Thread: Wasteland Flame (PsionicCuttlefish & jd97)

Just how far were these bastards going? Amy couldn't help but pant a little under the hot sun she'd been tracking this sect of Los Crneos for over four and a half miles now in blistering heat, ever since she'd found their carrier a little ways off the road. It was a flimsy thing, maybe a pre-war school bus. It was made for carrying people, not protecting them, but then, the Crneos never really cared about protection, and she had no doubt the 32 this thing carried weren't any different. She knew for a fact there had been 32 she pulled it out of the driver waiting alone with the carrier before she shot him. It was like they had come kitted out for war, and yet, as soon as they left the carrier, they split up. Their tracks were easy enough to follow it was almost like they had wanted to be found. They'd split into groups of four. Three of those groups had meandered off into the desert. They were easy to take down- their armor was weak and their tactics were almost nonexistent- but the rest had started hiding their tracks and met back up into one large group a mile off, like the others were meant just to be a distraction. Amy was almost impressed that this clan of bandits had actually grown a strategy beyond shooting whatever they saw, and a little worried that they were trying so hard to hide something. It was that large group of twenty she'd been following since. They were good, but they'd been expecting to be hiding from some human. They hadn't expected her no one ever expected her. Before the War, humanity got genetic engineering pretty well figured out. Officially, engineering human babies was illegal. Of course, if the result wasn't human, it wasn't really subject to that law. Not according to the courts, anyway. Thence came the Anthros The Pet that Talks Back. That's what her kind was meant to be pets. Usually sex toys, and really popular for it, too. Sure it was expensive as all hell, but the humans loved that they could screw like metaphorical or literal bunnies and not pop out a single kid, and the Anthros, well... they were bred to fuck. Most of them loved every second of it. Yes, the Anthros made to be sex slaves were well known. Military engineering, though? Well, supersoldiers were crackpot stuff, weren't they? Amy smiled as she walked. At over seven foot tall and with a physique most people would kill for, maybe not so crackpot after all. But that wasn't what had kept her alive. Sure, she was engineered to be the superior soldier bullet-resistant fur, high pain tolerance, beyond-human endurance, speed, and strength with a killer rack to boot, but none of that mattered if her enemy was focused. If they kept their heads and thought engagements through. A bullet could still kill her if it was high enough caliber and wormed its way past her fur, but when some canine anthro shows up playing hero? They laughed right up until they figured out she actually knew how to use that rifle. Gunshots. Dropping to all fours instinctually, Amy slinked forward with her eyes searching the ruins ahead of her this used to be a town. She could see movement, and what looked to be an armored Dunerunner beyond. Probably a meetup gone bad these pricks betrayed everyone they ever worked with at some point, and she wasn't about to let them get away with it this time. Rising to her feet, Amy broke into a sprint towards the battle. Sure, she probably should go for cover and take them out cautiously, but they were spreading out around the dunerunner so perfectly, and she couldn't wait to see the look on their faces. Her assault rifle- a heavily modified M4 carbine- was in her right hand and ready, but that wasn't what she was opening up with. She pulled her sidearm from its holster at her hip with her left hand, and hefted it up. A sawed-off, 12 gauge shotgun loaded with Flash Thunder rounds. Her ears clung closer to her head and she shut her eyes tight, then fired. BOOM! The force of what she just unleashed slowed her to a walk. Would she ever find two more Flash Thunder shells in the wasteland? Probably not. Was it worth blowing her only hand-held flash-bang on this group? She dropped her sawed-off as she brought her M4 up into firing position. Her enemy was disoriented, dazed, a few were probably blinded permanently. They were shouting in confused spanish no one could hear over the ringing in their ears, all while they whirled around only to see her striding toward them, grinning from ear-to-ear ready to take them all on. Oh, it was worth it, all right. She opened fire in controlled bursts, wading through the battlefield. She smashed into their formation from the rear, and they started to disintegrate. The five guys in the back had no hope of resisting her they couldn't stand up, much less stop her from putting a bullet in their heads. Around them, the Crneos figured out what was happening and brought their rifles up, but she had already taken cover where their friends had been a second earlier. She fired and she hit, dropping men first on one side of her, then on the other. They were managing to hit her, sure, but it wasn't often enough to matter. Their bullets hurt and bruised when they hit, but none had managed to penetrate her fur. Seven, Eight, Nine men were dead, and hadn't even reloaded yet. Their bullets were starting to rip apart the sand-whipped, crumbling wall she was up against, but it didn't matter. She fired again and made the body count ten. That was when she noticed them start running. First it was just one, shouting in spanish and turning tail running away from her and the dunerunner. Then another, and one after that. Not on her watch, she wasn't letting any more of these bastards get away. She dashed after them they didn't have much hope of outrunning a Rottie. She slowed once she'd closed the distance and aimed down her sights, then she heard shouting behind her. She turned and felt her stomach sink as she realized two things in her jubilance she hadn't bothered keeping track of the bullets in her magazine, and that Crneo- who she hadn't seen hiding in one of the bombed-out buildings- was holding what looked suspiciously like an anti-material rifle. Boom! A shot, and searing pain lanced through Amy's shoulder. Weakly, she brought her M4 up to fire back as she stumbled toward cover, only to hear it click. Fuck. Boom! Searing hot fire in her stomach as a second bullet ripped through her. Where the hell did they get an Anti-Material rifle?! She growled deeply in anger and pain and dropped her M4, going down onto all-fours and going into a loping run. Faintly behind her, she could hear a laser rifle being fired, but she didn't really care right now. Boom! A miss, aimed at where she'd been before she dropped. Her whole arm felt like it was on fire and every little movement was agony, every impact with the ground torture, but adrenaline was coursing through her veins now. She ran with the speed only an Anthro could muster, rushing his position. Boom! It was no use, she was inside his effective range now, darting between and over obstacles in the field. He dropped his rifle and reached for a pistol, but it was too late she was on him. First her teeth tore into his arm, ripping out a huge chunk of flesh as she tackled him to the ground, straddling his waist as her knees pinned his hands to the ground. Her right arm was out of commission, but she balled her left into a fist and drove it into his face. Again and again, long after he stopped struggling, long after the blood rushing out of her mixed with the blood surging out of him, long after the edges of her vision began to go dark and her adrenaline surge faded. Slowly, shakily, she grabbed the man's pistol and stood, turning back toward the battlefield as she struggled to breathe, each breath coming in a ragged gasp. Through blurred vision, she thought she saw a form standing and tried to raise her newly found pistol, but found her arm wouldn't obey her. It twitched upward before she fell to her knees, muttering threats right up until she face-planted into the sand, and her world went black...