Some Experience Necessary

1.15

By this time, Harmony was now curled up in her seat with her hands over her head and curled up tight into a little ball, rocking back and forth as her panic consumed her. A few stray shots had tagged her, but Harmony's zoid was so far untouched.

Her mysterious persona had been cast away in the attack, what lay inside that zoid was not a person in control of her destiny and aloof from the world, she was a frightened child who was discovering first hand that she knew and understood nothing. The other girls no longer mattered, and Raven was gone from her thoughts – they were all going to die. And she was going to die with them. It wasn't fair. It just wasn't fair.

The crashing and explosions were muffled outside, but she had to shut her eyes tight to stop what was happening in front of her from entering her mind.

Raven had dragged his zoid around a sink-hole. He'd lost a leg completely by now, and another was set to follow, his Fang labouring on its belly, it's chest cannons useless now that they were filled with sand. Two of the RevRaptors had tried to follow him around, but he'd managed to kick one of them into a sinkhole and the other had been pulled down with it when the first panicked. Now the Raptors were wary, but their programming was slowly winning over the zoid's natural desire for safety. Their jaws snapped and their cannons continued to fire, peppering the battered and smoking hulk with more shot.

The cockpit glass was cracked and splintering. Raven had managed to manoeuvre the zoid so that the head was covered, protected from most of the shots, but he was cut, bleeding and at the moment angry that he was so alone. He'd wanted to run. He could have run. But not with the stupid girl out there not doing a thing. The others had escaped to safety, and were out of firing range – why Harmony didn't join them he didn't know, and didn't care.

Raven took a few more deep breaths and fired up the machine guns again – shooting wildly at the mess of snarling monsters on the edge of the danger zone.

Harmony was aware of this, but just barely. She just wanted the monsters to go away, to leave her alone. She'd had enough. She wanted to go home.

Then she noticed something strange happening. One of the Revraptors simply crumpled, pieces of it coming off as though pulled apart by giant hands. Her heart fluttered with hope. Had Raven done that?

No. Hang on.

Three new zoids joined the fray – CommandWolves, she realized – and a Guysack! Bringing up the rear! They tore into the pack of Sleepers, ripping them to shreds. She felt a sob escape her – help! Help was here! She scrabbled at the control column of her zoid, trying to get a better view of the battle. "Raven!" She yelled happily. "Raven! Someone's come to save us!" He didn't answer. The zoid was still firing so she knew he was still alive. "Raven! Hey, answer me!"

"We are fucked, Harmony."

"Why?"

There was a hiss and a rattle. A moment later she heard the hushed voices of the others. "What's going on up there?"

"Where the fuck have you guys been?" Harmony exploded, her panic making her shriek.

"Ssssh! Shut up! We're holed up in the Orudius! A Revraptor totalled the Konig! We barely got away!"

"Mister Cloppy is deaaaaad!"

"EVERYONE SHUT THE HELL UP AND HIDE."

"Why? It's just the Republic." Rosalita sounded annoyed. "They can help us. The Republic are nice people."

"She's totally right, Raven. They're the good guys."

"You are wearing Imperial uniforms. You are on Imperial land. You're going to be bloody lucky to walk away from this with-" Raven was cut off, his zoid finally dropping into a freeze. Now they were no longer able to communicate, Harmony found herself alone – the other girls continued to burble over the link but she paid them no attention.

She could go back to panicking, but now the others were wondering what was going on. She watched the final RevRaptor fall, her heart pounding. She opened the cockpit. They didn't have to know she was afraid. How she'd almost wet herself. The other girls had run away into the ruins, after all. A fierce, frightened smile was now plastered across her face as she climbed out of the cockpit. "Hey! Hey!"

Beneath her, Raven was out of his zoid. Raven was running.

"Harmony! Get down!" Grace screamed over the radio.

"Shut up, Imperial bitch! I've got no loyalty to you!"

Raven might not make it.

"You tell 'em, Harmony!" Hah. Unexpected Rosalita would take her side. She waved again. The Guysack following the Wolves finally joined them, its guns still active.

She waved once more. And then out of the corner of her eye saw Raven rise up in front of her – how had he gotten to her so fast? – and leap across the carapace of the Deathpion, arms outstretched. She saw the muzzle fire of the Guysack, the loud crack of a shell being released, but then her world was suddenly tumbling and crashing, the blazing, sweating heat of Raven against her chest, painful as they tumbled. Sky, metal, the purple-blue of their uniforms, the gut-twisting fall off the edge and then blazing heat as the Deathpion staggered beneath the hail of fire.

They hit the ground hard, the breath knocked out of Harmony as she lay stunned against the sand. She didn't have time to rest however, because Raven was yelling, raving at her, grabbing her and pulling her up and up onto her feet. She heard one last cry from the radio before her feet were moving, falling automatically into Raven's wake. She sobbed, snorting a snot bubble in the process as he darted towards the ruins.

Wait! The sand! She tried to dig in her heels but tripped, falling into the horribly creaking, whispering sand.

"Come on! We're light enough not to sink, just run! We haven't got much time!" His voice barely carried over the booming of the guns a few hundred meters away, and the rising shriek of the Deathpion.

"W-Why? W-why are they shooting at u-"

The heavy whumping sound picked her up and tossed her towards the ruins like a leaf in the wind. Raven followed. The shockwave carried them out of the way of the detonating zoid core, the following shrapnel and the rolling fireball of ignited core-fluid that turned the sand to glass beneath it as it ruptured through the joints of the dead zoid. The next landing was just as rough as the first, but there was not only machine gun fire that was the issue now – it was the burning pieces of everything else that fell like rain all around them.

Raven pulled himself up, blinking through the ringing of his ears and the blurring of his vision. The world span in hundreds of colours around him, and he barely registered Harmony's spluttering cries of pain and rage. The goal was the ruins. He gripped it, held it close to his heart and lifted himself off the ground to start running again. The burning in his shoulder was ignored, but his grip on Harmony was like iron. He wouldn't let go.

Adrenaline made them both quick as their minds cleared and sound returned, but the question was, would they be quick enough? Zig-zagging over the sand Raven had ceased to care if Harmony was running or being dragged, his eyes were fixed on the ruins, and with them the safety they provided. The safety he had to reach. Her to reach as well.

They had to make it. They had to. Sand popped and exploded all around them, the fire lazy. Raven's lungs felt like they were about to burst, the inhalation of heat from the sun, the sand and the fire – he couldn't last much longer. Slowly but surely his desire for survival was slimming down to him alone, to leave Harmony to find her own sense of survival. But who was he kidding?

The ground opened up beneath their feet and he elbowed her back, coughing in the dust and sand as it slid out from beneath him. Raven gasped as he landed on his backside, and Harmony fled past him, caught in her panic again. "No, NO, YOU STUPID-" He lashed out, catching her ankle, dragging her against him as the next lot of shells fired overhead. Gripping her hand tightly, feeling the inside of his own gloves slippery with sweat, he pulled her around the opened hole in the ground, cursing the stupid idea of trying to get there on foot. They would keep shooting. Every stray shot made the ground more unstable. He was such an idiot!

Pulling, running, gasping they kept going. He could do this. He had to.

Another explosion.

Raven felt his fear rise. As suddenly as it came, he squashed it, his training kicking in and helping him to concentrate. Harmony shrieked but he ignored it, concentrating only on each step. Think about the next step. Don't think about what's behind you. It's okay. Just run. You can do this. You're almost there.

Across from them, Higgins was staring at the mess he'd caused, before flicking open the channels to Fleming. "You idiot! We needed that one alive!"

"We're all shooting at it! Don't pick on me 'cos I'm a girl!"

"I'm pickin' on you 'cos you got the best aim!" Fleming's Wolf ducked forward, it's head tilting to nip at the Guysack's hindlegs. Higgins scuttled away, his lips pulled into a sneer. "Alright already, stop dickin' about – Lidl, lace that place with explosives. Stupid kids brought us right to the ruins – we blow 'em sky high 'cos the organoid's bound to be hidden deep – we won't find it otherwise."

"Yeah, boss."

"Mackey, you awake yet?"

There was a moan over Ida's shoulder, and the young man leaned away to allow his superior officer to sway into full view of the zoid's commlink. "Heya."

Higgins pointed his finger at the screen, teeth bared. "Get your arse in that zoid and get into those ruins. Get those kids. Ida, go with him. Fleming, you're with me, we're going t'attack from the front."

"Yep!" A lot more enthusiasm there. The zoids split, the children now too far out to be hit clearly. Not that Higgins really wanted to hit them because people tended to make a mess when hit with bullets the size of the ones his little company were packing. He grinned, gunned the Guysack's primary motion system and started to walk towards the mess of zoids. Maybe they could salvage some of those parts…

"Boss?"

"Yeah, Lidl?" Higgins moved aside to let Fleming go first, searching for a clear way across the field as the Ida waited for Mackey to reach his zoid.

"Boss, we got a problem."

"How?" He turned the zoid to see that the CommandWolf was still there, and Mackey was getting into it, and there was Lidl…but there was a mysterious lack of explosives. "What the hell?"

- to be continued