Hello and welcome back! Sorry I wasn't able to keep my promise over summer, but things got in the way, I got a job and we had a few unplanned vacations. Sorry it took so long to get this one out too, it took me forever to proofread and develop this one. Still summer was awesome and now I'm in my final year of high school, its gonna be awesome! I also have a couple of free periods this year so I finally get to sleep in for once, score!
Now as always here are the review responses from the last chapter:
jtdarkman: Don't worry I fully intend to finish this story.
Aceshadow: I'll just repeat what I messaged you earlier, area 51 is going to play a role in this story later, but I don't want to say any more in the public responses.
Itchyboy: I'm glad you think that, I was hoping to achieve that sort of effect with my writing. Probably won't be working on anything but this for awhile, but stick around and you might see more in time.
The Stranger: Sorry you had to log out, but I'm glad you enjoyed the chapter so much. The next few chapters will focus on sector V and 362 exploring America after the initial invasion, so I can assure there will be more huge battles and one on one fight scenes.
x-WritingParadox-x: Thanks for the review of my work, I understand that as fanfiction nothing we write here is going to be perfect, but we all try to do the best we can.
Jack Cross: Yes, yes it is.
Also, thanks go out to WolFang1011, Batmanbane77, the-son-of-kami and staying young for the follows and Qirtz Azmi for the favorite as well as jtdarkman and coolness121 for the favorite and the follow. Thanks also go out to DC2030 for his advice on my update notice idea.
Now that thats out of the way, lets get back to it.
"As weaponry continues to advance and grow more powerful, the militaries of the galaxy have began a rapid shift towards energy based defenses as hardened armor plating becomes obsolete in the face of the considerable firepower presented by modern weapons" -An Excerpt from the Report of a Weapons Researcher at the Federation Academy of Military Sciences on the Future of Defensive Technologies
Unregistered KND C.O.O.L.B.U.S: Somewhere over the Atlantic Ocean
Nigel forced himself to stay awake as the battered old C.O.O.L.B.U.S. slowly made its way towards North America. Below him the Atlantic Ocean stretched from one horizon to the other with nothing but white capped waves for miles around. He yawned and stretched, reaching his hands towards the sky as he contemplated their course. They were still about an hours flight from the west coast, but the way this old junker was moving it would take at least three times that. He smiled as an amusing thought crossed his mind, thats still not as slow as adult tech though.
The smile faded as his mind turned back to his earlier thoughts: his visions. Though he knew it probably wasn't the smartest choice, he'd kept himself awake through the journey, hoping to prevent another vision from occurring. He couldn't tell why or how, but they were getting more intense each time, and it was weighing heavily on his conscience. He was too young to be seeing these kinds of things on a daily basis, fighting was one thing, but killing was something he was totally unused to. Still he couldn't help but feel that the visions were driving him towards something, he couldn't fathom what, or why he was seeing these things, but somehow he felt they all had a purpose.
Thinking of his visions turned his mind towards the task at hand and their somewhat of a plan. In all honesty, he thought, this was probably not the smartest thing to do, for zeros sake we're placing all our hopes on the ramblings of boy we don't even trust, not to mention that besides this little book, there hasn't been any mention of a Last Legion in the entire history of the KND. He paused for moment in his silent argument, zero... dad. I wonder how he's coping with all of this, and mom too. Are they safe? Are they even still alive?
He hadn't thought one bit about his parents the whole time he'd been here, not while on the Moonbase and not even after the crash. He'd completely forgotten them amid all the craziness that had happened since his return and now that he'd remembered, the possibilities scared him beyond all belief. Arthurs knew who I was, I worked for him, does he know about my parents, did I tell him? Does he have them right now?!
Nigel wouldn't have put it beyond the ruthless general to resort to such tactics, seeing as how he'd been completely unscrupulous in his strategies so far. Now that he'd thought of it, he couldn't get it out of his mind. They live right below a treehouse, did they get bombed? Did Arthurs send troops to the house, he knew sector V was up on the Moonbase with me, does he even know who's treehouse that is? The nagging thoughts would not go away.
Just as it was getting too much to bear, a hand came down on his shoulder, "hey soldier, everything alright?", Rachel asked curiously. "Huh, what?", he asked confused, she'd caught him off guard. Rachel looked at him with concern, "you've been staring out that window without moving for almost 20 minutes now, come on whats bugging you?" Nigel sighed, "anything and everything at the moment, I was just thinking about my parents." She walked forward and leaned her back against the wall beside him, looking very tired, "you too huh?" She interlaced her fingers and put her hands behind her head, "I haven't stopped thinking about them since this war started, if we can still call it a war that is."
She looked up at the ceiling, "not that they were home much of the time anyway, but I still can't stop thinking, did they survive the first attacks? How are they surviving right now?" Nigel looked over at her seriously, "Rachel what happened to my parents after I left?" "Its funny", she said, "when your friends went back to your house, your parents didn't even remember them, didn't even remember you either, its like...", "...they were decommissioned", Nigel finished, "I know, they told me before I left that they'd go through a version of the decommissioning process to prevent them from looking for me, I did get say goodbye though, by the way did you know my mom's number 999?"
"Get out", replied Rachel, with evident surprise, "you can't be serious?" "Yeah", said Nigel, "numbah 0 and numbah 999, guess it only makes sense in the long run." Rachel smirked, "whats that supposed to mean?" "Nothing", Nigel said with a smile, which quickly turned into a frown, "our parents... if they're dead, whats left for us to go back to when this war is over?" Rachel bit her lip and was about to answer when Numbah 2 yelled, "hey guys, I think your going to want to take a look at this!"
The operatives onboard piled into the front of the ship to see what he was talking about. The blue sky was dark with black smoke, rising up from the ocean below. Down in the waves, were the wrecks of dozens of KND ships, ranging from small fighters to even a giant K.O.L.O.S.S.A.L.I.N.E.R. Smoke billowed out of the charred remains of the small fleet and here and there between the wrecks, a body or two could be seen floating amid the waves.
Numbah 2 choked, "these guys have to be from the evacuation force, they must have been intercepted by enemy squadrons after leaving the base." "If thats true then what are they doing all the way over here?", questioned Numbah 5, "they should be over in the Pacific Ocean on their way to Asia." Numbah 2 shrugged, "they were probably ordered to split off from the main group, if all the evac squadrons left the continent in the same place it would make it easy to intercept them, I'm guessing Jack ordered a couple squadrons to escape in different directions to lower the chances that they'd all be caught."
"Well that didn't help these guys one bit", replied Nigel cynically, "lets just hope that a few of them made it through." "I can't see any survivors from here", said Rachel, straining make out details from their height, "we should stop and do a quick search." Numbah 2 was watching the skies nervously, "no, we'd better get out of here, judging by the smoke this was recent, so I wouldn't be surprised if whoever did this is still combing the area for survivors." "But what if someones still alive down there!", she exclaimed, "we can't just leave them!" "We can't risk it", said Nigel sullenly, "I want to look too, but Numbah 2's right, we can't risk it." "Alright, get us out of here", ordered Rachel, reluctantly.
As the ship sped on towards the horizon, Nigel went back to looking out the window, while Rachel sat down beside him and silently mourned the deaths of the lost operatives.
Confederate SpecOps Gunship #245: Holding position at Florida coastline
Cameron gripped the railing on the ceiling for support as he stood at the mouth of the ship's troop bay. The small gunship they had commissioned for this little outing was one of the Confederacy's newer Hummingbird class models, an atmosphere only type that was somewhat bulbous in shape, almost like a bloated helicopter. As a SpecOps model however, this version came complete with a full stealth package and crew safety system which included mag plates in the deck that could lock ones standard issue boots in place to prevent falling. However, the designers had still opted to put in one of the old fashioned ceiling mounted hand rails, an addition that Cameron very much appreciated.
There was something reassuring about tightly gripping that thick, sturdy piece of metal in your hands. It was a feeling that you just couldn't get with a pair of mag plates , no matter how safer the techs claimed you were when using them. Still, Kreller admitted grudgingly, these days it is better to be safe than sorry, ours is a dangerous profession. Cameron was infantry and a firm believer in the "once a soldier always a soldier" doctrine. He was genuinely happy to actually be back in the field for once, since unlike the Federation, the Confederacy wasn't inclined towards allowing its senior personnel to see active combat, not that many of the toadies and career officers in the KMC would want to anyway.
Cameron didn't have too many reservations about his defection, he had his reasons. Still, after having seen first hand the capabilities of the Confederacy when he'd been on the other side, he hadn't been too impressed and he still wasn't now. However, there were some days where he felt that maybe, just maybe, he'd have been better off staying with the USF. But, then he would remember the Battle of Tyr Plateau and all his anger and pain would just flood back in. I can never go back, not after the war, not after what those bastards did to me and my men, he thought bitterly, but still, I didn't expect things would ever come to this.
While he personally had more reason than others to hate the adults, Cameron had been hoping he'd be kept out of the invasion and he might have, if not for Uno. That son of a bitch just had to wind up back here didn't he, he thought, maybe if I hadn't helped him escape in the first place, I wouldn't be here cleaning up my own mess. He huffed and then smiled and said under his breath, "well no use bellyaching about it, after we catch him, I'll be able to smack Uno around all I want for this crap."
Cameron took a moment to survey the world beneath him, he hadn't been to Earth in a very, very long time and he wanted to remember the view. The coastline was pretty devoid of life, besides a few abandoned houses and some empty roads snaking off towards the hills, there wasn't much of anything to see. It was a pretty dull scene, but it was better than staring at the metal plates on the deck, so Cameron kept the door open. He had opted to bring 3 of his six agents with him, one of them being Chad Dickson. Cameron was aware of Dickson's special connection to Nigel, which was why he had misgivings about bringing him along on this particular outing, but the Commodore had insisted and Cameron wasn't one to disobey orders, no matter what kind of objections he had with them.
"Brings back memories", said a voice behind him, Cameron instantly recognized it as Dickson. The boy appeared beside him, surveying the coastline with a keen eye. Chad wasn't wearing his helmet and Cameron saw him take a deep breath, inhaling the salty sea air. "Its been a long time", continued Chad, "I began to think I'd never see it again." "You really shouldn't have", shot back Cameron, "you know the regs about recruits with past affiliations." Chad's special nature came from the fact that he was one of the few affiliated recruits who actually knew the true extent of the Confederacy beyond that propaganda crap that the recruiters spun for the boys they brought in from the backwaters.
It was regulation that all recruits with past affiliations to organizations that could be considered enemies, were to be kept in the dark about the true nature of the Confederacy. Cameron knew about the whole GKND BS that the recruiters had fed to the agents from this world since their induction, it was all a part of integrating them into the KMC without forcing them to immediately change their ideology. With Chad however, things had been a bit simpler. He was a pragmatic individual, enough to see the eventuality of what the adults could accomplish given enough time, and enough to realize why the Confederacy needed to do this. That, is what made him trustworthy.
Chad stared out at the landscape with an unreadable expression, Cameron had to admit the boy guarded his feelings well, a useful trait for a spy, but not so much for a soldier. "How do you feel about this", Cameron asked suddenly, "I know you and Uno had a history, even before you both joined up, so this can't be too easy for you." Chad snorted, "easier than you'd think sir", was all he said, as he retreated back to his seat. Cameron shrugged, Chad wasn't very sociable, even during the best of times, but he expected that what was happening now was affecting him much more than he let on."
"Sir I've got incoming on the radar", the voice of the pilot sounded suddenly in Kreller's ear, "IFF scanners confirm its KND." Kreller was wearing an enclosed combat helmet that was standard issue with his SpecOps type power armor, the helmet had a built in communications system that could be accessed via voice commands or eye movements towards specific sensors built into it's interior. Kreller subconsciously blinked to the pilot's com frequency, "how long till contact?", he responded.
"Its at least 1 mile out, judging by its speed I'd say five minutes, strap yourselves in, I'm moving to intercept." "Roger", replied Cameron, as he quickly closed the bay door and moved to sit beside Chad, "give me a heading." "Looks like they're on course for Virginia", responded the pilot, "at their speed, eta in exactly 25 minutes." "Alright", said Cameron, "trail them until we hit land, I don't want them drowning, once they make landfall shoot them down." "Roger, over and out", replied the pilot, who then cut the connection.
The gunship pivoted and fired it's engines, heading out over the water towards the incoming KND craft. As it moved away from the land, a network of energy lines lit up the plates on it's exterior and in an instant, the ship vanished from view as it's cloaking field powered on.
Unregistered KND C.O.O.L.B.U.S, 3 Hours later: On approach to Virginia
"Wow, thats a lot of smoke", commented Numbah 2. They were almost to the coastline and beyond that, huge plumes of smoke could be seen rising into the air. Right at the coastline, the remains of a few US navy ships could be seen, their still smoking hulls listing out of the water. Suddenly a large plume of water shot into the sky as one of the ship's munitions cooked off in the blaze below decks. "Alright, everyone strap yourselves in", commanded Numbah 2, "its been easy flying so far, but now that we're here we're bound to attract to some attention."
Everyone moved to comply as Hoagie brought the ship over the coastline and back onto the mainland of America. Nigel had opted to sit next to Hoagie in the copilot's seat, while Rachel had moved to take the commander's seat in the center of the ship. Everyone tensed up as the battered ship flew in low over the coastline, half expecting something to be waiting for them on the other side of the hills. But there was nothing, nothing but empty fields and abandoned towns passed below the ship as the C.O.O.L.B.U.S. flew on towards the trails of smoke.
"Ok, so we're definitely going to the museum, right?", asked Numbah 2, "because we could always go ask Numbah 50 million B.C. for help too, he knows about KND history." "Numbah 50 million B.C. is an archeologist", shot back Nigel, "and we have no idea were he is." "yeah", counted Hoagie, "buy Matt's a coward, how do we know he's even still at the museum?" "Numbah 101 is the foremost expert on KND history in the world", interjected Rachel, "if it has to do with KND history, he knows about it." Then she added sheepishly, "...and he's too much of a coward to leave his exhibits at a time like this."
Hoagie sighed and shrugged, "ok, if we have too, but I really hate it everytime..." He didn't get a chance to finish his sentence as a sudden explosion from outside rocked the ship. Hoagie grappled with his controls, as he fought to keep the battered old C.O.O.L.B.U.S. flying. Finally, he was able to right the ship, though the engine was now groaning considerably more than before. "What the heck was that", exclaimed Numbah 4, who had been startled out of his nap by the explosion. "Was that AA fire", asked Rachel nervously, "has someone spotted us?"
Numbah 2 shook his head, "no, that came from behind us, someone check out back." Numbah 5 looked out one of the windows, "nothing but sky out here fly boy." That was until the second missile appeared out of thin air and rocketed towards the rear of the ship. Numbah 2 saw it coming though, gritting his teeth, he threw the ship into a tight corkscrew, forcing the other operatives to hang on for dear life as the ship spun over and over. The missile narrowly missed them, it shot right past the starboard side, where it then detonated in a ball of fire a few feet in front of them.
The C.O.O.L.B.U.S. flew on, straight into the ball of fire, scorching on the paint on the hull as it flew on through the cloud of death. "Ok", said Numbah 5, who was now substantially shaken, "there is definitely something back there." Rachel looked at Nigel, "cloaking device?", she asked, Nigel shrugged, "its the only thing I can think of." "Can we fire back?", Nigel asked Hoagie. Hoagie looked grim, "this isn't a S.C.A.M.P.E.R., we don't have a rear gun and how are we supposed to hit something thats invisible?" "Like this", yelled Numbah 5, grabbing her S.C.A.M.P.P. off the ground. She thrust the weapon out the window and started firing wildly towards the rear of the ship. Numbah 4 and Numbah 3 joined her and soon the air behind the ship was alight with laser fire. After about 2 minutes of firing, a few the blasts actually connected with something, the lasers had scorched the hull of whatever was following them as they could now see patches of metal in the air behind them.
The air around the patches began to spark with energy and then, suddenly, the cloaking field failed and the small Confederate gunship appeared in the sky behind them. It was matte black, with a bulbous cockpit and elongated troop bay that tapered off into a slender tail with a pair of vertical wings on the back. It was propelled by 4 stubby, swivel mounted thrusters attached to the fuselage. On the sides near the bottom were a pair of missile pods and at the front of the ship underneath the cockpit was a pair of duel gun mounts.
"Looks like you guys shorted out the stealth system", remarked Numbah 2, as he swung the ship around to face the gunship. He activated the hood mounted laser array, "my turn he said", and opened fire. The heavy hood mounted laser ate chunks out of the gunship's fuselage and damaged one of the swivel thrusters. The pilot of the other ship was wily though, he gunned the throttle of his ship and pulled into a tight turn so that the gunship shot past the C.O.O.L.B.U.S. Hoagie was too slow, the other pilot braked and performed a maneuver that could be considered mid-air drifting, so that his ship spun round to face the rear of the C.O.O.L.B.U.S. and stopped with the ship dead in his sights.
The other pilot opened up with his quad guns, and heavy, rapid fire lasers slammed into the already damaged engines, which exploded in a ball of fire. "Aw crud", exclaimed Numbah 4, as the the ship pitched forward and began a vertical drop towards the land below. The operatives inside gripped their chairs so hard their knuckles turned white. The girls screamed, the boys hollered and the ship groaned as they plunged towards the earth below. Numbah 2 tried to pull the ship up, but the best he could manage was controlled crash. The C.O.O.L.B.U.S. hit the ground on its belly with a terrible crunch and the sound of breaking metal, and even though they were firmly strapped into their chairs, the operatives were crushed against their seats and thrown this way and that by the force of the crash, pushing their restraints to the limit.
The C.O.O.L.B.U.S. skidded across the ground for about 50 feet, carving a deep gash into the dirt and throwing off parts left and right as it plowed headlong into the earth. It finally came to an abrupt stop at the base of a small hill, unable to go up again, the ruined craft halted at the bottom of the slope, spewing smoke from its damaged systems. Nigel coughed and sputtered as he struggled to undo his restraints, around him his battered comrades struggled to do the same. After he managed to undo his safety belt, Nigel got out of his chair and promptly fell down onto the deck, his legs felt like jello and he could barely see straight. He managed to drag himself to the door and forced it open, pulling himself bodily out of the still burning craft.
The others managed to do the same, as they all stumbled, and crawled outside, trying to put some distance between themselves and the ship. They made it about six feet before a secondary explosion from the engines rocked the earth and threw them to the ground. Nigel groaned and looked around, on his left was Rachel, on his right Hoagie, they had been closest to the door, so they had been first out.
A little way to the right and behind them, Abby, Wally and Kuki were lying in the dirt, still recovering from the crash. Nigel's head was swimming, and his vision was still blurry, but he could now see straight enough to see the Confederate gunship hovering in the air a few dozen feet above the crash site. He could make out a faint red glow around the ship's laser array, as it charged up a second volley. I guess this is how it ends, he thought, groggily, he looked over a Rachel, who was only now noticing the gunship, if only...
Suddenly the gunship rocked sideways as a missile came out of nowhere and smacked into its side. Nigel looked up and saw a pair of adult F22 fighters rip across the sky right above the gunship and take off towards the east. The gunship must have been made of pretty hard stuff, because it just shrugged off the missile like a bee sting, pivoted and fired a few missiles off towards the fighters. The two fighters banked around for a second pass and one of them caught two of the missiles straight in the face, exploding in an eye watering display of pyrotechnics as it's munitions detonated in the blast. The other fighter evaded the gunship's shots and loosed two more missiles which connected with the gunship's rear.
That must have damaged it, because Nigel could now see trails of smoke coming out of its rear thruster mounts. Having been sufficiently chastised, the gunship banked away from the crash site in pursuit of the other fighter. Nigel was slowly regaining awareness now, and he noticed a few figures had crested the top of the hill and were running down towards him and his crew. As they got closer, Nigel saw that they were in fact, adult soldiers, US army forces from the looks of their uniforms. There were about ten of them, as Nigel watched one of the soldiers, who was apparently in charge, gave a few quick hand motions and six of the soldiers made their way over to the shaken operatives, the other four remained on the hill, watching the sky in the direction that the gunship had gone.
Nigel was helped to his feet by middle aged soldier, who's name patch read Jones. Jones was trying to say something, but Nigel's hearing was still not in full working order, and he was straining to make out what the soldier was saying. "Ar... ou ...D? Yo ...K..? ...ARE YOU KND?", he finally made it out. He was too shaken and confused to wonder how an adult soldier knew about the KND, so he responded shakily, "yeah, we're KND, who are you guys?" "Good you can still hear", replied Jones, "we're US army, 9th battalion, 2nd Rangers, we saw your ship coming in on radar and were ordered to render assistance, looks like you guys could use it."
Nigel looked back at the burning wreckage of their ship and replied bluntly, "yeah, we really could." Jones looked back towards his commander, they exchanged hand motions for a minute, then he looked back at Nigel and said, "we're gonna carry you guys to the rendezvous point, theres a small base not far from here where a few of your other comrades ended up, we're going to take you too them." Nigel nodded, still groggy and allowed the soldier to sling him over his back. The other soldiers were doing the same with Rachel and the rest of sector V, as the soldiers finished gathering them up they regrouped with the rest of their team on the top of the hill and started quick marching inland towards the nearest town.
And thats all for this chapter, I know it ends kind of abruptly, but I'm done for the evening, it took forever to proof read and redo this. Seriously I must have re-written the middle part three times already and its still not just the way I want it to be. Oh well, thats what updating is for, I know a lot of the important stuff concerning the plot didn't really happen here, but we'll get to some of that in the next chapter. As always please review and comment, I'm Jackrkazi and goodnight.