Bai shot to his feet. His finger went to the radio control at his collar. “Deploy.” he barked. He flipped to status of the other protests. No sign of incursion anywhere else.

Which meant they knew.

“Lethal force!” he barked. No time for stealth. No point now. “Links up! Squads one, two, three, to the square! Snipers, weapons free! Squad four, building defense!”

Then he activated his own encrypted radio link, felt his brothers all around the campus do the same.

Suddenly more than a hundred minds were linked crystal clearly to his. And the battlefield was alive in his thoughts.

Zhi Li scrambled backwards for the small rise in the center of the square, trying to stay low, trying to stay behind tents, tables, overturned benches, anything that might offer the tiniest bit of cover.

There was shooting everywhere. She could see gouts of flame erupting from rifles in twilight, see the flames of the barriers and the Molotov-ignited fires reflecting in the mirror helmets of the incoming soldiers. There were screams, horrible screams. Minds were yelling out in pain and fear.

Minds were winking out.

People were dying.

“Come on!” Lu Song yelled. He had his hand around hers, was pulling her, trying to move her faster.

“They’re coming after us,” Yuguo said. “They’ve seen us. There’s a squad heading this way.”

“You’re the leaders,” her bodyguard, Dai, said. “They want you.”

Dai drew his gun and stopped, crouched low. “Run!” he said. “I’ll hold them off!”

Zhi looked back at him, despair in her heart as Lu Song tugged at her. She saw Dai stand, his pistol in his hand. He pointed it back the way they’d come, fired, fired, fired again, flame shooting out of it.

Automatic fire erupted incredibly close. She saw Dai knocked backwards, blood shooting out of the back of his jacket.

“Dai!” she screamed.

Qi was on his feet too, firing, standing where Dai had fallen. There were soldiers in her view. She was trying to run, trying not to look, but she couldn’t help it.

Qi fired. He fired again.

She saw a soldier fall.

Then machine gun fire cut Qi in half.

“Qi!”

Bai moved out in a flood of his brothers into the square. He was fully visible, in ordinary fatigues, an assault rifle in his arms, no time for chameleonware.

The square was chaos. Ten thousand protesters. At least two thousand armed troops. Gunfire. Paralyzed tanks. Drones flying overhead. Molotov cocktails hurtling through the air. Grenades flying back. Emanations of pain and confusion from minds everywhere.

Bai sank into it. They’d trained for this. Chaos was their friend.