The Dark Edge Chronicles - Hardwire

Chapter 13: Hardwires Hunting

Tantalus frowned as she checked Viper's pulse. The blonde's heartbeat was steady and unwavering. 'They're finally responding to the treatments!' she thought with not a little relief, glancing over at the rising and falling chests of Hammer and Ravage.

Of the three, Ravage had been the most heavily damaged by the renegade's counterattack. Viper, on the other hand, had been hurt the least. Still, the blonde had all sorts of nervous system problems and neural shorts that were making it difficult for her autonomous system to keep her body running without constant assistance. Of course the shorts also effectively neutralized her talents.

Whatever the renegade had hit her with, he had made sure that Viper wouldn't be functional for a very long time! Tantalus sighed as she put Viper's arm back down onto the bed. The blocky second-in-command didn't even want to think about what the renegade had managed to do to Ravage with a single pulse of EM energy and superheated plasma.

The sound of the front door closing made Tantalus move away from the bed and out into the hallway, where she met Agony and Scorpion on their way in.

"Anything?" she asked quietly and both shook their heads.

"Not even with the virus!" Scorpion hissed with disgust. "It is as if he has gone to ground and has taken every trace of himself with him."

"Yah, the bastard," Agony muttered half to herself. "Cold cocks the hell out of us, then buggers off without even a note to say thanks! This guy ain't gonna be happy when I'm through with him."

"I'm more afraid of him launching a full scale counterattack and destroying the rest of the team, while our most powerful members are down," Tantalus quickly interjected, looking hard at the other two. "We are more vulnerable now than we've ever been! More so that we've now discovered two other ESETs are in town. They were working together to subsume a local nation named the Alliance. If they decide to move up the ladder by taking us out, they could do so by again working together. We mustn't let them know we're here."

"Hah!" Scorpion snorted in derision. "They're only the Elementals and Quick Poison. They had to team up to subsume the Alliance, because they don't have the strength to do so, otherwise. The Elementals all together couldn't beat even Waif! The four of us could easily destroy both teams put together."

"Yar, I second that!" Agony said with a grin and gave Scorpion's up-raised hand a high five.

"Unless we've just had the shit kicked out of us by the renegade," Tantalus grimly reminded them and the two powerful psionics fell silent as they pondered that possibility. It truly hadn't occurred to them that the renegade could choose now to attack, only considering it now after their solid second in command mentioned it twice in nearly the same sentence.

Seeing that they had finally paid attention to what she was saying, the thick-bodied tactician went on.

"We all know just how cutthroat the entire ESET ladder is. After all, we carved our way to the top through many a team before us! Because of that, we can't afford to let our guard down or we'll end up just like our former rivals: very dead!" Her expression tightened. "Unfortunately for us, we've also been contracted to eliminate a hardwire that's most likely the most powerful psionic we've ever faced, including members of the Inner Council. If we don't fulfill our contract, our fall from the top will be no less than spectacular." She shook her head.

"Being between a rock and a hard place seems too cliche for the situation, but it fits. If we don't pull it together here, forgetting vendettas and glory trips against would-be rivals, we'll end up as fish bait! Most likely dangling on the end of the Inner Council's overly huge hook as they try to reel in the renegade."

"And that would be exactly my point, too," Ravage said in a tired voice from where he stood in the bedroom's open door, bandages still covering his face and chest.

Quickly Tantalus rushed to his side.

"You shouldn't be out of bed!" she murmured with concern, looking into his eyes as she scanned his body for damage incurred by rising out of his sick bed too early.

"Hands off me, woman!" Ravage hissed in irritation, waving the fussing Tantalus away, his eyes glittered with barely restrained anger. "I've had just about enough of your fussing about! Now, link in. I'm doing a quick-start regeneration and I need the extra power your three minds will be able to generate!"

It was a couple hours later that found five of the seven members of Mindfire grouped around the small table in their apartment's tiny kitchenette.

"First things first." Tantalus nearly shouted over Scorpion, Agony and Waif, trying to get their attention as the three shouted back and forth. "We need to worry about the contract! Once we get the renegade out of the way, then we can worry about the other two ESETs."

"If we don't take them out now, they might just stab us in the back! Where will our contract be then?" Agony argued and Scorpion nodded vigorously in agreement.

"Ravage, can you at least talk some sense into them?" Tantalus implored, looking over at the ESET team leader.

The lean Ravage, looking almost totally healed except for a small scar on his left cheek, merely shrugged. Although physically he was back in one piece, psionically he was still crippled. He wouldn't be of much use in either defending themselves against other ESETs hunting them, or going after the renegade. Being in that position of weakness bred silence. A silence that he was wisely keeping.

Seeing that she'd receive no relief from that particular quarter, Tantalus turned back with a sigh to her bickering comrades.

"We should hide until Hammer and Viper are healed, too!" Waif insisted, as strongly as the normally weak-willed wirehead could. "We can scatter high resolution watchers all over the city and wait for the renegade to trip them."

"That'll take too long," Scorpion stated flatly, chopping her hand down towards the table. "We need to act before Quick Poison and the Elementals get wise ideas in their heads about taking us down."

"Fuckin' 'A'!" Agony chimed in. And so they went back and forth, for a solid twenty minutes before Ravage's soft voice suddenly cut through the shouting like a hot knife through butter. Injured he may be, but he still knew how to bring absolute silence to a room with a simple word and he had finally had enough of the arguing.

"We wait," he said quietly, looking each team member in the eye. "The renegade has obviously left the city. We, however, are in no shape to go after him." His eyes abruptly narrowed. "I have a feeling though, that he'll be back. There's something about this place, something my clairvoyance has picked up that is making my head buzz even in repair mode, that'll bring him back here. Calgary is crucial in the control of North America. More importantly, though, is that the Armageddon Project will be initiated here, during the conference."

Ravage smiled tightly.

"Thanks to his hacks into Preacher's databases, he knows it, and we know he knows. So, we wait. In the mean time, Scorpion, I want you and Tantalus to shadow Quick Poison to ensure that they make good on their plans to leave the city, now that the Alliance is gone."

He looked over at Agony.

"And Agony, you and Waif shadow the Elementals. If either one makes a bad move, take them out. The weakest first: the Elementals then Quick Poison. Poison is by far the stronger of the two. I know their leader; he's not bad. We won't underestimate their abilities and we'll leave them in the dust, if we have to. Everything clear?" At the quick nods from the other four, he smiled faintly.

"Good. Now, let's to it!"

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