Chapter 15: Chapter 15

Thirteen's POV

"That's not possible." Garrett mutters, his voice barely more than a whisper.

"You're right. It's not possible for you to come back from three explosive arrows to the chest. You catch on quick. The devil only allows one life extension deal per century. Sorry, you lucked out."

She fires the cross bow and Garrett's eyes widen even further before he dives out of the way. The three arrows make contact with the wall behind him and explode. Debris rain down on him but he's already getting to his feet...and running.

"Where do you think you're going? I haven't finished with you yet. Who gave you permission to leave?" Lily chases off after him. "You're going to be nothing more than blood on the walls, guts on the floor, and ashes in the air when I'm done with you buddy!"

There's a loud explosion and Lily's triumphant laugh echoes down the hall.

There's another explosion soon after, but this one comes from the opposite direction in which Lily ran. I turn and head that way. I barely make around the corner into the room when bullets spray up the wall around me. I duck quickly back into the hallway. I pull a couple more knives from boots and hold them tightly in my grasp.

I wait patiently for the shooters to come around the corner before lunging at them. The knife in my hand flies through the air hitting the first guy right in between the eyes. I switch the second knife in my hand to my good hand before swinging it out a drawing blood from a deep cut in his face. He reaches his gun out and I shove it back before plunging the knife deep into his gut. He drops to the floor.

I turn around just as another two guys come around the corner. They aim their guns at me and I hear the two gunshots, but I feel no pain. Instead both of them drop to the floor, a bullet between each of their eyes.

I furrow my eyebrows together in confusion before turning back around to look behind me. Fifty-three lowers his gun as he looks at me. He then simply turns and heads back into the room without saying a word. I follow quickly after him.

"How many?" I question and he shrugs as he keeps his gun at the ready and moves silently.

"A lot less than before. We're winning, and these guys are nowhere near professionals."

I stop in my tracks and Fifty-three stops too, turning to look at me. "What?" He questions.

"They're a diversion. If Garrett really wanted to beat us he would've brought professionals with him."

Understanding dawns on Fifty-three. "If they're a diversion, then what does he really want?"

I shake my head. "There's nothing here other than the weapons room, and he's not going to be getting in there. He knows that."

"So a better question would be, where does he want to keep us away from?"

I shake my head again. "Unless he's planning on storming the agency, I can't possibly think of any place he'd want to get into."

"What about the company?"

"There's nothing at the company. Unless he plans on paying my bills for me."

"Are you sure there's nowhere else around here that he would want to get into?"

"Not that I'm aware of...." I trail off as a thought comes to mind.

"What?" Fifty-three asks when he sees the look of concentration on my face.

I ignore him and instead pull my phone out my pocket and dial a familiar number, trying to confirm what I've already figured out. The call goes to voicemail after a few seconds and I try again. This time someone picks up, but it's not the person I was calling.

"Sorry, the person you're trying to call is otherwise...occupied." I don't recognize the voice on the other end as they laugh sadistically. Even though I know exactly who I'm talking to, the voice is nearly unrecognizable to me now with the pure malicious in the tone.

There's mocking laughter on the other end and I feel my hand tighten around the phone. "What's the matter Ev? Cat got your tongue?"

"You should've just stayed out of this." I growl.

"How can I?" I can hear the venom dripping from their tone, the absolute undeniable hatred. Hatred for me. "What more can I say-other than you get what you deserve."

"Then I suppose you'll be getting what's coming to you pretty damn soon."

"Unlikely."

"So you're working with Garrett now then?" I question, disgust in my tone.

More mocking laughter. "Garrett's usefulness only goes so far. He believes he's the one in charge, but we don't exactly see eye to eye on certain...ideas. So his time is just about expired. I'll send you his body in the mail after I kill him."

"And what exactly don't you two see eye to eye on?"

"What to do about you. You see Garrett simply wants to get information out of you."

"And you?"

"I want to bring you and your whole world crumbling down." I can practically hear the sadistic smile and the deadly glare behind those words. "I'll tell Lydia you said hello...if I don't kill her first. Oh I almost forgot...tell Sam I said hello."

The line goes dead and my anger gets the better of me. I throw the phone across the room and into the wall. It shatters on impact and drops to the floor. Fifty-three looks at me questioningly.

"Garrett came for Lydia." I tell him finally, my fists clenched at my sides and my expression deadly.

"Why?"

"Does it matter?" I growl out. "He got what he wanted and if I had to take a guess I'd say he's already gone along with his remaining men."

"Not yet he's not." Lily's voice sounds in my ear. "He's making a run for the gate though, but he's leaving his men behind. Typical. I'm pinned down, can't get to him."

"I got him." I say simply before running as fast as I can to the front door and throwing it open. It's like a battle field as soon as I exit. I don't stop as bullets whiz by my head and instead keep running. No way I'm letting him get away this time.

The gunshots behind me finally cease, and I hear a few sets of footsteps rushing after me. Though since they're not shooting I'm going to say it's safe to assume they're not the bad guys.

I see Garrett's figure at the gate. He's disabled the security on it but it still won't open so he begins to climb it. I waste no time in picking up my pace and jumping at the gate, reaching up, and grabbing a hold of his leg. I pull him roughly back off the gate and the two of us fall back onto the floor, with him on top of me.

I land on my back and the breath gets knocked out of me. I feel the familiar heat of the dagger just a few centimeters from my neck.

"Stop where you are, put your weapons on the floor, and I won't slit her throat." Garrett's voice is calm and collected, even though he's clearly losing this time.

I don't dare to turn my head to look and see who it is exactly that followed after me. Instead I listen to the clanging of weapons being dropped, and the many, many curses from Lily.

"I said drop the weapons Flower." Garrett mocks her.

She grumbles more curses before I hear another thud of a weapon being dropped. I risk turning my head to look at her. Instead of looking pissed off and murderous, she's smiling mischievously. Garrett has very good sense to look worried.

Lily casually glances down at the watch on her wrist and begins counting down. "7...6..."

"What are you counting for?" Garrett growls.

"4..."

"Stop counting and tell me what you did or I slit her throat."

Lily listens to the stop counting part...at least out loud, and instead holds up her and begins counting down on her fingers instead. When she hits one Garrett suddenly gets very quiet. I turn my head back to look at him just as he falls limp on top of me, the dagger falling to the floor way too close to my head. I shove him off and move away. It's only then I notice the small stream of blood coming from the exact middle of his forehead. A perfect shot.

Devin's the first one to break the stunned silence. "Uhh...didn't we kind of need the guy alive?"

"I say, halle-freaking-luiah." Lily says simply as she kicks at Garrett with her shoe. "Except for the fact I didn't get to ask him where he got his gun...oh wait a minute," she rolls him over and pulls the gun from his holster. "Never mind. I'll just take it. Problem solved."

"Who fired the shot?" Cody asks as he eyes the weapons on the floor and then the rest of us standing around.

"Sam's the only one still in the house." Olivia speaks up.

I shake my head as I eye the shot again. A perfect shot. "This was not Sam's doing."

"Then who? There's no one else in the house. We're all right here, and none of us had our weapons in hand." Hayden states.

"Who said anything about them being in the house?" I ask him and he frowns in confusion.

"You know who shot him?"

I give him a tight lipped smile. "Unfortunately yes." I shake my head and mutter to myself. "This is not the time or place to do this."

"What are you talking about?" Chase questions.

Lily smiles widely. "There's only person I know who could make such a perfect shot like that." Lily's smile grows bigger. "And Ev doesn't really want said person to be here."

"I don't know how you're so calm about this." I snap back at her.

Her eyes sparkle with mischief. "It's pretty easy actually." She says with an innocent shrug. She lifts her crossbow off the floor and tucks it under her arm.

I turn back to look at Garrett. I needed him alive, especially now that Lydia's been taken who knows where. I never thought he'd actually die if I'm being completely honest. I continue to stare and suddenly something seems to just jump out at me.

"Hand me a pair of handcuffs." I order. Josh pulls a pair out his pocket and tosses them to me.

I catch them effortlessly and roll Garrett onto his stomach. I pull his arms behind him and clasp the handcuffs tightly around wrist. Lily makes a face of confusion.

"He's still breathing." I mutter as an explanation before roll him awkwardly onto his back again.

"Now that's really not possible." Lily mumbles as she loads her crossbow and keeps it aimed steadily at him. "When did he turn into Wolverine?"

I ignore her and instead look closer at the wound in his head. I reach my hand up slowly and dig out some kind of metal dart with three prongs sticking out of its side like a set of legs. Lily squints her eyes at it when I hold it up for her to see.

"What is that?" She asks.

I shake my head. "I don't know. It broke through the skin but it didn't go very deep. Not deep enough to kill him at least."

"Of course not. If I was aiming to kill the bastard I wouldn't have stopped shooting till I emptied the entire clip."

I groan out loud and Lily sends me a wide smile, clearly letting me know how much she's enjoying this.

"Oh I need to go get some popcorn." I hear Devin announce from behind me.

I turn to face Ryder as he walks up, the sniper rifle propped up against his shoulder. He grins proudly at me when I meet his eyes. He has yet to spot Lily.

"The darts are something Nicky designed-just never got the chance to test them out until now. It was a fifty-fifty shot on whether or not they'd do what they were supposed to, or just malfunction and explode instead. I got lucky with that one."

"And what-may I ask-were the darts supposed to do?"

Ryder grins boyishly. "A really high powered taser. That's the general idea anyway."

"You and Nicky seem to be getting along fairly well then. Should I tell Mom to start planning the wedding?"

Ryder freezes in his tracks and turns his head slowly to look at Lily. She smiles widely, showing him all her teeth, and her green eyes sparkling with amusement seem to get even brighter. She cocks her head to the side and hold out her arms.

"I demand a hug." She says and he just stays frozen where he is. His eyes wide with shock, and glistening with tears he's refusing to let fall.

"Fine then you disgusting oaf." Lily mutters. She goes back to examining her crossbow as if looking for an smudges or imperfections.

Ryder takes a couple hesitant steps towards her, almost like he's afraid she'll disappear. Lily rolls her eyes, grumbles a few choice words under her breath and drops her crossbow on the floor. She walks up to him, closing the remaining distance and wrapping her arms around him. It takes him a second to respond before he wraps his arms around her small frame, squeezing tightly.

"I thought you were dead." He mutters, his voice soft and strained.

She pets his head like he's a dog but he doesn't let her go. "Not yet." There are tears shining in her eyes as well as his.

"Aww." Kate and Olivia say in unison before making a gagging motion.

Suddenly Ryder abruptly pulls away from Lily. He turns his gaze on me and I've never, and I mean never seen him look so angry in his life. Lily laughs evilly and I shoot her a glare. Ryder begins taking a few tauntingly slow steps towards me. I start to back up with my hands up in surrender.

"Let's not make any rash decisions here Ryder." I say gently. "I have an explanation."

"It's not a very good one if you ask me."

I shoot Lily a glare and she just shrugs as if she wasn't just trying to instigate this further.

Ryder's eyes shine with a hell blazing fury mixed with his usual mischief as he continues taking steps towards me. I make a split second (stupid) decision, and I bolt. I hear his footsteps echo after me but I don't dare turn around. I can hear Lily, Devin, Olivia, and Kate laughing hysterically.

Ryder's yelling every curse word and bad name under the sun he can think of at me as I zigzag around the yard, trying to avoid him.

"You're so freaking dead when I get my hands on you! Start digging your damn grave now!'

I can't help but laugh lightly but he doesn't seem to appreciate that too much as he begins spouting more curse words.

"I'm going to fu-"

"Mr. Stevenson!"

"-cking kill you Everly Kingston!"