Subject Nightingale 1: Birth and Death by Tim Cody

corner, arm extending fully to aim his sidearm square at Tommy's forehead. “Go %$#@ yourself, Tommy!” He squeezed his trigger in time with the other squad. A hail of bullets hurtled toward Jonny, but he didn't even seem to care. All his attention was focused on the one he had loosed—the one flying true to Tommy.
    “ Noooooooo!! ” Nightingale shouted, and the entire building rumbled.
    The floor around Nightingale and Michaela's body fractured, cracking in a perfect circle, leaving them completely untouched. A powerful and invisible shock wave erupted outward from that point, which all but laid waste to their surroundings. The walls burst outward and then crumbled in, doors were reduced to splinters, and the light fixtures in the ceilings shattered to rain down glass.
    The recently fired bullets were tossed all over and lost in the chaos. Jonny was taken off his feet and hurled several yards away, curling up and covering his head and neck with his arms as soon as he landed. He remained huddled against the wall, unable to do anything as his body was pushed around by this destructive force.
    The two remaining men at the end of the hall were tossed around like rag dolls. They were thrown into the walls with enough force to break their bodies in two, reduced to mere piles of flesh and broken bones in the few seconds it took them to hit the walls and then the ground. Their rifles were scrapped—reduced to parts, individual pieces scattering all over.
    Tommy missed the brunt of the impact thanks to his cover in the stairwell. The blast shattered his left arm and shoulder since he had been leaning into the doorway, and it took him off his feet. The cement landing he was on cracked and rumbled, and shifted suddenly as it prepared to give way.
    He looked down at the surface and tried to reach for something to grab on to, but the railing was out of his right arm's reach. His left arm hung limp, useless, his rifle on the ground by his side. “Oh, $#!%,” he said, just before the floor collapsed right out from under him.
    Once the destruction had subsided, Nightingale threw herself over Michaela's body and wept. The bird chirped and cried along with her, and in that moment, she wanted nothing more than Michaela to wake up and stroke her hair.
    She wanted Michaela to tell her everything would be alright, and she wanted to see her smile.
    But instead she got Jonny grabbing her by the shoulders and lifting her roughly to her feet.
    “ We need to keep moving,” Jonny said. His face was scraped and bleeding, and he was covered in cement dust.
    “ No!” Nightingale shouted and shoved Jonny away. She dropped back to her knees and grabbed Michaela's hand again. “I'm not leaving her!”
    “ Don't be stupid!” Jonny yelled. “I don't know what the %$#@ just happened, but it bought us some time!”
    He didn't even wait for an answer. He crouched and scooped Nightingale into his arms, and immediately bolted down the hallway toward a different stairwell. The floor was difficult to run over, having practically been reduced to chunks of rubble after the blast.
    “No!” Nightingale reached for Michaela—for something, for anything—as she was lifted, and managed to grab her medical kit. She clutched it by the strap, and used her other hand to shove and strike Jonny. “Let me go!” She landed a strong slap across his face, and then shouted and grabbed her head when a surge of pain rushed through it.
    She caught glimpses of Glitch squad—Jonny, Michaela, Theo, and Tommy—standing outside a crumbling, burning building. She could hear people screaming inside, and she heard Jonny and Tommy arguing.
    “The building was not clear!” Jonny yelled at Tommy, his face red with rage. “There were civilians in there! Children!”
    Tommy didn't back down—in fact, he stomped toward Jonny and leaned in close to yell back. “There were enemy contacts in there, too! And guess how many are in there now? Zero!”
    “You defied a direct