Megaman X2: Eternal War

Chapter 12: Countdown to Destruction

By Genoscythe

Disc: I pity da foo who thinks I own Megaman X

Dark. And cold, and damp. These were the things Drake knew he felt. The rest was hazy. For the past three days, he had been so beat up, drugged up, and tortured that he could barely think. His armor and weapon had been taken away, and by now his purple uniform had been so torn up and ruined that there was no point in wearing it. His flesh was raw from burns and whippings, and his system was telling him that he needed food and alcohol, quickly.

Despite all this, he hadn't told them anything. They repeatedly questioned him about the Maverick Hunters, but he didn't leak out a word of information. Then again, he didn't have much to leak out in the first place. Suddenly, the door of their dark, wet cell slid open and one of the reptilian guards stood holding a figure. He barely managed to prop himself up when it threw Briggs into the cell they were kept in. Briggs landed in a puddle of liquid, moaning in protest. The guard slammed the gate shut again, and all was silent. For a time, neither said anything. " I… I can't take this" Briggs croaked. Drake said nothing. Straining, Briggs reached into one of his pockets and took out a bottle of cyanide he had concealed from the guards.

" Not…yet" Drake whispered. " We still have a chance"

" Do we?" Briggs said, his voice shrill. " Do you really think… we can escape… on our own? Two men… have died from torture… already. These mavericks… are ruthless… we have no weapons. In this state…"

" I'm not talking… about us, jackass. The Hunters will come… my friends will… find a way."

" I'm glad… you're so optimistic." Suddenly, Briggs sat up straight, growling. " I almost cracked today! I almost told them… told them the access codes… for the MHHQ network. I'm not built…built for this…" His voice trailed off and he buried his head in his hands. He began weeping softly, and Drake muttered "wimp."

Three blocks from the city's edge, the BOL stood, sun glinting off the large hexiglass dome over it. Who knew what horrors were being kept in it, other than the wretched Mavericks that lay inside. Megaman X looked it over with a telescope attached to the wall of the swift N-14 Hover Vehicle Unit. There were no exterior gun emplacements, no guards of any kind. This was what he was afraid of. There had to be some reason that there were no defenses set up. Calliope was typing away furiously at a computer console on the opposite side of the passenger compartment. She was scanning the building for any abnormal energy frequencies like shields or gravity mines.

She was doing a final scan when she yelled out. " They've got an energy field one block in front of us!"

" What type is it?" VR asked calmly from the driver's cockpit. She took a few seconds for the scanner to analyze it.

" It's a PL-12!" The PL-12 model pulse shield was known as a shield specially designed to prevent sieges and large assaults. It was capable of jamming any electronic device, including reploids if they weren't careful. It was also strong enough to disintegrate any known kind of metal within seconds, making bullets and most vehicles useless against it.

Instead of replying, VR pushed the throttle all the way, and his two passengers were thrown back in their seats. He turned on the autopilot and opened the door connecting the passenger and pilot sections. X moved over next to Calliope and VR sat where X was and grabbed onto a handrail on the ceiling. " Brace yourself!" He yelled. X barely heard him through the howl of the wind through the window. " When we hit the shield, jump!" He shouted. X gripped Calliope's hand tightly, and she returned the gesture. She looked at the monitor next to her. The computer was calculating the distance between them and the shield. 400m…250m…100m…10m…impact.

The entire front of the vehicle seemed to shatter like glass; the sound of wrenching metal was deafening. Somehow, the hover truck kept going through the shield, even though the outside hull was fast disintegrating. The three hunters jumped, and the momentum of the N-14 sent them flying through the air, past the shield. They landed on a patch of bushes several meters away. When they got up, there was virtually nothing left of the hover vehicle.

The three hunters looked across the large expanse of jungle in front of them. It was going to be a long hike, and it looked easy to get sidetracked in there. X and VR began arguing about the route they should take, when suddenly, Calliope had an idea. " Why don't we just go straight and hope we find the compound? It must be in the center, so if we keep going forward, we'll have to reach it sometime." They both agreed, and the three sprinted off into the foliage at top speed.

It was a little after noon at the central compound which was guarded by eight defense towers fitted with turbolasers on top. To catch trespassers off guard, these cannons were camouflaged by a highly reflective coating that reflected its surroundings, with only a minimal fluctuation. A large generator underground some meters away, which connected to all of the turrets, powered this function. Three raptor sentries sat atop each guard tower, ready to jump down at a moment's notice. They were told to be on edge after the small attack three days ago, and nobody wanted to take any chances letting what was inside the compound fall into the Hunter's hands. Their secret weapon could make or break this guerilla war.

Suddenly, a sentry's head snapped right. It looked deeply into the foliage, but could see nothing. It had heard a soft thump, like a footstep. Its well-attuned ears could hear every sound like it was seeing it, and its head moved a few meters to the right. It could still see nothing, but the sounds were coming closer. Then, it saw something blue move in the foliage. It opened its mouth to sound an alarm cry, but no sound came out. When it looked down, there was a ragged hole torn through its chest. It fell to the ground, dead, and its killer stepped out of the bushes to the left of its field of vision, holding a sniper rifle.

The other sentries heard the death of their comrade, and they rushed over to their fallen ally, only to be dispatched by two more silent shots. Three forms rushed out of the bushes, not expecting the invisible guard tower to begin shooting lasers at them! A red bolt fired from the top of the guard tower and ripped apart the ground right in front of them, and they fell back, retreating to the bushes again.

***

"Damn it, what was that?" Calliope asked no one in particular. X shook his head, clutching his chest. His chest plate was dented in the center where a large rock had fallen on him after the blast. VR reloaded his sniper rifle and flipped on one of his special visors. It was specially designed to pick up frequencies emitted by camouflage devices. The feedback he got was faint, but there was definitely something there that wasn't meant to be seen.

" There's something there, but I can't tell what." He did a more thorough scan, then overlapped it with the previous scan to try and piece together what it was. " It appears to be some kind of turret. I can only assume there are more around the compound, so our best bet is to take out the one here and find an entrance before the guards can locate us."

" Is that all?" Calliope asked sarcastically.

" Yes, it is." VR said, completely missing the point. " I only have five energy shells left for my sniper buster, but I can try and find a weak point on it." He sighed. " Although, chances of success are improbable." X slammed his fist on the ground, gripping the dirt hard with his gloved hand.

" This is taking too freaking long! He could be dead by now!" Angrily, he grabbed a coconut that had fallen from a tree and chucked it at the tower. Since he could not see it, the coconut flew far to the right of the cloaked tower, but the turret detected movement, and it turned to fire at the hard projectile. If by sheer skill, pure luck, or fate, the turret's shot disintegrated the coconut and flew off into the forest, directly at the turret's power generator. An explosion shook the ground beneath the three hunters' feet, and suddenly they could see an immense tower in front of them with a large, two-barreled plasma turret on top of it. Others began appearing around the compound, and the three hunters stared in blank amazement.

VR patted X on the back. " Nice work, my friend. Now, we must get inside." Calliope leaned over and kissed him on the cheek.

" I always knew you were good for something." She said to him. He just smiled at her. They sprinted forward and began to search for an entrance. They were halfway across the clearing when they heard an inhuman screech. Four sentries leapt from a catwalk on the side of the 'L' shaped compound, holding electrically charged spears. VR reacted instantly, raising his sniper buster at the creatures. He fired, and blew one into pieces in midair, while another landed in front of Calliope, jabbing with its spear. Had the woman not been prepared to duck, she would have been impaled, but she was already sliding to the ground as the maverick landed. Aegis came up, slicing the spear in two, while Minos was thrust up at an angle, gouging into the raptor's chest cavity.

X raised his buster and fired three shots, all of which missed, and the raptor he was firing at landed in front of him, tapping the spear against his buster arm. An explosion of static pain surged up his arm and he leapt backward to avoid another hit. To his horror and astonishment, he backed up into the raptor! Grinning, the creature thrust downward with its weapon, intending to cut into his throat. X bent down slightly, kicking out his foot and getting the maverick off balance. Then, in the same brief moment, he brought his buster up against its chest and fired, sending it tumbling back into the brush. When he turned around, the others had finished off the last one. " Hurry!" He yelled. " They'll be on us in a heartbeat now!"

Just as he said that, five more were already rushing down the stairs to meet them, and behind them, eight more velociraptors stepped out of the bushes. " Any ideas?" Calliope asked skeptically.

" Not at the moment." VR said calmly.

" Can you get a reading on their location?" Genoscythe asked the driver impatiently. He tapped a booted toe impatiently on the mesh floor of the troop carrier. The driver shook his head.

" I'm sorry, sir, but the N-14's energy signature has…disappeared. Either it was completely destroyed or it was short-circuited." The driver replied. The Commander sighed and looked down at his steel feet.

" How far are we from the Biological Observation Lab?" He asked. The driver tapped a holo-map on the console next to him. They were less than a block away and closing fast. Genoscythe walked across the cockpit and leaned his head out of the open door. There, the BOL stood, but he could tell that the picture was hazy and distorted. He looked closer, and after studying it for a few moments, he came to the realization that a shield was up, but it was a very weak one.

" They've got a shield!" He yelled back to the driver. " It's been weakened, but I can't tell what type it is. Maybe a PL-12."

" How weak is it?"

" Pretty weak, but I can't say for sure." The pilot put the carrier on autopilot and looked out the window. He got back in his seat and turned off the auto pilot.

" Strap yourself in, sir." The pilot said with a grin. This guy was obviously new; he didn't have the authority to decide what to do.

" Hold on a second, what do you think you're doing? Do you have any respect at al-" Suddenly, the carrier jolted and Genoscythe was flung to the ground. Bits of metal and paint were sheared off the troop carrier as it blew past the weak shield and into the observation area. The carrier did a 180 spin, and came to a halting stop. Genoscythe was gripping a handlebar on the wall to keep himself from flying out the door.

" What the hell do you think you're doing? Do you have any idea how foolish that was? You could've gotten us killed!" He yelled at the driver. The young Maverick Hunter just shrugged and pushed his silver hair out of his way. Genoscythe turned and opened the door to the troop compartment. There, the entire 17th Hunter Division waited for instructions. " Move out." He instructed them. The hunters opened the back exit door and began collecting their weapons. The driver got up to join them. " Not you, Dynamo. You stay here and keep yourself out of my sight." The cheeky hunter frowned and sat back down in the pilot's chair.

By now, the shield had completely broken down, and the other troop carrier hovered in carrying the 14th's hunters. They were ready.

End

AN: Another testament to the fact that I won't stop writing until I say so. I decided to cut this chapter short, too, because I have so much left to write about and nobody's heard from me in awhile. I've gotten back into the spirit of writing now, so expect to get more fairly soon.