The armored SUV skidded to a halt in a spray of gravel. Six fully-kitted contractors burst out of it like seeds from a over-ripe pod.

They carried military-grade smart guns and hand-held spotlights. One of them had on a VR helmet with a full-body sensor rig, the input array pointed right at them. Hiding from that was out of the question. Trying to run from smart guns was equally suicidal.

“That’s her! That’s the Harold!” barked the squad leader. Or the guy with the biggest helmet, anyway.

Big Helmet leveled a hostile stare at Laredo. “You! Put her down and and back away and we’ll let you go!”

Laredo let his mouth fall open incredulously. He’d watched these guys gut his cell-mate and half the cell-block besides. Who were they kidding?

He shifted his grip under Thompson’s shoulders. He was taking almost all her weight now and she drooped on him like a blanket slung over a pole. The blood loss was getting to her and she wasn’t gonna be conscious much longer.

Big Helmet, apparently tired of waiting, gestured a couple of his squad forward. “Get the Harold! The other one doesn’t matter!”

“They keep calling me Harold,” Thompson muttered. “Why do they keep calling me Harold?”

“Your name is Sonja,” Laredo pointed out, reassuringly.

“I know that! But why—”

“You!” one of the contractors shouted at him, “Back away! Move!” The guy stepped forward, leveling his pistol at Laredo and making little shooing motions with quick flicks of his wrist. Laredo eyed the ground around him. If he let go of Thompson she was gonna fall. The only chance he had was maybe stepping off the edge, running down the slope to the pipe, carrying her. And that was no chance at all.

“I mean, I’m clearly not Harold.” Thompson flopped a hand vaguely in circles around the vicinity of her chest. “Exhibit A,” she slurred. “Did they confuse me with someone else? Is that why they’re chasing me?”

“How the hell should I know?” Laredo said out of the side of his mouth. “Look, Thompson, I’m gonna make a break for that pipe, you’ve got to hold on okay, this isn’t gonna be pretty but if we can—”

“She’s bled out,” the guy with the VR helmet said, “life-sign algorithm says she ain’t gonna make it back to Command.”

“Oh,” Thompson said, a tiny sound.

“Dammit!” one of them snapped, “I told you lot not to go into Vivo hot like that, Command is gonna have kittens…”

“I’m not the one that—”

“It’s cold,” Thompson said. Laredo wrapped his other arm around her uselessly. He knew that kind of cold, a hug wasn’t gonna fix it.

“You were the one that, you puke! And you better believe it’s all gonna be in my report!”

“That’s not fair—!”

Thompson rolled her pale, bloodless face up Laredo shoulder and looked him right in the eye. “Hey, criminal guy,” she said, “put me down. And go. We don’t both have to die up here.”

“We had our orders!” one of the contractors bellowed.

“Orders you didn’t follow! Command specifically said—!”

“Laredo,” he said, “that’s my name. It’s Laredo Tan. And…I’m not leaving you here, Thompson. You don’t leave people behind. You never leave anyone behind.”

Thompson smiled up at him. It was half a smile, kinda wry. Bittersweet. "Laredo," she whispered. "That's a funny name." Then she kneed him in the nuts.

“AAAAH—!”

Laredo lost his grip on her, lost his footing, and flailed, trying to stay upright. Thompson pushed him away and turned—

A shot rang out, the high energy pulse of a EM weapon on full.

Everyone froze, whipping around to stare open-mouthed at the shooter who looked just as appalled as they did. “I—I didn’t mean—” he stammered.

Thompson dropped like a sack of stones.

“You imbecile! You shot the Harold!”

“Stop calling her that! We’re supposed to be covert for fucks sake!”

“I didn’t mean—!”

“—gonna have kittens—!”

“…that bugger startled me! It was an accident!” the guy with the rifle pointed at Laredo.

Laredo knelt and turned Thompson over as gently as he could. She looked bad. Real bad. Even if he had a medkit on him he wasn’t sure—

Sonja Thompson blinked up at him. He grabbed her hand.

“You’re gonna be okay,” Laredo lied. “We’ll get you some help. Just hold on, Thompson, hold on…”

“Don’t let me die alone,” she whispered.

“You’re not, you’re not…it’ll be okay….just….”

Thompson closed her eyes.

“…aaand that’s it,” the VR guy said. “Neg vitals. Nice going, dumbasses.”

“Dammit!” Big Helmet shouted. He slammed his fist down on the hood of the SUV. It rang like the toll of a bell.

“We should shoot this dick anyway,” one of them said, pointing at Laredo. “They didn’t say anything about him.”

“They said he was dangerous.”

“Him? He don’t look dangerous.”

“Just do it and hurry up! We’ve already been out here way too long, the local cops are gonna…”

Laredo looked up. His skin was hot and too tight. He felt a snarl begin somewhere down in his belly, rise up into his throat and fill his mouth—a mouth that was bigger and more resonant than it should have been. His vision narrowed down to blues and yellows, sharpened, details emerging from the shadows, the quarter moon over head suddenly casting plenty of light to see.

He could smell Thompson’s blood. It filled his head, so strong he could taste it, sharp, metallic, intoxicating. His hands were covered with it. He looked down and watched dispassionately as his fingers elongated, became black, thick claws.

Somewhere far distant, some part of himself that was rapidly retreating thought he should be a little more freaked out about all this, that now would be a real good time to panic. That voice was weak and growing weaker. That voice didn’t know shit.

Laredo was pissed. Someone was gonna pay.

*  *  *