Page 35 of Guarded By the Krampus

“Not anymore,” I told him, before looking to Sarah. “Stay here. This place should be safe.” But what Sylas and I were going off to do likely was not. “Also? I love you,” I said, before running into the hall and closing the door behind me.

“So it’s like that, is it?” Sylas teased, surging along side me, before disappearing completely.

“You’d better be going up!” I hollered, hoping he would hear, before I hit the elevator doors.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

I stepped out at the MSA building’s top-most floor and then took the short metal stairs up onto the roof. The door was locked, but by then I’d built up enough of a head of steam that I burst through it, sending it flying.

I’d never had a reason to be on the MSA roof before, so I’d never seen the antenna tower up close. It loomed above me, a lattice of steel beams and cables narrowing as it climbed toward the sky. Dishes and receivers bristled near the top like the quills of some futuristic porcupine, and a ladder bolted to one side promised a precarious climb.

The whole structure hummed with energy, vibrating faintly as it fed signals in and out—a heartbeat of technology connecting the building to the world—and keeping it intact was the only gift I could give my mate for Christmas.

And Nex had been right. Past the antenna, there was a swarm of incoming drones, easily visible against the more brightly lit buildings behind them.

“Thoughts?” Sylas asked.

“Oh, now you care?” I asked him.

“I’m more of a wetwork kind of guy,” he explained, like I hadn’t noticed.

Were the drones operated by programming, or by humans? Either way—“They can’t aim for what they can’t see,” I said. “Keep me clear though?”

“Understood,” Sylas said, going diffuse in an instant, only to crowd the entire roof with smoky gray, as I ran for the antenna structure in the middle of the smoke and started carefully climbing. I tried each piece for stability before I trusted it, and made sure not to touch any cables—I had no doubt my sharp hooves could easily clip one by accident.

Sylas’s shadows were thick all around me, stretching up into tendrils that lashed toward the drones, slapping them out of the air. Some bobbed and recuperated, others plummeted to the distant ground, but oddly none of them were going off, yet—I imagined their operators didn’t want us knowing they were armed with explosives until they were sure they would work, to keep the element of surprise.

“Ace?” came a voice from inside my ear.Sarah.“I told Nex he could hack into this, so I could speak to you. There’s still nine minutes to go. I hope you’re okay.”

So far, so good,I wished I could tell her, but the connection was only for receiving.

“They’re sending more drones, Ace. A whole other wave of them. Whatever you’re doing now is working—but I wanted to warn you.”

“More incoming!” I shouted out to Sylas, so he’d know.

“Understood!” he shouted back.

“Also?” she said, sounding hesitant. “I know it sounds crazy. But I think I love you, too. So come back to me, all right?”

I was so stunned in that moment I almost fell off the antenna.

But then right after that, I became so light I could fly.

“They’re dropping payloads!” Sylas shouted—which gave me just enough warning to brace.

These drones didn’t bother trying to gain access to the antenna—they just began dropping their bombs. I could see explosions bursting through Sylas’s smoke, as he created a dome over the antenna, deflecting most of their energy outwards, but at a cost.

“This…is actually somewhat painful,” he said, sounding surprised. “Hold Lucian,” he demanded, and a baby sling materialized around my chest, strapped over one shoulder, and around my hips.

“You didn’t leave him in the server room?”

“A son’s place is at his father’s side!” Sylas said, sounding irritable. “How much longer?”

“Seven minutes.”

Sylas didn’t respond to that—and I had a feeling that was a bad thing.

“Okay, so,” Sarah said, returning in my ear. “Nex says they’re being directed by one larger drone that’s being operated remotely. He’s trying to get into their system now, but he says in the meantime, if you take that one out, it should take out the rest of them.”

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