Gundam 00: Phoenix
Crushing Blows: Part 1
Author's Notes, July 19th, 2014: It's been a long time since I've looked at this story. A combination of declining motivation, tiredness, school, and procrastination has led to this being put on hold for a long time. Now I've decided to come back, for the time being and hopefully one day finish the story. I will be shifting the story to smaller parts since it's much easier to write and develop.
Afghanistan/Turkmenistan Border, September 9, Rising Phoenix Rally Point Beta
"Watch the flanks, they're getting around us!" Daveral shouted to Flint from within the Phalanx over the comm.
"Easier said than done!" Flint remarked, growling while forcing a GN-X back with the Pegasus' physical blade. "I'm good, but not that good!"
"Well, it's not enough!" Daveral then shouted as the Phalanx's railguns fired. The shots missed, but the force behind them caused considerable damage to a couple of GN-Xs that had strayed too close to the shots. The Phalanx then launched several missiles in hopes of finishing them off. "I wish, Nena and Helana were here," he then muttered.
At this point, the two were trying to fight their way out and hoping the carnage they left behind them would be enough to let the rest of the Rising Phoenix escape. What was left of it.
On his monitors that displayed friendly forces, names were just disappearing and signals vanished. He prayed that some of the people would survive. All those names on the list that disappeared, to imagine each one flickering out meant death was horrifying and demoralizing. People who he could not see or hear were nothing more than names and statistics that could vanish in an instance on his screen, yet still, he felt attached to it all.
A GN-X then charged forward with its lance, aided by two others. Daveral fired, managing to cause one to explode, but the other two slammed in, tips up. With nothing to redirect the recoil, the Phalanx fell out of the sky, despite its shields absorbing the blow.
Feeling the G-forces that pushed down on him, Daveral struggled to regain control and get a lock on his target. He swore his vision darkened for a moment.
Immediately, the Pegasus redirected to assist and drove the GN-Xs off after severing the lance of one and decapitating the other with a quick flourish of its beam saber. Yet, that only drew more attention for additional GN-Xs and even some Aheads armed with shoulder-mounted missile launchers began turn on the Gundam. Their numbers and overwhelming firepower immediately put Flint on the defense with no ability to close in while return fire did little. The pilot had to concentrate more on dodging and maneuvering than aiming, even with computer-assisted targeting.
The shift in fire towards the Pegasus, did allow Daveral a moment's breather, the time he needed to pick his targets. Opening up with a volley of missiles and railguns enhanced by GN Particles, the A-Laws formation scattered and broke down into smaller teams once they he had begun his attack.
"These guys definitely aren't pushovers," Daveral noted. He had downed fewer target than he would have liked. It made him realize just how much of an advantage they had years ago against inferior machines, and even the old GN-Xs still had the problems of being a production model rather than having the design pushed to the limit and for a single goal.
"Guess A-Laws does something right, then!" Flint scoffed, pulling back towards Daveral after managing to hack down a GN-X that had did not have the benefit over nearby allies, driven into the open by Daveral's attack.
An alert then appeared on Daveral's screen.
With a quick glance, he saw that all surviving forces were to pull to a specified location. The distance, however, was considerable. If A-Laws failed to run them down, it would be a miracle.
"You got the message, Flint?!" Daveral called out with his friend giving a nod. "And I guess that leaves us as the rearguard," he muttered, narrowing his eyes with a heavy sigh. Flint simply gave another nod.
They knew what they had to do, yet suicide orders did not seem preferable to surrender.
Dozens of soldiers were doing what could be a considered a fighting retreat if it were not for the fact that the retreat simply resulted with the Rising Phoenix troops running into more A-Laws forces. Those who had been playing rearguard or had lost their transportation found themselves surrounded.
"We're getting butchered out here!" a soldier shouted after having noticed two of his fellow squadmates being shot by A-Laws special force units with deadly accuracy.
"Hold the line, hold the goddamn line! We can't let them through," another then shouted before one of their vehicles exploded nearby.
"There is no line, they're already on the flank! Bastards are going to close the gap!"
Confusion, panic, death. Even a veteran like Viper could be overtaken by it. Overwhelming odds could easily crush the spirit, even more so when your best weapons were failing to halt the enemy.
He signalled for whoever was nearby to seek shelter. No point in going out into the open to get cut down. All they could do was stay safe and hope for a miracle.
Even with their Gundams in the air, the enemy was too many, them too few. Their troops were dropping like flies and their escape route became smaller and smaller with each passing second. They were losing far too much manpower and equipment in an already limited force. How could they hold against such power? They already had enough trouble against the Federation in direct combat, A-Laws was a whole different deal.
"Where's the Captain?!" Viper then heard Josh shout over to him.
"I don't know! Last I heard they were getting him out by transport. Word is he just got hit and things are bad!" Viper replied, keeping his head down while bullets whizzed overhead.
Josh shook his head. "Where doe that leave us?!" he then spat.
"Screwed, that's what we are!" Viper answered, not bothering to think about what he had said at that point.
An explosion then detonated nearby sending people through the air and back to the ground. Worse, there were body parts in the storm of debris.
Viper then saw the soldier who had been trying to get the soldiers to hold their ground. Her back arched up slightly with eyes widened in shock, shock hiding the pain as she looked down.
"Oh my God, w-w, my leg, where's my leg?!" she shouted as two of her fellow squad mates dragged her back into cover despite her screams of agony.
She was not the only one who had been maimed. Half a dozen others had been injured with varying degrees of injury. The worst was one where a man had his stomach cut wide open and whoever was nearby could only comfort the man.
"Aw, shit, I'm hit!" he then heard Josh scream after having been temporarily deafened by another explosion that killed more people. "Help, stop the blood, someone!" he then wheezed, struggling for breath.
Viper turned to see Josh clutching part of his chest, blood beginning to pour out of his wound. He slumped over against his cover, with both hands trying to stop the flow of blood, long enough for a medic to try and save him.
"Medic, over here!" Viper then called out, desperately before looking around.
At this point, Viper could only look at what was going on amongst the troops. Many were injured, tired, and some even dying. Though some were still fighting, their effect on the A-Laws forces was negligible at best who made a slow, but steady advance, not risking their soldiers unless they needed to. Rising Phoenix troops were doing everything they could, but it made no difference, it could not stop the A-Laws. They were not going to make it. They had no transport and they were too far forwards to make a run for it. Nobody wanted to die as a martyr here in a battle that may never even be heard of to the public.
It made Viper truly realize there would be no miracles. There was no triumph card they could pull, no deus ex machina in the form of some sort of secret weapon. They had none. Their luck had finally run.
Shaking due to the situation and the plight of his fellow soldiers he could only begin with, "Stop." The words were soft, not loud enough to be heard, yet strength grew in his throat as he spoke again. "Stop!" he then repeated before shouting the same word once more, now looking at his fellow soldiers. "Stop all actions, cease action! We're done!" he said to them, hoarsely. "It's over it's all over, unless you want to die. Now stand down!"
Pulling out a white cloth from his personnel medical kit, he waited for the soldiers to cease fire. Most of them did, while the few remaining began to get the message when they began to truly look at was happening to them and their comrades or had been picked off by A-Laws forces. Once they had ceased, he raised his arm while waving his makeshift flag and coming out of cover, all weapons abandoned.
"Stop, we surrender!" Viper shouted, vigorously waving the flag to get the attention of the A-Laws soldiers.
He saw the A-Laws troops in their vicinity begin to approach, their squad leader signalling his troops to halt fire, shifting to a defensive stance. Many of them looked at each other, likely wondering if this was a trap.
"Don't do anything stupid," Viper said to his fellow soldiers behind him. He may not have the official authority to make the proper calls, but at this point, it was pointless to risk their lives in a losing battle.
Without a word, the A-Laws troops came over, gathering the Rising Phoenix troops and securing the perimeter before they let medical attention be given to those who needed it. Most of the A-Laws troops seemed surprised that their enemy had not fought to the death or attempted to flee. In turn the Rising Phoenix troops were surprised they were not fired upon when they were defenseless.
Maybe both sides were human and not the complete monster they had expected after all.
Turkmenistan, September 9, Katharon Base Anvil
Klaus and many others stood outside. The man himself stood motionless, having just witnessed the strangest thing that caused his senses to come alive that invoked shock and fear. It was never a feeling any man wanted to have by simply looking out to the horizon.
The darkness surrounding their base had momentarily disappeared in a brief instance before everything returned to darkness.
The source of the light seemed to have come from above and in the direction of where they had just sent their forces towards. The flash made him wonder if a sort of nuclear weapon had been used. Not many thing could make such a sudden bright flash, but that it didn't match up. There were no plums of smoke mixed with the red and oranges of the explosion. No rising mushroom cloud. All there had been was a flash of light.
Yet, the ground had already begun to rattle as specks of sand were blown by with increasing force.
Immediately Klaus turned to everyone.
"Get everyone back inside, seal up!" he shouted as people rushed back into the base.
"Seal the doors, lock down!" came a shout, confirming his orders. Now it was clear everyone knew what could be coming.
As Klaus began to head deeper into the base he saw Marina and the children wandering about the hallways, likely heading off to bed until the alert came through.
The Princess of Azadistan turned to him with a look of concern that was to be expected.
"Klaus, what's going on?" Marina asked him.
"We going to be okay?" one of the children asked, frightened by the commotion going on.
"We'll be alright," Marina replied to the child in a motherly voice, trying to calm him.
"I don't know," Klaus began as he signalled for her to go further into the base. He would not risk the Princess or these children, they weren't combatants. They had no reason to get hurt because of them. "Head to the bunker in the lower levels until I say it's safe."
Some of the children seemed to panic. Why were they being forced to hide? Yet, Klaus knew he needed to get moving to the command centre. He needed ensure the base had been locked down completely.
"Don't worry, children, it'll be fine," Marina then began as he continued off. "We have nothing to be afraid of, Klaus will ensure that we're safe, I promise. Remember..."
The Princess and the children then moved further in the base, but Klaus could have sworn he heard them singing some sort of song. Most likely to try and get the children to focus and soothe their anxiety. It also seemed to soothe his own as well.
He then entered into the command centre.
"Klaus, what's going on?" Shirin asked him as personnel were monitoring the systems, ensuring entrances and access points were sealed and secured for the worst case scenario.
"I don't know, but something big's just happened. I think it was the A-Laws," he replied to her, catching his breath.
"How so?"
"I-" he paused to Shirin's confusion. Something did not sound right.
While this part of the base was deep underground, below the surface, he could have sworn he heard the wind. It wasn't calm, instead, it howled and raged outside with a metallic ear-shrieking noise as if the exterior of the base and its components was being peeled away or ground down.
"You hear that?" he finally asked, still remaining focused on the noise.
Taking a moment to listen, Shirin simply nodded after a couple of seconds.
Klaus then turned to the main monitors. Cameras were being blinded by sand before they disappeared while sensors were blacking out. Everyone around knew something bad was going on outside, but they could not check it out, not just yet. If security systems could disappear from this storm, what would happen to a person if they exited the shelter of their base? And what would happen to the forces they had sent out if they had been caught in the middle of it all?
Earth's Orbit, September 9, Volga-Class Battleship Petersburg
Goodman frowned. Estimations for the damage were far greater than they had anticipated. The resulting shockwave carried over, causing a fierce storm several miles from the blast radius. They had not even charged it to one-hundred percent which would be enough to level any city of their choosing, yet the effects of this weapon would be more than apparent.
"This is unexpected," Goodman said with heavy emphasis on the final word, maintaining his frown. "So much power. Maybe even too much power." He then looked over his shoulder to one of the analyst. "What's the estimated radius of the shockwave?"
"From the calculations, we're looking around at a ten-miles radius from the epicentre of the blast. While the sand may have lessened the initial impact, the storm caused by the Memento Mori is lethal up to five-miles, judging from the wind speed."
"Will our forces in the canyons be able to notice the effects?" he then asked. There were so many variables to take into account.
"They might feel it, but the whatever force is left will hardly be lethal by then, more like a strong breeze than anything else. Spotters have also reported that the light was only visible for a moment. It could easily be mistaken for abnormal flash of light from an aircraft of flare, unless you were in the blast radius."
Goodman rested his chin on his hand. Even if no one of importance had seen it, questions would be raised. They needed to keep those voices silent. They had come too far to ensure that the world would be under one banner, that could not change now. If atrocities needed to be committed to unite all so be it. Far better than letting nations do their own thing with the chance for Armageddon. The Rising Phoenix had understood that, until they had decided to invoke a crusade to clean what blood stained their hands and it only got them into trouble. Maybe that's what the world intended.
Arthur Goodman finally then spoke, "Hmm, still we can't take chances, not when we have fools like the Kingdom of Suile, Celestial Being and Katharon still running around. Have the President and Commander Katagiri informed that Memento Mori proved to be successful. They should be able to clean up this mess should people try take notice." He then turned back to face the weapon.
Memento Mori, seemingly unremarkable, yet, incredibly deadly. Now, how could they make use of the weapon's power while ensuring the stability of the Federation?