Groaning, Mai cracked first one, then the other, eye open. Her head throbbed, mouth feeling like she’d been sucking on sand for her whole life. Nanites might work wonders in fixing her, but she’d lost a lot of blood. She was dehydrated and needed to get as much water as she could into her system.

And yet, I’m still going to have to fight my way through gods know how many other ambushers. Scrubbing her face with her hands, ignoring the metallic stench and the way that the ambusher’s blood coating her hand stuck to her skin, she tried to bring some semblance of focus to her life.

“First things first,” she whispered to herself, “get to the base.”

It made the task ahead seem simpler if she viewed it in those terms. All she had to do was get to the base and her friends. Then she could try and find out why there was a bounty on her head. And then try to work out what it was that made her so different that the those she considered different would want her dead. And she also needed to know why those she thought were different were different. Or if they actually were different and it wasn’t a figment of her imagination.

Shaking her head, she realised she’d got ahead of herself. One step at a time. Get to the base.

Running her hands over the dead ambushers, she searched them for anything useful. Typically, there was nothing much except for a couple of protein bars and their gang badges. She took it all. Checking her bio-mass, she saw she was at sixty-three per cent.

Healing must have really eaten into my bio-mass! Wish I hadn’t left my bio-mass boost behind.

Then again, she hadn’t had much choice. The Rebel Council had decreed that the bottles weren’t to be taken out of the base unless on missions, and her personal quest to find out what was going on hadn’t qualified. She was also keeping her side quest secret, so telling them what she was up to wouldn’t have worked either. The guards had been gentle in their search, but it had been made very clear that trying to sneak a bottle through the gate was not going to happen.

There were three bars, each giving a range of between three and five per cent. It wasn’t much, but beggars couldn’t be choosers. Eating as quickly as possible, she silently moved through the apartment, trying to find the dining room. Her bars boosted her bio-mass to seventy-five per cent.

Smiling as she stepped through into a small room only large enough to see two people, she spotted a nanite-oven.

Water and a better meal coming up, she thought smugly. Looking at the menu, she chose a cold soup, packed with extra protein to give her a maximum boost of fifteen per cent, and a minimum of ten. It also meant that the smell of cooking wouldn’t reach the noses of any ambushers close by.

Mai also had the machine create two litres of water. It would mean she’d be bursting for the toilet within the hour, but that was a small price to pay to get rid of the headache and nausea she kept feeling.

The oven pinged as it finished preparing the meal, and her breath caught in her throat, ears straining for any warning that the sound had been picked up by the ambushers in the other buildings.

Releasing her breath with a slow sigh, she picked up the bowl and drank directly from it, not bothering to use a spoon. It was an old recipe, a soup called Gazpacho. Packed with avocado and high-protein lichen, it was somewhat gloopy, but she forced the rebel thought of mouthfuls of mucus to the back of her mind and forced it down.

Finishing the soup, covering a belch with a hand, she checked her bio-mass. Eighty-seven per cent. More than enough to get her through what was to come.

Bringing up her weapons menu, she created a couple of flash-bang grenades. Each of them cost one and a half per cent. She went with more explosive grenades, at three per cent each. Total cost was nine per cent, dropping her back to seventy-eight per cent.

Even thinking of eating another meal made her nauseous, the soup and water sitting heavy in her stomach.

Feels like I’ve eaten a damned rock, she thought as she loosened her belt, sighing in satisfaction as the pressure on her stomach lessened. Can’t afford to risk eating more anyway, someone’s bound to notice that I’ve killed four of their friends at some point.

That caused her pause for though. Although the ambushers were working in pairs, they hadn’t seemed that co-ordinated. It was almost as if they were separate teams working towards a common cause, rather than one team acting as a whole.

Which could mean that they aren’t even going to check on each other. If no-one gives a warning that I’m here, then no-one else is speaking, unless it’s with the people they’re closely allied with.

And that gave her an advantage. Still, once she tossed the first grenade, all hell was going to break loose.

Brainwave.

Opening her menu again, she chose a long spool of thin wire. Dropping her down to seventy-seven per cent. As quickly as she could, she moved back through the houses to the entrance to the street.

Creating another flash-bang, she tied it firmly to a drainpipe, then looped the end of the wire through its pin, making sure that the spoon would be free to fly. Then, playing the line out as she went, she carefully made her way back through the buildings, making sure to keep the line free of any snags.

Opening a window, she climbed out of the last building she’d been in and dropping into the alley way between it and the next. Forming an SMG, with extended magazine, she wrapped the line around her wrist with a couple of quick loops, took a breath to steady her nerves, activated STEALTH, SPOT HIDDEN, URBAN CAMOUFLAGE, and SNEAK.

Ambushed becomes ambusher, she thought with a grin as she yanked on the line. There was a pause, so long to her adrenalin-filled body that she thought the flash-bang must have been a dud, and then it detonated.

The explosion was massive, a blast of sound which echoed off the densely packed buildings, and a flash of light which threw a harsh glare, like a lighting blast.

Cries of alarm rang out as the ambushers reacted. Doors were thrown open as some of the more impetuous charged off towards the source of the noise. Voices in the building next to her called out to each other and she used them to mark her minimap.

Footsteps sounded in the next building, moving past and behind her. Turning, she spotted a door. Laying her sights on it, she waited for it open. Whoever was making the noise was impatient. The door crashed open as they charged through it, stepping right into the line of her under-barrel laser sight.

CRITICAL HIT! 90%

BLEED @10% PER SECOND

KILL!

“Fuck! Jimmy’s down!” screeched a woman as she barrelled out of the door close on the heels of Jimmy. Only the fact that she tripped over her friend’s body saved her as Mai’s next burst zipped through the air above her head.

Cursing, Mai dropped her aim, laying the laser directly onto the shocked woman’s face.

HEADSHOT!

INSTAKILL!

Weapon raised, Mai moved swiftly up to the door, primed a flash-bang, and lobbed it through into the building beyond, squeezing her eyes shut.

HIT!

BLINDED

STUNNED

DEAFENED

HIT!

BLINDED

STUNNED

DEAFENED

HIT!

BLINDED

STUNNED

DEAFENED

HIT!

BLINDED

STUNNED

DEAFENED

PANIC

Four! At least four! Mai charged through the open door and into the chaos of a room filled with screaming opponents.

She activated her UNARMED COMBAT without a second though as she ploughed a kick into the stomach of a staggering woman.

HIT! 5%

WINDED!

Not letting the woman catch her balance, she ripped a burst from her SMG into her.

CRITICAL HIT! 50%

BLEED @5% PER SECOND

Leaving the woman to cope with her injuries, Mai spun, grabbed the hair of another ambusher, pulled him, placed the muzzle of her SMG against his head and fired.

HEADSHOT!

INSTAKILL!

“Someone’s in the room! They’re in the room!” screamed a ganger, the PANIC glyph hanging above his head. He fired blindly, sweeping the room with his combat shotgun. Mai dove to the floor, covering her head as he cut down one of his fellow ambushers. The others, including the wounded woman blazed away, bodies tumbling to the floor as they cut each other down.

Saved me a job, thought Mai ruefully as she pushed herself to her feet. The room was filled with the stench of death, rivalling that of the sewers. Shouts came from the street, drawing closer.

Popping her head up over the sill of a window, Mai counted at least another five ambushers headed her way.

Hope to gods that the noise has attracted the rebel guards. This close to the base they’ve got to come and investigate!

She fired over the sill, primed a grenade, and toss it into the street. Not waiting for it to detonate, she sprinted through the building, crashing through a door and into another alley way. A window was directly opposite her.

Firing, she activated FREE RUNNING and dove through the shattered window, rolling across the floor before coming to her knees.

“Oh shi …” an ambusher stood before her, mouth wide open, eyes bulging. Both moved at the same time, weapons raising.

DAMAGE! 5%

BLEED @1% PER SECOND

CRITICAL HIT! 2%

BLEED @12% PER SECOND

Wailing, the ambusher collapsed to the floor, clutching at their stomach as blood pumped through their fingers. Rising to her knees, Mai moved through into the next room.

Fuck! Shards of wall exploded into the air as a burst of gunfire narrowly missed her head. She dove forward, twisting in the air, bringing her laser sight to bear on another ambusher.

HIT! 1%

She’d barely clipped the woman. Landing on her side, Mai adjusted her aim. She didn’t have enough time to go for a body shot, so fired as soon as the laster landed on the woman’s knee.

HIT! 15%

STAGGERED

BLEED @7% PER SECOND

PANIC

Screaming, clutching at her shattered knee, shards of bone jutting between her fingers, the woman tumbled to the floor. As before, Mai didn’t bother finishing her off. All she wanted to do was keep moving before the rest of the ambushers could close in and finish off what she’d started.

Shots rang out in the street and Mai smiled as she heard shouts of alarm.

“Rebels! The rebels are here!”

Opening up a comm channel now that she knew the rebels were in range, Mai called out.

“Rebels, this is Mai. I’m trapped in a building three up from the start of the street. Be aware that there is a mixed affiliation of gangers. They’re all high-levels, not street soldiers, repeat not street soldiers.”

“Roger that boss,” Mai smiled at hearing Dakota’s voice. “Hold tight, we’re pushing them back now.”

“Confirmed. Good to hear you voice.”

Relief flooding through her body, Mai turned to see if she could learn anything from the ganger. Just in time she flinched as a shot rang out.

Without thinking she swept a burst of fire, raking the wounded ganger.

KILL!

Gods dammit! The next ganger is not going to die! And so as she waited for the rebels to rescue her, Mai set about planning her next move.