Once Giants: The Neon Amazon

Chapter 1

Tina kicked in the warped plastiply door of the rusted zinc shack.

The people within jumped as the door flew off its hinges and through the flimsy corrugated wall on the opposite side.

"Don't move, shitheads," she said quickly, as she ducked under the doorway and slipped into the room. "No one has to die here tonight."

Three men stared up at her in stunned silence, caught flatfooted as they sat on overturned plastic buckets; playing dominoes around a white picnic table littered with empty food containers, half empty beer bottles, and full ash trays. Shitheads indeed. Tina moved further inside toward the table, her bare feet yielding to the hard-packed clay of the dirt floor. She remained stooped to fit her eight foot frame inside the tiny shack, a situation she was so accustomed to she could almost do so without thinking.

The place stank as usual; reeking of marijuana smoke, mixed with piss and gun oil. And made all the more awful thanks to her nano-enhaced senses.

Her mark, Raul, sat at the far end of the table—a pudgy, full-blooded Portuguese man with greasy black hair and a beard to match. He exhaled heavily and leaned his head back with a roll of his eyes. "Puta Merda!" he swore at her in Portuguese. "You really got to show up at a time like this?"

"Você tá atrasado," she replied in kind. You're late. "And you know it."

Tina forced herself to focus on him and him alone—or at least that was the impression she wanted to give. Raul wasn't really a threat. She had kicked his ass enough times to make him think twice before trying anything stupid. But the other two were unknown to her.

And that made them dangerous.

Chestnut-skinned with dark dreadlocks, they wore camouflage fatigues, hidden poorly beneath expensive brown leather dusters. The sight of the fatigues caused her adrenal glands to kick in, speeding her pulse and forcing her already enhanced senses to acuity as her muscles began to swell beneath her own skin-tight apparel. She regretted it immediately, tasted blood in her mouth, her body pulling for nonexistent resources, cannibalizing itself.

Shit . . . already? Not even three days this time! Cheap-ass nanites.

She should never have come here. Smart money said to leave now, go back and beg her asshole boss for another dose of mercy while she still had blood pumping through her veins instead of battery acid. But Marcos wasn't one for mercy. In fact, it was just his style to be sending her out on a collection run this close to zero. More control. And returning empty-handed would be out of the question.

Not unless she wanted him to double her debt again.

A tickle caught in her throat, but she used every ounce of her will to avoid the coughing fit that would eventually follow. Showing weakness at a time like this would be an invitation to pounce that even Raul wouldn't be able to turn down.

"Damn," one of the dreadheads said in American-accented English. "That's a huge bitch!"

The dreadheads both laughed, gawking up at her with a mixture of awe, lust, and disbelief—a look she was all too accustomed to getting from men, and even some women. Although, it had been far easier to endure when she was in the ring.

"Marcos wants what you owe him," Tina continued in Portuguese, so the Americans wouldn't comprehend. "And I need to take back what you owe him to get what he owes me. So I'm real motivated, understand?"

An almost undetectable smirk crawled its way onto Raul's dark, bulbous lips. She had said too much. Raul could translate exactly what she was talking about. He didn't need to hear her cough now. He knew full well what state her body was in.

His emboldened grin confirmed her suspicions. "I think you better tell Marcos I'll pay him if, and when, I feel like it. Do you understand?"

Tina tensed. Raul was obstinate, but he wasn't stupid enough to outright defy someone like Marcos. Not without help. She looked to the two dreadheads again. Their eyes darted back and forth between Raul and herself, subtle expressions on their brows. Were they communicating somehow? Silently, through Neural Lynk implants? Raul had one for sure, and for American military types, it was probably a requirement. Not that neural-tech was uncommon. Cybernetics had been around for well over a century since the late 2070s, but in a shithole like São Paulo, they were either a status symbol or an indicator of extreme high performance capabilities.

And that made her even more nervous.

The posture of the dreadheads shifted, both adjusting slowly to sit upright. She could smell the adrenaline-tinged reek of their sweat as it beaded on their foreheads, heard the sound of their hearts racing with anticipation.

Tina took a step back toward the doorway, crouching into a ready stance. She released the mental stops she had placed on her body. Synthetic glands pumped hormones as a sheen of sweat coated her skin. What little strength her body had left would have to protect her now. Her breathing grew rapid. The adrenaline that heightened anxiety and fear quickly changed to produce determination and rage.

One of the dreadheads threw open his duster, and Tina saw him reach for a glint of metal beneath. She kicked the table into him, sent him flying backward over his bucket in a shower of bottles and trash. The other rasta headed man stood, whipping out a machete and bringing it down on her forearm. The sharp sting of steel slicing flesh triggered more glands to pump. Her head grew light; too many chemicals sending too many signals to her overtaxed brain.

A gunshot rang out.

More pain leapt through her side as the adrenaline surged, spinning quickly into rage. Tina screamed as genetic engineering and decades-old training took over. She grabbed the machete by the blade and buried her other fist in the man's head with a wet thud. Then, snatching his body by the collar and waist, she slammed it into his partner as he was rising from the floor. The other dreadhead crumpled back to the ground as the body of his friend was brought down on top of him. After two more slams, he stopped moving altogether.

Tina didn't stop slamming until long after she had lost count.

By the time she did, her breathing was strained. Her chest heaved and ached until eventually, her breathing slowed and she arose to stand over her handiwork. The dreadheads were now lying on the floor like two bloodied sacks of pulverized meat. Bile rose in her throat, and she had to turn away to keep from vomiting.

As the adrenaline waned, the reality of what she had done slowly set in. Killing someone was always bad. Killing two people was worse. But killing two people she didn't even know?

Now that was downright stupid.

She glanced over to see Raul standing motionless next to her, his head barely reaching her shoulder even in her stooped position. His face was a portrait of incomprehension and fear.

"Girl, you are so friggin' dead," he said.

Then, abruptly, he made a bolt for the open doorway behind her.

"Hey!" she cried. But Tina could barely manage to track him with her eyes much less stop him, as he clambered through the doorway and into the night. "Shit!"

She tried to go after him, but stumbled, the tickle catching in her throat again. She hacked loudly into her hand, falling against one of the flimsy corrugated walls for support as an all too familiar coughing fit took hold. When it finally subsided a minute later, flecks of rust-colored mucus covered her palm. Not good. Tina struggled back to her feet and staggered toward the open doorway.

She took one last look at the two bodies on the floor and the echo of Raul's words chilled her to the soul.

"Puta Merda," she whispered as she stepped out into the darkened alleyway. "What the hell have I done?"