“This is Ivy Erikson from RED Channel 1, your go-to source for what’s happening… in your world!”  The reporter nudged an earpiece with her fingertips as she clung to her seatbelt in the news chopper, attempting to make out the suggestions over the roar of the rotating blades above them.  Her cameraman steadied the mechanical rig against his shoulder and gave her a thumbs-up.  “Right now we’re above the Norman & Joan Tyler Convention Center and Memorial Gardens, which has been locked down by unknown hostiles since this morning without any contact from those inside, and very little information from the Aegis personnel around the perimeter.  We’re coming to you now with a new development.”

            Ivy’s grip on the belt tightened as the helicopter swerved around the head of a dark-haired Omega rising up off her haunches back to full height.  The young leviathan’s tanned features grimaced at the sight of the copter so nearly skidding along her cheek with its tail, but her brown irises were too intensely focused on the gravely silent fortress to react otherwise.  She hardly paid the whizzing vehicle any mind as her shoulder rose into view of the front window, forcing the pilot to steer sharply upward to avoid bouncing directly into Claire Lindon’s chest.  With mere feet to spare, the RED copter zoomed past the Omega’s ear, traveling in pace with eight other flying competitors from other stations converging toward the Center.

            “As I was saying…” Ivy grunted, patting down her shiny bangs to ensure they were in place for camera.  “The Omegas and other forces of Aegis have begun retreating from the Center, most likely complying with the terrorist cells that may be operating inside at this time.”

            The Alpha thoroughfare leading to the Center, by now positively jammed with a colorful mob of buzzing reporters, weeping parents, and angry protestors, had descended into hysterics over the last hour.  The covered Beta paths lining the roads were on the verge of structural damage from how thickly packed they had become with helpless Beta family members.  The din raised by the mixed races clamoring for the whereabouts of their children clouded the air, affecting even the Omegas’ auditory clarity.  Some carefully placed PR pleasantries from Rebecca Reynolds had managed to keep at least some peace in the road, but after the decree from Paradise to fall back, the crowd was rapidly losing its already short temper.

            “Everyone needs to move away from the building,” Abby Lindon instructed, allowing her voice to boom a solid mile down the road, so heavily trafficked with people the concrete was no longer visible between the waving arms, megaphones, and crimson-painted signage.  She raised her hands up, palms facing the city skyline beyond, and gently waved them back, knowing in her heart how difficult it was going to be for those people down there to want to listen when so little was known.  “Please clear the street.”

            Below, an armored frontline of Alpha security and SWAT teams were attempting to shepherd the masses back down the block without the use of riot shields, though a fully supplied arms van was nestled at the bottom of the hill in case the situation became direr.  Blended cries and desperate demands for answers from all over the throng intermingled from those who stood at six feet and three inches alike.

            “Cooperate and this can be over much sooner,” Claire announced to the crowd, taking a similar stance next to her mother near the edge of the blockade Aegis had arranged that morning with trucks and stone barriers carried in her own pocket.  She too raised her arms, brushing the air and gritting her teeth behind stoic lips.  “Thank you for your patience.”  The pair of towering brunettes, with help from the Alpha police below, steadily repelled the sea of faces.

            On the opposite end of the Convention Center, passing over the loping hills were Melody, Kyle, Dawn, and Enforcer Hart.  Each approached the news choppers one by one, holding out a hand to act as a temporary helipad as they calmly explained the necessity to move back for the safety of everyone trapped inside.  Those that were caught in Melody’s fingers, especially, beat a hasty retreat from the vicinity of the building.

            “It appears the Omegas are issuing orders that members of the press go back behind Convention Center property lines, thus infringing on our God-given first amendment rights as journalists,” Ivy Erikson reported intently into the RED camera from inside their helicopter: the final remaining airborne straggler.  “Our audience surely is familiar with the Aegis approach to freedom, and it would seem even in times of danger for our Alpha friends and… Beta friends… inside the building, they have no intention of involving the public in their master plans.  Personally, I think there’s no better time than now to-”

            Having slipped out of her seatbelt as she leaned in on the camera, Ivy was jostled roughly to the floor as a round of apparent turbulence nearly whiplashed the RED chopper out of the air.  Rolling over, stamping her pristine pantsuit in grease on the cold hull of the vehicle, Ivy struggled to regain her footing as she watched her cameraman thrown back against the seat.  The recording device slipped from his hands, shattering into a pile of useless glass and metal at his feet.  Ivy screamed with concern for the camera as her hapless coworker rubbed his aching temple.

            Meanwhile, the pilot had released his grip on the steering handle and given his full attention over to keeping his bladder from popping in terror as Jenna Reynolds’ blue eyes narrowed menacingly into the front window of the chopper, filling up whatever view of the sky remained.  Wisps of her fiery locks dangled over the glass rim as she cautiously drew the rebellious little fear-mongers closer to her face.  The enormous fingers trembled as they clamped around the tail of the chopper.  Jenna was doing her very best not to snap the protrusion clean from its metallic body and send the whole pile of junk spiraling to the ground in a plume of smoke.

            “Excuse me,” Jenna coughed with feigned politeness, instilling epileptic tremors into each passenger.  “I believe we asked you people to back off?”

            Halle Paradise blinked woozily, face-down on the floor of the Norman & Joan Tyler Convention Center and Memorial Gardens main auditorium.  She stroked a knuckle along her sore jaw and traced her gloved finger up to her lip, sampling the warm liquid that was trickling from the nostrils of her shattered nose.  Biting back the pain like she’d been trained to do, the woman was far more troubled by the foreign and utterly poisonous feeling of uncertainty she was being made to feel right now through the veritable molestation of Taylor’s deceit.  Batting her eyes with the effort to regain full awareness, she realized the room had gone black, and felt the twinge of another unwelcome novelty: fear.

            Like a wounded jungle cat, Alma Warren had sprung from the stage the moment Ben’s triggered EMP had cooked the lights.  She scrambled on all fours in the dark toward her pile of tools near the main console of her death-dealing architecture.  Rooting through the nothingness, her fingers flew over loose screws and rubber wire hunting for a socket wrench she’d left lying out.  There was nothing, though she knew it had to be there.  Despite her penchant for chaotic order in her workspace, Alma was not one to be forgetful.  She growled, unaccustomed to feeling lost.

            The wrench revealed itself as the brunt of its business end was smashed into the ragged Alpha’s spine, courtesy of a quick-thinking Taylor.  Alma doubled down onto the ground, ignoring the swelling on her back and instantly pinpointed her foe in the dark.  Wrapping both legs around the goggled traitor, she coiled her limbs like a snake and knocked Taylor down to the ground.

            Unprepared for such a speedy retaliation, Taylor landed hard on her tailbone, but scuttled backward out of Alma’s grasp as quickly as she could before the older criminal could land a blow.  Through her green-tinted night vision lenses, she watched as the blinded woman searched the void with shifty irises that would’ve looked more at home in the crusted sockets of a massive arachnid, her hands sliding like discerning claws over the floor.  With a gulp, Taylor chanced the immediate telegraphing of her location and leapt to her feet, slamming the soles of her boots against the ground for added support.

            This, too, brought a response the young Alpha wasn’t anticipating.  Alma lunged from the ground toward the sound, wrapping herself around Taylor’s thighs and dragged her right back to the ground, this time not letting up as she clambered her way overtop her prey.

            Squirming beneath the wiry frame of her savage former coworker, Taylor fought for the necessary leverage to heave the socket wrench into Alma’s neck but froze when she felt the woman’s nails sinking into her forearm.  She cried in pain, already feeling blood dampening her flesh as her hand instinctively released the wrench to the ground with a clatter.  Before Alma could lower her sharpened fingertips back into another exposed part of Taylor, however, the pinned girl tucked her knees into her attacker’s stomach, shoving up with all her might and tossing her aside.

            With the momentary distraction, Taylor grappled for the wrench as she rose, missing it in the panic of the rush to her feet.  Alma had already recovered, keeping a low center of gravity as she pivoted back around for another pounce, her fingernails now glossed with Taylor’s blood.

            Sucking in air between grinding teeth, Taylor squeezed her opposite hand around her ravaged forearm to dam up the blood as she silently stepped backward on the balls of her feet.  Alma was advancing slowly, shaking her head rapidly from side to side in furious search for any audible clues.

            Taylor peeked over her shoulder in time to see Halle stumbling up, her lips and chin stained dark.  Her embittered eyes darted through the dark as she and Alma both began narrowing their search into the cross section of the blackness, where Taylor was plotting her next move in an attempt to ignore the stinging sensation shooting down her limb.  She felt the five distinctive cuts carved into her skin and watched as Halle marched with increasing confidence into the black.

            That was when Taylor spied Mona Collins, risen at last from her chair for the call of duty, moving with impressive silence across the carpet behind Halle.  The woman’s practiced ear picked up on the disturbance, but too late to avoid the follow-through as the young Alpha heaved herself onto Halle’s back, wrapping her arms around her slender neck and kicking her feet into the woman’s thighs.

            The move was inefficient, foolish even for how vulnerable it made the teenager, but for the militaristic Halle, it was just far enough outside the realm of her expectations to buy Taylor time to move out of the woman’s warpath.  It only took the elder Paradise sister a few seconds to propel an elbow into Mona’s side, stunning and turning her into a human-sized ragdoll to be thrown aside in favor of more threatening targets.

            But it was enough, as the commotion had caught Alma’s attention.  She crept swiftly toward her employer, hands curved for more butchery as she passed Taylor.  The only Alpha burdened with vision clapped her borrowed wrench into Alma’s knee, instantly reducing her back to the ground, and this time didn’t waste an instant going for the woman’s chin.  Anticipating this by the time she’d hit the floor, Alma threw her arms up in defense, saving her skull but still suffering a crushing blow in her limb that snapped bone and shredded her vocal cords with the anguished screech that followed.

            The room was nearly theirs, and with it, the one hundred thousand innocents now clamoring in fright and fragile hope that their saviors had finally arrived.

            A survival lantern crashed into the floor and rolled toward the front of the auditorium, spilling damning light to all corners of the stage.  Instantly everyone present was illuminated, and Taylor’s goggles blared with blinding white, the accessory now betraying her.

            This was all that was needed to turn the tide.

            Within moments Halle had Taylor’s weakened arm in a lock beneath her elbow, snapping her away from Alma.  A painful pop echoed off the walls of the magnificent hall as Halle twisted Taylor’s shoulder out of its socket, yielding an ear-shattering scream from the young Alpha as she crumpled to her knees.  Wiping her wet gloves together, Halle spit onto the incapacitated girl’s face in contempt.

            “What in the unholy shit is going on in here?” Gail roared as she stomped into the glow of her provided light source.  She scoffed as her sister shuffled around to face her, looking none the worse for wear with disoriented pupils and bloodied face.

            “Little oversight,” Halle muttered, wiping a fresh red smudge off her nose and cringed at the contact on her broken bones.  “No problem.”

            “No problem?” Gail gawked, patting her sibling roughly on the cheek.  “Look at yourself.  You just got fucked up by a little girl in pigtails.”

            “I guess maybe I was distracted by the fact that she’s still alive,” Halle scowled, dodging her cheek away from Gail’s touch.  “I’m surprised you didn’t slit her from neck to navel.”

            “I was saving this one for later in case I got bored on the flight,” Gail said, unsheathing a kerambit blade and pointing it at Taylor, who wasn’t even bothering to look up now as she pressed her forehead to the floor, clutching her abused and bleeding limb in a trembling fist.  “Really, I think the main concern here is how you almost let our entire operation go to shit because you like to talk to your toys so much.”

            “Our operation?” Halle sneered, coughing with the awkwardness of inhaling through the blood as she advanced back on her sister.  She jabbed another finger into the woman’s chest as Alma, nursing her bruised knee and rapidly darkening forearm, looked on with stoic neutrality.  “I don’t know how many times I’m going to have to squeeze it through your thick skull, but nothing that’s happening here is yours.  Get that?  Everything we’re doing today… accomplishing… is because of me.”

            “Fair enough.  You can have what’s yours, sis,” Gail said, nodding with uncommon peace, even having the grace to ignore her sister’s prodding hand.  Instead she reached out to Alma.  “But if it’s okay with you, I’m gonna have what’s mine.  Alma?  Would you mind tossing me my cookie?”

            Wincing from the pain, Alma nonetheless found the focus to dig through her baggy pockets and produce a black trigger handle, capped on the end with a protective metal cover.  She threw it to Gail’s waiting hand without a second thought.

            “What are you-” Halle snarled, unwilling to believe what she was witnessing as Gail triumphantly caught the activation device for Alma’s execution machine.  Snapping the top open, the woman squeezed her finger into the red tab.

            But nothing happened.  A few crackles emanated from the machine as it attempted to establish a connection, but quickly fizzled out, still completely juiced after the blowout caused by Ben’s electromagnetic distraction.

            “Huh.  That’s funny,” Gail said, frowning at the now-useless gassing trigger as her sister seethed with apocalyptic fury.  “I hope we didn’t pay you up front, Alms.  I’m seriously starting to question your talents.”

            “What the FUCK do you think you’re DOING?” Halle burst, throwing herself into Gail with what little strength remained in her bones.  Both women tumbled to the floor as the trigger fell from Gail’s loosened fingers, rolling over one another as the more murderous twin allowed her sibling to wail against her chest and shoulders unimpeded with limp fists.  Halle’s throat croaked, as she was unable to make a choice between pure rage or broken-heartedness as her sister’s alternate plans became perfectly clear at last.  “You… that wasn’t the plan… you could’ve screwed this entire thing, right now.  You…”

            “C’mon, Halle.  You honestly thought I was just gonna let all those runts walk out scot-free?” Gail teased, catching her sister’s wrists and blocking any further attack as they tussled.  A few drops of Halle’s blood dribbled down her chin and plunked against Gail’s cheek.

            “You were always just going to kill them.  Sell us up the river, just like that,” Halle accused, her quicksilver eyes flaring as what little love remained for her sibling drained away.  “We would’ve all died, you know.  If what you’d just done had fucking worked, Aegis would come in here and tear us into cutlets.  You were really ready to-”

            “Of course I was goddamned ready,” Gail snarled, froth spilling rabidly as she looked on her sibling with renewed passion.  “And if you weren’t, too, then maybe we’re not even on the same side anymore.”

            “If you want to die so badly for your sick little cause, then maybe you should,” Halle taunted, her upper lip curling as she leaned in close enough that both sisters could feel each other’s’ harried breaths fogging against the nape of their necks.  “Seriously, sis.  You’re ready to lay down another Alpha’s life?  Just to make some pointless-”

            “Absolutely,” Gail said calmly, burying her knife into her sister’s stomach with a single thrust between the pieces of her armor.

            Too surprised to react, Halle’s body flopped, the air expelled from her lips as Gail shoved her twin onto the ground beside her.  She crawled in closer, not bothering to look Halle in her frightened silver irises, and pressed her lips to her sister’s ear: “And I would lay down a thousand more if it meant the fucking diseases in those boxes would be cured from my world forever.”

            Beneath Halle’s bloodstained tactical suit, the blinking display of her battery-operated heart monitor flared, sounding off its cautionary siren for the secondary trigger as the Alpha’s heartrate began to plummet.