Hackett crouched down against the tree in front of her and flipped the safety off on her HK416, resting her elbow on a low branch and half sitting on an exposed root jutting sharply up out of the ground. Her eyes were fixed towards the IR beacon, flickering on and off in the distance and casting awkward looking shadows down towards her, even though her night vision washed out before she could see them in detail... she knew what they were. It was prehaps a good thing that the others were already gone, and not seeing what she was now, because it gave her chills. Either a small group of the Infected were circling the beacon, or an absolutely massive group was moving through the open area. She couldn't begin to count the numbers, but well above a hundred or possibly more. Anna really thought it through, and did not want to know. Maybe it might help, but more likely it would only create stress and panic in her mind trying to figure something out. Absentmindedly, she played with the pin on one of her M67 fragmentation grenades hanging from her chest. She also had flashbangs and smoke grenades, which would be useful for drawing away the Infected once they were onto the group. They responded to sound, so it had been confirmed by the unknown from the plane and the other woman, for now Hackett would called her subject #1. She was less and less a stray and more and more a problem to deal with. Anna mused with the idea of ...dealing with both her and Derrick at the same time in a quick fashion. The idea was a bit hard to swallow; she was a civilian and only a few years ago it had been Anna's goal to help as many people like her as possible. But the locals were problems, because unless they could get a ride out for them and how many dozens or hundreds of other suvivors they knew, then knowing those savages they'd likely feed the entire group to the Infected and steal the gear.<br/><br/>Hackett licked her lips and stared down at the ground. She looked around, then up into the sky and listened. It was so quiet, it was nearly unbearable. She could no longer hear the others, which was a good sign. She felt uneasy about sending Ashleigh off but trusted Utem to do his job well enough. She did not trust Derrick, and did not trust the other two at all, which made her a little nervous. She had her comms on, just in case, but had muted her mic so they didn't have to listen to her constant breathing. A small breeze began to develop, even this deep in a heavily wooded area, and it felt nice against her skin, what little was exposed. Really, the only thing she could even hear was the wind, her own heart beating and the occasional crackle of the radios doing their thing. She felt a little bit tired, to be honest, things were not going as planned but Anna knew she wasn't really tired, just stressed.<br/><br/>And her stress got much worse with the howl. At first she only sat up and raised her weapon, thinking she'd heard a backfire or something on the radio. Then a deep, enormous howl seemed to originate from everywhere beyond her sight, and then it got louder and louder and more intense and more howling joined the fray. Hackett stood up and pressed her back into the tree, her head swinging around frantically as she tried to see them coming. She could hear leaves and twigs crunching and snapping in rapid succession as the sounds of loud, uncaring footsteps pattered all about her. She flipped on her IR designator and scanned it about with her rifle, slowing her movements down to a slow twist, she could see bodies moving rapidly through the trees, rotten as they were, stumbling over roots and practically flying straight into trees. Several passed so close Hackett could smell them. Her breathing intensified as she fought to come up with a plan.<br/><br/>As the Infected poured past her, Anna peeked around her tree and immediately saw movement, she raised and began firing her weapon on automatic into the chest of an approaching Infected, she let the recoil take her rounds up and put the abomination down quietly, it never even let out a howl of fury. Anna recoiled back behind the tree and fired again at another approaching Infected, this time scoring a headshot immediately, the Infected lurched forward and slowed to a tumble down to the ground. The others seemed completely unaware as they hurried off towards the noise, and more continued to come. Anna put her HK416 back to semiautomatic and crouched down, slowly stepping over a downed tree and zig zagging through the mess of branches and twigs, moving as quietly as she could.<br/><br/>"<strong>You've got heavy contact coming on your six, run!</strong>"<br/><br/>Hackett spoke into her mic and not in her indoor voice as she unhooked a flashbang grenade from her grenade webbing and threw it as hard as she could to her North, watching as she could just barely make it out sailing between the trees. She covered her ears up and kept moving in a crouch. The flashbang went off in a loud bang that would be heard for miles around and a flash of light that managed to flicker her night vision, even though she was several dozen meters away and looking in the opposite direction. Her ears thumped and mostly everyhthing went quiet as they rang out in discontent and anger. Anna picked up her pace and stood slightly, she could see the Infected ahead, and slowed as they pulled one hell of a U-Turn, at least some did, and went off towards the small fire and puff of smoke still remaining from the device. As Hackett moved about, a mean sounding growl made her heart jump as an Infected tackled onto Hackett. Her training kicked in immediately a she dropped her rifle to her chest and drew out a long, menacing looking black combat knife and ducked down as the Infected grapled her. Using its momentum and height, Hackett pushed herself foward with one leg and lifted her crouched body up rapidly as the Infected grabbed onto her and tried to bit at her helmet. She picked the Infected's legs up and tossed it over her back, spinning back and jabbing her knife into the side of its head and yanking it out almost instantly. Anna recoiled and leapt back as another Infected flew by her, reaching its arms out to grab her as she nimbly sidestepped it. Her heard pounded vicious in her chest, not used to this kind of physical activity while carrying her body weight in extra on her back. With her padded elbow Hackett lashed out, knocking the Infected back as a third ran towards her. She ducked again and this time, shoulder checked the Infected in the chest, sending it toppling down to the ground and rolling backwards. Her shoulder immediately hurt from the impact, but luckily it was not her knife wielding arm. The Infected still standing had been knocked against a tree and Hackett tended to it with a jab to the back of the upper neck, just below the brain stem and twisted her knife, kicking the twice dead corpse out of her way and turning to deal with the final one. It was just standing as she rushed it, and kicked it back to the ground, this time on its stomach. She wasted no time and killed the final one the same way she'd dealt with the last.