The wind howled through the open bay of the C-130 transport plane, a freezing gale that threatened to snatch the breath right out of Leo’s lungs. At thirty thousand feet, the world below was nothing but a void of churning black ink—the North Atlantic.
Leo checked his harness for the tenth time. No high-tech thrusters, no stealth-cloaking flight suits. Just a standard oxygen mask, a ruggedized altimeter strapped to his wrist, and a heavy rucksack full of "dumb" explosives.
"Sixty seconds!" Thorne shouted over the roar of the engines. He stood at the edge of the ramp, looking out into the abyss as if he were waiting for a bus. He didn't even look cold.
"Hey, Rookie!" Brick yelled, leaning over to slap Leo’s shoulder hard enough to rattle his teeth. "Remember: gravity is the only thing in this world that never malfunctions. Trust the fall!"
Vance gave a thumbs-up, her face obscured by her jump goggles. She was holding a mechanical stopwatch. In the V.N.S.O., they didn't trust the auto-deploy computers. If you wanted to live, you counted the seconds yourself.
"Green light! Go! Go! Go!"
Thorne vanished into the dark. Brick followed, a massive shadow plummeting into the clouds. Vance was next.
Leo stepped to the edge. His heart was a hammer against his ribs. He thought of Maya—not the silver-eyed ghost, but the girl who used to challenge him to races in the backyard. I'm coming for you, Maya.
He jumped.
The scream of the wind replaced the roar of the plane. For the first few seconds, it felt like being crushed by a wall of ice. Leo tucked his arms in, stabilizing his body as he watched the glowing numbers on his wrist altimeter tumble.
20,000 feet.
15,000 feet.
Below them, a cluster of lights pierced the darkness. The Apex Sentinel. It was a massive container ship, sleek and bristling with high-tech sensor arrays that were currently scanning the skies for anything with an electronic signature. Since the V.N.S.O. team was falling as "dead weight," the ship’s AI ignored them as mere atmospheric noise.
"Five hundred feet! Pull!" Thorne’s voice crackled through the low-power analog radio.
Leo yanked the ripcord. The jolt was violent, snapping his head back as the small tactical chute deployed. He had seconds to steer. He saw the deck of the ship rushing up to meet him—steel plating, humming with hidden power.
He landed hard, rolling across the wet metal and coming up with his rifle leveled.
Thorne and the others were already down, moving like shadows. They didn't use lasers; they used iron sights.
"Vance, get to the bridge and cut their external comms. Use the physical overrides," Thorne ordered. "Brick, you’re on crowd control. Leo, with me. We find the Icarus Core."
They moved through the ship with grim efficiency. Suddenly, the deck lights shifted from white to a deep, pulsing red.
"Intruder alert," a calm, synthesized voice echoed across the deck. "Lethal force authorized."
From behind the shipping containers, the Vipers emerged. They didn't run; they glided on mag-lev boots, their blue-lensed helmets tracking Leo’s heat signature. One of them raised a sleek, white rifle—a sonic disruptor.
"Cover!" Thorne yelled.
The air hissed as a sonic pulse shattered a heavy steel crate next to Leo’s head. Leo dove behind a winch, his heart racing. He remembered the training. Don't fight the weapon. Predict the movement.
He popped out from cover, not aiming at the Viper, but at the wet deck beneath the soldier's feet. He fired two red-tipped rounds. The ceramic slugs shattered the magnetic seal of the Viper's boots, causing the soldier to slide uncontrollably across the rain-slicked steel.
As the Viper struggled to balance, his kinetic shield flickered. Leo didn't hesitate. He fired a three-round burst directly into the gap in the armor's neck joint.
The Viper slumped to the deck, his blue lights fading to black.
"Nice shot, Rookie," Brick grunted, opening fire with his machine gun, the heavy tungsten rounds chewing through the high-tech shielding of two more attackers. "They’re fast, but they hate lead!"
They pushed toward the cargo hold, but as the heavy blast doors began to groan open, Leo felt a cold shiver crawl down his spine. The air in the hallway turned freezing.
A figure stepped out of the mist of the pressurized hold.
She wore the same interlocking plates as the others, but her suit was midnight black, etched with glowing silver lines. She didn't carry a rifle. She held a collapsible pulse-staff that hummed with enough energy to melt a tank.
She raised her head, and the silver eyes locked onto Leo.
"Maya," Leo whispered, his grip tightening on his rifle.
"Target identified: Leo Miller," Maya’s voice was a flat, tonal echo. She spun the staff, the air around it shimmering with heat. "Threat level: Minimal. Elimination commencing."
"Leo, get back!" Thorne shouted, raising his weapon, but Maya moved faster than a human eye could follow. She was a blur of silver and black, a machine-perfect predator.
Leo stood his ground, his "low-tech" rifle feeling heavy in his hands. He didn't want to kill her. He wanted to wake her up. But as she lunged at him with the glowing staff, he realized the first lesson of the V.N.S.O.: To save the person, you have to survive the soldier.
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