Mitzi swore, her brain racing to find a way out. “Backs together. Keep the flames going.”

Her team obediently crowded around her, Franc facing the same direction as Mitzi, the other three turned towards the stairwell. Their five streams of fire weren’t able to completely surround them, but it was enough to deter most of the parasites.

We can’t keep this up. Mitzi panned her flame from side to side, covering as much of the hallway as she could. How long until the fuel runs out? Six minutes? Five?

The Cymics were writhing just beyond the flame, changing shapes in the flickering light. As they shed their human skins, the living darkness inside spilled out. Mitzi glanced to her right, where Franc was waving his gun’s nozzle too quickly, making the flame ineffective. Beyond him, edging forward in search of an opening, was a merged Cymic.

CHAPTER FIFTY

Mitzi’s mouth filled with a metallic tang as she bit the inside of her cheek. The creature, inky black and covered in the twisting tendrils, towered almost to the ceiling. Its human skin hung from its front, the toes hovering a foot above the floor. The stubbled face of a young man was full and looked natural, but the body hung limply, like a deflated balloon. The pale flesh contrasted with the black monster behind it as the limbs swung, boneless and shrivelled, whenever its host moved.

The Cymic’s grinning human head was incongruous with the empty body below it, as its eyes followed Mitzi. She turned towards it, passing her stream of fire over Franc’s, and felt a small spark of satisfaction as the flame hit the human face, twisting its sardonic grin into a shriek of horror.

“Watch out!” Franc yelled, twisting to shoot his flame at a monster that had tried to take advantage of the gap in Mitzi’s guard. She turned back to help him, and her heart faltered as she saw more of the Cymics had become merged, showcasing their deflated human forms like desecrated trophies.

There’s too many of them. They know our fuel will run out eventually, so they’re not giving us the chance to move forward or escape to the stairwell. And we can’t use the grenades, or the building is likely to collapse…

Though, she thought as she took a half step forward to dissuade a Cymic that had skirted too close, is that such a bad thing?

“Hold on to your boots!” Mitzi yelled, dropping her flamethrower. She pulled four grenades off her belt and threw two into the mass of parasites ahead of them. After flipping the other two behind them, she snatched the final two off her belt and tossed them to either side. “Brace yourselves and get ready to run!”

Her team dropped their nozzles and hunkered down beside her. For a second, the Cymics surged into the opening, then everything went white as the explosions shook the building.

Mitzi forced herself to keep her eyes open. White dust burst from the decimated hallway’s stone floor, and bricks and chips of rock sprayed out, showering the huddled team. Then fire, lagging a second behind the dust, rolled outwards, enveloping both the parasites and her suit. She only became aware of the heat when it had passed over her, and by then, the grenades she’d thrown to either side had detonated.