Chapter 25
Anguish
Distressing was one thing the Quark crew could not get over. Throughout their trip towards the Klausian system, they did their best to comfort each other while still keeping their minds on their task. Marietta, for one, was unable to escape from the tense situation...
"Lazeria, Trena, Roukin, Wraitn... all will suffer from casualties if we don't hurry. And we all know just what the Alliance is capable of." Marietta spoke in a lowered voice.
"I'm not any less worried, but if you let yourself get so weak from fretting over things that you don't want to see happen you're only going to make situations worse. And you'll end up seeing most of those events occur... so let's not jump to conclusions and just do what we can to stop them." Mirage replied in her usual calm and collected manner.
Marietta just barely managed to cheer up as she felt her heart rise back up with energy from Mirage's influence, "I guess you're right, captain. You know... my older brother, Fred, was always an obnoxious and stubborn person who would often treat me with disrespect. And since my parents passed away at an early age, I really had no one to look up to during my life."
"That's until Mirage came along, right?" Steeg asked wisely.
Marietta smiled and replied, "Hehe, right!"
Mirage was slightly flattered by her comment, "I just do what I can to help..." she said as she tilted her head towards her shoulder in an feminine way. "You know i've always suggested you to sign up as a full-fledged student at Jingu."
"You know, maybe I should start taking that advice a little more seriously once we're done dealing with this mishap." Marietta chuckled back.
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Klaus IV, class M, the fourth planet of the Klausian system was under heavy security at Quark's arrival. This could possibly have hinted that the Alliance had already gotten here before them. Mirage told everyone to meet at the bridge immediately for an announcement.
"So what's going on?" Cliff asked Mirage.
"Looks like we couldn't catch up to them. I've received reports that Klaus IV is already under attack and the other Klausians are trying to take care of them right now, I doubt they'll last for long since we're up against the Alliance here. We still don't know what they're after yet." Mirage replied.
Xeim nodded as he slowly began to walk away, "We better hurry then before something drastic happens..."
Mirage whipped out her communicator to send a transmission to one of Quark's most reliable members. "Clark!" she called, "We're going to head down to Klaus IV now at the Lazeria space station. I want you to get all combat personnel ready with equipment level A. This is urgent."
"Leave it to me, i'll get them all prepared in no time!" he replied with a stiff voice.
"Thanks..."
Once everyone had gathered near the transporter room, the teams had by then already arrived. There were about ten or twelve in total that formed a number of squads, but they could only transport six at a time.
"We have Squad A, B, and C along with the support team all ready captain!" Clark announced to which Mirage nodded in confirmation.
Marietta stepped forward to hold Mirage's hand in her palm from affection before speaking softly, "I know you're all worried about your homes and your families, but make sure you don't get so carried away and forget to take care of yourselves while trying to protect them."
"Marietta..." Maria did her best to console her friend. "I promise we'll be back safely after we take care of all the matters here. Don't worry about us."
Afterwards, Mirage and the rest of the squad teams arrived to the space station on Lazeria which was by now packed with many people that consisted of Klausians and a few other similar races. They were mostly citizens of Lazeria being taken away to the evacuation shelters near the boundaries of the planet.
"Everyone has already begun to evacuate." Lieber noted in a slightly depressed tone as he glanced over the evacuation facility which consisted of many Klausians in a rush with a panicked expression planted on all their faces. The children were being evacuated first who had tears running down their cheeks from fear.
Cliff crossed his arms slowly, "Well we know now that Lazeria is in a pretty bad shape. I can just imagine what the other areas might be like." he stated and everyone nodded as they wondered how long the Alliance has been here. Just then, there was an announcement being made at the station...
"Your attention please... due to the unexpected large number of evacuating citizens and guests on Klaus IV, the emergency transporter will be unable to transport everyone directly to the shelter immediately. We will instead set a course to evacuate everyone onto the second floor where a transport jammer will be activated after everyone's arrival. There, a transporter awaits which will lead everyone into the emergency shelters. Due to this inconvenience, we request everyone to move in a hasty and organized manner."
The announcement was repeated twice to make sure everyone was informed.
"This looks bad... let's hurry!" exclaimed Mirage as she paced quickly past the evacuation facility in the station with the rest of the group where she layed her eyes on couple of soldiers from the local military.
"Stop!" one of the security officers said holding out his hand to gesture them, "All citizens are required to move into the evacuation facility immediately. It is extremely dangerous out there."
"You're mistaken, i'm Mirage Koas, commander of the military organization Quark. Our troops are here to help protect everyone within Klaus." Mirage informed him.
"Oh, Quark! Well, then this is good news. Most of the cities are in poor shape right now... if we aren't able to eliminate the Alliance in time, who knows what'll happen here?" the other officer stated worriedly.
"Can you give us a briefing on the situation?" Maria asked bluntly.
"Lazeria is in heaps of trouble as you may have noticed, but we're concentrating so much on rescuing as many citizens as possible that we're not getting time to plan out a logical offense. The other major cities are suffering from the same dilemma. But if you lend us a hand, you could possibly do the offensive part of the job for us so we can get rid of them quicker."
"Just leave it to us..." Xeim responded. "You must concentrate simply on your task and in the meanwhile, we'll take care of the Alliance."
The security officer thanked them before speaking once again, "Then we're counting on you. I'll inform the rest of the troops about Quark's arrival until then. We have pretty much secured Roukin, Wraitn, and the eastern cities. They are out of danger. Although the same cannot be said about Lazeria and Trena."
"Alright then, so any ideas Mirage?" Cliff asked as Mirage turned back towards the others waiting for her answer.
"I always thought you were full of them, Cliff." she cracked back wisely.
"Yeah, well i'm all out right now. Besides, I had a hunch you would have one anyway."
Mirage smirked to which she gave back a serious answer, "Fine then. We'll need to split up and scout out both cities. Lazeria is obviously a much larger city so logically, we'll need more people to stay here. Lieber and Maria, i'll need you to head over to the northern section of this city with the first squad team. Xeim, Welch, and Misty... i'll need you together once again to take care of the southern counterparts of Lazeria along with the other rest of the team. Meanwhile, i'll head over to Trena. I'm suspecting Shin is definitely involved in this as well, our task is to take him down this time as soon as we spot him!"
"Wait, Mirage..." Cliff stepped forward boldly towards Mirage. "I'll go with you."
Mirage not having any objections ordered everyone in the group, "Alright, Cliff. Now that we're all set... let's all spread out to our respective sections!"
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Lieber and Maria needed to take the local train towards Lazeria along with the squad. The train was empty at present, they headed towards the train station and boarded the first train heading for the downtown area of Lazeria located in the northern section.
"Wow, i'm actually surprised they're functional... considering how empty it is." Maria noted as she stepped into the open door. However, before the train started to move, she noticed two people dressed similarly in the distance who noticed both Maria and Lieber step onto the train.
"Stay right there!" it turned out to be a couple of Alliance soldiers. They held out their disrupter rifles in a steady position as they began advancing towards Maria. Maria, in turn, dropped her handgun and raised both her arms calmly without panicking.
"YOU! You must be with that worthless Federation! You're alw-..!" both were cut short before the Alliance soldier could speak any further. It was Lieber. He managed to take them down with his rifle from behind as he zapped them with thunderous bullets.
"Thanks, Lieber." Maria smiled as she began to walk forward to see if there were any other Alliance members onboard. But the only soldiers present were those from Quark.
"...No problem." Lieber said as he simply stood there still holding his rifle intensely.
Train rides were beautiful in Klaus IV. Mostly because of how they travelled between large domes known as the atmospheric shields which wrapped around cities. Lazeria had its own atmospheric shield since it was such a large city. Usually there are areas within each large city such as Lazeria where inhabitants could go to the highest point of the dome which made great tourist sites. The view looked extremely beautiful especially during the night. Outside of the domes were nothing but large bodies of water and guideways for the trains to function on when travelling between cities.
The trains functioned using the technology of magnetic levitation. These type of trains are a famous method of local transportation not only in Klaus, but in many other developed planets. They float over a guideway using the basic principles of magnets and make use of electromagnetic propulsion to accelerate. It is most famously known as maglev trains.
The interior of the maglev train wasn't any less fancy either. Once the path was clear, Lieber and Maria took a seat in the front section where the the seats were plated with a hard metal to give it a more durable surface. There were small cushions filled with a mass of padding on top of the rough steel-like material.
"It's been a while since i've been here..." Maria said with a slight relief as she plopped onto one of the seats.
"Say Maria?" Lieber turned towards her as a concern rose in his mind. "So what have you been doing all these past years? I mean you've changed quite a bit... your dress... your attitude... and Poshus all hint towards that. You must've been through a lot in these four years, huh?"
As the train trudged forward smoothly, Maria felt the wind blow from the open windows as she thought about Lieber's words, "Oh I actually managed to get the hang of the life in Edifice. I took up a college course and the people were really friendly there."
"I myself would have liked to visit Edifice once. Steeg used to tell me a lot about it from what he's read." said Lieber.
"Probably. I know I wasn't sure if I wanted to stay there too long when I first arrived but once you get used to the place, it's easy becoming a part of that world."
For such a happy statement, Maria sure looked quite hesitant and upset. Lieber noticed this and decided not to speak any further on the matter, "I see..."
"Oh look! We're in downtown already... come on, let's hurry out." Maria exclaimed suddenly as the train made an abrupt stop.
"Yeah..." Lieber replied unenthusiastically before following Maria.
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Trena had many tropical regions that consisted of numerous wild species which generally didn't pose much of a threat to a Klausian. As Mirage and Cliff stepped off the train, they could see the vast amount of trees extended in all four directions like they were surrounded by a forested region. The locality reminded Mirage a lot of the Vanguardian continent Gernn this time as she stepped down onto the ground. They would be quite similar if it weren't for the transporters on the edge of the field that extended up until the beginning of the forest.
"Don't worry about the old man, Mirage... I'm sure he'll take care of himself if he falls under any trouble." Cliff said comfortingly as they walked towards the transporter up ahead.
"Thanks, but i'm okay. I just hope the others are holding out okay..." Mirage replied as she looked up at the vast blue sky. It was a little chilly for a change, the wind was blowing vigorously as well.
An employee of Trena's space station stood beside one of the transporters and greeted both Mirage and Cliff at their arrival.
"Greetings Miss Koas," she said looking awfully calm considering the situation. "Welcome back to Trena. Where would you like me to direct the transporter to? Trena's space station?"
"No... I need to head home immediately." a blunt response came from the female Klausian.
"Very well... I shall then direct the transporter towards the residential area of Toutoi immediately."
Trena was a large city, and quite peaceful at that... especially the residential area. It was a lot less tropical than the area near the train station, but everything seemed to look intact which started to raise Mirage's suspicions a little bit.
"There seems to be no signs of the Alliance at all. And the way the employee spoke... she didn't mention anything about them either. Did they really even get this far?" she asked with a little bit of hope in her heart as she started to pace past the large fields towards the Koas residence.
"Right now i'm wondering what the old man will think of me for not being there when he wanted me to take over the dojo for him. I haven't seen him in a long time..." Cliff said. A lot of concerns other than the Alliance ran through his head at the same time. He was also worried about what Shin was up to and what he would do if he found Cliff.
"Well, he did seem pretty mad..." Mirage teased Cliff seeing him shudder a little from the fear of her father. "But don't worry... i'm sure he feels the four years have gone by a lot quicker than it would have if you were at the dojo."
"Ugh hey... that's cruel, y'know...?" Cliff replied amusingly.
Suddenly Mirage's eyes widened as she layed her eyes at a far away distance, "Look! Over there!" she shouted after locating a cloud of smoke emitting from a small building next to a lake about a hundred metres across from her.
"W-Wait... isn't that...!" Cliff stuttered, the building looked oddly familiar to him.
"Yes... it's the dojo!"
Mirage and Cliff rushed past the open field which led towards another opening in between the large trees up ahead and snuck in through as they reached just outside the dojo. The school had been half blown to bits as fire trailed on the edges of the building. The board which was on top of the entrance that read 'JINGU SCHOOL OF TAIJUTSU' had also fallen down to the ground chiped and cracked from the middle. There was a pool of blood just about everywhere surrounding the dojo, Mirage noticed the students that were lying in the pool of blood.
"Helen! Tiisho!" she screamed as she ran to their aid quickly. 'Good! They're still alive!' Mirage thought to herself as she kneeled down and checked their pulse beat.
"S-Sensei... ugh..." Tiisho, the short pupil, began to speak.
"Don't try to speak. Save your strength!" Cliff ordered as he looked down at them compassionately.
Tiisho simply shook his head slowly, "It's okay. I-I'm sorry... we c-couldn't do anything against them... all the t-training didn-.. ugh!... didn't help us..."
"Don't say that! That isn't true. You've done more than I thought you all could... you fought... and that's more than enough for me." replied Mirage.
"So the Federation's finally here..." Three alliance military officers appeared in an instant just behind the dojo. One of them was holding the body of another student and pushed him away causing the young student to fall to the ground lifelessly.
"No..." Mirage tried to reach to the student's aid but the soldiers stopped her as they held their weapons firmly. Besides, the student was shot in the tempo... this one couldn't possibly have a chance to be saved.
"What the hell do you guys want from this place anyway!" Cliff yelled from behind Mirage.
The three soldiers suddenly held down their disrupter guns looking towards Cliff confusingly, "Cliff? What are you doing here? Weren't you killed in Vanguard?"
"My, well you all certainly have saved me the trouble!" a voice hit Mirage from behind as she quickly turned herself to find none other than Shin who stood in his place firmly as he chuckled. "And Cliff! What a surprise!"
"Shin! What are you doing!" Cliff demanded to know answers from him right away.
"Shut up, you traitor!" Shin roared back while swinging his halberd in the air furiously. "You idiots fell into a trap. I was wondering how Quark and you vanished at the same time back there, so I came here and I knew you all would come running like rats! Hah!"
Cliff seemed reluctant to give Shin a formal explanation, "Did you actually think I was gonna buy all your little talks about your deal?"
"Grrr...!"
"So you went through all of this just to set up a trap for us!" Mirage asked furiously.
Shin nodded, "That's correct! It's payback time for what happened on Vanguard. I won't go easy on you this time! Get them!" he commanded his troops immediately.
"FISTS OF FURY!" Cliff yelled belligerently rapidly swinging both his fists in a jab-motion with enormous speed as he stood in front of Shin. Each strike from his fist caused Shin to wince in pain.
Mirage in the meantime darted towards the soldier who were ready to shoot her just that instant with their guns. However, she rolled underneath them just in time as she coiled in and swept of the soldier in front off his feet. Before the enemy beside him could turn and retaliate, Mirage caught him in a necklock and disarmed him of his weapon.
"Hiyaaa!" she yelled and obliterated him with a sidekick to the jaw followed by a roundhouse kick which sent him flying away. The third Alliance soldier tried to get back onto his feet but Mirage took him down with the disrupter rifle in her hands. Once Shin's troops were taken care of easily by Mirage, she made her way towards the other side of the half demolished dojo where Shin and Cliff were still battling it out. But before she could make it even halfway to their, an unusually strong gust of wind hit Mirage's feet from the back and made her take a hard fall on the ground.
"Hahahahaha! I told you I wouldn't go easy on you this time!" Shin snickered setting his eyes on the both downed Cliff and Mirage. He began walking towards them with his halberd drawn out resting on his shoulder, but a sudden impact hit him from his right side and his whole body went flying smack into the walls of the building.
"Unnfff!" he wailed as he struggled to get back up. His durable red armor nearly shattered from the impact. All three turned to the right to see what force caused the immensely strong impact.
"Stay back! Leave this one to me!" an old tough man with a long white beard and black hair shouted. He was dressed in a large grey robe and his shouts were more vibrant and resonating than anyone Mirage and Cliff have ever heard.
"Father! Thank goodness!" Mirage screamed as she got back onto her feet quickly, words couldn't describe how relieved she was to see him safe.
"Well, it's good to see you two back again. Now if I can just take care of this large fellow here!" Dan rushed towards the injured Shin and charged at him with his shoulder to smack him into the wall once again. For his age, Dan was surprisingly quick!
"Heh, well I see you still haven't lost the touch, old man... although I could've handled him myself." Cliff was impressed with Dan's powers, he simply stood in his place and watched the show with a smirk.
"Still as modest as ever I see." the old man shot back sarcastically with a slight amusement in his voice. Shin noticing that he was distracted quickly lifted his large halberd from the ground in his position and attempted to thrust Dan with it, but Dan grasped the edge of the sharp weapon just in time.
"Not today, sonny! Aura of the Soul, unleash!" Dan's hands began to glow brighter and brighter as he put all his energy into his hands that were grasping the halberd. The next thing anyone could hear was the snap of the weapon as it broke into two separate pieces. Shin held both pieces of the halberd in each of his hand as he looked at them stupefyingly. But the invincible Dan did not last long, it was one of the few times Mirage or Cliff had seen his old age affecting his techniques. Usually, he would be able to fight just as healthily as anyone else. This time, he began coughing and wheezing deeply as he held his chest with his bare hand.
"cough! hack!" Dan kneeled down on one knee as he tried to gather back his strength slowly.
"Father! Are you alright?" Mirage shouted as she began to walk towards him.
Dan, however, held out his hand, giving her a sign that he can handle himself, "L-Let me take care of this... ugh."
"Bahahaa! You impressed me there for a second, old timer! But a bed would really suit you a lot more than this!" Shin bellowed cockily as he started to chant a spell.
"No! Stop!" Mirage yelled.
"Ack!" Shin shrieked once again as a small dagger impaled his right shoulder out of the blue. A slithering dark figure suddenly leaped down from one of the trees and snuck up behind Shin. It was an exotic looking man slightly young in age and dressed in a mercenary outfit with shinguards. He held out a long knife in front of Shin's throat as he began to whisper something to his ear.
"Greetings, Shin." he said softly.
"Rudra! What the hell's this all about!" Shin blurted out as his eyes filled with fear.
"..." not willing to give a response, the man Shin called 'Rudra', simply flung his wrist inwards using his long dagger to slice Shin's throat as blood spilled on to his dagger and then dropped to the ground. "Goodbye Shin..."
"GRAAAGH!" Shin shrieked out as he fell to the ground, "Damn that Wakou! So this is what he's been up to all this time!" and those were his last words before he fell to his demise.
"What...? Did he say Wakou?" Mirage placed her hand onto her mouth from shock, she wasn't quite sure what was going on... "Who... is it?"
Cliff placed a hand on Mirage's shoulder before he began to speak as he focused his eyes towards Mirage, "I've seen him before. He's one of the Inner Alliance Specialists working under the wing of Wakou."
Rudra stepped over Shin's body looking at his opponents as he held out his two blades, "I was only ordered to kill Shin, so i'll spare you this once."
"What the hell did you kill him for!" Cliff demanded in anger. "And what's Wakou got up his sleeve! Speak up, kid!"
"You all seem to be behind so many things. So i'll let you on to it a little bit." said Rudra while turning his back to them. "The reason why the Alliance was split into the Inner group and the Outer group is because they both had different destinies. The destiny of the Outer Alliance is what you see now..." He pointed towards Shin with his blade. "The Inner Alliance's destiny to fulfill what is right and justify an act that has been left unjustified for four years now."
"So you just used them for your own benefit!" Mirage asked surprisingly.
"Every act requires sacrificing something. Even if it's justice." With that said, Rudra stepped over to Dan Koas who was still kneeling from pain. Rudra offered him his hand politely to help him back up. Dan hesitated at first, but saw no threat in simply taking his hand but he made sure Rudra did not catch him off guard.
"Father..." Mirage's mind suddenly went back towards Dan who was terrible taken in by his old age while trying to fight off Shin. Just as Dan got up, Rudra gave him a warm unusual hug with his one arm. Suddenly, a sharp blade impaled Dan Koas through his abdomen. Rudra withdrew his blade as blood spewed over it disturbingly. Mirage could have sworn she felt her eyes shift back and forth vigorously as they widened more and more from horror.
"FATHER!" Dan's body began to sink back to the ground after the blade left his body, but Mirage rushed towards him and was able to get a hold of him before he fell flat onto the ground.
"Damn you! You bastard!" Cliff roared aggressively as Rudra started to move back slowly.
"I'll advise you... stay out of our way..." Rudra flipped backwards before leaping away into the forested regions of Trena before vanishing completely out of everyone's sight in only a matter of a few seconds.
"Father! Speak to me!" Mirage knew he could not have possibly survived that blow but there was one small hope in her heart that wanted to ignore everything and wanted him to be alright.
"Ugh... M-Mirage... it's okay now..." Dan was barely able to speak.
"I'll go call for help right now!" Cliff shouted.
"Stop... Cliff... Ugh! I have n-no regrets... I died protecting my daughter... something I could not do for Lucia... I couldn't prefer another way to leave... P-Please don't let me miss this oppurtunity."
Every word of Mirage brought a teer down her cheek as she spoke, "What are you talking about! You have to live! How will you survive if you don't have the will to be alive anymore!"
"I-I promised Lucia that I w-wouldn't allow anything to happen to her. But I c-couldn't do a thing for her... you were just like her. cough I w-was scared... that even th-though I was strong, I would still not be able to pr-protect you... that's why... I h-had to push you s-so much and train you everyday... ugh... so you c-could take care of... yourself... M-Mirage... forgive me..." he stuttered oddly as his eyes began to fade away slowly.
"I have no regrets father..." Mirage sniffed trying to pull back her tears with whatever strength she had left, but it was no use... they were streaming down like a waterfall.
"Dammit, just hold on for a little longer. Don't die on me now!" Cliff said angrily but at the same time, sorrowfully.
Dan simply smiled back as Cliff's anger and insists made him happier, "Cliff... Y-You're the only one now... look after Mirage for me..." Suddenly his smile faded away. The expressions in his eyes disappeared, and his body stopped shaking from pain.
Mirage placed her hand on her father's eyes as she looked at him in disbelief. She kept repeating the word 'Father' over and over as if she was bottling up her emotions by each word. After Cliff noticed her kneeling in front of her uncomfortably next to Dan's body... he placed his hand on Mirage's head comfortingly.
"You don't have to, Mirage. 'It's okay to let your emotions out sometimes, you can't just bottle up your emotions or it may prove harmful to you at some point. After all, everyone has their weakness along with their strengths. You'll have to accept that.' Isn't that what you told me once?" he said as he kneeled down beside Mirage.
Suddenly, Mirage began to feel liberated from Cliff's words. She felt her emotions flow up her body slowly and then into her mouth just as she was ready to burst them out...
"FAAATHERRR!"