“Hear that?” Jasper asked as the sound of blasters firing echoed outside the diner. “Must be some higher-ranking Blades if they’ve got blasters. Most only get guns.”
“Which begs the question of why you use them.” Holly squeezed her own blaster’s trigger, firing a purple beam that knocked a Blade to the ground with a nasty burn on his arm. The team had no qualms using lethal force against the Blades, but Holly generally kept her blaster on a lower setting to reduce collateral damage. “When you’re not using knives, that is.”
Jasper briefly inspected her gun before taking aim again. “I use the stuff I was trained on.”
“What moron trained you on knives and swords?” Holly asked.
Jasper’s grip tightened. “Now’s not the time.” She fired off three shots and looked toward the balcony. More red beams sliced through the air. A few Blades were probably positioned on nearby skywalks.
Thea pulled Dax to the ground. Grace clung to the railing, face twisted in pain. Jasper frowned. Had she been hit?
Another blast tore apart the railing. Grace went over the edge.
“Oh. That’s unfortunate.” Holly fired again.
Jasper didn’t have time to be annoyed by Holly’s apathy. She leaped over the nearest table and sprinted onto the balcony. Thea yelled her name as she passed, but Jasper didn’t respond. At the edge of the balcony, she jumped.
She landed on a skywalk with a thud. Unconcerned with how the narrow walkway trembled beneath her, she peered over the edge. A straight shot down would be difficult. Maybe Grace hadn’t fallen far. Of course, the longer Grace stayed still, the better chance the Blades had of finding her.
Gunfire forced Jasper to keep moving. She dropped from the skywalk to a balcony, and from there leaped to a window ledge. A fire escape below the Bibi’s looked promising. Jasper inched to the other side of the ledge and jumped.
Her hands caught the fire escape’s railing, and she swung onto a landing. Fresh drops of blood were splattered across the metal. Jasper dropped her gaze to the city below. Traffic and walkways and buildings made it impossible to see far. Grace was nowhere in sight.
Jasper shifted her focus to the closest stream of air traffic. Numbers flashed in her vision, estimating the speed of approaching vehicles and the distance she would fall to reach them. She climbed up onto the railing, selected a target, and stepped off the fire escape.
She bounced off the top of the first car and landed on the next. Its driver honked at her as she paused on their hood to scan her surroundings. A heartbeat later, she jumped out of the flow of traffic and grabbed the top of a hovering billboard. Its thrusters struggled to support her weight, sinking and bringing her a few feet above a skywalk. She let go.
Jasper continued downward into the city, trying to maintain as vertical a trajectory as possible. The sunlight faded, replaced by flickering signs and dim streetlights and long shadows. Five more minutes and a few rough landings brought her into the Blue District.
Her final drop left her standing in a maze of back alleys. A skyway overhead blocked out most of the remaining sun that made it this close to the ground. Anyone she ran into back here would likely be a criminal of some variety.
Not as terrible as herself, of course.
Jasper kept her gaze upward as she walked, searching for signs of Grace’s path. A flash of movement brought her attention to a staircase spiraling up the side of a building ahead. Three people raced down the stairs. Red Blades. At the rate they were moving, they had to have eyes on Grace.
The Blades were still a few stories up when Jasper sprinted around the corner and found Grace.
She was slumped over a pile of trash bags. A dumpster—Jasper winced at the dent in the lid—shielded her from view of the main street. Jasper kept moving until she was standing over her. “Angel?”
Grace’s eyes fluttered open. “Where am I?” she mumbled.
“Down there!” one of the Blades shouted.
Jasper groaned. “Where are you guys?” she asked into the comms.
“Where are you?” Holly demanded in response.
“Under the interchange of skyways H and 72. Backup would be nice.”
“You’re on the streets? We’re still in the Silver District.”
The Blades were almost to the ground. “Fine,” Jasper said, turning around. “Guess I’m on my own, then.” She drew out the largest dagger she had and threw a quick glance back. Grace’s eyes were closed again. She’d sunk back into the trash pile.
The Blades came around the corner. “You’re outnumbered, Van Terra,” the one in the middle said. He was bald, blue-skinned, and easily the largest of the three. There were more tattoos than just the bloody knife covering his heavily muscled arms.
Jasper twirled the blade around her fingers as she strolled toward the trio. “You’re outmatched.”
“Are you sure about that?” came a voice from behind her.
Jasper glanced over her shoulder. Three more Blades. She could handle them without much effort if she were alone, but she had an unconscious Grace to worry about.
The blue-skinned Blade from the first group raised his gun. “How long do you think it’ll take them to find Alvarez’s body?” he asked.
“In this part of town?” the man to his right asked. “Could be a few days.” He smirked.
Jasper drew a smaller knife with her free hand. “You gonna shoot, or waste all day talking?”
“A high profile kill like this? I’m going to take my time.” This blue guy seemed to be in charge. To his associates, he ordered, “Do what you can to keep Van Terra out of the way, but Alvarez is mine.”
A gun went off behind Jasper. She spun and deflected the bullet with her larger blade. In the same instant, the smaller knife left her hand, spun end over end, and landed in the shooter’s chest.
As he collapsed, Jasper asked, “What, planning on taking all the glory for yourself?” She turned in a slow circle, waiting for one of the others to shoot. They eyed each other nervously while their leader moved toward Grace.
“Everyone fire at her at once,” he barked. “Are you all too stupid for basic strategy?”
Jasper raised an eyebrow. “Avoiding the question?”
Two of the four remaining Blades pulled their triggers. Damn, fights had gotten a lot easier once she earned the kind of reputation that made Red Blades hesitate to shoot at her. She jumped, snatched a couple of throwing stars out of her coat, and sent them flying into one of the men. A third star whizzed past the leader’s face, delaying his approach toward Grace.
He glared at Jasper. “I was the one put in charge.”
“But you aren’t here alone. It kind of sounds to me like you’re going to use this to boost your rank, while your teammates here don’t get any credit.” Jasper shrugged.
The leader raised his gun and fired three shots in Jasper’s direction.
The world slowed down. Jasper’s heart hammered a steady rhythm in her chest as she watched the bullets approach. At the last possible second, she ducked, moving only slightly faster than the Blades around her, despite the rapid boost to her perception.
The bullets hit a man behind Jasper. He cried out in pain and dropped. Jasper took down the last Blade on that side of the alley with another throwing knife.
“I’m sure we’ll all get credit for surviving a fight with you, Van Terra.” The leader shot the last two Blades still standing a warning look. “Assuming I get some help, that is.”
He was ten feet from Grace now. But enough Blades were down that Jasper felt she could take her eyes off her opponents for more than a few seconds. She lunged and pointed her dagger at the leader’s chest.
He fired, forcing her to jump and twist in the air to dodge. She landed between him and Grace, deflected two bullets from the remaining Blades, and attacked again.
The leader stepped aside, but Jasper’s blade grazed his arm. He slammed his gun into her head. She staggered. He knocked her dagger aside with the gun and took aim again.
Jasper dropped to her knees, feigning surrender. The leader lowered his gun to follow her head. Before he could decide to pull the trigger, she sprung up and swung her fist into his jaw. Her right fist. The Red Blade slammed into the concrete, unconscious before he hit the ground.
Jasper rose to her feet slowly. Her nails dug into her palms as she fought to hide her dizziness. The last two Blades exchanged uncertain looks.
“Tell me.” Jasper tipped her head to the side. “What do you think your chances are of beating me?” She drew her gun and fired a bullet into their leader’s shoulder. “Be honest.”
“What, you giving us an out?” the Blade on the right asked.
“We’ll face a lot worse if we go back empty-handed,” the other said.
“You think I’ll be nice and give you a quick death?” Jasper shrugged and aimed the gun their way. “I mean, if that’s what you want—”
“Whoa, whoa, whoa,” the first said. “We’ll take the out, thanks.” He shot his colleague a glare.
They ran. Jasper’s shoulders sagged and she turned around.
As her shadow moved over Grace, Grace’s eyes opened again. She tipped her head back. “Jasper?”
“Can you walk?” Jasper asked.
Grace pushed herself to her feet and stumbled forward. Jasper instinctively reached out to steady her, but Grace found her balance first. She craned her neck to examine her right shoulder.
“What happened?” Jasper asked.
“Bullet grazed me.” Grace winced. “I can’t really move the wing on that side.”
“Dax and Thea can fix it.” However intricately the cybernetic wing was connected to the rest of Grace’s body, those two could figure it out.
“Where are we going now?” Grace asked.
Despite the dull ache in her head, Jasper smiled. “My apartment.”