Four men, all gathered around a hatchback car, one of the shittier ones that had been made after Gold-Morning. All men wore the typical garage-worker, loading-dock style coveralls, along with heavy coats and hats. They glittered with light where the big lights that illuminated the loading bay caught the droplets of frozen rain on their gear.

The set of alleyways was shaped like a question mark, with the entry into the alleys being somewhere around the dot or tail end, a few parking spots at the top end, and these guys located at the part that was furthest in. Loading bay doors were partially closed beside them.

The rain stopped hitting my shoulders and hood as I saw them.

Their part of the alley was narrower, and as I entered the space, the walls were close enough that the Wretch could reach out and touch both, carving furrows both narrow and broad into brickwork.

“Shit!” one of them shouted. He bolted for the car. There was a flash of silver as he pulled on the door, and the back of the car came free, landing in his lap, smacking him in the face.

The other three men ran to the car. I could see what they were after. Tools or—

No. Tinker guns.

A flash of white instead of silver, above. I pushed out with my aura, being careful with the range, only catching two of the men with it as a consequence.

Didn’t matter. Swansong dropped down from above, white costume a swirl around her, and landed on the back end of the car that had come away. She made a threatening motion toward the guy closest to her, and he almost fell in his haste to get away.

“Guns in the car,” I called out.

A blast of her power made the other two men back off, but that meant they moved closer to me, and deeper into my aura, which was more intense as they drew closer to me. Caught in the middle, they stopped, paralyzed. Swansong turned to look at the contents of the car, one hand still out.

The sliding loading bay door rose, and there were two men and two women on the other side, all with what looked like riot shields in front of them, truncheons in their hands. The shields and truncheons all visibly crackled with electricity.

Precipice leaped from the rooftop, tilting as he fell so his head was closer to the ground than his feet were, silver blades already made but held firm in each hand. He stopped in mid-air, twelve or fifteen feet above the alley floor, and hurled silver blades, produced more, and threw them as well.

Ashley picked up the tinker gun, and aimed it at the group, nozzle glowing bright green.

One of them, maybe the squad leader, pointed the truncheon at her. The gun went black. She threw the gun aside, and produced a blast of her power instead—a gout about ten or fifteen feet long, not long enough to reach those at the loading bay door, but enough to give them pause.