Chapter 25: The red menace.
"I suggest that you hear what I have to say before trying such a useless tactic again." Haze said, gesturing at the two fireballs he deflected, they were speeding up and disappearing from view.
Harpuia stared at him and put his guard up again, "You can't be Haze. Haze died in an explosion." Haze raised his head slightly to look at him, "Indeed Harpuia? Or perhaps he faked his own death?"
Fefnir bared his teeth, "Then tell me why the heck would you make the plans for all of these weapons we have? The Pantheons, the bombers, you even made the golems!" He bellowed at Haze. Haze turned to look at him and underneath the hood two shiny yellow eyes glinted, "Just to show you that even with all of these weapons, your army, you wouldn't be able to stand against the might of my perfect creations." He gestured at Bullion and Daemon. Daemon looked at him in shock and let out, "You made us!" before Bullion clapped his hand on Daemon's mouth, shutting him up.
"You're mad!" Harpuia yelled, "Retire him!" Fefnir started sprinting towards him even before Harpuia gave the word. Bullion and Daemon moved to intercept him but Haze held them back.
Fefnir sent a powerful punch at Haze's abdomen and Haze made no effort to dodge it. Fefnir's fist collided forcefully with Haze's chest but Haze didn't move at all, he was in the same place, unfazed by Fefnir's attack. "What the…?" Fefnir managed before Haze delivered a punch of his own, so fast it was merely seen as a white blur reaching to Fefnir's chest, before Fefnir went flying across the street and into a human office building. Scared faces of humans could be seen peeking out of the windows down at Fefnir's unconscious form.
"Fefnir!" Harpuia yelled, flying directly to him and landing besides him.
Zero was sitting on a rock spire, hugging his knees and looking at the vast desert.
"Join us Zero!" Bullion said, "You know we're right! You know what the humans think about you don't you? They hate you Zero. They hate you with no reason at all. Join us Zero, and we can kill their hatred for reploids." Then Vulture stepped in, "You need to join us Zero, or else we'll have to obliterate you." Zero snickered, "You tried enough times to know that you can't do that." Then he heard Whirlpool's voice, not echoing inside his head but coming from nearby, behind him. "Hey Zero, there's something I think you should take a look at." Zero jumped to his feet and whirled around, drawing his Z-saber in the process. Whirlpool was standing there, holding something in her hand, a picture frame. "Why don't you relax and take a look at this?" Whirlpool said with a smirk, after 'modifying' the picture back at her base she brought it here for Zero to see. "I found this in Harpuia's office." She lied and smiled, Zero looked at the picture, which now said "To my dear Harpuia, love, Leviathan." and signed with a red lipstick mark of a kiss.
Zero stared at it for a moment, disbelieving. "No." He said, "She wouldn't…" Whirlpool smiled and placed her arm around Zero's head, holding the picture right in front of his eyes. "But she did." At that moment the voices renewed in Zero's head. "Argh!" He screamed, hitting Whirlpool as he tried to free himself from her grasp. Whirlpool stumbled and fell off of the spire, battering in the rocks before landing on the desert soil. "Ouch…" She said, slowly standing up and leaning on a harpoon she summoned. "What a grouch." she said and then transed away in a flash of white, leaving Zero to his rage. "HARPUIA!" He screamed. A pack of mechaniloid vultures that were circling him in hopes of catching him off guard fled at the sound of the shout.
Once again, Zero was surrounded in a brilliant flame and he jumped off of the spire, the impact on the sand was so powerful that the sand around him shot into the air and clouded him; he burst through the sand and headed towards the place where both Leviathan and Harpuia could be found, Neo-Arcadia.
"Indeed, I made weapons for Neo-Arcadia, indeed I helped my creator's son make weapons for you to use. But I plotted this for a long time, you have no idea. I always knew that one day the name Manus would strike fear into the heart of humans and I was right. I wasn't about to destroy you all, only the government. But you just had to go and do it." Harpuia interrupted, "Look at what you've done! You've killed countless of innocent reploids and humans!" Haze stared at Harpuia, "And you killed my brother." He said coldly. "What in the world are you talking about…?" Harpuia started, but Haze, Bullion and Daemon were gone.
"Damn." Harpuia said, radioing the headquarters so they would trans away Fefnir.
Fenrir, Hubershnicdt and Falcon exchanged gloom looks, and then looked at Harpuia.
"Find Zero you three. Falcon, go to Dysis forest., Fenrir go to the Kalendra ice fields, he might be there. Hubershnicdt, go to the desert.
The three nodded and transed away, each to the locations they have been ordered to go to.
Leviathan came running towards Harpuia, huffing.
"Harpuia…" She puffed, "We have to talk…" Harpuia looked at her, "Let's get back to the base, we'll talk there." He transed away and Leviathan followed him.
Vulture opened his eyes, green liquid surrounded him. He looked down at his arm and saw his new hand. He then turned to look at himself floating in another capsule, deactivated. He placed his hands on the sides of the tube and the green liquid started draining, slowly passing Vulture's head and coming down to his neck, then to his chest, stomach and knees. The capsule then opened slowly, and vulture stepped out. His new form felt much better than his old form, he was pulsing with power.
"Whoa, this power… I think I'm even stronger than Bullion…" Vulture said to no one in particular. He punched the air for practice and the punch was so powerful that it created a force wave that slammed into the nearby wall and cracked it. Vulture stared in awe at the cracked wall, admiring his new power. After a while a smile dawned on his face, he then started chuckling soon the chuckle became laughter which grew more and louder until Vulture was practically causing the nearby window's glass to shake with his sound waves. "The power!" He said and burst into a fit of maniacal laughter, "Vengeance will be mine!" He laughed.
Hubershnicdt transed to the desert gate, the guards slowly opened it and he started walking on the hot sand, perking his ears for any odd sound. He hastened his steps; they needed to find Zero and fast, Hubershnicdt continued walking and gained a couple of miles from Neo Arcadia when he heard this weird noise, flames crackling and a whistle. A gigantic ball of flame with a figure inside that Hub recognized as Zero passed by him, the sheer force of it pushing him away and unto the burning sand. "Zero!" Hub yelled.
"So she was on top of me and she was yelling about how humans abused her and the other executioner Daemon. In the middle of this she shed a tear, I could see on her face when she looked at me that she truly did believe that humans are monsters. These guys really do think that the humans are a burden on this world Harpuia. I just didn't know what to say." Leviathan said, looking at her feet. Harpuia placed his hand on her shoulder and looked at her in a comforting look, "And now Zero's gone too… Why did he run Sage? This is just too much… I don't think I can take this anymore… Why did these Executioners had to ruin everything?" Tears built up in her eyes. "Leviathan, this might not be the time to tell you but… The one who made the Executioners, the so called 'master' is Haze Manus…" Harpuia said quietly.
Leviathan always looked up to Haze back in the time he was working for Neo-Arcadia; she adored him for his determination, intelligence and wisdom. He and Phantom used to exchange their knowledge and he was always happy to show Harpuia his weapon designs and let Fefnir test the weapons themselves. Even master X was fond of this reploid, who dedicated himself to create weapons for the Neo-Arcadian cause. They all liked him, until the 'accident'. It was a very sad day when they heard that Haze died in an explosion. Leviathan, who had a crush on him at the time, was crying for the whole day. That was the one day that Fefnir wasn't in the training room. Harpuia himself climbed up to the highest point in Neo-Arcadia and sat there, mourning. No one knew what Phantom did but it doesn't matter now… He's dead too.
Leviathan stared at him in shock. "No… Harpuia you must be wrong it's impossible… not Haze…" she burst into tears, collapsing under all of the recent stress and cried into Harpuia's shoulder. Harpuia held her with one arm, looking down at her in a brotherly look.
Just then the alarms sounded and through the wall burst Zero, engulfed in a red flame. His eyes were wild and his hair untamed, instead of coming down in his usual pony-tail it was loose and spread on his back. Zero stared straight at Harpuia as if not seeing him at all.
"So that's what you've been doing! You just waited 'till I was gone huh you filthy bastards!" Zero shouted and charged at Harpuia, who pushed Leviathan out of harm's way and suffered the full force of the impact. Zero punched him in the abdomen and sent him crashing through the wall and into another room.
"I'll kill you Harpuia you traitor!" Zero shouted, jumping through the hole Harpuia made. He started to walk towards Harpuia, kneeling across the room in front of a cracked wall.
"What are you doing Zero?" Harpuia asked, holding his aching head.
"Don't you ask me what am I doing you moron! You know damn well what I'm doing!"
"Zero stop!" Leviathan yelled through thehole but Zero gave her a wild stare, so unrecognizeablethat it made her back up against the wall.
Hubershnicdt sprinted all of the way back to the gate, he reached there, breathing heavily and immediately called for Falcon and Fenrir. The guards flooded him with questions, seeing as there was now a gigantic hole in the middle of the gate, but he ignored them and ran to the transerver, deciding to immediately report to Harpuia.
He transed into the Neo-Arcadian base to find Leviathan, standing in the middle of the room in front of a hole in the wall, guards standing near her. Hubershnicdt ran towards the hole and entered the connected room. He saw Harpuia on the floor and Zero looking down at him, the fireball still around him.
"Zero no!" Harpuia said, trying to shield his eyes from the intense heat with his arm.
Hubershnicdt didn't waste time and pounced on Zero, the intense heat burning his artificial fur and skin, Zero however seemed unaffected by the heat of his own flame.
Hubershnicdt knocked Zero down on the floor and in an instant grounded him.
"Thro me a stun gun, hurry!" He called to the guards. Almost all of them were frozen in place but one of them quickly took up his stun gun and tossed it to Hubershnicdt. Hub grabbed it and quickly pressed it to Zero's neck. Zero, who has not yet recovered from the surprise of Hub's sudden attack didn't manage to react before Hub activated the stun gun.
To be continued…
Author notes: I am extremely sorry for the very long wait! I'll try to catch up quickly.