Just after 19:30, in an AV-4, a couple of metres above 'Big B' HQ, downtown NMK, Friday the 12th of March, 2055.

Just after 19:30, in an AV-4, a couple of metres above 'Big B' HQ, downtown NMK, Friday the 12th of March, 2055.

Well, that wasn't so bad, I just hope there's no remotely detonated bomb on this thing, with the detonator in Leon's pocket. Don't ask me why, but as we bank away from the Biotechnica building, I find myself imagining the sort of pre-flight briefing we might have been given before taking off...

"Good evening lady and gentlemen, I'm to be your pilot for tonight's AV-4 tour of the Harbour District."

"As we will be flying through military controlled air space, please keep your seatbelts fastened at all times. Those SAMs are buggers for tossing you about the skies, even if they don't knock out the engine and turn us into a plummeting metal coffin."

"Also please ensure all cigarettes are extinguished, as we don't want to find ourselves having survived a crash landing, only to be blown sky high because some fool has dropped their spliff in one of the ammo boxes."

"Our cruising altitude for this evening's flight will frequently switch between roof-, wave- and tree- top height, and with any luck our heads will remain above ground level for the duration."

"Passengers may exit the vehicle only via the rear doors, while I on the other hand have my own door here on my right. Parachutes are not standard equipment, so could you please refrain from leaving the vehicle while airborne."

"I would like to take this opportunity to remind you that AV-4s can hover and so, while it may not feel like we're moving, care should be taken to ensure the vehicle has come to a standstill on a solid surface before making a diving roll for cover out of the rear doors."

"Finally, should things get 'hot' while in or over the Harbour District, I will be 'bugging out', with or without you. Enjoy your flight."

Am I being pessimistic? Nah, realistic more like. Anyone who can't smell that this whole thing's a setup wants to get their nasal filters checked. It's just going to be a question of avoiding the trap when it springs shut. My money's on us being shot on the roof of the police building. No doubt the infected cops will get caught in the crossfire as us 'cowardly terrorists' use them for cover. That way, Biotechnica get rid of us and their troublesome police guinea pigs.

Time for a look around. We are indeed in a military medical AV-4. All sorts of storage compartments, filled with medical equipment, line the sides. We're sat on seats that fold out the way when not needed and there are four fold-down 'racks' for stretchers on each side at the rear. It looks like when the stretchers are in place, a couple of us are gonna find that it's standing room only at the back. Access to the 'cargo area' where we're seated is via the rear ramp 'door' or the sliding door on the left of the vehicle. Both the pilot and co-pilot seats have doors alongside, but to enter or exit those means climbing over the pilot's seats.

My attention is drawn to a small red box, but only because suddenly everyone seems to be looking at it, fixed to the roof above and behind the pilot. In white lettering on the side of it is written "In the event of the loss of the pilot, pull handle".

It's Crash who pulls the handle. Inside, embedded in a piece of foam, is a skill chip. Presumably, it's got a vectored thrust piloting program loaded. Either that or a stand-up comedy routine to keep everyone smiling for those final few moments as they plummet to their doom. Unfortunately for us all, only Crash has a chipware socket at the moment, and he'll be the first one I pitch overboard in an attempt to jettison unnecessary weight. Or maybe Shen, because he looks the heaviest and regularly kills the people we'd like to question. It'd be a tough choice.

Anyway, the flight continues for several minutes before we hear the pilot asking for permission to land. He's obviously given permission, as he then confirms our ETA as two minutes.

We touch down quite smoothly on the pad on the roof of the police building. The side door opens and we climb out. Opening the rear door we unload the stretcher 'trolleys', unfolding one to carry the other five on.

Two guards are stood watching us from across the roof by the door leading to the stairs down into the building. Having somehow been nominated as the 'officer' during the flight, I lead the others over to them and present our (fake) orders.

The guards question the orders, but I just say they're the orders I've been given and I've got to follow them. Looking unimpressed, one of the guards takes the orders and steps through the door, where we can hear him calling on the radio to ask someone else about them. He comes back and says he's to let us through, but he's to count us all in and then out.

We go down the stairs and are confronted by a sergeant standing outside the door to the room opposite the foot of the stairs. He's obviously the person the guard radioed. I show him the orders and he says that he knows nothing about them. I simply tell him that I knew nothing about them 45 minutes ago, but orders are orders and things have been really screwed up around here lately so who knows what's going on. I can only follow the orders I'm given, and I'm not supposed to question them. Implying that he shouldn't either.

He goes into the room and I tell the others to start making their way towards the ward where the infected police are being held while I wait for him to come back. A few minutes pass and he returns. He's not totally happy with our orders, but seems not to have anything to contradict them at the moment.

Asking where the others have gone, I say I told them to start heading for the ward so we can get our job done as quickly as possible. He says they won't have got far and shouts for a corporal, who appears round the corner, and tells him to escort us to the ward.

The corporal disappears round the corner again, but quickly returns with the keys necessary to get us through the doors between here and the ward. The others only made it into the patrol boat workshop before being stopped by a locked door, so we catch up with them in mere moments.

As we need to head through the cell area there are a number of locked doors and gates that we need to pass through, the corporal locking each one behind us before being able to open the next. Eventually, we reach the door from the cells area into the office area where the surgery and ward are located. The corporal says that he'll wait here for us.

Going through the door, we find ourselves in an area that is almost uncomfortably warm and stuffy. Here are the first police officers we've seen in the building and from the smell of the air, this is where they've all been confined for the last day or so. They all look pretty dejected and seem to view us with disdain and suspicion. Not surprising really as we're dressed like their 'captors'.

There's no-one that I recognise immediately visible and unfortunately I can't really start wandering around and talking to them without it looking suspicious. I'm sure we're probably being monitored on the building's internal security cameras.

We head into the surgery and can immediately see that a plastic 'airlock' has been taped over the door into the ward. There's not room inside the airlock for a stretcher to be wheeled through, but there should be room for us each to carry one vertically and as the stretchers have semi-rigid air- tight covers on them into which we can strap the infected police, the airlock shouldn't be necessary on the way out.

Putting on a respirator mask, for the benefit of anyone watching, we each grab a stretcher and head through the airlock. Yuki, being the medical expert, goes first. I follow behind and find her being challenged by the military medic on duty. I present our orders, and the medic seems happy to leave us to it, glad that the infected police are now someone else's problem, and heads out the way we came in.

The others make their way through into the ward with the remaining stretchers. At least our information about there being six officers here was correct, so we can get them all out. They are all in a pretty bad way, the infection having had a good twelve or so hours more to do its work on them, than it did on any of us.

We get them all safely onto the stretchers, under Yuki's close supervision, and begin to make our way out. It's now just a question of how long our luck holds out. I half expect to be challenged by a least some of the other police, but they seem to have just given up trying to fight.

We get back to the corporal, each of us pushing a stretcher, and he starts to lead us back the way we came. It's even slower going back through all the doors and gates as there's only room for a stretcher or two between them at most.

As soon as two of us are through the doors and gates, I tell them to head for the stairs and start getting the stretchers up and into the AV-4. It takes a while and there are a few slips on the stairs, but we get all the stretchers up to the AV-4.

Just as we're about to get the last one aboard, there's the sound of boots running up the stairs to the roof, and shouts of "Stop them!". One of the guards at the top yells "Freeze!" and they're both going for their guns.

Shen, who's loading the last stretcher, gives it a good push to propel it into the back of the AV-4. Roland draws his tranquilliser pistol and shoots the guard at the left of the stairway door, as we look at it, hitting him in the left leg.

The other guard manages to return fire and hits Roland in the right leg, but his armour prevents him coming to any harm. Yuki and I are busy checking everything aboard is secure. Crash throws a stun grenade at the guards. It's not a great throw and when the grenade goes off it has little effect on them.

Shen comes hurtling through the AV-4 and jumps into the co-pilot seat. Roland gets hit in the arm as he climbs aboard. The rear door starts to close as automatic fire rakes along the side of the vehicle. As the door closes, Crash throws out another grenade, but this one just bounces off the roof and can be heard to detonate somewhere below. Shen spots the controls for the minigun turret atop the AV-4, but showing unusual restraint for him, doesn't shoot anyone in the head with it as the AV-4 lifts off and banks away, accelerating all the while.

We're quickly clear of the city and within ten minutes we're over the hunting lodge. The pilot puts us down in the gravel car park out front. It seems we have a welcoming committee of six guys in black suits and shades, carrying automatic weapons, who are stood in front of three limos. They look at bit annoyed with themselves for standing there while the AV-4 landed and kicked up gravel and dust.

As we land the pilot opens the side and rear doors. Roland gets out the left door and stands alongside the AV-4 and Crash jumps out the back and runs around to the pilot's side for no apparent reason. Yuki starts undoing the restraints holding down the stretchers. I'm feeling nervous about being greeted by six guys with guns, and wait just inside the rear door, out of their line of sight, with my assault rifle at the ready.

From where I'm standing, I can just see Roland through the side door of the AV-4, so I know something is up when he starts to go for his pistol. Hang on a minute, he's going for his pistol! Why not the assault rifle he's been given and why has he brought his gun anyway? I thought the idea was that we left our own guns behind as they were numbered and traceable?

From where the suits are stood, there's a distinct sounding 'snick' followed by some cursing. If I'm not mistaken someone's gun seems to have jammed on them. At that moment a burst of fire rips into the back of the pilot's seat, displaying bits of his internal organs on the windscreen. I guess we're not flying out of here in a hurry.

I hear Roland return fire as I raise my rifle and lean out the door. I let fly a 3-round burst at the first suit into my sights, hitting him in the torso and both legs. He's obviously wearing an armoured jacket, but not trousers from the look of the bright red flowers that have suddenly bloomed in each of his legs. He just crumples to the floor, unconscious.

More gunfire from the suits and Roland stumbles back against the AV-4. He obviously took hits, but I think his armour stopped them. Crash jumps back inside and Shen has left the co-pilot's seat, with its minigun control, and gone for the RPG launcher.

More bullets rattle against the side of the AV-4, and again there's the sound of a gun jamming. Shen shoulders the RPG launcher and lets fly. It hits something metal and then there's a dull 'whumpf' and the sound of breaking glass. Not the loud explosion I was expecting!

I hear Roland fire again, but I can't see the result from where I am. Crash grabs the piloting skillchip and puts it into his chipware socket. Again there's the sound of a gun misfiring and I'm glad I'm not using the same guns the suits are. As I lean out the back of the AV-4 to deliver another 3-round burst, I see Roland take another hit and I reckon his armour has saved him again, but why is he still standing out in the open.

My gunsight crosses another of the suits and the smartgun link helps my trigger finger twitch at the right moment. All three bullets hit again. The first in his left leg and the other two in his torso as the rifle's muzzle climbs as I fire. On of the hits to his torso is stopped by his armoured jacket, so again there are only two glorious blooms visible.

Leaning back into the AV-4 for cover, I see Sykes milling around the inside, but it is unclear what he's doing. I see that Yuki has jumped into the co-pilot's seat that Shen relinquished and has taken a firm grip on the joystick control of the minigun turret. She gently depresses the fire button and the minigun fires wildly over the heads of the suits still standing. The bullets tear into the treeline behind them. I hope there's no squirrels unlucky enough to be in the way.

Roland comes to his senses and climbs back into the AV-4. Shen drops the RPG launcher and grabs his assault rifle. Leaning around the rear corner of the AV-4, I squeeze off another burst from my rifle. The shot is snatched a little and I allow the muzzle to climb too much, so only two shots hit. The first hits his right leg while the degree of muzzle climb means the second hits him in the head and he falls to the ground leaving half his skull and its contents spread over the car behind him.

Before I have time to duck back into the AV-4, Yuki lets fly several hundred rounds from the minigun, punching out the engine block of the first of the three limos. That demonstrates to the remaining three suits that "the war is now unwinable" and they decide to run for it. I watch them sprint into the trees, without firing. Unlike Shen, I won't shoot a retreating adversary. Gotta hand it to Yuki though, she managed to intimidate the remaining suits into fleeing, without breaking her Hippocratic oath.

That's the gun toting suits dealt with, now to find out who else is here, because I can't imagine that Biotechnica would have used three limousines just to send six 'killers' after us. There have to be other, possibly more important people in the lodge itself...