The few board members who’d risen from their seats when we barged in eased back down. Their movements were painfully slow, like they feared drawing my attention their way would put a target on their backs. Too late.

I did a pointless but fancy-looking spin-twist with my sword, then flipped it up and rested the flat of the blade against my shoulder. Best if these corporate asshats realized Mercy wasn’t just for show, but that I knew how to use her; it might make the proceedings move a little faster.

“Raise your hand if you remember a little boy named Sammy,” I said.

Nik rounded the head of the table to take up a position on the other side, leaning back against the At-coated windows, his hands in the pockets of his long leather coat. He was the only person who moved in the long seconds that followed my request.

After scanning the owlish faces surrounding the long table, I exhaled heavily, exasperated already. I whipped Mercy’s blade out, slapping it on the table’s surface. Every single human jumped in their seats.

“Who remembers Sammy?” I started to move around the table, dragging the tip of my sword as I went.

The razor-sharp At blade glided up the sleeve of a board member—a balding older fellow I recognized as one Gregory Spelt, Vice Chair of the Board. The blade traveled across the shoulders of his suit jacket, then crossed to the shoulders of the woman sitting beside him. Melinda Jones flinched when the blade first landed on her bony frame, then tensed up like she was being electrocuted.

I continued on like that, eyeing those across the table from me, not letting them look away. “You know,” I said, “the cute little homeless boy you guys yanked off the street? The one you infected with an engineered disease?”

I paused, putting the slightest pressure on the sword as it inched down a male board member’s arm. Mercy’s blade cut through the fabric of his sleeve. I couldn’t remember this guy’s name, but I was fascinated by the beads of sweat forming on his forehead and temples. I leaned in, focusing on his quaking eyelashes. “You know,” I said, voice hushed, “the boy you let good ol’ Mitch have some quality alone time with before you released him. The one you hoped would infect as many people as possible.”

My current friend yelped, and the coppery scent of blood reached my nostrils.

I straightened and glanced down at his arm, where a dark spot of blood blossomed on his sleeve. “Whoopsie,” I said, tone flat. “My bad.” I winked at the guy before raising Mercy and once again resting her blade on my shoulder. “Guess I got a little too eager.”

“You’re insane,” a guy said from Constance’s end of the table. He was the youngest looking of the board members, and I pulled the name Scott Easton from memory.

I also pulled a needle dagger from my sleeve with my free hand and flung it his way. It struck him in the forehead, sticking in his skull and reverberating with a dull thwang. He shouted out in pain, then brought his shaking hands up to his forehead. I’d used just enough force to get the knife to stick in the bone, but not enough to actually pierce his skull and enter his brain.