The lunatic was firing concentrated explosive rounds. They were expensive and dangerous to use, and he was using them in a fast-cycling automatic weapon. Red icons erupted all over my IVD. I slid to the ground. The table blocked his line of sight. Kring was firing indiscriminately. He stood and took any fire aimed at him, staggering as shot after shot hit him. I couldn’t figure out who else was firing. The room seemed to fill with rapid explosions. Then I realised he was firing at the twisted Berserks growing out of the wall.
I tried to roll onto my knees but hands burst out of the floor to grab me. I was screaming now as some kind of pincer-like claw tried to prise armour and flesh open. My blades extended from my knuckles and I stabbed them viciously into the floor, tearing at it. The partially formed Berserk mutant went limp, succumbing to the ferocity of my attack. There were more growing out of the wall all around us. Another grenade went off somewhere behind me. Now there were black beams and shards in the air just like back on Sirius. I saw Pagan go down as explosions rolled over him. Then I saw Rannu stagger in the doorway as he was back-shot. Mudge’s head whipped round. It looked like a black beam had taken half his face off.
I’d had enough. On one knee I fired a thirty-millimetre HEAP grenade at Kring. As I did, Cronin shot me with a gauss PDW. He got me in the arm. It penetrated hardening inertial armour and then my subcutaneous armour, tearing into actual flesh.
Kring dodged to the side, the HEAP hitting the wall just behind him. The explosion knocked me back to the ground. The table slid across the floor towards me. Kring was thrown forward over the wrecked table. I felt the organic floor moving beneath me.
Back up onto my feet. I fired a burst at Cronin. He dived for cover behind the table. He was fast for an exec. I pointed the SAW down and fired another burst into the ground because the floor just wouldn’t stop moving. Bringing the SAW back up, I was appalled to see Kring standing again. He dropped the two PDWs and drew two Benelli shotgun pistols. I risked a burst; he staggered slightly, and I hit the ground again. How much fucking damage could this monster take?
Morag was down! No, it was okay, she was tranced in. That was trust in this environment. Everyone else was fighting the Berserk mutants growing out of the floor, the ceiling, the walls.
Heavy-calibre hit after hit on my chest armour and helmet. Almost cracking the armour. There was more pain, more red icons on my IVD. Where the fuck was the fire coming from? Kring. His shotgun pistols were firing saboted gyrojet rounds with smart miniature warheads. Money truly was no object for these guys. The gyrojet rounds would track me regardless of my cover and I couldn’t take much more.
I staggered to my feet, taking more hits. I fired my last grenade at him. He dived out of the way and the blast knocked me off my feet again. Still at least I wasn’t getting shot. Then I did something really stupid. I charged.
I’d hoped to surprise him. I jumped onto the broken table and ran across its sloping surface, firing. The expression on his mismatched face with its bulbous fish eyes didn’t even change. He grabbed me as I closed. At least he had to drop the shotgun pistols. He lifted me off my feet and slammed me into the wall. He then threw me into the ground. He didn’t drop me. He threw me. The wind was knocked out of me.
My SAW was hanging loose on its sling and was just getting in the way. Fighting for breath, I dragged the Void Eagle out of its holster and fired it repeatedly at point-blank range into Kring. The shots staggered him and I managed to fire about half the magazine before he slapped the gun out of my hand. Something clawed through the floor, tearing through my inertial and subcutaneous armour and ripping flesh out of me.
Kring reached down and dragged me to my feet. I extended my claws. He hooked a punch into my chest. As he hit me, his now-spiked cybernetic fist was propelled forward into my chest by a jackhammer-like pneumatic action. My breastplate and subcutaneous armour cracked, the force of the blow causing internal damage. I spat blood onto his Hawaiian shirt.
I don’t know how I had the presence of mind to duck his other fist but I did. I heard buzzing. The organic wall behind me opened and I was showered with some kind of fluid. On his fist the fingers had slid back; it looked like the hand had split open to reveal a small chainsaw. I felt this was unreasonable.
I suspect it was more strength born of desperation rather than training and boosted muscle that allowed me to drive the four full-length blades on my left hand up through his chin and into his head. His features warped at the bladed violation of his face but he didn’t fall. Now I started to panic. The powerful fingers on his pneumatic fist wrapped around my neck and started to squeeze. I felt him push the chainsaw against my breastplate. I could feel it. With terrifying strength he began to cut through the already damaged plate. I screamed when it reached subcutaneous armour and then again as it touched flesh, blood spraying all over him.
I was clawing at the laser pistol on my right hip. The claws on my left hand were still stuck in his face. The gun came free. I put it against his head and squeezed the trigger again and again and again. I kept squeezing. The back of his head became red steam. By the time he toppled over dragging me with him, the entire back half of his head was missing.
I managed to free myself. I’d blown the tips of my own blades off with the laser. A clawed hand came out of the wall and ripped the side of my face off. I rolled to the side and scrabbled for my SAW. The deformed Berserk tore itself out of the wall and loomed over me. I pulled the trigger on the SAW. I walked a long burst all the way up its torso. It was coming apart as meat and not the usual liquid dissipation I’d come to expect from Them. It dropped to the ground. Killing Berserks was about the most normal thing I’d done in what felt like a long time.
Something stabbed through my armour from beneath. A cry of pain and I rolled to one side and up onto my knees. I fired another long burst into the Berserk rising from the organic floor. It disintegrated in a hail of bullets.
I was getting shot, a lot. I staggered forward. Pistol rounds. Just pissing me off. I spun round. A terrified and slimy Cronin was emptying a pistol in my general direction. I raised the SAW and fired. He was no longer there. He was fast.
Something fell through the ceiling and onto me, tearing at my armour. I stabbed into it with claws, fighting wildly. It was bleeding, not leaking all over me, or was that my blood? I managed to ram its head back against the table and fired the SAW one-handed until its only movement was the jerk of bullets tearing through dead flesh.
The floor was a bad place to be. I climbed to my feet. Rannu was slicing up a Berserk, a knife in each of his hands. Cat and Merle were fighting back to back. Mudge was firing rapidly, standing over an unconscious or dead Pagan and a tranced-in Morag. Need to get to Mudge.
Out of the chaos Cronin charged me with a katana. No time to shoot. I tried to parry with my SAW. The katana sliced right through it and buried itself in my helmet. I felt the blade bite into armoured skull and blood ran down my face.
I kicked forward, sending Cronin staggering back. Unfortunately he kept hold of the sword. I let the two halves of my SAW fall to the ground.
‘Come on then!’ I screamed at him like it was some feral pub fight back in Dundee as I extended what was left of my blades.
He was skilled, fast and desperate. He swung at me again and again with the blade. I parried what I could with the claws. The rest cut into me, going through my armour, painting me a deeper red. I ignored the warning signals on my IVD. I got cut so I could claw at him, not caring, pushing him back. Finally I got lucky and caught his sword between my knuckle blades. I headbutted him, and as he staggered back I jumped into the air and kneed him in the head. I felt part of his skull give way beneath the impact. I tore the katana out of his grip and stabbed him through the shoulder with my two remaining full-length blades. I pulled my other hand back, getting ready to ram the broken blades on my left fist through his face.
‘Bastard!’ I screamed at him, as inhuman as anything else in the room.
‘I surrender!’ Cronin screamed. He looked terrified but not of me. Why was he covered in slime?
‘Jakob!’ Morag. I heard the note of command in her voice. I wanted to kill Cronin so much I was shaking. Instead I grabbed him by his hair and pulled the antique assault shotgun out of its scabbard. I started making my way back towards Morag, firing the shotgun one-handed at anything that moved that wasn’t us, dragging Cronin with me.
On the other side of the table Merle and Cat were firing as they backed towards Morag, Rannu and Mudge. I saw Cat go down. Half her face was red steam and blackened bone. Laser fire. She hit the ground. I knew she was dead. I heard Merle scream. I saw Rannu, Mudge and Morag’s expressions change. They looked terrified. I turned round. Through the sphincter in the opposite end of the room I saw Rolleston and the Grey Lady enter. Marching at us, firing.
All of us poured fire at them. Merle’s repeated plasma blasts wreathed Rolleston’s head in white fire. His
