The Bureau of Time (36 page)

“Don’t worry, we’re not all like Reese,” she whispered, her Irish twang distorting her words. “He just acts tough. On the inside, he’s a big softie.”

Cassie wasn’t sure she believed that. They followed Reese down the stairwell, passing several civilian soldiers – all dressed in simple clothes with a crimson armband. They looked nothing like the Bureau’s experienced Operators.

Is this the best the Resistance has?
she wondered.
Vigilantes and reserves, to fight against White Tower’s agents and Adjusters?

“There’s nothing above the 66
^th
floor,” Reese explained. “The top half of the tower was taken out by a Russian jet in the last year of the War.”

The trio emerged into the mess hall again, several floors down, the tantalizing smell of potatoes and pasta hanging in the air. She even spied some strange-looking cakes, hastily made and rolled in what looked like chocolate and coconut. Cassie was starving and her stomach growled. Despite everything that had happened to her, she just wanted to eat, shower, and sleep for a week straight.

They hadn’t taken more than a few steps into the makeshift cafeteria before the alarm sounded. It wasn’t a sophisticated electronic system, but instead a series of loud bells that rang out in unison, one on every floor, a roar that made the whole building shake. The Resistance fighters leaped to their feet, food abandoned, forks suddenly replaced with guns.

“What’s happening?” Cassie asked, her voice a startled squeak.

“That’s the perimeter alarm!” Reese answered, his eyes wide. “It’s White Tower!”

“Move, now!” Alanna cried. She seized them both and pulled them back, but it was already too late. As the bells rang out through the building, screams started reaching up from the lower levels, accompanied by a rapid spike in Temporal Energy that sent Cassie’s Affinity spinning.

Opposite them, the reinforced windows exploded, the steel grids blown inwards, knocking over tables and scattering lunch trays. A howling wind blasted through the jagged remains of the windows, slamming into Cassie and throwing her down. With several loud
bangs
, black grappling hooks blasted into the floor, thick cables pulling taut behind them.

“Get down!” Reese roared. He grabbed Alanna and pulled her to the floor, flattening Cassie beside him. Black-clad soldiers came speeding into the mess hall, leaping off the zip line, rifles targeting the few fighters still trying to defend the base.

A horrified scream caught in Cassie’s throat as Adjusters teleported into the room, bearing the silver epaulets of White Tower. The faceless monsters were equipped with strange rifles – the guns exploded with bright light, decimating everything they hit, the walls crumbling to powder.

Reese fumbled for his handgun. The soldiers advanced, kicking aside tables and chairs, bellowing commands that were just static noise to Cassie. She leaped to her feet, smacking away Reese’s hand as he tried to pull her back; there was a brief moment of confusion as the soldiers saw her coming, then they raised their rifles, firing in unison—

She Shifted the world, a solid wall of energy exploding outwards and forming a spherical shield around her and the two Resistance fighters.

The energy blast from the weapons smashed into the shield and dissipated in a flash of light. Cassie threw her hands out, T.E. streaming from her body. The soldiers stared in shock as their shots faded away harmlessly. Reese stumbled upright, dumbstruck, his handgun loose in his grip.

“What are you waiting for?” Cassie cried. “Shoot them!”

Reese snapped out of his paralysis. He opened fire, Alanna just a moment behind him. The Irish girl was deadly accurate, every shot taking down another soldier. The Adjusters snarled and teleported away, leaving the remaining soldiers to scramble for cover.

Only three of the first dozen enemies made it to the kitchen – the rest died where they stood.

Cassie’s shield dropped and she sagged with exhaustion, her hands trembling.

“Nice work!” Reese said, slamming a new magazine into his gun.

“Not bad for a Timewalker?” Cassie gasped, sucking in a deep breath. She didn’t hear Reese’s reply – the soldiers opened fire from behind cover, narrowly missing her.

“
MOVE
!” Alanna shouted, leading them out of the mess hall. Their boots hammered against the floor, the sounds of gunfire and alarms following them throughout the base. They hurried down the internal staircase, but after only six floors, they found the stairwell caved in, blocked with rubble.

“Back up!” Reese said, leading them up and out onto the 57
^th
floor.

As they stepped over the lifeless body of a freedom fighter, three Adjusters teleported into existence, bearing down on the group.

Alanna’s startled cry cut through the air as an Adjuster threw her to the floor in a blur of blonde hair and crimson blood. Cassie acted without thought; she reached for her powers, rewinding time.

The world reappeared in a flash of light.

Reese opened the door to the 57
^th
floor.

“Adjusters!” Cassie breathed, placing a hand on his shoulder. He pulled the door closed a moment before the assassins arrived. Through a tiny crack between the door and the wall, she saw the faceless creatures look each way, like wolves sniffing for fresh prey.

Reese raised his handgun, ready to fight.

“Wait!”
Cassie mouthed, squeezing his shoulder. He hesitated, his features barely visible in the dim light. Slowly, he lowered his gun. The Adjusters teleported away and Reese opened the door again, stepping over the prone body without a second glance.

“How did you know about that, Natalie?” Alanna asked, staring at Cassie. She hesitated before answering – if there was anything her mysterious powers had taught her, it was that people rarely reacted to their own deaths well.

That’s something I have to live with. The knowledge and image of someone dying. An image that never fades. It’s my burden. They shouldn’t have to know.

“My Affinity,” she lied. “I sensed the Adjusters before they arrived.”

Reese grunted something incomprehensible that might have been ‘
thank you
’. Then, “We need to regroup with Command.”

An explosion rocked the building and the windows rattled – the sound of gunfire paused for a moment, then resumed with greater intensity.

“There’s another staircase on the opposite side,” Alanna said. “Let’s go.”

They darted forward, weaving through areas that had recently seen heavy fighting. There were bodies and bloodstains – both red and black. Abandoned guns and expended magazines littered the floor. Cassie stopped briefly to pick up a handgun. It was, like almost everything the Resistance used, several generations too old.

She recognized the weapon as a Glock 17C, identical to the Bureau-issued handguns.

“Know how to handle that?” Reese asked, with the faintest hint of condescension.

“Better than you know,” Cassie replied, racking the first bullet. Alanna made a
tut
ting noise and pushed between them, muttering something about
acting like children.

They found the second staircase and raced down twenty floors. A stitch formed in Cassie’s side, but she kept running, taking shallow breaths through the pain.

Reese slammed through a door marked
34
^th
– Operations,
emerging into a storm of resistance fighters. They weren’t fighting but barking orders, yelling out casualty numbers, men and women pressed together tightly. Soldiers were barricading the windows with tables and chairs.

Reese weaved through the crowd, approaching a circular table where half a dozen older men in gray uniforms were shouting at each other, shouting down the phone, shouting in general to be heard above the roaring noise. Cassie immediately recognized Commander Boreman.
How did he get down here so fast?
He broke away from the table to talk with Reese.

“We never saw them coming!” the Commander said, shaking his head. “They took down our perimeter guards silently and they’re blocking our Temporal sensors. We think they sent a breach party into the building already. You need to secure the servers.”

Reese’s face tightened and he ran a hand through his neon-green hair.

“Get down there!” Boreman shouted, gesturing for three of the closest fighters. “You five – Natalie too – get down to level ten, secure the servers and protect them at all costs! We can’t let White Tower destroy that intel!”

“Yes sir!” Reese snapped out a quick salute. He seemed to stand taller, instantly assuming an air of command. He led his squad through the crowded room and down a short hallway lined with soldiers. So far, it seemed like White Tower had left the area alone, perhaps due to the sheer number of fighters – but with every civilian soldier they passed, Cassie wondered how many were left to guard the rest of the building.

“What’s so important about the servers?” she asked, wiping her sweaty palms on her jeans. “The building doesn’t even have electricity.”

“They’re White Tower’s servers,” Alanna explained. “Blueprints, logs, names, finances – everything about White Tower’s assets and facilities, recon data on the Resistance from the past five years. It’s all there, and if White Tower destroys it—”

“Then we lose our advantage,” Reese cut her off. “They’ll be one step ahead of us, and we’ll never win this war. Down here!”

The group hurried down the staircase, one Timewalker and five Resistance fighters. The concrete steps vanished beneath their feet, hand-written floor numbers flashing past them. The scattered sounds of gunshots reached their ears through the closed doors, but the further they descended, the quieter the building became.

“What’s happening out there?” Cassie whispered, as they jogged past the 14
^th
floor.

“Don’t know,” Reese replied, “but silence is rarely a good thing.”

The group slowed as they approached the 10
^th
floor, stopping for a moment in the cramped stairwell to catch their breath. Cassie reached out with her Affinity, finding a cluster of signatures beyond the door, perhaps Adjusters standing close together.

“Enemies through there,” Cassie breathed.

“How many?” Reese demanded, cocking his pistol. The three new fighters held their shotguns at the ready, two older girls and a twenty-something man, their faces battled-hardened and lined beyond their years.

“I don’t know.”

“Some good you are.”

“Hey!” she snapped, indignant. “I saved your ass back there!”

He opened his mouth for another sniping comment, but Alanna stepped between the two.

“
Shut up!
” she growled, her eyes wide. “You’re acting like two little brats! You can finish –
whatever this is
 – after we get out of here alive. Okay?”

Reese mumbled something distasteful and Cassie nodded, her cheeks flushing. This wasn’t the time for petty arguments, but she was on-edge, a bundle of nerves liable to explode at any moment. None of this was going the way she had hoped. But Alanna was right – they couldn’t be divided now.

“Let’s go,” Alanna said, opening the door.

The first thing Cassie noticed was the server bank, dozens of massive machines bunched together with thick cables trailing across the ground, waiting for the power that the base so desperately needed.

The second thing she saw were the bodies – dozens of them, blood pooling across their chests – and their distinctive, sickening wounds. A hole had been punched through their bodies, right through their hearts.

And finally, as Cassie’s eyes traveled up from the horrifying array of dead Resistance fighters, she saw the black-haired Russian girl lazily reclining against a server, inspecting her viciously long fingernails.

“There you are,” Marissa purred, flicking her long eyelashes at Cassie. “Did you miss me?”

THE LAST

Shaun broke through the surface.

He coughed and spluttered, saltwater filling his lungs. His clothes weighed him down, threatening to pull him under again. Rough waves smashed into him and he spun around, desperately searching for something solid to hold onto. He spied an object, massive and gray – an upturned ship – and swam toward it.

His legs turned to lead and the frigid water sapped his energy. He sank beneath the waves, darkness pressing in on him. He swallowed water, his throat burning with the salty poison. He thrashed again, his head just reaching above the surface, the ship coming closer.

He reached out, fumbling for purchase. He seized a thick link of an iron chain, gripping onto it as though it could tether him to life itself. He hung there for several minutes, his white hair plastered over his forehead. Slowly, he pulled himself up the side of the massive ship, the steel behemoth groaning and rocking in the waves.

Spitting water and pink frothy blood, he hauled his limp body up the massive chain. The boat narrowed toward the keel, until finally he could get his feet beneath him. He crouched on the barnacle-covered bottom of the ship, its colossal propellers sticking up into the air, the blades dulled and rusted with age. His mouth hung open as he took in the devastation before him.

The Golden Gate Bridge of San Francisco lay in ruins, collapsed into the ocean.

Beached ships and cargo containers lined the bay. Hundreds of cars floated in the icy water, banked upon the remains of the bridge, long since abandoned by their owners. His eyes lifted toward the cityscape, where the skyscrapers were only skeletons.

The upturned frigate was beached on Angel Island; a fighter jet had crashed into the island, its wreckage scattered amidst the wild scrub. Hayden Miller sat cross-legged on the sand, as though nothing was wrong with the world.

“Hey!” Shaun called, his voice hoarse. “Hayden!”

Miller stood uneasily and made his way to the edge of the frigate. Shaun scrambled down the side of the ship, hitting the sand with a dull thud. His knees buckled and he stumbled, his head suddenly spinning. He took a few steps and vomited, emptying his lungs of ocean water.