Author's Note:
Hmmm . . . I wonder what the Wachowski brothers would do if they read this . . . or wait! Better yet, Warren Murphy and Richard Sapir, the authors of The Destroyer series!
Oh well, prepare for one long chapter with nothing but guns mixed with miles and miles of bravado – and yes, some of the scene's your about to witness might actually resemble clichés – and yes, this is an RO fic.
Also, I apologize in advance for any typo and grammar errors that might – or will – occur in this fic. This is just my second work after all.
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RAGNAROK ONLINE FANFIC
SOLDIER'S TASKBy: RAGNAR (that really is my name)
Chapter 04: PromisesIt's been ten months since Carol died. Somehow, John never got himself to grieve her death. The building in front of him towered all the way to the sky. Looking up, John noticed the enormous structure was swaying from the powerful winds that slammed on its walls from above.
The man he was looking for was on the top floor of this one hundred fifty six-story building. The man he was looking for was going to pay for the death of innocent people.
No amount of money – no army – will stand in his way.
John will exact his price on the man who ordered the restaurant's bombing. He will kill the man who caused Carol's death.
His mind ranted at him that he should call the Agency to back him up. But there was that part in the deepest corner that told him that he should do this alone. This was a personal matter.
The glass doors slid open as if to welcome him. The entire building was silent. There wasn't a single person in sight other than a lone security guard reading his porno magazine, rocking his chair back and forth, and grinning.
John's short hair was matted down to his brow with rain. His steel-toed boots made heavy sounds on the floor as he approached the reception desk. The guns he hid under his navy blue raincoat felt light compared to the thoughts that raced through his head.
Hearing the sound of John's boots hitting the marble floor, the security guard turned a serious face towards him. When he reached the desk, the guard leaned forward. "What's your business, sir?"
John kept his hands off his pockets. "I'm here to see Mr. Gonzales."
The security guard/receptionist replied, "He's not here. Do you have an appointment?"
John just went on ahead with practically no protest from the guard. "I'll just wait for him at his office."
Behind him, he heard the guard whisper into his radio "He's here. He's here."
With very little thought, John drew his .7 caliber Desert Eagle handgun and pointed it towards the man's face. With even less thought, he pulled the trigger without looking at the shock and terror that shone in the guard's eyes.
Brains plastered themselves to the wall with a loud splat. The dead body fell over backwards along with the now blood-soaked chair. Half of the man's head was now just empty space with smoke coming from what's left of his skull. The echo from the bang that came out of his gun faded away and was followed by the echo from the explosion that came from the bullet when it hit the guard's head.
John pushed the button to summon the elevator. He waited for a few seconds before hearing that familiar ding that signaled that the elevator had arrived. When the doors slid open, he was greeted by six men armed with Fn100 SMG's aimed straight at him.
As though by routine, John unconsciously pulled the pin off one of his napalm grenades and stealthily threw it into the box while sidestepping to the near wall to avoid the barrage of bullets.
After a moment of silence, there was an explosion followed by screams of men that burned to death. John made a mental note to remind him to thank Carl for bringing up the idea of giving the napalm an acid effect. It seemed that the special batch was actually able to eat through kevlar before reaching any skin. That way, the napalm's fiery effects weren't lessened.
When he walked towards the next row of elevators, all of them opened at the same time. A flood of armed men came out and pointed their guns at him.
This is becoming ridiculous.
John reached into a deeper part of his coat and pulled out his six-round grenade gun. Even while bullets drew closer and closer to him while he calmly circled the large group of men, he fired all six grenades in well-calculated locations.
The explosions shook the floor and the screams from the dying men filled the air. His rounds were loaded with napalm as well as gunpowder; fire blazed at the six spots that he fired upon. Dead men stared out into space through burnt faces, their skin roasted to a bright yet sickly red. Ignoring the gruesome sight around him, John dropped the grenade gun and walked towards the nearest working elevator.
The elevator doors slid closed, finally blocking the view of the carnage that he caused.
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Marus needed only one glance at the burned bodies around him to know that John finally brought himself to use Carl's incendiaries. He let go of his Cloaking ability and walked towards the reception desk.
Judging from the way the security guard died, Marus concluded that John also used explosive bullets as well. Interesting, John never struck him as the type to use undue force.
Marus jumped to the guard's side of the desk, tapped a few commands on the keyboard, and looked at the words that came out on screen.
Marus clicked his tongue loudly when he read the result that told him that there wasn't a Nathan Wong in their database. After a few seconds of thought, he typed in another command.
"Damn!" Marus practically cracked the screen open with his fist. Apparently, his hunch was wrong about the place. The building was supposed to be a secret bank for most of the city's more . . . renowned . . . terror cells. He knew that Nathan was able to collect an incredible amount of money, Marus was just hoping that his brother would be careless enough to deposit even a little bit of that here.
Suddenly, the floor at the center of the room slid open. There was a heavy mechanical sound like that of an elevator. A few seconds later, Marus was shocked to find that he was about to face an eight-foot-high mobile weapons platform – in short, a spider mech with a cannon on top and two gattling guns on the side.
Great . . . the last thing he needed right now was an encounter. Most especially, with this mechanical monster.
The guns started to whirl. With no hesitation, Marus Cloaked himself and ran towards the walker. At first, the mech was noticeably confused at his disappearing act, until the mech's AI commanded it to switch to thermal vision.
Marus was forced to run a semi-circle around the mech so as to avoid the guns.
The path behind him was strewn with large craters marking the spots where the high-caliber bullets made contact.
Before the spider mech could even start to turn around, Marus drew his two handguns and flipped a switch on the sides of both weapons. In the blink of an eye, the two one-foot long handguns turned into railguns.
It took about a fraction of a second for him to charge up the magnets and another half-second for him to jump back. Marus pulled the triggers and the bullets zipped right through almost every part of the mech.
The spider recoiled from every hit of a slug. Marus' every shot made sure that the thing wouldn't be able to fire that cannon on its back. The dents on the robot's alloy were disproportionate to the size of the bullets that he sent its way.
As soon as Marus' feet found the ground after his jump, he aimed for the thing's fuel cell located right inside its "belly". Time seemed to slow down for him when he carefully calculated the approximate location of the mech's power source. The fuel cell was small – almost the size of a fist.
Somehow, a part of Marus believed that he could do it. Another part of him ranted that he was insane.
The first part, he listened to. Marus smothered the other part into the deepest recesses of his mind.
He counted the rounds that he fired just moments ago. He had only five shots left.
The mech was slowly recovering from his barrage. Its gattling guns started to whirl again. The thing's legs were covering its belly, disrupting his aim.
Screw it all!
Marus fired all five rounds. The bullets went out of his handguns in white streams.
The first bullet hit a leg on the joint. A shower of metal, wires, and fluid burst out of the thing's severed limb.
The second bullet slammed on the mech's right gattling gun. The impact shook loose a gear inside the gun's firing mechanism. Without the proper rhythm, the gun exploded when it fired ahead of schedule.
The third bullet made a big dent on the mech's lower belly.
The fourth bullet took out another leg, making another violent display of machine fluids.
The final bullet miraculously went between the joints of the legs, slammed straight through the thing's belly, and exited out the other side.
Marus expected a big explosion that usually occurs in the movies when some mechanical monster was defeated. He even readied his coat to shield himself from a half-expected glare of a raging inferno.
Instead, the spider mech just shut down. There was a loud crash of metal when the mech simply fell to the ground with absolutely nothing to power it.
Marus let the two smoking handguns transform back into their original states and replaced them in their holsters.
There was nothing else for him to do here. It was time to leave John in his own business.
The shadows in the room spiraled to the spot where he stood and swallowed him.
When he left, there was only the unpowered shell of a wrecked spider mech, the burnt remains of mercenary bodyguards and terrorists, and an icy chill that seemed to persist despite the napalm's flames.
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It was nice of Gonzales to leave John a welcome party. There were approximately fifty men that popped out of the pillars when he walked out of the elevator on the top floor.
He didn't have the time to draw his weapons when the entire corridor leading to Gonzales' office was filled with the spray of marble and concrete dust. Bullets zipped right past him and whittling down the pillar that he used for cover.
John pulled out two grenades and blindly threw them behind him. He waited five seconds before there were panicked shouts of frightened men.
Idiots, he didn't pull the pins on those things. John came out into the open with his two Desert Eagles blazing. He started with the men that didn't drop on the gound. Each man toppled over violently when the slugs made contact with their heads and exploded. The mercenaries that weren't hit were obviously terrified at the kind of ammunition he was using.
It was a sensible reaction. No one wants to have their heads blown up from the inside by a half inch thick bullet loaded with gunpowder.
When he ran out of bullets and before the other men could even have the chance to pull their guns at him, John threw another grenade at them. This time, the pin was pulled.
The men laughed, thinking that he was bluffing. John ducked into another pillar when the five seconds were up. More dirt and dust was shaken loose from the ruined walls when three consecutive explosions rocked the floor.
When he emerged from the pillar, no one was left alive.
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Ervin Gonzales can scarcely believe he was reduced to simpering in a corner of his office. He can hardly find any comfort in his 12-gauge shotgun that he hugged a little too tightly. Ervin knew that the guards that he posted outside were dead.
Damn vigilante! Why won't he leave him alone?!
The silence from the outside turned out to be even more terrifying. But when he heard that something was being done to his barricaded door, Ervin's heart beat so fast that he thought he might have a heart attack.
With every heartbeat, he couldn't help but feel that something terrible was going to happen to him tonight.
Then, the door exploded.
Ervin was an expert with bombs before coming into the business of being a banker. His door was rigged with C4, and from the way those flames wouldn't stop burning on the floor, he assumed that that there was even napalm involved.
The smoke from the flames was so black that he couldn't see anything beyond the door. The fire's oppressive heat created beads of sweat on his forehead that joined the sweat that was caused by his fear.
A man's silhouette was outlined by the inferno. The person that emerged was wearing a long blue raincoat and was holding the biggest handgun he ever saw. From the way he walked through the fire, Ervin felt like he was looking at a demon coming out from hell.
A demon that was surely going to kill him.
The man strode slowly towards him. Ervin can't find the strength to lift his shotgun because of sheer terror. The man's eyes – although remarkably plain-looking along with the rest of him – reflected one single emotion directed at Ervin.
Hate.
Ervin tried his best to back away from the stranger. The man pointed his weapon straight at him. He might have wept if panic hadn't made him forget how to shed tears.
"Ervin Gonzales?" the man asked. The way he spoke sent even more waves of terror up Ervin's spine.
Despite all his efforts, Ervin nodded.
How did the man do that?!
Ervin panicked even more when he realized that the stranger could make him do things that he didn't want to do. Like make him reveal his identity.
Ervin gathered all that was left of his courage and spoke, "Who the hell are you?!"
He screamed when the man fired his gun. He screamed even louder when his left shoulder exploded into a shower of blood, bone, and shredded skin.
"Me?" the man said, "I'm the little boy that was crushed to death when the hotel that he an his parents were staying in collapsed when you blew up its foundation five years ago."
Another shot practically severed his right arm.
"I'm that fifteen-year-old girl that your men raped, beaten, and butchered so as to make a 'statement' for your useless cause two years ago."
The stranger shot again, this time, on Ervin's right thigh. The bullet exploded when it hit the bone. Even more blood splattered across the floor and the pain was incredible.
"I'm the woman that was celebrating her twenty-first birthday with her husband before you doused the restaurant with napalm and sent a car bomb to finish the job."
The man seemed to be a touch more empathic on that last statement.
"Do you know that she died slowly, Gonzles?" the man grabbed Ervin by the collar and dragged him to the nearest window. The man then slammed his gun handle on the glass. The cold wind from this altitude mercilessly burst through the shattered window.
"What do you think the husband must have felt when his wife was burning away before his eyes?"
The shock of losing too much blood was getting to him. Somehow though, the man did something to his mind that warded off the numbness. The pain from his wounds was starting to grow excruciating.
Ervin was dangling in the air. The stranger must be strong; he was only using one hand to hold him by the neck. Or maybe it was because he was missing three limbs that he was so light at the moment.
The man gripped his throat tighter when he spoke. Ervin couldn't breath anymore. "I am the man who made a promise to all the people that were killed by people like you."
"I promised that I will wipe each and every one of you from the face of this earth."
Ervin slipped into unconsciousness.
The darkness receded and Ervin was greeted by the wind on his face. He was glad that it was all just a dream. He was glad that – wind in his bedroom? – wait!
Then, his focus returned.
He realized what that strange black object that was growing bigger and bigger each moment.
It was roof of his stretch limousine that he parked just this morning on the driveway.