As they get into the center of town, Morgan and JJ are met with complete chaos. Gun fights, knife fights and hand-to-hand fights are abundant. Morgan looks at JJ.
"How do I know who's who?"
JJ points to two men fighting. "Mercenaries black their faces with mud to help them sneak up on us without being seen."
Morgan nods. "Got it. Let's go!"
The two race into the melee. They fire their guns until their bullets are gone. JJ then pulls a knife and with a banshee scream leaps on the back of a man who is strangling a police officer she works with. Jacob falls to his hands and knees trying to get his breath back as JJ slices the mercenaries' throat.
Morgan sees two men kicking a man who is down on the ground. He races at them and shoves one man away, while doing a spin kick and sending the other man stumbling. Both men quickly recover and pull daggers. Morgan steps to where he can see both men without turning his head. He pulls his own knife and smiles.
"Ready when you are, boys," he taunts.
One man leaps towards Morgan, awkwardly swiping his dagger at the man. That might work for inexperienced townsfolk but Morgan is a trained soldier. He knocks the man's arm away and slices upwards and across, slicing the man from hip to shoulder. The man stumbles back, grasping at his bleeding torso. Morgan kicks out at him, his foot connecting with the painful gash.
"NO!" the man screams, sure his insides are about to spill out. He turns and stumbles away.
Morgan turns his attention to the other man. This guy has figured out Morgan is not one to be taken lightly. The two men slowly circle each other. The mercenary fakes a couple of swipes to test Morgan. Morgan doesn't react. Finally the man decides to advance. He swipes at Morgan with the knife then spin kicks when Morgan blocks the blow. Morgan grabs the man's leg and upends him on the street. He stomps on the man's knife hand. The man growls and grabs Morgan's leg, yanking him down onto the street. They wrestle a moment and he finally gets Morgan to drop his knife by biting his hand viciously. Morgan rolls away.
"Son of a BITCH!"
He scrambles to his feet and sees his knife a few feet away. Unfortunately his opponent has regained his own knife and stands in front of Morgan's weapon. The man smiles cruelly, sure he is about to win this fight. He swipes skillfully at Morgan, making the African-American dance farther away from his own weapon. The mercenary swipes once more and uses Morgan's evasive maneuver to level a kick at the strong man's knee. Morgan grunts as his leg collapses. His attacker moves in for the kill, suddenly stiffens, then falls dead at Morgan's feet. Morgan looks in surprise at the knife sticking out of the man's back. He looks up and sees a woman disheveled by battle but still gorgeous. She runs over and pulls her knife out of the dead man's back.
"Jordan," she says with a smile.
"Morgan," he replies. "I owe you."
"And I always collect my debts," she says with a wink and hurries back into the fight.
Morgan watches her a second then retrieves his own knife and also rejoins the battle.
JJ had separated from Morgan quite quickly. After she ran out of ammo she had resorted to mostly using her fists and feet, only using her knife as a last resort. So soon after her beating at the Tipsy Kitten and the fight earlier at the electric plant, her body starts to give out sooner than normal.
She is leaning against a wall gasping for breath when she sees a figure running towards the protection offered by the library. Her eyes narrow and she runs off after her captain. He is starting to barricade the door when she bursts into the building. He is thrown onto his ass as she barrels in the door. He stares up at her in shock. JJ slams the door and levels her knife at him.
"Who do you answer to?"
He swallows nervously. "Uh, what?"
She takes a step closer to him. "Do you answer to the people of this town or to Ezekiel Jareau?" she yells at him.
He swallows as he nervously scrambles to his feet. "I…well…I…"
"I saw Jacob a while ago. So I ask again…"
She closes the distance between them and shoves him against the wall, leveling her knife at his throat.
"Do you answer to the people or to my father?"
Blanchet starts to cry and whimper. "I…I try to…I mean…" He takes a deep breath. "I want to do right but he threatens my family. My daughter is blind, JJ! My son has a safe job at the mines! I can't…can't just…I can't disobey him or he will hurt my family. I'm sorry. So sorry."
JJ snarls. "You're pathetic, Blanchet. You're no captain, you're no leader. You're just a pathetic lackey of my father's. Your actions, or rather inactions, killed Marcus and you know as well as I do if you had gotten me into custody tonight I would have never lived to see morning. Grow a fucking backbone and be someone your kids can be proud of!" She lowers her knife and steps back. "Times are changing, Blanchet. My father won't be in power much longer. Start working against him, even if to his face you appear to work with him, or you will not be happy with your lot in life once the power shifts."
The man drops to his knees. JJ turns and runs back out the doors into the fight. She sees things are starting to change. More and more mercenaries seem to be pouring into the city square. She grabs a villager as they run by.
"What's going on?"
"They've breached the wall in three places. We can't hold them back!"
"So people are surrendering?"
"Some are. Some are fleeing." He grabs JJ's hand. "If you want to save this town run with us. We need to regroup. Let them have the town tonight and we can take it back tomorrow."
"No! What about the electric plant? We have to protect the workers there!"
The man shrugs and continues to run towards the backside of town. JJ races towards the road to the electric plant. She sees people piling furniture, trash, and anything they can find on the one road to the electric plant.
"JAX! What's going on?"
"We may have to surrender the town to the mercenaries and Zeke but we won't surrender the plant. We'll make a stand here for as long as we can. If we have to surrender it I'll carry Reid out myself. Otherwise he'll never leave."
JJ smiles and pats his arm. "Thanks. Now where do I go to find the opposition?"
Jax looks around. He grabs a man with a bad wound in his arm. "Harry, take JJ to the camp. Get that arm treated and get back here when you can. Bring ammo."
The man reluctantly agrees. He and JJ take off across the town to the same gate Emily had used earlier that night. JJ glances back once before she steps through the fence. She sees buildings on fire and hears the lessening screams as people fight to stay alive. She shakes her head.
"I'll be back, Father. You won't get away with this," she vows, sure he had a hand in this attack in hopes it would kill her and Emily.
For her part, Emily and her guide had made it to the mercenary camp and found it completely deserted. Even worse, it shows signs people had packed up.
"They plan to take the town," she notes. "They don't expect to have to come back here."
"Why would they think that?"
Emily sneers. "Because someone in power promised them the town."
"Zeke?"
"Yes. Now, let's find proof of that if we can."
They quickly find a ramshackle hut that had probably served as the mercenary headquarters. They both start to go through the papers that are there. So far nothing incriminating. Then Emily notices the fire pit. She goes to it and starts to poke through the ashes. She finds two pieces that aren't completely burned. Though they have no names on them she can tell they are discussions about the town. Since they are handwritten she puts both in her pocket. Maybe someone will recognize the handwriting.
"Hey, Emily, what do you make of this?"
Emily walks over and sees him looking at a map of the town. The electrical plant has a huge red X on it. The miners compound is circled in green, as is the center of town. But what makes her heart nearly stop and her blood run cold is the block where her new house is. It has been scribbled over with black and then slashed with a knife multiple times.
"The green marks places they should avoid damaging. They should do some damage at the electrical plant." She points to her neighborhood. "But this area is to be completely decimated."
"FUCK! My family lives there!" her guide screams.
Emily starts to shake, working at turning fear to fury. "Mine, too. Let's go."
The two race out of the camp, aiming to get to their homes and save their families.
"BARRICADE ALL THE DOORS!" Reid orders. "Do NOT give them a way in! We have not gotten so close to success to lose it now!"
He and his assistant race around helping to secure all entrances. No one would be leaving until they had all the grids up and running. Reid settles his pistol against his hip. And no one would be coming in, either.
"I don't care who comes to the door. No one comes in. NO ONE! I don't care if it's your lover, mother, sister, son! No one else in. We can't risk that they've been turned via threats or other coercion."
The workers all nod. They hate the thought of turning away friends but they know Reid is right. Once the building is secure, Reid looks at his workers. He takes a deep breath.
"Okay, despite what is going on out there, in here we are business as usual. We all have our assignments and we all know what to do. Let's get going. We will succeed."
His workers give a cheer. Reid manages a smile, knowing it will show more confidence than he actually feels. Truth is, if the mercenaries break into the plant or if more of Zeke's men come the few workers inside will not have much hope of holding them off.
But Reid will gladly give his life trying.
Emily and her guide run through the remains of the main gate. This gives them the element of surprise and they take out several mercenaries who had been left back to make sure no one escapes the town via that gate. As they reach the middle of town her guide shakes his head.
"People are fleeing!"
Emily shakes her head. "No, they are regrouping. We can regroup to fight another day. Come on!"
She leads him towards an alley, hoping to get back to the gate she had used last night. She hears a grunt behind her. She stumbles to a stop and turns. Her guide lies dead on the ground, an arrow in his back.
"Fuck!"
She hears the arrow coming and drops to the ground as it whizzes past. It would have gotten her in the chest. She scrambles to her feet and leaps into the protection of the alley. She stands against the wall and carefully peeks out. She sees the archer lining up to shoot at someone else. She pulls her gun and prevents the bowman from ever firing again.
Emily runs on, she turns and races down the street that leads to her house. She sees a man set a torch to some debris piled up at the front door. She shoots him in the back. She yanks his body off the trash pile and kicks it out of the doorway enough to run inside. The kitchen and living room are already alight.
"DECLAN! GARCIA! HENRY!"
She races upstairs and into the boy's room. She sees the drawers pulled out, empty of clothes. She dashes into Garcia and Reid's room and sees the same signs of hurried packing. She smiles.
"They got out."
Elated, she runs back to the stairs but sees they are now in flames. She runs into hers and JJ's room and goes to the window. She slides it open and eases out. She hangs from the sill a moment, then drops to the ground, buckling her knees and rolling back to minimize impact. She quickly gets to her feet and races to the alley. She shoots two more men who are setting flames to her house.
"Jackass motherfuckers," she mutters as she steps over them.
She keeps her gun handy as she runs through the alley. She can remember the path taken from the gate to the river. She will have to hope that there will be some tracks to follow or some stragglers still making their way to the opposition camp once she gets out of the fence.
As she starts down another alley, two men block her path. She shoots one but the second gets a shot off at her. She winces and loses her grip on her gun as his bullet grazes her upper arm. She keeps running at him and tackles him to the ground. They wrestle for control of his gun. She finally gets his hand turned towards his head and pulls the trigger. She stands and tucks his gun in her belt and runs back for hers. She stops and takes the gun off the other man she killed and keeps running, gritting her teeth at the pain in her arm. She turns down another alley and stumbles to a stop when she sees the man sitting on the ground behind a trash can.
"Appropriate place for you, Zeke," she sneers.
He spins around, terror in his eyes.
"What's the matter, Zeke? Losing control." She pulls the papers out of her pocket. "I have proof you are behind the attacks." His eyes widen. "Your little buddies out there didn't destroy the evidence very well. Of course, if you're killed in this battle it won't really matter what proof I have or don't have."
She pulls her gun and levels it at his head.
"You wanted to kill your own daughter, Zeke. Everyone knows it. You wanted to kill me. If I hadn't been so fucking afraid of being underground you would have."
With each word she had stepped closer. Now she cocks her gun.
"Give me a reason not to end your miserable life right here and now."
A few seconds later her gun fires and she runs out of the alley, still aiming to get to the gate that will take her, hopefully, to her family.