Feb 2018 v01 online

the ground. Higher above, formations of fighter
aircraft engaged and broke apart, a new
formation emerging seconds later as the
situation changed. Davids felt dizzy just
thinking keeping up with the manoeuvres those
groups were undertaking.
The city was chaos. Its hapless inhabitants
had been going about their daily routine only
to find themselves at the locus of the conflict.
There was no front line in modern warfare; the
high mobility of most weapons and command
and control platforms had put paid to that. This
made it nearly impossible for the population to
anticipate where the fighting would be.
Drones of every description scooted around
and through cars whose owners had wisely
abandoned them when the fighting started.
Holographic signs which had survived the
fighting continued their looped advertisements
as if nothing out of the ordinary was happening.
Occasionally a cloud of dust and rubble would
explode out onto the street as a group of squat,
tracked vehicles breached a building, civilians
in their bright clothes stampeding out the other
side. The armies of the dictator were not above
using occupied buildings for cover. Still warm
corpses of ground based SAVs glowed from
behind fences and ruined buildings while the
survivors traded gun fire. Davids watched as
one moved up a flight of external stairs on
articulated tracks, the remainder of its parent
squad providing covering fire. When it reached
an opening, it swung its gauss gun inside on its
single arm, firing slugs into the building's
interior. Viper Squadron highlighted a threat
ahead; an enemy SAV with a large telescopic
array mounted on a turret. A line across Davids'
heads up display painted a vector, indicating a
laser was being emitted, imperceptible to
human eyes. Before it could reach them, the
machine warped and then exploded, hit by an
allied drone's rail-gun.
A crowd of civilians chose that time to run
across the intersection. Davids had no idea
where they were going; both sides of the road
looked to be being destroyed at a roughly equal
rate. He doubted they had any idea either,
probably even less than he considering there
was not much they would be able to see from
the ground. With the ordnance being
exchanged down there, no one in their right
mind would stick their head up to have a look
around.
He must have unconsciously articulated that
thought because Hellbat helpfully responded
with a pop-up window, highlighting an allied
SAV inundating the building the refugees were
fleeing from with a stream of plasma. The high
definition camera captured a shot of an enemy
cyborg disintegrating under the stream. Viper
flight would be sitting ducks if they slowed and