Artificial War

[cptflint]

Azm looked in the direction the first sound had come from. As soon as he looked he could see something displacing the water as it moved towards them. Before Kim could finish her last sentence Azm slammed the throttle into the floor board and screamed. "INCOMING!"

All of the men in the back immediately got as low as they could. Azm's truck rammed into the truck in front of him and the missile that was aimed at the cab instead passed through one side of the tarp and out the other, exploding far on the left side of the convoy.

The rest of the convoy, comprised of many different hummers and strikers, opened fire on both sides of the road. The light from the guns revealed at least a platoon of androids on the right side of the line of trucks. Azm could hear the LT yelling for his men to engage. "Right side, three hundred yards!" he called as he opened his door. He held self steady with his left hand on the door, standing over the cab with his sub machine gun in his right hand. He reached over the top of the cab and fired at anything moving towards the convoy.  

[Randomly Gone Insane]

Before Kim could react to Azm's shout, she was thrown back into the seat by the force of the truck speeding forward. Just as she heard the missile pass through their truck, she ducked down low into the seat out of instinct for the attack. When the missile went off on the other side, she sat up and looked outside again, seeing the many lights of gunfire, missile launches, and explosions from the enemy and of their own.

Like Azm, she saw the androids dimly in the light given off from the weapons, and was already rolling down her window again just as Azm called out their location for her. She turned in her seat, settling her arms and the rifle down on the door for stable support as looked down the scope. She did her best to take aim on the common weak points for the androids (eyes, mouth, head on the weaker modules, and other small openings that an average bullet could punch through. She didn't have time to dig for the high powered bullets, nor did she want to waste them in these conditions, with the truck rocking and bouncing around even with the best driver at the wheel).

The truck that had been rammed into by Azm picked up pace, more than likely not caring to be pushed forward and almost off the road. And the others ahead of it moved as well, making the whole convoy speed up and move faster down the road, despite the wet and dangerous conditions.

"Keeping move, men." The Lieutenant barked over the radio (which was placed where a normal car radio would have been). "Engage the enemy, but do not stop the convoy's movements. I repeat, do not stop the convoy's movements. We need to the supplies and you soldiers over to our destination, by any means necessary."

"Fun." Kim grunted, taking a shot after the orders have been given, and now reloading the rifle.  

[cptflint]

As soon as the order was given to move Azm jumped back into the truck and floored it. "Gogogo," he chanted quietly at the truck in front of him as the distance between them started to close again. "This isn't rush hour traffic dammit!"

Two shots passed through Kim's window before she could get it rolled down all the way, then they passed the windshield. "Those two were two hundred yards and closing."  

[Randomly Gone Insane]

((Wall of Text Warning. Sorry.))

Though the other drivers were not as quick as Azm to respond to the orders, the other vehicles too began to pick up speed, the convoy now moving as fast as they could without becoming reckless and dangerous on the watery roads, as not all the drivers were androids.

"We're only human, Azm." Kim reminded him, hearing him chant to the others to move faster. "We have our limitations, and bad weather and high speeds are one of them."

After getting Azm's spotting, Kim started to focus her attention within the two hundred yard range of their truck. Normally, they'd blow by and leave the enemy in the dust. But those were normal circumstances. Androids weren't normal. They could run at the speed of a car, AND move in, AND shoot at you with close accuracy. Damn androids.

Within a few moments, she found the shooter. A lone android armed with his own rifle, most likely trying to counter Kim's job. Another wonderful thing about the bastards, they could run and shoot just fine. Having perfect computer brains to calculate everything made war pretty easy on their side. Kim gave a low growl as she set her sights on the android's head, just behind the ear, the most common place for plug ins on an android, and one of their weak areas. She then moved the sights just ahead of the android, getting ready to fire...

The enemy took another shot, and got painfully close. The bullet cut across the side of Kim's head like a hot claw, but lucky for her the android shot too far ahead to compensate for their movement, just narrowly saving her life. She retaliated by firing back at the android, the bullet going right through the ear. She was too far forward like he had been, but her shot still counted. The android suddenly dropped down, sliding across the muddy ground until it came to a complete stop, dead.

"Mother ********..." She growled, finally pulling herself and her rifle away from the door. She reached her hand up, touching the hot flare of pain on her head. Her hand immediately pulled away the moment she touched the wound, the burning pain getting worse at the touch. Kim looked down at her fingers, finding only a little blood. This was good. The lack of blood meant the wound wasn't too deep, so she wouldn't start to phase out or get dizzy with blood loss, something she didn't need in the middle of a fight.

"Who else is out there, Azm?" She asked, turning back to the window just as there were more booms, these ones much louder and much closer than the previous ones. And this time, Kim saw where they had come from.

In time with the boom, flashes of light beamed from beneath the bridge. Shortly there after, the sound of crumbling rock followed as the bridge began to collapse, starting from the end closest to the convoy and ending on the other side of the river. The leading vehicles fell with the rubble and pieces of the bridge and into the flooding river, while those who didn't immediately fall slammed onto the brakes, trying to stop before they reached the edge. In the chaos, vehicles slammed into each other, inadvertently pushing everyone forward and closer to the collapsed bridge.

"AZM!" Kim screamed, gripping down on her seat out of fear and panic as brake lights shined brightly into their eyes, while their rear end was slammed into by the truck behind them.  

[cptflint]

Azm's eyes snapped to the bullet that passed inches away from killing Kim. After the bullet passed and she took down the android who fired it his full attention turned back to the road.

"HOLD ON BACK THERE!" he yelled as soon as the line in front of them stopped. Azm jerked the wheel right and the heavy truck lurched and tilted to the left. The truck road on two wheels and the tires screeched as the rear side of the truck slammed into the rear end of the truck in front of them. It sounded and felt a whole lot worse then the hit really was, as the vehicle jerked and spun back into control from the force of the impact. They bumped along on the rough ground for another car length before finally stopping. More bullets plinked of the armor of the truck. "Five targets. 100 yards. We need to get on the left side of the convoy where there's cover," he said opening his door and hopping out. "Come out this side, quickly!"  

[Randomly Gone Insane]

Kim had kept her grip strong on the seat as Azm took evasive maneuvers to stop the truck and keep them from pushing the line ahead of them closer to the drop. When the truck finally came to a complete stop, Kim had jerked forward out of her seat, giving herself a sharp whiplash. She hissed in pain, releasing the seat and grabbing at her neck while Azm[ was barking out something about leaving.

"Yeah, yeah..." She growled lowly, lowering down across the seat just as a bullet whizzed through, only missing by a moment. She crawled across the seat and for the door, while the soldiers behind unstrapped the trap and hopped out to the side.

The remaining trucks had followed Azm's lead, the soldiers who lived pouring out into the sides and using the vehicles for cover while they returned fire upon the enemy. When Kim got out of their truck, she continued to crawl across the ground and moved herself beneath the truck, hiding herself under it while she took aim and fired at the spotted androids. They closed in fast, and Kim only managed to bring down two (one with a neck shot, which severed it's movements but unfortunately did not kill it; the other had been injured from a blast, and Kim shot through it's damage armor, killing it). As she took aim on a third, something thudded against the ground close to the truck.
"GRENADE!" She threw her arms in front of her face, taking up a boxer's defensive position and rolled away in between the truck's tires. The grenade went off, and the shards of metal cut into the rubber, through the metal under belly of the truck, into the ground, and through the air and into some unfortunate soldiers caught in the blast. Kim felt a couple pieces graze her legs and arm and at least one piece punch through her armor and dig in her back (thank God she had the armor or she'd be choking on blood now). She could smell fluids though, and strong. Something was broke on the truck.

"CLEAR OUT!" She backed, shimmying out from under the truck. "Truck's compromised, we need to find better cover!" As she emerged out, she looked at Azm. "Can you see anywhere can take cover from here?"  

[cptflint]

Azm posted behind the front end of the truck and fired over it at anything moving. After a few quick three round bursts anything moving he shot at within 50 yards suddenly and quickly stopped moving.

One of the enemy androids got just close enough to roll a grenade under the front end of the truck. When the enemy rounded the corner to fire on the squad Azm quickly punched him in the cranium hard enough that Azm's fist shoved the androids head into the side of the truck behind him, denting the side of the truck and crushing the enemy androids head. This all took place while the grenade exploded under the truck.

Azm turned to Kim as she got to her feet. "Get behind this truck," he said tapping the truck he had just punched an enemy into. "GO," he said deploying his shield and followed behind the rest of the squad as they moved, covering them as best he could with his shield.  

[Randomly Gone Insane]

Kim moved with the rest of the squad as they raced across the brief open ground, moving onto the next truck as Azm kept the charging androids preoccupied. She wasn't happy about moving to another truck, one that was literally next to their compromised one, but it would do for now.

Kim took position at the front of the truck, whipping out above the hood to fire quick and brief shots at the enemy before they could counter fire on her with deadly precision. She wasn't sure how many of her bullets actually hit the targets, but she knew she was doing well enough.

Painfully and slowly, the ambush came to an end. The 'winners' of the skirmish were the humans, if they could be called such a thing. Though they survived, it gave at a great cost.

Three of their six convoy trucks had fallen into the river, taking out two-thirds of the supplies the convoy was trying to deliver, and one squad that had made up the total platoon that were in charge of delivering the supplies.
Combat causalities added up the death toll even higher, as enough men to make another squad was lost, leaving the originally forty strong platoon down to twenty soldiers. And those were just the survivors. Those injured were still being counted...

Kim gave a tired as she was leaning against one of the remaining trucks, exhausted from battle and injury. She forced herself into the back of 'the line', as there were others in worse condition than she was, and wasn't even in the mood to put up with their field medics. She hoped that maybe Azm only knew of her head injury, which was still burning but relatively minor, but part of her doubted it. Like the damn android he was, he had a way of knowing s**t that people wouldn't. No doubt his sensors picked up on her blood, or other some crazy a** thing she couldn't understand. But Kim still hoped, and kept her back to the truck in an effort to hide the grenade shard she had in it while she tried to regain her nerves and some energy in the ending of the fight.  

[cptflint]

Azm was already walking towards Kim with a med kit. She might be alive and kicking but there's no way she came out of that grenade blast without any injuries. Any intelligent human would know, even if he wasn't able to smell the wound after the blast went off. "You don't have to deal with the medics... but you do need to get the grenade bits out of your back."  

[Randomly Gone Insane]

Kim gave a tired sigh as Azm approached her with a kit. She knew right then that he knew about her back, and there no was faking it away. She didn't even bother trying to argue with him about the injury. Arguing with him was like trying to move a boulder by shouting. It just didn't work.

"I'm holding up fine, you know." She protested as she began to strip off the SWAT body armor, flinching and hissing at her movements as it flared her back up with pain. She forced herself through the pain though, not wanting to make it seem any worse than it probably was.
"My injuries could wait. I'm sure the bleeding has stopped, or at least slowed down." She sighed she now in only a long sleeved sport shirt that fit on her body like a glove. "Others could use your medical attention." She pushed herself away from the truck and turned herself to the side so that her back was exposed fully. She sat up straight, not wanting to lean over and stretch out her muscles and cause more tearing through the muscle. "I don't always need to be top priority."  

[cptflint]

"The longer we wait to treat this the harder it's going to be to treat," he replied as he opened the kit. "The fact that the bleeding has stopped means this is going to hurt a bit more," he said as he held an unpowered electro magnet over the wound in his right hand and a needle in the other. After a small injection of pain killers he turned on the magnet. The shard jumped through the wound, re opening the clot. After a bit of cleaning and some stitches she was good to go. "You are my priority. You are why I'm assigned to this unit," he explained. "I wish I didn't have to be like this all the time, and I've really been trying to eas' up a bit, but you did kinda get blown up by a grenade... just saying."  

[Randomly Gone Insane]

"It's a shard, not an infection." Kim snorted, rolling her eyes at Azm's argument about waiting. She had braced herself for the pain of a pair of tweezers to fish out the shard, and the actual pulling, and was surprised to feel only the shard coming out on it's own. It still hurt, but at the same time left an odd sort of relief. Though the treatment was odd, she wasn't entirely confused by it. It didn't seem too far fetched for Azm to have the ability to suck up metal like a magnet, on top of all his other perks. There was no end to his list of tricks..

"Yeah, I know, I know." She tiredly groaned in response to his explanation, sitting through the cleaning process rather dully now. Compared to receiving the shard, and then getting it pulled out, the ending was a walk in a park. "I wish you didn't act like this all the time either." She chuckled, looking over her shoulder at him. "And I'm sure it's not as hard as you make it out to be. I'm just another face for the army. Nothing more, despite what my father is pushing into your chips."  

[cptflint]

"No the job is not hard at all," he replied as he put his things away. "The terms are really flexible and easy. Make sure your chances of survival are as high as possible. Your father's words."

He leaned against the truck. "Having the privilege of being able to enjoy my wit and charm is just a bonus." He looked over at her. "Don't you miss being a civilian?"  

[Randomly Gone Insane]

"Of course he'd say something so stupid for a soldier..." Kim grunted, shaking her head now with a slight smirk.She reached for the armor, slowly strapping it back on herself as to avoid breaking the stitches, and she wondered if she'd even feel them break with the pain killer working in her system. She gave a chuckle at Azm's comment to his wit and charm. Kim was pretty sure he meant annoyances and over reactions and protectiveness. That privilege she didn't enjoy.

When asked about the civilian life, Kim grew quiet. She hadn't really thought about that. At the time of becoming a soldier, she was absolutely sure of her path and never thought of being a civilian until the war was over.

"I don't know.." She admitted with a sigh, slowly moving herself back against the truck beside Azm. "The thought of being civilian hasn't really come to me. Not since I signed up for the army." She lightly shrugged her shoulders, frowning slightly as she remembered some of the things about being a civilian. Calm, casual, almost quiet which was a huge difference between being a soldier. Their last skirmish just showed that. But of course, if the peace was broken by invading androids, civilians were herded off like cattle into the safe houses, even if they had the means to fight and wanted to join in defending their home. Kim can remember protesting, fighting, kicking, and even a bit of screaming as she fought against the militia who were in charge of defending their homes, and of course making sure every civilian was the blasted safe house. Those fights got even worse when her father decided to become president, and suddenly she was a top priority for the militia when they were herding.

"I don't like being treated like a doll." She grunted, a glare on her face as the memories put her in a bad mood. "I know that for sure."  

[cptflint]

Azm nodded, examining the look on her face. "I'm sorry... I've upset you," he said, looking away. "I will refrain from asking such insensitive questions in the future."