Memento Mori

1.10 - SYZYGY

"Hands off the toothpick," I snarl. "Get against the wall."

I don't know what I look on the outside by this point, and my mind isn't slowing down enough for me to think about it. Deranged is my best guess. Hopefully something that screams 'I will shoot you at the slightest provocation'. That and the gun are enough to make him start obeying until three men shout loudly from the corridor behind me, weapons priming. The thug twists away from the gun and tries to finish his arcana, ducking low under the barrel. I sidestep and trip him in the same motion, pop two electrolytic rounds into the side of his neck as he falls, then dive into a connecting hallway as a spray of slugs punches through his body.

Chased by shouts, I hobble back into a sprint, magdumping all ten of my remaining rounds back over my shoulder. Someone screams and starts pissing themselves. I tear my attention back to the front as I reload. The superheated ammo cylinder bounces between my legs, dripping onto the carpet. I thumb in the next and spin it into place with one hand.

Ragged breathing pushes me to an adrenaline-crazed pace. Bullets zing off the walls and chew into the carpet inches away as more enforcers join the chase. Security cameras swivel and blink malevolent red eyes as they track my progress. Gas-powered tripnets clatter off ridiculously expensive, gold-plated furniture. They're aiming for my legs. Shit. I've seen what Dynasty does to the girls they catch. A shot to the head would be a blessing in comparison.

Intersection up ahead, brighter lighting, confused conversations and curious questions drifting around the corner. A stray shot rips off a tuft of red-orange hair as I swing left at the intersection and run straight into a cluster of half-naked women clinging to some tight-shirt executive and two of his private guards. I bowl through them like a ram, whipping the hilt of my revolver into the exec's forehead before shutting down his Ki Fighter before she can so much as summon a basic aura. She hits the floor in a jittering mess of limbs, followed by the second guard a moment later. But one of the girls gets me with a ringknife when I tumble by. The blade punches into the cutout side of my bodysuit, nicking a rib. I curse and nail her with a shot as I flip back to my feet and keep going, momentum unstopped.

Panicked screams and furious shouts swell in my wake. Even with the Shatter's insanity overriding my nerves, I can't run any faster, and I'm already not fast enough. I still have no idea where I am. Somewhere expensive, too deep to find a way out. Like Sarah, I can feel the water rising, clawing at my mouth. Hyperventilating, knowing my life is measured in heartbeats that are running out far too fast. Dynasty was slow on the draw, but now that they know where I am, every enforcer they have pulling boring guard duty in the heart of the Orange is leaping at the chance for action.

Some small part of me dies to dread as it finally starts to hit through the insanity of the Shatter. There's no escaping this. I'm going to die here. They're going to catch me, fuck me till I'm bleeding out of every hole, then butcher whatever's left and ship the pieces back to the streets as a warning. That knowledge is the only thing that keeps me running. I won't be a victim again.

Duelists with polished blades come sprinting out of side corridors to try and cut me down. Martial Artists stage roadblocks at the intersections. Elementals weave fire from the archaic paper lanterns and wield the metal of the corridors themselves against me, forming walls and barricades to block my progress. One casts a cone of lightning straight at me. I duck it at the last instant. Hairs raise across my shoulder before the cone screeches onwards and fries a brawler who just dove into the hall behind. New bullet holes leak ragged streaks of red down my calves. My side is wet and sticky with blood from that girl with the ringknife, pumping more with every jagged step I take. I'm dodging more encounters than I'm fighting. And they're content to let me lose myself in the maze. Harrying me, corralling me like a wild horse into the richest parts of the block. Blood-red carpets underfoot. Gold trim. Exotic lanterns and darkoak paneling. Richly dressed people behind the open doors I sprint past. Lethal bullets slap and smash through glass walls that look out over the beating heart of the Orange's brothels and clubs, chasing my frightened reflection. I don't even know I've started responding in kind until I aim over my shoulder, find a target through the whipping braid of hair, squeeze the trigger, and someone's knee explodes in the distance. There's a sick, paracausal disconnect to it.