They didn’t move far, Emerald could still hear their brays from behind the hill, where they seemed to be waiting for further order. Now it was just Emerald and this ergate in front of her. What were its intentions? It crouched in front of Emerald, then bit her space suit open, exposing her fair ankle under her long dress. The freezing cold air on her now wholly exposed skin felt like she was in an ice cage. The ergate lowered its head as if sniffing her skin. There was still a strong smell of blood in the air, and blood was flowing down her shank. The ergate lowered its head to get even closer, and it suddenly stuck out a long and hard tongue to lick the blood off her leg. Emerald kept staring at the ergate. She was afraid it would bite off her leg. She was holding the knife she had been carrying in her pocket in one hand behind her back, waiting for an opportunity to fight back.She wasn’t sure if Zerg was treating her as food or as a pet. It just licked her softly and looked at her with its compound purple eyes, sliding its thick iron tentacle on Emerald’s thigh as gently as it could. Emerald realized it was touching her in a desiring way. After about 5 minutes, the Zerg seemed unsatisfied and looked up at Emerald with its dark, huge eyes. It moved around a bit with a pouting expression then spread her legs with its tentacles. As the Zerg looked at her with caution, Emerald slowly reached out her hand and grabbed a tentacle that was on her thigh while she unzipped her spacesuit with her other hand, exposing her bare breasts to the cold air. She held the tentacle and slowly pulled it to her breasts. She was concentrating so much that it seemed that time had stopped, and everything surrounding them disappeared. She looked softly at the ergate’s compound eyes, who appeared to be in a trance by her tenderness, and looked down along its tentacle and then back at the fairest human skin it had never touched. Suddenly a dull sound interrupted the silence, too low for the other to hear them. The ergate was struggling not to lose its balance, scratching Emerald’s hand with its tentacle, which started bleeding heavily. Then, without making a sound, Emerald slid her right hand from the bottom to the top, pushing the knife through Zerg’s stomach like cutting an apple in half. Although it was dead, the worm-like body was still struggling impulsively, and the compound purple eyes were wide open in horror as if it couldn’t believe Emerald’s sudden attack. Emerald held herself with one hand and stabbed it a few more times to ensure it was completely dead. Her face was covered in sweat after she finished. She felt cold and in pain, blood running down her leg. She started to see a blurry cloud in front of her but knew that now was not the time to faint because there were still six ergates behind the hill, ready to kill her any moment. She couldn’t hold her voice and groaned loudly in pain, letting her enemies behind the hill think that everything was according to their plan. “Boom-boom-boom!” Emerald shot the ergates fiercely until she felt light-headed and all the ergates lay on the ground. Their purple blood had covered half of the hill when she finally put away her gun. She felt so cold and painful that she couldn’t walk anymore. She struggled to zip her spacesuit back up, then crawled to one of the ergates to cut off two hard tentacles to use as crutches, supporting herself on them to walk. As the night grew darker, she walked step by step toward the nearest light. She didn’t know what was waiting for her outside the forest, but she didn’t want to stay in this cold, dangerous forest for another minute. Her leg was still bleeding, and she needed to treat her wound as quickly as possible as she didn’t want to lose the use of that leg for good. Emerald walked for about half an hour, which was the longest and the most miserable half an hour she’d ever lived. The sky was completely dark now. Her only guide was the light in front of her. What could it be? A Zerg Camp? A Zerg plane? She had no other way but to go there and find out. The only light that occasionally lit up the sky could be either Patrick’s gunfire in outer space or the Zerg’s searchlight searching for any surviving soldiers after the attack. She had only one thought, which was going forward, one step at the time. If it were, in fact, a dead-end, she would shoot herself to avoid further humiliations. **** Finally, she reached a small hillside. The light came from an SUV that was parked on the road at the edge of the woods. The SUV’s headlights were beaming through the cold air silently in the spooky, dark night. There was no human or Zerg in the car. It must have belonged to the team of ergates she just killed. Emerald was neither excited nor relaxed. Her legs were soft, and she suddenly fell to the ground. But nothing could stop her from saving herself now. She leaned on her crutches and crawled slowly down the hillside, across the road toward the SUV. The engine was still warm, the key was in. Those ergates were never expected to be killed in the woods. She reached over to the back seat and looked through the first-aid box she found under the seat. Then, biting her teeth as hard as she could not scream, she disinfected and bandaged her broken leg as best as possible. After she finished treating her wound, she gradually calmed herself down. Checking out the equipment in the car, she locked the door and turned on the heater, then ate all of the concentrated food and water she found without even looking at what it was made of. Using the darkness of the night as her cover, she drove along the road without a clear destination in mind. The sky grew brighter and became white and murky again. Finally, the light over Emerald’s head stopped flashing.She didn’t know whether the war had stopped or just paused. She parked the car in the forest to rest for a couple of hours before she kept driving again. She needed to get an airplane, though she knew it was going to be difficult. But having a car and weapons at her disposal, she had to use the night to her advantage.