ZOIDS:
Eisen Dragoons
Chapter 5: Devastator
The Commissioner sighed. The only time he in what was unanimously called the 'debriefing room', which was in fact an auditorium deep inside the ZBC's command Ultrasaurus, was when they tried to make the Backdraft fight fair. Needless to say that didn't go over very well. Despite the fact that the Blitz team won, it had only proved that the Backdraft would do anything to win. During that fight, all of his best officers had sat in the seats in the room and watched, as they were doing now.
Hancock waited until every one had settled down before flipping a small switch on the panel in front of him. The four doors at the back of the auditorium slammed shut and locked with four satisfying 'clicks'. He cleared his throat before talking.
"What you are about to see is classified information, you are not to discuss this outside of this room." On the screen behind him, the words "TOP SECRET: EYES ONLY" flashed on.
"Precisely one week ago, our facility in the capital city was attacked; as you know, half the facility was leveled, over a thousand enemy zoids engaged our forces, and a mysterious vanishing whale king was involved in the attack."
"The information that was acquired from the count not only details what hit us but whom as well." As the Commissioner spoke, the screen behind him changed. The words were replaced by four pictures of men from the shoulders up.
"These men are the ones responsible for the attack," as he spoke, the picture in the upper left hand corner expanded to fill the entire screen "This is their ring leader, known only as 'Nemesis', he is the master mind behind numerous assassination attempts on both the president and the emperor, and terrorist activity here in Europa. Other than that, we know very little about him."
The picture returned to its normal size and position on the screen as the picture in the upper right hand corner filled the screen.
"The next two appear to be Nemesis's right hand men; we have a little more info on them than we do Nemesis himself. This man, named Jason Butz, military rank Master Chief, is the self named 'Red Baron', is their air and high speed ground combat specialist. If the counts' sources are correct, he is in fact a genetically engineered super solider designed to endure higher G's than any normal human and he serves Nemesis unquestionable."
A new picture filled the screen.
"His second man, Korgoth, aka 'silent warrior', is their assault specialist. Along with Nemesis and Chief Butz, they make a deadly team, for Korgoth not only has heavy firepower at his disposal, but he knows how to use it as well. From what my sources tell us, he is the leader of a fanatical group calling themselves 'The Word of Blake' who are the ones who made the assassination attempts."
"The next person we have the most information on due to the fact that he used to work for us." As the Commissioner spoke, Korgoths' picture was replaced by that of a familiar masked face.
"Adam Monroe, aka Red X, used to be one of our elite agents until…" the Commissioner paused, for one of his officers had raised their hand.
"Yes Colonel Paris?"
"Sir, what zoids do they use?"
"I was going to get to that in a moment, so please hold all your questions until later." As the colonel sat down, the Commissioner continued.
"As I was saying, he was one of our elite agents until an information mishap caused us to believe that he had died. When he tried to report in he discovered our mishap and jumped to the conclusion that we sent him on a suicide mission just so we could get his zoid. He was trained in hand-to-hand combat and stealth techniques before going AWOL, and he is an excellent liger pilot."
The Commissioner paused to take a drink of water, it wasn't that he didn't like making long speeches; he did them all the time, it was because he was very nervous. Unlike his officers, he had read all of the data files on Nemesis. The man was not only a mastermind, but a master strategist as well, and if the count was correct, the man had an unhealthy fascination with the Genosaurer, so it was obvious what zoid Nemesis would pilot.
"We'll start with Red X, as I have told you; he is an excellent liger pilot." A new image flashed up on screen. "Along with the fact that he was piloting his blade liger along side the stolen Genosaurers, we can expect him to be using it in the fight."
The screenshot of Red X's Liger was replaced be one of a heavily modified, and very over gunned, Elephander. "Korgoths' zoid, as far as we know, started out as a command Elephander, until he heavily customized and modified it. We are unsure of the modifications, but it is clear from what you can see that he has replaced the dorsal cannons with an assault gattling unit and has added a medium ranged buster cannon to either side, giving this zoid a lethal amount of firepower."
"The Red Baron is the only member to use two zoids. For ground based combat, he employs a speed enhanced Lighting Saix, and for air combat, his preferred arena, he uses a red stealth type Storm Sworder. We are unsure if it is his personal skill, or if his zoid is modified, but so far he is undefeated in air-to-air combat."
The Commissioner sighed, now to tell them about Nemesis.
"Their leader, Nemesis, according to the counts sources, has what could be considered an unhealthy fascination with the Genosaurer, so it is no wonder why he stole the two Genosaurers, one to use in combat, and the other to keep as a trophy."
Yet again, the Commissioner sighed, to him this debriefing was taking more out of him than the Backdrafts attack during the Royal Cup tournament. He remembered when he first read the files; he went weak in the knees. Most of the information was beyond belief; the one thought that ran through his mind at the time was 'How could they create this monster?', but now that he was over the shock, it was time to inform his officers.
"Now, the vessel that attacked the Capital city facility is unlike anything we have ever seen." As he spoke, the pictures vanished and were replaced by a large 3-D model of what appeared to be a super sized whale king.
"Name: Devastator, Type: Ultimate Whale King." He pressed a button on the control panel and a scale model of an Ultrasaurus appeared next to the model of the Devastator. Usually, a normal whale king wasn't bigger than an Ultrasaurus, but compared to Devastator, the Ultrasaurus seemed small. When it appeared, there was a chorus of gasps and double-takes, most of the officers couldn't believe Devastators sheer size.
"Impossible! How could the Backdraft construct something so massive without our noticing it!" bellowed a young and upbeat officer that Commissioner Hancock had taken a particular disliking to. "Why didn't our satellites see this monster Commissioner!"
"Because she was constructed on the Eastern Continent, corporal," replied commissioner, his face showing no emotion. The corporal sat down thunder struck. The eastern continent was thought to be a wasteland, electromagnetic storms that circled the continent prevented zoids from getting close, only the heartiest of transports could fly their way through the storms. Even the judge satellites weren't immune to the effects of the storm. Whenever they pointed their cameras at the deranged landmass, all they got was electronic interference.
The commissioner cleared his throat and brought the officers out of their reverie. He could see the shocked looks on their faces, and he wasn't surprised. With its' armor and size, she could carry an entire army large enough to take on either Helic or Guylos. But that wasn't the worst of it.
"Devastator is massive; she is a kilometer in length, and 240 meters tall." As he spoke, a model of the Death Saurer was overlaid on the hologram of the Devastator. It was surprising to see that not only did it fit comfortably, but with enough room to spare to fit a second Death Saurer right next to it.
"As of now, only two parts of the Devastator remain unknown, a large portion beneath the skin, and the nose gun, which seems to run along the ships spine." The skin of the model pulled away, reviling a wireframe/blueprint type model. The aforementioned spaces flashed white to show the extent of the unknown area.
"Now on to what we do know; in order to power this massive craft, Nemesis had a very large and highly experimental plasma-based fusion reactor installed, it takes up the entire tail section and supplies massive amounts of power for Devastator." The other sections of the model stopped flashing as the tail section was highlighted to show the size of the reactor.
"The reactor powers many devices, including an extremely advanced cloaking device known only as a 'void-sig' and is capable of hiding Devastator from even our most advanced sensors. Her reactor also feeds into an incredibly powerful energy shield that, until struck, is invisible. Its strength is unknown, but with the reactor power backing it up, it may be stronger than the shields on board the Ultrasaurus."
"Now on to her arsenal: due to her size, she carries as the main gun six of the 'Colossus' type 360 mm cannons carried on the Ultrasaurus. Each gun is mounted in a turret capable of rotating 360°, can elevate 90°, and the two guns mounted along the rear spine are capable of depressing 45°, giving her all around firepower. The only place the guns can't target is directly below the Devastator."
"The triple barreled gun that usually exists below the bridge it replaced with enough missile batteries to destroy three full whale kings worth of Zabats, making any attempt to attack from the air suicide."
The Commissioner paused to take a drink of water; his throat was getting dry from all the talking. He opened his mouth to speak when a sudden and frantic knocking at one of the auditorium doors was heard. Disabling the hologram projector and plucking the counts' data rod from its slot, he disabled the locks. As the door opened, a rather crazed looking lieutenant tumbled in.
"Commissioner Hancock, Ultrasaurus three has detected the unknown vessel sir! They're waiting for you in the bridge!"
The Commissioner was confused, 'they found Devastator? Nemesis wouldn't be that careless, unless…' the Commissioners face lost its color as the realization hit him like a bucket of cold water 'unless he wanted to be found!'
Hancock barked "Dismissed!" to the officers before running out of the auditorium at a speed that would of put the lightning saix to shame. He literally punched the button for the command deck once he got in the lift. Known only to him and his officers, Ultrasaurus three was walking straight into a trap.
It was a well-known fact that the original Ultrasaurus that carried the Empires gravity gun was still out in the desert on the Dagen peninsula and the Ultrasauruses used by both the Republic and ZBC were in fact clones of the original and very expensive clones at that. The ZBC had ten Ultrasaurus, while the Republic had one and a recently resurrected Mad Thunder. It was also known that the facilities and equipment used to clone the Ultrasauruses were no longer available, so if they lost an Ultrasaurus, that was it, game over, they wouldn't be able to clone another one.
The commissioner impatiently taped his foot as the lift slowly crawled toward the bridge. 'Damn this elevator music!' he thought as lift neared the bridge, for the singsong cheery music was driving him insane. The lift dinged as it reached the command deck and the doors opened.
Walking into the command center, he barked "Report!"
His second in command saluted before speaking. "Sir, Ultrasaurus three reported in the moment Devastator appeared on her scanners, she's currently in range to use her missile batteries in addition to her guns. It's on screen sir and I have informed the commander to follow our orders to the letter."
Pleased with his seconds' quick response to this emergency, he sat down in his chair and watched the live feed from ultra-3. The display currently showed what was being seen from the camera mounted on ulta-3s nose, which just so happened to be the shimmering outline of Devastator.
"Any contact on the com channels?" the Commissioner asked
"They've been playing this one song on a loop sir, after a while it gets quite annoying."
"Let me hear."
With the flip of a switch, a very loud and (to the Commissioner) very familiar song came on over the speakers in the. The song was Trapts Headstrong.
Circling your, circling your, circling your head,
Contemplating everything you ever said
Now I see the truth, I got doubt
A different motive in your eyes and now I'm out
See you later
I see your fantasy, You want to make it a reality paved in gold
See inside, Inside of our heads (yeah)
Well now that's over
I see your motives inside, decisions to hide
Back off I'll take you on
Headstrong to take on anyone
I know that you are wrong
Headstrong we're Headstrong
Back off I'll take you on
Headstrong to take on anyone
I know that you are wrong and this is not where you belong
I can't give everything away
I won't give everything away
Conclusions manifest, your first impressions got to be your very best
I see you're full of shit, and that's alright
That's how you play, I guess you'll get through every night
Well now that's over
I see your fantasy, you want to make it a reality paved in gold
See inside, inside of our heads (yeah) Well now that's over
I see your motives inside, decisions to hide
Back off I'll take you on
Headstrong to take on anyone
I know that you are wrong
Headstrong we're Headstrong
Back off I'll take you on
Headstrong to take on anyone
I know that you are wrong and this is not where you belong
I can't give everything away
I won't give everything away
I know, I know all about x3
I know, I know all about your motives inside, and your decision to hide
Back off I'll take you on
Headstrong to take on anyone
I know that you are wrong
Headstrong we're Headstrong
Back off I'll take you on
Headstrong to take on anyone
I know that you are wrong and this is not where you belong
I can't give everything away
I won't give everything away
"Commander, open up any com channel with Devastator that hasn't been blocked." After punching a few keys, the commander nodded to signal that the Commissioner was on.
"Nemesis, this is Commissioner Hancock of the ZBC, disable your cloak and lower your shield or I'll be forced to fire!" The Commissioner wasn't stupid; Nemesis wouldn't let himself be found so easily unless he had a reason, and since ultra-3 had her guns pointed at Devastator, she would be able to defend herself if Nemesis tried to pull a fast one.
Three seconds after the commissioner sent his message, the music stopped, not because of his communications officers, but because it was cut off at the source. Two more seconds passed before…
"Sir we're being hailed by the unknown vessel!"
The Commissioner barked "ON SCREEN!"
The scene that met the Commissioner was surprising to say the least. For a whale king of that size, he had expected the bridge to be, well bigger than what he was seeing. The bridge of the Devastator was shaped like a pentagon; the two back walls were covered in displays and raised slightly higher than the front half of the bridge. Each display was manned by people in what appeared to be tan combat suits that were decorated by red tiger stripes on their sides. A smooth, curving rail separated the middle part of the raised section, preventing people from falling into the commanders' chair. Placed very close to the screen on both the right and left sides were silver colored counsels that were manned by Red X and Silent warrior. The Red Baron, however, was manning what appeared to be a piloting station that was sunk into the floor. But what drew everyone's attention was the commanders' chair, situated about five feet behind the Red Baron, and looked like a chair ripped out of Star Trek, and sitting in it was no other than Nemesis.
It only took a second before his face broke out into a grin.
"Ah, Commissioner, I was hoping we would be able to meet one of these days…"
"Cut the kiss-ass, Nemesis, I told you to de-cloak and surrender now!"
The insults didn't even seem to faze Nemesis. Instead, he turned to a small cylinder standing next to his chair and said "Anubis?" Immediately, the god shaped hologram appeared and replied "Yes Master?"
Nemesis grinned as he looked back at the Commissioner. "Let's give our new friends the 'usual' welcome."
The Commissioner knew what the 'usual' greeting was among the backdraft, for it involved shooting at each other.
"ULTRA-3, SHEILDS UP NOW!"
Seconds later, a multi colored dome of protective energy enveloped the Ultrasaurus just as Devastator began to de-cloaking like something out of Star Trek. The moment she fully de-cloaked, the guns on her back and left side turned to face the Ultrasaurus and fired. The shots impacted to little effect on the shield.
The Commissioner's second cleared his throat before speaking.
"Sir, Ulta-3 managed to launch a Pteras before activating her shield; I suggest that witness the battle from the Pteras' point of view sir."
"Do so" was the Commissioners only reply.
In a flash, the screen changed form the view behind the shield to that of the view from the Pteras. Many of the crewmen in the command center gasped as they saw how truly massive Devastator was. As the Commissioner watched, Devastators guns returned to their normal positions, and began turning toward the Ultrasaurus!
The Radio crackled to life.
"Now Commissioner, a demonstration of Devastators power." It was Nemesis
The Commissioner acted in a flash, grabbing the microphone in front of him, he bellowed "ULTRA-3, RETURN FIRE NOW!"
Ultra-3's shields dropped as her guns thundered and missile launchers screamed. The shots and missiles impacted the shield to little effect, other than the shield glowing a bright golden color were struck for a few moments before fading. As Ultra-3 continued to fire, the Commissioner watched the orange nose cap start to pull back, reviling the weapon concealed beneath it.
The Commissioner barked into the microphone "Cease fire, shields up!" The Ultrasaurus responded the instant the last shot was fired, reengaging the protective dome of energy. 'That should stop him' the Commissioner thought with a grin. Unfortunately, the sound of Nemesis's voice coming over the radio ruined his good mood
"Our first demonstration, Commissioner, will be of a weapon known as a 'shield breaker' which was specifically designed to neutralize the most powerful shields, even those of the Ultrasaurus."
As the Commissioner watched, the muzzle of the gun started to glow orange, like the hybrid cannons when they charged up before firing. Moments later, the massive gun unleashed its destructive payload. The bolt of energy was huge, punching through the shield and shattering it like so many pieces of glass. The recoil from the gun was massive as well, causing the vessel to suddenly jump back.
"Sir! Ultra-3 reports massive overloads on all systems, her fire control circuits and shield emitters have been fried as well!"
The Commissioner shivered, not only was Ultra-3 without her greatest defense, but without use of her fire control circuits, she couldn't fight back as well.
"Now Commissioner, a true demonstration of Devastators fire power!"
Devastator turned, presenting her left side to Ultra-3. It was then that the Commissioner noticed that the guns on her left side had rotated until they were perpendicular to her hull. As he looked, he noticed something odd; starting at the nose, and slowly moving back, the armor was slowing changing color from the stealthy black to a flat steel grey.
"Corporal, magnify the surface of Devastators armor now!"
A detailed image of Devastators armored surface appeared just in time to see the armor plates begin to open up like doors; after fully opening they were pulled into slots to revel an uncountable number of tube like devices mounted in pairs. The Commissioner felt his blood run cold as the realization hit him; they weren't tubes, they were gun barrels! The guns rotated out of the side of the vessel to point at their target, the defenseless and vulnerable Ultrasaurus three.
Commissioner Hancock managed to mutter the command to pull the camera back, which did to show both the Ultrasaurus and Devastator when Nemesis uttered five words that would haunt the commissioner till the day de died.
"Bridge to gunners: Open Fire!"
And with that, Devastator unleashed living hell upon Ultra-3. To the Commissioner, Devastator vanished as she unleashed wave after wav of bright yellow laser fire that was concentrated on the Ultrasaurus. Individually, the lasers were weak, but Devastator made up for that in sheer quantity of lasers it threw at the Ultrasaurus. To those watching, it seemed as though night had become day and Devastator was the new sun throwing thousands of beams at one target. The Commissioner was sure those in the command center had died went the first wave of lasers hit. Thirty seconds later, Devastator added her 360mm guns to the mix, blowing off huge pieces and chunks of armor. The moment the shots hit, Ultra-3 let loose a scream that shook everybody to the core. In six minutes, Devastator stopped firing, for there was nothing left of Ultra-3 worth blasting, not a piece of wreckage was left that was bigger than a man was tall.
The Commissioner fell back in his seat, pure terror flowing through his veins, how could one man unleash so much destruction? As the Commissioner fell into his seat, the screen reverted to that of Devastators Bridge. Nemesis looked at the Commissioner with an icy gaze, showing no mercy.
To Korgoth, he said "Fire two missiles at that Pteras after I'm done speaking with the Commissioner."
Nemesis approached the screen, as if to try and fill the Command Ultrasaurus with his presence.
"I have some demands, Commissioner, and they will be met otherwise I will declare open season on civilians."
The Commissioner could tell by Nemesis's straight face that he was not joking, and with Devastators capabilities, deifying him wouldn't be a wise idea.
"W-what are your d-demands?"
"First, you will disable the weapons on all your judge satellites and yes, even your super-satellite, for if even one blast hits Devastator, then I will carry out my threat. Two, when I take over a sanctioned battle you will not attempt to interfere in any way, shape or form. And three; don't even think about trying a bait-and-switch like you did with the Blitz and Champ teams, I'm not going to fall for it. Four, the zoid battle season will open as planed, there will be no delays of any sort or the consequences will be severe."
Nemesis turned as if to walk away, and then stopped mid-step and turned back to face the Commissioner.
"Two things I forgot to mention. First, as you probably noticed, Devastator is not of the carrier classification that most whale kings are, instead, she's of a battleship class, so we're able to take anything you can throw at us. And lastly, that Genosaurer that remains in your Capital city facility, I want it out of there, give it to some team for all I care, just so long as your scientists don't have their grubby hands all over it, and it better be moving within 48 hours or else." And with that, the connection was cut, the Commissioner knew what consequences would be if he didn't cooperate with this mad man.
An hour later, the Commissioner somehow found his way down to his office in the depths of the Ultrasaurus. The only thing he had to be glad about was the fact that Nemesis didn't demand complete control of all zoid battles. He scanned the messages he had received over the day while he thought of how to break it to the world that there was a mad man on the loose who had enough firepower to burn Zi to a crisp. He paused, for he recognized an e-mail address as the one belonging to Dr. Layon. This got him thinking. Nemesis had said that he didn't want the ZBC scientists to have access to the Genosaurer, and here, after reading the e-mail, Dr. Layon only wanted a core and body sample of the Genosaurer.
After making a few phone calls and the required arrangements, he leaned back in his chair and grinned. Dr. Layon was going to be in for a pleasant surprise.
(Puts ice pack to aching hands) This chapter took longer than I expected it to, oh well, Happy Holidays!
A very good christmas present would be for you to REVIEW THIS STORY!