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Hello everyone, glad to see ya'll again... well, you know what I mean. Hope you all had a Merry Christmas. And now, as a late Christmas gift, the new chapter of World Fury.
DISCLAIMER: I DO NOT OWN ANYTHING OR ANYONE IN THE SPYRO UNIVERSE. ONLY MY OCS.
Chapter 60: Resistance: United
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The hooting of the grey owls and chirping of crickets were the only sounds in the woods surrounding the Montague Residence. George gazed to the left and right of him and took comfort in the six Partisans nearby as he eased forward out of the bushes. In the distance by the large wrought iron gate there were two soldiers of the Occupation who were standing guard. He held the card Carmine had given to him and walked towards the gate.
In the event these soldiers were Royalists like Carmine, the card and pass phrase should work. If not...
...that was what the Partisans armed with supressed carbines was for. Insurance.
As he approached, the soldiers tensed and the one on the left took a step forward.
"Halt! Who goes there?" George came forward, hands raised.
"Name's Nick, I have buisiness with the General." The soldier to the right scowled.
"Haven't you heard? The General's under house arrest. No one in or out." George nodded.
"Understood, hey, tell me something, have either of you seen a silver star in the night sky?" The two soldiers looked to one another before they nodded. The one on the left lowered his weapon, snapped a sharp salute, and then turned back to his friend.
"Hey, time to start our rounds along the wall. Make sure none of the General's hounds got out again. Remember what happened to Hailt." This made the right soldier chuckle.
"Yeah, chased the poor bastard for two hours before they finally got them coraled again." The left nodded.
"Might as well get a few rounds in before our relief comes. OAC really likes their protocols." As they turned to leave, the right turned back to the left.
"Hey, do you think those guys at the armory we set up in the warehouse near the industrial sector are alright? I mean, if what we have stored there got into the hands of the Partisans, well, I wouldn't want to be on the front lines when that happens." The other nodded.
"Yeah, good thing that those guys are on our side, right? Hey, which warehouse was it again, I keep forgetting." The soldier made an exasperated sigh.
"Number Sixteen remember? You made that joke about the storage space in that place. Something about it being over nine-thousand. By the way, what the hell did you mean by that anyway? I mean was there over nine-thousand crates of ammunition and weapons stored in there? Or was there over nine-thousand crates of high explosives? I swear you say the oddest things sometimes, it's hard to believe that we're related-" George watched the men go around the corner and motioned for the Partisans to come up.
"Alright, we have two hours before the OAC shows up to relieve these guys. Furthermore, I need someone to run back to the base and get Hazzard detail together. There is an armory in Warehouse Sixteen that is guarded by soldiers who are part of the Royalists. Get the detail together, radio the Runners in case they need a quick getaway, and remember the passphrase." One of the Partisans turned and ran back into the woods to the sewer exit they had used and the remaining Partisans walked up to the iron gate. The gate wasn't locked and was held shut by a simple lever which, when lifted, released a mechanism that held tension on the gates so that they opened automatically.
Stepping through the gate, George and the others walked through the garden in front of the manor and came to the door which was locked. George knocked four times and heard the sound of locks being undone on the inside. A moment later, the door opened revealing a Rotarian soldier with a curious expression.
"May I help you?" George nodded.
"Have you ever seen a silver star in the night sky?" The soldier visibly relaxed and nodded. He opened the door to grant them entry and smiled when the last was in and the door shut. He stood before George and gave a sharp, crisp military salute.
"Your Highness, it is an honor. I mean, we rank and file rarely meet anyone above the rank of Major and never anyone in a leadership role like yours. Oh, forgive me. Private First Class Edmund Ringer, the General is in his study. This way, please."
The Partisans were led through the manor house to a large room on the east wing of the building. Along the way, three more Rotarian soldiers came up and, once they saw Ringer nod, they relaxed and fell in step alongside the Partisans. When the reached the large rosewood double doors, the Rotarians took posts on either side of the entryway while Ringer stepped forward and knocked. A muffled reply was heard.
"I said I wished to not be disturbed." The young man cleared his throat.
"General, sir. You have visitors." There was a pause.
"So be it, send them in. Once they're in, close the door and resume your duties. Mustn't attract attention now can we?" Ringer gave a soft laugh and opened the door.
"The General will see you now." George nodded and entered the room. Once he was in, the Partisans elected to remain outside and the door was closed. George turned to see a man sitting at the keyboard of a large grand organ pulling keys and switches before finally starting a small bellows that send calm air through the pipes on the large instrument.
A dark, haunting melody poured from the organ as it started. Being a musician, George recognized it as Christof's Ninth Orcestration, known as the D minor Fugue. It was a piece more commonly played at Vaudville Horror skits. The General rose and the machine connected to the organ kept playing the keys, the dark music filling the room. The elderly man looked to George and motioned for him to take a seat across from where he was going.
As he sat, he removed the top off of a decantur and poured some brandy into two glasses before lighting a fairly large cigar and lit it. The General's expression as he studied George softened. After taking a few drags from it, he removed it from his mouth and set it aside, the smell of rich Praetorian tobacco filling the room. He gave a smile as he took a sip from the glass.
"Forgive the music, Your Highness. I may believe the Rotarians in that they are not on Mechanos' side but that doesn't mean I trust them completely. They are still foreign soldiers on our soil illegally. The D minor Fugue isn't my first choice of music to mask our conversation but alas an OAC bastard destroyed much of my collection of music in an attempt to try and get me to betray intelligence to them." George nodded solumnly. He had long known the General to be a collector of rare and valuable works of music. He had made public his plans to donate it all to a museum when he died so that it would forever endure but that was no longer the case.
"General, you once sent a message to the Resistance cells that, if they could get you vehicles, you would get the students at the academy to help up retake the city?" General Montague nodded.
"Indeed. At the time, I hadn't known that you were in charge of the Partisan cell. Had I known, I wouldn't have spread my limited resources so thin." He took a deep breath.
"My resources are spread across the entire city. I've been in contact with volunteers who snuck into the city to join the Runners, smugglers getting POWs and high-value civilians out if the city without raising too much of a ruckus, and even getting in contact with the police force which has been replaced with the OAC. They're numbers are thin but they still have enough of a presense to try and resist. Now then, while I do have enough volunteers and vehicles to aid you, according to my sources, the Syllian Army is poised to take the city back in a month. Surely we can hold out that long?" George shook his head.
"I'm sorry General, but that's no longer the case. According to intel we recieved from a defector, the OAC has a failsafe weapon and standing orders to destroy the city if it's in danger of being retaken. The failsafe is an atomic bomb of some sort." General Montague coughed in shock, nearly dropping his glass as he turned to George.
"Are you sure?!" He nodded, General Montague cursed.
"The bastards! That's it! I'll break this damn farce and go to the castle and strangle that lilly-livered bastard with his own intestines and then tie them in knots and hang him by them from the Grand Clocktower!" George mentally whistled. He'd always heard from his Father that General Montague was a man who had a way with words and a certain charisma that would have made him an asset to any branch of service. His emotions were always on display except when he wanted to keep them supressed.
General Montague was a religious man who always went into battle with a copy of the sacred texts in one hand and a sword in the other. If he couldn't inspire, coax, or order his men into the fight, he dragged them into it by the scruff of the neck and if not then well...
...one notable moment recorded in his record stated that he literally kicked a man's ass for disobeying orders to run onto a battlefield to recover the wounded still lying in the mud.
George prudently waited for the General to calm down before speaking again.
"Sir, we have a plan in place. Rather than wait for Syllian forces to take the city by the end of the month, I need to unite the diverse cells of the Resistance into one united force and take the city back by the end of the week." General Montague gave him a sharp look.
"Can you do it? Take the city and secure it in a week?" George nodded.
"As we speak, I have a force prepping to raid an armory in the Industrial district, a squad linking up with Wolf's Den to sabotage some of the anti-air guns to give our dragons a fighting chance, and agents trying to contact the Tunnel Rats in the Castle District, Colonel Falcyion, the Launces Police Department, and Gordon Calawai." General Montague looked up at that.
"Your Highness, an old man's advice? Calawai, he may be a hell of a fighter but don't trust him as far as you can throw him. In human form, not dragon form." George looked to him.
"Think he's a spy?" Montague shook his head.
"Hell no. It's just... a man like that; fights the enemy, no holes barred, works best when left alone? He probably has some skeletons in his closet or something he would prefer remain hidden. Remember that incident nine years ago in Royalis?" George nodded slowly.
Nine years ago, several members of the Royal Knights, men who, for security purposes, kept their faces and identities concealed when they were on duty protecting the King and Queen, attempted to assassinate a high ranking member of the nobility. The plot had almost succeeded except for a loyal knight who, when he heard of the plot, intercepted the men and fought them off, being gravely wounded in the process.
Of the nine knights who were confirmed in the plot, only eight were found and arrested. The lone knight who had fought them off of their target also vanished without a trace. Rumors abound about the two but no trace of them has been found since.
General Montague rose and stepped towards a bookcase near the far end of the room, grabbed a seemingly nondescript book, and then bringing it over to George.
"Now then, unless I'm getting senile in my old age, I believe your two hours grace is almost up. I'm not in the habit of lending items in my collection out to just anyone but I think this book will have great interest to you. It's no secret that the Castle District is all but sealed off to prevent the Resistance from gaining a foothold and doing something more than these little 'nuisenses' that the Tunnel Rats are behind. But, there is, I believe, another way in."
George opened the book and saw a small piece of thin, nearly transparant paper folded into the spine near the center. When he opened it, he saw a line that went from one side of the paper to the other starting at the lower right corner, took a few corners, and then terminated close to the upper left corner. General Montague smiled.
"I believe the truth comes into focus when observed over a map of Launces." George's eyes widened as he looked up to him.
"The old Catacombs..." General Montague nodded.
"Like Father... like son... Also, there is an offshoot in there that leads to the old academy, you know, the one that was destroyed by fire but never rebuilt? There are some old untouched tanks in the basement near the armored combat training grounds." George nodded.
"The T7-Lt's right? I'm aware of them. The Academy used them for trainers until the T10s came into production and the T8s became obsolete." Montague nodded.
"When you have those tanks, send word to the students at the academy and I. We shall aid you in retaking our home." George nodded as the music from the organ ground to a halt and he saluted.
"Thank you General. I look forward to fighting alongside you in the coming days." The old man chuckled.
"Likewise lad. Likewise. I'll probably be the only general who could claim having fought alongside James de Launces in the Federation War and the Dalon Conflict, and now his son." George nodded and left the room, the Rotarian soldiers nodding as he and the Partisans left and resuming their routines just as the OAC came in to relieve them.
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Hazzard walked alongside a portly Rotarian supply sergeant who was going through the supply list. It was comical in its own way. The Rotarians, with the exception of bare nods, sharp salutes, and quick smiles, ignored the Partisans. Those who had intel to share did so as if they were speaking to a fellow soldier, paying no heed to the nearby Partisans who were also nearby listening in on every word said.
The supply sergeant was going through the list, speaking certain items aloud and, at quick glances to Hazzard to see what supplies he was interested in, had a squad of men ready to unpack the crate, confirm the contents, repack and send the crates outside to both vehicles where the Runners were waiting, or to where Zafra and Caldor waited to carry large crates of supplies into the Underground through a hole knocked through the floor in an abandoned building.
Once or twice, Hazzard got a glint in his eye when the supply sergeant listed a few things and payed particular interest to any high explosives, shaped charges, or incendiaries. The group had arrived and identified themselves around midnight and by 2:30 the group came to the end of the warehouse and the supply sergeant nodded.
"Now then, to keep the OAC from getting suspicious or worried, I'll fill out the papers saying that all this was transferred to another armory that is under our control. Heh, damn bastards think we're all singing off the same song sheet. It's enough to make me laugh." Hazzard chuckled himself.
"Yeah, you got that right. Now, since we're on the subject of being on the same side, do you have any spare Rotarian uniforms?" The sergeant looked around and nodded.
"Yeah, Lot no. 44578. Let's see... yeah, sixteen hundred spare wool and cloth complete uniforms. That means undershirts, chain jackets, long overcoats, helmets, trousers, greaves, vambraces, ammo bandoleers, and steel-reinforced boots. I don't know how many you'll need but I can give you the whole damn lot of 'em. OAC only cares about the explosive stuff, and last I checked, uniforms weren't exploding off our soldiers." Hazzard nodded and then turned to one of the Partisans with him.
"Get these uniforms ready and get to the textile and clothing factory here in Industrial. If we are to retake our city, a lot of us would rather go into battle wearing Syllian blue. There should still be some blue clothing dye left over to brighten these uniforms up a smidge." The sergeant looked at Hazzard and nodded.
"Well, if you're going to dye the uniforms, make sure you let the dye set and dry before wearing them otherwise you won't just be wearing blue, you will be blue." Hazzard chuckled and nodded to him before turning and leaving.
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A lone clock on the wall was the only sound in the room. Gordon Calawai held the missive in his hand from George de Launces, now confirmed by the Resistance as the defacto leader of all the independant cells. He slowly crumpled the letter in his hand, tossed it into the fireplace and rose from his chair and walked to the ancient candlestick holder in the library. Considering that the house was indeed powered, an old candle lamp was an oddity, yet visitors always overlooked it because it fit the decor of the old home.
Or visitors would if Calawai actually entertained people.
If any studied the object closely, they would have detected the latch hidden behind the object. A swift tug from Calawai unlocked the dead bolt that held the panel of wall shut against prying eyes. He reached inside and pulled an old dusty longsword from the hidden room and experimentally drew it, regaining the familiarity of holding the blade. He hefted the blade and then peered into the room and sighed.
"So... once more into the fray... perhaps... perhaps it is time..."
To be continued...
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Alright everyone, the time is drawing ever near. Forces are closing on Launces and the Resistance is getting ready to make the move. Are you as psyched about the upcoming chapters as I am? Oh what am I saying of course you are.
Next Chapter: Resistance: The Second Battle of Launces