It was always the same. You hear a shot, you hear someone cry out, and you drop whatever you’re doing. If there’s a wall, you break your way through. If there’s someone in the way, you push them aside. You turn and burn and pound dirt as hard as you can.

But I can barely move. I’m freezing up.

No. Not again.

44.31, says the counter.

I’ve been high functionality for nearly an hour now, riding the wave and feeling steel. I’ve gone higher than I’ve ever been before, swallowed in the glow of our reactor.

Now I’m just cold.

At first, I try fighting, straining muscles as I work to get the Juno moving in time. It’s like wading through syrup. Everything is heavier than it ought to be, numb and stupid and out of time. The Juno pulls away from me.

40.00

It bottoms out. Forty is as low as you can go without losing sync. I struggle and cramp, but there’s nothing I can do to find my way back.

It’s happening again.

I’m going to watch them die.

Breathe.

It feels like a gentle breeze between the pillars. A shiver through my jacks.

Breathe.

And don’t get us killed, I add, silently.

“I’m back,” I whisper. “I’m back. I’m sorry.”

The counter rises slowly. We could sync in a second, but the machine slows it down, gives me time to watch it climbing. Long enough to get the message.

Easy now.

“Thank you.” I shake one hand out, work my fist against the cold. I shift the imaginary weight of the rifle outside, stretch the other set of fingers. We vent the heat of the fight, trim our nets back to something quiet, blink our lenses to clear the dust away, and bring the weapon to our shoulder. “Ready.”

86.15

The Juno and I move on the balls of our feet, sprinting from pillar to pillar, crouching behind dust drifts and fallen masonry. We follow thermals between the vaults, map recoil-shocks through the floor and echoes off the ceiling. There’s no wind or noise or glowing Eye-light, nothing to interfere.

We find their footprints before we find the machines themselves, then sparks and glimpses off their plates. A firefight wakes across our narrow horizon, fills the world with shadow verticals.

A shell flashes in and out of the darkness, right on the edge of what we can see. It’s Salt, a flash of white plate and erupting weaponry, tracer-tracks and railgun sparks. Hail moves nearby, a ghost in the dust and gunsmoke.

A dark shape moves through the haze across from them, lit by muzzle flash. It’s the Mirai from before, missing its shield and burning bright in the infrared, still alive despite Hail’s best efforts.

It’s a stand-up fight, toe-to-toe by shell standards.