He ripped it off his uniform and let it clatter to the concrete floor.
“Humility, right?” Ryan said, a frantic, wild grin spreading across his face. “Someday you survive because of someone whose name you never knew.”
He checked his magazine. Slapped it back in.
“I’m going to pull the plug on that tower, Emily,” Ryan said.
Before I could grab him, Ryan kicked open the heavy steel door and sprinted out into the blinding, merciless sunlight.
Chapter 4: The Price of Humility
“Ryan!” I screamed, the sound tearing my throat. I tried to lunge after him, but the agony in my shoulder drove me back to my knees.
Through the open door, the blinding glare of the tarmac looked like a white-hot desert. Ryan was a dark blur, sprinting in a chaotic, zigzagging pattern. He wasn’t running like a parade-ground soldier; he was running like a desperate animal.
Three hundred yards of open ground lay between Building 32 and the base of the North Annex comms tower.
Crack.
The supersonic snap of a sniper rifle echoed off the concrete. A plume of asphalt exploded two feet behind Ryan’s heels.
Crack. Crack.
“Cover him!” Lucas roared. He had managed to find a shard of broken glass from a shattered window and was desperately sawing at his zip-ties.
I grabbed Mercer’s fallen rifle with my bloody right hand. I couldn’t shoulder it properly, so I rested the barrel on the doorframe, wedging it in tight. I didn’t have a scope, just iron sights, but I saw the muzzle flash from the roof of a distant supply warehouse.
I squeezed the trigger, laying down suppressive fire. It was inaccurate, desperate shooting, but it forced the sniper to duck.
Ryan reached the chain-link fence surrounding the tower base. He didn’t bother trying to climb it. He threw himself onto the ground, sliding underneath a gap where the wire had rusted out, tearing his dress whites to shreds.
Inside the corridor, Voss realized what was happening. “No!” he bellowed. He leaned out from behind his pillar to take a shot at Ryan’s retreating back.
