Page 41 of Hardline Torque
“Mano,” he said quietly into comms.“We’re being bracketed.”
“I see it,” Tane replied immediately.No question.No hesitation.
That was the first fracture in Victor’s instincts.
His body wanted to move—take point, break pattern, pull them out on a vector only he could see.That was how he had survived for years.Control was safety.Autonomy was survival.
But this wasn’t his op.
The west side lit up without warning.
Not with muzzle flashes or shouting—those would have been simpler, cruder.
This was worse.
A surveillance sweep rolled across the ridge in a disciplined electromagnetic wave, invisible but unmistakable.Victor felt it crawl over his skin, the fine hairs on his arms lifting as his sensor array spiked and then stuttered, struggling to recalibrate.The air itself seemed to hum, a low vibration that set his teeth on edge.
Below them, one of the temporary structures flared brighter as a generator surged, deliberately masking the sweep beneath legitimate industrial noise.
Clean.Controlled.Surgical.
Not gunfire—worse.
A surveillance sweep rolled across the ridge in a wide electromagnetic pulse, clean and disciplined, designed to flush movement rather than engage it.Victor felt it like a hand sliding under his skin, his sensor array spiking as the system tried to recalibrate.
“Breaker,” Kael snapped.“What the hell was that?”
“It was an EMP sweep, Surge, and I just lost three birds,” Luca answered.“They’re burning the area in deliberate quadrant movements.”
Victor swore under his breath.“They’re not hunting us,” he said.“They’re mapping our response.”
“Options,” Kael said.
Victor had three.
All of them involved him stepping forward, taking point, and leading the way.
Instead, Tane spoke.
“Torch, Reef—freeze,” Tane ordered.“Wraith, hold west.Surge, I’m pulling Specter south, hard.”
Victor’s head snapped toward him.
That wasn’t any of the plans or options he had in mind.He had no idea what Tane was planning.Every instinct screamed to countermand it—to take control back before chaos settled in.His muscles tensed, already preparing to move ahead of Tane, not behind.
And then the sweep hit again.
Closer this time.
The ground thrummed faintly beneath his boots.Leaves trembled.Somewhere downslope, a generator spooled higher, masking the pulse with ambient noise.
Victor made a choice, and was surprised how very easy it was.He trusted.
He let Tane take the lead.Victor folded the instinct to command down into something smaller and followed as Tane broke left, boots skidding on loose soil.
They hauled ass sideways into a ravine cut so narrow it barely qualified as cover.Rainwater had gouged it deep over years, leaving slick mud and exposed roots that clawed at Victor’s trousers as they slid.The drop knocked the breath from his lungs when they hit the bottom hard, shoulder to shoulder, Victor’s spine slamming into packed earth as Tane rolled them deeper into shadow.
A second later, light washed over the ridge they’d just abandoned—white and clinical, sweeping back and forth like a measuring instrument.
