My grip around both guns tightens painfully as I look up at the sky.

The sky is red, almost bleeding into the clouds and stretching endlessly above the wasteland we are standing in. There are birds flying somewhere above us, perhaps fleeing to somewhere safe.

Two of them pass directly over my head.

For a second, I just watch them, my mind elsewhere.

Then the ground shakes, slightly but that is enough a warning.

I look around me instinctively.

Everyone is already in position, arms stretched out, weapons ready. Mira is a few feet away from me, her electric daggers glowing between her lean fingers.

And then they fall, some with greater speed than the rest. My right foot dragged itself behind the other taking the body's pressure on it.

The ugly dark figures drop from the red sky. Too many to wait and count for distributing our work.

I raise both guns and start shooting.

The sound of bullets explodes around me.

One creature falls and then another but they don't stop coming.

They never do.

I have to keep looking up, keep moving, keep shooting, because the second I stop paying attention, one of them is going to land right on top of me and I can't let that happen.

I hesitated by a second and two almost parallel claws fall a few steps away from me, hitting the ground hard enough that I imagine the ground cracking beneath the pile of waste.

I move away immediately but still somehow one of its nails catches my forearm.

My gasp screams through my head as I hear the skin tear.

I look down with wide eyes.

A thin slit runs across my arm. For a moment, I can't tell if it actually broke through my skin or just the cloth over it. I really hope it didn't.

Because if it did, I'd have to go through it all over again.

I don't have time to think about that for much longer as the creature lunges at me. I duck beneath it and shoot twice in a row until it finally collapses.

The breathe that escapes my lips is ragged. Even after all these years, I fear them. When will I ever stop fearing these lifeless bastards that do no good but harm. They are not skilled, not with purpose...only full of deadly substance yet I-

Another one comes from my left.

I turn and fire, not noticing the other two immediately on my side. I manage to shoot one but the one a foot away reaches me almost.

"MOVE!", Mira's voice cuts through everything.

I glance toward her just in time to see an electric dagger fly past my shoulder and bury itself into the chest of the creature behind me.

It convulses and gradually drops.

Mira gives me a quick look. If I wasn't already preoccupied with a few more, I would've gone to her.

So, I shoot until at least seven foot around me is no one intimidating me with their filth.

And then suddenly the sky bursts and for a second, everything becomes white.

I blink at rain.

I stop looking up as it touches the skin just above my gloves but below the sleeves. The only part that remained exposed.

I don't remember the last time I saw it.

The real rain... not the artificial water sprayed over the protected zones. Not the recycled drops they give us in the cities.

Rain nowadays looks like these creatures falling from the open sky causing terror. I often miss the kind that used to fall from the sky without anyone being afraid of it, the kind people stood under even when they were told not to.

The one that was romanticized in songs and poems. I wonder what the generation growing up now would think of it.

Would they call it beautiful? Or would they be taught to run?

Because now, rain isn't poetry.

It's dangerous, venomous, something to be scared of.

And that angers me more than it should. So much so that when another creature comes at me, I don't even think. I tear it apart.

Dealing with them isn't only about strength. It's more about distance.

That's the real trick. We can't let them touch us... not even once because one contact with their skin can leave something inside my body that I don't even know how to fight.

Finally, after loading and reloading my guns again and again, I shoot the last one.

It drops.

My breathing comes in uneven lots.

I slowly lower my hands aching from holding up the guns. Then I look up at the Redland sky.

I search angling my eyes on all directions but I find no more creatures falling from up there. Are they gone?

I tilt my head back further, almost holding my neck as I look at the sky like I always do.

"LOOK OUT!"

I jump on reflex. Something crashes into me as I hit the ground hard.

The creature lands over me.

Dark as if burnt and strangely human looking.

The parts that opposes the idea are their scavenger-like nails, teeth that are far too sharp and long and glowing eyes. A cold chill runs down my spine.

My guns have already fallen somewhere beside me in the rough movement earlier when I fell. The daggers, as far as I remember, must be in the pocket on my lower thigh but if I reached for it then its nails would certainly dig my ribs apart. 

My fingers tremble as I push against its chest with both hands making distance.

My arms shake as it tries to move closer.

I push harder.

My eyes catch the mark on its arm.

Shades of orange and red in that particular type of design.

I have seen it before. Infact, everyone has.

The ones with red tattoos are supposed to be the truly dangerous ones.

That's what everyone says.

I don't know if I believe everything they say. Afterall the mark on my neck only ever just burnt me in the name of harm.

A shadow falls over me as I struggle.

Mira reaches down, grabbing its head with the electric gloves from without wasting a second. One thing we have yet noticed about creatures is that electrocution is the easiest way to kill them. Every weapon we make is thus made of electricity.

Electricity shoots through it. The creature jerks and then collapses on the ground as I push it off me.

I sigh as exhaustion washes over me, standing up slowly.

I look at her finding her smiling. How does one manage to smile in situations as this? Humans can truly adapt well, I guess.

I smile back and give her a small nod.

I don't smell anything foul but my senses tell me something moved behind me.

I always feel it before I hear it.

My hand immediately goes to the dagger hidden inside my pant pocket pocket.

I turn, very fast. I can't let them be faster or it'll cause me my life.

But the blade stops just inches from his throat when I caught the eyes did not glow.

Those familiar amber eyes meet mine. He freezes, looking just as stunned as I am. My breathing stops for just half a second.

He looks at the blade first, then slowly at me.

I realise only now that his shotgun has been pressed against my arm.

I hadn't even noticed.

My grip around the cutter tightens.

I thought he was an enemy. A few inches more and I would've pierced his throat apart.

Then his gaze flickers away, as he lowers the shotgun from my arm and takes a step back. I don't lower my blade immediately.

His head does not turn at me again.

Instead, he turns and starts walking in the opposite direction, lifting the shotgun back onto his shoulder as if nothing happened.

As if he hadn't almost been killed. As if I hadn't almost killed him.

My jaw tightens while I lower the cutter slowly.

I would have cursed at him or kicked a rock behind him but not today because something else is approaching.

The mark beneath my hair, hidden under the black collar of my uniform, suddenly feels like a burning warning pressed against my skin. The one that magically tells where the real threats are.

I run forward.

I can feel it. Its very near.

But my naked eyes can't see anything. The site has been destroyed so badly that everything looks the same now.

Broken metal over burnt ground and collapsed structures scattered all over it. Their dark shadows stretching across the wasteland.

There is nowhere for it to hide technically and yet—

I can't see it. I didn't even bring my laser spectacles.

I stop trying to see, listen, smell... anything that helps me find it but no luck. My fingers tighten around the cutter.

It's here. I know it is... I just don't know where.

Then I flinch as someone grabs my shoulder.

"Easy there, Lya, chill"

I turn to find Neel.

His helmet is already opening, a smile tugging at his face as if he hasn't just walked out from the middle of a battlefield.

I stare at him.

"Its over," he says.

"Aren't you too quick to judge?"

My eyes immediately move back to the surroundings, still searching.

His smile doesn't disappear though as he stretches looking around, not with purpose.

Neil, Mira and I aren't teammates, essentially. We belong to two different groups. Like everyone else on today's mission, neither of us belongs to a single unit.

These are the individual missions.

That's what they call it.

There was no proper plan. Just the understanding that we would hunt together when necessary and get back to the ravines together when it was over.

I look toward the sky where Neel was smiling at now. A blue laser light circles above us.

Three times in a row.

That was the alarm... we better move back to the base underground before the walls close.

The mission is over.