"Don't make me punch a hole in that helmet of yours." Cathy stared down the operative without flinching. In her mind, she was crapping her pants.

The operatives were just normal people underneath their kevlar armors and plexiglass helmets. They were just doing their jobs, obeying the orders passed down to them. Cathy was aware they had to deal with a lot of sickos as a regular thing in their life. And maybe they'd just gotten used to dealing with every other nobody with force and terror. But that was still not a good enough reason to put a scare in a pregnant lady.

"You can get arrested just for saying something stupid like that," the operative said to Cathy.

"You mean, this isn't arrest?" Cathy raised an eyebrow. "Telling a pregnant mom that she is supposed to step into some room for a while, not answering her why she should when she simply asks, threatening to use force just for asking a simple question." She shrugged. "Sounds pretty much like an arrest to me."

"That's it, get moving, lady!" The operative behind them shoved the muzzle of his rifle into Lisa's back making her wince and whimper.

Cathy sneered at him. "Hey, hands off, mister!"

That's when the first operative grabbed the collar of Cathy's shirt and yanked her forward. "I think, we'll have to take you in for our questioning as well," he said in his cold, baritone hiss.

This was like a green signal for the second operative who grabbed Lisa's arm and started to drag her with him. Lisa let out another low whimper, her free hand instinctively held onto her belly, guarding it. Before Cathy could say anything she felt the handcuff snapping shut around her wrists. Her eyes went wide. "Why are you putting these on me?! For asking a damn question?!"

Instead of a verbal response, Cathy was yanked forward even more roughly. She lost her balance and the operative was dragging her after him like a ragdoll, her shoes scraping against the floor of the airport lobby.

"At least let her walk on her own!" Lisa snapped at the operatives.

"Shut up!" the second operative growled. "That girl is getting the perfect response to her behaviour!"

"I asked a simple question, idiot!" Cathy growled back. "And she's right! I can walk! Stop dragging me like that!" She struggled in the operative's grip, trying to stand erect.

"Stop your flailing around, kid!" The operative kicked Cathy in the stomach and kept dragging her after him.

"Cathy!" Lisa cried out, reaching out towards the girl as if to help her up.

But the second operative yanked her back. "Hold steady, woman!" He dealt her a backhand across the face.

Lisa whined in pain.

With the position Cathy was in, she couldn't see what exactly the operative had done to Lisa. But her cries of pain were more than vivid enough.

The other few passengers who had been waiting in the lobby watched the drama unfold. The rest of operatives hadn't even stopped their patrolling or even raised a head. Again, this was probably just regular occurrence for them. Maybe they saw worse on a daily basis.

But none of that bothered Cathy as much as Lisa's sniffling that she could hear behind her as the operative dug his fingers into her arm. Something stirred inside Cathy. An emotion that was a little too intense, almost irrational because she felt it for Lisa, a person she'd only met a few hours ago. But Cathy couldn't bear to hear this woman's whimpers of pain. Maybe it was because Lisa was in a vulnerable state because of her pregnancy. Or maybe it was just that Lisa had insisted on taking Cathy with her on that plane, asked her to be alongside her, called her a good person and reassured her that everything would he fine if only they stuck together. Maybe it was all of those feelings combined, but Cathy knew, she wasn't about to let these bozos in plexiglass helmets harass them any further.

And that's when a voice echoed inside the girl's head. A distant memory of a high school gymnasium snapping up in her mind's eye. A blurry face calling out to her from the past. "Focus on your form, Cathy!" her gymnastics trainer's voice admonished her in another life, back when her school was yet to get bombed out of existence. "You're clinging too much to the bar! The bar is just an anchor. Use it as a leverage. Focus on your form and let the momentum drive your body like a bullet. Do it again, Cathy! Do better!"

"The bar is just an anchor," she muttered to herself while the operative was still dragging her. She let her body fall loose in his grip, ignoring the pain that the handcuffs caused when they bit into her wrists. "The bar is just an anchor." Nerve endings in her limbs tingled with anticipation, muscle memory dug up the corpse of a gymnast that she'd buried within herself long ago. It was like booting up an old computer in your basement and finding all your childhood snapshots still in the disk, still as vivid as the day they were first taken. "The bar is just an anchor."

Cathy used the operative's grip on her handcuff chain like an anchor and bent her waist to swing her legs forward as if she was swinging from the bar back in her school gymnasium. She drove the heels of her boots into the back of the man's knees, landing on her back and tripping his balance but also freeing herself from his clutch at the same time. She dug her flare gun out of her jacket before the operatives could react. She fired two shots in a quick succession.

"You bitch!" One of the operatives barked as the red dust exploded into their vision, allowing the women their window to escape. Lisa had taken the chance to snag the handgun out of one the operative's hip holster while they were still befuddled by the sudden action.

Cathy grabbed Lisa's arm and dragged her out of the red fog. The woman struggled to run along at the girl's speed.

"Get back here, you!" The operative who'd been harassing Lisa sprang out of the gale of red smoke. Lisa squeaked in panic, raised the gun and fired away. Frantic bullets flew around before one of them got the operative in his neck while his hand had almost reached her. The man went down, gripping his own gurgling throat and thrashing around in agony.

The other operatives had already started to fire their rifles at Cathy and Lisa. The two women dove behind a pillar before the bullets could get them. Lisa was panting, sweating frantically.

"You okay?" Cathy asked her.

Lisa just nodded. The operatives shooting at them were now spreading out through the lobby and closing in, meaning to surround them before they had a chance to make a run for it. That's when the emergency alarms went off. The main gates were locked automatically.

Cathy cursed under her breath. This was getting worse. She saw Lisa's condition. Even though the woman had said she was fine it didn't look like that. Her entire face was flushed and sweating and her breath was heavy. Cathy cursed again.

She peered out from the side of the pillar. The smoke from the flares was clearing up. The operative that Lisa had shot lay bleeding on the floor, dead still. But twelve other operatives that were drawing nearer, guns at ready. We're screwed. She grit her teeth, frowning deeply. They had to do something now!

Cathy still had four more flares on her. "Lisa," she said, loaded the gun, "at my signal, be ready to grab that dead operative's rifle."

Lisa's face was clearly indicated that she wasn't ready for this. But the woman still nodded. Cathy eyed the dead operative in the middle of the lobby, the puddle of his blood, dissipating red smoke, the operatives who had now formed a wide phalanx who were closing in on them. Then she noticed a luggage trolley that was idling a few feet away behind another pillar on the opposite end. Cathy nodded. This can work.

"Lisa, we're moving now!" Cathy snapped before she ducked out and unloaded the flares at the floor, setting them off and raising an even thicker screen of smoke this time.

The girl rushed up to the luggage trolley while Lisa ran at the dead operative and snagged the rifle off his corpse. In less than five seconds, Cathy rolled the trolley baco towards Lisa. "Hop on!" she said hurriedly.

Lisa's eyes went wide beneath the visor of her mask. "In the trolley?"

"I said hop on, Lisa!" Cathy snapped. "We don't have enough--"

"Not so fast!" An operative emerged out of the clouds of smoke and grabbed Cathy by her hair.

Her her flare gun clattered to the ground and Lisa screamed in panic. Cathy swung at the operative, her wrists were still trapped in handcuffs so the attempts were quite futile.

Lisa didn't waste much time watching the operative brutalise the younger girl. She raised the newly acquired semi-auto rifle and squeezed the trigger. The bullets shattered through his plexiglass helmet, a fountain of blood spurted out of the bullet hole. The man went down.

More operatives were emerging out of the smoke. Lisa quickly settled herself on the luggage trolley. Cathy snatched her flare gun off the floor, shoved it in her jacket. Then she took off, pushing the luggage trolley with Lisa on the carrier.

The operatives fired shots at the fleeing women. Lisa started to spray the bullet from the rifle she had stolen. "Out of the way!" She screamed as she kept squeezing the trigger. "Outta the freaking way!!!"

"Lisa, don't do that!" Cathy cried out over the thundering gunfire. "You are wasting bullets and you might hurt yourself!"

"You really care about the bullets right now?!" Lisa yelled back as she continued to fire away.

Cathy rolled her eyes but kept pushing harder, her feet pistoning away fiercely against the shiny tiled floor of the lobby as they ran.

They made it to the front gates entrance were locked up. Lisa hopped off the trolley and aimed her rifle at the guard by the security bay. "Open the fucking gates!" Lisa growled, her hair falling in her face, her mouth twisted in feral sneer and eyes blazing with madness.

The guard raised her hands which were trembling at the sight of the armed pregnant woman threatening to end her life. With the same trembling hand she slammed a button on the panel. The shutters rolled up.

The gate was only halfway up, when the operatives were approaching closer, they started to fire again. The women took cover. Lisa fired at one of the operatives who had gotten too close, immobilizing him with a shot in the leg.

The two women quickly rushed out the gates that were now open. They made their way down the parking lot. Cathy grabbed the rifle from Lisa, allowing her to move faster. Lisa couldn't manage to run, so she held onto her belly and walked as briskly as she could towards their car. Cathy covered her from behind, firing more shots at the approaching operatives to slow them down.

Lisa quickly unlocked the car and got behind the wheel. She fired up the engine just after Cathy jumped in the shotgun seat. The operatives were getting closer, now firing shots at the car. A few bullets punched through the trunk.

Lisa grit her teeth and backed out of the parking space. She floored the gas pedal and shot the vehicle through the entrance gates. Since there had been no guards at the entry gates, they managed to slip away without much hassle.

"Where to?" Lisa asked, still panting.

"Sector 24!"

"But we'll have to get to the inter-sector road," Lisa said. "Isn't it gonna rain in our sector."

Before Cathy could answer, she noticed something in the rearview mirror.

"They are following us in a goddamned armored truck!" she cried out in panic.

Lisa slammed down on the gas pedal. That's when the bullets started spraying. A couple of them punched right through the back of the trunk.

"Crap!" Cathy grabbed the rifle and leaned out of the passenger's side window and began to fire back at the truck.

"Didn't you say it was an armored truck?" Lisa yelled over the sound of gunshots.

"I'm aiming for their tyres!" Cathy yelled back as she took shots at the tyres but kept missing repeatedly. "Damn it!" She returned back to her seat, gritting her teeth.

"Cathy, I'm gonna take a hard left," Lisa said as they were nearing a turn. "This is the perfect opportunity to use the flare gun again."

"Okay." Cathy nodded. Only one flare left.

"Make it count," Lisa said.

Cathy loaded the flare into the gun and aimed back at the truck. She pulled the trigger.

Lisa whirled the steering, the car drifted to the left, tyres squealed as the rubber burnt. Behind them, they could hear the truck slow down a little but it wasn't for long. It blazed right out of the cloud of smoke and was back on their trail.

Lisa was slamming harder on the gas. The needles in the gauges were starting to shake. It was at its highest speed limit, yet it was nothing remarkable in front of a military vehicle eating up the miles between them. Then a bullet flew through the air and pierced into one of the rear tyres. Then Lisa's convertible hit a bump, Cathy was tossed off her seat, she hit her head against the roof. Lisa was trying to do her best to maintain the balance, but the flat tyre in the back was not making it any easier for her. Soon the rubber burnt away, then the tyre rim screeched against the tarmac. Sparks began to fly.

The operatives shot the second rear tyre. Then the car lost all it's balance, Lisa tried to hit the brakes but the forward momentum made the vehicle swerve around in circles until the car crashed into a street lamp on the road side.

The window on Cathy's side shattered. Shards of glass flew around. And one of them pierced right into her chest. The girl gasped, collapsing back into her seat.

"Cathy!" Lisa screamed next to her.

The girl was about to pass out, her vision already blurring. Then Lisa's voice was fading away.

Through the haze of pain and trauma, Cathy saw the truck coming to a halt in the rearview mirror. A squadron of shadows in kevlar suits hopping out, stalking closer to them. Her eyelids became heavy. Lisa's voice was just background noise by now.

The shadows were just a few feet away when Cathy blacked out. The last sound she heard was that of thunder...

...and then there was the sound of rain.