"Hot," Junebug commented. Softly as the rear of the line exploded in great geyzers of rolling flame. For a moment she felt like she ought to be ordering a platoon of tanks forward into the breech torn in an enemy line by an artillery barage. But there were no tanks, only her and Neil. Junebug raced forward through the smoke, leaping over a ruined adobe wall. All was chaos now. The Spiders and Scorpions had never been soldiers, but now any semblence of discipline was gone. Junebug saw one spider, stunned and bleeding, shoot another simply because he was a shape moving in the haze. Many more were simply throwing down their weapons and fleeing. Junebug fired her railgun methodically, every two seconds, simply swinging her reticule onto one heat signature after another and squeezing the trigger, careful not to overheat the weapon. Even so she felt the heat of of the glowing barrel against her armor, make work done in the hold of the Highlander not quite up to the task of properly cooling so potent a weapon.

A knot of resistance was forming at the entrance to the Spider's compound. The Scorpions had taken the worst of Neil's efforts and the Spider's were beginning to capitalize. Sayeeda targeted the strong point and fired, blasting sandbags and the weapon behind appart in a spraying fireball of white hot glass. She pulled a grenade from her belt and tossed it over the ruin, waiting a second for the concussive pop and the fingers of white smoke spread by the grains of white phosphorus. Scream tore from the a dozen throats and burning men scattered in all directions, clawing at their flesh. Sayeeda charged into the breech, her armor protecting her from the unspent grains which still hissed and popped. A spider leaped at her. She caught him, servos in the armor whining and then pitched him sideways into a concrete pillar with an audible crack. He slumped, legs slack and screaming. Junebug put a round through his chest, unwilling to leave a crippled man who could still pull a trigger at her back. A bullet spanged off her breastplate and she spun, dropping another attacker with a punch that shattered his jaw in a spray of blood and bone. Swinging her railgun she smashed the skull of a cowering thug and then felled three more with a long burst of atomized blood and burning clothing. The gangsters, accustomed to swaggering casual violence, were unable to handle the sudden and savage concentration delivered by a professional. They broke and ran. Junebug followed rail gun cracking as quickly as her optics could pick out targets in the smoke. 

"I think we are going to..." Junebug's trasmission cut off suddenly as something massive and hot slammed into her chest. The sky cartwheeled overhead and she crashed through the adobe wall of one of the dwellings which had survived Neil's detonation. A table broke beneath her in a spray of splintering timber and the breath was driven from her chest. She lay there, stunned and unable to move. Electrical discharge sparked over her chest and the reek of burning insulation filled her nostrils.

"I knew it was you bitch," a voice called from the hole she had blasted in the wall. Sayeeda couldn't turn her head. Her eyes flicked downwards moving through menus of her armors display. They flickered and disolved into static, a confused mass of damage reports and critical failure messages. The Spider stepped into view flanked by three thugs. She was in battle dress and carried a light anti tank rifle. A single shot piece which Sayeeda knew to be effective against light armored units at close range. The Spider was either very good or had gotten very lucky to hit her. Or both of course. The woman stood over her, thumbing another fist sized charge into the smoking breech of her weapon.

"I told your boyfriend not to fuck with me. Apparently he didn't convey my message..."