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As soon as Dante took the kitsune out the door, Rick went out the window, tucking and rolling as he hit the narrow strip of grass outside. The agents watching as back up spotted him fast and a heavily armed agent scrambled to his side and escorted him to the perimeter.
“Agent Brand?” The agent – Agent Milton, if Rick remembered correctly – glanced back toward the window expectantly.
“Not coming.” Rick ground his teeth, suddenly aware it looked like he’d abandoned his partner. The agent’s momentarily horrified look prompted him to add, “He’s buying us time. We need to stop the little Irishman that left here about half an hour ago. He’s going to try to kill the Vice President.”
“Finnegan?” Another agent, one with unnaturally sharp teeth that made Rick suppress a shudder, came up beside the first. “The banker?”
“Apparently warmongering is a lucrative side hustle. He hurt Dante, so don’t let his size fool you.” Rick looked the man over. If he was going to use this team to take Finnegan down, he needed to understand his assets. “No offense, agent, but I need to know, what are you?”
The man glanced at his partner nervously. “Werewolf, sir. We’re not all aligned with Wharton.”
“Good to know.” Rick briefly wondered if the Mythic Council fracturing would ripple out into PNI, then decided that if he, Dante, and the Vice President were going to survive that day, those questions would have to wait. He looked at the human agent he first encountered when he went out the window. “Hand me your phone, I need to call the director.” He held out his hand expectantly. He may have been with PNI for only a couple months, but he still out ranked these men.
The man fished it out, tapped in the lock code, and offered it to him without objection. “You’re sure we can’t help Dante? We’ve got a werewolf, a giant, a dryad, and three fully armed human agents. Vikas wouldn’t stand a chance.”
“Vikas is being controlled by Finnegan. Some spirit ball thing. I assume you know what that means because Dante didn’t have time to explain, and I really don’t have time to wait for explanations. Dante would rather not kill the kitsune for something he can't control, but Vikas won't stop hunting Dante until we stop Finnegan.” Rick dialed the number he now had recognized and put the phone to his ear to wait for it to ring. “Mobilize your team. We need to move as soon as I’m done here.”
The man nodded and the pair of agents jogged off to obey.
“Hello?” Director Leon answered warily.
“Rick McCoy, Director, we have a bit of a situation.”
“Welcome to life as Dante’s partner. What do I need to know?”
“Shamus Finnegan is our man. He has Vikas’s spirit ball and is using him to incite a human mythic civil war for financial gain. He’s on his way to murder the Vice President and pin it on the mythics.” That was an awful lot of words Rick wouldn’t have imagined himself using a couple months ago, much less using confidently. “Dante is keeping Vikas occupied and I’m taking the back up team to intercept Finnegan. Can you alert the Vice President’s protection detail?”
“I’ll handle it. Do we know which mythic guild he plans to frame?”
“Only that whoever he planned to frame was a water type.” Were they Pokemon now? Rick stifled a laugh. The thought of his partner as a fire type Pokemon was never going to leave his head.
“Makes sense. Vice President Lee is attending an aircraft carrier dedication this afternoon. The carrier’s named after his grandfather. I’ll make sure the agents working security there know to accommodate your team and look out for Finnegan. Godspeed, Agent McCoy.”
So they were his team now. Alright. He’d been a team leader in New York. Not a team like this, but he’d use it to his advantage. He handed the silent phone back to the agent returning with his team. He looked over the small group swiftly. Six agents, four male and two female, one of each definitely over six feet tall. Director Leon had chosen this team for brute strength, but hopeful Rick could get some speed from them as well. They looked at them expectantly, waiting for his lead.
“There’s a plot on the Vice President of the United States. Shamus Finnegan, king of the Leprechauns, has Vikas’s spirit ball and is preparing a water attack on the VP at the Navy Yard.” He scanned their faces to make sure they were following. They seemed to be. “The VP’s team has been alerted. Our job is to intercept Finnegan if possible and retrieve Vikas’s spirit ball. Any questions?”
The agent’s looked at each other and shook their heads.
“Good, I guess. I’m going to need your names and what guilds you belong to.” Rick rubbed the bridge of his nose. “We’re going to catch a leprechaun.”
# # # # #
DANTE HAD DIED ONCE already. Vikas had gotten his hands on Finnegan’s knife before he could and had used it very effectively. Fortunately, getting his body to the aquarium had turned out to be a bigger task than the kitsune expected and Dante had resurrected in the doorway of Finnegan’s office, torching the heavy desk, rich carpet, expensive wallpaper, and Vikas himself. Vikas was uninjured, but the intensity of Dante’s resurrection fire destroyed his clothes and drove him back long enough for Dante to gather his wits. Served him right. Served him and the faithless leprechaun right. The overhead sprinkler system had activated, dousing them both and eliminating any further risk of them burning the bank down.
“Your human will fail. Finnegan is too strong.” Vikas dove on him before he could fully recover and knocked him back over the desk chair to the charred carpet below. “Pietro didn’t stand a chance against him.”
The implication that Vikas’s human partner had been killed by Finnegan himself stunned Dante long enough for Vikas to take another jab at him with the knife he still held. Dante tried to roll out of the way, but Vikas had him pinned and the blade scored several ribs. He hissed out a pained breath, flung Vikas off him, and scrambled to his feet. He clutched his hand to his bloodied side, circled out of Vikas’s reach, and asked breathlessly, “Is that how he got your spirit ball?” Keep him talking. Keep him busy.
“Pietro protected my spirit ball with his life, but it wasn’t enough. Your human will lose his life retrieving it and it still won’t be enough.” Vikas leaned back and brandished the knife.
Ice threaded Dante’s veins. “Rick is a highly trained agent.”
“Pietro was a former Marine. It didn’t matter.”
“Rick is aware Finnegan is a threat. He won’t be caught off guard.”
“Is he aware of what a leprechaun can do? Does he know he can teleport?”
Dante froze again. He had no idea what Rick knew about leprechauns, but based on his previous reactions to other mythics, he guessed it to be next to nothing. His uncertainty cost him again. Vikas came at him with the knife again and this time he didn’t react in time. It caught him low, entering just above his hip bone and tearing out his side as he twisted away. He stumbled and fell to one knee, the room tipping as blood slicked his hip and leg. Whether he planned to kill Vikas or not, he was going to have to get that knife away from him before he died to it a third time. If Vikas got free to chase after Rick, his partner would be in grave danger.
“Rick will adapt. He has before. He took out three of Wharton’s dogs and held three others at bay while he arrested Wharton himself.” Dante found himself panting, the knife had to go and the aquarium had to be destroyed. Probably the aquarium first, because the knife had done its damage already, and if he wanted to be alive in a few minutes instead of literally floating with the fishes, the aquarium had to be out of the equation.
But if he destroyed the aquarium, would Vikas fall back to his original plan to corrupt his heart to keep him from rising? Rick was out of the way and there were no other innocents for him to use, but that didn’t mean there wasn’t another way.
“You seem to think your partner is invincible.” Vikas sneered. He had the upper hand, and he knew it. “Once you are dead, he will be too.”
“Whether you succeed in killing me or not, I have faith in my partner’s abilities.” Dante forced himself up on shaky legs and backed toward the wall aquarium. “And I have more faith still in the ability of our God to protect him without my help.”
A small tell, and Dante knew Vikas was about to charge him. He smiled wearily. Vikas could have waited for his current injuries to take their toll, but he chose a foolish offensive move instead. Dante pressed one hand against the glass to melt a hole in it, grabbed the knife blade in his bare hand and melted it to a rivulet of searing steel running down his arm, then leveraged Vikas over his shoulder into the compromised aquarium glass. Vikas’s weight punched a large hole in the safety glass, knocking Dante off his feet in a deluge of water, glass shards, and floppy fish. Dante rolled to his side, pushed himself to his knees, and shook off the water as best he could. Even the movement made his awareness flicker. He’d managed to take out the aquarium in time. Being wet wasn’t the issue, being submerged was, and by Vikas colorful cursing behind him, the kitsune knew it as well.
“Foolish bird.” Vikas sloshed through the soggy carpet toward him. Rage threaded his voice. He cursed Dante’s origin creatively. “I tried to have mercy on you within the parameters of the commands I am bound to. Now you have forced my hand. You will resurrect this time, but I promise you it will be your last.”
Dante clenched his teeth as his shaky limbs gave out and deposited him in the soggy plush carpet. I have faith in my partner and my God. Your threats mean nothing to me.