Someone moved closer behind me. With no warning, I suddenly dropped and shot my leg out, sweeping it under his legs. He fell with a satisfying off, and I stomped on his knee, feeling the break. The joint cracked under my heel, the sound just as loud as McCallum's stupid voice. He coiled up, screaming in pain.
Nine stun guns were pulled. I did a handstand, kicking away to guns. They flew through the air and fell with a clatter five meters away.
Rough hands tried to grab me, but these prison clothes were super loose, making it easy to wiggle away. Two more guards came at me. Springing up, I chopped my hand down in a ridge strike, aiming for one's gun arm. I heard delicate human bones break—so satisfying after thinking about my broken wing, all those years ago (but not ten! Surely not ten!)—and a guard sank to the ground, screaming and holding his arm.
I hit another guard with a palm strike to his nose, breaking it and shoving bone shards toward his brain. He, too, went down, but that one wasn't moving. That made three in the last eight seconds.
"Maximum!" McCallum said, sounding like my father. "We all know you can fight! Stop this pointless display—you're only making it worse for yourself."
"Worse than having my wings cut off?" I snarled, spinning backward to punch a guard in the kidney. When he staggered a bit, I jumped up and snap-kicked his head sideways. He dropped. They just weren't making guards like they used to.
Another snap kick to a guard's left ear, and he fell to his knees, his stun gun skittering across the ground. I punched someone else right below the ribs, then clapped both of my hands over his ears as hard as I could, rupturing at least one eardrum. He yelled and dropped the stun gun, then fell against a concrete wall. I'd lost count, but there were only a few left.
"What—who are you?" One guard shouted, trying not to look afraid.
"I'm Maximum Ride, you son of a bitch!"
And a roundhouse kick to the side of his neck, disrupting nerves and blood flow to his carotid. He looked confused, then melted to the ground.
I felt the brush of a stun gun against my arm, so I whirled and slammed it out of the guard's hand. "I think you use the pointy end," I said, then punched him hard in the gut. When he folded, I grabbed his head and smashed it down onto my raised right knee.
Then it was me and the remaining two guards. I saw one smile nervously, wishing he was armed with a regular gun or even a taser. The ground was littered with broken, bloody, and unconscious guards—the ones who had tried to get close enough to me to use their stuns.
"My legs are longer than your arms," I pointed out, and he lunged towards me, gun out. I ducked and snap-kicked his knee, making it forcefully bend in the wrong direction. Moaning, he fell hard but still tried to swipe at me with his gun. I stomped on his wrist, breaking it, then kicked the gun away.
When I looked up, the last guard was disappearing through the hidden door.

- Hawk, Chapter 37