Page 3 of Echo: Spark
"Tommy." My voice cuts through the tech specialist's panic like authority given sound. "We're leaving. Now."
Tommy scrambles from behind the desk, laptop hugged tight, eyes wide behind thick glasses that reflect the room's harsh light. "They… they know everything. Our locations, our safe houses, our...”
"Later." Because there might not be a later if we don't move now, if we waste precious seconds on information that matters less than survival.
I hand Stryker the Glock from my hip, the familiar weight seeming to steady him, training cutting through alcohol and trauma. The weapon changes him, drunk becoming soldier, victim becoming predator.
"How many?" Stryker's voice comes out rough, damaged by whatever happened before the chair, before the questions that left blood on his shirt.
"Eight, maybe more. Brennan's running it." My voice carries the weight of professional respect for a dangerous enemy. “Brennan is not the Committee. He runs Viper Solutions—a for-hire, mid-tier operator wealthy clients use when they want pain that leaves plausible deniability. In other words, he’s paid to poke the bear and watch what happens, not the kind of hand the Committee would put on a job themselves.”
"Shit." But Stryker's moving now, tactical instincts overriding three weeks of whiskey, sobriety forced by adrenaline and necessity. "Exits?"
"Loading dock. Forty meters. Two shooters covering, maybe more watching angles we can't see."
Stryker nods, checking the Glock's magazine with movements that speak of competence returning. His hands barely shake now, adrenaline burning through alcohol like firethrough paper, transforming him back into the man who painted Kinshasa red for the children who died in the mines.
I key my throat mic, the encrypted channel carrying my voice to a man who understands the cost of loyalty. "Dutch, you monitoring?"
"Always." Dutch's voice crackles through the earpiece, steady as bedrock. "You've got maybe three minutes before they realize the south side's a light show and start asking questions."
"Copy."
The first shots come as we hit the office door, someone finally noticing the guards down, raising the alarm that turns rescue into war. Muzzle flashes strobe through the mill, rounds sparking off metal like deadly fireflies, chewing through old wood with the hungry sound of violence finding its target. The sound echoes in the confined space, percussion that hammers eardrums and announces that stealth has died, replaced by the brutal arithmetic of gunfire.
I return fire, controlled bursts that force shooters into cover, muzzle discipline keeping my shots precise despite the chaos. Stryker moves on instinct, covering angles I can't, the Glock barking sharp against the rifle's deeper voice, harmonizing in the symphony of professional violence. Even drunk, instinct and experience make him lethal, makes him the man who can kill with hands or weapons, who understands that sometimes death is the only answer to certain questions.
We move in tactical formation, me leading, Stryker covering, Tommy sandwiched between us like precious cargo that must survive whatever comes. The mill becomes a three-dimensional puzzle of cover and concealment, industrial archaeology turned into a battlefield where every shadow might hide death. Behind the industrial saw, steel teeth providing armor. Along the conveyor belt, using its bulk to break line of sight. Through a gapin stacked lumber that might have been there for decades, wood seasoned by abandonment.
A shooter appears on our flank, tactical gear making him invisible until movement betrays his position. My rifle speaks first, the suppressor coughing its quiet death, but more shadows move in the periphery like wolves circling wounded prey. They're converging, understanding the escape route, moving to cut it off with the patience of professionals who know their business.
The loading dock appears ahead, massive doors standing open to the Montana night like a mouth waiting to swallow us whole. Moonlight paints the ground silver, showing the trucks positioned to block vehicle escape, steel barricades manned by men with night vision and automatic weapons. But also showing the gap—narrow, requiring speed and violence, but there, a slot in the armor that might mean survival.
"Go loud," I say, the words carrying permission for maximum violence.
Stryker grins, the expression sharp and familiar, the smile of a man who has made peace with necessary brutality. The drunk is gone, replaced by the operator who painted Kinshasa red for using children, who understands that some men deserve to die screaming. He pulls a flash-bang from my vest—when did he do that?—and sends it sailing through the dock doors with the casual expertise of a man who has thrown death before.
The explosion whites out the world, magnesium fire turning night into temporary day, sound and light combining to steal senses from men who depend on them to kill. Stryker and I flow through the night like death given purpose, rifles up, engaging targets who can't see to shoot back, who fire wildly into brightness that offers no targets. Professional violence, economical and precise, each shot calculated to steal lifeefficiently. Bodies drop. Others scramble for cover, night vision ruined, tactical advantage dissolved in artificial sunrise.
Then we're through, into the night, running for the truck with the desperate speed of men who know death follows close behind. Tommy stumbles, the laptop flying from his hands, precious electronics skittering across the frozen ground. He drops to his knees, scooping up the scattered pieces with frantic urgency. I grab him by the collar, hauling him forward with the strength of necessity, muscles powered by brotherhood and determination. Stryker covers our six, Glock empty but his presence is enough to make pursuers cautious, to buy us precious seconds with the threat of his reputation.
The truck starts on the first try—reliable American engineering that doesn't care about drama, only function. I throw it in reverse, tires spinning on frozen ground, rubber fighting for purchase on earth that doesn't want to let us go. Stryker shoves Tommy into the back, following him over the tailgate with the fluid grace of a man who has escaped death before. Rounds punch through the tailgate, starring the rear window with spider webs of destruction that speak of how close we came to dying.
I shift to drive, foot to the floor, engine roaring its mechanical defiance. The truck lurches forward, gaining momentum, steel and determination carrying us away from men who kill for money. More rounds chase us, one taking out the passenger mirror in a shower of glass and reflection. But we’re moving, gaining distance, the mill shrinking behind us like a nightmare fading at dawn. I glance down into my chest pocket where Crete's photo presses into my ribs. For the first time in months, the weight feels like a compass and not a chain.
Stryker's voice comes from the back, steady now despite everything, despite the blood and the chair and the three weeks of whiskey that almost killed him: "You came for me."
I meet his eyes in the rearview mirror, seeing Crete reflected there, seeing brotherhood that survives betrayal and time and the Committee's attempts to erase us all. "Mosul."
"Yeah." Stryker's hand finds my shoulder, squeezes once with the grip of a man who understands debts that can't be measured in money. "Yeah."
The remains of Tommy's laptop chatters against the truck’s back seat, the sound mixing with our harsh breathing, with the scanner's electronic chatter as Brennan's voice calls for pursuit, coordination dissolving into chaos. But Dutch's fireworks have every cop in the county pointed the wrong direction, professional distraction creating the space we need to disappear.
Tommy glances at Stryker to check his pupils with a penlight while the turn signal ticks like a metronome.
“His reaction time is sluggish but present.”
Stryker squeezes Tommy’s wrist once, a bleak joke ghosting his mouth. “If I stop breathing, you’re not allowed to do mouth-to-mouth.”
