Chapter 14: The end justifies the means.
In the past week, the Chaos Storm organisation and the newly invigorated Zoid Battle Alliance, as the cooperative effort of the ZBC and the Guardian Force had been dubbed, had put their plans into action, with the new Guardian Force judges finding themselves in the middle of pitched battle as often as not.
However, it was not for nothing that this seeming stalemate of a war was going on, instead, this was likely to become one of the most important struggles in the history, because unlike most wars, it was no struggle between vastly similar governments, but between regimes whose effects on the population would have been vastly different.
One of the temporary judges gritted his teeth. His name was Jonathan Baxter and he was surveying the battleground to be from the cockpit of his zoid, a modified König Wolf, whose arsenal was based upon that of the Command Wolf Juggernaut upgrade, but at least twice as powerful, and with less of a speed decrease than that of the Command Wolf Juggernaut when compared with the conventional Command Wolf.
From the cockpit of his Wolf, he could see everything for miles, whether it was the buzzards that circled over the carcass of a dead Jackal to the West, or the rapidly approaching Hovercargo to the North, which he assumed carried the Blitz team, or even the black form of a Great Whale King that was releasing armies of zoids to the South-east...
Jonathan did a double take, "darn," he muttered to himself, "of all the battles the Chaos Storm could try to intrude upon they had to pick mine!"
Quickly, he got in touch with the Blitz Team, ascertaining that they were ready and willing to take out this swarm of ex-Backdraft scum. They mobilised quickly, with the Shadow Fox, the Falcyon and the Gunsniper taking up primary positions on the battlefield, and then, through the side hatch of the Hovercargo came the form of a large White Liger, of a design that, while reminding him of the famous Liger Zero, seemed slower, heavier and more deadly at first glance, sporting what appeared to be a single turreted Hybrid Cannon, a quadruple-barrelled belly cannon and a pair of badly concealed Missile Pods.
Meanwhile, the Chaos Storm units were fully mobilised by this stage, and they looked formidable, even from a distance, with their numbers being made up of Red Horn, Strike Viper, King Gojulas and Nightstinger Guysack units, with the dominating form off a Mad Thunder at their centre, its four heavy cannons gleaming ominously.
The Mad Thunder, according to legend, was the best zoid that the engineers of the Helic Republic had been able to develop to match the capabilities of the imperial Death Saurer and other zoids with charged particle cannons, and this Triceratops-like zoid, as well as having the ability to mount four of the mighty super-cannons that it shared with Gordos and Gojulas designs, had some of the thickest armour, and one of the most ferocious temperaments, of any zoid known to man. This zoid, in the hands of even a novice pilot, would be easily match most elite pilots in both skill and power, and in the hands of an expert, would prove deadly.
Then, the two forces clashed, the combination of Blitz team and Guardian Force units being almost shattered by the chest-mounted heavy Gattlings of the King Gojulas units, whose upright forms resembled nothing so much as mechanical imitations of the Japanese film monster, Godzilla.
But this did nothing to stop the Liger Omega from Charging at the enemy. Bit Cloud, at the helm of this mighty Liger, set off immediately in a charge whose very speed, even without the use of its boosters, belied the weight of this super-Liger, which was now shrugging off any enemy shell that hit it, regardless of calibre. At once, Bit Cloud activated the Ion Boosters of his zoid, launching it into the air, and as he let out the cry of "strike plasma claws", the front paws of the Liger energised with superheated blue-white plasma, and the down-stroke of the Liger Omega cleaved bodily through the forms of seven zoids.
The Shadow Fox was also putting up a brave fight, somehow dancing through the Heavy cannon fire of the Chaos Zoids to down a large number of the Red Horn, Strike Viper and Nightstinger Guysack units with the wildly oscillating form of its Laser Vulcan cannon, although it was unable to deal vast quantities of damage to the King Gojulas units and the Mad Thunder at the centre of the enemy formation. Leena's own assault was short-lived to say the least, given that while her heavy duty missile barrage downed two of the King Gojulas units, she had run out of ammunition by the end of it, and her zoid was knocked out by a remaining Guysack on its way to reload.
In his König Wolf Juggernaut, the adjudicator for the battle that should have been happening around now, between the Blitz and Kaiser teams, the Kaiser team still not having shown up, was fighting for his very life, dodging his zoid between the progressively tougher zoids that remained as the weak and unlucky pilots were weeded out. With decisive force, he trained his cannons on one of the twelve remaining zoids at this point, six of them King Gojulas units, and five of them Red Horns, with the Mad Thunder launching its deadly barrage from the centre of the force, and as he pressed down on the trigger, his target, a King Gojulas opened its mouth in a shriek of rage that physically shook the ground beneath them, paralysing all of the zoids around it as they fought to keep their footing. Meanwhile, that particular King Gojulas aimed its twin super cannons and fired, both shells hitting the Liger Omega but doing little damage, if any, to its Ultimium Alloy armour, and then, the moment passed, and raising its Hybrid Cannon, blasted the rest of the way through the armour of the damaged Gojulas, because whether it was a king of its type or not, it would not survive against the mighty Liger Omega.
Very soon, only the armoured form of the Mad Thunder stood against them, firing the four Plasma Particle Cannons that had replaced its traditional Super-cannons and shared the exact same calibre as the guns they had replaced. But whatever the Blitz Team threw against this mighty zoid, its armour seemed to be capable of taking all they were launching at it and then some, and yet, even with its array of Plasma Particle Artillery, it could barely dent the armour of the Liger Omega, whose own armour was designed to withstand even the heaviest shelling, even when energy weapons were brought into action. Quickly, Bit Cloud retreated to the Hovercargo, using his team-mates to cover him, and there was fastened to the newly reinforced modification deck, switching to the mighty armour conversion that was the Omega Schneider arsenal, whose blades were as many and as long as those of the Zero Schneider, but were augmented by small concealed blades in the shoulders and hips of the red and white Liger, positioned to protect the legs from any attempt to chop them off; also the Omega Schneider possessed the next level in booster technology, with the bulky forms of twin Polarised Ion Boosters protruding from its back. Given the weight of the Liger Omega, this zoid could no longer be deployed via the catapult deck of the hovercargo but instead had to be deployed through the side hatch again, where it engaged the new boosters, with its main body blades out to either side of it, hurtling towards the ineffective defences of the Mad Thunder, which promptly deployed its final secret weapon, a massive energy shield of the type sometimes fitted to Whale Kings, which deflected the first attack of the Liger Omega, only for Bit Cloud to snap the Buster Slash down, using the newfound ability of his forward blades to absorb the shield energy of the Mad Thunder, channelling it into powering his other blades, thus cleaving even the upgraded Mad Thunder in two.
Meanwhile, in the underground headquarters of the Chaos Storm Organisation, another battle was taking place, this time in the simulation chambers that allowed pilots to test their skills without dealing serious damage to their zoids. The teams involved were: 10 Gunsnipers, 5 Iron Kongs, 25 Guysacks and 10 Hel Digunners, versus a single Modified Rev Raptor. The Rev Raptor pilot was a particularly shady character about which very little was known, other than that his name, or at least the pseudonym by which most knew him, was the Shadow Blade.
The many executives of the Chaos Storm watched his battle as it unfolded, watching as the force arrayed against him set up defensive lines to defeat him as quickly as possible. However, his Rev Raptor, blades unfurled, charged straight for the enemy lines, its speed like no other zoid of its type as it sliced through the sides of any Hel Digunner that got in its way, before opening fire on the Guysacks with the twin machine guns that the Shadow Blade had fitted to its chest, mowing them down as quickly as was possible.
Next were the Gunsnipers, which had turned their backs to him in order to use their sniper rifles. The Shadow Blade responded to these by activating a pair of smoke dischargers fitted to his zoid, then charging, under cover of the smoke, straight for the Gunsnipers, evading the shots from the Iron Kongs behind as he cleared the smoke, using his boosters to quickly get close enough to the Gunsnipers that they served as cover for his zoid against enemy shots, before carving and clawing his way through the assembled Gunsnipers, whose feeble close range capabilities made them easy targets now that the Shadow Blade had penetrated their defensive ring.
Then, to finish the job off, the Rev Raptor charged towards the remaining zoids, which were mostly the Iron Kongs, although two Guysacks and one Hel Digunner had managed to escape his wrath thus far, and so these zoids opened fire on the Rev Raptor that hurtled towards them, many times barely missing their target as it ducked under their missiles and shells or swerved at the appropriate moment, before it finally closed with what few zoids remained, gunning down the Guysacks and Hel Digunner, which had little room to manoeuvre in their present location, before activating its deadly tesla unit, adding electric shock capacities to its blades and claws, which ripped straight through the enemy Iron Kongs, paralysing even such mighty zoids with the first incision made. Eventually, only the customised Rev Raptor was left standing, its blades and claws glinting evilly in the simulated sunlight.
The Shadow Blade then emerged from the simulator cockpit, running over to his Rev Raptor, from which he detached the interface cable, which led to the simulator unit, and then he noticed the commotion around him.
Walking towards the Chaos Storm Executives, he moved with an air of supreme confidence that spoke volumes about him, especially because his feet, even in victory made no sound whatsoever.
The executives broke the silence, "Well Done, your skill in our little test shows that you should be capable of the task we will be setting you, the assassination of a number of elite zoid pilots and high ranking officials within the Zoid Battle Commission and the Guardian Force...These people are to be defeated by any means necessary..."