<blockquote><div><cite>Zung wrote:</cite>The female soldier saw the figure and thought to herself on what to do. she finally ran down the alleyway after the monster, Her quick footsteps could be heard by andrew at the end of the alleyway.</div></blockquote><br/><br/>The superheroic teenager of the Mary Sue fanfictions would have cunningly used the confusion among the enemy to dive in, grab the hostage, swing away on a convenient plot hook and end off on a witty remark about the visibility of the soldiers' internal organs. He also would have en passant defeated the soldier sneaking up on him without breaking a sweat.<br/><br/>Andy couldn't even hear the footsteps of the soldier as she stalked him, or smell her approach, because he was too busy being violently sick up against the wall. He'd watched in shocked fascination as the clearly insane 'Captain Max' had destroyed the squad of soldiers in an orgy of fratricidal violence the like of which he hadn't seen outside an online gaming convention, on the screens.<br/><br/>He'd seen realistic CG in over the top action movies, and as a scout, skinned and prepared animals for meat, but those had been already dead, bought from a specialist butcher. He held no affections for the soldiers, they would kill him without a qualm, but they were human beings, with hearts and minds... he could see this for certain in several of the more explosive cases.<br/><br/>He'd felt his gorge rising, and barely had enough time to drop his bags out of the way before proceeding to decorate the alleyway with stomach graffiti. This may have saved his life, along with the light filtering down the cross alley from the main street. A shadowy figure with great clubbed arms, stalking the shadows, was an incentive to shoot. A 5'2 foxboy in a hiking outfit and backpack with what looked like red and white high heeled sneakers, who was clearly miserable and attempting to rediscover yesterday's breakfast, was an incitement to pause.<br/><br/>An astute mind would have noticed the results of the search had more in common with the food in the plastic bags scattered around than the human skulls, rib cages and thigh bones a lazy cartoonist would have used to indicate a more humanitarian diet. Having finally run out of reaction mass, the teenager started to become aware of his surroundings.<br/><br/>His ears pricked up as the soldiers boots stepped behind him, and a quick glance over his shoulder confirmed that it wasn't just overactive imagination. He still had his paws against the wall in support of a none too steady body, and his whole posture slumped forward slightly, as if to say, 'Oh no, not this as well.'<br/><br/>Mad panicked bravdo, and a sense of fatalism caused him to blurt out. "Now, I'm sure you had a whole session of shooting me repeatedly and using my skin as a rug for your mess organised. Unfortunately, I already have a full evening of running away screaming in terror planned, so I'll just get on with that..."<br/><br/>It is said that there are no atheists in a fox hole, and Andy was about to prove this applied to foxes in a whole lot of trouble. His mental prayer wasn't exactly coherent,  but the general intent was 'Oh deus, please let me not die! Heeeeeeeelllllllp!' It wasn't exactly devout, but it was very sincere. Whether the goddess who's portfolio he was a part of would respond, remained to be seen.<br/><br/>(Deus - By the 2030's a number of new religions with female deities, or revamped old ones, had spawned in the highly stressed society of 'World on Fire' Earth. Combined with the excesses of various religiou fundamentalists of older religions, it made 'god' an unpopular term. The replacement neo-latin word 'Deus' came into common use as a neutral gender replacement in the mid 20's.)