I wondered if that was normal.
‘They’ve got a point to prove,” Tens told me. ‘Focus.”
Focus. Right. I’d chosen my target.
“Remember you’re not wearing armor.’
“So?” It looked like I was going to have to be quick, then.
“Fuck.”
“Not right, now, Tens and not with you.” I slipped away from Mack, moving closer to where Angravine and his crew were working, and choosing a point the mercenaries had turned from. On one side, they were moving to end the threat from the wolf squad. On the other, they were looking to Mack.
I guess one unarmed and unarmored girl didn’t rate a mention. I laughed, remembering to keep it soft so as not to draw attention. If it worried Tens, it would worry anyone else that heard it.
‘Doc, we’ve got a problem.”
Doc? What would he need him for?
“Can you get her out of there?” Doc asked, and I moved faster.
I had things to do before they hauled me back onto the ship.
“You really want a stimmed -up Cutter on the ship?”
“Yeah, see, Doc? Someone has an ounce of sense.” As I thought it, I bounded forward. There were no convenient bodies lying at the edge of the battle field. No matter.
I might not have armor, but I wasn’t going to stay unarmed for very long.
“Oh, Hells no,” Doc answered, “but...”
“I got you, Doc.”
I was glad Tens understood, because it sounded to me like Doc hadn’t made his argument, yet.
I heard their conversation as one part of my mind rummaged along the comms line, and another mapped a path to Barangail. The only question was whether I’d reach him before the wolves did, and how many of the mercenaries around him were arach.
That thought brought more cursing, and I toyed with the idea of trying to stop Tens from teleporting me out.
“I thought I told you to put a leash on her,” the wolf captain growled, as he fired from the hip with one hand, and used two feet of blade with the other. It would have been impressive, if he hadn’t been so slow.
I leapt, just as the closest mercenary realized I might be a threat, after all.
“Ha! Sucks to be you.”
I didn’t bother trying to take him off his feet. Heavy armor kinda made that a moot point. However, he was carrying two extra blades over his back, and neither of them were strapped down. I took both, glad of the training I’d done that allowed me to use them.
“Time to slice and dice!”
That thought brought more concern, but I activated the blades and kicked off the merc’s back, flipping to come down on my feet...or that had been the plan. I hit a chunk of stone and fell on my ass, just as the merc turned.
He registered me down, but still didn’t move fast enough to nail me before I turned my awkward landing into a backward roll and came to my feet. His solids hit the space I’d occupied, and I bounced to the side, taking myself around him and drawing his attention from the vespis that dropped out of the sky to land beside him.
“We have her”. I recognized the reddish tones to her carapace, and smiled.
The queen’s guard, and she wasn’t trying to stop me. “Hell’s yes!”
“Well there’s no need to sound so happy about it,” Mack grumbled, but I could feel his relief.
“Did either one of you knuckleheads remember to let Odyssey know you were joining a planetary revolution?” Case’s words might have stopped us in our tracks, if we hadn’t been kinda busy fighting for our lives.
Mack’s reply kinda said it all. “Fuck!”
“I’ve got it,” Tens reassured him.
I let them have their conversation, threading my way through the mercenary ranks, and shredding whatever got in my way. Man! These guys had the best gear.
“You can keep those,” Stepyan told me, as I slashed one blade across the servos of a knee joint, and plunged the other through the fallen merc’s back. His spare blaster wasn’t lashed down, so I picked that up, briefly hit the ground on my belly, rolled, dropped the other blade and picked up another blaster to come up firing.
“Never mind.”
To be honest, I was a little disappointed I’d had to leave the blades behind.
“I’ll get you more,” Stepyan reassured me. “Focus.”
Focus? I didn’t know what he meant. I was focused.
I shot one mercenary in the throat, put five quick rounds through the armor seam under another’s arm and sprayed ichor from an arach soldier as he turned to face me.
“Sucks to be you,” I told him.
He showed fang in reply. “No. Sucks to be you!”
I didn’t give him a chance to explain. He was still bringing his blaster around when I walked twin lines of fire up his chest and into his head. Barangail was next!
As I thought it, two more arach closed.
“What is it? My perfume?
You’re not wearing any,” Mack replied, “but you are the biggest threat there.”
“Cool.”
“Not cool. Focus!”
Man. Why was everyone telling me to do that? It’s not like I hadn’t already picked my next two targets and wasn’t dealing with them.
To prove my point, I fired both blasters, taking out an arach with each one.
“There,” I thought, taking aim on Barangail. “Focused enough for you?”
The vespis had engaged the mercenaries close enough to realize their employer was in mortal danger. I fired, just as the wolf captain broke through their lines and drove his blade into the man’s back. A solid round burned its way along my side as Mack slammed into me.
“No. Nowhere near enough,” he told me, grunting as he stopped the rest of the rounds that followed.
“Cease fire!” That order came from a merc.
I twisted under Mack, trying to see what was going on—and then I realized I was still stimmed.
All right! That shit made me insanely strong, and Mack wasn’t that heavy...not when I was like this. Not even when he was
