Their Property (Four Mercenaries 3)

In a flash of recognition, he saw the tear-streaked face of the girl looking at him from above the fighter’s corpse, her features twisted as if he were having some fucked-up trip.

She dropped to the floor as soon as she saw them, and Pyro leapt over the dead body next to her, his focus a tunnel leading him to the exit. He burst through the swing doors, but when one of them hit something, he didn’t get enough time to break his speed. In slow motion, he saw two rows of white teeth, with a single gold dot at the front, but when he noticed the black muzzle of a handgun aimed straight at him, time stood still.

Boar smashed into the guard at full speed. The bullet sped past Pyro’s ear, but the firearm dropped to the floor when thick arms grabbed the guard’s head and twisted until his neck snapped, as if it were a bottle cap. Pyro half-expected the head to fall off and a fountain of carbonated blood to explode out of the neck.

He picked up the fallen weapon and offered the drain cover to Boar without thinking. The matte glass panel embedded in the door burst, sending sharp fragments all over, and it was their cue to sprint down the corridor. No words were necessary. This was enemy territory, and for all they knew, a whole contingent of armed goons might attack from the back.

The sparsely lit walkway pulsed with each of Pyro’s heartbeats, and no matter what Boar thought about it, he was glad he’d taken coke before the fight, because at this point that was the only thing keeping his brain and body from scattering.

Heat grazed Pyro’s shoulder, and he spun around, his gaze passing over Boar’s bloodstained face and dark irises watching him from the pale background of wide eyes. The other end of the corridor was like a target, and the goons—bullseyes. Vital points on a human-shaped silhouette.

He pulled the trigger of the dead goon’s gun, locked in the state of absolute focus. Fear had no place in his head. He and Boar were invincible.

One. Two. Three. Four head shots. His mouth stretched into a smile when he saw the other men scrambling for shelter like bugs running from a predator. But when he tried to shoot again, the weapon remained dead, and he stared at it with an emptiness in his skull.

Who the fuck came to an event like this with just four bullets?

But he didn’t get to think anymore. Boar pushed him forward, and they both dashed along the curve of the hallway, away from immediate danger.

“I asked you a fucking question, Pyro. My absence was no excuse to go back to this shit again. So I wasn’t there, but you had Clover, and Tank. Hell, even Drake, to help you,” Boar snapped as soon as they changed direction after running into a wall.

“Now? Really?” Pyro growled, his boots squeaking against the laminate floor as he made the rapid turn.

Boar shook his head but said nothing, because the thudding of shoes behind their backs was becoming all too loud. Still, even his silence was an accusation that pierced the balloon of Pyro’s ego. Even now, he was nothing but a disappointment to the man he so desperately wanted to keep happy

“Stop! You’re surrounded!”

It was like a shot of adrenaline straight into the muscles of Pyro’s thighs. Just like that, he was back in high school, racing along the track, one of the fastest despite his short legs. The corridor was the inside of a gun barrel, and he was the first bullet. When something banged all too close behind him, danger propelled him forward, along the bend of the corridor. And that was when he saw it.

A window.

Pyro gave a choked gasp, but as he stepped forward, heart pulsing evenly, he caught a glimpse of movement in the corner of his eye. He didn’t even have to think. Ducking, he shot his arm up and grabbed a thick wrist. His other hand went for the barrel, and he pushed it to the side with so much steam the goon’s finger cracked, broken by his own weapon. Pyro tried to take the firearm, but a huge guy pushed his predecessor over, sending him, and the gun, to the floor. His fat arms grabbed Pyro’s head before he could have stepped back.

The monster’s thick neck went hard when he focused on Pyro, roaring like a madman as his hands squeezed on Pyro’s skull in a vise-like grip. Wheezing for breath, Pyro tried to send his boot into the fucker’s nuts, but the fallen goon wrapped himself around his feet, looking up like a cobra about to deliver its deadly venom.

Panic shot through Pyro’s veins as the grip around his skull became unbearable. Pyro grabbed his opponent’s forearms and pulled, but it was like trying to force steel bars apart. The crushing force created pressure in his head and left little room for thoughts, replacing them with the frantic sense of imminent death. His head was about to cave in like a can, sending brains down the sides of his face. Saliva sprayed through the giant’s clenched teeth, but all Pyro could hear was the frantic thudding, which got louder and louder.