Apocalypse: Every Woman I Invest In Makes Me Stronger

Uncle Ray’s frown cut deeper. The little amusement he’d been wearing left his face, and what replaced it was hard and ugly. Ethan could see the thought land. Ray had poured the drink. Ray had watched him fall. Ray had already started spending what was in the pocket.

And Ethan was laughing.

Quiet. Nothing friendly in it.

”I’m laughing because you thought that was going to be enough.”

He came off the floor in one motion. Ray’s eyes widened.

”A little poison.” Ethan’s hand lifted. ”That’s the whole plan?”

The air in front of his palm warped, thin as a heat shimmer, then tore.

Spatial Cut.

The slash went for Ray’s throat, invisible until it wasn’t.

Clang.

A shield slammed into the path. The ring of it filled the room. The man behind Ray staggered, both hands locked on an alloy plate, a deep bright cut opening across the face of it. Sparks died on the floor.

Ray’s mouth tightened. ”You’re not poisoned.”

Ethan stood straight. Breath even. Eyes clear. None of the sag Ray had paid for.

”So you’ve got more than one.” Ray took a step back. The skulls on his chest clicked. Then his voice cracked like a whip. ”Take him down.”

Chairs scraped. A table went over. Two men came up from under it with submachine guns, short and black, already off safe.

Ethan’s gut went cold. He caught Sasha and hauled her behind him. The sword left the sheath in a clean arc, emergency light running the length of the blade, and he cut at the nearest man before the barrel could settle.

”Get over here.”

Ray’s hand shot out. A dull metallic sheen crawled over his palm. The sword jumped in Ethan’s grip, humming, fighting him. His fingers locked. The blade yanked anyway, violent, like a cable had been hooked through the guard.

It tore free.

The sword crossed the room and slapped into Ray’s hand. He looked at it. Smiled with his teeth.

”Nice sword.”

Ethan’s jaw set. Metal Manipulation. The shield had suggested it. The sword confirmed it.

He shifted his weight, Gravity Control already rising ~ and a wall of wind hit him from the side.

”Ethan!”

Sasha went the other way. He twisted in the air and hit the floor hard enough to knock the breath out of him. Dust lifted. A chair skidded. Papers burst and stuck to the wet spill of liquor.

Then he saw the doorway.

Blaze stood in it. The mechanical arm burned a cold blue. Wind coiled around his boots and snapped his coat like a flag in a storm that belonged only to him. He was grinning.

”Ethan.” The arm came up. ”Let’s see where you run this time.”

The wind detonated.

Broken wood, glass, a bent fork, a shard of the chair Sasha had already ruined ~ all of it tore through the room on a horizontal scream. Sasha got an arm across her face. A splinter still slipped past and opened her forearm. She hissed. Blood welled, bright, and ran for her wrist.

Ethan’s eyes went flat.

Gun barrels swung. Fingers took up the triggers.

He vanished.

He was beside her before the first shot could finish being born. His hand closed on her arm. ”Stay on me.”

Then he spent it.

”Time Stop.”

The room locked.

Not a slow. A stop. The man with his finger on the trigger stayed there, knuckle white. Another hung halfway through raising his gun. Ray held the stolen sword. Blaze’s arm stayed extended, and the wind around him hung in the air like torn cloth, every splinter frozen where it had been flying. Five meters in every direction, the third floor became a photograph. Dust didn’t fall. Blood on Sasha’s arm didn’t move.

Ethan didn’t admire it.

”Go.”

His arm came around her. Space folded.

The room was gone.

Cold night hit his face. They stood at the mouth of an alley beside the building, brick on both sides, the market a rumor somewhere behind them. For half a second neither of them breathed.

Then the roar came.

It shook the alley. Dust sifted off a windowsill. Ethan’s stomach dropped.

He turned. ”You’ve got to be kidding me.”

The wall behind them blew outward. Concrete. Brick. A rain of it across the alley. A massive head forced through the hole, amber eyes locking on him, pupils pinched to vertical slits. The body followed, shoulders wrecking what the head had opened, weight crushing the broken wall under it. The Tiger King. Blood still dark along its ribs from the bats. It had not gone west and stayed there.

Ethan stared. ”How did that thing follow us?”

The beast lowered its head. One sniff. Another. The slits fixed on him.

”Don’t fight it.” He caught Sasha’s hand. Her palm was slick. ”Don’t fight me either.”

Space opened. They were gone.

The Tiger King lunged. The paw hit empty air and kept going. Concrete burst. A crater half a meter deep opened where they had been standing, cracks racing for the walls.

A second later Ray and his men spilled out of the doors.

Ray stopped. The color left his face. ”The Tiger King.”

The beast turned its head. For the first time all night, Ray looked afraid. Metal was a fine trick against men and ordinary mutants. Against a Quasi-King, it was a story you told so you could sleep. The Tiger King didn’t even grant him the look. It dropped its nose to the ground and hunted the scent, slow, patient, Ethan’s trail still warm in the dust.

Ray’s throat worked. ”Don’t move.”

One of his men broke. The gun came up. ”Shoot it!”

The muzzle flashed. The round took the beast in the rear flank and bounced, a tiny pale mark and nothing else.

The Tiger King went still.

Then it turned.

The roar this time was closer. The paw swept sideways, casual, enormous. The man never got the scream out. He left the ground like a rag and hit the far wall hard enough that the sound was wet. The paw kept going. Three men. Then five. Bodies struck brick, a dead car, each other. Panic ran through what was left of them like fire in dry grass.

Ray’s face twisted. He was already backing up. ”Fire! Keep it busy! If that thing gets through, none of us walk!”

They shot because terror told them to. The alley strobed. Bullets sparked on the hide, flattened, fell. The beast barely slowed. It shook once, annoyed, and a man who had been reloading simply wasn’t standing there anymore.

Ray understood it then. They weren’t fighting it. They were teaching it their names.

Blaze understood it sooner.

He stepped back. One pace. Another. Nobody was watching him. Wind gathered under his boots, tight, controlled. His eyes flicked to the roofline.

He jumped.

The whirlwind kicked him up and over the alley wall. Coat. Blue arm. Gone into the dark between buildings.

Ray saw it. ”Blaze!” Disbelief, then hate. ”You bastard!”

The wind had already taken the answer with it.

Ray had nothing left but the men who were too scared to run. He turned back to the amber eyes and the crater and the smell of blood on the bricks.

”Keep shooting!”

They obeyed. The Tiger King lowered its head again, sniffed the broken ground, and started toward the street, following a scent that was no longer there.