Days of Ruin Update History:
Update 5/12/2011—Modified and updated some content in Chapters 1-3. Basic maintenance; improving descriptions, modifying language, adding details. Removed chapter header in Chapter 3 (that Name, Date, location thing at the beginning of each chapter). Removed Authors Notes from ch 2-3.
A/N: Hello everybody, welcome to Days of Ruin: United Offensive, the parallel sister story to Days of Ruin: The Underground.
Sorry to those who love pokemorphs, but in this story, they-for the most part-play the bad guys. A bit of a change of pace.
Oh yes, before I forget. For the sake of this story, Pokemorphs were NOT created by human scientists or humans mating with pokemon. They are an entirely different species from pokemon and can't breed with them, but they can breed with humans and have offspring called Hybrids, who are a mix between the two parent's DNA and can look anything from exactly like a human to exactly like a Pokemorph. Furthermore, pokemorph moves (eg. Flamethrower) are weaker than their pokemon counterparts.
Anyway, without further ado, here's the Prologue to Days of Ruin: United Offensive.
"Infamy"
10/27/2030 – 11:00hrs
Cpt. Mark Sanderson, Leafeon Pokemorph
2nd Division, Pokemorph Liberation Army
Undisclosed location near Mississippi River, central USA.
"Hey, Captain," a familiar light-hearted voice asked through his headset as Mark Sanderson closed his journal and tucked it away inside his bullet-proof vest. "What'cha workin' on?"
"Writing a journal, Splash," Mark replied to the Buizel-morph sitting beside him on the bench inside their unit's modified CH-46 Sea Knight helicopter.
The Buizel-morph had earned the nickname back in Artillery Training, for his inability to hit sea-based targets. He would have liked to have been an artillery commander, but because of his poor marks against water targets, he was instead assigned to the 2nd Division and placed in Mark's squad.
"Oh really?" his friend replied with a cooky grin, "How long you been keeping one of those? I've followed your leafy ass all over the damn continent and I've never seen you writing in one!"
"That's because I just started it today! And remember this 'leafy ass' can give you lifetime KP duty if he so chooses." Mark said, giving his friend a playful push.
"Now we wouldn't want that!" the buizel-morph exclaimed. "Then who would this squad have who could woo the ladies back at base?"
Mark and several other squad members in the helicopter opened their mouths to retort with a quip, when their radios abruptly crackled to life.
"Outlaw 2-1," the voice addressed the squad by its call sign, "the ground forces have already made their way into the city, however, they have yet to make contact with enemy forces. Our fighters are all currently engaged with the enemy's air force, so you have been reassigned to support the ground forces from the helicopter's gun turrets until further orders are given. Over."
"Outlaw 2-1 copies all, support ground units until further notice," Mark replied to the Airborne Warning and Control System (AWACS for short) operator in charge of his division.
"Give 'em hell! Ghost Eye, out."
"Alright," Mark said through his com to the rest of his unit, as he tucked his long, leaf-like ears through the notches on his helmet and fastened the straps as he took position at the Sea Knight's starboard MK-19 grenade launcher, "Splash, you take position in the Vulcan cannon beside me; Taylor, Swenson, you take station on the port-side turrets. The rest of you, give the enemy hell with your M4s out the back hatch of this thing!"
The air was tense in the helicopter as the members of Outlaw 2-1 took to their stations and opened the tail hatch. The air over the city was quiet, not a sound to be heard as the morphs steadily continued their slow plod through the suburban housing, drawing ever nearer toward the heart of the city.
The battle-hardened troops inside the Sea Knight kept their heads on a swivel, their eyes peeled for any traces of movement. Then suddenly, an RPG burst through the window of what had appeared to be an empty house, impacting the friendly tank on the ground in front of the helicopter and immediately engulfing it in flames.
"CONTACT!" The occupants of the helicopter shouted in unison, as all hell broke loose on the ground below them.
A second tank in the convoy they were escorting fired its cannon at a house spouting gunfire, Mark feeling the heat of the explosion as the roof came down on top of all who were inside. Splash opened fire with his Vulcan, the angry red tracers carving a path of destruction, as the enemy soldiers took up defensive positions in yards, on rooftops, behind pillars, and parked cars.
Enemy tank regiments began to pour out through the garage doors of houses, their guns blazing and cannons firing as they engaged the advancing morph soldiers. Mark set his sights on a mobile SAM, blowing the anti-aircraft weapon to pieces before it had the chance to fire missiles at their helicopter, before he turned to shoot at a convoy of enemy Humvees and foot soldiers that were rushing to join the chaotic battle in the streets.
Gunfire from the foot soldiers impacted the side of the Sea Knight, tearing holes in the helicopter's thin aluminum skin. The airborne soldiers quickly opened fire on their aggressors, plowing the ground on which their enemy stood with gunfire and grenades. As soldier after soldier emerged from the previously thought empty houses, Mark decided they shouldn't take any chances.
He felt the trigger's familiar 'click' under his five-fingered paw as the grenades began to pour forth from the mouth of his gun, raining destruction upon the wooden houses below. Mark felt slightly guilty for firing on civilian housing without any discretion, as he knew that many homes still contained civilians and destroying them would destroy everyone inside. However, General Lockjaw, the commander of all the morph forces in North America, didn't care if they were civilian or soldier; if they were human, he wanted them dead. Civilians weren't a priority target, but there was no punishment for killing them, and the humans who survived the battle were simply left to die in the bombed out buildings left in the morph forces' wake.
After all, they deserve it for how they've treated us over the years.
Outlaw 2-1 continued to fire at enemy positions as the fighting continued. The morph ground forces, despite heavy casualties, were managing to advance into the more industrial parts of the city with the help of air support as bombers began to, well, bomb the city. Thick black smoke from burning buildings, crashed fighter jets, destroyed tanks, and gunfire was rising up in large columns as the attack pressed on.
Mark fired a grenade at an MBT as it pulled out of a warehouse, but the reactive armor deflected most of the grenade's blast away as Mark thought it might. Mark, however, didn't count on the tank firing its cannon at the helicopter itself, as such tactics rarely worked. This time however, the tank hit the mark, blasting off the tail rotor and sending the helicopter into a tailspin.
The soldiers of Outlaw 2-1 could only hold on for dear life as the force of the spiral ripped the tail hatch off and several soldiers were slung out of the helicopter.
This is it! Mark thought, clutching onto the turret's mount as the wounded bird spun out of control toward the ground. Mark felt his grip slip off his gun, and the next thing he knew, he saw the Sea Knight spinning away from him as he was thrown out into the open sky, before he blacked out.
Mark slowly opened his eyes and looked around. His vision was blurry, making his surroundings difficult to see.
Am I in... heaven? He asked himself mentally, blinking in attempt to clear his vision. As the objects slowly came into view, it became quite apparent that this wasn't heaven.
He was lying on his back; the remains of what was once a bush of some sort crushed beneath him. A short distance away, the Sea Knight's burning wreckage lay on its side against a steep grassy embankment beside a parking lot for a tool shed for the golf course behind it.
I got to get over there, Mark thought, I have to know if any of them made it out!
It seemed that no part of his body didn't hurt when he finally managed to drag himself out of the hedges and get to a sitting position to look himself over. His paws had been badly slashed, the deep cuts crossing his palms, his legs felt badly bruised, thought he may have a broken rib or two. His carbine was nowhere to be found, but he still had his side arm and his knife, so at least he wouldn't be unprotected if none of his comrades survived the wreck.
He struggled to his feet, clutching his head as he did so, before staggering towards the wreckage of what used to be his transport.
"Is anyone still in there? Taylor? Daniels? Splash?" he said as he made his way around to where the tail hatch used to be to peer inside.
"I'm okay," came a raspy response as Mark poked his head inside. "Taylor and Ramirez are too."
There was some shuffling followed by groans of pain, as a bayleef and a houndour morph climbed out, followed by a familiar orange-furred morph.
"Anyone else make it, Splash?" Mark asked, giving them the once over.
"No, they're all dead," Splash sighed as he checked himself over for injuries. Aside from some bad gashes on his shoulders, he didn't look too bad. "God, you look terrible Captain!"
"Maybe because I feel terrible!" Mark retorted, before remembering they were behind enemy lines; he continued, after lowering his voice. "I guess we're all that made it, then. We'll travel as a squad and try to get back to allied lines."
"You'll need a weapon, sir," Private Ramirez stated, the houndour-morph motioning toward the carbine he carried.
"I'll take this one," Mark said as he picked up an M16 off the ground. It wasn't the greatest weapon in existence, but it would do. "I'll just radio AWACS and let them know where we are, and then we'll plot our next move from there."
Mark checked his radio, and was pleased to see it miraculously still worked. He waited for a break in the chatter before beginning his transmission, "Ghost Eye, Outlaw 2-1 here. Our chopper was shot down and we're behind enemy lines. What's the status of the assault and what do you want us to do? Over."
Almost immediately the operator responded, "Copy that, Outlaw 2-1. The paratroopers currently dropping over the center of the city seems to have the enemy tied up at the moment, and we seem to be gaining some ground. Take cover and just sit tight, I'll see about getting a transport to your location. Ghost Eye, out."
There was little need for explanation as the whole squad had heard Ghost Eye.
"Alright, you heard him," Mark said to his three surviving squad-mates. "Let's take cover in the bushes behind the warehouse. I don't want to take any chances out in the open. Follow me."
"Yes, sir!"
~oo0oo~
Meanwhile, in a secret underground bunker beneath Washington D.C., a group of high-ranking military officers debated the battle as they watched through satellite feed.
"General Lockjaw! You can't be serious!" a uniform-clad absol-morph shouted, his crimson eyes wide in shock. He bore two stars on his cap, denoting his rank as Major General, and was by far and away the youngest morph present at the meeting at the age of twenty-six. The morph had risen through the ranks fast due to his favor among the troops and brilliant tactics. Furthermore, his troops were the ones spearheading the assault on the enemy stronghold along the Mississippi.
"I'm one hundred percent serious, Commander," The dark, scaly garchomp-morph said flatly, a cold look in his yellow eyes, "Your forces have served me well, but they're all pawns in the greater scheme of things."
"But General," the absol-morph protested, almost pleaded his superior, "Think of their families-"
"'Family' is the last thing on my mind right now," the garchomp-morph General snapped, "The miserable human's mistreatment of us shall be ended! It's high time they get what they deserve!"
"Governor, although I agree the humans need to be punished, General Blyght brings up a valid point," an elderly alakazam-morph said from the far end of the war room table. The morph wore four stars on his cap, General Lockjaw alone out-ranked him, and sported an incredible white mustache. "We're talking about detonating a nuclear weapon in a city where tens of thousands of morphs are fighting! If the public ever learned that we were responsible for it, then there would be a tremendous outcry against our government."
"That's precisely why we'll blame it on the humans General Ka Bar," the dragon grinned, revealing his rows and rows of razor-sharp teeth. "We'll say that the intelligence division made a mistake and the humans really did have a nuke on hand in the city."
The North American Head of Intelligence didn't like that idea.
"Now hold on just a second," the gengar-morph sitting between General Blyght and Ka Bar shouted, rising to his feet, "My division is going to take the blame for this action that will take the lives of thousands? Totally unacceptable!"
"Sit down, Drake!" Ka Bar ordered calmly to the enraged gengar, grabbing him by the arm.
"Don't touch me! No one dares blame things unjustly on my division! We've worked too hard to make a name for ourselves as a respectable organization! I'm not going to let you and your impatience ruin that!" Drake roared, slipping free of Ka Bar's grip and striding around the table toward where General Lockjaw sat.
"Sit down, Drake, that's an order!" Lockjaw shouted, rising to his feet.
"NO I WILL NOT SIT DOWN!" Drake shouted, grabbing the supreme commander by the shirt and pinning the garchomp-morph against the wall.
BANG!
A single gunshot echoed around the room, making everyone jump. Everyone except for Lockjaw, who instead casually sheathed his pistol and watched as his assailant fell to the floor. The said gengar morph convulsed on the ground, then lay still.
The General of the Army just killed the North American Head of Intelligence.
"Now, any more objections, gentlemorphs?" Lockjaw calmly asked, as if the whole confrontation never occurred.
No one dared to say a word...
~oo0oo~
"Ghost Eye," Mark shouted into his radio as gunfire cut through the bushes along the side of the golf course his squad had taken cover behind, "What's the status on that helicopter? Over!"
Not long after he and his squad had taken position behind cover, enemy soldiers arrived to the crash site to finish them off. Mark's team had decided to hold their fire in hopes that the soldiers would move on, but they instead had fanned out to search and had discovered their location. Badly outnumbered and low on ammunition, Mark knew his squad wouldn't be able to hold out long against their foes.
Mark quickly fired a Solarbeam into the crowd of soldiers, before ducking behind a tree as bullets raced by. His attack had an effect akin to that of a hand grenade, the blast badly wounding—if not killing—a few soldiers and throwing a couple others to the ground.
Just as he was beginning to suspect that Ghost Eye hadn't heard his call, a voice came through on his radio.
"Outlaw 2-1, we understand you could use some help," a feminine voice said. "This is Thunder 1-5, we can see the crash site from our location. We're your taxi out of here. What's your status?"
Mark slid out from behind cover to exchange fire with the advancing enemy forces. They were now less than eighty meters from Outlaw 2-1's defensive position. Mark hit one of the soldiers in the shoulder as the enemy grunt rushed across the warehouse parking lot for a better offensive position on the leafeon-morph's squad, knocking the soldier to the ground. Mark quickly finished the soldier off with several more rounds to his body.
Mark glanced around at his squad-mates as he slipped back behind the oak tree. An enemy had thrown a grenade into the area Splash was located in, but the agile buizel-morph quickly tossed it back at their advancing foes, killing several of them. Taylor was busy firing shots through the hedges from a prone position, and Ramirez busy letting loose with a scorching hot flamethrower.
Mark took out a red flare and threw it into the parking lot, before finally responding to Thunder 1-5.
"Outlaw 2-1 currently engaged with multiple contacts approaching from the east," he radioed to their helicopter-borne rescuers. "I've popped red smoke in the parking lot! Stand-by to engage on my mark!"
"Roger that, Thunder 1-5 assuming firing position," the pilot replied as the helicopter roared over the treeline.
"Thunder 1-5, cleared hot!" Mark shouted as he and his men all hit the deck.
Immediately the powerful cannons attached to the Sea Knight helicopter known as Thunder 1-5 opened fire on the troops in the lot, the streams of tracers cutting down anything that moved.
Mark's squad anxiously waited as the helicopter drove the enemy forces back, when finally the tail hatch opened and a kirlia-morph appeared from inside, motioning for Mark's team to make a break for the Sea Knight.
"Come on! Come on!" the soldier shouted, an order that was hastily obeyed by Mark's team.
The four soldiers burst out of the bushes and dashed across the concrete lot, dodging enemy gunfire. To Mark, that was one of the longest five seconds of his life, as everything seemed to slow down. Splash made it in first, followed by Taylor and Ramirez, then lastly Mark and the kirlia-morph soldier.
"Thanks for the rescue, guys," the leafeon-morph gasped out to his squad's rescuers as the helicopter trudged back into the sky.
"Don't mention it," the kirlia-morph replied, "Lieutenant Katrina Bowie, at your service."
"Captain Mark Sanderson, 2nd Division."
Mark took a seat on the bench that ran across the port side of the Sea Knight, looking out the open tail hatch at the final resting place of several of the morphs who had been with him mission after mission for the past few years. Some of the soldiers had even been his friends from basic training, morphs whom he had deep bonds with. Now in a single moment of misfortune, they were gone.
A frantic radio transmission snapped the battered soldier back into reality.
"Unidentified ballistic missile inbound!" Ghost Eye shouted, "Radar signature matches that of LGM-30 Minuteman Nuclear missile!"
Terrified glances ricocheted around among those present in the helicopter as various transmissions from ground forces came through the radio all asking the same question: "Where is the missile headed?"
"Stand-by, we're tracking the missile now," Ghost Eye replied, doing his best to stay calm despite the flurry of panicked voices from ground forces screaming up at him in the AWACS high in the sky. "SHIT! It's headed straight for the downtown sector of the combat zone!"
Mark instinctively glanced out the tail hatch toward the downtown skyline. It still looked awfully big from his seat on the bench.
"All units, flow to safe area," Ghost Eye continued, panic rising in his voice, "Fifteen miles from point of deton-"
A blinding white flash engulfed the skyscrapers of downtown, creating a wall of debris as the unquenchable inferno exploded outward at a breathtaking pace. Long before the sound of the blast even reached the helicopter, Mark could make out the gruesome details of the second sun as the rapidly approaching shockwave threw a retreating allied convoy into the sky like a bunch of kits' toys before they too were consumed by the white flash.
Mark couldn't tear his gaze away from the blast as it rapidly approached—then finally overtook their helicopter. First came the shockwave of the blast, the wall disturbed air throwing the helicopter into a spin so violent that the fuselage literally tore into two separate spinning halves as they plummeted to the unforgiving ground below. All Mark could do was hold onto his seat as for the second time that day he watched as soldiers were flung out of the gaping holes on either side of him to their deaths.
Oh God, help us! He prayed, before the helicopter slammed into the ground and everything went black.
His biggest regret: he wouldn't be coming home for his son's ninth birthday...
A/N: Okay, before I get a flurry of people telling me that I made a mistake and ghosts can't be killed with guns, I assure you this is not a mistake. You see, I believe that bullets and knives, as they are metal, most likely belong in the steel-type category. Now I'm not claiming to know everything about pokemon, but I don't seem to recall any ghost pokemon being immune to steel. Therefore, they can be affected by and killed by the like.
Anyway, so it appears that Mark was killed in action in the most action-packed prologue I've ever written. It's okay; he's not the main character anyway. So he's allowed to die. We'll meet the main character next chapter.
Until then, please review.
~Sky