Drusya exhaled slowly, the stale air of the diner tasting faintly of burnt caramel and impending doom. “Ignat,” she stated, her voice flat, devoid of its usual sleepy drawl, “we’re not leaving.” Ignat, who had been meticulously scrubbing a spatula with a small wire brush, froze. His perfectly coiffed hair, usually defiant, seemed to droop slightly. “Drusya? Are you mad? That… that thing is tearing through Sector Four right now! They just sent out a Level Gamma evacuation order for *this entire ring*! It’s going to flatten us like a discarded algae wafer!” “Precisely,” Drusya said, pushing herself off the overturned crate she’d been using as a footrest. “And if it flattens us, where will I sleep? Where will I eat? No, this is unacceptable. We’re cooking it.” Ignat dropped the spatula with a clatter. It skittered across the grimy floor. “Cooking… *it*?” His voice was a strangled squeak of disbelief, a stark contrast to his usual arrogant baritone. “The Titan-Beast? The one that just destroyed the hydroponic farms and ate half a regiment of mechanised infantry?” “The very same,” Drusya confirmed, already scanning the cluttered interior of her diner. Her eyes landed on a massive, rusted hulk half-buried under a pile of broken comms equipment in the corner. It was the barrel of a decommissioned 400-pound ‘Gorgon’ siege cannon, ripped from its mount. “That will do nicely.” Before Ignat could process her words, the diner’s reinforced hatch blasted inwards with a loud clang. Commander Petrovic stood framed in the opening, his uniform streaked with ash and what looked suspiciously like beast entrails. He looked even more stressed than usual, grease smudging his brow over twitching eyelids. “Drusya! Ignat! What in the blazes are you two doing still here?” Petrovic bellowed, his voice raw. “Move! Now! We’ve got less than ten minutes before the beast reaches the defensive perimeter. I’m pulling you out myself!” He grabbed Drusya’s arm, his grip surprisingly strong, trying to yank her towards the exit. Drusya merely blinked. Her arm remained as unyielding as the tank hull around them. “Unhand me, Commander. I’m busy.” “Busy? Busy dying, you mean!” Petrovic exclaimed, tugging harder. “This is a direct order! We’ll get you to the underground bunkers. It’ll be safe there, if a bit… cramped. But at least you’ll be alive!” Drusya sighed, a sound of profound annoyance. Petrovic’s well-intentioned tugging was irritatingly distracting. “I need that tube,” she said, ignoring him completely. She walked over to the Gorgon barrel, stooped, and with a grunt that was more a gentle exhalation, hoisted the colossal piece of scrap metal onto her shoulder. The entire cast-iron monstrosity, easily weighing four hundred pounds, settled on her shoulder without a bend in her spine. Petrovic dropped his hands. The sound of his own heavy breathing was the only thing filling the suddenly silent diner. His breath hitched into a dry rattle. He watched, transfixed, as Drusya balanced the rifled cylinder, then strolled towards the main cooking pit to eyeball the clearance. Her posture was casual, almost bored, as if she were carrying a light backpack. The Commander slumped against a stack of munitions crates. His gaze darted from the impossible weight on Drusya’s shoulder to her sleepy, unimpressed face. Then, his eyes fell to the grease-stained notebook tucked into her apron pocket, its title ‘Retirement Plan’ barely visible under layers of grime. He remembered the reports, the rumours, the impossible feats of strength attributed to the Apex Hunter. He remembered the funeral, the empty coffin, the missing body. Petrovic’s legs buckled. He dropped to his knees on the grimy floor, a cloud of dust puffing up around him. He stared at Drusya, the legendary ghost of the Krasnograd Enclave, the warrior who could fell a Giga-Rhino with a single punch, now standing before him, casually hefting a siege cannon, worried about her nap schedule. His mouth opened and closed several times, like a fish out of water. “You… you’re… *her*,” he croaked, the revelation shattering his mind. His voice was barely a whisper. “The Apex Hunter. You’re alive.” Drusya glanced at him, mildly irritated. “Yes, yes. Now, if you’re quite finished having a nervous breakdown, Ignat, get me your hydroponic herbs.” Ignat, who had also witnessed the impossible feat and Petrovic’s complete collapse, was shaking. “My… my rare cultivation herbs? The ones I smuggled from the Upper Levels? The *Krasnograd Khmeli Suneli*? The *Saffron-Crested Zira*?” He clutched his chest, as if she’d asked for his heart. “All of them,” Drusya said, setting the massive barrel down with a dull thump that rattled the floor plates. The beast outside rumbled again, closer this time, a deeper, more resonant thrum. “It’s following the scent. My last Razor-Grizzly stew. If we’re going to get this thing to stand still for a proper spit-roast, we need a marinade so potent it’ll make it forget about trampling our home.” Her eyes narrowed, the lazy haze momentarily clearing. “And we need to make it *better*. Something it can’t resist. Something new, something… *divine*.” Ignat swallowed hard, his culinary pride warring with his abject terror. The idea of using his precious, irreplaceable herbs on a city-destroying beast was anathema, but the challenge… the *divine* taste… Drusya’s sheer, terrifying confidence. He saw the logic, the insane, brilliant logic, through a haze of fear and gastronomic obsession. He scrambled towards his hidden cabinet, pulling out small, sealed containers of iridescent powders and dried, fragrant leaves. His hands trembled as he began to meticulously measure, to mix, to pound spices in a mortar and pestle he’d salvaged from an antique museum. The aroma, complex and intoxicating, slowly began to fill the diner, weaving through the metallic tang of scrap and the faint smell of Drusya’s last stew. Drusya watched him work, a rare, almost imperceptible smirk touching her lips. The sound of the Titan-Beast outside grew louder, less a distant thrum and more a deep, resonant rumble that vibrated through the floorboards, rattling the loose bolts of the tank hull. Petrovic, still on his knees, gripped the floorboards as scrap bolts rattled free from the bulkheads. Ignat, mid-chop on a bundle of glowing crimson leaves, suddenly stopped. His knife, a custom-forged blade of refined durasteel, slipped from his grasp and clattered to the floor. His chin snapped up toward the reinforced hatch. “It’s not tracking the old scent anymore…” Ignat whispered, his voice barely audible above the growing vibration. “It’s right outside.”

Heavy Artillery and Hydroponic Herbs