Thanks to all who reviewed. I'll add replies in later chapters, but I won't be replying that often. I've found that thinking of replies for every chapter often takes as long as writing the chapters themselves.
Chapter 2: No heroes, only death
The numerous fires that were strewn about the battlefield had turned the peaceful night sky to a familiar orange. The deafening sound of gunfire, explosions and the occasional scream that managed to break through the louder noises had in turn shattered the silence of the surroundings. And the smell of blood and fiery flesh had replaced the smell of clear, unpolluted air.
Corporal Adish Haajanen knew he should be keeping his mind on the battle as opposed to the scenery, but with the surviving enemy soldiers and war machines in retreat, (many of which were being chased down and sliced to pieces by sentinels), there wasn't much else for him to do.
In the distance, he heard another scream as an A.O.H soldier met an untimely end. A brutal part of him wanted to laugh. He locked it down and suppressed the briefest tinge of grief that this idea brought forth.
The first time he'd heard the sound, in the twenty-minute film the New Order had created to desensitise human soldiers. (A film that showed the most grisly and stomach turning deaths, mutilations and maiming imaginable,) Adish had been violently sick, along with everyone else. Now, in his fourth battle since the start of the war, the sights he'd seen in the film, and the sights and sounds of the battlefield, he could see and hear without so much as a raised eyebrow.
"Alright boys and girls!" Boomed the voice of Captain Sebastian Hackett, "Good job all round. Since none of you died, I'll keep up my end of the bargain and buy you all a beer when we get home."
A small round of weary cheering was met from the troops assembled in the makeshift trench. It was in fact simply a line of mud that had been dug away.
"Before that however," Hackett continued, "Let's get the search for survivors over and done with."
And so it began, Adish and the other members of the 045 platoon, (or human infantry unit 045 as it was called by the machines), set off into the newly constructed wasteland in search of anyone, friend or foe who had survived. The chances of finding anyone on the enemy's side were unlikely as New Order soldiers, human or not, had a habit of firing at a target until they were absolutely certain that it was dead, whereas the A.O.H troops were more known for firing wildly at anything they saw when it seemed obvious that they were loosing the battle. (Also, if a sentinel got their claws on an enemy, they were undoubtedly doomed.)
Many of the platoon's members split off into small groups. Adish walked with Corporal Azami Tanaka who was carrying the necessary detection equipment. This basically consisted of a small device that scanned for body heat, brainwave activity and electrical signals from downed machine soldiers or war vehicles. Adish simply carried a rifle in case any A.O.H soldiers were feeling idiotic enough to continue fighting.
"Adish," Azami said, mustering as much casualness as she could into her voice, "Glad to see you're still alive, and a little surprised." This last statement was accompanied by a slight grin.
"Yeah, glad to see you too." Adish responded with genuine traces of happiness in his voice. After spending two hours shooting at enemy soldiers and causing their bodies to stop working, it felt nice to talk to a friend, which was easier to do and less life threatening.
The two walked in a reasonably straight line for a few moments, Azami watched the display on her casualty identification device, (C.I.D), Adish simply tried not to stumble over any corpses or debris.
"Impressive, isn't it?" Azami said, referring to the destruction around them.
Adish didn't respond for a few moments. There had been a time, no so long ago, when he'd found Azami's enthusiasm for death and destruction un-nerving. Despite how much he hated the racist ideals and almost tyrannical regimes of the Alliance of humanity, he couldn't help but feel sympathy for the dead bodies of the enemy after he saw them in the flesh for the first time. It didn't take him long to become detached however, especially after seeing comrades dying next to him in the battles of Sydney and Brisbane.
"Yes," he sighed after a few minutes, "I guess it is."
"Oh come on," Azami said with genuine exasperation in her voice, "What is this Adish, your fourth outing? Don't tell me you're still squeamish."
Adish considered appealing to whatever passed for Azami's conscience, but then remembered what had happened the last time he'd tried.
Adish had asked Azami whether it bothered her that she had just ended the lives of people who may very well have been mothers and father to innocent children, loving husbands and wives who were fighting to keep their families safe as opposed to fighting for nihilistic, idiotic governments and regimes. Azami had given the simple if somewhat vague answer; If you're at the top of the food chain, you might as well enjoy it.
Contrary to the image she liked to portray however, Azami was not a psychopath. She took pride in her work, which came mainly from a hatred of the A.O.H for reason that she chose not to share with her colleagues, but she wouldn't deliberately kill someone anymore then a standard, halfway decent human would push someone off of a cliff.
"Adish? Adish!" Azami punched him lightly on the arm, breaking his chain of thought.
"Wake up dammit, I've found something." Adish raised his rifle instinctively after he took in what Azami was saying.
"Relax, it's one of ours. Machine, humanoid. Follow me."
Azami took off in the direction of the signal from her C.I.D with Adish on her heels. Soon enough, they came to the location of the machine that was holding up one arm, barely, in an attempt to signal to them. Adish raised his rifle to the sky to signal that they were on their way.
"Where's it hurt?" He asked when he reached the machine.
"I do not feel pain", the machine's vocal circuitry was singed, thereby distorting its speech, "But my body is immobilised."
Azami crouched to he knees and examined the various scorch marks on the downed soldier.
"Repairable?" Adish asked.
"Nah, we're going to have to remove the central processor and insert it into a new body."
The machine nodded, as if this is what it had been expecting.
Azami moved her hands to the machines neck and searched for a few, well concealed switches that would remove the machine's head, (in which laid its central processor, in other words its brain.) These switches were deliberately hard to access, as the machines did not want concussion from weaponry on a battlefield to accidentally trigger these switches and cause their soldier's heads to fall off in the midst of battle.
After about a minute, the head came away from the body with a loud click.
"Shame you can't do this with humans." Adish said.
The light traces of humour that this sentence produced died abruptly with another, familiar click.
Adish turned around and pointed a rifle at a bloodied A.O.H soldier who was pointing her own weapon at him. Her face made her look a lot like she was ready to break down and cry, and at the same time, that she'd love to see Adish and Azami dead.
"Give me that head, and lower your weapon." Her voice was deadpan, and sounded like she hadn't drunk anything for a week.
"Take a look around you," Azami said instantly, "Your friends are dead, New Order troops are all over the place and unless you drop your weapon, you're going to die very, very shortly."
There was silence for a moment, if the A.O.H soldier had paid attention to Azami's words, she didn't seem to care.
"The he…"
The soldier cut herself off in mid word and grunted in a short-lived pain as Adish shot her twice through the chest. She fell to the floor backwards and almost seemed to smile as her life faded away.
"Idiot." Azami said, returning her attention to the head in her hands.
To be continued. Also, do you think I should change the rating to R or leave it as it is?
Chapter 2: No heroes, only death
The numerous fires that were strewn about the battlefield had turned the peaceful night sky to a familiar orange. The deafening sound of gunfire, explosions and the occasional scream that managed to break through the louder noises had in turn shattered the silence of the surroundings. And the smell of blood and fiery flesh had replaced the smell of clear, unpolluted air.
Corporal Adish Haajanen knew he should be keeping his mind on the battle as opposed to the scenery, but with the surviving enemy soldiers and war machines in retreat, (many of which were being chased down and sliced to pieces by sentinels), there wasn't much else for him to do.
In the distance, he heard another scream as an A.O.H soldier met an untimely end. A brutal part of him wanted to laugh. He locked it down and suppressed the briefest tinge of grief that this idea brought forth.
The first time he'd heard the sound, in the twenty-minute film the New Order had created to desensitise human soldiers. (A film that showed the most grisly and stomach turning deaths, mutilations and maiming imaginable,) Adish had been violently sick, along with everyone else. Now, in his fourth battle since the start of the war, the sights he'd seen in the film, and the sights and sounds of the battlefield, he could see and hear without so much as a raised eyebrow.
"Alright boys and girls!" Boomed the voice of Captain Sebastian Hackett, "Good job all round. Since none of you died, I'll keep up my end of the bargain and buy you all a beer when we get home."
A small round of weary cheering was met from the troops assembled in the makeshift trench. It was in fact simply a line of mud that had been dug away.
"Before that however," Hackett continued, "Let's get the search for survivors over and done with."
And so it began, Adish and the other members of the 045 platoon, (or human infantry unit 045 as it was called by the machines), set off into the newly constructed wasteland in search of anyone, friend or foe who had survived. The chances of finding anyone on the enemy's side were unlikely as New Order soldiers, human or not, had a habit of firing at a target until they were absolutely certain that it was dead, whereas the A.O.H troops were more known for firing wildly at anything they saw when it seemed obvious that they were loosing the battle. (Also, if a sentinel got their claws on an enemy, they were undoubtedly doomed.)
Many of the platoon's members split off into small groups. Adish walked with Corporal Azami Tanaka who was carrying the necessary detection equipment. This basically consisted of a small device that scanned for body heat, brainwave activity and electrical signals from downed machine soldiers or war vehicles. Adish simply carried a rifle in case any A.O.H soldiers were feeling idiotic enough to continue fighting.
"Adish," Azami said, mustering as much casualness as she could into her voice, "Glad to see you're still alive, and a little surprised." This last statement was accompanied by a slight grin.
"Yeah, glad to see you too." Adish responded with genuine traces of happiness in his voice. After spending two hours shooting at enemy soldiers and causing their bodies to stop working, it felt nice to talk to a friend, which was easier to do and less life threatening.
The two walked in a reasonably straight line for a few moments, Azami watched the display on her casualty identification device, (C.I.D), Adish simply tried not to stumble over any corpses or debris.
"Impressive, isn't it?" Azami said, referring to the destruction around them.
Adish didn't respond for a few moments. There had been a time, no so long ago, when he'd found Azami's enthusiasm for death and destruction un-nerving. Despite how much he hated the racist ideals and almost tyrannical regimes of the Alliance of humanity, he couldn't help but feel sympathy for the dead bodies of the enemy after he saw them in the flesh for the first time. It didn't take him long to become detached however, especially after seeing comrades dying next to him in the battles of Sydney and Brisbane.
"Yes," he sighed after a few minutes, "I guess it is."
"Oh come on," Azami said with genuine exasperation in her voice, "What is this Adish, your fourth outing? Don't tell me you're still squeamish."
Adish considered appealing to whatever passed for Azami's conscience, but then remembered what had happened the last time he'd tried.
Adish had asked Azami whether it bothered her that she had just ended the lives of people who may very well have been mothers and father to innocent children, loving husbands and wives who were fighting to keep their families safe as opposed to fighting for nihilistic, idiotic governments and regimes. Azami had given the simple if somewhat vague answer; If you're at the top of the food chain, you might as well enjoy it.
Contrary to the image she liked to portray however, Azami was not a psychopath. She took pride in her work, which came mainly from a hatred of the A.O.H for reason that she chose not to share with her colleagues, but she wouldn't deliberately kill someone anymore then a standard, halfway decent human would push someone off of a cliff.
"Adish? Adish!" Azami punched him lightly on the arm, breaking his chain of thought.
"Wake up dammit, I've found something." Adish raised his rifle instinctively after he took in what Azami was saying.
"Relax, it's one of ours. Machine, humanoid. Follow me."
Azami took off in the direction of the signal from her C.I.D with Adish on her heels. Soon enough, they came to the location of the machine that was holding up one arm, barely, in an attempt to signal to them. Adish raised his rifle to the sky to signal that they were on their way.
"Where's it hurt?" He asked when he reached the machine.
"I do not feel pain", the machine's vocal circuitry was singed, thereby distorting its speech, "But my body is immobilised."
Azami crouched to he knees and examined the various scorch marks on the downed soldier.
"Repairable?" Adish asked.
"Nah, we're going to have to remove the central processor and insert it into a new body."
The machine nodded, as if this is what it had been expecting.
Azami moved her hands to the machines neck and searched for a few, well concealed switches that would remove the machine's head, (in which laid its central processor, in other words its brain.) These switches were deliberately hard to access, as the machines did not want concussion from weaponry on a battlefield to accidentally trigger these switches and cause their soldier's heads to fall off in the midst of battle.
After about a minute, the head came away from the body with a loud click.
"Shame you can't do this with humans." Adish said.
The light traces of humour that this sentence produced died abruptly with another, familiar click.
Adish turned around and pointed a rifle at a bloodied A.O.H soldier who was pointing her own weapon at him. Her face made her look a lot like she was ready to break down and cry, and at the same time, that she'd love to see Adish and Azami dead.
"Give me that head, and lower your weapon." Her voice was deadpan, and sounded like she hadn't drunk anything for a week.
"Take a look around you," Azami said instantly, "Your friends are dead, New Order troops are all over the place and unless you drop your weapon, you're going to die very, very shortly."
There was silence for a moment, if the A.O.H soldier had paid attention to Azami's words, she didn't seem to care.
"The he…"
The soldier cut herself off in mid word and grunted in a short-lived pain as Adish shot her twice through the chest. She fell to the floor backwards and almost seemed to smile as her life faded away.
"Idiot." Azami said, returning her attention to the head in her hands.
To be continued. Also, do you think I should change the rating to R or leave it as it is?