Would it be best for Jasper to fight her way out of this? Or to find some way to deal with the employee without causing a scene? Was he a low-level worker who didn’t get paid enough to care if she got away, or would he chase her?
“I’ll meet you by the entrance,” Jasper muttered to Grace.
“No, she needs to come too,” the employee said. He was short, but heavily muscled. Orange skin. Bald head.
Jasper shook her head. “Listen, she didn’t do anything. I—”
The guy folded his arms, and Jasper caught the briefest glimpse of the Blade tattoo under his short sleeve as the fabric shifted. Uh oh. She’d assumed the store manager was working with whatever small gangs hung out in the area, not Starr’s personal army.
“Fine, she can go,” the Blade said.
“No,” Jasper replied. “Never mind. You’re right. She should come too.”
Grace’s brow furrowed. “What?”
“I mean, you’re an accomplice this point.” Jasper tried to give Grace a look that said, “trust me.”
“Suit yourself. Things are going to go the same for you either way,” the Blade warned. Jasper’s eyes narrowed. What was the plan? Take them to a back room where more Red Blades were waiting to kill two of Starr’s biggest targets?
The Blade stepped toward Jasper and held out a hand. “Oh, and we’ve got metal detectors hidden at the entrance,” he said, voice low so that only Jasper could hear. “A gun, three daggers, a couple of throwing stars…you weren’t expecting a fight, were you? Go ahead and hand those over now.”
Jasper’s gaze flickered to Grace. “Or what?”
“You don’t have to die today, Van Terra. Make things easy for us, and you could walk away.”
With a sigh, Jasper pulled out her weapons and slammed them into his hand one by one. He tucked them into his jacket as he received them. Jasper tried to avoid meeting Grace’s gaze, but their eyes locked for a heartbeat. Had Grace picked up on the fact that this had nothing to do with shoplifting? The confusion in her eyes was shifting to fear.
“How long did it take you to recognize us?” Jasper asked.
“You have more important things to worry about.” The Blade gestured for Jasper and Grace to follow him.
Once they were away from civilian witnesses, they were as good as dead. Jasper wouldn’t be worried about fighting the Blades if she were alone—there were plenty of potential weapons in a supermarket, if you knew what you were doing—but she had to account for Grace, who was the real target here. Starr may have wanted Jasper dead for years, but he clearly considered Grace’s elimination to be a more urgent matter.
They needed to get out before the Blades could trap them.
They were almost to the back rooms. Now or never. Jasper was fast, but they were expecting that. She needed something better than fast.
She needed a distraction.
“I’m sorry I took the soda,” Jasper said loudly. “I’ll put it back, if you like.”
The Blade gave her a weird look. “The Nova Cora? You do realize we don’t care—”
Jasper held the bottle up in the air. “See? I’ll put it on that shelf.” She pointed to her right.
“If you insist, I guess,” the Blade muttered. “Makes inventory easier. But no funny business.” He leaned toward Jasper “There are more of us around than you think.”
“I’m just putting it back. Don’t even want it.” Jasper did want the Nova Cora actually. She’d been looking forward to a little treat after all her hard work. Ugh. She slowly set the bottle on the shelf, keeping both hands visible. “See?” She rested an elbow on the shelf and leaned into it slightly. “No problem.”
“Dragging this out won’t help you—”
It was easy for Jasper to put more of her hidden strength into the shelf without letting on, bracing her cybernetic leg against the floor while her corresponding arm pressed against it. She gave the Blade a casual eyebrow lift as she leaned. One moment, everything was calm.
The next, the shelf was toppling.
“Hey!” The Blade shouted.
“Oops.” Jasper grabbed Grace’s arm. “Sorry ‘bout that.” She delivered a swift kick to the shelf in front of her, sending it falling in the opposite direction. “Let’s go, Angel!”
Jasper flipped through her vision modes as they ran. Heat. X-ray. Shouts of alarm warned people to get out of the aisles in the path of destruction. Still, Jasper was prepared to race in and grab anyone not scrambling to safety fast enough, if she needed to.
The rest of her focus was on their pursuers. Her arm shot out to the right. She knocked a display to the ground, sending fruits rolling across the floor toward a snack aisle.
“What was that for?” Grace asked, eyes wild, chest heaving, hands shaking.
“Don’t worry about it!” Grace didn’t need to know about the squad of Blades approaching from that direction, just out of view. She was scared enough as it was.
The machinery and computer chips they’d jammed into Jasper’s brain all those years ago hummed as they kicked into overdrive. The world slowed down, and Jasper’s limbs slowed with it. The sound of shelves crashing to her left became distant. She focused on other sounds: a glass bottle dropping and shattering on the floor, a smartsphere buzzing, a gun going off.
Jasper’s hand tightened around Grace’s arm as her head turned in the direction of the gunshot. The timing had to be perfect. Three, two, one—she shoved Grace forward. The bullet zipped between them. She pulled Grace back. The world sped up.
They caught up with the wave of toppling shelves. Two security guards—more undercover Blades, undoubtedly—emerged from an aisle on their right to block their path.
Jasper pulled Grace to the left, into a toy aisle. “Faster!” she shouted. The shelf next to them began its fall. The patch of light on the other end, their exit, shrank. Jasper blindly grabbed at the items tumbling from the falling shelf, hoping for something that could do damage.
The shelf was mere inches from the top of her head when she and Grace burst out on the other side of the aisle. They were greeted by three Blades.
“Stay back,” Jasper warned. “Or face my—” She held up her hand and found she’d grabbed a yo-yo.
The Blades laughed and lifted their blasters. Jasper pushed Grace down as they fired. The yo-yo string looped around her finger. She swung.
The closest Blade yelped in pain as the toy smacked into his fingers with surprising speed. His blaster clattered to the ground. Grace started to get back up.
The other two Blades fired again, each taking a different target. In a panic, Jasper shoved a dazed Grace back to the floor. The blast meant for her grazed Jasper’s arm. She staggered back and sucked in a sharp breath. Her skin burned.
Jasper smacked the first Blade in the head with the yo-yo before he could pick his weapon back up. Then she hit a second Blade, sending the woman staggering backward and knocking her blaster out of her hands.
The third Blade fired at Jasper. While she dodged, he aimed at Grace, who was making another attempt at pushing herself up off the floor. The yo-yo wrapped around his wrist. Jasper yanked hard, and he stumbled toward her. One punch to the jaw sent him to the ground. Jasper kicked his blaster away from him, tossed the yo-yo aside, and pulled Grace up into another sprint.
An exit sign glowed up ahead. Jasper slammed into the metal door beneath it with more force than she’d intended. “Mia, summon the car!” she yelled as she flung it open.
“I’m sorry, could you repeat that?” Mia responded through the smartsphere in Jasper’s pocket.
“Summon! The! Car!” Jasper pushed Grace through the doorway.
“I’m sorry, could you repeat that?”
“Ugh! Never mind!” Jasper pulled the door shut in time to shield herself from two bullets. The dents they left told Jasper the door wouldn’t hold up against a third.
Red and yellow lights lit up the fire escape Jasper and Grace stood on, accompanied by sirens. Jasper glanced over the railing. Police cruisers were coming their way, fast. Jasper reached into her coat.
“Why would the Red Blades call the police?” Grace asked.
“They’ve got their cover as store employees,” Jasper reminded her. She pulled out the camera. “But if we could get footage of them with their weapons—”
“Jasper!” Grace yelped. “We have to go!”
Jasper turned the camera on and pointed it at the door. “Back up, they’re going to come through fast—”
“Police are coming up!”
Jasper glanced down. Officers were sprinting up the fire escape. Damn. “All right, up we go then.” Still clutching the camera, she ran. Grace kept pace at her side.
Jasper turned the camera on her face. “I’m being chased by the police right now! But before I make my escape, be sure to subscribe to Starchatter so you never miss an update!”
Grace stumbled to a halt. “They’re coming down, too.” Footsteps thundered above, warning that another wave of officers were coming to meet them.
Jasper stuffed the camera into her coat and peered over the railing. Only one way out. “Jump!” she told Grace.
“What?”
“You have wings! Jump!”
“What about you?”
Jasper picked Grace up and tossed her over the side of the fire escape. “I’m right behind you!” As she climbed up onto the railing, the door a level down opened. A gun fired. Jasper dropped from the fire escape, and the bullet whizzed over her head.
Grace pulled off her jacket as she fell and stretched out her wings. Her descent slowed, allowing Jasper to catch up. Jasper grabbed one of her arms and pointed to an open window below. “Can you get us into that building?”
Grace nodded. She managed a surprisingly clean shot. They flew in through the window, crashed into the ground, and tumbled awkwardly across the floor. The lady whose office they’d invaded shrieked.
“Sorry about that,” Jasper told her as she stood up. “We’ll just, uh, show ourselves out.”
While Jasper and Grace made their way out of the office building, Jasper sent the footage to Thea to edit and upload. After that, she led Grace on a longer route back to Starchatter to avoid trouble. Neither of them spoke during the walk. Jasper had too much on her mind to try for conversation, and keeping quiet would be safer, anyway.
When they entered the building, Jasper finally said, “Obviously, if I had known Blades were running the place, we wouldn’t have gone there.”
“How did you not know?” Grace blurted. “You knew about the secret weapons, and drugs—”
“I thought they were selling to smaller gangs!”
“You—”
“Galax!” Attom’s interruption drew a small sigh of relief from Jasper. “Nice job on the video. The footage was enough for the police to go back and seize the drugs and guns. You’ve been cleared, and those blasted Red Blades have been dealt a nice blow.”
“That fast?” Grace muttered.
Jasper was too distracted to reply. She folded her arms. “I’m just glad I was able to help take the guy down.” Starr would be upset by the loss of one of the Blades’ operations, but with viral video evidence, he couldn’t intervene in the arrests without looking suspicious.
“You don’t have to pretend to care about that stuff,” Attom replied with a dismissive wave of his hand. “But the dead fish was a nice touch for our bleeding-heart viewers. I’m sure that helped our view count.”
Jasper restrained an annoyed expression. “Of course. I’m glad my contributions to Starchatter are valuable.”
“They sure are. In fact, I want you at the staff party tomorrow night. You’ve earned it.”
“Thank you.”
“I’ll get you your invite,” Attom told her. “It comes with a special keycard to access room 72-7A, and it lets you into the offices after hours. Keep up the good work.”
Once Attom was gone, Jasper turned to Grace. “See?” she said, a grin on her face. “Mission accomplished.”
“So, how long until I can go outside without people trying to kill me?” The spite in Grace’s tone took Jasper by surprise.
“We’ve got access to Ringmaster’s hideout.” Jasper paused. “Well, access to the room below it. We’ll gather information, and from there, make a plan to catch him.”
“Sounds like you’re pretty far out from taking Starr down.” Grace’s hands were still trembling as she folded her arms. “Which is the whole reason I’m with you.”
“You’re with me because I’m the only person keeping you alive,” Jasper replied, sharper than she meant to. She immediately regretted it. With a wince, she added, “Angel, I want Starr gone even more than you do, trust me. But he’s powerful. We have to take away his support system before we can take him down.”
“You keep saying you’ll catch Ringmaster and take down Starr and handle all these other guys, but I’m going to need more than vague statements.”
“Or what?” Jasper asked. “You’re welcome to leave whenever you want. But I don’t need to tell you anything.” It frustrated everyone around her, but she’d always made up her plans as she went along. And it had always worked out. For the most part, anyway. Besides, there were some things you just couldn’t plan for.
And Grace wasn’t leaving any time soon. She had strength, but no street smarts, and she had to know by now she wouldn’t last long on her own.
Still, Jasper felt a twinge of guilt as she and Grace returned to the offices to meet back up with the rest of the team.