“No time to stall. There’ll be more soon,” he says.
Ambrosia swipes the bodies to the side and clears a direct path to the door. Atlas is the first to exit. A whirl of pungent smoke in hues of gray and black wafts through the space. The thick clouds obstruct our vision. Even the suit’s visor has a difficult time picking up anything through the intense layers. I followAmbrosia out, stepping over Barbara’s cadaver, slicked with blooming blood from multiple entries to the skull and chest. That urge to vomit resurfaces and I try my best to swallow it down.
We file onto Main Street, the occasional clearance in the air allowing us to see ahead by several feet at a time. I keep my eye trained on Atlas, ensuring he stays within my view. I can’t lose him either. I won’t. It’s my peripheries that notice a shift in the landscape—a life form that wasn’t there before. Infrared outlines an approaching radio signature. It moves slowly, negligently, without a care in the world—without fear that a town burns around them. Unless they’re injured, this can’t be good.
From out of the thickened haze, a figure dressed in the bare minimum in sheer black swaggers in our direction. Flame tattoos wrap around the length of his forearms like a spindle—fire hovers above his palms. Levi glares triumphantly through the heavy smog, cradling death within his hands.
“Whom do I have the pleasure of burning?” he bellows maniacally.
He’s deranged. Frenzied. And he’s enjoying every goddamned second.
Atlas dissipates in the smoke and rematerializes behind Levi, draping an armored hand around the mercenary’s neck, the other hand holding a gun to his temple.
“Atlas!” I wail.
“Where’s Ezra Gray?” he seethes.
Levi’s mouth betrays him and a delightful laugh escapes. Atlas digs the SIG Sauer deeper into the mercenary’s skull.
“Oh, it’s you two,” Levi says. His laugh grows uncontrollably, but his entire frame stays unnaturally still as Atlas keeps the gun trained on him. “Angela has him. If I’m correct, they’ll be siphoning him of his abilities any moment now.”
I lose all feeling in my legs.
“No!”
Instinctively, Atlas presses the trigger. Even in the pandemonium that captures the valley, I can hear the audible click of the gun—the indication it’s still in safety mode. Levi grins and shoves Atlas off, consuming his suit with flames. Atlas disappears. Ambrosia raises clenched fists. I let gunfire loose, spraying the area around Levi. He vanishes in a flare. I lose sight of him as the smoke covers his every trace, raining hellfire around the vicinity. Ambrosia keeps back and I hope that Atlas has the instincts to do the same. A light flares behind a fresh cluster of clouds.
The equivalent of a meteor barrels right at me. I lunge away from the blast’s radius and right into Ambrosia’s figure. She stumbles and loses her footing. I land on the asphalt with a loud thud. The smoke clears, revealing a brief flash of Atlas falling on top of Levi. The two come clambering to the ground. Fire erupts from the mercenary’s palms and Atlas has to once again teleport to safety. Ambrosia is quick to her feet, swiping her hand aggressively to the right. Whether her attack did the trick or not, we’re not sure. Levi cackles, vanishing into the smoke. Behind me, I hear the thump of heavy boots, watching Atlas rejoin me and Ambrosia.
“Motherfucker!” Atlas roars.
Infrared is hardly doing its job. Where Levi vanished off to is a mystery. I peer around, HK trained and ready to fire. Seconds bleed into minutes. Time passes excruciatingly slowly. I take a large gulp of ventilated air when Ambrosia is once more swept off her feet. She slams to the ground on her ass. Levi mercilessly sends waves and waves of flames all over her suit. I twist, releasing more heavy gunfire. The mercenary deflects what he can with an erected wall of fire and flees the brief exchange. Ambrosia moves to her knees and flicks her wrist, managing tolift Levi in the air before he can escape. He drowns in the very smoke he’s guilty of conjuring.
I gun the trigger. A large detonation implodes and Levi’s figure careens through the sky. He’s swallowed by flame and smog. Atlas unclicks the safety on the SIG Sauer, waiting for the mercenary to resurface. Levi charges, freeing sporadic fire darts that hail past us. Some find their target in my armor, singeing the seemingly indestructible material. Ambrosia twists her frame and pulls Levi into her telekinetic embrace. She lifts him high, high, high, mimes grabbing him with two strong fists, taking hold of both ends of his body. She pulls.
Atlas teleports and reappears at Levi’s bottom end. He grabs the mercenary’s feet, and in one cruel, sweeping motion, Levi Finch splits in two.
Chapter 74
Ezra
Angela Barclay stands before me in the flesh—the head of the Barclay trafficking network—the bane of my fucking existence.
Callum won’t shut up about his success. He’d been watching the Angelics for months through the mirrors, gathering intel, searching for Proctus’s weak points. He was in Eureka during those final moments when Mara and Levi attacked us during our extraction. Callum knew to bide his time, hide out in the reflections of Eureka’s storefronts, in the mirror of the Angelics’ vehicles. It was there he took several captive after causing a collision; Callum interrogated them with the help of Angela, which was where they discovered Levi and Mara’s location and where to find the elusive Angelic safe haven.
“I killed Benji, too,” Callum boasts.
The urge to rip his throat out prevails amongst the myriad of emotions circling inside me. If my hands weren’t bound, I’d claw and tear at every one of these bastards for what they’ve done.Benji was the kid responsible for Proctus’s protective magical barrier. He made it possible to live our lives in peace, and this is what he got in return.
“Your friend Tommy led us to Eureka, which led us here. How does it feel to know the Angelics perished by my hand?”
I do what I do best: I keep silent and bide my time.
“You made a stupid decision running from me that night,” he says.
Tommy and innocent Angelics are dead because of me. I should have surrendered when I had the chance.
Angela laughs despite the ensuing chaos around us. It’s depraved and cold. I shudder in the hands that clasp me down. Her gait is relaxed as she eases toward me. She glares down in disdain, eyes alight with victory.
