Uuchantuu was so shocked she nearly waited too long.

She brightened her gemcrest, conjuring a dome of hardlight around her, Araana, and Oka'ada the moment before shouts and gunfire erupted from both sides. Once she had that up, she slammed a block of hardlight into the fallen officer’s head to make sure she was unconscious.

"Araana!" Uuchantuu gasped, straining to hold her hardlight. "Closer, now!"

Araana blinked, then looked down at the Imaia officer she crouched over.

"Araana!"

The woman shook herself, then hurried back to Uuchantuu.

With a sigh, Uuchantuu reshaped the hardlight into a smaller dome. She still strained as the enemy fire pelted the shield like windblown rain, but it would hold.

"I had that under control!"

Araana shook her head. "She was onto us. She would have had her soldiers surround us, or one of the others would have been caught, and she would have made us."

Uuchantuu clenched her teeth. She wanted to yell at the woman. Instead, she let it out in a sigh.

That can wait.

Uuchantuu looked toward the soldiers on either side of them, then the cars. She activated her radio. "Jaran, we're under attack. There are soldiers headed toward the mine. Take what you can and get out of there. Get to the Ironpeak entrance if you can, but only if no one is following. Naruuna, are you and your team alright?"

"I'm inside one of the cars," she said, voice tight. "I don't know about the others."

Uuchantuu's jaw bunched.

"If I take care of the soldiers, can you hook up the cars so that I can pull them with a speeder?"

"Yes, but that would be too slow to get that far. Wouldn't it—?"

"Can you do it?" Uuchantuu snapped.

"Yes."

"Wait for my signal."

She switched channels. "Jaran, take care of that speeder. Take it, or make sure it can't follow us."

"Yes, sir."

Uuchantuu winced as the strain grew even greater.

Looking to the soldiers, Uuchantuu saw the two groups had closed in. The one near the end of the train had left their speeder unattended.

Taking a deep breath, she looked to Araana and Oka'ada.

"I'm going to split the shield and push it toward each group. You run after it, take shelter between the cars, then take care of those soldiers, got it?"

Both nodded.

"What about you?" Araana asked.

Uuchantuu nodded toward the half-dozen soldiers between her and the speeder.

"I've got them."

They nodded again.

"Ready?"

Both crouched, turning away from her.

Uuchantuu focused on her hardlight. "Go!"

The gunfire immediately grew louder as she broke the dome, reducing each half to a curved wall just tall enough to shield herself and her companions from harm, then roared with the effort of pushing both as far and fast as she could even as she sprinted toward her group of soldiers.

"Luuhuuta, Edendo?"

"Uuchantuu?" the woman's voice crackled. "What's going on?"

"Get over here, now," Uuchantuu snapped. "We need evac. Jaran's at the mine or the Ironpeak entrance. The rest of us are by the train cars."

"On our way."

Uuchantuu waited until her wall came within inches of the soldiers before her to look back. She didn't see Araana or Oka'ada, and her wall was past the first opening between cars.

Satisfied, Uuchantuu pushed on both hardlight walls even harder. She looked to the group of soldiers behind her and bared her teeth.

This narrative has been purloined without the author's approval. Report any appearances on Amazon.

As they braced or tried to scramble out of its path, Uuchantuu split her wall down the middle, reshaping each piece into a block she slammed into the soldiers. When she strained from resistance against the wall behind her, she shoved it away, then dismissed that construct, focusing her attention on the soldiers before her—the soldiers behind her wouldn’t risk firing on their own, and they would have enough to deal with in a moment.

The men and women before Uuchantuu didn't stay down. She'd surprised them but hadn't hit them hard enough to knock them out. She didn't have a wall to slam them against like she had the guards in the train car.

A spike of fear shot through Uuchantuu as the closest one raised his rifle—Uuchantuu had never gotten over that—but she'd trained herself to press forward instead of flinching away.

A small bar of hardlight pushing against the barrel sent his shot wild, and Uuchantuu jumped, following up with a knee to the face that landed with a crunch. Uuchantuu sailed over the man, sending him to the ground, and threw up another shield as she formed a tonfa in each hand with wide shields that would cover her arms.

She'd never taken to the acrobatic fighting style Matsanga had trained them in as much as Estingai, but she still had the strength to do things like jumping high enough to leap over a Natari man.

Bullets hammered against Uuchantuu's shield. Instead of strengthening it, she ducked, widening her arm-shields as she held them up before her, and shattered the wall-like shield into a hundred pieces, then shot them toward the five remaining soldiers. Two of them leapt out of the way. Two more stumbled back as she clipped them in the shoulder or leg. The last fell to the ground as shards of hardlight pelted his entire body.

He wasn't dead—maintaining an edge on hardlight was difficult enough when it was just a single piece, much less dozens of shards, and she hadn't put enough force behind them to damage any organs. It would have hurt, though, despite the man's armor, and Uuchantuu was certain he wouldn't be getting up any time soon.

Leaping up from the ground, Uuchantuu closed on the nearest soldier. She slammed the blunt point of her weapon into the woman's stomach, then followed it up with an elbow to the side of the head that sent her to the ground.

Uuchantuu pivoted as she regained her footing, lunging toward the next soldier. He got a shot off, but it grazed her shoulder armor. Still, it threw her off balance.

Uuchantuu spun to avoid stumbling and when the soldier blocked with his rifle, Uuchantuu kneed him in the back. The man cried out as he fell and Uuchantuu grabbed his rifled and threw it toward the next soldier. The woman had been about to fire, but the shots went wild as she dodged. By the time she recovered, Uuchantuu was on her. She knocked the rifle up, kneeing the woman in the stomach. Even as the woman stumbled back, Uuchantuu followed up with three quick strikes. One more to the stomach, one to the sternum, and another to the back of the head.

As the soldier fell, movement to her side caught Uuchantuu's attention and she dismissed one of the tonfas, reaching for her sidearm.

She drew and fired in one smooth motion. Her first shot caught the man in the shoulder. His armor stopped the bullet, but shocked him just long enough for Uuchantuu to get off her second shot.

It took him in the calf, dropping him.

Uuchantuu winced. She didn't like shooting people. Even a through and through like that would take a while to heal and retrain the muscles. He was down, though, clutching his leg. Uuchantuu stalked over to him and kicked his rifle up with her toes as he reached for it.

"You're alive," Uuchantuu spat. "Count yourself lucky we're not the monsters you are."

She brought the butt of the rifle down onto his helmet, knocking him out before he could respond. She'd rather not have done that—getting knocked out was terrible for one's body, especially from a blow to the head—but she had to make sure he didn't get to the speeder.

Uuchantuu glanced around to make sure the others were down, then crouched at the report of a rifle further down the uncoupled cars. She hesitated for a moment, about to drop the rifle, then holstered her sidearm and slung the rifle over her shoulder before running toward the gunfire.

Uuchantuu leapt over the track, rifle ready as she sprinted for the fight.

Her eyes widened as she took in men and women in guard uniforms pressed against the side of the cars. Two crouched behind them. Three lay on the ground. Those weren't moving.

Starless nights.

Uuchantuu forced down a lump in her throat and sprinted even faster as ice pierced her stomach. Those were her people. Dead.

How many others are between the cars or up ahead?

An Imaia soldier peeked around the corner of one of the train cars, firing wildly. Uuchantuu threw up a barrier before her just in case, but kept going.

Darkness*, what I wouldn't give for greynodes right now.*

Her heart pounded with the effort of running this fast, but she knew she'd trip or tear something if she tried to go any faster.

As she closed in, the Imaia soldiers fired again, and one of her people stumbled back.

Andor. No!

He caught himself, though, clutching his thigh as he knelt down behind the last two standing. Uuchantuu hoped one of them was Araana.

Just as the Imaia soldiers grew bold enough to burst out from the cover of the cars, Uuchantuu reached her people. She threw up a hardlight shield between them and the Imaia, sprinting past her team toward the enemy soldiers. A few of them fired at her. The others jumped out of the way as she and her shield careened toward them.

Uuchantuu used the same tactic she had before. Just before she reached the soldiers, she broke her shield apart and thrust the sections toward each individual.

It cost her. She was down to half her Auroralight, and she knew she'd have a splitting headache later from concentrating on so many constructs at once. But it worked.

Even as Uuchantuu knocked the soldiers back, she didn't let up. She barreled into the closest one, using her shoulder and her momentum to lift the man off his feet and send him sprawling. She fired on the one to her right, all shots center mass. He fell.

Uuchantuu spun and fired on those behind her, throwing up a shield to block any shots they might have gotten off.

Nothing hit her and the Imaia soldiers fell even as they leapt for cover.

Uuchantuu felt no joy, no satisfaction, at killing these soldiers. Just a ball of ice in her stomach that sapped the rest of her of any warmth. Despite what she'd told the other soldier, she knew these men and women weren't monsters. Some of them might be cruel or hateful, but most were just normal people who had been fed enough lies by the Imaia to believe what they were doing was right.

Taking a deep breath to help steel her nerves, Uuchantuu tore her gaze from the dead soldiers and jogged back to her people. Araana was one of the two still standing. Oka’ada was the other.

She activated her radio.

"Naruuna, are you alright?"

"For now," the woman said. “Wemba and a few others fought off the soldiers outside. Now they're in the car with us."

"All of them?"

Naruuna was silent for a moment.

“Freteret is gone."

Uuchantuu hissed a ragged breath.

"Uuchantuu?"

She shook her head. "Just get over here quickly."

"Yes, sir."