Page 24 of Wrong Squad, Right Mess

If we fell, Yun’s life was over as well. Killed? Nah, they wouldn’t do that, they needed her, but she’d lose her freedom, her choices, all of that. The Guild would probably list her as fallen in battle, erase her from the records, then put her in Obsidian or whatever research post they wanted to use to keep it all quiet.

It made this matter more. Usually I didn’t give a fuck—I’d put what I had into the fight and if I died?

Well, fuck it. It happened to all of us sooner or later—sooner for espers than civilians, for the most part. I’d take it as the natural conclusion of my life, the place I’d been headed to the whole time. My only concern had been not falling before the rest of my squad, because if I had, they’d have bitched at me in whatever afterlife we were headed to about dropping the ball.

This time though, we had to worry about someone else. Yun would suffer if we lost this fight, if we didn’t come out on top, and that wasn’t an acceptable ending for me. I wasn’t about to let Yun suffer for my failure.

It didn’t take long to size up our opponents. I’d done that ever since I’d become an esper, so it was second nature now. Five surrounded us—three men, two women and a whole lot of audacity. I knew they were S-Rank simply because there was no way the Guild would have sent anything lower. The fact they sent five rather than four said they weren’t playing around. They wouldn’t risk this if they weren’t fairly sure they’d come out on top.

I didn’t move right away, and neither did anyone else. We were all soldiers, all fighters, all killers. None of us were stupid enough to rush into something without thinking it through first.

It had Carter speaking up. “You don’t have to do this.”

“Yeah, we really do. You might be someone who ignores the Guild, but that’s why you are in the position you are,” said one of the women espers. She had her head shaved, though the dark shadow said it wasn’t quite down to the skin. It gave her this don’t fuck with me atmosphere, and I didn’t remember seeing her at the base.

It seemed they’d brought in a special forces team, the sort of squad who didn’t train with the rest of us. No doubt they wanted people who could handle this and disappear again. Plus, they probably didn’t want to risk any complications if we’d ended up friends with them.

Clearly, they didn’t realize that we didn’t make friends.

“Yeah, but this isn’t going to go well for you,” Carter said. He spoke as though this were nothing more than a minor speed bump in his way, like he barely noticed it. Any surprise he had, he hid well.

“You’re the fuck-ups of the Guild—I’m not worried. We remove you from being a thorn in the Guild’s side, imagine what we’ll get out of it?” The woman smirked, crouching slightly from her spot in the center of the road.

Two of the espers remained on the rooftops, with the other two surrounding us. It had been one of the males who had rushed by Carter, nearly catching him by surprise.

The closeness to the portal had made it all the harder to sense them, to hear them, counter them in time. It was a disadvantage for us, but also one for them.

“If you go back and just pretend you never found us, your day is going to be much better, and it’s going to last longer than the next ten minutes, as well,” Carter said, rolling his shoulder.

I knew he didn’t need to loosen the joint, that it was strictly to unnerve them, and it seemed to do its job. Sure, the squad against us appeared well trained, didn’t show much, but I caught the slight shifting of the two on the ground, the nerves running through them.

“You deal with the two at the top,” Shear said inside my head.

“Don’t fucking tell me what to do.” Even as I snapped back, we both knew I’d already planned to take that exact path. We’d worked together long enough to not need to think about our tasks. We read each other, knew our strengths and weaknesses, could work together without having to talk it out.

Still, Shear liked to call out moves like some sort of announcer. Maybe it made him feel more important?

I nearly felt his eye-roll in my mind at my complaint, and it gave me some pleasure.

“How about you let us take our guide here to the portal, then we do this? I don’t think either of us want to deal with her getting hurt. I doubt your precious Guild will be happy about that.”

“So she should be a good guide and stand back, out of the way. This isn’t her fight.”

“Like hell it isn’t,” Yun said, her shoulders pulled back, looking every bit as dangerous as the rest of us.

And, fuck, that made me hard. I didn’t love the idea of having this fight with an erection, but it seemed as though that was exactly what was about to happen. I guess I had to chalk that up to having someone as sexy as Yun around.

The woman looked at Yun for the first time, as though she hadn’t bothered to take note of her previously, as though she’d been unimportant until she opened her mouth. The woman’s lips curved into a cruel smile, as though she thought Yun was both an idiot and also a little adorable.

It also held more possessiveness and interest than I liked. I would have preferred none, and this was certainly far above that threshold. It made me wonder if this bitch had the idea of killing us and taking Yun for herself.

I mean, I got it, Yun had that effect on people. Anyone who didn’t see her appeal was fucking blind, after all. She was beautiful, tough, smart—everything an esper could possibly want.

Which made it even more obvious why this whole thing had to end with us winning—because I wanted this bitch nowhere near Yun.

“You’ve been given too much of a chance to run around without control,” the woman said, voice twisted and low. “You’ve gotten to do what you want and no one has made you fall in line—that stops here. After we deal with them, you’ll come with us. We’ll exit the portal—with you unconscious—pretending you’re a civilian. Don’t think for a moment that I won’t put you in your place while you’re under our command.” The way she spoke said she was really looking forward to doing just that. It annoyed me, the idea that even in some fantasy in her head, she had any say or control over my guide.

“I’ve survived stronger espers than you all on my own,” Yun said. “Trust me when I say you’re not about to take me anywhere I don’t want to go.”