Chapter 17 · Guns Between The Eyes

"Don't move. Not a fucking inch," the voice boomed through the megaphone, echoing off the concrete walls of the pit.

I felt the cold bite of a laser sight painting a red dot right between my eyes. I didn't even have to look up to know I was pinned. Next to me, Rook was breathing in short, jagged hitches, her shoulder pressed hard against my side. We were trapped in a dead-end alley of the lower slums, backs against a rusted bulkhead, with a dozen corp kill-team barrels leveled at our chests.

"Drop the chip, Mercer," the lead hunter shouted. "Or we carve it out of your skull while you're still screaming."

I shifted my weight, and the glitch-blade in my forearm hummed, a low, hungry vibration that rattled my teeth. The chip wasn't just humming; it was starving. It wanted the chrome in those soldiers' arms. It wanted to eat them alive.

"You're really not giving me a choice here, are you?" I yelled back, my voice sounding raspy, like I'd been swallowing glass.

"The choice is simple," the hunter replied. "The girl comes with us, you stay in the dirt.