Chapter 46: Nineteen

Su's command entered Mo's ear as the west loading door began to close. "Mo. Come to me." He stepped forward. Three men guarded the loading dock. One stood behind the door controls. Two knelt beside concrete barriers with rifles trained on the narrow opening beneath the descending steel. An ordinary man would have taken cover. The first rifle fired. Mo's right hand crossed the bullet's path. Qi gathered between his fingers in a heat-haze sharp enough to turn the air. The copper-skinned round struck that pressure, shed half its speed, and stopped between his fore and middle fingers. Heat bit through his skin. One night of sleep and a day of Lili's soup had given back enough for the corridors, not for whatever waited after them. He let the flattened bullet fall and kept walking. The rifleman surged up and drove the stock toward Mo's face. Mo caught the sling…