She was in the corner, vomiting. Shielding her face with one hand, she retched until her chest heaved, waving Ronnie back as she approached.
"I'm good. Just need a sec, yo."
Ronnie turned to Vigil with an accusing glare. "She's just a kid, for God's sake."
"She's a soldier," Vigil said. He searched the depot, optics scanning for hidden snipers and traps that they might have missed in the initial breach. The carnage around him was nearly invisible. The dead and dying weren't the threats. "Every soldier has to see war sooner or later."
Ronnie glared at him, not bothering to respond. She and Castle used the bundles of zip ties to secure the surrendered Warmongers. After a few seconds, Spitfire joined them. Her face shield was back on, goggles hiding whatever revulsion she felt.
Vigil joined Isaac and Heretic, who had discovered a doorway in the rear of the depot. Isaac glanced almost curiously at the gore that covered his hands and painted his forearms. Heretic turned to Vigil. His jerkin was so blood-spattered and charred that it couldn't be called white any longer. His armor was dented, and several bullet holes were visible, but he didn't seem hampered.
"Looks like this is what they were protecting. I don't see a lock. They probably didn't think we'd make it. Janus probably isn't far."
"Then that's where we're going."
"The others will only slow us down. We should let them mop this up. The three of us can handle things from here."
"No one's getting left behind." He turned and motioned to Ronnie and the others. "Wrap it up and gather. We have a positive on another door."
Ronnie cinched the last zip tie and stood, wiping her hands on her pants. "Fine. Backup will pick the prisoners up if they make it down here. Unfortunately, I can't send a signal — still too much interference."
Vigil nodded. "Then we're on our own. No telling what's behind door number two, so we repeat tactics until breach."
She gave him a searching look. "Whatever you say, Big Top."
He paused at the mention of his old codename from when he led the Hellrazors.
She knows.
The thought was more resigned than shocked. Ronnie was too smart to be fooled for long. It was only a matter of time. He pushed the distraction away, focusing on the mission. The next step. Turning to Heretic, he gestured.
"We're up."
When the doors slid open, the stink of body odor slapped him in the face, followed by the palpable sense of collective terror. As they entered without resistance, he saw the reason why.
Hundreds of people were lined up on platforms erected for a single purpose: mass hanging. At the newly-constructed gallows, the men and women were dressed as if for a formal party — evening gowns glittering jewels on the women; tuxedos and elegant suits on the men. But their fine clothing was soaked through with flop sweat and urine, their eyes wide with terror that they couldn't express because their mouths were gagged tightly with metal straps. All of them had devices attached to their heads, electronic caps that clinched their scalps and winked with alternating, multicolored lights. Nooses made of cables encircled their necks, attached to a horizontal crossbeam above their heads. At their feet were trap doors that could drop at any moment, sending them dangling to their deaths.
Jett recognized some of the terrified faces. Members of the city council, business and tech leaders, high-profile entertainers. People he saw on the brilliantly lit billboards and scrolling screens every day. Men and women who always appeared smugly content, regularly discussing the city's problems while not being directly affected by them.
Until now.
They made frantic muffled sounds, eyes rolling in panicky fear. He moved from one platform to the next, trying to find a control switch or operating panel. Heretic ignored the victims, passing without a glance. Ronnie darted under the gallows, searching as desperately as Vigil. She stopped at one of the men, breath hissing in her throat in recognition. Vigil glanced up.
It was the Commissioner of Police, Franklin Miller. Tears slid down his face when he recognized Ronnie. Panicky sounds escaped from the gag that cut into the sides of his mouth.
"Hold on, Commissioner." She examined the scaffold, eyes tight with frustration. "I don't think there is a way to free them at once. We might have to cut them down individually."
"Leave them," Heretic said from a doorway he discovered on the other side of the room. "They were left to slow us down."
She looked up in shock. "They can be killed any minute."
"As they deserve." Even filtered by his helmet, Heretic's voice was thick with scorn. "Do you think they were forced to come all the way down here? Look at how they're dressed. They came to glut themselves on the misery of others only to find themselves the main course. Their judgment is righteous. Let them hang."
Pressing the green button on the door, he turned his back on them.
The door hissed as it slid open.
The act seemed to trigger the scaffolds. The trapdoors on all the platforms opened, and the victims dropped, feet dangling and kicking, nooses tight around their necks, cutting into the skin. Muted sounds of panic seemed unnaturally loud in the death chamber as their faces turned scarlet and their eyes bulged in the sockets.
Frozen in the moment, Vigil glanced at Heretic, who took one step into the doorway before stopping with a grunt. His body stiffened when a metal spike punched through his chest and out his back, painted in blood. Barbs snapped out the tip in a spatter of crimson droplets, then Heretic was yanked into the adjoining chamber with irresistible force.
"Vigil!"
He turned at the sound of Ronnie's shout. She stood under the Commissioner, trying to support his heels on her shoulders. In his panic, Miller didn't seem to understand. Spitfire was on one of the scaffolds, using a blade to saw at one of the nooses. Castle aimed a handgun and tried shooting to break the cables. Isaac rammed into one of the rows of scaffolds, but even his great strength only managed to slightly buckle the alloy frame.
Vigil tapped his g-span, activating the cutting laser that fired from its holding in his gauntlet. Fanning his arm, he burned through the cables, dropping bodies to the ground like overripe fruit. Moving from one row to another, the laser sizzled as it snapped the cords, filling the air with smoke and the scent of scorched wires.
When the last body hit the floor, he turned and ran after Heretic, dashing through the door with his rifle at a low-ready position and the breach-laser charged. And despite everything he just experienced, what he saw still made him stop in his tracks.
He couldn't tell if the chamber was small or massive. It was surrounded by darkness with only small recessed lights illuminating it. It appeared rounded, with silhouetted columns that disappeared into the shadows and ghostly, mist-enshrouded light. A metallic monstrosity had a clawed foot firmly planted on Heretic's torso, pinning him to the floor. The hulking mech creature was feathered in jagged spikes and had three heads, six arms, and a long, sinuous tail that it used earlier to impale Heretic and drag him into the room. The creature looked like some mythological hybrid of beast and insect, only updated with cybernetic parts. It looked up when Vigil entered, eyes flashing with scarlet light.
Janus sat on a thronelike chair. It was outfitted with streamlined augmentations in an enhanced version of the Immersion chairs used in Haze parlors. He was dressed extravagantly in a ceremonial tunic of black threaded with gold, including pauldrons of onyx and gold on his shoulders, matching his leering mask.
He spoke in a smooth, melodic voice. "Place your weapon on the ground, please. It’s time that we had a conversation."
“We have nothing to talk about."
“Oh, but we do. It would be in your best interest to cooperate, or else you're going to need a new partner."