Headshot

Shellie slipped out from behind one sliver of altered, programmed reality in this space she'd broken with Ray's computer, ducked low around in between Avery and John, and gripped the fabric at Avery's shoulder to control where Avery was in the moments John had her in her sights. He couldn't put a bullet through Shellie without risking that it would pass through and hit Avery.

"Avery! Don't move," John barked out.

But Avery stumbled back, trying to pull away from the hand that gripped her, and Shellie slipped in behind, arm lashing out with a blade in it, not to cut but to strike the side of Avery's neck with a forearm, and block her retreat with the blade.

Now behind Avery, controlling her movement, moving fluidly despite the fact she, a grown woman, was crouching to match her height to a thirteen year old.

"How good is your aim, soldier boy?" Shellie asked, taking Avery hostage.

"Good," John answered. He pulled the trigger twice. The second shot came so fast Verona didn't have time to cover her ears before the sound blasted out.

So painfully loud.

Shellie's knife hand shattered, the blade flying away from Avery's neck with a violence that matched a spray of blood. As Shellie pulled away in the opposite direction, she seemed to move directly in the way of the second bullet. It clipped her eye, shattering bone.

Shellie fell, draping herself over the back of a bench, hand and upper left region of her face in ruins.

- Gone Ahead 7.6