"What now?"

Nick couldn't help but feel Mica's question was a little unfair. How was he supposed to know 'what now'? Base jumps without a parachute, breaking and entering, shooting gangsters and sticking guns in people's faces—quite literally—were not exactly everyday experiences for him. He'd wandered off the reservation quite some time ago and was now in uncharted territory.

"D-don't know. We leave, I g-g-guess."

"Oi! Uck-ead! Oo on't onna oo at."

The gun in his mouth wasn't doing Hugo's diction any favours, so—against his better judgement—Nick slowly withdrew it. "What?" he snapped, pleased to have pulled off a passable authoritative, commanding tone—always a tricky move with a speech impediment.

The fallen man wiped his mouth. "What I said, fuckwit, is you don't wanna do that."

Standing a couple of yards away and—despite the gun still clutched firmly in a double-handed grip—finding it difficult to will herself to come any closer, Mica glared down at him. "And why not?"

Twisting his head to look at her, the wounded man managed a strained grin. "Because you're gonna get caught, you stupid bitch. If you two morons think you can go around shooting up the place without getting noticed, you're even dumber than you both look. The whole building will be swarming with Syndicate people by now—you won't last five minutes."

"We'll t-t-take our chances," said Nick. "It's n-n-n-not as though we have a ch-ch-choice."

Grin fading, Hugo stared up at him. "What's with the stammer? You some kind of retard?"

Nick considered for a moment—this time, there was anger. Usually the most placid of individuals, this wasn't an emotion he'd experienced for a while, but there was no denying the slow rise of heat behind his eyes. He rested the barrel of one of his guns on Hugo's forehead. "Yeah. A real t-t-t-twitchy one. Wanna see?"

"Nah." To Nick's consternation, Hugo's grin returned. What, he couldn't help but wonder, could the stupid bastard possibly have to smile about? "I wanna live."

Mica edged a little closer. "What are you talking about?" she demanded.

"Simple," replied Hugo. "I can tell you how to get of here. There's just one little condition."

Her eyes narrowed. "Which is?"

"You two fucks promise not to kill me."

It was all Nick could do to keep his expression impassive, as he felt the blood drain from his face, taking any trace of anger with it. Kill him? Actually kill someone? Anyone? Knees weak, he fought off the sudden, almost irresistible urge to sit down, as the appalling reality of this situation washed over him—as the trance-like, almost apathetic state-of-mind that had enveloped him since their flight from the locker room evaporated in an instant. Here he stood, a gun clutched in each sweaty hand, bloody and violent death a mere trigger-squeeze away—and the musclebound thug, the foul-mouthed criminal goon who lay wounded before him, actually thought he could do it. That he could pull the trigger. That he was going to do it, unless they cut some kind of a deal.

"We're not the killers here," said Mica. And as if to reinforce her point, she lowered her gun.

Nick stared at her, both heart and mind racing. No, he thought, that wasn't going to fly. As distressed as he may be to find himself in the role of executioner, if it improved their odds of escape, then it was a part he needed to play.

"Sp-sp-speak for yourself," he responded, in his best attempt at a growl, placing the barrel of the second gun just above the first. He gave Hugo the most menacing look he could muster. "It's a d-deal. T-t-tell us the way out, and you l-live."

"Nick, what are you doing?" Mica frowned at him, in genuine puzzlement and concern. "Just leave him. We need to get out of here."

He shot her a look, in the sincere and fervent hope she would correctly interpret the impassioned 'please shut up' it contained.

No such luck.

"You can't kill him. It's bad enough that you shot him. If you kill him, then you're no better than...than..."—she stared at her rescuer, as though seeing him for the very first time—"than them," she finished, her voice almost inaudible.

"Shut-up," demanded Nick, steeling himself to put as much contempt into his tone as he could manage—which, he had to admit, wasn't very much. He tossed up throwing an inflammatory 'bitch' onto the end of the statement, but couldn't quite bring himself to do it. "You d-don't know me. You d-d-d-don't know what I'm c-c-c-capable of." Once again, he looked down at Hugo. "B-but I do."

Eyes crossed in a manner that was almost comical, Hugo took in the weapons resting on his forehead, before turning his attention back to Nick. "Two guns, huh? What are you gonna do, fuck-face—shoot me twice? Worried you might miss the first time? Talk about amateur-hour. Where'd you get your training, the fucking girl guides?"

Nick couldn't help but feel this response was a little less respectful than he'd been hoping for. So, taking a leaf out of Mica's book, he gave the thug a sharp rap on the head. "Shut your m-m-mouth." He swallowed, willing his larynx to behave itself for once. "I'm just worried a b-brain the size of yours might b-b-be hard to hit."

Eyes locked on the screen displaying the strange little tableau, Zima cursed the lack of audio—yet another of the changes she'd be implementing, once she was in charge. There would be no more of these half-measures, put in place by arrogant, incompetent fools. The Syndicate had far outgrown this amateur level of so-called security—her recruitment as a consultant by Jaime Salazar showed he knew it; she simply had to convince him as to the degree of change required.

Both in equipment and people.

Still, whatever Hugo was saying, it appeared to be working—neither the girl nor the stranger seemed inclined to leave him. In fact, she realised, leaning forward, just the opposite—the two guns now pressed to the wounded man's head suggested the stranger had a very strong interest in him. She just hoped it wasn't lethal interest. As much as there was no love lost between her and the arrogant fool, he was no use to her dead. At least, not in the current situation—the fugitive pair were hardly likely to linger for a chat with a corpse.

"For once in your life," she muttered, glancing at the screen showing her reinforcements gathering in the basement, "try not to make everyone in the vicinity want to kill you."

"Ha! A retard with a sense of humour, who'd have thought? Good one, retard. Maybe you should think about doing some stand-up. 'Cause you suck at this mercenary, soldier-boy shit."

Mercenary? Nick let that slide—at the moment he didn't have the mental capacity to process whatever the comment implied. "Says the g-guy lying on the floor with a b-b-b-b-..."—he swallowed again—"bullet in his leg."

Hugo scowled. "You g-g-g-got lucky, retard. Turns out you're only almost as pathetic as you look."

"Whatever. Now, the w-way out?"

For a moment longer, Hugo held his gaze—the pure, unadulterated hatred unmistakable in his eyes—before turning away. "Fair enough. A deal's a deal, retard. Now, let me see..."

They waited, Nick doing his very best to explain his recent actions to Mica by way of surreptitious eyebrow waggles—with limited success, judging by her expressionless face. They waited some more. And then some more.

He gave Hugo another rap, by way of encouragement.

"Back off, retard—I'm thinking. There's a fuckload of security points in this place, and I need to work out the best way for you to bypass them. My leg already hurts like a son-of-a-bitch, and your little love-taps aren't exactly helping. So, back the fuck off."

Watching on, gun once again raised, Mica was thinking hard. Firstly, who was this new Nick? Where was the lost-puppy-like character, the inept stutterer—the person who claimed to have plunged into the heart of the illicit, enslaved hell of her life, purely by accident? When had he been replaced by this stranger, this person who could take down an armed man virtually twice his size and who was now threatening to kill him?

While nothing he'd done indicated he was no longer on her side, he'd done plenty to suggest there was more to his story than he'd let on.

And then there was Hugo. There was very definitely something fishy going on with him; she wasn't buying this bargain, this deal for survival—not for a second. His intimidating figure had been a regular presence in the penthouse, and nothing she had seen during her incarceration led her to believe he was the bargaining kind, let alone somebody who would ever plead for his life.

He was up to something—and even if he wasn't, the longer they lingered here, the more the chance that somebody else would find them. Whatever he was planning, she just wished he'd hurry up and...

How could they have been so stupid?

"Nick!" she blurted. "We have to go, right now."

His only reply was another collection of semi-epileptic eyebrow twitches. She wasn't quite sure if he was trying to communicate something or whether the stress of the situation had induced some kind of facial tic.

"Keep your panties on, bitch." Hugo leered up at her. "Assuming you've got some on for a change. I just need another minute or two."

"Nick, he's just stringing us along until more of his kind arrive, I'm sure of it. We have to go, before they come. We have to go, right now."

Nick stared at her, indecision writ large on his features. He had a horrible feeling she was right. But he suspected there was an equally horrible certainty their chances of getting out of the building without guidance were next to zero. So, what to do?

For several pregnant moments, the decision hung in the balance—and then Hugo spoke.

"Don't tell me you're gonna listen to a single thing a slut like her has to say? A slut and a gook? Seriously? Don't be so fucking stupid. Look, just give me a second, and—"

Without conscious thought—almost as a reflex action—Nick straightened and stepped back, still keeping both guns on his adversary. "Shut up. J-just shut-up. I w-was never g-g-going to k-kill you, but if you d-d-don't shut-up, I m-might just change m-my mind." He glanced at Mica. "Let's go."

"What? No!" Already twisted in derision, Hugo's features became a mask of rage. "I don't fucking think so!" He lunged for Nick, who leapt back, but not fast enough to prevent the big man's slab-like hand wrapping around his ankle. "You're not going"—with a convulsive heave, he hauled him off his feet—"anywhere!"

Falling heavily on his side, breath exploding from his lungs in a brutal, concussive whump, Nick managed to hang on to one of his guns, but couldn't prevent the other jarring from his grasp and skittering away across the floor and out of reach. Battling to draw an agonised breath, he made to scramble after it but instead found himself sliding backwards, as with irresistible strength, Hugo hauled him in.

"You're mine now, retard." Rolling onto his stomach, swatting aside the kick Nick aimed at his head, the big man grabbed his quarry by the belt and with sheer brute strength heaved him alongside, before throwing a leg across to straddle him, his face contorting in pain as he rose to a kneeling position and put weight on his wounded leg.

Still fighting for breath, and appalled by the overwhelming, machine-like strength of this man who just moments ago was at his mercy—the man beneath whose hulking form he now found himself pinned—it was a moment before Nick even remembered his remaining gun, and another before he thought to bring it to bear.

A moment too long. Snarling with contempt, Hugo simply caught his wrist, snatched the gun away and flung it off into the gloom.

"Right," he panted, glaring down, "let's see how big a man you are now." He landed a savage backhand across Nick's face. "Not such a fucking tough guy without your toys, huh?"

"Stop it!" Unable to prevent her gun from trembling, Mica nevertheless aimed it directly at Hugo's head. "Leave him alone."

His grin in response was pure malice. "Or what?"

She swallowed. "Or I'll shoot."

"Ha! You? Little Miss Butter-Wouldn't-Melt-in-Her-Fucking-Mouth Goody-Two-Shoes Mica? Shoot poor old Hugo in cold blood? Right after you told this fucker here not to? Yeah, I don't think so."

"I will. I swear I will. If you lay another hand on him, I'll shoot you. I'll shoot you dead!"

"Lay a hand on him, you say?" He turned back to Nick, writhing beneath him in a desperate yet completely ineffective attempt to get free. "Don't mind if I do." And like a jackhammer made flesh, his fist smashed into the trapped man's face. "Whoops. Would you look at that. I seem to have laid my hand on him." He repeated the blow, and Nick's struggles became more feeble. "What a clumsy fuck I am."

"Stop it, stop it, stop it!" Mica cried, stepping towards the two men, tears welling in her eyes. "You're killing him!"

"Yeah." Hugo grinned down at Nick's bloodied face. "But given he's a bit of a retard"—again the massive fist struck home—"I'm probably doing him a favour, don't you think?"

And as the fist rose once more, Mica knew she must act. Limp and still, if Nick wasn't already dead, she knew it wouldn't take many more of those hammer-blows to finish the job. She couldn't let that happen.

But nor could she kill a man. Her upbringing, her faith—every part of her being, right down to the very core—would not allow it.

Wounding a man, though? On that topic, the core of her being might just have to learn to be a little flexible. So, taking a single step forward to shorten the range, she shifted her aim to Hugo's fist—the fist about to plunge into the face of the man who, regardless of how little she knew about him, was the sole human being to have shown her the slightest shred of kindness in the long weeks since this whole nightmare had begun—and blew a hole clean through it.

"I said, leave him alone."