AN: Apologies all for this taking so long! It's taking a little to get into the swing of things but I'm slowly getting that engine going again. If you want more regular updates as to progress on an upcoming chapter or just other information regarding my fics, you can follow my writing account Dunnwriting! I hope you enjoy this and continue to look forward to new chapters!
Airspace near Former Memphis, Transporter Hold
18:10
14/02/2113
Travelling to and from the battlefield was the part of any mission that Alicia loathed more than any other. Have her staring down a gun barrel. Have her bleeding out in a muddy ditch.
Anything but sitting, waiting, mulling over the unending disquiet that lingered in her head.
In the cockpit of her NEXT, she had to wonder to herself.
How many hours did her brother spend doing exactly this?
Shuttled to and from warzone to warzone, battlefield to battlefield. Spilling the blood of hundreds or even thousands every time he went out. Treated as little more than an animal with a chain around its neck, forced to bite on command.
A despicable, pitiable life.
No one would wish to live in that way, yet here she sat, walking that exact same path. An animal, a Lynx of Collard and by extension the League of Corporations.
She did this not out of some misguided sense of duty or a false belief in maintaining order. Not for anything as noble as faith or wretched as money.
Every step forwards, every life taken, everything was for revenge.
It couldn't be called good, you could even say it wasn't right, but it was all she had left now. If she stopped believing in her revenge, she'd have nothing left to live for. So she strived on, committing atrocity after atrocity, killing when ordered just to inch closer to her goal.
A life cursed to end the moment whether she succeeded or failed.
But at the end of the day, she had made peace with this inevitability. It wasn't something she was going to fight against. Why fight against something as certain as the Sun rising in the morning or Spring becoming Summer.
You'd only lose your mind if you didn't accept such things. But maybe that was just it. Somewhere along the line she already had lost her mind, this was just the outcome of that happening.
Oh well. There was no one left to care about her.
All gone.
The green light indicating an incoming com channel started blinking at her. It was likely her supervisor, Sajjan.
She opened the channel, "Whiplash here"
"We've got a little time before we reach the mission area, did you have any last questions before we begin? We probably won't have time for Q&A when the bullets start flying."
"Is that supposed to be your attempt at being supportive?" Alicia asked, lacing the words with snark.
"No, I just don't want to deal with you falling apart because you forgot to ask something important." He shot back with an equally cutting tone.
A thin grin spread across her face, there was that front again.
"No. I don't need to know anything else. We have our plan and our target. That's all that's necessary."
"Understood, standby until the drop signal."
With just that, the channel closed. Alicia guessed he didn't have anything else to add himself.
She settled back into the seat, closing her eyes not to sleep, but just to rest. The fight wouldn't last long, she'd make sure of that. But if it wasn't decided in the first blow, then she'd need every ounce of strength to keep up with a veteran pilot, even if she held the technological advantage.
Just like Sajjan had said previously, Ravens wouldn't hold back from underhanded tactics to level the playing field. It wouldn't be surprising if this Raven did something unexpected. Expecting the unexpected might sound like bad advice, but what it really meant was, things won't go as planned.
While at this point, she couldn't quite think of a suitable counter strategy for hers, Alicia would be thoroughly disappointed if he went down without a fight. If she wanted to get close to the League leadership, she needed to make a good impression on them.
Sajjan was apparently being liberal with his approximation of 'a little time' as the com light blinked again, this time the pilot of the transporter informing the two of them that they were almost at the drop point and to get ready to go.
Alicia began the standard procedure to decouple the NEXT from the gantry. If she had be first to go, she could have remained hooked up til the last second, but being in the second gantry meant clambering over the empty first gantry to exit the transporter.
From what she'd heard, Leonemeccanica had been commissioned by the League as a whole to resolve the many complaints that the Lynx were having about the transporters by designing a new model to replace it. It was still early days though, they wouldn't enter service for at least a year minimum.
The Corporations had pushed themselves to the breaking point, rushing to develop new Armored Core frames using the technology recovered from Maxwell. Several new NEXT class systems had been developed, tested and produced in only the six months following the war, but it had hampered their ability to work on any other project. Meaning that progress in many other fields had fallen behind in certain aspects.
Not that it was really any concern to her. So long as it killed her enemies then that was just fine.
Finally at the transporter's open rear, she let her NEXT topple out the back, embracing the incomparable sensation that came with uncontrolled free fall.
Falling was strange. Those seconds of weightlessness, she loved every moment of it.
It couldn't last forever though, as the ground rushed towards her, she fired the NEXT's boosters, stabilising her descent and aligning herself with White Glint which already stood on the baked desert ground.
The moment she touched down, with surprising grace, the com light blinked again.
"Nice landing," said Sajjan, as if it was an off-hand mention, "You know the drill, no names from now on, only NEXT names. I'm not Sajjan and you aren't Alice. Got it?"
She waved her hand dismissively as if he could see her, not willing to comment on how White Glint wasn't technically a NEXT but a bastardised AC with NEXT upgrades forced into the frame, "Yeah yeah I've got it. White Glint it is."
"Good to hear, Whiplash. Right, let's move to the indicated position on your HUD, we'll wait for the enemy there."
"Understood, Whiplash switching to combat mode."
"White Glint switching to combat mode."
With that short exchange, the two of them lit their boosters and began heading towards the skyline of a relatively large population centre.
Whiplash's HUD put it around 20km away, so covering that distance wouldn't take very long at all at their current cruising speed. Their target was due to arrive in the mission area in roughly half an hour, giving them a realistic buffer in which to set up their ambush.
The externally mounted radar system she had equipped would come in handy in keeping track of the target should they lose sight of it at any point. Her assault rifle had decent range but over a certain limit each round's effective accuracy would rapidly plummet almost as fast as its own velocity.
The missile launcher was certainly an option, but any pilot worth their salt would have the ability to react to missile lock/launch signals well before impact. Firing unguided could work, but missile's low speed compared to rockets would mean having to factor in a huge lead on the target in question.
Just as she was pondering this, the com light blinked and Alicia opened the channel.
"Whiplash here."
"I just want to clarify something," It was Sajjan, "You are fully aware that you could die during this, aren't you? No one is going to swoop in and call this off just because things aren't going your way. If it hits the fan out there, you've got to deal with that as it happens."
Alicia, gave a small bitter laugh at that, "Do you honestly think I'm so naive? That I don't know what I'm getting myself into? I'll forgive the misstep just this once."
If nothing else, she wanted him to eat those words and his concern. She didn't need it.
She had come to learn that more often than not, the people who worried about her ended up being the ones in need of help. A soldier from another branch of Rayleonard's special forces had once told her that she had 'A natural aptitude for the battlefield, like you were supposed to be here.'
Alicia had wondered what exactly they had meant by that for some time, but perhaps recently, since her brother's passing at least, she'd come to understand it.
From loving and kind parents who had worked to help the world had come two children born with the capacity to undo it all. Two children who had tried to do what they thought was right and ended thousands upon thousands of lives. Years and years of killing and destruction in pursuit of each other. Piling up innumerable corpses to try and reach the other's outstretched hand.
Only for their fingers to slip away.
The approaching buildings thankfully snapped her out of the sullen train of thought, bringing her back to the reality before her.
The two of them entered the population centre, weaving between the hollow dead husks of buildings taller than the war machines they used, soon reaching rough and cratered tarmac roads. Towards the centre, there was still significant signs of protracted battle, but the layout of the blocks hadn't been altered drastically. Skyscrapers hundreds of metres tall loomed over them, dozens of vehicles lay abandoned or destroyed along streets and on corners. Hundreds of thousands of broken windows and shattered store fronts.
All the signs of life, now in pieces around them.
It was only a few extra minutes to reach the building they were aiming for, using their boosters, the two of them shot upwards landing on the flat rooftop of a former banking building as gently as possible. Sajjan had picked this building in particular because it was reinforced and could support their weight so long as they didn't start jumping around too much.
They both sunk down to one knee, facing in the direction that their target was due to appear. Sajjan spoke over the com channel that had been left open since he last spoke.
"We've probably got around ten minutes until we have visual contact of the Raven's transport truck. In the event that we aren't able to disable his AC before he deploys, what is your plan of action?"
"You mean besides destroying him? Or did you want the specifics?"
There was a sound not dissimilar to coffee being ground over the line.
"Are you always this deliberately aggravating?"
"Only with people I don't think are taking me seriously. It's an excellent way to get under their skin so I can kill them easier."
"Are you planning on killing me then? You've got some guts to say that to my face I'll give you that."
A wry grin spread across Alicia's face, "Oh I'm not, but that'd be a thrill wouldn't it? Taking on the League's last Original? What better way to go than facing down the strongest pilot alive."
"Do you have a death wish or something? Besides, Original or not, I'm not the strongest. Gerald holds that position in Collard. You should have learnt that before you even signed up to be a Lynx."
She had to scoff at that, "You're a bad liar you know? No one in Collard believes any of Gerald's mission reports, the League can showboat him all they want but there's something wrong about how underwraps they keep him."
Sajjan apparently had no response, choosing to drop his original question and stay silent.
They only had to wait a few more minutes before a small cloud of dust crested the horizon, Alicia magnifying the centre of her main display like a pseudo sniper scope to try and identify the incoming object despite her certainty that it was the enemy they'd been waiting for.
After a second of squinting, her suspicion was confirmed.
"White Glint, confirming target approach at heading 079. I will be engaging at close range with right arm weapon system."
"Confirmed and understood Whiplash. Mission has begun. Show the League what you can offer."
Obviously a prepared line but one he had to say to maintain appearances of willingness at any rate.
White Glint backed off to the far corner of the rooftop while Alicia moved Whiplash so it was behind a raised section obscuring it from view in the direction of the Raven's approach.
A timer counted down until the target would be in the optimum firing point. All Alicia had to do was wait for zero, move around the corner and fire down upon it.
She only had to wait a minute. Simple.
Breath in. Breath out.
Remember, just aim and fire. Nothing else to it. This is child's play.
Thirty seconds.
Breath in. Breath out.
I'll do you proud brother, just you watch.
Zero.
She slipped Whiplash around the corner of the building's raised stairwell in a single smooth motion, rifle in both hands shouldered with the digital gunsight over the predefined point just as the truck rolled over it.
Without an ounce of hesitation she squeezed the trigger, the rifle kicking back as it spewed forth a torrent of high explosive shells.
The lightly armoured truck disappeared in a cloud of detonations and sand as the NEXT's rifle cut it to pieces, shredding both the cab and the trailer, it's cargo exploding in a series of secondary blasts that shook the building she stood on.
After emptying half of the weapon's magazine, she stopped firing, allowing the dust to settle.
"Confirming target destroyed, can we call that a miss-"
"Whiplash move!"
At the same time the channel cut dead, Alicia's HUD lit up with lock warnings, indicating a hostile FCS had targeted her.
She had no time to consider the incoming direction of fire or it's point of origin, instead firing Whiplash's boosters backwards, flinging herself over the edge of the building as fast as possible.
The split second warning had been enough as the spot her NEXT had occupied a moment earlier was turned to dust, the entire rooftop of the building billowing out as it exploded outwards, the top five floors disappearing in the blast as debris scattered across the newly formed battlezone.
Whiplash's PA field took the brunt of the attack, dropping by 12%, the pieces of rubble from the building bounced off at times but the slower pieces passed through and harmlessly shattered against her armour plating.
She landed on the road beside the building, still sliding backwards, ripping up the asphalt as she went, a small car was sent skittering away as she plowed through it.
Alicia had no idea where Sajjan was, he'd completely dropped off her radar and the enemy wasn't on it either. She panned the headpiece of her NEXT around, the FCS scanning constantly for a threat of any kind.
It didn't have to wait long as it lit up red moments later when something slammed into the ground around 200 metres ahead of her, just next to the building she'd been on top of.
Alicia switched from her handgun to the missile launcher, aiming both it and her rifle at the cloud of grit and dirt that had been kicked up by the impact.
It didn't take long to clear.
In a small crater of shattered tarmac stood an Armored Core, staring straight at her. It was a Rosenthal TYPE-HOGIRE frame with an Eqbal medium machine gun in its right hand and an old pre-Raven's Ark GA shotgun from back when they had actually attempted to make AC parts. It had no extension parts on it shoulders, but it did have a large MSAC missile system on one shoulder and on the other, an Arisawa grenade cannon, the source of the blast earlier.
That cannon was likely the biggest threat as the missile launcher could be evaded easily and the machine gun and shotgun could be dealt with by her PA for the most part.
For the time being none of it's weapons were leveled at her, but her NEXT was constantly giving a warning tone indicating that she was being targeted. Even if this Raven wasn't openly displaying hostility, a crosshair was still on her.
The com light blinked, she assumed it would be Sajjan trying to get a hold of her after the channel died, but there was every chance now that it wasn't him. She tentatively opened the line, but didn't say anything. An abrasive voice rang out in the cockpit.
"Well what do we have here? A little baby Lynx out on her first hunt falling for the Raven's tricks? Isn't that embarrassing! The League must be getting scared if they're bringing garbage like you out."
This was pathetic, he was trying to spook her out on the assumption that she was some thin skinned rookie fresh out of basic training? Was that really his grand strategy? If so, undermining that assumption would be the fastest way to break him down. Psychologically crack your enemy and any skill, tactic or ability they possess suddenly becomes a hinderance to them.
So she played the silent card, muting his channel on her end and attempting to open a line with Sajjan.
He answered just as he also showed up on radar just behind her, landing softly enough to not even crack the road beneath White Glint.
"Now this is unexpected, I backed out to remove the temptation to intervene and yet here I find you trash talking with the enemy?"
Alicia scoffed at him, "He's the one doing all the talking, I haven't actually said a word yet. Is he still going?"
"Looks like it."
"Well what's the plan in this situation then?"
"The plan never changed, the objective remains."
Alicia couldn't stop a thin, wry smile spreading across her face at hearing that, "Understood." She let go of the controls, rolling her shoulders and stretching her legs.
She wanted to enjoy this opportunity.
Sajjan spoke one last time before cutting the channel.
"I will provide no support henceforth. Show me what you've got."
The second White Glint's feet left the ground, she unmuted the channel with the Raven and grabbed Whiplash's controls, throwing the NEXT forwards towards the unsuspecting enemy.
"What? You little sh-" He spluttered out in surprise, quickly cut off as Alicia rushed him, rifle blazing and missiles screaming out of the launcher.
She wasn't aiming for any part of him specifically, just trying to catch him off guard and unnerve him. Any damage incurred was just a bonus.
The Raven did exactly as she wanted, stumbling backwards, boosters flaring wildly as he tried to put distance between the two of them. He fired his machine gun in Alicia's general direction, but his erratic movement threw his aim off drastically, not to mention that Whiplash's PA deflected any rounds that were on target.
She wasn't particularly concerned with incoming fire, for the time being, she was putting so much pressure on the Raven that his thought process was entirely dominated by trying to escape her unrelenting offensive.
Alicia gave her target no quarter.
On every front he was overwhelmed with a constant onslaught of rifle fire, missile barrages and handgun shells. She weaved around every line of fire the Raven attempted. Feinting not only side to side, but pulling off false leaps into the air, only to duck low, still pushing on.
Eventually he completely disengaged, burning a hard right, sliding down a side street, breaking line of sight with Alicia.
It bought him a second of respite, if that at best. Alicia wasn't going to let something like a building slow her down. There was no stopping her now.
Swinging Whiplash out wide rounding the corner, she pushed the boosters to their absolute limit, lifting off the ground with the combined momentum of the manoeuvre she ran along the side of the far building on the street the Raven had tried to run to.
"Damn you damn you damn you damn you! Go to hell League dog!" He screamed, trying to hit Alicia with the shotgun in its left hand. He got off a single shell before she was virtually on top of him again.
Not so fast!
During the manoeuvre, she'd thrown the assault rifle at the Raven, the timing resulting in it crashing into his left arm, knocking it wide and leaving him open to a counter attack.
Alicia followed through flawlessly, using Whiplash's now free hand to strike the enemy AC in the head, almost completely caving it in and crushing the right half of its optics.
With her target now half blind and reeling from the unexpected blow, Alicia began the final stages of her attack. Following through from the initial hit, she then reached out and pulled the AC in close, driving the barrel of her handgun into the shoulder joint of its right arm.
She pulled the trigger again and again and again, pumping round after round into the gap between armour plates.
It didn't hold long, the limb soon hanging by hydraulic lines and power cabling, swinging freely.
"W-what the fuck are you!? You… You goddamn monster!"
She released him, taking his limp, mangled arm in her free hand and ripping it completely away, before swinging it like a club, taking the AC's head clean off.
It's footing and balance finally gave way, the decapitated machine keeling over backwards, bright sparks and smoke pouring from its ruined right arm joint and neck. With it's head destroyed, the com channel that had been open between them was forcefully terminated.
She figured it was about time she spoke to this Raven.
Reaching out, she gripped onto the front of the AC's core, digging Whiplash's fingers under the armour before planting a foot on the lower section of the torso and pulling the entire front section away in a single smooth action.
With it, the front of the cockpit came away with it, exposing the pilot inside. Alicia tossed the hunk of twisted metal aside and stood over the fallen AC, the optics burning down on the comparatively tiny man.
She could see that he was injured. His leg had been crushed at some point and he was bleeding heavily from his head, crimson running down his face in wide rivers.
Turning on her external speakers she finally spoke to him.
"I thought Ravens were supposed to be intelligent? But at the end of it all you're the one lying broken on the floor by the hands of a monster. You were spot on, I'll give you that, because between you and me," She lent down, the head of her NEXT only metres away from the open cockpit, "I am a monster. If you could only see the bodies behind me, you might have thought twice about this. But I guess that's just it isn't it."
She leant away, standing up again as White Glint entered her radar range and landed next to her, just as gently as before.
The com light blinked on as expected, Alicia opening the channel almost immediately.
"Well done Whiplash, it looks like you've completed this test flawlessly, I guess we can take him alive. But I have to ask, where did you learn to fight like that?"
Turning off the external speakers, she answered, "Huh? Nowhere in particular. It just flows together and makes sense I guess." In truth it was mostly built up from her military training along with a very healthy dash of combat pragmatism allowing her to fight in such an unorthodox manner. "What makes you ask?"
"Nothing," Sajjan quickly dismissed her all of a sudden, "It just reminded me of someone."
Alicia didn't have anything to add to that, turning back to face the Raven who was still staring up at them, teeth gritted in both pain and apparent anger. Flicking the speakers back on she spoke again, the optics of both White Glint and Whiplash gazing down.
"So, what to do with you."
The pilot leaned up as best he could before yelling at them.
"You think you've won? You think this is all there is to us?! League dogs like you are nothing. All blindly following your masters waiting for the scraps from the table. Letting this world die because it's easier than doing the right thing. You all make me sick!" With that, summoning as much effort as he had left in him, the Raven spat at them, barely managing to make it out of the cockpit.
"Killing me gets you not one step closer to us, as there will be dozens of volunteers to take my place. Line Ark will never let you take me, they'll come for me! Havok will lead us all to victory as we crush the League! Not today, maybe not in a month, but when you're least expecting it, we'll carve the heart out of you and let you watch it stop beating!"
He seemed to be either running out of breath or willpower to keep living, either way, he was dying slowly before them.
Alicia was about to write him off, when he spoke one last time.
"As for you, monster. I hope you enjoy this while it lasts, because soon enough, you won't have anywhere to call home. We'll come for your friends, your family, everyone you love. We'll kill them all."
She could feel her heart rate skyrocket, rage coursing through her barely controlled.
Too late, someone beat you to it.
Turning ever so slightly to White Glint, speaking as if the Raven couldn't hear them.
"Say, out of curiosity," Alicia said, barely containing her anger, "Was there a bonus for bringing him in alive?"
A short pause followed before Sajjan answered, "No, it's at your discretion. I don't have a say in it."
The smug look and anger on the Raven's face melted away in an instant.
"I see, at my discretion."
Alicia leveled the barrel of Whiplash's handgun at the AC's cockpit, making sure the sights lined up with the man desperately trying to escape his coffin.
She fired and fired again and again, until the magazine ran dry.