“Whoa, Debbie,” I say, taking a step back into Vesper. “Stay over there.” When she takes a step toward us, I add, “Please,” just in case. It had worked at the safehouse.
It doesn’t work now.
As I focus on Debbie, a menu pops up beside her.
DEBBIE
Abominable yeti, chaotic evil
Ha ha. Run.
That’s it. That’s all it says.
We are so fucked.
Neither one of us can run in the snow, not with it this deep. As we move to the side, Debbie disappears, blending into her surroundings so well, she’s just gone. We have barely any weapons and we’re on a time constraint.
I glance at Vesper. “Run for the border. I’ll distract her.”
“Are you insane?” she snarls. “I’m not leaving you here to die.”
“At least one of us should survive?—”
“Shut the fuck up, Locke,” she spits as she draws her blade. “We’re fighting our way out of this together.”
Or we die together.
I blow out my breath and raise my hammer. Alright then. If this is how I die, so be it.
“Would you like to know your chances of survival?” Cipher asks, popping back in as Debbie bears down on us.
“No!” I snarl, rushing forward with my hammer raised.
“Fifteen percent,” Cipher answers anyways.
Fifteen percent shocks me. Mostly because we’d had less than one percent chance of surviving the orca pod and yet we had.
“You’re telling me we have a higher chance of defeating this thing than the orca pod?” I snarl.
Debbie roars and launches herself at me since I’m the one running at her with a hammer. Her large meaty fists slam against the ground, and then she shoves through the piled-up snow like it’s nothing. It doesn’t slow her down at all, not like us.
“Yes,” Cipher answers. “You should revel in that fact.” He pauses. “Keep Vesper alive.”
And then he’s gone from my mind, probably off to talk Vesper through this. He gives me no pointers, no hints, nothing. He just leaves me to go toe-to-toe with this fucking abominable yeti.
“Oh mygod,” Steve draws out. “Debbie! Long time no see! Girl, you’re looking particularly savage today!Sauvageeven. Meow!”
With my hammer raised and all my force behind it, I slam into Debbie. The hammer connects right at her shoulder, hitting the beast hard enough to make my hands hurt where they grip the handle.
Debbie . . . doesn’t move.
She looks down at me with a raised brow.
I stare up at her with wide eyes. “Oh, fuck,” I say, just before her fist punches out and sends me flying through the falling snow. I scream as I fly at least thirty meters away and slam into the soft, freshly fallen snow built up.At least it’s a soft landing, I think as I drag myself back to my feet and look around.
In front of me, Vesper is rushing around Debbie, her hyena mask firmly in place. Brilliant. At least she can tell where Debbie is even if we can’t see. I’ll be honest. I’d forgotten she had the thing, that she could use it like that, but the moment she’s wearing it again, I remember her wearing it before. She has better items than me. Her blade, her mask, her cloak.
“You know,” I grunt to Cipher as I start pushing through the snow again. “If you want me to protect her, I’m going to need better fucking items.”
