Stark white lights illuminated the room before me. It looked like some time of storage room, but things had been left all over the place without much care or thought to keep it in any kind of order.

I took some time to loot what I could, and was grateful for the extra dozen 9mm ammo I found. I was reloading one of the SMG magazines when I heard voices in the hallway beyond.

“I can’t believe their leader is still holding on,” a masculine voice said before he chuckled.

“She’s got a strong will, that’s for sure. But everyone breaks eventually,” a feminine voice replied. She sounded a little bit like a snake, letting the s sounds linger on her words for longer than should be necessary. “If she holds out much longer we’ll just kill one of her team. The biggest one first, yes?”

They were talking about Khopesh. He was the biggest and most soldierly of all of us.

“What about the dog?” the male asked.

My blood ran cold at the mention of Kaiser. I grit my teeth to stop myself from leaping out into the hallway with my guns blazing.

“We’ll keep him for collateral if the other one survived. Bastard wants to kill that one himself.”

“He couldn’t have survived that fall. There’s no way, Scythe.”

Scythe. So the female one was called Scythe.

“Bastard seems to think there’s a chance.”

“He also seems to think that we’re going to be able to survive what’s coming.”

“Come on, Trench. Why the hell did you even join Edgebreaker if you don’t believe in what we’re doing?”

Scythe and Trench. They were both going down before all of this was through. If Trench was his edged weapon callsign, I had no idea what it was. I’d never heard of a bladed weapon called a trench before. Maybe it was short for something?

Trench sighed. “I do. I just don’t see how anything that we can do is going to help stop what’s coming. It’s almost here, and we’re already so far behind. Do you really trust Edgebreaker to do what they’ve said they’re going to do?”

Scythe laughed. “I don’t trust anyone except for the woman I see in the mirror, and even then there are days when she’s an untrustworthy bitch too. The reality crash is coming, and Edgebreaker is going to make sure that the power is distributed to those who can use it to weather the storm. I can handle it. Can you?”

“Damn right I can,” Trench replied. “Come on, we got what we came for. It’s time to finish this.”

I waited until they moved on, and I slipped out into the corridor behind them. Scythe was short, but shapely. She had the kind of body that would have turned a young JD Rideout into a cartoon character with heart-shaped eyes and a tongue that he had to pick up off the floor. Those hips did not lie, nor did the saunter in her step. Two hand scythes hung from holsters on her hips.

Trench was big. Probably even bigger than Khopesh, and our big boy was massive. He had a pair of strange weapons hanging from his belt that combined a savage looking blade with a hand guard covered in savage spikes. It was a bludgeoning weapon as much as a stabbing or slashing weapon.

In the hands of a physical powerhouse like Trench, those weapons would do a lot of close-quarters damage in a very short amount of time.

There was no way I’d be able to take down both of these Edgebreaker warriors by myself. But if I could find a way to get the rest of my team out of their bonds we might be able to mount a decent defence.

Scythe and Trench made a turn into a nearby room. I didn’t follow them right away, because I couldn’t guarantee it wasn’t a dead end.

“Just one more report to download here,” Scythe said. “This is exactly what we need. The answer was here in the mountains all along, and EDGE Force knew about it. This is the answer, you know. The solution to a self-imposed problem. This is how we’re going to unlock the secrets of being able to survive the infusions and ascend.”

“So you’re going to submit yourself for ascension?” Trench asked. The tone of his voice tried to remain conversational, but there was a nervousness in it that hadn’t been there moments before.

“Are you not going to do it?” Scythe asked.

“I won’t be the first to put my hand up. When I know it’s safe, then maybe?”

Scythe laughed. “Nothing we do is safe, and change is coming. I want to be strong enough to ride out the wave of corruption the reality crash will bring, and I want to remain myself after all is said and done.”

“Come on, let’s go,” Trench said.

His voice came from somewhere way too close to the door. They were coming back out into the hall! I ran back to the storeroom and hid behind a pile of boxes. A second later a shadow fell across the doorway as Trench stuck his head into the room.

“Did you hear that?” Trench asked.

“It was probably just rats. Your nerves are shot, you know that?” Scythe said. “Come on, let’s go and finish the rest of them off then get back to base.”

Back to base? So Edgebreaker had some kind of home base somewhere near this location too? That didn’t bode well. If they had other operatives waiting on standby then they might be able to call in reinforcements too.

I waited until their footfalls faded before heading back out into the hallway. Every fibre of my being wanted to duck into that room and see what they saw, but every moment I left them alone with the rest of my team was one where things could go very, very wrong.

There was only one stairwell leading down to the lower level, and I took it. The facility went down another couple of levels, but one last check of the team tracker showed that the rest of my group were on this next floor. I noted that this floor had much higher ceilings than the one above that contained the storage room.

I headed through the next door and into the next dimly lit corridor. I watched as Trench and Scythe turned a corner further on down the hall. The lights flickered here, like they hadn’t been taken care of over the years.

I used the shadows to my advantage and stayed out of sight. I peeked around the doorway and saw a mostly open space, and in the centre, on display, was the bloody figure of Xiphos. I thought she was dead for a moment, then breathed a quiet sigh of relief as her chest rose and fell. Bright red blood dripped out of her mouth and down the front of her EDGE Force uniform in front of Stiletto, Khopesh and Naginata.

Their hands were bound behind their backs with zip-ties. I’d only be able to rescue one of them before my presence was revealed, but who? Khopesh had his invincibility. Naginata could parry perfectly for 5 seconds, and Stiletto could disappear and deal massive damage. Kaiser was stuck in a cage to the side of the room, still pacing back and forth in distress, but my new Warp ability could seriously take these goons by surprise.

It would be up to Kaiser and I to hold the rest of them off while whoever I rescued got the others free.

“Come now, Xiphos. You need to tell us why you’re here. What does EDGE Force want here in the Carpathians that they’d send a whole team in for? You silence is becoming irritating.” Bastard said.

Xiphos had taken that kind of beating without saying a word? Damn, she was tough as nails.

Bastard walked around behind Xiphos with his wicked sword held in one hand. A bastard sword was another name for a longsword, which came from the French term epee batarde. I’d done my research since my first mission, and I wanted to know everything I could about Bastard in case I needed to fight him again, including any possible weaknesses his weapon of choice might have.

Another glance at Bastard’s weapon revealed that it had a hand-and-a-half grip, and a concave crossguard, so he’d be able to wield it with both hands for more power and would be able to stop or deflect incoming edged weapon strikes. The blade didn’t look quite as long or heavy as a traditional longsword, so Bastard probably preferred to fight in a one-handed stance.

Bastard crossed in front of Xiphos and drove the pommel into her face. Xiphos swung back, her nose splattered.

Bastard pointed at Naginata. “Bring her here!”

Trench dragged Naginata over in front of Xiphos, and Xiphos’s eyes went wide.

“Don’t you dare hurt her. Hurt me!” Xiphos said.

“Oh so you can speak. Don’t worry, I do plan on hurting you,” Bastard said as he drew his pistol and fired it as Naginata’s chest from point blank range.

The world went quiet as Naginata fell backwards. Xiphos screamed and struggled against her restraints as I did something really stupid. Hatchet in hand, I ran into the room. There would be no keeping this quiet, no approaching this stealthily. There motherfuckers were going to pay.

If we were quick enough, I might even be able to save Naginata.

I brought my hatchet’s blade down on Stiletto’s restraints.

“Free the others!” I said, but Stiletto was already on it.

He’d activated his class skill and disappeared.

The restraints around Khopesh’s wrists split open without breaking his stealth. It was good to know that actions that weren’t considered attacks didn’t break his stealth. That might come in handy later on down the track.

Khopesh had his curved sword in hand and was ready for a fight the moment Scythe came at him with her pair of deadly curved blades. Those blades his Khopesh square in the chest, but his sand barrier stopped them from killing him. Khopesh dealt a swift kick to the centre of Scythe’s chest, which sent her tumbling away.

Gravedigger was in my hands as I activated Man’s Best Friend with Bastard as my target. A shimmering purple portal opened in front of Kaiser inside his cage, and right behind Bastard.

Kaiser leapt through and knocked Bastard onto the ground, letting let loose a Howl of Courage which increased our team’s damage output by a quarter.

Bastard rolled out from under Kaiser and was back on his feet in seconds. Xiphos was out of her bonds now too and engaged Bastard. Even though she’d been through hell, she was still ready to go toe to toe with that masked madman.

Naginata was flat out on her back, eyes open and staring up at the light in the middle of the ceiling.

I couldn’t let her die like this.

Trench stalked towards Naginata with his dual knives held in a street fighter’s back-handed grip. Stiletto appeared from stealth and sunk his dagger into Trench’s side. It sunk deep and made the big man stagger, but Trench managed to bring one arm down and lock Stiletto in place as he brought the other dagger down into Stiletto’s back.

He left three deep gashes in Stiletto’s back as I gave Kaiser the signal to attack Trench.

Kaiser leaped onto Trench’s back, claws digging into the big man’s back as he snapped his jaws, reaching for any flesh he could get. Kaiser managed to chomp down on Trench’s left ear and tear it off his face. Trench howled and stabbed back, trying to get Kaiser.

“Kaiser, disengage!” I said as I took a running slide to Naginata’s side.

I had no idea how this was going to work, but I needed to give it a shot. I only had a little bit of anima left in the tank, and I hoped it would be enough to stabilise Naginata.

I activated my claws, which burned green in the darkened room. I placed my open hand on Naginata’s chest and pushed anima into her in the same way I’d pushed it into the tree and roots above. I felt a rushing sensation as the anima passed from me into Naginata, and for a moment my consciousness extended into her. I felt her heart beating, but it was irregular and strange, as though it was missing a beat here and there. I even felt the bullet in her chest, but I didn’t have enough anima to fully heal her wounds.

Hopefully this small infusion would be enough to keep her going until I managed to extract some more.

I had three more sources of anima in this room to draw on.

I just needed to weaken them first.