Pro-now swung back to the ground. A smoking crater marred the battlefield, ringed by a perimeter of glass.

I blinked past the spots in my vision and wiped the sand from my face. Dust curled around the ground, worsening an already terrible night.

Off to the side, Manbite and Activity wailed on each other. The former was supposed to be the feral one, but Activity fought as a man possessed. He drove Manbite straight through a tree and punched him, hard enough to jar my teeth from a distance. Harvest’s makeshift forest trembled from the blows, losing trees in their wake.

Pro-now tapped my shoulder and gestured to the sky. Kabash darted past, iron rods extending beneath him.

“Follow,” Pro-now said, reloading his gun. “Go after Evans. We'll handle things here.”

“The Villain's not dead?”

Pro-now glanced at the crater. Heat roared up from within it like a piece of hell carved into being. “No. But I doubt his feet are having a good time. Funny things—powers. They always self-adjust to be useful. He distorts matter, vibrations, and light, yet somehow manages to tweak them enough to see, hear, and breathe.” He smacked the magazine into place. “He can't protect the soles of his feet though, and that renders him vulnerable like everyone else.”

Inside the crater, Tattoo-face shrieked. He latched onto the rim, fleeing the inferno within. Pro-now opened fire, and the Villain let go, slipping back into the pit.

Gunfire erupted from the direction of the millhouse. The sand puffed and parted, signaling we'd been the target of the shots.

“Get going, Volley,” Pro-now said. “Our screaming friend here needs to deactivate his power in order to interact with matter, but he’d soon realize he can just travel underground. I'll stall him and follow as soon as I can.”

He lobbed another incendiary into the crater and turned in the direction of the millhouse. Plastic bullets answered the distant shooters, matching theirs in intensity.

I didn't need any cajoling after that.

“Kabash,” I said into the earpiece, running in the direction he'd gone. “This is Volley. Over.”

“Volley,” came the reply, “This is Kabash. Speak freely. Over.”

“Any eyes on Evans?”

“No—” Air whistled through the radio. Kabash shouted in a voice that was both garbled and disjointed. A shrill cackle pierced my ear.

Drat. The jammer.

I switched off the radio and slowed to a stop. Evans could animate non-living things, but a mobile bed wasn’t exactly the best getaway. Where was the first place he would go?

“Garage,” I finished.

Nothing of the sort stood around the premises. But as if to confirm my suspicions, a car revved outside the fence.

I bolted in the direction of the noise, ignoring the main gates which were sure to be defended. Two masked figures ran past in the distance. One was familiar in his long overcoat and porcelain mask. The other . . .

“Bazaar,” I yelled.

A line of corals erupted between us, cutting me off.

Shit. Not now. Elixir first. Then Bazaar. Ava had joined up with the Four-oh-Four for a reason. Attempting a confrontation here would only derail me.

I picked up the pace and reached the perimeter of the sawmill. A fence blocked my path, too high for me to scale. A log of wood lay nearby, and I accelerated it into the wall. I leaped through the resulting hole, shell held at the ready.

Kabash barreled into me.

“What the heck?” I said, rising to my feet.

“Boil,” Kabash mumbled in a daze. “Boil's here.”

The Hero Killer?

Blood froze in my veins.

A few paces down the street, a large man stood in the headlights of a vehicle. He had arms that could be mistaken for iron cylinders, and a head that gleamed like it could bend steel and diamond to boot.

The Villain grabbed his native shirt with one hand, ripping the fabric with ease. He slapped the vehicle and it reversed. Heavy off-road tires slurred in the mud.

I glared at the fleeing truck and its bulky, armored coating. We couldn't let it get away.

“How do we play this?” I said in a whisper to Kabash, “You stop the truck, I square off with Boil?”

“Are you out of your mind?” Kabash yelped. “Get out of here, Volley. This is beyond your pay grade.”

I fired the first shot.

The missile slammed into Boil’s gut, taking him by surprise. He doubled over, emitting a grunt. A watery orb—reddish in the taillights of the receding vehicle—coalesced above him.

I ducked right as the watery orb contracted into a bullet. It grazed my shoulder on its way down, punching a hole in the ground.

“Volley!” Kabash said, struggling to his feet. His muscular arms morphed into beams.

“No,” I said, shoving him aside. “I can do this. Stop Evans. You can come back to help after you are done.”

I didn't wait for his response. Boil was a King-Rook hybrid, which offered him more offensive potential than my singular Bishop class. Judging from his earlier performance, he had enough fine control to be deadlier than I was at a distance. Taking cover was not an option. Which left what? Running?

Power flooded down my arms. A second orb came to life beside Boil. I obliterated it with a shell. He reformed it the next instant, but I dispelled the orb before he could fire. I followed up with a third strike, scoring a solid hit on his gut.

He didn't keel over. Four tentacular appendages rose from his back. They contracted into nozzles, belching great spurts of steam.

Kabash went airborne.

The steam from the nozzles condensed into watery orbs, four in total. Two plastic shells and a lightning-quick beam of metal halted their formation. The final one contracted, and the resulting water bullet bifurcated the air.

Kabash snapped to the ground before the death shot connected. He continued forward, making a beeline for the truck.

Boil swerved to attack him and took the missile I’d been preparing straight to the face. He smacked the ground occiput-first and folded into a roll that belied his weight. He came to a stop on all fours, fixing beady eyes on me.

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“You are annoying,” he spat.

I broke into a run.

Water surged past me in thin slices, shearing wall and wood and stone. I crossed over to the other side of the street, running haphazardly.

Did Boil take the bait?

A peek behind me nearly claimed my head. Water whipped past my helmet, slicing it off its straps. I tripped over a trash heap and tumbled down a bank. Wet earth slid past my fingers.

I crashed into a wire mesh fence, jarring my head against the surface. Black spots danced across my sight. The fence creaked, and gravel came loose, toppling into the water below.

I watched the ripples form in the water, blinking past the tears and pain.

Right. We were still at the lagoon. Lagoon . . .

I snapped out of my daze.

Couldn’t Boil control this too?

Boil didn't help with an answer. Steam erupted from his nozzles, and his stomach distended like a miniature wrecking ball. He propelled himself through the air, mimicking a short-distance rocket.

I grabbed just about anything I could find and wailed on him. Sticks, stones, discarded cans . . . everything I touched whizzed up the bank with unwavering accuracy. Boil smashed through each one in turn, barely noticing the impacts. He landed in a half crouch and dashed aside. Five watery orbs appeared in a line beside him.

I brought my palms down and countered with earth. Mud sped up to his face. Boil staggered, and the water bullets launched. They strafed the area, missing me by inches.

I took advantage of his temporary blindness and scampered behind a stack of timber. My heart thudded against my ribs.

Pound for pound, Boil and I were evenly matched. At least on the offensive end. The problem lay in the fact that he could tank my shots, while I was about as durable as tissue paper. Brute force was out of the picture. If I wanted to win this, it had to be with smarts. But how?

I looked around my immediate vicinity.

The timber stack exploded.

Splinters struck my sides, dousing me in pain. The shockwave knocked me flat on my face. I rolled out of range of the tumbling lumber, just as Boil emerged from the wreck, billowing steam.

Steam.

Steam!

I scurried up the scattered wood. Boil turned at my approach, forming orbs from the dense curtain of mist. They fired and would have connected had I planned on running. I had not.

I vaulted over Boil and blasted a shell into his nozzle. My second shot went wide, but the first did the trick. Boil jerked like he'd been stung by a needle. He rolled on the ground, clawing at his chest.

I rammed a piece of timber into his torso and followed up with another. I reached for a third, and a water bullet bored into my palm.

The resultant scream didn't sound like mine.

“You disrespectful bastard,” Boil spat, ambling to his feet. “You nameless child of accursed parents.” His torso rippled and the plastic shell fell out of him, ushered by a jet of steam.

He turned evil eyes on me, and for one horrible second, I was back at the manor, surrounded by Wicker's flames.

“I am going to teach you the meaning of misfortune, child. You made a mistake trying to fight me.” He grabbed the back of my costume.

An iron rod slammed into his head. Boil went down, past the wire mesh fence and into the lagoon below.

Kabash snapped down to me. “Volley, you absolute mad lad.”

I stifled a whimper, unable to respond. My right palm featured a prominent hole through its center. The pain hadn't set in yet, but heat blossomed from the wound. Tremors wracked the wounded limb.

Kabash noted my hand and swore. “Hold it up.” He retrieved a tube of quick gel from his pouch and slathered both surfaces of the wound. “Got any medical tape?”

“I’m not sure,” I said, finding my voice. “It's a new bandolier.”

Kabash hummed. He sandwiched my palm in gauze, then ruffled through his pouch until he found a small roll of bandages. He wrapped it around the wound.

“Crude,” he said. “But it should suffice. The gel would staunch the bleeding and sterilize the injury. We can get you looked at back at the base.”

“The car—” I started.

“Wrecked it. No sign of YamaYama. Just some thugs and a truckload of crates. I'm guessing meth.”

“Oh . . . What do we do now?”

“We regroup with the rest of the team. Someone might have seen YamaYama run past—”

The surface of the lagoon bubbled. Steam hissed up from it.

Kabash shoved me behind him. “I won’t accept defiance for an answer this time, Volley. Return to the sawmill. Grab anyone available and track down YamaYama, before he gets too far ahead.”

I eyed the bubbling Lagoon. “I'm not sure you should handle this alone.”

“Oh, please. I've fought Boil. As recently as the Sagidi explosion, in fact.”

“That doesn't mean—”

Kabash shoved me again. Harder. “This would be easier if I didn’t have to cover your escape, Volley. It's your turn to do your job. Let me do mine.”

I hesitated for a moment, and then I grimaced and dashed back toward the mill. I had pressed my luck once tonight. No point being stubborn.

Boil surged out of the lagoon, and Kabash rose to meet him. I turned away from the scene, focusing instead on the task at hand.

The fighting at the sawmills raged more chaotic than ever. Gunshots went off at regular intervals, and inhuman roars echoed into the night. An additional section of the fence had crumbled. Three jagged corals, rivaling the Habakkuk in height, stood in the gap. An even larger tree curled around the corals, and Harvest lowered herself from its branches. She dropped with a thud.

“Harvest,” I called.

She adopted a fighting stance, fists raised to her chin.

“It's me,” I said. Pain surged up my palm, chastising my movements.

“Volley?” She relaxed her guard. “Did you see me?”

“See what?”

“I-I did it,” she said airily, eyes open but unfocused. “I fought Cnidarian.”

“I saw. That was pretty badass.”

Harvest grinned, or at least, I thought she did through the respirator.

“You're here to help me chase them?” she asked.

“Chase who?”

“Cnidarian. She ducked out of the fight a few minutes ago.”

That was for the best, was it not? “Cnidarian's not a high priority target.”

“Yeah, but . . . no, listen. She fled with two others. And I caught some kind of four-legged creature running between them.”

My heart lurched. “Which way?”

Harvest pointed down the street. The ruined husk of the truck lay many meters away, and further ahead stood a row of shadowy warehouses. “They couldn't have gone far. I would have pursued, but a large group of armed men swarmed in to cover them. We should probably go help Activity, then regroup and—”

“There's no time for any of that. We have to trust that he can handle himself.”

Harvest stiffened, and I readied a counter to her refusal.

She drew herself up. “Y-you're right. We can't let them take Elixir. L-let's go.”

We flew down the street, cutting past the wrecked truck. Akinsete’s muddy roads ran in parallel to the lagoon. Rickety millhouses lined the street, much different from the facility we'd assaulted. They towered over the waterside, interspersed by shacks half-submerged in water. Moonlight glimmered far out on the water's surface, casting an ethereal glow on Akinsete's slummy cluster.

I reached the end of the street well ahead of Harvest and slowed to let her catch up. The road turned leftward into a second street. This one featured rows of timber sheds packed densely enough to double as a maze.

“Any idea where they went?” I asked.

Harvest took a moment to recover her breath. “I don't know. I only saw them run this way while climbing the tree.”

Dammit. Not another bust. Not after coming this far. “Okay, let's look around. I'm sure we'll find something.”

“I might have a trick,” Harvest said. “But I’ll need to disperse some spores. I can tell what kind of surface they land on. It helps with knowing which ones to trigger.”

I frowned, putting two and two together. Harvest was more of an asset than I gave her credit for. “Do it. We'll circle the area. Give you enough coverage.”

“I'll need a good breeze,” she said, raising a hand to her helmet. “Current one's not bad. But more wind would be nice."

“I can give you more reach.” I grabbed a stone and pulled a nylon bag from the carpet of rubbish caked into the ground. “We can form makeshift pouches with these. Pack your spores into the bags, and I'll launch them through the air.”

“Aerial dispersal, huh? Smart.”

We explored the sheds, slinging pouches of tree spores in a wide circle around us. Harvest identified everything from zinc roofing to soil to window sills, and on one occasion, she spotted a mangy dog. However, we didn't find any people.

I flung the eleventh pouch through the air, frowning as every wasted second took us one step farther from Elixir.

“Got something,” Harvest squeaked, grabbing my arm. “There!”

I bolted in the direction she pointed.

“They're moving!” she said, panting behind me. “I can sense two different sets of boots. A bedframe too.” She paused. “Oh no. The spores are coming off. I can’t trigger them from here!”

“Where are they headed?” I yelled, barely able to hear over my frantic heartbeat.

Harvest mumbled some words. “Sand . . . soft . . . wet? They’re headed for the shore.”

She was right. Off the streets, some three hundred meters away from the timber sheds, a dirty path ran down a slope toward a small strip of sand.

I threw myself forward at full speed, sticking to the cover of the sheds. The bastards planned to escape via boat. Like hell I’d let them.

The ground swirled around me. The night sky turned a deep purple, and happy clouds swooped over my face. A black rabbit slid out of the side of a shed.

No. I knew this sensation. I'd felt something similar before . . .

The rabbit smiled. “Well, that took longer than expected. What the hell are those masks, fam? Way better than anything the organization created. The CAH sure doesn’t joke around.”

I hit the ground, losing control of my limbs. Mud squelched around my torso.

“You’re pretty relentless, aren’t you?” Rabbit drawled, leaning over me. “You could have stayed back at the sawmill and avoided all this trouble.” She ripped the respirator from my face. “I am so sorry, Fingers.”