Page 12 of Echo: Burn
Kane appears beside me, his presence steady in the chaos. "Good shooting, Doc. Stay low."
He fires past my shoulder, three controlled bursts. Something heavy hits the ground in the trees below.
"North ridge neutralized," Mercer reports through the static. "Three confirmed."
"South ridge suppressed," Rourke adds. "They're pulling back."
But they're not pulling back from the center. If anything, more figures are pushing forward through the trees, using cover professionally, relentless in their advance.
"Kane!" I say. "They're massing for an assault!"
"I see them." His voice is grim. "Stryker, frag out!"
Something small and deadly arcs through the air into the tree line below. The explosion is concussive, pressure wave slamming into my chest even behind our rocky cover.
The screaming that follows is worse than any sound I've heard, including Jack's worst rages. These are men dying in pain and terror, and I helped make it happen.
Then silence.
The kind of silence that rings in your ears.
"Cease fire," Kane orders. "Tommy, give me eyes."
Static. Then: "Thermal shows withdrawal. All approaches. They're retreating to regroup. You're clear to return to base."
We won. Somehow, impossibly, we held them off half a mile from Echo Base—the base I’d only laid eyes on hours ago. They never got close. Never even suspected the base exists.
Kane helps me to my feet. "Let's move. Storm's covering our tracks, but I want us back inside within twenty minutes."
The trip back feels surreal. We navigate through the blizzard, our path invisible to anyone who might be watching. By the time we reach the hidden entrance, I'm shaking—partly from cold, partly from adrenaline crash.
Inside the warm bunker, I'm shaking harder, the adrenaline crash hitting like a freight train. The rifle slips from my numb fingers. Kane catches it before it hits the ground, setting it aside with gentle efficiency.
"First firefight?" he asks quietly.
I nod, not trusting my voice.
"You did good." He steadies me with a hand on my arm, his presence solid and reassuring. "Better than good. You might have just saved all our lives."
I look up at him, this scarred warrior who appeared in a blizzard to save me from killers I didn't know existed. His eyes are closer than they should be, holding mine with an intensity that has nothing to do with combat.
"They'll come back," I manage to say.
"Yeah." His thumb traces a small circle on my shoulder, probably unconscious. "They will. Because Protocol Seven doesn’t retreat,” Kane added grimly. “It escalates. Next wave will be heavier.”
"What do we do?"
Kane's expression hardens into something that might be resolve or resignation. "We finish what they started. The Committee wants a war? We give them one they'll never forget."
Standing there in the aftermath of violence, surrounded by men who've made darkness their profession, I realize something terrifying.
I believe him.
More than that—I want to help him win.
Footsteps approach from deeper in the bunker—light, uncertain. A woman I haven’t seen before emerges from the shadows, late twenties maybe, with dark hair pulled back and the kind of eyes people earn through pain. She's limping, one hand pressed against her side.
"Sarah," Kane says, his voice gentling. "You should be resting."
