The fifteen-degree upward flexion of Pei Jing’s right wrist was a movement of less than half an inch.
Inside the oiled hard dark metal wrist guard, the dual-catch bronze sear disengaged with a dull, internal click that was fully masked by the whistling sleet.
THWIP.
Two four-inch hard dark metal flying needles, propelled by high-pulling spring steel leaves, launched from their parallel tracks at ninety-five feet per second.
Across a distance of five paces, the flight time was fifty-two split seconds.
The first needle entered the standing sentry’s right temple, exactly at the pterion where the four skull bones met and the bone was thinnest. The diamond-sharpened point shattered the paper-thin bone plate, severing the middle meningeal artery and piercing the time lobe.
The second needle struck three inches lower, punching through the soft, exposed flesh beneath the man’s thyroid joint padding, severing the throat pipe and drilling into the main spine nerve between the second and third neck bones.
The sentry’s eyes glazed over in an instant.
