Page 20 of The Inheritance
The first responders dashed toward him with the stretcher. Elias let them get in position, lifted Damion Bonilla off his shoulders, and carefully transferred him to it. The pulse carver’s blood-smeared face was a mask of pain.
“Thank you, Guildmaster. I’m sorry.”
Elias nodded. “Nothing to be sorry about. Rest. You’ve earned it.”
The first responders carried Bonilla off. His legs were bloody mush below the knees, but he would walk again. The healers would fix him. They fixed anything except dead if you got to them in time.
This was the last time. Elias had promised himself that every time he went into the breach, but this time he meant it. He would strip off the armor, take a long shower in his hotel, board the guild jet with the rest of his team, and go home. He would eat well, sleep in his own bed, and then in the morning he would put on a suit, go into his office, and do paperwork like a normal fucking human being. That’s where he belonged. Running the guild, which had plenty of blade wardens without him.
The medics swarmed the assault team. A young kid with a healer’s white caduceus on his jacket ran up to him. Elias waved him off and squinted at the familiar orderly chaos in front of the gate, looking for the mining crew. He’d sent a scout ahead with the orders to wrap it up. The miners were on the left, stowing their gear. He counted them out of habit. Fifteen and eight escorts. Good. Everyone was out.
A familiar tall, lean figure in a black Tom Ford suit tugged at his attention. Leo Martinez, who seemed to be born to wear elegant suits and be the public face of a guild, the only man standing still in the flurry of activity. His XO, who should’ve been back at HQ, 2,000 miles away. Something had happened.
Leo started toward him.
Elias made himself walk forward. Whatever it was, he didn’t want to deal with it but avoiding it would make things worse.
A sharp sound cut through the human clamor, like the noise of a thousand paper sheets being ripped at once magnified through concert level speakers. The gate collapsed.
Leo reached him. “Cutting it a little close, sir.”
“Happens.” Elias headed for the familiar black SUV. The back hatch rose as he approached, and he began stripping his armor and tossing it into the plastic-lined vehicle. “What is it?”
Leo kept his voice low. “We had a fatal event.”
He’d figured that. “Where?”
“Elmwood Gate. The assault team is presumed dead. We lost nine of twelve miners, including a K9 and handler, four of the escorts, a scout, and a DeBRA.”
Elias stopped for a moment. Twenty-eight people. Good people. He’d approved the line up himself. It was a solid team that should’ve been more than adequate for the low orange gate. He’d personally trained them, he’d gone into breaches with them, and now they were dead. Half of them under the age of thirty. He’d sent kids to their deaths again.
This wasn’t a fatal event, this was a catastrophe. What the hell went wrong over there?
Leo’s face was carefully neutral. “The DeBRA is?—"
“Adaline Moore.” The best DeBRA in the Eastern US died in their gate dive.
“Yes, sir. I’ve got the mining foreman, the surviving miners, and London under lockdown.”
“London made it out?”
The crisp line of Leo’s jaw got sharper. “Yes, sir.”
“Hmm.”
“I’ve reported to the DDC,” Leo continued. “Cora Ward owes me a favor, so she will sit on it for as long as she can, but sooner or later this will get out and when it does, both the Hermetic Alliance and the Guardian Guild will scream bloody murder. The Guardians, in particular, have been vocal about our share of the gates.”
Adaline Moore had been in high demand. DeBRAs of her caliber were rare and monopolized by the DDC. Elias liked to know who he was working with, so he kept tabs on the assessors. Adaline was divorced, with an absentee ex-husband, two children, and a cat, and her life revolved around work and family. The very definition of a noncombatant. Her children were now orphans.
Leo was right, the fallout from this would hit them like a hammer, but the political mess and the PR nightmare weren’t important right now. He would deal with that later. “What does London say happened?”
“Humanoid combatants. Highest red level.”
“What kind of humanoids?” They had come across humanoid combatants in the breaches, but the word humanoid was used loosely, as in anything that was bipedal and somewhat human in shape.
A slight edge slipped into Leo’s voice. “He doesn’t know. He’s never seen anything like them before.”
Perfect.
