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Vic’s lower right hand flicked the triple-barrelled shotgun open. His lower left hand snatched the lizard-made power disc from its clip in the small of his back and threw it in a wide arc, transmitting target data from both himself and his P-sat. His lower left hand then slid three rounds into the shotgun. As he did this, he leaned forward and used power-assisted metal to dig his two upper arms into right twin’s flesh.

Right twin screamed as bladed fingers pushed through armour and into flesh. Vic straightened up and threw his opponent into the air. Then the bloodied hands on his upper limbs drew both his double-barrelled laser pistols. With rapid disciplined thoughts he neunonically transmitted orders to fire to the semi-automatic pistols. Right twin’s energy dissipation grid lit up, turning him into a red neon silhouette flying through the air.

Vic’s energy dissipation grid lit up as he started taking fire from one of the P-sats. Keeping one pistol on the twin, he moved the other to fire at the P-sat.

Despite his ruined face, left twin was trying to bring a short-barrelled disc gun to bear. Vic’s lower right hand snapped the shotgun pistol closed. His abdomen rotated slightly for a better shot and he fired. The three rounds left the barrels of the shotgun pistol. The sabots fell away and the miniature ramjets on the micro-missiles ignited.

Left twin got off a wild shot from the disc gun. A few of the discs hit Vic’s arm – he felt them beat armour and damage flesh and internal components. The force spun him round.

The micro-missiles from Vic’s shotgun caught left twin in the chest. Their armour-piercing heads penetrated the man-plus’s armour. The glow of their jet engines momentarily illuminated his chest cavity before exploding. It was little more than wet meat and muscle enhancement that fell to the cold hard marble.

Scab’s metalforma blade had widened enough to sever the Rakshasa’s neck and Jide’s head fell off. Scab reached behind him and caught the falling metalforma blade as it was retracting back to its normal size. The feline’s head bounced off the marble as the body toppled forward.

Scab backed away, trying to keep the wounded and angry berserker between him and the half-and-half. The berserker’s smart sickles flew out at him, the black blades moving like liquid as they reached for his flesh to cut him open. The lizard’s attacks were half overwhelming ferocity and half hard-wired randomised routines designed to make it difficult for opponents to predict them. The lizard was shredding Scab’s coat; blood had been drawn and dripped, smoking, to the cold marble. Scab drove the metalforma blade up into one of the lizard’s arms and then the other. Each time he neunonically instructed the blade to branch out to cause the maximum amount of damage, to render the limb useless. The berserker didn’t feel it. The half-and-half continued trying to circle around behind Scab.

While fighting for his life, Scab reviewed the sensor data from his P-sat. Through the fog of electronic warfare and the red glow of a rapidly overheating energy dissipation grid, it provided him with the wider picture he needed.

There was an explosion in the laser red light show above them. Vic swore as his P-sat exploded. He was firing up into the air at two of the remaining P-sats. Both were returning fire, making the ’sect’s energy dissipation grid glow bright red. Right twin was sitting up again, but Vic was pretty sure his power disc would take care of him. Then his disc changed direction.

Scab hacked the disc and gave it a new target. The flowing black blades of the berserker’s smart sickles opened him up, biting deep. Pain was just another sensation, Scab thought, one that he would have liked to be able to embrace. Getting badly cut doing it, Scab stabbed the metalforma blades up through the berserker’s reptilian maw, the blade branched out, growing inside the berserker’s flesh, hooking into it. Then Scab yanked the blade out, tearing a hole in the flesh of its maw. The berserker didn’t even feel it.

Scab screamed out as twin thermal oscillating blades cut through his armoured clothes, hardened skin and into real flesh and soft-machine augments. The half-and-half had got behind him. Scab’s altered neuro-chemistry and internal narcotics deadened pain, leaving only the strange sensation of the knives moving through his flesh like it was water, and the smell of burning flesh.

Vic’s power disc, which Scab had hacked, cut through both the berserker’s legs. As the lizard tumbled to the floor, Scab jammed the metalforma blade into his neck and then spun, trying to elbow the half-and-half. S/he ducked the elbow, but at least the blades had come out of his flesh now. Scab’s nanite and biotech medical applications tried to cope with the massive internal damage: biological systems shut down as redundant tech ones came online. Scab turned the elbow into a spin, bringing his leg up into a rear turning kick. The half-and-half flipped back out of the way.

Scab threw himself forward into a roll to get out of the way of the crippled berserker’s floor-bound attacks. The berserker continued pulling himself after Scab even as the metalforma knife grew to shovel-head size in his neck.

Another P-sat exploded in the air above them. Scab turned into a strobing neon-red grid as the half-and-half fired burst after burst from a folding laser carbine. Scab rapidly reloaded the spit gun and covered his face with his arm to protect it.

Vic sprinted towards right twin, firing one laser pistol at the man-plus, the other at one of the remaining P-sats. Right twin sat up glowing red as he fired the cut-down disc gun. Discs impacted Vic’s hard-tech armour, some making their way through. The ’sect felt no pain. He was too much machine. He just had the odd sensation of things moving inside him. Each shot sent him staggering, but he continued running forward, firing. The P-sat Vic was firing at exploded. Vic brought both pistols to bear on right twin. At the same time he finished reloading the shotgun pistol with his lower limbs and aimed the triple-barrelled weapon to the left under his outstretched upper arms and fired all three barrels. The sabots fell away as their mini-missile payloads locked on to one of the P-sats. The P-sat tried to flee, using the bridges and stanchions as cover. The micro-missiles’ miniature ram jets ignited. The electronic warfare transmissions from Scab’s P-sat prevented the targeted and locked P-sat from jamming the incoming micro-missile’s guidance systems.

Scab stalked towards the half-and-half, emptying the clip from the spit gun into him/her. The berserker crawled rapidly after him. Penetrator flechettes from the spit gun pierced the half-and-half’s armour and exploded. Those that hit flesh fragmented in the wound. Each fragment was coated in neurotoxin. Not enough to overwhelm the hermaphrodite’s internal systems but enough to keep them busy and slow him/her down.

The battery on the half-and-half’s folding laser carbine ran down as Scab tossed the empty spit gun away with a flourish. The hermaphrodite staggered as s/he tried to cope with the toxins. Scab, still glowing and smoking from the laser fire, leaped high into the air. He hit him/her in the chest with both knees, riding him/her to the ground as he repeatedly struck him/her in the face with sharpened envenomed fingernails. Fingers pierced armour and a combination of trauma and venom killed the half-and-half before s/he hit the ground. The berserker was still crawling towards Scab, reaching for him as the metalforma blade finished growing in the lizard’s neck and its head fell off. The headless corpse slumped to the cold marble.

With bloody fingers, Scab reached into his suit jacket and took out his cigarette case. He removed a cigarette and lit it.