Former photocopier technician? Was Hal making a joke? Either way, Ben was too stuck to the wall to get to the shattered photocopier.

I'd started with the people next to the far wall because of the high potential ratio of stuck people to goobot fired. It wasn't a bad decision either. I covered more than 20 people in my version of Silly String before anyone on the far wall realized what was going on.

When they did realize it, they began moving away from the wall and running to the right—a reasonable move, given that I'd started from the left.

I wasn't the only one in the room, though, and Tara had continued to give orders.

"Gravitystar, hold down the center of the room as far out as you can."

With that command, bodies fell in a circle with a roughly 20-foot radius, in several cases pulling desktop computers off the desk on top of people who appeared to be wearing helmets that connected to the computers with thick cables.

It didn't stop the people who'd been heading to the left from going that way, but the next one made it harder.

"Voice, Storm King, Mystic, Red Hex, and the Power, take down people in the outside hallways," Tara said, grunting as she hit the ground herself.

The wall directly underneath our entrance held the largest cluster of guards, but they were under direct assault from those of us whose strength lay in hand-to-hand.

That's to say they faced two practically invisible opponents in the form of Tiger, our armored giant dog, and Rachel, who was using a paralysis gun I'd designed for her.

They didn't do any better at avoiding paralysis than being knocked over as Tiger bounded through the group toward where Jaclyn and Izzy fought the people in bright green powered armor.

The fact that Tiger didn't stay didn't weaken our group on the ground there at all. They already had Tara, multiple Jennys, Dayton, Rod (in his troll body), Alex, Cassie, Amy, Sydney, and Marcus. In short, it was a bad day to be a minion.

How bad? Well, the big picture went like this: gravity in the middle of the room was too high for a normal person to do anything more than crawl, and even if it grew weaker the further out you went, it took work to get anywhere.

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Meanwhile, the troops on the side where we entered were falling to our best hand-to-hand fighters, the troops on my side were becoming stuck in goo, and the other two sides faced lightning, telekinetic blasts, orders they couldn't ignore, and being hit by random pieces of metallic office equipment.

Jaclyn and Izzy weren't finding the people in green powered armor easy, but on the whole, the opposition was falling more quickly than new people were coming through the doors and joining the fight.

Anyone who began to enter the room risked being zapped. Anyone inside who wanted to move had to run down or climb over rows of cubicles, but only on the edges, or they'd get caught in gravity.

Mind you, I was only peripherally aware of it. I had my stuff to deal with. About half of the people I hadn't zapped with goobots were running for the right hallway (relative to where we entered the room). The rest were taking cover in the cubicles and aiming at me.

"I'll take the cubicles," Haley told me via implant.

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw her jump on top of the nearest cubicle, drop a goo grenade into a cubicle where five guards pointed their weapons at me. Then she jumped fifteen feet into the next cluster, a blur of claws, fists, and feet. I didn't see many details, but I did see her cut through a rifle with her claws and throw two people out of the cubicle. They hit a group of goo-splattered soldiers and stuck to them.

When we started, I might have felt compelled to watch how she was doing out of the corner of my eye, but at this point, I knew better. She outclassed them.

I also knew that she'd say something if she needed help, and if she didn't, Hal would.

Besides, for all I knew, she might have to help me. She already was. Every person in the cubicles that she took out was one less firing at me. The rest of them were. Bullets, beams, and even a grenade (a questionable choice in your base) flew toward me, some hitting with no real damage, others hitting the wall behind me, and somehow I swatted the grenade out of the air into the hallway below me.

No one threw grenades after that.

Despite the hail of fire, I still blasted away at my own targets, the retreating guards, aiming for the ones in front so that the blast of goo stopped the front in its tracks as the ones in the back ran into it from behind, sticking to the group in front.

Then I fired at the ones in back, turning the group into a goo sandwich, a clot of people at the corner, making that spot impassible without crawling over the cubicle next to it.

Deciding to save some goobots for later, I turned around, firing paralysis rays from my suit at the stragglers hiding in he nearest cubicles. Haley wouldn't mind if I took out a few of hers.

I got off a few shots, but as the guards began to fall, I noticed something green appearing in the air—teleporting in. My first impression was of a glowing green skull the size of a human being, the same color as the Alienware-style powered armor.

My next impression was of a burning green light emitting from the skull's mouth, or was it eyes? Either way, I could see nothing else but the light, and it hurt. The chest section of the Rocket suit lost 40% of its protection in that one shot, and I dropped into cubicle land, smashing into the side of a row.

It wasn't a controlled drop either, coming more out of surprise than "evasive action." I slid across the floor, feeling the gravity increase, but at least I was out of the skull's direct view.

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