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[FICTION] Rygaard | Open Season

     The sound of the shot cracked through the white trees, and the Ritter went down with a sudden crash. Its comrades sharply stopped to see where the shot came from.

    In the distance, the lithe shooter slid from her position in the tree, landing softly in the dip just below. This had been the second Ritter she had brought down today, but it would be forfeit if they found her; her thoughts recalled fighting Suited targets on Asovel-- one or two were enough to wipe out entire squads of standard infantry. Expert as she was, she would still be no match for an upfront fight against three of them.

    She ran down the snow-lined gulley to remain out of sight. In the distance, the sound of the Ritter's rollers crashing through brush, breaking and snapping, with garbled digitized chatter. The sound grew nearer, and without hesitation, she dived into a hollowed tree. The Ritters went off their rollers with a loud clang, their heavy metal stomping subtly shaking the ground beneath. It wouldn't take a genius to realize that the random set of snow prints cutting off at the dead tree wasn't happenstance.

    Miraculously, the loud crackling chatter started up once more, and the Suits raced off to the east. She cautiously crawled out, and heard a rumbling in the sky. She looked up, and saw a fireball screaming down through the atmosphere. It clicked with her that her quarry must be going to intercept at a projected crash site. If they were interested, then so was she.

    She quickly and silently followed the roller tracks left by the Suits, though that is often easy enough-- harder to do is actually keeping up with them on foot. They can crash through brush; she cannot. As she ran, the falling fire rocketed toward the ground, and eventually, she heard the thundering roar of the impact-- no more fire lit the sky. It crashed, but no explosion?

    With her breath quick and sharp, she slid behind a tree. Ahead of her, stood the three Ritters, and ahead of them, a crashed escape launch, with the only legible marking on it "FOLBAN". Two of the three Ritters slowly approached on heavy footsteps toward the craft. One of the dark-tinted Suits opened the emergency panel aside the opening hatch, and the locked popped off in pneumatic-fashion, slowly opening and smoke pouring out. The Ritter who opened it, stood in front the open hatch, when a large spike metallic spike erupted from his helm, sanguine spray coating the brown and white.

    The remaining two screeched out their chatter, when she seized the opportunity, and put a shot in the neck of the rearguard. The last Ritter sprayed out a fearful burst of automatic fire into the trees, only to have a spike shoot out of the crashed launch, straight through the torso-casing of the Ritter.

    With all the Ritters dead, she waited behind the tree for a few moments longer. When she heard motion from the crash, she surreptitiously looked toward the sounds; a man limped out of the crashed launch, wielding what looking like a mining-spike gun, but more importantly, she instantly recognized the man. She stepped out from her cover, "Lieutenant Hollis?"

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