The wind tore at his face as he cleared the edge. Suddenly, he realized he’d made a very serious error.

  Adam plummeted and the ground reached up to claim him.

  One second. He fell.

  Two seconds. He fell faster.

  Adam spun through the air, the world around him coming in flashes of silver, gray and green as he fought to orient himself.

  Fuck, fuck, fuck.

  Three seconds.

  He pushed.

  He pushed harder than he’d ever pushed and the power tore from his veins, clawing its way out with a roar like a starting engine. It poured into his hands and they erupted in twin torrents of blue light.

  Adam fought for control as he righted himself, the ground rushing up with a nauseating speed. Barely contained panic thrashed in his chest as he pointed his palms toward the onrushing ground.

  Five seconds.

  The strain took its toll as he felt blood poured from his nose and into his eyes, pushed upward by force of the fall.

  Too much, too fast.

  Six seconds.

  Adam braced and dug into his power, throwing every ounce of his will against gravity itself.

  He landed with a bone jarring thump. Every joint from his feet to his spine exploding in a flash of white-hot agony, the twin jets of light snapping off with an audible pop. He stood, his spine firing off a rapid series of cracks as it realigned.

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  Less than a second later, the breath was driven from his lungs as something collided with his chest, sending him spinning through the air and slamming into the side of a parked HumVee.

  He dropped to the ground in a heap, his vision clearing in time to see the feline maw close in on him. The creature clamped onto his shoulder and the runes burned into his coat flared to life while the teeth ground against the bone. It threw him to the side and he skidded across the pavement, fighting his way back to his feet as he slid to a halt.

  “Alright!” he bellowed. “Come on!”

  The thing spun on its heels, kicking off the vehicle and rocketing toward him with a rising whistle like an oncoming freight train. It hit him again, and this time he was ready. He grabbed it by the razor-sharp fur framing its face, the runes on his gloves smoking as they kept his palms from being sliced to ribbons. Adam coiled his arm and drove an upper cut into the creature’s chin, an explosion of sparks and bone fragments flying from its mouth as the jaws clacked together. He drove his elbow into the top of its head, arresting its momentum and caving in its skull with a wet crack.

  It died just as the rest of the creature’s vanguard crested the makeshift barricade surrounding the building.

  A pulse of high-caliber rounds tore into the first of the horde bearing down on him. Adam covered his ears as the staccato of thunder belched from an embanked turret high on the opposite wall. For a moment the creatures paused, held back by the rain of death. Then they were over the barricade and pouring into the camp. The gun lost its angle and fell silent, the sound quickly replaced by a rising whistle.

  Adam steeled himself and drew his bat. Its polished surface glinted it in the afternoon light.

  How many times had he drawn it now? A hundred? Two hundred?

  How many times had he killed with it?

  He shook his head and his heartbeat became a familiar thrum behind his ribs.

  The first creature reached him, its wicked claws outstretched and grasping.

  Adam spun to the right, throwing a bolt of power from his left hand as he pivoted away from the creature. The lance of energy struck it in the side and it sailed past, skidding across the pavement as it jittered from the current. He leapt forward, bringing the bat down in an overhead arc, feeling the creature’s spine give beneath the blow.

  Two.

  Another surged across the pavement, the whistle growing so loud it vibrated his already ringing ears. He braced himself and the creature bore down on him. Thrusting the bat forward, he channeled power through the weapon as it collided with the charging beast’s chest. The thrust landed like a sledgehammer, folding the thing’s chest inward like it was made of cardboard. Less than a second later an explosion of sparks exploded from beneath its skin as the bat discharged into the creature’s insides. It fell steaming and smoking to the side.

  Three.