A single grunt answers the Delta captain's message.
---
The problem with blind fire (besides the whole 'not aiming' problem) is that you still have to look to see if you hit anyone. The Kansatai peeks out from the kiosk and catches a 7.62mm round above the right eye. There's a short spurt of red as the bullet spirals out the back of the man's helmet. Blood pools in the street where the two Kansat officers sprawl.
Davis and Ngawai leave their side street and reach the road running round the top of the concourse. Lancer and beam rifle fire flash back and forth between Kansatai on the ground and Bello's men inside the ruined facade of a building a block away. The dropteam skimmer hovers, pulsing bursts of destructive energy from its nose turret. It looks like the insurgents are either getting pasted or running for it; either way, the lancer fire from inside the building is dropping off quickly.
Crossing the road to the concourse would be risky - there are still several Kansat drones searching for offenders - but there's ample cover. Many gravcars lie abandoned, some with smoking holes in them. A fair handful of bystanders litter the street, victims of stray shots or hit and runs. A yellow and red skimmer, about the size of the dropteam skimmers, is coming in from the east side of Gran's Hope. It's running strobes but doesn't appear armed. Four drones of an unfamiliar design launch from the top of the vehicle and head down towards the wounded.
The Gateship monument is just wreckage now. Water from the pool spills out across the bottom of the concourse and floods the lower level shops. Twisted metal and broken supports jut from the center of the smashed architecture in a hellish parody of its former glory. Here and there Davis catches a glimpse of orange plating or chromed debris; it's all that remains of the Kansat patrol skimmer.
Davis doesn't see Swims-the-Black anywhere. Luckily, neither does the dropteam skimmer scanning the concourse.
---
A second drone plows right into a pedestrian who ducks the wrong way. The impact takes the robed man off his feet and sends the drone spinning into a wall. Max can't help but giggle a little. The last drone keeps up with Kilgore's insane driving. It's equal parts "I don't actually know how to fly this" and "This isn't the first time I've run from the cops". Granted, that was a long time ago and he got caught. At least the DOD stepped in...
The blue gravcar whines in protest, but Max does gain a little on his aerial pursuer. The traffic's gone from utter chaos to gridlock to a bustling normality, and that's even more dangerous. Nobody's expecting Max to burn through two-story intersections.
Arketta's still got her weapons broken down in her gear. Angel's SCAR is also disassembled, but at least he's got his .45. Arketta swipes their unconscious prisoner's handcannon and cycles the top of the gravcar's canopy. Max swerves again and Arketta almost loses the gun off the sunroof, but she manages to hit the last pursuit drone. The strobing machine strobes one final time as the erratic particle beam turns it into molten metal.
---
*Be advised Drop 1, offenders in blue gravcar are armed.*
*Copy that, drone control.* The sarcasm is audible even through the Toughbook's tinny speakers.
---
Max tilts the gravcar up, pulling a mid-air wheelie and decelerating hard before boosting nearly nose-down down another street. The dropteam skimmer drifts too far off course and falls further behind.
---
*Request additional units, control.*
*Backup is enroute. Skimmers six and fourteen, what is your ETA?*
"Swims, are you clear? We have eyes on the concourse but can't see you. Be advised, Kansat skimmers are right behind us." Davis pulls out the clip of prototype ammo, but doesn't load it yet.
*No - bird much close lake. No run now-skkkkkzzzztzzt* As usual, the Whiirr's communication is hamstrung by lack of visuals, but the white noise that squeals across the radio seems to indicate a larger problem.
Neck deep in the once-beautiful monument pool, Swims takes a big chance. He struggles out of his Alef-ka breastplate and tilts it, trying to signal Davis and Ngawai.
Davis spots the golden glint within the monument wreckage. The skimmer above the pool doesn't spot the sign, but it looks like one of the recon drones scouting the street picked it up and is floating closer to Swims. Davis and Ngawai duck back behind a smouldering gravcar as the sphere passes by.
---
In the gravsled, the team's radios scream with static. Hugh's vox, the one that he's talking One-Ton in with, still works, but the actual radios are going haywire.
*It's gonna be spotty once I get over your position,* One-Ton explains via vox, oblivious to the radio interference. *The port bought yer story 'bout calibrating the navs, but they ain't gonna let us buzz Gran's Hope unchecked without a miracle.*
---
Max's Toughbook likewise gives a burst of noise before its Kansat updates cease altogether. His earpiece blasts him with noise. Arketta and Angel flinch as their sets do the same.
The distraction causes Max to miss what would've been a good turn. Instead he plows through a last gasp of heavy traffic heading out of the city. He has to slow down just to stay alive, and the skimmer closes in again. Arketta tries to blast the Kansat vehicle but the artificial lightning bolt spits just a hair left.
The good news is that it is indeed a path leading out of the city. Max drifts the gravcar through the carefully maintained pathside (as the streets are ceasing to be roads and are quickly returning to cultivated swaths cut through Aikoro's equatorial forest), trailing a leafy green smokescreen behind him.
The bad news is that with faster speeds and less congestion, the skimmer is clear to fire! Pulse beams burn the greenery around Max's car and send clouds of cinders into the air. One lucky hit shudders the speeding blue car but Max can't tell if anything vital was hit.
Davis pulls out his earpiece, raises his mirror and bounces a signal back to Swims. He loads the prototype ammo clip into the SCAR and sights up on the drone. "Get ready to move closer to where Bello's men are. We blow this drone, get the skimmers over here, displace to a building closer to Bello's men, and keep the skimmers off of Swims so he can get to the lake. Ready?"
The bad news is that with faster speeds and less congestion, the skimmer is clear to fire! Pulse beams burn the greenery around Max's car and send clouds of cinders into the air. One lucky hit shudders the speeding blue car but Max can't tell if anything vital was hit.
"Hang in there, baby. Just a little farther..." says Max to the gravcar, coaxing the last bit of horsepower out of its engine.
"...Guys, this chase might end real quick. Be prepared to bail at any time."
BANG! The armor-piercing round blows clean through the little drone. It drops and rolls, lifeless, down the concourse walkway. Ngawai's beamer whaps up at the dropteam skimmer. Sparks and droplets of molten armor plate spiral off the Kansat flyer but it doesn't look that damaged.
"Moving!" Ngawai blurs again and this time the cloaking works amidst the cluttered background. The skimmer over Swims' position fires a few bursts that send fire and smoke across the street but it can't get a lock on the bounty hunter. The second skimmer rotates just a bit, drifting so it has possible shots on Davis as well as the rebel's building. The spook's plan appears to be working, however; the skimmers are focusing on where these new shots came from, leaving the rebels inside the building to the dirtbound dropteam.
---
"I don't think our velocity's conducive to bailing right now!" Arketta shouts from the open canopy. Just then, a miracle - an avian creature spooked by the whining grav impellers, some Aikoran bird-thing, takes to the sky with a handful of its fellows. The Kansat skimmer eats one right across the opaque armored canopy. The skimmer lists wildly, losing its temporary lead on Max's car and dropping just below tree level.
"I don't believe that just happened!" Arketta says. Then the skimmer strafes the gravcar again. Now the poor blue skimmer's trailing a smokescreen along with the foliage Max is mowing down. Max's gunner takes another shot but the blast goes wide again.
Max decelerates and tries to slip into the tall trees that border the right side of the path. The skimmer blocks his escape attempt with a withering stream of fire that sends more than one proud tree to the ground. Unfortunately for the Kansatai, without their advantage in altitude Max's maneuverability keeps them from drawing closer. Arketta misses again, finally dropping back inside the car to piece the SCARs back together.
Angel's just a few seconds from slapping a mag into his own weapon.
Please be thin branches... PLEASE be thin branches... Max silently pleads. He boosts the gravcar up and off of the battle-scarred path, plunging into and through the forest's canopy. There's a percussive symphony of cracks and thumps as the car crashes its way through the treetops for a few seconds, then it drops. Max is dodging trees now, Return of the Jedi style. Angel doesn't remember Luke Skywalker screaming as many obscenities, though.
Max throws on the airbrakes and the gravcar comes to a shaky dirt-strewn stop in the middle of the Aikoran forest. The fate of the Kansat skimmer tailing them is unknown.
"We're alive!" Arketta gasps, short of breath. "Have to.. have to move. I don't think they followed us through THAT but they'll send drones."
Davis pauses for a second to fire an AP bullet at the cannon on the skimmer in front of the rebel-held building, then keeps running. "Get ready to sweep the rebel building! If it sounds like there's anyone alive inside, we enter and clear! If not, we head for the monument rubble and sit tight until the Morningstar arrives!"
The AP's recoil buffet's Davis' shoulder; it's one of those "you had to be there" shots. Right in the servo. The skimmer's gun tries to track Davis, fails, whines, and sparks. There's a faint wham as something inside lights off.
Ngawai's prying open a side door, powered off from the severe damage already done to the building. She cranks it open and Davis baseball slides through trailing foamcrete dust. The bounty hunter jumps through just as the concourse skimmer blasts the doorway into flaming kibble.
When his ears stop ringing, Davis hears lancer fire from somewhere above him. The building's dark and the facade's collapsed from the pounding the skimmer gave it. Davis squeezes on the tac-light and looks for a way up.
"This way," Ngawai hisses. She's found some rubble that leads up, and so the pair of them clamber over jagged debris and sidestep oily half-melted glass-ish shards to come out into the open air of the third floor. They're at the same height as the now-impotent skimmer, and they've exited behind five of the armored dropteam Kansatai. Ngawai flattens behind the remains of a concave bed streaked with burns. Rebels silhouetted by something on fire deeper within the building take random pot shots as they attempt to withdraw, but beam fire from in front and below is keeping them from getting to street level.
The Kansatai are spread out across 50 feet of rubble and range from 25 to 40 feet away. They've all managed to find some form of cover from the rebel fire, but their backs are shiny orange targets for Davis and his teammate.
The Kansatai turn in time to see Davis and Ngawai sighting in on them. Perhaps their skimmer alerted them, perhaps they just have that danger sense born of experience. Whatever the case, it doesn't stop beam and bullet from dropping two of the officers in gory, brain-spattered heaps.
The Kansatai return fire is panicked and wild as they shift towards the best cover they can find; back to back, the remaining three officers on the third floor rapid-fire their beamers, hoping to keep their attackers heads down. They're not successful - and they're caught in a crossfire. The rebels' lancers whip past the dropteam survivors, but Davis and Ngawai's follow-up shots are solid hits. The AP round enters one officer's torso and he hits the deck, moaning. Ngawai sends a second down in a cloud of ablative cinders. The man's still moving, but is he too hurt to return fire?
Not too hurt to return fire, but far too hurt to hit anything. The Kansatai's beam rifles are all bark and no bite as they trade short-range fire with their opponents.
The skimmer hunting for Swims descends and drifts over to the ruined building. Its now-unarmed counterpart trades positions, boosting upward and searching the monument wreckage. It spots a glint of golden metal and heads lower. One of the few surviving recon drones heads in closer.
A battered golden breastplate sits propped up in some rubble, accompanied by a harness full of knives and various gear. Water covers the entire concourse; there's no footprints to follow, no trail to find.
Davis doesn't notice Swims' escape, however. He's realized that the new skimmer is very clearly armed and very clearly intends to do him harm.
"ETA 60 seconds," barks One-Ton over Hugh's vox. From the gravsled's vantage point, you can see the Morningstar. It's a tiny blob on blue sky but it's growing fast.
Davis moves to let Ngawai and the rebels take care of the last Kansat as he moves to different cover to deal with the second skimmer. He sights up on the closest set of stabilizers, hoping to ruin its aim long enough to bring their full force to bear. "Take him down fast, Ngawai, we're about to have company!"
Angel grunts as the skimmer comes to a halt, checking to make sure the mag is still securely seated in his rifle. He pulls himself out of the cramped grav car, using it for cover and a steady place to put the rifle while Arketta and Max...disembark.
With the gravcar shut down and the throughfare traffic a faint whine, the rustle of the alien forest comes to the forefront. The trees are covered in bark ranging from paper thin white shell to knobby brown carapace. Broad leaves shield the forest floor from the sun (as well as aerial surveillance). Max notes that his radio must be outside the effect of whatever was jamming them inside Gran's Hope.
Angel's braced on the gravcar's sloping hood, watching the way they came for any sign of pursuit. It takes about half a minute to manhandle the unconscious nebbish out of the car. He's still bleeding from the knife wound in his back and has yet to wake up from the pounding he got at the concourse.
---
Ngawai lets off a stream of curses as her shot misses the still-firing Kansatai by inches. The officer goes prone amidst his dead and wounded comrades and returns fire. His beam flares off Ngawai's skinsuit, numbing her arm from shoulder to elbow. The rebels in the back of the building manage to put down the Kansatai Ngawai wounded seconds before, leaving just the one Kansat dropman surrounded.
Davis fires into the stubby stabilizers along the side of the skimmer and is rewarded with a whump and a shower of debris. The dropteam skimmer lists, throwing its autofire into the ceiling and roof rather than into Davis or the rebels. This skimmer's bottom cycles open as well, depositing three Kansatai onto the street below. As for the skimmer itself, it heads skyward, quickly disappearing over the war-torn building before it can sustain any more damage.
"We have to move!" One of the rebels shouts over to Davis after figuring out that they at least have a common enemy. "We can't stay here!"
Davis stands up, takes a shot at the last Kansat on their floor, and moves back down. "We'll move to the monument rubble! Get ready to fight our way out, there's three more Kansat on the ground! Do you still have whatever you used to take out the first skimmer?" Davis remembers that Swims was carrying two more beam rifles on his person, and he hopes that he left at least one of them behind with his armor when he dropped out of sight, since it'd show up just as brightly as his armor would.
With the gravcar shut down and the throughfare traffic a faint whine, the rustle of the alien forest comes to the forefront. The trees are covered in bark ranging from paper thin white shell to knobby brown carapace. Broad leaves shield the forest floor from the sun (as well as aerial surveillance). Max notes that his radio must be outside the effect of whatever was jamming them inside Gran's Hope.
Angel's braced on the gravcar's sloping hood, watching the way they came for any sign of pursuit. It takes about half a minute to manhandle the unconscious nebbish out of the car. He's still bleeding from the knife wound in his back and has yet to wake up from the pounding he got at the concourse.
"I realize it's becoming bad habit, but it seems to work so...Any landing you walk away from..." says Max to his beleaguered comrades, cycling open the driver's side door.
"Let's get Stabby McStabberson out of the car and move. Angel, I believe the business of cover and conceal is your department, so I'm going to defer the where and how to you."
Inside Bello's gravsled, the rest of the team watches the dropteam skimmer deposit three more Kansatai onto the roof of Davis' building. It then drops off its last three officers in a wide spread on the roofs of the buildings leading away from the monument, where they would have overwatch on anyone exiting the back of Davis' building.
The damaged skimmer searching the monument rubble leaves the ruined concourse and boosts higher out of range to act as coordinator.
Without the suppressive fire from the skimmer, Davis is free to stand up, get a good angle on the remaining Kansatai, and fire. His shot hits center mass as the officer rolls over, trying to snap off a shot. The AP round exits the man's armored back and sprays arterial red across the dusty rubble. There is no return fire.
"Come on! We've got a pickup!" Ngawai shouts at the rebels after Davis explains the (admittedly shaky) plan. She's clutching her right arm; the armor's been slagged but the suit's intact. Ngawai peels off layers of now-inflexible ablative plating like a snake shedding its skin to reveal still-functioning cloaking fabric. With her stealth restored, Ngawai shoulders her rifle and follows Davis.
Accompanying the pair are four weary rebels. They're wearing typical Aikoran clothing, tunics, long-sleeved undershirts, fitted pants, sturdy boots. They leave the Kansatai weapons, knowing the IFF would take too much time to deactivate.
"We used our only plasma," a bald, bearded man with a beam-burn across his upper leg explains. He shows Davis what looks like a charred cardboard LAW tube with a slagged plastic cap on one end. He tosses the remains into one of the several fires sprouting up inside the building.
"The scrofa are coming in!" shouts one of the rebels, this one a reedy young man, maybe 18 or 19 years old. "Do we go down and out or climb the outside?" The bearded man looks to Davis. "That depends on our friends' exit strategy."
Davis chances a look outside. The three Kansatai are indeed heading into the bottom floor of the building, squeezing through a row of broken windows. It's a three-story climb down a shaky facade under fire from a skimmer, but at least there'd be handholds.
---
Back in the gravsled, One-Ton updates Hugh. *I can see the monu-... well, okay, I can see what you did to the monument. I'll be at the lake in 30 seconds and I can't stick 'round long. I've got two skimmers on my scopes over you and a few more a minute or two away.*
Davis quickly weighs another firefight where they have the numerical advantage against a three-story climb down a building with no cover while being shot at -- wait, that's stupid. He motions them to quickly follow him down the stairs. "If we hurry we can catch them before they get to the second floor and ambush them when they come up the stairs. It takes a bit to find the way up."
Ngawai heads down first, disappearing as her suit adjusts to the broken surroundings. They want the Kansatai out in the meager light streaking through the holes in the building, not hidden in the darkened first floor. Davis is about slide down after Ngawai but the scrabble of boots on debris nearing the twisted, half-collapsed stairwell keeps him upstairs with the rebels. To their credit, the four insurgents don't make a sound, although they can't make it into the best ambush positions in time either. They settle for good cover instead.
The three dropmen move quick; the first one peeks into the stairwell and waves her comrades over. One watches behind them; the first one you see stays covered in the doorway; the third starts climbing up to recon the next floor.
"Where are our damn drones?" hisses the guy in the rear.
"They've got 'em in the alleys; too many got slagged and they're bringing more with Drop 7 and 6."
The trailer doesn't even see Ngawai. The shot comes from his right flank less than three feet away and sends his bowels and lower spine ripping through his stomach. The gore sprays across the woman (ironically covered from the stairwell but not from behind) and startles her long enough for Ngawai to shoot her in the chest. She falls out of cover screaming and trailing smoke, but she's still alive.
The guy climbing up spins and kind of sits down in the stairwell as he brings his beamer to bear on the bounty hunter. The rebels fire at the same time. The gunfire lights up the ruins like a Pink Floyd show. When the smoke, brass, and dust settles, the guy in the stairwell is dead and actually on fire. The woman Ngawai wounded is dead, ruptured like a brat left on the grill too long. The rebels and Davis are unscathed.
The reedy teenager and the bald leader fist pound upon seeing their victory.
Ngawai staggers into the stairwell holding her right arm and leans against the cratered doorway for support. "Davis... we... we have to g-get moving..."
Davis realizes she's not holding her arm - she's holding her arm on. Her suit starts streaking with crimson. Her severed arm is still grasping her beam rifle.
In the gravsled, Hugh and Luis get to assembling their weapons.
"Acknowledged," Hugh voxes back to One-Ton.
"Bello, keep us out of the fray for a bit longer. We'll cover their retreat when the Morningstar shows up." Hugh hands the vox over. "Tell your contacts that they should prepare for a hot pickup, because I don't think this planet likes us anymore."
Admiral Duck Sauce
