again. Same with his buddies who couldn't break through the triangle's defense. Regardless of this, they tried doggedly again and again, often darting dangerously close between the energy beams before they had to back off for the sake of their skin.


Meanwhile, Fir and Tarkran were slowly making themselves felt the wasted energy, and Maiju, too, felt her body slacken. But they couldn't take a break, had to constantly defend themselves and so far they hadn't met a single time!

Her opponents, on the other hand, seemed tireless.


Maiju felt Tarkran tremble with the effort. She knew exactly how exhausted he must be, what overcoming it cost him to laboriously wrestle every single energy beam. He wouldn't do that for a long time and then there would be only two of them and they would be very bad off. Maiju wondered if she could risk a failure and came to the conclusion that she would not be able to stand any longer anytime soon.


As if on cue, as soon as she had finished thinking, Tarkran fell to her knees again. Two of the locals immediately attacked him, Maiju and Fir fired at the same time, but neither hit one nor the other seriously.


Maiju hissed desperately when she and Fir were attacked by two each and were beaten further and further by Tarkran with no chance of escape. She struggled bitterly, hit, kicked and scratched like a fury gone mad, but every hit she got back to the power of two.

A fist flew towards her from the front, she jerked her hand up and fought back, sharp claws hit her from behind, cut through her armor, hurled her forward into the fists of the other, who instead of Maiju caught a hastily charged kiball, an explosion that swept away the fighters, terrified screams. Maiju took a deep breath, jumped up, shot a box beam at the enemy, who was sitting on the floor whimpering and holding the stump of the other with one hand. The jet hit him right between the ribs in the stomach, punched a huge hole, with a terrible scream the victim fell forward and stopped moving.


A wiry arm grabbed Maiju by the neck from behind and pressed her firmly against the body that belonged to it, stifling her resistance.


"So, now comes the reckoning, you, you ... there is no swear word for you that is hard enough! I'll kill you!" hissed a breathless voice close to her ear. Maiju fainted, gasped quickly and still couldn't breathe.She felt himself pulling away ...


A comparatively tiny beam of energy hit the local's head, but from a distance of a few centimeters it was enough to burn a clean hole through the skull. He tipped back silently, Maiju fell, she could no longer stand, her throat and chest ached, she took a deep breath. She didn't even know how she had managed to create an energy beam in this condition.


No time to hang around, damn it, she had to help Fir! With an effort she brought up her eyes, at first saw nothing but a transparent flicker and dust, but through the dust she sensed three scurrying shadows, which she identified as Fir and his two opponents. Fir had held up better than she. Just not much longer.


A simultaneous attack from the front and rear of the two locals knocked him down, he did not get up again.


> Come on, get up! Help him!

At that moment she was as miserable as never before, Fir and Tarkran in mortal danger and she could not do anything, her body would not obey her although she fought against exhaustion with all her might. She could not bear to be beaten by a potential victim, her pride rebelled.


And that was what made her attack again with the unpredictable suddenness of the Liel cat: her pride.


The backbone of the local, who was about to give Fir the coup de grace, splintered under the force of their attack, he was dead before he hit the ground. The other backed away at first, saw his chance when Maiju landed awkwardly, struck just as hard a blow as she had before, screeched, because the moment her head flew back, she caught his arm and held him, poked him once with clenched paws in the soft lower abdomen.

Black blood rushed out of the wounds, with his hands in front of his stomach the man who had just won the day stumbled back.


"Did you think you had me? I have to disappoint you - I have you!" gasped Maiju. With unsteady steps she approached her victim and bent over it, held it tightly as it reared up in despair, and bit down. The cracking of the neck bone under her teeth, the warm blood stream in her mouth filled her with a devilish joy and the delirium of the predators after a successful hunt. One last tremor ran through the dying man, then his body went limp.


Maiju let go of him. Her eyes glittered, a mean smile around her mouth, she approached the remaining two locals who had both seriously injured her.


Bottomless horror was reflected in their faces. As if frozen, they followed with their eyes every movement of the girl, the merciless fighter, the cat, which crept up to kill its prey with one blow.

There was only one chance left ...


The one with the scratches on his stomach and chest jerked open, he took two quick steps to Tarkran and pulled him up by the collar, aimed deadly claws at his face.


"Not one step further!"


Maiju hissed at him. "Leave him out of the game and fight, coward! Taking hostages is such a crude thing!"> You almost won too, I can no longer! <


"Plump but effective!"


“Don't be so sure about that!” She bluffed. She knew and so did he. Unfortunately ... she couldn't make others pay for their mistakes!


That was it! Mission failed! Because of Rotus' ignorance and inability to defend her teammates!


Because she allowed her to develop feelings for her colleagues! A fighter has to be cold-blooded, it has to pass his ass what happens to others! If your team members ride their way into some shit, please let them ride their own way!`Jurke and Trail had already preached to her.


And she was unable to do that.


No, she couldn't! It was her fault that Tarkran had gotten into this situation, so she couldn't tell him to get himself out of it! Or let him die ...


"I see you are sensible!" the local interrupted her self-reproach. "Now go backwards slowly until you can no longer see me, and then you go to your spaceship as quickly as possible and get away from here! And don't think you could turn around and stab my back! I'll follow you and if you do you don't feel, then ... you know! "


Maiju was silent. What should she do now? Either attack immediately, then Tarkran would be dead, or turn around and try to attack him from behind, which couldn't work if he followed her. And she couldn't trust the scouter to report his presence.


Eventually she decided on the latter, hoping that he would not follow her with his injuries or abandon his badly injured leader.But she had to be quick because if he did what she hoped he would most certainly kill Tarkran before he left, and Fir, who was still unconscious on the ground, unless she took him with her. And if he did follow her, she'd have to lure him far enough and then - hopefully - chill.


Hard to believe that he would drag his hostage across half the planet.


As she backed away step by step, she wanted to laugh at the irony - be quick, what if she could barely get her legs off the ground?


She paused next to Fir, shouldered him, then continued her slow retreat.


Her scouter beeped, reporting two forces moving swiftly towards her; two forces with Scouter!


She almost breathed a sigh of relief. She had to hold off the locals a little longer, then the problem would be solved.


She was moving even more slowly now, stumbling as if the weight of Fir was too much for her.It was almost.


She only glanced furtively at the scouter's window, which told her that Turnus and Tiang were rapidly approaching.


Seconds before her arrival she disappeared behind the rocks and thus out of sight of the local, dropped Fir, slipped past the rocks a little to the left, jumped over them with a huge leap, shot a volley of energy balls without aiming. They missed, but the local man, his hand raised to strike, was distracted just as long as it took Turnus to nail him to the rocks with a lightning-fast attack.


Maiju fell into the dust, unable to move, she lay there, the volley had used up its last energy.


So she didn't get much of the following fight apart from the background noise. Turnus, who had hardly used his strength during the course of the mission, finished him within minutes.


Then he stepped up to Maiju and turned her on her back with the tip of his foot, as if he didn't want to get his hands dirty on her.

“What's that supposed to mean?” His icy tone again. Maiju looked up into his gray eyes, which were drawn together into sparkling slits.


"What?"


"What! Don't pretend to be more stupid than you are! Why did you defy my orders?"


“Because they didn't make it!” It was clear to her that this statement would have dire consequences. But if Turnus couldn't take the truth, then he was unlucky.


"What? You ..." Turnus pulled her up by the collar, his face contorted with anger. "You are full of mouthfuls, Maiju! Carry on like this and you will soon wish you had never been born!"


That hurt, because Maiju's greatest weakness was still her past. Involuntarily she bared her teeth and hissed at him: "I will do that anyway! So it doesn't matter if I obey your fucking orders or not!"


"For the last time: You should do what I want from you and nothing else!" shouted Turnus and hit her in the face. Then he dropped it like a garbage bag."Where's Fir?"


With one hand Maiju