Did people actually use words like 'perimeter?' Fatima suppressed a smile. In part to avoid embarrassing her new friend.

And in part because it kind of hurt, considering how cut up the inside of her mouth was right now.

She was wasting time, anyway. Standing up straight, she pulled the hunting knife out of her boot, hurling it at one of the monsters she'd managed to let slip through. The knife embedded itself to the handle in the creature's skull and the critter dropped like a stone.

Sloppy. Arty would not approve.

"Hey, Flying Guy!" she shouted up to her new friend, "Give me a rough head count of what's coming this way."