Blood & Thunder (THIRDS 2)

His legs free, Sloane pulled himself out, and with Ash’s help, got to his feet. “Isaac took Dex,” Sloane ground out, trying to push away from Ash. To his horror, his team ran back, the pain in Maddock’s face telling him all he needed to know. “No.” Sloane shook his head. He refused. “I have to go.” Sloane tried to push against his friend, furious when Ash wouldn’t let him go. “Get the fuck off me! I need to get him back.”

“Sloane, they’re gone,” Rosa said. “They had a plan. This whole thing was planned.”

“I can’t….” Sloane shook his head. What did he want to say? He couldn’t lose Dex the way he lost Gabe. He couldn’t. “I have to save my partner.” His rough words sounded more like a plea, but he didn’t care.

“And we will,” Maddock assured him. “What did Isaac say to you? Did he give any clue to where he might be taking Dex?”

Isaac’s words echoed in his head, and then it all came crashing down.

“I know where he is.”

SLOANE STORMED into Lieutenant Sparks’s office, his fingers flexing at his sides. “Where is it?” he demanded.

“I beg your pardon?”

?

?Where the hell is the facility?”

Lieutenant Sparks stared at him, her hand covering the receiver of her phone. “Agent Brodie, I have the Chief of Therian Defense on the line.”

“Good.” Sloane marched over and snatched the phone from her. “This is Agent Sloane Brodie. I need to know where the First Gen Research Facility is.” He listened as the Chief of Defense huffed and spewed a bunch of bureaucratic bullshit and threats, none of which Sloane gave two flying fucks about. “Now you listen to me, you paper-pushing son of a bitch, Isaac Pearce has my partner. He has Dr. Shultzon, and most likely the First Gen files. If you want to suspend me, you do that, but after I save my partner, and your sorry ass from a media shit storm. Now where is the goddamn facility?”

There was a long pause, and as Sloane was about to give the Therian a piece of his mind, he rattled off the address. Sloane thought maybe he’d heard wrong, but he knew he hadn’t. You’ve got to be kidding me.

“That’s the secure location? In the middle of fucking Manhattan? No offense, sir, but you need to revisit the meaning of ‘secure,’ because that sure as hell isn’t it.” He thrust the phone at his lieutenant and stormed off, calling out over his shoulder. “I’ll sign my suspension papers when I get back!” He headed for the briefing room, rounding up his team, along with Beta Ambush and Beta Pride. Inside, he addressed the room, aware of Maddock hovering by the door, his expression grave.

“All right, listen up. This is an extraction. Our priority is to preserve life. Get Agent Daley and Dr. Shultzon out of there alive. Destructive Delta, you know what you have to do. Everyone else, I don’t think I need to paint you a picture of the extreme danger this group poses to our city and our organization. Approach the facility with extreme caution. Whatever happens, Isaac Pearce does not leave that building unless it’s in cuffs or a body bag. Understood?”

“Understood, sir!”

“Then let’s move out.”

Moments later, they were all sitting in brooding silence, strapped in their seats inside the BearCat as it drove through Manhattan. Sloane couldn’t stop himself from thinking the worst. What if they were too late? What if he lost Dex like he’d lost Gabe? Would he be able to handle it? What the hell did Isaac want with Dex? There was no way the guy believed Dex would join him. Sloane quickly pushed all those thoughts out of his head. Dex needed him. He needed to keep it together. As the BearCat sped through the city, Ash spoke up beside him.

“I can’t believe the facility’s been there all this time.”

Rose checked the magazine of her Remington rifle, before moving onto her next weapon. His team wasn’t leaving anything to chance, considering what was at stake. “You think they were trying to hide it in plain sight?”

“I don’t know what they were thinking, probably that it was secure, and no one would be able to breach it,” Ash muttered. “Same shit they believe about every secure location until someone infiltrates it. Secure, my ass.”

As soon as they’d boarded the BearCat, they’d received word from Lieutenant Sparks. The facility had been breached. From the inside. Which was why they hadn’t been alerted. The reason they knew anything about it now was because Isaac himself had sounded the alert. Sloane wasn’t surprised. If Isaac had managed to get Dr. Shultzon to cooperate using his family, Sloane had no doubts the guy had used similar tactics to infiltrate security. Themis had confirmed several guards with high levels of clearance at the facility had families, including young children. Isaac wasn’t the sort to go in guns blazing, hoping everything would sort itself out. He meticulously planned, went in under the radar, and exposed the weaknesses. Then he made himself known.

The First Gen Therian Research Facility was located on East Seventy-First Street, past an antique shop, Sokol, and Cornell University Medical Center. It was a light gray building with dark gray accents, eight floors containing seven large mirrored windows per floor (except for the highest two floors, which had three windows), a parking garage, and a set of large glass doors. No numbers, no signs, or information. It was frightening knowing how in this innocent looking neighborhood, all manner of tests and experiments had been performed on young Therians. How countless lives had been altered, destroyed, and saved. Looking at it made him want to be sick. After years of trying to put this place behind him, there it was staring back at him, larger than life.

“Hey, you okay?”

Sloane heard Cael’s soft words, and was about to answer, believing his teammate had been addressing him, but when he turned, he found Cael had actually been talking to Ash. His friend had gone pale, his eyes on the building across from them.

“Yeah, I uh….” Ash shook his head, his words trailing off into nothing. Shit, Sloane hadn’t thought of how being back might affect Ash. He gave Cael a reassuring smile and pulled his friend behind the truck, away from prying eyes.

“Hey, look at me,” He took Ash’s face in his hands, turning his face so he could look his friend in the eye. “It’s okay. They can’t hurt us. Things are different now. We’re not those scared kids anymore.” Ash nodded, though Sloane could still see the uncertainty and fear in his friend’s eyes. “Ash, you can do this. I need you, buddy. I need you to help me get Dex back. I wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for you. Please.”

Ash looked at him then, truly looked at him, his expression turning hard. He took a deep breath and nodded. “Let’s go get that partner of yours out of there.”

With a grin, Sloane grabbed Ash’s head, and Ash did the same to Sloane. They pressed their heads together like they used to do when they were kids, pretending to be tough soldiers, brothers-in-arms. Now they were.

“Let’s do this,” Ash declared, moving away. He jumped into the van, helping Cael up. “Show me the building’s layout.”