From my side, things were far worse.

The female Ossarian struck Hannah like a vehicle tearing through flesh.

One moment, she was alive, trembling as she tried to reload. The next, her body caved beneath the impact with a wet, sickening crack. Her ribs folded inward, blood bursting from her mouth before spraying across the dirt. The force lifted her off the ground, twisting her body in the air as if her bones had turned to cloth.

She hit the ground several meters away.

Not as a person. 

Her shoulder struck first, twisting at an angle no human limb should ever make. One arm folded beneath her, the bone jutting against the skin until the fabric of her sleeve darkened with blood. Her ribs had caved in so badly that her uniform no longer sat flat against her body; it sagged around the ruined shape of her chest.

Her eyes remained open, staring at nothing. The worst part was her face. It still carried the last trace of panic, frozen there, as if she was still trying to understand how everything had gone wrong so quickly.

The Ossarian stood above the carnage, its gray skin painted red. Pieces of torn fabric and flesh clung to its body, and Hannah's blood dripped from its limbs in slow, heavy drops.

For a moment, I could not move. I could not even think of her as Hannah. My mind refused to connect the girl who had been standing beside us seconds ago with the broken thing lying on the ground now.

Then the Ossarian turned toward me.

That was when instinct took over.

I buried everything. The horror. The nausea and the burning lump in my throat that threatened to break into a cry.

My body moved before my mind could catch up. I pulled the bolt back, ejected the spent capsule, grabbed a fresh one, forced it into the chamber, and locked the weapon forward. 

This process took about 5 seconds

On a battlefield, that was too long. By the time I finished reloading, the distance between us had already become dangerously short. She was close enough that one wrong breath, one delayed shot, or one moment of hesitation would end everything.

The creature in front of me barely looked gray anymore. Hannah's blood covered her from head to chest. The sight alone almost broke my focus, but I forced my rifle up. My stance was far from perfect, but it was enough. I aimed at the center of her body and pulled the trigger. 

The shot struck her chest.

The Ossarian froze, as if something inside her had been ripped loose. Then she dropped to one knee, staring down at the ground in stunned confusion. I did not waste the chance.

I pulled the bolt back, ejected the spent capsule, loaded another one with trembling hands, and aimed again. This reload took longer,six seconds, maybe more, but this time she was not moving.

I placed the sight over her head. 

And fired.

The capsule tore through her skull with a wet crack, snapping her head backward as part of it burst open. Dark fluid and fragments of bone sprayed behind her, scattering across the dirt. For a moment, her body remained kneeling, twitching as if it had not yet realized it was dead.

Then she collapsed backward.

When her head struck the ground, what remained of her head broke further against the stone, leaving a dark smear beneath her. One side of her skull was simply gone, exposing torn flesh, shattered bone, and something pale beneath it that I refused to look at for more than a second.

I lowered the rifle, but my hands refused to stop shaking.

The battlefield had not gone silent. But as I stared at the body in front of me, I realized something.

All I felt was the weight of the rifle in my hands, the blood on the ground, and the horrifying truth that I barely survived my first encounter with an enemy.

***

Captain Sullivan scanned the battlefield in a single glance. At the front, Alexander and Aaron were both reloading, while the two wounded male Ossarians continued advancing. They were injured, but not finished. Sullivan knew they still had a few seconds before those things reached them, thus he could choose to ignore them for now

The rear had no such luxury.

His eyes moved toward Hannah just in time to see her body thrown from the ground in a spray of blood. Then his gaze snapped to me. I was reloading, my face locked in desperate focus, my rifle already turning toward the blood-soaked female Ossarian. For a fraction of a second, Sullivan seemed ready to move in my direction.

Then I fired.

The shot struck the female Ossarian in the chest, forcing her body to seize and drop to one knee. Sullivan's expression eased slightly with relief. One danger had been stalled, which meant his attention could move to the next.

His eyes immediately shifted toward Harper's side, and his expression tightened again.

She was already on the ground, pinned beneath the female Ossarian, and whatever was happening there could no longer be called a fight. Harper was not defending herself anymore. Her body only jerked with each blow, limp and helpless, while the creature tore into her with every punch.

By then, her face was so badly damaged that it was hard to recognize the person who had been standing beside us only minutes ago.

Sullivan had a loaded weapon. That was the worst part. He could shoot, but from where he stood, firing meant risking Harper's life as much as the Ossarian's. The two bodies were too close, tangled together. One wrong angle, one small shift, and the shot would tear through Harper instead.

So he made his decision. He lowered the rifle just enough to move, then rushed toward Harper's side, closing the distance as fast as his legs could carry him.

***

Alexander saw the carnage unfolding behind us.

For a moment, his focus broke. His eyes moved toward Hannah's body, then toward Harper being beaten into the ground, and guilt twisted across his face. He wanted to turn back. I could see it clearly. Every part of him was screaming to help.

But Aaron's shout snapped him out of it.

"Alexander! Focus!"

Alexander clenched his jaw and forced his eyes forward again.

The male Ossarians were still in front of them, wounded but not dead. That was the problem with males, they could endure far more shots than the females. If one of them managed to close the distance, neither Aaron nor Alexander would survive. They were stronger, faster, and tougher than any human, even without fully using Radiance.

At close range, it would not be a fight. It would be an execution. So no matter how much Alexander wanted to help, he had no choice. Before he could even think about saving anyone else, he and Aaron had to finish the enemies in front of them.

I looked across the battlefield and saw Captain Sullivan closing in on the female Ossarian from behind. At first, anger flared in my chest. He looked too calm, too controlled, too untouched compared to the rest of us. While everyone else was bleeding, panicking, or barely holding together, he moved as if this was just another mission.

Then I saw Harper. Her situation was far worse than I had realized, and suddenly Sullivan's plan became obvious. He could not shoot from a distance without risking her life. The only way to kill the Ossarian cleanly was to get close, find the right angle, and put it down without hitting Harper in the process.

Captain Sullivan closed the distance from behind, raised his rifle at a careful angle, and fired directly into the Ossarian's head. The shot landed cleanly. The creature collapsed, and Harper fell with it.

I forced myself to look away almost immediately. I could not handle the state of her body, not her face, not the blood, not the way she lay there barely recognizable beneath the thing that had almost killed her.

Instead, I turned my rifle toward Alexander and Aaron's side. 

Their situation was not that bad, at least it was controlled. The male Ossarians were still standing, but both were wounded and slowing down. I aimed at the nearest one and fired, striking it hard enough to stagger it.

That was all Alexander and Aaron needed.

Alexander followed with a clean shot, while Aaron finished the second one moments later. One after another, the remaining Ossarians fell, until the battlefield finally began to quiet.

I reloaded my weapon first, afraid that something else might appear. Only then did I rush toward the tanker.

The driver was still inside, curled beneath the dashboard with his arms over his head, shaking so badly that he looked like he had forgotten how to move. The tanker had been positioned farther ahead for a reason. If anything attacked, we were supposed to draw its attention before it reached the vehicle. Most of the danger would fall on us, not the tanker.

I yanked open the passenger door and leaned inside, ignoring the driver's trembling breaths as I searched the glove box. My fingers found a medical kit, and I pulled it out before sprinting back toward Harper.

When I reached her, my stomach twisted.

Harper was lying on her back, barely moving. Her uniform was torn and soaked through with blood, her chest rising in shallow, uneven breaths. One side of her face was swollen beyond recognition, smeared with dirt and red, and her body looked too fragile, too broken, as if one wrong touch would finish what the Ossarian had started.

"Is she alive?" I asked, my voice rough.

Captain Sullivan was already kneeling beside her, pressing his hands against one of her wounds.

"Yes," he said. "Barely. Go get medical supplies. Now."

"Here," I said, pushing the kit toward him. "Take it."

Surprise flickered across his face. He had not expected me to have it already.

He took the kit without wasting a second and tore it open.

I stepped back. I did not know enough about first aid to help, and even if I did, I doubted it would have made much difference in a situation like this.

While Sullivan worked on keeping Harper alive, Aaron and Alexander rushed toward us. Alexander was the first to speak, his face pale.

"How is she?"

I cut him off before panic could spread any further.

"Captain's helping her. Form a circle. Now."

A circle formation was a basic defensive tactic used when a squad was surrounded or outflanked. Everyone faced outward, covering a different direction, creating a full 360-degree perimeter with no exposed flank.

We moved into position.

But the real reason I gave the order was guilt.

I could not stand there and do nothing. I could not keep looking at Harper. I could not keep thinking about Hannah. So I buried myself in something practical, something useful, something that made me feel like I still had control.

But I knew the truth. I had used the weakness in our formation to survive.

I had gambled that Hannah would be targeted instead of me. Maybe I could have saved her if I had taken a greater risk. Maybe if I had moved differently, aimed faster, or thrown myself into danger, she would still be breathing.

But I had not. And the worst part was that if time turned back, I knew I would probably make the same choice again.

That thought did not ease my guilt.

It made it worse.

From my side of the formation, I could still see Hannah's body.

It was hard to believe that the broken thing on the ground had once been human. Her limbs were twisted unnaturally, her uniform torn and dark with blood. Her face still carried that final look of terror, frozen in the moment she realized death had reached her. She had been scared. She had panicked. She needed help.

And I had let the battlefield choose her. My chest tightened.

A burning lump rose in my throat, painful and impossible to swallow. I tried to force it down, tried to focus on the ruins ahead, on my rifle, on anything except the body lying behind me.

But I failed.

Before I even realized it, I was sobbing.

Aaron and Alexander could not see my face from their positions, but they could hear me. Aaron said nothing.

Alexander looked toward me.

And from the look in his eyes, he had finally realized I was carrying the same guilt he was.

And beneath that guilt, there was something worse.

Fear.

If this could happen to Hannah and Harper during an F-rank mission, then what would happen to Victoria if her team ran into something unexpected? What would become of his sister if Team B walked into an ambush of their own?