An emotion hit me, not my own or one of these two women’s, but somewhere, nearby. I sensed what Cheri was going after—a woman. Not fear, not anger… curiosity?

  “Don’t attack,” I said, and moved up close to Cheri, my currently out of control mind unable to ignore the way she was crouching and how it made her ass stick out so sexily. “Where?”

  She pointed, and I looked around the corner to see the face of an attractive woman staring at me. This woman wore a revealing vest held together with mesh, tight camo shorts, and had the left side of her hair shaved in a way that made the blonde hair hanging over to the other side seem more special. There was something familiar about her, like we’d met before, but I couldn’t quite place it.

  “Don’t move,” she said, stepping out, guard rifle aimed right at us. Lying at her feet was a corpse, but not that of a guard. It was a large man who, judging by the piece of metal pipe covered in blood next to his caved-in skull, had been beaten to death with it.

  I still didn’t sense aggression, so stepped forward, putting my weapons away. With my quick draw, it wasn’t like I was at a huge disadvantage anyway.

  “You’re not with the rest of them?” I asked.

  She shook her head. “Judging by your conversation, neither are you.”

  How much had she heard? That was potentially—no, it was definitely—embarrassing. “We...” I tried to think of what to say.

  “Hey, no judgment in that regard,” she said with a nod to Cheri. “I’ve had my share of fun, believe me. But…” She saw Erupa for the first time now, and her eyes went wide. “Sorry, I just… I’ve heard about others like you, but never seen…”

  “A freak?” Erupa said.

  “No, sorry. Sorry.” The woman lowered her gun, and then stepped forward, sticking out her hand for me to shake. “I’m Letha, from Earth.”

  I shook her hand, introduced myself and Erupa, then Cheri. “Huh, Letha, Cheri… I hope this doesn’t get confusing.”

  “You let it confuse you, I’ll smack you upside your head,” Cheri said with a laugh. “So, sugar tits, who’re you?”

  “Sugar…?” Letha chuckled. “I missed this kind of weirdness. I was a prisoner here, but am on the way out. Truth be told, and since I have no idea which side you’re on—fight me if an enemy, help me if not—I was on my way to take out some corporation sons of bitches. Highly involved in the overthrow of my family and stealing some of my most precious memories. I mean to have my revenge.”

  “Revenge against the corporations isn’t bad,” Cheri said with a shrug.

  Letha nodded, looking us over, and then said, “But I just need out of here. No offense, Ezra, you’re hot as fuck and all that, but I’ve had enough of these scenarios to last a lifetime. No dick, no pussy… just revenge. Can you all help with that?”

  I blinked, confused, and then it hit me. “Oh, shit. Letha? As in… didn’t you ascend from Planet Kill?”

  “What?” Erupa asked, and Cheri looked equally confused.

  “Some show they get here,” I said. “Caught a few streams while I was dropping off inmates from time to time. Not my cup of tea, killing and fucking and all, but this lady here was a bit of a celebrity.”

  Letha nodded. “Had my own harem, ascended… and then killed some important people. Tried to kill more, and ended up here.”

  “So she’s legit?” Erupa asked.

  “I’d guess so,” I replied. Glancing around, I said, “Are we in trouble here? What about Muerta?”

  She shrugged. “Should be fine for a bit. Saw a group of them going off to a fight. As for Muerta, she ran into some trouble and took off, chased by this group of supers, one with a tail and ears. I wasn’t sure if it was a costume or for real, but now…” She faced Erupa. “…seeing you…”

  “So we don’t need to kill her, or at least, not unless she returns after having killed that other team.”

  “But there are still those loyal to her, those who—”

  “DOWN!” Cheri shouted, tackling me as a strange sound hit the air and a second later…

  KA-BOOM! The walls a few cells over blew inward, stone flying our way, and Letha took a strike to the shoulder that knocked her sideways. She recovered and then was up and shouting for us to get back as she charged toward the opening in the wall, shooting at some enemy she apparently saw out there.

  Us get back? She clearly had no idea who we were. Cheri was the first up, then Erupa and they were both firing now, but then Cheri flung herself out through the gap!

  “Holy shit,” I muttered, running to the opening to see another blast coming our way from what was a sort of makeshift cannon the enemy seemed to have constructed out of various loot crate items.

  I guessed that Orion Corp. had seen me out there fighting against the very same people who had proclaimed to be after Muerta’s head, and now they were pissed. That also meant going on from here was going to be more of a challenge, and that if I didn’t play my cards right, they might come after me directly instead of trying to have me taken out for their live event.

  Which meant I needed to become a ‘fan favorite’ at least for a few minutes, so there’d be outrage if there was any outside interference.

  Cheri had rolled and taken cover behind a half-wall, sword in hand but no guns—which pissed me off. If she could make the fall, you can bet your ass I could too.

  “You all coming?” I asked and then ran out, drawing as I did and shooting out the main cannon operator and hitting the shoulder of the guy to his left, then leaping to join Cheri.

  She turned to see me coming and let out a “Woohooo!” and, emboldened by my decision, charged out from her cover to go take on the enemy. Since the cannon shooter was down and the other guy injured, that gave her a window as the enemy was working to get their fancy weapon back in place.

  I hit hard but rolled into it as I’d practiced numerous times back in my training at the temple. There was something else at work in my landing though, as it seemed to go much smoother than I’d anticipated. When I was up, I remembered leveling up and wondered if somehow that had something to do with it. No time to check now, though. The two ladies above were on their way down, lowering themselves instead of jumping, and I needed to provide cover fire for them as well as for Cheri.

  Sure enough, a new operator was at the cannon and they had it aimed in at Cheri. It would tear a fucking hole in her, and that would certainly ruin my day. So this time I aimed from a still position, letting my full instinct take over, and shot. The bullet went true, straight in through the end of the cannon, blowing them the fuck up.

  It was a nice fireworks show, metal exploding and flames erupting, then the three enemy fighters running about on fire. What made it more dazzling was when Cheri was in among them, slashing and thrusting, separating a head here and gutting another there, and then her teddy bear caught fire and it was swinging around like she was putting on a fire show.

  Cheri being Cheri, the moment she saw this she fell to the ground, snuffing out the fire on her bear and screaming, “Man down! Man down!”

  It was a fucking teddy bear, but I cared for her so the first thing I did when reaching her side was kneel, check on the bear—only half-singed—and tell her the bear was going to make it.

  She smiled amid tears, and then we were up together charging into the enemy once more.

  A few had seen what we’d just done and retreated to regroup, but just then another group arrived, staring in confusion from the original group to us. Making up their minds, they charged us. These guys didn’t have any guns so that meant hand-to-hand, which suited me just fine.

  “This’ll be fun,” Cheri said, voicing my thoughts exactly.

  I stowed my pistol and drew the arc baton, charging in at Cheri’s side. Shots rang out from behind and three of the first line fell, trampled by their companions. Then we were in the mix, Cheri’s sword slashing in one direction, my baton going to work in the other. This was where the adrenaline kicked in, where I started to feel like a true Psychobitch, laughing like a madman as a punch struck me across the ribs and a giant of a man tried to lift me up so he could slam me head-first. I managed to get my baton around and zap him full of electricity, which also hit me, but at least it got me out of his clutch. I recovered before him and came in with a push kick to the face that flattened his nose and sent blood gushing. I turned to my next opponent as Cheri brought her sword down through the area between the man’s shoulder and neck.

  Erupa roared as she charged into the fight, horns taking out a man and claws ripping through another, and then I spun to crack my next foe across the jaw with my baton. The newcomer, Letha, was there, watching us with fascination and curiosity, but smiled at my glance and then stepped in to help out, using her rifle as a weapon to break skulls.

  I saw Cheri get knocked back. A woman had her by the hair, yanking her and dragging her across the ground as a man stepped up with a sledgehammer ready to bring down on her face. Erupa saw it too and did her shadow kill thing, reappearing behind him to yank away his hammer and spin so that when he turned to see what had happened, the hammer crushed his face instead.

  Cheri finally managed to reach up and grab her opponent’s wrists, then kicked up to land her boot in the woman’s face, just as I got there to finish the job with my baton.

  “Next time, feel free to use your pistol,” Erupa said to me.

  Cheri, still recovering, waved off the comment and said, “No, fuck that. Takes away from the excitement.”

  “Speaking of excitement…” I pointed to our new friend, who was going bare-knuckle with a woman and man, all by herself, and doing quite well.

  “I’ll even the odds,” Erupa said, already taking off.

  “They looked even to me,” I said with a chuckle.

  Cheri reached over and took my hand, and I wrapped an arm around her so that we stood there like that, watching them beat the shit out of their opponents.

  “The bear,” she said, looking at me with the most honesty I’d ever seen in those eyes, “it’s not like… I mean, I know she’s not alive.”

  “Yeah?” I was hesitant to go anywhere near this topic.

  She nodded. “But the voices, you know? It’s nice to pretend they come from somewhere, and for me that somewhere is Lilly here.”

  “Lilly,” I said, smiling and wincing as Erupa tore the enemy woman’s neck out as Letha finished off the other. “It’s a nice name.”

  “She picked it.” Cheri ran her finger along the singed part of her bear, then looked up with determination. “Let’s find the rest of them, make them pay.”

  I agreed and helped her up so that we could finish killing everyone.

  80

  As we all charged after the retreating team, Letha told us how she’d one day thought she might be able to live a normal life, to get her revenge and move on, but every step of the way she was learning more about the corporations and what had happened to her. She had become aware that there were more people than she had at first thought behind an attack on her once-wealthy family, that the heads of the corporations were behind it all. In her heart, she knew that it would likely be her end in taking them down.

  “You won’t be doing it alone,” I told her.

  “No?”

  “Ezra here’s a recent convert,” Erupa said. “Used to serve the devil, now he means to destroy Hell itself.”

  “Or die trying,” I said, giving Letha a nod. Maybe I didn’t know the half of what she was going through, but it was my duty to see that others didn’t suffer like she had, or like those we’d seen down below were still suffering.

  “I believe the other team I met is going after them too,” Letha said. “Maybe at this rate, I’ll get there and there will be nobody left to kill.”

  I laughed. “What would you do then?”

  She ran, focusing on her breathing, but looked confused at the question. “Hadn’t thought about it,” she finally said, as we reached another wall that led to a back compound of the asylum. “Maybe I come find you all and see what this world of foxy-eared and blue-skinned horned people is like?”

  Erupa chuckled at that. “Not so many of either type, but you’re welcome anytime. Hopefully we’ll have our shit squared away by then, too.”

  “Problems at home?”

  “More than you would believe.” Erupa turned my way, an eyebrow raised. “And more than he has any idea about.”

  I kept my mouth shut, knowing she was right. Up to now I’d spent all of my energy on my policing work, only to find out it was all a sham. Right now I couldn’t even begin to think about the greater issues in our galaxy. It was all beyond my understanding.

  “Suffice it to say,” Erupa continued, “an outside force has attacked, somehow Orion Corp. might be involved, and last I heard the Citadel—where the main supers hold the defense—has fallen.”

  We stopped now, guns drawn and checking around corners as we moved between smaller buildings of brick and stone.

  “I don’t follow,” Letha admitted. “Supers?”

  “As in, what we are,” Erupa explained. “Many, many years ago colonists went into other galaxies, one being ours—and the sun mutated us, at least we think that’s what did it, giving some of us superpowers.”

  “Holy shit, that’s awesome.” She shrugged. “I mean, I’ve seen a few things here… so that makes sense of it all, actually. But if I went there?”

  Erupa and I shared a glance, both of us confused.

  “You might explode,” Cheri said, grinning, “or suddenly learn to fly and have lasers shooting out of your tits. Who knows.”

  We all laughed at that, though Letha’s laugh was clearly one of confusion and concern. She didn’t get Cheri like we did. Not yet.

  We paused, and I asked. “You’re here by yourself?”

  “No,” Letha said. “At least, I didn’t come by myself. My companions though, I don’t know. I’ve been looking for them since the uprising started, with no luck. I’m starting to get worried.”

  “We had another,” Erupa said, then held her hands about six inches apart, vertically. “About this tall. Little lady, with wings.”

  Letha’s eyes went wide. “No… a super? Others were talking about her, said they saw Orion Corp. workers taking her and a couple of others below ground. I honestly believed they were talking out of their asses.”

  “Afraid not,” Cheri replied, then turned to me. “We have to get her—she’s your responsibility.”

  “As were the others,” Erupa chimed in. “But Flyer, or Tink, a tad more in trouble if her powers aren’t working.”

  “I delivered…” I started in my defense, but the look of horror that came into her eyes and anger in Erupas’s made me back off of that real fast. “…her, so of course I will find her.”

  “We,” Letha said. “If there’s a way to fight Orion Corp., I’m in.”

  “Then it’s settled,” Erupa said. “We take out these fucks here, and then get back down there.”

  “Back?”

  “We might have stumbled across one of their entrances,” I explained, glancing up as I remembered that all of this could be being filmed and recorded.

  As if reading my mind, Letha lowered her voice as she said, “Then we need to get down there, now.”

  “Actually, I agree,” Erupa said. “Just…” She took one of my grenades, and then I saw why. Someone had just peeked over the rooftop of a building nearby, and then there was a flash of a gun. We all took cover as Erupa lobbed the grenade.

  “Where from here?” Letha asked, interrupted by a loud explosion and shouts of pain.

  I turned, trying to get my bearings, and then spotted the location we’d come up through. “Follow me.”

  The four of us ran for the entry point to the tunnels below, only to have layers of light shine down, indicating a beacon that was traveling right along with us above our heads like a big ‘X marks the spot.’ It read BONUS LOOT.

  “That can’t be good,” Letha said, preparing her rifle.

  It definitely wasn’t good because it meant that Orion Corp. certainly was aware of us and our new goal, and that now any fighters not currently engaged in the action would be coming after us. If they failed, there was no doubt in my mind that the corporation itself would come after us.

  “Good?” Cheri countered, “This will be great!”

  “More fun, right?” Erupa asked with a roll of her eyes, and we all pulled up short as a new group of attackers appeared ahead, directly in our path.

  As they started trying to take us out, my shield took a couple more hits but showed up starting at one hundred percent again. That meant it had a recharge function, likely based on time. I was glad for that! We were shooting, clearing a path, and going from cover to cover.

  When we saw that route wasn’t working, we doubled back and found one that took us over to the trees. But to get there, we still had to take out another handful of former inmates and another group that came at us dressed in dark suits of armor, suits that I assume revealed them to be some of the Orion Corp. military trainees.

  Erupa used her shadow technique to appear behind one of them and then tear out her throat, then spun to use her upgraded shadow punch on the next, basically sending this one’s head into a smoldering heap as the brain likely burnt up inside of his skull. Nasty—and no wonder she was Tier Three instead of four like Cheri and me. We were both badasses in our own right and knew how to work it, but the potential in Erupa was intimidating by comparison.

  Her look added to the effect and scared off two more of our opponents, but they didn’t make it far before being dropped by shots from me. Meanwhile, Cheri was in there tearing them down, and Letha had as good a spot to shoot as she could when not worried about friendly fire.

  “Go!” I shouted when we’d made a clearing, and we moved toward the tree line, where the tracker lights had a harder time staying on us.