After the sound of the explosion we had heard faded, I moved a portal up in the air to take a look. There wasn’t anything obvious, but a moment later Thea confirmed my assumption, probably via her connection to the public part of the ATC.

  “The ATC is sending out emails, one of them said that Paxton has gone rogue.”

  I sighed. “We will need to move quickly then.”

  Moving my portal closer but still way too far up in the air to be noticed, I got my first good look at what we were up against.

  Dozens of super soldier clones, or replicas as they were generally called, were swarming the area, splitting off and hitting different regions of the ATC complex.

  They were wearing all black tactical gear but, interestingly enough, they had torn off or defaced the ATC patch on their uniforms. I didn’t remember that in the game, but it did make sense. The ATC had experimented on, controlled, and manipulated Paxton his entire life. He would have probably destroyed any connection to the ATC as soon as he could.

  I momentarily wondered if I could find and catch Paxton, however I had no idea where he was. Plus my portals were relatively slow and I was limited to moving only a few at a time with any degree of finesse. To be blunt, in speed, we had physically surpassed the movement allowed by the portals. We were even starting to really make progress with our stealth training to further tilt our strategies.

  However, that meant we were going to have to get in there and deal with the issues personally. That involved a risk that I wouldn’t have been comfortable with without the emergency portkeys.

  Turning back to study the clones, I was pleased to note that the invading super soldiers did indeed seem to be focusing on the guards. They let a lot of the employees simply run away, but they also killed anyone that tried to stop them, even if they weren’t a threat.

  I winced as one of the employees screamed a warning into the phone about the replica soldiers going crazy as he was gunned down. I guess the replicas were trying to reduce the information that got out since they let his three coworkers go… or maybe he was a little more complicit in the ATC’s sins. I would probably never know.

  Regardless, that did confirm that we were now in a time crunch. The replicas were being kept in what appeared to be a barracks compound to the side of the ATC complex, but they were quickly moving towards the main buildings.

  Calling out through the earring radios, I raised the alarm. “Hey girls, we are out of time. The replica soldiers are on the move.”

  I didn’t need to wait long as the girls came running out of the gate a moment later in their full wargear, Hinata the last to appear as she led Tonks and Fleur through the vanishing cabinet since they still couldn’t see it.

  Standing up from the chair I had conjured, I checked over Fleur and Tonk’s equipment and then nodded now that they were fully geared up with everything we could get them in such short notice.

  I considered asking if they were sure they wanted to come, but at their looks, I knew it would be taken badly. Both would have fought in Tom’s second blood war in only a few years so it shouldn’t have surprised me they would want to fight here with what I had shared of Alma’s story..

  Looking back around, I gestured towards the three portals that were now full size. “Everyone ready?”

  I was pleased to hear the hard and firm chorus of “Yes” and “Yeahs”.

  Turning to Tonks and Fleur, who despite their determination were both clearly nervous, I tried to reassure them. “We will keep you safe, the bullet wards and radios will help. Just remember that you can portkey out whenever you need. Focus on keeping yourselves safe and watching my girls’ backs.”

  That seemed to give the two of them something to focus on and they gave me firm nods so I turned to Taylor and Holly. Checking them over, I took a breath before I tilted my head, “Are you two ready?”

  Taylor was nearly emotionless as she did her swarm trick, but Holly was still a bit nervous. However she was controlling it well, and seemed even more determined despite said nervousness. “Yeah, let's go and knock some sense into these idiots.”

  Taking a deep breath, I stepped through the portal to the Auburn District and looked around. Behind me, I heard the guns and spells start as the other teams started their own work.

  However, we quickly realized that we had a problem.

  I knew the secret vault where Alma was stored was around here, as it was the center of the abandoned district, but the entrances were so cleverly hidden that I had no idea where to start looking.

  Taylor, however, didn’t hesitate for more than a few seconds. She stood still and focused for a moment before her eyes snapped down and to the left. “Bloody Hell, that is huge.”

  I blinked in surprise. “What did you find?”

  Taylor hummed for a moment. “I don’t know for certain, but it feels like a nuclear reactor based on the bug’s reactions. A few of them can see the blue light and the bigger animals avoid the area like the plague.”

  I nodded. “Yeah that makes sense. In the game, you, as the Point Man MC of the game, blow up the reactor to try to stop Alma. It blows up her body, but it really doesn't actually stop her. It destroys this entire district though.”

  Taylor grimaces for a moment before she points towards what looks like a normal apartment complex. “I think we can get in through there.”

  Nodding, Holly and I followed as we jogged the two hundred meters or so towards the building, only to hear a voice call out from some sort of speaker. The voice was gruff and deep, but was too distorted to get much more than a sense of annoyance from him. “This place is private property, you are trespassing. If you don’t leave, you will be fired upon.”

  We paused and I glanced at my companions who looked surprised and a bit uncertain. Not sure what to do myself, as I didn’t see any cameras, I just tried talking in a slightly louder voice. “Can you hear me?” I tried.

  There was a pause before the voice returned. “This place is private property. Leave now, I won’t ask again.”

  I tilted my head. “I haven’t checked here, but you do know that good-samaritan laws mean that pretty much all privacy and property laws are ignorable if it is the process of saving a life or stopping abuse. We know about Alma and both exceptions apply here.”

  The pause was longer and I wondered if they would listen before the voice spoke up again. “You have been warned, this is your last chance or you will be detained or shot.”

  Out of nowhere, a door opened up and six guards in ATC uniforms burst forward, guns already tracking us. I actually had to do a subtle double take because the outside of the disguised door had been boarded up and blended in with the rest of the building that looked condemned. However, the interior of the door was an inch thick of solid steel.

  That was something I needed to get better at spotting, and a skill we needed to train.

  Turning my attention to the soldiers, I sighed and tried one last time. “I don’t want to hurt anyone that is just doing their job, but the ATC is torturing Alma Wade down there. If you insist on blocking our path, we will assume you are complicit in her torture and attempted murder. That said, even if you don’t know about that specifically, the vast amount of human experimentation being done by the ATC is damning. Please just step aside and we won’t have to do anything rash.”

  To their credit, the group visibly hesitated, possibly considering what I had just said before their guns snapped up and they walked forward. “That is classified information. You are being detained for questioning.”

  I ran a hand down my face. “First, actual classification is something the government does, not private security companies like the ATC. Second, you do know that you pretty much just confirmed my allegations. ”

  I was hoping that would give them pause, only to be disappointed when they increased their pace with the two guards on each end starting to circle us.

  Reaching up, I mimicked touching an earpiece so they would know they were being recorded, “Thea, did you get all that for your rebroadcast?”

  Thea’s voice called out, pleased. “Yes, perfectly clear.”

  That got the group to hesitate for a moment, but then their posture got even more tense as they stepped forward, guns now trained on our chests or heads.

  I sighed one more time before I shrugged. “Well, just like the Nazi’s, listening to the commands of murderers and criminals makes you complicit. Just following orders is not a defense.”

  That got their hackles up and I saw several of them move their fingers to their triggers.

  That was actually good discipline, considering that we hadn’t really shown ourselves to be a threat. None of us had any visible weapons yet, but it wasn’t going to save them. Not when they were getting ready to shoot us.

  Snapping up my left hand, it was suddenly filled with my silver desert eagle while my right was casting a shield charm with my wand still in the ring.

  Next to me, I felt Holly doing the same except drawing out the sword of Gryffindor with her left hand and her wand in her right. Bringing a sword to a gun fight sounded dumb until you realized how fast we could move, remembered it was indestructible, and that a single nick would kill anyone or anything without access to powerful magical healing due to the basilisk venom.

  Taylor on the other hand, didn’t bother with defense, trusting her armor and our shields. Instead, she drew two Smith and Weston 4500s. Both were enchanted to be identical and had piercing and small explosive runes engraved into the bullets.

  Honestly, despite looking cool, dual wielding pistols was normally pretty stupid, but her ability to target through her bugs meant that she was terrifying since every shot was always on target, even shooting through walls if needed.

  Still, I didn’t fire on the soldiers, wanting to give them one more chance. Hoping there was a chance to end this without killing these men.

  However, I was disappointed as several dozen shots impacted our shields, bullets being slowed by my magical shield and deflected up. I made a note that most of the shots were aimed for our heads and chests.

  They had just tried to kill my girls, so my voice was cold as I spoke. “So be it…”

  The six guards, who hadn’t even gotten into cover as they must have assumed there was little chance we would survive their first shots, weren’t prepared for our counter attack.

  My Desert Eagle wasn’t loaded with explosive rounds, but my first shot still made it look like it was as the large caliber bullet went right through the body armor of the guard carrying a heavy machine gun, practically exploding his chest.

  Quickly snapping my gun to the man behind him, I fired again. Two taps this time, as he tried to dodge out of the way, meant that first his shoulder and then his torso was gone even as I stepped forward.

  Ahead and to the right, Taylor had already fired with both pistols, putting a bullet through an eye on each guard to our left. She snapped her guns to the other side, firing again and putting the last two down.

  Holly grimaced at the death, but I could see her determination in pushing forward knowing what these people had done.

  Stepping towards the door, I was momentarily stopped by Taylor. “Turrets.”

  I sighed and swapped my gun for the black one with explosive rounds. I was glad that none of my girls had seen Hellsing yet so they couldn’t call me out on copying Alucard’s aesthetics.

  As we approached, Taylor pointed out the general direction and I opened a tiny portal just a tad to the left so I had a clear shot. Holding my breath, I took aim and fired two rounds. The first shot went through the first centimeter of the turrets’ armor and exploded, making my second shot complete overkill.

  Honestly, despite being the initial inspiration for my second gun’s setup, I wasn’t sure my gun was on the level of Warhammer bolters, but as I studied the wreckage I suspected it was close.

  Again, the voice called out. “You have killed ATC staff, you will be tracked down with prejudice. If you do not leave and wait outside with your hands up, your safety can not be guaranteed.”

  That was ludicrous enough that Holly actually scoffed. We all knew that even if they had hesitated before, they would now kill us the moment they got the smallest opportunity, regardless of what we did to surrender. Both as revenge for their men but also because we knew too much.

  The door forward was locked, and to my surprise, an Alohomora spell didn’t do anything. Maybe because it was being held shut or just because it had an electric lock. Regardless, I shook my head before backing up and putting another explosive round into the locking mechanism, followed by a banishing charm, which bashed the door open followed by chunks of the door frame.

  Heading through, I winced when we found two more crumpled guards. Ones that had probably planned on ambushing us.

  Calling out, I tried one more time to get the rest of the guards to stand down. “Your men really don’t have any chance. Please call them back. They don’t have to die for this. We are just here to retrieve Alma.”

  I was surprised when the response finally came. “No, you and that monster Paxton Fettel will be stopped here and now.”

  I grit my teeth as I realized our position. “Bloody hell, he is going to be trying to come in after us to get to his mother.” Turning around I waved my hand, levitating and then depositing a large cabinet of computers to block the way in. “That won’t stop them for more than a minute. We need to move.”

  I didn’t wait as I picked up the pace to a careful jog, even if a jog for us was probably olympic level sprinting for anyone else.

  We could obviously go faster, but full blown sprinting at our top speed was probably going to see us running face first into a trap, even if Taylor was keeping an eye out. There just wasn’t much time to give a warning at those speeds.

  There was a moment of silence as we moved forward, which was only broken as Taylor snapped a shot off down a hall we were passing to take out someone leaning for an ambush shot.

  Finally the speaker spoke up again. “How in the hell do you even know about Project Origin? And how do you know what Paxton is going to do if you aren’t working together?”

  I wasn’t sure where the cameras were, and I didn’t feel like asking Taylor to look for them, so I just shrugged while I moved. “You have literal, psychically controlled, super soldiers, and the ghost of a girl you murdered still clinging to her corpse, and you doubt divination of the future exists?”

  Once again, Taylor held up her hand for us to stop and gestured through the next door talking quietly. “Five at 4-oclock, three at 9-oclock.”

  I nodded and then gestured for Holly. “Cannon blast and flash on 3.”

  She nodded and after hesitating, put her sword away as I counted down. She probably realized that in this situation, it was better to focus on her wandwork.

  “On Go. Three… Two… One… Go!.”

  Blowing the door open with a full force banisher took a quarter second. I shielded my face as a blinding flash of light and a massive blast of sound from Holly’s wand rocked the room.

  I had to push through the disorientation for a tenth of a second, making a note to get us eye and ear protection at the very least for any future engagements. Having several forms of healing didn’t mean that we shouldn't protect our senses, and I didn’t want this tactic used against us.

  Without giving the enemy a second to recoil from the shock, I jumped through the door and put two shots into the metal table that the soldiers to the left had knocked over and positioned themselves behind.

  The explosive rounds detonated and the table they were using for cover shattered, shards ricocheting into the men, blowing them back, instantly killing all but one of them.

  To the other side, four shots rang out and even behind cover, four bodies fell to the floor.

  Sighing, I shook my head, sending one more shot through the chest of the last survivor from my explosive round on my side, putting him out of his misery.

  Giving the room a once over, I couldn’t help but notice how awkward it was in the sudden silence to be surrounded by corpses.

  I picked back up our careful jog through the facility as we pushed forward. No time to be awkward about the tactics needed now. The time for subtlety and a slow measured approach was gone. Not when we could potentially be caught between the ATC and the replicas coming in behind us.

  The next twelve hallways and rooms passed by in a blur as nothing could even slow us down, before the hairs down my neck stood on end.

  My girls felt it as well and they suddenly snapped around, guns and wands scanning for targets as we looked for the new threat.

  Nothing happened for several seconds before a quiet girl’s voice called out from nowhere. “What are you? Why are you here?”

  I swallowed, knowing that this could be the make it or break it moment. “Hello Alma, my name is Max. We have two objectives. One is to get you out of your prison, ideally heal you, and then offer you a way to get away from everyone here. The second is to put an end to everything the ATC has done. It is monstrous and deserves to be burned to the ground.”

  We waited tensely as Alma seemed to consider what I had said, but her response was disheartening as she suddenly appeared in her child form, a girl of about 8 in a blood red dress coming out of a cloud of ash, face already contorting into a furious scowl. “They deserve to die, they ALL deserve to die!”

  Out of the corners of the room, ashy blackness began to rise up and close into small balls of darkness.

  Then, the shadows on the edge of the room started flickering as if the room suddenly had fires burning, but the flames were red and black, absorbing light instead of emitting it.

  Out of said darkness portals, I saw four or five somethings flicker with red eyes. Taylor didn’t waste any time in putting bullets through each of the ones ahead of us. I turned, firing through the ones behind us.

  Now back to back, we fired, waiting for the onslaught to slow.

  At this point Alma stepped forward and repeated herself. “They deserve to die, they ALL deserve to die.”

  I winced. It was almost a mantra and I wondered if she wasn’t even sane anymore, unable to see anyone as anything other than an enemy whenever the ATC was mentioned.

  Focusing, I tried to see her soul. Part of me expected the wispy remnants like the Hogwarts ghosts, even if they wouldn’t let me get close enough to actually inspect them in detail.

  However, Alma wasn't like that. She clearly had a soul and to my shock, nearly her entire soul was standing in front of us. I had obviously never seen it done but, considering the small chain-like construct that led back to what I had to assume was her body, Alma had figured out how to astral project herself and manifest her presence so even normal humans could see her.

  That was impressive, but I also noticed that her soul seemed warped to my view. Almost like it was curled around itself. Maybe reinforcing itself, maybe comforting itself, or maybe just keeping itself together. It was also dark. Not black, but I could practically feel the anger radiating off of her.

  However, before I could actually say anything about what I had seen, or even think of what we could try next, Holly stepped forward, having only cast shields up until this point, and pointed her wand at Alma. “Expecto Patronum!”

  I blinked in surprise and swung my head around to see Holly in the corner of my eye looking determined as Alma wasn’t exactly a dementor. Yet as a fully formed doe sprung forward, Alma practically fell backwards as if the silvery doe burned her.

  Again, I wondered if this was proof that she couldn’t be saved before I watched as her child form flickered for a moment before a much older, naked skeleton with stretched skin appeared in front of us.

  No one spoke for several long moments as the doe patronus slowly circled the ghost girl. The doe’s very presence finally closing the darkness portals that her fury had unleashed.

  Alma looked startled, trying to understand what was happening, and I could practically feel her soul unclench, before her eyes narrowed and she hunched her shoulders in obvious effort, trying to push the patronus away with her power.

  I watched as a blackness, deeper than anything I had ever seen, seemed to bellow out from her back. A dark force that seemed to drink the light around it formed around her and started to surge forward, yet the doe stood its ground. Next to me, Holly lifted up her wand and visibly pushed her magic harder.

  I actually felt the pressure as a weight in the air, as if the air had suddenly thickened, as the two titans of power pushed against each other. It was almost like we were being buffeted by two different winds. Except one was warm, almost comforting despite its power, and the other was icy and cutting, threatening to rip us to shreds.

  Alma was nearly a force of nature. Almost unrelenting and indiscriminate with her direction. The world warped at her whims even if she didn’t seem to know exactly what she was doing.

  On the other hand, Holly had always been powerful. She was on another level from everyone else around her, albeit untrained. No one else could have driven away a horde of dementors with a single patronus in the books. And now, with Tom's parasite gone from her soul, Holly was even stronger, truly Tom’s equal in magical strength.

  The problem was we weren’t here to test them, and I wasn’t trying to more permanently kill Alma… or at least not if we didn’t have to.

  As the struggle of wills continued, I momentarily considered calling for a retreat, before I considered the portkey in our rings. With the promise of instant retreat, we could try for a little longer.

  I swallowed, and ignoring the very real fear aura that Alma was producing, somehow way worse than even dementors, I called out. “Alma, can you hear us? We are here to help you.”

  Yet she didn’t respond to me.

  “Alma, we want to get you out of here, can you hear me?”

  She paused at that, but didn’t seem to be paying attention as she stared at Holly’s patronus.

  The darkness started to fade, and Alma remained perfectly still. The specter of her long-dead bones frozen.

  I tried one more time. “Alma, we want to help. Can you lead us to your body? We can help you live again. We want to help you be free.”

  I thought I saw a flinch at the word ‘free’, but she must not have been listening as her form started to shake.

  A moment later she was gone. Not disappeared. Not faded out. Just one moment she was there, the next she wasn’t.

  Swallowing, I glanced at Holly and Taylor before I shook my head. I didn’t know what was going on, but Alma’s condition made our mission a lot harder.

  Looking at Taylor, she concentrated for a moment before she pointed us down a new path. “That direction now has less personnel and just a few more turrets.”

  I nodded and we set off. In the game, the ATC personnel and turrets were a pain, but they didn’t have the power to get past our shields and just crumpled against my imitation bolter .

  While we jogged, I turned to Holly and asked. “When did you manage to complete your Patronus? I didn’t think anyone had managed to make them fully corporeal yet.”

  Holly blushed for a moment before she shrugged. “Walking through here made me realize that I wanted to help… more than anything. A girl with gifts, who was mistreated, kept isolated, made to feel like a freak… It reminded me too much of my past. So I thought of the moment I knew I was free and had a new family and… just pushed.”

  I smiled. “You really are Holly Potter, aren’t you.” Holly looked a little confused at that statement before I explained. “Your strongest moments in the books, including blowing back an entire horde of dementors, were in the defense of someone else.”

  Holly blushed before she smiled a small cute smile.

  I didn’t want to ruin the moment and mention that I felt like we were still being watched.

  Just as that thought crossed my mind, I saw the corner of a red dress twist and disappear down one of the branching halls as if Alma had been watching around the corner before leaving.

  My smile was further tested as we ran into a half dozen more ATC guards. This time they had upgraded from their submachine guns to high power rifles, shot guns, and some sort of explosion launcher. All of them pointed at the doorway we needed to cross.

  Worse, even as we ducked back around the corner, I heard the call of "Grenade out!”

  Having hit our stride together, I didn’t need to set up a plan as I snapped out a flash bang spell while Holly cast a repulsion for the grenade, sending the ball rolling right back towards their cover.

  If you spot this narrative on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

  As the soldiers were now momentarily disorientated, I dashed forward at my full speed with Taylor right behind me.

  I suspected that we looked like a blur to a normal human baseline, as we hadn’t quite achieved the ‘blink and you miss it’ level of speed Anko enjoyed.

  Still, it was more than enough as we easily turned the corner and got off three shots, ending the threat even before the grenade went off underneath an unfortunate vending machine, scattering the shredded packaging and bits of chips and cookies across the floor.

  As the dust settled, Holly followed us around the corner a moment later and grimaced at the bodies, but simply shook her head. I grabbed a nearby concussion rifle and threw it through a portal so it landed next to our gate. That was something I wanted to study later. Out of the corner of my eye, I noticed that Taylor was collecting all the grenades she could as well.

  Engrossed in my work, I only flinched a little at the sound of a small girl’s giggle from somewhere behind us.

  That was when Lara reported in, via the radio. “Hey Max, We have pushed through into the school, but we are meeting heavy resistance from the ATC.”

  A loud bang and then gun fire echoed across the radio.

  I glanced at Taylor, who tensed but didn’t say anything.

  A moment later we heard Lara continue, breathing still even. “Hinata and I have been able to drive them back any time they push us. That said, there are apparently some of Alma’s tissue samples down there that they don’t want us to access. We have been headed for them, but it is locked down pretty hard. However, from the radio chatter we’ve overheard, there have been calls by multiple parties to move in and relocate the ATC president, Genevieve Aristide.”

  I felt like kicking myself. I had been so worried about collecting the data, saving any innocents left in the ATC, and getting to Alma, that I had forgotten about Genevieve. If anyone besides Dr. Wade deserved to die, it was that psychopath that basically orchestrated Alma’s treatment.

  This time I saw a flicker out of the corner of my eye so I only jumped a little when I heard a voice practically growl even as the volume stayed at a whisper. “They want to make more of me?”

  Yet before I could I turn to look, the voice and the presence were gone.

  I shuddered thinking about what Alma might do to the soldiers and special forces over there.

  Radioing back to Lara, I gave her my best summary. “If I remember correctly, they probably won’t send anyone in to get Alma’s DNA until much later. Probably to clone her so they can attempt to birth new psychic commanders or something… I think it is best we blow the entire research lab up if you are unable to collect further data or you think someone else might get it first.”

  I hesitated for a moment before I continued. “I think Alma might have heard us talking. Be aware that she might assist you in destroying the samples, but watch your back. The only thing that has been able to shock her out of rage so far has been Holly’s patronus.”

  Lara was silent for several long seconds before responding and I could hear the determination in her voice. “Understood, we won’t fail.”

  I frowned, thinking of the fact that Genevieve might be working on her backup plan of modifying a special forces soldier named Beckett to be nearly irresistible to Alma. The plan sounded stupid, but apparently it worked as Alma was more focused on jumping Beckett’s bones than killing Genevieve.

  Really, I had nearly forgotten the plot of the second game as it wasn’t as memorable as the first.

  Calling out to Ahsoka this time, I decided to do something about it. “Ahsoka, how are you doing?”

  There were several moments of silence before Ahsoka responded. “We have made a lot of progress. We managed to find quite a bit of damning evidence, which has been passed to Thea.”

  I nodded, even if she couldn’t see me as we rounded a corner, only to have to shoot three more ATC guards. “Understood, good work Ahsoka. I want you to push to catch Alice Wade. She is Alma’s sister, but she wasn’t aware of what her father did. Grab her and any other civilians for extraction, knock them unconscious and portkey them away if need be. We can collect them later and send you back. Then I want you to move out and apprehend Genevieve, the ATC president.”

  Ahsoka’s voice sounded darkly happy about that so she must have seen the evidence that showed what Genevieve had ordered done. “Understood. I think we are close to Alice Wade. That said, we have been hearing some faint gun fire from behind us. I think that the FEAR team you mentioned might be catching up.”

  I bit my lip even while gunning down the floating turrets that attempted to pin us down around another corner. “Do not risk yourself, but we don’t need a third enemy. If they attack, put up shields and fall back.”

  Across the radio another crackle of gun fire echoed out. “Understood. We have been delayed by some of these heavies. I think there might have even been a full blown mecha back there.”

  I hummed. “If you get the chance, try to grab some of that heavy’s armor. I wonder if we could figure out some sort of personal shield like they have.”

  A trio of heavy thuds and her lightsaber’s hiss echoed through the radio. There was a gurgled cry that was cut off before Ahsoka answered. “Heavy down. We will grab what we can.”

  Nodding, I focused back on our own path, following Taylor's lead through the complex.

  Heading down the next hall and into a small waiting area, we were interrupted by another male voice through the speakers. However, this time it was at least a different person.

  “Who are you, why are you doing this?”

  I paused and considered for a moment before I decided to answer. “We are just some travelers that try to right some wrongs. That includes saving Alma when we found out what happened to her.”

  The voice was silent for a moment before I heard a groan from the other side, like the world was crashing down over there. “I have regretted what I did every day since then,” the man’s voice said quietly.

  My eyebrows shot up. “Are you Doctor Wade? Alma’s father?”

  He was obviously surprised that I recognized him, but his voice still carried the sound of someone who was at the end of their rope. “Yes, my name is Harlan Wade.” His voice was shaky now. “Alma is my daughter.”

  My voice went cold. “And you experimented on her?”

  Dr. Wade’s voice almost turned pleading. “She was like nothing we had ever seen before, we had to study it. It could have changed everything. We were learning so much… but she began to lash out.”

  The walls shook for a moment as Alma appeared, once again in the form of a little girl, a few meters off to our side. “Why do you think I would have fought back? When I did what you wanted, I got to go outside or receive sweets, but when I didn’t do what you wanted, you hurt me! You hurt me badly, FATHER.”

  I winced at the fury and scorn in that title. I didn’t think that I had ever heard that level of blind rage against anyone except maybe Alice when she spoke about Dr. Bumby.

  Alma’s child-like form started flickering again, alternating between the child in the red dress and a corpse wreathed in a mass of blackness.

  As she continued, even her hair started to flow like it was caught in small unseen currents of air. “Many of those tests were bad enough to make my head ache and my nose and eyes bleed. Yet you forced me to go through them, over, and over again, for YEARS. You treated me like an ANIMAL!”

  The room once again shook, dust falling from the ceiling, as Alma unleashed a bit of her rage.

  Around me, I could see the black mist start to build in the corners of the rooms and shadowy presences started appearing, looking at us with twisted snarling faces.

  Taylor wasted no time in shooting three, but I could see more starting to form.

  I considered trying to disrupt Alma by shooting her manifestation like you did in the game to get her to disperse.

  However, I couldn’t help but notice, despite the shadows' obvious desire to kill us, Alma wasn’t paying us any attention at all. That made me think she didn’t really have any control over her manifestations and they were just aspects of her blind rage.

  On the other hand, we weren’t either of her sons. So the fact we remained untouched probably confirmed she wasn’t blindly lashing out at everyone around her.

  While I was thinking, Holly had seen enough and she once again cast her patronus, the doe shooting out and bounding around the corners of the room.

  This finally snapped Alma out of her rage as she stumbled back, reverting to her older naked skeletal form as she looked wide eyed at us.

  She actually sounded a little frazzled this time. “What are you?” Then her eyes narrowed. “Why can’t I read you?”

  Out of the speaker, I heard Dr. Wade mumble out his own confusion, “What… why… what are you doing…”, but I ignored him.

  Taking a deep breath I tried again, talking in a soothing voice while taking a tiny step forward, hands up after making my gun disappear. “Alma, we are here to help you. We want to free you and punish the ATC for what they have done. We will even try to help your two children if we can.”

  To my surprise, Alma actually took a step back at that. “My… children…”

  I nodded. “Yes, we could help you and them to get away from here.”

  There was a slight ripple before she seemed to solidify and look at me, seeming to get more real. “You… you want to help?”

  Then suddenly she gripped her head as her form wavered and started to disperse like it was smoke being blown away.

  Dr. Wade was the one to speak up, obviously talking to someone else. “What are you doing? The psychic dampers are already maxed out. Are you trying to blow up this entire facility?”

  There was a moment before Alma's form solidified again.

  Taking advantage of the silence I tried to get Alma to see us as allies again. “We can help you. We have other teams already hitting the ATC headquarters. The world will know what happened here. Everyone will be punished.”

  My heart fell as Alma glared at me, reverting to her small girl in a red dress form. “Them… they all deserve to DIE!”

  I didn’t get to say anything else as she disappeared.

  With a grunt, I kicked a small chunk of concrete from our previous battle so that it soared across the room and exploded against the far wall. I ran a hand down my face. “Damn it!”

  Scanning the room for a moment, Taylor turned to me. “What happened? It seemed like she was actually listening for a moment.”

  I shrugged, head slumped. “I have to assume that reminding her of her captors triggers her rage and then she loses just about all of her rationality.”

  Holly turned to look at me as well, looking a bit sick. “So, what are we going to do? Are we really going to kill all of the ATC?”

  I sighed. “Alma is right about the ATC leadership. The very top probably have enough dirt on politicians that they will probably get away with no more than a slap on the wrist.” My face hardened. “I also don’t want to have to go around just killing everyone we don’t like, but those backroom deals seems to be what happens to the rich and powerful every time they get caught… we will have to play it by ear, maybe just end the worst ones that seem like they will get away with it.”

  Turning, I looked at Taylor. “What way should we go?”

  Taylor hesitated for a moment before she pointed towards the left-most door.

  Nodding, I started another careful jog forward and around the corner only to come face to face with Alma, looking curious, but before I could do anything but jump back, she was gone again.

  Trying to calm my now-racing heart, I shook my head. “I wish she wouldn’t do that.”

  Taylor and Holly chuckled, but they didn’t disagree either. Taking a steadying breath, I gestured forward. “That said, we still don’t have time to waste.”

  Yet my hope of getting further ahead as we went down yet another hallway was dashed by the radio going off.

  Ahri actually sounded a little concerned as she spoke up. “We have found Alice Wade. However, we are being hounded by some of those replica super soldiers. A few of them can go invisible. Repeat, watch out for stealth capable replicas. They only blur the area when they move. We only barely managed to get Alice Wade away from them.”

  Then I heard shooting as she continued. “We have been falling back, trying to keep her safe.”

  Over the radio I heard Alice Wade call out. “I need to find my father. I won’t leave without him. I just need to find out where he went. What is going on? I don’t believe he did…”

  I ran a hand down my face. “Why didn’t you just knock her unconscious?”

  Ahri hesitated, but a moment later I heard Alice’s chatter cut off as she was probably hit by a stunner.

  Still moving forward, albeit a little slower, Taylor motioned us to be careful.

  Opening a tiny portal to see what we were dealing with, I sighed. This time it was a room filled with ATC guards, including three shotguns, two impulse guns, and a laser gun, along with a half dozen turrets.

  I pulled back around the corner as they tensed, maybe getting a notification through their comms that we were around the corner.

  Gritting my teeth, I turned to Taylor. “How many grenades have you picked up so far?”

  Taylor glanced down at her storage ring as she thought about it. “I have 14 right now.”

  I nodded. “That should be good enough. We will portal them above them and…”

  I flinched slightly as the entire chamber shook. This time, I managed to feel something somewhat similar to raw magic burst out from around the corner. A moment later, that was joined by a chorus of blood curdling screams.

  Looking at both my girls' concerned eyes, it was clear that neither one had any more idea what was going on than I did.

  Opening up the portal, I was greeted by red.

  Blinking, I had to turn and look around the corner myself and when I did, I felt my jaw drop.

  In front of us, the guards were skeletons, their flesh painting the floor, walls, and even the ceiling, red. The turrets had exploded and were now shrapnel littering the area.

  In the center of the room, I watched as the naked wraith-like form of Alma slowly turned around and faced me.

  I swear I could see her shift her form to look more alive and her mouth make the beginnings of a smile.

  I swallowed. “Uh, thank you?”

  The smile on Alma’s face got wider, before suddenly she was gone.

  Yet I could also tell she hadn’t actually left completely, as the hair on the back of my neck didn’t go down.

  Moving on, we jogged into what looked like a control room and were about to fire upon the two ATC guards when I saw a flicker behind them. Then, as I blinked, the twos’ chests exploded like someone had reached through them and crushed their hearts.

  Suddenly, I was reminded of how Alma behaved when she was stalking Beckett in FEAR 2.

  How she would routinely interject herself to try to help the new object of her desires. It was creepy, especially when she did it naked, or in the form of a little girl.

  Deciding to head this off now, I called out. “Alma… could we talk?”

  There was a moment of silence before the little girl appeared to the side of us again, head tilted.

  Not the start I wanted, but I needed to try to talk this out. Especially since I didn’t want her to try to compete or try to get in between my wives and me.

  If she actually seriously hurt one of them, I would find a way to kill her permanently, sympathetic backstory or not.

  Taking a deep breath, I centered myself for this conversation.

  “Hey Alma, why don’t we start over. My name is Max. I haven’t completely decided on a last name yet, but I am leaning towards Walker since I am a planeswalker and the simplistic surname might keep me humble. This is one of my wives, Taylor, and this is another that may one day join me, Holly.” I said while gesturing towards the two of them.

  Not waiting to see what she would do with that information, I continued with the most sincere smile I could give. “I love all of my wives more than life itself.”

  Alma closed her still open mouth… or at least the mouth of her apparition. A part of me wondered if that was a conscious decision to change the image or if it was her subconscious.

  Next to me, Taylor stepped forward, hiding any of her nervousness in her bugs. “Hello, Alma. I didn’t have it as bad as you, but in high school I had a few bullies that made my life a living hell. They even nearly got me killed by stuffing me in a locker filled with rotting blood and human waste for hours.” Taking another tiny step forward, she gestured towards Alma. “I just want to say that I understand a little of what it is like. Hell, almost all of Max’s wives come from bad situations.”

  Understanding the assignment now, Holly continued where Taylor left off. “I grew up with powers, except mine were more magical than psychic. My guardians tried to stamp it out of me. There were a few light beatings or withholding food when I did something they called freakish. However, that stopped when it made my magic lash out even harder. So instead they kept me busy with chores from sun up to sun down, and I slept in a shoe cupboard until I was too big to fit.”

  Ignoring my desire to mess with the Dursleys again, I noticed that Alma had gone from glaring to tilting her head in interest.

  Holly continued her talk-no-jutsu, “It has only been recently at 14 when I found out that there were other people like me at a school. But even then, I was still treated like an outsider because of something my parents did. It was my friends, Hermione and Ginny, followed by Max, Ahri, Amy, and Luna along with the rest of his girls that finally made me feel like I belonged.”

  I frowned and stepped forward now, only a meter or two away from the apparition. I wasn’t sure that I wanted to recruit someone as mentally unstable as Alma into the family, but I wasn’t about to tell her she couldn’t join here and now with things this delicate. “We will get out of here and find a place where you can be free, wherever you want to go.”

  Alma seemed to study me, then she turned and looked over both of the girls for several long seconds before I saw her apparition smile.

  … it wasn’t a particularly nice smile, but neither did it seem actively malicious.

  Before I blinked, she flickered to arrive right in front of my face. “... me.”

  Beginning to expect her unpredictable moods, I managed to only flinch a little while feeling a chill run down my spine.

  A moment later, she was gone, or at least her apparition was…

  Once again jogging, I tried to judge how far we had come before giving up. “Hey Taylor, how close are we to Alma’s vault?”

  Taylor focused for a moment while still not breaking stride. “About 75% there, I would guess.”

  I nodded. “Nice, I hope to be able to capture Dr. Wade, although I will probably need to just let Alma kill him. Then we should focus on the elementary school and…”

  Another radio call cut me off, this time by Sabah. I was instantly on guard when I heard the tension in her voice. “Attention, we are under fire, I repeat, we are under fire from multiple directions.”

  I opened my mouth to ask for clarification only to be interrupted by Sabah as she continued explaining, “We are pinned down between a replica force and the ATC. Thea also says someone is trying to activate the turrets on everyone that isn’t ATC, including the remaining employees.”

  Swallowing, I realized that they were in a critical situation now and they couldn’t just portkey out… well they could, but Thea and Sabah, probably Tonks and Fleur too, wouldn’t leave if she was fighting to control the turrets.

  Immediately, I started opening a portal to help. However even if locking in on Sabah's soul portal only took a few moments, it felt like an eternity and I made a mental note to figure out a faster way.

  As the portal opened, my worst fears were realized. My girls were caught in a horrible crossfire, stuck in the intersection between two hallways, only barely able to take cover behind a security checkpoint’s counter built into one corner.

  However, even the bullet proof glass had collapsed with the amount of gun fire being aimed their way, forcing the group to hide behind the reinforced cement facade on the counters.

  Tonks and Fleur were holding and renewing shields around their position while Thea was apparently focused on hacking their systems in this area.

  Sabah was clearly doing everything she could by popping in and out of cover and taking pot shots. She was also using her powers to confuse and distract the enemy by lifting and lowering the helmets of a few ATC guards that had previously held this position.

  Even as I watched, she put down another replica as it approached the right hallway in front of her, but this only managed to slow them down while the ATC took a little more ground in the left hallway while she was distracted.

  Worse, it appeared that another group was coming down the hall behind her position on the right, based on the gunfire we could hear from that direction.

  As my portal opened behind Sabah, still within the security checkpoint, I could see that the ATC guards were bringing more heavy weapons forward, but my attention was yanked back to the left hallways when I spotted two Replica Heavies stomping forward.

  In the meantime, the radio crackled to life with Ahsoka breathing hard. “I am coming.” Judging from the direction and movement of her soul portal, she was probably running here at a full sprint.

  In a split second of decision I decided to focus on the replicas, managing to shield against another burst of fire.

  However even as I reinforced my shield as the heavies took aim, movement from the right caught my eye. I felt the blood drain from my face as a laser beam shot out from the ATC forces, punching through the crumbling stone of the security counter.

  It wasn’t a bullet and so wasn’t even slightly deflected by our bullet wards. The beam passed straight through, clipping Fleur’s arm and cutting most of the way through her bicep and only barely missing the bone. Her arm flopped uselessly to the ground as she cried out in agony, completely unable to move it. It was terrible, but similar to a lightsaber, it had cauterized the wound so she wasn’t actually bleeding much. It probably would have been worse if she hadn’t been wearing our enchanted clothes, but we hadn’t had time to fit a basilisk coat for her which might have blocked it entirely.

  I twisted my shield to the right to block any additional fire, catching another shot, but had to grimace as my shield was almost broken.

  Worse, the instinct to recoil from the injury made Fleur fall back and into the line of fire of the now unguarded replicas with heavy machine guns. Those hit exceptionally hard, and might even make it through the bullet wards. However, even as I was casting another shield, Thea moved her drone into the line of fire, taking a trio of shots before my shield was able to block the rest.

  Out of the corner of my eye I watched as Fleur tried to fight through the pain. I couldn’t help but remember the time Taylor had fallen against Tom and I felt like a dark part of me woke up and snarled. She might not be one of mine, but I was starting to like the somewhat sassy French veela, and no one was allowed to hurt what was mine.

  Now with the portal a meter wide, Holly could start helping too. She quickly cast another shield, powerful enough to glow slightly as it replaced my efforts towards the replicas before casting a massive knockback jinx.

  Holly’s jinx was applied as an area of effect, which lessened its impact, but it was still impressive as the entire attacking force was knocked back, some by several feet.

  My voice was sharp as I tried to organize the group. “Tonks and Holly, transfigure a stone wall and give us covering fire,” I directed. I then called over the radio. “Amy, Fleur’s been hit, how far away are you?”

  Amy didn’t delay as she responded. “I will be there in 20 seconds.”

  Conversely I saw Tonks hesitate before following my order. She had turned to try to do something for Fleur’s arm, but maybe seeing the wisdom in my request, she started pulling a wall of stone from the ground. Holly was a bit slower, but when she pulled, the width of the wall more than doubled what Tonks had done, a full foot thick and now a solid four feet high.

  Looking up, I noticed with concern that even with Holly’s power, the shield she had previously cast was starting to fade as the soldiers got up and resumed firing. It seemed that nearly a dozen machine guns and several scifi weapons could wear down even our strongest mage.

  Considering our options for half a second and judging the cover we had now, I pulled my wand out to ensure I had the maximum power possible and cast “Bombarda Maxima!” at the ATC guards down the right hall. Putting that much effort into the spell left me feeling exhausted, but it was definitely effective.

  Holly winced at the hall I had attacked as it turned into a bloody mess before she glanced down at Fleur and grimaced. Now with a bit of snarl on her face, she turned towards the left hallway and let out her own blasting curse at the replica forces.

  I watched with a vindictive smile as, despite their attempt to dodge, the replicas were thrown back, some in pieces. As they did, their gunfire finally stopped. Only the two replica heavies remained. One's shield was flickering so I swapped back to my silver desert eagle, putting three into his center mass. The other was getting back up and turned its gun towards us, so I renewed my shield while Holly did the same.

  In that brief second to think, I looked down to check Thea’s drone and my heart fell. I knew that she was fine, but it still hurt to see her drone unable to fly, limply laying there and sparking slightly on the broken desk.

  That was the point that Ahsoka arrived, dashing forward at the heavy before either Holly or I could follow up with another set of attacks.

  I watched in awe as she twisted in mid-air to avoid a concussion blast from the backpeddling heavy, probably via a force push, and swung her lightsaber. The white blade hit the shield and struggled for half a second before something in the suit failed. The saber continued through the heavy’s neck, allowing the body to fall backward with a thud, the head landing a half second later.

  As she stepped away, I dropped the two heavy armors, corpses and all, through a portal onto our island for future study.

  I wanted to inspect Fleur’s gash, but before I could, I heard additional footsteps coming from the same hallway that Ahsoka had appeared from.

  We didn’t need to wait long as the rest of Group 1 came jogging up, Amy finally arrived carrying an unconscious Alice Wade thrown over her shoulder like a bag of rice.

  I didn’t need to say anything as she threw Alice into Ginny and Ahri’s arms and dove to start healing Fleur, murmuring obscenities at the ATC and the replicas while she did. I specifically ignored her threat of giving them all a new form of cancer that would make their dicks rot off.

  Dropping my shield so it was just Holly’s shield left, I confirmed everyone else was unhurt before I turned and turned my full focus on Thea’s chassis. “Are you alright?”

  Thea made her drone’s eyes look down at the damage for a moment before she looked back at me. “Chassis motion controls are critical, anti-grav propulsion is non-op, sensor arrays are at 80%. Remote connection has decreased SNR, but is operational, and data ingress capability is physically damaged but fully functioning.”

  I glanced at the variety of USB-C and ethernet ports currently connected to the mainframe behind her. Despite being shot down, she had apparently not stopped her work of data mining the ATC secrets and fighting for control of the turrets.

  “Good. Did you get enough info to sink the ATV and their backers? What is the status of the turrets?”

  Thea's chassis barely twitched, but her voice was happy. “Affirmative! And I only need approximately 32 more seconds before permanently deactivating the turrets in this region.”

  I nodded at her camera, “Great work Thea.” Then I looked around at the rest of my girls. “Great work everyone, let's grab Alice and…”

  Suddenly, the security gates all slammed shut except for one, down the hall where we could hear a new set of gun fire that was getting closer.

  Thea seemed surprised, but after a moment she spoke up to explain the situation. “Correction, the party that was fighting me for control of the turrets has ceased his efforts.” At that I heard the turret down the hall fizz and then start smoking. But then Thea continued, “Instead the party has activated several of the security doors. They appear to be trying to force the various groups in this facility onto specific paths.”

  I felt my eye twitch, “Ah, yeah. I had forgotten about that asshole. His name is Norton Mapes, he is a morbidly obese man who is trying to get all three sides, the ATC, the replicas, and the investigating FEAR team, and now us I guess, to kill each other while he wipes the ATC servers of various incriminating documents.”

  I squeezed my gun in annoyance and I felt my knuckles pop. “Really, I can’t believe I forgot him. In canon, he tries to get the Point Man killed multiple times and you aren’t allowed to shoot him. Trust me, I tried.”

  Shaking my head, I put my desert eagle away as I picked up Thea’s chassis. “Ok, well I take anyone trying to kill any of my girls very personally…” just about everyone nodded at that. “So let's kill that bastard while we are pulling out, Thea, please backtrack his location, if you would. I will leave a portal here so you can stay connected, but I am going to move your chassis back to the island. Then we can…”

  The guns down the hall went silent, and we all turned towards the one remaining hallway.

  There were several seconds of silence before a blur, even to my eyes, came flying out of the darkness towards us.

  I threw up a shield, but instead of hitting it, the blur suddenly shot off to his right, bursting through a window and cutting through an office to get around our blockade.

  Time felt like it was slowing down as I focused my full attention on what could only be the Point Man, but I couldn’t help but notice that he was still too fast for me to fully track.

  I cursed in my head as I realized he was probably roughly on par with Anko.

  I moved to cast another shield to keep him out, but he burst out of the office and started dashing towards us, gun up.

  That was when Ahsoka moved forward in her own blur.

  Due to their previous training, Ahsoka and Hinata were by far the fastest and best melee fighters of our Family, and she showed that here.

  Unfortunately, there wasn’t much I could do except watch as the two dashed forward at speeds I was only barely able to track. I wanted to warn Ahsoka not to kill him if we could help it, but she must have realized who he was on her own, or at least that he wasn’t with the ATC or replicas, because her lightsaber seemed focused on cutting down any gun that the Point Man switched to.

  The Point Man was clearly not expecting her as she managed to swipe through and destroy his shotgun. However, that allowed him to swing out with an elbow that connected with her ribs, driving Ahsoka back.

  However, even with that exchange, they didn’t even pause as the Point Man drew and fired two pistols faster than a normal human could blink, forcing Ahsoka to dodge. The bullet wards didn’t straight up stop bullets, instead they deflected them, which allowed them to defeat much larger calibers than if we had tried to stop them outright, however that meant there wasn’t much they could do at this insanely close range.

  Fortunately, Ahsoka must feel some echo of the Force even in this universe… or she was just trained exceptionally well, as she was moving even before the Point Man brought the guns up.

  Yet even with that dodge, I watched as her basilisk jacket, reinforced with enchantments, was forced to block three bullets to her shoulder because she wasn’t able to get out of the way in time.

  I would have dodged back and returned fire, but Ahsoka jumped forward, under the arc of his guns and swinging her blade forward trying to cut off his weapons… or maybe she was going for his hands. Considering Amy was here and could heal him, I couldn't fault that logic.

  She managed to hit one pistol, but he pulled the other back in time to save it and managed to pull the trigger, this time at Ahsoka’s face.

  The bullet wards tried to do their job, but again, at a distance of less than a foot and even with Ahsoka dodging, the bullet intercepted the corner of her montrals.

  This made Ahsoka rear back in pain, even as Holly finally got enough room between Ahsoka and the Point Man to work and threw another shield forward to cut the Point Man off from us. That gave me time to cast another shield behind him, blocking him in.

  Now breathing deeply, the Point Man watched us as we focused on him, all except for Amy, who hadn’t stopped healing Fleur. I didn’t doubt he would eventually find a way to break out unless we did something drastic. But that might cause FEAR to hunt us down and we still had quite a few things I wanted to get done in this world. Then, most importantly, it could also potentially anger Alma who was a much bigger danger to us.

  Deciding to break the silence, I spoke up. “Are you the Point Man?”

  I was pretty sure he was, but I shouldn’t know that.

  His body barely reacted as he continued breathing hard. “...Yes.”

  Pointing at my Family, I continued. “We are on the same side. We are trying to expose the crimes of the ATC.”

  The Point Man didn’t say anything but a moment later, his ear piece chimed in loud enough for us to hear. “Why should we believe you? You broke into a restricted military contractor office space. Why wouldn’t we assume that you are working with the replicas?”

  Wincing, I wanted to kick myself. We had basically intercepted most of the ATC forces and collected most of the blackmail. I wasn’t sure if FEAR even knew what was going on without that information. So from their point of view this all made us look like either saboteurs or thieves.

  Something that the FEAR command, and Rodney Betters, the unit commander would be looking for.

  Glancing down at Thea to ensure she was still operational enough for this, I then looked up at the Point Man again. “The ATC are guilty of just about every crime against humanity you can think of. We are just here to try to save Alma Wade if we can manage it, and expose their crimes so they can be stopped. We are more than happy to send you the proof we have collected if you give us an email.”

  There was a moment of silence before Commander Betters responded through the Point Man’s radio. “Even then, we will need you to surrender and we will take you into custody until your story can be confirmed. Until you can send your information to…”

  I sighed as Thea proceeded to start sending data over and considered our options.

  What they offered was just not going to happen, so I needed to figure out what we could do.

  Looking down, I turned to Amy who had nearly finished healing Fleur. “Amy, please use these bandages to wrap up Alice’s wounds. I am sure FEAR is looking to take her into protective custody despite her not actually knowing anything about what is going on.” I discreetly cast the same danger portkey enchantments that I had used before, but this time centered on the alley behind the mall we had first appeared in. Worst case scenario she would be able to escape anything except a bullet to the head. I didn’t want a repeat of Paxton eating her like in the game.

  As I stood up, looking at the Point Man and holding Thea tighter, I simply shook my head. “We have no problem turning over Alice Wade to your care. She is innocent of her father’s crimes. However, I have no doubt that someone in the ATC would attempt to have us silenced and I have no intention of staying in a jail cell for the next few weeks.”

  Turning back to the smaller portal I had left behind us, “Taylor, we will be back momentarily, please hold our position there if possible, but retreat if you need to.” Snapping that portal closed, I looked at the Point Man.

  His radio crackled to life again. “You are not free to leave, surrender and you will be treated well. You have to know by now that you can’t outrun the Point Man here.”

  I had to stop myself from laughing at that, but apparently my mirth was obvious as his eyes narrowed.

  As I stood up straighter, the Point Man tensed, obviously waiting for our attack. However I didn’t bother, instead clearly saying. “Yeah, no. We aren’t going to fight you and we aren’t going to get into a running retreat. So option C it is. FAMILY PORTBACK!”

  Then I felt the hook behind my navel activate, and I made sure I was holding Thea tight as we hadn’t been able to bond her portkey ring to her chassis.

  I was satisfied by the absolute disbelief on the Point Man's face as we seemed to spin in place before suddenly disappearing.

  A fraction of a second later all the Family members, plus Tonks and Fleur, who were present in the room and could hear my voice, popped into existence in the medical bay.

  Turning around, I saw everyone except Tonks manage to land easily in the interior of our gatehouse. Her hair flashed an annoyed orange as she fell to her butt due to her Metamorphmagus clumsiness and not expecting the sudden change.

  Fleur landed well, but swayed a little. Amy had healed most of the missing gash, but she was clearly still in a bit of shock which Amy noticed and went right back to treating.

  For everyone else, now that they were here, they got to look around the medical bay I had created the night before we left. To one side there were multiple hospital beds with the best medical equipment I could obtain, including the Bacta tanks from the shuttle, and on the other was a massive shelf of potions with the far side being filled with Amy’s slow growing mushroom farm she recently developed as biomass storage.

  Taking a deep breath, I turned to everyone. “Well, that wasn’t ideal.” Running a hand through my hair, I sighed. “We are going to need to move up our time tables even further.”

  “Tonks, please help Amy get Fleur to one of the beds to rest. Everyone else, restock if you need to, but we are going to move out soon, just give me a second to grab that weasel Norton.”

  At their nods, I turned my attention to following Thea’s instructions for moving my portal until I spotted an incredibly fat man attempting to waddle away from his previous position.

  Sending a stunner towards him, Norton fell on his face before I levitated him through a portal and dumped him in the corner of the room. I paused and then sent an Incarcerous spell at him to tie him up with magical ropes while making a mental note that I needed some sort of jail cell for future prisoners.

  However, before I could consider that any longer, Taylor surprised me with a radio call. “Max, I think I have arrived at Alma’s cell… except Dr. Wade already seems to be opening it.”

  Interlude Lieutenant Johnson:

  Roy Johnson felt himself twitch as three more shots rang out down the hall.

  He wasn’t sure why he was still here.

  He had come to the ATC from a recommendation straight out of the Marines.

  His Sargent Major had seen something in him and pointed him towards an old buddy of his, as he put it.

  Roy saw the six figure salary and jumped on it.

  It would allow him to live somewhat comfortably after his bitch of an Ex cheated on him while he was deployed and he had come back to find another man in his bed.

  Well, actually it was the only work he could find… but he had jumped on it as it seemed too good to be true. They even made sure the case against him was dropped once he pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor charge of unmediated domestic abuse. Considering she was still in physical therapy and that SOB was in several casts, that was pretty good.

  From what he could tell, most of the men around him were from similar backgrounds.

  Men who were desperate for money or just wanted to go back to shooting things. Well, that, and anger issues. He was man enough to recognize that he had a bit of a temper. Nothing like Luke or Terry, but clearly he could see red when he got mad enough.

  And he certainly felt like he was doing something important any time he was called to help put down the science experiments. Maybe once these egg brains finished this, he wouldn’t have to see his brothers die, like Rick with that IDE.

  So yeah, it was important work.

  That motivation was gone now.

  He didn’t know who she was, but…

  Another explosion sounded out, this time only a few rooms over.

  He had seen the footage from the security cameras, he knew that she was headed towards the vault.

  He didn’t even know what was in there, but the closer this woman got, the more he thought it wasn’t worth getting between her and it.

  Swallowing, he took a step to the side, ducking behind the rack of servers.

  Behind him Luke and Terry were taking positions, guns braced on the table pointed at the only door she could come from.

  Thud, thud, thud…

  Her casual loping run came echoing down the hall towards them.

  Swallowing again, he knew he was supposed to be taking position… but he couldn’t help but think… was this really…

  Before he could finish that thought, he heard the door bang open.

  He braced for the sharp bark of gunfire, but to his horror he just heard two cries of surprise.

  Glancing around the corner again, he saw both of his companions recoiling back from two cockroaches that had fallen directly onto their faces.

  He couldn’t believe it either.

  Out of the corner of his eye he saw the woman, this time alone, appear in a blur.

  Bang!

  Both pistols fired so close together that his ears heard just a single crack even if it wasn’t nearly as loud as it should have been.

  To his mounting disbelief, both Luke and Terry’s heads practically exploded as the rounds missed every piece of armor they were wearing and entered just below their goggles… right where the cockroaches had landed.

  As his blood ran cold, the gun snapped up and pointed at him despite the fact that he was hidden behind the rack, only peeking out via a tiny gap between the servers.

  There was a moment where he was sure he was going to die, but after a long blink the woman in the black jacket snapped her other gun forward again and he heard another shot ring out.

  From his angle he could see Aaron fall to the ground, head gone.

  He hadn’t even rounded the corner of the door yet… she had shot him through the wall.

  Glancing back at this demon… staring deep into her uncaring eyes, he felt himself lose control of his bladder.

  Dropping his gun, he waited for his death, completely unable to look away.

  There was a long moment before the woman seemed to huff. Then she tensed her legs and a moment later she was gone, dashing forward.

  Roy felt himself start to shake… maybe… maybe he should consider a career change

  … and some therapy.

  Either way he was getting out of here.

  Interlude Luna:

  Luna grinned as she read the quick letter that Max had sent through the message tube explaining what had happened, and coming only just short of apologizing for leaving her out…

  Then her grin widened as she read Amy’s much longer explanation.

  Turning, she called out to Dinah, “Sister! Max finally proposed, plan ‘All-Out Pummeling’ isn’t necessary anymore, we should be good to go straight to ‘Double Shock’ and ‘Double Team’!”

  Looking over, Dinah shook her head, but Luna could see her mood brighten.

  Behind, she managed to catch Aisha sneaking up on her, trying to use discussion with Dinah as a distraction

  Not even turning around, Luna bounced on her toes and spun, blocking a tackle. “You are going to have to try harder than that… especially if you want to watch.”

  To the side Luna could see, Riley preemptively facepalmed as Aisha opened her mouth before closing it again… “Tauros dung… Fine, just you wait!”

  Luna giggled to herself. Everything was going according to plan…

  She just wished she could check up on Hogwarts. She felt like she really should be more concerned about what was going on there.