The camera drone rocked and whirled, rotors damaged by a stray bullet. It spun away and crashed to the street below. Red collapsed to the roof, clutching at her foot.

“Fuck!” Her voice was shrill over the radio. “I’m hit! Get your ass down here!“

I gritted my teeth and swept my craft down low, blasted the ground with my thrust exhaust and sent years of accumulated garbage spinning away. The stick bucked and fought in my hands, my VTOL nearly knocked out of control by the vicious winds I was generating.

Bullets pinged against the the armored hull, ricocheted back down towards the ground and sent the police ducking for cover. I slapped the hatch release, and the air whipped into the cockpit like a tornado. I watched my screens, dipping the craft lower, closer to the roof. Red stood, stumbled, and leaped when I was close enough and landed in an untidy sprawl, half-in, half-out.

“Fuck, Kent, go!“

I slammed the throttle home, diverted the thrust downward and shot us up sixty meters in a blink of an eye.