Again, for a guy his size and a guy my size, this simply was not possible.

He bent close so that those unnatural eyes were inches from mine. His hands were as cold as ice.

“Last chance,” he sneered. “Where is the flash drive?”

“Fuck you. Where are the nukes?”

He paused for a moment, and I could see that I’d both hit a nerve and said the wrong thing.

“You know…” he breathed. Then his red eyes flared with rage that was ten times hotter than before. “Listen to me, you piece of shit—you have no idea what you are interfering with here. Give me the flash drive, tell me exactly who you’ve told, and I will end this quickly for you.”

“Or,” I choked out, “you could go piss up a rope.”

His eyes grew hotter still. “I am doing God’s work, and if you don’t tell me what I want to know I will rip your throat out and drink your life.”

Okay, I never heard that one before.

Not in real life.

I had a couple of witty comebacks for him. Stuff about his mother and livestock. But I thought that I was losing my audience. So instead I kneed him in the nuts as hard as I could. I put all of my pain and rage and fear into it. The impact canted him sharply forward, so I grabbed his head and clamped my teeth on his nose and tried my absolute best to bite it off. Blood exploded through the fabric of his mask, splashing against my face as cartilage collapsed between my teeth.

He screamed—so high and shrill that it hurt my ears. Then he started thrashing and tried to pull his head back from my teeth, but I wasn’t about to let go. I growled at him, clenched harder, and whipped my head back and forth like a dog. Hot blood gushed into my mouth.

His screams hit the ultrasonic. He flung me away from him and staggered back, pawing at his ruined face with both hands. I slammed into the wall again and dropped hard to the floorboards on knees and palms. The blood in my mouth was hot and tasted of salt. I gagged and spat it out. Part of his nose and the lower half of his mask flopped onto the floor.

Screw fair play. Screw the rules.

The man reeled and thrashed, slamming into one wall and then the other, keening in a high-pitched wail of inarticulate agony. His mask hung in dripping shreds. Most of his nose was gone. His mouth and chin were slick with dark blood.

I got shakily to my feet, sick and dazed. I figured I had him now if I could manage one more really good hit. Maybe break his neck, or crush his hyoid bone.