Chapter 2
In the Resistance base...
"Are you sure this will work, Alex?" a blonde girl looking very matured for her age says worriedly. She looks tired and shaken, having fought and ran for a decade already ever since the Deployment. She awkwardly checks her backpack to make sure she has the necessary supplies and gear in case she has to make a run once more from the clutches of the Sentries.
A bespectacled scientist with glasses nearly as big as eggs briefly glances at the clipboard in his hands. "I'm not sure, but it'll have to do." he says honestly. "You know that anytime, Greg can choose to kill us all at once. And we cannot catch up with him in terms of technological strength and strategically, we're outmatched. Even one Sentry can leave this place a bloody slaughterhouse."
"Is there no hope?" Holly tiredly asks.
"There is." Alex Aruda says. "Remember what we discussed months ago? With my knowledge of time travel experiments from my time in Greg's labs, I can create a portal that can take us back to the past. The fabric of time and space will be briefly torn apart to produce a tunnel in which we can send a ship back in time. Imagine that if Greg never ran away and got chased by the authorities only to create those terrible Sentries, we'll be happy and free. We can live more comfortably, have families without a worry and above all, this world will never be living in fear. Additionally, we'll won't remember any of these things. We can just enjoy...life."
"But you said it was unstable." Holly states.
"Well, if too many ship were sent through the portal, then yes, it could become unstable. A ship might get lost in the unstoppable flow of time. That is why we're sending one ship only, containing you and Susan Heffley. You are both key members of the Liberation, and also considered the closest to him personally, despite his inability to er...communicate."
"Inability!" Holly Hills spits out. "Greg is obstinate and pig-headed, always wanting to do things his way. Very forceful too. But he has had his good side. Now to think of it, he was a better person than all those suitors and admirers of mine. They merely wanted me as a toy, something to boost their reputations. But Greg was only looking for a companion, a close one. And when he failed to find one, that disfigured him mentally. It's all my fault." She buried her face in her hands.
"He chose it." An elderly lady looking still energetic comes in. She's carrying a plasma rifle. "People go on their own paths because they choose their own decisions. But somehow I never knew that his decision would go to far, until it is almost the end of us all. But what else can we say and blame now? The Greg we know now is a cruel calculative snake."
"So we shall go by the plan, Madam." Alex Aruda says. "Where are the generals from the Eastern Seaboard, and from the Kowloon territories?"
"In these troubled times, call me Susan." the lady says. "I have just received a distress call from Beijing. The Sentries have found the location of the main camps, and are wiping them off from the map. Although the Beijing chapter is located in our deepest bunker yet, a thousand feet underground layered with steel, the Sentries are drilling through as we speak."
"Don't tell me that all the commanders are being taken out." Holly Hills stammers.
"The British Remnant submarine carrying their leaders struck a deep sea mine and went down with all hands lost. An Afghani mine. Greg's working hand-in-hand with the New Caliphate to secure the seas." Susan Heffley says.
The whole room feels graver than a graveyard.
"I thought the New Caliphate was neutral." Holly Hills says.
"Yes, but apparently the British Remnant attacked too many of their cargo ships for supplies. Those desperate impoverished fools. So Greg offered to guard their ships with Sentries and naval support. And of course we all know that the Federation and the New Caliphate have a free trade and neutral policy with each other since the 10 Hour War."
"So all the main commanders are taken out?" Alex Aruda says in disbelief.
"Who knows?" There is a hint of uncertainty in Susan Heffley's voice. "Before the Federation set up the blockade around us, we received radio reports of Sentry drop ships heading for California and Alaska, where our American camps are. Greg has put his chess pieces in position to cut us from every source of support. We are surrounded." She pauses to reflect on the grim conditions, before continuing, "So we have to do this. We have to go back in time and stop this from ever happening. The Sentries must never be created."
"There's no other choice?" Alex frowns. "Time wrangling is worse than black magic, to dabble with it. I mean, I still can't understand it fully. But I can at least create a portal and based on theories and calculations, pinpoint the destination in the past."
"If we ever get there, I wonder if we should go by persuasion or kill him straight away." Holly smirks. "The Sentries are demons as far as the Chancellor is concerned."
"We have to talk to him." Susan sighs. "I can only hope my son can think straight and consider about the future as long as he isn't in the deep yet."
"Alex! Susan!" A dark-skinned captain hurries in. "The Federation troops have started to advance! Still no sign of Sentry drop ships, though." "That doesn't mean they won't be coming, Julian." Susan says. "Alex, power up the portal generators. I know they will take a few hours to reach full power to cut time flux, but we have to go back in time now. I think our chances of holding out, let alone defeat Greg's Federation are too slim."
"How about the ship? Supplies? A solid plan to try to stop Greg from running away or creating the Sentries, getting him home?" Holly Hills queries, a thousand things bombarding her mind heavier than a German Blitzkrieg. She cannot believe that they are actually doing something totally unrealistic, impossible, improbable and highly dangerous, just for the sake for stopping a desperate runaway kid from inadvertently causing the apocalypse that they lived in.
"We'll take a shuttle, Holly." Susan Heffley says as she dashes out of the room. "See to the supplies at the stores. Get maps, hooks, weapons, tinned food, anything that could be useful. I don't know where this trip is going to end up, but this is the only way we can somehow save our world. And maybe Greg." She ends tenderly, as if her heart were aching with what remained of motherly love.
Outside of the Resistance base...
Soldiers clad in dusty military gear, blackened with the hazy air of the polluted wilderness dash about, shouting and slamming ammo clips into their rifles, shells into their battered artillery cannons or revving up grunting tanks and armoured vehicles. The rebel observers scan the skies and the expanse of the land beyond them with high-powered binoculars, taking note of the advancing Federation troops and hovertanks.
"No Sentry drop ships yet." a scout says to Captain Julian, who is overseeing the defense of the base.
"Why am I not surprised?" Julian scoffs. "The Chancellor always plays hard with his toys until they are broken, that spoilt brat. He may have all the powerful Sentries and military might in the world, but we'll show him! Thinks he can wipe us out easier than flies. But we'll prepare our best anti-aircraft crews to show down the drop ships before they ever deploy the Sentries. A missile or shell to the cockpit should suffice. They'll find that coming here won't be as easy as they think!"
"Captain, the longest any of our bases have lasted a full-scale assault was one-week. A thick dense bunker in China stocked to the brim with the remnants of People's Liberation Army firepower. But it fell in the end. How long can we last this? The Federation is superior by numbers and tech." the scout says worriedly.
"We'll find out!" Captain Julian exclaims. "But their birds will have flown by the time they step on our bodies! Greg will have no idea that we're doing something rash and stupid! If he did know, well then, we'd have Sentries right up our a$$es. Hah! I see five Drones up ahead! Five Drones! Skirmishers are out! Brace yourselves, soldiers! We have to hold them off as long as we can. Commanders Holly and Susan need time to jump back in time to save us all!
Out from the skies, five light slim Drones, slightly resembling stingrays, descend, silently but deadly. The anti-aircraft defenses roar to life, launching missiles at them or bursting with shells from AA cannons. A Drone is taken down by a shell to the right wing. The others break up and shoot back up to higher altitude, only to drop back down abruptly, raining plasma fire on the base defenses.
The Resistance consists of several mounds as big as a hill perspiring enough for a hiker. Each mound would be equipped with a forest of barb wire, machine guns, a small cache of missiles and steel reinforcing. Some of the mounds are highly impervious to heavy fire, strengthened thoroughly with steel alloys laced with stanium scavenged from the ruins of downed Sentry drop ships, fitted with a high-ranged cannon or missile systems, controlled via electronics by the soldiers protected inside. Others are mildly armoured, with troops using all kinds of weapons perching out from carved-in trenches. And then again these are the front line defense pits, more versatile than their heavier counterparts.
Soldiers duck to prevent the plasma rounds from blasting their heads off, but Julian is blown rolling to the side of the trench by an explosion only to see the scout's leg rolling after him.
"Open fire!" he shouts, pulling out his own laser rifle and firing at the approaching Federation hovertanks. The Resistance launch an impressive wave of laser fire and rockets that knocks out the first and second lines of the Federation tanks. But the hovertanks move on, undeterred and stubborn, like ranks of crabs foolishly approaching the wide expanse of the seas. They release a torrent of blue inferno from their cannons, slamming and punching into the lines of defenses. A Drone lowers altitude just as the soldiers' attention turn towards the ground targets and launch several plasma warheads, obliterating a defense mound of two. It swerves narrowly to dodge a rocket or two, before its plasma guns open fire, reducing screaming soldiers into limp corpses and mangled limbs.
As the Drone retreats to the safety of the skies, some hovertanks halt to unload Federation Guards, black clad soldiers of Chancellor Greg. They cover behind troopers holding sizable energy shields before advancing slowly towards the front defenses amidst heavy Reisistance fire. They lob grenades over their covers into the Resistance's faces or fire quick rattles from their guns whenever there is a lull in fire.
Julian spots an opportunity, and he grabs at it. A machine gun crew rains hell on a Fed column behind a shield man on the left flank. From the right flank, Julian dashes over with a band of soldiers and open fire on the unshielded right. The enemy soldiers tumble over like skittles, yelling with pain. A Federation hovertank fires a plasma shot at them to cover the troopers, but an ancient Resistance Abrams tank erupts with defiance, its shot smashing into the cockpit and exploding.
The Resistance soldiers cheer and fight on like bloody boxers vying for the main title.
"We need to hold them off for as long as we can!" Julian shouts as loud as he can, so that all his men are encouraged further to fight on to the bitter end. "Fight on! Think of the families we can have, think of the brighter future we may enjoy, when we succeed to stop Greg!"
As soldiers duck, dodge, dash, yelp and shoot back amidst Federation hellfire and Drone assaults, artillery crews and AA systems are in full swing, targeting every threat in sight. A perspiring sergeant yells before his squad's mortar launcher erupts, sending a shell into the nose of a hovertank. Unfortunately, the miserable shell bounces off the tank before it responds in kind, vomiting blue fire that fries the entire squad into charred skeletons in an instance. Two Drones dart downwards and release several mini bombs that open to scatter shiny powder like seeds all over the base.
"What is that?" Julian asks quietly, before yelling, "Take cover!" as the powder makes contact with the ground only to ignite and blow up.
There couldn't be a worse hell-on-earth than this. Three quarters of the defenses are set a lit in a second by the explosive powder, courtesy of Greg's dirty tricks. Soldiers run screaming out of their hovels, their uniforms ablaze, only to be gunned down by the Federation troops. With much of the frontline exposed to a Federation advance, they march in steadily, hovertanks stalking. Julian throws off his flaming jacket, with a slight burn on his right arm and orders, "Power up the shield generator!"
A cavern slightly exposed near the main bunker fires up with energy from an underground generator. A purplish energy sphere forms around the entire base, and a Drone crashes into it just as it solidifies. A significant amount of Fed troops are trapped within the impenetrable shield around the Resistance base. A barrage of Resistance artillery blows the trapped Federation units to ashes.
With the enemy advance contained for the time being, Julian wipes off some sweat off his brow as the remaining Resistance troops scramble to rearrange their positions, replace damaged weapons and clear the mounds of debris and corpses. He check his watch and notes that the engagement took half and hour. "What now?" he wonders aloud. Obviously he is still unsure whether today could be the day his ashes are scattered across this accursed wasteland.