chapter twenty-four

Christin and a group of her terrorist friends hold up a bank on Madison Avenue a couple of days after Redwood's visit. The local police department tries to handle it themselves at first, but Dennis, the AI in our tower that I keep forgetting exists, eventually puts through a call from the department asking for our assistance. They report that there's an enhanced person in the field, so our partial team suits up and gets moving as fast as we can.

Max outlined a few different team lineups for different situation after the assembly in D.C. He's decided that anything Christin related should be dealt with by everyone but Cecelia, Cally, and Tony. His choice to essentially bench Cecelia and Cally for now makes sense because of their powers. They're only consultants for a reason. Tony is the one agent Max has decided to leave behind at the tower on any given mission since he knows how to run everything and take care of things if something goes wrong.

Everyone on the partial team Max decided on suits up as quickly as possible. We're ready to head out of the tower in under ten minutes, which is kind of a miracle considering how long it takes to shimmy into our uniforms alone.

"I can fly one of you there with me," Nick says as our group is making its way to the elevator. Max volunteers me, so Nick and I head to the roof while the rest of them go down to the parking garage.

We land within a group of cop cars stationed on the street outside the bank. A few of the officers have guns trained on the building, but that's the extent of the actions they've taken. I can't exactly knock them for that, though, because that's protocol. Situations like this one where enhanced individuals are threatening civilian lives automatically enter the League's jurisdiction. The police follow our lead once we arrive.

"Agent Castillo, Ford," one of the officers greets, walking up after we've landed and Nick has let me go. "They're all still in there. We sent in Officer Mendel first, who alerted us to the enhanced activity. He radioed in but hasn't come back out. Says there's at least two dozen hostages. Mother and her baby, the works."

"Blackwell is enhanced, but she can only teleport, so we'll take care of her. Is there anyone else in there with powers?"

"As far as I'm aware, no. I could be wrong, though. If two Blackwells can go bad, other ex-agents can, too. I'd keep my eyes open."

"Alright, we're just waiting for our captain before we move in. You'll follow us close behind. I'm sure seven of us will distract them enough for you to take care of the hostages."

The officer agrees and goes off to relay the information to his coworkers. Max and the rest of the team arrive a few minutes later.

"What's the situation?" he asks. Nick explains everything to him while I try to catch a glimpse of the inside of the bank through its floor-to-ceiling windows. The hostages are being held too far back in the building for me to see clearly from here, so we're going to be playing a dangerous kind of guessing game when we get inside.

"I want Crystal Witch right in front of me. I'll follow her directly in so she can scope everything out for the PD. I'm going straight for Blackwell. Ghost, take care of any weapons. Bolt, you help the PD get all the hostages out. Angel, you're aerial defense. Inferno and Hurricane, work defense, as well. If you see someone in trouble, fix it," Max lists, laying out orders cleanly and precisely. Hearing him use code names instead of our actual names is definitely something I'm still not quite used to. They're pretty much self-explanatory, though. Wendy, Flint, JD, Nick, and then Rowan and I. I'm kind of surprised he put me on background defense, but I suppose somebody has to do it. I'm also coming right off of multiple injuries, so it's probably better that I take it easy. The broken arm and fingers are all better, but they're still a little stiff and sore.

"Are we killing on sight?" Flint asks, his normally cheerful face drawn and stony.

Max heaves a heavy sigh as he adjusts the comm in his ear.

"There is a kill-on-site order on her from the Director. I would prefer, however, that nobody dies today," he replies, eyes flicking to me for a moment before settling back on Flint. "Take her out if necessary, but let's not going straight for it."

I start a bit in surprise, but I really shouldn't be shocked. I was there when Director Scofield issued the order and I wasn't exactly objecting to it when she was bashing my head into the floor of the assembly hall. She's murdered a horrifying amount of people. It's time to end this already.

Wendy goes invisible before entering the building so it appears that Max is the one leading the pack. He sprints right in, finds Christin, and goes directly for her. It's difficult to keep myself from following him, but I have my orders. A man masked by a bandana starts moving straight for me, so I don't have much of a choice in who to fight anymore.

By the time I have the man on the ground and cuffed with power-inhibiting cuffs, half of the hostages are already gone. The police are fast, but JD is infinitely faster.

The ground rocks beneath me as a quake blasts through it. Max. His code name is "Tremor" for a reason. I look in his direction long enough to see a huge crack in the marble floor where Christin must have been a moment ago.

An unpleasantly familiar scent hits my nose and it takes me a moment to understand what it is. Charred flesh. Rowan is shooting flashes of flames left and right. He's taking down multiple anti-League people at once. It's an awfully brutal way to subdue someone, but they knew what they were signing up for when they decided to take on a team with a fire bender on it. None of the have guns. Flint took care of them as soon as possible, so he's fighting people hand to hand at this point.

I freeze a woman from the waist down when she comes charging towards me. I snort a bit at the crudely cut fabric domino mask affixed to her face, stepping over her to see where else my help may be needed.

A shot rings out in the bank. There were many in the first few moments after we entered, but everything significantly quieted down once JD and Flint had taken everyone's weapons. My gaze swings back to where Max and Christin just were and my stomach drops into my feet.

A crimson stain is spreading from a hole in the black fabric of Max's suit. He stumbles a bit, but regains his balance and doesn't go down. Flint thrusts a hand into the air and tries to pull the gun from her hands from where he is, but it doesn't budge. It takes me a second to realize why. She's tied the gun to her hand. She must have seen another fight the team was involved in because no one has ever thought that far in advance before.

Another shot cracks through the air just as I start moving towards them. The bullet hits Max in the lower leg. He sways to one side and then the next before raising a hand to toss another vibration beam her way. Christin teleports away as he starts falling forward, reappearing just in time to grab him from behind.

The next few moments happen too fast.

More pops of gun fire. One. Two. Three. Four. Four bullets enter Max's back and leave through his chest. My heart stops. A shard of ice pierces the woman's shoulder after leaving my hand, but it doesn't even matter. Max's eyes go wide. Christin lets go and he crumbles to floor in a heap of far too much blood. He doesn't move an inch once he lands. I'm not even sure if he's breathing.

Anguish spikes up inside me. My heart is screaming in my ears as I stalk straight up to Christin, my mother, and I go immediately for her neck. I'm really going to do it. I'm going to strangle the life out of this woman. Max isn't here to stop me this time. He's probably dead. There's a loud flutter that I recognize as Nick's wings, but I ignore it.

I am going to murder my mother.

She teleports before I can even touch her. She doesn't go too far, though, so I pursue her, tossing shard after shard of ice as hard as I can physically manage as I go. She dodges all of them, disappearing and reappearing here and there with a psychotic grin stretched across her face all the while. I guess the first one I threw was a lucky hit.

It takes me too long to realize that she's just toying with me. Fighting someone who can teleport is nearly impossible. The next time she disappears from view, she reappears by catching me in a choke hold from behind.

"You didn't really think you could come in here and just win, did you?" she says sweetly. "Please. I raised you, didn't I?"

"Not exactly the term I'd use," I choke back, using the little breath I have left. I yank my arms up and grab onto her own with my hands before pouring everything I have into them. The ice burns in my veins as it travels around my body. It always burns a little bit, but this is kind of insane. I shove the pain out of my head, trying my best to ignore it. I'm only going to get one shot at this because she'll know my angle once I go for it, so I really need to focus.

When I'm nearly blacking out from the lack of oxygen and the strain of my powers, I unleash everything I have. My hands freeze over as they freeze her arms. The ice spreads up the lengths of both of her arms and even reaches as far as her chest. Wetness drips from my nose, into my mouth, and down my chin. My reflection in the glass divider between the lobby and the office cubicles tells me that its blood. The pain is nearly unbearable, and that's saying a lot for me. This is probably going to kill me.

Christin has started thrashing around, finally realizing what it is that I'm doing. I force more ice out, though, strengthening any cracks that she may be creating with her struggle. She deserves to die. I can do it. I can.

"Where's your escape act now?" I breathe, smiling cockily. I can freeze her entire head, encase it in ice, and suffocate her. She'll die. She deserves to. I could. I could. I...

I force myself to stop. The ice has spread all the way up to her shoulders. I could kill her right now. I want to. I think.

I catch her eyes in the reflection of the glass. The panic any normal person would have isn't there. The psychotic rage that has taken over jumps out at me through them. She kills who she wants with reckless abandon. I'm not like that. Her death isn't necessary anymore. I have her where I want her. It's over. Killing her would make me just as bad as her.

The ice has stopped spreading. There is still a serious shortage in air reaching my brain right now, though, and I start to fade out quickly. My vision fuzzes around the edges. Sure, this may be my end. At least I'll be remembered fondly. Or maybe I won't. Nobody likes the Blackwells, after all.

Something whips past me and kicks up all the papers on the floor around us. There's a click from below and then JD and Rowan are suddenly at my side. JD holds up a spare set of power-inhibiting cuffs and suddenly I understand. He must have clipped some around her ankles. She can't go anywhere even if she was loose.

Rowan gets closer and places his hands on the ice binding me to her just as I feel my eyes start to roll back. The warmth slowly starts to break through and the ice quickly melts into water that drips down the front of my suit. My knees buckle and my only thought is that I hope Rowan is fast enough.

"She's choking him, Inferno. A few burns isn't worth dying for," JD says, goading Rowan to go faster. His voice is muffled, though, and very hard to hear over the rush of blood in my ears.

I blank out and figure that this is finally the end. I gave it a good run. Christin's done. Mission accomplished.

My vision comes back, though, to JD and Rowan staring down at me. I'm breathing normally and freely now. Rowan thawed me out in time.

"You got her?" I croak out, immediately rolling over onto my side to see.

"Yeah, yeah, Hurricane, we got her," Rowan says, rolling me back. "Can you at least pretend to take it easy? You almost died. Again."

"I'm fine, I'm fine," I slur out, pushing his hands away as I drag myself to my feet. I sway heavily, so Rowan grabs onto me to make sure I don't topple over. "Max," I rasp.

"Nick's with him. She found a pulse after he went down. She already flew him out to the hospital."

I lean against Rowan and let a shuddering sigh rush out of me.

"I was gonna kill her, Row," I mutter shakily, "I almost fucking murdered her."

"Hey, now," he says, bringing both hands up and placing them on either side of my face. "You didn't. You stopped yourself."

I bark out a wet laugh but don't say anything else.

Flint and JD join us. They haul Christin to her feet from where she had been sitting slumped over on the marble floor. Someone has already cuffed her hands behind her back with a second pair of power-inhibiting cuffs for good measure. Good.

"You're going to regret this you little shit! You'll pay!" she shouts as they pull her away.

I grin at her with bloody teeth.

"Nobody comes back from the Vault, Ms. Blackwell," I reply. Her face contorts, but she's outside on the street before she can reply.

Rowan and I walk back out onto the street with Wendy at our side. She breaks off to make sure JD and Flint get back to the tower alright. Rowan and I hang back from the giant group of police cars because my head is already spinning just from the short walk. I'm still quite lightheaded and I can feel the dry blood crusted on my face. I hear a few clicks and know it's the press, but I ignore it. Let them take all the pictures they want.

Rowan and I step off to the side behind the many police cars and away from everyone else.

"You know, you continue to scare the absolute shit out of me," he says, aiming for a joking tone that falls a little flat.

"Yeah, well," I reply, giving an uncoordinated shrug, "What can I say? Life with me is a ride."

He grabs me and pulls me close before leaning down to kiss me. I kiss back, placing my hands on both sides of his face and pulling him down closer. I forget where I am for a second, but the chatter and closing of car doors pulls me back to reality before things can truly get out of hand.

I pull away and stare into his eyes like we're in some kind of dramatic romance movie.

"I love you," I say.

"I love you, too," he says back with certainty. "Now, let's get you to the hospital, huh?"

/-/-/

Rowan and I go to the hospital together. It's not as bad when I'm walking in voluntarily instead of waking up from a coma. The triage nurse doesn't even make me wait in the waiting room and she even lets Rowan come straight back with me.

I have another MRI done. I can basically expect some kind of imaging every time I get dragged into a hospital at this point. The demand League agents put on hospitals is actually a growing issue as the organization grows, so D.C. is slowly phasing medical floors into each team's base of operations. They're going in order, it seems, starting with teams A and B. Lucky bastards. A med bay has to be better than a real hospital.

The doctor assigned to me determines that the nosebleed and roaring headache I've developed since we got to the hospital is a side effect from my powers. Translation: we can't fix anything, so here's some Tylenol and get out of our faces. I'm not even mad. I'll take what I can get.

I march straight up to the front desk and demand information about Max once I've taken three times the recommended dose for Tylenol. The nurse at the desk stammers for a few seconds before asking for ID. The rectangle of plastic has dried blood on it when I retrieve it from the pocket in my suit, but she nods and tells me his room number, anyway.

Nick is standing outside of his room when we get there. She smiles sadly when she sees us and I don't even hesitate to pull her into a hug. She shudders a bit, but then the moment is over and she's straightening her uniform up.

"They removed the two bullets in his leg," she says quietly. "The four that tore straight through him destroyed his insides, but he was already healing when they got him on the operating table. I didn't know his healing factor was that strong, but apparently a bullet ripped apart his spinal cord. They thought he was gonna be paralyzed, but it's already repaired itself. The doctors that worked on him are shocked, but they're sure he's gonna be fine."

"His spinal cord?" I say smally.

She nods, eyes wide with mutual shock.

"That's insane," Rowan says from beside me.

"It is, but you don't hear me complaining," Nick agrees, shrugging one shoulder. "Is Blackwell taken care of?"

"She is more than taken care of," I confirm, flashing a vicious smile. The petite woman looks a bit taken aback for a moment before nodding in understanding.

We wait around for a while until Max gets out of surgery. He's fast asleep and his doctor informs us that they'll be keeping him sedated for a couple of days so he isn't awake for any of the internal healing. The three of us sit around his bedside for a while until Rowan catches sight of the clock on the wall and curses loudly.

"What?" I reply, looking over at him from across Max's bed.

"I gotta pick up Bella in ten minutes."

We simultaneously look down at what we're wearing: League uniforms. Yeah. That's totally inconspicuous. There's nothing against walking around in our suits outside of missions, but it obviously attracts attention.

"If even one person gets a picture of us with her, it's over," I say quietly. It just about sums up the life of most League agents these days. There's a huge struggle for privacy in an age that cares so little about it. Realistically, wearing a domino mask and dark, heavily armored uniforms doesn't do much to hide our identities. We need to rely on the fact that most people will have never seen us out of uniform. Every time Atlas sees "Arctic Hurricane" on the news, he obviously knows it's me. He would have known even if I didn't tell him. The average classmate I had during this past semester would be none the wiser, however. I was hardly a passing face to them. Getting a picture of two League agents with a little kid between them would have any wrong-doer within a hundred mile radius readying a target directly on the little munchkin.

"I know," he agrees.

"I'll text JD," I say suddenly. "He'll be more than happy to sprint some clothes here in the time it takes for me to send the text."

JD appears just as quickly as I figured he would. The flimsy curtain to the side of Max's bed sways with his sudden appearance.

"You rang," he drawls, handing over two sets of street clothes.

"Actually, I texted," I reply, smirking slightly as I place the stack beside me on the bed. "Thanks, J."

"Yeah, yeah, you two kids have fun now," the older man jokes. He even has the audacity to ruffle my hair before disappearing from view with only a gust of wind in his wake.

Rowan and I waste no time moving into the bathroom connected to Max's room. Rowan's suit actually zips all the way up his back so I have to undo it for him. Jesus christ. You'd think Tony designed his suit with the sole goal of making me want to jump Rowan's bones every time I see him. I have a decent amount of wiggle room in my own, but the thick material of Rowan's uniform hugs the curve of his back like a dress hugs a woman's. It's unfairly hot, especially because we're in an ER and it isn't socially acceptable to do the dirty here.

"You're insatiable," he huffs when I take a little bit longer than necessary to pull the zipper all the way down to just above his tailbone.

"Only for you," I hum back, and the Bond that's always thrumming quietly in the back of my head warms happily. It's still something I'm struggling to get used to. The counterpart system seems outlandish enough already, but the Bond sounds like something straight out of some crappy young adult novel that wasn't screened nearly enough before publication.

We change quickly after that, folding up our uniforms to leave with Nick before leaving the hospital. Rowan and I have to basically book it to Bella's daycare if we want to have any chance of making it on time. We're still about eight minutes late despite our efforts when we finally arrive.

Bella's sitting with her teacher and another child at an otherwise empty desk. All the other kids have already been picked up, but at least Bella isn't the very last one.

"I'm so sorry," Rowan says quickly as he signs Bella out on the attendance sheet. I grab Bella's backpack out of her cubby, and she runs up to put her arms through the straps. "We were running late."

Ms. Reyes raises a single eyebrow and smiles.

"I can imagine," she replies with a glint in her eyes. "I saw the news."

Rowan and I exchange a prolonged deer-in-the-headlights look.

"Even without the privacy policy, I wouldn't say anything."

"Thank you," I pipe up, because Rowan looks so incredibly dumbstruck.

He grabs my arm when we're finally out of the school with Bella in tow.

"What if she's lying?" he whispers, so Bella doesn't hear.

"Have a little faith," I say back. "Not everyone is out to get us. I'm pretty sure a Reyes was on the KIA roster last December." The League releases a list of all of the agents who were killed in action during the year every December to honor them. Their names are also added to the memorial set up in the headquarters in Seattle. The names aren't released to the public and remain confidential, but it goes out annually for a limited period of time to each League member. The names on the memorial plaques are only codenames for the most part, but agents are just normal people to those in their lives.

"You really think..." he says, trailing off.

"It's very possible," is all I say in reply. We don't lost agents every day, but it happens. Those left behind either severely resent the League or lose the glamorized love that most civilians feel for the organization. Ms. Reyes strikes me as the second type, the ones who are realistic but can still see the good in the League.

Neither of us says anything more on the topic. I take one of Bella's hand and he takes the other. She laughs and squeals as we swing her back and forth between us. The three of us appear as nothing more than the average family to the outside world. The idea used to terrify me, but now it just makes sense. Bella is Rowan's and Rowan is mine. I don't think I'd be overstepping boundaries by saying that Bella's at least partially mine now, as well. She holds onto my hand as tightly as she holds onto Rowan's, and I think that says a lot.