My ribs flare the second I adjust, the pain sharp and immediate, and I suck in a breath that scrapes going down before I can stop it. I lean back just enough to take pressure off my side, keeping my weight balanced over my feet, even as my leg threatens to give under me.
“You’re fine,” I mutter under my breath, forcing my stance to hold. “You’ve been worse off than this, so stop acting like this is the one that takes you out.”
The wind shifts above the basin, the sound of it scraping along the ridge filtering down in a distorted hiss, and a thin sheet of sand slides across the ground below, briefly obscuring movement. One of them uses it, darting forward and then freezing again, testing distance.
I track it, raising the weapon, but I don’t fire.
“Not wasting it on that,” I say quietly. “You’re gonna have to commit.”
Another one circles closer, dragging its path just a little tighter than before, and I adjust my stance again, the motion slower this time, more deliberate as my muscles start to protest.
“You’re closing in,” I mutter, watching the pattern shift. “Yeah, I see it, so let’s stop pretending this is going to drag out forever.”
It lunges.
I fire.
The recoil snaps through my arm, sharp and grounding, and the creature drops mid-motion, its body slamming into the sand hard enough to kick dust up into the air. The others scatter, but only briefly, regrouping faster this time, their movements sharper, more coordinated as they close the space I just created.
“Great,” I breathe, resetting my aim as my arm shakes harder now. “You learn quick, don’t you.”
Another one darts in low from the left, faster than the last, and I pivot into it, firing again. The shot clips it, not clean, andit stumbles before regaining footing, dragging one side as it pulls back.
“Not dead,” I mutter, shifting my weight. “That’s going to come back to bite me.”
They tighten their circle again, pushing closer, testing my reaction time, and I feel the delay creeping in, the fraction of a second where my body doesn’t respond as fast as it should.
“You’re slowing down,” I whisper, more to myself than anything else. “That’s a problem, so fix it.”
My hand tightens around the weapon, forcing stability back into it, and I adjust my stance again, ignoring the way my leg trembles under the shift.
“Come on,” I say under my breath. “One at a time, I can handle that, so don’t get creative.”
They don’t listen.
The one I lost track of moves first, surging up the rock at an angle I didn’t think it could manage, claws scraping against the surface as it closes distance faster than I can fully process.
“Yeah, no,” I snap, twisting and firing at close range.
The shot hits, knocking it sideways, but the sudden movement pulls me off balance, my foot slipping against the heated rock as my center shifts too far forward.
“Damn it,” I hiss, catching myself with one hand before I go over the edge with it.
The world tilts hard for a second, my vision narrowing as I fight to regain control, but the stumble costs me.
They push.
All of them.
From different angles.
Too fast.
Too close.
I fire again, one shot, then another, forcing my arm to keep moving even as the strain builds, but the timing is off now, my reactions just slow enough that the gap starts to close.
“This is it,” I breathe, the realization settling in without panic, just?—
