Armored core: Overboost Destiny
-Chapter 6- Memory Ignition
Mail to Yavangel Cross…
We have recently acquired information about a weapon being developed in a Zio Matrix storage facility to the Northwest. The power of the weapon is too great to allow it to exist, so we are looking for your help on this matter. Infiltrate the storage facility and destroy the weapon and anyone that stands in your way. Additionally, another Raven has been hired for the job, but by a rogue terrorist faction resembling the likes of the Indies. If contact is made with their client, destroy the Raven as well, an additional reward will be given to you. Good luck.
"Almost like they want me to come in…guess I'll take the invitation." Van said, shifting Einherjar forward.
The long column of the underground facilities walls stretched up and up, covered by an iron skeleton to hold it together, along with ladders and walls made out of metal. They gave it this polygonal shape that stretched up to the door entryway. The door's jaw splitting it in the center shook violently for a moment, and then started to separate. The door to the shaft opened, making a bright glow of sunlight cover its floor. The Einherjar leapt into the middle of the sunlight, its shadow growing bigger and bigger as it fell to the base of the shaft. As Einherjar landed, the ground shattered under its feet and a cloud of dust covered its hull. Before him on the screen, Van examined a long and dark corridor lit by a few linear lights where the walls met the ceiling, and where they met the floor. Van moved his Ac through the hall, noticing a door at the end of it. As he neared it, an announcement came over his transmission. 'Warning. Intruder detected, defenses operational, attack on sight.'
As Van send a signal to the door to make it open, a horde of Mt units has entered the room in front of him. When the door was fully open, he entered the room and noticed his enemies. Einherjar then strafe boosted to the left, firing several rifle rounds into the group of attackers. The gunshots collide with a few muscle tracers, making the impact zone the tail of a booster flame, throwing them in the opposite direction with its boost. They collided with walls or pillars and engulfed a dozen more units in flames, making them inoperable. Van narrowed his eyes.
"Hey Lynn? Where's this weapon located?" He asked, looking at two elevator doors on the opposite side of the room.
Lynn's radio transmission appeared on his screen. "Emeraude says it is in the center of the facility," Lynn stopped, looking for more information on her map screen that detailed the facility. "It should be a few floors down. Use the left elevator."
Ein strafe boosted to the left through the air. When Van fully faced the horde, he stopped Einherjar's boosters and landed it gracefully onto its feet. Einherjar knelt down onto its knees, dropping the grenade launcher onto its shoulder and firing a grenade into the middle of the horde. A tremendous explosion covered his enemies, and all that Van could see was smoke. He flipped Einherjar's overboosters on, and gripped his controls. The Einherjar overboosted forward into the dark gray cloud of smoke. He could feel charges of electricity floating in the air around him.
The flame of the Einherjar's overboosters began to clear the smoke out of the room by pushing it into the vents. Van ignited Ein's turn boosters periodically, circling the room. The smoke turned into a dissipating whirl of the wind created from the boosters. Van noticed a few enemies left, and overboosted straight for them. He fired his rifle at one as he passed, and tackled another into a wall, crushing it with his Ac's weight.
Van turn boosted to face the center of the room, where the last enemy stood. It raised its cannon and lifted its reverse joint legs to turn towards the Einherjar. The cannon's inner shaft started to glow. Quickly, a blaze of machinegun fire jumped out of it toward Einherjar. Van Overboosted toward the Mt and released Ein's energy blade. Ein pulled its left arm towards its chest, and swung it to it's left, slashing the blade through the muscle tracers canopy shell. Ein turn boosted around, utilizing a turning slash technique.
The Einherjar strafe boosted to its right, and before he knew it, Van had run his Ac into a wall. Something wasn't right, Van thought.
"Van! There is an Ac on the opposite side of that wall!" Lynn explained.
Ein boosted forward, throwing his rifle to his right, only to face his opposition with a bazooka barrel to its scope-eye. Van examined his enemy. It was an Ac called Red Knight. A large, red and black heavyweight mecha armed with a bazooka, energy shield and pursuit missiles. The Ac's pilot was a woman named Cass. Van and her had taken a few missions together as tank pilots.
Her transmission appeared. "You aren't getting passed me Van."
Van sneered. "You can't hold me back with that giant hunk of junk Knight, I could easily go around you."
"With a barrel to your head?" Cass said, laughing after.
Ein turn boosted to the right and pulled its energy blade with it, slashing the end of the bazooka barrel off. The barrel pieces fell to the floor, causing it to tremble.
Cass gasped. "I see why you're so highly regarded now. I never remember you being clever enough to use your resources."
Back in the present, Van modified the cockpit's temperature, noticing the change in temperature from the outside on the inside of Einherjar. He checked temperature gauges, making sure the temperature maintenance systems were online so his Ac wouldn't freeze.
Van noticed he stopped telling the story. "Oh, sorry I had to check the gauges."
"It is all right, how is Einherjar?" Valkyrie asked.
"Good as new, just as she's always been." Van answered. He shifted in his seat, looking out at the horizon. A peaceful haze of snow drifted slowly before Ein.
"So Cass was hired by Zio to defend the weapon? What are the odds." Valkyrie commented.
Van shook his head. "No, she was hired to kill me. I was already a threat to Zio by then. They probably didn't want another Raven messing up their plans."
"So she was your match? You're equal?" Valkyrie asked. Van nodded. He thought about Valkyrie for a moment, remembering the last time he saw her.
"Well, yeah. She was a lot tougher than I ever will be." Van said, letting out a deep sigh.
"What happened next?" Val asked. She seemed interested.
Van looked at the radio transmission box, reading her question a few times after hearing it. "We fought for a long time, eventually both of our cores had had it. I had an injury too. Another Raven joined the fight. It must have been a new partner of hers because he came right after me. Oddly enough, I took him out and before he died he took her out too. He said it was what he wanted, and what he was ordered to do. I think they were in love…"
"How romantically sad…" Valkyrie added.
"Romantic? How could anyone kill someone they love? Even if they believe they'll end up together again, I can't see how someone could just end the other's life." Van yelled frustratingly.
"I'm sorry…" Valkyrie apologized.
"It's fine I'm sorry I yelled," Van said as quick as he could. "I wish I knew how she reacted to things. I wish I could have seen her face more." Valkyrie was fighting herself from crying. Van suddenly got the distinct feeling something wasn't right. Something was missing from his train of thought. He looked on the situation quickly, feeling a strong resemblance between the voices of Lynn and Valkyrie. "You know, you remind me of her."
Valkyrie was a little surprised. "What do you mean?" She replied quickly as if in a rush to know the answer.
"She'd always talk to me when I'd travel…she'd always ask me questions about things," Van stopped to laugh for a second. "Even though she already knew most of the stories already."
"I wish…I wish I knew her more too. I wish I had met her." Valkyrie said, sighing softly.
"Me too Val…Me too…" Van noted, noticing a structure in the distance.
"You see something?" Valkyrie asked.
Van nodded, pressing a few buttons to open a window on his screen that zoomed in on the structure. It looked like the top of skyscrapers sticking out of the ground. Some had a strange angle and some were pushed out of the ground higher than others. Van recognized the area. He noticed another large structure behind it. A broken down cargo space ship had crashed behind it and inside a small light was burning. "I see the ruins, and a broken down ship too. Looks like someone is inside…" Van moved the Einherjar across the cold desert's mix of snow and sand.
"So was there any other friends of yours that you had to fight against on the battlefield?" She asked.
"Yeah. It is an interesting story actually. I was assigned to ambush a team of ravens who planned on attacking an Emeraude outpost nearby Scissors Forest. My old colleague Phoenix had recognized my voice as I was fighting him and his teammate. He turned his back on his ally and helped me protect the outpost from then on for a few months. He became a respected Emeraude pilot, just as I had." Van told her. He remembered the conversations he had with Phoenix during those few months.
"So he was like you?" Valkyrie figured.
"I guess you could say that. He was a highly ranked Emeraude raven. We had a lot of missions together until he disappeared. He was on a mission in space and supposedly left out there. I was told he betrayed Emeraude forces."
Ein stepped closer and closer to the cargo ship. Van zoomed in once again, examining the fire inside the ship. Van had thought the ship might have just crashed, and it was still burning. Van realized someone was inside the ship, living there. He seen movement inside, and noticed a single person standing close to a window, looking at the Einherjar.
"Oh my god…" Van uttered.
Valkyrie sunk fast, wondering what was wrong. "What is it?" She asked.
Van recognized the person, and realized a very familiar Ac was nested inside the ship. It was an old friend. "Phoenix…"