***
SARAH STORM
The air pressure shifted the moment she and Nick cleared the clouds.LAX sprawled beneath her like a wounded beast.The runways were choked with grounded aircraft.Sirens blared across the terminals, while security lights sliced frantically through the dark.
And above it all, a Dioscuri variant darted through the night sky in jagged, unnatural bursts.
“Southwest terminal’s compromised,” Nick’s voice crackled over the comm, calm despite the chaos.“Evacuation’s underway, but the variant’s picking targets close to the fuel lines.”
Sarah banked left, letting the wind catch her body as she dropped into a tight arc.The sensation of freefall had always been instinctual for her.Gravity wasn’t a thing she obeyed so much as a suggestion she negotiated with.
Below her, the Dioscuri variant dove toward a cluster of airport vehicles.
“Got visual,” Sarah said.“Engaging.”
She folded her wings into her body.letting speed gather until her skin prickled with cold.The wind tore past her ears.The runway lights rushed toward her like streaks of molten gold.
She aimed for the variant’s blind spot and closed the final distance in a heartbeat.
He sensed her a second too late.
Sarah struck his shoulder with the full momentum of her descent, sending him spinning end over end above the tarmac.The impact jarred her bones, but she righted herself quickly, wings flaring wide as she used the turbulence to regain altitude.
The variant’s snarl cut through the wind.
He came at her with stunning acceleration.
She baited him upward, drawing him away from the fuel lines, the civilians, the bottlenecked aircraft.Higher and higher they climbed, until the air thinned and the lights of the airport blurred into distant constellations.
“Nick, now,” she said.
A sonic boom cracked across the sky.
Nick appeared in a rush of compressed air, velocity bending the night around him.He collided with the Dioscuri mid-ascent, locking his arms around the variant’s torso in a controlled grapple.
“Got him,” Nick grunted.
The two men plummeted.
Sarah folded her wings and dove after them.The wind roared, her eyes streaming as she kept them in sight.Nick was maintaining his chokehold as the Dioscuri thrashed wildly, trying to break free.
They dropped toward the coastline at terrifying speed.
At the last possible moment, Nick disengaged.
The Dioscuri hit the ocean like a falling star, an eruption of water exploding upward.Sarah caught Nick midair, her arms straining with the force, and together they arced back toward the shoreline.
He was shaking from adrenaline.Nick never feared the fall.That was their bond in a nutshell.He trusted gravity enough to defy it, and she trusted herself enough to catch him.
They touched down near the loading bays just as a Protogenus response team wheeled a device toward them—sleek, metallic, humming with the all-too-familiar green glow.
“Weapon at twelve o’clock,” Sarah said.
Nick didn’t hesitate.
He put on a burst of speed, snatched the device from the operatives’ hands, and flew it so high they vanished into the darkness.Then he dropped it straight into the ocean.
A soft, distantsplashfollowed.
