A/N: I sneezed and half the year was gone. So I'm just going to drop it off, go back into my hidey hole, and tell you I have more of an explanation on my tumblr. Hope this chapter at least half as good as you were hoping for.
Natasatch ought to be furious that their rescuers were attempting to murder them, or worried how her injured friend would fare in the firefight, or wondering how to contact the Avenger when their only communication line was these angry rebels. Those concerns took a backseat for the moment, as a familiar cold fury took the helm. This was far simpler than human social intricacies. It what Natasatch was bred and trained to do.
Eliminate the opposition, fulfil the mission. Kill the rebels and protect Malcolm. The two goals were in sync. The attackers could hardly kill her human if they were dead.
From a daring peek over the rock, she got a better fix on the targets. Closest was a human male with a shotgun, followed by a small human female with an assault rifle that looked far too large for her. Mid -range were two more human males suppressing them, one missing an eye with a gray shirt and another hiding his face behind a blue bandana. And of course, the sniper, the lens glare position showing no movement from his original firing position.
Natasatch reflexively switched her rifle off of safe mode, but of course simply thumbed the empty air. She groaned, but felt a slight sense of relief as she saw Malcolm pulling out a pistol holster from his pack. He shot her a smile as he checked the revolver's chamber, as glad as her to see the odds against them slightly reduced.
The Viper spoke louder to counter the gunfire. "How much ammunition do you have, Malcolm?"
"Not enough to fight our way out of here!" He responded. "But I got another plan!"
She nodded, and to her complete surprise, Malcolm threw his only weapon into the dirt.
He already stood up before she realized what her apparently-insane friend was attempting, with his hands empty and raised up in the air. Perhaps his unexpected surrender honestly gave the attackers pause, or maybe he caught them mid reload, but Malcolm stood straight up and wasn't dead the next moment. Breathing heavily for another second, he finally addressed the gunmen.
"Stop shooting? Good, good, thank you! This is all just a misunderstanding, and we don't need to hurt each other." Malcolm said. The water from his swim had evaporated by now, but fresh drops of sweat once again glinted off his face as his mouth worked.
Natasatch half-hissed, half-whispered an objection, but a wave of his hand quieted her after the first word. "I'm going to reason with them," the human whispered from the side of his mouth.
No response came from the attacker's side of the valley, and Malcolm continued, "I'm Sergeant Silva, XCOM, and so is Natasatch. The Viper, I mean. You're with Safari, right?"
A gruff, deep human voice answered him. "Obviously."
The Viper watched Malcolm's brow raise, and he spoke more freely, "Yeah, we called your guys, explained that we need a medic. And of course we mentioned the Viper. If you're not who they sent, you can call in and they'll tell you-"
"Oh, we got your message alright," the same voice answered. Peering out from the side of the rock, the Viper saw it belonged to the closest human with a shotgun, tall and lean and with a radio headset and shades. Yet, there was something familiar about the way he talked.
Malcolm realized it just as Natasatch did. "Hey wait, you're the one who answered when the LT called in, aren't you?"
The radioman looked back and forth, the accusation landing spot on, but a shrill yelling caught their attention. The human female raised her rifle and screamed, "Just fuckin' shoot the traitor already!"
The girl started unloading her rifle afterwards, but she'd given Malcolm plenty of time to duck back into cover. The air once again filled with bullets, and Malcolm's palm met his forehead as he groaned.
"Well, you tried," Natasatch offered when he looked to her. Malcolm grabbed the revolver and she turned around, and flinched when she felt Malcolm's hand tugging on her shoulder.
He looked impossibly lucid when he said his next request. "Nat, listen! We're not trying to kill them."
She rolled her eyes. "Now is not the time for humor, Mal!"
"I'm serious!" He was, to her surprise. "Don't! Kill! Anyone!"
The Viper hissed in frustration. "You already tried being nice!"
"I know! But we need to keep trying, Natasatch!"
"Mikey, move up!" One of the attacker's voices called, and more shots whittled the top of their cover. Whatever safety they had right now wouldn't exist in a few seconds. Natasatch needed to make a decision.
She looked at Malcolm's eyes again, and she noticed how... calm he looked. Genuine, sincere. As if his plan wasn't utter foolishness. His peace infected her as his brown irises reflected the setting sun. "Please," he spoke, almost inaudible.
He won. But that didn't mean she needed to be gentle.
Their attackers stood in the open, confident their prey was unarmed, a mistake quickly exposed as Malcolm fired his revolver in their general direction and sent them diving to cover. Furthest from anywhere to hide, the shotgun-wielding radioman turned back to bark something to his comrades as a pink tongue wrapped around his waist and flung him forward. Impacting the waist-high stone, the rebel tumbled over into the damp earth with a thud, and Malcolm was on him as soon as Natasatch unwrapped her tongue. He struck the radioman's face with the butt of the revolver, and the Viper felt a fresh rush of adrenaline as she heard the cartilage of his nose crack. The human howled in pain, but stopped as Malcolm pressed the barrel of the revolver just behind his ear and pushed his face further into the dirt.
Her human spoke with an ice she'd rarely heard before, a cold tone of authority. "Stay down, buddy."
The radioman struggled half a second more, then went limp and placed his hands over his head in surrender. He wouldn't be a problem for the immediate future.
A girlish roar of anguish caught her ears, the young human furious at losing an ally. She yelled and charged towards the two defenders, and then yelled louder and charged backwards even faster when Natasatch spat poison in her vicinity. The Viper's cloud didn't impact the girl, and she'd meant it more as a smokescreen, but the young girl panicked anyway and toppled behind another boulder.
"Nice pull!" Malcolm commented.
"Thanks you, but that's only the first one," Natasatch responded, and the flurry of grunts and footsteps from the attackers seemed to agree with her.
"They're moving up, Nat! Could you-"
She'd already sprung up and spotted the next threat. The girl, nearly running forward, stopped and flinched at the sight of the Viper up close. Natasatch clenched her chest and felt the venom force it's way up her throat, and she spat the cloud of green miasma to cut off the advance. Controlling her poison cloud was second nature, and it went exactly where she aimed it to where it wouldn't instantly catch the rebels in the spray. Yet, the young female screamed as if she'd been hurt and scampered away. Natasatch would have chuckled at the rebel's cowardice, if she had the time.
The hazy poison cloud shrouded the two from the rest of the attackers, but that hardly meant they were safe. Bullets cut wildly through the miasma, hoping to score a lucky hit. Still, her poison gave them an opportunity.
Malcolm gestured at a dirt incline further down the horseshoe, and dashed for the new cover, his feet kicking muddy water as he ran. Natasatch had no trouble following him, sliding over the drop only moments later.
The weapons fire stopped, replaced by a volley of insults being thrown their way. Not that Natasatch minded, it simply gave her info on the rebels' positions. But the one threat she couldn't hear concerned her the most.
"We need to take out that sniper," she stated. Malcolm gave her a quick nod.
He glanced at the cliff closest to them, then pointed further down the way, at a clump of plants climbing the walls like... well, like a snake. "See those vines?"
"Yes."
"Think you can climb them?"
Natasatch frowned. The Viper understood his line of thought, but she just didn't like it. "I'm not leaving you alone and injured, Malcolm." She put a fingertip on his leg wrap, making him flinch a bit.
The human gave her a small smile, but he hardly seemed enthusiastic either. He only offered, "I know, but we're not going anywhere with that scope hanging over us. And if you're quick enough, they won't notice a thing."
Some chance felt better than none. But still...
"And don't worry about me. I'll make enough of a fuss that they'll stay back." He gave a pump of his newly-acquired shotgun as he finished, then scrambled for the unspent shell he almost wasted. Brushing the dirt off, he caught a smirk breaking through the Viper's concern.
Natasatch turned around, plotting the best course to reach the vine ladder undetected. She glanced back before she dove into the water. "Malcolm, if you get killed... I'll be very upset with you."
"I'll be very upset with me!" He agreed.
The water felt as good as ever as she dove down, and but she didn't let the sensation distract from her goal. The poison smokescreen would be gone any moment, and Malcolm had the only radio between the two, so she wouldn't know his status until she was done. Keeping low, sliding along her belly, she emerged behind a partially submerged rock and darted to the mat of vines Malcolm pointed out.
She heard a shot ring out, and then more, and when she reached the cliff top she surveyed the battlefield below. Malcolm once again fired wildly to keep the aggressors at bay, and his distraction seemed to be working. Not a single bullet whizzed her way, which, conversely, meant more pressure on Natasatch to relieve her friend, fast. There was a silver lining to this gunfire sandwich, as the human expression went, as the continued gunfire meant the rebels' target was still alive.
Natasatch slid behind the short foliage, keeping low as she advanced. It was a short ways away to where she estimated the sharpshooter to be, and sure enough, she spotted a human female prone on the rocks, almost glued to her scope. All too easy to eliminate the target. Getting it done silently would be- Wait. She promised Malcolm she wouldn't kill them.
Natasatch paused her silent advance. The Viper winced, considering the new complication. Fortunately, it seemed an easy addition; bind and release just before the captive died, instead of just after. Keeping the sniper from calling for help was another matter. She could use her hand to cover the sniper's mouth, at risk of being bitten, or perhaps shove in a gag if she had one. Natasatch remembered she did have a rag, the thin fabric circling her chest. It was the humans that cared about its presence, not her. Perfect.
The sniper finally noticed the dirt and twigs rustling far too late, and the moment she started to yelp Natasatch coiled around her, shoving her rolled-up clothing in the woman's mouth to gag her. Her plan worked flawlessly, and the sniper passed out after half a minute of inaudible struggling. Well, almost flawlessly. One of her human friends would be certain to complain about her improvised muffle later. Releasing the unconscious body, she pressed herself flat and peered over the edge of the cliff. The attackers were still firing on her friend, not looking in her direction at all. The sniper's radio sounded as one of the attackers asked if she could spot the alien, giving Natasatch a measure of amusement, and more importantly, an idea.
The Viper tilted her head, one red eye gazing through the scope of the commandeered sniper rifle. Only a few moments of observation gave her an incredibly detailed look of the battlefield. Malcolm had repositioned further back, and recently too, judging by the fewer bullet marks nearby. Blue Bandana continued to hang back, firing in a wide arc to keep up the suppression. Closest to her friend was the child, and she could see clearly both her long golden hair, and the amateurish way she fired her rifle from the hip. Mid-range was the gray shirted soldier with the eyepatch, and her crosshairs lingered on the man longer than the others..
In only a moment, Natasatch reviewed the timeline of the fight, and recounted their opposition's every misstep. They had advanced straight in the open, shot wildly and with little discipline, kept their entire focus on the one visible target, and the Viper finally noticed their reload speeds took longer than the most untrained XCOM rookie. All except one of them. Eyepatch moved with purpose, focus, from cover to cover and sent his bullets where he intended. She guessed that he was the only enemy who actually had combat training, and therefore was the biggest threat they faced. She expected Malcolm would probably be able to dispatch the girl and Blue Bandanna, but not with Eyepatch bearing down on him.
Natasatch trained the crosshair right behind Eyepatch's ear, squeezed the trigger, and hoped her friend would forgive her.
...And the only thing she'd have to apologize for was her poor marksmanship. As she fired, Natasatch remembered this was the first human weapon she'd fired, ever. There was no predictable warmup of the plasma coil mechanism or continuous beam of energy. Instead, the violent jolt of the large caliber round firing forced her to flinch, and the scope bumped painfully into her eye ridge from the recoil. It took a moment for her to process the whole event, and when she looked back down the scope, Eyepatch's head was remarkably intact, and he was raising his radio to his ear. Fortunately, his gaze was still forward.
"Watch it, Slip." His voice came over the comms, still smooth and deep, and only his heavy intonation hinted at annoyance. "Keep your sights on the traitor."
"Ah, sorry!" Natasatch said into the sniper's radio, doing her best to imitate the rebel's voice. It'd been hard to notice if the gagged woman had an accent or specific tone, but nothing in the remaining rebels' behavior showed any suspicion. Natasatch took a breath, lined up a second shot, and tightened her grip on the rifle. This time when she pulled the trigger, nothing happened, besides a tiny 'click.' She looked down at the gun, slightly confused. Perhaps the powercell was empty? The viper felt the underside of the gun, finding nothing to indicate a powercell or ammo source. There was a lever on one side, and she was certain she'd seen their squad sniper Schwarzschild do something after each shot...
Natasatch huffed, realizing she was wasting time. Every second mattered. She was plenty dangerous on her own. Red eyes peeked over the cliffside, confirming that no other eyes were upon her as she charted out the quickest path to the closest target, and then the alien slithered back into the grotto.
Even with his fire support's last shot almost killing his ally, Blue Bandana didn't sense anything amiss. He'd lifted almost his entire body over the low cover to suppress Malcolm's position, firing with abandon. Avoiding tunnel vision like that was among Natasatch's earliest lessons, and a failing she was happy to exploit. The partisan's rifle clicked empty, forcing a pause. He at least remembered to duck back down to reload, and the turning motion finally let him see the furious viper darting towards him. He only had time for a short gasp before Natasatch overtook him.
She laid prone against the low rocks, and she peered over the top to make sure Malcolm was still okay. Her friend held his own against the yellow-haired girl, who'd advanced so far that Malcolm was able to grapple with her over the shotgun. Natasatch gave a wicked grin as she noticed Eyepatch gritting his teeth, unwilling to fire and risk hurting his comrade. When Malcolm bested their ringleader, she'd be ready.
She didn't have to wait long. Malcolm eventually hooked his leg behind the young girl's, and his superior size and muscle guaranteed the outcome. Driving an elbow to her temple, he shoved the stunned girl back, where she promptly tripped and fell on her backside. Scampering back a step, Malcolm turned the shotgun around, pointed it at the girl, and looked the last fighter in his remaining eye.
The tension was palpable. Even with the older man's steely gaze and scars, Malcolm matched the intensity with his own. One of them desperately wanted to take the shot, the other one desperately wanted not to.
The girl screeched from her prone position, "What are you waiting for?! Shoot the bastard!"
"You don't want to do that," warned Malcolm, calm but forceful. "It's over. Now we talk this out."
"You're right. You take the gun off Ro, and I won't shoot you like the traitor to humanity you are. No more violence," Eyepatch returned.
Silva looked indignant. "Traitor? You're the one shooting at two XCOM sergeants."
"Oh, what? You expect me to buy the snake is with XCOM?" Eyepatch let the anger seep back in. "XCOM kills aliens, they don't keep them as pets. You're some spy meeting your handler."
Malcolm took his left hand off the foregrip, raising his fingers as he spoke. "One," he began, "... you'd know we're XCOM if your buddies-" he pointed a finger at the child "- weren't lying to you. Two, a real traitor wouldn't be trying so hard to keep you alive, especially when you're trying to murder us. Oh, and speaking of aliens, three."
At the cue, Eyepatch flinched as a whip-like tongue tore his rifle from his grasp. His remaining eye widened, and with incredible speed, he reached for his sidearm and fired off a shot or two before Natasatch tackled him into the dirt, quickly wrapping her coils around the man. The Viper chuckled a little, pleased at the distraction's success, even if she distantly registered that pistol's bullets struck her. The man struggled and spat, enough that Natasatch had to use her arms to fully restrain him, but it was no use. The two of them won.
'Ro' started yelling angrily again, with a little injection of despair in the volume. The small girl looked back at her ally and forced herself up on one knee. A pump of the shotgun got her attention. "Don't. Move." Silva ordered. "You're going to have a lot of explaining to do."
Her lip wavered, and Natasatch felt the girl's body heat up, overwhelmed and distraught. She even noticed a wetness gleaming off her eyes. Suddenly, her body dropped, and the Viper knew Ro would attempt something very stupid.
Screeching again and pulling a knife from her boot, she charged towards Malcolm. A foolish move, since Silva already had his shotgun leveled at her. Youth or not, Silva would take the shot. She waited for the loud boom of the firearm to cut the girl down.
The sound didn't come, and the screaming girl got closer and closer to her friend. What was he doing?
More frustrated than angered, she yelled, "Malcolm! Shoot!"
When 'Ro' could finally strike, Silva finally moved... and threw the shotgun back. He raised his left arm to shield himself just as her knife fell. Natasatch hissed as she saw the blade cutting across his flesh, leaving dripping red lines as she swung and swung. She hissed louder when she felt a crushing and piercing pain on her hand, as Eyepatch wiggled enough to bring her palm into bite range. She couldn't drop him, not now, even if her friend was in danger, or else she'd just exchange one problem for another.
Malcolm held firm, but distressingly, refused to alter his approach. The young man avoided what he could and gritted his teeth through what he couldn't, but the crazed strikes made predicting her moves a losing fight. Eventually, Ro slipped up, reaching too far to slice down his breast, and Malcolm wrapped his arm around hers and immobilized her.
Perhaps he could handle himself from there, but Natasatch couldn't bear inaction anymore. She pulsed her coils hard once, hopefully to finally incapacitate the eyepatch soldier, and released him. At the same time, Malcolm sent his free hand into the girl's stomach hard, enough that Natasatch saw the heat and blood drain from her face. Ro doubled over, dropping the knife, and when she looked up, she saw a furious alien serpent hissing right in her face. Ro screamed, liquid terror turning her face cold, and she threw herself prone, covering her face and crying.
The Viper wanted to slash, spit, anything to further neutralize the girl, but a hand on her shoulder interrupted the fury. She spun around, and her human friend gave it another tug. "Nat... it's over," Malcolm said, between his panting breaths. She locked eyes with him, and her breathing started to slow as well. "We won," Malcolm added, hushed, audible only as the chaos died down.
Natasatch tilted her head, eyeing the side of her human friend opposite her. What she saw made her wince. Crimson dripped from a number of horizontal slashes on his left arm, most clustered on his wrist and forearm. She couldn't judge how deep or how serious Malcolm's wounds were, but the way every other breath was a sharp inhale told her plenty. "You're hurt, Mal."
Malcolm only gave her an apologetic smile. "How bad?" Natasatch asked.
"I'll live," He said. "And, uh... "
Malcolm broke eye contact, shot his eyes downward, and then looked to her again. She saw a flush of heat overtake his cheeks. She definitely called it.
"...where'd your top go?" He asked in a very tiny voice.
She was about to explain how sacrificing her bikini was a tactical necessity, but Natasatch saw movement in the corner of her vision, and whipped her head around. Eyepatch was on his feet again, eyeing the assault rifle Natasatch had torn from his grasp. She immediately dropped back into her combat stance, ready to intercept him, but Malcolm acted first. He waved his blood-soaked hand at the rebel, and said casually, "How about we give peace another shot, pal?"
The final rebel looked at him, then back at the rifle, and then back at Malcolm, and then finally to Natasatch. The Viper, meanwhile, never took her red eyes off him, and she hoped her gaze promised a terrible, terrible future should he make the wrong choice. Fortunately, he released the tension in his legs, lowered his hands, and stepped back. "Fine. You won this round, snake. And maybe, just maybe, it looks like you might not be bullshitting me after all."
"You are very impolite for a disarmed and outnumbered man." Natasatch commented, with the same sass exhibited by Malcolm. Eyepatch refused to respond, which suited her just fine. The Viper shot a look down, confirming that Ro hadn't moved from her spot, when she noticed at least a dozen camera flashes at the top of her visual range. Of course, they weren't cameras.
Natasatch and Malcolm sighed in tandem, and raised their hands above their heads as the rest of Safari outpost finally arrived.