Xavier didn’t flinch at the name. Didn’t blink. He stared with the flat focus of a predator.
“Who are you?” I stepped out from behind Xavier’s human shield.
He immediately shifted to block me again. His grip tightened on my hip, fingers digging in hard enough to bruise. Stay back. The command was silent, desperate.
The stranger’s gaze, cold and mechanical, slid to me, then back to Xavier’s palm on my waist. He tilted his head. Genuine surprise cracked his boredom.
“Well. That’s new.”
“Answer the question.” I tried to project Emergency Room Charge Nurse authority while standing in a freezing alley with a fugitive. “Who are you, and how do you know...” I stopped myself from saying Xavier’s name. “Him.”
“I’m the guy risking his neck to keep you two from ending up as lab rats.” He took a step forward.
Xavier let out a low, warning sound. Not a growl, exactly. A vibration that traveled through his back into mine. He drew the knife.
The stranger stopped. Examined the three-inch blade, then Xavier’s face. A smirk touched his lips. “A serrated fishing knife? Really? Budget cuts hitting the department hard?”
“He’ll use it.” My words shook just a little. “He killed two cops with his bare hands. I don’t think he needs the knife to hurt you.”
The amusement sharpened. “I know exactly what he can do, nurse. I watched him clear a room of cartel enforcers in Bogota in under forty seconds. But usually, he doesn’t stand in front of the civilians. Usually, he is the threat.”
He locked onto Xavier. “Status report, Blackout. You’re off-mission and your signal is broadcasting to every hunter in a five-hundred-mile radius. Explain.”
Xavier didn’t answer. Didn’t even look confused. He tracked the man’s center of mass, calculating the most efficient way to stop his heart.
I watched the stranger wait. The silence stretched, thin and agonizing.
“I asked for a report.” The tone cooled. “Don’t tell me you’ve gone rogue like Reaper. One defector is a tragedy, two is a statistical anomaly, three is just poor management.”
“He can’t answer you.”
The gaze snapped back to me. “He’s refusing orders? That’s... disappointing. I had fifty bucks on him being the loyal one.”
“No.” Frustration overrode fear. “He can’t speak. Literally. Physically. He doesn’t have a voice.”
For the first time, the mask slipped. He studied Xavier, really studied him this time, scanning with that terrifying competence.
“Mute? Since when?”
“Since I fished him out of the river four days ago. He was half-dead. Hypothermia, blood loss, multiple lacerations. He doesn’t remember you. Doesn’t remember Bogota. Doesn’t remember being called Blackout.”
The stranger stared. Xavier stared back, hate radiating off him in waves.
“No memory.” More to himself than us. “And the vocal suppression... that’s crude. Even for them.” A short, sharp laugh that sounded like dry leaves crunching. “It’s starting to fall apart. All the King’s horses and all the King’s men...”
“Who are ‘they’?” I stepped forward again. Xavier’s arm blocked me instantly, his body heat a barrier against the freezing drizzle. He was shivering, subtle tremors I only noticed because I knew his body better than my own by now. He shouldn’t be out here. He needed antibiotics and warmth, not a standoff with a sociopath in a designer coat.
“Call me Havoc. And you need to put the knife away, Blackout. We have maybe four minutes before a satellite sweep flags your heat signatures. If you want to live, you’ll stop acting like a feral dog and start thinking like the asset you were built to be.”
Xavier didn’t lower the blade. If anything, his grip tightened.
Havoc rolled his eyes. “Stubborn. You were always stubborn. It was the only personality trait they couldn’t scrub out of you.” He looked at me. “Your post on the forum. You asked about the chip.”
“You told us to delete it.”
“I told you to delete it because you were basically lighting a flare and waving it at the Death Star. Do you have any idea who you’re dealing with? You think this is about the police?”
“Two dead cops usually bring the police.”
