Enjoy...
: : The High Road of Honor : :
"If one doesn't fight for his freedom, there is no point to living. If one fights too hard for his freedom, there will be no one left to enjoy it. A wise leader will know where the balance lies." -'Chaos, Order, and Free Will' by Sage Harpuia
The screen was already filling with threat indicators from the north, and more of them arrived with each minute that passed. The sensor terminal was having difficulty labeling each of these dangers, choosing instead to give an estimate of the enemy's strength of force based on energy readings. The processing power of the portable unit was struggling to calculate the variables being thrown at it. Despite that, it shone a single large number to indicate the coming power.
It took little to mistake the signature of an approaching Patheon Phalanx.
"What can we do?" Cale asked, staring at the screen with an annoyed look.
Shawl, from her post at the terminal, only moaned in despair. "Do? So far, the only thing we've done is run from them, and look where it got us. They'll overrun this position in twenty minutes at this rate."
"So you think this is a good place to make our stand?"
"It's better than anything else." Shawl snorted. "Figures, doesn't it?"
Cale nodded his agreement.
"What about Miss Ciel?" Another person asked.
He looked to the speaker. "Milan's taking her to the spot right now. She'll be safe so long as he's there."
The civilian nodded, holding his issued auto-rifle as if it meant the difference between living and dying. Of course that was fact, though, since the only solution to the dilemma facing them all was either killing others to win or to be killed and lost. Nearly a hundred reploids, all armed with the cheaply made rifles and green armored fatigues, were the difference between life and death for everyone. Five times as many others all huddled in the nooks and crannies of the building they selected to hide in. For them, there was only the agony of being useless in battle to think of.
"How safe can she be?" Trant suddenly growled, brows furrowed in pent in frustration. The one-time security reploid was growing short of temper, matched only by his utter lack of faith in their odds of survival. "We've barely been able to slow those Arcadians down. All our other outposts have been attacked, and this one will go, too! It was a mistake, trusting some rumor about a legendary warrior. Look where it got us!"
"You think we're doomed?" Shawl turned in her chair to look the burly reploid in the eyes. "I believe. Ciel will come back with the legendary hunter Zero at her side and bring Neo-Arcadia down once and for all!"
He gathered himself up, hoping not to look weak in his resolve. "Pah! It's all just a fairy tale! We'll die sitting here, and waiting for some savior to sweep away the enemy is just a daydream! I say we leave this place and head west, somewhere that Neo-Arcadia doesn't have so much influence."
"That's a waste of time, Trant, and you know it." Cale stepped up to the man, adding his own glaring blue eyes to the argument. "Neo-Arcadia has people all over the world, you just can't just run from them. We've got to think of something, and looking for the legendary hunter is the best thing we've got now!"
"Cale is right, we've got to trust Miss Ciel and buy her time."
"At the cost of our own lives! What's the point of fighting if we'll just die!" He turned to face the general population of green clad reploids at the walls. "Think about it! Why should we let ourselves be killed for some legend that isn't true?"
Cale grabbed Trant's vest and spun him around. "Keep quiet, fool! I won't have you scaring the others, we know what the risks are looking for him."
Trant remained silent, glowering.
"Shawl, let me know when the enemy gets within five hundred meters of this location, okay?"
"Sure thing."
Cale tugged Trant towards a crack in the wall of their hideaway. "Come on."
The two reploids passed through the crack and into the brisk air of the city ruins. Had they really been able to cross the deserts and wastelands to arrive here? Neo-Arcadia itself seemed so far away, the tilting ruins of an abandoned metropolis all that was close by. Clouds hung low overhead and the winds howled like a symphony of agony for those hiding inside. Free of prying eyes, Trant shoved Cale aside and stood ready for anything to come.
"What is it? Something you want to tell me?"
Cale crossed his arms. "I don't like this any better than you do, but we've been given a job to do. If we can just delay the patheons for even a few minutes, it will be enough for Miss Ciel to find the legendary hero. We all swore to protect her. Do you want to just give up on that? Neo-Arcadia will slaughter us regardless of what we do here."
"Then it is hopeless!" He barked.
"No, it isn't. What we do here is for the sake of all the other reploids in hiding around the world that live in fear. If we can find the hero, then he can defeat Neo-Arcadia and save all reploid-kind from this genocidal war!"
"But it's hopeless! Neo-Arcadia has an entire Patheon Phalanx coming for us! How can we slow that down?"
"By doing our best and working together as a team. It's our only chance."
Trant huffed, staring out to the distance. "I...just don't want to die like this. I don't want to be fighting against impossible odds with only a rumor to justify it. I just can't put any hope in it."
Cale was about to snap another remark at the reploid, but the expression on his face halted the words. He looked angry as ever, but his eyes seemed to glimmer with worry and fear. Everyone else had that same look, but his was far worse than any other. It was the same look in his comrades in the city, at Pyrric Square and the red crossroads.
'He's already dead inside.'
The blue eyed reploid approached Trant and put a hand on his shoulder. "I understand."
"Liar."
Cale smirked at his forced humor. "Alright, maybe I don't, but I'm not without feelings. If you want to go, then go. I won't hold you here against your will. Maybe you'll survive and be able to help Ciel when she returns, with or without the hero."
That made Trant quake, his eyes peering back towards the reploid whom he had only known for three days since the running started. The person who had rallied against fear and brought them together like an extended family, the person who fought harder than any for the sake of freedom, and now he said to leave?
"Leave?" Trant croaked.
A nod.
"...You won't think ill of me?"
Cale shook his head, stepping back. "You've already proven yourself braver than most men I know by sticking with us thing long. Going now, it might as well be for the better."
Trant hesitated for a long while, mulling over the choices presented to him. Cale was hoping that the reploid would stick with them, since they needed all the men they could muster. If he chose to leave, then they would have to do without. He looked back to the distant city, as if something within drew his eyes with the promise of freedom and life.
'Cale, they're coming.' Shawl radioed to his headset. 'Sensors picked up a strong energy reading at the front. It's trouble for sure, more than we thought.'
'Okay, get everyone stationed. I'll be there soon.' He replied in the privacy of peer-to-peer communication.
Trant turned around and hefted his support rifle, heavy with the weight of adamantium tipped munitions. Cale took it respectfully despite his sadness. Without a word said, the burly reploid began a brisk walk towards a flood channel in the east, a route of potential safety. Cale sighed, turning for the building and his destined meeting with the approaching drone swarm.
"Where's Trant?" Shawl asked when he came into the main room.
"He's gone."
"Gone? He ran off?"
"Don't be upset, he wouldn't have been any help in his condition. How's the line?"
"Everyone is set. Scouts report the numbers to be in the hundred, and there's a division of Golems hanging around the rear."
That struck a chord in Cale, one that nearly dashed his own hopes of living through the day. Golems were awesome weapons, so powerful that no one in the resistance had ever seen one destroyed in battle. The patheon units could be easily duped into traps and ambushes, but not so with the armor clad giants. Pin them down as you would, but no force could match their raw strength or the cyan laser mounted in their 'head'.
"Plus there's that other reading. We can't analyze it, and I haven't got a visual on it, either." Shawl turned the sensor relay off and began packing it. "What do you think it is?"
"It could be anything."
"One of the...Guardians?"
Another nervous quiver ran up his spine. "Let's hope not."
Closing the sensor, she slung it on her back and drew out a rare mark three plasma buster. Since she was one of the few who were given the honorary titles of a leader, they offered her the powerful weapon as a real safeguard against the enemy. They would be needing her soon to help stave the assault off. "Well, even if it is, the only thing we can do is try, right?"
He grinned and patted her shoulder. "No, we will do it and win. Bring the assault and heavy arms teams to the left flank and keep them hidden. We'll draw the enemy to the right and strike at the Golems as they pass by."
"Right!" She ran for the walls, bounding over a fallen concrete block and gone from view.
Cale opened a radio line to the members of his resistance. 'Attention, men! The enemy is almost within range of our weapons. Do everything you can to draw the enemy towards the right! Remember, don't think you'll be safe in this place. Keep on the move and draw them out as far as you can. Group up on them and keep them confused! I believe in each of you and wish you the best of luck!'
With that last line, he cut the radio link and moved to his spot at the near tip of their defensive line. Making use of his improved optical eyes, he focused on the front with binocular-like precision and saw the most feared sight of the modern world: Patheons, hundreds if not thousands of them, all marching towards his men without fear or regret. Blue bodies and large red eyes, modeled after the Neo-Arcadian leader Master X, clumped together thick enough to be a wave cresting on the beach. The sight soured what courage was left to him.
'I think I'd have gone with you, Trant, if I didn't have faith in Miss Ciel's plan. Better to take some of them with me when I die.'
Suddenly his sight fell onto a green figure among all the blue, and he stopped on it and focused in. Fear roiled in his gut as he recognized the thin and angular form of the green guardian, General Harpuia. Swords drawn, hovering above his men, he seemed a misplaced member of the ranks. His collected and smug expression told that he was more then ready to add his weight into the fight.
"Attention mavericks!" His voice boomed over the landscape, echoing eerily along the building grounds. "You have been surrounded and are without hope! Throw down your weapons and submit to the rightful authority of Master X!"
Cale was tempted to reply, but an unfamiliar voice came before his.
"To hell with your authority! We have our rights, you can't just label us mavericks without cause!"
"The fact that you defy my master only shows that you are truly twisted creations unfit for our utopia!" Harpuia retorted. "I say again, surrender and come with us peacefully. If you do so, I will ensure that none of you are harmed."
"If this is your idea of Arcadia, then we'd rather roast in Pandemonium!" The same voice cried.
Harpuia seemed to be cross with the choice, but he raised an arm and waved his men forward. "So be it."
Cale watched as the enemy came closer and closer, until at one hundred meters they raised their arms and brought their semi-auto plasma cannons into action. The green General was already a blur in the air, closing to make use of his arsenal. As hundreds of yellowish balls of superheated gas came rushing for their positions, he opened fire with his rifle and adamantium cartridges. Many of his men carried conventional bullets of lead, nearly worthless against the neo-titanium armor of the Pantheon soldier.
His worry only lasted as long as it took the fire to reach from one side to the other.
>>>
"Oh!"
"Hmm? What is it?"
"Zero, look! There are reploids over there!"
The red hunter looked to where the nervous scientist pointed, noting a few green bodies lying across the rubble of a demolished building. Quick scans showed that none of them were alive.
"They are dead." He stated.
"But still...! We should check for any survivors, they might need help." She jogged towards the rubble, pushing aside her fears in the hope of finding someone alive.
Zero followed her, checking the area for enemies and to understand what happened. Taking a visual account of the surroundings for their new home was tedious, more so with the discovery of bodies. Obviously, there was a fight between resistance reploids and the Patheons here, and it seemed that it went badly for them. There were stones cut with precision marks, melted and evidence of heavy weapons use. A battered golden hand lying in the debris told that it was Golems that raided the building, part of a larger force.
"Zero!" Ciel's voice carried over the winds easily in the silence. When he arrived at her side, she was trying to help a reploid to lean up from his place on the ground. His lower body was smashed, an arm bent awkwardly behind him and his face bloodied.
"Zero, he's still alive!" She exclaimed. "Can you carry him? He needs help right away. I'll call Cerveau."
While she fumbled with a portable communicator, Zero carefully picked up the fallen reploid. He was looking towards the distance with pale blue eyes, barely able to stay conscious. Those eyes then looked to Zero, and he seemed to liven up at the sight of the red hunter.
"W-Who are you?" He wheezed.
"My name is Zero."
"Z-zer...? Ah-h, I see..." The reploid smiled, eyes wavering. "Then there really is...hope..."
At that, the reploid closed his blue eyes with the satisfaction of knowing his efforts hadn't gone to waste.