The roar of a shotgun echoed through the room; the guy with the sawn-off was firing. I managed to push away the futures in which I was hit, but only barely. The cone from the second shot was too broad, and I dived behind a crate. The guy pumped the action on the shotgun and started advancing. The one I’d disarmed earlier had retrieved his gun and was circling to my right, aiming left-handed. I lunged out of cover, closing the distance before he could fire, twisting his hand behind his back in a wrist-lock and putting him between me and the shotgun user. The guy with the shotgun hesitated. Pyre didn’t. I shoved the gunman away, letting him take Pyre’s fire blast in the chest, then broke left. The shotgun user didn’t react fast enough: his first blast hit air, he worked the action, then I caught the barrel before he could fire again. I kicked him in the crotch, twisted the shotgun to break his fingers, fired into him at point-blank range.
A kid with dreadlocks who radiated earth magic came rushing for me, fingers hooked. I worked the action on the shotgun, fired into his chest, aimed left, shot another who’d been about to open up with a machine pistol. Another fire blast from Pyre forced me to roll, and I came up to see that the earth magic adept was still standing and glaring at me. I frowned, lowered the shotgun, blasted his legs out from under him.
Another of Onyx’s gang charged me with a shortsword, yelling. I leant away from the first swipe, but couldn’t bring the shotgun to bear; two more were pressing in with a pickaxe handle and a Stanley knife. I pushed the knifer into the club man, giving me a second to focus on the guy with the sword. It was a cheap wakizashi, painted black. I blocked the slash with the barrel of the shotgun, shattering the blade, then hit the guy across the jaw with the shotgun butt. He went down and the knifer tried to get me in the back; I let him catch me, put the shotgun against his body, fired. It was the last shell; I let the shotgun go, moved into the guy with the pickaxe handle, threw him, ripped the club out of his hands as he went down, then pivoted with a full-body swing to bring the handle down on his head with a crack of splintering bone.
The earth adept was up again and swinging. I ducked, hit him in the face with the handle, then slugged him across the jaw. It didn’t seem to do much but piss him off. He swung again and I leant back, took a windup, and hit him in the side of the head.
The pickaxe handle broke. The earth adept shook his head, glaring, then kept coming. I looked at him in annoyance, stepped back from his punch, saw that the guy with the wakizashi was trying to get up, and stamped on the hand with the broken sword, making him yell and drop it. I scooped up the wakizashi, jerked its owner’s head back, cut his throat with the jagged blade, then rose to face the earth adept. He came in with a straight punch and I stepped into the attack, letting his fist brush my hair as I rammed the broken sword through his eye and into his brain.
The earth adept’s death gave Pyre a clear line of fire. I turned and ran, following a curving arc as bolts of flame flashed past, yanking the machete from the body of the dying force adept and bending to scoop up a handgun. Another adept blocked my path, this one carrying a longsword that blazed with fire. I leant away from his strike, cut his arm, then had to jump aside from another of Pyre’s bolts, snapping off a shot as I did. Pyre’s shield flared red, sparks flashing as he deflected the bullet. Before he could recover, I was on him.
I pressured Pyre, machete in my right hand, handgun in my left, trying to find a way through his defences. Pyre backed away, shooting hurriedly aimed blasts. I watched the flow of his movements, studying his shield in my magesight; a weak point appeared and I aimed my gun, trying to force a future where the bullet broke through. At the last second I realised it wasn’t going to work and I had to jump aside, shooting at Pyre’s face to make him flinch. The kinetic component of Pyre’s shield was slipshod, but a bullet didn’t carry enough mass to destabilise it.
The adept with the sword attacked from behind, flames roaring around his blade. I ducked, fired again at Pyre, twisted to dodge the follow-up. Futures opened up and I chose the one I wanted. Pyre aimed a fire blast at the same time that the adept tried a downward slash; I spun aside and Pyre’s spell hit the adept, giving him time for one agonised scream before his head and chest were burnt away. Pyre turned on me, snarling, and I fired my second-to-last bullet to make him miss, then lunged in with the machete held low.
Pyre saw me coming, strengthened his shield, and I picked the future where the weak points aligned. The machete sank into the shield, destabilising it: the shield ruptured in an explosion and a flash of flame, and the machete flew apart into red-hot shards. Pyre stumbled back, his shield renewing itself almost instantly.
Almost, but not quite. I’d already dropped the broken machete and was aiming my gun. Time seemed to slow. I could see Pyre, his face narrowed in concentration as he worked to repair the shield. My finger tightened on the trigger and the bullet left the barrel with a bang. The hole in the shield shrank as the bullet flew; I found the future I wanted, pushed, and the bullet threaded the needle, reaching Pyre’s body just as the shield closed behind it.
A hole opened up under Pyre’s ribcage. He staggered, coughed, threw up a wall of flame that forced me to jump back. “Kill him!” he shouted.
The last half dozen thugs were between me and Onyx. They hesitated.
Pyre spat blood, glared at them. “Get in there or you’re dead!”
The three at the front looked at each other, then charged.
I was getting faster with the fateweaver the more I used it, and I had all three categorised before they’d taken their second step. An adept with curved claws growing from his fingers, an illusionist with a butterfly knife, a normal with a hatchet. By the time the claw user slashed and missed, I had one of their deaths plotted and was setting up the second and third. It felt so inevitable that I almost couldn’t understand why they were still coming.
I drove the claw adept back with a kick to the stomach. The hatchet user came in from behind as the illusionist engaged me from the front, butterfly knife whirling. The illusion he was using was a displacement trick, appearing a few feet from where he actually was; it might have worked on someone who couldn’t see the future. The visible knife passed harmlessly through my chest as I caught his arm and spun him, choosing the future in which the hatchet user’s swing met his. The illusionist screamed as the hatchet sank into his back; the hatchet user let go of his weapon and backed away wide-eyed. I hit the illusionist in the throat, reached past him as he fell to yank the hatchet out, and turned to meet the claw adept’s rush.
The remaining guy with an AK-47 was aiming it at me: he’d reloaded but now the claw adept was between us. “Get out of the way!” he shouted. “Let me shoot!”
The claw adept was tunnel-visioning on me and didn’t react. He attacked, and I pulled my stomach away from a swipe that would have spilled my guts out. I slashed at him but the hatchet was clumsy; he dodged and the future I was trying for wisped away.
“Get down!” the guy with the AK shouted. “Let me—!”
The claw adept’s and the AK user’s heads came in line and I threw the hatchet, the weapon spinning through the air with an eerie whickering. The claw adept had enough time to dodge. The AK user didn’t. The blade sank into his head with a thunk as the claw user charged, and the now-hatchetless thug tried to grab me from behind. I spun him around, let the claws go through his stomach, then while the adept was still struggling to pull his claws free, I hit him in the gut, then again on the back of the neck. He went down and I grabbed the illusionist’s butterfly knife and rammed it into him, stabbing over and over as he struggled to rise.