Page 116 of Chaos

She makes a face, but lifts her walkie, pressing a button that makes it bloop and cough. But nothing comes back.

“What does that mean?” I ask.

“It means we don’t know. They either can’t hear me or can’t respond.”

“How did we not have advanced warning?” I hiss at her. We have a lookout at the top of the clocktower at all times. Someone should have warned us.

And where the hell is Colleen? Did that soldier ever find her on the wall?

She lowers her useless walkie, a bead of sweat slipping down her cheek, making me think whatever anxiety I’mfeeling at this moment—the panic, the adrenaline, the fear—it started for her long before it started for me. “That hornisour advanced warning.”

Yanking Shasta with me, I take off running for Auden.

28 |Suckedback in

YORKE

THE COFFEE,packed by privates in the early hours, was hot when we drove here. So hot it nearly burned my tongue.

It’s cold now.

The skin of my hands is red, raw from the relentless wind rushing the road and whipping into a circle so fast it howls and rushes when it hits the trees behind the warehouse.

I shove my hands into my pants pockets for warmth, finding the bullet and the ring there, icy, hard lumps. Onereminding me why we’re here, another reminding me of a promise I made to Kelly.

I imagine the cold temperature has kept the Butcher’s Gray Caps home instead of coming here.

We’ve seen no one beyond the crew that was stationed here. The mission has gone according to plan without exception.

I swallow the rest of the cold coffee inside, my empty stomach clenching. I ate a couple protein bars on the way, but they’re long gone.

There’s a heavy thump, dull and metallic, through the closed freight doors to the warehouse, as soldiers dismantle the machine. It’s not as big as I expected, about the size of a small SUV. Every part, cable, and tool is coming, too, everything documented, labeled, photographed carefully.

I stayed inside long enough to confirm that the headstamp on the completed bullets match the one in my pocket.

E & H 9MM 2036

And thanks to Ephie confessing to Shane, now we know there was a deal at some point between Ben and the Raiders and the Butcher—which makes sense in a roundabout way. Ben and Renata were here before we were. It makes sense they’d have made contact with the Gray Caps.

Five more teams are posted up at integrals down the road, watching for incoming traffic.

Ebundi is standing beside me along the tree line that runs at the back of the factory where a line of picnic benches would be in the shade if it were summer and there were leaves in the trees or a sun to cast shade.

He’s a solid soldier, with a thick, chalky voice, and big, round eyes.

We’ve been standing on guard, and not talking for over an hour. No one else has spoken to me. I haven’t spoken to them, either, but they make their feelings known. I’d hopedthe excitement of the mission, the promise of renewable bullets might help them hate me less—not for me, but I don’t want their feelings for me touching Frankie and Auden when I’m gone—but the goodwill of White Winter has faded in the wake of the shitty weather and dismal sky.

“It’s been smooth,” I say, testing out Ebundi for acrimony.

He watches me from the side, works his tongue around in a way that feels vaguely disapproving. “Too smooth.”

We haven’t seen anyone since our initial push, when we moved silently through the dark windy pre-dawn silence, dispatching Gray Caps as we cleared the neighborhood area-by-area, building-by-building, room-by-room, on silent boots.

Only four people were on guard in the actual factory. They put up almost no resistance.

None of them had walkies. There was no communication system here.

Making it impossible for anyone to have told Auggie the Butcher what’s happening here, or for him to send in backup to cut us off.

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