Page 80 of Breached

I leaned my head down and spoke quickly into my own radio. “Fox One to Raven Two.”

“Raven Two, go ahead,” Mark answered quickly.

“You’ve got eyes on you. Suggest moving out of visual range.”

There was a pause. “Copy that, Fox One. Appreciate the info.”

“Threat to Raven Two is being evaluated,” Mike said. “Thanks for the heads up, Fox One.”

I tucked the Cartel’s radio into my pocket. It had already proven useful. The sudden downpour had stopped, and I stayed low and moved into the tree line. I scanned the forest for anything I could see. I knew I needed to get to the house—Bruno would soon start questioning my whereabouts, and the plan would go sideways if I didn’t pick up the pace.

A small, faint chirp found its way to my ears, and the corners of my mouth rose when I felt the Guardian’s presence. My NODs quickly synced with it, and suddenly, six beams of light shot down in the area I was in and outed more of the enemy. I was almost surrounded. I sank low into the brush, thanking God it was dark.

“Jesus.” West was suddenly in my ear on a different channel as he guided Guardian around. “Fox One, you’ve got a shit load of company.”

“Yes, well, seems I’m the one target Bruno wants brought in alive. It makes me the most desirable of all of you to hang out with.” I chuckled darkly as I mentally calculated the best course to avoid the beams.

“You’ve got one moving directly toward you. Move ten feet to your right,” he directed, and I stayed low and slid myself around a tree, trying my best to be quiet. I watched the beam as it followed the man. He ran right by me, and when he did, I had my knife ready and went for his throat. I didn’t want him to alert the others.

“I see two on my nine,” I whispered to West. “I know they can sense me.” They almost tripped over their dead friend on the ground and stopped. I reached out and sliced into one of their necks and spun quickly to the other and wrapped my arms around and got him in a choke hold. He was strong and flipped me forward and slammed me into the ground. My NODs were knocked off my eyes and shifted up to my forehead.

Feeling around, I grabbed a medium-sized rock, hopped to my feet, and threw it at his head as hard as I could. It was the last thing he was expecting. He stood there stunned and fell backward.

“I’m okay,” I whispered. “I see the other three beams. I’m liking this advantage.”

“I see them, too,” West replied. “Can you see that one that just went by you? He’s headed right toward the edge of the cliff.”

“Thanks. I can see I’m fine for the moment. The other two are moving away from me.”

“Odd,” West murmured, “I’m getting a weird reading from something. Not sure what it is—maybe a glitch.”

“Well, figure it out if you can. I don’t want any surprises,” I replied and stayed still.

“Hold on.”

I stared down at the dead man and made a mental note of where I was so that later we could make sure the bodies were all dealt with. I knew Guardian would help with that anyway. I sure as hell knew we didn’t want to leave any Cartel bodies on our land. I pictured one of the kids finding one by accident once all this was over.

“I think you’re okay to move. I’m not sure what that was about,” West advised me.

I began to slowly head toward the house.

Lightning cracked, white and violent, and for a split second, the world went bright. Trees, shadows, movement— I froze. Not because I saw something, but because I didn’t.

The ravens. They’d been with me since I entered the forest, riding this storm out, cawing, shifting from branch to branch, calling to one another like they owned the sky, but then suddenly—nothing.

Just silence.

A silhouette broke away from behind a pine. There was no beam above it. I pushed up my NODs and put an eye to my night scope to scan it with my rifle as my finger hovered over the trigger. My eyes played a trick on me as two shadows morphed and became three—not one. I pulled on my NODs again. I could see two beams.

“Ah, Fox One,” West’s voice told me something was wrong, “something isn’t right here. I see two Cartel, but the third man isn’t reading correctly—he’s fading in and out.”

I went through all the metadata in my head for the drone, and then it hit me. “Are all the teammates’ stats still active online?”

I slid my finger off the trigger to rethink my plan as I inched closer. I moved the scope and locked in on the guy without an obvious beam—he just sort of flickered. I squinted as I waited for West.

“Yes,” he answered, but he made a strange sound, “well, sort of. One hasn’t moved in a bit. it’s Bl⁠—"

Lighting flickered and lit up the silhouette. John!