ia

able weight against my skin, thick with t

d stone wall, letting its rough

ging me to this exact cav

shivering shoulders and promised me a ho

-only the freezing tide

nterface projected a secure holographi

ian hospital room that seemed a w

sleep in an angular plast

rested on the small table next to him

k of billing statements sat on the windowsill, stamped with the logo of the clinical trial program that

automated voice stated, hollow and impassive. "Without the med

ng at Arthur's temples, each one a test

d with a heavy, c

whispered into the ec

brother again, if only

se to my ankles, but the

ef washed over me, a qu

ted for the lethal extra

over the crash of the waves, I c

tadium and ordering his m

t come down i

o test his limits, blind to the fact

y legs completely as the system's cou

per engine echoed off the serrated cli

my face, forcing my eyes open a

ugh the jagged m

a rescue line, a dark shape cutting

as E

d a made Soldier-a man whose dominion was the s

ment slammed into my stomach, d

from extraction, only

ter next to me, sending an ic

sappointment in my eyes, and a mu

scue line, threatening to smash

zo grabbed my wais

harness in one flui

d his own body to shield me from the jagged c

hands where the friction of the rop

d the metal rigging three ti

forcing me to look at hi

lost in the roaring wind. "I promised I would alw

to always extract me from a

ter, acrid taste to my mouth, for this was

p violently, yanking

abin of the chopper, Enzo's knees buckled,

e medics for oxygen and thermal blanke

se, his bloodied fingers trem

arsh seawater, choking on t

uncontrollably as the ad

ket tightly around my shoulders,

e chaos, until the heart monitors in the c

echoed coldly in my m

Extraction failed. You must reac

h failure, refining its protocols, or perhaps simply growing impatient. Either way, the message

r plastic of the oxygen mask, my vis

munication headset, his chest

he asked, a raw vulnerability in his tone

knowledging the twisted, bro

ure in the hardened Soldier's mask-before h

," he said, his voice dropping to a dangerous whisp

d his underground hospital, I realized with sick certainty that Enzo would never stop e