Ch. 53: Checkmate

A.N.:

The semester is finally over!

Holy s*** I thought it would never end!

Okay, so everyone…work will now proceed without interruption!

Thank you for your patience to those that have been waiting for the newest chapter.

Also, I was asked if progress would be made on Inferior Soldier and Broken Goddess. The answer is yes, however I regret to say that I do not know when as I have also taken on a BioShock story and have been requested to do a Dead Space story as well.

Fear not though, I am not the kind of writer to leave stories abandoned in place.

This chapter is admittedly short but I have been dying to get a new one posted to show that I feel absolutely awful for how long it has taken. Please know that I never once stopped thinking about you guys and even though my grades slipped slightly as a result, I never once stopped trying to find time to work on my stories.

You guys mean the world to me and you are all the reason that this story has gotten so far.

Please forgive my absence. I know I probably lost most of you because of it but to those that have stayed, I thank you.

Read and review if you want.

As we moved forward, my thoughts turned to the sight that I had just seen. How many people had we failed to evacuate? We had not had time to properly plan an evacuation but until now I had felt confident that we had at least succeeded in getting the majority of the survivors out of the city before it was completely consumed by Akira's Nightmare World. How many people did we leave behind?

I felt nauseated at the thought that I had failed to protect the lives of so many innocent people. My allegiance and rank had changed but not my fundamental purpose. I was a professional, career soldier. It was my job to protect people regardless of their nationality or beliefs against those who sought to cause them harm. My heart sank slightly as the little voice in my head reminded me that my mentor had entrusted me with this task and I had failed miserably ever since that day in South America.

Looking down at my wife, I thought about the strange being in the plague doctor outfit. His riddle-shrouded statements continued to point towards a more divine identity. My experiences so far in what little Alma had revealed about her family to me, what I had seen during the little visit to the Underworld, and my experiences in the parallel universes to our own had enlightened my understanding of the reality of this world. Based upon what I had learned, perhaps the identity of the being was not much of a mystery after all.

Following the merciless game of evolution, there were two species fighting for control of Earth: Psionics and human beings. Psionics were originally unrefined monsters much like what the Ancient Greeks called Titans. The Psionics were merciless to human beings and, as such, there was constant warfare between the two species. However, the original monster-like Psionics were simply too powerful for human beings to be able to win against them. Of course, these original Psionics themselves were originally living in the shadow of incredibly powerful beasts. However, these ancient beings were eventually hunted down to near extinction by the original Psionics. The great beast that we now knew as Ares was the sole survivor of this mass extinction.

Eventually, there came a generation of Psionics that were much more human-like both physically and emotionally. The eldest of these siblings, who the Greeks would later identity as Zeus, led a successful uprising against the elder Psionics. However, unlike the mythological Zeus, the real being did not regard human beings as playthings for his amusement. This attitude was picked up by his daughter Athena, Alma's mother, who took it one step further by dreaming that one day there would be mutual harmony between the two species.

It was perhaps ironic that Alma, having never known her mother, had unintentionally pursued her mother's dream through her intimate partnership with me, which was ironic still because I was a descendent of Achilles while Alpha 1 was a descendent of Odysseus. Psionic power in human beings was not naturally occurring but it could be imprinted in a person's DNA through exposure to a Psionic and then passed down through the succeeding generations due to the inherited imprint of the contaminated genes. Hence why I had innate "psychic" potential that Armacham could detect with whatever device they had used. Once a bloodline was contaminated by Psionic exposure, it was impossible to remove even over countless generations. This was why certain individuals had natural "psychic" abilities while others did not.

The degree of "psychic" potential was based upon which Psionic had contaminated the bloodline. Alma had indicated that it was Athena who had contaminated my bloodline during what the Greeks later called the Trojan War along with Alpha 1's though she also reminded me that the exact events of the ancient war were somewhat different than what the Greeks had believed to be true. Athena, being the daughter of Zeus, was an incredibly powerful Psionic and, thus, my bloodline along with Alpha 1's was heavily contaminated, which is why our innate potential had been enormous by the time that Armacham had first started investigating "psychics".

All these things considered, it was more than likely that the identity of the being was indeed Alma's grandfather. The plague doctor outfit must have been from the last time that he had felt it necessary to personally walk amongst us to ease our suffering. As powerful as he was, I had little doubt that he could easily hide his presence from all but the strongest of human beings. So, he would only be seen by the dying or those that he needed to deliver a message to the rest of us.

The troubling thing was that while his Psionic power was still intact he was clearly physically in a bad way. As a living being, even Psionics were no match for the forces of time. They aged but not on the same time scale as human beings. He had mentioned that he was the last of his siblings. That meant that, aside from Ares and Death, he was the last of the "old guard". While he was still far more powerful than Akira and Alma, he would be in danger of overexerting himself if he challenged either of the young Psionics in a duel.

However before I could contemplate the identity of the plague doctor further, I was riled from my thoughts by the distinct sound of gargled screeches that were coming from further down the pitch black tunnel. I raised my left hand to signal for everyone to halt. Then, after crouching down, I reached out with my Psionic-enhanced senses. With my sixth sense, I was able to pierce the darkness and "see" six of Akira's hellsoldiers in the tunnel approximately one hundred yards ahead of our current position.

The six scorched soldiers appeared to be a scout group since they did not have heavy armor or weapons. The largest soldier, the leader, was a mere grunt that was clad in standard all-purpose infantry armor that was lighter than my own. The grunt was armed with a Patten PK470 Assault Rifle that lacked a scope. Meanwhile, the remaining five soldiers only had lightweight combat armor that allowed increased mobility at the cost of the majority of the protection afforded by standard combat armor. They reminded me of the typical Armacham foot soldier except they had the typical gas mask found on all of Akira's soldiers. However, the weapon that the five soldiers were wielding negated any thought of taking a confrontation with them lightly.

The lightly armored scouts were armed with the extremely rare Briggs SMG from Akira's Universe. Having only been developed by the Armacham Technology Corporation found in the universe that Akira was from, the Briggs SMG was a rifleman's best friend with its powerful .40 Smith and Wesson round in a large clip that held thirty-five rounds. Compared to the Andra FD-99 Submachine Gun of our universe, the Briggs was easily superior. The only weapon in our arsenal that rivaled the Brigg's accuracy, rate of fire, and knockdown power was the venerable Patten PK470 Assault Rifle. Indeed, if my favored weapon had a bigger magazine, it would be reclassified as a lightweight machine gun.

With a red dot sight that could distinguish friend from foe and even if the weapon was aiming at an explosive object, the Briggs was light-years ahead of the vintage PK470. Long before the incident at Fairport, there had been talk of replacing the old weapon for a newer, more lightweight model. Having been introduced to give the Western soldier enough firepower to counter the powerful new generation of Russian AK-family assault rifles, the Patten had been invaluable to the NATO soldiers that had wielded it in the second decade of the 21st Century.

Now, however, the PK470 was beginning to show its age with its heavy frame that could quickly tire its wielder. While it was indeed rugged to the point of being nearly indestructible, it was far heavier than the typical infantry rifle and was nearly on par with the weight of a squad's supporting machine gun. Newer variants made from lighter synthetic materials had been introduced and fielded by various Special Forces including the United States Navy Seals but it had been found that the lighter weight came at the cost of decreased mechanical reliability. As such, the non-physically challenged Special Forces, such as the United States Army's Delta Force, continued to field the original heavy steel alloy model. In my own opinion, the heavy weight of the original model aided in the suppression of the otherwise monstrous recoil of the powerful 7.8mm round that it fired.

I noted something interesting about the six hellsoldiers that seemed to confirm my suspicion that Akira did not control the supernatural beings in the tunnel. The soldiers all had their weapon-mounted flashlights activated and were purposely keeping the area around them illuminated at all times. With the "lost ones" that Alpha 1 had mentioned constantly waiting from the shadows for the first opportunity to attack anything other than themselves, in addition to the other supernatural beings that were residing in this tunnel, even Akira's soldiers appeared to be in constant peril without the protection of a source of light.

I mentally cursed when the soldiers did not advance towards us even after nearly five minutes of waiting. They were not scouts after all. They were the forward unit of a much larger force that awaited us further beyond. We must have finally been getting close to the command bunker. Given the strong signatures of the beings found in the tunnel, I had not been expecting Akira's Forces to have such a strong presence within its dark interior. Perhaps, I had not given the hellspawn as much credit as they deserved. After all, I was used to Armacham's incompetent mercenaries that never had a hope to "tame" the supernatural world as they had attempted to do at Fairport.

While they were themselves supernatural creatures, the hellsoldiers were still a far cry from the abominations and monsters that had once been contained in the Underworld. Furthermore, considering the intense fighting on the surface, I had expected Akira's Forces to recall the soldiers down in the tunnels. Despite her youthful nature, Akira was an exceptionally gifted tactician that had honed her methods over the many conquests of the nearly infinite number of other universes. The number of soldiers that she had placed in the tunnel to prevent our advance towards the command bunker could not have been very many; likely only a few squads that were lightly armed and lacked heavy equipment such as light power armor or heavy squad weaponry.

Confident that we could wade through them without much trouble, I communicated with my brother through our telepathic link, "Six hellsoldiers at one hundred yards. One grunt. Five lightly armored scouts. Likely forward unit of a larger group. I doubt that we will encounter much resistance since the majority of Akira's Forces were likely recalled to the fight on the surface."

My Heavy Trooper brother replied, "Agreed. Statistics report only a 10% chance that Akira has more than five squads of lightly armed infantry between us and the tunnel entrance to the command bunker. Time constants dictate that a full-frontal assault is the best option with only a 30% mortality risk."

I said in response, "Couldn't have said it better myself. Let's do it."

He replied, "Right behind you."

With my PK470 at the ready, I stood and then began to move forward towards the six hellsoldiers. Behind us, I heard Lucy and Private Ano sticking close to each other. Alma allowed us to take the lead as we proceeded towards our objective. As we neared the soldiers, I saw the pencil thin blades of light slicing through the darkness. The leader cried out in a loud guttural cry to alert his comrades as he noticed the light from Alma's lantern.

Aiming through my rifle's pseudo-ACOG scope, I activated my reflexes. The red dot sight of my scope was not functional because of Akira's interference with our electronic devices but I was not overly inconvenienced by this as I fired no less than seven rounds into the central light that I had assumed to be the leader. My disciplined shots hit their mark but my sixth sense indicated that it had been one of the scouts.

In my peripheral vision, I saw Alpha 1 advancing beside me as he provided heavy suppressive fire with his Vollmer Ultra92 Automatic Shotgun. The .40 S&W rounds were of little threat to my heavily armored partner as they continued to harmlessly ricochet off his thick armor. If one were to be watching our advance from the third person, they would have noted that Alpha 1 was actually slightly ahead of me as he drew the bulk of the enemy fire because his silhouette against Alma's lantern was more pronounced than my own.

With little cover to be found in the tunnel, Alpha 1 and I had silently planned that he would advance slightly ahead of me to draw the enemy's fire and provide highly effective suppressive fire while I would advance slightly behind him and pick off the distracted hellsoldiers. To say that we had the utmost confidence in each other was an understatement. While the man that ATC had named A0001 did not have the slow-mo ability or godlike powers, my brother was a three-hundred pound organic war machine. While he respected all of his brethren and even other ATC products such as Point Man, Alpha 1 only trusted me with his life.

With my reflexes still activated, I switched targets and began to fire upon the rightmost source of light. Firing a single round for seven straight shots, I succeeded in eliminating the second soldier. Meanwhile, I could hear the leader informing his command with his guttural choking voice that they had encountered us. Snapping my aim to the leftmost target, I placed seven rounds into the third scout. However, before I could take aim at another hostile, the distinct sound of a metal object landing on the tracks ahead of us filled the air.

Deactivating my reflexes and with my body glowing with a hellish red aura, I used my Psionic abilities to envelop us with a kind of shield against the grenade's splash damage. Seconds later, however, my caution proved unwarranted as the object in question merely ejected a thick white smokescreen. Beyond the smokescreen, I could hear the remaining hellsoldiers retreating. It would have been foolish for us to advance through the smokescreen so we mutually decided to allow the enemy soldiers to get away while we waited for the smoke to dissipate.

It was obvious that they intended to draw us into a trap but we did not have a choice but to chase them. As I waited for the smokescreen to clear, I reloaded my rifle while Alpha 1 did the same with his shotgun. Moments later, the smokescreen cleared and we began to advance once again. We moved quickly but methodically as we proceeded through the darkness. While we proceeded forward, we could hear the hellsoldiers retreating back through the tunnel just beyond our reach. Behind us, we could hear the other residents of the tunnel following just beyond the protection of the small lantern.

The ghostly echo of the former metropolis appeared before us in the form of the occasional adjoining track that was visible running beside our own. Moreover, during our pursuit of the retreating soldiers, we came upon the dark remains of an abandoned station. The silent structure's residents retreated upon the arrival of Alma's lantern but I could still see the humanoid figures' piercing red eyes that emitted unimaginable despair. The mummified remains of nearly a dozen people, including four young children, dotted the length of the station's platform. The bullet wounds in the dried husks and the spent rifle cartridges littering the ground around the remains identified the individuals as yet more survivors that we had failed to evacuate. With nowhere to go, the individuals must have retreated into the temporary shelter of Hong Kong's metro. However, Akira's soldiers found them shortly afterwards and mercilessly cut them down.

My heart sank even more but there was nothing I could do to ease their suffering except to ensure that the balance was restored and thus allowing them to move on from this world. Lucy appeared to have known one of the young girls because she called out for her but Private Ano stopped her and forced her to stay with the group as we hastily made our way past the haunted subway station. I found myself pondering the reason for how Lucy and Private Ano had escaped the clutches of the evil that resided down in the endless maze of tunnels while others had not. Perhaps, their bond to each other had shielded them from the fate that had befallen the other trapped psychic imprints.

Eventually, we came to a slight bend in the tunnel. I took point and proceeded through the snaking path. Towards the end, I noticed a bright light shining on the rails ahead of me. There must have been an illuminated section of track on the other side of the last bend. Once again using my sixth sense, I reached out to scan the area beyond. I saw what appeared to be a large station approximately three hundred yards long. Its layout was similar to the one that we had encountered at the beginning of our slog through the dark abyss. Two bridge-like structures ran over the track on either end of the station. There was a ticket booth in the center of the platform beside the tracks. Unlike the previous station however, I sensed that at the far end of the platform there was a large automatic staircase that allowed access to a much larger area beyond that easily could have been the way to the command bunker.

There was a strong Psionic presence in the station that prevented me from seeing any potential dangers however. The telltale signature of the being gave away her identity almost immediately: Akira. The twisted version of Amara was lying in wait for us along with an unknown number of her loyal soldiers. I grimaced as I returned to my body. We were not equipped for this kind of confrontation and there was no telling what kind of twisted game that Akira had prepared for us.

I communicated with my two comrades, "Akira is lying in wait in the station beyond. The station appears to allow access to another area that might be the way to the command bunker. We will have to get past her in order to get to the bunker."

My brother commented, "Mortality risk just rose to seventy-five percent."

Alma teased, "Are the two big tough soldiers afraid of a little girl?"

Alpha 1 replied, "Negative. However, statistics do not lie."

I pointed out, "The station appears to be illuminated. Alma, you can even the odds since we will not need the lantern."

I shivered slightly as I heard my wife remark with a strange manic tone that curled my blood slightly, "Just what a girl wants…new toys."

I sighed and then brought my rifle back up at the ready. After steeling myself, I began to make my way forward. As I walked out of the tunnel and into the brightly lit station, I was met by the sight of nearly a dozen hellsoldiers with their weapons pointed at me from various positions around the station including nearly five of them up on the bridge on the far side. They appeared to range from the lighter scout units to the more armored grunt units. I started to activate my reflexes but stopped when I noticed that they were not discharging their weapons.

I was confused until I heard the soft giggling coming from above me. Looking up at the first bridge, I saw Akira clad in her white dress. My alternate daughter smiled happily at me despite her black eyes. I smiled back before I called out, "Akira, always a pleasure to see you sweetie."

Akira continued her innocent demeanor as she replied, "And you as well, Father. Now…I believe the term is…checkmate."

Before I could reply, Alpha 1 walked up to stand beside me in the trench-like track area that ran between the platform on our right and left as he informed the young demoness, "Checkmate can only be declared when the King has no escape route, Miss Wade."

"UNCLE!" Akira cried out in delight as a faint sea of red appeared on her porcelain-like face. She continued as she said shamelessly, "Oh Uncle, our time apart has been quite the burden on my fragile heart. My body burns with hunger with the mere sight of you before me. It is all I can do just to keep myself from throwing myself into your arms."

My partner replied, "It is a pleasure to see you again as well, Miss Wade."

From where she was up on the nightmarish version of the bridge, Akira pouted before she remarked, "Stop being so formal, Uncle. Call me Akira…or…better yet…my love."

He replied, "It would not be proper, Miss Wade."

Akira pouted once again before she flashed a cruel smile. Then, she remarked, "Well then, it appears that I will have to force you to call me 'my love'."

At that moment, the thunderous sound of multiple boots hitting the rusted steel automatic staircase drew my attention. Looking towards the far side of the station, I saw nearly thirty heavily armed hellsoldiers lead by four of their equivalent of our Heavy Armor soldiers. The bomb disposal suit-clad hellspawn were armed with charred rocket launchers that they were able to wield with just their right hand as they marched down the frozen steps of the staircase with their disciplined formations of grunts in tow. As they reached the bottom, the four heavily armored soldiers began to direct their soldiers to various locations. Within moments, we were facing an intimidating number of barrels pointing at us from nearly every angle. A fight against such a large number of well-armed and well-organized opponents seemed like a fool's errand.

However, fighting against seemingly impossible odds was what being a Spartan was all about. With my body glowing with a hellish red aura, I activated my reflexes. As the hail of bullets began to fly all around me, I took aim at the four rocket launcher-armed behemoths through my still powerless pseudo-ACOG scope. My aim was true as I unleashed a disciplined hail of 7.8mm rounds into the first giant humanoid. It took no less than thirty rounds to take the large brute down.

As I reloaded, I called out, "Reloading. Cover me." I deactivated my reflexes as I unlocked the spent cartridge and let it fall to the ground at my feet with a dull metal thud. Meanwhile, Alpha 1 put up a covering barrage of scatter shot in all directions with his Vollmer shotgun. As I inserted a fresh clip into my PK470, I heard the telltale sound of whistling that could only be one thing. I called out, "Rocket! Get down!"

Mere seconds after we had taken cover beneath the edge of the top of the trench, the warhead roared overhead. The high explosive rocket propelled warhead continued on its path until it detonated against the far corner behind us. Even still, we were hit by numerous pieces of concrete chunks as the debris cloud rained down onto us. Having reloaded my PK470, I stood once again with my reflexes activated and began to open fire on the next heavy hellsoldier.

The overwhelming nature of the enemy fire made it extremely difficult for me to maintain focus while dodging the incoming streams of hot lead. However, even with my reflexes, I was unable to avoid all of the incoming rounds and more than a dozen had already hit their mark. The ballistic plate of my combat armor had taken the lethality factor out of the rounds thus far but I knew that it could only take a few more rounds before it would be completely compromised. Absentmindedly, I noted that Akira seemed to have instructed her soldiers to not go for lethal take down shots against us such as a headshot, which would have, in my case anyway, proven highly effective due to my lack of armor protection in that area. Instead, she seemed to only want her soldiers to wear us down.

After expending yet another full clip, I succeeded in eliminating the second rocket launcher-armed Goliath. Returning to the cover of the trench, I deactivated my reflexes as I started to reload once again. At the same time, my brother started to reload his shotgun. However, as we were reloading our weapons, a fragmentation grenade landed between us. Dropping his empty firearm, Alpha 1 yelled with his deep distorted voice, "Grenade!" With only seconds to react, my brother jumped on top of the small explosive device to contain the blast with his body.

I watched in horror as I was powerless to stop what happened next. The grenade detonated beneath my partner with enough force to send him up into the air nearly a foot. His heavily armored form had not even landed before I heard a deep, loud demonic scream rip through the station. The air became overtaken by a orange hue that was laced with darker tendrils as Alma manifested near the far end of the platform in front of the stairs.

She was in her child form but her unruly raven hair hung down over her eyes while an unnerving scowl was visible through the curtain-like cover of her hair. A thick coating of blood covered her feet and legs. Drips of the iron-rich substance fell from the saturated hem of her blood spotted red dress to the dissolving ground beneath her that was rapidly dissolving into nothing but a black abyss as her rage overpowered the very fabric of the nightmarish world around her. Behind the rage-fueled child of darkness, ripple-like portals were opening up to allow her own nightmarish creations born of her years of torture and despair to come forth at their master's behest.

A black aura surrounded her childish frame that seemed to soak up all of the remaining feelings of hope and warmth in the nightmarish subway station as if it was her way of reminding the world that this was the way life was: cold, dark, and full of misery. The surrounding area around her began to ice over as the fire of her rage consumed all of the energy as if it was a vacuum. By the time that the floating dark grey humanoids began to emerge from the portals behind the being of nightmares and insanity-fueled dreams, rhythmic emissions of cloud-like breath were clearly visible coming from the pale raven-haired girl in the red dress.

The hellsoldiers diverted their fire from our position to the manifested humanoids that silently began to float through the air towards them in a seemingly endless horde. A few rounds missed their mark and hit Alma instead. However, the hot pieces of lead had no effect on the immortal being that could easily warp the very fabric of reality. A slight stirring beside me drew my attention away from the hypnotic, if horrific, sight unfolding in the far corner of the station. There, I saw my brother getting to his feet, the shock wave of the grenade's detonation having temporarily rendered him unconscious. A large dent was visible in his chipped olive green chest plate but otherwise I failed to detect any signs of damage or injury.

As I handed him his shotgun, I lectured him half-heartedly, "You really need to stop saving me. People might start taking it the wrong way."

Taking his weapon from my grasp, Alpha 1 remarked with a steady tone, "Statistics calculates your life's importance to victory over Akira's Forces to be ninety-eight percent…meaning that you have been classified as 'Invaluable for victory'. Heavy Trooper Serial Number A0001's importance for victory over Akira's Forces has been calculated to be ninety-five percent…meaning that I have been classified as 'Valuable but expendable'."

Appalled, I backhanded my brother's armored, battered face with my gloved left hand before I said, "To Hell with fucking statistics and numbers! You are not expendable! I mean, who would I have if you were gone? Alma? As much as I love her, that girl is a living nightmare that is so evil that Hell itself wouldn't take her. The rest of them buy into the whole 'saving the world by being skull thumpers' bullshit like this is some adventure story to be proud of. But you…you see what I see. You understand what it means to be a soldier…the disgusted sickness of it all…fire and sword with blood on our hands that never washes off until our own blood turns cold. Blood and fire…that is what defines our lot…that is what we do…and this is Who. We. Are."

I extended my open free gloved left hand towards him. Without hesitating, my brother extended his own free gloved left hand. Ignoring the violent carnage around us, we gripped each other's hand as tightly as we could without breaking the fragile phalanges of our fingers. Then, when we finally let go, I nodded at my brother not of blood but of spirit and experience. He returned it without hesitation. After reloading our weapons, we stood and joined Alma in the counterattack on the still overwhelming force that stood between us and the command bunker.