Side missions gave stupid amounts of XP. Especially the ones that looked suicidal. I clicked my tongue again, sharper this time.
"You know what fuck it."
I muttered as I broke into a light jog, well, a limping approximation of one, heading toward the echo of gunfire, boots crunching over debris, pain flaring with every step.
Genesis spun to keep pace with me, eyes wide.
"Oi!"
She shouted.
"Do you have a fucking death wish, you moron?!"
"Maybe!"
I called back between breaths.
"But if I'm gonna die, I'm at least levelling up first!"
The gunfire dragged me through the ruins like a hook in my spine. After about a few hundred meters.
I skidded around the corner of a half-collapsed building and slammed my back against what remained of the wall. Concrete dust puffed into the air.
The impact rattled my teeth and sent a white-hot lance of pain up my leg.
"Son of a..."
My breath came out shredded. I bent forward slightly, hands on my knees, chest heaving like I'd just sprinted a dozen kilometres instead of limping/jogging a few hundred meters.
"…bitch…"
Each inhale burned. Each exhale felt too shallow. My lungs weren't keeping up, my body lagging behind the part of me that still thought it was invincible.
"You're hyperventilating,"
Genesis said immediately, voice sharp and clinical.
"Try not to die from oxygen deprivation before the abominations get to you, yeah?"
I ignored her. I pressed my forehead briefly to the cracked concrete, closed my eyes for half a second, and forced myself to slow it down. In through the nose. Out through the mouth.
Again. Finally, the world steadied. Just enough. I shifted my weight, winced, then leaned out to peek around the corner. That's when I saw it.
Across the street stood a building that was, miraculously, still mostly intact. Windows blown out, facade scorched black, but upright. On its roof sat a VTOL.
Or what used to be one. The fuselage was crumpled like it had been swatted out of the sky and slammed down hard. One wing was gone entirely. The other hung at a wrong angle.
Smoke stains radiated outward from the impact crater. And mounted to the open side door.
"…hey, am I hallucinating or is that a fucking minigun?"
I whispered.
"Yes,"
Genesis said flatly.
"And before you get any ideas, no, you are not sprinting up there."
My eyes dragged downward. At the building's second floor, a man was pinned behind a barely passable sandbag barricade between the big ass holes in the wall sides.
He wore what had clearly been a field uniform at some point, color faded, fabric torn, insignia long since burned or ripped away. Middle-aged. Thick, wild beard streaked with grey. Eyes hard.
Shell shocked, the kind of look that one had when he had seen and experienced too much to ever be normal again. He fired in short, controlled bursts. Someone who knew what they were doing.
The people he was firing at, well, I wasnt sure you could even call them people at this point. Four of them. They moved wrong. Too jerky. Too eager.
Bodies twisted by growths that shouldn't exist, bone spurs jutting from shoulders and forearms, rib fragments visible beneath stretched, scarred skin. One had a jaw that hung half-detached.
Teeth bared in a permanent rictus grin. Fallen humans. Mutants.
What humanity had left behind when psionic radiation mixed with chemical weapons, bio-agents, and nuclear fallout and decided evolution should be a meat grinder.
Their armor was a joke. Leather scraps, rusted steel plates bolted on at random, strips of rubber and trash fused together into something that might charitably be called protection. Trash camo.
That's what it looked like. Like they'd rolled through a landfill and called it tactical. Weapons were worse.
One carried what looked like a length of iron pipe duct-taped to a wooden stock and called It a gun. Another had a fucking pool cue for a weapon. They screamed as they advanced.
"MEAT...!"
"KILLKILLKILL...!"
"MEATMEATMEAT...!"
Their voices scraped across my nerves.
"Four hostiles,"
Genesis said.
"One friendly."
"I know," I muttered as I stepped out. Dropped to one knee. The pistol felt heavy. Too heavy. My hands trembled despite myself. Pick one. Focus.
I chose the one with a pipe for a weapon, hiding behind an abandoned jeep with blowout tyres, paint all peeled off, glass smashed apart, paint non-existent. Inhale. Exhale. I fired. BANG.
The round sparked off concrete near his feet, as It did, he looked back, and the next moment I know hes charging straight at me, eyes locked, froth at the corners of his mouth, pipe swinging sideways.
"Miss,"
Genesis snapped.
"Lower your muzzle, compensate for..."
BANG. The second shot clipped his shoulder. Blood sprayed, dark and thick. He didn't even slow down.
"Fuck,"
I hissed. BANG. The third round grazed his ribs, tearing flesh. He howled, more in delight than pain, and picked up speed. My heart slammed against my ribs. BANG.
The fourth punched through his side. I saw the exit wound bloom sickly red. But he still kept coming. He was ten meters away now. Eight.
"Chest,"
Genesis barked.
"Center mass!"
BANG. The fifth round hit him square in the chest. Blood burst outward in a wet spray, each heartbeat pumping more of it out through the hole. He staggered. Didn't fall.
"For fucks sake"
I cursed.
"Just fucking die already"
BANG. The sixth shot tore into his sternum. He staggered. Took two more stubborn, impossible steps. Then his legs finally betrayed him.
He pitched forward and slammed face-first into the dirt, momentum carrying him a few more inches until he slid to a stop right at my feet.
Blood poured out of him in thick, dark sheets, steaming faintly in the cold air. His fingers twitched once. Just once. Then nothing. No scream. No last curse. No cinematic bullshit.
Just meat hitting dirt.
"One down"
Genesis said automatically, like In good old days.
"Move, change position."
Hearing this, I forced my legs to cooperate and ran, more like stagger-sprinted, toward the abandoned car.
Pain screamed up my injured leg as I skidded in behind it, shoulder slamming into rusted metal hard enough to knock the breath out of me.
I sucked air and popped up into a standing crouch, pistol already rising. Across the street, behind a collapsed slab of concrete and twisted rebar, another Fallen had dug herself in.
Female, I thought distantly, wider hips, narrower shoulders, but the mutation had made it hard to be sure. Bone growths jutted from her forearms like natural bayonets.
She wielded a self-made rifle, if you could even call it that. A pipe reinforced with welded scrap, a crude wooden grip, firing mechanism probably stolen from something industrial.
She was firing wildly at the building, rounds cracking and sparking as they chewed chunks out of stone. I lined up my iron sights. Inhale. Exhale. I squeezed the trigger. BANG.
The shot smacked into rubble inches from her head.
"Miss,"
Genesis snapped. I fired again. BANG. Over her shoulder. Chips of concrete exploded.
"Fuck..."
Third shot. BANG. The round punched clean through her arm. She let out a raw, animalistic roar, the sound half rage, half pain, and the rifle clattered from her grip, skidding across the ground.
She didn't fall. She screamed, already turning to face me. I adjusted instinctively, no thinking now, just muscle memory clawing its way back from a past life. Fourth shot. BANG.
Luck, pure and simple. The round hit her in the side of the head. Not clean enough to explode it, but enough.
Her body went slack, collapsing sideways against the rubble like a puppet with its strings cut. She slid down slowly, leaving a smear of blood and grey matter on the concrete. My slide locked back.
Empty.
"Magazine dry,"
Genesis barked only to shout.
"Left... LEFT..."
Movement. Fast. I caught it in my peripheral vision just as another Fallen broke from cover. This one was bigger. Broader. Wrapped in layered trash-armor and scraps of steel.
In his hands was a bladed pipe, dried gore crusted along its blade's edge. He saw me. And charged while throwing his bladed pipe, which was basically an apocalypse edition tomahawk.
"SHIT...!"
I cursed out as I dropped behind the car as the bladed pipe smashed into the hood, denting metal inward with a shriek of tortured steel. I moved on instinct. Release mag.
It dropped free and clattered onto the pavement. My fingers fumbled in my pocket, slick with sweat. Found a fresh magazine. Slammed it home.
"Ice that fucker!"
Genesis shouted as she did, I released the slide, the Fallen howled at the top of his lungs as he reached for his bladed pipe, not giving me any time to aim properly.
I stood up while raising the pistol and pulled the trigger as fast as my finger could move. BANG. Chest. He flinched but kept coming. BANG. Shoulder. Bone cracked audibly. BANG. Stomach.