SS: TIE 019

Rey signals to Lili, then to Elsa.

More cars slide to a halt, and molten rubber bubbles on the burning asphalt as cops take aim over whatever cover they can find. Radios crackle and cops shout at idiots on the sidewalk trying to record with their phones instead of taking shelter.

Elsa nods, slaps a fresh magazine into her rifle, and fires rapidly up the street as Elsa does the same in the other direction. Lili darts into the open, keeping low and hugging her gun to her chest as bullets fly. She lets off a burst, and the door of a vape shop dissolves in a cascade. She vanishes into the store as Rey’s rifle clicks empty. Rey drops out of sight and changes magazines, hearing Elsa doing the same. The cops make no move to pursue; they think that Lili’s trying to escape and they’re counting on the tightening perimeter to stop her.

SS: TIE

Under the circumstances, there is no humor in the way that people react to a blonde with her boobs out, wearing a tactical harness and skimpy bikini bottoms, wielding a submachine gun. A stunned woman stands in Lili’s way in the store, and Lili knocks her aside and shoulders into the back, firing a shot into the ceiling. The cowering employees hurriedly make room, and she kicks her way out through the back door into the flat, ugly space where the dumpsters are at the rear of the strip mall.

She can easily reach the van, but she can’t drive it into the hot zone, and nobody’s driving anywhere with this many bullets flying.

A squad car screeches into the entrance blocking her path. Lili brings up the UMP and blasts away the windshield, reducing the two cops inside to Halloween lawn decorations. She bounds forward, up the hood, onto the roof, and down the back of the squad car, hurtling around the corner.

SS: TIE

Buckshot from a police shotgun sends stinging chips of metal through the air as it strikes Elsa’s cover. She hisses and falls back, grabbing at her bloody face.

Rey fires two bursts, then hurries over. It’s just cuts; Elsa’s eyes are OK. She’s already picking herself up. Elsa signals to scatter, and Rey knows she’s right.

Miami is a big city with thousands of cops. They can’t kill them all, and nobody’s getting out if the cops are all converging on the same place. They have to split up; someone has to run interference. Rey nods, and opens up on full auto.

Elsa takes off west, carrying her rifle in her left hand and firing rapidly with her pistol in her right. Rey feels a flash of pain on her side and pivots to fire at the cops to the east. The air swims in the heat, making the endless red and blue look like a tsunami. She’s bleeding.

SS: TIE

“There. There.” Sally points and Shelby spins the wheel. Sally twists to get the shotgun out of the back. The gunfire is blistering; it sounds like a movie. The street ahead is full of damaged cars and Sally sees at least five uniformed bodies on the ground. More cops are crouched behind their cars. As Shelby accelerates toward the scene, one of the officers fires a shot only to be hit in the neck. He goes down in a spray of blood.

“Jesus Christ!” Shelby says.

“Step on it.”

A blonde—all but nude—darts out of an alley firing a fully-automatic weapon. It happens so fast; Sally can only watch in horror as the men and women are hit from behind, helpless to do anything about the bullets cutting them down. They’re cops, not soldiers.

Shelby jerks the wheel, aiming directly at the blonde’s back and racing forward. Some part of Sally’s brain recognizes that as Lili from CCL.

The blonde whirls and fires without hesitation. The windshield explodes and Shelby jerks in her seat. Warm blood spatters Sally’s face. Lili rolls out of the way as the car slams into lamppost and Sally’s airbag slaps her back against her seat with a bang.

Stunned and aching all over, Sally claws her way free and gets the door open, spilling to the ground with chunks of glass from the window. She yanks the airbag out of the way to reach Shelby, but there’s nothing she can do for the woman slumped over the steering wheel.

Sick to her stomach and **** on humid air full of gunpowder, Sally stumbles away from the car, then ducks as bullets whizz past. There’s no sign of Lili, but there’s still at least one shooter down closer to the marina. She fumbles for her radio, but a big engine howls.

There’s too much horror for there to be any relief, but she’s glad to see the Miami SWAT van come around the corner. The van slides to a halt and the rear doors open. Sally’s all set to try to reach those guys in black tactical gear, but a sudden blast deafens her and knocks her over. Blinking, ears ringing, Sally scrambles behind Shelby’s car.

She shakes her head and peers out; there’s smoke and fire, and… body parts in the street. She watches SWAT members gunned down as they stagger around, trying to recover from what must have been a grenade going off in the midst of them.

Chica Flores advances on them, firing an M4 covered in attachments. She goes empty and pulls her pistol, executing an officer trying to crawl away before firing several shots into the back of the van.

That done, she ejects her magazines and strolls on toward the marina, leaving the smoking bodies and wreckage of the SWAT van behind as she reloads her weapons.

Sally sees Chica’s shoes crunching on glass and shell casings, but hears nothing but ringing as the other woman goes by. Hands shaking, Sally raises her gun and closes her eye, trying to make the sights line up on Chica’s back.

SS: TIE

Rey sees Lily throw her UMP aside and draw her pistol. She doesn’t have magazines for that gun in her rig; that means there are fifteen rounds between Lily and big trouble unless she can scavenge something from the fallen cops.

Rey’s a little low herself, but Chica has arrived and it’s time to move. They are still in it. The path out might be narrow, but it’s real.

A single shot pops off and Rey sees Chica go down behind another car. Rey tries to aim, but she doesn’t have a line on whoever just shot Chica. Rapid pistol shots signal that Chica isn’t dead.

Lili winces and ducks. Elsa has pulled some of the police away, but not all. More will be coming.

Lili signals that the path to the van is clear. Rey hesitates.

Go after Chica? Or go with Lili?