Confused and overwhelmed, Nick could only stand there, staring in horror at the bizarre-looking half-man/half-machine rising to its feet and turning toward him.

Nick's scream had given Kahlee just enough time to realize what was happening and brace herself for the impact. Nevertheless, the biotic wave hit her so hard, the pistol in her belt was jarred loose and sent skittering across the floor.

Fortunately, she hit the wall with her shoulder rather than her head, and she managed to keep her senses about her. She didn't know how Nick had found them; she knew only that by attacking Grayson he had marked himself as a threat in the Reapers's eyes.

Reacting rather than thinking, she got off the floor and threw herself across the hall toward Grayson, slamming into him as he raised his pistol and fired at his young assailant. She was able to knock him off balance, but as the pair tumbled to the ground, she heard the explosion of the gun and the sharp grunt of surprise from Nick.

Grayson sprang to his feet and grasped the back of her belt with his free hand. He hauled her up by the belt, holding her suspended horizontally like a sack of flour before heaving her aside.

The throw sent her helicoptering through the air, her arms and legs flailing wildly. Caught off guard by the sudden move, she didn't have time to brace herself for impact this time, and slammed face-first into the floor.

The blow left her seeing stars. Dazed and stunned, she couldn't even roll over to see what was happening behind her.

From inside the office Kai Leng saw Nick get shot, the bullet catching him in the stomach. As the young man gasped in pain and fell to his knees, Kai Leng was already in motion.

He'd seen the pistol fall from Kahlee's belt; he knew he had to get to it if he had any hope of surviving the confrontation. Grayson tossed Sanders aside, his distraction buying Kai Leng a few precious fractions of a second. He slid across the floor and wrapped his hand around the pistol, rolling over onto his back so he could fire at Grayson.

But the Reapers were too quick. In the time it had taken him to secure the weapon, they'd crossed the hall to where he was lying on the floor. Grayson's foot kicked the gun from his hand, striking with such force it shattered Kai Leng's wrist.

The assassin knew it was over. He stared up at the monster looming over him, prepared to meet his end. He flinched at the thunderous echo of a shotgun, his mind taking a second to realize he had not been shot.

Grayson staggered away from him, revealing the source of the blast. Anderson stood halfway down the hall, the stock of his weapon wedged firmly into his stomach as he held it with one hand. His right arm hung limp and useless at his side.

He fired a second time, and Grayson's body shuddered and collapsed to the floor.

As Grayson lay on his back, staring up at the ceiling and gasping for air, he felt the Reapers abandoning his body. Their vessel broken, they directed their consciousness back into the void of dark space, leaving Grayson alone as the last sparks of life flickered away.

Finally free of their control, he turned his head as the world began to grow dim. He saw Kahlee gamely hauling herself back to her feet, and he smiled.

His head lolled back to its original position, leaving him staring up at the ceiling once again. The head and shoulders of a dark-haired man of Asian descent appeared in his field of view; it took Grayson a moment to recognize him as the one who had attacked him in the Cerberus holding cell.

Life seemed to slow down, and he heard the familiar pop-pop of a pistol, the standard double-tap taught to all Cerberus assassins. As the pair of bullets entered his skull, everything went dark for the last time.

TWENTY-SEVEN.

To aim the shotgun, Anderson had to brace the butt against his stomach. When he fired, he had to hold his breath and keep his abs tight to try and absorb the kickback so he wouldn't pass out from the pain. Despite these precautions, it took him a few moments to recover each time he pulled the trigger.

He managed to score a hit on Grayson with his first attempt; fortunately, with shotguns it wasn't necessary to be particularly accurate at short range. Grayson was staggered by the first shot, but didn't go down. Between this blast and the one Anderson had delivered when he caught him in the data archives, however, he had sustained such grievous injuries that it was all the Reapers could do to keep him on his feet.

That gave Anderson time to gather himself and fire again, finally dropping Grayson to the floor. In the time it took Anderson to recover from the kickback of the second blast, Kai Leng had scooped up a pistol from the ground and finished Grayson off with two point-blank shots to the head.

Before the assassin could turn his attention toward another target, Anderson said, "Drop the gun and don't move!"

He didn't shout or yell; despite his being dosed with medi-gel, his collapsed lung and broken ribs were too painful for him to take a deep breath. But he knew that Kai Leng had heard him clearly.

The assassin stood frozen, his weapon still pointed at Grayson's corpse on the floor. Anderson knew what was running through his mind. Could he bring his pistol up and get off a shot before Anderson could squeeze the shotgun's trigger? He was quick, but was he quick enough?

"Don't do it," Anderson warned. "I've got you dead in my sights. At this range even I can't miss."

To his relief, Kai Leng let the gun slip from his hands.

Anderson had seen the unconscious teenager lying on the floor bleeding from his gut when he'd arrived on the scene, and in his peripheral vision he could see Kahlee trying to shake off the cobwebs and regain her senses after being thrown by the Reapers. But he couldn't offer help to either one. Not yet. Kai Leng was too dangerous to take any chances with; until he was neutralized Anderson had to push everything else aside and focus on this true threat.

"I want you to take it slow and easy," Anderson told him. "Gently-very gently-use your foot to slide that pistol over to me."

He kept his trigger finger ready as Kai Leng complied, ready to fire at any sudden movement; God help the man if Anderson sneezed. The gun skittered across the floor and stopped a few inches from Anderson's feet.

"Now put your hands behind your head, turn around to face the wall, and get down on your knees."

The assassin complied, and Anderson finally felt like he had the situation under control. From that position even Kai Leng wouldn't be able to react fast enough to avoid a shotgun at point-blank range.

"What do we do now?" the assassin asked.

"All this gunfire is sure to attract someone's attention. I figure the security patrols will be showing up in a couple of minutes. We'll just wait for them to arrive."

He glanced over at Kahlee and saw she was on her feet, bracing herself against the wall and trying to get her bearings. She glanced down at Grayson's body lying just across from her, and then her eyes fell on the boy farther up the hall.

"Nick!" she shouted, racing over to him and crouching down to inspect his wounds.

Anderson kept his shotgun trained on Kai Leng, wary in case he used the distraction to try to escape. He didn't move, but he did speak.

"I could have killed you, you know," Kai Leng said, keeping his eyes fixed firmly on the wall. "But I didn't. I have no reason to harm you."

"David," Kahlee said, looking up from the body of the unconscious boy. "He's losing too much blood. I need a med-kit."

"All I wanted was to stop Grayson," Kai Leng continued on as if he hadn't heard her. "My job is done. Just let me go."

"You're not going anywhere," Anderson snapped at him. "This is all your fault. Grayson. This kid. Their blood is on your hands!"

"David!" Kahlee barked out. "I can still save him. But I need that med-kit!"

"Go," Anderson told her, not taking his eyes off Kai Leng. "I don't know where they are. Grab one and bring it back."

"We need to keep pressure on the wound," Kahlee protested. "He'll bleed out before I get back."

"I can't take my eyes off this guy," Anderson told her with a shake of his head. "We'll just have to wait for security to show up. Shouldn't be long now."

"There isn't time," Kahlee insisted.

"You," Anderson said to Kai Leng, coming to a decision. "On your feet. Nice and slow. Come over and put pressure on this kid's wound. Hold it until Kahlee gets back."

"No," Kai Leng replied without moving, his voice completely devoid of emotion.

"No?" Anderson repeated incredulously.

"You have a choice," the assassin calmly told him. "You stanch the flow of blood while Kahlee retrieves the med-kit, and I disappear. Or you keep that gun pointed at me until security shows up and we all watch as the boy dies."

"You son of a bitch!" Kahlee screamed. "He's just a boy!"

"It's Anderson's choice," Kai Leng told them. "All he has to do is let me go."

Kai Leng was still facing the wall. Anderson took the opportunity to set the shotgun down and gingerly pick up the pistol. Moving carefully, never taking his eyes off Kai Leng, he made his way over to where Kahlee was sitting beside Nick. She had her injured hands stuffed up inside the wound in the boy's stomach, her arms trembling from exertion as she pressed with all her might.

"I've only got one hand," Anderson warned her.

"You've got more good fingers than I do," Kahlee reminded him. "Reach inside and press as hard as you can."

"I assume this means I'm free to go," Kai Leng said confidently.

He was still facing the wall, but he became bold enough to get to his feet. Anderson took careful aim with the pistol and fired. The bullet lodged itself in the thick muscles at the back of the assassin's right thigh, causing him to cry out and drop back down to the floor.

Writhing on the ground, he reached his hands down to awkwardly try to clutch at the wound. Anderson fired the trigger again, this time catching him in the calf of his other leg.

Kai Leng roared in pain and anger, then rolled onto his stomach and looked up at Anderson with death in his eyes.

"Security's on its way," Anderson noted. "If you want to get out of here you better hurry."

Kai Leng flashed him a hateful grin, then turned and started crawling on his belly in the opposite direction in a desperate attempt to escape before reinforcements arrived.

Finally able to turn his full attention to Kahlee and her patient, Anderson let the pistol fall to the floor.

"Show me what to do," he said.

"Reach into the wound and follow along my fingers," Kahlee told him.

Anderson followed her instructions, carefully pressing his hand up and into the warm, sticky hole in Nick's abdomen.

"Feel that tube my fingers are pressing against?"

"Yeah. I think so."

"When I pull my hands out, you press down on it as hard as you can. Whatever you do, don't let go."

"Got it."

"On three. Ready? One ... two ... three!"

Kahlee slipped her hands out of the way, and blood began to seep from the wound as Anderson fumbled to get his own hand in position to clamp down on the bleeding.

"He's still bleeding!" Anderson said, his voice frantic.

"Press harder!" Kahlee shouted. "As hard as you can!"

Anderson leaned the entire weight of his body into it, and the oozing blood slowed to one thin trickle.

"Good," Kahlee said, standing up and patting him on the shoulder. "Can you hold it?"

"For a bit," he answered. "But hurry."

She didn't need to be told twice. He heard her footsteps disappearing down the hall, and then he was alone with Grayson's corpse and the dying boy.

Nick's breathing had become rapid and shallow. His skin was so pale it looked like he'd been rolled in chalk, and beads of sweat covered his forehead.

"Don't die on her, kid," he whispered. "She's lost too much today already."

Kahlee was back inside of two minutes.

"How is he?" she asked as she set the med-kit on the floor beside him.

"Still with us," Anderson replied.

She pulled out a hypodermic, grasping it clumsily in her palm because of her injured fingers, and injected it right through Nick's pants and into his thigh.

Unlike the small amounts of medi-gel Anderson had been receiving from his suit, a concentrated dose could have immediate, almost miraculous, effects. The clotting agents would stop the bleeding and the biologocial nanides would begin to repair damaged tissue and cells. At the same time, the powerful sedative properties would send the patient into a state of virtual hibernation, the medically induced coma maintaining vital systems and preserving internal organs. Surgery would still be required for serious wounds, but except in the most extreme cases medi-gel could stabilize patients long enough to get them proper medical attention.

Within seconds Nick's color returned and his breathing became slow and regular.

Kahlee leaned in and scanned his vitals with the omni-tool from the med-kit, clasping it awkwardly with both hands.

"It's working," she said. "You can let go."

Anderson carefully slid his hand from the wound and rolled gingerly out of the way, giving Kahlee room to work.

From the med-kit she retrieved bandages and a thick tube of ointment. Unlike the liquid medi-gel she'd injected into Nick, this batch had been processed into a thick, gooey salve. She struggled to open the cap, her splinted fingers unable to find any purchase.

"Hold the tube," Anderson said, reaching over with his one good hand to grasp the cap.

He twisted and the cap came loose. Kahlee spread the salve directly on and into the wound, then covered everything with a bandage. Using the omni-tool, she scanned him one final time, just to make sure nothing had been missed.

"I think he's going to be okay," she announced, wiping the back of her hand across her sweat-drenched brow.

"We make a good team," Anderson remarked. "Maybe we should open a med-clinic."

"You are looking for a job," she reminded him. "It's either that or-"

Anderson held up his hand, cutting her off mid-sentence. "Hear that?"

She tilted her head to the side. "Footsteps!"

Kahlee scrambled to her feet and began to yell at the top of her voice. "Over here! By the admin offices!"

Soon four security guards-two men and two women-came around the corner.