General Howe felt like he was in a nightmare.

At first he thought everything was under control. All the military personnel were assembled in the dining area under the watchful eye of hundreds of guards, and the large scale mutiny he was afraid of didn’t happen.

That was when bad news started to come in.

“General, the guards at the mutant laboratory didn't report in.” An officer in the office said loudly. She was calling the major positions one by one, and captain Gregor of the mutant lab didn’t answer. It was part of the protocol, and the fact that he didn’t answer likely meant something was incredibly wrong.

Howe frowned. The mutant lab was important. It not only held the major information about the mutant experiments but also held the terrible secret of what he was doing to the mutated. If the rebels got there and showed the entire army what he was doing...not all soldiers were fine with his rule. For now he could enforce his authority by using lies to cover his true nature to make sure most of the soldiers follow him and use an iron fist to crush those too clever to be fooled. However, if solid proof was delivered, the guards by themselves couldn’t take on enemies ten times their number with equal training and equipment. Bottom line, the lab was too important to fall.

“Send a squad there to investigate. Order them to report in as soon as they enter. If they don’t answer, send in all available guards.”

Before the order could be passed down, another officer stood up.

“General, a guard patrol is attacked by a group of mutant prisoners. They are requesting reinforcement right now!”

A group of guards patrolling level four heard the explosions created when Paul ambushed the reinforcing guards. They moved to investigate and were unfortunate enough to run into a dozen men and women in orange prisoner suits.

Both sides were taken by surprise. The only difference was the guards tried to take the mutants alive by yelling for them to get on the ground while the mutants didn’t waste any time doing a similar thing. They had more than sufficient hatred for the soldiers to act without mercy. Instantly, the guards found themselves attacked by all sorts of powers, including fire, ice, lightning, energy blasts. The couple survivors only managed to scream a few words into the radio before being ripped apart by a mutant with enhanced strength.

Without overwhelming firepower or overwhelming number, ordinary soldiers struggled against mutants.

“What…Deploy half the available guards toward level four.”

The officers looked at each other, not moving. At their level, they had some right to give advice.

“General, we don’t have the men.” One of them finally spoke.

Howe went silent. Before everything happened, there were around five hundred guards. This was around one tenth of the entire army and was enough to make Howe the most important man in the fortress. Since the explosions went off, the guards were put in the frontier and were continuously assaulted. He knew for sure that the guards at the mutant prison and the mutant lab were down. Reinforcement to both places didn’t answer as well. As far as he knew, at least fifty men were dead.

Those fifty men were incredibly precious. His control of the compound fell with every guard down.

There were around 450 men left, but at least 250 were needed around the military personnel. The 1:20 ratio was already risky. 50 men were positioned at the command center. An absolute minimum of 50 was needed to secure the gate and maintain the armory. In that case, only 100 men were available. If he wanted to divide that into two and send them to two different places...they might be picked apart one by one. Even now he had no idea who the attackers were and how many of them there were.

Suddenly, behind him, a certain lieutenant walked up.

“General, may I suggest we try something else?”

Howe looked at one of his trusted underlings.

“What is it?”

“We can go to the soldiers and tell them the situation and order them to join the fight.” Jean suggested.

Howe frowned. He was excited for a moment, but his hope died down when he heard what Jean said. “There’s a reason I am only using guards. Whoever the attacker is, he might be one of the soldiers. If I send soldiers against soldiers…I believe they will fight. The only difference is for whom.” Everyone in this room was on Howe’s side, so he could speak freely.

Jean took a step forward. “With all due respect, general, you should have some trust in your men. Plus, a group of guards enforcing your command will shut down any sign of mutiny before it can spread.” She paused for a second. “This can also be a chance to root out potential traitors. If we keep this up, then the guards will only be taken down one by one while the potential rebels are unharmed. Even if this rebellion is put down, the guards left will be too weak to do anything.”

“If we order the attack, those that hesitated are traitors, and they can be identified and executed.”

Howe nodded. The woman had a point. He would need to use the soldiers eventually. It was better to pick out the potential traitors now when he could kill them rather than wait until later. This might be risky, but he immediately decided it was worth the risk.

Jean’s eyes returned from a shade of gold to her normal form. A fragment of her psychic power was needed to convince the general.

A few seconds ago, she sensed Paul and Alia making it out of the lab and toward the exit. She had to admit she was impressed by what Paul did, but then again the difficulty was severely lowered by Howe’s distrust of his men. According to Jean’s plan, Paul should fight well, get to Alia, and get stopped on the way out. In the moment of absolute desperation, he should call for her help. As a result, he would owe her his life. In the end, Paul saves his sister and Jean gets a loyal follower. Everything would go according to her plan.

Paul and his sister making it out with ease wasn’t part of her plan.

She decided to turn the difficulty up a notch.

Things went just like Jean promised. The soldiers were told there was a group of rebels ravaging through the base. They were ordered to shoot on sight. Some had questions, but orders were orders.

And things turned very tough for the siblings as they were intercepted on the way to the exit.

Dodging behind a cover and taking off the head of yet another guard, Paul reloaded his SMG for the fourth time.

The guards kept on coming. His power was helpful, but it couldn’t do area damage in a short period of time. His guns weren’t enough by themselves. The guards weren’t for show either. Their training and equipment meant Paul couldn’t plow through them like they were crop waiting for harvest.

The more and more reinforcements didn’t help as guards and soldiers alike rushed into the field.

“Let me burn them!” Alia yelled. If things went with her way, all the resistance would be ashes on the ground and the two would be gone by now. But her brother, because of some stupid concern, stopped her.

“No!” Paul denied without turning as he dropped another soldier with a shot to the leg. He watched as several fellow soldiers pulled the wounded behind cover.

“We will never make it out! We are literally in the middle of an enemy fortress!”

Paul bit his lips as he sent out a couple bullets at the incoming enemy. He was very aware of the situation, but he also knew, as long as he had another way out, he wouldn’t allow his sister to burn everyone in her way.

His thought halted when something hit him in the chest and knocked him over. He groaned. The familiar feeling told him he was shot.

The bullet didn’t hit anything critical and he could get back on his feet in at most twenty seconds, but that was all the soldiers needed. As soon as the bullets stopped, the experienced men and women moved out of cover and toward the other side.

When Paul got back up, he was looking at twenty gun barrels.

He was captured, but he wasn’t worried about himself. Instead, his eyes went to his sister, and he was horrified to see a spark being ignited.

Wasting no time, he screamed for help.

“Jean!”