Ex-Heroes, Peter Clines [reading like a writer txt] 📗

of the garbage truck moved, thrashing against the bindings. The armor’s lenses punched in, swelling the image in her view. “Shit,” Cerberus hissed, recognizing it. “Go!”

Mean Green dropped into gear and lunged down the street. Big Red was a beat behind it. Bullets pinged off the steel lift gate. One of its new tires blew and the big truck kept going on the dually.

A few rounds bounced off the battlesuit as she thudded over to a phone pole. She grabbed it, yanked, and felt the wood splinter under the armor’s fingers. The thick beam crashed down across the street. She scooped up an Accord near the sidewalk and flipped it out into the street, too.

Mean Green was out of sight. Big Red was just reaching the overpass. The Seventeens were a block away.

She threw her legs forward and ran.

“Why do I need to see this?” asked Stealth.

Gorgon stood by the cell doors. “Because you won’t believe me if I just tell you.”

“What could be so impossible for me to believe?”

“Just come over here.”

Her head tilted to the puddles of blood. “Suicide.”

“Two of them. They smuggled in razors, but only two went through with it.”

“Regrettable. Call a cleanup crew.”

“That’s not the problem.” He gestured her to the last door.

“Did they rise? I am sure you can deal with them one at a time, and Doctor Connolly would probably like to see them. I have things to do.”

“Not more important than this.”

She glared at him. Gorgon unlocked the door and swung the cell open.

The suit could run. It could hit forty-five miles an hour on pavement, less on dirt, gravel, or sand. She hated doing it because she could watch her power levels drop with every stride. It wasn’t cheap to make twelve hundred pounds of armor and electronics move fast.

Behind her there was a crash she could feel. A quick blink shifted her screens to the armor’s rear-view cam. The garbage truck had dropped the two huge arms that caught and flipped dumpsters, battering aside the phone pole. They speared the Acura like a pair of metal tusks, barely slowing the enormous truck at all.

She switched back to the main view. The battlesuit had caught up with Big Red. Forty percent of her power was already gone. She could see abandoned cars shake as she ran by. An ex stumbled into her path and she plowed over it, crushing it to a pulp.

“Turn,” she bellowed to Luke. “North on Western. We can cut across Santa Monica and circle down Gower.”

“What about Harry and Mean Green?”

“Fat bastard’s probably back at the Mount already,” she shouted. “They’re fine.”

Luke spun the wheel and Big Red lurched onto Western, weaving between dead cars. She stomped after them, cracking the blacktop with each footfall. The freeway ramp was up ahead and Sunset a few blocks past it.

“SHIT!!” Luke tensed and stood up in his seat. Big Red squealed, tires smoking as it slid forward another twenty feet. Shouts came from the back as the guards were thrown forward.

Cerberus tried to dodge and smashed her shoulder into the driver’s-side corner of the truck. Big Red lurched, the fiberglass sides crumpled, and the battlesuit spun away, stumbling over a low sports car and crashing down on the sidewalk on top of a crawling ex. Her screens went gray for a second as the computers tried to keep up with the whirling images.

Inside Cerberus, Danielle tried to clear her head. Even with the armor it had been a hard hit. She blinked a few times and the suit tried to interpret the subtle commands, racing through half a dozen views and status reports as it tried to get the cameras back online. The flashing screens didn’t help her throbbing skull.

“Chains,” shouted Luke. “They’ve got the whole road trapped!”

Big Red’s tires sent up white smoke as the truck reversed. Cerberus pulled herself up with a parking meter, crushing it in the process. “Where to?”

“Side street,” shouted Luke.

She shook out her electronic limbs and ran past the truck. She could hear the Seventeens getting close. She glanced down Marathon and the targeters highlighted the line of spikes. “Wait!” She grabbed the chain and yanked it free of a bolt on the north side of the street.

The truck spun in a violent three-point turn behind her. “Clear?”

“Clear.” There was a classic Volkswagen Bug parked in a driveway. She glanced at her power levels as Big Red raced past her and debated throwing it at the dump truck. Instead she whipped the chain out onto Western just as one of the pickups roared into view. The spiked links caught one of the Seventeens in the head with a flash of red and yanked him from the back of the truck.

The pickup’s engine roared and it shot forward. She lunged and drove her fist through the grille. The engine block crumpled beneath her knuckles as her punch pushed it up into the cab of the truck. The Ford twisted into scrap around the titan, carried onto her arm by its own momentum. Two red-centered spiderwebs blossomed across the windshield where the driver and passenger slammed forward. One of the bed passengers sailed over her shoulder.

The garbage truck shrieked to a halt out on Western and a few more rounds pinged off her armor. She kicked free of the ruined Ford and headed west after Big Red. Behind her she heard the steel tusks of the garbage truck hit the pickup.

Luke cut onto St. Andrews Place. In his side mirror he could see the blue and silver titan thundering down the road behind him.

Ahead of them the Dodge pickup squealed in, grinding an ex beneath its tires and blocking the end of the street. Luke hit the brakes and threw Big Red into reverse.

Cerberus skidded to a halt, sparks shooting off her feet. Her targeters locked onto the Dodge. A bullet clanged on her shoulder. The battlesuit tallied enemy weapons and manpower. She ached for her missing cannons and imagined the