Tick screamed and threw the silver antidote in the general direction of Dark Infinity, the cylinder blurry and bouncing in his vision. He heard an ear-splitting crack, then the bubbling sound of sizzling acid eating at metal. His vision darkened until he could barely see. He fell to his knees, screaming, and grabbed his head with both hands, squeezing his eyes shut.

Then, though he would have thought it impossible, everything got worse. The pain, the sounds, the shaking, the spinning, the flashing lights. Tick didn’t think he could survive another second.

A booming crack rocked the air, and his eyes snapped open. His vision cleared in time to see that Dark Infinity had exploded into countless tiny golden pieces, flying and swirling through the air like snowflakes in a blizzard. A sparkling tornado. It sounded like millions of killer bees swarming.

“Atticus!” Jane yelled again, somewhere closer to him. “You have to stop!”

Tick knew he wasn’t thinking straight. His mind was a chaotic soup of jumbled memories and thoughts. He glanced to his right and saw Jane running for him; Chu had disappeared. A small part of his brain knew she was coming to help him, but all his eyes saw at that moment was the woman who had tried to kill him, to choke him to death in the hallway. The horrendous fear and rage he’d felt when he’d been so close to death returned full force.

He didn’t know exactly what he did, but he knew he couldn’t stop it. The swarming specks of metal that had been Dark Infinity flew at Mistress Jane, like flies descending on a feast, surrounding her in a blur of sparkling gold. The metallic tornado consumed her body, obscuring her from sight.

Somewhere deep inside of him, Tick knew he’d just done something terrible.

I didn’t mean to, he thought. I didn’t mean to!

In answer, Jane’s screams erupted through the air.

Chapter

46

~

The Drag Race

Paul threw a Rager at the only remaining metaspide close to him, watching with glee as it steamrolled into a massive ball of earth and wiped the machine out, sparks flying as pieces of crumpled metal flew in all directions.

“Yeah, ba—”

A hard claw grabbed his ankle from behind and lifted, slamming his body to the ground. Paul tried to scream but there was no breath left in his body. He looked up to see a metaspide staring down at him with glowing robotic eyes. He wanted to say something—spit, yell for help—but he could only open and close his mouth, fighting to get air back in his lungs.