Sky over Caldari Prime
23:15-00:25 1-7/1-8 YC115
He was a meteor. A streak of light bursting through an atmosphere, utterly tranquil to the billions of inhabitants below but buffeting and scorching at him high above. His helmet blacked out to protect his eyes from the brilliant flare of the air superheated into a haze of flames around him. His dropsuit's shields were protecting him valiantly, but he knew that even the slightest variation from his current trajectory could cause the shields to overload and he would burn to a cinder miles above the planet surface. His mind drifted back to Shalee. Always Shalee.
"Target update." Leela's voice chimed in his ears.
"Go ahead."
"Target is located second floor from the top, illuminating on your HUD."
"Thank you." He replied, even though his target was still at least a thousand kilometers away.
He was about to enter the night side of the planet, the terminator still visible ahead, a hazy line between dark and light, with the darkness approaching. He slipped into the planet's shadow, the ground becoming closer, the planet filling the entirety of his view. Below him, he was greeted by the sight of millions of specks of light on a blanket of deep sable. The air around him was a cacophany, but still, he held on course. The lights grew closer, and with it, the ground.
He saw he was nearing the last couple hundred kilometers. His speed was decreasing, and with it, his lateral angle. His trajectory was parabolic, and soon, he would begin to descend much more rapidly. He could already see the spaces between lights growing. The edge of the Capitol city was nearing ahead.
One hundred kilometers to go. His speed began to decrease much more rapidly, the air thicker at these lower altitudes. He could see the tops of buildings below him. 30 km. 20 km. 10 km.
He prepped himself. He would pass by a tall skyscraper approximately 300 meters before his target. At that point, he must be ready to react without thought. This was going to be very razor edge.
He saw the skyscraper ahead, and 300m past it, his target. As the skyscraper passed, he flipped over and fired a device from each arm, one into the skyscraper behind, and one into the target building. Between the two stretched a cable, which he quickly looped an ultra-strong piece of nanofilament with handles. He had just created a zipline while moving over 100km/h. He fired his thrusters to quickly shed speed while acquiring his target on his HUD. What happened next took less than three seconds.
Hilen Ashenokka was standing in his parlor, enjoying a drink, watching a newsfeed on the wall. His penthouse apartment was a large and opulent one. One of the major features was his parlor, which sported windows floor to ceiling on three sides. He enjoyed the view of the capitol city's skyline from two thousand feet up. He never thought they would be his demise. As he turned, drink in hand, to look out on the night skyline, his death came crashing through the glass at high speed.
Ryven rolled to brake his momentum and shot out his arm to grab hold of Ashenokka's throat. Without missing a beat, he took five rapid strides at full sprint and dove out the opposite window, tossing Ashenokka as he went hurtling out into the night, two thousand feet above the crowded sleepless streets, shards of glass falling along with him, Ashenokka screaming, arms flailing. Ryven wasted no time, spinning to fire a second zipline.
This one deposited him ten blocks away in a crowded city street. He keyed up his ex-fil comms circuit.
"So far so good. I need an exit, currently set for plan A." He spoke tersely.
"Copy. Ex-fil inbound to point alfa. ETA ten minutes."
He sprinted down the crowded thoroughfare, knowing he would be pursued at any moment. A man running down the street in a combat dropsuit draws attention, and not the kind Ryven needed. Still, this was expected. Which is why he managed to dodge the first few gunshots fired by pursuing police drones. His dropsuit armor would protect him from the majority of small arms fire, but incendiary rounds or armor piercing ones would put a damper in his survival plans for sure. His best defense was speed.
He ran as though the devil pursued him, pushing aside civilians, leaping over kiosks and personal vehicles. Ahead, he saw the flash of blue lights, and he knew a roadblock had been set up for him. He swore. He had hoped to limit casualties as much as possible. He sighed and drew out a pair of sub machine guns he had stowed in his suit's weapons holds. He jumped, using his suit's muscle amplification and minute jump thruster maneuvering to evade the security forces' opening salvos, his HUD placing reticles on each of the men. He fired bursts at each of them, watching as they flickered out. He felt the impacts of small arms fire on his suit, and he thanked God they weren't armor piercing. He had promised Shalee he would come home from this, and damnit, he intended to.
An explosion knocked him off balance as he landed from his jump on the other side of the roadblock. A Caldari main battle tank stood a hundred meters off, smoke trailing from the barrel of its rail gun turret. Ryven rolled to dampen the blast, his sensors flaring from the superheated and ionized air.
"Damn. That shit showed up fast." He bounded toward the tank, zigging and zagging, using vehicles as cover. He prepped a satchel charge, one of three he had stowed in his suit's backpack. Running as fast as his suit would allow, he charged the tank, closing the last fifty meters in mere seconds. The tank's gun fired, but he slid on his back, the 155mm round skimming a mere inches from his helmet's visor as he ducked under it. He placed the charge as he slid past the tank's left side and leapt to his feet, running down the street away from the blast that demolished the Caldari armor.
He had five minutes to make it to extraction a mere eight blocks away. He had chosen this spot because it was a cliff that overlooked a subterranean section of the city.
He closed the distance as quickly as he could, knowing he was bound to encounter more resistance, and soon. He keyed his comms.
"1 klick from ex-fil point Alfa. Status of ex-fil?"
"En route, ETA three minutes."
"Roger, proceed. Extraction is green."
He could see the extraction point ahead. He was nearly free and clear. That's when he felt a searing pain in his back as the first large bore incendiary round burned through his dropsuit's armor and into his flesh, cauterizing, thankfully, but causing massive trauma in the surrounding tissue. The dropsuit responded by injecting biofoam and painkillers, along with nanites to control the damage. Still, the painkillers didn't do a damn thing for the initial trauma, and Ryven's vision flared into bright white. His instincts kicked in and he quickly spun and dropped, drawing his large caliber assault rifle. Two aerial intercept craft were approaching at high speed, firing their blasters. He felt another impact in his lower torso, and he buckled under the force, but still, he maintained his aim, opening fire on the lead intercept. His rounds were aimed at the pilot, and he was gratified by the craft's sudden loss of control. It careened into one of the many high-rise buildings along the busy street. He was thankful most of the civilian traffic had cleared out. These were his countrymen once, after all. They shared the same blood, even if he no longer followed their flag.
The second intercept jinked out of his line of fire, sending another wildly aimed shots his way. He knew the slender gunmetal blue craft, designed to resemble a mantis, would return shortly, and Ryven resumed his sprint to the extraction point. The dropsuit's damage control measures were helping, but he had lost a good deal of speed. His abdomen was stiff, and he could tell there was a monstrous amount of damage. He had to take care to limit any more incoming.
One hundred meters to go and that's when things got nasty. Five more intercept craft, two tanks, and a host of ground security forces were closing in. Fire was incoming from everywhere. He put on all the speed he could manage, a trickle of blood running from his lips, hidden behind his visor. He ran, though every fiber in his being was being torn apart by pain that had outstripped the ability of painkillers to control. His lungs ached. His vision tunneled into a black corridor, and all he could see was the approaching cliff. Everywhere projectiles careened and impacted the road and vehicles around him. The world seemed to move in slow motion, every step an eternity.
10 meters. Where's the damn dropship? Had they left him? Was he going to break his promise to Shalee and face capture, torture, and the failure of all his planning? The distance closed rapidly.
"Jump." A voice echoed in his headset.
Why not?
Ryven hurled himself over the edge of the cliff, city lights below, above, and all around him. Most importantly, though, was the dropship, tilted so its side doors were open to him as he dropped through.
Ryven screamed into his helmet's comms. "Get us the hell out of here, Zhou."
The voice of Zhou Liang chuckled to him over his helmet's comms. "Like I want to die here, either, man."
The dropship's nose pointed upward at a steep incline as the side door came closed. Ryven was thrown violently into the aft end of the craft as Zhou ignited the ship's rockets. The air around the ship exploded violently under the explosive force of thrusters that weren't meant to be used at such low altitudes, the atmosphere's denser oxygen ignited by it. The security forces within 100 meters were instantly vaporized, the tanks melting under the heat, the intercept craft thrown violently to the street, rendered useless. The dropship accelerated rapidly into the upper atmosphere, carrying them away from pursuit.
The last thing Ryven remembered seeing was the dwindling speck of Caldari Prime from the viewports of Zhou Liang's stealth bomber.
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