21 Kurz vs Lauren

"Keep it moving!" shouted the soldiers to the hostages.

The students crammed into the idling transport vehicles.

Mao's M9 was on its knees, shielding the civilians. There were no enemies in sight.

"Two of the students is missing!" yelled one of the hostages, breaking out of line. The woman, dressed in a suit, appeared to be about the same age as Mao.

"Kaname and Sousuke will be traveling home on another plane."

"A-another plane? How do you know my student's name?'"

"That's not important. Hurry up and board that plane."

Totally flustered, the teacher followed the instructions.

Time was not on their side. Sousuke and Kaname were still MIA, and Kurz was still out in combat somewhere. Thirty seconds ago, he had reported having some kind of trouble, though.

A woman exited from AS. Then she rushed toward Kuroko that was hugged by Momoi.

"Are you Kuroko?"

"Who are you?"

"I'm Melissa Mao, Sousuke's partner. Tell me what had happened to this base? I need the detail"

"Okay, it just a simple, I wiped out all enemies here"

"WHAT?"

"Now you must save Sousuke and Kaname, I think they are in a dangerous situation. He brought Kaname with A.S. to the northwest. I will leave the detail after that. Enemies' reinforcement army had arrived there"

"Not good"

She thought "if Kurz and Sousuke did not come back, although they had 2 A.S. on their side, the reinforcement army must be powerful"

She entered the A.S. again.

"Urzu Six, aren't you done yet?" Mao inquired.

No response.

The hostages and soldiers took their seats and the rear doors of the planes closed.

"Hurry up, Urzu Six. Get them here, pronto."

Silence.

"Urzu Six, respond. Urzu Six!"

No reply.

"Don't screw around at a time like this, Kurz! Don't piss me off!"

Still, Kurz said nothing.

...

"Gotcha!"

Kurz let one rip from his rifle. The violent recoil jarred his frame.

The silver AS took cover in the shadow of the brush. Actually, it changed course just before Kurz fired, but it looked nearly simultaneous.

"Man, this bastard's quick," growled Kurz. Smacking his lips, he changed the rifle's magazine.

Although they started fighting several minutes ago, the silver AS hadn't fired a single shot yet. Since Kurz destroyed its rifle, it probably had only close-combat weapons left.

"Ha! You think you can get me?" taunted Kurz.

Blam! Blam!

Kurz fired twice. Both shots came as close as bullets can come without connecting.

"What the hell, is my aim off?" Kurz asked rhetorically.

"Negative," answered the machine's AI, "the ballistics error margin is within set margins."

Kurz knew that. He spent a great deal of time fine-tuning the thing in between missions. The enemy's evasion abilities specifically known as "random evasion"-were impressive.

Staying alive for that long without firing a shot was more than remarkable.

The abilities of the enemy's AS were on par with Kurz's, maybe even higher. But how could anything be better than Mithril's weapons, which were ten years ahead of the rest of the world?

"How is that possible? Crap"

Kurz imagined the silver AS to be smiling as it dodged the shots.

"Don't screw with me!" Kurz knew time was of the essence. He had to finish off the enemy in a hurry and go pick up Sousuke and Kaname. He worked out a plan.

"Time to get tricky!"

Making it look as though he wanted to keep some distance between himself and the enemy, he fired several shots as if he were terribly confused. Keeping his distance, he dropped to his knees and aimed the gun steadily.

However, he didn't fire. He looked down on the rifle and manually moved the bolt several times.

Raising the gun again, he still didn't fire.

It all seemed suspicious to Lauren.

Kurz dropped the large rifle and took out his monofilament cutter, which was shaped like a combat knife.

Pulling out his own blade, the enemy immediately rushed at him.

"Aha! Gotcha!"

Kurz's M9 stood to wait for the enemy to close the gap. When the enemy neared, Kurz threw the knife, forcing Lauren to knock it aside, relaxing his position. Meanwhile, Kurz already had picked up and aimed his large rifle in a single, fluid motion.

At this range, he couldn't miss, and evasion was impossible.

"See you in hell!"

A shot. The fifty-seven-millimeter shell flew out of the barrel directly at the machine's silver torso.

....