The Dominion hunter charged. His boots hammered a frantic rhythm on the curved metal surface of the turbine. His rifle spat fire, a controlled three-round burst. The shots sparked off the floor around my feet, so close I could feel the heat. He wasn't trying for a kill shot; he was suppressing me, trying to pin me down while his squadmates rappelled to our position.
Anya, grimacing through a mask of pain, rolled onto her side. She grabbed the Phantom SR-90, the heavy rifle looking like an anchor in her hands. She fired from her hip, a wild, unaimed shot that was more sound and fury than precision. But the sheer power of the rifle round hitting the hunter in his armored chest was like a punch from a giant. He staggered backward, his own burst of fire going wide. The shot hadn't penetrated his armor, but it had bought us a precious second.
"Leo, the terminal!" Anya yelled, her voice strained. She pointed with the barrel of her rifle towards a small, fortified control room built on a platform across the factory floor. A single, glowing green light pulsed above its door. "Seraph's objective! It's our only chance!"
She was right. If we could get to that terminal and scrub my bounty signature, maybe Seraph's snipers would stop seeing me as a target. Maybe we could disappear. But it was fifty meters away, across a wide-open stretch of factory floor. We'd never make it. The Dominion squad was closing in. And the Ghost Enforcer was now descending from the broken gantry above, its movements silent and graceful, a spider dropping on an invisible thread. Its red eye was fixed on me.
My mind, cleared by the surge of adrenaline and the raw terror of the situation, saw the battlefield with perfect clarity. It was no longer a chaotic mess. It was a game board. I saw the pieces. I saw their positions. I saw their objectives. And I saw a single, insane path to survival.
"No," I said, grabbing Anya's arm and pulling her behind the cover of a massive, piston-like structure that jutted out from the turbine. "We don't run for the terminal. That's what they expect. We split them. We make them fight each other."
Anya stared at me, her eyes wide with a mixture of pain and disbelief. She coughed, a dry, dusty sound. "Are you crazy? They all want to kill us! Look at them!"
"Wrong," I said, my voice fast and confident. In that moment of absolute clarity, I finally understood the fundamental weakness of the forces arrayed against us. "The Dominion wants the bounty. They need me alive, or at least my system core intact for the reward. They need to be careful. The Ghost Enforcer wants me dead. It doesn't care about the bounty. It wants a personal kill. Their objectives are mutually exclusive!"
This was the fatal flaw in their attack. It was a classic conflict of interest. Greed versus Vengeance. All I had to do was pour gasoline on the fire.
"Here's the plan," I said, the words tumbling out, my brain working faster than my mouth. "You're noisy. You're a high-value target with that rifle. You're the bigger threat. You go left, towards the old assembly line over there. Make a lot of noise. Draw the Dominion hunters. They'll follow the biggest threat and the biggest prize. Lead them on a chase through the machinery. Just keep them busy."
"And what about you?" she demanded, her gaze flicking nervously towards the Ghost Enforcer, which had just landed silently on the turbine housing twenty meters away. "What about him?"
"It's not hunting 'us'," I said, a grim, humorless smile touching my lips. "Look at it. It's hunting me. I'm going to make myself the most annoying, irresistible target it has ever seen. I'm going right. And I'm going to get its undivided attention."
It was a terrible plan. It was a textbook example of what not to do. It involved us splitting up, a cardinal sin in any squad-based game. It relied entirely on me, the weak link, surviving a one-on-one encounter with a perfect killer. But it was the only plan that didn't end with us dying in the next thirty seconds.
Anya looked at me, her gaze searching my face. She saw the absolute certainty in my eyes. The old dynamic between us was gone. I was no longer the student, the sniper who needed her guidance. In this moment, I was the strategist. And she, with her legendary rifle, was the weapon. She had to trust my call.
She nodded once, a sharp, decisive movement. "Don't get yourself killed, Leo." There was a silent 'or I'll kill you myself' in her tone.
"You too," I said.
We split. Anya, clutching her rifle, pushed herself up and limped away, her cybernetic leg dragging her wounded one. She disappeared behind a row of giant, silent machines. A few seconds later, the roar of her sniper rifle echoed from the far side of the factory. It was a clear signal, a challenge to the Dominion hunters.
As I had predicted, the Dominion squad, who had been cautiously advancing on our position, immediately changed direction. They charged towards the sound of her gunfire, their greed overriding their caution. They were chasing the bounty.
Now it was my turn. The stage was mine.
I stepped out from behind the piston, into the open. "Hey!" I yelled, my voice raw and loud. "Ghost! Over here, you piece of scrap metal!"
The red eye of the Enforcer, which had been scanning the area, snapped to me. It locked on, its focus absolute and unwavering.
"You want me? Come and get me!" I shouted, raising my pathetic pistol and firing in its direction. The shots pinged harmlessly off its armored chassis. It was like throwing rocks at a tank.
But it wasn't about damage. It was about insult. It was about ego. The Ghost was not a true machine. It was a human consciousness filled with rage and envy, wrapped in a metal shell. I had to provoke the man, not the machine.
The Ghost Enforcer ignored the distant sounds of Anya's battle. It ignored the Dominion hunters running away from it. Its sole directive, its core programming, was me. It began to stride towards me, its movements calm and methodical, a predator closing in on its prey.
I turned and ran, my heart pounding in my chest. My path was not random. It took me directly towards the area where the Dominion hunters had been moments before. My gambit paid off sooner than I expected.
One Dominion hunter, slower than the rest of his squad, rounded the corner of a massive hydraulic press. He was looking in the direction of Anya's shots, his rifle ready. He didn't see the Ghost Enforcer approaching from his flank.
He came face-to-face with the silent, gray machine. The hunter froze, his body tensing up. He raised his rifle, recognizing the Enforcer not as an ally, but as a rival.
The Enforcer paused its advance on me. Its red eye swiveled from my running form to the new obstacle in its path. Its programming had a conflict: eliminate the primary target, or eliminate the immediate threat blocking its path.
For a moment, the two enemies just stood there, a silent standoff within a larger war. Then, the Dominion hunter, seeing the Enforcer as a rival for the bounty, made a fatal mistake. He opened fire.
A stream of bullets hammered against the Enforcer's chest. The Enforcer, its path to me blocked by a hostile entity, retaliated instantly. Its own programming deemed the hunter a higher priority threat.
The first shots between my enemies had been fired. The beautiful, brutal chaos had just begun.