"Three stars? I'm guessing that's not a good sign, right?" Lisa asked, her arms crossed. She tried to keep a stoic expression, mostly because she was unsure what they were up against.

"Actually, three stars is the highest rating you can get before special units come into play. Anything above that involves more extreme measures," A explained. "For now, let's make our way to the adjacent building, head up to the rooftop, and await our helicopter extraction."

The elevator doors slid open to reveal the 45th floor, and A guided Lisa through a maze of hallways. They were aiming for the skybridge that would take them to the building next door. The air was thick with tension, and every sound seemed amplified, from their footsteps to the distant murmur of voices.

As they rounded a corner, they found themselves staring down the barrel of guns held by a SWAT team. The team was poised in the hallway, right in front of the skybridge, their rifles aimed and shields at the ready. Most wore heavy ballistic armor paired with formal police uniforms. Despite the dire circumstances, Lisa felt a tinge of relief wash over her. At least none of these officers were from the ISB, she thought.

"DROP YOUR WEAPONS!" the lead officer bellowed, his voice echoing off the walls.

"We don't have time for pleasantries, L," A murmured under his breath. Swiftly, he swung his PKP into firing position and lobbed a grenade toward the officers.

In a split second, both parties unleashed a volley of gunfire. A and Lisa seized the element of surprise, quickly taking down two officers before the SWAT team could mount an effective counterattack. The grenade soared through the air, and as it detonated, Lisa took cover behind a wall. Shrapnel rained down, scattering across the hallway in a lethal spray.

A advanced, his PKP rattling off rounds that forced the SWAT team to keep their heads down. Lisa followed suit with her MDR, meticulously targeting any officer who dared to venture out from behind cover. They were outnumbered but far from outmatched. Despite their smaller numbers, their state-of-the-art weaponry and military training gave them the upper hand.

Pushing past the remaining SWAT officers, they sprinted toward the skybridge. This glass-enclosed walkway connected the two towering skyscrapers, offering a dizzying view of the city below. However, as they neared the opposite end of the bridge, Lisa heard the unmistakable sound of helicopter blades cutting through the air above them.

Glancing up, she saw multiple SWAT teams rappelling down toward the glass roof of the skybridge. Within moments, the officers shattered the quietness, their rifles sending a storm of bullets through the glass to force their way in.

Glass shards rained down like lethal confetti, glittering dangerously as they fell. Lisa quickly aimed her rifle upward, firing at the descending SWAT officers before they could detach from their rappelling ropes. Several lifeless bodies plummeted, disappearing into the abyss 45 floors below.

Ejecting her empty magazine, Lisa swiftly replaced it with a new one. "A, ABOVE!" she yelled, signaling for him to target the helicopter.

A took aim with his PKP and unleashed a sustained burst of fire. Sparks erupted from the helicopter's undercarriage as bullets found their mark. A final, well-placed shot hit the pilot, and the helicopter spiraled out of control. With a deafening roar, it crashed into the building behind them, erupting in a blaze of fire and smoke.

Suddenly, Lisa felt an unsettling sensation in her right arm. It felt wobbly, as if its strength had been sapped. She glanced down and saw a grazed wound on her arm, the injury looking almost like a gritty knife cut. Warm blood began to seep from the wound, trailing down her arm.

"Your arm, are you alright?" A inquired, his eyes narrowing with concern.

"It's just a graze. Let's keep moving," Lisa said, dismissing the injury for the moment. Though she knew she'd eventually need stitches, she was relieved to see that no major arteries had been severed.

A pushed open a door leading to the adjacent building. It turned out to be an apartment complex, with hallways lined with doors sporting room numbers above them. The walls appeared thick enough to potentially block incoming bullets, a detail that made Lisa wary of the likelihood that the police could still use lethal force to subdue them.

With urgency fueling their steps, Lisa and A rushed to the nearest elevator, aiming for the sanctuary of the rooftop. As they reached the elevator door, it appeared that someone was going up from the bottom floor. Lisa suspected it might be the SWAT team from downstairs, but she wasn’t too sure about it. This was a civilian populated building, it might be an innocent person coming out.

The elevator pinged and the door slowly opened. She was hesitant to pull the trigger in case there was an innocent person aboard. However, what greeted her was a straight punch to her face. The ballistic visor took most of the blunt force from the punch and she looked at the person punching her. It was a tall buff guy and Lisa got staggered by the punch. The guy then charged at Lisa and pushed her body, almost pinning her with his sheer weight alone. He then gave Lisa another punch at her jaw, lifting her ballistic visor and wounding her mouth.

Lisa then hit his head with the frontal part of her helmet. The man got stunt for a while, Lisa then slammed his face with the rear end of her rifle. She then shot the man in his foot, the man fell to the ground and she aimed for his head. However, just before she pulled the trigger, she noticed a woman alongside with a child on the elevator at the end of A’s PKP.

Instinctively, she thought this man must be a husband and a loving father. However, knowing this man was a threat, she just repeated another slam at the man’s face to put him down. She fixed the ballistic visor back and she shouted at both the woman and child.

“Get out of the elevator, now!” She shouted while aiming the rifle. 

The woman and the child ran towards the man while Lisa and A walked towards the elevator. A closed the elevator door and grabbed his tablet. The elevator then went up after A hacked it to go to the maintenance floor. Lisa held her jaw in pain, she felt she bit her own tongue.

“I appreciate your hesitation, I truly am,” A commented as he put his tablet on his backpack again.

“If the man didn’t charge at us, he might have a nice warm dinner instead of a trip to the hospital,” Lisa shrugged.

She opened the medical kit attached to her tactical rig, she looked for a tablet marked as Traxemid. She popped open a small blister package and ate it without showing her face towards A and chugged it with a bottle of water. She then had a moment to inspect her wound, it was bleeding more than what she expected.

“What did you take?” A asked.

“Traxemid.”

“Not paracetamol?” A asked.

“Nah, I can manage with the pain,” Lisa just gave him a thumb up.

“Alright then. We can take a temporary breather in the maintenance room, I’ll lock the elevator so no one disturb us.”

“Yeah, I probably need that.”

The elevator finally stopped at the maintenance floor, and A immediately locked the elevator with his tablet. "We've got a few minutes," he said, his eyes scanning the dimly lit room that was filled with tools, utility boxes, and HVAC equipment.

Lisa nodded, holstering her MDR and sitting down on a metal crate. She opened her medical kit again, this time pulling out antiseptics and bandage. She took off her ballistic vest and partially opened her shirt to get the better view of the wound itself. The graze was deeper than she'd thought, and the blood was flowing more freely than she'd expected.

A looked over at Lisa. "How's the arm?"

Lisa unwrapped the bandage and took a closer look at the wound. "It's a graze, but the bleeding isn't stopping as quickly as it should."

"You think it hit an artery?" A asked, concerned.

Gloving her left arm with sterile glove, she then fiddled with the wound, assessing the damage. The wound penetrated deep enough to her muscle, but luckily, no artery was severed. The wound ran a vertical line from her shoulder to her hand. It seemed, a little bit deeper, and she would have to deal with bone fractures.

Lisa grabbed a bandage and wrapped it around the wound with intense pressure to reduce the bleeding. It was too impractical to try to close the wound now, and she didn’t have any of that bandage with suture ability with her. She then wore her shirt back and put her tactical vest back.

“Shit.”

“What?” Lisa asked.

“The helicopter would be late by three minutes.”