Elias pressed his back against the rusted shell of a collapsed billboard, trying to slow his breathing.
His scry-dampeners were completely fried. His cybernetic eye was throwing a cascade of red error codes across his vision. Below him, navigating the flooded concrete of the 101 Highway, a P.A.C.I.F.I.C. Hound-Drone swept its blue search-laser through the mist. It was a dog-sized quadruped made of matte-black plating, designed specifically to track blood trails.
Elias was bleeding from a shrapnel graze on his ribs. It was only a matter of seconds before the Hound caught the scent. He reached for his combat knife, calculating the angles for a drop-assault that he had a four percent chance of surviving.
He tensed his legs to jump.
A shadow detached itself from the girder directly above the drone. It wasn't a monster. It was a rusted, two-hundred-pound engine block, released from a jury-rigged pulley made of fraying climbing rope.
