Nico's Recklessness

Nico's Recklessness
NICO ROMANO POV

Three hours of them talking in circles and something in my head just breaks.

Marco's drawing tactical diagrams. Dante's building risk assessments. Luca's sitting there like a kicked dog. Isabella's shrinking into herself with every passing minute. Getting smaller. Quieter. Waiting for someone to tell her if she gets to live or die.

Waiting for permission to choose.

Fuck. That.

I stand up. Chair scraping loud. Everyone stops mid-sentence. Stares.

"This is bullshit." The words come out sharp. Angry. "We're sitting here planning while Marcus is in Montana. While Isabella's dying. While time's running out."

"We need strategy." Marco's using his leader voice.

"We need to move." I look at Isabella. "You want real answers? Let's go get them."

"Nico." Dante's got that calm voice on. The one that makes my fists clench. "Acting without intel is suicide."

"Sitting here overthinking is slower suicide." I head for the door. "Isabella. You coming or you gonna let them decide for you?"

She looks at them. At me. Something hardens in her face.

"Coming."

"Isabella, no." Marco wheels forward fast. "This is reckless."

"Everything's reckless." She grabs her jacket off the chair. "At least this way I'm picking the danger."

"We need proper planning," Luca tries. Still trying to protect her. Still trying to fix his betrayal.

"You've protected enough." The words cut. I see them land. See Luca flinch. Good. "Isabella's not a kid. She gets to make her own stupid choices."

"That's what this is?" Dante's analyzing. Reading me. "A stupid choice?"

"Probably." I hold my hand out to Isabella. "But it's ours."

She takes it. Her skin warm. The bond sparks hot between us. Certain. Right.

Marco's yelling about tactical protocols. Dante's already typing, trying to track us before we're even gone. Luca just stares like I punched him.

Don't care. Done talking.

We're in my car in thirty seconds. Engine roaring. I punch the gas before her door's fully closed. Tires screaming on pavement. The compound gates already opening because I'm not stopping for anything.

Isabella grabs the oh-shit handle. "You know this is insane."

"Yep." I take the corner doing sixty. Feel the backend slide. Correct without thinking. "But waiting for Marcus to make the first move is more insane. This way we control something."

"Do we? Or are we doing exactly what he wants?"

"Don't know. Don't care." I merge onto the highway. Push the speedometer past eighty. "I'm done being reactive. Done planning for every possible scenario. Sometimes you jump first and deal with the landing after."

"That's a terrible life philosophy."

"It's kept me breathing." I weave through traffic. Late night. Not many cars. "Marco would spend weeks planning. Dante would build models and projections. Luca would find forty reasons to stay safe. But none of them would actually go. They'd talk themselves into waiting."

"And you?"

"I'm the stupid one. The reckless one. The fuckup who acts without thinking." I grin. Probably look half crazy. Feel half crazy. "But I'm the one who gets shit done."

She goes quiet. Mile markers flashing past. Two. Five. Ten.

Then, "Thank you."

"For kidnapping you?"

"For treating me like I can choose. Even if the choice is stupid."

The bond pulses. Warm. Understanding. This is why I grabbed her. Not just for answers. For agency. For her to take control instead of being controlled.

"Your phone's exploding," I point out.

She checks. "Twenty six missed calls. Nineteen texts. All from the brothers."

"The brothers?"

"That's what you are. What you've been since I was seven. Brothers." She looks at me. "Even when you kidnapped me. Terrified me. You were still my brothers under all Vincent's manipulation."

My throat tightens. "Brothers who hurt you."

"Brothers who were hurt too. Who had their memories stolen. Who are trying to be different than Vincent made you." She puts her phone face down. "I'm angry. Hurt. But I understand. We're all broken. Trying to figure out how to heal."

"Think we can? Heal?"

"Maybe. If we stop letting dead men make our choices."

We drive through darkness. Hours bleeding together. My phone rings. Rings. Rings. I ignore it. Focus on asphalt. White lines. Isabella breathing beside me. The choice we're making together.

Dawn breaks over mountains. Pink and gold. Beautiful. Montana sprawls out rugged and empty. The GPS shows Marcus's facility close now. Middle of nowhere. Perfect for hiding.

Perfect for dying.

"Last chance," I offer. "We can turn around."

"Not turning around." Her jaw sets. "Let's meet my father."

The facility looks dead from outside. Single concrete building. No windows. One door. Security cameras dark or hidden.

I kill the engine. It ticks cooling. Neither of us moves.

"This is a trap," Isabella says.

"Definitely."

"We could die."

"Probably."

"Then why aren't you scared?"

"Who says I'm not?" My hands grip the wheel. Knuckles bone white. "I'm terrified. But living scared is worse than dying brave."

She gets it. Gets me.

We walk to the door together. It opens before we touch it. Motion sensor. Or someone watching.

Inside reeks of bleach. Old coffee. Recycled air. The lights buzz on. Fluorescent. Harsh. Revealing a hallway lined with identical doors.

"Isabella." Voice through speakers. Crackling. "I'm in the main lab. End of the hall. Come alone please."

"Not happening," I yell at the ceiling. "She goes, I go."

Pause. Then, "Very well."

We walk. My heart hammering. Each door we pass is closed. Some have windows. I see exam tables with restraints. Medical equipment. Computers. Empty beds.

Test subjects. The ones who didn't make it.

The main lab door stands open. Waiting.

Marcus Hart's inside. Older than photos. Gaunt. Gray. Eyes too bright. Feverish. His hands shake holding a tablet.

Behind him monitors fill the wall. All showing the same thing. Isabella's genetic code. Rotating. Fragmenting. Breaking apart.

"My daughter." His voice cracks. "You actually came."

"You didn't leave options." Isabella's voice is ice. "Forty eight hours. Come alone. That's not an invitation. That's an ultimatum."

"I needed urgency." He gestures at screens. "Look. See what I see. Your enhancements are unstable. Degrading. Attacking your cells from inside. You're dying, Isabella. Five years maximum."

"How do you know?" She steps closer. Staring at her own DNA destroying itself.

"I've been monitoring. The Romano bonds accelerate it. Every time you use your powers, every bond activation, you burn hotter." He pulls up a simulation. Her body consuming itself. "Without intervention you're dead before thirty."

"What intervention?" I ask.

"Genetic reversal. Experimental procedure. Removes the enhancements completely. Makes you baseline human." He shows medical diagrams. Scary looking. "It's dangerous. Seventy percent mortality rate in simulations. But survivors are cured. Normal. Free."

"Seventy percent die." Isabella's voice flattens. "Three in ten live. Those are shit odds."

"Better than guaranteed death." Marcus's hands shake worse. Tablet nearly dropping. "I can save you. Give you a real life without powers, without bonds, without burning alive from inside."

"Or kill me trying."

"Yes." He doesn't sugarcoat. "But you'd die free. Not Vincent's weapon. Not my experiment. Just Isabella."

The bond pulses. Her fear bleeding into me. Her desperate hope that maybe there's escape. That maybe she doesn't have to die young.

"I need time to think," she says.

"You have minutes." Marcus checks his watch. Frantic. "The procedure takes six hours prep. Needs to start immediately for any success chance."

The floor shakes. Subtle at first. Then harder.

Explosion. Outside. Close.

Marcus goes ghost white. "No. Not now. I need more time."

"What's happening?" Isabella grabs my arm.

"Someone found us." I move toward the door. "Someone who wants this research dead."

Another explosion. Much closer. The building shudders. Concrete dust raining down. Alarms start shrieking.

Marcus runs to a computer. Typing wild. "My work. Everything. They're destroying it all."

"Who?" I yell over alarms.

"Vincent's successors. Project Genesis leadership. They don't want cures. They want weapons." He's downloading files. USB drive. Desperate. "Can't let Isabella become normal. Can't let other subjects know freedom's possible."

The ceiling cracks. Spiderweb pattern spreading. Chunks falling.

"We leave. Now." I grab Isabella's wrist.

"My brothers." She looks at me. Eyes wide. "They followed us. They're here. They're outside. They're where the next bomb will hit."

The bond confirms it. I feel them through it. Close. Too close. Right in the kill zone.

Marcus grabs Isabella's other arm. "The procedure. Now or never. Let me save you before we all die."

She stares at him. At me. At the building coming apart.

Choice between death in five years or death in five minutes.

Another explosion. Bigger. The walls crack open. Fire licking through gaps. Smoke filling fast.

Outside my brothers are dying. Because I was reckless. Because I didn't think. Because I acted instead of planned.

Isabella screams over the alarms, "Save them! Get to them!"

I move toward the door. The main support beam groans. Metal shrieking.

It breaks.

The ceiling drops.

I see Isabella's face. Marcus reaching for her. Fire everywhere. Smoke choking.

Then concrete and steel and darkness swallow everything.