Page 64 of Wraith: Lethal Impact

Then the gunfire starts.

Automatic weapons from the elevated position on the right. Muzzle flashes strobe through the tree line—four, five, six distinct positions in a staggered line running parallel to the road. Rounds punch through the Hilux's body panels with the sound of a pneumatic riveter, each impact sending sparks and fragments of sheet metal spinning through the cab.

I'm out of the vehicle before the first burst finishes. My boots hit the mud, and I drop behind the engine block—the only part of the Hilux that will stop rifle rounds. The M4 comes up. I shoulder the stock and acquire the nearest muzzle flash through the ACOG.

Breathe. Squeeze.

The rifle cracks. The muzzle flash on the ridge goes dark.

"Contact right, six shooters in the tree line." Rook is out, crouched beside the rear wheel, returning fire in controlled pairs. "Classic L-shape. They've got us in a kill zone."

The Land Cruiser's horn blares—Bronco's signal. The M249 opens up from behind the diesel's engine block, hammering the elevated position with a sustained burst that shreds vegetation and splinters tree trunks. The noise is apocalyptic, the deep bass of the belt-fed weapon shaking the ground beneath my boots.

Hammer works the far side of the Land Cruiser with his carbine, calling the positions by number so Bronco can walk the belt onto them. Left two. Center. Center again.

Cipher crawls out of the Hilux's back seat, clutching his tablet in one hand and his sidearm in the other. Blood streams from a gash above his left eyebrow—shrapnel from the windshield.

"Cipher. Status."

"I'm good." He wipes the blood from his eye with the back of his wrist. "The tablet's still live. I can⁠—"

A round punches through the Hilux's fender six inches from his head. He drops flat.

"Stay down." I transition to the next muzzle flash. Squeeze. The chevron settles, and I take the shot. The flash dies. "Rook, flank left. Use the ravine. Get below their sight line and roll up the position from the south end."

"Moving." Rook drops below the road edge and disappears into the undergrowth.

I reload. Magazine two.

The firefight settles into a brutal rhythm. Bronco's M249 pins the center of the enemy line with suppressive fire while I pick off the flanks with precision shots. The hostiles return fire in disciplined bursts—not panicked, not spray-and-pray. These are trained shooters executing a rehearsed ambush.

But they're not pressing the attack.

The realization surfaces between trigger pulls. The volume of fire is consistent, but static. A competent ambush force with elevated terrain would send a flanking element through the ravine to roll up our blind side.

These shooters aren't maneuvering or closing the distance. They're stalling, not killing.

Containment. Not elimination.

They don't want us dead. They want us here.

I chamber a fresh round and scan the tree line through the ACOG. The remaining muzzle flashes are holding position—four shooters maintaining a steady rate of fire from behind heavy cover. They're content to keep us pinned.

Why?

If the Consortium knew our route—and they clearly did—they had the intelligence to position an overwhelming force. Thirty hostiles from the radar installation could have flooded this road and wiped us out. Instead, they deployed six shooters in a static ambush designed to fix us in place and hold our attention while the main effort strikes elsewhere.

Elsewhere.

The logging facility.

Lily.

"Ivy." I key the radio. "Ivy, respond."

Static. Dead static.

"Ivy, this is Wraith. Respond immediately."