The sounds of explosions and gunfire fill the night as the two agents and the cadet move under the bridge towards the island fortress in the middle of the lake.

Wu maneuvers the boat, Sal sits in the middle and Kasao watches ahead as a spotter. While Chris does a good job in getting the attention of everyone above, there could still be things such as turrets, sensors or cameras that they need to destroy or avoid.

The bridge above their heads groans from strain, either due to the weight of enemies above or just the age of the structure itself if the rust is anything to go by.

Kasao looks back behind her and sees the two agents looking at the bridge, their heads moving towards any sound they could hear coming from it. Sal breaks the silence by talking to Wu, a worried tone can be heard in his voice.

“Can’t you make this thing go faster?”

“Don’t you think I would’ve done it already if it was possible? Just shut up and look ahead.”

“...Fine.”

Sal ends the conversation, letting the boat fall back to silence. Above, the sounds of fighting become more intense, with debris starting to fall from the bridge. The three could see crushed drones fall into the water, disturbing the reflection of the stars.

Kasao returns her gaze forward again, seeing that they're halfway towards the island. Suddenly, they began to hear the old bridge rattle from something big and heavy moving on it. From what the cadet could pick up, she could hear what sounded like rapid squeaking mixed with something else.

Before she could figure out what it was, the sound stopped and an eerie silence fell on the world. The peace is violently shattered as the sound of a cannon erupts followed by a loud impact onto something hard, causing the whole bridge to violently shake.

The three passengers of the dinky, old motorboat are now worried for what’s to come as more cannon fire can be heard from the side of the fortress while missile launches can be heard from their side.

Kasao looked back towards her instructors again only to see that they were panicking much more than her. Sal tries to plead with Wu, thinking he would be able to improve their situation.

“Maybe if you let me look at the engine-”

“No! We’re making good progress right now, I don’t want you fucking it up for us.”

“I’m not gonna fuck it up! I’m just gonna see if I can make it go faster.”

“Even if I let you, there’s not enough space for me to move out of the way. I’m not letting you lay on top of me, Sal.”

As the two continue their bickering, a shell from the tank above goes through the bridge’s superstructure and hits one of the pillars behind them. The misfire was enough to shut the two of them up.

As the boat got closer to the other side, they could now hear the screams of anger and frustration from the anti-foreigner soldiers above as they did their best against the power armor above. More tank shells go through the bridge and splash on the water behind them.

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

The three realize that the situation above was getting worse as the bridge started to groan even more with the stress from the fighting above. Kasao looks again to the front and sees that they are only 15 meters or so away from the other side.

Suddenly, their comms flare up with the sound of explosion and gunfire from Chris’ microphone.

[WU: “Chris, what-”]

[CHRIS: “GET OUT FROM UNDER THE BRIDGE! THEY’RE TRYING TO BRING IT DOWN!”]

The warning is confirmed by gunfire and explosions ripping through the bridge and hitting another pillar along with the superstructure itself. Wu acts fast and steers the boat towards the left while Sal shouts to the cadet to get her attention.

[SAL: “Kasao! Weapons free!”]

Hearing her instructor, she unholsters her guns and readies herself. As they leave the shadow of the bridge and into the open, they are immediately targeted by 10 of the flying drones near the bridge.

The bridge that they emerged from started to collapse from the assault, with the burning wreckage of the tank falling into the water. Despite its destruction, Kasao could still see that the attacks have not stopped. But she needed to focus on the drones that were not pursuing them.

The drones in question have a quadcopter design but instead of rotors, they have been replaced with thrusters. Despite the stronger engines, they only have a basic shell good enough to protect the internals from dirt and water.

To compensate for their fragility, the engineers have attached rotary cannons, lasers or railguns to make use of their speed and mobility in the air.

While Wu focused on driving them towards the side of the island, Sal and Kasao aimed their sights on their pursuers. Using his dual hand cannons, Sal manages to destroy two drones that were hovering in the air.

The other drones swerved away from the line of fire and started to buzz around the boat. Kasao tries to hit the drones but as soon as she gets a bead on one, they move away before she could squeeze the trigger.

After bringing down two more drones, Sal notices the cadet having a hard time hitting her targets. He turns on his comms and tries to give her advice while following another drone with his eyes.

[SAL: “Hey Kasao, they need to stop moving in order to fire at us. Just wait for them to-”]

Sal stops talking after seeing the drone he’s tracking stop abruptly in the air before being shot to pieces by a burst of bullets. He looks towards Kasao to see that she has holstered her left gun to use her hand to lock the drones in place so she could shoot them.

[SAL: “...That works too.”]

With the combined efforts of the agent and the cadet, they were able to destroy all of the drones pursuing them but not until one of the rotary cannon types was able to put multiple holes onto the body of the boat.

Thankfully, they were close enough to the island’s shore that they could just swim from there. Standing up and diving onto the water, they leave the old boat to sink into the dark waters of the lake.

Reaching the sandy shore, the trio shake off any water on them before moving close to the wall of the fortress to hide from any cameras. Thankfully, the guards were still distracted by Chris’ assault to look for others.

Still shaking off extra water from her guns, Kasao decides to ask Wu on what to do next as Sal was too busy cleaning his device of any particles from the lake. Before she was able to, their comms opened again to the voice of Chris.

[CHRIS: “Are you guys dead?”]

[WU: “Do I sound like a zombie? No, were not dead. What about you?”]

[CHRIS: “I’m fine, just finished killing everything outside. Smoke from the tank wreck covered me so I managed to slip away. Anyways, I got a plan to take out the towers.”]

[SAL: “Oh? Mind sharing with the class?”]

As Chris told them of his idea, the sirens from the fort blared as every available soldier started erecting barriers and setting up defenses for an attack.