Total pages in book: 96
Estimated words: 89763 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 449(@200wpm)___ 359(@250wpm)___ 299(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 89763 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 449(@200wpm)___ 359(@250wpm)___ 299(@300wpm)
She really did hack it. It should be impossible with this tech, but when have the rules ever applied to Hermes?
I curse myself for getting into this mess and walk through the door. The outside of the building might lean more toward office, but inside is all military. There’s a foyer with a booth on the other side. Two people stand inside it, their shocked faces showing through the glass.
Well, shit.
Hermes could’ve given me some warning. As the guards and I stare at each other, I notice that their black uniforms don’t have an expected crest on the shoulders. It’s not Athena or Ares or even Artemis. It’s the gears and tools that denote Hephaestus.
She really was right. There’s something important pertaining to the barrier here.
“Hey.”
They stare at me. One is tall and nearly as broad as me, their skin the sickly kind of pale that comes when white people spend too much time away from the sun. The other one is nearly an identical build, but with warm medium-brown skin and a shaved head.
How long has it been? A minute? Two? I guess we could stare at each other for the next ten minutes while Hermes does whatever it is that she’s doing. But surely there are more people here than just this pair. If they’re going to such lengths to keep this place hidden, they would leave more than two people here to protect it.
I have the distant thought that Theseus had never mentioned this place, but he was a really shitty Hephaestus. His people hated him, and he hated the job. There’s probably a lot of really important stuff that he just never noticed or knew to even ask about. The irony that he held the position that we needed to actually bring down the barrier is almost too much to bear. I can’t even hold it against him, though, because neither one of us are cerebral. That’s not the kind of weapons Minos trained us to be. If he wanted us to be brainiacs, he should’ve gone about shit a different way. That’s on him.
All at once, the guards snap out of their shock. They draw their guns and start shouting. “What are you doing here? How did you get in? Who are you?”
The last one almost makes me laugh. For once, my reputation hasn’t proceeded me. Typical that it’s the one time it would’ve been useful. I hold my hands up slowly, skating my gaze around the room once more. There’s not a lot to work with here, but I don’t need much to make shit happen. “I’m just a tourist looking for a good time.”
They exchange a look of disbelief. The white guy starts to lower his gun. “Dude, you’re in the wrong place.”
His friend narrows his eyes. “He’s lying. There’s no way he could’ve got through the door unless he was trying to.” He points his gun right in my face. “Put your hands behind your head.”
“Sure, sure.” I do as he asks, but my shoulder screams in protest and the movement is jerky.
The white guy jumps back a step and grabs his radio. “Intruder at the front! We need more people up here.”
Well, fuck.
The other guy curses and hurries toward me, out of the relative safety of his little booth. Another mistake in a long line of them. People get guns in their hands and think they’re invulnerable. If they were trained properly, they would know better. It’s super fucking easy to take a gun from someone when you’re in close proximity.
Which is exactly what I do the moment he reaches for my hands. I spin and deliver a sucker punch to bend him in half. From there, it’s child’s play to grab the pistol. I kick the back of his knees, sending him flailing to the floor, and aim the gun at his friend. “Drop your weapon.”
I don’t wait for him to decide what he’s going to do before I move forward and slam my pistol butt into his temple. His eyes roll back in his head and he slips to the floor. I take the opportunity to grab his gun, eject the clip, and toss it across the room.
The first guard has a couple of zip ties, so I use those on both of them. He sputters threats that I ignore because the door deeper into the building opens and eight more people emerge. “Fuck.”
Ariadne would want me to not kill them, but I promised her I’d make it back to her safely. Their lives versus my promise? It’s no contest. Even so, I shoot the first one in the kneecap instead of the head. They topple into the person next to them, making their shot go wide.
Two strides and I’m in the middle of them. Shittily trained or not, they hesitate to use their guns in such close proximity for fear of shooting each other. I use that to my benefit. I ignore my wound shrieking in pain and slam two of their heads together hard enough that I feel the sound the contact makes. They drop with twin groans. Three down.