Page 107 of The Girl Who Only Died Once

All her actions slow, like she’s struggling through a vat of jelly, she fumbles for the holster, black spots crowding around her vision.

She’s been choked before, but never like this. Never without someone’s hands willfully trying to stop her from breathing, but this, with just the air unwilling to work with her lungs, is far, far worse.

Popping the leather strap loose, Chloe pulls the gun out and aims.

Her fingers, slick with sweat, slip twice off the trigger, the metal biting rough into her palm, but she forces herself to still, to control her hands even though her vision goes dim and her head goes light, and pulls again.

“Oh, guns won’t hurt me,” the demon scoffs, “you should know that—”

This time, the gun fires.

Black blood blooms across the other demon’s chest, and she staggers back against the metal lab table, a stunned expression on her face.

She touches her hand to her chest, to the black blood flowing freely, her eyes wide, before her knees buckle. She catches herself on the metal table, clattering on the hard surface, and she’s still breathing, she’s still blinking, and—

Out of the corner of her dim vision, Chloe sees Killian step forward, clenching power in his hand, and the other demon jerks, before falling limp to the ground.

Immediately dead.

All at once, air floods through the room again, and Chloe gasps, immediately light-headed, and curls herself in to put her head through her knees.

Her heart pounds through her skull, blocking out all other noise, until the body on the table whimpers.

Jerking her gaze up, Chloe can only watch as Killian teleports the short distance to the table, the power still clenched in his hands.

“Wait,” she wheezes, as Killian lifts his hand to strike down.

His eyes flicker to her, holding his hand aloft, as she attempts to push herself up, but her arms give up, dumping her back onto the slick tile.

“This is more merciful,” Killian says, his voice eerily smooth. “You would doom him to a life of pain.”

The body doesn’t even register the words, just blinking, his eyelashes gunky with gore.

“Just no,” Chloe blurts out, and slowly, ever so slowly, Killian lowers his hand. “We can figure something out, something else, he could be like Ambra—”

The scientist in the corner lifts his head, eyes bleary and focusing on Chloe.

Without missing a beat, Killian flicks his hand at the three scientists, and his head thunks back down, his pulse still obvious in his throat.

The two women never even stirred.

“We might be able to help, we might be able to reverse it or something or…” Chloe trails off, as the body blinks over to her, and his eyes reflect red. “Ambra told me what they did to her to get her to that point, she didn’t deserve it, he doesn’t deserve—”

“You really don’t know that,” Killian immediately challenges. “You’re dooming them to pain and possible insanity.” Thankfully, he stalks closer to Chloe, away from the body laying listlessly against the metal. “Do you want to doom the world to another Terese?”

“We know how to deal with that now,” Chloe says, getting her feet underneath her and wobbling to standing.

Killian grabs her by her elbow, stabilizing her despite the scowl on his face.

“And we can help prevent that,” Chloe says, then forces herself to take a deep breath, to clear the black splotches from her eyes, before focusing back on the cage.

Unlike the last two, this one isn’t covered in rust. The metal still gleams with attention, freshly sterilized, and the muzzle is clean despite its obvious disuse of time.

Killian follows her glance. “Clear the anti-teleportation trap on this floor first,” he mutters, and Chloe gets the distinct feelingthat she won some sort of argument. “I want to be able to leave the moment we get the data.”

Chloe nods in return, shoving her hair out of her face, though her eyes stray back to the body on the table, at the blood streaming from his mouth and ears.

“It’s an easy unravel,” she says, and her voice quivers out of her throat, like the air that had been stolen from her left its own indelible mark. “Give me…”

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