Kevin activated RTD.

  The world stretched like warm taffy, sound compressing into deep, distant vibrations that barely registered. The red bar in his vision began to drain as reality bent around his enhanced perception. Jan seemed frozen in the act of firing, his face locked in a rictus of concentration, finger moving with glacial slowness against the trigger mechanism. The rocket began to emerge from the launcher's tube, propellant gases expanding behind it in a slowly blooming cloud that refracted the reddish sunlight into prismatic patterns.

  Kevin drew both pistols in a single smooth motion, the energy weapon in his right hand, the makeshift ballistic pistol in his left. He tracked the rocket's lazy arc through the air, calculating its trajectory with mathematical certainty. The crude explosive device tumbled slightly, its stabilizing fins not yet fully deployed, making it vulnerable to interception.

  With absolute confidence, Kevin aimed the energy pistol and squeezed the trigger. The blue-white bolt left the barrel at normal speed relative to his perception, crossing the distance to the rocket in what seemed like slow motion. He watched the energy discharge intersect with the rocket's warhead, molecules exciting on contact, heat building exponentially as the projectile's unstable payload reacted to the sudden energy surge.

  The explosion blossomed like a deadly flower unfolding its petals in time-lapse photography. The central core of the blast formed first as a perfectly spherical ball of orange flame that expanded outward with majestic slowness. Next came the pressure wave, distorting the air into visible ripples that pushed debris and dust before it. Finally, the black smoke billowed outward, curling and twisting into elaborate patterns that hung suspended in the thick atmosphere.

  All this Kevin observed in the split-second between heartbeats, his enhanced perception transforming the chaotic violence of combat into an almost beautiful tableau of cause and effect. The red bar continued to drain, now below half capacity, warning him that sustained RTD would soon deplete his reserves completely.

  He released the time dilation, allowing the world to snap back to normal speed. The explosion's roar hit him like a physical blow, the pressure wave washing over him with a heat he could feel through his uniform. Fragments of the rocket casing pinged harmlessly off nearby structures, the warhead having detonated far enough away to pose no threat to the Humvee or its occupants.

  Jan Twotimes stood frozen in shock, the empty launcher still braced against his shoulder, his mouth hanging open in disbelief. Around him, the raiders who had been charging forward were now backing away, eyes wide with fear as they processed what they'd just witnessed. A man shooting a rocket out of the air should have been physically impossible.

  Kevin didn't give them time to recover. He was already moving again, pistol tracking new targets as Duncan brought the Humvee back under control and Val's sniper rifle sought the most dangerous threats. The battle for the raider camp had only just begun, but first blood, and first fear, belonged to them.

  Duncan yanked the wheel again, sending the Humvee on a wide arc away from the immediate threat zone. "We need better position!" she shouted, her eyes scanning for tactical advantages in the broken landscape. Kevin nodded, the adrenaline of combat singing in his veins. Without conscious thought, he began to run alongside the accelerating vehicle, his enhanced muscles propelling him forward at impossible speed. His boots barely touched the ground, each stride covering yards rather than feet, the world around him a blur of motion as he matched the Humvee's pace without effort.

  The raiders scattered, their earlier confidence shattered by the destroyed RPG. Some retreated toward the apartment complex, while others took up defensive positions behind scattered debris and abandoned vehicles. Jan Twotimes disappeared back into the building's shadow, screaming orders that carried across the broken terrain.

  Duncan identified a defensible position about a hundred yards from the camp. It was a collapsed section of highway overpass that would provide both cover and elevation. She brought the Humvee to a skidding halt behind the concrete ruins, the tires kicking up dust that momentarily obscured them from enemy sight lines.

  "Here," she ordered, already unslinging her assault rifle. "Val, get the barrier."

  Cox leaped from the vehicle, her movements seamless and predatory as she yanked a folded portable barricade from the Humvee's rear compartment. The device unfolded with a series of metallic clicks, locking into a waist-high shield of reinforced alloy that would stop most projectiles short of heavy artillery.

  "I'll flank right," Cox said, her ears rotating to track the faint sounds of raiders repositioning. Her tail moved with controlled excitement, the predator in her responding to the hunt. "Give me covering fire in thirty seconds."

  Duncan nodded, already positioning herself behind the barricade, her assault rifle braced against her shoulder. "Kevin, you hit them center. Drive them toward Val."

  No further discussion was needed, for they moved with the lethal synergy of a unit that understood its individual roles in the coming violence. Duncan's rifle hummed with building energy, the power cell glowing blue as it cycled to maximum output.

  "Go," Duncan said simply.

  Her weapon erupted in three-round bursts, each bolt of energy finding a target with deadly accuracy. The air filled with the distinctive crackle-hiss of ionized particles and the screams of raiders caught in the open. The energy bolts didn't just damage, they devastated by punching fist-sized holes through torsos, vaporizing limbs, and igniting clothing into sudden flame.

  Cox used the chaos to vanish into the debris field to their right, her form blending with the shadows as she circled behind the raider positions. Kevin caught glimpses of her movement, a flash of black fur here, the glint of her scope there, always advancing, never exposing herself for more than a fraction of a second. She moved the way wolves did in old nature documentaries, with a liquid grace that made human locomotion seem clumsy by comparison.

  Kevin prepared to advance straight into the raider defenses. Duncan's fire had pinned many down, but at least a dozen remained active threats, returning fire with a mixture of energy weapons and crude ballistics. A bullet ricocheted off the barricade inches from Duncan's face, but she didn't flinch, her next burst catching the shooter in the chest and throwing him backward in a spray of blood.

  As Kevin tensed to sprint forward, AIDA's voice materialized in his mind, cool and analytical against the hot chaos of battle.

  You have quickly begun to acclimate to using RTD and Redz40 in your system, the AI observed. I have ran background data and you can certainly use it to supercharge your physical attributes as well as heal wounds of yourself and others. Try tapping into RTD and focus on the muscles in your body.

  Kevin frowned, momentarily confused. "In the middle of combat?"

  Perfect time for experimentation, AIDA replied with her particular brand of clinical detachment. Your adaptability under stress is optimal.

  Kevin had no time to argue. Two raiders had spotted him and were advancing with improvised clubs made of metal pipes wrapped in barbed wire. He activated RTD, but this time, instead of using it to slow his perception, he focused on his musculature as AIDA suggested. He visualized the energy flowing not just into his brain but into his legs, arms, and core.

  The effect was immediate and extraordinary. Power surged through him, his muscles responding with an intensity beyond anything he'd experienced before. The red bar depleted faster, but the payoff was undeniable. When he pushed off to sprint forward, the world didn't just slow, it blurred completely around him. His speed doubled, then tripled. He wasn't just running, he was flying across the ground, covering the hundred yards to the raiders in less than a second.

  The sensation was intoxicating, terrifying, and disorienting all at once. He moved so quickly that his brain struggled to process the visual input, everything smearing into streaks of color and light. He rocketed past his intended targets, overshooting by twenty yards before he could adjust to the new velocity.

  He pivoted hard, boots skidding on broken concrete as he fought to control his momentum. The raiders turned in confusion, unable to track his movement with their normal human perception. He was just a blur to them, there and gone and there again before they could raise their weapons.

  But his inexperience with this level of enhancement cost him. As he decelerated, a raider with a wooden baseball bat, its barrel studded with rusty nails, connected with Kevin's face in what could only be described as blind luck. The impact was jarring, splinters cutting his cheek and forehead as the bat shattered against his enhanced bone structure. Blood trickled down his face, the wounds already beginning to close thanks to his accelerated healing.

  Still, the blow staggered him, momentarily disrupting his concentration. He released RTD reflexively, the world snapping back to normal speed as he regained his footing. The raider who had struck him stared in horror at the remains of his weapon, unable to understand how a human face had destroyed solid wood rather than the other way around.

  Before Kevin could re-engage, movement to his left drew his attention. A female raider stepped from behind a concrete pillar, her neck pulsing with glowing red veins that mapped the heavy Redz40 concentration in her system. Her jaw unhinged like a snake's, stretching to impossible proportions as her throat bulged. Kevin recognized the threat too late, a Redz mutation he hadn't encountered before.

  The woman belched a stream of yellowish liquid that arced through the air toward him. Kevin reactivated RTD, time slowing just enough for him to roll away from the trajectory. The acid splashed against the concrete where he had stood a millisecond earlier, instantly hissing and bubbling as it ate through the surface, melting a six-inch depression in solid stone.

  Coming out of his roll, Kevin drew his energy pistol and fired in a rapid burst. The bolt caught the acid-spitter directly between her eyes, the energy discharge converting her frontal lobe to superheated plasma that exploded outward from the exit wound. Her body crumpled in on itself, the red veins along her neck pulsing once more before fading to dull gray.

  In his peripheral vision, Kevin caught glimpses of Cox's deadly progress through the raider ranks. She had flanked as planned, appearing behind two raiders who never saw her coming. Her energy pistol discharged twice in rapid succession, the shots so exact they entered the base of each man's skull and severed the brain stem without exiting. They dropped like puppets with cut strings, dead before they hit the ground.

  Kevin turned toward the next threat, his enhanced senses already mapping the battlefield, identifying priority targets as the three-pronged assault began to collapse the raider defenses from all sides.

  The raiders found themselves caught in a perfectly executed trap. Duncan's assault rifle continued its deadly rhythm from the barricade, pinning down those who tried to retreat. Cox materialized from their flank like a ghost, her ears pinned flat against her skull as she picked off stragglers with methodical skill. And through the middle came Kevin, his enhanced strength and speed making him seem like a force of nature rather than a man. Bodies dropped in his wake, blood painting the cracked concrete in crimson splashes as energy bolts and his blade found their targets.

  A raider with a crude flamethrower stepped into Kevin's path, the pilot light flickering as he squeezed the trigger. Kevin activated RTD just long enough to slip past the initial gout of flame, then drove his combat knife up through the man's jaw into his brain. Another raider fired an energy pistol wildly, the shots going wide as panic overtook training. Kevin didn't bother with RTD this time, a standard combat roll brought him within striking distance, his machete separating the woman's hand from her wrist before reversing to open her throat in a spray of arterial blood.

  "Six o'clock!" Cox called from somewhere to his right.

  Kevin pivoted, dropping to one knee as an energy bolt passed through the space his head had occupied a split second earlier. The raider who had fired it, a tall man with radiation burns covering half his face, was already lining up another shot when Cox's sniper round caught him in the temple. The man's head snapped sideways, a fist-sized exit wound erupting from the opposite side as his body crumpled to the ground.

  In less than five minutes, it was over. The coordinated assault had decimated the raiders' ranks, leaving the survivors huddled behind an overturned cargo container, their will to fight evaporating as they watched their comrades fall. One by one, they tossed their weapons onto the blood-soaked ground.

  "Don't shoot!" called a male voice, cracking with fear. "We surrender!"

  Kevin assessed the immediate environment, looking for materials to secure the prisoners. A partially collapsed wall section caught his attention, concrete with exposed rebar jutting from the broken edges. He approached it, wrapping his hand around a three-foot length of steel rod. With his enhanced strength, he tore it free from the concrete in a shower of dust and pebbles. The rebar bent easily in his grasp as he shaped it into crude but effective restraints.

  One by one, he secured the raiders, wrapping the metal around wrists and ankles before driving the ends into the ground with enough force to embed them six inches deep in the hardened earth. When he finished, all four were effectively pinned in place, unable to move more than a few inches in any direction.

  "Clear!" Duncan called from her position, having completed a thorough scan of their surroundings. "No movement inside the building."

  Kevin straightened, wiping blood from his machete onto a dead raider's shirt. "Let's check the interior. And find Jan Twotimes."

  They entered the apartment complex with tactical care, Duncan taking point, Cox covering their six, Kevin scanning for threats with his enhanced vision. The building's interior was a warren of makeshift barriers, sleeping areas, and improvised workshops where the raiders had maintained their weapons and gear.

  In what had once been the building's courtyard, they found the slaves.

  "Jesus Christ," Cox whispered, her ears pressing against her skull in distress.

  Dozens of people, men, women, children, were confined in crude pens constructed from chain-link fencing and barbed wire. Their bodies were emaciated beyond recognition as human, ribs and hip bones protruding through filthy, tattered clothing. Many bore marks of systematic torture, such as burn scars, missing digits, or eyes swollen shut from repeated beatings.

  Kevin felt something cold and hard form in his chest. It was a crystallized fury that transcended the heat of combat rage. This wasn't the necessary violence of war; this was cruelty for its own sake. He turned on his heel and strode deeper into the complex, his focus narrowing to a single objective.

  He found the door at the back of the ground floor, locked and reinforced with scrap metal. With a surge of enhanced strength, Kevin kicked it open, the hinges screaming as they tore from the frame.

  Inside, a small man scrambled backward into a corner, knocking over a cot. It was Jan Twotimes, his face pale, eyes darting frantically around the room for an exit that didn't exist. He clutched a small energy pistol but his hands shook so badly he nearly dropped it.

  "Don't kill me! Don't kill me!" Jan shrieked, pressing himself against the wall.

  Kevin crossed the room in two strides, knocking the pistol from Jan's hand with a casual backhand swipe. He grabbed the lieutenant by his collar and hauled him to his feet, slamming him against the concrete wall.

  "Jan Twotimes," Kevin said, his voice dangerously calm. "We need to talk."

  "I'll tell you anything! Anything!" Jan babbled, spittle flying from his lips. "Just don't kill me! Just don't kill me!"

  Duncan and Cox entered the room, weapons lowered but ready. Duncan stepped forward, her expression hard.

  "Start talking," she ordered. "What are you doing here?"

  "We're part of the Waste Mob! The Waste Mob!" Jan stammered. "Just a small section. After the Gulf Confederacy fell, we decided to move up north to DC and Virginia for easy marks."

  "The Gulf Confederacy fell?" Kevin pressed, tightening his grip on Jan's collar.

  "Civil war! Civil war!" Jan nodded frantically. "The eastern groups are fighting the western ones. Resources are gone. It's chaos down there. Chaos!"

  "And who is leading this push north?" Duncan asked.

  "Big Boss Krag! Big Boss Krag!" Jan's eyes widened in terror at the name. "She's gonna sack that little shithole you call Fairville and turn you all into slaves. She'll be coming through here in less than a few months. Less than a few months!"

  Kevin exchanged a look with Duncan. This confirmed the young slave's intel. A warlord named Krag mobilizing forces that would make the Bloodbath's group look like a scouting party.

  "Is that all?" Kevin asked, leaning closer. "Is that all?"

  "Yes! Yes! I swear! I swear!" Jan sobbed.

  Kevin nodded slowly. He produced a set of plastic flex-cuffs from his belt and spun Jan around, securing his hands behind his back.

  "You're coming with us," Kevin said, hauling Jan toward the door. "Fort DC intelligence will want to hear this. Twice."

  They marched him out past the slave pens where the survivors watched with dull, hopeless stares, too broken to even register that their captors had been defeated. Kevin's expression hardened as he surveyed the human suffering before him. These people needed immediate medical attention. And beyond that, Fairville needed to prepare for the storm that was coming.

  The Gulf Confederacy was in collapse. Thousands of raiders were moving north. The world had ended one hundred and fifty years ago, but this war, his war, was just beginning.

  Chapter thirteen

  LIFE AND DEATH

  The liberation became a grim inventory of human suffering. Kevin moved through the makeshift pens, cutting chains with methodical care, his enhanced strength snapping iron collars that had bound necks raw with infection. Some captives flinched away from his touch. Others stared with hollow eyes that registered neither hope nor fear. A few, the recently captured, wept as comprehension dawned that their nightmare had ended. Most just waited, conditioned by months or years of captivity to expect that any change, even rescue, would bring fresh pain.