A squad of twenty trying to hold out against nine monsters that had once been ordinary people and animals, when any one of those monsters could rend all twenty individuals limb from limb? It worked as an example.

One of the smaller dogs fought to get past the others and get a piece of the action, black froth at the corners of its mouth as it lunged, tried to climb over and was hit with one elbow, flying ten feet.

It stopped making its strangled scream sounds as it recovered from the hit, then resumed its strangled scream sounds, I could see the jerky full body contractions and expansions as it worked at breathing.

It didn’t try going back at the main wall of people and animals, who were battering at the front of the building and threatening to pummel their way through the concrete. Instead, it circled around.

The smaller dog leaped through a window that wasn’t sufficiently barricaded, got halfway through, and scrabbled to get the rest of the way through. Putting my mask on, I flew after it.

People shot at the animal, and the shooting did nothing to slow it.

I collided with it, smashing it down into the floor, my forward momentum driving it across the floor. The Wretch hit it once before the forcefield flickered off. I flew up to the ceiling, back flat against the painted surface, as the dog scrabbled to get its limbs under it. The muscles hampered more than anything in the moment.

I used my aura, but it agitated the room more than it bothered the dog.

“Don’t shoot!” I called out. “Don’t waste your bullets!”

And you’ll hit me.

“What the hell are we supposed to do!?” a young woman shrieked at me. One guy in the background was audibly sobbing in his panic.

Fuck me.

“Do you have an empty cell!?” This was supposed to be a jail.

I didn’t get a decisive answer, only a muddle of ten voices talking at once. The dog was back on its feet now, and the Wretch was active.

I’d fought mutant dogs before. Those had been a bit bigger, armor plated, with sharper edges, hooks, and decorations. This was… denser. It was the only way I could put it. I flew at its legs, expanding the Wretch out to knock its legs out from under it, then punted it across the floor.

“Which way are the cells!?” I barked the question like an order.

A hand pointed.

“But they’re full!”

“Get over there, move people to another cell, and get yourselves into that same cell if there isn’t an escape route! Leave me a door open!”

Some people headed that direction.

“You have thirty seconds!” I told them.