The breach charge blew the corrugated steel door inward, twisting the heavy metal like wet cardboard. It flew across the room to embed itself into Mike’s workbench barricade with the shriek of tearing iron. Smoke billowed into the container instantly—thick, grey, and mixed with the stale air of ozone and rotting garbage.

  And then came the lights.

  They cut through the smog like physical blades. White tactical beams mounted on the barrels of kinetic rifles swept the room in jerky, aggressive arcs to dissect the shadows.

  "Breach clear! Left side!"

  "Right side clear! Moving up!"

  The voices were distorted by rebreathers, devoid of humanity. It was just tactical subroutines executing a purge.

  Mike crouched behind his overturned workbench, his heart hammering against his ribs like a trapped bird. The dust was choking him, but he did not cough. The Other inside his head clamped down on his autonomic nervous system and forced his lungs to hold the air.

  The fuel canister lying on its side in the center of the kill box trembled. Inside, the suicidal roach obeyed its final command. It was bloated with volatile energy.

  [Skill Activated: Bio-Detonate]

  THUMP.

  It was not a fiery explosion like a grenade. It was a wet, bursting rupture like a sledgehammer hitting a melon, amplified a thousand times. The canister acted as a cannon barrel, funneling a spray of high-velocity acid and pressurized chitin shrapnel directly into the doorway.

  The lead Cleaner took the blast full in the chest.

  His tactical armor was rated for ballistic impact, but it was not designed for a chemical shotgun. The acid hit the ceramic plates and hissed violently, eating into the composite instantly. The force of the fluid impact lifted him off his feet and threw him backward into the man behind him.

  "Contact! Chemical agent! I am burning!"

  His voice cracked as the green slurry ate through his neck seal.

  "Suppressing fire! Light it up!"

  The room exploded into noise.

  Bullets chewed into Mike’s workbench, punching through the wood to spark off the metal plating he had reinforced it with. Splinters rained down on his head. The noise was deafening, a continuous roar that drowned out his own thoughts.

  He needed to disrupt them. He needed the high ground.

  Spitters. Fire at will.

  In the rafters above, the three green-shelled horrors unlatched their legs from the ceiling. They did not drop, but hung inverted, their abdomens pulsing.

  Streams of neon-green bile arced down from the darkness. One stream missed, splashing harmlessly onto a crate. The second hit the Tech-Specialist right in the faceplate. The glass fogged and then cracked, sending the man flailing as he dropped his gear.

  "Roof! They are in the roof!"

  The Cleaners were pros. They did not panic, but adjusted. Two of the rifles snapped upward.

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  Brap. Brap. Brap.

  The first Acid-Spitter exploded in a shower of green gore as a heavy-caliber round punched through its unarmored underbelly. The connection in Mike’s mind snapped with a sharp and stinging recoil.

  One down.

  The second Spitter tried to scuttle into the shadows, but the tactical lights pinned it. A three-round burst turned it into a smear on the corrugated wall.

  Two down.

  Mike grit his teeth against the feedback pain throbbing behind his eyes. His artillery was gone in seconds. The Cleaners were pushing in now, stepping over their screaming point man. Their boots crunched on the glass and debris.

  "Flanking right!"

  A soldier vaulted over the pile of intake pipes Mike had scattered, moving with terrifying speed. He was coming around the side of the workbench. In two seconds, he would have a clear shot at Mike’s head.

  Mike saw him—a hulking silhouette backlit by the muzzle flashes of his squad.

  He did not have a gun. He had a knife, and he had a rat.

  The large sewer rat was hiding under a pile of rags right next to the boot of the flanking Cleaner. It was trembling with terror as its primitive mind screamed to run.

  Mike reached out. He did not soothe it. He crushed its will.

  Grab him.

  The rat lunged and sank its yellow teeth into the gap between the greave of the Cleaner and his combat boot. The Cleaner grunted and kicked his leg out instinctively. "Get off!"

  [Skill Activated: Bio-Detonate]

  Mike poured his remaining energy into the rodent. He did not wait for the swell but forced the critical mass instantly.

  The rat popped like a balloon filled with nitroglycerin.

  The explosion was small and focused, but vicious. At point-blank range, it was devastating. The blast shredded the heavy fabric of the Cleaner's pants and blew the side of his calf muscle apart.

  The Cleaner shrieked. It was a raw, human sound that cut through the tactical discipline as he collapsed sideways, his leg buckling under him.

  "Man down! Right flank!"

  The scream bought Mike a heartbeat of hesitation from the squad. The suppressive fire wavered for just a fraction of a second.

  He moved.

  He did not scramble. He launched himself. He vaulted over the workbench, the adrenaline spiking so hard that time seemed to stutter. The flanking Cleaner was trying to raise his pistol.

  Mike was there before the barrel could level.

  He did not stab. He swung the heavy iron shiv like a hammer. The blade punched through the weakened side of the neck armor and buried itself in the throat. The man gurgled, blood spraying inside his helmet as he went limp.

  A red, glitchy text box overlaid Mike’s vision.

  [LEVEL UP!]

  [Level 6 -> Level 7]

  [Attribute Threshold Breached: ALL STATS > 10]

  Mike gasped, his back arching.

  It was not like the previous level-ups. This did not feel like a shot of adrenaline, it felt like a realignment. His muscles tightened and the fibers knit together with a density that felt like steel cabling. His perception expanded, the blurry edges of his vision sharpening until he could see the individual scratches on the armor ten feet away.

  He looked at his hand. The shiv looked like a toy. He felt invincible, the surge of power coursing through his veins.

  Kill them all, the System roared in the back of his head.

  Mike turned with a feral grin spreading across his blood-spattered face, ready to tear the squad apart.

  Crack. Crack. Crack.

  Three rounds hammered into his chest.

  The impact threw him backward like he had been kicked by a mule. The feeling of invincibility evaporated instantly.

  Stats over ten made him fast. They made him strong. They did not make him bulletproof.

  Mike slammed back against the metal wall and slid down, gasping for air. His new stats and reinforced vitality were the only reason his chest did not cave in completely, but physics was still physics. The bullets had been stopped by his makeshift armor and high constitution, but the kinetic energy had cracked his ribs.

  "Target exposed! Pin him! Shred the target!"

  The remaining two Cleaners did not rush him. They did not make mistakes. They went prone behind the debris and opened up.

  The air above Mike turned into a shredder. Bullets chewed the wall inches above his head and sparks showered him like fireworks. A ricochet grazed his shoulder, tearing through his jacket and slicing the skin.

  He tried to reach for his rats.

  Snap. Snap.

  He felt them die in the crossfire before they could even move.

  He was alone. He was cornered. He was Level 7 and stronger than he had ever been, but he was about five seconds away from being turned into a sieve.

  "Grenade!"

  A small cylindrical object clattered over the top of the workbench and landed three feet from Mike's nose. A red light blinked on its side.

  Beep. Beep.

  His eyes widened.

  Mike scrambled backward, fighting the pain in his cracked ribs to dive toward the hole in the floor where he kept his scrap metal.

  Run.