KIND

Going after Spectres was nothing short of suicide. It was also what Kind and his squad, the Executives, were currently attempting to do. Insanity.

Especially considering the assets available to them. They only had Kind’s personal squad and a support vehicle to work with. The squad contained two teams: Alpha and Bravo. Alpha and Bravo were both four man teams with one team leader, one ordinance specialist, one breacher, and one tracker -- all troops trained by Kind personally. They also had one standard hover truck modified to act as a gunship being piloted by contractors. Kind was rolling with Alpha for this op because Bravo had drawn the short straw.

“I know that look, Kind. You’re contemplating how stupid this is.” said Pershing, his second in command. Focused, tenacious and highly motivated, the Alpha team leader sitting across from him was everything Kind would want in a successor.

“Yup. Definitely going to kill Ventrilo after this.”

“Focus Kind, we’ve got a job to do.”

“You’re right, you’re right. Bravo team, are you up?”

A green light flashed twice on his wrist, indicating an affirmative.

“Alright, we’re good to go. Alpha and Bravo teams are the pincers. We’re going to line up shots on the spectres from both sides of the canyon. The gun truck will go down the middle of the canyon and provide overwatch. If you’re in a sticky situation, call it to strafe the floor. Do not open fire until we’re all lined up or you’re engaged.”

The truck Kind and his team were in shuddered as it hit the rooftop of the skyscraper. Across the canyon, an identical truck did the same and began to spew out black-clad Executives. Kind and his team dashed across the open rooftop and stacked up on the access stairs.

“Remember, Spectres utilize shimmer suits so they’ll vanish as soon as we open fire. Those suits put out a lot of heat though, so your thermals will be able to pick them out.” said Pershing. “Once we’ve got a lock on their specific heat signature, we should be able to track them with our drones.”

Pershing nodded to indicate that he was done with his brief.

“Alright, good luck everyone. Let’s go!”

With that, they kicked the door open and started rushing to their positions.

VI

Two figures clad in kaleidoscopic purple-blue body armor laid atop a rooftop peering down over the artificial canyon between two skyscrapers. Both tracked a single man running down the canyon with their rifles.

“He’s getting away, isn’t he?”

“Could we let someone survive to actually tell the tale for once?”

“We’ve got the psy-ops people for that.”

“Aye, but that’s not authentic. Where’s your flare for drama?”

The two lapsed into silence for a moment. Vi sighed, then squeezed the trigger and ripped the running man in half with a tungsten slug to the spine. Vic, her partner, looked at her and sagged his head in defeat.

“You know, it would’ve been nice to let someone live this time.”

“It’s not procedure Vic, and you know it.”

“Sheesh, you and procedure. You’re no fun, Vi.”

“And you’re a loose cannon, Vic.”

“Uh huh.”

Vi took a knee and scanned the area for hostiles. Detecting none, she blink-navigated through the computer system displayed on the visor of her helmet and signalled for pickup. Somewhere in the atmosphere, their KN37 gunship began to descend to their position.

“Pickup ETA: Ten minutes.”

“We’ll be back just in time for dinner.”

At that moment, a hover truck passed between the two skyscrapers and began to descend towards the duo.

“Hey, that’s not a normal skylane.”

“Drop it?”

“Better safe than sorry.”

Vic aimed for the truck’s gravity pad, then fired a round from his Enforcer sniper rifle into it. The truck shuddered and began to lose altitude, but managed to hover and present one side towards the duo. The side of the vehicle slid open to reveal a machine gun pointed right at them.

“Ah, shoot.”

Vi blinked and set off her shimmer suit just as the truck opened fire, blanketing the rooftop in a haze of light and concrete dust. As the rooftop vapourized underneath their feet, the two sprinted in opposite directions and dove towards the neighboring buildings.

Vi fired two shots ahead of her before she crashed through the glass window and landed on a sofa. Getting up and looking around, it seemed as if she’d fallen into someone’s living room.

“Thanks,” said Vi to the sofa as she gave it a quick dust off with her hand before she drew her sidearm and headed for the door.

“Vi, I landed in the skyscraper opposite you. I’ve got eyes on that truck deploying troops into your building from the 60th floor. I’m going to try to gain some height and give you some support.”

“Sounds good, Vic. There was a skybridge above us around floor 75, meet you there for pickup.”

“Copy”

Vi looked around the sparsely decorated living room and sighed. She hated close quarters combat. The surgical precision of taking targets out at a distance with a good rifle was much more appealing.

“Alright Vi, let’s get out of here.” She said to herself as she got up and dusted herself off.

The apartment really was a one room block, with a bed shoved in the corner and a small kitchenette off to the side. Directly opposite the rear of the couch was the front door and perpendicular to that was another unmarked door, presumably the bathroom.

“Hey Vi, these guys have some sort of lock on us. They hit my location even with my shimmer running. Turning shimmer off seems to confuse them. Think it’s thermal.”

“Noted, thanks Vic.”

Time to set a trap.

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KIND

“Never trust a contractor, Pershing. No sense of timing.”

Things were not going well.

The truck had jumped the gun and gotten taken out before the teams had gotten into position. Now they’d be forced to go room to room hunting the spectres. Not ideal. At least their overwatch drone had pinned the shimmer suits’ heat signatures, so they were able to track the Spectres’ positions. Alpha, Kind’s team, were holding in an apartment room directly above one of the spectres.

“We have one target in the room directly below us. They haven’t moved in a few minutes, so they might have been crippled by the fall.” said Kind. “How do we want to do this?”

“Could be a trap, so I’m in favor of blasting a hole in the roof and dropping down.” replied Pershing.

“Good idea. James, you’re our demolitions guy. Take point on the team entering through the ceiling. Just to make sure they don’t slip out, the rest of us will enter through the main door. Soto and Vargas, go with James. Lee, Pershing. You’re on me.”

James saluted Kind, then gestured to Soto to set up the demo charge they’d use to get through the floor. Kind and his team headed out of the room and towards the stairs. Once they reached the floor their target was positioned on, the group halted and Kind surveyed the hallway.

“Hall looks clear, advancing to the doorway.”

Kind’s team moved down the hallway and stacked up on the doorway, being careful to approach quietly. Kind was in the rear position, while Lee, the team breacher, was at the door with his scattergun at the ready.

“Engage thermals.”

The team collectively tapped their goggles, activating the thermal imaging system and causing the lenses to glow a deep red.

“We’re ready. Pop the hatch.”

Kind heard a loud Bang as the ceiling blasted open and James’ team dropped into the room. Kind counted to two in his head, then said,

“Coming in!”

And Lee kicked the door in.

VI

The first team executed a textbook roof breach, dropping into the room quickly and engaging the stunned humanoid heat signature in the room within seconds. The only problem with their execution was that they’d just emptied their magazines into a drone projecting a humanoid heat signature. They had less than a second to react before Vi came out from behind the refrigeration unit and gunned each of them down with one well placed shot to the back of the head with her custom Que-Star revolver.

The second team that came in through the front door wasn’t much luckier. The first soldier through the door had his leg blown off by a motion-sensitive mine. A shot to the head put him out of his misery. The remaining members of the team sprayed indiscriminate fire into the doorway as they retreated.

“Hey Vic, I wiped most of the team that came after me. I’ve got a runner though so I’ll need to clean them up before we can head out. How’s it going?”

“I’m just about done with them. I’ll get to the roof and provide overwatch.”

“Good. I’ll clear out the runner.”

Kind

Kind was running. When Lee set off the mine it had blown Pershing and Kind clear of the doorway. Kind got up just in time to see Lee’s head explode in a cloud of blood. If that wasn’t a clear enough sign that they needed to run, the metal music that started to blare out of the room definitely was.

Now Kind and Pershing were sprinting up the stairs as fast as they could take them towards the roof where they could hopefully get a pick up. The music blasted up the staircase behind them, slowly getting louder. Kind looked up the stairwell and realized with a sinking feeling that they weren’t going to make it.

“Throw your grenade Pershing! I’ll cover you.”

As soon as they hit the next landing, Kind turned around and started to fire down the staircase towards the approaching music. Pershing knelt by the railing and pulled a grenade off his vest.

“Airburst, three seconds.”

Pershing nodded and configured the grenade, then tossed it over the edge. The pair dove flat on the ground in anticipation of the blast when they heard a single shot ring out. Kind watched as the grenade they’d just thrown down flew back up and over them. The Spectre had shot it out of the air!

BOOM

“-ershing! Pershing we gotta move!”

Kind’s hearing was slowly coming back through the ringing. His armor had protected him from the worst of the blast, but his helmet hearing protection wasn’t able to stand up to a blast at that range. Pershing was much worse for wear. He was bleeding from his abdomen and was unresponsive. His icon in Kind’s heads-up display was red, critical.

“Pershing! Wake up!”

Kind tore off his goggles. The HUD was useless without a team anyways.

“Mm. Go without me Kind. I’m nn... not going to make it.” Pershing mumbled.

Kind grabbed Pershing by his armor and started dragging him down the hallway attached to the landing they were on.

“Gunship, this is Kind. I need fire support now! I’ve got one wounded, the rest are gone.” Yelled Kind over the comm.

“Roger. You’re in luck, we just got back in the air. Get down, we’ll strafe the floor.”

Kind continued to drag Pershing down the hallway, all the while firing sporadic bursts down the hallway to keep his pursuer at bay. He just had to make it to the elevator five more doors down.

Then Kind’s weapon clicked empty and the end of the hallway exploded into a kaleidoscope of noise and light.

Vi

Vi knew as soon as the grenade dropped over the edge of the stairs she was actually chasing two people, not just one. There were three arms sticking up over the wall when it was thrown out. She’d ruled out cybernetics based on the other enemies she’d taken out. Cyborgs tended to be shunned since the Marwan Virus hit a decade ago, so it was unlikely to find a sole cyborg amongst full organics. Whatever. They probably weren’t much of a threat. She’d shot the grenade back all the same.

“Pershing! Wake up!”

Yeah. Probably just one now. Vi slowed herself down at the top of the stairs before she entered the hallway her quarry had retreated down. They’d be putting sporadic bursts down the hallway, so all she had to do was wait until they ran out of ammunition. Based on the amount of slugs they were firing, it wouldn’t be too long.

Sure enough, after about a minute, Vi’s amplified hearing picked up the distinctive click of a bolt locking to the rear.

Time to jam.

Vi activated her shimmer suit and drone holofields, turning herself invisible and projecting a mind-numbing display of light into the air around her. To the man vainly trying to drag his teammate to the elevator, the hallway had just exploded and was collapsing into a slowly encroaching cyclone. Vi’s music, which she’d turned on when she started the chase, was now amped up to room shaking levels. Insulated within her suit, Vi didn’t feel a thing. Her quarry, on the other hand, would be deafened. She approached slowly, considering. It almost seemed unfair.

The last survivor of the team that came to kill her now sat on the ground in front of her, cradling his dying comrade. She deactivated her shimmer suit, the coils expelling steam with a hiss, and leveled her handgun with the soldier’s head. Piercing blue eyes looked back at her, lit with a cold fire born of comprehension. This man had been in her position many, many times. That much was clear. Yet something stayed her hand.

Maybe it was the long forgotten feeling of sympathy twisting its way up her chest. Maybe it was just pity. Either way, Vi stepped back, away from her execution, and dodged a bullet.

Vi reeled back in surprise, then activated her shimmer suit and started to run for the stairwell.

“Vi! That gunship’s back off the ground. They’re coming in for a strafing run!”

“Copy, thanks Vic.”

“Where have you been? I’ve been trying to raise you for almost a minute now.”

“Preoccupied Vic.”

“OoOokay. Our ride arrived, so I’ll get that gunship for you. Properly, this time.”

“Thaaank you, Vic.”

Vi made it to the stairwell and dropped flat. A moment later, an explosion rocked the building from Vic shooting down the gunship. A second explosion followed from the crash.

“A Carfiex missile solves everything. Get to the roof, I’ll pick you up.”

“Moving.”

Vi paused before she headed up the stairs and looked back down the hallway. There was a trail of blood leading to where she had been prepared to execute the soldier, just next to the elevator. It disappeared at the doors, along with any trace of the two bodies.

Vi considered for a moment, then made her way to the roof. Maybe she was the one becoming the liability.