He looks small. Fragile. Nothing like the man who threw himself in front of a bullet for me.
I pull a chair to his bedside and sit. Take his hand in mine. His fingers are cold, but his pulse beats steady beneath the skin.
"You stupid fucking idiot," I whisper. "Why did you do that?"
He doesn't answer. Of course he doesn't. He's unconscious, drugged, lost in whatever darkness the anesthesia dragged him into.
I stay anyway. Hold his hand and watch the computer track his vital signs.
And I think about what I did.
A dozen people. I killed a dozen people tonight. I can still feel it. The give of flesh under my blade. The crack of bones breaking. The wet heat of blood spraying across my face.
I've killed before, tons of times. But never like that. Never with that much rage, that much abandon. I wasn't thinking. Wasn't calculating. I was just destroying everything between me and the people who hurt him.
I liked it.
Correction: Ilovedit. And I’ll do it again and again.
Webb's face floats up in my memory. The surprise in his eyes when I caught him. The way he tried to bargain, to plead, to offer information in exchange for his life. I didn't listen. Didn't care. I put him on his knees and took his head off with a blade I pulled from one of his own operatives.
After I had a little playtime with a few of his body parts. The skin stunk as I peeled it off his body, almost like the evil inside him had permeated his pores.
I should feel something about that.
All I feel is satisfaction at a job well done.
The door opens behind me. I don't turn.
"Brother." Jace's voice, quiet and careful. "We need to talk."
"Later."
"Now." He crosses to the other side of the bed, looking down at Jonah. "The Ministry knows what happened. Webb had a tracker. They know he's dead. They know we were there."
"Let them come."
"That's not a strategy. That's just waiting to be erased. They’ll send the Disposals."
"Maybe I don't care anymore."
"You care." He meets my eyes across Jonah's sleeping form. "If you didn't care, you wouldn't be sitting here covered in blood, holding his hand like he might disappear if you let go."
I don't have an answer for that.
Jace pulls up a chair of his own, settling across from me. He looks tired too. The gash on his forehead has been stitched, a neat line of black thread against his skin.
"Tell me what happened," I say. "At your end."
"Ambush. Four operatives waiting in the trees. Jinx spotted them before they spotted us." He pauses. "We handled it. But by the time we circled back, you and Jonah were already inside."
"And then?"
"We heard gunfire. Saw you come out the back, saw you go down." His jaw tightens. "Saw Jonah take the bullet."
"You saw that."
"I saw everything." He leans forward. "I saw you walk into that firefight like you wanted to die. I saw you kill six men without taking cover, without calculating angles, without any of the things the Foundry trained into us. I’d have come to help,but we ended up having a scuffle with some goodie two shoes trying to score points with Webb. It was quite the fight. I took a roundhouse kick to the knee. But that aside, I saw you tear Alfred Webb apart with your bare hands and carry his head out like a trophy."
