“Everyone’s in place,” confirmed Dakota.

“Good luck everyone. Smoke,” ordered Mai.

Smoke grenades sailed out from the windows to land in a completely different direction to that which her small squad would take. It immediately had the desired effect. Any Culler still alive started splitting their fire between the growing cloud of smoke, and those they’d already been shooting at.

This had the added benefit of allowing her people to spot any Cullers who might have been undetected thus far. Their counter-fire started to take its toll, adding more culls to the minimap.

“I bet the viewers are bloody loving this,” muttered Dakota over her and Mai’s private channel. “You’ve got a right little army going on here.”

“Can’t say I blame them,” Mai replied as she made a visual scan of the people assigned to her. “This has got to be the biggest battle of the Culling in history.”

“Go,” ordered Chan over the team’s main channel. Mai held up an open hand, clenched the fist, pointed to the supplies and opened her hand wide.

The rebels with her needed no further prompting, a couple of them were up and running even before she’d finished her visual command.

No one spoke, they ran in utter silence, weapons up and ready to engage anyone who tried to stop them. Hurdling the bodies of dead Culler, they made it at least thirty paces before their opponents realised what was happening and started to engage them.

“Shit! These suits are amazing!” crowed one of the rebels as she took a stream of bullets which her suit just shrugged off.

“Chan, that’s coming from your allotted sector. Stop it please,” Mai started to zigzag, weaving unpredictably to throw off their enemies’ aim.

“On it already,” Chan’s voice was utterly calm. Mai reckoned that if he’d been hooked to a heart monitor that she wouldn’t even be able to tell he was in combat.

“Opening the first crate,” commed one of her team as she slid into the cover offered by the armoured crates. There wasn’t one which hadn’t been pitted by bullets or shrapnel. Bodies and bits of bodies littered the area.

“Keep low people,” warned Jock as Cullers directly opposite and higher than them tried to drop rounds over the crates hiding them.

“Don’t need to be told twice,” laughed Mai as she popped the seal on a crate and started to stuff bottles into her backpack.

“How many bottles do these crates hold?” asked another rebel who was too busy shooting at an enemy Culler to actually check for themselves.

“One hundred per crate,” replied another.

“Our bags can take ten each. Maybe twenty if you’re willing to crack your helmet visor and take a big drink,” Mai continued snatching out bottles.

“Fuck that,” Jock chuckled. “I’m just going to take the whole thing!”

Before Mai could say anything, the big man grabbed hold of the carrying handles on either side of the crate he was beside, grunted, and then lifted it.

“Everyone, give Jock cover!” Mai commed over the team channel.

She and the others popped up, spraying bullets in the direction of every Culler that had been spotted. It was an impressive weight of firepower and SUPPRESSION notifications popped on her retinal monitor as she raked her fire across an enemy position.

“Go, Jock!”

“Oh, don’t worry, I’m bloody going!” he started off as fast as the suit would let him run. It was quicker than if he had been out of the suit but considering the amount of fire that he was attracting it still wasn’t fast enough.

“Shields! Two of you shelter him with shields,” Mai popped up and blasted a grenade in the direction of a particularly annoying Culler.

CRITICAL HIT! 58%

BLEED @3% PER SECOND

STUNNED!

SUPPRESSED!

Three rebels ran over to Jock, forming shields on the run. It was her fault; she should have specified two people to go.

An explosion rocked her, the shockwave throwing her forward.

“Fuck! I’m hit! I’m hit!”

It was one of the shield bearers. She was down, both legs gone, a pool of blood growing far quicker than Mai would have liked.

“Kick in your healing!” Mia ordered over the comms channel.

“I can’t,” moaned the woman. “I used up the last of my bio-mass making the fucking shield.”

“Stay low, we’ll try and get to you,” ordered Mai. She looked beyond the wounded rebel to see that Jock and the other two shield bearers had made it to the safety of Chan’s position.

The weight of incoming fire was increasing, and the sound of it had changed. The weapons firing were of a heavier calibre.

“We’ve got a new group,” Dakota’s grim voice came over the radio. “They’re Imperials! And they’ve got suits I’ve not seen before.”

“Numbers?” Mai’s brain raced as she looked at the people with her and over towards the wounded rebel. Imperials had never interfered in a Culling before that she was aware of. The only reason they would do so now would be because of the presence of the rebels. She hadn’t once thought that might happen.

“Can’t really tell. Twenty at least. Gods look at the minimap.”

Cull markers were popping up rapidly. Whoever the new Cullers were, they were well armed and good at what they did.

Too good, dammit, she thought as she looked at the rapidly appearing kill markers.

More and more incoming fire blasted at the supply crates. It came from an angle that forced them to shift their position, moving away from the wounded rebel.

“Shields, let’s try to get Melissa before we’re cut off.”

Mai formed her own shield, looked at her people, trying to make sure that they were committed to rescuing their friend. The enemy fire was so heavy that it seemed there was no break in the sound. Just a solid, continuous ripping.

“Fuck me, they’ve got bio-mass to waste,” whispered one of the rebels.

“Move,” Mai surged to her feet and sprinted towards Melissa, shield up. Enemy bullets hammered into the shield, the force of them causing her to stumble.

HIT! SHIELD DEPLETION - SHIELD STRENGTH 65

HIT! SHIELD DEPLETION - SHIELD STRENGTH 60

HIT! SHIELD DEPLETION - SHIELD STRENGTH 55

HIT! SHIELD DEPLETION - SHIELD STRENGTH 45

“Back! Get back!” Mai skidded to a halt, mere paces away from Melissa then scrambled to get back into cover.

“Mel, we can’t get to you, I’m going to throw a bio-mass boost bottle over. Try to use it.”

There was a blast, the heavy crates thrown on the other side of the resupply point up into the air as if they were as light as confetti. Bottles and bio-mass booster liquid rained down upon them.

“What the hells was that!” screeched one of the rebels.

“Trying to see where that came from. Gods, you need to leave. Leave now!” Chan’s panicked voice ordered.

“We need to get Melissa!” snapped Mai.

“You can’t. Get out! Get out! Get out!” Screamed Chan. “We’re sending smoke!”

Another blast rocked the pile of supplies, the force knocking Mai and her people to the ground even though they were sheltered by other crates.

Smoke grenades exploded into life, spilling their electronic countermeasures, visual scramblers and all manner of other blinding components into the air.

“Move, run through the smoke now, Mai,” ordered Dakota. “We can’t fight this.”

Her voice was much calmer than Chan’s, but Mai realised this was only because she was managing to keep her panic under a tighter rein.

“Mel, here’s the bottle. Use it, try to get to us as soon as you’re healed,” Mai lobbed the bottle over to Mel. She caught it, but Mai could tell she was weakening.

“Run, Mai. You can’t fight this,” Mel waved an arm, trying to urge them on.

Another blast, and yet more crates were shattered.

“Moving,” Mai patted the shoulders of the rebels next to her and they charged as one into the supposed safety of the smoke.

*

“You left Melissa. We never leave our people behind!” screamed Anna as Mai, Dakota and Chan stood before her in the command centre.

“What was I supposed to do, kill her?” asked Mai.

“Yes! Yes! Yes!” Anna screeched, apoplectic with rage. “You never leave anyone behind because they can give our position away!”

Mai rocked back on her heels, looking over at Chan for confirmation.

“Seriously, you kill your own people?”

Chan’s head gave a jerky nod before looking away.

Unbelievable, Mai could never imagine doing that to someone she knew.

“Why the fuck didn’t anyone tell me?” She snapped.

“Maybe she got away,” Dakota interrupted before Anna could start screaming at them again.

“Maybe she got away,” mimicked Anna in a sing-song tone. “How fucking stupid are you? They had a battle suit three times the size of anything we’ve got the ability to build. You seriously reckon she was able to use the bio-mass boost and then run away?”

“There’s the chance that she was caught,” Mai grudgingly agreed. “But yes, there’s also a chance she was able to heal herself and get away whilst the enemy was busy going after us.”

“Just how many times were you dropped on your head as a child?” sneered Anna. Her large finger stabbed into Mai’s chest. “You’ve endangered the whole base. Again.”

Silence descended. There wasn’t much Mai could say to that. Yes, they’d managed to secure well over two hundred bottles of bio-mass boost, but she had also opened the base up to discovery.

“You’re a traitor,” Anna’s finger poked into Mai’s chest again. “Kill her.”

Anna looked over at a rebel who was supposed to be working on a computer, but who was sitting open-mouthed as he watched the drama unfolding before him.

“What?” he choked out. His eyes danced between Mai and Anna.

“Kill her”, Anna repeated slowly. “She’s a fucking traitor. Are you deaf?”

He sat in dumbfounded silence. Mai’s stomach flipped as she realised she’d finally pushed Anna too far.

“No,” whispered the rebel, looking away.

“You! Kill her!” Anna ordered another rebel.

The rebel slowly stood, pushing herself away from her comm position, then walked out of the room.

“Mutiny! You’ve put this base in danger and you’re causing my people to mutiny! Spy! Traitor!”

Knives suddenly sprang out of Anna’s forearms as she cocked her wrist downward. In a flash she was lunging at Mai.

Without thinking Mai changed her hands into a gladius and small shield, their weapons meeting with a clash, sparks flying as the blades slid down each other.

SWORD FIGHTING, DIRTY BOXING, UNARMED COMBAT, ENDURE PAIN, KNIFE FIGHTING, PUGILIST, SEWER COMBAT, and TUNNEL FIGHTER were activated in the blink of an eye, covering Anna with various hit boxes, and critical hit chances. She couldn’t differentiate between them, and didn't want to. Didn’t have time to.

Twisting, Mai forced Anna’s hands down and away from her. It gave her an opening, so she threw an elbow into the vat-born’s face, putting everything she had behind it.

HIT! 7%

Anna went with the blow, spinning and freeing up her blades for another double attack, forcing Mai backward. She parried a cut-slash-thrust-cut combination, hands seeming to move through their own volition.

“Mai!” shouted Dakota, weapons forming.

“No!” gasped Mai. “Stay out of this.”

The distraction nearly proved fatal as she failed to block a nasty upward swing. Throwing herself backward she avoided the tip of the blade by a hair’s breadth.

Anna pressed home her advantage, arms blurring as she tried a double stab.

Without thought Mai blocked the blade headed for her heart and allowed the one aimed at her stomach to hit home. It was a move called “The Blade Sinks Home”. A sacrificial move designed to open up the enemy to a fatal counter-attack even as they thought victory was theirs.

Mai would never have considered such a thing if she hadn’t been able to heal herself. As it was the shock of feeling the blade enter her was almost overwhelming.

DAMAGE! 68%

CRITICAL HIT!

BLEEDING @5% PER SECOND

“Die, you fucking traitor,” hissed Anna, her rank breath washing over Mai’s face as the vat-born leaned in until they were nose-to-nose.

“Not, this, time,” snarled Mai through bloodied teeth. Her shield arm changed back into a hand grabbing hold of Anna’s top-knot and twisting, exposing her neck.

Anna’s eyes widened in anticipation of what was to come, fear replacing her victorious smile, only to be replaced by shock as Mai’s gladius punched into the side of her neck.

Blade spearing Anna’s throat, Mai twisted it then cut towards herself. Blood showered over her face as her blade severed Anna’s windpipe.

INSTA KILL

CONTESTANT 200000 ELIMINATED