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As Leon continued to rail against the gas, he heard the crackle of Sebastian speaking into his radio. He broke eye contact with the crowd long enough to glance at the roofs of the surrounding buildings where they’d set up snipers and observers for the event. He caught the glint of sunlight off a barrel.
“I don’t know—I can’t know—if this is a war we can win.” Leon leaned forward, as though he could transmit the urgency of his words to the crowd by getting closer to them. “But it’s a war we can’t—”
The radio behind him crackled again, and Sebastian barked into it loud enough for Leon to hear. “Get him. Fucking bring him down.”
“—afford to lose,” Leon continued. “For the sake of—”
“Down!” Sebastian slammed into Leon, and they crashed to the balcony floor as gunshots rang through the air. Bullets flew past them and cracked into the masonry behind them, showering them with shards of rock. “Back inside!”
Leon gasped for breath, trying to recapture the air their hard fall onto the concrete floor had knocked from his lungs. More gunshots rang out, and then a hissing and the sound of glass breaking in all directions.
Sebastian’s hand wrapped around Leon’s wrist like a vice, and he hauled Leon back away from the banister.
“Goddammit, Hess, move!” Sebastian yanked on him again.
Leon’s lungs finally filled, and he scrabbled across the ground after Sebastian.
He belly-crawled across the balcony that now seemed enormous until he made it across the threshold of the double doors. Sebastian scrambled after him and slammed the doors shut. They wouldn’t hold against anything, but at least the curtains across their glass hid them from view.
“Well, everyone’s got plenty of fear now, I’m sure,” Sebastian snarked as he got his feet under him and put his back to the wall, though he still didn’t stand all the way up. He already had his gun in his hand, held ready at his chest and pointed to the ceiling. “Were you hit?”
Leon did a quick scan of his body, knowing from experience how adrenaline could hide wounds, but he came up empty. “No. I’m good. You?”
Sebastian glanced down at his hip, where a line of red was expanding into the cloth. “Just a little scrape.”
Leon reached for him. “Sebas—”
“Little. Scrape.” Sebastian fixed him with a firm glare.
Leon clenched his fists but nodded. They didn’t have time. “Where did the shots come from?”
“I don’t know.” Sebastian moved to the door and pressed his ear against it. Leon didn’t need to be so close to the door to hear the screaming and shouting and more gunfire. “Everywhere.”
“But you saw someone.” Leon stayed low to the ground as he went to his own bag, still sitting on his chair, and pulled out his pistol. “You were telling security to bring him down.”
“Yeah, but obviously, he wasn’t alone.” Sebastian reached up to the door’s handle, slowly cracked it open, and peered out. “Clear. Stay close. I’ll find us a way out of this rat trap.”
“We’re not getting out.” Leon checked the bullets in his gun—plenty—and joined Sebastian at the door. “We’re defending our headquarters. A cheap assassination attempt isn’t going to scare us off.”
He made to push open the door, but Sebastian caught his arm. “That wasn’t just an assassination attempt. This is an attack.”
“All the more reason to mount a defense.” Leon yanked his arm back. His heart still pounded in his chest from the near miss, but now it was getting his blood up. Energy fizzed up and down his spine, and his gun felt cool and steady in his hands. The sounds of fighting filling the air wiped away his exhaustion. “We have plenty of soldiers and—”
“That’s the problem.” Sebastian pushed in front of him as he tried to make it out the door again. “Didn’t you see the canisters?”
Leon paused. “What canisters?” He hadn’t seen anything, too busy trying to breathe again and follow Sebastian to safety.
“They were shooting canisters into all the windows on the first floor.”
“Who’s they?”
“I couldn’t see them.” Sebastian shook his head. “Not well. They were just spies in the fucking crowd, same as the one guy I did see. The Klah’Eel do have their own intelligence operatives, you know.”
Leon looked Sebastian up and down. He was as nervy as a live wire, fingers twitching against his gun, eyes wide but brows low. “You think it’s the gas.”
“I know it’s the gas.” Sebastian looked out the door again. The hall was still clear, but more sounds of fighting echoed up from the marble stairwell. “And we need to get the fuck out of here before we get caught in it.”
Leon frowned, unnerved by Sebastian’s clear agitation. “But it doesn’t affect you.”
