The barrel of the enemy bulwark's rifle lowers in slow motion. Death sense has given me a mere handful of seconds to react to the threat. But a handful of seconds is all I need.

To summon my own bulwark.

My deployment ring erupts into flames as a chassis of flash forged metal bursts into existence from thin air, closing around my body and encasing it completely. That's one second spent. My sight is completely blocked thanks to the sealed helmet of the bulwark, but half a second later, the bulwark's heads up display activates, restoring my ability to see and helpfully telling me through a feed on the left side of the holographic screen that the machine's automated systems are functioning within their factory parameters.

All well and good. But far from enough.

I take another half second to summon the true power buried beneath my skin, allowing me to sink my claws deep into the bulwark, far deeper than what a pilot is supposed to be able to access. And once I reach the bulwark's core programming, I dig even deeper, right into the bedrock of divine energy that allows the machine to even exist. My metaphorical hand reaches out in frenzied urgency, grabbing at one of the pillars that form the bulwark's foundation.

AGILITY - D

Seizing hold of it, and crushing it completely.

AGILITY - D

And replacing it with something more suitable for my needs.

AGILITY - EX

That is the true power of an Operative. To impose our will over this world as we see fit. Even in defiance of the laws set by the gods. My blood heats up and I feel a portion of the serum within my body burning away, having been expended to perform this minor miracle. Only one second left. My armored hand tightens its grip on the collar of Jasvinder's shirt. Our chat had been rudely interrupted. But that doesn't mean I can't bring this meeting to its desired conclusion. The bulwark's servos whine as I lift Jasvinder up by his shirt.

"Don, sto -" the traitor shouts.

And before Jasvinder can say another word, I pitch him straight towards the window of the nurse's office.

Just as the enemy Operative opens fire with his rifle.

I immediately drop to the ground in a single smooth motion as the window shatters inwards from the attack, my enhanced dexterity more than a match for mere bullets. But as Jasvinder's body flies towards the incoming barrage, his face shifts into a determined look, with the eyes blazing with determination. Jasvinder clenches his fist, and his deployment ring surges with unleashed power, and a Stormer class bulwark, the exact same type used by the attacker, is flash forged into existence within the span of an eye blink.

Right in time to absorb the brunt of the rifle fire.

Sparks fly as the gunshots tear into Jasvinder's armored back. But to his credit, the man does not panic. With experience born from fighting in the War of the Fallen, Jasvinder fires his bulwark's jets and performs a quick roll, facing his opponent. At the same time, ablative slats spawn across the structure of the traitor's Stormer and Jasvinder shifts his body subtly to ensure the slats catch the bulk of the gunfire being thrown at him.

Bulwarks are not built to be equal. The machines equipping the Valkyries are far superior to what an Auxilia has the ability to pilot. But the same rule also applies to bulwarks within the same class. Command had always made distinctions between various grades of pilots. And that rule applied in full force today. Jasvinder might have originally been a conscript, but he was deemed competent enough to rise through the ranks and his bulwark reflected it. He was no longer regarded as expendable as the rest of us knuckle draggers. The ablative armor was an upgrade installed just for officers of Jasvinder's grade or elite Auxilia to help them survive and keep fighting that much longer.

The assassin nevertheless stands his ground when faced by this development and keeps blasting away at Jasvinder with the rifle. An unrelenting wave of lead is vomited in Jasvinder's direction and pieces of the ablative slats begin to be sheered away from the ballistic impacts. The traitor clears the broken window of the nurse's office and his bulwark is sent into a corkscrew motion, allowing it to block the rifle fire with a set of relatively undamaged slats.

Jasvinder's a good pilot, I'll give him that. Though I suspect part of it was thanks to the advanced training he was sent to attend just before his promotion. Nevertheless, if we kept our respective bulwarks at their default settings, Jasvinder would school me hard, no ifs or buts. That was how much of an advantage Jasvinder had over me. It wasn't that he could perform spins and rolls better than I could, though this fact was certainly also part of the equation, but Jasvinder had been taught how to do things with his bulwark that pilots who merely completed the basic training would be totally clueless about.

Things like advanced management of the bulwark's divine energy reserves. And how to manipulate the machine's default settings.

The flame from the jets of Jasvinder's bulwark shift color from a warm orange to an icy cold blue hue as he begins pumping additional power into that system. Most conscripts would not bother to do this, leaving power management up to the bulwark's systems to manage, but this tactic is part of every hardcore pilot's toolbox of tricks. And for good reason. By overclocking specific systems in this manner, the pilot can briefly break through the bulwark's limits, 'naturally' raising a stat to accomplish maneuvers not otherwise possible.

With a sudden burst of speed, Jasvinder rockets straight towards the assassin, a sword appearing from the ether and dropping into his hands. Jasvinder's Stormer screams towards its target as he draws the sword back, ready to bisect the enemy with a single stroke. Textbook charge against an opponent who prefers fighting at range, full marks.

Also completely pointless.

The assassin casually drifts backwards on his own jets, causing Jasvinder's charge to miss by a figurative mile. The traitor slams the air brakes and attempts to course correct, but the assassin leisurely darts around to the side, firing the rifle all the while. Jasvinder is forced to break off his attack and go back to blocking gunfire with his slat armor or risk being shot down.

There's a reason why I never bothered to get actually skilled at the whole piloting business. An Operative's powers makes vanilla tricks like what Jasvinder is using irrelevant. Our ability to directly hack the machine and manually set stats makes power management pointless. And since we can force our bulwarks to fight far above their 'real' capabilities, textbook strategies simply won't work against us. Something that Jasvinder is finding out right now.

The assassin has settled into a comfortable routine of circle strafing Jasvinder as he flails about, blasting away while Jas alternates between blocking the shots and making abortive attack runs. Already, the traitor's Stormer has lost the bulk of its additional armor and several ugly holes have been punched throughout the bulwark's frame. Sparks and smoke occasionally emerge from the gaping wounds as Jasvinder's attacks grow increasingly desperate. But as I had observed before, its pointless. He can't move fast enough to close distance between himself and the assassin. The enemy Operative will just plink away at Jasvinder until his bulwark goes down in flames. I toggle on my bulwark's communicator and fire a message off to Jasvinder.

"Just let Sheryl out." I taunt, "She's the only way you're surviving this."

No response. So be it. That old man must be in a hurry to die. As Jasvinder and the assassin dogfight over the school's parade ground, screams of panic begin filling the air. The remaining teachers and students who had not left the premises yet begin their panicked flight from the area, trying to get as far away from the unexpected battle as possible.

I duck behind the wall and peek over the broken window, seeing a stream of students running straight for the main gate. But there are also small clumps of gawkers standing about, spectating the fight between Jas and the enemy Operative. The gawkers probably believe that they're safe because neither combatant has made a move against them yet. Idiots. If the enemy Operative decided to perform a harvest after this fight, those spectators would be first in line.

I take a look at Lisa's sleeping body on the bed and notice that other than being covered with broken bits of plaster thanks to the assassin's initial volley of gunfire, she is otherwise unharmed. But there's no guarantee how long that will continue. From the looks of things, Jasvinder is not going to last much longer. And once he unceremoniously explodes in midair, the enemy Operative's attention is going to return to me. I need to get going while the going is still good.

Dismissing my bulwark, I scoop Lisa up in my arms as the machine fades away into thin air. The safest way out of this room is through the corridor leading past the classrooms. While keeping the bulwark active is tempting, I might actually meet up with fleeing students once I step outside. And the bulwark would attract unwanted attention and questions that I am not keen on dealing with right now. With Lisa securely in my arms, I barge through the door and run down the corridor.

So far so good. The corridor is empty and I see the stairwell from where I am. Getting Lisa to safety shouldn't be a problem. Then a wail of sirens overwhelms the panicked cries of the teachers and students. Damn it. That can only mean one thing.

The Militia are here.

...........

Pilot Record

Name: Captain Jasvinder Krishnan

Service Branch: Auxilia

Affinity Level: D

Assigned Bulwark: T-50 Stormer-Kai

STRENGTH - D

STRUCTURAL INTEGRITY - D ©

DEXTERITY - E (D)

FIRE CONTROL - E

ENERGY RESERVE - D

Armament: 1 x Titanium-Diamond Sword

Attack Power: D Base chance to hit: D

2 x High Power Gravity Bomb

Attack Power: B (each) Base chance to hit: F

Additional Notes:

Stormer-Kai ablative armor - Raise Structural Integrity by one rank while active.

Advanced Piloting, Impulse Charge - Briefly raise Dexterity by one rank.

Skilled Pilot: Bonus to all actions taken.