Major Fuhito was in a frenzy. His troops had run into a carefully prepared ambush and were currently pinned down. The hunters had, temporarily at least, become the prey. The idiocy of the late Captain Murrough had cost them the element of surprise, as well as the armament in the helicopter and one of the armored personnel carriers. The mercenaries were armed much more heavily than his agents had reported and were putting up a defense out of all proportion to their numbers. His requests for more air and ground reinforcements had been delayed by the inability of anyone to locate security manager Haesslich. T he overpaid monster is probably out devouring someone , the Major fumed silently. What should have been a short, surgical operation had turned into a bloody brawl, and even in the Barrens, the Seattle government frowned on overt military action by the corporations. The only positive was that Murrough’s death provided a convenient scapegoat on which to blame this debacie.