As if the death of Lanius was prompt for charge, the Legion soldiers broke into a sprint. Joshua could hear the footsteps of thousands shaking the earth, answered by the thunder of a thousand bullets from the NCR army. Joshua looked into the distance, where the wall of legionaries approached fast. His eyes narrowed. Pulling a machete from Lanius' body, he ran at the army. A faint cloud of blood misted from the army, and they fell to the ground by the handful. The Second Battle of Hoover Dam unfolded, with him at the center. He pushed his legs. The adrenaline flowed like rivers, as did the hate that burned in his heart. The nearest recruits drew their weapons. Joshua could see the formation. Recruits in front, veterans in the back, just as he would charge them on others, did they charge on him. Only these recruits could not be ready for what charged at them, a one man army. Joshua deflected the first machete with his own, his blade cutting deep into the man's throat. Joshua deflected blow after blow, swing after swing. Never before had he appreciated the philosophy of Caesar's battle formations than when he was cutting through them himself. The attacks he dodged, blocked, or deflected became increasingly calculated, incrementally stronger, and steadily smarter. As he entered the most experienced wave of soldiers, he began to rely more and more on 1st Recons reliable cover, and began to abandon his defense in favor of carving through the army quicker. Besides, he would need the stamina in his arms for when he reached the back, where the centurions waited to clean up anyone who survived the previous waves.
Even with the muffs on, 10's ears were starting to ring considerably. Gunshot after gunshot rang out from their hiding place. He never really liked the feeling of splitting a skull with a .308 round, but from this distance, hitting anything felt invigorating. The beauty of the bolt action between each shot provided 10 with the rush he needed to continue. Being able to akin the killing to shooting giant rats back home, he consoled himself in the comfort of being on the good side.
Joshua was quick, and discerning the genuine threats from the ones who would not be was the hardest thing 10 had ever done. He peered hard, often having to shoot soldiers who were well ahead of Joshua, so as not to let an overwhelming group close the gap. He stared at Joshua's flowing movement on the battlefield. Never once was he merely running. Always swinging, always ducking, sometimes sliding or rolling. Every movement a gambit for an opponent whom he was too many moves ahead of. Bodies piled in his wake. Joshua lept over the dead and cut the throats of the living.
10, in a rare moment of anticipation, moved his scoped view ahead in the crowd. A Legion Centurion ordered his troops to charge Joshua, 10 nearly shouted.
"Two o'clock! Centurion!"
The others adjusted their view.
"Shit! Joshua can handle himself, focus on that compact group!"
The three of them shared a moment of eerie silence, readjusting and assuring their aim, before they unleashed a maelstrom of gunfire. Blood fountained from the group as the bullets found their way into heads, necks, and chests alike. The Centurion quickly noticed the assault, and ordered his troops to hasten. They quickly closed in on Joshua.
Joshua noticed the softening of effort to cover him, and assumed that something must be awry. Carving a gap ahead of himself, he focused his eyes on the group ahead of him. A Legion standard bearer stood proud amidst a large group of veteran soldiers. Barely visible was the frill atop the helmet of the centurion leading the group. The squadron suddenly took cover, as a hailstorm of rounds pierced them in droves. The faint cry of the centurion pushing them further caught the extremity of Joshua's hearing. The group redoubled its efforts and moved uniformly, with incredible pace, toward Joshua. Joshua's mind, however, did not race, nor did his limbs tremble. Breathing deeply, he stared at the crowd, purposefully. He broke into a sprint. The hate could not be silenced, it could not be stilled. He lunged at the group bodily. Spinning and swinging madly, Joshua's borrowed machete cleaved through the faces of men he once commanded. Dodging instinctually, the group could not make sense of the frenzy Joshua brought to the heart of it. Grabbing a neck, Joshua used the man to absorb blows as he discarded his machete and discovered the use of a spear. Face after unfortunate face caved inward to the force of the spear. But the carnage was catching up with Joshua, as dead bodies began encumbering him badly. Before he could adapt his strategy, Joshua was nearly completely blanketed with the dead.
The three watched as Joshua launched himself into the fray. He felled foe after foe, like a machine harvesting war. Unfortunately, the group were many, and they slowed his advance so. The death in his wake soon caught up, and the group could only bear witness as Joshua was completely engulfed in dead bodies.
"Ah fuck! What the fuck do we do? They're gonna dig him up and kill him!" 10 had never experienced, or for that matter seen, such lunacy on a battlefield.
"If he doesn't suffocate first. There isn't much we can do. Keep shooting" Bitter-Root's confidence was assuring, and 10 valued it greatly. He pointed his gun toward the centurion, who kept tactfully behind cover. 10 then did something life had rarely called on him to do, either that or 10 just never heard the calls.
10 waited.
Bitter-root noticed 10's unusual reserve, "What're you waiting for?"
"I'm gonna put a bullet in a centurion at twelve hundred yards."
"Forget it. Even if you could hit him, and I'm not convinced you could, he ain't leaving that cover."
But the wind was perfect, and the drop was easy to calculate, and 10 knew that you don't get many chances to shoot a centurion.
The centurion's arms pointed and gestured wildly. He continued to issue orders for his squad to continue forward, and when he did so, his arm ventured from behind his cover farther than a wise man would advise it to, and 10 fired. He waited again, figuring the bullet to have stopped for lunch along its way. Suddenly, the man's arm exploded in a red cloud. The bullet contacted with the elbow, piercing through the weak point in the armor. The forearm piece of the armor fell to the ground. The soldiers arm did not extend past his elbow any longer. 10 admired his shot aloud.
"Hah! Did you see that shot?"
Bitter-Root laughed, the first 10 had heard him do so.
"That's gotta be the longest shot in the history of the NCR"
"Give you fifty bucks if you can hit him in the head now."
10 concentrated hard. The man had fallen down, head exposed, and there was money on the line this time. 10 fired a second time. Bitter-Root shook his head, reaching into his pocket to pull out a fifty dollar bill, as the man's head erupted into the air. 10 was ecstatic.
"Thumbs down, fucker!"
Bitter-Root joked, "You ought to put down shooting after this."
"Why?"
"Because you will never shoot a finer shot."
Sterling landed the vertibird on top of a hill where could only be adequately described, as Kimball put it:
"Why have we landed in the middle of friggin' nowhere?"
Sterling exited the vertibird. Luckily, his mind had calmed drastically now, as he was beyond the point of return. Opening the hatch shielding Kimball inside, Sterling leveled a pistol at the president of his country. The gravity of the situation was not lost on him.
"I'm terribly sorry, Mr. President, but we've kidnapped you. For your own good, I promise."
"Kidnapped? For my own good? Soldier, you're in a heap of shit, you know that? I'm the goddamn president of the New California Republic, what good reason could you possibly have for abducting me?"
Sterling bit his tongue.
"I'm sorry, Mr. President, sir, but I'm afraid I'm not at liberty to be divulging such information."
Sterling could see the confusion in the president's eyes, "Who the fuck are you?"
Joshua's knees buckled under the weight of the many dead he'd created. Man by dead man, his foes piled on top of him, until the sun no longer shone. Joshua partied all his strength into moving them, but they lay about him with the density of dying sons. They shifted to fill the gaps he created with his movements, like fluid, until he could no longer move. Their blood fell from their bodies like waterfalls, staining Joshua's gauze. Joshua wriggled as hard as he could muster. Finally, his right arm found some room. Footsteps paraded past him by the hundreds, practically shaking the earth as they did so. He grasped one of the legionaries' machetes. With no room but the six inches in front of his face, Joshua placed the blade on the midsection of the man directly on top of him. He carved it into the flesh, blood poured forth without hesitation. Joshua pushed on the blade hard as he sawed through the bones and organs. Deftly carving in between ribs, Joshua's machete stopped hard on the man's spine. His frustration was building, and he used to maniacally cleave through the spine. Joshua stopped breathing through his nose, in an effort to comfort himself, as the body split in half. He punched through it, rolling the bodies atop it over. His hand found the air, and his eyes found sunlight shortly after. He forced himself upright, forcing his head and upper chest through the two halves of the man he'd butchered. Bringing in his legs from entrapment, he launched himself out of the pile of bodies. Looking upon the macabre mountain of death he'd created, Joshua let out a breath of lament. Turning forward in his endeavor, he began sprinting again. The air blew the blood off of him as he ran, but his bandages could not be rid of it. The blood clung to him like his past.
10 yelped in excitement as Joshua erupted from the stack of death.
"He's alright!"
Bitter-Root too, was impressed, "That man's forgotten how to die."
"You think Sterling managed to handle the president?"
"Yeah, Sterling's a twenty year guy, besides, he got the easy part, he only had to trick the NCR. Makes me wonder what Hanlon is up to."
10 smiled as he squeezed the trigger of his rifle, dropping another foe for the Malpais Legate's advance.
"Boss, Caesar's Legion and the NCR have engaged in full out combat."
"And what of Joshua Graham and 1st Recon?"
"I witnessed the kidnapping myself, the hijacked vertibird is en route to the Legion camp, Graham is cutting a path of death through the Legion army as we speak. By my estimates, I figure he ought to have the both of em' rounded up in a few hours or so.
"Exemplary, Victor, prepare the securitrons below the Legion fort. We'll sweep in when Joshua and the NCR have taken it."
"Boss, uh, what of this Hanlon character?"
"The washed up ranger from a bygone era? I do believe we won't be hearing from him again, his part in this story is over. Only our part remains.
"Shall I prepare the champagne?" The robot was not without a sense of humor.
Mr. House cracked a short laugh. It had been too long since he had done so. He had figured, however, he would have the last one.