Stolen, page 23
We had reached the end of the hallway; any farther and we'd be fully exposed to the courtyard. I halted there, just before the gate, and glanced out, around the corner to find–
“What?” Madison asked, just behind me. “What is it?”
Tara Hays shouldered past her, then stuck her head out, briefly, past me, then immediately drifted back. “That's a bloody Chinese army waiting for us, it is.”
“And behind you as well,” came a crisp voice, projecting and echoing through the entirety of the prison. Two doors swept open in the hallway behind us, and out poured two dozen Chinese soldiers brandishing their QBZ rifles.
All of them were pointing at us.
CHAPTER SEVENTY-TWO
“Deep breaths, everybody,” I said, watching the Chinese soldiers – stiff, impersonal, cold, professional, and without a hint of rage, no yelling, just fingers on the triggers, safeties off, ready to riddle us with bullets at the slightest command. “No sudden moves.” I had my hands up in front of me, well away from my gun, and no suggestion of fire or ice coming off my hands.
CHAPTER SEVENTY-THREE
Wade
We knelt in front of the Chinese soldiers, rifles pointed at the backs of our heads – Zollers to my left, Harry and then Cassidy to my right. Tired, bleary-eyed, we'd been dragged out here and positioned by just a few of the hundreds of Chinese soldiers and metahumans (both, technically; their metahumans were clearly soldiers, military-trained) who were waiting, waiting for someone to show up...
And then the first figure came around the corner, and I slumped.
Because even through the glare of light on the gas mask...
...I could see it was Sienna.
CHAPTER SEVENTY-FOUR
Fen Liu
This was the moment before total triumph, but Fen Liu was not ready to celebrate just yet.
Certainly, she had Sienna Nealon in her grasp. Yes, the woman appeared overmatched, and she had adopted the posture of surrender, but she was still wearing a gas mask, her associates in a similar posture of surrender, pincered between Fen Liu's forces, shuffling their way out into the courtyard.
But Fen Liu would not breathe easy until Sienna Nealon was darted, gassed – and possibly dead. Probably dead.
Definitely dead, she realized, coming to the decision. The propaganda value of her death was limited, after all. Perhaps it would be better to simply have her dead and disappeared than ever admit what happened here today. For whatever good it did her here, in China, it would probably be a negative elsewhere in the world.
Besides, if the scientists she had standing by acted quickly, any useful biomaterial – eggs and the like – could be harvested before they spoiled.
“You will take off your gas masks and submit to darting,” Fen Liu ordered, watching this band shuffle forward, not an ounce of defiance in them.
“Why would you gas us and then dart us, mate?” came a female voice from the front of the back with a lower British accent. “Seems like a bit of overkill, dunnit?” Tara Hays, presumably.
“Let's all just keep cool,” Sienna Nealon said, shuffling along, hands in the air. The Chinese army was behind her, weapons pointed, ready to unleash. “There's no need to turn this place into a shooting gallery, they've clearly got us fair and square.”
That made Fen Liu arch an eyebrow. “Halt,” she ordered, putting enough command in her voice that her own men all stiffened.
But Sienna Nealon did not stop her slow walk.
“Halt, I said,” Fen Liu snapped. Outside, the rattle of the wind against the building had faded away, and distantly she could hear the helicopters, the tanks, and the armored personnel carriers rolling in. “Halt!”
“Just stay calm,” Nealon said, slowly drifting to a stop, and looking up at Fen Liu. Her hands were still extended skyward, and she was only twenty paces from the prisoners. “We're complying. No need to get violent now.”
Fen Liu stared down at her, and felt a twist in her guts. This was the woman who'd caused her so much trouble over the last months and years? She seemed so small looking down from the catwalk above. She couldn't help herself, really, she couldn't; she spat, “So this is the great Sienna Nealon?”
Nealon looked up at her, some of the view of her eyes obstructed by the bright glare on the gas mask. “And you must be Fen Liu. I wondered if we'd ever meet face-to-face. It felt like you were trying so hard not to.”
“You're a terrorist,” Fen Liu said, taking a step forward; she was still seemingly miles from Nealon, and with her own metahuman army surrounding them. “I am a head of state. To meet with you myself would have been to elevate your importance far behind its real-world value.”
“You're too good to meet with me, I understand,” Nealon said, and there was a hint of irony in her voice.
“Yes,” Fen Liu said, taking two steps toward her, strangely drawn, “that's it exactly.” How had she feared this stubby waif, whose hands were up, who was completely in her power? If she tried anything, a hail of bullets, a lungful of gas, and dozens of darts would spell her end. “I am always impressed with your arrogance. Did you really think you could simply sneak in here, retrieve your men, your people, and teleport back out?”
“Walk back out,” Nealon said. “Metaphorically, that's the right way to say it. And yes,” she said, a glimmer of humor barely visible through the glare on her mask, “I do.”
“Such amazing arrogance,” Fen Liu said, almost to herself.
“I call it confidence,” Nealon said, glancing around with only mild interest. “And you have to admit, as much of a bellyache as I've given you the last few months, it's not entirely unearned.”
A small laugh escaped Fen Liu's lips. “Bullets to the back of the head of your compatriots. Powers that will sizzle them to ash. Your powers, stripped away in a hail of darts, or, failing that, a whole army outside waiting to level the building and crush you. And finally, if that all fails, you must know we're ready to nuke this entire city just to kill you.” Fen Liu's hands gripped the rail in front of her. “Knowing all this is against you, still you stand there like you have the whip hand. So what else can this be...but arrogance?”
There was a long pause, and Nealon checked the watch on her wrist and finally answered, her voice tinny and muffled – very muffled, actually – through the gas mask. “I told you – confidence. Confidence is the belief you that can deal with any problem that comes your way. Arrogance is the mistaken belief in that. But see,” and here Nealon lowered her face so that the glare permitted Liu to see her eyes, glinting with great amusement, “I know I'm ready for all the bullshit you think you're about to throw at me, so...confidence, not arrogance. See?”
“Darts,” Fen Liu ordered in Mandarin, a dark feeling creeping down her spine. “Masks. Gas. Powers. And ready yourselves to fire!”
Someone fired first, though, and it echoed through the space. Not one of Nealon's people, but rather, one of Liu's, as it sprang forth from behind Nealon's little party–
And promptly slammed into a hazy barrier shield, ricocheting off and striking one of the Chinese soldiers.
“Huh – ahhhhh!” Every Chinese soldier in the formation with a gun suddenly found it slammed into their face in an abrupt, sudden maneuver. Liu watched the blood flow from a dozen wounds as guns were wrenched from their owners' hands in a display of raw force the like of which she'd never before seen.
“Magnetos!” Liu screamed. She raised her own hand, ready to rain green fire upon Sienna Nealon's arrogant face, to turn her head into a valley of blood and seared brains.
But when she raised her hand, nothing happened. No spark of light, no release of energy...nothing.
Liu stared at it in amazement as her soldiers were battered with their own weapons all around her. No energy beams snapped to life from any of her forces, no rescue seemed to come from any source. There was only the screaming and wailing of her troops as their weapons battered them, and were wrenched away. Some were still fighting for control of their guns when the QBZs began to fire.
The sound was deafening, the echoing of gunfire as it bit into the lines of Chinese soldiers she'd set up in ambush. It quickly became a stampede for the exits, which...of course were barred, it was a prison. Fen Liu stood there on the balcony, shocked into silence as rifles lit off all around her, turning the prison courtyard into war zone.
No...an execution site.
The earwig in Fen Liu's ear crackled to life in an unrestrained burst that almost deafened her – or would have, if she hadn't already been nearly deafened by the gunfire that had killed her men. “Premier!” the voice of the chief tech sounded. “We have had to suspend the radio jamming! Our powers are gone and Nealon's Thor has completely overwhelmed our systems!”
The gun smoke hung thick in the air, and Fen Liu stared down at the moaning survivors from her platform as the explosive rifle shots came to a slow, rolling halt. Her army was down, all the way to the last man. Hao lay beside her, his spandex uniform torn, but his flesh still unmarred beneath save for the places where glass still remained embedded in his flesh. Hao, through his own gas mask, gave her a subtle wink that no one but her could see. So she still had one soldier.
No...she had more than that. Her army was just outside, and forces were waiting to level the building if need be.
This was not yet lost. Liu merely had to stall for time, and wait for an opportunity to present itself.
Mimicking Nealon's attitude of moments before, Liu raised her hands in the air in the gesture of surrender.
CHAPTER SEVENTY-FIVE
Sienna
The smoke of the guns was clearing, the strain on Renard's face was lessening. He wasn't shooting the survivors yet, though as the QBZ rifles hovered over the fallen and moaning bodies of their original owners, the threat was clearly implicit. The screams and moans had replaced the thundering gunfire, and the ringing in my ears had just about stopped.
Fen Liu still stood above us on the catwalk, her hands in the air, her face a nearly impassive mask, radiating cold.
And about ten paces in front of me, my friends – Cassidy Ellis, Quinton Zollers, Harry Graves (complicated), and Jeremy James Wade (even more complicated) – knelt unharmed, eyeing the massacre that had just unfolded around them.
“Huh,” Wade pronounced, letting his arms drop to his sides. “I gotta admit...I did not see that coming.”
“Neither did she,” I said, nodding up at the premier of China. “Come on down, Fen Liu. The water's just fine.” With a glance at Renard, I nodded, and with another at David, his shield dropped – for the moment.
“I have complete control of their system,” Arche said.
“Is that how you bested us?” Fen Liu asked. “Took over our system, activated our suppressant without us knowing?”
I cocked my head, smiling impishly. “How do you think that would work? You had Thors guarding your systems, telepaths to warn you if we tried to boggle your minds. No, I went about it much more simply. First, I had my friends procure a large supply of suppressant–”
Fen Liu bristled, then relaxed, her eyes closing, a small smile parting her lips. “Our chemical depot at Changsha.” When her eyes opened, she looked right at me, maybe even through me. “You never cared about stealing tanks or trucks.”
“Not really,” I said. “Those are easy, and could come from just about any base in China or Russia. But Changsha...is where you keep your chemical weapons. Including suppressant.” Which was what Kristina Bonner had seen on the night of our first heist that had her crowing – a crew of my top people stealing the chemical drums while we drew the attention away with our vehicle heist. “And then all I had to do–”
“Was have your brother deliver it,” Fen Liu said bitterly, “on the winds of this hurricane.”
“You gotta admit,” I said, gesturing to the prison around me, now silent, because Reed had killed the winds after he'd saturated the air around the prison facility with enough suppressant to drown almost anyone, “it was an elegant solution. We got it in on you early, let you think you were in control so you didn't wear your gas masks yet. Then all we had to do was make sure we threw ourselves into your trap before you realized you'd been disempowered.”
“I would say it is impressive,” Fen Liu said calmly, taking the last few steps down, “but it changes nothing, you understand. Take back your people, if you like. Bring them with you into your exile. Kill me, even. China is still your enemy. And China will not stop because of this, or because of my death.”
“Oh, I know,” I said, nodding. “China's a rising military power, and now that you've conquered Russia and America, you're the top nuclear power on the planet. No one can hope to touch you.”
I checked my watch again, rather theatrically. “Or at least you were until now.”
A squeal in Fen Liu's earpiece was so loud I couldn't help but hear it...and smile. “Madam Premier! We are receiving panicked reports from Beijing saying that radiological sensors are going off all over the nation. And that our nuclear arsenal – it's gone!”
Fen Liu looked up at me, and narrowed her eyes in spite. “You did this?”
“Yep,” I said. “You didn't really think that all this was about a prison break, did you?” Looking at Arche, I received a nod. “This was about so much more, Fen Liu. This is war, you see. You declared it, and I'm fighting it. You had the most nukes on the planet.” I smiled, bright and broad. “And now...I'm the top nuclear power on the planet.”
CHAPTER SEVENTY-SIX
Drusilla Cross
It had started small, with her in a lead-lined room in a hidden place, far from where anyone would see or detect her. Drusilla Cross's only power was radioactivity, a skill that had nearly cost the cities of Los Angeles and Minneapolis their every citizen. It was all she had to offer; no other gifts, no other skills, no aid to offer, no comfort. She didn't even have arms anymore. That, to Drusilla Cross's mind, made her useless.
But apparently she had use to Sienna Nealon, because Sienna had entrusted her to the snarky Alannah and slightly-more-patient Brenda Greene, who'd entreated her to, “Sit still, you silly bitch, and we'll take care of you.” She'd let them do what they had to do – while she was unconscious, drugged out of her mind.
She'd dreamt of phantom agony in her arms that no longer existed, in her shoulders where they ached and burned.
And when she'd awakened...she had arms again.
Now...she had sooooo very many arms. Of the nuclear variety.
“Coming through again,” she said, carrying the last of the nuclear stockpile. In her ear, through a staticky earpiece was a voice giving her instruction in a soft, formal British accent – some expert from the UK Ministry of Defence that Sienna had patched her in with.
With his help, and that of the teleporter Taxi, she'd single-handedly robbed every single nuclear power plant in China and Russia over the course of the last several hours. All this while two other teams robbed every missile silo, mobile launch site, and stockpile.
To this, Drusilla smiled. She'd twice been nearly responsible for a nuclear apocalypse. It felt good to, just once, be preventing one.
CHAPTER SEVENTY-SEVEN
Sienna
“Every missile,” I said, ticking them off on my fingers, “every bomb, every warhead – I even had Scott and his family crush your submarine fleet.” Fen Liu was halted a few steps from me, her face radiating a cold fury. Wade had slowly made his way to his feet, though I was trying not to watch him save out of the corner of my eye. I could barely suppress a shudder; he and the others looked simply awful, emaciated, their maltreatment appallingly obvious.
“Well done,” Fen Liu said stiffly, now almost eye-to-eye with me. She was just about my height. “But surely you know I don't fear you with nuclear weapons.” She almost shrugged. “I don't believe you'll ever use them.”
“Probably not, since I didn't hurricane Shenzhen to the ground,” I said. “The nukes were just to keep them out of your hands, Fen Liu.” I smiled tightly. “After all, you were going to nuke Shenzhen and blame it on me. Right?” I glanced at Heidi, who nodded, her view of Fen Liu's mind completely unobstructed, now that her telepaths were disempowered, and dead or dying. With a light shrug at her look of surprise, I added, “I kinda figured.”
“None of this matters in the end,” Fen Liu said. “You still don't control the United States, nor Russia, and you will never get your grip into China.” She stood tall and proud, sticking her chin out at me, as if daring me to hit it. “Kill me, and my generals will continue the fight.”
“Your generals?” I asked. “You mean the ones you left assembled back in the Zhongnanhai? Waiting for you to return so you could plan the next phase of the war?”
She stared at me warily, the first hint of panic starting to break through her steely calm. “What have you done?”
I grinned. “Show her what's behind door number one, Charles.”
Barron opened a portal beside me, to what had once been the most secure building in the eastern hemisphere. The Zhongnanhai, basically the Chinese capital building.
Where now sat, beneath a cloud as black as if a hurricane had struck downtown Beijing, a crater that smoked quietly, devoid of any hint of life.
CHAPTER SEVENTY-EIGHT
Fen Liu
There was something about the sight of the Zhongnanhai destroyed that hit Fen Liu particularly hard. It was more than her office, it was her home, and everything she'd aspired to in the years she'd climbed the ladder of the Chinese Communist Party. First she'd been positioned outside the gates, looking longingly in, then she'd made her way inside, taking control in the face of seemingly impossible odds, climbing an impossible ladder until finally, finally–
