Chapter Twenty Four
The sand rose to meet Wraith hard as she sprawled, wincing when her shield splintered. She spat out a mouthful of dirt and flipped onto her back, returning fire. Barker lobbed a light grenade, focusing fire with her on the opponent who had followed them. In the back of her head, Wraith cursed that she'd aided an enemy instead of her squad.
Blinded by the grenade at his feet, Mirage clumsily tossed a grenade of his own. It landed wide, far past Barker on her right.
Beneath their combined fire, Mirage's Gold shield eventually cracked, and the Trickster hit the ground. Wraith was on her feet by then, dragging out a shield cell right there in the open because they didn't have any time before-
You're in their sights!
A Scout shot pierced her chest just as the cell was popping, and for the second time in as many minutes, Wraith was sprawled on the sands.
"Fuck!" she yelled to release the pain that flashed like fire, watching helplessly as the MRVN unit turned his fire on her squadmate.
Where was Darwyn?
"Pinned!" came the reply to the question she didn't know she'd cursed out loud, and Wraith's heart sank a little.
They were going down, she knew it. And she was losing to Mirage.
She'd never live this down. As Pathfinder and Barker traded fire, dancing left and right with the toxic anticipation rising steadily in Wraith's veins, her PDA pinged.
Four squads.
Four squads left and she was in the dirt, bleeding out and watching her teammate slowly losing a fight through wavering vision. She groaned as a wave of pain washed through her again, struggling to draw a full breath when every twitch agitated the hole in her upper chest. It was close to her heart, she realised as she clenched her fingers over it, wondering if he'd pierced a lung.
A wicked shot. Pathfinder's a wicked shot.
A hysterical sound swarmed up her throat but she clamped her mouth shut and pressed her eyes shut tight to clear the blurring. Come on, Barker. Come on!
Like her words had been heard, the light specialist went down, his knockdown shield buzzing to life. Wraith hadn't even activated hers, squirming backwards initially but succumbing a little to the agony bleeding through her chest, watching the loss that was arriving for her. Pathfinder turned his head her way, and met her eye. Despite the distance she'd put between them and the continuing roar of gunfire from the compound, she heard his words as clear as if she were poached into his comm-line.
"This is unlucky, friend. If you were on my team, you would be happy about this."
She fought the urge to roll her eyes as he cocked his gun.
As he took aim, to the surprise of them all, Pathfinder lit up. Flames crackled from his monitor and he spasmed, twisting partly around before hitting the ground, engulfed in sudden, bizarre fire. Wraith's first hazy thought was a thermite grenade, somehow, his shield must have cracked as he downed Barker. But the fire was inside his monitor. She could see it licking out into the air as he scrambled on the ground.
And then she saw the protruding edge.
Wraith stared at the man who stood on the cement wall, one arm cocked awkwardly upwards over the metal fencing, fingers empty as he met her eye over the fire, chest heaving. Somewhere to her right, a dark and half-delirious laugh emanated.
Darwyn's lips stretched into a grin as he lowered the bow, his eyes gleaming bright behind his goggles as he hopped down. As he passed Mirage and kicked the trickster's gun out of reach, he threw him a wink. It was a pity Wraith was in so much pain, for Mirage's responding expression was more than amusing.
The archer made quick work of getting her back on her feet, the fast-working painkillers a blessed relief. Mirage was talking, low and fast, and Wraith looked off towards the gunfire still raging in Runoff. Their third, the woman whose shields Wraith had all but cracked in the tunnel pipe, was clearly faring better than her squadmates.
Her shields filled, she slid another needle under her skin as Darwyn hauled their third back on his feet.
"Impressive." Barker murmured as he too sorted his shields, the three of them turning to the downed Elites.
"Yeah, if shooting a guy in the back is impressive." Mirage called out, voice laced with a pain he was trying to hide and managing to sound somewhat cocky.
Before Wraith could point out that that was precisely what he'd done to her, Darwyn's amused voice interrupted her.
"I figured I'd learn from the best, right?"
To his credit, Mirage managed to roll his eyes pretty dramatically for someone bleeding out. Wraith pulled out her pistol as she reached him and made his death quick and clean, ensuring Barker gave Pathfinder the same. There was no need to draw out a kill when you'd bested another legend in combat. She believed there was an unnecessary cruelty in prolonging the pain.
"In another time, another place, maybe you killed me." she allowed, reloading her weapon, "But not this time."
~.~
"Careful." she whispered, peering around the high wall.
They'd made fast work of raiding the two Elites' well-stocked packs and high-tailing it out of the area. While the gunfire had died off momentarily before starting up again, Wraith wasn't sure that they could assume the fourth team had arrived in Runoff. They were still waiting on that next alert, surprised that the newcomer Mirage and Pathfinder had been assigned had somehow survived. Particularly when the small compound now contained some big names.
If she was holding them off still, Wraith's squad might be about to walk into a team who had had plenty of time to secure themselves good vantage points to defend this, the inevitable next ring.
"What you thinking?" Darwyn answered, absently sweeping the runways through his scope.
"She's thinking we might not be the first ones here." Barker answered for her.
Darwyn half-turned in surprise when Wraith looked back to confirm, his gaze flickering to his wrist.
"Oh." he said softly as it dawned on him, "Oh."
Wraith recognised the expression as he glanced back towards Runoff. To hold off a full squad on your own was impressive enough, but to be holding off three of the best on the Elite roster was a notable feat.
"Better to make use of the time we have." Barker spoke again, and Wraith turned her attention back to the building they were rounding.
"Should one of us head round the other side?"
Wraith shook her head.
"Not this late. We stick together, we don't know who we're up against. Things could get messy."
Darwyn frowned but nodded. Wraith readied her gun. Better now than never. She slunk up along the wall, her pace swift and silent, pressing her back against the corner and ducking her head around to shove open the closed door, pulling back fast in case someone waited inside.
Adrenaline thrummed as the ring countdown started again. Two minutes, and it'd be moving, forcing whoever was left alive in Runoff their way. Wraith wanted to be in a position to challenge them when they got there. She slipped around into the small room, sweeping the corner and reaching for the tiny room door, more a cupboard than anything, when she heard three sounds in the same instant.
The air-blast crackle of a Respawn beacon being activated. Her head turned automatically to the door to her left, out towards the sand, as her head raced through possibilities.
As she pushed the door, a dreadful and all-too-recognisable hiss. As she leapt back to spin away, the cry of a rifle; like the call of a wild bird, knocking Barker to the floor with its impact. Darwyn dove for the doors, slamming them shut in time to block a second shot. Barker hauled himself to his feet and grabbed a shield cell, winded but otherwise no worse for wear.
And then of course, with naught but a heartbeat for Wraith to realise how foolish she'd been, the door behind them opened and a heavy object landed between them. Dread pooled in her gut as she grabbed desperately for the edges of the air.
"Get the door!" she yelled as the open one swung closed, already gagging as she backed away from the vicious green gas exploding around them.
"The sniper-"
"The door!"
Barker shoved Darwyn aside and threw open the door as the Void slid around Wraith like a burning stream, and she pounced through.
There was little choice, as she made her snap fire decision, launching herself over the balcony towards the sniper on the runway and racing towards the abandoned jumpship, gritting her teeth against the pain and the screaming of the gunfire. She tumbled at the ship mouth, hauling out her gun and spinning around the outside, thankful that the woman scrambling to switch weapons was on her own.
Wraith pushed her, knocking her down onto the tarred runway, firing at her while dancing from the lashing feet that could send her over, dodging the peacekeeper fire as her opponent found her bearings. She felt the tug of the Voidstream and then, as her clip emptied, the woman screamed as she was engulfed, somehow avoiding the very edge of the island as she spasmed, flailing before dropping silently to the ground.
Wraith had seen it all, in the Games, but as she pressed her back against the furthest end of the disused jumpship, she took a second to clear her nose of the lingering green gas and the smell of burning flesh. An uneasy ghost whispered up her spine.
"You good?" her comm-line crackled and she coughed.
"Yeah. Barker?"
Radio silence, and Wraith's eyes automatically flashed to his healthy green marker on her wrist. No response to Darwyn's query either, and Wraith was already heading for the portal still burning away at her energy reserves.
Silence was a message just as clear as speech.
As the portal yanked her back into the doorway of the room Caustic had made so dangerous, Wraith slammed bodily into someone stepping into the room. It was incredibly bad timing, a one-in-a-million collision that sent her sprawling onto the floor, her pistol in her hands as she took aim.
"Darwyn stay there." she barked as she pulled the trigger.
His shield sang as her shots dinged, and he scrabbled backwards around the doorframe. The archer's voice was in her ears but she was too busy to hear him.
"Turned tables, huh?" a voice laughed as Wraith found her feet and fled the still-gassed room through the other door.
"Trickster's back up." she relayed as she took a fresh breath, shaking her head to clear it of the faint, woozy sensation that she so hated from the Doctor's poison.
"I got that death box covered." Darwyn alerted her, "Setting up shop."
Okay. So they'd replaced the sniper with their own. Hopefully, that would aid them. Wraith's muscles sagged in relief as she let the portal fall, heat and pain lancing up and down her spine almost overwhelmingly. She raced the length of the Airbase building, following the green alert of Barker on her display and listening to the new shots ringing out.
"I could use assistance."
"I'm on my way. Caustic?"
"And company." Barker's voice was strained, distracted, as he traded fire.
Wraith hopped the fence and ran along the abandoned vehicles, skidding down the long ramp as the scene opened up before her. She tugged a grenade from a pocket and halted long enough to estimate the arc, curving it neatly behind the crate where someone stood. When they darted from cover to get away, a clear cry rang across the whole base, followed swiftly by a second.
"Dead on the ground." Darwyn chirped in her ear as she continued her run.
"Just Caustic to go." she concluded, eying the not-so-distant moving ring.
In a moment or so, this side of Airbase would be all but lost to it, and she didn't want her team spread too thin when that happened.
