Moving carefully, Kira pointed her pulse rifle at the wraith.
"What do you sense?" Lothos asked from out of sight.
Kira's lungs froze at the appearance of the general. She didn't dare move so much as a muscle for fear of causing the branch to shake.
A wraith she could take. Even a squad of demons wasn't a problem. A general, though. That would be difficult.
Of all the rotten luck.
The wraith inhaled, air whistling through its nasal passages. "Death. A lot of it."
An explosion shook the forest.
"That has to be her," Lothos declared, looking in the direction of the blast. "Find her. I want her alive."
The demons and war drones set off, crashing through the underbrush. The wraith held back, studying the forest around it carefully.
"You too," Lothos ordered.
The wraith padded forward, gliding silently through the trees after the rest.
Kira didn't let herself relax, remaining tense as Lothos lingered under her tree. He remained there long enough for Kira to get antsy.
An ambush might not be so bad. Definitely preferable to the alternative.
She had just decided to drop on him from above when he left his spot, following the rest.
Kira released the breath she'd been holding. Lucky.
She waited until she judged him sufficiently far away before dropping to the ground. Only at that point did she realize that she'd forgotten to order the J1N to take cover.
"J1N," Kira hissed, scanning the area. "J1N, report."
The drone appeared under a nearby fern's large fronds. The dull gray of his casing doing a good job of blending in with his surroundings.
"J1N, really? Is that how you've been addressing my body all this time?"
Kira stopped. "Jin?"
"Do you really need to ask that?"
With a glad cry, Kira threw herself at her friend, grateful when he let her snag him for a hug.
"How?" she managed to ask through the tears that wanted to fall.
"Proximity."
Kira nodded, forcing herself to recover a modicum of control. With Elena still in danger, they didn’t have time for an emotional reunion. "Makes sense."
This close he’d be able to connect with the J1N in the same way he did his spawn.
The drone jerked back and forth. "What did you do in here? Everything feels wrong."
"I had to improvise."
"On my body?"
"I judged it necessary. Yes."
