Forever Falls, one of the Kingdom of Vale's most beautiful landmarks. It was anomalous in nature due to appearing as if it was eternally locked in the season of Fall. Leaves were red all year long, and the weather was always windy and chilly even if the rest of the kingdom was in the midst of either blistering Summer or freezing Winter.
Railways were also built to allow tourists to view its natural beauty, but private corporations used the same rails as well to transport goods. Although not completely safe, relatively few packs of Grimm are sighted at least in comparison to other forests. Perhaps a side-effect of Forever Falls' unusual nature.
Meaning that the SDC transport train packed at least 20% less security than standard to make room for more cargo space to maximise profits. A mistake on their end, as they expected mostly Grimm and thus equipped their automated defences as such. Only a single Spider Drone, two Paladins and a platoon of Atlesian Knights to guard their precious goods.
It won't be enough for two Talons of the White Fang.
"They're coming, right on schedule." Ilia informs from her position, sitting on top of her AC with a pair of high-tech binoculars scanning the horizon, "One good thing about the SDC, is they're punctual when Lien is on the line."
"Good. Then we'll proceed as planned." Blake Belladonna approaches her own AC dressed in a flight suit that has become somewhat of a standard issue in the White Fang. They were flight suits used by Bullhead pilots modified for use in mechs.
A black military jumpsuit with a white flak jacket over it with red markings, along with a helmet with tinted visors connected to an air supply via a tube. Besides the markings on the flak jacket, they also added features from the Grimm masks standard among White Fang to their helmets. It prioritised affordability and protection against flames and shrapnel, against G-forces one would have to rely on their Aura instead, unlike both NEST and SDC flight suits that aid in resisting high acceleration forces while still granting protection.
She hops into her AC, the MIDNIGHT PHANTASM, and begins engaging in manual mode. Unlike the pilots of corporations, it was far harder to get surgeons skilled enough to perform the augmentation process that wasn't part of either corporation and was sympathetic to the White Fang cause. Never mind accessing the secrets both companies possess about augmentations.
But they make do like they always did. It doesn't matter if their equipment was subpar. They had determination, and goals larger than mercenaries looking to earn quick Lien. With their resourcefulness, the mechanised division of the White Fang, the Talons, could compete with their counterparts across the globe. At least on their own terms…
Ilia climbs into her own AC, the PHANTOM SCALES, a scavenged AC of the ECLIPSE model. An early Gen-1 scouting AC meaning both its hardware and firmware were outdated but thanks to the engineers of the White Fang, as well as stolen parts, they were able to update it enough that it wasn't completely obsolete.
The Reverse-Jointed AC was customised with black absorptive plating meaning that radars would have a hard time detecting and locking onto her, which makes her an excellent partner to have in ambushes.
As for her MIDNIGHT PHANTASM, it was created using a mixture of parts, from various types of AC parts instead of one whole model. The legs were Reverse-Jointed like Ilia's, and to maximise mobility the rest were made with lightweight parts such as the ECLIPSE and ZEPHYR. Armour plating was stripped in certain areas to allow it to become more flexible and reduce its weight. A cycloptic head from the BREACHER model with a singular red optic, crammed full scanning equipment and early warning systems. And there were even the little gadgets she picked up from SDC raids.
Both of them knew their ACs couldn't hold a candle against modern mech weaponry, so they had to focus on speed and agility to avoid being struck, scanners to detect their enemies first, and special plating to make them as hard to track as possible.
Hit them first, hit them hard, hit them fast. That was their stratagem. The only stratagem that they could afford to fight without massive casualties.
"Talon-2, Shadowcat, beginning engagement." Blake activates her AC and boosts it forward, launching it over the side of the hill and skids down, tramping over trees as it does so before Ilia follows closely,
"Talon-5, Mirage, engaging," Ilia informs as she boosts forward, the two of them skidding towards the passing armoured train. Immediately after powering on their AC, the energy signatures were detected and cannons built into the armoured train began turning towards their direction, attempting to lock on to the two ACs. "Deploying countermeasures."
Immediately, a rack on the back of PHANTOM SCALES pops out, deploying a dozen clusters of missiles that shoot upwards before raining down on the area before them. Immediately clouds of electrified smoke covered them and disrupted the tracking of the cannons as they closed in.
"They're engaging Paladins." Blake detects through their scanners, calibrated to look beyond the electric smoke as it picks up a pair of Paladins detaching themselves from compartments on the train's hull.
Both were equipped with the standard loadout, assault rifles along with missile pods on their shoulders. Just like they predicted.
"Split up." Blake orders as she engages her AC's weapon units, whipping out a disruptor pistol in one arm and a shotgun in the other, "I'll take the one on the right, you take the left."
"Copy that Talon-5," Ilia affirms and moves in for close quarters, pulling out a grenade launcher in one arm and the other ejecting a long metal whip crackling with Lightning Dust infused into it.
The two of them ran circles around the disoriented paladins, the electric smoke encompassing the area began to thin out as the Paladins opened fire, hoping to catch them via the sheer volume of fire.
The two leap on the armoured train, rendering the mounted cannons ineffective as they circled the paladins with their thrusters boosting in quick bursts to reserve EN levels. Ilia fires a grenade at them, striking one Paladin in the shoulder but instead of exploding it dispenses another smaller cloud of electric smoke, disrupting their sight once again.
Blinded by this, Blake fires her disruptor pistol in rapid fire, blue bolts of electricity striking the Paladin and temporarily shorting it out. But before its pilot could reboot, she fires the shotgun at point blank, shredding both legs apart as it falls off the armoured train. At this, the pilot quickly ejects, a rocket-boosted seat launching out of the cockpit in time and carrying them to safety as their Paladin crashes.
With Ilia, the Paladin she fights sprays a volley of fire at her but she manoeuvres herself out of the way before striking with her electric whip. It lashes out and cuts off one of its arms from the elbow downwards, causing it to drop its assault rifle. In desperation, the pilot fires its missile pods at close range but Ilia and Blake deploy flares from their ACs, causing them to miss them and explode prematurely.
Ilia slashed with her whip again, cutting the other arm off this time before targeting the legs, turning the Paladin to just a cockpit as it was kicked off the train, with the pilot safely ejecting before the broken mech could hit the ground at high speed.
"That's them taken care of," Ilia smirks behind her helmet before Blake reprimands her,
"Don't get cocky, Talon-5. We still have the internal defences to take care of." she warns, "Begin your hack, I'll disengage the engine."
Ilia moves to obey her orders, hacking the security of the armoured train to disengage the hydraulically sealed doors as Blake moves up ahead to the train's, firing her shotgun at the pin holding it to the rest of the train and disconnecting them. The cargo begins slowing as the front speeds off, and after a while disappears from sight while the rest of the train slows to a halt.
"Match, set, point. This is getting too easy don't you think? The SDC must be slacking on security recently." Ilia grins as she uses the cyberwarfare suite in her AC to begin wirelessly hacking the locked doors.
"Come on, you know what the High Leader always says." Blake rebukes, "Never celebrate until the mission's over. And it's far from over, isn't it? We need to grab as much cargo and get out before reinforcements arrive."
"But they never sent a distress signal." Ilia points out causing Blake to freeze, "Yeah, it's pretty weird, isn't it? That's never happened before. Usually whenever they spot us, one goes straight out. What do you think it means?"
Blake pauses to think. Not sending a distress signal was extremely strange. Usually, it was an automated process that would occur so why hasn't it this time? She looks through the cargo list in her memory trying to think if there's maybe something special in the containers but finds nothing. Something was off about this…
"Shit, no Knights or Spider Drones either?" Ilia cries out incredulously as the hack nears completion, finding herself access into the security system and finding nothing besides a few deactivated cameras, "Who was in charge of intel? They've got it all wrong."
"Mirage! Get back right now!" Blake cries out in alarm the moment she sees an EN signature build-up from inside the boxcar they were attempting to hack, Ilia barely has a moment to react and leaps to the side as a purple blast of plasma fires out and melts through the metal door in an instant.
"Fuck…Who the hell was in charge of intel?!" Ilia shouts in frustration and fear as a metal claw smashes through the melted boxcar and pushes it apart to allow a hulking twelve-metre Sentinel covered in heavy metal armour fashioned after a knight, with its other arm wielding some kind of massive solid tower shield as four legs emerged and spread, allowing it to stand at full height.
"That's a Sentinel!" Ilia shouts, "Nobody mentioned a fucking Sentinel!"
"Evasive manoeuvres!" Blake orders as the two begin circling the Sentinel at a distance with their thrusters hoping to throw its tracking off.
This wasn't just a standard Sentinel, it was a Principality Type II Heavy Weapons Unit! More of a mobile fortress than an average Sentinel with enough firepower to match. They specialise in wiping out large hordes of Grimm while providing protection with their shield amplifiers. It was also a terrifying siege weapon that was used many times to break down defences like that of deep underground Grimm nests, well-entrenched bandit camps or even White Fang bunkers. She has seen such a sight in recovered footage from black boxes of ACs the White Fang sent against them… It was not an opponent they could handle.
"Disengage now! The mission's over! Fall back to the rendezvous point!" Blake orders as she fires her disruptor pistol in desperation, but the Principality Sentinel raises its tower shield and erects a cylindrical Hard Light barrier around it that absorbs the bolts without difficulty.
The Principality Sentinel fires off a volley of missiles from its shoulders that encircles them in a fifty-metre radius before the Talons realise they aren't ordinary missiles, they are drones. They flew high up before charging and deploying their payload, erecting a Hard Light dome all around them, trapping them inside with the Sentinel.
"No one's getting out of here alive… No one's taking me back alive!" The Sentinel pilot growls over an open channel, the clawed arm charging the cannon built between the pincers, "The two of you are dead!"
"We have reached a decision." One of the three judges of the tribunal announces as he reads from a document, "The defendant Tenne Koamaru, the Sentinel Pilot known as Blaze-6 of Blaze Squadron, has been found guilty of mass devastation of three settlements on the Vale frontier therefore, the mass murder of over three hundred non-combatants, breaching the Vacuoan Treaty of Criminal Mercenaries and Huntsmen. You are stripped of any and all licences and legal protection pertaining to mercenary work and sentenced to death for your crimes. May the Brother Gods have mercy on your soul. This court is adjourned."
"You fucks!" Koamaru shouts as he struggles against the bailiffs holding him back, "I just did what I was ordered to! Where's everyone else?! Where's my damned squad, they were there too! This is a fucking sham!"
He was ignored before being forcibly escorted to his cell where he was thrown in, but before he could recover and attempt to flee the doors were slammed shut as he banged against the bars,
"I did what I was told to do damn it!" the former Sentinel screams, "It's those fucks in the SDC you want! I got my orders from them!"
"Is that something you should be shouting so haphazardly, Blaze-6?"
A voice speaks out and Koamaru looks out his cells to see a man in a white suit approaching, recognising him immediately as the lawyer in charge of his defence sent by the SDC. He glares in anger,
"Fuck you! My life's over! You promised I'd get out of here didn't you?" Koamaru screams, "I did my job! All I've done is what the SDC told me to do, and what do I get?! The fucking death sentence?!"
"Fortunately for you, someone in the company thinks your skills are too valuable to waste. And if you want it to stay that way, I suggest you shut up and stop slandering the company with what is clearly false information. Or am I wrong?" His eyes gleamed with a dangerous glare, sending shivers up Koamaru's neck before he swallowed his anger,
"...Yeah, sorry. Just don't like the idea of dying." he says slowly but still with an angry glare, "What's it going to take man? How am I getting out of here?"
The lawyer looks around briefly before whispering, "The prison transport that is supposed to take you to your lethal injection will instead take you to a second location where you and your Sentinel will be brought to a secret facility and you will continue operating in a new squad with a new name. After some facial reconstructive surgery of course."
Koamaru winces at the thought of his face getting replaced with another, but hell if it means he gets to keep some semblance of his life he'll take it. Fuck dying, he had a good life he wasn't going to throw it all away just because some idiots got caught in his crossfire. They all should've given up the White Fang they were sheltering if they didn't want to die that badly. They had to be sure they wiped out every last White Fang… It was his job, it wasn't his fault damn it!
"And AEGIS right? I'll still have her after this, right? Maybe right now?" Koamaru asks hastily, earning a raised eyebrow from the lawyer as he grabs the side of his head frustratedly, "Come one man, I need her. The voices… the screams… they won't shut up since the SDC cut me off. I can't hear it anymore… the ringing… she drowns out the voices, please I need AEGIS. Come on man, just give me ten minutes with her."
The lawyer sighs, having read about this in the pilot's file. Some kind of psychosis due to side effects of his Gen IV neurocybernetics and long service history in fighting the White Fang, as well as a strong dependence on AEGIS' support to remain functional as a pilot. Honestly, it was a miracle he lasted this long without breaking. If it wasn't for his talent for breaking down defences and heavy fortifications, he doubted the SDC would view him as a resource.
"Continue taking your medication." the lawyer turns around and walks away, "You'll be able to reconnect with AEGIS once a new identity has been established for you."
"Wait a minute, you're not mercs… You're White Fang Talons!" the pilot sneers in recognition while firing blasts from his heavy plasma siege cannon, "What, you came all this way to Vale for revenge? Is my head worth that much?!"
"What the hell is he talking about?" Ilia asks frantically as she deploys another electric smokescreen to give them as much cover as possible. Besides that, the only reason they weren't dead now was that a Principality was designed against slow-moving heavy targets or fixed defences, not fast-moving opponents, which was why it was commonly escorted. But if they were even grazed by that heavy cannon not even a scrap of metal would be left of them.
"...Look closer, Mirage. Grey armour and orange scratched-out markings… There was supposed to be a prison transport today for a member of SDC's Anti-White Fang unit, Blaze Squadron. The Butcher of Vale who murdered three hundred civilians all to catch twenty members of our brothers and sisters escaping with corporate secrets." Blake realises, her voice dripping with disgust, "I heard he was found guilty and sentenced to death for his crimes. I suppose the SDC does what it does best…"
"SHUT UP!" the criminal Sentinel cries out sounding almost angered, "Butcher of Vale… Why is it me who gets the blame?! There were plenty of Butchers during the massacres, so why just me?! I was just following fucking orders like the lot of them, I'm no one special! Alex! Vance! Mindi! Razz! They killed civilians too, it was Alex's idea anyway! I was just following the order!! Why me?!"
"...Are you seriously playing the victim?!" Ilia shouts outraged as she slashes her electric whip at the Principality Sentinel, but it bounces haplessly off the large tower shield projecting the Hard Light barrier, "You killed people! Not just Faunus but even your own kind as well! Hell, there were probably more humans than Faunus in those villages! Women and children! I heard the stories and saw the recordings, you were the one who kept them from running with a dome like this, right? I hate your kind, but even that was monstrous!"
"Shut up… I said SHUT UP!" He roars, sounding deranged upon being reminded of his crimes, his plasma cannon charging up before blasting a concentrated beam of plasma at them. Both Talons barely dodged the blast that tears out chunks of earth before being stopped by his Hard Light dome.
"We have to take him down, our cyberwarfare suites aren't enough to take down his shield drones." Blake rationalises, "Keep the cover-up and we'll whittle away at his shields, after that, we initiate the Gambit Protocol."
"Gambit?! Are you sure?" Ilia asks, concerned before leaping into the air and bursting out of the way to dodge the incoming plasma beam, "That's-!"
"The only chance we have to take down a Sentinel like this." Blake says determined, "To get out of this alive, and avenge our brothers and sisters. I'll take the assault role, you're on disruption duty."
Ilia analyses her friend's tone before sighing, "As suicidal as that is, it doesn't sound like you got a death wish… Fine. I only got so many smokescreens left, so don't die on me, Shadowcat."
"Affirmative." Blake nods before she starts planning her approach as the Sentinel pilot continues his rant,
"You think I wanted that?! You fuckers!" He screams, "You think anyone wants to murder innocent people?! Who in their right mind would want that?! It was your fault! You people involved them! You people used them as meatshields and we had to root you out! You monsters… DAMN IT!"
His firing became more erratic, not even waiting to finish locking on properly, firing blasts more rapidly and more often overheating his weapons and forcing them to be cooled down at frequent rates. All the while Blake and Ilia use their weapons to chip away his Hard Light shielding, both the electric whip and disruptor pistol designed to disrupt Hard Light Dust making their jobs just a bit easier.
"Breath…just breath…AEGIS, she'll fix it all…" he murmurs over his comms, sounding almost in a trance as his firing steadies. The firing mode changes as power levels become vastly weaker in exchange for rapid-fire pulses almost like a machine gun, "She always fixes you… stop the voices…yes, stop the screams… You just have to kill some White Fang fucks. You're good at that."
"Shit!" Blake curses as a plasma pulse slams into the arm carrying the shotgun, depriving her of one of her two weapons as she closes in while firing her disruptor pistol. Not yet… just a bit further… Now!
Immediately she sets her disruptor pistol to full power, overloading it since the safeties were modded out. She throws it at close range and it detonates just as it hits the shield, turning it into an improvised EMP grenade and causing them to flicker, losing massive amounts of power.
"No! Damn it!" Koamaru curses as he mentally activates a switch and the Principality charges before releasing the remaining shield energy into a small explosive pulse with the MIDNIGHT PHANTASM being caught in the blast radius. The outdated AC was immediately shorted out, circuits burning up as the Principality Sentinel aimed its cannon at her.
"Gotcha…" he smiles before firing a medium-charged blast causing the AC to be turned to molten slag, "HAH! One down and- huh?"
He sees something move from the camera feed but his scanners pick up nothing. Some scrap from the wreck most likely, and he was about to turn his attention to the remaining AC before he heard a metal clang as his augmented eyes caught up to what he was seeing, "WHAT?!"
Blake had thrown her weapon, Gambol Shroud, and clung onto one of the gaps between the plating while being ejected from her AC, using it as a grappling hook to swing closer. The Sentinel pilot was confused about how his scanners did not pick her up, unaware of the prototype SDC personal stealth device she had acquired. Although one-time use, it made her invisible to most scanning and tracking technology for a few brief seconds. Which was all the time she needed.
He quickly attempts to trigger countermeasures but that's when Ilia strikes. With his shields exposed, her electric whip strikes and pins onto his Principality Sentinel's back before unleashing all the EN the machine had and stunning the more advanced mech.
"Warning. Warning. Warning. EN overload detected." the on-board dumb AI announces as he frustratedly reboots. But before it could fully recover, he heard something land on top of his Sentinel.
Blake whips out something from behind her back, a cylinder with a spike on one end, before using all her Aura-enhanced strength to stab it into the shoulder joints of the Principality, holding up the arm with the claw and plasma cannon. She leaps off it moments later before it detonates, covering the entire Sentinel with fire and smoke.
Blake and Ilia wait with bated breath, but their hopes are immediately dashed the moment the smoke clears and only see scorch marks on the arm joints.
"You little shits…" he growls over his loudspeaker, "You think I don't know your tricks? I've been hunting your kind for the past years. That little trick might've worked on your normal Sentinel, but I ain't normal."
"Blake! Run!" Ilia shouts as she hastily tries to power up her AC, but the power is mostly burnt out and still recharging from her earlier attack as the Principality aims its cannon at Blake. Even if she dodges now, a moderately charged blast would catch her in the blast radius, and it was a gamble if her Aura would even give her a chance at surviving.
As she braces herself, he suddenly pauses as both remaining mechs pick up something on their scanners. A third energy signature.
"Warning. Unknown AC signature detected." both their onboard AIs announced as they turned towards the source, a blip in the sky racing towards them at high speeds.
Reinforcements from the White Fang? Hope sprang in Ilia's heart before she properly read the data. The EN levels were too high to be another Talon, this was something else. But what could it be?
Then a slash of red crackling energy cuts through the air, slashing through the Hard Light dome and disrupting it for a brief second to allow the AC to smash through the opening and land a few metres away from the Principality Sentinel. The shockwave from such a landing sends Blake flying backwards a bit, as the mech almost lands directly on top of her.
"No…" Koamaru's fear accidentally makes the Sentinel he was piloting take a step back as he recognises the AC in front of him, "Red and black… four legs a giant sword… not you, it can't be!"
Not even Blake can blame the Sentinel for reacting like this. Even someone like her knows who this AC in front of them belongs to, their reputation and deeds are almost as legendary as the Raven himself.
"You led me on a merry chase, Blaze-6." the voice of the AC pilot announces over the loudspeaker, it was another Tetrapod-based mech with heavy armour plating but was slightly smaller than the Principality by two metres. It was painted black and red, with white crossed-out skulls painted on the left arm, kill counts likely. It wielded a greatsword almost the size of it, strapping it onto its back before plucking two drum-fed heavy automatic shotguns from its waist, "This is Watchdog-2 speaking. By the authority given to me by the Mercenary Overwatch Committee and Vacuoan Treaty of Criminal Mercenary and Huntsmen, I hereby place you under arrest. You are to return with me to the city of Vale to face punishments for your crimes against humanity and Faunus-kind."
Even behind the armour plating they could hear the smirk of the pilot as he racked his shotguns, "Or don't, give me the excuse I need."
Before them stood the Dragonslayer of Glenn, the infamous Hell on Four Legs, the attack dog of NEST.
Adam Taurus the Ravager.