Chapter 5

Jaegis

"Shit..." I whispered, ducking behind the lip of the building, grabbing Tao's shoulder and dragging her down with me, "Stay down, if that bastard sees us we're fucked!"

She whispered back at me, anger floating off her in waves, "Are you kidding me?! We can't leave her down there like that!"

Terror gripped my heart like never before, and I became paranoid, nearly unable to resist checking behind me. My grip tightened a little on her shoulder as I tried to get my point across. "You don't understand. That guy side stepped a fucking hecate round like it was nothing, and took down that Pale Rider guy. There is no stopping that guy."

She reached up and gripped me by the collar, dragging my face into her's, her cyan eyes burned with rage, "Listen here, do you think I thought about how many bullets that fucker had in his clip when I saved your sorry ass? No. The answer. Is no. Now I'm not gonna stand idly by and watch someone helpless get killed like that. It's not an honorable way to go, nor an honorable way to kill. Now either set your gun back up on that railing and shoot his ass like a big boy or give me the gun." She held her hand out, as if demanding I turn over the rifle…

No, not the rifle, but my Kar98.

Something about her anger with me made something spark in the back of my head, quickly roaring into a blaze. I had made it to the final 10 of BoB. I wasn't afraid of some guy dressed up in a bad Halloween costume. Hell, I was supposed to be the scariest motherfucker in GGO. I was Jaegis.

Jaegis.

The.

Fucking.

Plague Doctor.

The roaring turned into an unbridled inferno, an inferno that demanded to break through. My eyes found Tao again.

"No one uses my fucking gun except for me, clear?"

I subconsciously raised my bandana back over my face, the first time since our little rest. For a moment I absentmindedly entertained the idea of fire spewing from my mouth and onto Tao. I dismissed the childish fantasy.

I spun up on my heels, raising into my firing position, my rifle stopping dead in the air- perfectly still. I was going to kill that bastard, my bullet would connect. He was going to die here, and then I'd deal with Sinon. And Kiriko. And… well, maybe not Tao.

My rifle is me.

And I am my rifle.

Together we kill.

Together we live.

The mantra repeated itself in my head as my finger tugged the trigger with such delicacy I barely felt it. But before my bullet found its mark, another hit the cloaked figure. Then another.

I saw his red eyes flash to the right, and my scope followed, resting on Kiriko. I smirked wickedly at the thought of all three of them being right there, waiting to be shot… But no, I was saving Sinon from that cloaked bastard. My mind found its way again and I dragged my scope back to the guy within a second. Following my scope was a grenade thrown by who I assumed was Kiriko.

A yellow band, a smoke. And she hadn't pulled the pin. Fuck.

My crosshairs lined up on the top of the smoke and I fired, my suppressed round finding its place. Smoke immediately flew up in my vision, hiding Kiriko, Sinon, and the guy in the cloak. I raised my eye from the glass of my scope and looked to Tao, who was looking at me with something I assumed was wonder and sparse anger.

"There, I helped." I spoke, a snappy tone creeping into my voice.

She looked back with a genuine smile, half closing her eyes and cocking her head before standing up and raising the glass to her eye. She looked out into the field of smoke, looking for something. I stared intently at the her, awaiting a remark. She popped up out of the rangefinder, a silent gasp visible on her features.

"Kiriko is carrying her away." She said

"What?" I nearly couldn't believe it. She didn't try to rush Sturben but took Sinon and left.

There was no reasoning behind why she'd do that. I mean sure, they were a team, but she would have to kill her eventually anyways, so why not now, when she had taken out most of the largest threats and only a few left to go? Then my mind drifted to Tao, and I wondered if I'd really do different. I shook off my mind's wanderings, scoped in and found the two, Kiriko running as fast as she possibly could with Sinon tucked close to her chest.

I peeked over the scope and looked down at the smoke before scoping in again. A shot rang out, echoing across the arena. Sturben was firing at the two with his pistol, walking steadily towards them as if not a care in the world.

For whatever reason, this angered me. I stood to full height and shouldered the rifle, preparing to fire. I focused in on the cloaked figure. The circle around him was going wild, but I couldn't risk the chance he get away. I was preparing to pull the trigger when he turned around to face me, red eyes staring directly into my scope. His stare held me there, captivated, stuck, even as he drew the gun from his shoulder and aimed it at me I couldn't move.

He raised his own gun to his shoulder and took aim. I could almost feel the bullet line on my forehead, burning a hole straight through the skin and boring into my skull. I tried to force myself to pull the trigger but my hand wouldn't move, couldn't move. I could almost see in slow motion as the bullet left the end of its barrel, not a sound being exchanged. As the bullet neared, my vision was lessened and lessened until the scope was thrown from my eye and my view blocked. Everything sped back up as Tao was sent sprawling across the rooftop, a metallic ping blasting through the air.

"Tao!"

I looked at her body, sprawled across the rooftop from me. I dashed over and slid on my knees, coming up right beside her. My mind reminded me of my discarded Kar98 left behind me at the railing, but I didn't care. I yanked my bandana off my face and glanced over her in concern. I looked at her health, and watched as drained down into the red. There was no way she could have survived that shot. I rolled her body over onto her back and looked down into her… her faceplate! The bullet was lodged in the metal, nearly having penetrated the steel.

I let out a sigh of relief before my eyes dropped to her hips. Her health stims. I pulled one off her belt and jabbed it into her leg like she had done me, and I watched as her health raised to 74%. Not a lot, but better. Her faceplate stayed stationary, unmoving from its position in covering her features. There was no use in checking for her breath or a pulse, I could see by the gray bar by her head that she was alive.

I breathed in, satisfied for now, and rocked back into a sitting position, pulling on my bandana to calm myself down. "Fucking hell… the shit you put me through in…" I looked at my watch. "Not even 2 damned hours…"

I allowed myself an absent minded laugh as I sat, guarding her prone body. There was nothing I could do as of right now, the game would decide when she was to wake up. My eyes roamed down to my bandolier, where so many of my little virtual keepsakes hung. I smiled lightly as I spotted a familiar little claw that had dropped off an area boss. And the first bullet casing that I'd ever fired.

Huh, funny.

Throughout this entire ordeal, I had never stopped to pick out a worthy souvenir. Strange for me, though it could be expected given some people's interference… But whatever. I had a while before she woke up, might as well find something. I glanced around the rooftop for something of note, worth, or general oddity. The only thing I found was the empty syringe that I had used on Tao. I thought about it for a moment before leaning forward to pick it up, slipping it into my coat's deepest and most secure pocket.

A rock tumbled from inside the main stairwell and my M9 and a grenade were in my hands before I noticed my own movement. After nothing happened, they returned to their places.

I'd better go set traps in case Mr. Red Eyes decides to drop by. Would be stupid if I didn't prepare at all.

I stood and stretched my back out, bending backwards and twisting this way and that. I felt a large pop and sighed, moving towards the stairwell. I opened my coat and looked at the HE's I had left, all of them. I considered making a Siamese Jericho trap with those, easy kill, easy setup. I was pulling one from its loop when Tao crossed my mind once more. I internally groaned and let the grenade slip back into place. I looked at the flashes and smokes, non lethal, only one momentarily debilitating. Nowhere near what I needed. I drifted to the other side and eyed over my gas grenades. No explosion, constant debilitation and damage, simple enough to set up. Perfect.

I jogged halfway down the stairs before unlatching a grenade and weighing it in my hand. I tossed it back and forth subconsciously as I planned the trap out. I had a bit of wire for this exact reason, so I would just need to tie one end to the pin and the other to a construct and string it across. The problem we had now was that this concrete staircase had no railing, so nothing to latch onto.

Perfect, now it was time to get creative.

I removed my knife from its sheath and slammed it into the concrete, it stuck halfway in before I stood and brought my boot down on top. Thank every divine thing out there that I had decided to craft this one myself. One of those cheap ass knives they tried to pawn off to people wouldn't be able to do this stuff. I plucked a piece of fishing wire from my utilities pouch, stringing it across the gap. I set the primers to "Pull Only" and wrapped the string around the action points.

I carefully stepped over the newly placed tripwire and gazed at it for a moment. Call it vanity. Or coincidence. Or both. But I had never used one of my chem grenades like this before. I pondered for a moment, scouring my mind for a worthy title for this… Well, whatever the fuck I was making. My eyes dropped to the canisters themselves, the bright orange bands and ashen grey cans giving it a distinct appearance. The…Rattlesnake. No, too bland.

The Mustard Bomb. No, too stupid.

The… Asinine Scorpion. Wait, the fuck does asinine mean?

The Taormentor.

Fuck.

The hell.

Yes.

It was only fair, she was the only reason the idea had come about. I mean, who was I not to give the girl her fair share of the credit? No one, that's who. I tore a length of camo netting out of my utilities pouch and set it on top of the grey canister. The optic mesh faded into its surroundings, making it look like an ordinary rock. I stood and started making my way back up top when I heard a cry from Tao.

"Jaegis!"

I bolted up the stairs and crashed out onto the rooftop, stopping to find an alarming sight.