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Hi everyone! As the battle goes on, our intrepid heroes' mission gets difficult. Please comment if you like the story and let me know what you think about the pacing, action writing, characterisation, and so on :)

Also, don't worry! Porn on the way in another few chapters! Yay porn!

Chapter 28

Olliver didn't laugh as Black Jack tore through dozens of Junta soldiers, though the urge was there. He exulted in the feeling of power, sleek and deadly and massive, as the jacked-in otter strode across the battlefield hurling death like gods threw lightning. The Mark-73 rail-propelled grenades, fired from one of his optional sidearms, were penetrating structures with their high-impact heads then detonating once deep inside. This served to shatter defensive concrete barricades like crackers under a sledge hammer, leaving defenders exposed to his autocannon's brutal flesh-shattering fusillades.

The locals couldn't see him, even those that were near Black Jack's towering frame. They did, however, understand what was going on enough to advance based upon his fire zones, rushing into the breaches created by his guns to assault and overrun defensive positions that had until mere minutes ago been lethal and unassailable death traps.

Raining artillery shells were taking their toll, of course. He'd watched now as more than one group of spike-furred psychopaths had been rendered to hamburger and scraps of metal and fabric by the air-bursting flechette bombs. He'd heard the shrapnel scrape and ping off Black Jack's armored skin, felt it as tingles of pressure, theWalker's sensors linked directly into his own tactile sensations by his Whip link.

All in all, it left him feeling the exultation he imagined Zeus or Ares might experience, in myths of ancient Earth's early days. Unlike those long-ago gods and titans, however, the sheer carnage bore weight for him. He knew that every one of those soldiers had a life that mattered, now snuffed out by a monster they couldn't hope to defeat, simply because they could not see.

The aristocratic warrior reminded himself that they would, in his place, have killed him too. It wasn't much consolation, he knew, but the otter was no green recruit, knew himself well enough to understand grimly that there could be no hesitation in killing these enemies. There would be guilt at some point later, likely in a week or two, and he hoped to spend that rough after-battle time with his new boyfriend. He hadn't been romantically involved since the accident that had crushed half of his spine, and certainly never to another member of the military. The thought that, for once, he'd be able to talk to someone who actually did understand battlefield mental traumas was an odd one.

Derry's voice came through, straight into the virtual-jacked otter's head, and he realized with a ruefully amused feeling that the wolf's voice wasn't raising his hackles any more. As much as Olly wanted to hate the Marine for killing his oldWalker,Derryhad earned his respect. A complex relationship, the otter mused.

"Four, we're almost inside. How's the weather?" Captain Tense, Sitrep!

"Thunder and rains. You wouldn't like it out here." Heavy combat, antipersonnel artillery.

_ _

"Any sign of the storm breaking?" Are enemy lines holding?

_ _

"The storm wall could move either direction. Flooding everywhere." Impossible to say at this time. Losses heavy on both sides.

_ _

"Understood, Four. Stay dry." Understood, Captain Tense. Be careful and stay alive.

_ _

The code was fairly simple and intuitive, designed more to confuse anyone intercepting it than to prevent information being decrypted. The theory was that any enemy who had time to puzzle out exactly what was happening wouldn't learn anything all that useful anyway, and in the meantime wouldn't be firing their rifle.

"How's the storm where you are, Lead?" Any resistance to report?

_ _

"Light showers. Nothing serious." Light resistance, stay focused on your area for now.

_ _

"Wilco."

Olliver advanced again, as he'd done intermittently throughout the chaotic melee. Another shell exploded, likely directly overhead, jarring Black Jack and setting the rubble to sliding, an avalanche of trash, scree, corpses and bits thereof. Walkerand Whip strode through, ignoring the rubble slide by walking right over it, crushing whatever got underfoot beneath multiple tons of well-programmed and balanced machinery.

He was within a short jog of the hospital now, standing atop the pancaked remains of a parking structure he himself had destroyed just minutes ago. His computer-aided vision, fed through Black Jack's external sensors, began lighting up with red and orange shapes as targets became visible. Hundreds of enemy infantry were advancing on his current position, laying down heavy covering fire that had suppressed most of his own rabble escort and bounced off his own armoring with tinkling noises akin to rain striking a tin roof.

Then orange, boxy shapes began appearing in the distance, down the undercity's main avenues. A column of tanks, he guessed based on shape and his sensors' readout of their exhaust. Olliver re-opened the comm. channel.

"Lead, weatherman says we've got ten hours until the thunderhead rolls right over us. Better get everything done before the power goes out." Heavy armor incoming. Estimated time to firing range ten minutes.

_ _

Derry's voice was hissed out, though the head set of his armor would muffle any sound from escaping. Olly knew that meant they were stalking stealthily past enemies that might be as close as arm's reach.

"Understood, Four. Stay out of the storm. We'll pick you up at the warehouse after work." Understood, do not engage heavy armor. Rendesvouz at map coordinate W-1.

_ _

The wolf's voice came through one more time.

"Wait one...Niece, did you see that?"

The private's voice came through as well, over the unit-wide link.

"See wha...UNF!"

Vernier gripped hard on the molded metal handle over his head, as the shuttle hurtled at its best velocity through an asteroid field of fighter debris, dodging plasma pulses and solid round ammunition that blazed past them and exploded off the chaotic mess of broken ships. Though there was no momentum to feel, no gee-forces to their turns, the wolfhound felt as if his heart were going to leap out his throat every time the sweating, panting young pilot jerked them to the side or looped them over to avoid the death that flew at them from every rearward angle.

Over the communication headset he'd pulled on, the Sword of Sol's CAG reported in.

"Sir, our fighters are thirty seconds out. We've cleared you to land in the main bay, so don't hesitate. Get in here where it's safe! Over!"

Vernier growled, and looked down at the instruments panel again. Electrical surges were everywhere in nearby space now, a slowly building storm of zero-gravity static that was covering ships in arcing purplish displays of light. Meanwhile, the enemy fleet, massively outnumbering his own, had boosted hard and dumped a tsunami of fighters before his own shuttle had even finished un-docking from the derelict 'parlay' craft.

If they had not been about to enter combat, Vernier judged that captains would be moving their ships further away from one another for the sake of safety, trying to figure out what the anomalous sudden static boded. Such phenomenae in space could mean a variety of things, from a massive but invisible solar storm to the rays of a gamma radiation pulse off some faraway supernova. Right now, nobody was bothering to wonder. Vernier managed a strained grin.

Another spray of cannon fire came from the pursuit fighters, two of whom were now on the shuttle's tail. The young pilot, though on the verge of swallowing his tongue by the look on his face, had managed genius work in keeping the three of them alive. His luck, however, could not hold indefinitely, the Rear Admiral thought.

"Pilot, fighters are on their way to escort us. Twenty-five seconds. Get above the debris field so they can see us."

"Sir, we'll be sitting ducks!"

Vernier grunted, low in his throat, as the shuttle jolted to the left and red lights started dancing on the control panel.

"We're already sitting ducks. Pull up, pilot, now!"

True to his military training, the pilot jerked back on his stick without a second thought, the order short-cutting around his brain's desire to second-guess. His stomach dropping into his pants, Vernier caught the quickest glimpse of the debris field turning sideways and upside-down, his equilibrium desperately trying to come to terms with his inner ear and eyes' conflicting information.

Then they were out of the field, coruscating starlight lighting up the night beneath and behind them as the enemy fighters were thrown off track by the sudden motion, firing at nothing but rubble now.

Vernier looked up, and felt his pounding heart jerk.

Regal and rampant above them, the United Galatean Dominon's massive battlefleet had closed distance with them in half the time it should have taken. While his own fleet was powerful, as well-suited for main line conflict as any group he'd ever led, they were outnumbered more than three to one, and outgunned as well, by the hulking armada that stormed toward them across the vast blackness.

Silvery shapes flew towards his tiny shuttle, great behemoths swimming through space oblivious to his unarmed presence. Quick canine eyes automatically tried to count the enemy vessels by type and armament, spotting four battleships immediately that were bringing up the armada's potent spear-shaped front. The cruisers, destroyers, corvettes and fighters were beyond counting, without the computer assistance needed to sort them.

His own fleet, bereft of his leadership while he'd been out on his little joy-ride with the UGD agent, had formed a defensive dome-shaped formation in the hopes of offering themselves a tactical advantage to offset the massive disparity in power and numbers.

Still well beyond effective torpedo range, the approaching enemy fleet opened fire with all the suddenness of an earthquake. He saw the flashes of light, hundreds upon hundreds of them, as the UGD's longest range cannons filled the night with rail cannon rounds ranging from the size of his body to the size of an entire fighter craft, lancing through the night as streams of reflected silver moonlight barely slow enough to be caught by the eye.

The counter-fire seemed pathetically small and sparse by comparison, less than one third the enemy fleet's armament still online after the brutal battle that had only recently ended. Then second volleys and third were fired by both fleets, well before the first would impact, forcing ships to begin the complicated calculus of deciding where to move and how to maneuver to best avoid crippling hits.

All of his speculation and observation had happened in half a minute, he realized, as dozens of fast-moving silver shapes darted past, swirling, engaging the fighters that had been trailing the shuttle and trying to knock it down. His pilot, soggy with fear and adrenaline sweat, turned them toward the Sword of Sol.

He prayed the static would coalesce soon. These things could be unpredictable, sometimes, especially given the massive nature of the coming induced event. The wolfhound had bet his career, his life, and the lives of his entire fleet on this gambit. Or, rather, Grand Admiral Kerrick had done so, with his tacit acceptance.

Niece flew down the abandoned bullet-riddled hospital hallway as if she'd been flung by the paw of an invisible giant, her suit's active camouflage warping and failing as her sheer velocity combined with the impact to error out the cameras. She landed with a crunch and rolled like a rag doll.

Before anyone could shout or open fire, the near-invisible shape assaulting them continued its blurringly-fast attack.

Candace had already been in a combat stance, her SMG pressed to her shoulder, when the surprise fight began. Her quick mind registered motion in the empty air, and she opened fire, getting off one bullet of the three-round burst before something wrapped around her throat and yanked her off her feet, slamming the vixen-hybrid to the ground so hard she heard her shoulder dislocate with a loud pop just before her head met cement and knocked her senseless.

Derrywas a half-moment slower, but was behind Candace and had just that much longer to react. His ocular lit up with an unknown red shape, as invisible as his squad, moving at speeds his flesh eye couldn't have tracked. His paws came up and his rifle fired as if part of his arm, spilling rail-accelerated rounds down-range in a blur of motion. The coming enemy ducked under his stream of fire as if able to predict it, and surged forward far more swiftly than the Marine wolf could react.

He knew he was going to get hit, and clenched his muscles down, twisting his center just in time.

The blow took him across the chest, emptying his lungs like a stomped balloon. Even with the weight of his muscles and equipment, Derry jolted back and slammed up against a wall, his leg exploding with bone-wrenching pain answered by new blossoms of agony all up his back. He ducked to one side entirely by instinct inculcated to his fighting style by endless hours of being beaten by Tenh in combat training over the years of his youth.

Concrete rained down on him, an invisible fist shattering through crumbling grey artificial rock. The wolf blinked against the concussed blurriness in his flesh eye, then closed it, as the blaring red outline shown in his ocular implant spun, aiming a kick that would have taken his head off if he hadn't dropped flat and rolled to one side as Derkin's musclebound form hurtled forward.

The armadillo filled so much of the narrow hallway that he couldn't miss the opponent, visible or not. He smashed into the tall, slender creature, barreling him toward a hard reunion with the crumbling concrete wall, only to have his slippery foe raise both feet and run up the wall surface and over Derkin's head before the 'dillo could close his arms. A stiff kick to the back of Derkin's skull smashed his own face into the unyielding surface, and he rebounded with a dulled roar of pain and a dizzy stagger.

Derry's rifle, still gripped tightly to paw, went off from his spot on the ground with a squeeze of his fingers, clipping the red shape's edge. He'd been aiming for center of mass, in the hopes that adaptive camo armor wouldn't entirely ablate the force of impact and he might at least share his winded state with this invisible insanely fast foe. The struggle to make his lungs fill seemed to be a losing one, but it wasn't the first time he'd had to fight with no air.

Instead of staggering like it'd been shot, his enemy spun along with the shot's impact, bringing its foot up and across Derkin's armored face with a crash that echoed up the hall. The armadillo hurtled backward as if yanked by a winch, hitting the ground hard enough that he bounced, before instinctively curling his legs in to his body and ceasing to move.

As he finally forced a ragged gasp through his lips, still squeezing off shots, the red-outlined shape leapt over his stream of fire and landed, stomping on his rifle's barrel, crushing the carbon nano-tubed metal with a metallic squeal. A kick landed across his temple, and the wolf sprawled across the floor in a nerveless flop, head ringing and vision wobbling.

Then he was up off the ground, feet dangling, choking for breath as a vice-like grip held his entire weight up by his own throat, strangling him even through the armor as he kicked and thrashed, trying to win free. His ocular implant managed a glimpse past the suddenly-distorted air in front of him, to see the rusting gurney onto which Derkin had slipped his sister just a minute or so before the brutal fight began.

A voice came, amused and panting orgasmically, from the invisible male in front of him.

"Ho ho ho! Presents for me? How kind of Enigma to indulge me!"

The wolf tried to spit, to growl, his voice choked off by the pressure on his windpipe. His right paw found the wrist holding him and tried to twist it, to lock the joint and force a release, only to find the limb was preternaturally strong, un-budging. Meanwhile, as stars danced in his eyes, his off paw made its way toward the combat knife on his belt, struggling to get it before it was noticed.

"Naughty naughty..."

He flew across the room, smashing into the far wall so hard that his vision exploded in a sea of black and colored lights. By the time he was registering thought and sight again, he was on the floor, on his back, a heavy weight sat upon his chest nearly forcing what little breath he had back out. Breath fluttered the fur of his face, and as his vision cleared, he realized what he was looking into were a pair of bright yellow eyes set in a stark black face that hung just inches above his own. Someone had pulled his face plate off, he realized.

The enemy's eyes were wide, dilated, his lips open to pant, fangs bared and inexplicably bloody, the wind tinged with copper. Those eyes were like pits, endlessly dark in their center, and a sudden fear that he hadn't previously had time for pushed past the adrenaline. He feared those eyes, feared falling into them forever.

Derry's heart jolted, when the thing kissed him hard, mashing thin black lips to Derry's own, raspy tongue shoving into the wolf's bloody maw to swirl around his and draw on his breath. The wolf tried to struggle, breath crushed from his body by the repeated impacts, pain dazzling his eyes with stars, unable to draw air around the lips and tongue that were savaging his maw.

In a moment of anoxic calmness, he recalled a conversation.

An enemy is too close for guns or knives. He is stronger than you, and has you pinned. What do you do?

_ _

Mr. Tenh...

_ _

Think, boy. He is going to kill you. He is toying with you. He has a knife and control of the grapple. What do you do?

_ _

The wolf slid his tongue along the other male's, sucking on it, despite the rising bile in his gut at the act. Then it happened, a moment of hesitation, of startlement in the enemy, who had until that motion of reciprocity thought himself utterly in control of his victim.

ThenDerry's robotic tail wrapped around the thing's throat, whipping up around his side with impossible dexterity for any flesh limb. He bit down, hard, smashing his sharp lupine teeth into the fleshy tongue until he felt them click together and his muzzle filled with a surge of steaming-hot copper.

The jaguar's scream was atavistic, guttural, choked, spit and blood spraying from his maw as he was jerked back by the powerful cybernetic, slammed into the nearby wall by his head as the fully articulated metal limb ground down, clenching its robotic muscles to tighten the noose until the jaguar couldn't get air for enraged howling.

Derrytried to grab for his rifle, but found his joints too sluggish, struggling against anoxia as his chest tried to rise and fill. His tail, made of hundreds of nano-metal plates and machine muscles, continued constricting, holding the foe up high as the wolf tried to move, watching as his enemy managed to get hold of a pistol from its side holster.

The look in its baleful yellow eyes screamed of murder and mayhem, butchered corpses and indignation. Then it spoke of nothing, as a clean, smoking hole appeared as if from nowhere, mirrored by a not-so-clean burst of brain and blood as the round mushroomed out the back of his skull.

Derrygasped, finally, sucking in a breath of sweet, blood-rancid air after spitting out something sticky and slimy. Looking to his left, he saw Nivea Gordon, her back up against a cracked concrete wall, her rifle braced on a raised knee with her other leg splayed out to one side and bent in places it shouldn't have been.

Seeing him looking her way, the wolf raised a paw, giving him a thumbs-up, before her head flopped back against the wall with a soft thud. His tail, as if of a mind of its own, shook the flopping corpse hard, once, and then released it with a dull thump.

Grunting, limbs screaming with pain and his lower back feeling as if someone had tried to pull his spine off through his ass, Derry managed to grab hold of a crack in the wall, and began pulling his throbbing body upright, trying to take stock. His suit's headset was gone, flung somewhere down the hallway, but the ocular implant had immediately taken over, and was now showing him the vital signs of his squad.

They were alive, if bruised and bloodied. Derkin looked unconscious, Nivea halfway so and with a clearly broken leg and arm. The readings on Candace Waters showed she was unconscious, a quick glance her direction confirming she was bleeding from the scalp. After what felt like forever of working in perfect tandem, with no serious losses and only one serious injury, in just moments one single opponent had nearly killed them all.

"Fuck..."

He reached up, slapping the comm. unit on his collar only to have it fizzle and spark, battle-damaged beyond use. The wolf yanked it off and flung the thing away with a clatter, growling in aggravation that he couldn't contact Olliver. All the busted comm. unit could do now was spark at bad times and give away his position.

Then, he limped over to Nivea, wincing with every step. The back of his right leg felt wet, and the whole limb sluggish.

"Damnit, Gordon...Ngh...Wake up, Marine!"

She jerked, listlessly, head lolling to one side a moment before straightening up. Her voice came pained and pinched, muffled under her mask.

"Yeh...Derry?"

He ignored the flare of pain from his back and leg, and knelt down, grimacing, in the muck of the hallway. His paw moved gently, carefully, touching her throat and shoulder to feel for the seam in her hood. She was breathing deeply, strong graceful muscles moving under his fingertips as he slid them under the headpiece's edge and rolled it up.

The eyes that looked up at him were a pretty chocolate brown with hints of green in normal light. Here, they looked black, and swayed twitchily as if drunk. He grimaced, and put a paw to her cheek as Nivea's head tried to loll off to one side. She grinned at him, that same playful smirk he often got just before she threw something at him.

"Hey boss..."

"You're shocky, Niece. Try to stay with me, okay? Mind if I take your communicator?"

She grinned and raised a paw, flopping it in an affirmative.

"Where are we...? You don't have to drug me to get some,Derry..."

She didn't sound upset, and he blinked at the odd statement, before worriedly filing it in his hiead as signs of concussion and shock. He couldn't stay with her though, and helped sit her up straight against the wall before standing and limping away painfully, to check on the others. Meanwhile, he flipped Nivea's hood inside-out and pressed it to his cheek.

"Four, do you read me? This is Lead."

Olliver's voice indicated he registered something was wrong. It sounded tense, concerned, and adrenaline fueled.

"This is Four. Go ahead, Lead. What's wrong?"

"Four, I need you to advance straight into the hospital. Leave the locals behind if you have to. Things here are FUBAR."

Suddenly discarding code had the desired effect. Oscar instantly knew the urgency of what was going on, without having to speak of details. Out of the corner of his eye,Derrysaw the corpse of his enemy twitch, limbs jiggling, and had to swallow bile and terror lest he damage his own authority in front of Olliver or fail his injured troops.

"I'm on my way. Is Derkin..."

"Get here now. He's alive."

Derrybroke the connection by pulling the headset away from his ear, then turned and pulled his pistol, emptying the clip into his downed opponent with a staccato series of blasts. Then, he heard the coming footsteps, booted, multiple, and growled as he continued limping, grabbing Candace and shouldering open a door to slide her inside. He needed to get the whole unit out of the line of fire, if this was going to work.

The Fist of the Nascent Dawn hurtled through the void, her engines shunting such immense power that she left a trail of glowing stars, tiny balls of vented plasma from her one damaged thruster, scudded across space. Trailing behind her, forcing her own struggling engines to great feats of speed, the Star of Aden fought to keep up, firing individual cannons and torpedoes in a staccato arythmia, her systems utterly discombobulated by the roiling massacre that stewed in her cyclopean bowels.

Captain Adriana Leith was flushed with the heat of battle, her feral grin held back only by a sense of decorum as she called out orders to her bridge team.

"Keep up fire, Mr. Gunner. Helm, give us a twenty degree climb, initiate in thirty seconds. Then I need calculations for RT-jump, six light years, followed by a second quick-jump to break our trail. CAG, get our birds back on board."

Her bridge staff called out confirmations, the CAG as well, via wired communication. To her left and above, the sounds of automatic rifle fire rose and fell like the strings of a concerto, as Galen led the Marines and Naval Security seamen in a pitched firefight against Junta Marines trying to capture her bridge.

"Mr. Adeling, any information yet on what that static buildup is?"

"No, Captain...But it's massive. It's not a solar storm, either, already ruled that out ma'am."

Sati Anwar's voice came through the wired comm. Through the battle-rush that filled her with lust and life and a pulsing sense of glee and adventure, Captain Leith felt a surge of relief that the otter was alright, even though it was the third time she'd spoken in the last five minutes.

"Captain, the surge isn't just electro-magnetic. It's radiation as well. I think we're about to see-"

Adeling cut her off with a wordless yell, and pointed at the rear screen of the bridge chamber, as explosions rocked the hallway.

Captain Leith twisted around, her seat spinning in its mooring, to look upon the swirling lopsided battle. Behind them, the Star of Aden trailed, still firing off pointless pot-shots at her rapidly receding foe. The great monster was billowing smoke and slag, from the many hits she'd taken from the lighter, faster Fist, but what Adeling pointed towards was beyond even that.

A line of light so dark it was purple had zipped across their screen at such impossible speeds that the computer was registering them on screen as an 'anomalous event', its catch-all for anything that hadn't been properly documented. Whatever was moving, it was so swift that the computer couldn't guess its size, though it was clearly tiny, no larger than a shuttle craft.

Just as the two great fleets were crashing together, crossing lines as Vernier's desperate captains sought to close range and deny the enemy's tactical advantage in cannons, the purple light flashed between them and blurred to a stop. So far away, all Adriana could see was a single point of light, like a tiny purple star blossoming into life to the backdrop of great chaos and universes crashing together.

Sati Anwar's voice yelped out.

"Singularity! It's generating an uncontrolled sing-"

The single point of light blossomed outward like a flower blooming in time-advance photography. In a single second, it had exploded into a shape reminiscent of a gigantic rose, before collapsing in again on itself, all that light sucked into the heart of a tiny black spot of light that the computer automatically outlined in grey as a singularity. Then the singularity blew outward, shattered apart by its sudden gaining of virtual mass.

In it's wake, the computer scrambled, outlining thousands of new-found shapes in shades of yellow for unknown newcomers, then in blue and green. The attacking enemy fleet broke ranks and started scattering, forcing their ships to reverse against their own mass and thrust, as their ranks were suddenly interlaced with those of hundreds upon hundreds of vessels that had come as if from nowhere.

Space transmitted no sound, no great fanfare of flash and thunder to herald the coming apocalyptic appearance. Nonetheless, Adriana felt her blood go suddenly cold like glacial ice, then hot like magma was pulsing from the throbbing volcano in her chest. She started to laugh, hard, loud, then shouted orders as her bridge crew slapped themselves out of their sutnned state.

"Helm, angle to bring us directly over the Star of Aden! I want a full broadside right into her top decks. Then get us moving back towards the fleet!"

"M-ma'am?" the helmsman stammered, in disbelief.

The computer began generating text to match the newly warped-in super-armada. Thousands of lines, for thousands of vessels, ranging from tiny craft smaller than a garbage can to a great ovoid shape that was visible even at the vast stellar distance they had placed between themselves and the clashing fleets.

A single five-word line flashed in bright green over the great Ix'kat hive ship, as the ship's computer staggered beneath the weight of naming and classifying so many new vessels that they blotted out the system's star from the Fist's view.

"Sacred Song-Haven, Ix'kat Homeworld."

The Junta fleet wasn't fast enough. Sacred Song-Haven floated motionless in the void between the two great armadas, suspended as a great golden jewel, graceful, like a giant egg full of living potential and beauty. Then, the hundreds of millions of Ix'kat drones that clung to her surface, sealed against the void, began to rustle, a great sea of a million collars of carapace, as they took flight in massive rainbow clouds of death and savagery.

She had warped straight into the fight, circumventing the great range-advantage human vessels had over the Ix'kat insect's slower, less-armed vessels. Drones were already slamming into ship hulls, clawing and tearing at the armor meant to stop rail cannon and plasma stream, burrowing into metals never made to resist expert claws well-trained on how to pull rivets off and stream their way inside.

A stripe-furred feline Lieutenant's head exploded like a gore-filled piñata as Kerr's rifle penetrated it with a high-caliber rail round, instantly cooking the flying contents from the sheer friction of the round's passage. Then Olliver Tense and Black Jack stormed through the disrupted fortification, spitting hundreds of rounds in seconds from his right arm's autocannon and left arm's gripped heavy machine gun.

Kerr sprinted after him, before pausing to fire again, putting a round through the throat of a lizard who had stuck his head out the hospital's sixth floor window, trying to aim a shoulder-carried rocket launcher towards the charging battle titan. The creature's head flew off in a spray of gore, and his decapitated body slid out the window to land with a sick smack on the pavement eighty feet below.

Both operators sprinted right past the last layer of defenses, having left their unwitting escort far behind as Junta troops swooped in to fill the gap and prevent a whole-sale breakthrough. They ignored surviving enemies, many of them concussed, in shock, screaming and hiding from the silent and invisible slaughter that ran seemingly at random in an unstoppable train of carnage through their ranks.

The last barricade clearly knew what was coming, and broke from their position, fleeing in either direction perpendicular to Black Jack's thundering approach, as 40mm grenades streamed from the cannon built into its left arm, shattering concrete and humanoid bodies alike wherever they happened to meet.

Olliver's voice clipped over the comm.

"Corporal, we have to assume we're extracting the whole team. I can only carry one or two, and won't be able to fight properly. Do you think this place has air transport?"

Kerr looked up at the building, noting it's flat roof, then looked past that to the cavern's ceiling half a kilometer above their heads.

"It might have a high-alt hovercraft on the roof. If it does, I can fly it. I doubt we'll be able to get all the way to the surface that way though."

The otter's voice sounded angry, but under iron-clad control as he responded.

"Doesn't matter, we just have to get away from the combat zone. If the mission has gone belly-up, we at least need to survive it."

Kerr paused, popping up straight to fire another shot, splattering a soldier's chest cavity out its back as the cat tried to approach and fling an explosives package.

"If there's a flyer up there, we won't be able to carry Black Jack, Olly."

The otter didn't respond immediately, focusing on gunning down a team of infantry that had just exited what was once the hospital's ER doors, cutting htem to pieces before they could reinforce the front lines. Then he bee-lined for the nearest blank section of wall, pumping grenades into it that shattered the façade and blasted hunks of cinder block and transparent metals away in heaps and clouds.

"Worry about that when we've secured the rest of the team, Corporal. Of everyone here, you and I are the most self-sufficient I should think. If I have to, I'll find a way to walk out of this hell-hole."

Tenh laid the unconscious tigress down gently, cradling her head and neck as the limp great cat's body settled down on a gurney. The smell of electrical discharge and old-fashioned cartridge ammo filled the hall beyond, and the ancient mountain knew his rescuers were in dire straits.

A moment after she was laid down, he was back out the door, closing the thing behind him and casually wrenching the metal sheet to warp its pins, making it non-operational without significant force and intent. Then he was off. Nimble, powerful legs carried him swiftly down the hallway and towards a stairwell leading up to the ground floor.

He hit the first stair at a flat-out sprint, arms pumping in time with his legs as he took steps four at a time, eating distance without breaking so much as a sweat. The taciturn immortal couldn't help the slightest bit of a smile, and the reflection that it must be an aspect of his rapidly-returning youth.

When he reached the security door leading to the hospital's main floor, he didn't even slow, lowering a shoulder and plowing into it so hard that the steel portal ripped free of the wall frame and all, crushing a hapless guard to jello against the far wall before his companions could even register something had happened.

With the speed and power of a freight train, Tenh rocketed through the crumbling doorway. The first soldier turned in the slow-motion Tenh had grown used to over so many centuries, as if he were wrapped in molasses. Tenh's paw caught him under the chin, curled in, and tore the canine's throat out in a languidly-slow spray of blood. Tenh's footpaw came up and back, crashing into the third guard's solar plexus with a terrible wet crunch that sent the hapless soldier flying backwards down the hallway.

Before the corpses were done falling, Tenh had moved on, grabbing up a rifle from one soldier and a combat knife from another.

Derryducked back behind the door frame as another spatter of machine-gun fire spalled off the walls, bouncing and ricocheting from concrete and steel as enemy soldiers tried to advance down the hallway into his dead-end holdout. Behind him, Nivea Gordon seemed to be fading in and out of consciousness, and Derkin had only just begun to stir. Waters grunted and sat up, abruptly, calling out through her headset.

"Mask off, Waters, mine's fucked. Grab a rifle and help me!"

The vixen tore her headset off and tossed it aside, before rushing up to the black wolf, stopping only to grab Derkin's carbine and grenade bandolier. She could tell the Sergeant wasn't in a great way either. The dark fabric of his active camo suit was waterproof, but she could see just by the way he was standing that his wound had torn open.

"What the hell happened, Sergeant?"

"We were ambushed by some sort of super-agent...Crazy-looking black jaguar with yellow eyes and a real mean disposition."

She almost swallowed her tongue in startlement.

"...How are we still alive?"

Derrydidn't look back at her, instead taking a brief pause in the enemy's fire as his cue to stick his paws around the corner and empty his rifle in their direction.

"Grab grenades, start lobbing, we gotta keep them back until Olliver gets here! As to your question, he kicked the shit out of us, then I pinned him to a wall for half a second and Nivea blew his brains out. What?"

She was just staring at the side of his head, in a kind of terrified wonderment, which quickly roiled through her stomach as a nauseous sense of horror as she looked behind them, scanning the room.

"Where's the body?"

"In the hall. Why?"

"Because he's not dead!"

"Bullshit, his brains were on the wall. Now get those grenades and start throwing!"

There wasn't more time for argument, so Candace did as she was told, though her tail wanted to shove itself so far between her legs it would have stuck out into the hall. She yanked a pin free, hurled the grenade side-arm out into the hall, then slipped back a step to do so agan asDerrycontinued firing.

"He's a Shadow,Derry. Remember? First generation nanos? So long as he still had body fat, he'll be back!"

The Sergeant growled, and yanked his arms back as the intensifying spray of bullets nearly tore the rifle uot of his paws. He glared down at the rifle, and the smoldering dents in its surface where high-velocity iron flechettes had impacted the nano-steel.

"So we kill them what...By burning them?"

"Or killing them over and over til they stay down," she grunted, yanking another pin and flinging the grenade. A second later, the thing exploded with a sharp crash, and someone screamed as flying shrapnel bounced off a wall and managed to hit one of them.

"And even then, they more or less just stay down til something gets fed to them...Or at least that's what my handler told me. I don't really know, okay?"

Derkin snorted then, and made a deep, heaving noise, before splattering the half-digested remains of his breakfast on the floor.

"Derkin! Check Niece out, I think she's in shock!"

The armadillo grunted again, coughed, spat, and raised his head, muzzily trying to get his bearings. They were in a storage room, he realized, stacked high with boxes of medical supplies and equipment covered in dust cloths. The prisoners were gone, having run off as soon as the fight with that invisible psychopath had started, which he figured was probably the smart choice.

He managed to get up, slowly, as the world wobbled, and made his way over to check the wolf female out. Derkin already knew he himself was concussed, barely able to remember the fight that had put him down so harshly. He was fairly sure the wolf was in even worse shape. Nivea whimpered softly as his heavy paws touched her skull, first checking it for breaks, as she whispered incoherently.

"Gotta get home...Not s'posed to be out this late..."

"Stay with us, Marine. Try to focus, okay? You're in a half-ruined hospital on Centauri. Can you remember your name?"

Her eyes wouldn't focus, and she grinned dopily then winced, sucking in a harsh breath as Derkin's fingers found a swelling, squishy spot along her left temple.

"P-princess Fluffy..." she mumbled, struggling to keep her eyes open, while leaning her head against Derkin's paws. He pushed it upright again with gentle pressure, and held it there, while digging in his medical bag.

"Sergeant, she's concussed and delirious. Her skull's broken, and I won't be surprised if she's got cerebral swelling."

Derrygrowled, low and basso, and chucked another grenade around the corner, as Candace stuck her head and paws around to empty her clip at the oncoming enemy force. The wolf-ape hybrid yelled out as she pulled back.

"They're reinforced! I count twenty at least, and they're moving up!"

"Like fuck they are, keep grenading!"

Derkin hunched in armadillo instinct as a grenade thudded into the chamber with them, only to have Waters' blurring-fast paws grab it and chuck the thing back out into the hall to exploded harmlessly, sending a wash of wind and concrete dust back in its wake. He shook his head, winced at the swimming effect that motion gave his vision, and then went back to focusing on his work.

Once his paw found the brace, he brought it up and wrapped the soft collar around Nivea's neck, belting it into place to stabilize any neck injury. There was no nano-injection for this sort of injury, at least not in the field - without knowing exactly what needed repairing, the machines could do vastly more harm than good, especially in an organ so delicate and intricate as the brain.

The wolf's head ceased lolling, thanks to the brace, and for a moment she met eyes with him. He saw the lucidity there, however brief, as a flash of focus before her eyes started dilating again. His paws had just found a hard lump in her abdomen, just above where that invisible monster had kicked her, and he knew it was a sign of serious internal hemorrhage.

"A-are we...Are we fucked, Corpsman?"

"No idea, Private. Hang in there. Cavalry's coming."

He looked back towardDerry, as the wolf discarded a block of spent ammo from his rail rifle, replacing it off his belt bag.

"Cavalry is coming, right?"

The wolf growled back, ducking fully into the room again as a hail of lead and plasma bolts splattered across the walls and down the hallway.

"Better fuckin' be..."