Wergyld (V.)

The kid was probably 17 and he didn't have a chance. All that timing in my head, X seconds before they have the chance to react, X more to bound through the cluttered rooms, dark save for the bright cartoons strobing and beating out across the walls, and around the snake aquariums and children who should be asleep. If he planned it at all, he didn't think about those things, or it could be that I underestimated Rhiel and her people. All I heard was the hiss of air forced from a Ziploc bag by a hasty hand and the great black arm that crushed a throat against the wall so that the pictures fell and I stepped backwards onto a shrieking baby's hand.