence and ripped it open, ducking under. In a moment, he was inside the darkened warehouse, moving away from the airport proper.
'You re guilty.' The ghost-voice echoed through his thoughts. 'Guilty about the men you lost during Operation Rainbird. Guilty about those who lost their lives tonight while you didn't. You're guilty because you didn't keep your promises. Am I close?'
'Piss off.' The words slipped from him before he could stop himself.
