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and other pedestrians and convincing them with a
hard stare to keep the hell out of your way.
He'd just made the opposite side of the street when a bullet struck him high
in the left shoulder.
He stumbled and fell, the window above him shattering as a second bullet
missed him. He hit the sidewalk in an explosion of pain that threatened to
black him out. A bullet kissed the sidewalk beside his cheek and ricocheted
off in a whine. Another tugged at him as it plowed through the leather of his
jacket.
He rolled and fumbled out his pistol. He hated to use a gun in an urban
situation, but he had no choice.
He scrambled to his knees, braced himself, and aimed down on the shooter, who
was nearly on top of him. His first bullet took the shooter square in the
chest, sprawling the man backward onto the sidewalk with a meaty, lifeless
thump. Recoil sent a shock of fresh pain through Atticus. Gritting his teeth,
he aimed at the second man. His pistol kicked pain through him as he fired,
the first bullet only grazing the man's shoulder. Unlike a normal human, the
man no, creature
didn't even flinch, coming straight at him as if pain and death didn't
matter. Atticus squeezed off two more shots, nailing his attacker this time.
His SIG Sauer had a magazine of twelve bullets plus one in the chamber. As he
lined up the axe man, he counted the bullets down. Nine. Eight. Seven.
Six bullets left, he thought as he lurched to his feet, ears ringing. Three
down, but would they stay down? There were rats forming in the pooling blood
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from the first, and he sensed the body knitting together heart muscle at
stunning speed.
The other two Parity and the woman were closing. He could wait and shoot them,
but then what? He'd be out of bullets and the first man would be healed. He
needed breathing room and more of a plan.
He ran east, along the busy street. Behind him he sensed the first dead man
come to life and start after him.
A human Atticus could outrun, even if he was hurt. Wounded, against these
creatures so like himself, he could sense the gap between them quickly
closing. There was the Jag, though, parked close by; if he could get to it,
he'd be home free.
Bullets whined past him, striking storefront windows, marking his trail with
fractured flowers of
destruction in the safety glass.
He was running past a red-trimmed building when a bullet caught him in the
leg. He stumbled out of his full run, and the female Ontongard tackled him
through a window. They dropped down a stairwell beyond. Atticus hit worn tile
a story and a half below, the female on top of him, a smothering blanket of
hate in human form.
They were on a subway station platform, and the handful of people waiting were
startled by their sudden, violent appearance. An outbound train had just
pulled in, its doors clattering open. From the dark tunnel of the inbound line
came the ominous roar of an incoming train.
Not good.
The gunman and axe man he'd shot, the ones who should still be dead, dropped
down to land lightly beside him.
Atticus lashed out at the woman, slamming her off him and coming up in
sweeping kick to take out the axe man. He couldn't reach the gunman in time.
This is going to hurt.
Suddenly Rennie Shaw was between him and the gunman, wearing a black leather
jacket with the picture of a snarling dog and the words "Dog Warrior." The gun
thundered, booming in the enclosed space. The bullet punched through Shaw,
exiting out of his back in a fist-sized hole. Blood splattered
Atticus and crawled, gathering together into a tiny mote of snarling anger.
The female punched Atticus hard in his wounded shoulder, distracting him from
the sentient blood. He caught her arm and broke it as he swung her into the
axe man. Humans would have fumbled, but the two dodged each other with
choreographed ease. The female grasped Atticus's arm, her bones already
knitting, and held him as the axe man swung back his axe. Behind them the
inbound train thundered into the station.
With a snarl, Hellena Gobeyn dropped from street level to the axe man's feet,
picked him up, and flung him into the path of the oncoming train. The man
vanished under the bright steel wheels with a bloom of blood scent. A moment
later, rats swarmed out up out of the pit.
Another Ontongard and a wave of Dog Warriors rolled down the stairs, already
locked in battle.
The subway platform became a mass of snarling, struggling bodies.
The door-closing chime sounded on the outbound train and Atticus found himself
suddenly hauled up and thrust into the subway train.
"Go!" Rennie Shaw barked, producing a sawed-off shotgun from under his duster
like in a magic trick. He turned, firing at one of the Ontongard in a roar of
sound and a cloud of gunsmoke.
Then the door closed and the train pulled away from the carnage.
Atticus grabbed a pole to keep from falling. His phone vibrated. He pulled it
out to discover he'd missed two calls already.
"Steele."
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"Where are you?" Ru cried through the phone. "Cambridge looks like a war zone!
What the hell happened?"
"I'm on a subway train." Atticus turned to ask the other passengers the
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