Chapter Twenty Eight
Behind you.
Almost the second her toes hit the ground, Wraith was being shot at. Someone had lucked out right behind her, straying from their own squad to chase her dive-trail down when she broke off from the others. Fuck, they must have scored a gun in the very first box they opened. She wove side to side as she bolted down the runway. Let them waste the ammo.
She slid across the rough tarmac as a ricochet clipped her heel and rolled behind the loot bin, throwing the lid up. Seconds on the ground and probably already bleeding from the burn of scrapes along her legs. Great.
Shotgun bolt, sniper clip, thermite grenade. Shit.
She grabbed the thermite grenade while the sound of footsteps grew closer and hurled it without aiming to lurch towards the next loot bin. She popped it too, still no gun. The gunfire chased her out of cover and she scrabbled with the third lid, biting her tongue when the round hit her in the hip and snatched up the first thing she saw, spinning on her heel and pulling the trigger. The burst went long, slicing sideways across the figure and buying her a second to duck back into cover.
When movement popped behind the abandoned forklift, two further bursts put them down. Wraith sidestepped and confirmed the kill. Without pause, she slipped back behind the open bins incase there were others. She replaced the clip and let herself take a breath.
"Kill confirmed." she finally answered the concerned voices in her ear, and she took a second to grab her breath before looting the ammo and weapon from the fallen opponent. She pocketed the bits and pieces from the crappy bins and headed for the zipline across the water. Better she was with her squad since she was already wounded.
"Body armour, level two."
Pathfinder's voice notified her as her toes left the edge, trusting the rope to keep her from the sheer drop, and she tapped the bump on the side of her watch to keep the ping marker there for her to follow.
"I'll take that. I need a heal if you find one."
"Noted, friend."
The adrenaline had settled to a more manageable level already, and her hip was beginning to sting just from the pull of muscle as she hung in the air. She needed to dig the bullet out, if she could. Too early to ignore it. She was lucky it hadn't shattered the bone. Although it almost certainly had more to do with bad aim than luck.
"What are you running?" came the next query as she eased herself back onto solid ground, "There's some spare Heavy here if that was a Hemlok I heard."
His teasing tone told her he was pretty sure on that front, and despite herself Wraith snorted in amusement.
"Sounds good."
"I shall keep watch."
Pathfinder chattered brightly about what he could see from his perch atop the wall once Wraith was safely inside the closest shelter, and it only took her a moment before she had the bullet successfully removed. It had been surprisingly close to the surface, another ricochet by the look of it. It wasn't even bleeding too bad, thankfully. More an irritation than a hinderance. Losing blood right at the beginning of the day was just annoying. Mirage retrieved the fresh rounds for her, dropping them beside her as he passed through to empty the far bins, and Wraith felt better once she had shields and more than a measly handful of rounds. She traded the stolen RE-45 for an abandoned EVA-8 and adjusted the various straps until she was satisfied.
"That stray's team went to Runoff, looks like." Mirage hummed thoughtfully when he was back at her side, and Wraith snorted.
"Idiotic play, dropping so far away."
Mirage merely gave her a flirtatious grin and waggled his eyebrows.
"Maybe they just couldn't resist your trail."
The vicious glare she shot him earned her nothing but laughter, though the faint sound of approaching feet not long after had a much more sobering effect. She hefted the rifle into her hands and cocked a brow at him, and he took point. They eased themselves from the building and along the towering wall. Definitely someone approaching. With an obnoxious click of his fingers, a startlingly realistic hologram sprang forth, running from their shadow and towards the opening in the high wall. Wraith watched it absently, her gaze scanning what little she could see of the horizon with such a poor angle, and so it almost caught her by surprise when her wrist gave a melodic ping just as the fake Mirage shattered and disappeared.
There on her map was a round blue dot. It disappeared in seconds, Mirage's Longbow leaving a mighty crack in the air before he turned to her. His kill counter flickered to life. His eyes were lit with pride and smugness and his grin was toothy.
"Told you it'd help."
It dawned on Wraith what had happened, and she was more than a little impressed, if she was honest.
"That's handy." she said instead, but Mirage chuckled like she'd stroked his ego anyway, and she rolled her eyes before turning back towards the faraway cover.
She flicked her fire type to single and cocked an eyebrow without looking at him again. They waited several seconds, but if anyone further was approaching, they were being much stealthier than their companion had been.
"What's your cooldown?"
Mirage clicked his fingers again and the hologram appeared, racing out into the open. Wraith kept one eye on it and one on her wrist, and when the dashing figure scattered into nothing, the blue dot guided her eye. The trigger fell under her touch, and in seconds her PDA was raising her killcount to two.
With naught but a second's pause Pathfinder had claimed the third, and the first full squad of the Game had fallen. When Wraith lowered her gun and got to her feet to head out she said nothing more, but Mirage looked pleased enough with himself anyway.
~.~
Wraith tossed the blood-soaked rucksack over her shoulder and twisted her other arm through the matching strap. She stepped over the body at her feet and cleared away from it to let the collection crew do their thing. Scaling the balcony into the building proper, she swept an eye across the open space by the waterfall, but there was no sign of anybody racing to catch them after the fight.
She eased the door shut with her shoulder anyway, just in case. Pathfinder looked up in greeting from the corner atop the stairs, deftly knotting the bandage he had wound around Mirage's arm. She briefly met the Trickster's eye, but he only grinned. So he was fine, despite taking a sniper round just above the elbow.
"Not my gun arm." he informed her cheerily, waving the other hand at her.
"Good." she answered while taking up position by the barred window, "Still got a long way to go."
"Five teams left to defeat." Pathfinder chirped in helpful agreement.
"Piece of cake." Mirage laughed.
Of course Wraith was right to disagree, for it was very much not a piece of cake that lay between them and the end of the Game. In fact, not five minutes after that exchange they found themselves ambushed en route to Artillery.
Stuck in the open with the Ring at their backs, what had been a relatively slow Game for them was suddenly more dicey. Wraith cut through the air, feeling the kiss of the bullet trajectories as the Void deflected them, but there was nowhere to run for without seriously separating herself from her team.
The Elite appeared in front of her just as she returned to the late afternoon air, and the round that cracked Wraith's shield was delivered at point blank range. She dove in surprise, crashing into the waiting bracken and twisting back to her feet in the hopes of circling.
A grappling hook clanged bluntly against a tree nearby but Wraith had lost her rifle in the previous scuffle and found her fingers closing around the handle of a blade as she pounced. The soldier hollered when their bodies collided, and despite how viper-fast Wraith struck her with the blade, the gun went off. Wraith collapsed atop her with a jagged gasp, her hands slipping when they sought purchase.
Copper coated her tongue and flooded her nose and she threw herself harshly to one side with a growl. The blood-slicked Konai in her hand was as familiar as an extra limb and ready, but the panicked rustling was gone.
"Bangalore out." she spat into her comms, realising only when she drew her next breath that something was seriously wrong.
"I'm pinned!" Mirage was yelling, but Wraith's heartbeat was punching hard in her ears and there was warmth pooling down her abdomen and soaking her waist.
Syringe.
Get coagulants, now!
They're coming!
Wraith tore blindly for her rucksack, the silver body of the syringe in the side pocket slipping between her fingers and almost disappearing into the brush. She tore the cap off as the crashing sound of oncoming opponents hurtled towards her, and stabbed the needle through her shirt and into her ribs.
She was barely on her feet and ducked behind another tree when someone stumbled over the body, and Wraith drew her EVA up to take general aim and let the shot punch through the shadowy branches inaccurately. She rounded the tree fast and shot again, downing the Medic.
"Fuck." Lifeline spat as Wraith snatched her pistol from her hand, before she put two rounds into her heart.
Wraith spat blood off to one side as she heaved in air, hauling the Medic's kit open to see what she could find. Her Hemlok still missing and her shotgun down to a measly seven rounds, she needed something to help-
"I am down!"
"Path!"
The Kraber shot silenced everything else for just a second, and Wraith's PDA chimed sadly. She froze for a second where she was, her head snapping towards the sound, but her teammate's curse only confirmed what she already knew. Pathfinder was out.
"Need a little help here, Wraith."
Calm and clear with only the tightness to tell her he was in pain, Mirage was in bad shape. She gave up looking for a better gun and forced her legs to move despite the blood that was starting to congeal on her thighs.
"I'm on my way."
She reloaded the P2020 with a grimace. It would have to do for now.