"C'mon, suga.Nana won't let those scary pictures get her baby girl, okay?"
The child refused to budge. "They move, Nana. I don't wanna go!"
Rider took his 9mm out of the holster and checked his magazine. "I'm from coal mining country. I think this little cutie is our canary."
Jose took a deep breath and pulled a Berretta out from the back of his jeans that had been stashed under his shirt. Carlos and Damali were on their feet, as was Val, holding the child to her breast.
"Yo, G," Carlos hollered, motioning him over.
Phat G hustled to the table, his locks crackling with static. "What up, man?"
"Deep concern," Carlos said. "How's your menon the roof?"
Phat G hit his two-way."You good?"
"Yeah, we cool up here. Got a problem?" Anthony replied.
"Brother Net is feeling some type-a way. That ain't good."
"We on it."
A high-pitched whine made Carlos, Mike, Damali, and Inez turn at the same time. Carlos pushed Val to the floor with the baby and drove across the table to body-shield Mom Delores, flinging a disc of Heru that cut through brick.
"Incoming!"
The blast rocked the top of the building, sending patrons in a screaming frenzy. Phat G's squad came over the bar, out of the kitchen, and from hidden alcoves.
"Get these civilians out of here!" he ordered."Protocol drill alpha!"
Damali swam against a sea of panicked bodies. It had to be an aerial assault, because the roof was being bombarded. Carlos had shattered a window and had a shield up blocking the first floor where there were hundreds of innocent lives at risk. Chaos thrummed in her ears as he folded-away to the roof to assist Guardians there, and tacticals on Level One had commandeered the rack of firewood, sending stake missiles whirring through the door like MLRS shells.
Tables turned over, Guardians hunkered down. Flaming demon arrows whizzed through the front door and windows with black bolt charges, falling at Carlos's shield. It was surreal. Pandemonium would leak into her mind in sharp, quick-stop frames and then erupt in real time.
Valkyrie had her niece clamped between her athletic thighs behind a table while she loaded silver-tipped arrows in her bow. The archer then went up on one knee, firing out the unblocked side windows, while Ayana scrambled behind her. Val's movements were physical poetry, like a choreographed dance, as she popped up quickly, set a target, released instant death to splatter a demon, and then dropped down again to protect the child.
Rider, Shabazz, Jose, and Mike had commandeered the four corners of the establishment, teaming with Phat G's squad to shoot out of side windows as the crowd cleared out. Bobby and Dan covered civilians, helping to usher them out the back exit with Berkfield and several fast-moving brothers on Phat G's team. Fire extinguishers manned by team members were sending white plumes of dense fog everywhere, countering the inferno from flaming arrows designed to smoke the teams out.
Phat had rolled out the heavy artillery with the kitchen crew. From under the cabinets they broke out rocket-propelled grenade launchers, tossing them to Inez and Juanita, while the rest of theNew York squad handed off handheld Uzis and assault rifles. Marlene got the assembly line going until every Guardian was strapped. Crowd screams got farther and farther away. Mom Delores stayed with Ayana and Valkyrie as Damali unsheathed her blade. She looked at Inez's mother and Val.
"Val, you got 'em?"
"On my life, Queen."
Phat G dropped down beside them with two Uzis and a shoulder launcher. "I got her back. Y'all go make it do what itdo . They ain't comin' in our house like this." He pointed to the train tracks with the barrel of a machine gun. "The third rail's got a lotta juice. Get my roof squad to tell your tacticals when the trains roll-soon as they go by, stand with our squad and bend the beam to fry those f**kers, feel me?'Scuze my French, ma'am."
"Good look, G. Good look," Damali said, ducking through the arrow assault and heading to an opening in the side windows as the building shook again.
She met Carlos on the roof, shielding three men.
"These guys were lucky," Carlos yelled. "Brother Ant is hit, but if you work on him, he'll be able to use that leg again."
"They're sending up what feels like mortar rounds from catapults," Rene shouted over another rocking blast.
Carlos looked at Damali."Catapults? What the-"
Another blast rocked the roof, but Carlos's shield took the heavy impact.
"They've got a position up on the train platforms," Rod said, bracing through another blast.