Helena’s body buckled, her spine arching against the crates with a violent, bone-snapping tension. Her eyes rolled back, white and unfocused, as the plasma blade burned and fused the arteries shut.

Chronos felt the heat radiating off her skin. The smell finally broke his limits and turned his face away. He was used to this because of his line of work.

But now, because of his condition, he couldn’t control himself to endure any longer than this. He could feel his own throat stifling as it dry heaves.

Guh... hugh...

The sound of Helena’s muffled groans and Chronos’s quiet retching was like a signal in the quiet gaps of the fight.

Across the room, Keres’s antennae stood bolt upright.

"Faster," Chronos hissed through gritted teeth, his eyes darting to the shadows. "Helena, I think that zerg heard us. He’s coming."

He reached for the second plasma blade at his side, but his arm felt like it was made of water. His fingers brushed the hilt, but he couldn’t even find the strength to curl them around in a tight grip.

Grayson instantly saw the change in Keres’s movements. He roared as he unleashed a barrage from the plasma gun.

Thwip-thwip-thwip!

He was trying to draw the monster’s focus, move him away from the other side.

But Keres was no longer playing the part of the cornered animal. He endured and took a hit to his secondary shoulder plate.

Crunch-fizz! 𝑓𝑟𝑒𝘦𝓌𝑒𝑏𝑛𝑜𝘷𝑒𝘭.𝒸𝘰𝑚

He ignored the bubbling green blood and took a graze to his hind leg that sent him limping.

However, Keres’s eyes never left the crates. The satisfied expression on the humanoid Zerg’s face was chilling.

It seemed that everything before this had been a feint. Keres had lured Grayson into a rhythm that kept the Alpha on the opposite side of the room.

The moment Grayson’s blade-arc swept wide on the right, Keres broke sideways with a terrifying burst of speed.

"No!" Grayson shouted, his thrusters screaming—EEEEEEEE—as he tried to correct his momentum.

But it was too late.

Keres’s forelimbs scythed past Grayson and plunged into the darkness behind the ration crates.

By the time Grayson leveled the plasma gun, his finger on the trigger, the scene had changed into an agonizing situation.

Keres stood tall, his massive silhouette blotting out the flickering lights. He had Chronos hooked under his left arm. The narrow waist cinched in a crushing, considering grip.

Helena was hooked under his right, lifted clear off the ground by the back of her ruined, blood-soaked gear.

Helena’s hand twitched, still holding the plasma blade, but the effort of the cauterization had drained all of her strength. Her arm fell limp, the blade clattering to the floor with a hollow tang.

Keres’s mouth twisted into a grotesque humanoid grin. He didn’t tighten his grip enough to kill, but the threat was clear.

One squeeze, and Helena’s spine would snap. One twitch, and Chronos would be bisected by a chitinous claw.

"Lower the gun," Keres hissed.

Grayson stood twenty feet away, the blue light of his plasma gun reflecting in his silver eyes.

He didn’t move.

He didn’t flinch.

He even slowly and deliberately raised the gun higher. The muzzle was aiming directly between Keres’s glowing red eyes.

But even though Grayson had raised the weapon with the cold determination of a man ready to pull the trigger, he still hadn’t decided whether to take this gamble.

Keres tilted his head with jerky movements. His mandibles flicked in a rhythmic, clicking amusement—click-clack, click-clack.

"Aren’t I lucky?" Keres hissed, "I have both of the best persons to take as a hostage, but the hardest to actually take as one... and even luckier, in their worst conditions."

"Are you treating them as shields?" Grayson’s voice was cold, indifferent, and undeterred. "It’s useless. Do you think I’ll let you walk out of here just because you’re holding onto the dead and the dying?"

The muzzle of the plasma gun settled directly, aiming at the seam of the armored plate where Keres’s neck met his thorax.

It was a target no larger than a coin, the only true vulnerability in his frontal chassis. Behind that plate lay the two primary hearts that fueled the zerg’s unnatural speed and regeneration.

"They are your friends."

Keres vibrated, his grip on Chronos tightening just enough to elicit a sharp, pained gasp—agh!

"I know you humans and beastmen are known to be soft and cold in some places. But you all do have something in common, you value the individual over the whole race."

His bloody red eyes glinted against the light, "Lower it, or I’ll paint this wall with their flesh and blood."

But Grayson didn’t lower his gun; he even stepped forward as a challenge. He seemed to say that their sacrifices would be worth it as long as Keres was killed.

Keres knew what Grayson meant and felt a little exasperated. But he also knew something that Grayson didn’t.

"Which is faster, Grayson Maxwell?" he continued to taunt, his voice dropping into a wet, multilayered rasp. "Your gun? Or my forelimbs?"

Grayson’s hand on the gun did not move for a second, but he asked, "What do you want?"

His voice was flat, devoid of the rage that Keres was clearly trying to provoke.

Keres laughed unambiguously.

Skritch-hiss-hiss.

Keres didn’t answer the question. Instead, he moved a little, making the heavy armor of his legs grind against the concrete floor—grrr-clack.

"Such a shame," he mused, his eyes glowing with a predatory glint as he looked down at the man in his grip. "To kill this one."

Keres lifted his right forelimb very deliberately. The serrated inner edge of the claw was stained with a mixture of oils and drying blood.

He tapped it against the soft, vulnerable hollow just under Chronos’s sternum.

Tap. Tap.

Once for emphasis.

Twice for the sadistic pleasure of watching Chronos flinch.

Chronos’s complexion went past pale, turning a translucent, sickly shade of alabaster.

A single bead of sweat ran down the bridge of his nose, hanging off the tip before it dropped soundlessly onto the dusty concrete.

He looked like he was ready to crumble at the slightest touch.