Page 85 of Echo: Line

My training in evidence collection never covered improvising explosives under combat conditions. Good thing Alex's training did.

I grab the charges from my vest—small, directional, designed for exactly this situation. Place them on the backup servers across the room, set for remote detonation. Not enough to bring down the room but enough to create chaos.

Ninety-three percent.

"What are you doing?" Alex asks.

"Creating options." I return to the keyboard, watching the download accelerate. Ninety-six percent. Ninety-eight.

The door handle rattles. Someone's breaching. Alex's rifle tracks the movement.

"Delaney..."

"Five seconds."

The door starts to open—slow, controlled, tactical entry.

One hundred percent. Download complete.

I yank the device free, hit the detonator.

The charges blow with enough force to shake the floor. Not the servers I'm standing near—the ones across the room where I placed them. Smoke, sparks, and chaos erupt. The door slams shut from the pressure wave, buying us maybe ten seconds.

"Go!" I shove the device into my vest pocket, bringing my rifle up.

Alex moves first, clearing the doorway with practiced efficiency. Three Committee operatives are scattered in the corridor, disoriented by the blast. He drops two before they recover. The third gets his weapon up.

I fire. Three rounds center mass. The training takes over—stance, sight picture, trigger press. The operative goes down.

"Move!" Alex pulls me into the corridor, away from the server room that's rapidly filling with smoke.

We run. Behind us, shouts and gunfire. Ahead, the access point that got us in. We need to reach it before they cut off our route.

A figure appears at the corridor intersection. Committee operative, rifle rising. I'm faster—two shots that force him back into cover. Alex puts a round through the wall where the man's hiding. The operative doesn't reappear.

"Kane, we're coming to you!" Alex transmits.

"Negative, we're cut off. Head to extraction point Bravo."

"That takes us through the security station."

"Then you better move fast."

We hit the stairwell at a run. My lungs burn from the sprint in full gear but I don't slow down. Can't slow down. The evidence is in my vest pocket, irreplaceable and absolutely critical. If I go down, someone else needs to get it out.

"Alex," I gasp. "If something happens?—"

"Nothing's happening."

A door above us crashes open. Footsteps pounding down stairs. They're boxing us in from both directions.

Alex stops, spins, fires up the stairwell. The footsteps pause. He grabs my arm, pulls me through a door into another corridor. This one's finished—carpeted, lit, looking like normal office space except for the bullet holes appearing in the walls around us.

We're taking fire from behind.

"Suppressing!" I drop to one knee, return fire at the doorway we just came through. Three-round burst that keeps their heads down. Alex moves ahead, clearing the next intersection.

"Clear! Come on!"