Forewords

This story is still very close to the beginning in the sense of how many chapter it will be having. So you will have to wait a very long time before you see the conclusion.

And...there hasn't been another review to this story since I've continued it. Reviews, please...

Back to the storyline, we go!


Chapter 6: Go Deeper

Time: 1930 Hour; 30th of December, 2040.

Location: Somewhere inside the Everest Facility.

"Attention, all personnel. The Secret Weapon Of The Luftwaffe is currently on its way to the Deployment Hangar in the east face of Mount Everest. Please ensure that the catapult is clear of all obstruction and working properly. All engineers are to report to the Deployment Hangar as soon as possible. All security personnel, you are ordered to remain at your current positions."

An announcement was broadcast facility-wide just as the Red Eagles are approaching a massive elevator shaft that never finished construction.

"Secret Weapon Of The Luftwaffe?" Jason took note of the announcement. "Have the RAPs found some Nazi secret technology?"

"No, Jason..." Jenny corrects the red-clad mercenary. "That is the placeholder name for the massive airborne aircraft carrier slash mobile cruise missile launch platform slash flying battleship deployed by the Ptolemaic Army during their last appearance years ago."

"And Regular Command certainly won't allow that thing to take off, buddy..." Ash adds in. "Bastard's armed so well that..."

The chainsaw-totting mercenary was interrupted by Mina. "...It can make even Metal Gear EXCELSUS look like a Lego brick..."

Jason cocked his handgun. "...And that's not even considering the upgrades given to it now."

The Red Eagles looked over the guard rails of the steel walkway they are standing on, down at the very deep industrial-grade elevator shaft.

"Only problem is that this is as far as walking can take us..." Ash told the others. "We're going to have to grapple down this elevator shaft..."

Jenny sighed at hearing the suggestion. "Great, another descend down a very deep chasm, just a few meters from the previous one..."

...

Mission Briefing

Looks like that secret facility inside Everest was bigger than we thought. Our latest geological scans shows that part of the facility extends below sea level, and then raises back up to the halfway mark of the mountain. Regular Command was only able to get the full satellite scan when a massive bulkhead opened on the east face of Everest, which in turn compromised its shielding against scans.

We were also getting more of the Unknown Radiation on our readings. But right now, that is the least of our concerns, or President Drippiek's for that matters. I'm sure you Red Eagles have just heard the facility-wide announcement about something nicknamed The Secret Weapon Of The Luftwaffe. Regular Command have decided that, with the upgrades the massive aircraft is given, we cannot allow it to reach its target, which considering the location of the Deployment Hangar's bulkheads, is very likely to be Beijing, China.

Forget about Morden and Amadeus for now. It is imperative that The Secret Weapon Of The Luftwaffe does not leave the facility and failing that, be shot down with some of the Slug Flyers that are stolen by the RAPs before it reaches Beijing.

That is all. Godspeed...

...

MISSION FIVE START!

With the grapples locked onto the guard rail of the walkway, and the climbing ropes secured to themselves, the Red Eagles began their slow descend down the chasm.

"Be glad with what we have here, guys." Jason told his friends while descending slowly alongside them. "The Regular Commandos have to navigate through a missile silo that's only 20 meters wide when they infiltrated the Amadeus Syndicate Headquarters. We have an elevator shaft that's a hundred times wider."

"But a lot deeper..." Ash mumbles under his breath, as he keeps an eye out for any RAP Joint Forces troops that might appear on the walkways and platforms within the shaft. "Damn. You gotta give credit to whoever designed this facility. Being inside a hollowed-out Everest is one thing. Making it invisible to geological scans is another."

Several Rebel Bazookas pooled themselves onto a metal walkway and started firing their bazookas at the Red Eagles.

The Red Eagles have trouble evading the shots due to the grapples obstructing their movements. Good thing that none of the Rebel Bazookas hit their intended targets. The mercenaries quickly retaliates with their handguns, killing all the Rebels.

"That one was just our luck, guys." Jenny told the others. "Avoiding attacks in these equipment are quite difficult. You either kill the enemies before they attack, or hope that they missed you, so be very careful."

The Red Eagles descended another few meters before encountering a Ptolemaic Bradley that is parked on a broken-off walkway... Which only got to take aim before Mina nonchalantly blows it up with two Grenades.

"Ironically, Ptolemaic Bradleys were easier to deal with than the original Rebel variants, despite the former being an upgrade." Jenny points out about the fact. "Weaker armor, less missile capacity, and actually destructible missiles whatnot..."

The Red Eagles continued their descend down the elevator shaft for several meters without any interruptions.

"An Ammo Box?" Jason said as he points at an Ammo Box that is conveniently left on the edge of a broken off railway that may have been meant for the Caladgolg war train. "You've got to wonder why there's always weapons left in the most unexpected locations..." He proceeds to hang a lamp before approaching and breaking open the box with his Machete.

The Ammo Box contained... something that looked like a flare gun, but was tagged as a Smart Shot, and isn't loaded with flares.

"Smart Shot? Never seen something like this before..." Ash wondered about the identity of such an odd weapon.

Jason picked up the Smart Shot anyway. "Some kind of prototype Regular Army weapon, perhaps? Regular Command seems to be fishy about their technologies lately..."

The Red Eagles are suddenly ambushed by a group of both Rebel and Ptolemaic Paratroopers dropping down from above and peppering them with bazooka shots.

"Oh, goddammit! This thing better be useful!" Jason complained about the ambush as he points the Smart Shot at a Rebel Paratrooper, and fires.

Turns out the Smart Shot doesn't need to be aimed. Instead, the projectile fired from it left the muzzle slowly, and only for about five centimeters before it erupted into a massive flash that somehow kills off the Paratroopers as though they were hit with Rocket Launchers while leaving the Red Eagles themselves unharmed.

The Red Eagles watched with deadpan the dying Paratroopers (whose parachutes were somehow disintegrated by the Smart Shot) scream their way toward a falling death below the elevator shaft.

"Jeez, either Miss Germi made this while intoxicated, or Regular Command is smoking something more potent than what they had with the developments of the Drop Shots..." Ash hangs a lamp on the ridiculousness of the Smart Shot.

"Kasamoto-san is another person you could blame on with the intoxication excuse." Mina joked.

Ash scoffed at the joke. "Yeah, right..."

Continuing their descend down the elevator shaft, the Red Eagles fought their way through Ptolemaic Gunner Units, Iron Isos, Girida-Os, Ptolemaic Bradleys and Melty Honeys that are somehow able to park themselves on the metal walkways, as well as Paratroopers, Airborne Melty Honeys, Hover Units and Fanatic soldiers of all three variants appearing from out of nowhere. All of them were easily dealt with by Jason's Smart Shot (although it does take the weapon quite a few uses to bring down a vehicle or mech enemy).

"This is the weirdest, but most useful weapon ever." Jenny comments on the usefulness of the Smart Shot.

"Yeah, but it is somewhat useless against armored vehicles, and carried less ammo than a Super Grenade, because its empty after just ten shots." Jason adds in before he throws the now empty weapon away.

The Red Eagles only descended a few more meters before their grapple reached their extension limit, stopping them just short of a metal walkway that spanned across the elevator shaft.

"Ah, well..." Jenny quips. "Scanners determined that the bottom of this elevator shaft doesn't lead anywhere else, anyway..."

"So I guess we should walk the rest of the way, right?" Jason asked before he undoes his harness and drops down safely on the walkway.

"I guess so..."

...

Location: Everest Facility command center.

"So, Donald Morden..." Amadeus calmly asked the Devil Rebirth. "What are the next parts of your plan?"

"I will make sure that the so-called Red Eagles go after The Secret Weapon Of The Luftwaffe if they do manage to get to it." Morden said with a straight face, despite facing a blank wall at the moment. "After that, I'll stir up some more troubles in Beijing so as to distract President Drippiek's pawns from what our friend, the Ptolemaic Boss have in mind for them in Peru!"

"And what if they foiled your plans with Beijing?" Amadeus raises a question.

Morden answers with confidence again. "Then I'll let an old friend of mine from Saudi Arabia know that he'll be expected to hit a snag in his latest plans."

"What if the Regulars foiled that too?" Amadeus raised another question.

This time, Morden couldn't give a straight answer. "Th... Then you and I will go AWOL wh... while the Ptolemaic Boss executes the final part of his plans. Fr... From what I've heard about his troops' actions from years ago, even the Regulars considered them to be crazier than they think I am..." The Devil Rebirth said with a bunch of stammering in his sentence.

"Correction, Donald..." Amadeus corrected. "If they do manage to foil your Arab ally, you and I will hide out in my Syndicate's newest headquarters in Kamchatka..."

Morden took note of the location mentioned by the Syndicate leader. "Russia? Just what plans do you have with that place?"

...

Location: Somewhere inside the Everest Facility.

The metal walkway had led the Red Eagles into a scaffolding laid against the walls of a fully functioning elevator shaft wide enough that The Secret Weapon Of The Luftwaffe can fit in it. The aforementioned massive aircraft is currently being transported on a platform which then stops it descend down the shaft before going through a bulkhead that opened on the opposite end of the shaft.

"So that's the Ptolemaic's ace of the skies..." Jason comments about the massive aircraft. "Makes you wonder how they build it in the first place..."

"Only question now is..." Ash pointed a finger at the bulkhead that the Secret Weapon was sent through, which has just sealed shut. "How do we get to it now?"

"It's a pretty long way down, and I don't see any elevators or stairs we could walk on..." Jenny told the others while looking around the shaft.

The scaffolding didn't have anyone or anything else on it, aside from the Red Eagles... and a Supervisory Camera that is missing its gun.

Mina went and poked that gun-less Supervisory Camera with the tip of her katana. "Why do you suppose they put a lone security camera over something not worth guarding?" The purple-clad Japanese mercenary girl asked with curiosity.

The gun-less Supervisory Camera seems to react, and "stared" straight at Mina. This surprised all four Red Eagles, causing them to each take a step back and point their guns at the camera.

The camera remained "staring" at the Red Eagles for about five seconds, before it turned lower toward the ground, and...

"Is that camera... projecting a 3D hologram?" Jenny points out about the strange thing happening right now.

The hologram is of what appears to be a decorated Rebel commander.

"So you are the mercenaries that The Government has sent to do their dirty work for..." The Rebel commander's holographic projection spoke to the mercenaries calmly. "I am Colonel Gyllendal, and I, like Allen O'Neil, answer to General Donald Morden..."

Ash purposely interrupts the non-physical conversation. "Yeah, yeah. I know what you are going to say, blah, blah. And I also know you're not an answering machine, judging by how you greeted us..." The grey-haired mercenary even swings his bloodied chainsaw at the hologram in a mocking manner.

The Rebel commander, Colonel Gyllendal, is rather unpleased with being mocked, but he kept calm, and continued with his speech. "Mocking me won't get you anywhere, just like how Marco Rossi and his friends mocked the General all the time. Oh, and the General also wanted me to forward this message to you..." Gyllendal's hologram pointed a finger behind him...

...Just in time for a large mechanical contraption of some kind, which sported a quad-barreled rotary cannon on its upper half, and a trap door of some kind on the lower half.

"...The General would like you to be the test subjects for his newest ally - the Ptolemaic Army's upgraded version of their tower-scaling machine. Until then..." The Rebel commander's hologram then simply dissipates, just before one of the mechanical toes of the wall-crawling monstrosity knocks the projecting camera right off its sockets.

The Red Eagles turned toward each other with deadpan.

"Sheesh. Some calm demeanor that guy has, being Morden's other right hand man..." Jenny figuratively hangs a lamp on Gyllendal's character.

"None of this would be happening right now if Regular Command had not sent Morden's son on that anti-terror mission with insufficient intel..." Jason adds in.

The mercenaries turned back toward the wall-crawling monstrosity.

Boss battle: Wall Crawler

"Let's do this!"

...

The Wall Crawler starts off by firing several larger-than-necessary cannon shells at the Red Eagles with its rotary cannon. The shells not only were fired faster but travelled faster than the ones fired by the original Wall Crawler, but did not give the Red Eagles much difficulty in avoiding being hit.

"Don't be so grateful yet, guys. This thing's definitely have more upgrades than faster shots." Jason told his friends as he fires at the Wall Crawler with his handgun.

After firing a few cannon shells, the Wall Crawler climbed two floors down the scaffolding, in which the hatch on top opens, and the controller of the monstrosity comes out to call in reinforcements.

But, while the original Wall Crawler's controller called in two Bazooka Guerillas on the floor below, this one called in a Gatling R-Shobu that pops out from behind it.

"This one's not really an upgrade, just a change of tactics." Jenny points out, as she blows up the Gatling R-Shobu with two Grenades.

As soon as the Gatling R-Shobu is destroyed, the controller went back down and sealed the hatch, and the Wall Crawler climbed two floors up so that its rotary cannons are on the same elevation as the Red Eagles.

"Guys, I think this is the part where the damn thing fires a Sonic Cannon that causes the floor we're standing on to crumble..." Ash warns his friends...

...Just as an odd pitch of noise erupted from the floor below that caused the ground of the current floor to wobble so much that it starts cracking.

"Then jump!" Jason yells out, and everyone jumped just as the wobbling floor somehow explodes and disintegrates, causing the Red Eagles to land on the lower floor.

"Ow. That's why I hate fighting hulking machines without any Slug vehicles..." Jenny complains as she tries to stand up.

The Wall Crawler descended one floor, and fired its rotary cannons a second time at the Red Eagles a second time.

The Red Eagles easily evades the large shells, but Mina failed to completely jump over a shell that was fired at ground level, which caused her to trip over and face-plants the floor.

"I'm okay!" The purple-clad Japanese girl calls out to her friends as she gets up. "But, that thing is not going to be..."

That said, Mina chucked several Grenades in succession at the Wall Crawler just before it climbs two floor down, and the controller calls in another Gatling R-Shobu.

This time, the Gatling R-Shobu only manages to fire shots that only hit the floor before the Red Eagles' combined firepower blows it up. The explosion somehow threw a Heavy Machine Gun toward the mercenaries, which Jenny snatches from the air.

"Sometimes you also have to wonder why enemy vehicles often carry infantry weapons that we can use. But that can be answered later..." Ash hangs a lamp on the phenomenon.

The Wall Crawler continues with its attack by climbing up. But rather than two floors to point its rotary cannons straight at the Red Eagles, it climbed just one floor so that the rotary cannons are aimed at the floor below.

"Now what will its next upgrade be?" Jenny wonders while being careful about it.

The Wall Crawler fires its rotary cannons in a different mode while it is aimed at the floor below. The original one fired a large number of unguided and random missiles in this mode, but this upgraded version seems to fire landmine-shaped objects that upon landing on the floor, fired a straight beam of laser that ripped right through the floor the Red Eagles are standing on.

"Whoa! Whoa! Whoa! This is not what anyone of us have in mind!" Jason exclaims loudly while he and his friends tries their best at avoiding the laser beams.

After the Wall Crawler is done laying down the laser-spewing landmines, it climbed one floor up, preparing to fire its Sonic Cannon again.

"Payback time, bitch!"

Jason and Ash pounded on the rotary cannons of the Wall Crawler with their melee weapons rapidly (with Jason using his machete in conjunction with Vulcan Chop) while Jenny and Mina fired at the mechanical monstrosity with their Heavy Machine Gun and handgun respectively.

BOOM! The Wall Crawler sustained enough damage that it blew up as soon as it fires the Sonic Cannon.

The Red Eagles jumped one last time to avoid the explosion that erupts from the floor they're standing on because of the Wall Crawler's last hurrah Sonic Cannon attack. The mercenaries lands safely on the lower floor just in time to see the Wall Crawler slowly sliding down the scaffolding while in shambles.

The controller of the monstrosity popped the hatch open, and said to the Red Eagles "Damn you!" before he jumped off the Wall Crawler and into the elevator shaft with a parachute.

Wall Crawler defeated.

"Well, we've defeated this monstrosity. So what now?" Ash asked the others for opinions.

"According to Regular Command's geological scans, this particular elevator shaft isn't very deep. In fact, we can see the bottom clearly from this height." Jenny analyzed the next part of the mission. "The same scans indicated that there's a maintenance shaft at the bottom of this elevator shaft that leads straight to the hangar in the east face of Everest. If we hurry up, we might just be able to catch up with the Secret Weapon..."

...

Location: East Hangar, Everest Facility.

After spending several minutes getting to the bottom of the elevator shaft and crawling through the aforementioned maintenance shaft, the Red Eagles find themselves emerging inside a very large hangar, with the bulkhead leading outside already opened.

The Secret Weapon Of The Luftwaffe is also there, currently being prepped for deployment by several Ptolemaic Engineers (strangely enough, not a single Rebel Soldier or Amadeus Syndicalist can be seen in the hangar).

"I'm guessing that's what we're supposed to destroy." Jason points out. "Hard to see why, if Regular Command would rather lose track of Morden than to let that thing loose."

"Come on, like Mina said, even Metal Gear EXCELSUS looked like a Lego brick when compared to that thing!" Ash reminded everyone.

The Red Eagles are seen by a passing-by Rebel Soldier, who quickly ran off in panic. The mercenaries quickly noticed that, unlike the usual Rebel Soldiers, this one is dressed in bright blue fatigues along with a helmet that seems to have two Tesla coils on it.

"Wait a minute..." Jenny became suspicious about the oddity of that Rebel Soldier. "That Rebel Soldier is not a normal one..."

"They seemed so familiar, yet I can't recall any information about them from Regular Command's databases." Mina wonders.

Before they can get their confusion answered, the Red Eagles were quickly approached by a mob of Ptolemaic Special Force Troopers.

"Ah, never mind. Priorities first..." Jason deadpanned as he aims and fires his handguns at the Special Force Troopers.

The other Red Eagles followed suit by firing at the mob of enemies. Jenny's Heavy Machine Gun mowed them down very quickly, but because there were simply so many of them, the Heavy Machine Gun ran out of ammo after the last Special Force Trooper is pumped full of lead.

"There's always the handgun and other weapons we can use." The blue-haired female mercenary said as she tosses the empty gun away.

The Red Eagles moved on, and soon encountered a Ptolemaic Officer, who simply called in two Ptolemaic Slugs (one coming from behind him, the other driving onto the walkway above) before having a freak-out moment and running away.

The Ptolemaic Slug directly in front of the Red Eagles wasn't very smart, as it tries to jump up and fire its cannon in midair, which the mercenaries can avoid by simply standing next to the AI-controlled tank. Ash easily destroys it by hacking it into pieces with his chainsaw.

The Ptolemaic Slug on the walkway above, while is a bit smarter with its tactic of sniping the Red Eagles with its Vulcan gun, takes far too long with its aiming. By the time it fires a bullet, the Red Eagles have already shot it out of commission with their handguns.

"Humans were smarter than those things..." Jenny lampshades the stupidity of the Ptolemaic Slug AI.

The Red Eagles moved on in an effort to get to The Secret Weapon Of The Luftwaffe before it takes off. Though it wasn't very long before they encountered another Rebel Soldier...

...Who literally popped out from thin air.

"What the?!" Jason was surprised at this.

The strange bright blue-clad Rebel Soldier lunged at Mina like a Fanatic soldier, but one difference is that he was using an electric glove-assisted Karate chop instead of the usual combat knife.

Mina only manages to save herself by beheading the Rebel Soldier with her katana.

"Now I remember!" The Japanese female mercenary exclaimed. "This guy is from a futuristic version of the Rebel Army!"

"Future...? You don't mean... the Future Rebel Army?!" It was Jenny's turn to exclaim.

"Correct! The Future Rebel Army, the same bunch that came to Morden's assistance back in the Garbage Island Standoff." Mina gives out the full details of what she knew.

Within seconds, more Future Rebel Soldiers materialized out of thin air, and all of them deployed bouncing bombs from their futuristic backpack.

"But thankfully, they aren't as hard to take out as their present day counterparts." Mina added as she slides under a bouncing bomb, and kills a Future Rebel Soldier with a headshot.

The other Red Eagles said nothing more, as they jump over the volley of bouncing bombs and takes out the Future Rebel Soldiers.

"So I'm guessing that Morden and his new friends must've found a way to reactivate the Time Portal..." Ash voiced his own opinion on the matter. "Should have expected that when the reports stated that the Time Portal disappeared on the Regular Commando's second visit to Garbage Island."

All of a sudden, a klaxon sounded loudly in the hangar, drawing the Red Eagles' attention on to The Secret Weapon.

"Secret Weapon Of The Luftwaffe prepped and ready for take off in one minute. All non-essential personnel are to vacate the hangar immediately. Security personnel are to at least delay the intruders while the aircraft is leaving the hangar." An announcement was made in the hangar, which is followed by the Secret Weapon starting up its massive rocket thrusters.

"Oh, shoot. That thing's about to get away!" Jason exclaims.

"Good thing the RAPs have conveniently left some Slug Flyers behind." Jenny said and points ahead of her, directly at four Slug Flyers that are several meters ahead.

"I guess an aerial dogfight with that behemoth is unavoidable now..." Ash deadpans about the turn of the situation.

The Red Eagles quickly headed for the parked Slug Flyers. Halfway through their rushing, several Future Bazooka Soldiers on jetpacks teleported out of nowhere, and started firing their laser cannons at the mercenaries.

Despite probably having more advanced aiming mechanisms, the Future Bazooka Soldiers still managed to not hit their intended targets.

"Get lost! We've got no time with you guys!" Jenny shouted at the enemies before shooting them all down with her handgun.

After the Future Bazooka Soldiers have been taken out, a Future Masknell teleported in and fired suppressive shots at the Red Eagles.

"Damn! This is something even the Metal Gear cast wouldn't be facing in their missions: Time-travelling armies!"

The Red Eagles tries their best at dodging the suppressive fire. When they successfully did so, they combined their firepower and shot down the Future Masknell before it can get ready for a second round of fire.

"Come on, the Secret Weapon is about to leave the hangar!" Jenny called out to her friends. "Let's go after it and shoot it down with the Slug Flyers before it reaches Beijing!"

As the Red Eagles approaches the parked Slug Flyers, the loud noise of the Secret Weapon taking off and leaving the hangar masked the sound of an ambush of Future Bazooka Soldiers and Future Shield Soldiers teleporting in from behind them. At this point, getting into the Slug Flyers was actually faster than turning around and shoot the ambushing soldiers, and the Red Eagles chose the former, getting inside the Slug Flyers and going after the Secret Weapon which has just left the hangar, while hoping that the Future Bazooka Soldiers don't land any shots on them.

...

Location: Stratosphere layer, somewhere above the India/China border.

"Whew, that was a close one..." Jason sighed in relief after having just barely escaped an ambush by the Future Rebel Army.

"But now we got a giant, flying Metal Gear-esque aircraft to take care of..." Jenny reminds everyone present.

"But where could it have gone to?" Ash said as he looked around the sky while inside the cockpit of his Slug Flyer.

It was Mina who had located the massive aircraft in question. "There!"

The Secret Weapon's familiar camo-green can be seen streaking past about a kilometer to the left of the Red Eagles. It dived below the clouds and disappeared...

...Only to suddenly reappear directly behind the Red Eagles' Slug Flyers.

Boss Battle: Secret Weapon Of The Luftwaffe

"Everyone, evasive maneuvers!" Jenny called out to everyone right as the Secret Weapon aims and fires both of its double-barreled full-auto Electro-Cannons.

This version's Electro-Cannons weren't much different than the original Secret Weapon's, except for the fact that this upgraded version uses its forward facing flak layers at the same time. The Red Eagles soon finds themselves peppered by a cloud of flaks after evading the volley of Electro-Cannon shells. Luckily their Slug Flyers did not sustain much damage from the cloud of flaks.

"Man, I thought we were goners..." Ash exclaims softly about the situation from earlier.

The Secret Weapon dived below the clouds once again, and reappears in front of the Red Eagles. The massive aircraft proceeds to release a barrage of napalm bombs that flew all over the place. The bombs can be shot out, but there were simply too many of them, and the Red Eagles were trying their best to shoot down as many as they can while avoiding the ones they didn't shoot.

After it is done releasing its barrage of napalm bombs, the Secret Weapon topped it off by firing an unguided cruise missile that only travelled a few meters behind before erupting in a massive explosion that can best be described as a scaled-down nuke.

The Red Eagles only manages to avoid getting vaporized by flying their Slug Flyer closer to the Secret Weapon.

"Holy shit! Now imagine if this thing reaches Beijing!" Jason exclaims loudly about the massive aircraft's latest weapon.

"It will be able to reduce the capital to rubble several hundred times, and still have enough payload to do the same to other world capitals!" Mina points out a horrific possibility.

"We may be mercenaries, but we go for what is the right thing to do!" Jason announces to his friends his intentions.

The Secret Weapon tries to use its massive rocket thrusters as giant flamethrowers to incinerate the Red Eagles. Luckily for the four mercenaries, this attack is rather easy to avoid. The massive aircraft sped off and disappeared into a layer of cloud once again.

When the Secret Weapon reappears behind the Red Eagles, it is suddenly accompanied by two Ptolemaic Eaca-Bs, which proceeds to launch their missiles at the mercenaries.

"Why am I not surprised by this?" Jason said with sarcasm as he evades a missile and shoots down the Ptolemaic Eaca-B that fired it. The fighter jet bursted into flames before crashing into the Secret Weapon.

"The original Secret Weapon carried fighters in its cargo bay. I wouldn't be surprised that this upgraded version actually uses its fighters for assistance." Jenny points out as she blows up a Ptolemaic Eaca-B with a missile from her Slug Flyer.

The Secret Weapon tries its Electro-Cannons and flak layers combo again. This time, the Red Eagles knew what to expect, and carefully navigated around the volley of projectiles. One of the flaks had spawned a crack on the windshield of Ash's Slug Flyer.

"Oh well. At least its not such a big deal... yet." The chainsaw-totting mercenary deadpanned.

The Secret Weapon dived below the clouds once again, and reappears in front of the Red Eagles, where it releases a barrage of napalm bombs once again.

"Not this one again!"

Due to the sheer unpredictability of the movements of the napalm bombs, the Red Eagles got into the exact same situation as the last time they faced this attack. This time, all four Slug Flyers came out of it in critical condition.

"I don't think either of us could take another hit..." Jenny hated to point out the obvious, but that's the only thing that can be pointed out at this moment.

The Secret Weapon fires yet another cruise missile at the Red Eagles.

"Don't even think about it, baka!" Mina shouted out as she focuses the firepower of her Slug Flyer on the cruise missile.

The cruise missile blew up before it can close in to the Red Eagles. The massive explosion also took out the rear rotor fan of the Secret Weapon, leaving its backside greatly damaged.

"Good one, Mina!" Ash congratulates the Japanese girl for what she did.

The Secret Weapon counterattacks with its rocket thrusters, which is once again easily evaded by the mercenaries. After doing so, it sped off and disappears into the clouds once again, before reappearing behind the Red Eagles, accompanied by two more Ptolemaic Eaca-Bs.

"This is dragging on for too long. I say we blow this piece of junk up!"

Deciding on their strategy against the Secret Weapon, the Red Eagles quickly shot down the Ptolemaic Eaca-Bs, and fired all the missiles they have left at the cockpits of the massive aircraft.

The volley of Slug Flyer missiles destroys the cockpit of the Secret Weapon, which set off a chain reaction that causes the rest of the massive aircraft to burst into flames. The damage it has sustained in total crippled it to the point that it can't stay airborne any longer.

"Yeah! We did it!" Jason yells out in excitement. "We've saved Beijing from the wrath of the RAP Joint Forces!"

As the smoking remains of the Secret Weapon descends below the clouds, the Red Eagles noticed that a jet of unknown model emerged from its cargo bay. The unknown jet sped off before anyone of the Red Eagles can fire at it.

"Well, no doubt that Morden and Amadeus are in that jet." Ash stated in disappointment. "Which means that they got away, again..."

Secret Weapon Of The Luftwaffe defeated.

"Don't worry, Ash. It seems that fate has just gave us another chance at taking out those two madmen." Jenny told the chainsaw-totting mercenary. "Regular Command has just called us. They want us to head for Beijing right away. Seems that the Everest Facility is just another ploy to draw attention away from us, as Regular Command has just detected activity in the Chinese capital and the rural region outside of it..."

"Another ploy?! Goddammit!" Ash cursed out loud from inside his Slug Flyer, prompting a bit of chuckle from Jason, Jenny and Mina.


Afterwords

This chapter took me two weeks to finish, because I have to think of the upgrades that fitted the Wall Crawler and Secret Weapon Of The Luftwaffe quite well. Sorry for the delay.

So the Future Rebel Army are now part of the RAP Joint Forces? This is starting to get more interesting...

Some details to note about the Secret Weapon: 1)That's the Mission 2 boss of Metal Slug 5, which has no official name as of the writing of this chapter. "Secret Weapon Of The Luftwaffe" is just a placeholder name the entire fandom gave to it, though some, I believe called it "Ptolemaic Air Force". 2)Promotional art of Metal Slug 5 revealed that the Secret Weapon is capable of deploying fighter jets from its rear cargo bay. It doesn't do that in-game, so my upgrade to the thing have it does precisely this. 3)There is no such thing as a Ptolemaic Eaca-B in the games. The Ptoles have their own Flying Tara variant, but not an Eaca-B.

As for the Smart Shot, it is actually the SS weapon box from Metal Slug: First Mission that was never even mentioned in the Metal Slug Wiki. One Let's Player had called it "Super Soaker", but to me, the SS may have stood for something else.

Finally, Colonel Gyllendal is an OC made by MadSoldiersProduction, just like the Red Eagles Squad. Thanks, man!

Shout-out index:

Go Deeper - "We need to go deeper..." ~Tagline of Inception.

"...Metal Gear EXCELSUS..." - Proves that you need more than Optical Camouflage and a Cardboard Box to make down mobile nuclear missile launch stations, especially if the station in question is an aircraft instead of a walking bipedal tank.

That is all. "Dismissed!"