The Phoenix Variant: The Fifth Column 3 Read online

  Chapter 55

  Get back up, Sophia told herself. Get back up.

  She crawled to one knee. The corners of her vision seemed to pulse and curl. Denton was searching for his pistol. It was halfway between them.

  He ran for it.

  She ran for it.

  A ripple of explosions tore the ground up from under them. The blood-smeared marble of the Grand Central main concourse cracked into violent shards and the center dropped inward. Sophia never got to the pistol. Denton scooped his hand to collect it, but it bounced off the marble and skittered into the collapsing floor.

  Denton went with it. The transmitter tumbled from his grasp. He slid down the center. Sophia tried to keep her footing. The information booth in the center disappeared through a cloud of debris.

  Czarina and the Commander were still lying on the outer edge. Sophia wanted to get to Czarina but she was too far in to climb out. The marble floor gave way underneath Sophia. She dropped through the abyss, bounced off displaced slabs of marble, shuttling feet-first toward Denton.

  Sophia fell with the center of the concourse, down a waterfall of debris. She landed, rolled down a mountain of debris and landed on the level below. She wiped her face. Her hand came away smeared with dust and blood. She was on the lower concourse now. Quickly, she moved away from the rubble in case more chunks dropped from above. She searched for Denton’s USP pistol and for the transmitter, but she couldn’t see anything through the cloud of debris.

  Chapter 56

  Jay rolled clear of the sword. It sliced through the tourniquet on his leg. He looked down. The entry wound in his thigh was finally healing and the tourniquet was due for removal.

  ‘Oh, thanks,’ he said.

  The soldier with the sword advanced.

  The train platform was covered in fiery debris and chunks of carriage. Behind the soldier, other soldiers pressed forward, swords and spears gleaming orange. Jay leaped onto the fallen carriage to avoid another swipe. Not one but two soldiers had clearly made it their mission to cleave Jay’s head from his shoulders. Both leaped onto the carriage, sword and spear cutting the air toward him.

  Jay dropped into an empty window, past a row of seats. His stomach burned but it had come a long way toward healing while he’d been confined to this platform. He landed in the other row, quickly climbed the seats into the aisle. One soldier dropped in behind him, sword slashing. Jay rolled from its path, his shoulder crunching along an armrest. Everything in the carriage was sideways. He moved quickly, feet alternating between the luggage compartment and the edge of the headrests. He leaped up toward the row of seats above, stepped up on the outside armrest and sprang off the seats until he reached the window. He was out and rolling along the scorched surface. A spear hunted him. He diverted, leaped off the train and back onto the platform.

  ‘Get out of here!’ DC yelled.

  Jay saw him exchange blows with two soldiers while their leader, the crazy woman, circled him in search of an opening.

  Nasira was below Jay, fending off another soldier with just her knife. Nasira cut an artery along the inside of a soldier’s elbow, and then the inside of his thigh. She stole his sword and called to Jay.

  He landed on the platform—unarmed—and followed her into the train carriage on the other side, the train that was still upright and mostly intact. He didn’t like the narrow aisle but it was this or the open ground crawling with Batmen.

  ‘What about DC?’ Jay shouted.

  ‘Not my problem,’ Nasira said.

  A soldier cut Nasira off and thrust his spear toward her. She stepped out of the aisle, forcing Jay to do the same. Nasira brought her sword down on the spear, splintering it into a staff. Jay took the end—now a short spear—and threw it into the soldier. It struck him above the collarbone. He still moved forward, with half a spear.

  Jay spun to find another soldier behind him, wielding two puglio daggers. Jay was unarmed again. He retreated in time for the first dagger to sink into the foam headrest. Jay was trapped in the window seat. He avoided the second dagger by leaping over the seats into the next aisle. The soldier lunged over the seat after him. Jay leaned back, his neck inches from the blade. He gripped the armrest, thumb over the button, and kicked the chair. It thrust back, pinning the soldier between two seats. Jay used the kick to push himself over another row, away from the soldier.

  He found himself beside the spear-wielding soldier, the spear end still embedded below his neck. The soldier drew a puglio of his own and closed on Nasira. Jay wrapped a hand over the soldier’s eyes and used his other hand to rip the spear out. He now had a short staff with a spear tip at his disposal.

  He kneed the soldier in his lower back, driving him into Nasira’s sword. This gave Jay enough room to fend off the dual-puglio-armed soldier with his spear tip. It wasn’t ideal, but at least he had something to keep his arms from being sliced.

  ‘Go!’ Jay yelled.

  Nasira jumped into the aisle, sword in one hand, and moved to the end. Jay kept her rear covered, retreating as the daggers closed on him. He found himself back to back with Nasira at the end of the carriage. She had stopped.

  ‘Which way?’ Jay said.

  The puglio wielding soldier moved toward him with confident strides.

  ‘Outside,’ Nasira said.

  She changed direction, wrenched the doors open beside them, and skewered a soldier.

  Jay followed her out and closed the doors behind him just as the puglio guy reached him. On the platform the woman’s soldiers were everywhere.

  ‘Shit,’ he said.

  Two soldiers broke off and moved for Nasira and himself.

  Behind Jay, the puglio guy was pushing the doors open. Jay pivoted and drove the spear tip between the doors. It struck the puglio guy through the bridge of his nose, right through the forebrain, killing him instantly. His hands slipped and the doors shut again, the spear tip pinned between them. Jay tried to draw it out but it was too wide.

  Nasira weaved to avoid a soldier and counter-attacked with her sword.

  Jay couldn’t stand here forever. He ran. Scooped up an abandoned carbine and used it to deflect a sword. Two swords. He was trapped between two soldiers. He held the carbine with one hand on the pistol grip, the other on the barrel. He caught the blade with the top of the rail. The notches stopped the sword from slipping along the carbine.

  He stepped in toward one soldier, deflected another blow with the sword, and jabbed the barrel into the soldier’s neck. The sharp edge of the carbine’s flash suppressor crushed his Adam’s apple, knocking him to the ground. Jay wasn’t close enough to steal the sword so he left it. He kept moving, circling the other soldier.

  With both hands on his carbine, Jay pinned the soldier’s sword hand to the side of the train carriage. The soldier used his free hand to draw his dagger. Jay slipped the carbine’s barrel up behind the soldier’s neck and pulled him in with the barrel as leverage. The dagger was out of range. The soldier stumbled past Jay, tripped over Jay’s well-placed knee and sprawled across the platform.

  Jay had a sword now.

  In the center of the platform DC was surrounded. His tachi sword was almost a blur. He divided its arcs precisely between the soldiers. Two lay nearby, bleeding out. Another two closed on him. Nasira was engaged with a third.

  He moved around Nasira and caught up with DC. He didn’t stand back to back: not a good idea when using a sword. They formed a loose figure-eight, enough clearance between them.

  ‘I told you to go,’ DC said, deflecting a sword.

  Jay laughed. Parried and sidestepped a sword. ‘You’re part of the family now.’

  ‘Like hell I am,’ DC said.

  Jay heard air escape a windpipe and knees drop to the platform. He turned just enough to make sure it was a soldier and not DC. As he did so, his own soldier moved in for an attack.

  The soldier’s sword came down in an overhead strike. Jay went to intercept the vertical strike with a horizontal one—the typi
cal response—but this time he moved differently. Something he’d picked up from Nasira. He sidestepped and ran his sword along the soldier’s blade, altering its path. The soldier’s sword reached waist height, having cut nothing but air. Jay’s sword was on top of his. Jay changed trajectory, flicked his sword up into the soldier’s neck.

  It was over.

  DC and Nasira stood nearby. The soldiers were either dead or losing vast amounts of blood across the platform.

  The leader of the soldiers, Crazy Jamaican Woman, seemed impressed. With her engraved sword in one hand and a pistol in the other, she aimed the pistol at DC. She stood near the ramp at the end of the platform. Far enough away that he had no hope of closing on her. But close enough to make an accurate shot with her pistol.

  ‘This pistol be not fingerprint coded,’ she said. ‘Drop your weapons.’

  ‘How about you let us go and we don’t kill you?’ Nasira said.

  ‘Some of your men can still be saved,’ DC said, ‘if you stop their bleeding in time.’

  She seemed unconcerned about the welfare of her troops.

  ‘I only be repeating this once,’ she said. ‘Drop your weapons. The gentleman in the suit belonging to me now.’

  Jay weighed up the possibility of running into the train carriage. It might not stop a round from her pistol, but it provided enough concealment. The trouble was, he was too far away. Nasira was the closest—she could make it. DC, maybe, but her sights were on him. Jay knew he could take a hit, and maybe DC was wearing ballistic protection.

  Nasira reluctantly discarded her sword.

  DC gripped his tighter. ‘Listen lady, I’ll only be repeating this once,’ he said. ‘Lower your pistol and we walk. All of us.’

  Crazy Jamaican Woman squeezed the trigger. DC collapsed. The tachi sword slipped from his grasp.

  ‘Now,’ she said to Jay. ‘Drop the weapon.’

  DC was on his knees, hands over his chest. Jay wanted to drive his sword through her skull. But he couldn’t.

  He dropped his sword.

  ‘Everything cool,’ she said.

  Her aim shifted to Nasira. Jay saw her finger in the trigger guard again.

  ‘No,’ he said.

  She squeezed the trigger.

  A blade appeared through the Crazy Jamaican Woman’s neck. It missed her windpipe. It looked like a knife. The woman’s jaws worked, but she said nothing. The knife withdrew. Jay watched the woman stagger forward, one, two steps. She dropped the pistol.

  Jay could see the attacker behind her.

  Aviary.

  She clutched her knife with both hands. Her brilliantly red hair was darker, plastered wet against her forehead. Jay could barely see her dirt-smeared face and liquid eyes. She said nothing.

  Nasira was on one knee. She looked unharmed. She moved her hands across her body, checking for injuries. The window behind her was fractured. The round had gone wide. But DC didn’t look so good. He was face-down and covered in blood.

  The woman faced Aviary, her engraved sword now in both hands. Jay took up his sword and moved forward.

  ‘Silly girl,’ the woman said.

  She moved for Aviary.

  Jay broke into a sprint, but he knew as he ran that he wasn’t going to make it in time. Aviary didn’t retreat. She didn’t evade. She didn’t do anything. Her body was frozen in place. She clutched the knife over her chest. Her limbs were locked, her gaze transfixed on the woman with the engraved sword.

  Jay ran toward the ramp.

  The engraved sword drew back, ready to skewer her.

  Aviary was still.

  The blade drove in. Aviary stopped breathing.

  Jay screamed.

  Something shimmered behind Crazy Jamaican Woman.

  Someone was standing behind her. The engraved sword thrust forward, but wide. It missed Aviary. As Jay drew closer, he saw someone remove a knife from inside the woman’s collarbone and sweep it across the side of her neck. Blood pulsed from below her neck. The operative stepped back from the woman, let her slump to the floor. With her subclavian artery severed under the collarbone, she would bleed out inside ten seconds. Severing the carotid arteries in her neck was just a failsafe measure.

  Jay knew the technique because it was part of the sentry removal module in Project GATE.

  Operative, he thought, drawing to a careful halt twenty feet away.

  The operative glared at him. This one wasn’t Sophia’s friend. This operative wore a mask like the Blue Berets. Jay stood maybe ten feet from the discarded pistol. The operative didn’t appear to be carrying anything other than the knife. And if he did, he didn’t move for it.

  Jay lowered his sword and watched the operative shimmer out of visible wavelength. Jay adjusted to infrared and watched the operative move past Aviary and up the ramp without so much as glancing at the redhead.

  Nasira moved past Jay. ‘Check on DC!’

  Jay turned on his heel and ran back to DC. He was still lying face down. Jay reached him and checked his pulse.

  DC’s heart was still going strong.

  He rolled DC onto his side to find him blinking. His chest rose and fell with each breath.

  ‘You lucky son of a bitch,’ Jay said. He slapped DC on the chest.

  DC coughed, his hands reaching for the shattered ceramic plate under his vest.

  ‘Oh right, sorry,’ Jay said.

  Chapter 57

  Sophia stood at the perimeter of the haze. She couldn’t see or hear Denton, but she could smell his anger and desperation. He was close by, that she was sure of.

  She heard his footsteps crunching on debris before she saw him through the haze. He held the transmitter in one hand.

  ‘Which platform is the meteorite on?’ Denton said.

  Before Sophia could even think of an answer, he’d already taken it from her.

  ‘Good,’ he said. ‘Take me to it. Or I kill all your friends.’

  ‘If you do that, you lose the meteorite forever,’ she said. ‘How many years have you been—?’

  ‘If I hit the transmit switch,’ Denton said, ‘that’s a two for one. Jay and Nasira, last I checked.’

  His finger hovered over the transmit switch. He emerged from the haze, his white buttoned shirt streaked in blood and dirt, torn to reveal a pale gray covert vest underneath.

  ‘You’ve already lost Damien,’ Denton said. ‘His blood’s on your hands now. Tell me exactly where the meteorite is.’

  She was about to respond but he roared, screamed, at her. He’d heard her answer before she had a chance to speak and hadn’t taken it too kindly. He gripped the transmitter tightly. She thought he was going to press the button but he relented.

  ‘You don’t know where it is!’ he yelled. ‘How about we go find out?’

  Sophia thought of DC. She tried to undo the thought but it was too late. Denton had seen it. His face twisted into a close approximation of a smile.

  ‘There’s a start,’ he said. ‘Take me to your guard dog. Take me to DC.’

  ‘No,’ she said.

  His finger wavered over the button.

  You won’t press it, she thought.

  ‘Maybe I will,’ he said. ‘Maybe I’ll just destroy it all. The meteorite. Everyone you care about. Most importantly, you.’

  I don’t need to read your mind to know you’re lying.

  Denton stepped closer.

  The meteorite is worth more to you than me.

  ‘Care to find out?’ he said.

  You’re scared.

  Denton’s thumb ran the edge of the transmit button.

  ‘So are you,’ he said.

  Sophia tried not to think of any of her friends in particular, tried not to divulge any details Denton might find useful. She focused on him. On what he was doing now. She couldn’t consider a strategy because he’d see it coming.

  His hand trembled. He discarded the transmitter, started toward her. He wasn’t armed, but he didn’t seem to care. He ripped off the last of his s
hirt, leaving only his suit pants and gray ballistic vest—shoulders and triceps shiny with perspiration. His body gave off fresh waves of fury. Fury with little beyond.

  Under normal circumstances, Sophia would have welcomed the opportunity. And she wouldn’t stop. She would do what she should have done in Denver. She would kill him.

  But now it was different. He had an edge.

  Denton reached striking range. Sophia sidestepped. He was already there. His fists worked in rapid succession. She deflected, moved, kept the blows off her body. But he came in with precisely the right movement. The right timing. Faster. Quicker. Every time he got better. She was running out of reaction time. The blows glanced off her body.

  She thought of Damien, possibly dead. She thought of Czarina, dead. All because of him. She wanted to tear him apart. Her arms weaved between his. A blow glanced off her cheek. She absorbed the blow, moved along its trajectory. Drove her knee into his sternum.

  Denton avoided it, drove his foot hard into the side of her knee. She buckled, fell to her other knee. His elbow glanced her forehead. She moved barely in time, right into the path of an open palm. She felt her nose crunch under the pressure of his strike. She fell to her back.

  She used her legs to entrap him, knock him off balance—but he moved around them effortlessly. Came in from her side. One hand bore down on her forehead, twisting her head to one side. The other closed over her neck.

  ‘I’m going to take your life,’ he breathed. ‘And then I’m going to take my rock.’

  The pressure on her skull was incredible. But it wasn’t what worried her. His fingers crushed her neck.

  She couldn’t breathe.

  Her vision frayed.

  Her thoughts faded.

  She brushed her hand down his arm. He seemed confused by the motion. She focused. With the same hand, she pushed his hand off. The grip broke. Denton stared at it.

  She grabbed a piece of debris nearly. It was thin, disc-like. She didn’t think, just brought the object around. It slammed into the side of his neck. He almost lost consciousness from the blow. Sophia looked down to see she had struck him in the neck with an iPad. She was lying in a pile of rubble of Apple products from the store above.