The Dark Edge Chronicles - Hardwire

Chapter 22: The Titan Awakes

 A sharp inhalation of antiseptic tasting air and the big man lying sprawled on the hospital bed stirred. Heartbeats quickened, blood hastened in its journey through vessels and arteries and, with a flutter of eyelids, a pair of intense blue eyes flickered open.

Quickly they noted the cocoon of darkness that swathed the body that housed them before dancing to the left to pick out a number of dark shapes standing somewhat uneasily against a shadowy wall, barely glimpsed in the dimness. Sharp hearing picked out four separate rhythms of breathing and the eyes narrowed as the mind behind them began to churn.

Carefully the man sat up, calculating the distance between himself and the shadowy figures. Then, with a grimace, he clenched his fist, drawing it back as if to hurl something. And immediately a trickle of blood oozed from a flared nostril. A frown appeared on the man's face as he unclenched his fist to wipe the warm stream from his lip and chin before it dripped to the floor.

The dark blue eyes stared at the blood for a moment, the mind continuing to churn as it pondered possibilities. Then, almost savagely wiping the blood onto the sheet beneath him, the man silently eased himself from the bed to stand, barefooted on the cold tile floor. Ignoring the flimsy hospital gown that he found himself clothed in, he slid forward without a sound, a hunting cat stalking its prey, his muscles coiling in preparation as he neared the first of the shadowy figures, standing with their backs to him. Then he struck.

The first guard, a burly constable with the Calgary Police Department, never knew what hit him. He only heard the soft hiss of air being split before a crashing pain to the side of his head accompanied by a bright flash of light sent him spiraling into unconsciousness. And, in a flurry of silent violence, the other three were down as well, the last hitting the floor only seconds after the first.

Carefully stepping over the heaped bodies, the big man made his way to the door. An ear pressed to the heavy metal guarding the portal to the room revealed the faint sounds of two more persons, breathing evenly and shifting slightly after several hours of watchfulness. The man frowned as he decided what to do. Then a hand was reaching out to take hold of the door's handle to carefully turn it, releasing the door's latch. That done, he just as carefully eased it back, letting light spill into the darkness to splash across the fallen figures of those he had overcome first.

There, uniformed and heavily-armed guards, one standing on each side of the door. Slipping through the gap that he had opened in the doorway as silently as possible, the man was heartened to find that, as the door closed behind him, the guards hadn't stirred. They were both unaware of the fall of their comrades and his exit from the room.

A slight smile touched the man's lips. Then, reaching out with big, strong hands, he took a hold of each guard's collar and, without hesitating, slammed their helmeted heads together with enough force to knock them both out.

"Hey!" a startled voice called from further down the hallway as somebody caught sight of the guards abruptly go limp and sag in place.

Throwing the two unconscious guards to the side, the man leapt out into the hallway. And immediately he spotted a third guard a handful of metres down the hallway, holding a tray of paper cups, steam curling up from opened lids. Seeing the man abruptly appear, the guard, a big man in dark blue combat gear, threw the tray to the side with a muffled curse as he clawed for the holstered weapon at his waist.

Seeing the guard reach for his weapon, a Glock 9 mm, the big man darted forward with incredible speed. The handgun hadn't even cleared the top of the holster before the big man had covered the intervening space and, smoothly leaping up into the air, slammed the guard to the side and into the wall with a blurred scissor-kick to the head.