Task Force 727 navigated up the submerged escalators and broke the surface, being greeted with deafening white noise. A fresh downpour had already begun from the November Monsoon. The rain was extraordinarily thick, too much even for their high-powered flashlights. Neither Jade nor her teammates could see past the tip of their laser rifles.

“Task Force 727. Bad weather alert. Drones off-station. Heli-evac unavailable. Land transport en route. Hold position. ETA, seven mikes. How copy, over?” Command radioed.

“727-Actual, copies-all. Holding position for rovers. Out.” Jade replied.

The victorious task force did not have to wait long, however.

Lightning flashed and as thunder rumbled, all of Jade’s subordinates dropped to the rain-soaked soil with holes in their heads. A shadowy figure appeared from behind the trees and two more flashes blinded Jade as she crashed onto the ground with holes in her knees.

This novel's true home is a different platform. Support the author by finding it there.

She struggled to squeeze off a shot from her rifle, but her opponent was too fast, kicking it out of her hands and slashing the ligaments on her elbows and wrists.

Her opponent held her by the chin.

“The Princess of Clams… look what they did you… turned you into a monster… that’s what they do… if they can’t fit a square peg into a round hole, they’ll carve your corners off…”

Lightning flashed.

“My husband would be ashamed…”

Thunder rumbled.

“Not me though… my daughter died ten years ago when she did not return home… when the government told me she was killed in a terrorist attack at the spaceport… you are just a ghost in a shell… one of many puppets to the throne… a fish out of water… nothing special…”

The hot barrel of the pistol pressed itself against Jade’s slimy scaly forehead.

“Every day, the X-Levels steal children like you from us! From me! People who fear poverty more than the government! People who treasure the quality of life more than the meaning of life! The poor who bring death upon the poorer to live amongst the rich!”

A loud bang. Ringing. Darkness. Jade fell backwards limp and blind.

“There is no God to forgive us. And so, both of us are right. And none are wrong.”

The rain’s white noise grew ever louder.

Jade stopped breathing.

She was drowning.