Read Part 1 here
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You need to move in ten seconds, Leep tells me.

“Is our cover blown?” Lead asks.

“I stopped the alert before it sent, I’ll stop the destruct,” Nerd says.

“Are you sure?”

Go now.

I stay rooted in the spot for half a second, my attention fixed on listening for Nerd’s response. But it doesn’t come. I walk up the edge of the crater, toward the coming Enforcers. My head peeks up over the ridge, just high enough to see the base of the array and where the UDS ship will be landing. I stop there, Wilson at the head of the Enforcers, two feet ahead of me.

Before either of us can say anything, Nerd’s song starts in my ear again. This time nobody says a thing. Leep keeps the volume at background noise.

“I thought we were going to be left alone to test out weapons,” I say to Wilson.

“The situation has changed, we need you to come back to the outpost,” the Lead Enforcer says.

“And why is that?”

Wilson’s gaze darts over to the circle of guards awaiting the UDS ship. “We’re about to have company, which may be less forgiving of weapons testing here.”

I falter in my response as Lead says in my ear, “Nerd, do we need to evacuate?”

The humming finally changes songs, to something faster.

Wilson speaks again, not giving me a chance to recover from my falter. “Where is the rest of your crew?” he asks. Three of the Enforcers directly behind him shoulder their weapons.

“They went to see how far the terraforming goes,” I say, putting on the most sincere expression I can manage. He doesn’t seem to believe me.

“Wherever they are, call them back. We need to-,” he stops, eyes turning up. “Shit.”

The UDS ship has arrived. I look over my shoulder to watch the sleek gray ship slow to a hover and lower to the ground inside the circle of guards. The bright red, stylized UDS logo almost glows among the bleak colors of the ship and asteroid.

“Nerd?” Lead’s voice is still calm, but that could just be how his AI is transmitting his thoughts.

“Get out, I’ll keep trying to stop it,” Nerd says, interrupting the humming in the background.

“Not a chance,” his sister says.

I bite my tongue, forcing my face to remain neutral. Turning back to Wilson, I say, “Unified Defense and Security. What are they doing here?”

“We don’t know, but we need to move,” the Enforcer says. “I ask again, where is your crew?”

I look over my shoulder again, feigning searching for them. In reality I watch the back of the UDS ship open and men start to pour out. Most of the guards are approaching them, leaving one watching me and the Enforcers.

“We can’t get out anyway,” BB says in my ear. “There are guards in the hall.”

A breath to compose myself and I say, “I’m not sure where they are. They went that way.”

“Call them back, before the UDS get too suspicious of us,” Wilson says.

He makes a good point. I step toward Wilson, turning all the way around, making it appear as though I’m aligned with him. At least I hope that’s how it appears. “Alright,” I say and touch my earpiece as though it will turn on a mic. “Wilson is here and says we need to leave.”

“Does that say fifteen seconds?” Breach asks. “Fuck.”

I bite my lip and force my eyes to stay in the direction I told Wilson the team had gone. But in the corner of my eye I watch the array, waiting for the explosion.

“Well?” Wilson asks.

I can’t unclamp my teeth from my lip. My team is about to die and I, Guardian, can’t do anything about it.

“Well?” Wilson repeats. His rifle barrel raises a couple of inches.

“They’re coming,” I force out.

The UDS team has exited the ship, all ten of them. Unfortunately, they are too far away for any of them to be taken out in the blast that is about to wipe out my entire team.

“Thank God,” Lead says.

The release of tension in my body must be noticeable, for Wilson says, “What’s happening?”

“One of their grenades almost went off,” I say. “But they stopped it. They’ll be here in a minute.”

“Guardian, our mission is a success, but we’re going to need a distraction if we’re going to get out,” Lead says.

I shoot a sideways glance at Wilson. He has a solid hold on his rifle’s grip. The three Enforcers behind him still have their weapons tucked to their shoulders.

What did Wilson say about messing with the array? I ask silently.

“Don’t do it and it won’t mess with us,” Breach says.

Right. Get ready.

Leep says, Just the one guard has seen them drawn on you.

Distance, wind and gravity information pop onto my glasses and the guard watching us gets outlined in red.

I snap my DMOTER to my shoulder and squeeze the trigger. As soon as the rifle has recoiled against my shoulder, I drop to one knee, out of sight of the array behind the ridge. The red outline blinks out, confirming the only guard that knew I wasn’t an Enforcer died.

“What-,” Wilson is cut off as a fusillade of bullets answers my shot.

I spin around, swapping my DMOTER for my PDW. With two quick bursts I drop the only two Enforcers paying me any attention. The others are all scrambling for cover.

“Was our mission just compromised?” Lead asks.

We’re clear as long as you can get out without being seen. Just know there’s a firefight out here, I think.

“Whatever you did, it cleared our path. Meet us at the outpost.”

I jump to my feet and dash away, past the Enforcers. As I crest the crater, I shoot a glance over my shoulder at the UDS team. They are advancing toward our position. And their ship is firing back up.

Taking full advantage of the lighter gravity, I bound down the next crater with large leaps. The Enforcers must be too fixated on the UDS team, because none of the dozens of shots echoing across the barren asteroid come my way and soon the woods loom ahead.

I have to turn lateral to the trees, avoiding the road as it fills with people drawn by the sound of gunfire. None of them see me as I slip into the undergrowth, just in time as the UDS ship lifts off the ground and hovers over the firefight.

The ship rotates. And a minigun unfolds from the front. It spins up.

Shouts erupt from the crowd on the road. It thins out, people darting back into the woods, toward the landing field, either to escape or get their weapons.

I touch a link in my belt, calling for the shadows to be pulled over me, and creep through the trees, parallel to the road. The whirring of the minigun follows me as it mows down the Enforcers and moves toward the outpost.

“We need to get out of here before the outpost is destroyed,” Lead says. “Guardian, meet us at the landing field. Quickly.”

Abandoning all attempts at stealth, I straighten up and dash toward the ship. Undergrowth threatens to trip me with every step and low branches grab at my headset and clothes, scratching me with their rough fingers. But I don’t dare use the road, which is flooding with people rushing in both directions. Half of the people are armed now. A few shots go off, aimed to the sky, and the crowd parts. Several men rush through the gap, toward the array.

I chance a look over my shoulder as I enter a clear part of the woods. Smoke curls into the air from the edge of the outpost. It swirls out of the way of the UDS ship, which unleashes another barrage from its minigun. Weapons from the ground return fire, to little effect.

Back into the thick woods, I continue running. A building goes by on my left, and I leap across its worn-down path. A thick patch of undergrowth forces me to detour away from the road. I circle back around and continue on my straight path.

My breath begins to come heavier, my muscles fatiguing. Light gravity can only help so much. Conditioning takes over. I don’t slow.

Then I burst out of the trees. I skid to a halt.. The terraforming building looms up ahead of me. Surrounded by a dozen armed men. All of which aim their weapons at me.

“Who are you?” one of the men demands.

I let my DMOTER hang by its strap and hold up my hands. “Just trying to get back to my ship and get off this rock before they kill us all,” I say.

None of the weapons lower. A few of the men exchange looks. One peers back at the building.

“They aren’t going to harm the terraformer,” I say. “They need it for their array. Your best bet is to get out of here before they kill you all.”

“That sounds like something someone who wants the terraformer would say,” says the same man who asked who I am. He moves his finger onto the trigger.

Shit.

“Look,” I say, “I’m just going to my ship. I will leave right now. Just don’t shoot me.”

That seems to be a doable suggestion as the man removes his finger again. Then his eyes go to my rifle.

“Wait. You’re the guy Raiden spoke to. The one with the, what was it, Demoter?” His finger goes back to the trigger. “You know, he’s been loading up everything he can since you arrived. And now our outpost is getting destroyed.”

Something behind me explodes with a concussive blast that shakes leaves clear of the trees. I flinch as the shockwave hits me in the back. The men around the terraforming building also flinch, and worse than I do.

I drop to a knee and swing my PDW to my shoulder. With one spray I down three of them. Before the others can recover, I race back into the woods. A few yards in, I slow, allowing the shadows to envelop me again. They won’t be able to see me now no matter how hard they search, not from a distance, among the trees.

But that doesn’t stop them from trying to kill me. Bark splinters from a trunk in front of me, sent flying by a bullet. A leaf over my head gets ripped right off the branch by another. Time to go. And not on the straight route.

Staying low, I move as fast as I dare away from the road and the building, perpendicular to the direction I want to go. Bullets continue to tear the woods apart, but, after a minute, I am out of the danger zone; they didn’t see me moving. I turn back toward the landing field. Now I just have to get there before-

Smoke billows above the treetops ahead of me. Flames leap toward the sky.

It isn’t the landing field, it’s the warehouses. The fighting is all behind you still, Leep assures me.

With a quick thought of gratitude, I move on, adjusting my course yet again away from the landing field and around the burning buildings.

The others are going to beat you to the ship, Leep says.

Trusting that I am again out of sight of any of the outpost’s residents, I straighten up and hurry on. The crack and crash of the burning warehouses takes over the sound, overpowered only by the tattoo of gunfire behind me. The latter is more sporadic now.

I skirt as close to the fire as tolerable. The heat oppresses me as I move through the flickering light. I breathe lightly, keeping my throat and lungs clear from the smoke as much as possible, an attempt mostly in vain.

Something inside the warehouse explodes, throwing burning chunks of wall into the woods around me. The undergrowth catches fire.

They’ve made it to the field, but there’s a problem, Leep says.

In response to my unspoken question, Lead’s voice comes through my earpiece. “We don’t want trouble,” he says. “We didn’t sign up to be in a gunfight, so we’re out of here.”

“I know better than that,” says another voice, probably picked up by a mic and amplified by Leep. “I know who you are.”

An image appears in the corner of my glasses, security footage of the field. I check it as I shuffle away from a bush that ignites in front of me.

My team is in the field, weapons raised. They are surrounded by a good dozen men, also with weapons raised. One man stands in front of Lead, a pistol in hand. Raiden.

A root trips me. I focus again on running and listening.

“We’re nobody. Please just let us go,” Lead says.

“I saw the DMOTER first, but the rest of your weapons are just as recognizable to someone who knows,” Raiden says. “You’re Shadows agents.”

“Who?”

Raiden ignored Lead’s question. “And if a fight breaks out with the UDS,” he says, “I’m willing to bet you were involved.”

I bite my lip, then have to let it go as I cough. Almost there.

Lead apparently has decided the charade is over, as he says, “If you know who we are, you know it isn’t smart to get between us and our mission.”

An explosion somewhere behind me. I chance a glimpse over my shoulder and see a greater cloud of smoke over the other end of the outpost.

“This was my home,” Raiden says, “my baby. I built this place and you’ve destroyed it. I can’t let that go unpunished.”

The burn of the fire is behind me now. The field is in view ahead. A map appears in place of the security footage in my glasses, complete with the locations of each of the ships in the field, a dot for each person, and dark zones for shadows. A line appears, forming a route in shadow to Raiden.

“Let’s just kill them,” Hellfire says.

“We’ll take rounds too. If we can get out of this without spilling our blood, we have to,” Lead says, then out loud: “We’re terribly sorry about that. That was not part of the plan, but the UDS showing up was unexpected, we had to improvise.”

“Be that as it may, you’re still killing my baby.”

I crouch low in the shadows alongside the field, inching my way around behind the ships.

“Your baby only exists because of us,” Hellfire spits. “We gave you the air you’re breathing.”

Peeking under one of the ships, I see Raiden wave his pistol and say, “I don’t believe that gives you the right to kill it.”

Following the route on my glasses, I sneak my way onto the field, careful to stay hidden in the shadows of the ships.

“Then why haven’t you killed us already?” Lead asks.

“Because I’m intrigued by you,” Raiden says. “And we have one more thing being loaded, so I have some time.”

I make my way to directly behind Raiden. The shadow of the nose of a ship leads almost right up to him. If the nearest of his men keeps his focus on my team, I should be able to slip past.

As if in response to my thought—and it probably actually was, I remind myself—my team steps outward, tucking their weapons tighter to their shoulders. Raiden’s men react with increased attention.

“Intrigued how?” Lead asks.

“I’ve never really understood the whole mercenary-vigilante thing you have going. And I’ve always been fascinated by your technology and, more importantly, your ability to remain hidden from the, ah, more official agencies of the universe.”

I creep up behind the nearest man. Two feet to his right, I slip on by. His eyes never leave BB, who is aiming an ONYX at him.

“Would you like to see some of our technology at work?” Lead asks.

I’m at the edge of the shadow now, three feet off Raiden’s left arm. I let my DMOTER hang and shoulder my PDW.

“I would love to,” Raiden says.

Lead lowers his UMBRA and nods my direction.

As the smuggler turns my way, I straighten up and step out of the shadow. My PDW points directly at his face. Which shows no sign of fear. Only wonder.

“Holy shit,” Raiden says. He laughs one big belly laugh. “That was fucking cool. You like melted right out of that shadow.”

“Let us leave,” I say, sliding my finger onto the trigger.

He seems not to even have noticed that I spoke. “I was wondering where you went,” he says. “I thought maybe you were lining up a shot on me from a distance with that DMOTER, but damn, this was cooler. Bravo.”

None of his men have moved. All dozen weapons still aim at my team. The threat isn’t working.

Just maybe something else might. . .

It might. Lead gives it a go, Leep says. Be quick. The Enforcers have lost and the UDS are turning this way.

“I’ll give you the tech if you let us go,” I say.

Raiden raises one eyebrow. “The tech that will let me disappear into the shadows?”

“Yes.”

He eyes the burning outpost over his shoulder, then turns his attention back to me. “Done.”

A second passes before it clicks in my head that he accepted the deal already. “Just like that?” I ask.

“Boys, weapons down,” Raiden says and his men obey. “Just like that.”

After a look at Lead, who nods, I pop the link off my belt and toss it to Raiden. The smuggler catches it and turns it over in his hand.

“Just press the long end and step into a shadow,” I say.

He presses the link and backs up into the shadow of a ship. The darkness pulls over him, so I can only see him with difficulty.

“Did it work?” he asks.

“It did,” one of his men says.

“Wonderful!” Raiden steps back out of the shadow and smiles at me, then at Lead. “It was excellent doing business with you. If your Shadows ever want to make another deal, well, I’m a businessman at heart. Gentlemen.” He dips his head and walks to his modified UFA ship. His twelve men turn their backs on us and disperse to several different ships.

Lead and I just shrug at each other.

UDS ship is coming in hot, Leep says.

“Let’s get the hell off this rock,” Lead says. We make the dash across the field as a team and pile into our ship. It lifts off before the ramp even fully closes. The UDS ship speeds toward the field, minigun spinning up. Luckily, our modified craft has us out well before we’re in danger.

 
 
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We have full access to the communications going through the array, including the clandestine ones. Our involvement in the destruction of the Rues criminal outpost seems to have gone unnoticed. The bomb is ready when you need it.
I know of this Halt Raiden, yes.
Very well. I will infiltrate his crew and report back what he is working on.