Page 97 of Static/Cling
Pushing down his doubts, Bjorn nodded, glanced both ways down the hall like he was six years old crossing the street, then made a dash for the corner Rufus had indicated.
Because at the end of the day, the mission had to go forward. If any of them died trying to get it done, those deaths had to mean something. He was not going to be the guy who let people die and still didn’t at least try his best to achieve their goal.
The room, thankfully, was exactly where Rufus said it would be. The door to the room opened when he swiped the card. Excellent. Didn’t it just figure that the only things working in their eleventy-seven plans were the electronic bits of it.
He dropped the card and shirt just inside the door and headed for the nearest bank of servers, hoping the charge he held was enough to travel through the entire room because oncehe let it go, he had no way to build it back up quickly without going back to the carpeted room.
He doubted he would make it there, shuffle around enough like a complete fool to build it up again, and get back here without getting caught.
Static skittered under his skin, as though eager to jump from him to the humming machines. Hairs along his arms stood up. He shivered at the power of it spiralling up his spine. Even the build-up he’d acquired to fry Kassian’s computer had not been this strong.
“This is going to fucking hurt,” he muttered, and laid his hand on the server.
Hurt was not the word.
The heat seared his skin.
The sparks that flew made him close his eyes against the light, so he heard, rather than saw the crackle of electricity as it skittered away along the metal frames of the server racks, and through innards of the servers themselves.
The scent of ozone and burnt flesh churned his stomach.
“Don’t let go,” he muttered at himself through clenched teeth.
His tightly shut eyes meant he didn’t see the threat until the windows at his back shattered and the noise of gunfire deafened him.
He let go then, sprinting the length of the server room to dodge behind the banks of machines.
He should be dead, or at least riddled with holes, but whoever was shooting out the room was apparently a terrible shot. Around him, the servers snapped and sizzled, tiny fires springing up in their depths to melt plastic and fuse wires and fill the air with acrid smoke.
“Great. If I don’t get shot, I’ll burn to death. Or die from inhaling mercury or some stupid thing.”
He growled.
“This is bullshit.”
Leaning his head back against the heating metal stand, he pulled in a breath, choked a bit, then called out as loud as he could. “Hold your fire!”
The gunfire ceased.
“Really?” Carefully, he peeked up to see between a slit in the racks.
Leif stood in the hallway outside the room, breathing hard, hands and shirt bloody, murder in every line of his stance.
“Baby?” Bjorn whispered, unsure if he wanted to get the small, angry man’s attention.
Leif’s head turned slowly, as though he fought against his own body, and he peered towards Bjorn. No. Not towards him. At him. How he could see Bjorn behind the racks of servers, how he knew exactly where he was, Bjorn had no idea.
“It’s me, babe,” he called. “You okay?”
Leif continued to stare. Whoever—whatever—looked out at Bjorn from his lover’s pale, clear eyes, it was not Leif.
“Fuck my life,” Bjorn muttered.
Earlier…
A second after Leif ran, the lights flickered back on.
“Generators still work, then.” Rufus started after Leif. “Come on!”
