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back inside.
     
    The Pariah touched down right outside the adjacent alleyway that had taken Scott to Esther’s position. With its nose-mounted cannon pointed at the corner ahead—the very one that Scott, Becan, and William had been holding earlier—the transport waited and watched for EDEN’s presence.
    As soon as the rear bay door was down, David rushed outside to meet Lilan. “Good to see you, sir!”
    “Same to you, Jurgen!” the colonel said as he and his troops rushed into the troop bay. The moment they caught sight of Centurion and Ju`bajai, the Falcons collectively froze.
    “Pay no mind to our guests!” David said. “We collect aliens.” On the floor, in the middle of it all, Flopper barked merrily. “And dogs.”
    From the co-pilot’s seat, Tiffany looked back into the troop bay. “Cat!”
    Blinking, Catalina craned her neck to see over the bustling bay. “Tiff!”
    “Reunions everywhere!” said Boris. “This is such a happy time.”
     
    Bullets zinged past Esther as she ran down the hallway, some exploding into the walls around her as flakes of plaster hit her in the face, sticking to her eyelashes and hair as she tried her best to continue looking ahead. The Nightmen had been pushed back to the precipice of the hallway as the firefight entered the safe house. She could see EDEN’s forces through the smoke and debris, the bursts of orange E-35 assault rifle fire reflecting off the silver and blue of the soldiers’ armor as they pressed inward.
    Finally reaching the door that led to the dungeon-esque maintenance hall, she flung it open just in time to see Jayden reaching his hand out to grab it from the inside. “Let’s go, Jay—move!” the scout shouted as bullets peppered the open door, which was now partially concealing them in the hallway. “The Pariah ’s in the hallway!”
    Jayden blinked as he ran past. “In the what ?”
    “In the street! I meant the sodding street. Go, go, go!” Aiming backward blindly, she fired her last remaining bullets toward the front of the building.
     
    “Esther, where the—” Scott was cut off as Esther and Jayden emerged from the back of the safe house. The scout, drenched within seconds of reentering the freezing deluge, glared at him without words. “Okay, just go!” He got on the comm. “Faraj, fall back! The Pariah ’s waiting.”
    “Acknowledged.”
    The order to retreat couldn’t have come at a better time. EDEN was steadily being reinforced, and despite Rashid and his slayers’ ability to hold the advance off until this point, their being overrun was inevitable. Much as was the case in Cairo , the numbers they were up against were too stacked to overcome. Rashid, Rodion, and Feliks backpedaled behind cover to Scott, at which point the three Nightmen made their turn down the adjacent alley. Scott, Becan, and William were right there with them.
     
    Literally shoving Jayden inside the Pariah , Esther looked back at the alley from where Scott and company were coming, then behind the transport to the street farther back, where a police car, its sirens blaring, skidded to a sideways stop. Whipping her head back to the troop bay, she signaled to David. “Dave, weapon!”
    The former NYPD officer, blocked in by the Falcons and Pyotr Alkaev, hurled his assault rifle in Esther’s direction. The scout dashed forward to catch it, flipped it around until it was properly in her hands, then knelt down and took aim at the car just as the police officers were opening the door. Finger laying down on the trigger, the Briton opened fire. With every burst from the muzzle of her E-35, her pearl necklace danced wildly around her neck. The pair of officers took shelter behind the car as it was riddled, its lights shattering and its frame shuddering with bullet impacts.
     
    Scott was running with reckless abandon toward the street, the sound of approaching EDEN operatives growing louder with every second. The injury to his thigh might as well have not been