The cabinet rail crushes against my windpipe, cutting off my air. I instinctively try to swallow, which just makes everything worse. My throat spasms, pressing against unyielding metal.

  "This is how it ends," Shrike rasps, his face inches from mine. "Liberty Belle's mongrel, put down like the dog she is."

  The spike curls from the rail's edge, seeking the gap between my helmet and collar. I squeeze my eyes shut, concentrating through the oxygen deprivation, and force a layer of Instant Armor to form along my neck. The teeth cascade under my skin, creating a white barrier that meets the approaching spike.

  But Shrike just laughs - a wet, gurgling sound - and presses harder. "Doesn't matter. No more tricks."

  He's right. The armor stops the spike, but the rail itself continues to crush my windpipe through the plating. The spike just adds pressure and a lever arm. My vision starts to blur, dark spots dancing at the edges. I claw at his arms, but Hypeman has given him unnatural strength. Or maybe I'm just getting weaker as my oxygen depletes.

  Can't breathe.

  Can't think.

  My blood sense pulses with my fading heartbeat, showing me Shrike's circulatory system in black and white and red - the torn vessels in his nose, the ruptured capillaries in his eyes, the damaged arteries in his chest where my punches landed. But it doesn't matter how much damage I've done if I can't break free.

  Something pings off a nearby spike. Squeaking, squealing, sharp little bullets of glass. If Shrike notices, he isn't saying anything. His eyes are bloodshot, and he's drooling on my helmet like a hungry animal.

  "I told you to stay back," I try to say, but no words come out, just a strangled wheeze.

  The third marble catches Shrike in the shoulder. He jerks, his focus momentarily broken. It's enough. I drive my knee up between us, catching him in the stomach. His grip on the rail loosens just enough for me to drag in a desperate, burning breath.

  "BLINK!" I rasp. "NO!"

  But she can't hear me - or chooses not to. Another marble whistles through the air, this one striking Shrike's cheek, ripping it open where I cut him earlier. A bigger, nastier cut now. Not big enough to put a finger through, but that hardly matters. Blood sprays across my visor. He roars in pain but doesn't release the rail.

  My vision clears just enough to see his face. What I find there chills me more than the lack of oxygen. His eyes have changed - the calculation, the smugness, the performative cruelty all burned away, leaving something primal and terrible. Blood pours from the marble wound at his cheek, and his hair is matted with sweat, slobber, and droplets of blood.

  "Die," he snarls, pushing down again.

  I manage to get one hand between the rail and my throat, wedging my forearm against the crushing pressure. My arm screams in protest, bones grinding against the strain, but it buys me enough space to gasp another breath.

  "You first," I choke out.

  With my free hand, I punch upward, driving my teeth-knuckles into the thinnest fabric I can see and twisting, then raking. My teeth catch and rip out with an agonizing yank, pulled out from my hands from his buttons. For a moment, his weight shifts, and I use that instant to heave myself sideways, rolling out from under him.

  I scramble backward on hands and knees, lungs burning as I gulp air. My throat feels, uh, crushed, each breath a ragged scrape through swollen tissue. Shrike is already recovering, pushing himself up with one hand, the other still clutching the cabinet rail.

  "Running, Bloodhound?" he slurs, blood and saliva dripping from his mouth. "Nowhere to go."

  The air is full of too much noise. Sirens, gunshots, the skinheads chanting something, and I'm almost certain I hear helicopter rotors. I try to look for the DVD - Bulwark, Fury Forge, literally anyone would be great right now. But it's just a black wall surrounding me. I can't tell if it's metal or my vision giving out. In my oxygen-deprived state, I can't remember which way from his forest leads out. My back hits something metal - a spike, thankfully not pointed at me. I use it to pull myself to my feet, wobbling.

  Shrike rises too, swaying slightly. The marble hits left a deep gouge in his cheek, blood streaming down his face, soaking into his collar. His suit is in tatters, stained dark with blood both old and new. He looks half-dead already.

  But he's still coming.

  "Lighthouse," I croak into my comm, "I need--"

  "We're trying to get through the paramedics but someone threw a fucking molotov, Bee! You have to get out of there. I'm trying to reach someone. Anyone," Tasha says, trying not to sound like she's whimpering.

  A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

  Shrike staggers forward, dragging the rail along the ground beside him. Each step seems to cost him, his movements jerky and uncoordinated. But his eyes never leave mine, burning with hateful purpose.

  I back away, trying to create distance, but my heel catches on a spike jutting from the ground. I stumble, nearly falling. When I right myself, Shrike has closed half the distance between us.

  Two more marbles streak past, one missing entirely, the other glancing off Shrike's shoulder. He doesn't even flinch this time, just keeps coming, but he does let out an undignified little grunt.

  I need to move, to run, to get clear of this spike field. But which way? My blood sense should help me navigate, but I can't focus enough to use it properly. Everything is chaos. My entire body hurts, even through the pain meds. What little packing of the wounds that got done is totally useless now. Ripped right open.

  Run. Get away. This isn't a fight. This is a wild animal attacking you. This is a bear in the woods. This is a wolf at night. This is a shark in the water, and you're bleeding, Sam.

  I turn around and try to move. With all the cuts and scrapes and that big gouge in my back, it's the best I can do to shuffle, and it's so hard to keep an eye on Shrike and weave through this nightmare at the same time. I try to look towards the overpass to orient myself, but a black, lightless roof has already formed when I wasn't looking. Only streaks of the city's lights cut through. Arrows in the dark.

  Taking cover from Blink and preventing me from seeing at the same time. I would be more impressed if I wasn't trying to avoid pissing myself.

  Pain explodes in my calf as something catches me from behind. I crash to the ground, the impact driving the breath from my lungs. Looking back, I see the cabinet rail, its spike buried in my leg. Shrike holds the other end, grinning through the blood coating his face.

  "Got you," he wheezes.

  He yanks the rail backward, trying to drag me toward him like a fish on a hook. The spike tears through flesh as it pulls free, sending fresh waves of agony up my leg. I scream, the sound barely audible through my damaged throat.

  I kick with my good leg, connecting with his knee. There's a wet pop, and he stumbles, but doesn't go down. Instead, he swings the rail like a baseball bat, catching me in the ribs as I try to scramble away.

  The impact sends me flying into a cluster of spikes. They scrape along my back and sides, breaking more padding, more bruises through kevlar, leaving fresh cuts across my skin. I land hard, face-first in the dirt, tasting blood and soil.

  Get up. Get up!

  I push myself to my hands and knees, limbs shaking with the effort. My calf throbs where the spike tore through it, blood soaking my boot. My ribs feel like they're on fire. I can't get enough air.

  Shrike limps toward me, dragging his now-useless leg behind him. His knee is clearly dislocated, the joint bent at an unnatural angle. But his grip on the rail hasn't weakened, and his eyes still burn with the same murderous intent. He takes a moment to stomp the ground, forcing his foot between two diagonal spikes, planting himself in place.

  CRACK! Knee's fixed.

  "No where to run," he slurs, blood bubbling between his teeth. "No one to save you."

  I force myself to move, crawling forward on hands and knees like a wounded animal. My blood leaves smears on the dirt, marking my path. Shrike follows, inexorable, unhurried now that I'm reduced to crawling.

  There - a gap in the spike forest, a clear path. I drag myself toward it, ignoring the pain, focusing only on escape. Behind me, Shrike's footsteps grow closer, his breathing louder.

  "The others are next," he calls after me, voice raspier than mine. "Your parents. Your friends. Everyone you've ever touched. I'll scour this planet of Liberty Belle's corruption. But it starts with you. Destroying the name Bloodhound."

  I won't let that happen. I can't. But first, I have to survive.

  The gap leads to a chain-link fence marking the edge of the construction site. Beyond it, I can see police lights, officers with weapons drawn, held back by more of Shrike's spikes erupting from the ground in a makeshift barrier.

  So close, yet impossibly far.

  I reach the fence, fingers curling around the metal links as I pull myself upright. My injured leg buckles under my weight, refusing to support me. I cling to the fence, turning to face Shrike as he approaches.

  He stops a few feet away, swaying on his feet, the cabinet rail hanging loosely from one hand. We stare at each other across the distance, both breathing in ragged gasps, both covered in blood and dirt, both reaching the limits of endurance.

  But there's a difference between us. I'm fighting to live. He's already decided to die, as long as he takes me with him.

  "Nowhere left to run," he says, lifting the rail. "End of the line."

  I press my back against the fence, feeling the links dig into my skin through the tattered remains of my costume. My good leg trembles with the effort of keeping me upright. My calf is a mess of torn muscle and exposed bone. My throat burns with each breath. The fentanyl either hasn't worn off, or it's just too much pain to muffle, leaving me seeing stars just from raw pain. I unclip the muzzle of my helmet and let it fall off just to give me more oxygen to gulp. I need it like I need... oxygen.

  "It's over, Shrike," I manage to say. "Look at yourself. You're dying."

  He laughs, a sound like breaking glass. "So are you."

  "I've had worse." I force the words out. "Give up. Let the paramedics help you."

  "And go back to Daedalus?" He spits blood onto the ground. "I don't think so."

  "Let anyone help you. You don't have to do this," I cough, trying to sound dignified. It comes out as a whimper.

  "I don't have to do anything. I chose this," he gurgles back.

  "I didn't want this," I tell him, my voice barely a whisper.

  "I did," he replies, and lunges.

  His movement is clumsy, hampered by his ruined knee, but there's nowhere for me to go. The rail catches me across the chest, pinning me against the fence. The links rattle and bend but hold, trapping me between metal and metal.

  He leans into me, a frothy mixture of snot, saliva, and blood running down his face. I hear the hiss of slingshotted marbles, the shriek, the impact, and watch as a new cut explodes out of his ear, ripping a chunk out.

  He doesn't even move an inch. His pupils are blown out, and all around us, spikes are beginning to haphazardly grow, reaching for anything, not even bothering to aim. Enclosing us in a metallic cocoon. I don't even know if he's in control of himself anymore.

  I don't even know if I'm in control of myself, either.

  I headbutt him.