The Covert Academy Read Online Free Page A

two others split up to try and outflank him. One reached a drainpipe and started up it like a cat, the other kicked down a loosely boarded up door to enter the building and prevent Joshua from doubling back that way.
    But it was the two drones that made straight for him that would be the challenge. They could skip the heavy work of climbing and fly straight to him. Most likely the drones would try to incapacitate him with a heat ray so the soldiers could simply come and collect him. Joshua’s only comfort was that they would want him alive. They probably didn’t know the specifics about what he had taken and would have been instructed to be careful not to damage his valuable cargo. The heat ray would still put him in enough pain to wish for death.
     
    He took in all of this in a few seconds, then hauled himself up the ladder, legs dangling below. The first of the three Confederates made a jump for them. Joshua felt a slap on his boot but he reached the base of the fire escape unharmed.
    Breathe . He gasped for air and clambered up the steps, around and around two at a time, heading for the roof. He glanced over at the soldier scaling the drainpipe. He had reached the top and was pulling himself over. The soldier could just kick him in the head when he came down from above. Time to change the game.
    One of the drones was hovering in the middle of the alley, keeping its red tracking light fixed on him. The other drone moved in for the money shot.
    On the fifth landing of the fire escape, Joshua stopped and turned to face the drone, the red light glaring. He took a step back, then pushed himself forward into mid air, just as the soldier above dropped down to where he had been standing a second ago.
    Joshua reached out and grabbed the drone with the fingertips of one hand, while the other pulled his hunting knife free from its sheath. Pivoting on his arm, underneath the drone, his knife-arm arced around in a loop with the blade pointed outward. The knife swept cleanly through the guts of the drone. His momentum sent it spinning.
    He released his grip at the apex of his swing and continued to fall, smashing through the window of the building opposite. He scrambled on his knees to get out of the room and turned to see the drone slowly sink to the ground. It was damaged but not dead, like a helicopter with the tail rotor blown. The short drop wouldn’t destroy it, but it was now out of the race.
    With that, Joshua had bought himself a slight head start. Now to disappear , he thought.
    The remaining dro ne turned to track him, but its pale red light shone through a broken window into an empty room.
     
     

Chapter 4
     
    Sarah leaped across a chasm between two low buildings, not pausing to look down. She might not die from this height, but she certainly wouldn’t get up after a fall. She tapped her sleeve again, sending the ninja rope shooting forward into the approaching face of the next building.
    With no time to run the distance, she retracted the ultra-thin rope, quickly pulling herself onto the side of the wall. She had been sprinting at her top speed for five minutes, and even after a three-story climb up this building, she still wouldn’t be breathing hard.
    She disengaged the active camouflage and rerouted the jumpsuit’s power to its limited anti-gravity ability. Instantly she felt like she weighed half as much as her original lean physique. The trade off was that the fluctuating colours of her jumpsuit faded to a regular dull blue, rather than attempting to blend in with the environment by bending the light around her body in real time.
    Sarah was now exposed, but this was one of the few buildings that still offered an unobstructed view of the area so close to the Colonnade. That also meant she could expect it to be guarded.
    She had better slow down and be careful, she chided herself, as she replayed the conversation with the doctor...
     
    ‘General Withers has the bio-ID tech,’ Dr. Prewett had said.
    ‘What