Ranger24: That's right folks I am back with new ideas for this story thanks to having read the works of Dan Abbnet! If you haven't read his stories then I can kinda understand but seriously go read them.
Chapter 5: Skewer the winged beast.
Disclaimer: I own nothing.
10 kilometers from USC base camp in Nagasaki, Dragon Fire flight DF-59/DF-67 Okinawa Task Force
"59 this control do you read over?"
"Receiving control this is 59 go ahead," Shirely replied.
"Saxon Team has cleared an LZ you have green light proceed to transmitted coordinates," Euphemia replied.
"Understood control, 59 out," Shirely replied easing herself back into the pilots chair. "You hear that 67?"
"You know it," the other pilot replied. "We'll keep the skies clean."
"Glad to have you up here," Shirely put in.
"Hey Lieutenant!" Haji called from back.
"What?" Shirely asked trying not to take her eyes off the skies.
"Surely you can't be serious!"
Shirely gave the drop ship a violent shake and the two gunners yelled in fright.
"Okay sorry! Bad time for a pun!" Haji apologized.
Saxon Team, Outside Nagasaki Government Center.
The squad made it's way down into the streets. Already out in the street was Kallen and the two other survivors. Tamaki stepped right in front of him as they stepped out onto the streets.
"Hey! Look who managed to survive this little strip of hell?" Tamaki said happily.
"Alright Tamaki what is the 'suprise you were talking about?" Kallen asked in a brusk tone.
"What? Not even a 'hi, how are you doing Tamaki...'"
Before Tamaki could finish however he double over on the ground and several of the men winced as Kallen pulled her foot away from Tamaki's groin. She hadn't changed much in Lelouch's eyes. She'd grown her hair out a bit and she looked a lot more of exhaustion, she also probably need a shower. But her face looked the same as always, her hard blue eyes and glare; not to mention her old scowl.
The moment she saw him however her expression changed from anger and annoyance to surprise, shock, and obvious discomfort. She stared at him for a moment in silence. He smiled at her.
"It's been a while, Q-1." Lelouch said.
"Zero..." She whispered. The other two looked suprised and whispered to eachother frantically.
"She's pissed," Suzaku muttered to Lelouch.
Kallen continued to stare at him in silence. Calares interrupted her silent thoughts.
"Where's the Resonator Captain Kozuki?" He demanded.
She snapped out of her focus and jabbed her thumb back at the Mausoleum. "It's where we were hiding."
"I'll get it," Tamaki groaned, stumbling towards the Mausoleum.
Then there came to their ear's the sound of the approaching Dragon Fires. Two came into view a gun ship model in the lead followed by a transport.
"Saxon Team this is DF-59 my name is Lieutenant Fenette, I'll be your pilot back to Okinawa."
Lelouch blinked in surprise, Shirely was a pilot?
Suzaku sighed as Lelouch glanced at him. "Shirely joined up after you got arrested."
"Great," Lelouch sighed, just imagining how Shirely would be reuniting with him.
Then just as the Dragon Fire came around for the landing and Tamaki came back with the Resonator in his arms, a single black shape came flying at the gunship. Lelouch's eyes widened as he recognized the shape of a nemycast. It crashed into the tail of Shirely's Dragon Fire and all hell broke loose!
Bullets came flying down from the surrounding buildings and Young fell dead as bullets ripped apart his chest! Shirley's scream cut across their mike's as her Dragon-Fire's tail exploded!
"I CAN'T CONTROL IT! MAY DAY! MAY DAY!" Shirely screamed mere seconds before her Dragon fire crashed into side of the Government center. The remains of the tail and wing crashed into the ground. The squad's scattered as dozens of locust poured onto the street! Lelouch fired into the on coming horde mercilessly. He glanced about to see the majority of the group falling back to the Mausoleum. Calares however was on the opposite side of the remains of the crashed Dragon Fire.
The gun ship began to open up raining fire on the on coming locust waves. Dozens of drones where shredded by its main guns before the locust on the ground began to open up on it with their small arms. The Dragon Fire pulled up out of the narrow canyon between the buildings trying to get out of range of the locust small arms fire.
'I am pleased with your progress... I understand they have located another squad...'
"Fall back!" Calares shouted firing furiously with his rifle into the oncoming horde. What he didn't see however was a large hulking locust moveing up behind him.
'Our strategy remains the same...'
Lelouch's raised his rifle to fire on the new locust but a round narrowly missed his skull.
'Cut off the head and the body dies...'
Calares seemed to become aware of the figure approaching him. He turned about to get punched clean in the face by the massive locust.
'We will win this war... It's only a matter of time...'
Lelouch looked up just in time to see the new locust warrior pulling out a long serrated blade and running it through Calares's chest. After a second the locust warrior dragged the sword out of Calares's corpse and threw the limp body onto the ground. Lelouch raised his rifle only for Suzaku to grab him by the shoulder.
"Forget it! We gotta get the hell out of here!" Suzaku shouted before the two of them broke off and fled up the steps into mausolem. One of the soldiers stumbled and was instantly set upon by a Locust warrior. They fled inside the Mausoleum and slammed the doors behind them.
Once inside the dark tomb Tamaki and Rivalz piled several wooden boards and large rocks in front of the door. They stood there panting in the dark. Lelouch pressed down on his mike.
"Command, this is Lieutenant Lamperouge. DF 59 is down, Colonel Calares is KIA along with Sergeant Young, we've taken refuge inside the Mausoleum." Lelouch said wiping the sweat from his brow.
"Say again Lelouch, Calares is dead?" Euphemia said in a disturbed voice.
"Yeah, we got ambushed at the LZ and we've taken refuge inside the mausoleum."
"We're totally fucked," Rivalz growled.
"Stowe it britannian." Tamaki shot back.
Rivalz was about to respond when there came a loud roar from with in the tomb and the sound of heavy feet. Tamaki, Kallen, Rivalz, and Suzaku's eyes widened in fear.
"Oh shit a berserker!" Kallen muttered, there was silence. "Stay quiet, she can hear us... and smell us."
Lelouch pressed down on his boom mike. "Command, we have a berserker in the area please advise!"
"Hold your fire Saxon! Standard weapons are useless against that thing!" Euphemia whispered.
"Oh this is fucked! We're screwed!" The one surviving member of Kallen's squad said panicking.
"Quiet down!" Suzaku hissed.
"I'm getting the hell out of here!" The man screamed before running down the corridor.
At that moment however a massive shadow appeared around the corner! Just as he rounded the corner he screamed as a massive muscled granite gray arm grabbed the black knight by the head and dragged him into the hall with a roar! Blood splashed across the walls as the man screamed in agony and terror. The sickening sound of cracking bones and organs being crushed filled the air. Then the grisly remains of the mans hand was tossed down the hall to them.
Everyone's eyes were now wide with horror and alarm. Lelouch pressed down even harder on his boom mike.
"Command, we need a way to kill this thing right... fucking... now!" Lelouch hissed.
"Okay... okay..." Euphemia said quickly, there was a pause. "Do you still have the hadron targeting unit?"
Tamaki nodded his head lifting up the targeting unit.
"Yeah we've still got it." Lelouch answered.
"Okay, you've only got a few minutes left of satellite coverage left. You have to get the berserker into position for you to use the hadron cannons against it." Euphemia instructed.
Lelouch nodded. "Understood, we'll get on it."
"And Lelouch," Euphemia added. "Be careful."
"Right," Lelouch muttered. "Saxon eight out."
He glanced at the other members of the squad. It was obvious he had to be the one to take out the Berserker but bringing them all along would invite disaster with such a dangerous enemy. He took the targeting unit from Tamaki.
"Alright, you guys stay here. Suzaku and I will take care of the berserker." Lelouch whispered.
"Got it." Kallen whispered back.
"We are so screwed." Rivalz hissed.
Lelouch sighed and with Suzaku began to head deeper into the Mausoleum. There was a garden in the back of Mausoleum that was open to the sky, if the two of them could get there they could fight the Berserker.
"So how do we draw it out?" Suzaku asked.
"Like this," Lelouch replied raising his rifle and unleashing a spray of bullets. The gunshots echoed about the chamber. Suzaku glanced about in fear eyes watching every door. Nothing happened.
"Well that was a bust." Suzaku muttered.
Then the wall behind Suzaku exploded! Out of the new hole charged a massive granite gray creature with no eyes!
"RUN!" Lelouch shouted and they both fled out of the chamber! The berserker roared in fury and charged after them smashing through anything that got in it's way. They ran all of the way to the back of the tomb before at the last second they both dove out of the way just barely in time! The berseker burst through the massive stone wall and out into the sun light outside the tomb. Lelouch brought up the targeting unit and pulled back on the trigger! The berserker turned about roaring in fury!
Then down came the hadron beam and the Berserker roared in agony as it was rapidly melted alive by the continuous beam of Hadron energy. Then the Berserker exploded violently sending gore flying everywhere. Lelouch gave a sigh of relief and leaned back against the wall of mausoleum. He pressed down against his boom mike as he set down the hadron targeting unit.
"Kallen bring everyone up, the berserker has been dealt with." He said tiredly.
"Right, understood... Lelouch." Kallen muttered.
Suzaku pulled Lelouch up of the floor and they stepped out into the late day sun. Lelouch pressed down on his boom mike again.
"Command, Berserker neutralized, requesting pick up over."
"Negative Lelouch, we can't risk sending in anymore air units into the area as of right now." Euphemia replied as Kallen, Tamaki, and Rivalz emerged from the tomb with the resonator on Tamaki's back. Lelouch tossed Tamaki the Targeting unit.
"Then how are we getting out of here?" Lelouch asked.
"That's up to you now, Major." Corneila's voice replied.
Lelouch blinked in surprise.
"Major?" Rivalz said in a mix of shock and annoyance.
"You're team is going to have to deploy the resonator at the Nagasaki Sakuradite mines, which happen to be twenty five clicks outside of town. You're being given command of Saxon team as of right this moment." Cornelia continued.
"Respectfully sir but what the hell?" Lelouch asked. "How the heck are we supposed to cross more than twenty five kilometers of Locust territory in one night?"
"As I said before, that's up to you Saxon one, Command out." Cornelia answered.
"They made you a major?" Rivalz said incredulous.
Nagasaki, Wreckage of DF 59
Shirely could barely hold back her tears as struggled to squeeze through the small hole in the cockpit glass. Her left arm was broken and she couldn't see out her left eye but she could feel blood on her face that she knew was her own. Everyone else aboard DF 59 was dead, blood splashed like paint across the interior.
She clambered out of her downed craft and with a cry fell to the floor and landed hard on left arm. She bit her lip so hard trying to stifle the scream she nearly tore it off.
She could hear footsteps coming towards her downed bird and though it pained her she drew her side arm.
A locust drone entered the hall and Shirely raised her weapon up as well as she could and fired.
Her first shot caught the drone in the shoulder and it took a step back loosing a yell of pain. Shirely fired again and this time caught the drone in the chest, her third round got it in the eye. As it fell dead however more locust entered the hall and Shirely cursed and continued firing. Another drone fell dead, why weren't they shooting back? She had three rounds left. She put the first one into the leg of one of the advancing drones and put the second in its groin. The final round she then turned the gun towards herself.
Before she could pull the trigger however a hand grabbed her by the hair and pulled her up. She found herself staring face to face with the largest locust she had ever seen. It glared at her and then punched her in the face. Everything went black.
Ranger24: And thats a chapter folks. Very dark at the end but it helps set things up for later. I also apologieze if anyone thinks I'm being to rough on Shirely. Its for plot folks. Anyways read and review.