“And if we can’t?”

“Then we go through them.”

Riley swore again. “All right,” he growled. “Go, then. We’ll be right behind you.”

The helicopter swung around again, and we held our breath as it went by, spotlight crawling over the walls and floor. I waited until it passed, watched it glide around a corner, then darted for the stairwell entrance. I heard the others scramble after me, and hit the door handle without slowing down, bursting through the frame into the building.

We quickly descended the stairs, myself in the lead, Ember close behind me. Ava and Faith followed, and Riley brought up the rear, watching our backs. Our footsteps echoed throughout the stairwell, unnaturally loud in the stillness. Each time we passed the entrances to other floors, my nerves jangled, wondering if this time the door would burst open and a squad of soldiers would step in to kill us.

A body suddenly rounded the corner and lunged up the stairs, making Faith shriek. Not a soldier, but a civilian in a white tank top, a baseball cap perched sideways on his head. He stumbled, nearly running into me, and I barely stopped myself from driving a fist into his throat.

“Shit, man!” The civilian glared at me wide-eyed, then shoved past, lurching up the steps. “Move, a-holes! Fucking SWAT team is everywhere.” He scrambled past Riley, who gave him a disgusted look, then continued up the stairs, his footsteps fading into the darkness.

Ember took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “They’re in the building,” she breathed as we started down the steps again. “How close do you think they are, Garret?”

Two floors beneath us, a door opened.

I jerked to a stop and whirled around as flashlight beams pierced the darkness below. “Go back!” I ordered, hearing booted feet ascending the steps behind me. “Everyone, get back! They’re here.”

Shots rang out, sparking off the walls and railing, and Faith screamed. We fled back up the steps, hearing the soldiers give chase, spatters of gunfire echoing up the stairwell.

“This way!” Ahead of us, Riley paused at the entrance to the twelfth floor and wrenched the door back. “We’re sitting ducks in here. Everyone get out. Go, go!” Ava and Faith quickly ducked through the open door, and the rest of us followed, emerging into a narrow, unfinished corridor with empty rooms lining the walls. A maze of hallways, dark and empty, stretched out to either side.

The soldiers were still coming. Without hesitation, we ran, rounding a corner just as the door behind us opened and our pursuers followed us into the labyrinth. I heard a soldier calling for backup, informing the rest of the squads where we were, and knew the entire strike force would be swarming the floor in a matter of minutes. The rest of them would be sent to guard doors, exits, stairwells; anywhere we might try to escape, they would be waiting for us. A cold lump settled in my stomach. Getting out of here was going to be difficult, if not impossible.

After a minute or two of running, when it appeared the soldiers weren’t right on our tail, Riley ducked into an open room, and the rest of us followed. “Okay,” he panted, leaning against a wall, “this whole thing has gone completely FUBAR. We need a new strategy, quick.” He looked at me. “Suggestions, St. George? What are they doing out there?”

“Right now, all squads will be converging on this floor,” I answered, peering into the hall to make sure the soldiers were not close by. My mind raced, trying to think of a plan, to counter whatever they were going to do. “They’re going to try to cover all the exits,” I went on, ducking back inside, “but if we find another stairwell before they have a chance to get here, we could possibly slip past them and get to another floor. It’ll buy us some time while they’re searching for us up here. The challenge will be finding an exit that isn’t guarded.”

“One problem at a time,” Riley muttered tiredly, and pushed himself off the wall. “First thing, let’s try to get off this floor before the rest of the bastards arrive. Any ideas?”

“There’s another stairwell at the west end of the building,” Ava said, surprising us. She stood beside Faith, looking pale but calm in the face of approaching death. Unlike the other hatchling, who was frozen in absolute terror, her eyes huge and staring. “I saw it when we first came here. We could try to reach it before St. George does.”

A hollow boom echoed from an adjacent hallway, followed by a gruff “Clear!” The soldiers behind us were kicking in doors, systematically checking each room before moving on. Riley winced.

“Stairwell it is,” he whispered, beckoning Ava to the front with him. “Let’s go.”

We raced for the end of the hall, Riley and Ava leading this time, me bringing up the rear. I didn’t know if the soldiers heard us and were giving chase, and I didn’t pause to look back. We fled down narrow concrete hallways, ducking beams and scrambling over rubble, praying we wouldn’t turn a corner and find the way blocked by soldiers and guns.

As we approached an intersection where two hallways crossed, the hairs on the back of my neck stood up. Four armored, masked men rounded the corner at the far end of the corridor we’d been moving down. Hissing a warning to Riley, I grabbed the two closest bodies—Ember and Faith—and yanked them into the cross section of hall, just as the scream of M-4s filled the corridor.

Faith wailed, hands flying up to cover her ears, as the roar of gunfire tore through the air and bullets ripped chunks of wood and plaster from the walls. Pulling her back from the edge, I looked up to see Ava and Riley on the other side of the corridor of death, streams of bullets zipping between us. The soldiers were advancing, firing short, continuous bursts as they marched forward in unison. From the sound of the guns, they would reach our position in a few seconds.