Page 12 of Black Bay Protector
He took it all in within a matter of seconds, attempting to pinpoint the best areas to target in combat. He’d have to go for the head, he decided. The side that wasn’t covered in metal. There was no telling how much was mechanical and how much was still human underneath those clothes.
The soldier smiled. “Where’s your girlfriend?”
“Where’s your backup?” Jace countered.
“Don’t need it.”
Cocky bastard. But that was to Jace’s advantage. Not that he’d take this guy’s word for it. He’d still keep his senses open for a secondary or tertiary threat.
When the guy threw away his pistol, Jace was thrown for a moment. Then, he slid out his blade and threw that away too, saying, “If we’re going to do this, let’s do this. Let’s see who’s the better creation.”
The better creation?Was this what Doctor Dietrich had been working on? It didn’t seem like her style, but a lot of time had passed. People did occasionally change, though honestly, he hadn’t thought the Doc had been capable of it. He’d think more about that later though. Right now, he had some Terminator ass to kick. Jace always preferred hand-to-hand to a shootout when possible, and this would buy Paige even more time to get the hell out of there. Slowly, making a show of it, just like the other guy had, Jace threw his weapons aside. He still had a blade in his boot, as he suspected the other guy did as well.
They circled each other, each eying their opponent, assessing vulnerabilities, and in Jace’s peripheral vision, he saw the van begin to slowly move in reverse. Good girl.
It was Jace that initiated the first offensive attack to ensure the soldier didn’t realize she was leaving. Settling his weight into his thighs, he launched himself toward his opponent, intending to sink his teeth into the neck. It was a mistake. He might as well have been biting down on a rock – or in this case, a steel beam. And he’d put himself in reach of that mechanical arm. The metal fingers clamped down on his forearm and dragged him off holding him just out of striking distance. Instead of releasing his arm, that mechanical hand squeezed, and the bone didn’t just break under the pressure, it splintered.
The pain was so intense, Jace couldn’t hold back his scream of agony as that hand continued to grind his bones to dust while the soldier stood there and laughed.
“Grady?”
That was Paige’s voice. No, no, no. She was supposed to be gone! Jace’s vision was blackening around the edges, and he was in danger of passing out, but a quick look was all it took for him to see that not only was she not driving away, but she’d also left the safety of the van.
“Get back!” he yelled, but she didn’t listen. Instead, she stood there and stared wide-eyed as if she’d seen a ghost as a green beam of light swept over her from head to toe.
The soldier’s other hand reached behind him, unholstering a pistol he’d had tucked to his lower back, and while Jace was helpless to do much more than thrash around like a fish on the line, that gun was pointed at Paige’s head.
Jace struggled to cling to consciousness, his free hand stretching to reach the blade in his boot before the soldier fired that gun.
Paige took a stumbling step closer to death, her hand reaching out. “Grady! It’s me, Paige. Your sister.”
Holy shit fuck.
Jace wasn’t sure what happened next. As he slashed out with his blade in a wide arc, his arm was suddenly released and he hit the dirt. The gun never went off. It was as if the soldier… glitched. There was no other way Jace could think of to explain it. It looked like he was trying to press the trigger but couldn’t, his head twitching oddly, and his eyelids flickering.
Whatever the reason, Jace didn’t care. He may only have seconds before whatever had gone haywire righted itself. Ignoring the searing pain in his arm, he sprung to his feet, grabbed the guy’s gun, and kicked the soldier back. The guy fell on his ass but didn’t otherwise react. It was as if something had switched off, powered down, and he was waiting to reboot.
Jace leveled the gun at the guy’s head, but Paige was suddenly grabbing onto his arm. “No!” she screamed. “That’s my brother.”
Jace ground his teeth together. “Get in the van, Paige.”
“Not until you come with me.”
He couldn’t hold back his snarl. It went against every instinct to leave an enemy combatant alive but he couldn’t shoot her brother in front of her.
With an annoyed growl, he lowered the gun to the low-ready position. “Fine. Grab the weapons and get in the van. I need to check the truck to see if there are any more of them.” With a narrow-eyed glare, he added, “Since I know you won’t shoot him, if he moves, you drive away as fast as you can. Understood?”
Nodding, she began to back away picking up Jace’s discarded weapons as she went, her eyes never leaving the prone form of the soldier. Whether that was to keep a dangerous opponent in her sights or to wonder how her brother had come to be like this, he wasn’t sure, but he’d bet it was the latter.
Only once she was back inside the relative safety of the van did Jace cautiously approach the truck, keeping one eye on Captain Mech Tech for a resurgence of hostilities. The back was empty, so he moved around to the front. There appeared to be only a driver, who to Jace’s surprise, had earbuds stuffed in his ears, his head bobbing along to music loud enough for Jace to hear and his eyes were closed. Idiot. This guy, whoever he was, certainly wasn’t a soldier. Probably a good thing since Jace was down an arm. But one arm was more than enough for this guy.
Utilizing the advantage of surprise, Jace wrenched the door open, and as the little guy screamed shrilly enough to pierce eardrums, Jace hauled him out, threw him to the ground, and used the butt of the pistol to knock him unconscious.
That was the last of it. His energy was depleted. His vision had narrowed to a pinprick and his legs could barely support his weight. He was going to go down, soon, there was no escaping it.
Staggering back to the van, he barked out, “You drive,” before almost falling into the passenger side. He hated it, hated leaving Paige vulnerable, but he was going to pass out. His pain was off the charts. He wasn’t healing as he should and his body needed to shut down. “Watch your six,” he managed to slur, and the last thing he saw was Paige’s concerned expression before the darkness took him.
“What just happened?” Anne Dietrich screeched, unable to maintain her usual calm control as she turned her attention from The Commander’s body cam footage on the screen to Doctor Jerome. “What the hell just happened?” She jabbed a finger toward the other doctor. “Who is she? I know you know who she is. I saw it in your eyes earlier.”
