A/N
I apologize for taking so long to update (especially compared to that "Avatar Sigma guy). I won't make excuses except that I have been watching Legend Of Korra. Now I kinda wish I had crossed over with that instead. Maybe after the series is over I'll make one.
Anywho, enjoy this one. I would also like to thank those people who caught mistakes in earlier chapters. Those have been fixed (I think) and the chapters reuploaded.
The Dawn landed right outside the gate of the base, with her hangers facing it. A makeshift ramp was bended to allow easy access to the ship. The scorpions drew looks of respect from the native soldiers. They knew tanks were an integral part of the Fire Nation army and the looks of these tanks meant these sky-people could dish out pain. What amazed them even more were the warthogs. Small vehicles were almost unheard of due to the steam system that drove them.
One soldier commented that they looked like cougar-foxes.
What were most impressive were the soldiers. Each walked with an air of discipline and strength that spoke of lethal capabilities. Then they saw the Chief.
"WHAT IS THAT!" shouted an earth kingdom soldier when he saw the Master Chief emerge from the ship.
"Oh sure, the giant flying hunk of metal doesn't impress you but a guy in green armor does. I know I've never seen someone wear green armor before."
"Smartass."
The generals, followed by Johnson, observed the troops marching out of the Dawn with vehicle in tow.
"It seems you have an impressive airship. I am curious as to the abilities of your land craft."
"I'll set up a demonstration later. If anyone wishes to tour our ship, all they have to do is ask and not get in anyone's way."
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Ramirez was bored. The doctor had ordered him to stay in bed and not do anything strenuous. Why, he didn't know. It was his face that got injured, not his leg, and the skin-grafts already healed without any scaring. After he got patched up, he needed to do something. It was a relief when Johnson allowed him to lead a tour since it got him out of the infirmary.
The first group had finally arrived. There were about half a dozen of them, mostly dressed in green though a few didn't.
"Hello and welcome to the frigate Forward Unto Dawn. My name is Ramirez, and I will be you guide for the remainder of the evening. If there are any questions, just ask them. Keep you hands and arms inside the ride at all times and follow me."
They walked into the main hanger bay. The bay was currently being used as a large workshop and recreation room since none of the other rooms were as spacious.
"Now this here is our main hanger. This would be where all of our flying vehicles are kept." Ramirez gestured toward the severed opening that made up most of one of the sides. "As you can see, it's in need of a little work."
"How do they work?"
"Um, the electric current causes the engine to –"
One hour (and fifty seven questions) later.
"So, this fu-shun stuff work?" asked Sokka.
"It's basically a miniature sun. It heats the water into steam to power our generator," answered one of the engineers. Basically, it's the same as your steam engines, but bigger and hotter."
"But how does it make the heat?"
"It destroys matter and turns it into energy."
Sokka quickly wrote this down on the sheet he had with him. These "pen-sills" were rather useful.
"OK, so how does your anti-gravity system work?"
"Don't know."
"Well, what else can you tell me?"
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The generals were hashing out how the sky-people could do their demonstration without holding back. When the generals offered to have a few of their soldier volunteer for the demonstration, the sky-people were most adamant that they not have any living people in the demonstration. The solution was to use practice dummies.
The dummies were statues of clay and stone that were accurate representations of a human body and were commonly used for the earth-benders to practice their more dangerous techniques. Multiple statues could be controlled by a single earth-bender and allowed for relatively accurate mock battles.
Johnson allowed for the demonstration to proceed provided that it took place a distance from any major population.
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The five earth-benders stood waiting on the outside of the arena waiting for these soldiers to arrive. Before the mock battle, they had said something about needing a dynamic entry.
"Hey, Chong."
"Yeah Xin?"
"You think these guys are ever going to show up?"
"It's been ten minutes. I don't think that anyone who takes ten minutes to get ready can be any good at all."
They stood in silence for another few seconds. Then there was a whining sound.
"Hey, you hear that?"
They looked for the source of the noise and saw several of those flying machines the sky-people called "pelicans" whatever those were.
"What can they do from up ther-"
CRASH!
Five metal boxes slammed into the ground in the arena not far from the stone soldiers that had been set up. The fronts of each of the metal boxes flew off. From each box sprung one of the soldiers that they had called "ohd ee est ees."
In their hands were the "guns" that had been shown to the earth kingdom soldiers earlier. All were shooting in tight controlled bursts and bringing down stone soldiers in droves.
"Son of a bitch," shouted Chong as he hurried to move the stone soldiers to attack and Xin did the same.
It didn't do much good.
Within twenty seconds, half of the stone soldiers had been reduced to broken masonry.
The soldiers bent walls between the dummies and the ODSTs to provide some sort of cover. The ODSTs focused their attention on the edges of the wall. They weren't prepared when a large section of the wall shot foreword faster than a charging hunter.
It struck one and sent him flying. Behind the wall was one of the stone soldiers. The ODSTs cut it down along with the rest that charged through the hole in the wall. The whole battle lasted less than a minute.
"OK, I want one of those," said Xin with awe.
"Wow Xin, I didn't know you swung that way."
"Shut up."
Linebreak
"So, your soldiers just get dropped into the battle?" asked Sokka.
"These ones do."
"That's suicidal."
"But effective," retorted one of the generals. "Perhaps there could be something similar done with our war balloons."
Linebreak
The Generals were more than impressed. They convened in the secret meeting hall. It was located far below the fortress and was only accessible by earth bending.
In addition to the alliance generals, Avatar Aang, the Mechanist, and Sokka were all in the meeting. Each had something to say about the UNSC.
Everyone was in agreement that it would be best to stay on their good side.
"I haven't seen any soldiers so dangerous. Not even the Yu-yan could devastate so many so quickly."
"What about their weapons? Mechanist, what do you think?"
"I tried making personal cannons with blasting jelly, but the yield was always far lower than what even a single bender could do. It seems these people didn't have to compete with benders so they had use for weapons and improved them to tremendous degrees."
"Maybe we could ask to see if they could train some of us to use those weapons," said one general.
"I doubt they would," muttered.
"They could win this war for us," spoke up Sokka
"Then conquer us. Did you see that monster they called a frigate? And supposedly that was only half of one," exclaimed a general.
"We don't have any quarrel with them," retorted Aang
"An ant has no quarrel with a boot."
The generals and Sokka broke out in an argument. Aang desperately was thinking of a way to keep peace with the UNSC. Another war was something he didn't want, especially with the Republic as weak as it was.
But the cacophony of the argument was too much.
"SHUT UP!"
They did.
"They are stronger than us, this is true. But, they did help people because it was the right thing. I don't think that they are a threat. What we need to do is secure an alliance."
"Very well, Avatar Aang. I will personally dispatch the messenger hawks to contact the Tribes, Fire Nation, and the Earth Kingdom."
"Have them meet here in a week."
"Yes, Avatar Aang."
A/N
And that's that. I'll be heading on vacation soon and then heading to summer classes for college so the updates will be … about the same. Super slow.
Anywho, thanks for reading and all your reviews. Tell your friends about this story. Unless you don't have any friends, then tell a random person on the street.