Special Thanks as always to my editor, Darkfire7881

Chapter 14

Actium, May 6, 2545
1000

"ODC to NORTHCOM, be advised we're picking massive amounts of Covenant drop pods and drop ships inbound to your AO. ETA, two minutes to impact."

"Copy that ODC, we see them too. Interrogative: approximately where are those craft going to touch down, over?"

"Trajectory of all incoming places them as landing within the southern to western metropolitan areas of the city of Byzas within the Thracia Province, over."

"Solid copy ODC. Any idea on numbers?"

"Uh...satellite network is mostly down, but estimates place Covenant landing force at approximately ten thousand strong within the first wave, with far more to come."

"Understood ODC. NORTHCOM, out. Actium Northern Command to all military headquarters, Covenant landings detected in the southern, south western, and western Byzas metropolitan areas. All military commands are hereby ordered to immediately counterattack - do not allow the Covenant to obtain a lodgement!"

XXXXX

Byzas, Thracia Province
May 6, 2545
1005

Selene

SWOOOOOOSHHHH WABOOM WABOOM!

The ground shook as more and more Covenant drop pods landed within the city limits. Looking directly south, maybe less than a thousand meters away, Selene could see smoke rising from where the pods were hitting. The crackling of automatic weapons fire could be heard as the nearest units immediately responded to the Covenant landings.

Selene hunched down in her seat, trying to make herself as small of a target as possible. Despite being surrounded by a dozen men with machine guns, she never felt more vulnerable in her life, more fragile. The air attacks had been bad enough, but at least she could have taken some comfort in the fact she wasn't specifically being targeted. Here, she was riding straight into the belly of the beast where everyone would be a target.

"Come on! We got to go!" Shin muttered from the seat beside her.

"Everybody, get out of the way!" Kingsley yelled through the loud speakers of their police cruiser. Dozens... hundreds even, of civilians were running down the roads and sidewalks in the opposite direction, trying to flee the coming onslaught.

"This is Colonel Paxton(1) of the Thracian Provincial Army," the military officer who had drafted them was saying. Sitting in the front passenger seat of their cruiser, he was busy yelling into his radio, and seemingly not aware of the massive amount of civilians blocking the road. "I want defensive lines and road blocks set up on every intersection of 5th Street, Hague Street, and 9th Street! Designate them as Phase Lines Apache, Iroquois, and Mohawk! Use whatever personnel you've got to man them, and make sure to coordinate with the UNSC and the Actium Armies! What? Yes, military and police! If you have to, grab every male and female civilian of military age, give them a rifle and put them on the line! We have got to contain this situation before the Covenant can get their bearings!"

He tossed the radio back to the man wedged in the seat between him and Kingsley, before glancing over his shoulder and addressing the soldier sitting right behind Selene. "Lieutenant Forney, get my wife on the phone and instruct her to take the kids and go south! Do not attempt to join me in the city, Byzas is now a war zone!"

"Yes sir!"

"Officer Kingsley, pull over to the right!" Paxton ordered. "Striker Actual to all Striker victors, we're setting up headquarters, right here! Everybody else, dismount!"

"You heard the Colonel!" the soldier riding in the very back with his legs sticking out of the trunk immediately bellowed. "Everybody: out!"

Selene popped open her door and hopped out, mostly spurned on by all the other soldiers behind her. She stepped to the side as they, along with all the other soldiers who had been following them in Warthogs, began unpacking the truck and setting up weapons, radios, computers, and other electronic equipment. As they worked, Selene looked around at the intersection they had stopped at. To her surprise, a number of soldiers were already there, setting up a road block barricade made out of a combination of abandoned civilian cars and sandbags.

"HANGING!"

"FIRE!"

She jumped in fright as she heard an explosion go off behind her, and she glanced over the street to see a couple of mortars had been set up in the middle of the street running perpendicular to the intersection. A number of soldiers were firing mortars in the direction of the Covenant landings. She hoped they were raining all sorts of hell on them; every Covenant soldier killed potentially meant at least one more civilian would be able to make it out alive today.

"Officer Kingsley! Put your cruiser with the rest of the barricade, it's no good to us now!" Paxton bellowed. To the soldiers already assembled there, he yelled out, "Colonel Paxton, Thracian Provincial Army! Who's in charge here?"

"That would be me sir!" among the group setting up the barricade, a young woman raised her hand and walked over, snapping off a salute as she did. "2nd Lieutenant Zahara, 1st Brigade, 53rd Armored, UNSC Army. I have with me elements of my dismounted mechanized infantry platoon, along with a mortar section from one of the Actium Army's weapon's companies!"

"What's the situation!?"

"We're hitting the Covenant DZ with everything we got sir, but those drop pods are hitting the ground faster than we can kill them! Covies have already overrun first, third, and fourth streets, and we're trying to hold fifth! We're setting up a tertiary defensive position here, as well as every single intersection on this road, fifteen blocks in either direction!"

"HANGING!"

"FIRE!"

"Alright, as you were!" Paxton barked and Zahara saluted, before running back to her men. Another soldier, one that had rode with Selene and the others, came running up.

"Sir, with all due respect, I think we're setting up your headquarters a little too close to the frontlines. May I suggest we pull back at least another three blocks?"

"Negative Sergeant Major! We need all the soldiers we can get our hands on manning these phase lines, and that includes us! We also need someone of sufficient rank to pull the chain on all the firepower we can get onto that drop zone, as well as coordinate the defensive actions of three separate armies! It has got to be us! Tell Major Hudgens I want 1st Battalion on our left flank, 3rd on our right, and 2nd in reserve! Get our MP platoon to take up defensive positions at the barricade! BPD!"

Selene jumped and realized Paxton was staring right at her. "Yes sir!?"

"Get these fucking civilians out of my line of fire!"

"On it sir!"

Selene ran around until she found Shin by the barricade, helping a couple of soldiers set up what looked like one of those machines that fired tennis balls on a practice court.

"Shin!" she called out. "You still helping us, or you with the soldiers now?"

"Dunno," he said in a surprisingly calm voice, despite the chaos that rained around them. "Let me ask. Hey Lieutenant Forney! You want me helping you guys, or you want me with the BPD?"

"You're not equipped for frontline combat Airman!" Forney immediately replied, even before Shin finished talking. "Help the BPD!"

"Well, you heard the Lieutenant," Shin said with a nonchalant shrug. "Guess I'm your man. What are we doing?"

"We got to get these civilians out of here!"

"Really? Well, that seems like a waste of time. Bet you most of these civilians are going to be dead in the next ten, fifteen minutes."

Selene turned to him, shocked by his callousness. But before she could comment on it, Kingsley came running up.

"Riddle! We got to go! We got to get as many of these civilians out of here!"

"Where are we supposed to bring them?"

"Just get them over the military barricade! We got city buses coming by in a few minutes one block down to pick them up, and deliver them straight to the evacuation zones!"

"Roger that LT!"

Shooting one last disgusted glare at Shin, Selene took off running. Vaulting over the barricade, she ran towards the nearest group of civilians.

"HEY!" she screamed, waving her hands. "EVACUATE THIS WAY!"

She gestured over her shoulder. At once, a group of civilians turned and ran towards her.

"Come on!" she yelled, urging them over the barricade. "Keep on moving this way, this way!"

One young lady carrying a small child in her arms and holding onto the hand of another paused as she ran by.

"Where are we supposed to go once we're through!?" she asked over the sound of her son's crying.

"City buses are coming to pick everyone up and deliver you directly to the evacuation zone! Go down one more block!"

"Thank you! Jason, come with mommy!"

"Hang on, I got you!"

Swooping down, Selene grabbed the kid and ran towards the barricade with the lady in tow. Lifting the boy onto the top of the barricade, she started to lower him to the ground on the other side, only to realize she was a bit too short to reach. She glanced in the direction where the soldiers were busy setting up boxes of ammo.

"Hey! Someone grab this kid from me!" she yelled at them, but they were too busy to pay attention. "HEY!"

"I got him."

Selene looked up in surprise to see Shin grabbed the kid from her and gently depositing him onto the ground. Saving her comments for the moment, Selene grabbed the other kid from the lady's arms, handed him over to Shin, and then turning around to help the lady over the barrier. Once all three were safely on the other side and on their way, then she turned to Shin.

"I thought you didn't care about these people?" she accused.

"I didn't say that," Shin calmly denied. "I just thought there were other priorities to be dealt with at the moment. Priorities that could save much more than just a handful of civilians. But if this is what we're doing, this is what we're doing. What do you want me to do?"

Selene was willing to bet that was not at all what Shin had intended, but at the moment, she just didn't have the time to argue. "You stay there on that side of the barrier! Anyone who needs help crossing, I'll direct them to you!"

"Sounds good to me."

Nodding, Selene ran back out onto the street. "Everybody! Come this way! THIS WAY!"

Another large crowd of civilians turned in her direction and started streaming her way as she gestured wildly at them. Selene stepped aside to allow them room to pass, looking up in alarm as the sound of the fighting in the distance was rapidly growing in intensity.

SWOOOOOOSHHHH WABOOM!

Selene stumbled as more Covenant drop pods came screaming in, causing everything to shake as they hit the ground and sending plumes of smoke up into the air. Looking up, she saw a number of civilians fall to the ground, including one older looking lady who dropped the suitcases she was awkwardly carrying, one of which burst open upon hitting the ground and spewing its contents all over the road.

"Crap!" Selene yelped before running over to the lady to help out.

The lady was on her hands and knees, desperately trying to recover all her stuff, but it wasn't easy as another crowd of civilians were running by and distracted by their fear, they kept accidently kicking her stuff out of the way.

Shoving her way through the crowd, Selene dropped to her knees to try and help the lady out. The lady looked up, noticed Selene's uniform, and seemed to perk up.

"Thank you officer!" she yelled.

"No problem!" Selene automatically yelled back, until she noticed what she was actually throwing back into the lady's bag: squeaky toys, fancy costumes, cans of designer dog food...

Looking at the three suitcases the lady was carrying, Selene realized that at least two of the three appeared to be packed with all the same things.

"No offense ma'am, but I don't think you're really going to need all this stuff!" Selene called out.

"Oh, they're not for me dearie, they're for Mr. Pickles!" the lady lifted up her last bag, causing Selene to realize it wasn't a suitcase like she had originally thought, but some sort of carrying bag for a small lap dog.

"Ma'am, you do realize there's not going to be that much room on the evacuation transports? I don't think you're going to be able to bring all these bags with you!"

"But Mr. Pickles needs them! You see, he's got a very weak stomach, and can only eat specific types of food, so this bag has all his grain free salmon that he loves so much! We don't know if we're going to be sent somewhere cold or someplace warm, so I had to bring his jacket that he looks so cute in! And –"

SWOOSH SWOOSH SWOOSH!

Selene reflexively ducked, and then looked up as two military VTOLs passed by overhead, firing rockets in the direction of the landing site. Emptying their magazines, they started to turn away, but then a bright green streak came up from the ground and smashed into one of them. The VTOL immediately caught fire and went spiraling to the ground, disappearing behind some of the buildings while the other VTOL made a hasty retreat.

" – and these are his treats for being such a good boy!" the lady was saying.

"Ma'am!" Selene yelled, cutting the lady off. "Listen to me! You cannot take all this stuff with you!"

Ignoring the lady's astonished gasp, Selene grabbed her bags and hurtled them to the side.

"Take your dog and run! NOW!" Selene screamed.

The lady drew herself up in a huff. "How rude," she chided, but thankfully, did as she was told. Gathering her pet dog, the lady ran off in the direction of the barricade.

Selene looked up in alarm as the sound of the fighting continued to grow, not just in intensity, but proximity. And yet, somehow the stream of civilians headed her way had yet to die down. In fact, their numbers seemed to be growing. How could there be this many people in the city?

"OFFICER! OFFICER!"

Selene's head snapped up as a young man, who looked to about thirteen or fourteen, came running up to her.

"Officer, give me a gun!" he demanded.

"What?"

"Give me a gun, I want to help out!" the man, or rather boy, eagerly demanded. "I can help!"

"TOMMY! TOMMY!"

Another man came charging up the street with a young girl in tow. Based on how similar he looked to the boy, Selene felt it was safe to assume this was the young boy's father.

"Tommy, what are you doing? We have to leave, now!"

"You leave dad!" Tommy insisted. "I'm staying! I can help out! Just give me a gun! My granddad showed me how to shoot a gun once, I know what I'm doing! I can help!"

"Tommy, these are professional soldiers out there and they do not need a little kid running around distracting them!"

"I'm not a little kid dad! I'm fourteen; I'm probably going to be drafted soon enough, so why does it matter if I start a few years early?"

"God dammit Tommy, this is not up for discussion! We are leaving, right now!"

"Tommy, we need to leave!" his little sister cried out.

"No!" Tommy insisted. "I. Can. Help! Officer, just give me a gun!"

"Officer, no!" Tommy's dad yelled before Selene could say anything. "You cannot give this boy a gun! I am his legal guardian and I am not giving permission for him to get drafted!"

"It's not up to you dad!" Tommy began to say, but Selene quickly waved her arms, catching their attention.

"LISTEN!" she bellowed. "I don't have time for this shit! Kid, no I'm not giving you a gun! This is not a fucking video game, you don't have the training or the equipment to hope to stand against the Covenant! Listen to your dad and get the hell out of here!"

"Tommy, come on!" his sister insisted, tugging on his hand, but Tommy refused to relent.

"I don't have to have a gun then!" Tommy persisted. "I can help out in other ways! I can be like, a stretcher bearer or something! Or a… a powder monkey! Yeah! I can give you guys ammo and stuff when you run out!"

"No means no kid!" Selene screamed.

BRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRTTTTT!WHIRRRRRRRRRRRRRR!

Selene jumped in surprise as the sound of a very big gun overhead. She looked up to see some sort of military jet pulling out a strafing run and she immediately turned back to Tommy and his family.

"You see that!" she roared. "That's what we need more than infantry! So unless you can fly one of those things, the only thing you're going to be is a liability! GO! Get out of here, now!"

Tommy didn't look convinced but nevertheless he didn't put up a fight as his father tugged on his shoulder, pulling him in the direction of the evacuation zone. All three of them darted off, leaving Selene alone.

Pulling out her sidearm to just to double check it was still there and that the kid didn't somehow steal it, Selene looked around. The stream of civilians was finally slowing down, but in their stead, a large amount of uniformed soldiers were coming down the street. It was getting a bit harder to see as all the smoke and dust from the landing site was beginning to filter through the streets, but as they drew closer, Selene could see they were all wounded in some way or another.

"Come on guys, come on!" she yelled, trying to urge them on as they streamed past.

All sorts of soldiers were being carried on stretchers, or their buddies' backs. Others were capable of walking, but they had to be supported by their comrades. Some of the soldiers' injuries had already been dressed and bandaged up, but many of them hadn't. There were all sorts of third degree burns, vicious gashes, and there was at least one guy whose entire leg had been blown off. Selene tried to avoid staring at some of the more horrific wounds, but given how many of them there were, it was almost impossible to avoid.

"CAN I GET SOME HELP HERE!?"

Selene looked up to see two wounded soldiers, one of which was leaning heavily on the other, staggering down the street. Holstering her sidearm, Selene ran down the street to help out. Grabbing the arm of the more heavily wounded man, she wrapped it around her shoulders, picking up some of his weight. The man, whose face was covered in blood and had a number of bandages wrapped around his abdomen, barely reacted.

"Thank you!" the other man called out.

Selene glanced in his direction and to her horror, she realized the soldier had been hit in the side of his face, causing his eyeball to pop out of its socket, but not severing it, leaving it to hang off the man's face by the optical nerve. She quickly turned away, doing her best not to be sick.

"How bad is the fighting?" she asked instead.

"I don't know!" the soldier admitted. "It's getting harder to see! All those drop pods keep throwing more and more smoke into the air!"

"RUN! RUN!"

Selene jerked in alarm, only to see a crazed looking soldier staggering down the street, blood streaming out of his ears, screaming at the top of his lungs.

"RUN FOR YOUR LIVES!" he was screeching. "THEY'RE GOING TO MURDER YOU! THEY'RE GOING TO MURDER US ALL! THE REAPER IS HERE! DEATH HAS COME FOR US ALL! THE APOCALYPSE IS UPON US! RUN! RUN!"

Selene could see a couple of medics emerge from the barricade and run towards the soldier. Together, they managed to tackle the man, and began to quickly dress his wounds.

"RUN! SAVE YOURSELVES!" the man hollered, even as one of the medic injected him with something.

"REPENT! REPENT!" he continued to scream as Selene walked past.

"Shin! I need help!" she called out as she reached the barricade. She could see Shin extending his arms and she quickly passed the wounded soldier over to him, waiting until he had grabbed him before letting go.

"Thanks! Good luck officer!" The other man called out, even as he clambered over the barricade.

"You too!" Selene yelled at the departing soldier's back.

"HANGING!"

"FIRE!"

WHOOMP!

"ROUNDS COMPLETE!"

"ALRIGHT GUYS, PACK IT UP AND FALL BACK!"

Selene looked over shoulder. The mortars had stopped firing and the soldiers manning there had started to break them down, packing them up and getting them ready for transport. She briefly wondered if she should go help them, but some of the mortar stuff looked rather sensitive, and she didn't want to accidentally break anything.

SWOOOOOOSHHHH WABOOM!

Another few Covenant drop pods came screaming in, this time coming the closest they had yet so far. As Selene glanced down the street, she was startled to find that the stream of wounded soldiers had ended, and instead, there were now unwounded soldiers running down the street.

"Fall back!" she heard one yell while she spotted another turn around and fired an extended burst from the hip back up the street. At this point, the smoke had reached the barricade, making it impossible to see what the soldier was shooting at.

"Riddle!"

Selene jumped as a hand grabbed her shoulder, and she turned to see Kingsley standing behind her.

"Come on, we got to get behind that barricade, the Covenant are coming!"

Selene nodded and tossed herself over the barricade, and found herself situated right next to Lieutenant Zahara.

"Copy that Hoplite 1-1!" the woman was yelling into her radio. "Fall back to tertiary positions, now! Colonel! Secondary defense have fallen! There nothing standing between us and the Covenant now!"

"Got it! All soldiers! Take up firing positions! Ready your weapons, but don't fire until I give the word!"

Selene looked around as a number of soldiers dashed up to the barricade and began setting up.

"Shouldn't we be running?" Selene asked Kingsley. "We're not soldiers."

"I was one once," Kingsley reminded her. "So I'm staying! Besides, they could use an extra gun!"

"Then I'm staying too!"

Turning to face down the street, Selene pulled out her shotgun. She glanced at her less-than-lethal shotgun, and then at all the machine guns all the other soldiers were sporting, and she suddenly realized how foolish she was being. What was she doing? She didn't belong here. She was a cop, not a soldier.

But she had already committed, and she wasn't about to back out now.

Still, a little bit of extra firepower wouldn't hurt…

"I need a gun," she muttered, looking around for a spare. "I need a gun."

"Hell. Just wait a couple of minutes. There'll be plenty lying on the ground soon enough."

Selene jumped in surprise, and glanced to her left to see Shin taking up position beside her, holding an M6G handgun.

"Where'd you get that!?"

"Took it off one of the walking wounded back there," Shin reported, and Selene mentally cursed at herself for not having the foresight to do the same. "Surprised to see you sticking around; this doesn't seem to be your sort of thing."

Selene opened her mouth to reply, but before she could, Paxton screamed out, "MAKE READY!"

She quickly looked downrange. The street was now completely covered in smoke and dust, limiting visibility to maybe about fifteen meters. The sound of fighting continued to ring out, but it was muted, as if it was taking place several blocks away. Even the sound of the incoming drop pods seemed to have died down.

"Steady!" Paxton yelled out, but his voice seemed somewhat tempered.

Selene strained her ears, listening for movement, but there was nothing but the sound of blowing wind. Then she heard it. The rhythmic thumping of hundreds of feet charging straight towards them...

"raaaaaaaaaaAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!"

Emerging from the smoke came all sorts of monstrous creatures from deep within the Covenant Empire! Howling, screaming, and waving all sorts of weapons around, they charged headlong straight at the assembled UNSC forces.

"FIRE!"

The entire line exploded as every single soldier simultaneously opened up with everything they had! Selene nearly dropped her weapon in pain, that's how loud it was, but she managed to hold onto it. She started searching for something to shoot at.

Despite their reckless charge, the Covenant weren't stupid. Knowing they were going to be charging straight at an entire firing squad, the entire Covenant front ranks consisted of twisted, evil-looking, vulture-like creatures all carrying some sort of glowing energy shield. The row behind them consisted of much larger creatures, firing over their heads. Clad in blue and crimson armor, their most noticeable features were the four separate mandibles attached to their faces, as well as the fact they all appeared to be equipped with personal energy shields. Despite all this, there were still gaps in their defenses for the bullets to get through.

Selene desperately looked around as the soldiers around her fired everything they had at the incoming mass. All sorts of Covenant soldiers were falling dead to the ground, but the Covenant were giving as good as they got, shooting back with their blue and green lasers. Most of the rounds shattered against the barricade, but every now and then a soldier would collapse to the ground, a smoking hole in his or her chest.

Selene spotted one vulture-like creature advancing down the street, looking the other way. He had his shield hoisted in front of him and was firing his pistol over it, but his flank was exposed to Selene's fire. She immediately lifted her shotgun and fired -

KABAM! klikt. KABAM! klikt. KABAM!

- only to see her beanbag rounds bounce harmlessly off the creature's armor, to the point where the vulture-like thing didn't even notice he was taking fire.

"Oh, fuck this!" Selene yelped, tossing the shotgun aside. Pulling out her sidearm, she leveled it and opened fire.

Bullets shattered against the Covenant's armor, actually causing it to crack and doing far more damage compared to her beanbag rounds, but even still the 10mm hollow points failed to penetrate. Selene cursed, vaguely remembering Shin warning her something like that might happen as the vulture ducked and looked around to see where he was taking fire from.

He spotted Selene, ineffectively unloading her pistol on him, and he spun around, but then one of Selene's rounds hit the armor the vulture was wearing on his forearm. The bullet ricocheted off and slammed into his neck. Dark purple liquid immediately began gushing from the hole, and the vulture quickly brought his shield hand to plug the wound while at the same time, he also brought his weapon to bear as Selene's pistol locked empty.

"Oh crap!" Selene yelped as she started to reload. But before she could finish -

BANG BANG BANG!

Selene jumped as Zahara fired a burst into the vulture from beside her, pumping three holes into the creature's chest. The creature collapsed, and Selene turned to Zahara to thank her, but the Lieutenant had already turned away.

"Hoplite-1 to Panther-6, fire support WARNO incoming, over!" she was yelling into her radio. "Panther-6, do you copy? Panther-6 - GUK!"

The lieutenant let out a grunt as a pink needle speared her right through the throat, and exited out the other side. Blood began gushing from both holes as Zahara bonelessly collapsed to the ground, a look of surprise and shock plastered across her face.

"Lieutenant!" the young soldier crouched beside her screamed. "Medic!"

Selene holstered her weapon and hastily crouch-walked over to the fallen soldier to see if she could help out. It didn't look good. A puddle of blood was already forming underneath Zahara's prone body, and her breath was coming out in short spurts. She abruptly coughed, spitting out a large amounts of blood. Then she started choking.

"Oh no!" Selene cried and quickly made her way to Zahara's side but by the time she got there, Zahara had already stopped breathing.

"Lieutenant! Lieutenant!" the other soldier yelled, crying and shaking Zahara's body inefficiently, but it looked to Selene as if Zahara had already died. She wondered if it was even worth trying to administer first aid, but then again, she was a cop, and her department's policy was that police officers were to administer first aid to any injured person and continue to administer first aid until the EMTs could arrive and formally declare the person dead. So instead, Selene quickly removed the lieutenant's chest plate and immediately began doing chest compressions.

"One, two, three," Selene silently counted as she pushed down on Zahara's chest. "Four, five, six..."

FWOOZ!

A plasma bolt splattered against the barrier next to her head, causing Selene to flinch, and she looked up to see the Covenant were steadily advancing towards them, undeterred by the amount of fire thrown at them. While she wasn't supposed to stop administering aid, she also realized she couldn't do it under these conditions. She had to move Zahara to safety first.

Standing up while at the same time, trying to keep as low to the ground as possible, Selene grabbed a hold of Zahara's webbing and tried to move her, but at that point Zahara was just dead weight and Selene found it impossible to move the body by herself.

"Hey!" she screamed at the other soldier, the one who initially noticed Zahara getting hit. Unlike everyone else, this one soldier wasn't doing anything but was instead, curled up in a ball and rocking back and forth.

Selene cursed, recognizing the signs of someone suffering from psychological shock.

"Hey!" she tried again, but as expected, he didn't respond.

There was technically a laundry list of things she was supposed to do to help someone in psychological shock, but Selene found she didn't have the patience to try and go through it all, so she ran up to the man and slapped him across the face, hoping it would work as well as it did in the movies. It surprisingly did as the man immediately turned to her with a blank look on his face.

"Hey! What's your name soldier?" Selene asked, hoping to keep his attention on her and not the body behind her.

"Wilks," the soldier whimpered. "Private... Private Wilks(2)."

"Private Wilks! Officer Riddle, BPD! Hey, listen! I don't have the medical training to deal with this!" she yelled, pointing at Zahara. "We got to get her to a hospital, otherwise she's going to die, but I can't pick her up by myself! I need your help! Can you do that?"

Wilks blankly stared at her. "A hospital?" he asked.

"Yes! A hospital! You know, a, uh..." she tried to think of what that one TV show always called it. "A MASH?"

"Oh!" Wilks excitedly said. "You mean a hospital!"

If the situation wasn't so serious, Selene would have rolled her eyes. As it were though, all she did was quickly bob her head.

"Yes! A hospital! Come on, we need to go!"

Wilks leapt to his feet and ran over to Zahara.

"Grab her shoulders!" Selene commanded, grabbing Zahara by the legs. Together they lifted the body up and started heading down the block.

They were making good headway when the sound of heavy thumping filled the air.

"HUNTERS!" someone screamed and Selene turned around to see several massive creatures charging down the street straight towards the barricade. Each creature looked like one of the armored knights from old, only these things were about three to four meters tall, had bright orange skin, were completely clad in dark blue armor, and while they had some tower shields strapped to their arms, instead of swords, they had humongous arm cannons.

The soldiers manning the barricade all scattered as the Hunters smashed into it, cutting through the cars like a hot knife through butter. One unfortunate soldier found himself landing right between one of the Hunter's legs, and he quickly raised his rifle and emptied the magazine, only to have all the bullets bounce off. In retaliation, the Hunter lifted his shield and swiftly brought it down on the man's head. All Selene heard was a terror-filled scream before it was abruptly cut off as the shield literally cut the man vertically in half.

At that sight, Selene lost whatever courage she had manage to build up.

"FUCK! THIS!" she screamed, dropping Zahara's body and running in the opposite direction. Behind her, she could hear the Hunters firing their weapons.

BOOOOSSSSHHHHH! BOOOOOSSSSHHHH!

"RIDDLE, LOOK OUT!" someone screamed.

Selene glanced over her shoulder. The last thing she saw was a stream of radiative green fire headed her way.

BOOOOOSSSSHHHH!

1. Yes, that is intended to be the same Paxton whose lovely wife we met back in chapter 7.

2. Some of you might remember Private Wilks from my other fic, Missing in Action (maybe not; no one seemed to have picked up my reference to Norén in chapter 7, and Wilks was a far more minor character. It was also a very long time ago.) At any case, for anyone who is curious or simply wishes to remind themselves, Wilks appears in chapter 2 (my chapter 2; has labelled it chapter 3 because of the prologue) as one of the guys helping Moss man the .50cal soon after they crash landed on Actium. That chapter also details Wilks' fate. And now you know how his day started!