Danev
On second thought, perhaps last night had been a mistake. My head was pounding, but there was a good chance that it was due to a mix of the constant thumping of the camp moving around me, the uncharacteristically hot Autumn day, or the shrill whistle that woke us all up from our slumber. I wish I could say that I'd been sleeping. Properly at least. It would have been easy to blame it on the alcohol, but I'd had more than that and been fine the next day as a youth in Citadel. I knew that had nothing to do with it. The truth was, simply, that I'd hardly slept the night before, kept awake by a blind rage for the man that now stood in front of the Dragon platoon tent with a whistle in his mouth.
"Dragon platoon!" he yelled, stirring those of us awake who didn't already have it drilled into them to be out of their sleeping rolls and in armor by the time a minute after the morning whistle had come.
The morning routine was one we'd spent the last few days coming to know. We were up and in our uniforms within two minutes max, and from there, Dragon Platoon was split in half. Half of us, chosen by squad, would retrieve morning meals as doled out by logistics, and the rest would begin tearing down the camp. After about ten minutes, a whistle would blow, and we'd switch, eaters to camp, campers to logistics for breakfast. Within thirty minutes, if all platoons had performed to their standards, the company would be good to move, and we'd set off.
I'd argue we performed moderately well that day, perhaps not as well as others, but not poorly either. It came out to a net even that half seemed slowed to a lethargic paste by the understanding we were to meet the enemy on the field today, and the other half actually driven by it, wanting to get on the field and get the fighting over with. And soon enough, we would, we were on the move, and the thirty minutes of heart-racing preparation were not enough to make me forget about last night, and lieutenant Aozon.
Ahead of Dragon Platoon, he marched, behind Captain Yuzeh, who in front of him was Lieutenant Colonel Aranee, and ahead of him, Colonel Eemusan, and far ahead of that, the enemy. I should have been focused on that and that alone, and perhaps there was the chance that the alcohol from last night was at least playing some small part in perverting my priorities as they formed in my mind.
I would choose to blame the heat, however. It was easier that way if no blame was attributed to my own actions, and for what I may just end up doing if things came to blows in the field. We would be surrounded by enemies, in the thick of the chaos, and nobody would know if the knife that'd found its way in Aozon's back had been from the enemy, or form one of his own.
Stop that, I told myself. What I was considering was fragging an officer–treason. Getting caught would mean not even a court martial, but a walk straight to a firing squad. Would they use Dragon Platoo for it? I wondered. Were Aozon alive by then, I'm sure he'd have wanted nothing more–than to see me killed by my own men. I wondered if division command would care enough, however, to honor that final wish of his.
They won't have to, I reminded myself. Because you're not going to do anything.
It gnawed at my mind, however. Spirits knew he deserved it, but…if I were to fail, to leave Dragon with nobody but Aozon, no, I was better use to my men, my friends, alive than dead. Still though, his back was to me, and would still be to me when the fighting began. I could.
I prayed we would encounter the enemy soon lest the voices prevail. Fortunately, however, I believed that moment would be coming soon. It was nearing noon, and sooner rather than later, we would meet the enemy at their position. Which was altogether odd, however, as we had yet to encounter even an outrider party.
"This is s'pposed to be where they are, yeah?" Murao asked as we were marching.
"Supposedly," I answered, glad for the idle chatter to take my mind away from the superior officer who marched only a few yards in front of me. "Could be they had the position off by a bit."
"Okay, but to the point we haven't even seen a sign of them? How far off would intelligence have to be for that?"
"About as off as they usually are," Chejuh chimed in, met with a chuckle from a few other soldiers of Dragon, excluding, of course, lieutenant Aozon who turned only to say, "Maintain silence!"
We quieted down as per his orders, having little other choice. They're the only thing keeping me from shoving a knife in your throat, I thought to myself, saying nothing, of course. I chose instead to try and focus on what Murao was saying because, to a degree, he was right. There'd been no ambushes, no outriders, no scouts, nothing. We were deep in Earth Kingdom held territory by now. For all intents and purposes, we should have seen some sign of them.
Unless this is all a trap, I thought.
There was always the chance of that. Hell, we'd walked into our share of them before, and we were simply a platoon, or company, or perhaps even a battalion, I wouldn't have discounted it, but there were 2 brigades' worth of us marching together. From the most objective mathematical standpoint, the Earth Kingdom did not have the numbers to encircle, surround, and ambush us.
An attempt to encircle us would only get them killed. They wouldn't try that. They would try something else. What it was though…
"Brigade halt!" a call from up ahead came.
All soldiers of the 29th Brigade came to a sudden stop as they were directed, be them footsoldier, cavalry, or armored unit alike.
Why did we stop? What's going on?
The confusion was voiced by others beside myself, whether it was Murao shaking his head while saying, "this is messed up," or Mano commenting about how "something feels wrong."
"Danev," Mykezia hissed beside me. "See what's going on?"
"Not really," I said. "You?"
She shook her head.
"Obstacle on our path," Chejuh said, clearly having a better view than the two of us.
"See what it is?" Mykezia asked.
In that time, I managed to work myself closer to where Chejuh was, and achieved the same angle as he. I saw indeed what was in our way, but couldn't quite know if what I was looking at made any sense. It's…I muttered the rest under my breath.
"It's a Fire Nation Tank."
Fluke
We departed that morning with full bellies, cleaned armor, sharpened weapons, and a refurbished tank.
I was almost convinced at first that it'd simply been replaced, but I recognized those etchings on the side marking 8 battles somehow won. It was ours, alright.
It was near impossible to believe, especially after the hell it'd gone through just days prior, but sitting inside it now, back on the road, we all knew that we were back home.
And spirits did it handle like a dream. We were a ways behind in the hierarchy of the brigade's marching, but that didn't change the fact that we had more than ample space and time to get a feel for how our tank ran, and in all honesty, it somehow felt to be an improvement even from what it'd been before.
I was glad to be back out here. We'd only been with the Dragon's Host for what couldn't have been more than just three days, but it hadn't felt right, in some strange way. Out here though, back in our tank, there was a sense of purpose, even if it was mixed in somewhat with the dread of knowing that we were headed straight towards the enemy.
If there was one thing I missed about the 29th Brigade, it was that I had less of a view here. Not placed directly at the front of the formation as Deming was prone to do with the 62nd armored, I only had the view of fellow soldiers and armored units to accompany me as we drove ahead. We were close enough to the front, part of Lu Ten's brigade, but notwithstanding, a clear line of sight on the terrain ahead would've been nice.
"Nice not to be at the very head for once," Gan chimed in, countering my very views, but I saw the logic in what he said. It meant that, if and when things came to blows, it wouldn't be us directly in harm's way.
"Can't see shit though," I said, only realizing after just how complainy it'd sounded. I decided that my grievance wasn't worth voicing, not when something so elementary and, by all metrics, something I should have been glad for. We weren't on the front, we weren't the ones immediately in harm's way. For the moment, we were safe. We were safe while marching straight into the enemy's position. We shouldn't have been safe, but the fact remained that we'd seen no sign of them for a while now. It was nearly noon, the time at which we and the 64th division should have been converging on the same point to attack the enemy from both sides. Still, however, we haven't found the slightest hint of the enemy, be them scouts, outriders, skirmishers, anybody. "Think it odd we haven't seen anyone yet?"
"Don't look into a gift horse's mouth," Gan answered from his driver's seat, accompanied by a nonchalant shrug. It was a fair argument. When we'd woken to leave the Dragon's Host this morning alongside Lu Ten's brigade, the preparations around the camp had indicated that the men were preparing for the worst and nothing short of it. Soldiers were practicing at drills in the minutes afforded to them before they departed, armor was being refitted, blades sharpened. Not a single person was letting themself go to waste, but as of now, it seemed that the readiness had worn off. It seemed that there was yet no sign of battle, no purpose to the early morning drills and sessions at the whetstone, or the tricloptic royal guards that accompanied the young Lu Ten in his ornate command tank, at the head of our armored division. It seemed a bit overly spectacular, but I supposed from a command standpoint, having a way to stand above the others and get their attention was a necessity. I'd have felt less of it if his tank were at the rear of the formation, but leading from the front, as a true commander should, I could hardly bring myself to levy any grievances against him, not that there seemed any purpose to it now with no Earth Kingdom present.
That's just what they want us to think, I reminded myself. I'd been caught in too many earthbender ambushes by now to think that any silence was ever truly quiet. This was their home turf, now more than before, and one could bet they had eyes on us. It was only a matter of time before-
The thought was interrupted by a horn from the front of the formation, and an eventual total stop. Our tank came to a sudden halt at the behest of Gunji who put the handbrake down soon enough that we wouldn't collide with the unit in front of us. In good time too or that would have been a sad collision. And for what?
I opened my hatch to try and see what was going on, Gunji asking below, "What's going on?"
Though our armored spearhead was somewhere near the front of the brigade's position, our company was far enough back that my line of sight was blocked by about five rows of other tanks. I saw one gunner, however, a tank ahead of us, seemingly with a line of sight, pull out a telescope from his vehicle and extend it to look ahead.
"See anything Fluke?" Gan asked now, though I ignored him for the moment, focusing instead on the gunner who seemed to perhaps have more answers than I did.
"Hey!" I called out, trying to grab his attention. He turned back, seemingly startled by the call. "See anything?'
He nodded and answered, "Yeah!" 64th division's on the horizon!"
The 64th? We could see them all the way from here? Without having encountered the enemy?
"And between us and them?!" I asked.
He turned back to his scope. "Nothing! Just a lone tank for some reason! One of ours!"
One of ours?
"Mind if I get a look?" I asked.
The gunner shrugged, folded his scope, and tossed it my way. I caught it before it could fall to the ground, and extended it once again. The gunner slightly ducked back into his tank to afford me a view, and I looked ahead. Sure enough, perhaps only a couple of miles ahead of us, I could view the assembled mass of what had to be the 64th division. I might have suspected that there was a chance of them being Earth Kingdom, but the smoke their equipment was sending into the air made it clear enough that I was looking at Fire Nation machinery. They seemed stopped in their tracks, perhaps having realized that this was exactly where we were all meant to be, awaiting further sign of what to do. Because sure enough, no Earth Kingdom between them and us.
The only thing out of the ordinary and in the way was the gunner had indeed pointed out, a lone Fire Nation tank, perhaps only fifty or so yards away, sitting in the middle of an empty field. What the hell?
"Whatcha see, Fluke?" Gan asked again from inside the tank, not having gotten an answer the last time he asked.
"One of our tanks, I answered, trying to steady my hands so I could focus on it. "Sitting alone by itself."
Had we sent scouts out that I was unaware of? Our Beijing had mentioned nothing about it.
"It manned?" Gan asked, seemingly with the same thought on his mind.
By the looks of it, it wasn't, but looks could be deceiving. Already, from my periphery afforded by opening my non-magnified eye, I could see that a pair of tanks had been selected from our unit to scout ahead and investigate. I wouldn't have minded being there with them if it meant getting a satisfactory answer all the quicker. I did what I could from where I was then, steadying my telescope to look closer, interested by a minor detail, however. It surely wasn't a repurposed Earth Kingdom tank as it still bore the Fire Nation's insignia, but so too did it bear other identifying markings that caught my eye. There was an assignment number, located just up and to the right of the serial number too small for me to see from here. I could, however, make out the numbering of the assignment number, one not too different from the number I'd been given.
'642962,' it read. 64th division, 29th brigade, 62nd armored. It was one of ours. Not just Fire Nation, but specifically one of my old unit's tanks. We'd never sent tanks out this far, not this direction at least. It hadn't gotten here on its own. The Earth Kingdom had put it here. It was a trap.
I released the telescope, letting it drop onto the side of my tank, the last thing on my mind being to return it to its proper owner even as the gunner signaled "Hey!" From in front of me. I didn't have the time to focus on it. I didn't have time to tell Gan what I was doing when he asked it of me as I scrambled out of my seat. I only had the time to drop onto the tank's main floor, reach over Gan, and press down on the horn, emitting a low blow from outside our tank that would most likely get a good amount of attention, but not enough. Not enough for the two tanks already midway between us and the trap that I imagined we were about to be caught in as well.
"Mano!" I yelled. "Red flare! Now!"
All hesitation that used to be characteristic of the boy was gone now. Not a moment was spared as he opened the hatch, and I knew he was already on top of it.
I ignored Gan's protests and cries of confusion once again as I crawled back towards my gunner seat and out of the hatch to find over half of our unit staring straight at me. That half soon became all as I emerged just in time for my face to be lit red by the flare that soon enough fired directly out of our tank and into the air.
At the front of the formation, I could see him too—Lu Ten, staring straight my way, a look on his face that demanded explanation, and so I yelled as loud as my lungs could muster, tearing off my helmet to ensure my voice wasn't trapped within, "It's a trap!"
As though it was my voice to trigger it, though more likely the bright red flare Gunji'd fired into the sky, another source of light soon joined it—a single arrow, lit at its tip, trailing through the sky in a perfect arc, coming right back down onto the Fire Nation tank-a bomb.
No…
Nothing could be done to stop it from striking. It must have been the perfect shot, hitting a canister. Of blasting jelly or something else that'd been stored within, because it was reduced to a ball of fire the second after, consuming the two tanks around it the very second after that one. With each second that followed, another blast would come, from under the ground, cascading towards us, an over-growing ball of fire. We were too close, and there was no denying that in a matter of what couldn't have been more than five seconds, it would consume us as well, and so I braced, and I prayed.
Danev
Ant platoon of the 114th was sent ahead to investigate the lone Fire Nation tank. Supposedly, we were right where we were meant to be, and the presence of our reinforcements to the northeast proved that much was true, but with no sign of the enemy, that tank was about our only way of knowing what in spirits' name was happening.
We all knew that something was incredibly wrong. We weren't idiots. Between every man and woman in our company knowing that we should have encountered the enemy a long time past, as well as Mano insisting that something felt wrong, we knew the enemy was somewhere, always watching, always acting, but we hadn't expected for all of Ant platoon to be consumed in a ball of fire.
Ant's platoon had been at the head of their cluster of course, but it was Hilan who'd been given the order to take point.
"There's something beneath us," Mano said beside me.
"Earth Kingdom?" Mykezia asked, figuring that the likely answer given our past run ins with them.
Mano shook his head. "They're not moving."
"Bodies?"
Mano shook his head.
I don't know just what the trap the Earth Kingdom had set, if it'd been a trip wire, or pressured charge, but whatever it did would do the trick.
"Bombs."
Hilan was killed first, obviously. Between the fireball and the fragmentation of the tank, I was putting no bets on the soldiers of Ant platoon that were now hidden from me beyond the veil of fire and smoke.
The explosion expanded, the bombs dug into the ground all connected to one another, growing in a cascade of fire approaching us.
It was Aozon's own fault that he wanted to be at the front of the company's formation alongside Captain Yuzeh as the two of them would be the next to be wrapped in flame. It only would have been a matter of seconds before we shared their fate had not Mano stepped forward, bending up from the ground a wall of earth that rose in a semi-circle around the 114th company, shielding us.
I saw as the flame hit the wall and rose above, tendrils tickling at the sky in a battle to overcome, but they wouldn't, Mykezia's efforts now combined with Mano's, suppressing the fire as the minefield we stood atop finally bless its load, but the roar of explosions did not end.
The distinct thumps of muffled explosions breaking out from underground, however, was now interrupted by a new form of explosion—a sharp crackling ahead of us. I'd never the earth quake before. I'd felt as the spirits' wrath had shaken Citadel and toppled buildings, but I'd never seen the earth break apart as it was said the spirits' wrath could do, but I saw it now.
Mano's wall lowered, the flames immediately around us suppressed, we were afforded not only a view of the dozens of dead that surrounded us, perhaps even surpassing a hundred, but also that of the Earth splitting apart.
The ground opened up, its two halves widening, and allowing to emerge from its depth a great bastion-a fortress-the enemy. We'd wondered where the enemy had gone, and had indeed considered beneath the surface, but to surmise that not only them, but the fortress they had built to separate our lines had been beneath the earth as well had been too ridiculous to conceive, but we saw it now-walls, towers, soldiers, artillery, archers, all now breaching the crust of the Earth, and they were ready.
There was no time to assess the damage, to count the dead, to collect our thoughts. The Earth Kingdom didn't wait but for five seconds upon breaching the surface to open fire, and we couldn't be any different.
Aozon was dead-our platoon lieutenant. Yuzeh was dead-our company captain. I couldn't see where battalion command was, still too scattered to collect itself, perfectly open to be wiped out in the blink of an eye had Lieutenant Rulaan of Elephant platoon not been the one to step in.
"114th" he shouted. "Advance and find cover!"
While advancing ordinarily would have sounded like the most ridiculous thing in the world, Rulaan was right. The Earth walls, maybe 20 feet tall, rose only a short sprint ahead of us, and where we were now, their archers had a perfect lines of sight. Up against their walls, however, that wouldn't be the case. We had to move.
"Dragon, move!" I shouted, echoing Rulaan's instructions, and joined alongside him with Dragon platoon as well as the others of the 114th hot on our heels.
We didn't all make it, naturally. The Earth Kingdom soldiers atop the wall released on us a similar volley of fire in rapid succession the likes of which had claimed no shortage of times last time I saw its likes almost two weeks ago. Their earthbenders once again fired shards of earth at us in rapid, precise succession, and they tore us apart as we ran from cover. There was Yam from Dragon platoon who took a shard next to me, then Eraim from Elephant who'd tried to catch up to Rulaan only for a similar shard to enter through his forehead and exit through the back of his helmet.
There were others, of course. Many others–those who I couldn't let myself dwell on, be distracted by, not until we reached our target.
I slammed myself against the earthen wall upon reaching it, located tightly between two jutting turrets, a trail of earthen pellets crackling on the ground behind me in rapid succession, having just barely missed me. Soldiers of the 114th were immediately behind, most making that final stretch to join me, others not. I recognized Chuta as he was shot through the heart, falling face first into the ground. There were others too who got shot down, but beneath the wall as were were, our priorities were shifting.
There were earthbenders right above us, well aware of how we were a straight shot just twenty feet below them. They moved to drop boulders on us accordingly, and would have crushed our skulls in had Gunji not moved in to create a ceiling over our heads constructed of the very wall we hit beside to shield us. The earthbenders' boulders crumbled on impact, their pebbles rolling off, harmlessly.
It gave Mykezia a needed moment to poke out from cover and shoot a blast of fire up at the enemy. My line of sight was enough that I could see it harmlessly collide against the barricades of one of their jutting turrets. It wasn't enough. She dived back into cover before the next volley of rapid-fire earthen bullets could take her.
It allowed the Earth Kingdom a moment to resume thor fire on the other soldiers of the 114th coming to join us. Barely over half made it, and by a slim majority two, the rest hit and either killed or injured. Rulaan saw the massacre as it ensued as well as that facing other companies and battalions as they moved in to join us, and his understanding of the situation was clear.
"We need those turrets gone!"
And I knew just the way. It was the Earth Kingdom's own fault for failing to consider we had our own earthbenders too.
"Mano!" I called out, looking towards the one to his right. "Bring it down!"
He nodded, and was right on it. I watched as he planted his feet into the earth, bending it up around his feet as though to secure himself in place, and dug the two of his hands straight into the rock-solid wall as though reaching into soft sand and like one would shovel out a chunk of dirt from the earth when digging a trench, he did so now with the turret, tearing out an entire chunk of its base.
He stepped back, naturally, and so the turret fell, crumbling from its own wait as the structure and its occupants fell to the ground. Those earthbenders and Earth Kingdom soldiers who'd been manning those death machines just seconds ago now sat in a pile of rubble ,stunned, struggling to stand, but wouldn't get the chance to do so. We were on them in a moment, Tosa and I stabbing the first two soldiers we came across with spears while Chejuh eliminated a third with his hand cannon.
One down.
"Other one!" lieutenant Rulaan shouted.
Mano wasted not a single breath, shouting, "Stand clear" to the soldiers who stood near, identifiable to me as Jora of Cat Platoon and Ele of Bat. They dove, allowing for Mano to kick into the ground, creating a tremor and series of cracks that approached the tower until reaching the base. And as though I was watching a pane of glass smash under pressure, so too did the base of the tower break apart, bringing the rest of the turret down to the ground with its soldiers atop it.
They fell, opening them up to be subsequently killed by our men. Not all had gone down, however, a third just barely managing to retain his footing up above, but not for long as Mykezia retreated from cover to fire a blast of fire into his chest, piercing directly through his chest, felling him to the ground twenty feet below.
The two nearest turrets were down. The Earth Kingdom defenders holding off, however, did indeed quite have a literal control over their terrain, and so easily could have reforged them to resume fire, but Rulaan had other plans. He'd seen as the Earth Kingdom had reinforced and rebuilt trenches in the midst of assaults and artillery barrages to know we couldn't trust to destroy their defenses. We had to fight on their turf, especially as their defenses still gunned down other Fire Nation soldiers around us. We had to overwhelm them, and charge.
"114th!" Rulaan shouted. "Up the debris! Now!"
There was no time to disagree. Whether it was the fact that the earthbenders above us were already moving to repair their turrets and wall, or that Fire Nation soldiers were being slaughtered by the dozens behind us, none of us gave it a second thought. We charged.
"Dragon! Charge!" I yelled, adding the extra voice to Rulaan's call to action as we made for the pile of rubble left by Mano's abilities.
It was a steep climb in spite of Mano's efforts to level the ground for us. And it would be one of many. The wall we scaled and charged up now would hardly lead us into the fortress, which was less of a fortress and more of a hive, multi-tiered each with different stories and layers of defenses, likely housing barracks, armories, sleeping quarters, and all matter of other threats inside. Our only other saving grace was the fact that the fall of the two turrets had created a cloud of dust and smoke in the air, so when we rose, the Earth kingdom had no idea until we came charging out of the clouds, arms at the ready.
Fluke
The ground shook as the first blast came, or perhaps that was already the shaking by the others coming directly from below us.
I saw the ball of fire rising from the trapped tank, speeding towards us, and knew that there wouldn't be enough time to duck and close myself in our tank. Not before it enveloped us.
It would have too. Only, as they reached us, the flames parted way, as though clashing against an invisible wall in front of us. I'd closed my eyes in anticipation of the blast, but opening them again now, I saw as they parted around us, rising into the air, harmless, and the man who made it so–Lu Ten, standing at the forefront of our formation, bending them aside as though they were nothing.
But they weren't nothing. They were only the prelude to more blasts to come. Lu Ten had shielded us-his men, from the first of many, but we were only getting started, and he knew that. Even as he bent the flames with all his might, he turned towards those under his command to yell, "Brace!"
It was at that moment I felt the tank shake beneath me, and I knew not to take Lu Ten's words for granted. I ducked inside, my hand on the hatch, closing it above me, and felt a sensation horrifying similar to that of only a few days ago when at the Earth Kingdom's mercy–the world shaking around us.
It passed just as quickly though, and it took a few seconds of blinking the dust out of my eyes to realize it had. The fact we were alive was one miracle, and we weren't about to push our luck with another.
"Everyone alright?!" Gan asked.
"Fine," I coughed, struggling to catch my breath.
"Gunji?"
"I'm good!" he shouted back.
The three of us still alive, that only left the matter of seeing who else was. I opened the hatch of my tank, now confident that the blasts were gone for the moment and saw that we were hardly the only ones hit. Thankfully, it was primarily the armored column that'd been hit, meaning that unprotected infantry hadn't been caught and torn about by the blasts. Poking my head out confirmed that, and that, for the most part, we'd been largely spared. I saw only a few tanks within our ranks that'd been hit hard enough that crews were now evacuating from smoking plumes, being aided by surrounding crews.
Lu Ten stood at the head of the formation, somehow unscathed, his whole body heaving, likely from the strain of having just saved an entire armored column's hide, and turned just to see that the job had been done, but his attention did not remain on us for long.
It took only a few seconds longer for another rumble to come, this one not of landmines however, but from the earth itself. We saw it crack then, stone and other debris flying into the air as the earth itself was divide, a crack in the very crust appearing, then growing, and growing further until the entire world seemed to be parting to make way for a behemoth of a structure to now emerge from the ground as though a lion turtle of tales from old. And there it was, hidden from us up until now, directly beneath our feet–the Earth Kingdom fortress, wall stacked upon wall upon wall, towering high above as a multi-tiered hive, manned and at the ready. And ready it was.
"Into cover!" the colonel called. "Now!"
He jumped down, and no sooner did the fire begin. I heard the *pings* of earthen bullets colliding against the hulls of our tanks before I actually saw that we were being fired upon, but we were, and in rapid succession to. I ducked back into our tank just as I heard a similar enough *plink* against its hatch, directly behind where I'd been a second ago. Close. Too close.
I closed the hatch above me, daring to stick my arm out to do so, and was met back inside the tank with a barrage of questions that had the general consistency of asking, "The fuck's going on?!"
"We found the enemy!" I answered back, moving now towards the rear hatch. I had to get out. The enemy was out there, and the brigade would need support. I clambered down from my seat and moved towards the rear of the tank to open the hatch as Gunji asked, "You're leaving?!"
"We're under attack," I said as though the connection was obvious, but when I still saw the confusion on Gunji's face, clarified myself by adding, "Need to get orders!"
Gan's eyes were on me too, I noticed, and really, I imagined the decision would come down to him. He nodded. "Gunji," he said. "Get the hatch open. Fluke, get our orders, and get the fuck right back here!"
I nodded back as I heard Gunji manipulate the back hatch to get it open for me, allowing me to duck out into the middle of a siege, except it was us now being held at bay by the enemy.
Our tanks were still gathered in formation, our lines too closely compressed to allow for freedom of movement. We didn't have space to try to break away from the ranks and so were held in place, fire being laid down upon us by their imprecise rapid fire pellets as well as more damaging boulders being flung from catapults and benders. I noticed already a few tanks that'd taken a mix of direct and indirect hits, none catastrophic to the point of immediately annihilating their crews, but enough to remove their combat efficiency.
Some tanks, however, still were in flames and smoke resulting from those initial explosions, forcing their crews to find safety from the enemy fire with the tanks that were still operational. I ducked from one tank to another, some crippled, some destroyed, and some still active, firebending gunners taking potshots at the enemy from here to what I was sure would be minimal effect. We won't accomplish anything from here, I knew as I crept forward, hiding behind the hull of a tank's chassis as a spray of pellet fire kicked up dust from the ground right next to me. I used the opening left by its absence to sprint ahead, closer to where I saw Lu Ten was now, ducked behind his tank alongside four royal guardsmen, one of whom he was talking to.
"-to get artillery on their position as quickly as possible. Make sure they don't overshoot. We've got Fire Nation on the other side. And Inform the 21st battalion to move up!"
"Yes sir!" the royal guard saluted before making his way past me en route towards the rest of the brigade. He's telling the infantry to move forward? Into that? I shook my head. It didn't matter. All I needed to know for now was where I played into things.
Lu Ten noticed my approach and so I promptly saluted with a single hand, not daring however to stand lest I find myself directly in the line of fire. "Sir!" I said. "62nd attache, armored! What are our orders?!"
A catapult's boulder struck nearby as the question was asked, forcing me to yell again, louder this time, "Orders, sir?!"
He turned to look at me. There was a lack of recognition, and I couldn't blame him. In uniform and with my helmet on, I looked no different a firebender as anybody else, albeit slightly shorter. It made no difference, though. Not to a man like Lu Ten who, from what I'd gathered about him, treating all of those under his command with the exact same degree of respect.
"Get back to your tank!" he shouted, "And be ready to move out! I asked for artillery support and for the 21st battalion to join us!"
"They're infantry! "They won't have any cover," I countered, only realizing after it was said that I was questioning a superior's orders-something that never would have flown in the 64th. This wasn't the 64th, however, and Lu Ten was not Deming, was not Aozon, was not like most people there.
"That's where you come in! They'll use the tanks for cover! So be ready to move out! Now!"
I nodded and saluted, turning back in time to see soldiers from the 21st beginning to move into positions besides our tanks. We need to get moving.
I dodged past them back towards my tank, evading another spray of earthen pellets that managed to catch any infantryman from the 21st in the leg above his left knee. His leg crumpled beneath his weight, but before he could hit the floor, he was caught in place by two of his comrades and dragged to cover behind a tank before another flurry of hail could catch him.
I made it back to my tank, entering back in through the rear hatch in time for a pair of infantrymen to gather behind our tank, expectantly. Already, the horn to advance was blaring, and I could hear the deep rumbling of other tanks starting up their engines to get in motion.
"We moving?!" Gan shouted.
I nodded. "Yeah! Providing cover for the 21st. Gunji, engine!"
He turned to his station in affirmation, and I braced for the racket of the tank starting, but found myself left waiting, met only instead with a soft whir and an unwelcome crackling from below us. Something wasn't right.
"Fuck!" Gunji shouted. "Explosion shook us up! Engine's not starting!"
"Can you fix it?!" Gan asked.
"I'd need time! Five, ten minutes maybe just to see what's wrong!"
Already, the other tanks were beginning to move, slowly. We were holding up the line. They could've moved around us, sure, as they were with the other inoperable tanks, but we were holding up the line as it was, exposing our comrades, holding back the offense, putting the 114th and 122nd in jeopardy with every minute we stayed here. We don't have that fine.
"Gunji!" I shouted. "Put the tank in neutral! Gan! Get out here!"
"What?!" Gunji shouted as Gan, unquestioningly, moved back to help me with a task I hadn't yet elaborated to him. He didn't need to, the same way I didn't question his orders. This was our crew. We trusted each other.
"We're going to push!" I said, answering Gunji's question, and so, though it took a second, he nodded and turned to his station, changing gears, putting the tank in neutral and raising the brake.
The Earth Kingdom's defensive fire was picking up outside, our only saving grace the hunk of metal we, as well as the pair of 21st soldiers, assumed as cover.
"Why aren't you moving!?" one of them shouted to ask as Gan and I exited outside.
"Tank's busted!" I shouted. "Help us push!"
"You kidding?!" the other shouted back.
"You rather take your chances out there?!" Gan asked just as another volley of pellet fire hit both the tank's chassis and the ground, spitting sand into the air. That seemed to do the trick in getting our point across, and so there were no further objections.
"On three!" Gan shouted, now coordinating the effort. A catapult's boulder struck right beside us, striking an adjacent tank, and we learned quickly enough that every second wasted was a second closer to that same fate. There was no time to wait. Three!"
We pushed, and it was a hell of an effort to. It was thankful that the entire column was still moving at a snail's pace, fortunately, so we could keep up, not that there was much choice. They had their gunners and catapults raining down on us. At least, they were until we finally returned the favor. I heard the thunderous boom from behind us, and looking up above, saw the first of the shells as fired from our own artillery guns flying above us. Looking ahead now, I saw as they made impact, greats clouds of dust, smoke, and debris forming atop their walls, as accompanied by a break in their fire.
It would pick up again, as soon as they'd gathered their composure, but so too would our artillery strike once more. We now fought with their catapults and turrets firing against us as our shells flew over our heads to return the favor, and we pushed forward, their fortress growing ever closer. I struggled as the four of us worked to push our tank, yard by yard, foot by food, inch by inch, fighting for each and every one. The crews of tanks that'd fallen into disrepair now did the same, pushing beside us lest they fall beside even as we came under unrelenting fire.
Finally, we were close enough that I could feel the airburst of the last artillery shell that'd struck their fortress, and I knew that the real fight was about to begin, situated as we were only yards away from their rumbling walls.
"21st battalion!" I heard Lu Ten call from the front. "Advance!" And so he would be the first one up alongside his four tricloptic royal guardsmen. The 21st followed, leaving their cover behind our tanks, the two who'd been moving and pushing our tank with us patting us now on the shoulders before leaving their positions to charge. I wondered how many of them would make it, and realized then that Lu Ten had made no mention of us. Are we just supposed to stay here?
I stood up to join the others, but felt a hand around my wrist, stopping me. "Where the hell are you going?!" Gan asked.
"To help them!" I answered, as though it was obvious.
"Those aren't our orders!" His grip tightened around my wrist. Unfortunately for Gan, however, I was accustomed to such situations. His wouldn't be the first grasp I'd slipped out of, and the recipe to do so remained the same here as it had for over ten years now.
"Oh, so Gunji can go?"
Gan turned. Gunji was right where he should have been, staring wide-eyed at the two of us, not moving from where he was meant to be, not like me. Misdirection, distracting attention, slipping away, I was accustomed to all of it. Even if it'd meant leaving behind the glove that covered only half of my hand, it didn't matter. I was gone, having disappeared into the ranks of the 21st before they were any the wiser.
The enemy was right in front of us. Already above, up the debris of their walls left by our artillery, I could see blasts of fire and earth being thrown back and forth accompanied by the shouts of men fighting above. I was charging right into it. Why?
Because my friends are there.
It was obvious. Because the people I cared about-those in the 114th-Danev and his people-were up there fighting, and whether or not I could help them, I had to try. I told myself that was all that it was; I told myself that it was for them alone. It made it easier when I came eye to eye with my first Earth Kingdom soldier of the day, and shot a blast of fire into his heart.
Danev
I cut through his chest as he faced away from me, distracted by Zihe who he'd clearly believed the bigger danger. Though any other day that soldier would have been right, he was wrong today.
I cut through him, placing a foot against his chest to pull my blade out, bloodied and still hanging from it, bits of his insides. I didn't bother to shake them off, not having the time, needing to step aside out of the way of an enemy soldier's swipe with a spear. He noticed his swing went wide, caught himself before it was too late, and managed to raise his shaft in time to block my downwards cut with my sword.
Rather than cutting through, the cheap iron got caught in his shaft, splintering it, but nothing more. It gave the soldier time to ditch his spear, realizing its use expended, and so instead reached for his belt, drawing a knife that he proceeded to lunge at me towards with until he was knocked off his feet by a swig of a sword, cleaving straight through his ankle. He was summarily finished off then by Shozi, the same one who'd cut through his foot.
I exchanged a nod with Shozi, and regained my composure, looking above towards the many tiers of the fortress that still needed clearing. I grimaced. We'd ascended and cleared only two stories up until now, and the fighting was only intensifying, more and more Earth Kingdom reinforcements emerging from within, but I couldn't get tired. Not now. Not when there was so much left to do.
"Dragon!" I heard Rullan shout, catching my attention. When he saw I was looking his way, ducked behind cover while hand cannoneers from Elephant tried unsuccessfully to dispatch the Earth Kingdom soldiers above us, he shouted, "Head southeast and scale up from there! Clear the turrets above us and make way for the company!"
I nodded. It was the only way to get the company to continue.
"Dragon!" I shouted, rallying those near me who immediately picked up on the call. "On me!"
To go southeast would mean following the circumference of the fortress around to an area we hadn't yet cleared. It was safe to assume that most forces there had been drawn to us, but notwithstanding, Dragon would be breaching into a part of the fortress that friendly forces hadn't yet engaged, unless a few stray artillery shells from what I could only assume was the Dragon's Host had managed to find their way there.
From what I saw now though, approaching with my men, that wasn't the case. We made it only a minute at most of heading southeast before we came across a force of their men, already en route towards where the rest of the 114th was. Infantrymen, earthbenders, and turret operators, ready to set down emplacements in a moment to lay down suppressive rapid fire on us from behind. We'd deprived them of that element of surprise, but that didn't stop them from frantically setting a single turret down to see what they could still do.
They opened fire in a moment, and it was a grace from the spirits that, as fast as they were, Mano was faster.
He bent a rock barricade from the fortress wall to cover us, and us the divot left in the cliffside to offer us cover as we ducked inside. Not all of us were that quick though. The earthbenders amongst the enemy destroyed Mano's wall, and so caught two Dragon men in their rapid fire–Hash and Penar. Penar was shot through the chest, killing him instantly while Hash took two hits, one in the upper leg, and one in the side.
He went down in an agonized scream, falling to the ground, and would have been finished off mercilessly. Chejuh, however, took the moment that the gunners were focused on Hash to take a shot. He, unfortunately, could not secure a shot on the earthbender, but did instead on the operator who kept the cylinder used to suppress the fire, in his stead. Him down, the aim was immediately thrown off, sending the earthfire aimless, allowing Murao to pull Hash out of harm's way and into Mano's alcove instead.
He would tend to the man, but the Earth Kingdom would be right back on us momentarily. We had to move before then. "Get him back to Rulaan!" I shouted to Murao. "Mano!" I shouted. "Give us cover!" He knew instantly what needed to be done. From the ground now, he bent up a block of earth to cover us. "Squad 1 with me!" It was Mykezia I would need more than anybody else, but welcomed the extra manpower notwithstanding. We took position behind Mano's wall as he kept it standing regardless of the resumed Earth Kingdom fire, and so I shouted, "Forward!"
Mano moved the wall forward, and we followed behind it. We knew it wouldn't last long, and all it would take was their earthbender to tear it apart for our cover to be done, but it'd protected us from his barrage this far, and so it would get us close enough to do the trick.
Sure enough, the enemy earthbender tore down Mano's wall, but only too late for himself as the wall was less protecting us as it was him by then. The wall down, there was nothing stopping Mykezia from sending a sweeping kick of fire that caught the earthbender and his two fellow soldiers face-first, sending them falling back and to the ground, engulfed in flame.
A few of the soldiers darted past, not bothering to put them out of their misery, Shozi included, but Aosore and I stayed behind to finish the job at least for all of the three seconds it took. It was no trouble to catch up with the others and to realize that we had come to a relatively quiet stretch of the fortress wall, one that could be easily scaled.
"Mano!" I said. "Up here!"
The man was an architect. There was no other way to put it. He singled out the piece of the wall I'd made reference to, and as though it was nothing, bent into its shape the perfect stairwell for us to climb with me at the front. We'd gotten around the brunt of the Earth Kingdom's defenses, and so now returning Northwest, it would be us flanking them. I kept 4th squad watching our rear lest we be flanked and thus encircled, but notwithstanding, we had the jump on the enemy.
Sure enough, they had benders, archers, rapid fire turrets all trained down on the 114th as well as other stragglers such as those from the 122nd who'd been sent in after us. And they didn't see us. Claiming the element of surprise on them was simple, Mykezia focusing first and foremost on their benders, burning their clusters of gunners to a risp while us infantrymen stormed their archers, catching them out of their element, cutting through like a hot knife through butter. Mano didn't need to be told what to do to know what his job was, and so instinctively collapsed a segment of this tier's wall, creating a pile of debris atop which the 114th could climb to join us.
Lieutenant Rulaan at their head, they did just that, his gamble having paid off just perfectly. Aozon never would have thought of that, I knew already. We'd cleared another level, but those above, judging by the Earth Kingdom soldiers retreating from here to reinforce the peak of their spire, would be an obstacle not easily surmounted, especially as their first instinct upon seeing they were losing the level below was to rain down rapid fire upon us. They still had soldiers fighting our men, but that made no difference. They fired regardless, and the effect was not one to scoff at. They lost more men in their crossfire as we did, which was to say, many. I counted at least half a dozen soldiers from the 114th shot through with Earth Kingdom projectiles before Mano was able to stop them in place for but the moment it took for him to yell at us to find cover.
He could only stop them from falling for so long, however, and so the next earthen projectile to come down found him, piercing through his shoulder. He managed to find cover with the rest of the 114th however, at an angle on the wall that the Earth Kingdom couldn't reach us, but here we were trapped, enemy fire raining down, daring to pierce through us lest we step an inch out of place.
"We're cornered!" I yelled out, searching frantically for any vector of escape that would allow us to get around the enemy, but there was none. None that I could see.
"We can't go around!" Rulaan said. "We'll go through instead!" He looks at me, seeing my confusion, but the certainty on his face was enough to remind me of the obvious. The Earth kingdom fortress was a hive, enemies constantly moving through it, hollow. I understood.
"Mano!" I shouted, getting his attention where he was, clutching his arm where he'd been shot and retrieving aid from Murao. I regretted needing to call on him now, but there was little other choice. "Can you feel the other side!?"
He looked at me, confused as to what I was asking.
"Of this wall!" I clarified.
His eyes widened in understanding, and recalling the severity of the predicament we were in,shrugged off Murao's helping hand to place one of his own on the fortress wall. He closed his eyes for the time it took to get a read of what awaited us, then looked at me, and nodded. "Way clear through," he said.
"Earth Kingdom on the other side?" Rulaan asked, attracting Mano's attention, who proceeded to nod.
"They don't notice us though," he said.
"So we have the element of surprise," I observed.
"For the time being," Rulaan clarified. "We use that, get in, and take this fortress from inside. I nodded. We could break through now, but once we did, we would simply transfer the fighting from out here into the middle of the hive. The hive. The thought almost brought back fond memories. Fighting in close quarters, I could handle that.
I looked at Mano. "Do it."
And before I knew it, the wall was replaced by a cloud of dust and smoke, and so we charged in, continuing this fight where they least expected us.
Fluke
I finished off the man on the ground where he lay in a pile of blood after my blast of fire had burst a hole into his left knee. I crouched over him, and put one final blast into his chest, putting him out of his misery as he lay there in agony. Twenty-four.
I turned, watching now the soldiers of the 21st continued forward at record pace, locking themselves in melees with the overwhelmed enemy as they charged forward, leaving no Earth Kingdom soldier alive.
Friendly artillery had ceased as, by now, it would be endangering us as much as the enemy, but it'd already done its part. The Earth Kingdom's defenses facing us had been obliterated, their infantry culled, their walls in shambles, breaching holes in their cliffside from which Earth Kingdom soldiers had fled like hornets from a burning hive. It was impossible not to be reminded of the Hive in Citadel and its end there, a burning pile of rubble, the Rats trapped inside scurrying out, still aflame, and our attack that'd followed when they'd been at their weakest. We thought that'd been their end, but they'd come back, they'd killed again, and put down everybody I ever knew like dogs. The job wasn't over then, and neither was it over now, and so I joined the soldiers who entered the breach into their fortress's interior, knowing that only when every Earth Kingdom soldier here was dead or in custody would the battle be over.
"92nd company!" Lu Ten cried, gaining the attention of those who would be piercing within. "On me! Rest of you, clear the exterior!"
So I'll be embedding with the 92nd, I realized as I followed, blending into their ranks as though one of their own. If it had to be any company, I too would have chosen the 92nd-the same men who'd rescued Gan, Gunji, and me from those mountains. I wondered how Gan and Gunji were now-I imagined in far less danger than I was deliberately putting myself in now. The thought was some relief, but then I also considered there was the chance they would come after me. I prayed they wouldn't. I already had my mind occupied by thoughts of how the 114th was doing and hardly needed to worry about them too.
One thing at a time, I told myself as my turn came to clear the breach, and so I was in, pushing past a Fire Nation infantryman in front of me to get a shot on an Earth Kingdom archer he hadn't noticed. The archer clearly had been en route outside, but was caught on his own turf where he was now at a disadvantage in close quarters. He attempted to ditch his bow in trade for a shortsword at his side, but wasn't quick enough, my bolt of fire catching him in the stomach. Hastily prepared as it was, it didn't quite pierce through his entire body, but did pierce his body and work its way into his stomach, burning him now from the inside.
The spear of the infantryman I pushed past finished him off, and so I carried on. Twenty-five.
The fortress interior was unmistakably that of a military base. We emerged in the middle of a barracks, mostly abandoned but for a few Earth Kingdom soldiers attempting to restock on basic supplies, caught dead however by an enemy force breaking through their wall. Adjacent was an armory that'd mostly already been cleared out, all of this base's resources put to its defense apparently. From there were more rooms and hallways. Be them kitchens, logistic offices, strategy rooms, anything, it didn't matter, we cleared them out, the company dispersing as we went either to upper or lower stories or to simply clear out rooms that hadn't been cleared before. One could hear the fighting all across the fortress, further down the halls. They weren't our men, I knew that much. Lu Ten hadn't yet sent troops that far.
114th, I already knew, and it was just my fortune that when lu Ten turned to say, "With me," to his guardsmen, I followed quietly behind. Between him and his guardsmen, all firebenders, the Earth Kingdom hostels we encountered did not stand a chance. We followed down the earthen hallway where soldiers were already retreating from blasts of fire in the distance I assumed could only belong to the 114th's firebenders, be them Mykezia or Zihe, and right into us.
Lu Ten fired a blast that caught two infantrymen in the chest. An archer managed to get a shot off at Lu Ten that was swifty absorbed by a guardsman's shoulder plate, allowing another to push aside an send a kick of fire that damn near split the archer in half. He, however, would take the brunt of an earthbender's boulder, directly to the chest, knocking him to the ground, still alive by the sound of it.
A second guardsmen moved to engage, but was intercepted by the action of a third earthbender, picking up the dirt from the floor beneath his feet to solidify and slam him into the wall, not stopping there, but seeking to bury him alive within. It was now Lu Ten's turn once again to intervene, firing a blast of fire at the earthbender. It was caught in place however as the earthbender divided his attention, bending a pillar of mud from the earth to absorb the blast. His attention diverted, however, the guardsmen being buried alive was able to free himself, blasting through the earth surrounding, and so unleashes his vengeance on the man seeking to bury him alive.
This, he could not defend against, and so found his head blown to bloodied bits as he fell lifeless to the ground.
The first bender, however, still alive, was well aware of who he was facing, and so, hands raised to the ceiling, created a splintering fracture that dared to bury Lu Ten, our commander, a damn good one at that, alive. My attention on the earthbender, however, the way in front of me cleared, he wouldn't get the chance. Two hands forward, I let out a spray of fire as a solid stream that engulfed the man. The earth he'd been manipulating fell atop him, crushing him and the flames that enveloped him, making for what I was sure was no doubt a miserable death. Twenty-six.
Lu Ten turned, as though wanting to acknowledge the guardsman who'd saved his life, but saw only then that there was a normal firebending soldier in his stead, only short and scrawny, me.
His helmet not a covered one such as ours, it was easy to recognize the immediate confusion in his eyes as he asked, "What unit are you?"
"62nd armored, 29th Brigade, requesting permission to attach, sir!"
"29th-" his expression twisted in confusion. I knew from the look alone that he was doing the math, and could see that by my voice and stature alone, he probably also recognized me as the soldier that'd asked for orders before. "Fluke?!"
"Yes sir!" I said. He remembered my name.
Lu Ten opened his mouth as though to say something, but no words would come, interrupted as he was by more of a commotion behind us. We turned in time to see a retreating earthbender soldier blocking one blast of fire after another until a boulder came flying at him, forcing him against the rear wall with a bloody splatter as the boulder broke apart, and I knew instantly that there was only 1 earthbender in the 29th that was still alive. Mano. The 21st was here.
The firebender guardsmen immediately turned upon seeing the earth being thrown, and when Mano revealed himself, even in Fire Nation armor, the royal guardsmen almost fired and it took me yelling, "Woah woah! They're on our side!" to just get their attention. Mano turned to face us, revealing a bandaged shoulder, and seemed just as shocked to find us here.
They did not lower their guard however until Lu Ten turned, saw the approaching men, and clarified, "Guards! Stand down!"
They did so then on his word, and I breathed out a sigh of relief. The relief was short-lived though, not replaced by something negative, but another emotion, far more overwhelming-elation.
At the head of the group of soldiers coming to join us were men I recognized and knew-Lieutenant Rulaan, Mykezia, Mano. Where's Danev?
Their pace slowed down when they saw we were friendlies, and came to a halt, realizing, if not the man, then the rank they were talking to. My eyes searched frantically for the man I knew should have been there beside them.
Rulaan saluted immediately at the sight of the colonel, and while I was sure Lu Ten would ordinarily have returned the favor, we were in the midst of a battle, and so he only asked instead, "What unit are you?!"
"114th company!" Lieutenant Rulaan said. "29th Brigade!" It was now that, from the crowd of 114th soldiers I recognized, Danev emerged, and it was impossible to hold myself back.
"Danev!" I shouted upon seeing him, removing my helmet lest there be a possibility he not recognize me. But even by my voice alone, he recognized me, and his darted towards where I was, pushing my way out from between the two royal guardsmen.
"Fluke?!" he asked in shock upon seeing me. I could have run up and hugged him in that moment but for the fact we were in a warzone. It'd have to wait.
"Where's your commander?" Lu Ten asked, recognizing that Rulaan's ranking patch was not one of a company as he was leading now.
"Dead, sir! I assumed command. And you are?!"
"Colonel Lu Ten, 91st Brigade."
"Colonel Lu-," the lieutenant started, his tongue suddenly frozen as he awkwardly tried to find space to kneel in fealty.
"Time for that later!" Lu Ten yelled. "We need to-," I was confident that perhaps something more would have been said, but the time was not afforded for that to happen. The fortress was shaking. The entire fortress. Dirt fell from the ceiling, a wall cracked, and then it was still once again.
"That…that your artillery?" Rulaan asked the colonel, now rising from the half kneel he'd been trying to make.
"No," Lu Ten said, looking around him as though in search for a source. "We stopped our artillery. 29th's?"
"Our idiot general left it behind," Danev grumbled from the sidelines until he realized the type of thing he was saying in front of Fire Nation high command. "I mean…"
The fortress rumbled again, enough to nearly shake us now off our feet. That wasn't coming from outside. It's
"It's coming from below!" Mano said now, a bare hand against the wall, 'listening' the way he did. "Earthbenders! They're going to bury the fortress and us with it!"
"Signal an evacuation!" Lu Ten said to Rulaan. "Get your men out of here, and I'll do the same with mine!"
"Sir!" he said, already seeming to counter the command with a thought of his own. "Earth Kingdom's been harassing us from tunnels beneath the surface for months now. They retreat here, this siege isn't ending any time soon."
I looked at Lu Ten, his face one of consideration. Nobody in the Dragon's Host had been hearing of the state of affairs from the 64th for a while now and so it was news to him, and with that news, an understanding that Rulaan was right. "What do you propose?"
"That I deploy my men into the tunnels to clear them out."
"They're connected to here?!"
"They are!" Mano yelled above the next rumble.
"If they're anything like this, it'll be too cramped for an entire company's worth." Plus the risk of losing an entire company on top of that…
"Dragon will go," Danev asserted. We're the most combat capable right now. The least amount of casualties. Figured that would be the case under a leader like Danev.
Lu Ten nodded, and it was impossible not to notice the glimpse of respect there. He turned to Rulaan. "Lieutenant," he said. "Organize the evacuation in case things take a turn for the worse." Rulaan nodded, and was off. Lu Ten then turned to one of his own guardsmen to add, "Find Zale and tell him to get the 21st out of here!" The soldier was gone, and so came the next matter of business, turning back to Danev to add, "Me and my men will join you."
Not without me.
"Sir!" I said, gaining his attention once again. "Permission to attach to the 114th?"
"You really want to come along?"
Whether it was a matter of want or duty, the answer was the same. My eyes looked towards Danev, and I knew there was one right answer. "Yes sir!"
"Then permission granted! Dragon Platoon!" he yelled, now finding his place at the head of our formation. "On me!"
The platoon set into motion, Danev allowing the rest to move past him only to momentarily linger behind and ask me, "How in spirits' name did you get all the way out here?"
"Long story," I said, putting my helmet back on. "I'll tell you all about it after."
After.
We had to get through this first.
There wasn't much resistance left in the above ground stories of the fortress, mostly cleared off. We'd descended to the first story, fighting our way through Earth Kingdom remnants who hadn't yet fled further beneath the group or given themselves up to captivity. Near the back of the formation, no chance was given to me yet to fight, but it made little difference as there was little fighting left to be had. Up here at least.
We were as low down as obvious passages could take us, and the rumbling and shaking of the fortress was only becoming more violent.
"How the hell do we get further down?!" a soldier from Dragon, Chejuh, I think, exclaimed at one point. "They're blocking every other passage!"
"Way there is still down!" Mano exclaimed, clearly in some state of discomfort on account of his injury. "I can bend an opening, but you'll have to drop down!" He turned towards Lu Ten, as though waiting for approval.
"Do it!" Danev said in his stead when the colonel did not immediately answer.
I would have expected Lu Ten to give the order, but in consideration of the way he'd, up to this point, only been offering Dragon fire support, he was leaving command to Danev-Dragon's proper commander.
Mano turned towards Danev, and he seemed half inclined to look towards Lu Ten as though waiting for permission, but he understood too by the lack of objection, that that was the plan.
"Gonna need our firebenders in first," Danev said, turning towards me. "Fluke, you good with that?"
"Of course," I answered, my voice leaving my mask through a metallic filter.
"You gonna bother asking me?" Mykezia asked through no different a metallic filter.
"Do I need to?"
She scoffed, and I could actually picture the grin beneath her helmet. "No."
"My guards and I will follow behind," Lu Ten said. So we'll be in good company.
Danev looked towards Mano and gave a nod. Six firebenders including the Dragon of the West's son against a retreating Earth Kingdom force, they didn't stand a chance.
Mano stood, crouched, and moved his arms in such a way that a ring of cracks appeared in the ground, and then pushed downwards, throwing the circle of earth directly below, crashing on top of, by the sound of it, was an Earth Kingdom soldier mid-retreat.
The room was by no means empty, no shortage of enemy personnel in the midst of retreating or setting up defenses, but the last thing they were expecting was a Fire Nation breach from above. Such, however, was precisely what they got. Mykezia and I dropped in from above, taking into account immediately the soldiers in the room, about a dozen, none ready for us. We would need to be quick to take advantage of that moment.
I landed, and sent a kick of fire towards two infantrymen standing near one another, catching them in a blazing inferno that caught them both. Twenty-five, Twenty-six. I felt the heat of a fire blast behind me, and saw as Mykezia threw a bolt directly into the heart of another man, arousing the attention of another earthbender who seemed to have been occupied burying the fortress atop us, but now turned to pull a segment of the wall on top of us. He did not get the chance as a blast of fire from me caught him in the side, blowing out an entire chunk of his torso. Twenty-seven.
Doing so left my rear exposed to two other Earth Kingdom soldiers who approached from behind. In response to a nod from her head, I ducked and she sent a blast over my back catching the one. The other managed to evade, but wouldn't last long as Lu Ten and his men descended next, practically atop the man who was summarily executed with a contained blast to the back of his head.
All of us down now, the room was ours, and so the remaining Earth Kingdom personnel took notice, and thus began to retreat. We wouldn't give them the chance.
"After them!" Mykezia called out, and I was not about to turn down the chance to catch more of their men unaware before the alert was given.
Already, the 114th's other men were dropping down behind us and I could hear the battle now being fought elsewhere as their personnel dispersed.
I gave chase to what appeared to be a bowman, struggling at his belt for a dagger to put up a defense of sorts. He would never manage to do so, caught in the leg by a blast of fire that came from me. He fell, his leg below the right knee no more than a charred mess, and so I finished him before the pain could kill him first. Twenty-eight.
He'd manage to flee so far as another room that seemed to have actual purpose, lined with desks and other workstations that seemed to be acting as a logistics center of sorts, now in the midst of evacuation. In addition to mere workers and fleeing guardsmen, earthbenders worked continuously at trying to bury the fortress above us. I had no idea how far along their progress was coming, but I wouldn't let it go any further. I caught one in the chest with a fiery kick that pierced straight through his heart, dropping him in a moment, and earning me the eire of his comrade beside him. Twenty-nine. He hurled an earthen desk at me which I just barely evaded and shot a blast of fire as I ducked to the ground. It was on target, though he blocked the blast with another earthen desk, which he shot along the ground towards me.
I moved to hurdle over, and so made air, but not quite fast enough. It struck me in the lower leg as I tried to jump, forcing me to the ground with a pain that resonated across my body. I would have sent another blast of fire his way, but the need to do so was cast aside by a loud bang that shook the walls, though didn't belong to the earthbenders. It was a shot from a hand cannon, the Fire Nation soldier who'd been wielding it now offering me a hand up. Chejuh, I recognized as he pulled me back up to the ground and I caught a glimpse of the bender's smoking remains.
Other soldiers of the 114th were charging into the room now as the other Earth Kingdom pursuit moved to flee, and so I gave pursuit.
They would not have far to run. I could hear more of the battle being fought behind me as other friendly soldiers caught up, but I turned my attention on those trying to run, who would doubtlessly be tomorrow's enemy if not put down today. I caught a pair of spearmen as they ran across the room to assist an earthbender who Mykezia had forced to the ground and was finishing off now. Thirty, thirty-one. I punched through the heart of a man I believed to be an earthbender as he roared at us from the far corner of the room, arms raised. Thirty-two. I caught sight of an enemy as he ducked behind one desk after another as he ran to, well, spirits' knew where. One of my blasts missed, striking a desk he hid behind, but the next, a stronger and more powerful fireball, broke clean through. It was more the fragmentation of the desk that peppered his skin than my fireball that killed him, but he was dead all the same or would at least be soon. I decided I would check on him later to finish him if he was still alive, but couldn't be distracted now. Thirty-three. I found the others he'd been running towards for aid, just outside of that room and in a hallway whose exit seemed already to be blocked, leaving these men stranded. I had them cornered, ready for the slightest move from any of the seeming seven of them. One of them did move in fact, the one at the front, reaching to his belt for the knife there, and I didn't let him go any further. I raised my arms, and let the flame pour out, catching them all where they stood, backs against the walls, burning their ashes into the earth itself.
Thirty-four.
Thirty-five.
Thirty-six.
Thirty-seven.
Thirty-eight.
Thirty-nine.
Forty.
Behind me, running. I turned in time to see another fleeing man cut down by a Fire Nation soldier's sword. I retreated back into the main room, catching a soldier in my periphery who had his sword raised in defenses, eyes frantically searching across the room, wondering who would be the next threat to him. He didn't see me, however, and so my bolt of fire that cleared straight this upper torso took him by complete surprise as he now fell dead, a lifeless, unexpecting expression on his face. I wondered if the fact he hadn't seen it coming made it any better. Forty-one.
There was another hallway that led out of the room, yet unblocked, and saw another soldier running towards it. He ditched his spear, slowing him down, and ran, but I knew that, unarmed though he may have been now, he wouldn't be forever if he got away. He would be back, spear in hand if not holding an earthbender's cylinder turret, and would thus kill far more. I stopped that from happening, shooting a followup burst clean through his heart as I advanced forward, taking me past an alcove of the room where more enemy personnel huddled. Forty-two. I turned, saw them, and so knew what had to be done. I let the flame grow in my palm, and-
"Fluke!" I heard a voice behind me call. The flame died, my head turned, and the enemy ran. No!
I turned again, ready to stop them, but they wouldn't get far. I saw the hallway they were running to immediately close, and wondered at a moment if we were still being held at the mercy of enemy earthbenders, but no. That wasn't the case. It was our own, Mano, cutting off their escape, trapping them.
They turned, staring at the platoon of us who now decided their fate, and I was at the ready to burn them where they stood should they make the slightest move, but instead, the man in front raised his hands, and so followed those behind. One by run, the dozen plus of them surrendered, raising their arms in fealty, and it was only then I became conscious of the fact that my hands were held forward, flame building between them, ready to torch them where they stood. But I wouldn't need to. They surrendered. They were surrendering. It was…it was…
"Fluke," Danev said again at my side, startling me with a jump that almost made me fire, but the voice being his thankfully did not have that effect. I turned towards him, my heart finally beginning to slow under what must have been two-hundred beats per minute, and looked up to meet his eyes, though he couldn't see mine past my helmet. I could see his though, and there was something there, something grim, something almost cautious, and that was no more clear than in the way he told me after, "It's over. It's over, Fluke. We won."
And so when I looked around me, I saw the corpses that lined the labyrinth we'd breached into. The rumbling had stopped, and around us, the enemy were dead, over a hundred of them. The sound of combat was over. It was done.
We had won.