Apex Five: Mech Elite novel · Chapter 18 of 24

Chapter 18: Hold This

They came at noon, in two black cars and a League van.

I watched them from the hangar door.

A man in a gray suit got out of the first car with a leather folder.

Six Pryce guards spread out behind him across the yard.

A League marshal in a tan coat got out of the van.

Hob put down his torch.

"Lawyers," he said, and spat.

The man in gray walked up to the door and held out a sheet of paper.

"Miss Calder. By order of the League board, your blade core and sync key are to be surrendered for a pre-final safety audit."

"The board met at dawn."

"The Chairman's office met at dawn. The board's emergency committee signed this at ten."

"Who is on the emergency committee?"

He smiled.

"The Chairman and two of his deputies."

I read the order.

It was real, in the way that things are real when the people who own the stamp write them.

Ronan came down the stairs behind me and stood at my shoulder.

His color was better, and his hands were steady.

"This order names only her," he said.

"It names the blade, the core and the key."

"Where is the key?"

The man looked at the marshal.

The marshal looked at his boots.

"Miss Calder carries it," the lawyer said.

That was the weak spot in the whole plan, and I knew it.

The sync key was not in my head.

After he read the logs, Hob had pulled it from my core and burned it onto a little steel tag the size of a fingernail.

It hung from a chain around my neck, under my flight suit.

I had worn it ever since without touching it.

The lawyer held out his hand, palm up.

"Now, please."

Everyone in the yard was watching me.

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