Disclaimer: See chapter one

Chap. 14

"Hey guys. Did you see that battle?"

Koemai had just returned to the dorm rooms after the battle with Metal Gear. Cain was sitting in a single seat in front of a monitor screen when Koemai entered.

"Yeah. Well, I did. Elijah…well, see for yourself."

Indicating to the nearby couch, Cain showed him Elijah's sleeping body.

"He's been asleep all day."

Koemai gave a bemused expression, "What'd you do to him? Put him through hell?"

Cain shrugged, "Data recording for Obelisk. He spent the whole night recording and downloading his data. He passed out as soon as he got out of the simulator."

"Obviously."

At that moment, Elijah began to stir from his sleep and his eyes slowly opened. Seeing Koemai, he yawned, "Uhhh…Oh, you're back… He yawned again and slowly stood up, stretching along the way. "How'd it go?"

"You should have seen it." Koemai replied happily. "Those AIs were destructive, like gods of some sort."

"Don't worry." Cain added. "I recorded the battle for you to watch." Focusing on Koemai, "Our credits."

Koemai blinked at his shift of behavior, but let it drop and pulled out the credits, "Okayyy. Here."

Koemai handed him his pad and then tossed Elijah his. Elijah looked it over and nodded, pleased at the amount.

"Hey, not bad at all." He remarked. "Perhaps we should let our AIs fight in our place more often, eh?"

"Unlikely." Cain replied as he pocketed his credits. The AI systems are difficult to maintain, plus the weaponry is costly. And I don't have the credits for it right now."

Koemai blinked again, "Huh? But those credits…"

"…Are not enough." Cain cut off and finished. Grabbing his coat, he limped slightly to the exit. "Excuse me."

The two remaining Ravens watched their comrade go, but not without a serious line of confusion on their faces.

"Not enough?" Koemai exclaimed. "What the heck? First his AC and now this? What does he do with his credits?"

Elijah shrugged, "Hey, it doesn't matter. I feel good." Stretching his arms, "In fact, I better check up on Havoc. It should be finished by now."

Later…

Elijah walked into the massive where which housed his AC. The repairs that it had suffered from his last battle had all, but disappeared for the most part. The only visible damage was a scorching mark that was on the right arm. Moving to his computer terminal, he checked up on the AC's status.

AC overall repair- 95.50%

'95 percent. Alright. It won't be long now.' However, as he continued to gaze at his machine, a new thought popped into his head. Looking down at the terminal, he accessed his inventory. Some time back, he won a few new weapons and parts from his arena battles. Checking them over, he found something that could work.

'This will be good.'

Entering his choice, he pressed a key and looked up. A slight rumble could be heard as the extra ammunition unit on the back of Havoc was removed and replaced with something far different. It was another dual back unit, but it wasn't ammunition. It was double-chain cannon. Shaded in green, the weapon settled and connected with the AC. Elijah grinned slightly and looked at the AC status once again. 'Hm. A bit heavy, but well within parameters. Perfect.' Elijah then moved up to the AC cockpit and sat inside. The system for the new weapon was up and running, but there was a slight problem. The reason that Elijah didn't use it before was because in order to use the chain cannon, his AC would have to be stationary. And that sucked to him. 'Why can't I have an Intensify option?' He knew that both Cain and Koemai had one. Koemai used it for his back grenade launcher. But he never really understood why Cain had it. After all, Cain had no back weapons.

'I wonder if he would…'

Beep, beep

Elijah half-shot up from his seat before he realized that it was his signal. It was a mission contract from Kisaragi. A convoy had to trek through a desert in the Midwest sector. Due to the content of their package, it was very likely that they would be ambushed by opposing forces. Their security would not be enough if a full-scale battle took place, so a Raven would be need to level the playing field. Reviewing the mission, he saw that it would be a tough mission, in harsh conditions no less. And with his machine only nearly complete, he would need an edge in the fight. 'An edge.' With a slow glance, he looked over at Glaive, still being repaired from its damage.

'He wouldn't mind…if I borrowed it for a bit.'

'He didn't'

Cain had returned to the hanger a half an hour after he left. He obviously noticed the missing Havoc AC, showing that Elijah was out on another mission. But it wasn't until he checked up on his own AC that he saw his Intensify option missing and well, put two and two together.

"…"

Silently, Cain went over the review log, checking the list of missions for ACs. Looking at Havoc's, he found that Elijah had accepted a mission near one of the desert terrains by Kisaragi. It was hostile territory and the mission presented great risk. Elijah could probably handle it, but that wasn't Cain's concern. Accessing his personal controls, he typed in a pass-code.

AIsys: GBI-003

The floor opened up before him and Cain was lowered down into the floor. After a few minutes, he reached his secondary chamber. Moving through it, Cain flicked the lights on. Obelisk and Slifer shone in the lights, but Cain walked past them toward the back. The, also in the light, was the last AI he had created. One that he felt was too unstable to use…until now.

"Great beast of the sky, please hear my cry…"

Desert wasteland

Havoc stalked beside the short line of truck in the desert plain. So far, nothing had happened and there was no immediate sign of danger. The convoy was nearing the destination; a fort just a half a mile ahead. So far, things were going smoothly. But he's been a Raven long enough to know that there was no way it could be that easy. But then again, one can always hope.

"Raven. Enemy detected."

'So much for that' Elijah thought grimly as he turned toward the enemy. In the dry skies above, a set of objects appeared. Elijah recognized them as jets.

'That's it? They can't be serious.'

Shifting to battle mode, Havoc armed up and raised its right arm machine gun. This was shortly followed by the loud rattling of the machine gun's fire and the explosion of three enemy jets. The remaining three flew overhead and Havoc turned and flew up in the air in pursuit. Locking onto one, he fired once more and brought down another jet just as they flew out of range.

"Raven. Help us!"

Havoc turned around and looked at the convoy. It was now being attacked by a group of heavily armored MTs. 'Where did they come from?' Havoc landed on the ground and swooped right back. Moving as fast as he could, he tried to lock on, but he was still too far away. One of the convoy trucks exploded in flames as the MTs moved in.

"Ahhhhhhhhhhh!"

Elijah growled inside, but then remembered as important detail. 'Wait as sec… My chain cannon.' Still in movement, Havoc switched to his new weapon and began targeting. Due to the Intensify option, he was still able to move while the weapon was set. The targeting range was greater than his machine guns and he was able to lock on instantly.

"Say hello to my little friends!"

The barrels whirled rapidly, letting loose a hailstorm of heavy bullet fire. The lead MT was literally chopped down within the first five rounds and blew up. With that done, he locked on to the next one and fired again, with the same result. Havoc soon moved between the convoy and the attacker and continued his assault. The attacking MTs were falling fast and Havoc was driving them off.

"Come on guys. Give me a…"

Suddenly, a heavy blast hit him from behind. Checking the radar, Elijah discovered that the jets that had gotten away had returned and fired on him. Enraged, he turned his attention toward them and pulled the trigger, but nothing happened.

"What?"

Elijah checked his weapon status, only to find that his dual chain cannon and his EO had been blown away. 'But how did that happen? That hit shouldn't have done that much damage.' But then he remembered that his AC wasn't fully repaired when he left. The upper back section wasn't as fixed as the rest of the machine and it now served as a soft spot for Havoc. Elijah shook it off for a moment and gunned down the remaining jets, turning them into cinders. Checking on the convoy, he saw that they were well ahead and nearing the fort. But there was also a large amount of MTs approaching them rapidly. And these were just as armed as the last few, equipped with bazookas and pulse guns. And to make matters worse, there were a lot of them. A whole lot.

'What the heck? Whatever Kisaragi has, somebody wants it badly.'

Havoc swooped back and fired more rounds from his machine guns. Three MTs fell, but that was nothing compared to the ones that were coming. Even worse, his ammo was running dangerously low. The armor on the MTs was heavy enough to the point where it would take a good amount of ammo to bring them down. The forces were increasing. And without his EO, he wouldn't have anything to fight back with soon.

Shhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkk!

Suddenly from out of the sky, a bolt of flaming energy swooped down and destroyed one of the MTs. As Havoc looked on, two more bolts flashed forth and blew away two more. Elijah turned Havoc to look at the source and was amazed by what he saw. There in the skies was what appeared to be an AC. But Elijah couldn't see it directly because of the sunlight and because of the shining golden color. It was as though a mystical creature had come out from the sun.

"Who are you?"

The AC didn't respond as it swooped toward the MTs with the amazing speed of its OB. It rushed past them all and then spun around. Its back weapon shifted open and a thick box-like object flew out the opposition. But after a while, the box exploded in mid-air and a swarm of missiles flooded out and attacked everything. Many of the MTs were all hit by the missiles and exploded in session. Wile the missiles were still falling, the mysterious AC raised its arms. One arm fired a thick bolt of violet energy, demolishing a MT that had managed to move out of the way of the missile barrage. Seeing another escapee, it fired once more, this time with the left arm. A grenade blast flew out and the second one exploded as well. Meanwhile, the missiles had all hit their targets and almost all of the MT force was completely destroyed, except for one.

One very unfortunate MT…

The AC raised both its arms while the sole MT fired upon it. But the weak bullets of the MT paled in comparison to the combined blast of energy and grenade and the MT was literally blown away into ash.

'What kind of machine is that?'

Elijah had watched the entire scene with his mouth wide open. The AC had just flew in and wiped out an entire force of heavily armored MTs within a few seconds. Nothing he seen had that kind of…wait a minute. He had seen it before. On the recording of the battle he had seen just before he left on his mission. It was then that Elijah realized what he was looking at. The golden AC before him was the third of Cain's AI Armored Cores.

The Winged Dragon of Ra…

AN: The Winged Dragon of Ra AC is derived from the anime series Yu-Gi-Oh!, which I do not own.