“Oh, I am afraid that you do, Mr. Cready.” WHAM! His attacker managed to flip Solomon on his side, causing pain to radiate out from the still-healing wound in his side. Solomon thought he could feel his stitches burst…
“The Boss takes your treachery of his New Kowloon family very seriously indeed…” the man hissed, leaning closer as he straddled Solomon, pushing with all of his weight on the knife.
Solomon couldn’t spare the energy to shout, or yell, or scream. Sweat beaded on his forehead as he felt the pain withering his muscles, forcing the knife lower and lower towards his throat.
“Hai!” There was a shout and the sound of splintering glass as the double-doors exploded inwards, and Jezzy landed on her feet. She had kicked the panel of reinforced glass in and didn’t stop to jump through into the room, shattering the remaining panes of glass still further as she raced to the commander’s aid.
“Sol!” she shouted, aiming a kick to her handler’s head where he crouched atop her commander.
But the handler was quick, and he wasn’t exhausted from either being shot or spending the last twenty-four hours running around a collapsing mine. He rolled easily out of the way, bouncing up onto his heels in a perfect martial-arts pose, knife still in hand.
“Jezzy, no!” Solomon wheezed, panting in pain on the floor.
“With greatest respect… Get out of the way, Commander.” Jezzy dropped into a matching stance opposite the man, her hands up in front of her as she started to circle. She had no weapon, but then again, Jezebel Wen didn’t need one, did she?
“He’s got a knife!” Solomon gasped as he managed to crawl under the bed.
“You don’t think I can see that?” Jezzy had a chance to say, just as the man made his move.
Her handler didn’t lead with a stab, of course. He was far too good for that. He instead performed a roundhouse kick that Jezzy easily skipped out of the way of, before pressing his advantage in a series of blisteringly quick moves—strikes, knees, stamps, and kicks.
Jezzy countered, ducked, blocked, and dodged where she could. The two fought at a speed that Solomon hadn’t even thought possible. He had always known that his combat specialist was good, but this was insane. The two also fought in near-silence, just the occasional hiss and grunt as the silver of the knife flashed and fell.
“Hyugh!” Jezzy jumped back suddenly, a line of red breaking into life just above her eye and starting to run down her face.
“Jezzy, no!” Solomon breathed.
The attacker—her handler—moved in for the kill….
But it had been a ruse. Jezzy was wounded, but it took more than a scratch to slow her down. As the Yakuza handler relaxed his vigilance for just a second and stepped forward, Jezzy stamped out his knee in a cracking snap of noise that reverberated around the room.
The man screamed.
Thock-thack! Another two blows from Jezzy—sharp, quick blows to the sternum and neck that saw him stagger backwards, gasping for air, his hand automatically dropping the knife. It spun through the air, glinting silver—
Thump! Jezzy caught it and slammed it into the handler’s chest. The man wavered in place for just a moment, gurgling as he looked down in astonishment at his own blade sticking out of his chest, before collapsing to the floor, dead.
A moment later, Jezzy collapsed to her knees too, exhausted and panting.
“What the hell…. What the hell…” Solomon emerged, his eyes round as he looked at Jezzy.
“Commander? I think we need to talk,” Jezzy groaned wearily.
“Can we do it after people stop trying to kill us?” Solomon said.
Jezebel considered. “Given the sort of day that we’ve had so far? Probably not.”
THANK YOU
Thank you so much for reading the Outcasts of Earth Boxed Set, which includes the first three stories in the Outcast Marines series. I am happy you took the chance to read them and I really hope you liked them. If you could leave a review for me, that would be awesome because it helps me tell others about my books.
The next story in the series is called The Martian Incursion. You can get the story as part of the Invasion Boxed Set or you can buy it individually.
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Outcast Marines series Boxed Set Page 39
