Recognition

Esmerelda was an old friend. The Barrett M107 was comfortable and familiar in her hands. Ricochet knew all of it's quirks, all the finicky little things the rifle liked. It helped to keep her calm. That was her favorite thing about being on high in a nest: no matter the chaos raging on the battlefield, it was always calm where she was.

Voices barked and chattered in her earpiece. The ground team was pinned down, B.A.T.s had swarmed the road and disabled the Havoc. The armored truck was operational, but couldn't risk moving through the sea of robots until they were more thinned out. Low-Light was getting into a better position.

CRACK!

A fifty-caliber hollow-point at barely 200 meters left a pretty nasty hole. Head-shots were best against the androids, as it disrupted their CPU and turned them into a pretty pile of scrap metal. She squeezed off three more shots, before slithering back a few feet on the roof to duck out of sight. Rule number one, never stay visible for too long. Crawling sideways on the roof, she readjusted herself for a better angle on the larger mass of approaching B.A.T.s.

The distinctive deep report of Low-Light's bolt-action split the air. Followed by the deep timbre of his voice in her ear: "You've got incoming on your position. Vipers."

"Ooh-rah." She breathed back as an affirmative. If Low-Light was in coverage, that means she could withdraw to deal with her new threat. "Angel Two, disengaging."

The fire escape she'd used to climb up was her ticket to getting the drop on the Vipers. She heard the dull whump of the ground floor doors being breached. Slinging the rifle over her shoulder, she pulled her sidearm and swung back onto the fire-escape. Smashing a window, got her egress into the building. Thankfully, the officials in St. Petersburg had seen fit to evacuate the surrounding office spaces, including this building.

Ricochet got to play cat and mouse for a little while. She was patient. The first Viper she killed without even firing a weapon, driving her k-bar into his kidneys and upwards, puncturing his abdominal wall and collapsing his lungs before he could even shout. She dragged his body under a desk. The second one spotted her first, firing, and shattering a mirror instead of Ricochet's skull. Nine millimeter ammo usually bounced off skull when used at point-blank range, so instead, Ricochet fired and blew a chunk out of his neck, severing arteries and dropping him in his boots.

"Mop up those BATs, we need to get out of here!" Flint barked in her ear, on the open comms line.

"Visual on Mindbender!" Mutt's voice could barely be heard over Junkyard's snarling attack barks.

"Negative. Priority is the package." Flint wouldn't let them forget that.

Ricochet eased out into the ground floor from the stairwell. Other Vipers were still canvassing the upper floors, she'd heard them try to converge on the fatally wounded Viper left bleeding out a floor up. She could see the exit and that meant she could make a break for the other Joes. The foyer was wide open and lacked any imaginable cover if things went south though. There was nothing, and no one in sight, all the way up until she started across the floor.

Then the revolving doors ahead of her swept around, and the most ridiculous looking man came through, yanking a voluminous purple cloak free of the doors, while complaining loudly the entire time. Bald, mustachioed and monocled, the identifying marks triggered the most recently memorized list of who's who.

Dr. Mindbender turned at the sound of a round being chambered, and stopped in his tracks just before the muzzle of her pistol pressed into his sternum. A half-heartbeat later, she felt herself come into the crosshairs of other weapons, the remaining Vipers all had her in their sights from behind. Something clattered on the ground from Mindbender's grasp, as he threw both of his hands up in the air suddenly.

"Call off your Vipers, and we both walk out of here alive." Ricochet offered the compromise, knowing the comms would pick up the statement.

Someone in her ear swore, but she refused to pull her attention off the idiot facing her. "It's an easy choice, Mindbender. Even a blind kid couldn't miss at this range."

Mindbender's Adam's apple bobbed comically as he swallowing his heart. Blinking, he let the monocle fall to the end of it's gold chain. Ricochet fought the urge to smirk, and fought harder the urge to call him out on his ridiculous get-up. Instead, she did her best to focus on keeping herself steady, even as she felt the attention from at least three other firearms bearing down on her back.

"Monica?" Mindbender fairly squeaked the name out, disbelief cracking his voice.

"Excuse me?" Ricochet's confusion caused her gun to drop just slightly. She recovered and releveled as the sounds of safeties clicked off behind her.

"No, no, you're much too yo-" Mindbender for a moment looked like he'd been struck by something. But suddenly, he started waving his hands. "Put them down! Put your guns down! There, there, see? We can come to some civil conclusion, can we not?"

Ricochet didn't believe him for a second. Instead of taking him at his word, she launched into movement, grabbing one of his shoulder straps and hauling him around. She put his back to the Vipers, putting him between her and any bullets like a living shield. The muzzle of her pistol pressed into the soft skin beneath his chin, as she dragged him towards the revolving door.

"You look just like her, you know," Mindbender took the opportunity to gloat, even as he was being used as a human shield.

"Don't listen to him, Rico. His whole MO is to fuck with your head." Flint's voice was steady in her ear.

"I would really like you to just fuck off, now." Ricochet growled at him. Her heel hit the edge of the door, and with a kick she pushed it into motion. There wouldn't be enough room inside the wedge of glass to drag him with her. Instead, at the last second, she withdrew the pistol and clocked him in the chin with the butt.

It wasn't enough to drop him, but it bought her enough time to shove her way around the door. She bolted as soon as she was free of the glass. She figured the Vipers wouldn't open fire with Mindbender in the way, but she couldn't be sure.

"Where's your mother, little girl!?" Mindbender shouted after her. "Where is she?!"