verb.
To come or go back to a place or person.
noun.
The firing of a weapon to counter a shooter's shot.
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They recoiled from their pasts, and in doing so found each other.
But the universe isn't kind enough to let a moment of peace last.
It took se...
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The jungle was dense. Humid and close after the sterile, air-conditioned space of the lab, the contrast hit Kat like a brick wall as she stumbled out of the access tunnel she had found herself in at the foot of the mountain. Her ribs ached after being thrown to the floor, her throat burned after the clawed hand of an alien had closed around it, but still she had to push on.
Beyond the trees she could hear the sounds of the ongoing battle. Clearer than she had been able to up in the lab - now she could pick out the sounds of snarls, cries of pain, gunshots and explosions.
But she couldn't see any of it. Not through the thick canopy of waxy, emerald leaves that surrounded her.
"Anyone have eyes on Vision?" She called over the Comms, glancing upwards towards the mountain and trying to gauge where the synthazoid would have landed after the plummet from the lab's window. They wouldn't have made it far; he couldn't fly with his injury.
Her heart seemed to be beating a pulse in her throat as she was met with silence, her eyes frantically searching the undergrowth for anything that would give her a direction to follow.
"Guys! Vision needs backup now!"
"Where?" She demanded at Bruce's strained yell in her earpiece, her hands tightening around the grip of her rifle as no answer came. Shaking her head, she could only turn in the direction of where a crash echoed through the trees to her left. She couldn't fly above the jungle, there was no way she could pick out Vision with the precision Bruce or Wanda could, but she had to try. Setting her feet to the overgrown forest floor, she ran as quickly as she could in the direction of the sounds, her breaths coming in low pants as she fought against the fearful whispers of doubt that came with sprinting along the edge of a battle. Those thoughts were halted though, as she heard a crack in the undergrowth behind her.
Spinning - her rifle raised - the instantaneous swelling of bile in her throat didn't do enough to accurately represent the repulsion she felt at the sight of the creature ambling towards her. Almost canine in its build but four times the size of any dog, leathery black and yellow skin covered its muscular body as it pushed through the ferns on four clawed limbs, snarling softly as its head whipped from side to side, revealing fleshy pink burns. As far as she could tell, it hadn't spotted her. She couldn't even see if it had eyes in its head - but the rows of sharp teeth it exposed as it screeched out its call were more of a concern.
It was with a jolt she realised that it apparently didn't need eyes to locate her, as that ugly head snapped towards her with a chilling roar.
The squeeze of her trigger was instinctive - the hail of rounds hitting the creature's body still not stopping it from leaping towards her before it fell heavily to the forest floor with a splatter of electric blue blood.
Kat had hardly drawn in a steadying breath before she was yelping out a cry of alarm, her body slammed to the earth by a ton weight of snarling, scratching creature that had sprang on her whilst her sights were on the corpse. Gasping past the panicked thrashing of her own limbs she managed to brace her rifle between her own face and the gnashing fangs that sought to tear it off. A yell of pain was screamed in its hideous face as a vicious rear claw scraped down her calf, her legs responding by kicking out fiercely. Digging deep to draw on every ounce of strength she had as she bought herself a bit of space, using her legs to force the dense body of the creature back - long enough to get her finger to the trigger of the rifle once more and release a rapid succession of shots directly into its open maw.
