Marcus didn’t answer.
Through the soundproofed glass, underneath the crowd and the music, something else reached him.
A high-pitched electronic whine.
Capacitors charging.
He watched the War Machine suit.
The shoulder cannon jerked upward, servos locking onto the VIP boxes ringing the arena.
At the same instant, the optical sensors on all thirty Hammer drones snapped from neutral blue to a glaring, hostile red.
They weren’t on standby.
They were acquiring targets.
Marcus’s vision flashed, the pale blue interface overriding his sight with blood-red text.
[SYSTEM ALERT: CRISIS EVENT DETECTED.]
[Lethal Threat Imminent. Dynamic Quests Generating…]
Emma was still smiling, opening her mouth to speak again.
Marcus crossed the room before she got the first word out — one hand closing on the lapel of her suit, wrenching her backward off her feet, the other snatching Rogue by the jacket and hauling her down behind the concrete lip of the balcony.
“Hey—!” Emma’s champagne glass shattered against the carpet as she hit the ground.
“What do you think you’re—”
BRRRRRRRRT.
The rotary cannon drowned her out.
The bullet-resistant glass exploded inward, raining shards over their heads.
A line of heavy tracer fire tore through the space where Emma’s chest had been a second earlier, chewing through the couches and blowing out the back wall in a cloud of plaster.
Screams erupted from the arena below as the drones opened fire on the crowd.
Marcus kept his head down as a second volley shook the booth’s foundation.
He looked over at Emma.
Marcus brushed a shard of glass off his shoulder.
He looked at her, his voice perfectly level over the sounds of explosions ripping through Flushing Meadows.
“I believe you owe me a master keycard.”
Emma stared at him.
For a fraction of a second, her mask slipped entirely.
The untouchable, telepathic ice queen was gone, replaced by a woman who realized she had just been three inches away from being ripped in half by a machine gun.
She opened her mouth, but the roar of a repulsor blast hitting the roof of the pavilion drowned out whatever she was about to say.
The building groaned, concrete dust sifting down from the ceiling.
Marcus didn’t wait for a thank you.
He stood up into a low crouch, moving toward her.
He extended a hand down to where she lay in the glass-covered carpet.
“Get up,” he said, the casual tone completely gone.
“Unless you want to wait here and see if they have a second volley.”
Marcus held out a hand.
Emma stared at it.
Plaster dust streaked one cheek, and beneath her, shattered glass glittered across the carpet, catching what was left of the strobing arena lights below.
“I don’t need—”
Another burst of cannon fire tore into the ceiling above them, plaster raining down in a fine gray mist.
She flinched, the sentence dying unfinished.
“Take the hand, Emma.”
She took it.
He hauled her up fast enough that she stumbled, catching herself against his chest for a second before shoving back, putting space between them, brushing at her ruined suit like she could scrub the whole last minute off with it.
Below, the screaming hadn’t stopped.
If anything, it had gotten worse — the drones were still firing into the crowd, and somewhere close by, metal was grinding against metal, a fight happening in the sky just beyond the shattered window. Get faster updates on novelping.com.
“What the hell is happening—” Her eyes went to the shattered wall, to the drones still visible through the gap, still firing.
“That’s not — those aren’t supposed to be armed—”
“They are now.” Marcus glanced past her toward Rogue.
Her face was already pale — first time she’d been anywhere near something like this.
“Move. We’re not staying here to figure out why.”
Another burst tore into the far wall, closer this time.
Emma flinched, any argument dying in her throat.
A red-tinted interface flared across Marcus’s vision, cutting through everything else.
[CRISIS EVENT: THE STARK EXPO]
[Objective 1: Evacuate the Bonded Heir (Rogue) from the kill zone. — 150 Merit Points]
[Objective 2: Ensure the survival of High-Value Target (Emma Frost). — 100 Merit Points]
[Objective 3: Civilian Extraction. — 20 Merit Points per extraction]
A hundred and sixty already banked.
That puts me at four-ten.
Five people pulled out on the way down and I’ve got Control money by tonight.
He closed the system panel, focus narrowing entirely on getting the two of them out safely.
Before he could kick the jammed door the rest of the way open, splintered wood shoved inward from the hallway side.
A woman stepped through — red hair, a sharp, composed face, a deep maroon blazer and skirt that had no business being in a warzone.
Compact Glock in her right hand, angled toward the floor.
“Out of the open! Over here!”
Emma blinked, brushing dust off her sleeve.
“Stark’s assistant? Rushman?”
“…”
Natalie Rushman.
Right.