Mary hated Ceryshen. She always had. It was always so cold...
She tapped the chip on her neck as she ran from the AMS, activating her infiltration suit's light-bending power. No one noticed the blur that streaked from the AMS' protective bubble, nor did they see that same blur get thrown roughly to the snow-covered ground when the AMS exploded. Mary rolled flat onto her back and lay motionless, concentrating on controlling her breathing.
Around her, the pack of TR BFRs proudly surveyed the carnage they had brought to this portion of the Vanu front. Several poor Vanu were standing up here and there, from where they had been tossed by the AMS explosion, wearing their standard exosuits and dazed expressions; some of them managed to shoulder their suppressors and squeeze off a few shots before they were literally torn apart by high-caliber rounds. Their work completed, the BFRs one-by-one turned and began plodding onward. Mary could have reached out and touched several of them as they passed dangerously near.
Instead she closed her eyes and waited for it to come. The cold touch of ice-crusted steel, barely registering with the brain before it was followed by overwhelming pressure. Bone snaps. Muscles flatten and tear. Vital organs, mashed into an unidentifiable pulp, burst from the flesh in a final, instant orgasm of death. You would hardly feel anything at all, she told herself, and then you'd just wake up in a spawning tube and not remember any of it. Just like the last time, apparently. It was... comforting.
When she opened her eyes and realized that the entire group had somehow missed stepping on her, Mary's mind instantly moved beyond bracing for its own destruction. She rolled onto her stomach, pushed herself to her feet and began moving in a crouched position in one fluid motion. Many of the Vanu bodies were utterly destroyed, but some looked salvageable...
But when she reached into the webbing of her infiltration suit, she realized that she had spawned without her medical applicator.
Damn it!
While she turned over the idea of what to do next, her hands pulled out one of her collection of ACE combat devices almost of their on volition. She programmed it to deploy a spitfire - just something to slow down anyone coming up behind her - and spiked it into the ground among the bodies. Again it was instinct guiding her when her withdrawing hand pulled an AMP pistol off the nearest dead Vanu.
She headed off at a run in the direction the BFR's had taken away from the AMS wreckage. When she had a minute she would check the map on her HUD and find out where exactly she was... it was Ceryshen, thought. She was sure of that. She frowned darkly at the glacial landscape around her.
For now, all she needed to know was that the BFR pack wouldn't be satisfied with destroying a single AMS - the eradication of so vital a target would embolden them. They had tasted blood, and they would crave more. They would head for the front.
Suddenly she tripped, eliciting a groan of pain from someone unseen on the ground. Panic sent adrenaline pouring through her veins once more, allowing her to wrench her body around to land on her back. Her breath shot from her mouth and her lungs screamed out for air, but her muscles were already propelling her off the ground. Her left hand tapped the chip on her temple to activate her darklight implant; her right hand tore the AMP from her webbing.
The figure on the ground, now glowing bright white against the black background of darklight, was wearing a Vanu infiltration suit. He must have escaped the AMS blast too... but not the BFRs. Starting at his hips, the lower half of his body was crushed into a single BFR footprint. Mary hoped the Terran pilot hadn't noticed; she hoped with every fiber of her being that the TR hadn't intentionally left the man here in this condition.
She released all of the energy she had built during her moment of panic in a long, heavy sigh. Raising her AMP, she emptied a handful of rounds into the soldier's head before saluting the now-still body with her gun.
Mary hated Ceryshen. She always had. It was always so cold...