“The average infantry trooper survives approximately twelve point eight seconds in direct combat without the support of their squad. Most of that being spent taking out two of the several Model Threes advancing on them. Don’t get caught without your squad. Don’t get caught outside the wire, or you're fucked.”

  –Sergeant Henry Barrons to Beta Squad after assignment. December 25, 2031, Jacksonville Florida

  ***

  “No, kid. Don’t bother him.”

  “What? Why not, Sarge? Shouldn’t he be ready alert? I mean, we’re going into hell here?”

  “Kid. Dax has survived twelve incursions in this unit. Nobody, not even me, has been in this unit that long. If he wants to sleep, you let him fuckin’ sleep.” The Sergeant shook his head, sighing as he went back to checking over his issued rifle. “We’re the sharp end of the spear, but we’re government grunts. They don’t expect us to live. I don’t know who you pissed off to get fucked like this, but Bad Company doesn’t really bring back survivors often. Except Dax.”

  “Yeah, kid.” Corporal Wong agreed, leaning over from the other side of the cramped IFV troop space. “We all fucked up somewhere. You don’t get to be in this unit if you don’t. We don’t care whose daughter you fucked, or what porn you downloaded on government machines. But if you wanna live, when the shit hits the fan, you grab Corporal Daxion’s ass and stick to it. Damn the plants for dropping on us on fucking Christmas.”

  “I know, right? It’s like they don’t respect our holidays!” Sergeant Barrons chuckled as he shifted in his seat.

  Private First Class Nolan Kidman leaned back and looked down at the rifle in his hands, instead of at Corporal Daxion, who was sleeping in the corner of the IFV like it was a Sunday morning drive. He had all of five seconds of thought to himself before the driver started screaming something and the gunner lit something up outside. Then, the whole world went ass over teakettle.

  The IFV rolled in the air several times before it hit the ground again. The crunching sound reverberated through its hull as it hit its top deck. Slamming the turret through the ceiling and into the gunner, flipped again, and landed on its wheels before coming to a stop canted against something. Everyone was thrown around in the vehicle like ragdolls, rendered unconscious in the process, regardless of whether they were strapped in or not.

  ***

  Funnily enough, I was the first one awake, being the one faking napping while we were rolling. Not like I can let any of them see how absolutely fucking terrified I am. Every goddamn time.

  I still had no idea what got me fucked and sent to Bad Company, so I’m a little insubordinate sometimes. So what, isn’t everybody? Still got me sent to a partial strength punitive squad that got routed to the worst fighting, knowing the survival rates. It was an execution squad—but somewhere up there, some deity liked me for some reason. I keep living, somehow. Didn’t make things any less of a brown pants sort of event. Today was just another clusterfuck in a long line of them.

  I sighed and pulled my combat knife from where it was attached to my vest shoulder strap, cutting my way from my ride restraints before sheathing it again. Only fucking guy in the whole Infantry Fighting Vehicle who was wearing them. On the upside, the groaning from some others let me know they were still alive. Mostly.

  Getting out without falling over or cutting something important was easy enough, not the first time I’ve survived an IFV crash. Finding who still had a heartbeat and making sure they weren’t broken too badly was much harder. Nobody uses the damn straps so everybody gets thrown around, inevitably getting injured or killed in most cases.

  “Sarge. Wake up.” I smacked him in the face, he was breathing and relatively undamaged by the looks of it where he was lying in my lap.

  He snorted, blinked awake, and jerked back from where I held him up. His sudden motion caused the whole IFV to rock precariously. We both stopped and waited to see which way it went. When it settled, still tilted he turned to me carefully and raised an eyebrow.

  “What the fuck happened, Dax?”

  “Hell if I know, Sarge. You were the one awake?!” It was a lie, but a little white one. I really had no idea what happened. “As far as I can figure, based on experience, we got shoulder checked by something big. Just keep it down and check on people. Try not to rock this pig.”

  He nodded and pointed at the newbie, then moved in Corporal Wong's direction. Way too much blood was leaking out of the crushed turret seat, and the driver’s head was on backward, so they were probably no-go’s. The kid, Private Kidman, was breathing well enough, so I skipped the basics and went for the direct battle readiness check: neck for pulse, neck for spine, and eyes for dilation after waking them.

  He seemed fine so I smacked the shit out of him too. “Fuck, what?”

  “Wake up, Kid. Take stock and get ready to jump in the shit. Watch it, we’re not stable.” I pushed him up into a seat and shifted past him carefully to check on our last member, Private Oldman. “Fuck. Oldman’s toast. Broke his neck.”

  “Dammit. He was on his last run in rotation. Nearly survived penance.” Sarge was more than a little annoyed about that. “We’ll tag the vehicle for retrieval later. Lock up when we leave, might not get eaten before a Samurai clears this area. For now, we need to link up. You good, Kid? PB?

  “I’ll live.” Corporal Yun ‘PhoneBook’ Wong nodded as he rubbed at the side of his neck. “Gonna need a fuckton of aspirin after this though.”

  “I will buy you a bottle if we survive.” He turned to me. “Dax, check the electronics and see if we’re fucked or not. PB, help me with the back hatch. Kid, straighten and police the casualties.”

  “Aye Aye, Sarge,” Came the chorus of replies.

  I moved cautiously towards the front of the IFV, carefully pulling the driver out of his seat. Fucker should have worn the harness. They don’t make them as art pieces or something. The kid caught him from behind me, took him off my hands, and let me shimmy into the driver's seat. A few switches flipped and got the electronics in the cab back up.

  “Not good, Sarge. We’re trapped. There’s a fucking hydro bus pinning us up against the edge of the freeway. Upside, I don’t think we’re going over unless we get crazy. Downside, if we do, we’re probably going over the edge. That’s a three-story drop. Nobody’s surviving that.” Several curses came from the back of the IFV. I kept looking, hoping for a way out.

  “Can you back us out?” Sarge had moved up and put a hand on my shoulder to make it easier for him to look at what I was seeing.

  “Nope. The drive train is fucked. This thing is scrap. Sensors say there’s a few Threes over in the cleared section of the road, but the whole column got trashed.” I rewound the sensor logs to see what did it. “Looks like a Twelve… No, a Fourteen. See the segments? Bastard is fast. Probably left us in the dust. Orders?”

  “We try to link up with anybody else in the column and then call in for orders from up top.” He sighed and moved to withdraw. I caught his wrist, his attention snapping back to me as I pointed at the screen and re-ran the logs. “Fuck. Did vehicle two just go flying over the edge? Are there any others up here?”

  “I didn’t see any before I started fucking with the logs. We’re it. So don’t be disappointed when we eyeball it.” I frowned over my shoulder at him and he nodded.

  We both made our way back where the other two were working the manual release crank on the hatch, dropping it so we could get out. I made sure to grab the tags of both men out of the Kid’s pocket before it was my turn on the crank. Soon, we had it down enough to climb out and hopefully not get dragged over the edge in the process.

  The noise of the door opening had caught the attention of the Threes in the area, so as soon as it was open enough, Sarge started shooting while I finished with the crank. Sarge called back, “Hey, you two. Grab every mag and spare weapon you can carry. Leave nothing!”

  They scrambled to capture magazines and spare weapons from lockers, loading up a couple of rucksacks. By the time they were done, Sarge and I were off the tail ramp shooting the Model Threes trickling in. Nobody had to tell them; they just added fire to the line. As soon as it was clear enough, Sarge gestured to stack up, which we did quickly, then followed as he snapped a knife hand forward to move out.

  “Hurry up, kid,” Wong hissed behind him. “This is lucky thirteen, I feel it.”

  I grit my teeth. This stupid legend. Yeah, I survived twelve deployments that went ploin-shaped in B squad, but nobody else survives on those runs. Ever. Somehow scuttlebutt keeps exaggerating the whole fucking thing.

  “Can it, Wong. I got Threes incoming. Fireline,” Sarge snapped from the front. We staggered to his right, opening up into an angled fire line, and started picking off the Threes with our battle rifles.

  Seven more Threes down had us moving for the offramp we passed a bit ago again. I had been right of course, nobody else was even on the overpass. The whole column, twelve IFVs, mostly gone, and we had no idea where the Fourteen went.

  “What’s the plan, Sarge?” I didn’t really care. At this point, I was ready for death to find me, but I wanted to try and save somebody else first. Just once, I wish I was actually lucky, and everybody survived.

  “Unless you suddenly became a Samurai, we check the ground for survivors to link up with, then make our way back to lines.” He turned onto the ramp, picking his way along the edge of cars, looking for the best cover and sightlines he could find.

  “This is fucking fucked.”

  “Shut up Kidman.” I was a little harsh. His surprised look zeroed in on me, hurt like a puppy. “You may draw in more Threes with that volume. Just remember what the Sarge said. Glue yourself to my ass. Best chance of survival.”

  “Right.” He nodded hard enough he almost threw off his strapped on helmet. He promptly started crowding me, which prompted me to gently push him back before snapping my hand back to my rifle grip. Eyeballing each other, he nodded and repeated the word, before getting back in position. “Wait, you heard that? Were you awake?”

  “No, the Sergeant always says that.” I shrugged and shook my head a little.

  “Does it work then?” Kidman all but squeaked as he spoke. He was so terrified he couldn’t whisper without distending his voice.

  “Well…” I scowled and moved to a hustle to keep him from talking more as I muttered, ”You’ll live longer that way.”

  We quickly made our way down the ramp and turned to look back at the other troop transports, taking cover within the nook of a triangle-shaped set of road barriers.

  We laid eyes on the complete disaster of a street under the freeway. That was a bad idea. Each one of the vehicles was approximately two tons of armor and troops. Each one was at an odd angle, propped against buildings, on their noses, upside down—one was even broken open in half with a Model Four ripping into it. Each one was obviously a complete write-off.

  “Nope.” Wong straight-up refused.

  “I hate to say it, Sarge. But I don’t think anybody survived that shit. Hell, we barely did.” I shrugged as I spoke, gesturing down in the direction where there were plenty of other Fours ripping at the vehicles and nobody fighting from within them. “Lost cause.”

  “Fuck. You’re right. Getting killed is stupid. Let’s—” He was cut off as the sound of thrusters blasted by overhead, about ten feet off the ground.

  We were able to see the backside of some guy wearing a helmet, some sort of booster on his hips, and some standard-looking armor. He was blazing away with some sort of smart rifle, each shot going exactly where it needed for maximum damage. He cleaned up rather quickly, taking out all of the antithesis in sight in two minutes flat before trotting over to us.

  “You lot survivors of that?” He thumbed over his shoulder.

  “Yes, sir. We lost comms, the jamming is too thick. A Twelve or Fourteen knocked us all off the overpass—well, everybody but us. We got jammed in somehow. Did you find any survivors over there?”

  “Sorry, no. Everybody’s gone. I can cover you while you check for yourselves?”

  “We’d like to recover their tags, if that’s okay, sir?” Sarge had stiffened up to ramrod straight.

  “Yeah. I can cover you for that.” He nodded before moving to lean against the side of an overturned ground car. “Just be quick about it?”

  “You heard the Samurai. Get all the tags you can and make it quick.” Sarge started gesturing at us, indicating which of the nearest vehicles to hit.

  Sadly, most of them were jammed up or completely inaccessible. Over the next ten minutes, I managed one IFV worth of tags—just twelve more—but we couldn’t waste any more time on this, so when Sarge whistled a regroup we all trotted over.

  “What’s your plan now, guys?” The Samurai sauntered over, a new rifle in hand, the old one slung across his back.

  “Head back to the FOB. Link up with another unit.” Sarge sighed and made a knife hand in the direction of the secure area.

  “Aren’t you supposed to support us or something?” The Samurai pointed at himself arrogantly.

  “You really wanna slow down for four dumbass grunts? It’s not like we bring much to the fight.” I couldn’t help myself, I just had to snark a little. Fucking Samurai all full of himself. They weren’t all that bad, but a lot of male newbies tended to be dickish, especially to government grunts. At least in my experience.

  Love what you're reading? Discover and support the author on the platform they originally published on.

  “Hold that thought.” He held up a finger and twisted his head around in the direction of the overpass ramp. A second later the rest of us could hear it. The thudding of feet. Lots of them. “Take cover, we’re about to have company. A little help this time would be nice.”

  I rolled my eyes as I trotted over to the IFV I had gotten tags out of, since it still had a working turret. I didn’t ask, Sarge didn’t complain. I took the turret as everybody else found cover nearby, ready to move as needed. As soon as the leading elements of what was coming down curled around the end of the on-ramp, I lit it up. It was the fucking Teen Model. Definitely a Fourteen. More than three segments long too. It immediately began to disgorge its carried troops on top of its outriders.

  Which was good since my pitiful 50. Cal couldn’t do more than scratch that fucker. But the Threes and Fours were mince under my sustained fire. The Fives were kind enough not to laugh as they trotted forward to shield their lesser brothers. Fucking armored plants take ten times as many rounds to kill.

  The real shitty thing was, I’m dead inside. I don’t feel the fear anymore. I’ve been ready to die for a while now. Seeing everyone I know die again and again, it’s just too much. I would be happy to die. But my fingers still pulled the trigger. Again and again. Seek a new target. Fire. Something deep inside me won’t let me die. I’m just a robot killing antithesis when they’re in front of me.

  “WAHOO!!!” The dumbass Samurai just leapt through, unloading an automatic shotgun with explosive rounds on the things. The shitty thing was, he was actually effective on the armor. Bastard.

  “After this… I’m taking life in Leavenworth.” I growled as I kept sending out short bursts trying to pick off the weaker ones when they became available. “Fuck this noise. I’ll fucking go UA. I’m so fucking tired of this… just tired.”

  The Samurai bounced off a building and slammed more rounds into the top of the Fourteen which started twitching funny. It did nothing to stop the advance of the dozen or so Fives, which were all launching quills covered in neurotoxin at us. The others were pinned so I, being behind armor plates, was the only one returning fire.

  I cut off fire though, because dumbass landed between us and the Fives. He promptly took a few quills and staggered, before falling over.

  “Cover me!” Sarge decided to get heroic and charged out, using a riot shield from the back of one of the other vehicles.

  I opened up, intent on at least distracting the last of the enemy I could see alive. It had been only a minute or two of fighting and over a hundred antithesis, including a Teen, were dead. Sadly, the most dangerous ones to infantry were still advancing. Sarge caught the guy by the drag strap on his armor and started pulling as the rest of us kept distraction and suppression fire up. It didn’t really help.

  By the time he made it back to cover he had two quills punched through the shield and his arm. I could see the things from where I was in the turret via the rather powerful targeting cameras. Nobody survives a Five without a fucking Protector AI in their heads and some quick thinking. The dumbass Samurai had a quill sticking out of his spine. That was two down.

  Fuck. I’m not gonna win this am I? Lucky my ass. Death, just take me. Leave the others. Just this once. Please.

  The kid, suddenly feeling like a superhero or something, catches a hold of the Samurai’s automatic shotgun and reloads it from the dead man's chest webbing. Then, he steps straight out into view and starts firing like a madman. Not one to let a chance escape, I did the same, targeting the strike points from where the explosive shots landed.

  When the last explosion occurred, the last round in my turret went down range. Funny coincidence, but that sort of shit happens more often than you’d think around me. I swiveled the turret to look at Kidman. He was covered in quills from the waist down. Dead, even with his finger on the trigger. Rigid, thanks to the neurotoxin locking his muscles in place and his solid stance.

  “Fuck.” Wong didn’t get up, but he saw it. He slumped against his cover, sitting on the ground. “This is it, isn’t it? We’re dead?”

  “We’re not dead yet.” I growled, but while I could hear him from the sensor net, he couldn’t hear me.

  I quickly crawled out of the wrecked vehicle, it was useless now anyway. Trotting over I squatted next to Wang and smacked the shit out of him. It took a minute but he finally focused on me. “What now Dax? It’s just us?”

  “Put that Vanguard's gear on, I’ll pry the shotty out of the Kid’s hands. We need to hurry. I can hotwire one of the ground cars and we can use that to get out of here.” I turned and trotted over to Kidman, collected his tags and the ones he’d collected, then began to cut fingers to get the weapon out of his hands. It wasn’t pretty, but it worked.

  I turned to find Wong under the heavy body of a Four, which was eating his face. Before it could turn and try and stab me with one of its spike tipped tentacles I turned and made a mad dash for cover. An empty Samurai gun was useless, but the noise of dropping it would draw attention I didn’t want so I kept a hold of it.

  One of the reasons I had stayed alive so long was luck. The other was my willingness to dive directly into the heart of danger. After all, sometimes the only way out is through. This is why I ditched the shotgun as soon as I was out of sight, pulling my battle rifle back around into position.

  After the first incursions, the United States government had switched up to the Israeli Galil instead of the Armalite platform because the older 5.56 was simply not enough to stop anything besides the damn Ones. Since, Armalite had switched from pushing the AR-15 to the 10, a much larger round, as 7.62 could do significantly more damage, even if it was slower. Nothing human made, or easily portable at the time, could penetrate anything with actual armor like the antithesis could output. So we only needed to upgun enough to deal with the lesser variants. The AR-10 could handle a Model Three easily enough. You’d need an entire mag for a Four if you weren’t lucky or good enough to hit just the right spots, but it was doable. Enough fire down range and most things under a Nine were killable by infantry. Fives were one of the exceptions due to their heavier armor, as even a .50 caliber round had problems with their armor.

  My battle rifle was a .300 Winchester rather than the standard Nato round. While comparable in many metrics, the .300 is still the preferred for large game and moderate antithesis, even to today. It’s even more effective when you’ve got an illegal mag of thermal rounds from a buddy in supplies. Which is why I quickly slipped my ten round mag out from its hidden pocket under my vest and swapped it for the thirty round mag of standard penetrator core rounds that was mostly empty anyway.

  As soon as it was seated, I stepped up to the cover I was using. Settling in to rest against it and target the big ass tentacle-bear looking mother fucker. It was already sniffing around trying to find me, spotting me just as I lined up on it with my 5x top scope.

  It didn’t roar, or even open its mouth. It simply turned and charged at me where I was hidden behind a concrete street barricade. I took a breath in, slowly letting half of it out as the Four shrunk the ground between us. Aiming tightly for its approaching eye was unnerving, but I had trained for this. I had done this before.

  My finger depressed the trigger before I knew it, right on the pause between heart beats.

  The beast’s head rocked back, its momentum carrying it forward as light and fire spewed from its eyehole. It face planted and skidded five feet to bump into the divider. I squatted there, wishing I had brought a spare change of pants and thankful I was wearing a diaper. Even my pre-mission shit didn’t clear me out enough to prevent situations like this. Didn’t help the squishy feeling, but there’s nothing to be done there.

  I didn’t waste time. Damn Wong hadn’t even started. The dead Samurai’s gear was mostly strapped on outside his body armor, which didn’t seem much better than what I was wearing. So, I skipped that and went expedient, pulling my flack vest off and swapping it for his plate carrier, strapping on the rocket butt-pack. Then prying off the helmet and removing the quills. He was a kid, maybe fifteen or sixteen. No wonder he was so fucking dumb. Goddamn tragedy, but one that happens every fucking day in this crapsack world.

  With all the gear on, helmet in hand, I checked the pouches on the plate carrier. He had nearly a full loadout cued up. His bad luck, my good. Finally I slung the shotgun, swapping it out for my old rifle’s sling since I was more comfortable that way.

  I stood a moment, staring at the faceplate of the tech helmet, almost unable to bring myself to put it on. I felt dirty looting a corpse, but even though I was consciously ready to die, my fucking drive to live was too strong. It was the same reason I couldn’t bring myself to take my own life. It was like I had something I needed to live for, and not even my unconscious mind would let me skip out on it.

  “Fuck it.” I spun the helmet and slammed it down on my head.

  After a five second boot up, a neutral monotone voice piped up in my ear. “System Initialized. New user registry confirmed. Greetings, Corporal Daxion, I am the class two AI AU-6185, and I am here to assist you in operating the equipment you have been assigned. Please feel free to address me as you desire.”

  “Uh. What?” I just kinda stood there stunned. Did it reset somehow or something?

  “Mission protocol: One, Link to user. Two, Uphold the Mission. Three, Protect the user.” There was a brief pause, “Mission parameters logged from previous encounter are to retreat to the forward operating base for reassignment. Correct?”

  “Uh. Correct.” The hud snapped to life, AR arrows indicated on the ground for direction, a distance tally buried in the broad line. “Why did a Samurai have an AI in their helmet, don’t they have one in their head?”

  “Samurai AI are restricted depending on the situation. A secondary AI was required for proper use of additional utilities, such as the jump pack and aiming, as my previous user was unwilling to accept implants.”

  “That’s good, so am I.” I shrugged deeper into the plate carrier to settle it more comfortably.

  I made sure I had a new mag in the shotgun and a round chambered. The thirty round drum was tight and primed so I nodded to myself. Turning, I began to jog in the direction indicated by the arrow. A pinch at my jaw startled me, and nearly made me stumble into an empty decorative planter near the intersection.

  “The fuck was that?”

  “A stim, you are exhausted and require boosting in order to perform at maximum capability.” It wasn’t wrong, and the sudden energy washing over me was kinda nice. It let me go from a brisk jog to a stable run, without seeming to feel too winded.

  Those stims were definitely illegal. I was starting to feel kinda invincible, not punch druggy but definitely high as a kite. It felt good to just run. All the way until an alert popped up on the helmet hud, indicating a Model Three lunging from a storefront to my right.

  I dropped into a baseball slide, targeting with my new shotgun and unleashed a single round directly at its ugly ass cranium. The near immediate explosion of said cranium was intensely satisfying. I wasn’t afraid anymore, as the group of mixed Threes and Fours that were behind it started crossing into the street. I now understood why that dumbass kid got himself killed.

  Consciously, I had to force myself to calm down, to focus. Zone and Flow, those are how you survive. Once you're in the zone you can find your flow and that takes concentration, skill, and a strong intuition about what it is you're doing. I’ve always been good at this. Killing is my business.

  And today, business is fucking good.

  Tracking locks popped up on all the Model’s heads, so I simply moved across, hitting each tracking lock and popping a shell off. It took seconds, they hadn’t even had enough time to clear the building fully before they were all dead. I snapped the weapon down, counted my shots to confirm the number of rounds remaining in the magazine, and started running again. All in the same swift series of moves.

  I had barely made it half a block when the arrow directed me to the side of a building, and then up it, with a ghostly figure of myself running along the side of the building at an angle. Free running wasn’t a thing I did, but I knew of it. Fuck it, let’s try.

  It was a good thing I did. As I hit that wall and angled up, a Twelve punched through the wall under me, steamrolling out into the street.

  I didn’t even think, simply aimed at the spots highlighted and pulled the trigger. Five precise shots hit five individual weak points and the damn thing barreled into the building on the other side of the street, dead.

  It was followed by a veritable horde of single digits, including a flock of one’s. I decided not to stop, as doing so would lead to a fall. Instead, I hit the edge of the three-story I was running on and leapt. The jump jets that had held me up on my long wall run burst to life stronger than before and gave me enough boost to get across the two lanes, up onto the roof of the building across the street.

  Snap decision, Zone and Flow. Keep running. Do not engage the enemy here. Odds are abysmal, not enough assets.

  I didn’t even slow down, flicking the mostly empty mag out and hauling another drum off my mid back. I seated it and slammed it into place with half an eye. New gun, but I was working it like an old one. It was similar enough to an AA-12 that it wasn't hard.

  The far side of the building gave me highlights and a ghost for the way down the two levels back to the street. Then, I had to run across the upper surfaces of a bunch of cars in a traffic jam. Boosting across lanes twice to get far enough away that I couldn’t hear the building damage of the antithesis behind me any more.

  I’m no coward, but I’m also not stupid. Direct retreat at maximum speed is the only way to survive this shitshow—so that’s what I did. It took another stim shot and a little confusion after, but fifteen minutes of running got me back within sight of the front lines.

  Which were under attack.

  I slowed to a stop about two blocks back. Standing right in the middle was dumb, but my brain was compromised by drugs.

  “AU, I need thirty soft targets and a path over that wall.” I reached down and checked the high caliber smart pistol that had been attached to the jump harness at the hip. A full mag plus two on my other hip. “Plus little targets for the pistol as we go. I want to be dry when we get over that wall.”

  “Understood. Calculating.” There was a brief pause, maybe two seconds. “Recommend using all rifle ammo before moving, switch to grenades, placed roughly in positions indicated for maximum explosive disruption. Then pistol for the final leg.”

  A ghost ran the course in front of me, I waited and watched it run a second time, ignoring the quartet of Threes that had spotted me and were backtracking in my direction quickly. The second time the sim ran, I felt I had it and started moving.

  Sprinting forward, I angled for the left-hand buildings while unleashing all thirty rounds from my auto shotgun. Each correcting its own trajectory to hit and explode on target. They must have been shaped charge HEAT rounds for the damage they did, even on armored antithesis.

  As I emptied the rifle, I let it go to dangle and reached for grenades. My feet carried me up the side of a six-story building about a quarter of the way, pitching grenades the whole time I went up. There were only four, but it would have to be enough. It was at this point I was certain that the stims also fucked with my perception of time, because I felt like I had all the time in the world to aim and throw, each one on target enough to do its job.

  I had barely shifted attention, drawn the smart pistol and started firing when a ripple of explosion shoved me further up the building. The grenades had been thermobaric. I lost footing and went tumbling off course, slamming through a window, clipping my head and hands on the rim. My pistol went scattering into the room and I belly flopped onto the floor, skidding into the wall.

  “FUCK!”

  “That was suboptimal.”

  “You think?!” I clutched my chest, barely able to breath enough to snark. It took me a second to get my bearings and stand up. “New plan?”

  “Calculating.” After it finished speaking a ghost followed a line to the door and out. I rooted around and found my smart pistol before following it.

  In the hall, down to the front door, out the door and into the building hall. Down that hall was a window, the ghost leaping through it. I slumped and muttered something profane before straightening up and tapping into that energy still buzzing my teeth. I only needed a third of the long hall to get to full sprint speed. The window didn’t even slow me down as I leapt through it.

  The drop after would have had me filling my pants again, if I had anything left in my bowels. Thank god the AI triggered the jump jets again, boosting me across to the far building and into another building through an identical window to the one I just leapt out of. Cookie-cutter buildings, cheap and easy.

  I followed the line, which was showing negative numbers now, down two flights of stairs and out into a lobby area where there were a half dozen squads aimed out the shattered and destroyed front door.

  Slowing to a stop I looked around for the back exit, not wanting to bother them concentrating on any enemies that might come this way. The guy on load duty for the tripod mount in the middle of the hall turned to me and raised an eyebrow after twitching violently.

  “Back door?” I asked, which caused several riflemen to snap around at me. The loader just pointed and I nodded to him before turning to leave.

  Outside I was met by a Major, pristine in his uniform. He looked me over and raised an eyebrow at my collar flash. Halfway to a salute he stopped, dropped his hand and peered at me more closely. So I obliged him by taking off the helmet. The disgust that slithered across his face briefly was telling enough. I knew him, he knew me. Nominally, he was one of the men in charge of my unit. A real piece of work. Major Upton.

  “Are you a Samurai now?” I shook my head to his question, not having the energy to answer as the fight, and maybe the drugs, flowed out of me. “Where did you get that gear then, soldier?”

  “Salvage, sir.” I let my voice carry my exhaustion.

  “I assume that’s how you survived?” He didn’t seem to give a fuck, as usual, a stick rammed so far up his ass he could only look down on everyone.

  “Not really, sir, it was a group effort. Until I was alone.” I shook my head and shrugged, unable to answer any differently.

  “We lost contact with your entire column?” It was less a question and more a demand for information.

  “All dead sir.” That hung in the air, everyone listening extruding sorrow. I pulled out my jangling wad of dog tags. “Model Fourteen.”

  “All but you. How then, did you survive?” He snatched them from my hand, still demanding.

  “Sir.” I sighed and flipped him a sloppy salute. “Practice?”

  AN - I must thank Misurae and Alia from my SCS Writers Discord for doing the Beta on this. Cleaned it up massively. My punctuation is MUCH better now.

  Merry Christmas, ya filthy animals! Happy Holidays!