The hulk groaned. The God Hammer was powering up. A deep, subsonic thrum vibrated through the floor.
Meridian dropped from his cables, planting a boot on a mutant’s chest. “Show-off. Try this.” He snap-kicked a grenade. It spun end over end, and Nakamura, acting on instinct, Leash-whipped the grenade mid-flight. It curved around a pillar and detonated directly in a fourth mutant’s face. “Longshot! +200! Style Multiplier x3!”
Behind Kael, the Hammer’s lens focused on a blue dot on the viewscreen: Earth. bulletstorm
Meridian clapped her on the shoulder. “You just kicked a man into a planet-killer. That’s a new one. Gotta be worth a thousand points.”
A second mutant jumped from a catwalk. Nakamura flicked her wrist again, wrapping the Leash around its ankle, and slammed it into a third mutant. The two bodies crumpled. “Bowl-a-rama! +100!” The hulk groaned
Nakamura looked at her glowing, humming Leash. Then at the viewscreen, where a blue, living Earth spun peacefully.
“Welcome to the Party,” a voice slurred from her comm. It belonged to a grizzled man in a duster, hanging upside down from a tangle of cables. He was eating a protein bar. “Name’s Meridian. You’ve got a Leash. Don’t point it at anything you don’t want to explode.” Meridian dropped from his cables, planting a boot
Nakamura wasn't here for points. She was here for General Kael, the man who'd sold her squad to the alien Hive. The man who’d laughed as she was spaced. Now, Kael was somewhere in this labyrinth of scrap and screaming, trying to activate the “God Hammer”—a spinal cannon that could crack planets.