I woke up to warm rain falling on my face. It felt like someone had beaten me to death then left what remained to bake in the sun. My brain was fried. My skin was on fire and my mouth was filled with the gritty vinegar taste of ashes mixed with vomit.

I opened my eyes and realized to my horror that it wasn't rain falling gently on my face. It was sticky blood and burned flesh. The explosion had scattered Gershwin and Kasha's remains like confetti. I rolled onto my hands and knees and felt my stomach empty itself out onto the gray stones of the bridge.

Shakily I got to my feet. I didn't have time to grieve. Across the bridge the Bone Syndicate soldiers were milling around in confusion. They hadn't noticed that I was alive yet but it was only a matter of time before they came for me.

A warning echoed in my wetware as I made my way towards them. Catastrophic damage detected. Repairs initiated. Retreat recommended.

"Numquam retro…" I rasped as I continued to force myself to march forward. I needed to close the gap if I was going to have a chance at surviving. I needed to be close enough to get them all in one shot.

I fumbled for the radio and turned it on. "Sacher, it was a suicide vest with a dead-hund's switch. Gershwin is dead." I told him as I limped through the gore and debris. "They have me outnumbered and I'm hurt bad. I'm going to need your help."

The radio was silent. Sacher didn't reply. "Sacher, you fucking ape. For once in your life do the right thing and help me. You owe me that much."

Once again there was no reply. I threw the radio aside with disgust and continued to walk forward. My foot slipped on something wet and squishy but I didn't look down to see what it was. I didn't want to know.

The bone syndicate soldiers finally noticed me when I was halfway across the bridge, one shouted and pointed at me, but it was already too late. "Play dead…" I snarled as I triggered the updated software.

I locked onto the twelve enhanced enforcers and forced a viral payload into their minds. They began to scream and claw at their faces. Some tried to run, others just stood there screaming. But one by one they all eventually fell to the ground and went silent. Occasionally one twitched but there was no fight left in them. They would be unresponsive and comatose until the imprint took hold.

The remaining dozen grunts looked around in confusion. I took the opportunity to shoulder my carbine and flicked off the safety as I continued forward closing the gap. The armored personnel carrier seemed to be in a kind of sleep mode now that its connection with Kasha was severed so I ignored it and focused on the task at hand. I could deal with it later.

Automatically my wetware began to interface with anything electronic it could find. Cameras, car alarms, phones, anything unprotected. I extended my consciousness even further and felt my mind touch a Döbian spy satellite. It shouldn't have let me connect but somehow Gershwin Prime had managed to grant me access when he updated my software.

Outlines appeared around my targets, even the ones behind cover. I knew where everyone was and what they were armed with. An icon of a golden crown appeared in the corner of my vision as the Warmaster subroutines in my wetware interfaced with the satellite and calculated the ideal attack strategy.

My weapon and I were one as I took aim at the first grunt. There was no need to use the sights. The sensors in the carbine and the multispectral camera mounted on top transmitted data through my trigger finger directly into my wetware. I was seeing the world through the gleaming eye of my gun.

All my pain faded away as I pulled the trigger. I was where I belonged. This was what I was made for. There was nothing else that mattered. There was no grief. No sorrow. Only the battlefield.

The G44 smart carbine barely recoiled as it launched a burst of hypersonic projectiles into the face of the first grunt unfortunate enough to be picked by the Warmaster subroutine. He was carrying a machine gun and was partially hidden behind cover so it had designated him as a priority target.

I continued forward off the bridge and onto the street maintaining my momentum. Most would have gone into cover but I couldn't stop moving. They still had me outnumbered eleven to one. That meant if I stopped for even a second they would pin me down with automatic fire and envelope me.

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Speed was life. Speed was safety. My Warmaster subroutines calculated the optimal path for me to follow as I wove through the parked cars and took aim at my next target. The big Möhin bruiser looked down at his ruined chest in disbelief as my rounds chewed through the car door he had been hiding behind and punched through his body armor like wet paper. Two down, ten to go.

Döbi had lost the war but her weapons were still unmatched, and I was one of them. I was more than flesh and blood. I was a Döbian Jagdkommando. I was the lighting. I was war. I was iron.

I felt a warning in my head as a grunt stepped out behind me and took aim. I sprinted forward and pointed the carbine back at him with one hand as I moved. I took aim through the electronic eye of the smart carbine and pulled the trigger. Three down, nine to go.

By now the remaining grunts had begun to organize. Two of them had anticipated where I was heading and moved into cover. No doubt they had thought their friend was going to drive me into their trap. Hunds were pack animals after all. We had evolved to hunt as a group. We didn't need to be packbound to work as a team, it was pure instinct.

I snapped ninety degrees to my right and fired just as the first one left cover. The hypersonic projectiles scrambled his brain inside his skull like an egg hitting pavement and he dropped lifeless to the ground. The second ambusher looked down for a split second as his phone rang in his pocket, giving me the opportunity to break his line of sight and circle around behind him.

I put a burst into the side of his head and moved on. The satellite had anticipated my need and called his phone to distract him. There were only seven left now and they were firing wildly at where they thought I might be. They weren't even aiming, they were just shooting blindly from behind cover.

I watched as a neat hole appeared in the low cement wall one of them was hiding behind followed by an explosion of debris that shredded the unlucky grunt. The Warmaster subroutines sent me an inquiry. Mark human sniper as friendly?

Oh yes! I thought. Mark the big ape with a huge fucking gun as friendly. For the love of all that is holy mark him as friendly.

The system traced the trajectory of the bullet back and told me that Sacher was hiding on a rooftop under some kind of adaptive camouflage. Then it brought a second remote controlled sniping platform to my attention. It must have been the one that Sacher was using earlier. The clever monster had given himself multiple vantage points.

Of the original force of two dozen only six remained. I liked these odds much better. The Warmaster subroutines adjusted to take Sacher into account and assigned me a new priority target. It was a grunt hiding behind a car with a grenade in his hand. That wasn't good. I had already been blown up twice this week. Three times would qualify as a habit.

I dove low and fired at the ground underneath the car the grunt was hiding behind. The projectiles skipped like stones across water and peppered the unlucky hund with hot metal fragments, cutting his legs out from underneath him. I heard a muffled yelp of pain followed by the words "Oh shit!" as he dropped the grenade. I was already onto the next target by the time it exploded.

One of the grunts peeked out of cover to see what had happened and got a face full of metal for his trouble. Eight down, four to go. Sacher's rifle boomed and converted another grunt into paste. Three to go, I corrected.

They should have run at that point. I would have let them run. I might not have let them live, but I would have let them run. I found the remaining grunts cowering in an alley trying to force me into a fatal funnel. Instead I reached down to one of the comatose enforcers and unclipped a pair of grenades from his belt.

Neat, I thought as I twisted the dials on top and set them to explode on contact. I tossed the first grenade into the mouth of the alley and the satellite recorded three more kills. Twelve down, none to go, I thought as I disarmed the remaining grenade and tucked it into my pocket. It was over. Finally it was over.

I didn't have much time to celebrate before I felt my hackles raise. If it was over, where was that low electric hum coming from? I cocked my head to the side. What was that?

I spun around scanning for the source of the sound and realized too late that it was the armored personnel carrier coming back on line. Warning bells rang in my head as my wetware recognized the threat. Extreme Danger! Run! Retreat!

Time seemed to slow as the turret spun up and locked onto its target. But it wasn't aiming at me. The auto-cannon only had eyes for Sacher.

Before I could so much as blink the big gun found its target and fired, sending a literal stream of explosive tipped rounds at the human. It didn't just obliterate the rooftop he was hiding on, it brought down the whole fucking building.

I scrambled for my remaining grenade but couldn't even arm it before I felt my body freeze and my vision flash into static. EMP… the fucking thing had hit me with an EMP. That had been the high pitched whine I had been hearing. It was the capacitor banks charging up. I collapsed to the ground and felt the unarmed grenade roll harmlessly from my limp fingers.

My connection with the satellite was severed and my wetware was still rebooting. Sacher was probably dead. Gershwin was in a thousand pieces scattered across the bridge and I was blind.

The emotional whiplash of going from victory to utter defeat made me want to scream and howl. But I couldn't. I could barely breathe.

A familiar voice called out over the speakers of the armored personnel carrier. "You didn't think I would actually let you win, did you?" It asked.