The drop pod screamed through the air. Whether it was intentional, Mai had no idea. She’d never seen a culler deploy and whilst she had watched a few hours of the Culling, she’d missed the start.

Now she was wishing she’d studied it hard and taken notes. The gee-forces the pod was putting her through made it feel as though a sumo wrestler was sitting on her chest.

Must be for show. Bet people are watching my reaction even now. Making bets.

In a brief lull she managed to lift her hand and give the middle finger salute to whoever might be watching. The odds were slim that someone was, considering the number of cullers still alive.

Can but hope someone finds me plucky enough to help out when I need it.

CULLER – PREPARE TO DEPLOY

There was a small screen just in front of her showing the pod’s progress through the city. It zipped between two massive stanchions keeping a pair of hab blocks apart, or helping one keep standings, she couldn’t quite tell. Then rolled to dive down a massive waste pipe, lined with centuries of detritus.

The pipe was long. At least three miles judging by the level numbers flashing past. Each level was given a specific number. First was the mile, for example 3, then the actual level 500.

Mai’s heart sank as they dropped out of the three mile and into the two.

“Ooooof!” the pod slammed to a halt, hovering in mid-air before dropping with a clang onto level 2387. The front lifted and her harness raised.

“Culler, please exit the pod. Refusal to do so will result in immediate Culling.”

She didn’t recognise the voice. It was cold, authoritative, and left nothing to the imagination as to whether it was bluffing. She couldn’t even tell if it was human.

Stepping out of the pod she climbed down the small set of steps at its bottom and onto the metal floor.

“Shit, shit, shit,” she muttered, not realising she’d spoken until her voice echoed back to her. “Where the fuck am I?”

The chamber she was in stretched at least fifty metres in each direction. At some point it had served an industrial purpose but seemed to have been abandoned a long time ago.

Miserly Minions, she thought as she interpreted the gang glyphs which had been scrawled on the floor and wall nearest to her. She hadn’t heard of them, but since they were two-milers she’d definitely proceed with caution, the further you dropped in the city, the more vicious the gangs got, their members having less and less to lose. There was a crack behind her. Jumping, she spun to see that the pod had resealed itself. Engines flaring into life it shot up into the sky.

Calling up a map of the city, Mai tried to work out where she was. She wasn’t going to blindly set off in a random direction hoping everything would work out. That was madness.

The map projected itself on to her retinal monitor, appearing as though it was on the floor. It made her head spin, so she changed the settings, changing it to a top-down map. As far as she could tell, she was in an old water reservoir. According to their training, cullers would be dropped in clusters and usually no more than five hundred metres apart.

That damned pod taking off probably let the whole damned world know where I was.

Every time a culler was killed, the location would be marked on the map. Technically there wasn’t a limit as to how far away a kill would be marked, but the further she zoomed out on the minimap, the less distinct the details would be until at some point, a kill marker would cover hundreds of paces. If a cull was above, then it would be a triangle point up. If below, it would point down. If it was on the same level, then it would be a dot. This would draw cullers in. Or help them avoid the trouble.

From what she’d seen, the prisoners and former soldiers would be the type to be drawn into the kill, keen to enter combat and reduce the numbers of cullers.

CULLERS – 294475, 397683, 989752, 329185, 098375,019382

HAVE BEEN CULLED

Shit, that was quick! Mai’s stomach flipped at the cold hard realisation that her fellow cullers were killing and dying, and she still didn’t know which direction she was going to take.

Trying to force her rising panic down so that it merely gibbered in the corner of her brain, she frowned as she studied the map. The kills were all on different levels.

“Not a battle then,” she said to herself. It was most likely that the cullers had bumped into each other, had a brief but violent struggle and either one or both of them had died.

Be sod’s bloody law that I kill an opponent only for them to cause so much damage to me that I die as well.

She laughed at the thought, surprising herself. Things couldn’t be that bad if she was laughing.

“Oh goody. Glad we get to meet again.”

Mai shrieked with surprise as Smith stepped out of the shadows, Culling knife in one hand, nano-blade projecting from the other. Her jaw dropped open in shock. She’d not expected to come across another culler so soon. Even though she’d seen notifications of kills it hadn’t sunk in as to how close she might be to another culler. She should have tried to see where the actual kills took place compared to her location. Dumb, just dumb. “Shall we?”

Mai was confused as to why Smith hadn’t just shot her from the shadows. Still, she wasn’t going to waste any time asking her. She quick-blinked a shotgun and tried to form it.

WARNING – BIO-MASS NANITES INSUFFICIENT

Smith laughed at Mai’s obvious confusion. “The bastards have dropped our BIO-MASS to zero, remember? We needed to find BIO-BOOST to get our nanites up and running.”

Mai shuddered as the other culler licked her lips. Clicking back up through the list she selected a rapier. It was a long, thin blade with good reach.

WARNING – BIO-MASS NANITES INSUFFICIENT

Shit. Shit. Realization crashed in on her as she finally understood she couldn’t even get a stupid sword to form let alone anything else. Wait a second. How did Smith form her hand knife then? She stared intently at Smith as she tried to process what this meant. Time had seemed to slow as all these thoughts went through her mind. That was when her memory kicked in, and she finally remembered she had her culling knife. A sword would have been a perfect weapon to pair with her knife, but when life gives you noodles, make soup.

“Bring it,” Mai rasped, knees as weak as jelly, breath coming in short pants.

Smith did just that. Mai barely had time to activate her KNIFE FIGHTING skill. Their blades clashed as she parried Smith’s thrust while avoiding her knife hand. She tried activating her SWORD FIGHTING SKILL as well, to try and trap Smith’s blade.

Smith twisted, easily avoiding Mai’s attempt, and countered with a stab. Spinning, Mai avoided having her stomach punctured, and created enough space for her culling blade to come over and back at Smith’s face.

“Shit!” screeched the other woman as Mai’s blade scored a red line across her forehead.

HIT! 5% DAMAGE

BLEED @2% PER SECOND

BLINDED

Blood poured down Smith’s face from the gash on her forehead, the blood blinding her.

The smallest amount of black filled Smith’s health bar. More satisfying though was the appearance of the status effect glyphs over her head. Especially the BLINDED one, a closed eye.

Mai didn’t waste any time. Activating STREET FIGHTING she targeted Smith’s solar plexus and she stamped forward into a thrust. Smith gasped as the tip of Mai’s blade entered her body near where her heart should be, then sighed as the rest of the blade sank through.

There was a brief moment of resistance as the tip of the blade grated along Smith’s ribs and then it was sunk completely in, having stopped when Mai’s hand encountered Smith’s chest. They stood transfixed.

HIT! 94%

BLEED @35% PER SECOND

Mai watched as blood flowed from Smith’s mouth. The woman tried to speak, but only succeeded in burping up more blood. She gave a slight shiver, eyes widening as if she was surprised, and then collapsed to her knees.

“Can’t … heal,” Smith choked out, which explained the look of surprise.

Moving backward, Mai pulled her blade from the culler’s body, ignoring the announcement of Smith’s death.

KILL!

CULLER 0003485 ELIMINATED

Does it ever truly get easier? She thought as she stared at Smith’s body for a few seconds longer before kneeling down and taking the woman’s Culling knife. She quickly searched her body trying to find if there was any BIO-BOOST left to be had. She knew it was a long shot, but she had to try. Nothing. Not even a wrapper, if they had wrappers.

And then the significance of Smith’s Culling announcement hit home. Opening her minimap she saw the kill marker right over the green arrow marking her position.

Shit! Someone could be on their way right now!

Mai cast around for a quick way out of the chamber. There was a ladder set into the wall a few metres away. Activating her CLIMB skill she sprinted over to it and started to ascend.

***

Reaching the top of the ladder she found herself in a communal area. Looking about her, she spotted a good corner to take cover in for a while. She needed to get her bearings, get her head straight and see what was close. It took her a few seconds to locate the legend for the mini-map.

As she studied the map, a flag just over three hundred paces away, and roughly two levels down waved in a non-existent wind.

This must be Capture The Flag. All I have to do is grab it, then follow the guideline to where I need to leave it. Simple. She gave a dry chuckle at that. It didn’t last long. Three hundred paces, two levels. That’s literally just over three hundred of my normal steps. Do that, and I get BIO-BOOST.

Tracing a finger over the map on her retinal monitor – which appeared as though it was hanging in the air a few hands in front of her, she worked out a plan. Looking at the kill markers, she could tell none of them were that close. The issue was if anyone was near to where she had killed Smith, and if they would search for Smith’s killer.

Doesn’t mean that there aren’t any bloody cullers nearby, just that they’re not busy killing each other, she thought, reminding herself to not get too complacent.

It took a lot of willpower to push herself back up on her feet again. And even more to take the first step. She knew she needed to move quickly in order to beat other cullers to the flag, but at the same time knowing that she was heading towards a spot where she was more likely to meet cullers absolutely terrified her.

Fucking with my mind, she thought. They’re fucking with my mind. Who they were she wasn’t too sure about, but she hated the thought that someone was playing with her mind in such a cruel way.

Over half-an-hour later Mai crept into a pool of shadow. The flag she was hoping to capture was just over twenty paces away in the middle of a small square which measured forty paces across. Standing in one entrance, she could see one directly opposite her, and her retinal monitor showed her that there was a door in each of the other walls as well.

She activated her STREET SMARTS. At sixty-five per cent skill, she would have one minute five seconds before it entered a cool down lasting one hundred and thirty-five seconds. Content to sit in the shadow of the entrance, she took a few seconds to get a better feel for the square. Everything seemed fine to her. There was nothing that stood out, although her gut was doing somersaults at the thought of entering the square.

Moving forward slightly, she lowered herself to the floor, using the new angle to see how far up the walls stretched.

“I’m in a fucking well,” she sighed as she saw the walls stretching away higher than she could see. Small windows overlooked the square, but the higher ones wouldn’t be able to give a sniper a line of sight to the flag. “First three floors only. I’m up, they see me, I’m down.”

That was one lesson which had well and truly stuck from training. It had been part of their counter-sniper training. Snipers have a narrow field of view when they’re using their scopes, especially if they were using non-nanite weapons. Which meant if she moved it would take them a second or two before they spotted her, another second to react to seeing her, and another second for them to fire. Three seconds. By which she would be down on the floor, rolling to another position and then repeating the whole process.

Thirty seconds had passed and still her active STREET SMARTS hadn’t shown anything. It didn’t mean that there wasn’t anything there. Her skill was only at Rank 3, so there was still a very good chance that she wouldn’t be able to spot anything.

“Fuck it. Fuck, fuck, fuck.”

She activated FREE RUNNING, it would last for one minute twenty-five seconds. Scanning the square, she ran her eyes over the benches and flower planters dotted around it. Every time she moved her eyes, a new line was plotted. She blink-clicked on the flag as her first waypoint, then the door in the left wall as the second. A guideline appeared. She could be across the entire square in under five seconds.

Once she touched that flag however, she would be marked as a flag carrier on every culler’s retinal monitor. Her destination, the place she would need to plant the flag would also be marked.

Mai was up and running before she had a chance to second-guess herself. She sprinted into the square, jinking first to the left and then to the right. A planter gave her both cover and concealment. Cover would stop bullets, concealment would hide her from any enemies.

She wasn’t going to give anyone waiting for her a second chance. A chill raised goose bumps on her skin as she ran through the flag.

CAPTURE THE FLAG – TAKE IT TO THE POINT MARKED

DO YOU ACCEPT YES/NO?

The guideline popped up on to her retinal monitor and she gasped as she saw she needed to cover five hundred paces through what looked like a communal park.

Lots of open spaces covered by shrubs and trees dammit!

No shots rang out as she made her way out of the square, bouncing off a wall to keep her momentum going, making the most of her FREERUNNING before it entered cool down.

***

No point in being sneaky, she thought as she entered the park. At least it had been uneventful getting here, despite her mind screaming that something would happen any moment. Its ceiling was an animated scene of Buddha’s Court, and was at least five hundred paces above her. Trees covered the open space of the park, which in itself was at last one thousand paces in length.

Fountains threw water high into the air, and various animals walked or flew through the open space.

Her destination was clearly marked, the flag point waving in what looked like a small auditorium. Strange tall blocks threw shadows in different directions and there was no way she could check all of them without exposing herself to someone hiding behind them.

Heart in her mouth, she used her FREERUNNING’s passive buff to help plot a potential route. She added STREETSMARTS. Passive it hadn’t given her any sign, nor did she get anything once it had been activated.

Nothing for it, she thought. The longer I sit here with this bloody flag hanging above my head, the bigger the chance some bastard is going to come and kill me.

And with that she was up and running. Taking as direct an approach as she could, she still managed to randomise her direction. She zigged and zagged. Flipped over planters, benches, and bushes. Tucked and rolled. Did everything she could to make it as hard as possible to target her.

With one final flip, tuck, and roll, she crossed over the flag marker, ending up in deep shadow, using one of the standing stones to cover her. A chime sounded and a chill like last time washed over her.

FLAG CAPTURED

REWARD – 1 BOTTLE OF BIO-BOOST

DO YOU ACCEPT YES/NO?

“Fuck yes,” she snarled, stabbing the YES.