She doesn't need protection from this. The worst dangers are back home. This isn't yet catastrophic, nor is it unlivable. What it is, at least for the moment, is a whirlwind of movement and sound. They need to get away from this nexus of motion and get to somewhere with less spaces for infected to hide and lurch out of the shadows; right now, seeing infected through the crowd is as hard as seeing the path ahead is. Unfortunately, they don't get to choose the battlefield, the battlefield simply exists wherever people are present in this city.
It's hard to gauge how far ahead safety is. That's not her job. Focusing on how long the fight will be is a way to wear yourself out before the start. Second by second, she thinks to herself, and jumps surprisingly high off to the side to jump atop a car, surge forward and, producing a second knife, dive down onto two infected at once, knives making hard contact in the centers of their backs. Rapid stabbing with a strength humans shouldn't have directly into the place where the neck bones meet the base of the skull have them staying down, and then she's sprinting ahead again.
Her sprinting speed is much faster than anything she looks like she should be capable of. But perhaps more surprising, for a girl coated in blood and carrying knives, is the flicker of humanity that abruptly kicks in. She produces a small piece of carved jade from her pocket, pressing it into the boy's startled hand. He holds onto it, looking at her questioningly.
"It's alright, tiánxīn. I got it from the temple to Guanyin back home. She'll protect you. Just keep your eyes shut and hold on, okay?"
Once he does as he's told, Li snaps back into action, throwing herself to the side at an angle that lets her knock down an incoming infected by slamming her shoulder into his torso, sending him stumbling. It's a sloppy, deep cut across his neck that she levels, more momentum than precision, but then he's laying dead at her feet and she's up again in a blink, instinctively wiping her knife off on her skirt, eyes bright and alert, the red bright and focused.
It's going to be a run the entire way there and they're going to have to carve through a lot of people, but they can do it. The kid needs to be somewhere safe. Some tiny part of her never fully beaten out by training remembers that children are not supposed to be in these situations.
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It's hard to gauge how far ahead safety is. That's not her job. Focusing on how long the fight will be is a way to wear yourself out before the start. Second by second, she thinks to herself, and jumps surprisingly high off to the side to jump atop a car, surge forward and, producing a second knife, dive down onto two infected at once, knives making hard contact in the centers of their backs. Rapid stabbing with a strength humans shouldn't have directly into the place where the neck bones meet the base of the skull have them staying down, and then she's sprinting ahead again.
Her sprinting speed is much faster than anything she looks like she should be capable of. But perhaps more surprising, for a girl coated in blood and carrying knives, is the flicker of humanity that abruptly kicks in. She produces a small piece of carved jade from her pocket, pressing it into the boy's startled hand. He holds onto it, looking at her questioningly.
"It's alright, tiánxīn. I got it from the temple to Guanyin back home. She'll protect you. Just keep your eyes shut and hold on, okay?"
Once he does as he's told, Li snaps back into action, throwing herself to the side at an angle that lets her knock down an incoming infected by slamming her shoulder into his torso, sending him stumbling. It's a sloppy, deep cut across his neck that she levels, more momentum than precision, but then he's laying dead at her feet and she's up again in a blink, instinctively wiping her knife off on her skirt, eyes bright and alert, the red bright and focused.
It's going to be a run the entire way there and they're going to have to carve through a lot of people, but they can do it. The kid needs to be somewhere safe. Some tiny part of her never fully beaten out by training remembers that children are not supposed to be in these situations.