They didn't move much the next few days. Command had them on standby again, and with the last sweep done, Sector 12 went quiet, eerily quiet. The kind of silence that didn't feel like peace. More like a pause before someone slams a hammer through their skull.
The city was still smoldering in places. Gas still hung low in the air, clinging to concrete and twisted steel. Cyma Unit had taken over the rooftop of a partially-collapsed tower, using it as an overwatch spot and makeshift lounge. Berta was stretched across a cracked concrete slab, boots off, legs propped up on a broken AC unit.Rus was sitting nearby, rifle across his lap, the sky starting to turn that ugly shade of overcast green they see when weather decides it hates them.
Down below, the rest of the team was scattered. Dan and Foster were arguing over who would win in a fight between a Mutate and a gunship with a malfunctioning targeting system. Gino was napping next to the turret with a rifle in his lap and a half-eaten protein bar on his chest.
Berta flicked a pebble off the edge of the roof. "Sector 12's too fucking big," she muttered.
Rus didn't look away from his scope, scanning nothing in particular. "What gave it away? The seven sub-regions or the fact we've been here for months and haven't cleared even half of it?"
She sighed. "It's not just that. It's how everything looks the same. You move from one cluster of ruins to the next, and it's the same bullshit—burnt-out buildings, overgrown roads, and those twisted-ass metal sculptures we used to call cities."
"Repetitive architecture," Rus nodded. "Nature's version of Ctrl+C, Ctrl+V."
Berta sat up a little, stretching her back with a groan. "I swear to god, if I have to patrol another mile of bogs and murky puddles, I'm going to shoot myself just to get med-evac'd."
"Swamps are hell," Rus agreed. "They're nature's armpit. Full of disease, biting insects, and the occasional surprise deathpit."
"You ever get your boot stuck in one of those?" she asked, raising an eyebrow.
"Once. Boot got stuck. Sank past the ankle. I yanked, pulled, fell backwards into a Gobber nest."
She winced. "Gods."
"Yeah," Rus said. "It smelled like rotting fish and shame."
Berta chuckled. "I hate the way the ground moves. Like it's trying to suck you in."
"It is trying to suck you in," Rus muttered. "Everything in a swamp wants to kill you, eat you, or breed on your face."
She leaned back again. "I hate the noise, too. All that buzzing. Croaking. It's like the whole place is taunting you."
"And the mud," Rus added. "Sticky enough to swallow a truck, but somehow not enough to stop an Orc from sprinting through it like it's goddamn pavement."
They sat in silence for a moment, both of them staring off at the horizon. Gray clouds were forming up in the distance another storm maybe, or just the sky keeping them guessing.
"Sector 12's too much land for too little payoff," Berta muttered, more to herself than anyone else.
"That's the job," Rus said. "Clear land, make it safe, burn everything that looks funny, then wait for the brass to build a prefab city no one wants to live in for a few years."
She was quiet for a while, then said, "You ever think we're not making it out of here?"
Rus took his time answering. "I think we're not supposed to make it out."
She turned her head toward Rus, curious. "Say more."
"We're Counters, Berta," Rus said. "We're the ones who get sent in to see if a place is killable. If it is, someone else gets the credit. If it isn't, we die and someone makes a report."
She didn't argue.
Instead, she leaned forward, resting her forearms on her knees. "Still. Beats being a civvie for now. Heard it was bad there for now"
Rus gave her a sideways glance. "Only because the food's free and you get to flirt with men while covered in blood."
She gave a mock gasp. "Are you saying I'm not charming?"
"I'm saying you're charming like a landmine with lipstick."
She grinned, but it faded quickly. "Still hate swamps, though."
"Same," Rus said. "Maybe we'll get posted somewhere dry next."
"Yeah," she muttered, "like hell."
They went quiet again, both watching the sky and listening to the low hum of wind through the broken bones of a dead city.
Standby always felt like this for them, too much time to think, not enough reason to do so.
***
The swamp didn't exactly invite company, but duty called and as always, it was calling collect. Cyma Unit had been ordered to do a slow sweep of the boglands just south of the collapsed rail corridor. "Routine clearance," they called it. Which was military-speak for "go shoot things we don't want near the new forward outpost."
So, naturally, Rus found himself knee-deep in mosquito-infested soup, with his rifle trained toward the fetid reeds ahead, and Berta beside him, chewing on a ration bar like she was on a picnic.
"Romantic, isn't it?" she said, giving Rus that infuriating grin of hers. "Just the two of us, waist-deep in the swamp, surrounded by nature, guns in hand."
"Romantic?" Rus muttered. "Berta, I've had more romance getting punched in the face by a shower curtain back at the city . At least that didn't come with the risk of dysentery."
She chuckled and leaned in, a little too close for someone caked in sweat and swamp stench. "Come on, Wilson. Don't tell me you don't feel the chemistry. We're perfect together. Like bullets and brain matter."
"More like fire and kerosene," Rus said, scanning the brush. "With the added bonus that you never stop talking and I can't claim you as a dependent on my military insurance."
A rustle ahead caught their attention. Rus raised his rifle just as a scrawny swamp Gobber, half-naked and dripping slime, peeked out from behind a tree. Rus gave it two rounds to the face—one to stop it, one to express his deep disappointment in evolution.
"That's five," Berta said, racking another round into her rifle. "I'm still ahead."
"Oh no," Rus said, deadpan. "However will I recover from this devastating blow to my ego, delivered by a woman who thinks foreplay starts with saying her body count."
She snorted. "You wound me."
"Not yet," Rus replied. "But the temptation grows by the minute."
They pressed forward, the bog gurgling beneath their boots, the air thick with gnats and the smell of decaying plant life. Another Gobber darted across a log and caught one in the thigh from Berta, squealing as it tumbled into the water.
"See that shot?" she said proudly. "Right in the ass. Pure instinct."
"Ah yes," Rus said. "A true markswoman. Surely, the Gobber Academy of Advanced Pain and Suffering will be hanging your portrait in their slime-slicked halls."
She elbowed him lightly. "I know you like it when I get dirty."
"Berta," Rus said flatly, "we're in a swamp. Everything's dirty. Including that thing you call flirtation."
She gave Rus an exaggerated wink. "Just admit it. You enjoy my company."
"I enjoy malaria more," Rus replied. "At least it only flares up once a year."
Another burst of rustling ahead. This time, a small group of Gobbers emerged, four of them, hunched and snarling, armed with sharpened sticks and suicidal confidence.
They both opened fire. Three fell immediately. The fourth tried to charge, only to trip over a root and fall face-first into the mud, squealing. Berta walked up and put one round in its skull, then looked back at Rus smugly.
"That one's mine."
"By all means," Rus said, motioning grandly. "Take your trophy. Mount it on your wall. Perhaps stitch together a lovely pillowcase out of its skin."
"You do know how to talk dirty," she purred.
"I've had conversations with sewer rats that felt more hygienic," Rus replied.
She laughed and slung her rifle, sloshing over to the edge of a moss-covered rock. The sun was starting to dip behind the treeline, casting everything in a warm, damp glow that made the swamp look almost… bearable.
Berta sat down on the rock, wiping the sweat off her forehead with her sleeve. "So," she said, "if we survive this, what are you going to do?"
Here we go again with this talk, Rus thought.
"Retire," Rus said. "Get as far away from you and your harem of sexually-charged murderers as physically possible."
She leaned back, stretching. "I'm flattered. You think about me that much."
"I think about many things," Rus said. "The heat death of the universe. Toenail fungus. Paper cuts. All of them, coincidentally, less irritating than you."
"You'll miss me," she said, eyes closed, smiling.
"And yet," Rus muttered, watching the horizon, "somehow I think I'll manage to live with the heartbreak."
They sat there for a while, watching the water ripple from the bodies they left floating. It was quiet again. Eerie. Peaceful in that sick, swampy way.
Then Berta opened her mouth again.
"You know, Wilson, when you're not busy being an insufferable little shit, you're almost charming."
"And when you're not trying to hump everything that breathes," Rus said, "you're almost tolerable."
She laughed. A real one this time. Not that mockery she throws around.
"You're lucky I like men with sharp tongues."
"And you're lucky I haven't put a bullet through mine just to escape this conversation."
They were still bantering as the sun dipped further, their rifles resting in our laps, and the swamp whispering all around. If Sector 12 had a heart, it was probably rotten and full of bile. But for now, at least, it wasn't trying to kill them .
And that, by their standards, counted as a pretty damn good day.
***
The silence hung a little too long.
Berta glanced sideways at Rus, eyebrows raised. Rus was leaning on his rifle, staring at the murky water, calm as can be. Too calm, maybe.
"You know," Rus said, voice casual, "there's something oddly poetic about this swamp. The way the stench clings to your soul, the way the mud threatens to suck your boots off with every step... it reminds me of you."
She blinked. "That supposed to be a compliment?"
"Oh, absolutely," Rus said, straight-faced. "A filthy, suffocating, semi-sentient ecosystem that won't let go no matter how hard I struggle? That's peak romance in my book."
Berta stared at Rus, eyes squinting. "Hold up. You thinking about Mama B?"
"What?"
She frowned, leaned in like she was checking me for a fever. "Did one of the Gobbers hit you on the head? You concussed or something?"
Rus shrugged. "Maybe I've just finally realized what a radiant swamp witch you are, Berta. Perhaps I've been fighting it all this time, and the murky ooze of this beautiful bog has finally opened my eyes."
Her jaw dropped. "You're actually flirting back. That's... I mean, that's new."
"Strange, isn't it?" Rus nodded, brushing some nonexistent dirt off his shoulder. "I figure if I'm going to die in this hellhole, I might as well go out appreciating the finer things in life."
She was quiet for a beat too long.
Rus smirked. "Your reaction is flattering, really. I'll pencil in our wedding somewhere between the next Gobber purge and my mental breakdown."
Berta recoiled like he'd slapped her with a wet fish. "Okay, that's it—who the hell are you and what did you do with Rus?"
"Oh don't worry, I'm still me," Rus said. "Still the same miserable bastard who prefers trench mud to pillow talk, and thinks STDs should come with loyalty cards. But every now and then, I like to spice things up. Keep you guessing."
"Gods," she muttered. "I actually liked you better when you were being an emotionally unavailable shithead. Go back to being a piece of shit, will you?"
"Well, then, allow me to return to form."
Rus stood, gesturing toward the cluster of thick reeds where smoke had begun to rise from the latest Gobber nest we'd torched.
"Shall we finish burning these slimy vermin out of their moss-covered fuck-pits, or would you like to sit and let me braid your hair while we write love poems in blood?"
"Now that's the Rus I know," she grinned, grabbing her flamethrower. "Come on, lover boy."
They sloshed through the mire, reaching the half-collapsed structure that passed for a Gobber den. Smoke puffed from the cracks, and a high-pitched wail echoed from inside—some straggler still kicking.
"Want me to handle it?" Berta asked, already adjusting the nozzle.
"Please," Rus said, waving her forward. "I wouldn't want to deny you the joy of exterminating your spiritual cousins."
She snorted, pulled the trigger, and unleashed a satisfying jet of flame into the nest. The shrieking was brief. The fire roared louder.
The stench was unspeakable.
As they backed away from the blaze, their boots squelching in the sludge, Berta gave him a side-eye. "Still think I'm radiant?"
Rus nodded solemnly. "Like a radioactive sewer pipe with delusions of grandeur."
She laughed, hard. "You know, for a guy who sounds like he crawled out of a grave, you're oddly fun company."
"And for a woman who could crush my spine like a breadstick," Rus said, "you're almost tolerable."
They trudged off, leaving the burning nest to belch smoke into the sky. The bog hissed and steamed behind them.
More waiting. More walking. More bickering.
Business as usual.