Snap Crackle Pop Dead Bandits

"Well that was easy." Xanthiana had made the jump to the guard tower, snapped the neck of the bandit closest to her and buried his knife in the guy across from him with little effort. She felt pretty good so far.

"Fantastic we have taken the guard towers, now exactly what was the plan?" Elly was less convinced the plan was a fantastic success.

"Now we ring the dinner bell." Xanthiana snagged a grenade off the dead bandit at her feet and gave a shout to the bandits in the mine. They came out running just in time for the grenade to hit the ground and explode taking out the initial wave. Xanthiana opened up with her rifle scattering the bandits near the mine entrance only to be completely caught off guard by a couple bandits emerging near the cars.

"This structure is not structurally secure!" Elly announced as the guard tower buckled under gun fire and started to tip.

"Elly activate the adrenaline burst." Xanthiana tried to keep her footing, but the tower was definitely falling over and if she didn't get off it soon it would take her with it. Elly activated the adrenaline and everything went in slow motion. Xanthiana jumped off the structure and brought the butt of her rifle down on a bandit's head caving it in. The assorted bandits were too slow, far too slow, with the adrenaline pounding in her blood Xanthiana moved around them like they were standing still. One bandit even ended up shooting his friend in the melee. Xanthiana didn't even notice the bandits were all dead until she almost collapsed from too much adrenaline. She could feel her heart hammering in her ears with each beat, she had become something else for a brief moment, she wanted to blame it on the EGO device, but she knew the truth, it was all her.

"Are you there Xan you aren't responding." Elly's voice sounded concerned.

"I'm here I was just tired for a moment." It was a lie and she knew the EGO device probably picked up on the lie, but she didn't want to admit or believe the truth.

"Bandits are 100% accounted for all dead, do you wish to proceed into the mine?" Elly seemed chipper in the face of all the murder.

"Yeah we're here to do a job lets get it done." Xanthiana hardened her heart and moved forward. She didn't see any among the dead that looked particularly leaderish, but bandits weren't exactly supporters in strict military rank showing. The mine didn't exactly look safe, probably a product of being hastily assembled post Ark fall to extract the new minerals from the ground Xanthiana surmised.

"Xan we have a large group of people up ahead, be aware." Xanthiana checked her rifles magazine, and moved forward. She was surprised at first the bandits had not moved forward, but when she came to the group of people she wasn't that surprised, they weren't bandits at all but Votan miners.

"Put your gun down." The muscley leader was a Sensoth, from his outfit it looked like he had probably been a miner prior to taking over the mine with the bandits.

"I believe that's the leader Xan."

"Ya think Elly?"

Bandit Tower Removal

"We should not have let that bandit go." Xanthiana was approaching the area the bandit had told her about. It contained he claimed the local bandit leadership, she didn't entirely trust him, but his fear of her at least told her something would be actually at the location, and it was a lot better than just killing every bandit camp with the hope that one of them actually mattered.

"He did what I asked of him and he's wounded, bandits are like wild dogs, when he returns he'll be killed by them anyway."

"That's horrible."

"That's Bandits Elly, have to harden your heart to the horrors, no need to bloody my hands anymore than they already are." The camp was of course set into a mine as they all had been, but this one definitely did have a lot of bandits outside of it, and vehicles, some of the vehicles even looked like they were still working.

"I think your heart is hard enough for both of us." Xanthiana shook off the AI's mind set. She had to, because the world post Arkfall was a shitty place and getting lost in all the horrors did no one any favors.

"Any word from Cobb?" Xanthiana did not like being out of contact with Cobb, especially not before she tried to pull off a difficult operation, but he hadn't exactly given her great instructions or any back up to begin with.

"Negative Sgt. Cobb is not returning my requests for communication."

"Fantastic I just love all the help I'm receiving while a member of the Earth Republic."

"Technically we are contractors to the Earth republic."

"Even Better, all of the having to bow to superiors, none of the actual job protection." The bandit base also had a couple guard towers, though the guards in them looked to be pretty terrible to Xanthiana. They weren't keeping their eyes open for ambush points from the cliff next to the mine, nor were they looking toward the canyon area that cut in front of the mine. Instead they were just jawing at each other like humans generally did in Xanthiana's experience. Xanthiana made her way around the guard towers, making sure this time to be more stealthy for fear of metal men. Thankfully neither guard picked up on her presence and kept on talking about something Xanthiana couldn't hear, but she figured was probably awful.

"What's our plan Xan?"

"Well first we kill these two bandits, I'm thinking snap one guys neck, and then take a knife and kill the other."

"Do you have a knife?"

"No, but the guy who's neck I snap will probably have one, if you can scan for that it would be great."

"The bandit on the right has a knife that will sufficiently kill the bandit on the left when thrown."

"Excellent."

"And then?"

"And then what?"

"What do we do after we have killed those bandits?"

"Hadn't exactly gotten that far Elly."

"I sense no way this plan will fail Xan."

The Worst Plan

"I don't feel this plan is going to be successful." Xanthiana was laying down in the middle of some wreckage she had pulled from one of the several collisions that pock marked paradise. She had attempted to make it look like a fresh collision with herself as the sole surviving wounded victim.

"I feel you aren't giving it the proper credit."

"What if a local farmer comes by? What if the authorities in the area? What if literally anyone, but bandits show up?"

"We're in the middle of bandit territory, anyone who comes this way is a bandit or has bandit like tendencies, and if someone else magically shows up we'll apologize for the incovenience and go about our way, to try this somewhere else." Xanthiana had to admit ti wasn't the best plan, but she figured a good ambush would lead the way to killing a roving band of smaller bandits so she could capture one and interrogate him proper.

"We have no cover."

"It's an ambush Elly, if we were behind cover it would be obvious that we were ambushing. Trust me, I know bandits, and I know idiots, this is plan will work flawlessly! I mean we used this in the war all the time."

"I can assume in the war you had more than just yourself doing the ambushing?"

"Hush Elly." Xanthiana did not need a robotic AI second guessing her brilliant ambush. She waited for at least an hour before she started second guessing her own plan. The sun was falling over the horizon when she heard some kind of vehicle coming close.

"We have incoming, scans show at least three men on an atv."

"Bandits?"

"Well they are all men and what little I can glean with my limited sensory capabilities appear to be dressed raggedly."

"So either bandits or.."

"WHAT DO WE HAVE HERE BOYS!"

"Bandits." The voice was loud and gutteral. She waited till they were fanning out before she rolled over with her rifle and killed two of the bandits outright and wounded the third by blowing out his knee. He threw away his weapon and begged for mercy, seeing as he had dead friends next to him it was the smart move in Xanthiana's opinion.

"Like I said Elly, most of the time this plan works."

"Most of the time?"

"Speak bandit before I send you to whatever god you believe in." Her rifles barrel was still smoking, the bandit pissed his pants.

"Whattttttttttttttttttt, do you want to know?"

Xanthiana smiled, "Everything."

Bandit Plan Revision

"And so you disobeyed my orders to save a small girl who got killed anyway and you don't know where her body was, nor if there were other people in the area who might be held hostage." Xanthiana had met up with Cobb on the cliff where he took his shot, he had the rifle held in his arms like that of a small child. Xanthiana could see a sequence of marks down the butt of the rifle, with a fresh scratch for the Sensoth, Cobb clearly had issues.

"Not buying any of that are you?"

"Roeyka I may sound like I'm some dumb farm boy, and I may have once been a dumb farm boy, but I'm not that stupid, let me guess you thought you were in a better position than you turned out to be and they found you, you fled because you didn't have a weapon capable of piercing the metal guy's armor and I saved your stupid ass against my better judgement." Cobb was alone, he had apparently also been sent to scout bandit hide outs, though he didn't have to walk like Xanthiana did, he had a nice atv nearby.

"Sounds about right, though that last part is a bit insulting, my ass is not stupid at all, its quite smart the rest of me is where the stupid resides." Cobb did not smile, Xanthiana thought him quite incapable of smiling most of the time. Cobb sighed, and looked around, she could tell he was trying to decide what to do with her, for a moment she thought of drawing down on him and killing him, because with his state of mind she didn't know if he was thinking the same thing.

"Ok heres the problem. You reported to a bunch of bandit camps, I found a bunch of bandit camps, and the Erep high command does not want any bandit camps." Cobb was thinking out loud, "The issue of course is that command doesn't want to give me a real force of anyone as this trip is already a public relations nightmare and we've lost a lof of good men of earth already." Xanthiana did not like the way he said men of earth, it was an implication that losing Votans was perfectly fine, which from what she'd heard of Cobb was the exact implication.

"So where does that leave us Cobb?"

"Fucked Roeyka." Cobb spit and then went back to get on his ATV.

"I'm going to need orders sir, unless you want me to just hang around until you figure it out Cobb."

"Do me a favor and kill some damn bandits, try not to burn down any more farm houses while you are at it."

"Any other suggestions Cobb?"

"I'd say act like a soldier for once Roeyka, but I believe you are incapable." And with that Cobb rode off leaving Xanthiana to wonder where or how many bandits Cobb wanted her to kill.

"I don't think he likes us very much Xan." Elly was the master of the understatement.

"Nah he had a bad day I'm sure in a few hours he'll calm down and apologize for being a dick."

"Really?"

"No Elly, not really."

A Problem Seeking a Solution

"Roeyka I need your report." The voice of Cobb was in her head, the sound of rockets and bandits was behind her as she kept fleeing, Xanthiana had not exactly figured where she was running too, but away seemed like the best option.

"Kind of busy right now." The rocket launcher bandit was at least slower than his other comrades though no less able to chase after her. Xanthiana could see a farm house in the distance, she hoped it was abandoned for the inhabitants sake.

"I sure hope you're not fleeing from a group of bandits as that would pretty much be in direct contradiction to the orders I gave you of observing bandit camps not engaging them." The farm house was closer and Xanthiana could see people who looked horrified at the hell she was about to bring down on them, her luck had not held at all.

"Nope not engaing bandits Cobb, I'm training for the Paradise marathon, tough competition this year." The farmhouse group had moved into their home and locked their door, which was smart and safe for them, but left Xanthiana without a place to bunker down, the only other area there was a barn and it would have to do. She ran inside brought both of the barn doors closed behind her just in time for Bandit fire to almost take her ear off.

"Roeyka." Cobb almost sounded like her dad if she could remember what he sounded like.

"Sorry Cobb losing you signal isn't strong enough to maintain soon as I get back in range I'll get in touch bye." It was weird trying to fake transmitter issues with a radio she couldn't just simply shut off, "Elly disable the feed to Cobb."

"Already done Xan, though I think Sgt. Cobb will clue in we aren't having signal issues."

"We have to live for that to be a problem Elly." Xanthiana scampered up to the second level of the barn, the livestock were apparently still in the fields as aside from her and some hay bales the barn was empty. She used the hay as makeshift cover and waited for the bandits.

"Options?" Xanthiana had a moment while the bandits themselves considered their tactical options.

"Run keep running? We're in a wooden structure behind hay bales and one of our enemies is wearing armor we can't penetrate."

"We can't keep running Elly I'm already tired and if we leave these bandits here the people of this farm will get murdered." Xanthiana saw the front door of the barn open slowly and then shut, the bandits were apparently being cautious seeing as she had killed four of them while running already.

"The family of this farm was all set to leave you to die anyway, self preservation Xan." Xanthiana couldn't exactly find fault with the logic the AI was using, the world was a harsh place and most people would leave you to die rather than help you, but Xanthiana held herself better than one of those people. The barn doors exploded in a hail of wood announcing the arrival of the metal man Sensoth.  Roeyka figured it was better to go out on her feet than fleeing and so she opened fire on the bandit and his group, the bullets cascaded off the Sensoth but found their mark on the two bandits with him, the death throes of one of his companions messed up the Metal Man's aim and his rocket went low and blew out the back wall of the barn, she heard a creak from the roof up above.

"Xan."

"Not now Elly kind of busy." Xanthiana looked around but there weren't any windows up in the loft section of the barn.

"Xan, the structural integrity of this building is compromised, if we..."

"Make it worse we can bring it down on that asshole and his friends." Xanthiana snatched up one of the grenades she had, they were incendiary which would have done shit against the Sensoth, but if he was trapped under flaming wreckage he'd be in considerably more trouble. The Sensoth fired another rocket up her way, he missed but punched a hole out the back wall Xanthiana could escape through. She tossed her two incendiary grenades down below at the places Elly highlighted and then lept out the hole the Rocket had made. The grenades did their job, exploding and weaking the other support the barn had and it came crashing down on the bandits and their Iron leader. Xanthiana was about to check on the farmers to make sure they made it through fine when the Metal man emerged from the wreckage, his rocket launcher appeared busted but he was still a very large menacing figure.

The partially on fire, very pissed off Sensoth slowly made his way out of the burning wreckage. Xanthiana opened fire on him hoping the barn has dislodged a piece of his armor but nothing stopped the creature. He was about on top of her his hulking fist coiled up to crush her when a bullet pierced his head. The Sensoth went rigid and then crashed to the ground in front of her, Xanthiana heard the boom of the Sniper rifle right as he landed.

"Roeyka can I assume now you have fixed your communications issue and ceased training for your marathon?" Cobb's voice sounded smug, Xanthiana couldn't blame him, it was a hell of a shot.

Lack of Authority

"And we have our third group of bandits who have overrun a local mine, are we sure there is a local authority in the area?" Xanthiana had been doing the scouting job on foot and had spent the majority of the day walking between bandit camps which seemed to make up the majority of the paradise mining community.

"According to my records law enforcement in the area is understaffed."

"You don't say I can't imagine how that is considering how many bandits are in the area. I would figure they could wake up everyday shoot bandits from dawn till dusk and not actually make a dent in the population."

"I believe that is probably Sergeant Cobb's plan Xan." Cobb hadn't really told Xan his plan at all. It was just go scout the camps and don't come back till you've done the job.

"Won't that upset the authority in the area? I mean in theory there is law right?" Xanthiana realized of course that "law" in the new world pretty much amounted to shooting people before they shot you, but she wanted to believe that it didn't have to be that way everywhere. Bullets coming at her from the bandit camp explained to her not everyone felt the same way about rule of law.

"We have multiple bandits incoming."

"Gee I couldn't figure that out." Xanthiana was crouched up by a rock, she thought she had snuck up on the camp decently especially in the low light of the evening, she had apparently been very wrong.

"MOVE!" The voice of Elly was practically screaming at her, Xanthiana obeyed and the rocket that exploded the boulder she had been hiding behind showered her with debris. Xanthiana slid down the hill she had climbed up to spy on the bandits and turned around to wait for the rocket launcher bandit and his friends.

"I hadn't noticed the artillery, we'll have to talk with the local authority about some gun control amongst the general population." She didn't see the bandit with the rocket launcher, but several other bandits emerged from the smoke and she opened up on them. She got three before they realized the rocket had not killed her. The other bandits disappeared back down the hill they had come from. Xanthiana breathed a sigh of relif until a massive Sensoth in what appeared to be welded on armor emerged, carrying some kind of makeshift rocket launcher with him.

"I do believe that armor will not be penetrated by our rifle Xan."

"You're a wealth of information Elly."

"Tactical retreat?"

"Is that anything like running the hell away because that was my plan."

Business Almost as Usual

"Its fucked." Elly had done her diagnostic of the Challenger's engine and this was her final report. Xanthiana was underneath the engine trying to fix the hybrid human/votan engine. It seemed like everything she did just made something else break, in a way it was exactly like the erep's encampment in paradise. For every mutant group or hellbug colony they wiped out another problem sprung up. On top of that the other Ark Hunters had apparently gotten into some new shit with Von Bach and local law enforcement. Xanthiana in the meantime had been trying to fix the Challenger and failing, it had been five days since Cobb had said he was assigned to her and he had not returned. She was beginning to think the reassignment had gotten forgotten when she felt a boot strike hers.

"Time's up Roeyka time for you to get back in the field." Cobb had his usual don't give a shit demeanor to him.

"Car's still busted Cobb I'm going nowhere."

"Don't need a car to do the job I need you to do. Its a quick scout and out something even a Votan could pull off." Xanthiana picked up the anger in the way Cobb said Votan, she'd heard it before but wrote it off as Cobb being an ass, but now she wasn't so sure.

"Tell you what, you help me find the parts I need to get this running and I'll do your little mission." She slid out from underneath the car and to Cobb's scowling face.

"I have a better deal, you do what I tell you to do or I execute you for being a traitor to the Earth Republic."

"You know how to make a bargain Cobb." Xanthiana was a bit distressed how quickly the conversation turned from simple discussion to threats of execution, but in her experience that was the Earth Republic in a nut shell.

"Get to the quartermaster, get some new clothes, some ammo, and get moving, I'll upload the map to your ego device." Cobb turned around and walked off, she could hear him yelling at some private for something else apparently today was Asshole day for Cobb.

"Cobb is not a very nice person is he?" Elly had been quiet during the exchange choosing to not overwhelm her operator with an additional conversation that only Xanthiana could hear or participate in.

"No one from the Ereps usually are in my experience."

"That's not fair considering your experience Xan."

"Life's not fair." Xanthiana reached the quartermaster and he had a package of clothing and ammo already ready for her.

"Thanks, anything I should know?" The quartermaster was a man named Styles, he didn't so much have a base of operations so much as he had a tent, a guard, and some scattered supplies behind him.

"Yeah this job sucks." Styles was like everyone else a man of few words.

"We're moving off the mountain!" Elly was excited, Xanthiana considerably less so.

"Oh yeah?" Xanthiana was waiting for the other shoe to drop.

"Yeah we're heading into paradise proper, they apparently have issues with bandits."

"Oh that's wonderful Elly, any other good news?"

"The bandits are apparently in mines?" Elly's voice trailed off like a child who realized their parent was not happy, "That's a bad thing right?"

"Yes Elly, yes it is."