Page 77 of Wrath
Wyatt came to stand next to her and put an arm around her shoulder. “You don’t need to convince us,” he said.
“Where do you think Dimitri would be holding him?” Parker pointed at the blueprints. “AIMI, pull up the heat map of The Kremlin on the surveillance screens.”
A screen on the wall, previously showing a news network, changed to display a satellite image. It zoomed in, and little orange, red and yellow blobs milled about. Misha could only assume it was imagery of bodies moving about the club.
At that moment, Sloan shuffled in from the direction of the elevator. “Sorry I’m late. What did I miss?”
Parker checked the time on his watch. “Everything.”
“Okay. I’ll just go back to bed.”
“No—” Parker grabbed her by the shoulder as she turned around. She jolted back into his hold. “You can man the comms. Flint is busy repairing the relay on the communications jammer you fucked up last week with the spilled soda.”
“Can’t AIMI handle the comms?”
AIMI?Misha mouthed to Wyatt.
“Artificial Intelligent Management Interface,” he whispered to her.
“AIMI isn’t infallible, Sloan. And, while we’re at it, you should be out in the field, not mooching around operations. I think we’ve indulged your sin enough. In fact, when the new security team gets here, that’s exactly what you’ll be doing again.”
Sloan whined dramatically and slouched over to where Mary and Flint worked. She picked up a headset and sat down near a laptop.
Wyatt ignored his siblings and turned to Misha. “We’ll all be going into The Kremlin with bulletproof clothing. We’ll storm the place, and before you know it—”
An alarm sounded and everyone in the room began talking at once until Parker shouted for quiet. His big voice boomed so loud that even the alarm turned off.
“AIMI?” Parker’s face was staunch as he stared at the screen on the wall. “What triggered the alarm?”
A map of the city came up, stretching from the top to the tail of the city. A red dot flashed near the bottom of the map.“There is a disturbance in the south-side of the city, here. It appears as though the South-Side Bank is under attack. Please hold. More incoming data. Triangulating the new location now.”She paused.“Analyzing police scanners. Adjusting outcome. There. Another bomb has gone off in the Quadrant Center Park.” A red spot flashed when the woman spoke.“That makes two disturbances.”
“Any footage?” Parker asked.
Screens flickered to CCTV footage of people in a park, running, screaming. Another screen showed gray dust blooming before a building, making it hard to see.
“Three disturbances.”
“What the hell?” Tony muttered as he peeled his prosthetic nose from his face. More footage came to light. More attacks. One by one, on the screen with the map of the city, little red dots appeared at random intervals.
“AIMI, anyone reporting?”
A news network video feed replaced one of the CCTV footage screens. A female news anchor was speaking—not only reporting on the unexplained explosions, but on the white-robed fanatics creating mayhem in the streets, inciting looting, causing violence.
“Faithful.” Tony spat the word out like a bad taste.
“Four disturbances.”
“Holy shit,” breathed Liza as she palmed the gun in her holster.
“It’s like my building collapse, only on a bigger scale,” Grace gasped.
Misha cast her mind back and remembered Lilo telling her that Grace lost her family in the Cardinal Bombing a few years ago. Many people died that day, all because—Misha turned to Wyatt as the memory of his confession slid home. His ex-fiancée set that bomb off and killed all those people in order to frame the Deadly Seven as the perpetrators. The city had turned on the disgraced heroes for years.
“This is different,” Wyatt said. “We know the Syndicate is behind it now, and the Faithful are caught on camera. The city will know it’s not us, either. They won’t turn the blame on us.”
“Bombs are going off everywhere!” Liza whipped her gaze to Parker. “I need to get out there. CCPD is short staffed today. I think it’s better I go as a cop.”
Parker nodded abruptly, and Liza disappeared down another corridor, presumably toward an exit. To Griffin and Evan, he spoke next. “You two are already geared up. Griff, you head here”—he pointed at a red angry spot on the south outskirts of the city—“where metal structures are in danger of collapsing. Use your power to keep those buildings up until survivors can get out. Take Tony. Stay in pairs. Evan, I want you here, near the Northside. I’ll go with you.”
