The Jotnar guards screamed with surprise when I bit the man’s head off.
Then everything turned to a storm of screams, blue energy bullets, and blood.
The room was set up like a long classroom, with thirty terminal stations in six rows of five facing a large screen at the front of the room. My mad sprint through the door had taken me all the way to the far side of the room, and I had killed the three guards that were closest to the other exit door. In some ways that was good because they would have to get through me to leave. It was also bad though, since I was now cut off from my wives, and the twenty-one other guards in the room were pulling out their pistols and shooting at me.
I dove back under the closest terminal desk as the energy bullets poured over me like a tidal wave. I felt something hit my shoulder, but it seemed like my aegis had deflected the hit, and I didn’t feel any pain.
My rifle was too long to twist around while I was trying to squeeze under the terminal and take cover from both sides, so I dropped it to my side and pulled both of my revolvers out. As soon as they were in my hand, an armored Jotnar asshole tried to pull a move like I would have done, and leapt over the closest terminal as he aimed his pistol down at me.
I was already looking in that direction, and the golden revolver in my left hand was ready. My finger feathered the trigger, and the flame that came out of the barrel burnt a hole on the chest of his armor before the bullet blew it apart. His body separated into two pieces as he flew through the air, and blood rained down on me as I twisted my silver revolver to my right so I could cover the door where my women were trying to come through.
Aasne and Elana charged through first. The taller woman darted to my left as her long-barreled rifle slowly spat blue bullets, and the freckled woman dove to my right with her rifle spraying in wide arcs like a machine gun. A guard jumped up from behind one of the terminals and tried to shoot Elana from the side she wasn’t covering, but the thumb-sized bullet from my silver revolver hit him in the upper shoulder, and both of his arms exploded from his chest.
A wave of red fire poured through the room a moment before Eve entered. A chorus of screams arose as the guards closest to the door dropped to their knees and tried to pat their armor down, but then Juliette’s large black revolver barked, and each of them were opened like a can of tuna being smashed with a pick axe.
I turned to the far side of the room where Elana was and saw that she was trying to take a position in the corner so that she would have a bit of space. She raised her rifle up to her face and squeezed off a shot which took down a Jotnar on the other side of the terminal row, but then two more leaned up from their cover and aimed their pistols at her. Elana ducked down just as they shot, and their pulse bullets passed over her head, but then both of my revolvers shouted with the rage of Thor, and their backs caved in and exploded out of their chests.
Another fucker jumped over the terminal where I was crouched and landed on top of me. This guy was about as big as I was in human form, and he made his strength apparent when he tried to hold on to both of my arms. Unfortunately for him, my weretiger shape gave me herculean strength, and I yanked my arms free before slamming my gold revolver into the maw of his wolf-helmet.
Then I pulled the trigger and sent his teeth and armor through his brain like an asteroid through a glass window.
I twisted my revolvers in my grip so they rested in the palms of my hands and then lifted the corpse of the man I had just killed up over my head like I was lifting a dumbbell. He probably weighed a hundred and twenty kilograms with his armor engaged, but he might as well of weighed as much as a pillow. I tossed his body two rows over, and the three guards taking cover there were buried under his mass when he landed on top of them.
A pulse bullet hit me in the back, but it splashed off as if it was being shot by a child’s water pistol. I didn’t even see who had shot it, I was too focused on the three men I had just occupied with the corpse, and I slammed my boot on top of the terminal behind which I was hiding before I launched myself in the air toward them.
They saw me flying toward them, but there was nothing they could do, they just stared at me through the glowing eyes of their wolf-helmets as my pistols issued their thunderous death warrants.
My shoulder slammed into one of the terminals when I landed, and the thing cracked in half like a block of ice. Another fucker was taking cover behind the device, and he got a shot off with his pistol before I could aim at him. His shot missed my face by a dozen centimeters, but my shot was true, and his face caved in like a smashed tomato.
Then there were no more gunshots, and I spun around the room to assess the results.
“Everyone okay?” I growled.
“Good,” Elana said from her position on the other corner of the room. Her aegis was up now, and the stripes on the silvery metal were a dark yellow color while her helmet looked like a snarling tiger.
“Fine,” Aasne said as she fired off a shot, and I turned to find her on the other side of the room pointing her rifle at a fallen Jotnar. Her armor was actually a bit bulkier looking than Elana’s and the stripes on the metal surfaces were a deep burgundy color. Her helmet looked like a tiger with a closed maw and an intense glare.
I turned toward the door we had come through. Eve’s armor was as black as the void of space, and the red stripes on her aegis streaked across the metal and ended with sharp bladed points. She didn’t have her helmet up, and her long hair blended in with her armor almost as if they were made of the same material. She smiled at me, and I turned to look at the doorway we had just entered.
Eve, Zea, and Kasta held their rifles, but the three blonde women were leaning out around the corner so that they had some cover. They all had their armor and helmets on, and Paula’s silvery armor had blue streaks that matched Kastas, but her helmet looked like a smoothed out organic version of her sister’s sharp robot helm.
Zea’s armor was black like Eve’s, but the stripes were a bright green neon color that seemed to pulse in the lights of the security room. Her helmet looked like a tiger with its ears back as if it was trying to be coy and sneak up on prey.
“I’m fine,” Juliette laughed as she broke open the cylinder of her massive black revolver and reloaded. “You all sure do like the direct approach, huh?”
“It works,” I said as I quickly followed her example and reloaded my own pistols.
“So when do I get my fancy cat armor?” Juliette said as she holstered her weapon and gestured at Eve.
“You have to go camping for two weeks,” Zea said as they moved the rest of the way into the security room.
“Camping?” Juliette asked with confusion, but before the hacker could clarify, Layalina stepped into the room and cleared her throat.
“Well, that answers the question,” she said.
“What question?” Aasne growled as she stepped toward the tattooed woman.
“The question about your capabilities,” Layalina said as she raised her palms up toward the burgundy stripped woman. “You are all capable. You might even be able to kill Uffe.”
“I think it is time for you to start talking, Layalina.” I closed the cylinder of my silver revolver with a loud click and then held it in my hands instead of holstering it.
The woman’s red eyes drifted down to my weapon, and then she glanced up at my helmet. “I heard that the Vaish king could change into a monster, but I did not get a close look as I ran into this room. Are you human under that armor? Or are you some sort of monster?”
“I’m definitely a monster,” I growled. “Now start talking.”