Chapter 13

13

D avis burst through the door, a woman thrown over his shoulder. "We've been sold out. They know we're here. We need to move, now!"

"Put me down, you jackass," his captive snarled, struggling against his grip. "I can walk on my own."

"Ryke," Davis bit out, holding on to her with effort, "we've got a plus one."

He tightened his hold, his jaw clenching. "Now's not the time for stubbornness. We need to move fast."

"And I need you to stop treating me like a damsel in distress," the woman shot back, her voice gaining strength. She pushed against his chest, finally breaking free and landing unsteadily on her feet.

Jesh arched an eyebrow at the exchange, tension crackling in the air between Davis and the mystery woman. Their eyes locked in a fierce battle of wills, neither backing down.

"You're being an asshole," the blonde spat, straightening her disheveled clothing. "I can take care of myself."

The world exploded as the windows shattered. Jesh ducked and turned, automatically shielding her face from the shower of glass raining down. Light glinted off the deadly shards as they cascaded over her shoulders like a deadly waterfall. Smoke filled the room, cutting off her vision as the stench of ozone and burnt circuitry filled her lungs, choking her.

She solved that by not breathing anymore as her body hummed with sudden energy, her mind racing at an impossible speed. Covak's huge hands reached through the smoke as he tried to push her behind him for protection.

Something inside her refused. Time slowed, the world around her coming into sharp focus as she reached for a nearby tray of medical instruments. The first soldier burst through the door, but she was already moving, letting the tray fly as it and its contents headed for his face in a lethal flock.

Covak roared, his massive form barreling into the two soldiers who stepped over the first one she'd taken out. The sight of him in action sent an unexpected thrill through her. She pushed the feeling aside, focusing on the task at hand.

"This way!" a voice called out. She turned to see the blonde woman who had been arguing with Davis gesturing frantically at them. "I know a way out!"

Grabbing Covak's arm, Jesh shoved him that way. "Let's move!"

Within seconds they were all crowded into the cramped passageway, the hidden door sealing itself behind them with a soft whisper. The din of pursuing footsteps and bellowed commands cut off to almost nothing, giving way to the harsh breathing of the group as they cleared the last of the smoke from the grenades from their lungs. However, Jesh had to admit as she started breathing again, the air in here didn't help. It was thick and musty, laced with the unmistakable scent of reprocessed air.

The blonde turned to face them, her face pale but determined in the dim emergency lighting.

"Not being funny," Ryke growled. "But who the draanth are you?"

"I'm Mira," she replied, not backing down from his steely gaze. "Doctor Rettnor's PA… or I was. I know a way out of here."

Anson's eyes narrowed, the big B'Kaar's posture tense. "Why should we trust you?" he demanded, his hand hovering near his weapon in silent threat.

Davis stepped between his teammate and the blonde. "She turned on her boss. Betrayed him to help us. We can trust her."

Jesh watched the exchange, noting the slight tremor in Mira's hands and the way her gaze kept darting to the closed door behind them. She saw fear there, but also a steely resolve.

Anson still looked skeptical, his jaw clenched.

"The enemy of my enemy is my friend," she said with a shrug. "Besides, without me, you'll never get out of this building without being caught."

Reapers exchanged glances, and then Ryke gave a curt nod, his ice-blue eyes locked on Mira. "We need to get to the landing pad. Can you get us there?"

"Not a chance." She shook her head, blonde strands escaping her messy ponytail. "They'll be locking the building down. We won't get past security."

"We have to," Ryke countered. "Rann will be coming in the shuttle for us. I'd really prefer that he didn't have to destroy half the building to get us out."

Lines creased between her brows as she thought. After a moment, her eyes lit up. "The roof," she suggested. "It's a viable alternative."

"How many people know about these corridors?" Jesh asked, looking around them. These definitely weren't public-facing areas. In fact, they looked a lot like maintenance corridors, but she couldn't work out why a medical clinic would need them.

"Just me," Mira said. "I had to dig out the building plans a few years ago for one of the operating room refits, and I realized they were here.

Ryke considered this for a heartbeat before nodding. "Lead the way," he ordered.

Covak turned to her, the dim light of the corridor making his eyes glow as he handed her his backup weapon—a sleek, black handgun with an oddly curved grip.

Her fingers closed around it, the cool metal a reassuring presence in her palm. She took a moment to familiarize herself with its weight, her thumb instinctively finding the safety.

"Thanks," she murmured, the word barely audible over the soft hum of the ventilation system shafts that ran over their heads. Because of the scan, she'd had to leave her own sidearm behind, and walking into the clinic without a firearm had left her feeling vulnerable and exposed—helpless again.

The group followed Mira through the rabbit warren of dark back corridors. Emergency lights pulsed an angry red, casting eerie shadows that danced across the walls. She led them with a confidence that said she'd used these passages a lot, her small frame darting around corners and through maintenance access ways until she paused by a door.

"This as far as these can take us," she said, tension written in every line of her small body. "We have to go the rest of the way to the roof in the main corridors."

As they stepped into the corridor, the Reapers fanned out, their movements fluid and practiced. Jesh fell into step with them, her body responding instinctively to the unspoken cues of a battle formation. She'd never fought alongside these alien mercenaries before, but she moved into place like she'd been a member of the team for years.

Covak looked over his should and smiled. She couldn't help smiling back. He was behaving himself now, not trying to protect her anymore but letting her be who she was… who she'd always been. A solider.

They approached an intersection, and Mira held up a hand, stopping the group instantly.

"Wait," she whispered as she looked around the concealing cover of a pillar. "This is a choke point. They'll be expecting us to come this way."

Jesh frowned as she tucked herself in behind Mira.

"Do you have military training?" she asked, even as she cast a glance down at the woman. She was tiny, almost frail-looking, with the gaunt features of someone who had been depriving themselves of proper nutrition. She couldn't have been more than twenty, which meant she was far too young to be a veteran.

A blush crept across Mira's cheeks.

"Gamer," she admitted. "I'd like to go pro, really. But Dennis would never allow it. He smashed my rig."

"You should go definitely pro," Jesh said, wanting nothing more than to go back and give that asshole doctor a piece of her mind. She knew a lot about having her choices taken away, and it looked like Mira did as well. "You're good at this."

Mira smiled, genuine happiness on her face. But before she could say anything else, the sound of fast-approaching heavy footsteps jolted them back to reality.

"We need to move," Anson growled, turning to cover the rear.

"Follow me. Quickly," Mira said, leading them out of cover and down the corridors at a run.

As Mira led them toward a heavy metal door, Jesh's eyes flicked to the keypad beside it. She knew before her onboard fed her schematics that she could hack it. Before she could make a move toward it, though, Mira punched in a code, her fingers flying across the keypad with a practiced ease.

The door hissed open, revealing a stairwell that led up to the roof, the dim lighting above a contrast to the harsh glare of the corridors they'd left behind.

"It's just up here," Mira said, her voice low and urgent as she gestured for them to follow her.

They headed up the stairs in a tight group, and Jesh's senses were on high alert for any sign of danger. As they burst onto the roof, the cool night air hit her face like a slap, a welcome respite from the sterile environment they'd left behind. She looked around and her face tightened.

Just one problem.

They weren't alone…

A dozen heavily armed soldiers in tactical gear surrounded them, their weapons trained on the small group. And at the center of it all stood Amanda Hargrove, her eyes blazing with a hatred so intense it made Jesh's skin crawl. Her business clothes and the perfect blowout of her hair was gone, replaced by a scraped back bun and combat gear. She held a nasty looking assault rifle.

"Did you really think you could escape, Elena ?" Her "mother" sneered, her voice dripping with contempt. "You're nothing but a failed experiment, scrap metal pretending to be a person."

Jesh clenched her fists at her sides, anger surging through her like a tidal wave. But before she could respond, Amanda's gaze shifted to Mira, half concealed behind the group.

"And you," Amanda spat, lifting her gun. "Fucking traitor!"

Time seemed to slow down as Amanda's finger tightened on the trigger. Jesh moved on pure instinct, throwing herself in front of Mira. The crack of the gunshot rang out, and her head snapped back on her neck.

Everything went black as something inside Jesh's head shattered. Memories exploded outward in a violent torrent of knowledge, images, and sensations that held her paralyzed in place for what felt like an eternity.

Zero point three four seconds, her onboard informed her in its dry voice. Recommend movement before adversary can react.

She blinked. Everything. She remembered everything cascading backward from the current moment in time.

The experiments… training… pain… the explosion… and Dael… oh god, Dael .

"Jesh!" Covak's anguished roar cut through the fog of memory, overlaying the echo of Dael's voice from the day when the portal that had brought them to this universe had torn their ship apart.

Jesh's eyes snapped open, her vision clearer than ever before. She was no longer confused or uncertain. She knew exactly what she was… she was a cyborg created for war. And right now, she had a battle to win.

Her mind raced, processing information at light speed. Using her onboard system, she reached out and brushed Anson's circuits. He was easy to find, a blazing beacon of cybernetic energy on the roof.

Anson, I need you to synchronize with me, she projected through a neural link.

What the— Anson's mental voice was filled with surprise. How are you doing this?

No time to explain. Trust me.

He hesitated for a split second before relenting. Alright, I'm in.

Their cybernetic systems synchronized, and she gasped, momentarily overwhelmed by the dual sensory input. She could see through Anson's eyes, feel the tension in his muscles as he prepared to strike. It was disorienting yet exhilarating.

What the draanth? This is… incredible, Anson's voice echoed in her mind.

She allowed herself a brief moment of surprise. She shouldn't have been able to link this deeply with another cyborg, especially not one of a different technology from an entirely different system. Yet here she was, sharing Anson's senses as if they were her own. For a moment she frowned, sure she sensed two presences within him, but then the other was gone like it had never been there.

Odd, but a problem for later.

Together, they broke away from the rest of the Reapers and tore through their enemies, their enhanced strength and speed giving them the advantage. Her fists connected with flesh and bone, each impact sending shockwaves that would have stopped a human in their tracks, but she barely registered them. She reveled in the familiar sensation of combat, her body finally operating at its full potential after so long.

Energy bolts filled the air around them, their trajectories clearly visible to her enhanced senses. Through Anson's eyes, she caught glimpses of herself in action—a blur of deadly efficiency even as he kept up with her.

On your left! she warned.

He reacted without hesitation, ducking low as a soldier swung an energy cannon toward him. In one fluid motion, he snatched the weapon and then swept the attacker's legs out from under him as he broke it in two.

Thanks .

She smiled.

No worries.

Every circuit and neuron in her body hummed with energy as they fought. She processed multiple data streams with ease—her own sensory input, Anson's perspective, and the constant flow of tactical information from her onboard.

As the last of the soldiers fell at her feet, she shook her head and looked over at Anson. She'd fought linked before, many times, but always with another cyborg trained to link with the group. And even then, it had been surface level, and she'd been fed data for her onboard to parse. She'd never linked that way before, but she had no time to dwell on that now.

The battle was won, but the war was far from over.

The roar of engines cut through the gunfire. She looked up to see the Reapers' combat shuttle balanced precariously on the edge of the roof, its back ramp lowered invitingly.

"Come on!" Rann shouted over his shoulder from the pilot's chair in the cockpit, his voice barely audible over the whine of the engines. "I've got heat incoming and we're sitting ducks here!"

"Jesh!" Covak yelled, his massive form silhouetted against the shuttle's interior lights as he stood on the edge of the ramp, his hand hooked around the hydraulics as he reached the other out to her. "We need to go now!"

But she wasn't done. Her gaze locked on to Amanda Hargrove, who was crouched behind a ventilation unit on the other side of the roof, clutching her injured arm.

"Not yet," she growled, her voice barely recognizable even to her own ears as she stormed across the roof toward her "mother."

Anger fueled her, and she barely needed her enhanced strength to toss aside the heavy metal cover her prey cowered behind. Jesh's lip curled back in disgust. The human had taken cover as soon as Jesh and Anson had torn into her soldiers, not willing to put herself on the line. Amanda scrambled backward with a gasp, her eyes wide with fear as she fumbled for her handgun.

Jesh reacted instantly, Amanda's reflexes no match for hers. A single shot rang out, and Amanda's arm went limp, the gun clattering to the ground.

"You fucking… machine!" Amanda spat, her face contorted with a mixture of pain and hatred.

Jesh snorted. "Yeah, yeah… believe me. I've heard it all before. And from assholes who actually know what I am," she said as she pressed the barrel of her gun under Amanda's jaw, feeling a surge of satisfaction as fear and the knowledge she was looking her own death in the face filled Amanda's eyes. "Where is he? Where is Jex?"

Amanda's laugh was bitter and broken. "What are you on about? Who is Jex?"

Jesh's finger tightened reflexively on the trigger, but she held herself back. She needed to find out where Jex was… where they were holding him… whether they'd broken the encryption on his onboard and what information they'd managed to retrieve from it.

But before she could ask anything else or demand answers from the human, Amanda jerked violently, her spine bowing into a hard arc. Blood bloomed in a deadly scarlet flower in one of her eyes and she slumped to the floor. Lifeless.

"Shit!" Davis swore, looking over Jesh's shoulder. "Intra-cranial explosive on a remote trigger. Someone didn't want her talking. Come on!"

She stood frozen for a moment, staring down at the lifeless body. Shit. The answers she needed were in that dead brain. Covak's hand on her shoulder jolted her back to reality.

"We need to go," he said softly, his deep voice rumbling through her.

Nodding, she turned and ran for the shuttle with him. It was already starting to take off, the other Reapers already aboard, but she wasn't worried. For her, the leap was nothing. Every circuit in her body hummed with energy as she landed on the ramp, Covak right next to her.

Surprise washed over the faces of the alien mercenaries as they looked at her, and she bit back a smile as she straightened up. No human could have made that leap.

But she wasn't human.

She had finally remembered who—and what—she truly was. And nothing would ever be the same again.