Adrian, more impressed than surprised by the start of the ambush, followed Aidan’s lead. The bulk of his communication with his teammate relied on direct contact—not following along would be relatively faulty thinking. The urgency of the situation was recognizable, however, and Adrian was switched on.
 “Tracers?” he groaned off radio as a bright streak ran across his field of view, “I’m not impressed anymore.” The feel of a bullet impact shook his gear and he felt the machine’s balance immediately shift to the right. “They hit the ballast,” he noted, “If they’re aiming down there, probably not the best idea to keep [i]this[/i] on me.” He disengaged the auxiliary ammo box at his GEAR’s hip and threw it into the dusty distance, lid flapping open and scattering its contents across the field. He disengaged the now half empty water container and held it in his GEAR’s off hand.

	Once the dust began to settle, Adrian picked out the shapes of the enemy GEAR. “Maybe that black wouldn’t stand out if we were in a wetter region,” he mumbled [i]Three regulars, one marksman, one MG, one grappler. Newfangled civilian models with some good mods. Those pointy things are missiles, aren’t they?[/i] The L-68 planted its rifle in the ground, butt first as it held the water container out and back, and set to pivot on its skates. He opened radio communication. “Prowler, Blitzkrieg, confirmed six hostile—“ One of the GEAR took a shot in the side and immediately fell over— “Five GEAR on our position. This ain’t their first rodeo, over. Aim for the top left of frontal center mass. You can detonate their explosives prematurely, got that?” Soon as he identified movement in the opposition, the L-68 swung its arm forward and spun on its feet as it launched the container outward, directly into the enemy GEAR’s path forward. Upon completing his rotation, Adrian looked down to the utility monitor of his rifle’s scope and shot the container as the fast moving GEAR began to adjust its course. The container, under the bullet’s influence, rolled directly into the new path, caught on the SMG-toting GEAR’s legs, and sent it toppling to the ground in a fresh cloud of dust. He unloaded several shots into the grounded GEAR before he moved on to a new target.