A single ignition spark connected the device to the boxes in the van. A single light passed through its cable as he could smell the burning sensation, small as it may be. His injector system shot into action. Stimulants pumped into him as he activated his deflector shield. Pushing his forearm out to block, he pushed Claire out of the way with his body as a fireball consumed the van.

The explosion sent a shockwave into the ground and up into the air around as shrapnel was shot out from the van. It smacked into both civilians and operatives gathered nearby.

A few seconds passed. Flames, heat and steel stung the air. Kazuki's artificial lungs filled with smog, making him cough. He opened his eyes. His ears rang as he felt blood trickle down from his forehead.

The corners of his aug-glasses were cracked as one-sided holo imagery stuttered in and out. The faint memory of gunpowder and the smell of scorching plasma filled his nose. He saw tracers flying over him. He could feel something tugging him downwards, an added weight as his mind fractured into disorder.

At that moment, Kazuki lazed in thought. Everything was dragging him down again, beckoning death once again.

Another hand tugged onto the back of his armoured vest. His muscles were limp. But just as he was about to close his eyes, Claire's helm-mask came into view. She stabbed an injector into him and pumped an overdrive concoction made by Chizuru into him.

His limbs ached as gunfire filled his ears. His mind sharpened, and his golden eyes grew wide as his focus came into view. He turned his head around, seeing the debris from nearby vehicles and the exploded van.

His lungs ached for air. The mental weight subsided away. Their shuttles were destroyed. Loyalists were approaching from all sides. Roofs, down the street, over the bridge. Civilians and operatives litter the area. Some dead; some alive.

"Arbiter! Wake up dammit, we're pinned. And you better not fucking overclock on me, I'm not treating you if you do!" shouted Claire, firing back at a Loyalist that fired down from a nearby building window, 'This is Lazarus. We need immediate exfiltration! Overwatch, strikes - ASAP'

He looked down at his legs. His ANCHOR-support braces were in shambles as blood covered his lightly armoured trousers and leg guards. He took off the braces, leaving only his slim exoskeletal frame left on his legs. His chest remained relatively unharmed as his deflector shield took the brunt of the damage.

He slid his hand to his SMG as he helped Claire deal with the Loyalist. His voice remained calm. 'All forces hold firm. Conserve as much ammo as possible; Sato, can we get an ETA?'

his cold voice echoed across the uplink as he staggered to his feet, taking cover behind one of the destroyed vehicles beside Lilly.

'Kaz! W—we're sending reinforcements your way… hold out…' Eliza trailed off as Lilly made an audible grumble. She unloaded her magazine into a Loyalist that tried to clamber over the car's hood, before ducking down to reload, narrowly avoiding a vacuum grenade's heat.

"This friend of yours… is getting on my nerves," complained Lilly, dusting spent cases off her white-trimmed armour. She glanced at Kazuki with her flower-painted armoured helm-mask. It had marine markings, splattered with blood. "Fucking Loyies… got blood on my helm-mask."

She grabbed hold of her mask, clicking her fingers as she ripped it slightly off. Claire threw her an inhaler, as Lilly puffed down on it.

"Shit…" Claire trailed off, a bolt flying by over her head.

Kazuki shook his head as he peeked out of cover, noticing a storm of Loyalists slowly creeping towards them from up the street. Looking towards the bridge, he could see an even larger group of Loyalists hiding behind cover as they slowly slicked towards the barricades of broken shuttles and debris.

Meanwhile, his operatives were holding onto their lives as they made every bolt count. Another tried to clamber onto the car, yet Lilly violently grabbed them, activating her WRIST-SHOT, splattering their neck with a discharge of a dozen plasma-bolts.

'Gambit. Status report on the ambush force?' asked Kazuki, calmly displacing Loyalist skulls with explosive lead.

Kazuki ducked underneath a string of low-powered whistling bursts as Riharia said, 'We're retreating right now, under attack. But we're good, minimal casualties—'

A stream of bullets came across the uplink as Riharia paused. An exchange of bullets ensued for a second. Then, she heaved back into the uplink.

'—DAMMIT. WHY CAN'T Y'ALL JUST LEAVE US ALONE!'

Her shout came right before a cacophony of gunfire. Kazuki wiped the blood that still ran down his face, trickling past his burnt cheek and onto the bloodied debris below.

Quinn spoke up, 'WATCH OUT!'

'THAT WAS A FUCKING CIVVY EPSILON!?' shouted Riharia, the two devolving into an argument. Lilly chuckled slightly, before shaking her head.

"I'll give them cleaning duty later," she said, as Kazuki glanced towards her.

'Well, THEY were aiming a gun at us!' remarked Quinn. Kazuki facepalmed, groaning slightly at the annoyance as he shook his head, feeling it ache.

'Well, WE did break into his fucking house!'

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Only the sound of more sporadic gunfire ceased their argument as the cacophony of death gave Kazuki more peace than the noise of beratement.

'Arbiter. We have three shuttles inbound. The pilots know the LZ is hot, so they're only landing for ten seconds. They'll keep cycling until you're all out,' said Sato.

Her expertise in this type of thing came in handy - as one of the only experienced military uplink-handlers. Brigadier Martinez, Rear Admiral Sato and Commander Lilly, Archius chose well when deciding whose loyalties to secure.

'ETA is one minute. Survive.' Archius added on, calmly.

Another operative hugged to cover, avoiding a skidding bolt as their helm-mask was already fragmented and dented. "Fuck, you think there's civvies in those buildings?" asked Tamara, loading a grenade launcher. Kazuki didn't even need to look at the paint job or the name tag to know who it was. "Or do you think these little shits ganked them all into nice piles of meat already?"

"Second one, hopefully," Kazuki replied. Tamara chuckled as Kazuki continued, "I don't mind the first, though."

"Just make sure not to hit us, alright?" snapped Lilly.

Tamara laughed as he knelt upwards, firing a grenade into the nearby buildings, but before anything else could happen, a crash of explosive bolts echoed. And beside Kazuki, Tamara fell, bolts had smacked directly through his helm-mask. At least he didn't see the eyes, Kazuki thought… Never the eyes.

Lilly looked down at them, grimacing at the sight as she placed two fingers on Tamara's neck. No beat.

Kazuki reached for the helm-mask on his belt, but found that it was a complete mess. Its armoured visor was cracked - respirator dented. He didn't need a diagnosis from his aug-glasses to tell him it wasn't usable.

"Shit…" Claire said, sneaking over to their vehicle from one of the other wreckages as she lightly threw an adrenal-jector to Lilly. She caught it whilst firing with one hand and stabbed it into her neck, pressing down on the plunger.

And just in time, a shuttle passed overhead. Immediately, bullets and rockets were thrown at it from the Loyalists on the rooftops and from the street. Kazuki looked out from cover, taking note of a group of Loyalists trying to destroy it with launchers up the road.

'Dammit. Someone take out those damn launchers!' shouted Karl, piloting the first shuttle. Escort drones attempted to shoot down the rockets, with only a few smacking into the shuttle's layered shields. 'I'll come round for another pass.'

Kazuki tapped his deflector shield. It flickered on and off as he felt his ICAPAD tighten on his left forearm. Not the best, but usable. 'I'll buy us some time. Get as many people out.'

"Don't get yourself killed, it's hard putting you back together… Well... really hard," Claire trailed off, tossing Kazuki a stimulant injector. Catching it, he recognised the crimson-blue hue of the drug. Kiarani stimulant. Not a big fan of it, but between death and that, he'd take the latter.

"Just ask Archius how to reassemble me," snapped Kazuki. "Plus, you can sew my head back on my torso and it'll be fine."

Injecting himself, he reloaded his SMG, replacing the plasma cartridge and bolt magazine. The overflow of morphine, adrenaline and cocktails spiked his system as he felt his exospine heat up. But that didn't matter, he leapt out from cover, sliding over the destroyed hood and activating his deflector shield. He rushed forward, firing his SMG with one hand whilst attracting the Loyalists' attention. He went from cover to cover, taking out Loyalists easily with simple headshots. Any bullets meeting his shield caused it to flicker - it still hadn't fully recharged. But time was blood. And he's running out of both.

As he ran out of bolts, the Loyalists wielding launchers came into view, cowering. The impacts crackled into his body. Ramping up his ANCHOR, he teleported directly onto the launchers. As he apparated, he lobbed his SMG at the first of three. The other two twisted around towards him.

The gun slammed into them. He side-stepped out of a blind mag dump, unsheathing a black dagger. In a single motion, he slashed their neck in two.

One fired point blank with a shotgun, but Kazuki was just able to block the attack with his shield, energy slowly tittering out. He pushed forward as the Loyalist tried to fire more and more plasma-shot into his shield. But with each passing plasma pellet, his shield's strength slowly weakened. The second one fired his pistol at him, deflecting off his back-armour, clipping the dark-gold trim markings. Kazuki twisted his body and threw his throwing knife directly into the chest of the Loyalist, staggering them.

Looking up, he could see the shuttles cycling in and picking up the operatives grounded near the destroyed shuttles. Archius spoke up, 'Get back, you've bought enough time.'

'There's not enough time.' stated Kazuki, seeing even more rockets thrown their way as more Loyalists streamed to this location, 'I'll handle things here. All it takes is one launcher…'

He pressed his shield against the shotgun's muzzle, dragging his railgun out from his holster. Firing it directly into the lower torso of the Loyalist before he twisted around to the Loyalist with a knife stuck in them. He loaded another shell into the railgun's break-action, then completely removed their head.

More bullets rained towards him as the Loyalists tried to eliminate the isolated Contract-Breaker. He ran over to the now-dead Loyalist, grabbing his knife back before sliding behind one of the vehicles. Steam started to exit out from his mouth once again. The hot vapours stung his gums and teeth. He slid his railgun back into its holster, taking out his backup pistol.

'Kaz! Don't be silly… you have to get out. You won't last a minute…' Eliza's worry seeped into her voice as it quivered.

Archius sighed as he followed through with his friend's orders. 'Shuttles. As soon as the last agents are on the shuttles, haul your asses and RTB.'

Kazuki looked towards the LZ, seeing a litany of plasma and bullets flying about as the gunners and drones were helping the exfiltration, firing down laser bolts at the Loyalists that dared show themselves out of cover.

'Archius!' shouted Eliza, stress and worry continued to break her down. Ugh... annoying, Kazuki thought.

'Dammit…' Lilly said, 'Focus. Arbiter will survive, don't worry about him.'

'I'll find another way out,' said Kazuki, popping his head out from cover and swiftly killing any Loyalist approaching him. From his memory, he had fired 86% of his munitions. Not good. 'Just get out. Now!'

'I…' Eliza trailed off as she fell silent. Good, Kazuki thought. Now he can finally think.

'Last one out! RTB,' said Karl, the shuttles now leaving. Escort drones shot down any missile or rocket sent their way as Kazuki was now left stranded. They streamed by overhead, disappearing over the buildings and slums.

'Gambit. Status report,' Kazuki said, calmly. He needed to know whether he should buy more time.

'We've slicked off into the alleys, Arbiter. Fuckers got some of us but we're good.' reported Riharia, her hot-headedness now seemingly cooled.

This was a mess. More bullets smacked into the hood of the hover car he was hiding behind. He took in a deep breath, latching onto a thermobaric grenade out from his belt. He activated it, lobbing it over. Its explosion sent a shockwave of vacuum heat and smoke all over. Smoke engulfed the area and he stood up.

'Good. RTB,' he said, escaping into the alleys amongst flame and fog.