1/13/2114
Saturday morning in Monroe, Michigan. The place shadowed the happier times. There were DuVarden scavengers and encampments here and there. And AI scouts. What ever appeared were mutilated by locals, or cleanly captured or executed by the soldiers. Over the past years, these troops were nicknamed different things, mainly by suits.
Airborne F's, were known as Eagles. Airborne E's were known as Vultures. Infiltrators and Snipers were Lions. So on and so on.
Nathan ducked behind cover in his new midnight blue Assault armor. Which, of course, was dubbed the Rhino. Mainly because they were pretty hard to kill.
Jasper leaped onto a building, still in his chrome Prototype suit. Of course it wasn't a prototype, it was named that because it was an unchanged prototype of the Airborne E. The suit had spikes on joints. Wrist, elbow, shoulder, knee, you get the basic idea. And what was it called by the world? A Porcupine. Obviously.
Then there were a shots, very quiet ones. Jasper looked at the AI scout. It leaked hydraulic fluid and lubricant out of several holes. Only two guns were that quiet, and only one made small holes like that.
The Hurricane. Which turned water into ice and shot them out of a sniper like barrel at speeds fast enough to pierce almost any metal. One main one was Gliesnatium, a metal discovered on the planet Gliese.
Jasper readjusted the pistols in his hands. He gave the sign of hesitancy. The second twin pulled the pistols close, not wanting to take too much space. Then he saw the grey boot that belonged to his mentor. The rest of his suit was mainly grey, with blue and orange highlights.
An Airborne F landed some distance behind Nathan. The Eagle had white and sky blue paint, making it harder to see in the sky. The Antimatter Jet, a sniper rifle that shoots streams of dark energy, nestled snugly between the Eagle's twin turbines on her back. Her javelin was in her hand, loosely hanging in her grip. And she showed some pride in her students.
The other, the grey Albatross, turned towards the Eagle. His nearly purple optics leveled at the three. His helm was sharp, and gave a slight form of a crown near the top. The face plate hosted the XianLu flag below his eyes, to his chin. The flag was pretty simple. Two small grey strips on the outside, two longer red ones between the grey but spaced apart.
His wings were smaller, but turbines much more powerful. The Hurricane was on his back, twin combat hooks locking the gun in place.
Daric twitched his head back, signaling them to keep going. He turned and crushed the nearly dead AI's head under his boot, giving a very crunchy sound. Nathan wolf whistled, to signal to the others in Daric's unit the clear. All ten others whistled back, and followed. Some in the shadows, sky, or open. Nathan climbed up to Jasper, curious expression behind his mask.
"Any'ing wrong?" Nathan asked as they continued their trip to Holland, Ohio, a good thirty five miles south south east, to meet up with the rest of Century 13.
"Just..." Jasper stopped, and his heart rate sped up. "Just feeling different. No Matt to watch out for. No sidetracking. You know." He lied.
"Oh." Nathan said, moving forward. "We got abou' a day to ge' there."
Jasper was walking, but his mind was thinking. And his heart was pumping. Jasper had shown hesitance. Because his heart began to pump again. For somebody. He sought love before. Before he was an orphan. After the death, he took point. Nathan had mental breakdowns. His mind had refused to accept it. He was gradual in letting it go, but still had moments.
Six years to get him from locking himself in rooms, to an almost normal person. And Matt and Noah can't care for themselves. Noah was an Infant. Matt barely was learning to fight. But six years later, Noah was in his studies, Matt in the ICG. So there was no time for romance.
There was barely room here. But it served enough. His heart pointed, and he's very reluctant to follow. Like a disoriented bird.
Daric lost his sense of warmth two weeks ago. Silence here, sadism there. Emotion free everywhere. He focused only on the road. And stopped. He yelled it on comm.
"Hunters." He hissed. Then the rest froze. Only those in the sky moved, counting three in total.
Hunters, are the result of extra terrestrials bonding with human AI. They are the only who speak human tongue, but only use batteries or human flesh for energy. They possessed agility, and heightened senses of smell and touch. They spoke, but only to sing lullabies as it hunts you down. But they were very sensitive to sudden changes in light, and is possible to kill one with a flash bang if they were in total darkness. And they can kill a hundred before being taken out by the Auto Rifle. The basic gun.
"Snipers, I need you ready to hit their knees. Everyone else, get some flashlights, or draw them out into the open. Eagle, Vulture, how many we got?"
"No more than five."
"Navarro, flank 'em. Attack from behind, but keep your eyes peeled."
"Which one?"
"Both." Daric shot one in the shoulder. It turned to him, called the others, and all began to sing. And stalk forward.
One of the team pointed a laser pointer into it's pupil, and the affected one recoiled greatly, hissing. There was a crack shot, who hit one in the abdomen.
Alia pointed her barrel at one of their knees. She fired a beam, and it went down quick. In the back, Nathan and Jasper had one in a blade fight. The rest of the unit open fired on the other two. One came to Daric, the other to the the rest of the unit, dodging, slashing, and hacking at the members.
Replacing the Hurricane onto his back, he pulled out both hooks, and took a defensive stance. The Hunter smirked, and released its natural talons and spikes. Daric experimentally slashed his right arm forward, and had the tip lightly deflected by the Hunter.
The Hunter, seeing this as a weakness, raised both arms, and dropped them, attempting to slash Daric. The defensive caught both arms in the hooks, and locked. The Hunter easily out powered him, and smirked again. And saw the turbines powering up. Daric smirked behind his mask.
The turbines went full power, and the two shot out, heading for a wall.
The Hunter frowned, and flung Jasper a good twenty feet, leaving him to hang on the edge of a building. The AI then launched Nathan in the same direction, but his weight reduced the distance.
The two knew next to nothing about Hunters, much less how to easily kill one. So Nathan rushed it, and gave it a normally bone breaking punch to the skull. The Hunter was shocked, and Nathan drove his combat knife into its thigh, making it audibly gasp. The Hunter clawed at his suit, leaving six deep scratches in the chest plate. Nathan stepped on its toe and shoved it hard. The Hunter fell over, Nathan's boot breaking its foot.
Nathan grabbed its lower jaw, and its upper one. The Hunter screeched.
Alia watched from her rifle's scope. Nathan's gloves turned from white to a pink-ish orange as he ripped the Hunter's head open. The Hunter was clawing at him, but the Rhino's armor was thick. His dying attempts didn't penetrate. Nathan turned back to Jasper.
Wiping his hand clean, he gave Jasper his hand to help him up.
"Sorry to leave you hanging." Nathan grinned. Jasper smacked him upside the head, as a concrete wall came crashing down in dust.
In winter, the night sky can get darker than Asphalt. 1317 Found the old Hotel, with two rooms still working. This was the rendezvous point. The two rooms were split by thirteen people. The Infiltrator was on the roof. Waiting for a signal.
Inside one room, Jasper was feeling... warm. Even after he washed his face in the still running water for the fourth time. To see a candidate for his love peacefully sleeping on a chair, it was the reason he felt warm. His cheeks were flushed. He woke in the middle of the night, and Daric was still on the roof.
Putting his helm back on, he sneaked out, and gracefully found a way to the roof. Daric was standing over the opposite edge. Watching something.
"You know what the plan is?" Daric asked, not moving.
"Only parts. One is what we did just now, and what we're waiting for. Another is something to do with a raid." Jasper said, standing next to his mentor.
"Century thirteen will be split again. All below twenty will raid bases. Ours will be in Fort Wayne. Ninety-five miles out west. We have a week."
There was silence.
"You have feelings for her don't you?" Daric broke the silence.
"Who?"
"Who else?"
"I do. I'll back off if you want. She's your's to begin with."
"We were never together. Go ahead. Try. And don't give up. She's a diamond, in more ways than one."
The sun broke the horizon, and the sky was flaming.
"So is this sight." Jasper stated.
"I agree." Daric's ever monotone voice said. Several points of movement were visible. A hundred flags came up, representing each Unit in the Century. One unit composed only of four people, and they are the highest ranking officers in the hundred.
"Wake the others up, and line them up out front. Centurion just called for a Captain's meeting."
Jasper nodded and went back to the rooms. He woke up one room by making the alarm clock go off. Crossing thresholds, Jasper went to the other room and woke them up gently, meaning to isolate the Eagle. Once the two were alone, Jasper bent down on one knee, and tapped Alia's knee repeatedly.
The female rose slowly. And Jasper saw her real eyes. The white on green on black. Alia saw her eyes on a reflection on Jasper's chrome helmet.
"They look so well on you." Jasper commented.
Alia shut her eyes, and put her helmet on.
"Don't tell anyone." She whispered faintly.
"Never intended to. Rest of us are here."
Alia got up. As Jasper waited for her on the stairs, She smacked him with her wing, shoving him off of the top and down to the ground. The two vertical slits on her helmet over her eyes blinked, suggesting her giggling. Jasper rolled his eyes.
Daric entered a tent erected within three minutes. A data table stood in the center of the circular tent. The tent itself was at least twenty feet in radius. The unit of four owned a truck, to carry everything needed at rendezvous. Ammo, armor, food, you name it. Even a portable television. Just not a toilet.
Daric was the last to enter. The Centurion looked up from his tablet.
"Refreshments in the back." The Centurion said. "Now. As captains of your unit, you should know your plan. First off, casualties?"
All captains shook their heads.
"Good. Any city above our position has been secured by twelve and fourteen. Now. Captains zero to twenty, you know your points?"
The first twenty captains nodded. This was the weird thing about every hundred units. Centurions didn't command a hundred soldiers, they commanded a hundred units.
"The rest of you, scatter among the borders. Eliminate all hostiles. If you don't know the borders, the captains in the cities of Cleveland, Akron, Columbus, Dayton, Cincinnati, Indianapolis, Gary, and South Bend will direct you."
The map displayed on the data table erected pins on the said cities.
"We will give you two sentries when you collect any necessary supplies. Check in with your teams. Dismissed."
As Daric came out of the tent, he witnessed Jasper fall down the stairs. He rolled his eyes. The other units were dispersed at several places. Some out on the road. Some down below. The casual stride he had led him to the supply truck. He took the standard care package, with food and flares. He also took an extra clip for each gun in the team, as well as a backpack.
The sentries were balls, the widest part as wide as a standard land mine. Daric placed the care package in the bag, then the two sentries. He put the backpack down, and handed out the clips. Once that was done, he put his own clip in the last slot on his right thigh.
Night fell. Nathan adjusted the bag Daric had given him days earlier. Fort Wayne was secured, the sentries floated and roamed. Yes, they were balls in their offline form but once online they sprouted engines that ran on friction power. They had infinite power, really. The friction they used came from the axle that held the fans. Their ammunition was compressed air, and it's fire rate challenged the Hurricane's. The power that the air is shot at is enough to crack open a human skull from thirty seven meters away.
The sentries were controlled by humans, or more specifically the human's communicators. Remote control, basically.
Supply ships came every now and then. Reinforcements could be called, and a pod would fall out of the sky with another unit.
Nathan heard metal crunching.
"BREACH! At least twenty AI!" One sentry pilot yelled. Everyone suited up.
Daric's luminescent red optics looked down on them. "Recall the remaining sentry. Get your explosives out, and red flares. We have brutes inbound. Versatiles, Heavies, pincer movement. Lights, get your rifles out."
Eric, the team's largest, hefted his chain gun. Brutes were big. So was he. Brutes were dumb. He wasn't. Brutes were sensitive to thermal changes. He wasn't. So really, it's just attrition. He followed his section, right as a chain gun blasted through the front doors. They waited for the signal.
"Pinch!" Daric yelled over comm. The ten individuals surrounded the twenty AI, space and cover to their advantage.
The lights, Daric, Alia, Thomas, and Curtis sniped out the AI.
Below, Nathan leaped forward, onto a Brute's back.
David, a Versatile, yelled, "Rodeooo!"
The other AI didn't bother to turn around. Nathan charged his Mag Rail, a mid range rifle, and unloaded his clip into the AI's neck. The brute responded by collapsing. Another was about to grab Nathan, if it weren't for Jasper shoving him out of the way.
The result? Jasper was now captured and no one had a clean shot. Not even the snipers. All guns pointed to the remaining Brutes, who didn't fire. Curtis, the other Airborne, had his engine shot. He went down, but not before both engines exploded, effectively cooking the man. Alia touched down beside Thomas, still staring at the fireball that was once his brother.
"Anyone have a shot?!" Nathan half yelled into comm.
"None." Daric said.
"Surrender." The AI said in his very robotic voice.
"Fourteen to four. Your move." Nathan returned.
"Correction. Fourteen to twenty six." An AI said. All looked up, to see an AI pod coming.
The first AI looked at Nathan, and said, "Your move."
Soon enough, the whole team but Daric was surrounded.
"Drop your guns. Then back away. " An AI said. The team complied when a sniper rifle was pointed at Jasper, barrel within three feet of his heart.
"C'mon Daric..." Nathan threatened.
Daric heard it. He pulled out his Gravity Hook.
"If I take out the Brutes, can you eliminate the officers around you?" Daric asked over comm.
"We can."
"Is this what you want?" Daric asked Jasper on private comm. Daric aimed to pull a supporting beam with the hook. If it was successful, the brutes would be separated from the rest, and they could escape. Save one... Or twelve.
"DO IT!"
