Free Slag Attack by Andersen Prunty Page A

realizing what she planned to do.
        He reaches down to clasp the door handle and she knows if he actually closes the door then it’s all over. She will never make it out alive. She wants to remain silent. She’s crouched right beside the door. She wants to not blow her cover until she is right up on him but she blurts, “Syd Barrett!” and then she has to act. She springs at him, standing right there beside her, and rams her head into what’s left of his face.
        He slashes out with the knife, catching her just below her ribs. It goes in deeper than the other ones had. Those had been warning, cautionary cuts. Keep him from the door, she thinks, and go for the eyes. Go for the eyes.
        He reaches out for her but maybe his eyes have not fully adjusted to the light because he can’t grab her. She throws her body crossways into his knees and feels the blade come down hard into her ass. Already, she is covered in blood. She has to move before he has the chance to stab again. He’s bent over. She raises her head as fast as she can, praying she doesn’t run it into the knife. The back of her skull connects with his nose and she hears a popping noise, feels the slags squirming against her scalp.
       “ Robert Smith!” she shouts. Then she falls onto her hands and sweeps her legs around behind his, dropping him to the ground.
       “ Stop sayin those fuckin names!” he shouts, swinging his arm out with the knife but now he is on the squirming floor and she is standing up. She eyes the distance, sits down perpendicularly to him, brings her ankles together, raises them and brings the heavy cuffs down onto his left kneecap, shattering it.
        She wants to go for the eyes but he has the knife.
        And he’s trying to stand up. If it weren’t for the damn ankle cuffs she could just run and she’s pretty sure she could outrun him. She can’t let him stand up. She leaps across him, bounding from her place on the ground, and brings both her knees down into his other knee.
        He swings the knife down toward her back but she’s already moving away from him and the blade slices rather than plunges. Her organs are grateful.
        She has visualized so much of this in her head. What he would do with the knife, how she could maneuver in her restrained fashion, that it feels almost like she is fighting something she has practiced before.
        He swings out with the knife again and she raises the cuffs behind her enough to snag the point in one of the few chain links. Quickly jerking her wrists, the knife falls from his hand and she throws herself on it.
        He still has upper body strength, she reminds herself, thinking of that bullish head on those bullish shoulders. But he’s weakened so much. Parts of his skin have been eaten away.
        He sits up and pushes her back, trying to get her off the knife but she already has it in her hands. His face is a mass of blood from his exploded nose. She turns with her back toward him, still on her knees, and thrusts herself backward, careful not to let go of the blade’s handle as it plunges into his flesh. The knife hits to the right of his bellybutton, barely missing the huge transplanted nipple. Using his still considerable arm strength, he grabs her around the neck, squeezing brutally and lifting her up. She manages to plant her feet on the floor and give another great thrust, this time aiming the knife near his head. His hands, slick with blood, slip, and she buries the knife in his left eye. He squeals in pain and clamps his teeth on her lower buttock.
        Knowing she is in position, she mentally gauges where his right eye would be from the position where her hands are. She is surprised she hasn’t penetrated the brain. His teeth grind against her flesh.
        She savagely stabs the knife downward, feels it punch into his eye, and screams, “John Lennon!”
        This is her time to leave, while he is blinded, while those powerful