"Chopper!" Oliver reminded them. "Shooting rockets now!"

D'khara sat up in the bed of the truck.

"Oliver, please tell me you grabbed your Zentech cannon today?"

"Well, you said we weren't going to be running into any tanks out here!"

"I'm sorry, okay? I was wrong, so very very wrong, and I please just want to know that you have that!"

Spits of asphalt shot up in a stream of splats along the road ahead of them as the chopper opened up with its rotary autocannon. They made a jagged, crazy line of fire that crossed the road, climbed the truck, and left a row of neat holes across the hood. It took a moment for the angry bzzzz sound of its firing to catch up to the bullets.

"I have the Strauss!" yelled Oliver, pulling his twin-barrelled, .30 caliber machine gun out of a crate.

"Great, let's go with that!" D'khara yelled back.

Oliver opened up with both barrels, the Strauss' flat blasts sounding mild in comparison to the Warbird's autocannon. He tried to keep on target as the truck slewed around, dodging explosions and potholes. The Warbird began dodging and weaving, and Oliver, having never studied air combat, was having trouble getting rounds on the target.

A rocket mounted under the chopper burped smoke, and began to grow.

"Rocket!" Oliver yelled. Robby pulled the wheel over to the left as hard as he dared at that speed. The rocket whoooooshed by on their right close enough to leave exhaust soot on the rearview mirror, and exploded in a field next to the road.

Oliver, rattled by the nearness of the rocket, and half-deaf from its passage, shakily opened fire again.

"Can you please just hit him?" D'khara yelled.

"This is a lot harder than it looks!" Oliver screamed back, holding the long trigger flat against the handle.

"Well you're the strategist, strategize something!"

The Warbird swooped in close and flared short of the truck. At that range, it was too close to aim effectively, but the rotary autocannon roared nonetheless, forcing everyone down into the bed, covering their ears. The downdraft pushed the truck around, causing it to fishtail wildly. Robby clutched the wheel, wrestling the mad vehicle back under control.

The helicopter backed off, and the Riotfish slowly returned upright. The powerful downdraft was as painful as a beating. The respite didn't last long, as one of the sleek cars surged forward and rammed the truck, dislodging everyone's feet. It fell back quickly, before the Riotfish could get a bead on it.

D'khara glanced at the helicopter, but it was clearly too far away for his shotgun. His PZ-12 was deadly up close, but at any kind of distance, the spread was such that he couldn't hope to do any real damage. He lined up on the cars, which were also out of range, but less so.

He'd barely burned through his first drum of ammo when the Warbird swept in again. The buffeting drove him back down along with everyone else, and the overwhelming roar of the autocannon pounded into his skull, the pain of the overwhelming noise sweeping aside every other consideration.

Once again, the helicopter backed off. This was followed by the two cars sweeping up, ramming the truck, one after another, repeatedly.

The Riotfish, increasingly rattled, were having trouble hitting anything, and it wasn't even clear what they should be shooting at.

D'khara shucked the empty drum out of his shotgun, slid in a new one, and was racking the bolt when the Warbird hammered in once more.

"Not again," he growled. As the massive helicopter approached, he lined up on the body and unleashed a flurry of buckshot at the beast. He grimaced as his firing plinked pathetically off the Warbird's armor. He braced himself as it flared.

He stood firm as the downwash slashed at him, whipping his mustache so fiercely that the ends left welts on his face. Teeth clenched, he raised the barrel of his weapon again, higher, higher, higher... and laid on the trigger, firing at the main rotor.

One of the blades crumpled upward, shredding and throwing debris up into the air. The sound of the engine rose to an injured whine. The Warbird leapt away from the beleaguered truck, but the damage was done. The chopper started looping around in huge, crazy circles, heeling over and losing altitude. It crashed in a massive fireball in the woods near the road.

Everybody in the truck cheered a little. D'khara was even feeling bold enough to try a little dwarven jig, but the 100 mph wind of their travel made celebratory dancing impossible.

They were interrupted by one of the black cars crunching into the bumper. The truck slewed alarmingly, knocking everybody over. The second car crept up the side, and began pushing into the left rear wheel again.

Tires smoked against gravwell as Robby struggled to keep the wheel straight. The midnight-black sedan pushed in more, and fed more juice to its engine. The other Utopia backed off and rammed forward, dislodging the truck's tires from the road.

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Robby's truck spun out, and the Riotfish burned up at least three guardian angels to keep from rolling over. The truck left huge, looping black swirls on the road as it skidded out of control.

The truck left the road and slammed through a shallow ditch, catching air on the far side, bodies in the back floating weightless for a gut-roiling moment before they all slammed back down to the ground, sliding further in the grass, and finally slewing to a stop in a field of tall sugarcane.

The engine died, smoking and ticking.

It took a moment for everybody to catch their breath.

"We got to scatter out, break dese boys up some. Everybody who ain't shot, get out de truck," Daugereaux said.

"Do I count, since I got shot?" Oliver asked, poking his face in through the shattered back glass.

"Boy, if you don't get out de truck, I am gonna slap de stupid right off your face."

"What about Mr. Fleer?" D'khara asked.

"I don't think dey gon' mess wid him. We'll lie him down gentle. He'll keep till we can get clear of dese fellas."

They disembarked and looked dubiously at the tall green sugarcane stalks. Even Oliver on his tip-toes could only just barely peek over the tops of the sugarcane.

The two black cars had had time to loop around and come back. They pulled smoothly up and stopped, hovering with menace. The Riotfish overcame their hesitancy and vanished into the sugarcane field. Five men in suits and sunglasses stepped out of their vehicles, armed with short-barreled rifles. They scanned the field briefly, and waded in.

D'khara, who'd been watching from the edge of the cane, stepped backward, tripped over a loose dirt clod, and fell into a row of cane, rattling and shaking the tall stalks. All five suitmen turned toward him. He dashed deeper into the field.

Just my luck, he thought. My bad lu-- well, not bad luck. But doggone if it doesn't look just like it.

It was hard to believe the quiet after the noise and confusion of the previous few minutes. D'khara strained to hear movement, but couldn't catch anything meaningful. Rustling cane stalks whispered on every side, every breeze hiding the sound of movement in the imprecise swish of a thousand cane stalks shifting and bending.

D'khara ached and sweated and tried to move as silently as he could. His movement crunched the crisp cane stalks, and left a clear, trampled path pointing straight to him. He tried to weave around some and confuse his trail, with limited success.

He had his shotgun, but in the mad scramble out of the truck, he'd not grabbed any ammo, and he was empty. He didn't have another gun on hand. He didn't even have his grenades. Right now, all he had were his bare hands.

Fortunately, if you're going to fight bare-handed, being a dwarf is about as much of an unfair advantage as you could hope for.

He slung his shotgun-- at this point, it was only getting in the way. He held a balled fist cocked, ready to strike. He just hoped he could make it back to the truck without being noticed.

Gentle rustling surrounded him, fading in and out at different points. It was impossible to tell if anyone was near.

Even here, the occasional mosquito buzzed around. They drank greedily, and all he could do was grit his teeth and endure it. The vicious sun beat down, and the tall cane prevented the mild breeze from cooling his skin.

He slowly turned his head, trying to peer through the knobby green stalks, but his visibility was limited to a few yards.

Swivel. Green. Swivel. Green. Swivel. Gunman.

One of the black-suited men appeared near him. As D'khara turned in slow motion, the gunman raised his rifle to his shoulder. D'khara saw the reflexive flick of the gunman's thumb as he clicked off the safety.

With a fine dwarven battle cry, D'khara hurled himself at the corper in the crisp black suit. The gunman sprayed autofire in D'khara's direction, but startled by the charge and the piercing cry, he shot wide. D'khara cannoned into his knees, knocking him flat. The rifle flew out of his hands.

Bouncing back to his feet, the corper dropped into a ready stance. He brought his stiffened knife hands up and set his weight back, preparing for hand-to-hand combat.

D'khara stood in place, sneering.

The corper danced back and forth, light on his feet and vibrating with energy, ready to snap an attack out at any moment. With two feet of height on the dwarf, he bounced in, feinted, flicking his hands and feet out to draw D'khara off balance.

D'khara stood motionless.

Finally committing, the corper drove a lightning-quick kick at D'khara's head, and winced as the bones of his shin drove into D'khara's suddenly upraised arm.

Dropping back, he gingerly put his foot down. Kicking the dwarf was like kicking a cinderblock: no give. Jumping forward, he drove a heel kick at D'khara, putting all his weight and momentum behind it.

He "oof"ed as his kick hit the dwarf in the chest and stopped dead. D'khara held the corper's foot firmly in both hands. Reaching forward, he grabbed the front of the corper's pants. The corper tried to shake loose, but D'khara's grip was solid. D'khara reached forward with his other hand and grabbed another fistful of fabric.

Panicking, the corper started raining down blows with his fists, striking D'khara's head, shoulders, neck and chest. Nothing was effective, and nothing slowed the dwarf as he steadily dragged the corper closer, hand over hand, creeping up his pants, his shirt, and up to his collar. The corper yanked and flailed to escape, but D'khara's grip was welded firmly shut.

Some people dismiss dwarves as fighters, and it is true that they lack the reach and leverage of most humans. What they lack in length, though, they more than make up for with bone density like cold-rolled steel and the upper-body strength of an orangutan.

D'khara pulled back a fist that, objectively, was dwarf-sized, but to the corper looked as big as a freight spacer.

With the first blow, the corper's world disintegrated into crazy shards of light and color, all layered with pain. The second blow switched him off.

Of course, D'khara had to make sure his opponent was no longer a threat.

He was four more blows into "making sure" when he heard a rustle behind him, and heard the click of a safety coming off.

Without even looking, he lunged into the cane, followed by the rapid brrrap brrrap brrrap of machine gun fire.

D'khara bolted as the ripping sound of burstfire opened behind him, zipping rounds through the cane. He zigzagged, trying to lose the gunman, who had stopped firing and started chasing.

Probably didn't want to shoot blindly in the cane, D'khara thought as he huffed across the field. The sugarcane sure wasn't stopping any rounds, and there was no telling where anybody-- friend or foe-- was at.

He ran and crashed and stumbled through the field, describing a broad loop, making his way back to the truck and his ammo. Over his own noise, he heard the sounds of pursuit. The gunman was closing in.

He burst from the wreckage of the field near the truck, and slapped the side, preparing to vault into the bed, but he stopped as he recognized two more of the gunmen standing guard over the truck.

They raised their rifles. He raised his hands.