Her suspicion was quickly confirmed. There was a flash and a puff of white smoke, which stretched up into the sky, reaching out towards the PJs like a ghostly tentacle.

“Break!” Cara called on the radio and tucked her arms and legs into a ball.

As her glide turned into a fall, the two gliders above her banked hard in opposite directions, splitting the trio apart.

Their close formation was intended to trick the missile’s seeker head into identifying them as a single target. When they flew apart in different directions, its guidance computer experienced momentary confusion—unable to select which fragment to follow. The pause lasted just long enough to take it straight through their formation and harmlessly off into the clouds.

Cara stretched out into a glide again, but any sense of relief was cut short. Her fall had taken her perilously low. As the mountain ridgeline reared up, she would have to pass over a spur in order to continue the glide behind it, and now she could see that she would be lucky to get past that spur. Deploying her chute too early would leave her as an easy target for a second missile shot, but if she misjudged, she would impact the mountain, headfirst.

“Stay high,” she radioed her teammates, who had been descending to rejoin her.

The mountain drew closer, and Cara saw that she would have a chance—an incredibly slim chance. They raced towards the rocks at more than a hundred miles an hour as Cara held the shallowest glide she could manage without stalling.

She offered a silent prayer to whatever might be listening.

The rocks came closer, rising up to meet her until she was certain she would impact. They were a blur, a matter of feet away from her face, and she felt a gentle pressure under her right foot. Then the mountain side was dropping away hundreds of feet below her, and they were descending in the cover of the ridge, heading to the far end of the valley. Cara’s inner child wanted to whoop and yell, but the soldier stayed quiet, knowing that the hardest part of her job was still ahead.

The trio continued the glide until the ground began to rise again, leading up to the saddle on which the dropship had come to rest. The flyers separated, pulling their chutes a hundred feet above the terrain.

Cara steered her chute hard, driving into a downward spiral, before flaring at the last second into a painful landing across the slope. Her body impacted shale, sliding and bouncing until she smacked into a large rock.

She cut away the canopy before it could drag her down the mountain, then ripped the vanes out of her wing suit, giving her the freedom to move and fight until she had the time to properly remove it.

Ahead of her, she saw with satisfaction that her teammates had also landed safely enough, so she released her weapon from the flight harness, and rushed over to join them. Once they reassembled together, they sprinted straight up the col towards the wreckage. They ran hard, moving as fast as they could without slipping on the rocks.

When they reached the crash site, Cara motioned to the two other PJs, who raised their weapons and moved into the surrounding rocks. They would secure the site while she moved straight for the wreckage and the casualties that would surely be waiting for her.

As she approached the downed dropship, what she found stopped her short. The corpse of a monstrous creature lay close to the wreck, while two women were on the ground, both covered in blood. One looked terrified, but alert, and was bent over the other and trying to apply soaked bandages to a nasty bleed on her chest. Cara approached her.

“Hey there—I’m with Pararescue. What’s the situation?” she asked.

The young woman looked up, and Cara saw desperation, shock, and relief pass through her eyes in moments.

“She’s hurt. She’s really hurt,” the woman sobbed.

“What’s your name, soldier?”

“Christie. She’s Rose. Please, you have to help her!”

Cara glanced at the nearby mass of twisted metal. “I’m going to take care of your friend, Christie, but I need to know about the other casualties.”

Christie struggled to keep her emotions under control. “T-they’re in… inside the cockpit. Unconscious, I think.”

Just then, one of the other PJs re-appeared, signaling with a thumbs up that they were in the clear.

“Check the cockpit,” Cara instructed her, then dropped her pack and knelt down to Rose’s side.

What she saw appalled her; a gaping chest cavity, and heavy bleeding that didn’t seem to be slowing. She got to work immediately, cleaning up the wound, before trying to locate the worst of the damage. Rose was drifting in and out of consciousness, and would occasionally make eye contact with her.

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“C….cockpit,” she whispered. “Pilot.”

Cara placed a hand on her shoulder. “Don’t worry, my friend is taking care of them. I’m taking care of you, okay?”

Rose passed out again, while Christie’s fingers were white as she gripped her hand. She was obviously on the verge of panic.

“Will she be okay?” she asked, desperately.

“I’ll do everything in my power to help her,” Cara answered. She inserted an intravenous drip into Rose’s good leg, then passed the attached bag of fluid to Christie. “Can you hold this up for me? Keep it nice and high.”

Christie wiped the mix of tears and blood from her face and did so.

Kayla watched as all of the researchers except Weslan grabbed what little belongings they had from their rooms.

“Wrap up as warm as you can,” she instructed them. “We are at high altitude, and it is cold. While we can get you out of the lab, you won’t be leaving the mountains anytime soon.

Once ready, they joined Valenti’s squad, ready to escape through the tunnels. Two more Rangers stayed behind, eager to help attack the transformation chambers.

“Give ‘em hell Vipers,” Valenti said, and led the huddled group out into the maze of tunnels, guided by a map she had copied from Kayla.

Only the hard part lay ahead.

“I forget,” said Ash, “Did I join this organization because I wanted to live forever, or because I wanted to die young, doing something stupid?”

She seemed significantly more amenable now that a clear plan lay before them.

Kayla shrugged. “I feel like I want to live forever doing stupid things, but I guess we’ll see how that works out.”

She caught Weslan’s eye and saw an expression of astonished confusion on his face.

“What’s wrong with you?” she asked.

“I don’t know, I just thought… I had gotten through to you before you left.”

“What are you talking about?” she replied, genuinely confused.

Weslan frowned. “I thought you would strive for greatness, but instead you’re…”

“What?”

“Well… I mean, this is an awful situation, and you seem… almost happy.”

“I’m just feeling punchy,” Kayla said with a wink. “I’ll be happy when we win, and Rayker is lying in the dirt.”

“But this isn’t what you were supposed—” He stopped, suddenly aware that dozens of eyes were watching him with interest.

Kayla raised an eyebrow. “You think we’re all crazy, huh?”

“Don’t get me wrong,” Weslan stammered, trying to ignore the Ranger’s stares. “I’m so grateful you all came down here and risked yourselves to put an end to this nightmare. But Kayla, I just thought you were meant for so much more…”

Ray slapped her forehead hard.

Thandi snorted. “This guy? Seriously? Kayla, when this is over, you and me are having a talk.”

“Okay,” Ash interrupted, as Kayla glared daggers at the young scientist. “This is a wonderful conversation for another time and place. Right now, we need to move out. Barnes, will you be okay without a rifle?”

“Definitely,” she said as she lost interest in Weslan. “If I need more than my sidearm, I’ve already screwed up.”

“What are we going to do about the Tiger teams?” asked Thandi.

“I guess if we can capture one of the soldiers, we can interrogate him about the teleporter,” Ash added. “With a little luck, we’ll get them back unscathed.”

“A little luck?” Ray snorted. “Since when do we enjoy such luxury in the Rangers?”

The squad made their way back through the tunnels towards the transformation chambers, bounding from cover to cover. Once they reached the open cavern of the laboratory, they saw more than a dozen armed guards patrolling the area, together with five soldiers, and Rayker, visible in the hall itself.

Looking closer, Kayla saw that they had a prisoner with them. Her lips twisted into a snarl.

“I think they’re doing something,” she hissed urgently to Ash. “I think they’re going to transform that guy.”

“They could be sending out a new strategy to the rest of the drones,” Weslan explained. “It would be the simplest way for them to establish control of the fighting.” He pointed a finger. “That’s the control booth where we’ll need to input the new program.”

To Kayla’s relief, the booth was unguarded. Rayker and her soldiers were focusing their attention on the transformation chambers in the center of the hall.

“Alright Barnes, can you see a route through there?” Ash asked.

Kayla examined the piled-up machinery. “Yeah. I can go around to the right—there’re a lot of big cables we can crawl through.”

“Ok, so we’ll go left, kick up a firefight with those guards over there, and retreat back through the tunnels.” She glanced nervously at the young and inexperienced rookie. “You’ll be alone in here for a little while.”

“I’ve got this,” Kayla nodded, hoping she portrayed more confidence than she felt.

“What if something goes wrong?” Weslan asked, nervously.

“Then I’ll hold them off while you run,” Kayla said. “Regroup with the others back at the dorms and get the hell out of here.”

He looked unhappy with that response, but she didn’t have any better options to suggest.

Thandi grabbed her shoulder. “Hey, next time you bring me to visit your homeworld, someone else can be the tour guide, okay?”

Kayla hugged her friend. “Don’t kill all of them. Leave some for me,” she said with a smile.

Thandi blinked. “Uh… sure, I guess? God be with you.”

Staying low, the Rangers moved off, working their way around the crystals to the far end of the hall.

“Um… I’m sorry about what I said earlier,” Weslan said, while they waited.

“I’ll get over it,” Kayla replied, “But you know what I won’t get over?”

Weslan stared anxiously at her.

“Getting shot in the face. Let’s try to focus, okay?”

Weslan’s appalled expression told her that this may have been the wrong choice of words, so she searched for something more comforting to tell him. Coming up short, she settled for patting him on the shoulder.

“You can do this,” she said earnestly. “And don’t worry about me.”

Suddenly, the quiet was broken by the ear-splitting crash of a flash grenade, followed by gunfire. Kayla watched anxiously as two of the distant guards fell dead.

“There they are—kill them!” Ash roared, drawing the attention of the Helvet soldiers scattered throughout the lab, while the Rangers ran between cover, shooting their rifles.

Keeping low, Kayla grabbed Weslan’s wrist and pulled him forward, leading him into the dense clutter of machinery. They crouched behind a humming powerbank, watching as the Rangers began to withdraw back into the tunnels. Someone collapsed onto the floor as the Helvets shot back, while another Ranger pulled the body away.

Kayla hoped that it was only part of the act.