Ch7. Friendship on the Battlefield

"Everyone, this way! Hurry, everybody must evacuate the area!" Hamelin soldiers escorted lines of citizens out of the city and away from the main street where the Hamelin ruler and his friends were doing everything they could to stop Porco Moco's rampage of destruction.

The bangs and booms of the possessed tank resonated in the smoggy air as it shot deadly projectiles at the trio. Marcassin drew a symbol in the air and summoned a ring of icicles around the tank. They sank their icy sharp edges into the machine, hoping to damage the target…but failed as they shattered with the piercing sound of ice breaking. Porco Moco swayed his canon arm at the prince but was stopped as Gunther leaped upon Porco Moco's 'face' and hammered his fists on the tank's eyes.

Moco was not happy with this annoying little familiar. He spun his head around like a top, trying to shake the Hurlabaloo off. Gunther held on tightly but the tank was simply spinning too fast. At last he was tossed away as his grip had given up.

"Gunther! Hang on boy, I'm commin'!" Swaine ran towards his familiar with outstretched arms. "Come on back, Gunther!" Gunther aimed for the man's chest and disappeared back into Swaine's heart. He raised his gun up at the tank.

"You want some of this? Fine, come and get it!"

Swaine fired his gun with a mighty bang, bang, bang! Hitting the machine's red eyes, the glass that protected them was now shattered…but not out of order. It now had eyes with sharp glass surrounding them, giving them a horrifying appearance as they were tinted red by the lights.

Somebody whistled sharply, catching the attention of the monster as it turned around. Esther raised her harp, "Hey, take this!" She played her harp madly as awful, earsplitting notes screeched through the air. The vibrations sent painful shivers up the tank's system while Swaine and Marcassin covered their poor ears. Porco Moco's gaze intensified on the annoying blonde. He whipped out his arm cannon at her, sending her flying to a wall with a thud. Her harp was dropped to the side and the tank ran his large tires over it, reducing it to a pile of wood and strings with dull cracks.

Esther fell to the ground, her eyes closed. The tank opened up an apartment in its 'chest' and revealed a lethal looking canon, even bigger than the one on his snout. Swaine's eyes widened with realization on what it was planning to do. "Oh no…Not that move!"

He ran over to the unconscious woman. She defiantly wasn't dead, but there was no way she would be moving out of the way anytime soon. He picked her up just as the cannon was about to fire. Swaine's mind began to work in slow motion…the cannon blasting…shutting his eyes…bracing for the impact while holding Esther…a bright blue light…

Wait-a blue light? "What the hell?"

Swaine opened his eyes, taking in his surroundings-he was no longer in his previous spot by the wall, but a few meters to the left of the tank. The place where he once stood was now nothing but a pile of rubble, soot, and some smoke. He blinked a few times and looked down to see Esther starting to snap out of her unconsciousness.

"…Mm? Wh…What happened?"

"Oh, well it looks like sleeping beauty is up among the living again!"

Esther was still weak, but she managed to sarcastically glare at her friend. "Ha ha, very amusing."

"Esther, are you alright?" A concerned male voice called out from behind Swaine's shoulder.

Esther's blue eyes grew large with surprise. "F-Father!"

Swaine turned around to see The Great Sage Rashaad standing as he held his wooden scepter with golden rings around the top. He wasn't much different than three years ago, save a couple of small wrinkles on his face.

"M-Mr. Rashaad? When did you get here?"

"Aar, just now, my scruffy friend!"

The mechanic looked around to see the familiar sky pirate captain, Kublai, standing besides The Great Sage Khulan.

"Tengri came back to Al-Mamoon and brought me here. He looked so worried and he didn't bring Esther back so I feared the worst…On our way back here, we ran into The Iron Wyvern, and Khulan and Kublai joined us as well." He gazed at his daughter who was gently being put back on her feet by Swaine. "…When I saw it attacking you, I used a teleporting spell to get you out of harm's way." Rashaad raised his staff and sent out a powerful pulse spell at the mechanical beast that dared to harm his daughter.

Porco Moco' steam hissed in pain as he felt his engine system being physically harmed. He whipped his eyes back towards the six humans, his lust for destruction reflecting in his eyes.

"Wait-I think that last spell worked!"

"So it's physical attacks that it needs, eh?" Kublai pulled out his pirate sword. "Well, then here it comes! Prepare to meet the wrath of Kublai! Aaaarrrrg!"

The rugged pirate charged at the tank with his sword glinting without mercy. He leaped up and raised his weapon and struck-or would have if Porco Moco hadn't hit him aside with his arm.

"Oof! Argh…Ha! It'll take more than that to scratch me!"

Khulan ran and stood between the pirate and the machine. "Kublai, let me distract it before you strike. Once you see an opening, take it by surprise." Khulan raised her green gloved arms and summoned a purple sphere of mist around her. A second later, a dozen more appeared all around and melted into multiple Khulan's.

Porco Moco looked around for a minute before zooming in on a Khulan to his right. He readied his flame thrower and it roared with flames. She jumped to the side with a shocked expression, narrowly dodging a hot, fiery fate. The other Khulan's vanished into clouds of purple mist.

"Hmm…It appears my illusions won't work on this machine."

Marcassin ran to her side. "Porco Moco is the latest addition to the Hamelin military technology arsenal and has heat-sensing vision so it can target a foe in the dark-he probably saw the heat radiating off of your body and-"

"Everybody, stand aside!" Swaine hollered out as his gun was loaded and ready to shoot. "'Ey, Porky! Try this on for size!" The man fired several shots at the metal pig, aiming for the tiny openings of the machine that served as room for it to bend and move. When he was finished, the tank's movements were restricted, his joints jammed.

"Now, Kublai!"

The pirate stood up, "Much appreciated, my scruffy friend." Once again he charged with his sword raised. "Aargh! Have a taste of my wrath, you foul swine!" Jumping in the air, he thrust his sword into a gap between Porco Moco and his right arm canon. Kublai grunted, summoning all of his strength to break off the mechanical limb. Porco Moco began to spin again like a top to throw the muscular man off. The strong man held on and continued to try and break the metal as the world blurred before him like a horrifying merry-go-round.

"Uuurgh…Damn, what is this thing made off, diamonds?" Marcassin watched the poor man spin in circles as he cursed the fact that he couldn't cut this monster.

"Um, actually its armor is a combination of shadow glass and raw steel, and is very strong…"

Moco's spinning had loosened up the bullets that had chained his movements and came to a sudden halt, sending the captain flying in the air and over a building.

"Aaaaaaarrrrgh!"

"Kublai!"

"He's a sky pirate, so he should be fine; right now we've got to stop porky here!" Swaine reached into his pocket for more ammo. "Okay, Moco, you-huh?" His eyes suddenly grew wide and dug his hand into other areas of his trench coat. "...Oh, great…I'm out of bullets. Can this day get any worse?"

Moco snorted some steam from his engine as if he was saying "Hah! What now, you useless human?" He revved his engines with ferocity, daring the thin man to try.

Swaine looked up, raised his arm, and pulled the trigger. "Here goes nothing…" The pistol's grappling hook flew out towards the tank. It made contact with a clink as it caught the door of the engine hold and flew back, claiming a tiny gear as a prize.

The insides of the machine could be seen at work through the new opening. The mechanical pig hissed with pain as if the man had torn a bone from his body. The man's eyebrows shot up, an idea starting to shape in his mind.

"Hey, Esther! You distract Moco here, I'm going in!"

"What?! But you're out of bullets!" The blonde tamer ran up to his side. "You could get hurt! Or die!"

"Just trust me on this, alright?"

"No! You can't just go charging in without anything to protect yourself with!" She gripped on his arm tightly, halting Swaine in his tracks.

"Esther, I'm a grown man-I know what I'm doing!"

"So you know you're killing yourself?" She bent forward with her hands on her hips like she always did when they argued.

"No, I am not! I'm gonna to stop Porky here!" He mimicked her stance; bent forward and with a frustrated glow in his eyes. Their faces were mere inches apart.

"Look, you don't have a weapon and you're not dead yet!"

"Hey, leave my harp out of this!"

"You're dense, you know that?"

"Well, you're an idiot!"

"Oh yeah? You're a-"

Swip!

A dangerously sharp dagger flew past between the couple's faces as it hit a nearby post box, its tip stuck in the metal. The two were frozen for a moment before they slowly turned in the direction the weapon came from to see a rugged pirate standing on a roof above them.

"Aargh, save your quarrels for later, maties! We have bigger pigs to fry now!"

Porco Moco was relentlessly launching his guns at Rashaad and Marcassin as the two sages did their best to avoid being blasted to pieces. Swaine looked back to Esther.

"Okay, look, you want me to avoid getting killed, right? Then make sure our mechanical friend here doesn't see me behind him, got it?"

"But what are you going to do?"

Swaine shouted over his shoulder, "Shut him down for good, that's what!" and ran off.

The menacing tank was about to aim his chest canon out before he felt a hard rock hit his head. Turning around to Esther, he hissed with aggravated steam.

"H-Hey! Yeah you, stupid! Over here!"

She waved her arms and jumped swiftly away. Moco placed his aiming cursor over the tamer…only to have her disappear from the radar again. He twitched with surprise as he saw her again-and saw her vanish. The desert girl moved with such swiftness and grace that one would think she was part ninja.

"Yeah, over here! No, over here! Hey, you!"

Porco Moco growled as his enraged gears turned. He switched to machine-gun mode and fired with the loud bangs echoing though the steamy air. The tiny bullets hit the path of the dancer-and eventually hit the ground by her feet, causing her to trip. The machine then fired a special blackish blob at her feet, hitting the ground with a sticky splat.

Esther tried to move out of the way, but she was stuck; the splatter was some kind of glue that nailed her to her spot. Porco Moco recognized this and opened his chest canon, ready for the finishing blow. "Hmph. So long, pitiful huma-"

"Oh no, not this time!"

"Huh?"

Moco tried to move his head to see the gruffy voice's owner, but couldn't-Swaine was on the very back of Moco's head, digging in the engine compartment. He began to pull out gears, wires, and pipes from the opening, making Porco Moco leak steam out in the wrong spots of his body.

"Dammit, this would be a lot easier with a wrench." Swaine struggled to loosen up the parts of the machine; most of it was securely bolted and needed tools to disassemble them. Without a tool on hand, there were only a few select things he could remove from the tank's system.

"Hey, Spooky," The mechanic called out to his ghostly familiar friend as he floated out of Swaine's chest. "Get me a tool box or somethin', and make it snappy!" Spooky nodded and darted away in search of the requested item.

Meanwhile Esther had managed to free herself from the sticky bomb with the help of her father's magic. Once again she was promptly jumping from side to side, confusing the mechanical menace. Unfortunately, Swaine was on the tank this time, and had to hang on for dear life as Porco Moco jerked his head from side to side.

"Whoa! Woaah! Whooooaa!"

"Just hang on, Swaine! Haha!"

"This isn't funny, Esther! Whoa!"

Esther suddenly stopped her movements and darted away, "Hey, here boy! Come and get me!" She grabbed a stone from the ground and tossed it at Porco Moco. It hit the tank with an annoying clink and with that, he charged towards her.

Swaine regained his grip on the tank and continued to pull at a gear, but it wouldn't budge. "Rrrr, c'mon, da-" A wide grin carrying a wrench suddenly appeared in front of his face. "'Ey, good boy, Spooky!" The mechanic wrapped his hand around the tool and dove back into the engine. With skilled hands, he briskly removed various bolts and gears from the inside of the monster. Pipes, wires, and motors of every kind flew out as Swaine tossed the objects outside.

Porco Moco twitched and jerked franticly, gravely concerned with what this human was up to. He felt his system failing to respond or operate as his weapons were slowly lowered, out of order.

"Okay, just a few more-huh?" Swaine tugged his arm but his coat sleeve was jammed between two gears. He tried to pry free, but he was hopelessly stuck by the machine. The jam also halted the flow of power. Porco Moco was frozen in his spot. The gears tried harder to do their job of turning, only resulting in a buildup of pressure.

"Oh no…Everybody, get the hell outta here, now!"

Esther shouted, "Why?"

"'Cause Porky's gonna blow!" Swaine yelled back as he continued his attempts to free his arm from the stubborn clutches of the gears.

"W…What?! What about y-"

A high pitched scream of steam ran though the air. The pressure was rising and the machine radiated grave amounts heat. Sweat began to appear on the thin man's forehead.

"Just go, NOW!"

Wheeeeeeeeeeeeet! An unusual whistle was released from the tank.

Prince Marcassin's eyes were glazed in fear with what was about to happen. "…Everyone, we must flee! Away from Porco Moco!" Kublai and Khulan dashed away while Rashaad ran to his daughter, who was still arguing with Swaine.

"Esther! ESTHER!" The Great Sage protectively grabbed his daughter's arm and pulled her away.

"Father! Father, wait! Swaine's still-"

KA-BOOM!