Welcome again...boy this is getting redundent.
(As I smile with envy) Now we go to my forte...combat. If any of you all have read the comics, you should know about an aqua blue hedgehog name Rob-O. This is where he makes his appereance. Enjoy...and have fun the Diplomacy!
Disclamer: I observe the rights of the creaters of the original characters and stand to gain no profit.
Please Review.
The Sentry
by: Mauser
The air gently wafted along the grassy plain that stretched eastward to the edge of Deer Wood Forest. Wesson held his head just high enough to see over the sandy cliff of the beach, listening and watching intently for anything that didn't belong in the eerily calm evening. Time was growing short and he was getting impatient. Once more he looked left then right, doing it smartly as not to attract attention to him and the rest of the group that hovered just below him. Glancing up, he used his ocular enhancement to search the sky. No threats, but not a sign of Seminole either.
With a blunt sigh, he skulked below the edge of the cliff and turned to Ell-Tee, who was just about as anxious to break for the cover of the forest as everyone else. "Now what?" he hissed under his raspy voice.
Ell-Tee turned behind him, shooting his vision past Yanar, who was helping Stenson hold a large rifle in place to keep it from falling to the sandy beach below them. "Field Marshal, we need to move now!"
"I have to agree with your Lieutenant, Mr. Stenson," Yanar professed. "If we stay here any longer and get spotted, Albion will be in danger for sure."
"Coming from a guy who told us to have faith?" snorted Vickers, kneeling amongst the five Albion Centurions along the steep and narrow path with his weapon clutched in his hands.
"That was just to get you across the water!" Yanar harshly whispered back.
What Yanar wanted as a lesson in faith turned into a joke amongst the Legionnaires and now the Albion Centurions who were tagging along. "It takes a leap of faith," he remembered saying to them with confidence. All Stenson did was shake his head at him and boldly state: "Lead the way preacher man." And now he was crouched down in the sand, finding his strength was just enough to help hold Stenson's Diplomat.
Yanar had thought for a minuscule second that the Field Marshal was going to bring someone or something to arbitrate with Eggman's machines. But that didn't make sense to him and Gala-Na, especially with the gossip of the Legionnaires ringing true when they stepped off the boat. When Ell-Tee and Stenson popped the lid off from a large carbon-polymer case, Yanar realized that it was the "something" that was going to be doing the arbitrating.
One way and down range!
Yanar studied the thing as it lay in its case as if it were a vampire in a coffin; just in pieces. He knew the weapon had to be large just by seeing the large crate it was stored in, but as Stenson and Ell-Tee assembled it, a demonized giant was born. Aside from the name being a cruel joke, the rifle had a menacing aura around the black parkerized steel. The muzzle brake looked something to the effect of a posthole digger, and the barrel was as tall as Yanar, enclosed in unobtanium polymers that dissipated the high degree of heat that Stenson swore ranged in the Kelvins at times. In fact, the whole rifle was unobtanium in Stenson's pristine eyes, due to the materials and skills needed to fabricate one. The Diplomat happened to be a bull-pup sniper rifle that took on light-armored vehicles as if they were empty aluminum cans. Unfortunately for the Eggbots and a few unlucky Dingos, the term "light-armored vehicle" was used very liberally with the Dark Legion.
When Stenson saw the rifle being put through the trial runs, he had to have one. And what the Field Marshal wants, the Field Marshal gets.
But the prime characteristics of the rifle lay not in its looks but its teeth. Double stacked in an eight inch tall titanium magazine, the shooter had only two types of ammunition he could use: armored piercing and a new cartridge affectionately named the Slammer. Unlike the latter, the Slammer was the epitome of projectile hunks of lead. As Yanar observed Vickers loading the ten rounds into a mag, he caught sight of the large hollow point round that was the last to be loaded. It was a spectacle to behold even when it wasn't launched from its titanum casing. Platinum jacketed and with the hint that it would be embalmed with hot plasma upon flight, Yanar could only but trembled at the sight of it. What he didn't know was that the round used more kinetic energy as a lifter and tumbler than to just piece through objects. A hoverbot that was used as a test subject looked as if Chaos had kicked the thing in the side and leaving an impression that covered two-thirds of the transport that sank half way into the compartment. Sometimes the round went through the hull, but never exited to the other side.
"I thought you were talking about diplomacy, when you spoke of this?" he asked Ell-Tee after the Legionnaire had finished putting the rifle together.
"We were...just three-hundred and ninety-seven grains of it."
Yanar still remembered rolling his eyes at Ell-Tee's comment. He almost wanted to again, but prescient of the current task of not getting killed made him stop.
"Thirty seconds!" Stenson quickly whispered to the hunched group.
Vickers turned to the squad behind him and motioned them to get ready. They were visibly nervous, almost wondering why they had even volunteered for the little night stroll to the other side. But they were still willing to go along. Clutching their rifles, the lead echidna nodded at Vickers, awaiting the signal to climb the rest of the way up the bluff. Craig, as the name patch said over his right breast pocket, was the only name Vickers cared about in the bunch. After all, it was Craig who saved him from wearing old ladies clothes, suppling the Dark Legionnaire with a set of the dark blue, battle dress uniform. The only problem with it was that the trouser over his robotic leg was a tad too small, almost looking as if it would rip at the seams.
"So what's the game plan again if we get pinged?" asked Craig from behind Vickers. He was grinding his teeth for action as the other three guys, plus one girl, in his assembled team. Problem was, they'd never experienced combat outside of training. And that was what made Craig more nervous.
"Fire and maneuver. We'll be working off Ell-Tee's lead with precision support from the Field Marshal. Ell will lay down the juice as we flank the living daylights out of the enemy. The bots are pretty stupid when it comes to reaction in an ambush, but after the party is in full swing, we better have our jobs done by then or we'll be working a lot harder than we should." Vickers looked on at Craig as if he was born yesterday. "Please tell me you train offensively?"
Craig quickly shook his head. "A good defense is a great offense. That's been our philosophy."
"Three words, Craig;" Vickers held up three fingers and one by one, closed them down into a fist: "War-of-attrition. You passivist bunch wouldn't stand a chance against us, much less the fat Overlander, with your idea."
Craig felt his throat tighten as he tried to swallow. "Who are these guys?"
"Alright, Wesson," whispered Stenson, "you first! Signal us when you secure the perimeter."
Wesson slung his pulse carbine around to his left hand and balanced the stout forearm with his robotic right. He was about to bolt across the plain into the forest when he did one more scan of the tree line and the sky with his ocular right eye. Switching from night vision to infrared, he found the tree line was clear of all threats. But the sky produced something else. Closing is natural left eye and zooming in with his right, he smiled at the red and yellow image. It was Seminole.
"Contact; friendly," Wesson curtly whispered.
"I hope that's your feathered friend!" said Ell-Tee. Wesson nodded, his eyes still fixed to the trees.
It wasn't long before Seminole made his diving approach, finding his perch on the young sergeant's gloved arm. "About ten clicks to the northeast, Master, the bots have a marshaling area. It's in a clearing, but there are civilians amongst them. They're being forced to load materials onboard about five transports."
Ell-Tee shifted his heavy auto-cannon around on his shoulder as he nodded to Seminole. "Strength?"
"Platoon size. About ten on the civilian side."
Ell-Tee turned his head to Stenson. "Field Marshal?"
"I heard," Stenson curtly replied, "Wesson, take point; get across the field and wait for us. Everybody else, line formation; ten meter gaps to the man in front of you." Stenson watched the pink echidna girl give out a gruff protest to the one-sighted gender order.
Wesson released Seminole and ordered him to get back to Albion after the bird gave him a precise bearing of the bots' location. Darkness was overpowering the last gasp of sun light and he didn't want to be occupied with his bird in harm's way while scouting the terrain. With a breath for courage and another for determination, Wesson sprang from his nook and sprinted across the field, putting his head on a swivel as he bolted across toward the tree line. He felt a wave of tension lift off him when he reached it, practically sliding to a stop in the kneeling position, his carbine up at the ready for any possible ambush. Seeing nothing in his field of view, he took out a red lens, pen light, and flickered back to the awaiting team.
"Clear, Field Marshal!" relayed Ell-Tee, his auto-cannon firmly planted on the ground in front of him, steadied by a bi-pod under the heavy, square metal frame as he scoured the tree line with the cone-shaped muzzle.
"Roger that! Stand-to everyone!" hastily ordered Stenson. Turning back to the assembling squad below him, he pointed to the girl. "You go first. Me and the ambassador will be right behind you."
He grinned crookedly towards Yanar. "How's that ammo?"
"Not light, Mr. Stenson!" came the sharp reply.
"This thing isn't a walk in the park, either. And that's Field Marshal Stenson, Mr. Yanar. You are under my command now."
Yanar let out a low grumble as he let the girl by him. He could tell she was extremely apprehensive for what she about to do; her tail sagged low enough to trace a path in the sand.
Ell-Tee reached out and took her arm when she got up to him. "Don't run flat out, Ms. Le. Just keep a double-time pace to Wesson unless we are engaged or something. Don't return fire, don't stop. Just run like hell if something happens, okay. I've got your back," he instructed, seeing the name on her battle blouse was Nata-Le.
She brought her slender plasma rifle up to her chest, clutching the pistol grip even tighter. Brushing her hair out of her eyes, she took off across the field, becoming annoyed right off with the restrictive gear strapped across her back and waist. She was scared beyond measure, wondering if she was going to see the age of nineteen before the night was over. Breaking training half way across the field, she looked over her shoulder to see Stenson not far behind her, carrying the Diplomat over his shoulder and making his best efforts to run with it. Behind him, Yanar was realizing he needed to do more weight training as the four magazines he toted in a rucksack almost sent him on his back.
Nata-Le reached Wesson, who still had his weapon pointed towards the heavy undergrowth beyond him. "Anything?" she asked, finding herself in the kneeling position beside him to his left.
"No, ma'am, but keep your eyes peeled and your heater covering the left flank."
She did as she was told but she still kept her eye on the left handed Legionnaire. She didn't know what was more frightening; him or the bots that they were searching to terminate. After a moments thought about it, she concluded that she was glad that Wesson was on their side. There was something about his eery silence as he attuned all his senses to the woods that made her believe that and still be afraid of him in the same breath of air.
Two hours and seven kilometers later, Wesson wasn't too happy with his surroundings. "No thanks to Yanar." he scorned in the air. The Ambassador did get them through most of the foliage and broken trails, but where they were now had changed over the years, and Yanar was starting to question his memory and self-confidence. Which meant Wesson was back on point. Twitching his head back, he flickered his infrared mode on. Seeing the body heat signatures of the rest of his group about two hundred yards off, he pushed on further through the forest.
No matter how hard he tried, he couldn't stop the leaves from crunching under his heavy boots. Every sifting step he took sent a shudder up his spine and over his dreads, fearing that the dead would hear him coming. Then came the rocks and the fallen trees, putting his mind a little at ease as he climbed over them. He didn't mind them as much as the dead leaves. They could be used as cover if he needed it, and if he had to freeze, he could stand there without making a sound. But with another crunch, back came his anxiety.
Wesson froze in an instant when he picked up something that didn't belong in the dark: light, and lots of it. Switching back to his normal sight, he steadily crab-walked his way down the small incline, working in the shadows of the moon and the large rounded trees. Concealing himself behind one, he skulked around the side of it, his pulse carbine ready to pulverize anything that happened to be too close for comfort. And if that happened, he was the fastest thing the Legion had to offer that wasn't totally a machine. He didn't move like a certain blue hedgehog, but he could clear the two hundred yard gap between him and his entourage in two shakes.
He couldn't believe his tactical senses: the bots had flood lamps up and pointing towards their transports. If he wanted to, he could've come out from his concealment spot by the tree, do a series of jumping jacks, and the bots still wouldn't have seen him unless they switched to their night vision. Wesson was totally hidden in the abyss of the dark thanks to the back lighting that Eggman's minions had put up. And what was even better about it: the flood lights exposed the five transports in living color.
"They must be handing out the butt whopping around here. They've grown complacent; even for Bots!"
Wesson took two quick scans of his surroundings before he began to advance a little further towards the target rich environment. Shouldering his carbine and bringing out his pistol from his utility belt, he leopard crawled across the ground, using the undergrowth to his best advantage. Moving three inches every ten seconds, he painstakingly kept himself low and quiet, extending his tail straight out from his body the whole time. Before he would place his hand on the ground, he'd gently swipe away the leaves in front of him, exposing the dirt that hadn't borne grass for many moons. He smiled inward when the only sound he heard was the mechanics operating in his robotic arm.
He found a large tree to his right and rolled down in a burrow that was deep enough just to hide his entire prone body. Lifting his head up, he peered over the large exposed root of the tree, and flexed his enhanced ocular to zoom in, activating the range finder --that was an added bonus to losing his eye-- to gauge the distance. Looking down the shallow incline that didn't have much in the way of obstacles or cover, he saw movement but it wasn't friendly by any means. Seeing the readout from him to the bots was just over five hundred meters, he reached for his radio that was hidden in a sleeve beside the poaches that held his extra battery cells, switched it on, and gave two taps on the talk button. He hoped to the Ancient Walkers that Stenson or Ell-Tee had theirs switched on just to hear the two static blips signal that danger was present.
He waited. No reply, but he did notice that his quick transmission didn't arouse the bots. He watched one move back and forth, doing menial tasks as Wesson was sure they were forcing their prisoners to do the real work. Sure they didn't feel the strain of working since they were machines, but it was all psychological warfare against their captives; "Break em' so they don't have the strength to revolt or escape."
Piifft...piffft!
It was what he wanted to hear. They had their ears on and they were now awaiting for him to give the all clear. Switching to infrared, he took in more of a threat assessment, gathering as much information as he could before he signaled the rest of his team to advance. To his far right, he could see the outlines of Mobians, huddled in a group beside the back of a transport with about four bots standing guard around them. He only counted six, but they were bunched up enough that he was sure there were more. Surveying to the left, he could see the energy sources of the bots as they lumbered around the huddled transports. Wesson knew it wouldn't be long before they departed.
Holstering his pistol and grabbing his pen light, he flashed it towards the infrared signature of his team, holding it down for a half minute so they could get a bearing on him. Satisfied when he saw them start to move, he turned his attention back to the target rich environment. He assessed the transports further, figuring that they were going to be an easy shell to crack. They were Eggman's lower model Cyberdyne ships: rectangular in appearance with short stubby, wings for stabilization, and sporting nothing in the way of armament. They were just to move supplies and the spoils-of-war from point A to point B. They weren't in any formation to speak of, closely huddled together like the prisoners they were about to receive. Wesson could see the powerplants to their engines were running. It wasn't hard to miss the white glow from the inside of their thin hulls.
"Wow, what luck!" bolstered Ell-Tee in a whisper as he came up beside Wesson. "What's the distance?"
"About five hundred yards. Our civilians are on the right flank and a good majority of the bots are center and left, possible more in the ships."
Stenson came up beside them now, lying as low as he could while holding his rifle over his shoulder. "Yanar and I will deploy here. Ell-Tee, take three and position yourself on the left flank." Stenson looked behind him at the gathering Albion Centurions, circling in a close defensive stack. "Wesson, where are those civilians?"
"Right flank, sir. Looks like they are the last to get loaded."
"Okay, Mr. Craig. Grab two of your best shooters and go with Wesson. Figure you can handle that position better than us?"
"We'll find out, Mr. Stenson," replied Craig. He then quickly turned to his assembled team. "Nata-Le...Oscar, on me. The rest of you, listen to the Lieutenant."
Ell-Tee brought his auto-cannon around and held it stiffly to his shoulder. "Vickers and the rest of you, lets go. Noise discipline all the way."
"Roger that!" whispered Vickers, bringing his standard Legionnaire rifle up to low ready position in his shoulder.
Stenson watched as both teams fanned out. Wesson led Craig, Nata-Le and the other brown echidna, Oscar, just to the right of the clearing, shadowing themselves behind the trees as they leapfroged their way down. Ell-Tee took his team further away from the clearing, navigating to a spot where they could maximize their firepower from one central location.
Now it was time for Stenson's part in the operation. He lumbered the Diplomat off his shoulder and brought it and himself down towards the ground, placing it on its bi-pod. He tightly locked his shoulder into the custom made stock that was specially fitted for him and him alone. Satisfied with his natural point of aim, he turned his head slightly to Yanar:
"I need one of those magazines, Mr. Ambassador," he whispered evenly.
Yanar happily slung off the pack and produced one of the large magazines to the Field Marshal. The titanum casings glimmered in the moonlight. Seeing the first round was a Slammer, Stenson slid the magazine under his arm and pushed it into the well. Upon hearing the snap of the mag locking into place, Stenson reached forward and grabbed the two and a half inch charging handle on the right side of the weapon and racked it home. Yanar turned white as the pale moon when he heard the mechanical action chamber in the first round that ended with a hard thump.
Pushing the safety down to the fire position with a flick of his thumb, Stenson steadied his right eye over the scope and took a bead on the side of a transport. If all went well, he could also destroy the one beside it with the first shot.
"What's the plan Mr. Wesson..."
The Legionnaire snapped around and pushed his right robotic arm at Craig's mouth. "You speak one more time when we are this close, and I won't hesitate to snap your neck off!" Wesson growled over his deformed voice, He waited until he saw Craig nod his eyes in affirmation. "What we are going to do is execute an ambush. The only difference is that we have to move into position before we open fire. Usually it's the other way around." He quickly looked around him and found that they were still unseen and unheard. "When we spring it...no-holds-barr. Understand me? Our key to this is silence, a good position, and lots of violence. If a mobian happens to cross your path and you happen to kill em, shrug it off and keep killing the bots. We need to drop as many of those things as possible."
He released Craig and continued working his field craft, inching himself closer with his carbine shouldered, ready to scorch anything that surprised him.
Craig had to kick himself to follow Wesson; he was just as shocked as Nata-Le and Oscar from the Legionnaires raspy speech. "Shrug it off? Who the hell are these guys?"
Nata-Le was having the same feelings as Craig, but she still looked to Wesson for guidance. She and the rest of them had only trained to hold off hoards of enemy combatants; not go looking for them. She knew it upset the sergeant and she couldn't blame him, but she also found it as a fault in keeping their world safe. But Wesson's idea of shrugging off innocent people getting killed disturbed her. She didn't understand how someone could think that way.
Wesson lowered himself lower to the ground and motioned for the rest to do the same. They were close enough that they could make out most of the bots and the Mobians that were held captive. Wesson threw his arm up and motioned for Criag. The Centurion did his best to not make a sound as he moved closer to Wesson.
"Spread out from here, no more and no less than two meters from each other. Find anything for cover," Wesson softly whispered, gauging that they were just about twenty yards from the impending kill zone.
He watched Craig turn and motioned for the team to grab a position. "At least they have hand signals," he snorted to himself. Turning back to his left, he zoomed in on where Ell-Tee was supposed to be with his infrared vision. He could barely see the other team but he was satisfied that the main key to the ambush was set. Balancing his carbine to keep it at the ready, Wesson lightly grabbed his radio from his pocked and began to send the ready sig...
...Fear bolted through his body that told him to drop his radio. Out from the corner of his right eye, just before he switched it back to his normal sight, he picked up a warm body beside him. He centered his target rectal of his carbine's holographic scope on it, standing as still as he could. Beyond the bow and arrow that was ready to be released at Wesson's head, he could make out a figure under a hood, his eyes filled to the brink with rage.
"What in the name of Dimitri!" cursed Stenson under his cloak. "Get him out of the way!"
Yanar's heart sank further than where it was. "What's going on, Mr. Stenson!" he demanded in a harsh whisper. He could tell that Stenson was fidgeting under his cloak as he steadied his rifle through the whole ordeal.
Stenson could see him plain as day through his night vision scope. Even the outline of the bow and arrow. "A hedgehog just dropped down right in front of my sights..."
"...Is he wearing a hood!?" Yanar fired back.
"Yes?" Stenson didn't like where this was going.
"That's our sentry! That's Rob-O..."
"...Well, he's about to get splattered if he doesn't..."
"...Get down! Do it now!" Wesson held his ground the whole time, whispering his commands as loud as safety permitted. He waited; the hedgehog did nothing.
Nata-Le looked over her shoulder at where Wesson was supposed to be. Finding that he wasn't beside her, she frantically searched with the ambient flood lights giving her aid. They were just enough to trace the figure of the Legionnaire echidna in a stand off with something just in front of him. She became frantic. She wanted to shout out to Craig for help, but she knew if she did, they and everybody else could be dead in a heart beat. Leaning harder up against the tree Nata-Le clutched the pistol grip of her plasma rifle harder as she waited for the deadly outcome of the stand off.
Wesson's mind was racing so fast, that between his thoughts and his head becoming dizzy from the two way vision of his eyes, he was starting to have a hard time thinking straight. Suddenly time seemed to stand still as he tried to rank the threats into priorities: in front of him was a very agitated hedgehog who was about to send him packing to the afterlife, and beside him were the hoard of bots that would soon detect them if he didn't get the situation under control.
And up on the hill was Stenson...ready to splatter the hedgehog to the four winds if he didn't drop to the ground.
To Wesson's surprise, it spoke; "Put thou weapon down."
"Oh, hell no! We are not going to do this!"
Wesson snapped his eyes to the right when he saw movement come from the side of the transport that he was sure was Stenson's first target. Throwing his stare back to the situation that was about to spiral out of control, he cursed in the air as he tried to plead with the man in front of him.
"Get down, or I'm gonna make you!"
"Is that a threat...if so, thou won't be seeing the next few seconds!"
Wesson lowered himself to the ground, ready to pull his trigger if it came to it. Sweat rolled off his brow, and for a good reason; he could see one of the Eggbots was beginning to take some interest in them.
"Mr. Yanar; can you replace a Sentry if you had too?"
Stenson's question drove through Yanar like a knife. "WHAT!?"
Stenson felt the breeze pick-up, fluttering his cloak that was draped over him and his rifle. For a second he thought it was Yanar, but he knew the Ambassador didn't have that much hot air in him.
"Okay, cretin. I've had enough games."
Wesson bolted quickly to his right, counting on the hedgehog's reflexes to get the better of him. It worked. Wesson heard the fletching from the arrow whistle by his head, swearing it hadn't come more than two inches from the sound of it. Closing the short distance with a hard sprint and a diving jump, he pounced on top of the hedgehog before he could retrieve another arrow. Slamming hard to the ground, the hard thump attracted the Eggbot's attention and it quickly brought its sensors up along with its plasma launcher for an arm. Wesson was about to extend his carbine out and drop the bot, but he stopped himself cold. He instead placed his whole body weight on top of the hedgehog, feeling his quills digging into his jacket, covered metal chest. He took one last look up with his infrared vision just before he turned it off. For the split second moment he had of his sight, he realized that the hedgehog wasn't alone, seeing the body heat signatures of others in the trees.
But Wesson wasn't alone either...
"Thank-you!" With that mutter, Stenson squinted his left eye, took a breath which he let half way out...and slowly squeezed the trigger to his rifle.
He didn't necessarily hear the harsh bellow of thunder from it, but more so of the tightly wound springs in the stock. Stenson knew his shot had found its target even through he couldn't see from the white out of the flash and his scope. The slamming kick of his rifle scared him when it went off, a good indication that he didn't jerk the trigger. Yes, the transport wasn't a hard target to miss...but he couldn't say the same for the Eggbot at over hundred yards away.
He just hoped Wesson kept his head down.
A brilliant purple comet raked the humid air above them at over three thousand feet per second. Wesson could feel the immense heat on his back as he kept still the whole time, using every ounce of discipline that he could muster to not stand up and bolt for cover.
He couldn't say the same though for the aqua-blue hedgehog that he finally saw from the brief streaking light.
Rob-O had taken out his stout, little knife and was about to give Wesson a bad cut to the throat when he saw and felt the Slammer go by. He snapped his head over as he tried to follow it across the field. For the time it took him to blink from the induced shock, he watched the purple ball smash into the bot that was about to fire its plasma arm at them, sending it backwards into the side of the transport behind it. The round had began to mushroom as it picked up the bot, fully spreading out to all angles when it impacted the metal side of the ship with a deafening THWACK!
Time seemed to pause for everyone and everything for the few seconds it took the transport to be lifted off the ground and slightly rolled over onto its back before crashing into the transport beside it. The engulfing fire ball from the explosion signified the start of the Battle for Deer Wood Forest.
Ell-Tee felt a rush of adrenaline surge through his body as he adjusted his hand on the trigger group and touched off his auto-cannon at the open ramp of a transport. He caught the bots napping as they tried to stand-to and rush out of the rear compartment to meet the intruders. Ell-Tee's shoulder shook with every plasma round that was energized and thrown out of the barrel. He had both eyes open the whole time, watching his shots impact everything that had meaning.
Vickers wasn't far behind Ell-Tee on the shooting. Raising his standard issue Legion rifle, he held both handgrips firm and pressed the trigger. Catching two bots with his quick burst, he searched out for more targets and fired once more, sending three more plasma rounds into an assaulting bot that was cut in half, its white hot mechanical innards scorching the ground on contact.
It didn't take long for the prone Centurions beside him to take the hints and put their weapons to good use, catching anything that happened to pop into their holographic sights and cutting it down with a squeeze of their triggers.
Nata-Le felt her rifle jump in her soft hands as she took out the closest bot to the prisoners. It dropped without so much of a shudder from its hydraulic servos. With the smell of ozone filling the air around her, she felt the charge of battle come over her as she shifted her stance around the tree and let another Eggbot have its last rights. Muzzle flashes erupted beside her as Craig and Oscar joined the fight, tearing the machines down from their stubby legs.
Four hard, loud cracks of metal colliding with metal at a fierce velocity commanded her to swing back to the sanctuary of cover behind the tree. Catching her shaking breath helped her to regain her courage. She knelt further down over her shaking body that was racked with fear and peered around the left side of the tree. Her eyes caught four large holes that had pulverized the side of the transport, leaving a line of destructions.
Nata-Le was about to swing out and engage another bot when the Diplomat made her sink back behind the tree.
Stenson felt his toes digging a trench into the ground when he touched off his sixth round. He could feel the rifle getting hotter under his cloak, making him sweat more with every shot.
He smiled briefly when the armored-piercing round landed in the cockpit of the transport and killed the two bots that were inside. He could see the glimmer of the glass that was shattered to the four winds, littering the newly charred ground from stray blaster fire. From his vantage point, the skirmish looked as if a rock concert was under attack by an army of shooting stars. Bright traces of green and orange plasma fire raked the encircled bots' opened position, cutting only a few down at a time. Stenson knew it was a waste of energy cells, but the whole idea was to not let the enemy have a chance to respond in kind. Normal free-thinking beings would just wait out the first wave of forward fire, counting on the aggressors to stop and switch out batteries in their weapons. But not the bots. Stenson had seen this many times back on Angel Island: Eggman's machines would keep coming, no matter what level of ferocity the direct fire was as they attempted to blast away anything that was computed to as a target. It was a fault that Stenson used without prejudice.
Two Eggbots emerged out from behind the two burning hunks that were ships only seconds ago, and brought their weapons down on Wesson and Rob-O. Breathing in a short stint of air, Stenson let it out and adjusted his finger over the trigger...before he squeezed it.
Wesson used every ounce of free-will and strength to keep low, depending on the Field Marshal to keep his aim true the whole time.
He still winced when the seventy-one caliber round sliced through the air with a thunderous waft, exploding the first bot to what looked like an infinity of pieces. The driod behind it didn't fair too well either, taking what was left of the armored piercing round just as hard as its counter-part.
The Legionnaire counted on his fingers in his mind, guessing Stenson had about...
Three more rounds cruised overhead again and found their marks in another transport's cockpit to his left. The enemy bots had no escape now. In Wesson's calloused mind, they were nothing but scrap metal now if all continued to go well.
Craig slammed a fresh battery cell in his warm rifle and steaded his holographic sight on an approaching bot. Three hot plasma rounds later, it was terminated from binary existence. Climbing up to a kneeling position on the balls of his feet, he searched out more targets with his right eye fixed on his sight and his other eye open, giving him a better field of view. Checking over his right shoulder, Oscar was still prone and reloading, all the while keeping his head and eyes forward.
But when Craig looked to Nata-Le, he found her shaking to pieces behind a large tree.
"Nata-Le! Pull it together and keep firing!" he shouted to her over the earsplitting sounds of weapons discharging all around him.
She glimpsed up at Craig when she heard his voice, bracing her rifle close to her chest as if it was an energy shield to protect her. She wanted to throw up and soil herself all in the same timespan. Fear had stricken her, taking over her trained mind that was a virgin to battle as she, herself was with a mate. But with an uneasy breath, she regained her trained thoughts along with her courage. Chasing away the fright just enough to the back of her mind, she rounded the tree and looked for something to kill that was a machine.
There...a bot dashed out from behind the transport in front of her. Her rifle shook in her tremoring hands as she brought it up to her shoulder, placing the dim red-dot scope at the round center mass of the bot. Feeling her throat tighten when the droid brought it's plasma arm down at the prisoners, she threw her breathing techniques to the wind and drove the trigger back. Her rifle shuttered from the long burst of plasma leaving the barrel. Three rounds went wide, but four found their fatal marks that disintegrated the thin armor of the bot, melting vital internal operating components to its survival.
Nata-Le was beginning to realize that she had it in her now. She only needed to be motivated just enough to brush her young, feminine self aside to bring out her training and the taste for blood.
That was until she caught a glimpse of countless more bots coming around the transport, seeking to kill the prisoners that were lying and crying on the ground.
"Well, at least I'm not the only one who's scared..."
"RELOAD, YANAR!"
It was the third time Stenson had to yell at the Ambassador. With his cloak already unfolded to make way for the reload, Yanar hadn't quite come regained his senses to be of any help. His hands were still over his ears, protecting his vital mechanisms of hearing that he still wanted to keep. He wanted to hear his offspring say "daddy" without being deaf as a stone.
That was if he made it out of the fight alive so he could have a chance to reproduce.
Stenson reached over and grabbed a warm spent titanum casing and tossed it at Yanar, hitting the stunned brown echidna in the head with it. The Field Marshal was relieved when Yanar snapped his head around to him –he hadn't knocked the Ambassador unconscious with the heavy round object.
"I need a reload, Yanar!" he shouted over what he knew was the ringing in Yanar's ears. He had it too.
Yanar hesitated for a brief moment that Stenson knew was wasted valuable time, and reached into the large rucksack and pulled out another magazine. Practically heaving it to Stenson, the Field Marshal took it and shot a quick glimpse down at the first two rounds that he was going to be sending down range. "Slammers!" he said over a mirth in his head. Pressing the release catch just above the trigger, he dropped the empty magazine out from the Diplomat before chucking it aside, and replaced it with the fresh one. Bearing his teeth from the rush of adrenalin, he pulled the op-rod back to his shoulder that was music to his ringing ears. With the next round in battery, Stenson took off the night vision setting of the scope, centered the top of the glowing red arrow of a crosshair over the last transport that was emptying out bots from the rear...and continued giving them a bad case of the "Legionnaires' disease".
The situation was starting to look desperate in Ell-Tee's fierce eyes. To his right, he could still see Wesson lying on the ground and shielding someone or something over his body, and to his left, Vickers and the two Centurions were giving the new oncoming bots all they could dish out with their blasters. But what was really unsettling to him; he wasn't hearing the Diplomat orating its reports of destruction. He began to wonder if the Field Marshal was really becoming withered in his old age. The reload should have been done over ten seconds ago.
Pushing all thoughts aside except for his valuable training, he fired a series of bursts at two Eggbots, rendering them into molting white hot ribbons. He could see the front of the transport that he knew they were coming from, but his view of it was mostly obstructed by the rectangular tomb he created during the opening shots of the ambush.
That all soon changed when he saw a glimmer of purple light streaking across the ozone filled air that passed over Wesson again. Ell-Tee only hoped the poor boy hadn't lost his nerve yet.
The time for him to get to his feet and break for cover elapsed at over three-thousand feet per second as two Slammers raced over his head. Their fast streaking aura of purple light brightened the hedgehog's face once more. Wesson did his best to keep his game face on as the stunned look on the hedgeho'sg face almost sent him into a frenzy of laughter. Wesson could tell that the aqua furred hog had never witnessed anything this raw or destructive in his existence.
The lead round impacted just forward of the rear compartment, picking up the tail of the ship from the ground just enough to start swinging it around. It wasn't more than a half second later when the follow up came. The added inertia that struck dead center on the transport ripped it open at the constructed seams, tossing bots and bulk crates through the air that rained down in a ballet of destruction. At that moment, Wesson had a new found respect for physics and the wonders that it brought to help win a pitched battle.
Leaving the stupefied hedgehog where he lay on the ground, Wesson bolted up to his feet and swung his carbine out and dug it into his shoulder; ready to kill anything. Throwing his battle attuned senses to his team, he realized in tactical horror that their base of fire was about to collapse. The bots were out of their knee-jerk modes and beginning to process a counter-attack that Wesson knew that the very "green" Centurions couldn't repel.
Fostering his resolute resolve that was going to be projected by his carbine, he purposely forgot about the hedgehog's friends above him, and sat off to reinforce Craig and the others from the growing tide that was coming in mass numbers.
Vickers was on his last battery and things weren't looking like they were going to stop anytime soon. If anything he wanted to do –if he survived the skirmish– was to go back to Albion and roast Wesson's bird. There was no way that the Eggbot force that they were dealing with was "just" a platoon size. Between him and Ell-Tee, they must've dropped at least two and a half squads of machines, neglecting to count what the Centurions had finished off.
"Ammo status!?" he shouted out over the low, cracking impulse sounds of the blasters. Looking dead at the two red echidnas, who were doing their best to hold the line, Vickers saw fingers shoot up in the air that quickly went down just as fast –two and three.
"Crap!" Ell-Tee cursed under his breath. He wasn't too far off on his count as well. Nice thing about the whole affair, he had enough energy in his battery packs to stay in the game a little while longer if he had too. It just meant he was going to have to be a little more conservative with his close fire support techniques.
He saw the outline of three bots coming at him just to his right. At first, he could see their round hulks from the passing plasma fire that seemed to miss them by mere inches. But soon they entered into the flood lights, and that made Ell-Tee's job the more easier.
He was horridly wrong when he squeezed the trigger. Nothing! "OH, CRAP!"
"RELOADING!" he yelled out at the top of his lungs.
Everything went back to training; dropping the large lithium box down; searching his pack that was beside him; snagging another cell; feeling the anxiety as the bots closed in, their plasma arms lowering down at him.
Vickers took three shots and dropped the far left bot that was about kill his Lieutenant. Centering his fixed iron sights on the next bot in line, he squeezed the trigger. Only one shot leaped out from the rifle that only melted the skin of the bot. It was just enough to divert its attention off from Ell-Tee, and rotate its permanent smiling head around toward Vickers. Soon, its blaster arm elevated with mechanical precision.
All the corporal could do was grumble to himself. "Ah, hell..."
...Something flew through the air that for once, wasn't bright enough to be plasma fire, but was too slow to be something from Stenson's Diplomat. It was a bolt; piercing the air and sticking halfway through the metal head of the bot, cracking the positronic brain that didn't have much of anything for freewill.
Ell-Tee had just slapped his fresh battery in the large well when he saw the second bot drop to the ground like a falling statue. The commotion was just enough to make the last Eggbot look to the trees from where the lone bolt had originated, giving Ell-Tee enough breathing room to shake away his anxiety and let his weapon come alive again.
The bot was little more than a smoldering hunk of white hot liquid in the end.
Rob-O fired an arrow that slammed right between the eyes of a bot. Reaching around and grabbing for a second arrow, he placed it on the gut string of his bow and pulled it back passed his ear.
Out of the corner of Wesson's eye came a bot. He swiftly turned to shoot it, but as he brought his barrel up, an arrow pieced through the center mass of the machine, severing wires that ran precious energy and information to the CPUs. Not even looking back –as the arrow was not for him– Wesson hurried over to Nata-Le; she was visibly shaking as she tried put forth the effort to reload her weapon. He stopped in front of her and helped her fumbling hands find the square hole to reenergize her weapon. When he felt the springs snap the cell in place, he took a long look at her and squeezed her shoulder with his right hand. "Follow m..."
His life was almost cut almost fatally short when a plasma bolt hissed past his head, causing him to flinch and press up against Nata-Le to gain cover of the tree. With his anger flowing across his eyes, he leaned out from the side from the tree and gave a bot –which he was sure had tried to kill him– a quick burst that dropped it to the ground. He smiled broadly when the bot ceased to move. He finally got to kill something!
"Follow me!" he finally finished, looking back to the petrified girl. For a brief second, he felt guilty at himself for shouting at Nata-Le the way he did. Wesson knew that she would accept the order, but he felt that his voice, which sounded like a demon from Hell, was issuing it as her death warrant. He honestly couldn't help it, a dingo –and a dead one at that– made him sound discomforting to virgin ears.
Ducking low and quickly zig-zagging with Wesson as best she could her over coming physical and mental self, Nata-Le wanted to turn around and run back to the tree, and possibly away from the fight all together. But it was only her sense of duty and honor that cut her short from becoming a deserter. She kept a few meters distance apart from Wesson and she was glad she did. A few too many plasma bolts that had come between them as she dart across the cumbersome undergrowth. With another volley of enemy fire racing overhead and sometimes singing the ground around her, she was finding the ten yard sprint was taking forever to complete. She was wishing that she had done more physical training before she had signed up for this "recce" run.
Wesson dropped right beside Craig and let another two bots have it with his carbine. Nata-Le was soon there beside him.
"Prisoners!"
Craig heard Wesson's raspy voice even over his own weapon. Touching off two quick shots that sent a bot to the ground, he gave the distressing news; "I saw a civilian take a round from one of the bots. I was in the middle of a..."
Wesson cut him off curtly, "...Don't give me freakin' excuses now! They still keeping their heads down?"
"Along with ours!"
Wesson took a pop shot at a bot that exposed itself just enough from around the ship to receive a good dose of blue, static pulse energy. "Good! Stand-to and advance...!"
"...WHAT!" shrilled Nata-Le.
Wesson shot his head over, his eyes crimson with rage, along with the burning hunks of bots and ships. "We take the fight to them! It's the only way to win this, now!"
"Tactics?" spat out Craig.
"Can you leapfrog?" Wesson's raspy voice was now eerily calm.
Craig replied with a fast nod. "Oscar!"
"Present and accounted for, SIR!"
Craig smiled at the knee-jerk response. Oscar was holding it together far better than anyone else who wasn't a Legionnaire. "Leapfrog advance; stagger formation!"
Craig swapped out to a fresh cell, nodded to his left and right, and stood up along with Wesson. Oscar followed suite and took the lead role; kneeling down and shooting at anything that moved that wasn't a Furry. Craig bolted in front of him with Wesson to his left, taking down a pair of machines as they gained ground across the twelve yard space between them and the prisoners.
Nata-Le soon treaded to the forefront, finding the more bots she took down, the less she would have to worry about killing her. She still felt the tightness in her throat and her stomach the whole time, but the only way she knew she could feel better was by trudging on to victory --one bot at a time.
Stopping just in front of Wesson, she fired blindly over the heads of the hostages; their status changing on a whim thanks to the bots. When Oscar appeared in front of her, she shifted her weapon to the left, striking down another bot with a pull from the trigger. Red bolts littered the air around her suddenly. She could see the muzzle flashes of the blaster arms lighting up the hulks of the bots. She cringed when one landed at her feet, making her hop back.
Then Wesson come around in front of her, firing his pulse carbine that she could see drop two bots...maybe three. She felt safe again at that moment. With that thought instilled in her, she brought up more courage from her heart that made her tense her hands around the hand-guard and pistol grip of her rifle. Before long, she readied herself to...
There was no time to think or move, just scream! She saw it coming; the red ball of hot energy streaking towards her as if a homing beacon was put on her. It shocked and burned her all in the same excruciating instant, her left arm and shoulder taking the blunt of the impact that hurled her towards the Mobian surface. She twisted over enough that when her smoldering shoulder met the ground. More pain shot to her skull as she expelled every ounce of air from her lungs in an earsplitting scream. The smell of burnt clothes, fur, and flesh invaded her nostrils which seemed to push the burning and agonizing pain deeper into her head. Panic and shock soon took their dementive course when her eyes fell on the charged remains of her arm.
All she could do was scream from the torturous agony.
Ell-Tee was disciplining himself not to be jumpy. Nothing came running across his sights for the last half minute and he was afraid that if something did, he would regret it. The noise of battle was beginning to die along with the bots they killed. Turning to his right, he saw Vickers lying down for cover while the two Centurions were still dishing it out. Their target, Ell-Tee finally figured out, was the still blackness that only they could see.
"Cease fire–cease fire!" he ordered across the ranks. Vickers instantly stood up and shouted the same commands, waving his right hand in front of his face along with his curt commands. "Status!?"
It took Vickers awhile before he relayed the team's condition; "No casualties, Ell-Tee!"
With a thumbs up from the ground, Ell-Tee took in a long, deep breath of the thick ozone air before standing to his feet, and placing his auto-cannon at the ready in his hands, shifting his gaze to the rear and to the trees; searching for where that lone bolt came from. "We're not alone, Corporal! Eyes peeled!"
"Yes, sir!"
He was about to take a step further when something filtered over the ringing sound in his ears. For a brief instance it sounded like someone was laughing their head off.
He was dreadfully right when he heard Craig:
"MAN DOWN! MAN DOWN!"
Ell-Tee's blood charged through his veins once more as he darted across the ground in a furious sprint. As he brushed past the young saplings of trees and bushes, he could see figures jumping down from the trees all around him as he hurriedly made his way over; Vickers taking up the rear. At first he feared it was Wesson, but his sinking thoughts of the young sergeant meeting his demise –or getting more replacement hardware– vanished when he heard the harsh screams from a girl in immense pain.
He could see Wesson kneeling beside her, his weapon slung across his back and doing all he could to aid and comfort her. He definitely wasn't alone: Craig and Oscar were beside her, along with what was left of the now freed prisoners crowding around them.
Somewhere a soft stuttering female voice ranged over Nata-Le's crying screams, "Everyone--everyone please move back and give the poor girl some air."
Wesson looked up to see Ell-Tee and Vickers approach. "She took a hit to the arm and shoulder!"
"What!?" Ell-Tee shouted, not hearing Wesson's raspy voice over Nata-Le's moaning screams.
"Hang in there, Nat!" came Oscar, trying to calm her down, rubbing her legs.
"She's going into shock, Ell-Tee!" clarified Wesson, bumping up the triage level.
Ell-Tee placed his weapon by the feet of an elderly feline girl and began to see how bad the damage was to Nata-Le's arm. It wasn't good. Wesson had already striped away the burnt fabric of her blue battle jacket while Craig was injecting her with a sedative from his battlefield medical kit that would still keep her conscious, but as loopy as a village idiot. Ell-Tee could see the burnt contusions were somewhere in the neighborhood of third degree burns, stretching from her shoulder to the lower portion of her biceps. Shads of purple blood and red tissue glimmered in the surrounding flood lights.
She stopped screaming from the harsh pain as the injection calmed it down some, but it wasn't relieving the shock. Oscar took his backpack off and placed it under her head. He could see tears raining down her face.
"I want my mom!" she whimpered out shrilly. "I want my MOM...!"
Craig choked back his tears, putting his leadership training to the forefront as best he could. "We're here, Naty! We're not going to leave you, okay!"
Ell-Tee held her head, stroking her hair as gently as his mechanical hand could actuate. Wesson glanced up at him, slowly shaking his abjectly pained face with his observation. He didn't have to say anything. Ell-Tee knew she was probably going to lose her arm, but it was her life that they all worried about. Between her being borderline traumatized –probably the worst she has ever been in her life– from her first battle, and with shock really starting to set in from the reverberating pain and loss of blood, they could lose her with little thought of anguish to spare from her friends.
"What did you give her, Craig?" asked Ell-Tee in a disarming voice.
"Anti-shock! It only helps for the first hour or so. We can only give her one injection for every twelve, though. Stuff is brutally potent and could make her heart explode if we give her more! But it calms her down and eases the pain a little."
Ell-Tee nodded, looking over his shoulder at the aqua blue hedgehog. He just stood there with an expressionless face.
"Rob-O!" came the same soft voice he heard before. Ell-Tee rasied an eye-brow when he witnessed a red female echidna race to the one she called out and embraced him. "I knew you'd come."
Ron-O returned the hug just as tight. "I wasn't going to let them take my Mari-An," he scoffed. "Anyone else injured?"
"Yea," Oscar replied somberly, "a lynx took one in the chest. I'm sorry but he's onto the next life. "
Rob-O released Mari-An along with his anger; "And you about got more of us killed, friend..."
"...Someone's approaching from behind!" The wolf who touted the warning swung his crossbow to the rear, pointing it at a large figure dressed in black. He could see it was wearing a cloak of some kind, and held something enormous over his shoulder.
"Stay your weapons, please. We mean no harm." It was Yanar.
"Field Marshal, we've got a problem!" reported Vickers.
"I see her, anything that these people can help wi..."
"...Yanar!?" inquired Rob-O, cutting off Stenson as he rigidly walked up to the brown echidna.
"It's Ambassador Yanar now, Rob-O," he replied with a smile, awaiting to accept Rob's hand.
He would get it, but not on friendly terms.
Rob hurled his fist at Yanar's face, connecting it to his left jaw line with precision accuracy. Before Yanar could blink, he was on the ground, caressing the side of his face, which was visibly stunned.
"Yo'...hey!" blurted out Craig, rising up from beside Nata-Le.
Rob-O's friends went straight for their leader, holding the hedgehog back from making another attempt at Yanar's physical well being. Stenson placed his rifle on the ground and marched straight up to Rob-O, looking squarely down at the hooded face of the hedgehog that was visibly painted with scorn and distrust.
"I understand your quarrel with the Ambassador, Rob-O...is it?" Stenson got a confirming nod. "Okay...listen, that girl needs our help right now, so put it aside until she gets the care she needs."
Nata-Le suddenly began to scream again, only to be quieted down when Wesson began caressing her face gently with his natural hand. Stenson saw this, taking note of something that he was actually afraid of from Wesson.
"Why should I listen to you, friend. After all, thou art is with this Yanar and his cold shouldered society..."
Stenson waved his hand, cutting Rob-O short of what Stenson also believed the people in Albion were. "I'm not with those pacifist low-lifes, hedgehog. If it wasn't for my kind, your little bow and arrow party might've been the end of you..."
"...Field Marshal, we might lose her in due time!"
Stenson fired off a glance at Ell-Tee. The urgency in his look said it all. "Do you have a base with a proper medical center?" asked the Field Marshal evenly.
"I'm sorry, we don't," answered Rob-O hesitantly. "Me and my merry band of Crazy Kritters have been using the ground for our beds as of late."
"Hear that, Mr. Yanar?" scoffed Stenson.
Yanar was back on his feet, but still feeling lower than scum. He nodded his head.
Stenson looked towards Wesson. The boy was definitely changing with every stroke of his hand to Nata-Le's tearing face. Something was turning him inside out and Stenson knew it was probably going to save the girl. "Sergeant Wesson!"
Wesson snapped his head up. "Yes, Field Marshal!"
"You're the fastest runner we have. You need to take that girl back to Albion and get her the proper care she needs." In the back of his racing mind, Stenson feared that he brought forth an underlying message with the order. "Are you up to it?"
It was over nine kilometers back to Albion; eight miles. Wesson could run three miles at a full double-timed pace in about fifteen minutes, but he didn't know about the last five he needed to hump. Plus the fact of having a girl in sever pain within his arms during the whole run added to his burdening mind. "Thank Dimitri I have a replacement arm!"
He looked down at her, seeing her face blushing red from her crying. He shot his head back up to Stenson, his face filled with confidence and resolve:
"...I'm game, Field Marshal!"
"You sure, Sergeant!?" asked Stenson with a nod.
"Yes, sir! I am totally game for this!"
Stenson gave a curt nod. "Lighten yourself up expect for your carbine..."
"...I'm leaving it too. It'll slow me down," retorted Wesson, taking his weapon, jacket, and utility belt off. Even leaving his pistol.
"How are you going to defend yourself, dear sir?" asked Mari-An in a calm voice.
Wesson glanced up at her, but not before wrapping Nata-Le in his jacket. He smirked at her and brought up his right cybernetic hand, crushing his fingers down to show his intent of what he would do to anything that got in his way.
Mari-An nodded and graced the ground over to him; "Could you be so kind to deliver a message to Gala-Na from me?"
Wesson stood up to her to formally address her request. "Yes, Milady," he acknowledge with his gritted voice. He had an idea of what was going to be said; he could see her eyeing what skin he had left on his muzzle.
"It's just to her and not to you." And with that, she slapped Wesson on the side of the face, rocking his head over slightly. Gasps filled the smoldering air around them.
"I understand the message, Milady," Wesson replied, feeling the stinging burn on what was left of his face. "I'm wasting time now."
"Right you are, Goddess speed."
Wesson gently picked Nata-Le off the ground. She was shaking in his arms the whole while. He walked passed the gathered group with pride rigidly instilled in his body, his face showing determination and resolution to his mission. When he passed Stenson, he shot a quick glance at him and said; "I will not fail, Field Marshal."
Stenson waited before he replied; "Your allegiance to your mission doesn't lie with me...its with her. Now make haste!"
And that he did; leaning forward with Nata-Le's legs over his left arm, and her body over his right to support her, hammering his feet across the ground.
All the while as he cleared the first hundred yards with a breaking pace, he thought why he suddenly found it in him to do this. For a long time, he thought only of himself and maybe of his bird and comrades throughout the ongoing war. But something did change him, and Stenson had seen it...
Wesson had never heard a girl scream so hard for her mother in his life.
I may be indesposed for a long while I'm afraid. I will try to get the follow up before certain things take me away from this. Please review...or at least tell me how I'm doing.
Thanks go out to the dedicated readers. I see your numbers, and can only offer my thanks.
The next chapter was inspired by a true event over thousands of years ago.