It made me wonder why she hadn’t taken the time to pull me out, too…and then I came across the stairwell that had been opened to the sky.

  “This thing’s got a basement,” I said, and Mack sounded out of breath when he replied.

  “It’s why you’re still there. Get us into it.”

  Okay, then.

  At first, I couldn’t see his point. I mean, the whole damned stairwell was open to the sky, so getting into the basement had to be the easy part, right? I bolted down the steps, thanking the Stars that enclosed spaces weren’t one of my fears. Airlocks aside, caves, stairwells, and cellars were all okay. I descended as fast as my feet could carry me, comming Mack as I went.

  “What am I gonna find?”

  “Busy. Nothing good.”

  Busy was he? Well, okay, then. I guessed I was on my own.

  And nothing good? I wished I’d seen a blaster I could have used in the blast zone, but not a single one of them had been intact, so I was stuck with the Glazer. Place like this, though…chances were I’d find another set of guards before very long.

  Man, I hated it when I was right.

  And these guys had known I was coming…or that someone would be coming.

  The first shot clipped the air near my shoulder, and I flattened myself back against the walls.

  “Give it up!” I shouted, trying to sound a lot bigger than I really was…and like there was more than one of me.

  “Odyssey, right?”

  I thought about that.

  “Not really…”

  I heard the cautious scrape of someone extricating themselves from a hiding place. When it spoke, again, the voice was a lot nearer.

  “Then who?”

  Footsteps accompanied the question. They were probably meant to be too soft for me to hear, but whoever made them needed a lot more practice before that ever happened. I checked the charge on the Glazer, and decided dishonesty was the best policy.

  “Bluebirds.”

  The footsteps stopped, and then started, again.

  “That’s not what we heard.”

  Judging from the nearness of the words, whoever was coming was about ready to strike.

  I ducked, and the hand that lashed around the corner missed its mark. I didn’t. As I’d ducked, I’d taken a crouched step to the side, pivoting so I could come up under the grab.

  Two hard jabs to the gut doubled the guy over and sent him stumbling back. A knee to the face as I grabbed either side of his head and brought it down, had him disoriented enough for me to push him back. The fast, hard kick to the knee took him to the floor, as I looked for anyone else.

  Unfortunately, it also meant his body was no longer acting as a shield, and since he wasn’t the only guard I had to contend with, and the next one was still behind cover, I was in trouble. I caught sight of movement and snapped a shot in their direction, as I stepped past the guard, making sure to keep out of grab range.

  He was down, but I doubted he was completely out—and Bluebirds had a reputation.

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  “They sent you on your own?”

  Apparently, I wasn’t living up to it, so I lied, again.

  “They always send me on my own. Wanta find out why?”

  And I accompanied that with the most sinister grin I could manage.

  “No.”

  I threw myself sideways as several shots seared the space I’d been standing in.

  “Too bad,” I said, trying to think of what a hard-assed solo killer might do, if they were in my shoes—and diving back across the floor for the first guard’s dropped blaster. He was still moving, so I shot him in the head with Glazer, as I went. His partner was unimpressed.

  “You bitch!”

  More shots split the space I’d been in, and I realized that someone needed to spend more time on the range. Lucky me.

  The blaster was an easy grab, and I rolled past the first guy’s inert form as I picked it up.

  Even luckier me.

  Luck had very little to do with my next two shots, however. I had spent a lot of time on the range—and then I’d spent a lot more time doing simulations of this very thing. I could shoot on the move, and usually hit what I aimed at…usually…

  My first two shots splintered crates, but they did make my opponent keep their head down long enough for me to find my knees, pivot, and get my eyes on the barricade they were hiding behind—and by ‘they’, I meant ‘he’ or ‘she’, since I was pretty sure there was only one of them left. For a long moment, nothing happened.

  Whoever was behind the crates didn’t move a muscle, and neither did I—although, I was going to have to move, soon, because this position was hard to hold. The guard saved me the trouble. I saw the top of her head as she bobbed up to see where I was, saw her face explode as my first two shots reached her, and watched the third bolt blow a hole in the door behind her.

  Her partner must have dialed up his settings on his way across the floor, because there was no way known the shots fired at me had had anywhere near this amount of power. When nothing else moved, and I heard no protest about her demise, I moved around the barrier.

  There’d only been two.

  That was both a relief and a worry. I slid past the mess I’d created, and tried the door. When it swung open, I guessed these guys had been relying on their position to keep what they were guarding secure.

  Amateurs.

  I wondered where the real protection lay.

  “Most of it was upstairs.”

  It was a relief to hear Mack’s voice, but I wasn’t going to take his word for it. I slid through the door like there was another ambush waiting on the other side—and I wasn’t comforted to find there wasn’t. The corridor was exactly like the ones upstairs, except the doors were spaced more widely apart. I didn’t want to look to see what lay behind the first one, I really didn’t, but I hacked the coding, and cracked it, anyway.

  The kid was alone. He looked up when the door opened, saw me looking through it, and gave a moan of fear. I stepped back and away, pulling the door closed between us, and locking it, again.

  “Mack…” I managed, suppressing the urge to be sick. “I need…”

  Nausea roiled my stomach, and I stopped, swallowing convulsively against the urge to throw up. Fortunately, Mack got it.

  “Delight is sending a team. Hack the feeds, and make sure none of them are still being harmed.”

  Beyond being locked in a room, waiting for… I pushed the thought away. Once I’d made sure the kids were out of danger, I was going to go hunting, but first…

  I sat down with my back to the wall, and went back into the system, finding the feeds for each room, and the corridor leading to where I was. I probably should have found a secure room to do it from, or even remembered to lock the door behind me. Being brought back to reality by a size thirteen combat boot in the ribs was not something I ever wished to repeat.

  I jolted back to reality, trying to push to my feet, only to have what I assumed was the same size thirteen stomped hard in the centre of my chest. The impact slammed me back down and I remembered to shut my mouth, drop blaster and Glazer both, and raise my hands. I sure as shit hoped Delight had decided to come in person, because the muzzle and barrel I was staring at looked like they were ready to do business.

  I took a breath, and saw them twitch, so I closed my eyes, and spoke really, really fast, hoping I’d make it to the end of what I wanted to say, before Mr. Size Thirteen pulled the trigger.

  “I’m part of Mack’s team. I need to get back in the system, and make sure they didn’t leave anyone behind to hurt the kids. I’m going to do that now, okay?”

  I didn’t bother waiting for an answer, and the pressure on my chest didn’t ease, but no-one said anything, and I sank back into the system, running through the scans to each room, and doing my best to ensure nothing was happening anywhere that I needed to stop.

  In truth, all I wanted to do was run away screaming, to take a long hot shower and scrub myself over with something stronger than soap, to find and destroy every visitor who had ever logged into this stars-forsaken complex, to... I found the girl Mack had promised to retrieve.

  She was in the last room I checked, and I came out of my head to find I wasn’t looking down the business end of a blaster, anymore. The corridor was full of movement, around me, but I’d been left on the floor, beside a familiar set of size thirteens.

  I must have moved, because the boots shifted, and the soldier standing in them looked down.