That which the world had never seen before, the writings of a dreamer, the one named Slider.
It has been over a year since the iwork was last seen. Now, aided by those who seek the return of the legend, the mighty Author has gathered his will again, and so the next chapter shall take place…
(fake lore blip aside, it's been far, FAR too long since I updated this, for a number of reasons. In either case, enjoy these words at your leisure and expect more of them to come in a much shorter timeframe than the last.)
"STRIKE ONE, MOVE OUT!"
The newly-arrived troopers wasted little time in spreading out, assuming a defensive position around their transport as the apparent leader assessed the situation.
Namely, the mass of dead aliens, the obvious mother and child combo responsible for said massacre, and the slightly less obvious pair of nerds in power armor doing their part as well.
Oh, and the second wave of the alien swarm (this time Mutons, along with the remaining Chryssalids), but that should have been obvious.
Virgil had to admit that they knew what they were doing, as the leader of the team barked a command and the entire defensive line shifted to face the incoming threat, weapons ready and waiting.
The first shots were almost anticlimactic, really. One of the soldiers apparently had decided to take a potshot against the aliens, probably as a test to see how much firepower would be needed to actually deal with the opposition.
Said shot, from a line-of-sight laser weapon no less (and one that reminded him eerily of one of the many, many takes on a Warhammer 40k lasgun), found its target on the head of a Muton…and removed it with almost contemptuous ease.
The entire gaggle of aliens stopped almost in unison, and turned towards the soldiers as one, the Mutons with looks of almost pure horror not only visible but recognizable on their faces.
The savage grin on the commander of "Strike One" was absolutely vicious, and Virgil found himself matching it almost immediately.
"OPEN FIRE!"
Nobody needed to be told twice.
The resulting hail of lasers utterly annihilated their targets, leaving little more than burning chunks of meat in their wake. The few Chryssalids that managed to scurry to some kind of cover were brutally cut down by the Raccoon pair with just as much swiftness. The end result was a street swept clean of alien activity, with only the rapidly cooling corpses left as a testament to what had happened there.
It was utterly glorious to behold, and Virgil could only nod in savage satisfaction at the result.
The commander quickly took advantage. "Alright, listen up! Lancer, take Briggs, Rush and Scrapper and get us a forward path. Ryker and Zillah, you're on recon; find anyone still fighting and get them back here for exfil until we can get a better safe zone. Falcon and Spanker, you're on overwatch: if it moves and isn't human, I want it dead. Ariel, Jouster, and Rock, you're on LZ patrol. Make sure the place stays secure until we get a better look. The rest of you are with me.
He grinned even as his people moved to perform their tasks. "We got our work cut out for us, and the Eggheads have no clue about the new stuff on the ground. Stay sharp and watch your backs, and make sure you report anything unusual so they can figure out what the hell is going on. With any luck, we're done and back in time for chow. Make it happen, people!"
He then turned his attention towards him, nodding in respect. "Thanks for the assist. Virgil Hawkins, I assume? Parahuman alias Uber?"
Virgil only barely didn't freeze in his tracks at being outed like that. Instead, he merely gave a stiff nod that was only partially muffled by the armor he was wearing.
"Good. We were hoping to catch you two before the place got overran. We're gonna need your help to clear out the place, as our organization has their hands tied putting out fires everywhere else and you have the most firepower available until we can get to our objective–"
The mini-brief was interrupted by the sudden appearance of a Chryssalid jumping out of cover and moving at frankly ridiculous speeds towards them, malice clear in its movements.
Said movements were interrupted even faster by a sudden blur and the sound of actual, no-shit audible sharpness as the same Chryssalid all but fell apart in motion, revealing the Raccoon kid on the other side looking down at it curiously.
One of the remaining troopers nearby almost immediately emoted over it. "Oh god, so cute! Boss, we're keeping the kid, alright?" The fact that she had also moved to encircle the poor kid in a massive hug that probably would have included a taste of marshmallow hell if not for the body armor was another matter.
Which was made worse by the kid himself. "Sorry, nice lady, but mama says I have to stay near her for now, but maybe later?"
This only encouraged the trooper to squeeze harder and make even more obvious 'I'm gonna keep him' motions, even as his mother snickered in the background along with the other troopers. For his part, the poor commander simply took his L with stoic pride, knowing there was no way to actually win that.
Either way, things were definitely looking up. He'd have to ask about the rest of how the hell they knew who they were later, though…
-=[/\]=-
In a rare turn of events, Miolala Granliss Green was actually angry.
And nearly all of it had to do with the fact that the fucking Ayys who were interrupting her precious "sexy dragon wife" time with her Satori were pointedly refusing to just roll over and fucking die like a good Xeno.
It was enough to drive a woman mad!
The fuckers simply would. Not. QUIT. They kept coming and coming and coming, again and again, to the point that the automated defenses she'd set up outside the hospital now had entire berms of bodies stacked in front of them, and were actively burning through the excess to get kills on the ones trying to hide.
But that wasn't all! The fuckers could apparently teleport, too, and were using that to try and insert strike teams inside the Hospital to terrorize the survivors and potentially drive them out into the open.
Something which worked only once, as Mio just so happened to be in the area and was in dire need of a stress ball, which the Xenos were oh so gracious to provide.
Too bad about the walls, though. They're never going to get those stains out…
Of course, said attack had prompted her to stretch her already overtaxed resource reserves even more, and set up internal defenses to deal with future incursions, along with pushing forward the "arm the people" plan even faster. The second was paying massive dividends at the moment, as apparently extremely overtuned Las was highly effective against the walking corpses, while the locals were very much of the opinion that taking the fight back to the enemy was a positive thing that should be done as early and as often as possible.
Unfortunately, even the automated lasgun constructor stations she'd set up to convert various forms of scrap metals into weapons were running low on materials, primarily because of the sheer weight of numbers being thrown at them. If not for that, she would have already gone out herself and started clearing out the rubbish, but the constant attacks were keeping her pinned in order to handle any surprises that came along.
Surprises like the fucking Dreadknight wannabes that were currently trying her long since exhausted patience.
The mechs were a thing that her Satori had run into earlier, something about a secondary strike force dropping reinforcements into the field through unusual methods. The mechs themselves were, while impressive, nothing too major for her to worry about, and only required her attention because they were being annoying and trying to end-run around the defenses to get inside.
Which earned them several nice bolts of highly focused directed energy in strategic locations from her as a reward.
Annoyingly, despite that, they just kept coming anyway, and they showed no signs of actually letting up anytime soon, even with their air cover quickly beating feet to avoid getting shot out of the sky by her Volcano Lances. And they had enough in the way of shielding and armor that the "normal" lasguns that were being issued to the people were not going to be enough to stop them–which, while easily solved, had the secondary issue attached that she didn't have the needed materials for the bigger guns and she couldn't go scrounging because they tried to push every time and then–
Yeah, it was frustrating in the extreme, even if she was still winning the war.
'Satori, you are going to be spending a lot of time inside me after this is done. Remember that.'
Her only response was an exasperated sigh and loving caress in her mind, which she took a brief moment to savor.
An electric purple light sprang to life next to her, one of the precursors of the teleport effect that the xenos used.
Her brow twitched in irritation. Another one…
-=[/\]=-
"HEY! OVER HERE!"
The group of Mutons turned towards Marcy with clear killing intent in their motions.
They never actually saw the blades slicing them in half as she moved, the entire motion swift and seamless as she blatantly executed her opposition.
Yeah, Marcy was a natural when it came to Aura, and it showed. The woman adapted to the powerup with an ease and grace that was shocking to behold, and quickly adjusted to push herself to heights unseen in order to "keep up" with me.
The result, when combined with her usual enthusiasm, was a nightmare machine for the poor xenos bastards who stood in her way.
And her emotions…dear god, I had never felt anyone feel that alive before. It was like a blinder had been taken off, and the previous glow she held was but a mere fraction of her true splendid shine. Simply being near her was almost overwhelming to my senses as she zipped around and generally flexed her newly awakened prowess.
Key word being almost. It is a lot easier to not blind someone with exuberance and general "you-ness" when that person wants you there, after all, and Marcy most definitely wanted me around. This lent her aura a form of…acceptance is the closest word for it, honestly, that let me not have to actively dim my own senses or shut her out to still be able to perceive the world.
It was also, much to my amusement, having an effect on the world around us.
See, ever since we'd started really moving, I had been noticing more people armed up and taking the fight to the enemy. This being Texas, the level of available firepower was appropriately high.
Meaning that the guys with the AR-15s and FALs were doing most of the work, backed up by the local Hood-equip AK platform variant. And doing shockingly well, even, for all that they were getting hit by airstrikes from the damned ships whenever they started getting momentum.
Airstrikes that I was, if not deflecting, then at least diverting with some judicious applications of the Force. Applications which left me open to attack by the larger elements whenever I did so, and were exploited ruthlessly…only to be counter-ambushed by my beautiful Knight of Mice mere moments after their arrival, thus clearing up more room for the small guys to have more of an impact.
Fun fact: despite what the games would try to say about it, .308 Winchester was still just as effective on aliens as it was on people. .45 ACP shockingly was even more so, and where that one dude had gotten a Barrett I would never know, but .50 BMG was once again proving to be the great equalizer in Infantry ammo.
Of course, this was all dealing with unarmored targets or the few times that the big boys dropped their guard and got sniped. None of the conventional shit was doing anything against the actual armor, which was expected and seemed to be accounted for by the defense simply by applying pinpoint accuracy to the problem.
Hey, its Texas. Tons of hunters over here, even in the "liberal hell" that is Houston, and lots of marksmen of both civvie and military provenance that could make the shots under pressure. (It is low-key the real reason why nobody actually wants to fuck with America when it comes to shit like invasions–they know full damn well that the civilians would eat their troops alive with raw skill.)
But back to Marcy and her damned Aura. Because her emotions were filtering out onto the defenders as we passed, bolstering their spirits and generally giving them the strength to carry forward in the face of Armageddon, which they did with gusto.
Maybe it was her Semblance?
"So, Satori. When you planning on pulling the saucers out of the air? Mousey wants to play~"
I should also mention that Marcy was very much not letting me live down the prior incident and was making it blatantly clear with her newly enhanced newtype powers (because of course they were) that she meant that in the most perverse, depraved and sexual manner possible. The bad guys being around were interrupting her potential "jump Satori" time, and that was unacceptable.
Too bad she would have to fight against Mio for that timeslot, because she had first dibs and already had made it clear that she was going to be making use of me.
Still, I had work to do, so unfortunately I couldn't address the innuendo. "I was aiming to try and find a big enough area where I could just drop the fuckers with no issues, preferably near the ship channel so I could avoid clogging up landmass we might need elsewhere. We still haven't gotten to the port proper yet, so I don't have the room I want to work with–"
Marcy cut me off almost immediately with a mental smack. "Satori. Stop thinking of this as the Houston you know. This city is completely different from the one that is a thriving metroplex. This place is struggling to stay relevant, even with the port, and only has as much traffic as it does because it's basically the only viable port in this part of the country left. Seriously, just pick a spot and start dropping flies. I can deal with the fallout until you are ready to back me up."
Honestly, I kind of felt like an idiot after hearing that.
Because she was right. Hell, I'd noticed it myself even before the attack kicked off. This Houston is very much not the thriving port city that was the crown jewel of the South and basically the fourth-largest city in America by size.
No, this was a place that was already struggling to get by, and was likely going to need months if not years of rebuilding to ever get back to anything looking like its former glory even by the standards of Earth Bet. And here I was, trying to spare as much as possible when it was already obvious that Mio and I were going to have to do a total overhaul of pretty much everything simply due to the sheer scope of even the current damage.
…I was going to chalk this up to a combination of brain fart and emotional overload from the massive backlash from the dead and dying around me. Yes, that was the reason and nothing else.
Stop laughing, both of you.
(Spoiler: they did not stop laughing.)
So, moment of embarrassing flubbery aside, all I needed to do was just find a spot I didn't really care about and start stacking spaceships until the idiots either got the message and bailed or, and this was the more desirable outcome, I ran out of shops to stack with.
Finding a suitable spot didn't take as long as I'd feared it would. There was an entire section of abandoned warehouses and similar former industry just kind of hanging around the area we were in, and all of it begging to be used as a landing pad for my targets.
I quickly got to a decent vantage point away from my drop zone and started scanning the skies. "Mouse, I need you to keep our guests busy while I start clearing out the skies. This is going to take most of my concentration and I am really not going to have much to spare to handle the chumps."
A feeling of approval and determination was my reply, and with that secured I got to work.
-=[/\]=-
Sydney Orland, better known as the newest member of the Houston Protectorate Grey Knight (a "compromise" from his own preferred name of Orlandu, due to identity concerns), was in a bit of a bind.
Mostly because his family was caught out in the open when this little invasion kicked off, and he was too far away to see to their protection personally. Not that his wife couldn't take care of herself; Sharra was no slouch when it came to their shared powers by any means, but with the level of madness going on he wanted assurances.
Especially with his kids in the mix. They were just getting out of school when this shit started, and by all accounts would have been priority targets for the asshole aliens just to cause suffering and strife to the people…
"Daddy, look out!"
A quick backspin into an empowered slash took out the oncoming insect thing that had been attempting to creep up on him, the carcass cleanly bisected with little effort. His daughter cheered from behind her improvised cover as the enemy fell before him, clearly excited to see her beloved daddy win against the bad guys.
Of course, this was yet another reminder of why he was in such a bind. He had both of his children with him at the moment, a lucky streak allowing him to locate them before things got really bad, and was currently looking for a place to stash them so he could get back to the fight proper. The issue was that basically every safe zone that he could think of was getting overrun long before he could even begin to help, and the few he knew of that were actually holding out had a figurative sea of aliens between him and safety…which was all but a death sentence for his children.
And that was just for the shit on the ground. Once you added in the crap floating above (that he was even now actively shielding against to prevent them from sniping him or his kids) then things got completely out of hand.
The fact that nobody could seem to figure out a plan and make it work was just the shitty icing on top of a shitty cake as far as he was concerned, and based on the waves of enemies headed his way the bad guys had obviously figured out that he was a soft target due to his kids and were angling to take him out of the fight as quickly as possible. The group he had just dealt with was the biggest pack he'd faced yet during the crisis, and he had a sneaking suspicion that they were only going to get even larger until something broke…
A strange groaning sound caught his attention, and he quickly snapped to the source…only to look on, slack-jawed at what he was witnessing.
One of the alien spaceships was quite literally being dragged out of the air by an unknown force. The ship was obviously struggling to try and break free from whatever it was that was pulling against it, but it was of little use, as the ship was inexorably dragged further towards its doom.
To make matters even worse for the bastards, whatever tinker weapon system that had been set up to help control the airspace had taken a look at the situation and decided to add its own opinion to the discussion, with large, hilariously powerful laser blasts reaching out and piercing through their targets with almost contemptuous ease now that they weren't dodging. They'd obviously hit something important, too, because suddenly the resistance against the ground-tugging failed outright and the enemy ship was…well, the only word that even fit was 'yeeted'., into the ground at tremendous speed and with exceptional force. Hell, the landing zone was clear on the other side of downtown and he still felt it from here.
Then a second, larger ship started to suffer the same fate, this time being dragged down even faster, almost as if whatever parahuman was responsible for this had finally gotten their bearings and was really putting in the work, now. The air defenses, likewise, seemed to understand almost immediately that the best option was to keep at least one gun ready and waiting for the inevitable tug-of-war match and then riddle the offending ship with holes until they hit something important and caused the ship to suffer another yeet reaction.
He continued to watch, transfixed, as the ships in the air kind of just…petered out, slowly, piece by piece, as they were yanked out of the air and peppered with what he could only describe as artillery-grade laser fire.
His kids, for a change, were actually enjoying the show, if their cheering was any indication.
Sadly, his big moment of introspection was cut short by yet another group of aliens coming directly for him, energy weapons (he suspected plasma of some kind) already firing–and not doing much to his shield. Sadly, the shield was not perfect by any means, so he had to actually engage this batch before they got too close and endangered his children.
But hey, he signed up for this, right?
-=[/\]=-
So, in retrospect, I probably should have put a bit more preparation into the whole "lets' yeet the ships out of the sky" thing.
Mostly because, despite appearances, making gigantic towers out of the wreckage of alien spacecraft was very much not a good look, even if it was actually doing a lot for me in particular. Especially because I could feel the fuckers flailing in absolute Terror as they impacted the ground with forces sufficient to ensure that the ship would never fly again unless I laid hands on it personally.
Which was a good thing, because even though I was making this shit look easy, actually yanking those things out of the sky like that was almost impossibly difficult with my current skill level. Sure, the Force was juicing me up with pretty much everything to assist, but the simple fact of the matter was that this honestly should have been beyond my skill level if not for Mio taking advantage of my being able to grab the ships and arrest their movement long enough for her to land a critical hit. And I knew it was her, too, because of the raw, vindictive glee I was getting back from her as the ships went down, one by one.
That was the good news. The bad news was that the ground forces did not like this particular brand of events, and were increasing their efforts at preventing me from taking out their air support.
And they were coming in hot and heavy.
Those tanks I'd captured and disabled before? Apparently they had plenty of those just hanging around and were not afraid to deploy them if needed, in both the small and large varieties. The Mechs? Fuckers had modular loadouts and could vary their configuration enough that trying to adapt was only this side of a fool's errand.
Oh, and apparently they also had IFV equivalents, complete with Sectoids at the controls and some kind of amplifier for their mind control?
Like, Jesus fuck, I knew in the games that the Ayys were holding back, but this shit is ridiculous.
To anyone else, it would have been utter suicide, not even worth the attempt. Even for me, it would have been needlessly difficult to deal with all of that and still accomplish my goals on my own.
The problem that the Ayys currently faced was that, sadly for them, I was no longer alone.
And as good as those tanks and other miscellaneous armored vehicles may have been, they had shitty operators at the controls, beings who were unused to actually prosecuting a proper battle utilizing Armor.
And it was something that the newly arrived Texas National Guard took immense relish in teaching them the error of.
With extreme brevity.
Seriously, I hadn't even noticed the guys had arrived in all the chaos. One minute, I am dodging and flailing away from weapons fire while trying to hold one of their bigger ships still long enough for Mio to get a shot, and the next the very enemies firing on me were being subjected to actual, proper Armored Warfare…or at least the mechanized infantry version thereof.
As it turns out, the Earth Bet version of the Texas National Guard Armory kept a significant ready reserve force for "just in case" situations just like this one, and were more than willing to make use of it where they could. The only issue they really had to deal with was travel time from the Armory and potentially fuel concerns for the bigger stuff, which was probably why they were using the light stuff instead.
Which meant that the Ayys were now subjected to the unrelenting skill and determination of the US Army in Reinforced Company strength…which was, shockingly enough, just what Mouse Protector and I needed to get back into the game and finish the job.
Even better, the Guys in the Stryker IFVs made a point of not interrupting my yanking the ships out of the air just to introduce themselves, and even treated Mouse like one of their own in their planning!
"Focus fire on those mechs, keep them pinned down!"
"Engineers to the disabled vehicles! See if you can get those started up!"
"Javelin teams, on me! Aim for the big one, two o'clock!"
It was simply beautiful to not only see, but hear my people in action. Yes, they were ground pounders and thus automatically inferior to my excellence as an Airman, but that was for later. Right now, the Green Machine was spinning up, and woe betide anything that stood in its way.
I just stayed focused on the ships that needed to die as I continued stacking my jenga tower of doom.
'Satori, the interference is clearing up. Looks like it was coming from the ships, and needed a critical mass to stay operational. I should have a line with the leadership soon to coordinate things!'
Oh Hell Yes.
The defense getting actual comms back was pretty much the ball game for the invasion as a whole, as that meant that people could call for backup from unaffected areas and coordinate fire support from beyond visual range onto targets.
This meant that we could call in the other members of the Triumvirate to help clear this mess up in short order, as well as the other National guard units. And with the air cover gone, the Air Guard now came into play, complete with all of the Air Power a man could want.
Things were finally looking up.
So, of course, the damned Ayys had to try and invoke Murphy by taking all of their remaining air assets and attempting to divebomb me at speed, likely hoping to take me out before they died by any means necessary.
Too bad for them that Mio is just as empathic and precognitive as I am, and had already adjusted the other Volcano Lances to compensate for the new trajectory.
Also helped that the dumbasses were still so close to Downtown, but that was their fault
"Hey, Satori, we got incoming, you need to…oh."
That was Mouse, trying to bail me out before the storm hit…only to watch as the incoming ships got sniped out of the sky by pinpoint Laser Lance fire. And then be possessed of even more awe as I immediately spiked the ship into the ground to kill its forward momentum before it could still do what it wanted and flatten my location underneath itself.
Judging from the whooping and cheers I could hear from the back, the Guardsmen were equally impressed at the spectacle.
I felt more than heard their commander approach me, once the area was clear enough to do so. Giving him a brief glance out of the corner of my eye, I only noted the important bits: the unit patches in their appropriate places, the nametape on his pockets (Parker, from the looks of it) and, most importantly, the Flag patch on his shoulder, stars forward and rushing into battle.
And his rank patch, of course. Captain, he was.
I conspicuously avoided giving him a salute, which he noted in the back of his mind appreciatively. "Mr. Green? I'm Captain Raymond Parker, with the Texas National Guard. We were ordered to locate you and assist in any way possible."
I finally turned fully to the Captain, which not only let him see my own rank patch of warrant officer, an action that elicited a snort of amusement from the man before he regained his decorum, but let me get a proper look at the man himself. Overall, not much to say: pretty average for a white guy, in what would be considered an attractive way by those inclined. The only point of note on my end was the blonde hair and gray eyes.
"No problem, Captain, Definitely could use the help right now, especially as all of these mechs and shit need people to operate them so we can start cleaning up. If you'll give me a few minutes, I can see about setting things up so you actually have real firepower to work with and not the usual stuff, sir."
Captain Parker nodded. "I say get to it, and keep us posted on what you got available. Any word from up the chain on your end? My guys can't punch through the interference for shit." He waved in the direction of his command vehicle for emphasis, where a radioman was finishing up a quick check of his gear before attempting to send another transmission out.
"Hoo boy, do I have good news for you." I grinned, rubbing my hands together. "As it turns out, the ships I've been dragging out of the air here were the source of the jamming and emissions static, so every one I took out cleared up the airwaves. I haven't actually poked my head back in there, yet, but my guess is that things should be clear enough to get word out to everyone else that the skies are clear to send in the air support for cleanup. Also, what happened to the Artillery? I thought there was a depot for that in town?"
Parker pumped his fist in victory, then immediately started handing out orders. "Simmons, radio should be clear. Get on the horn to the big wigs and tell 'em to get the good stuff in ASAP. Riley, call the other teams and get everyone on the same page."
I decided to preempt him on his next orders. "Make sure they tell the brass to get in touch with my wife, if possible, so she can coordinate getting everyone better gear. You're gonna need it for the bigger fuckers" Parker looked at me briefly before nodding, and I returned my attention to the Captain. "As for the rest, I have some work to do. First tank should be ready in five, tops, have your guys ready to go so we don't get jumped, please." I took off to work before he could get a word in edgewise, though judging from the light chuckles I heard with my large, exceptionally sensitive ears I doubt that he was going to say anything.
As for the public?
All I heard from them that wasn't more shooting at the alien assholes was cheering as the real heroes showed up.
-=[/\]=-
Captain Shawn Simms, callsign "Bruiser", looked on at the chaos of the streets of Houston in disgust and very carefully controlled fury.
What the X-Ray attack had done to the people of the city was unimaginable, the barbarity and callousness on full display for all but the blind to see for themselves.
Bodies, everywhere…at least, where there weren't more of the damned abduction pods that they still had no clue how to open safely. Wreckage and rubble everywhere, with the fighting having completely torn apart some buildings while leaving others almost completely untouched.
The smell. That distinct, unnatural, different odor that always came with the Aliens when they arrived, when they attacked.
The only difference from other attacks and landing zones was that this particular engagement was far larger in scale than what XCOM was normally used to seeing…and that the Aliens had clearly not been having it all their way, even despite having broken out new technology just for this run.
The strewn remains of their opponents were everywhere. The bodies of the opposition were all over the place, and with wounds ranging from multiple gunshots to what looked like edged weapons to even a case of what looked like a freaking Mechtoid being ripped apart with bare hands. Even in the midst of the ongoing tragedy, it was clear that the city nor its inhabitants had any intention of dying quietly.
Something made even more apparent as he and his squad rounded a corner and came face to face with what would normally be open parkland, strewn with the wreckage of alien vehicles and what looked like some form of bipedal, piloted mecha.
Whoever had been doing this was putting in some work.
Still, he and his people had a job to do.
"Fan out. Fast Assault formation, watch the flanks. We have approximately half a kilometer to go before we hit the Hospital Zone–don't lose it now, people. Keep an eye out for stragglers or any civilians as we go."
The Team acknowledged his commands and prepared to move. Meanwhile, their tagalongs turned auxiliary element were obviously wary and rattled. It was clear just from body language that neither of the men (not boys; anyone who was willing to brave the hellscape that the city had become had more than earned that right) looking outward with suspicious eyes wanted to be here
Simms didn't blame them. He'd been on enough drops to know all too well that shit could go wrong at the worst of times just because you decided to not look at a completely bare wall a few seconds ago, let alone missing a hiding enemy in the middle of a debris-strewn battlefield with plenty of cover and concealment.
And that was before the damned insect things had come along. Chryssalids Uber had called them. A terror weapon of immense magnitude that acted like alien botflies and implanted their young inside the dead bodies of those they killed, then reanimated the body as a kind of zombie before hatching out a new bug to repeat the process.
Vahlen had been adamant about getting a sample to study as soon as possible, to see if there was a counter, and for once nobody had anything to say about it.
That alone rang warning bells for many; Vahlen was notoriously callous about anything that wasn't science and learning more about the alien threat that besieged them, to the point that she would often be seen as semi-dismissive of the lives of the soldiers out on the field.
Bruiser knew better. As did everyone who was around for the first few missions, who had been there when the war was really getting started.
Or when he alone had returned from that disastrous first op that had wiped out the rest of his team with almost zero effort. He'd seen it then, the way she reacted. The one time she'd allowed the mask to slip.
Still, the fact that she was so blatantly letting her normal mask slip off over this… it had him worried.
Worried that this war was about to enter a new and far more terrifying phase.
"Contact left! Type Unknown!"
His thoughts were interrupted by the appearance, via some weird-ass purple sphere thing, no less, of a group of X-Rays on their left side, up on the small berm that served as a boundary into Hermann Park proper. And the group was…
Okay, he didn't know what to think about those fuckers. It was yet more new types, this time some variation on the Cyberdiscs that was instead a giant sphere, along with a bunch of weirdly mechanical hulking things with big guns.
He didn't need t tell the team to get to cover, they were already moving as soon as the callout was made….and to his horror it didn't seem like it was going to do any good. The hulking asshats were, on closer inspection, wearing what looked like fucking personal power armor and acting like a super-heavy shock troop, complete with what looked like a no-shit plasma cannon, meanwhile the spheres…
The Spheres were going to be a problem. He could feel it.
"What kind of alien is that? I've never…is that a weaponized life support frame?"
"I can't tell just from looking at it, but that cannon on the arm seems like it means business. I'm more worried about the giant orbs…this is a significant escalation of the Alien's previous drone technology…"
"Either way, the big one looks ready to smash something. Stay sharp, Strike One."
Drs. Shen and Vahlen were obviously trying their best to get a read on what the hell they had just run into, and it wasn't looking good if they were both confused like that. Central wasn't much better, even if his additional tactical analysis was useful in corroborating what everyone else probably felt as well.
One of the spheres opened fire on his position, forcing him back down behind the garbage truck he was using as cover. To his horror, the weapon, some kind of laser, did horrendous damage to his cover, melting a significant way through the truck itself. It almost certainly wasn't going to be able to take more than one or two more of those, at best.
Unfortunately, moving was…contraindicated at the moment. There were at least six of the fucking orb things, each with that big-ass laser cannon, and while it was apparently inaccurate (as judged by Rush, the lucky bastard, somehow managing to not get hit by one as he was diving behind a concrete divider) the punch was very much undeniable. Meanwhile, the armored things were just charging through whatever the hell they felt like just because, including all the potential alternate cover locations as they moved in on his team.
One of the power armor suits stopped for a moment, seemed to angle itself in the oddest fashion for a moment…and then fired off a goddamn blob of something from its shoulders that splashed all over Rush's position.
His scream of pain and panic chilled him to his soul.
The substance, obviously some sort of acid, was clearly eating through the concrete as Rush screamed louder, desperately trying to scrape as much of the stuff off of himself as possible…before a plasma shot from one of the other ones stilled him.
Briggs' scream of rage echoed through the air as she almost immediately broke cover and unloaded everything she had at the X-rays, her Heavy Laser Cannon doing a surprisingly good job of tearing at the armored asshats…before a laser shot from one of the spheres blew a literal hole in her torso, taking her down.
The raccoon lady traveling with them quickly moved to try and shield what was left of his comrades while digging for something on her person, though to what end he had no idea. Meanwhile, her son made an attempt at rushing the one responsible, only for a coordinated crossfire to push him back just as quickly as he came. Uber, for his part, was already moving to try and tend to the wounded, with Leet covering him as much as he could, which wasn't anywhere near as much as they needed…and the less said about the rest of his people with them at the moment, the better.
Sticky wicket didn't even begin to describe this…
"Strike One, this is Xanadu Actual."
'And now the Boss Lady is on the horn. This can't be good…'
Sure, the Commander technically had tactical command of the situation by her own order, but in practice how that worked was that she gave a general directive based on the overall picture that the bosses could see from their own sensor feeds, and he utilized his best judgement on how to carry out the order as directed. Under more ideal circumstances this could, and had, led to a pseudo chess match as the Commander shuffled people around almost like a tactical game to achieve near impossible victories, but in this situation she was acting more as an Operator assist than anything else, especially with how quickly the battlefield was changing around them.
The Commander spoke, as usual, with an iron core of resolve. "You are authorized to eliminate the new X-Ray assets by any means necessary, preferably before they can begin attacking civilians. On my order."
…Oh. Now that changed things somewhat.
Fun fact: XCOM had a lot more fun toys waiting in the wings than people thought they did, including a few gee-whiz doohickeys derived from tinkertech thanks to some "friends" they had access to. Toys which included a few party favors that normally would not be authorized for use inside of an urban area due to their…potential.
Toys which were now fully and unambiguously on the table.
Simms wasted no time. "Strike One, Crackerjacks are authorized, now light em up!"
"Crackerjacks" in this case being the shorthand for the tinker improvised grenades that were now being thrown or, in one case, launched into the enemy formation. Grenades that had some very interesting effects.
Like freezing things. Or corroding the hell out of the alloys involved. Or in one particularly vicious hit, just outright popping a fucker with an energy field and watching it fry itself with its own reflected heat output cranked up to who knows what.
Simms could only laugh in triumph as he saw the results. Most X-Rays down, with only a few of the new floater things still hanging around to cause trouble, and all of them heavily damaged. Those would be easy enough to get around, anyway, now that they weren't swarming them with backup…
"Hey, what the hell? Wasn't that the Random Bomb that I made a few months back? How the hell?"
And that was the other amusing part: the fact that the gear was based off of none other than the very tinker they were fighting alongside's tech. Even better, the "random bomb" he was speaking of was meant for a show idea based on Bomberman that fell through when the local authorities refused to grant them the needed explosives permits to make it work right. All XCOM had done was take the idea and…play with it a little…
"Strike One, This is Central. Scope looks clear, proceed to…wait, what the hell?!"
Central's shock immediately had Simms looking around for whatever the hell was the cause…and it let him see the alien armor suits getting back up as if nothing had gone wrong.
As in all of them. Standing back up, and clearly moving into combat positions, despite the obvious cockpit-slash-control center having been damaged or destroyed in some capacity.
"...Wait a minute, look at their movements!"
It was, oddly enough, the small raccoon child who pointed it out: the alien armor suits were moving jankily, almost haphazardly, as if whatever was controlling them had no actual skill in operating the technology in this environment. In fact, if not for their sheer bulk it was clearly obvious that at least one of the suits would have long since fallen back over already.
Which gave him a plan of sorts.
"Falcon, talk to me. You see the funky power armor moving in on us?"
"Copy visual, boss. Whatcha need?"
"Hit the fucker on our left with the Bertha, would ya? You should know the one."
"Copy target. Stand by."
Falcon, AKA Sergeant Jerry Grimes, formerly USMC, was the team's resident Sniper, and a graduate of the Marine Scout Sniper program prior to his selection for XCOM. He was easily the best shot on the team, and arguably in the entire organization with some of the insanity that he could pull, with only the leaders of Strike Six and Strike Seven being on the same level.
In fact, even now Simms could almost see the targeting reticle of the advanced scope on the new heavy laser sniper moving into position and giving the appropriate information needed for the shot. Not a second later, the crack of a bolt of light impacted with the designated armor, practically blowing it apart with the sheer force the shot imparted.
Sims, and quite a few of the others, could only whistle in appreciation. The Bertha was the heaviest gun they had available to use, and it was very much proving that the "Lasgun" tech was definitely superior to the lasers that XCOM had previously been developing.
Falcon, taking a bit of initiative, quickly shifted targets and started laying down fire on the other wild alien power armors as well, making use of the incredibly quick cycle time on the Sniper to extreme effect while the rest of the team cough their breath. Which was a good thing, because it left the rest of the m to focus down on the fucking orbs and start taking them out.
Leet chose that moment to aim a device at one of the Sphere things and fired it off…only to emote in clear confusion as whatever was supposed to happen didn't.
"Guys? We have a problem! Those Orbs, they're not–"
Leet never got to finish his sentence. Instead, he was interrupted by one of the orbs opening itself up, and revealing the horror within.
Namely, the mass of flesh and tentacles that served as the core of the Orb-thing, openly flailing and clearly swirling with the telltale signs of psionic energy as it did something…
The energy quickly spread across the battlefield in a moderate radius, even covering many of the recently created corpses strewn all over the place.
And those very corpses began to move, rising up once again and clearly under the control of the alien.
"And, of course, it had to be more zombies."
The statement caused nearly everyone to blink in confusion. The Raccoon woman, whose name he still hadn't gotten, was suddenly standing right in the middle of the newly formed zombie swarm, with an air of blatant irritation surrounding her.
"Because, after everything else that has happened today, we have to keep hammering on the classics, right? Keep giving me reminders…"
She swung her weapon once, in a wide, almost lazy arc.
Everything in the path of that swing, and a good few meters out from it as well, found itself cleaved in two…including the X-Ray that was still exerting its energies on the zombies.
"So how about I give you something to remember as well, hm? Marcos, stand back for a moment."
And then she moved.
Even augmented as he was, Simms couldn't see the movement. He was pretty sure that not even Falcon had seen it when it happened, and he easily had the best eyes of them all present.
The result, however, was undeniable. Everything that was still moving on the X-ray side just…stopped for a moment…before simply falling into two, or in the case of the last remaining power armor thing, multiple pieces. All of which were clearly down and unresponsive.
Her kid, Marcos apparently, quickly zoomed back from wherever he had ducked for the moment to survey the damage. " Wow, Mama! All of that with just four swings?"
WHAT.
Four sw–no, there was no time for any of that. There was still an objective to reach, a city to save, and after that…then maybe he would get some answers as to how the hell a single mother with an archaic weapon was doing more damage to the enemy than his highly-trained troops.
Hopefully.
-=[/\]=-
The Medical Center area was complete bedlam.
It seemed like everything that could be directed at the area was hitting it all at once…and judging by the literal berms of bodies surrounding the place, they were failing.
Miserably.
Even now, as Strike One moved in on their objective, the cause of said berms was making itself known and apparent, complete with the cacophony of light and destruction that only heavy las weapons could provide.
The setup only made Richie want to meet whoever was responsible for setting it up even more.
Much to the shock of everyone involved, the aliens were seemingly ignoring their advance onto the complex, instead doing everything they could to try and get something past the defenses…and failing miserably.
Granted, the sheer push was creating enough of a buffer zone that anything that wasn't them trying to make a break for the obvious safe location was going to die in the attempt anyway, but ti was the principle of the matter. You treated the enemy like they were actually dangerous and out to get you, not like worthless chumps who didn't know better. Not doing so was one of the fastest ways to get surprised by some newbie cape with an insanely powerful and/or expansive ability when you least expected it, after all.
Case in point, a group (he was tempted to call them a pod, but nobody but Virgil would get the reference) of Mutons was attempting to use the improvised berms as cover from the oncoming laser fire, only to get shanked in the back by little Marcos as he sped by, twin blades flashing as he moved. His mother was not far behind him, finishing up the job her son did not with clean decapitations of her opponents.
For their part, the XCOM guys were no slouches, either. Apparently fired up by the display of annoyed Raccoon Mom earlier against the Orb things, they had clearly stepped up their own game and were pushing ever harder in their own assaults, complete with using even more tinkertech-derived toys to tear into the enemy as they moved.
Well, it could also be the fact that they were moving their severely injured comrades with them, with hopes of accessing some medical attention once they got in.
Still, even with the clear double hammer punch being delivered by the obvious professionals and the mom-and-son duo, a hole in the attack wave was not appearing.
And they were running out of time. The "intelligent" aliens may have been ignoring them, but the Chryssalids sure as hell were not, and it was taking everything that both himself and Uber had at the moment to keep the fuckers off of the group…a fact that was made worse by the fact that the damned things were apparently evolving in real time, now, or at least having the successive generations of offspring become stronger and faster than the last. The Weapons they had available were getting dangerously close to not cutting it anymore with the rapid escalation going on.
Besides, they were running out of ammo, and the spares were back with the Van, AKA not here. It was looking suspiciously like they weren't actually going to make it to their objective without somebody forcing the issue one way or another…and the consequences of that were likely to be dire.
"...Mama, what's that noise?"
Marcos had stopped for a moment, clearly straining to hear something and try to identify it by the noticeable twitching of his ears. Based on his focus, the noise he was hearing was coming from the south end somewhere…but even accounting for Marcos having better hearing than everyone else here, whatever was moving must have been loud as all hell to be noticeable over the din of combat, especially here.
And the only thing he could think of that was that loud was–
There were a series of *bloop* sounds suddenly noticeable over the din. Almost immediately after, there was near complete chaos as an entire section of the wall of bodies–and the aliens that were hiding behind it–were blown sky high.
And coming from the very direction that Marcos had been monitoring, down one of the somehow still barely navigable streets, was a military vehicle. Specifically, one in the distinct olive drab of the US Army…and mounting what looked to be a grenade launcher of some sort, complete with wisps of barrel heat from recent use.
Ritchie had to blink for a moment at the inconsistency he'd just noticed. This was Texas. In the middle of Summer. With a day that was already breaking 100 before the aliens showed up. How the hell was he seeing barrel heat?
Said question was soon answered as the vehicle opened fire again, and this time he–and everyone else–could clearly see the trails of energy from the weapon as it launched its payload at another section of the berm, blowing away yet more attackers and more of the built-up wall in the process.
Weirdly enough, the bad guys actually took this one seriously. A bunch of the other alien types, including one of the mechanized Sectoid bastards that had basically camped their van, almost immediately changed targets to try and take out the vehicle…what looked like a Bradley IFV, if he remembered correctly. Much to his surprise, the vehicle didn't immediately die in flames when the return fire hit, instead, some kind of energy field revealed itself, deflecting the energy-based attacks away from the IFV, leaving it free to counterattack without fear.
Naturally, XCOM was enthused.
"Oh HELL Yeah! Army finally got off its asses and got some work done, eh?"
Surprisingly, the IFV responded via an external speaker system. "Ah, you must be a marine to be bitching like that, then. See if the Army ever bails your asses out again, Jarhead!"
That this was said while using a heavily modified M-2 Machine gun to mow down yet more aliens attempting to take the vehicle out removed what little sting was actually present in the barb.
"Anyway, heard from a little birdie that you guys were in the area and would probably need some help, so here we are! And since we got all kinds of new and shiny gear to beat people up with, figured we could use it to deal some damage, right?"
That part caught Ritchie's attention. "New gear? From who?"
The speaker was obviously in a sharing mood. "Ah, you guys must not know. Our team ran into him during our push into the city. A Warrant Officer Green? He fixed our stuff up with some new goodies to keep us alive in this shitstorm. It's helping a lot, lemme tell ya!"
The leader of the XCOM guys perked up at that. "Wait, you met one of the Greens? We were supposed to be linking up with 'em around here and getting some help to clear the city out. You know which way he went? We need to catch up before he gets too far off."
"No need, Captain. You're in the right spot."
The newest voice in this conversation was arguably the weirdest of them all, considering that the owner was walking out of the hospital at the time.
The Hospital, whose entrance was still well over a hundred feet away and still surrounded by active defensive measures, making a lot of noise.
And yet, everyone had clearly heard her voice as clear as day, even him.
"Apologies if this is a little weird for you guys with the telepathy and all, but it's easier to communicate over the noise like this. I'll make a hole to get you guys inside and get your people patched up…especially that Rush guy, considering he was already flat lining before I got a hold on him. Move unless you want them dead, Captain."
The woman, clearly one of the animal hybrid people with obvious horns and a lizard tail, then looked directly at him. "As for you, Mr. Foley? You and your partner are going to be getting a crash course in Infantry combat tactics and field acquisition. I'm going to be using you two as pack mules for a bit while I hold things down here. And since I have no intention on either of you dying in the process, I need to get your gear up to spec before I send you back out. So don't get too comfortable just yet."
Before Virgil could ask the obvious question, a pack of the never to be sufficiently damned Orbs showed up, this time flanked by dozens of–wait, were those fucking Wanzers?
Not that she cared about that, as with nary a gesture, a particularly vicious cannon materialized itself over her shoulder and proceeded to completely annihilate every piece of opposition that had made itself known before they could even so much as get off a shot.
She even had the decency to look apologetic as she finally came within normal speaking range. "Sorry about that. Every time I try to poke my head out I get swarmed, and if I ever actually bothered to leave, the rest would just overrun the Hospital and break the safe zone. Which is why I need you two to go and gather stuff for me, and for Strike One, here, so we can actually get this clusterfuck unfucked sometime this month."
She then shrugged slightly, the small flame on her tail flickering as she swished it about.. "On the plus side, I have hot food if you wanna eat before you head out…"
Virgil turned to Ritchie. "They'll never believe us."
Ritchie could only nod in agreement. No, they would never believe them. Nobody would.
And thus, the Battle of Houston come more or less to an end. Yes, I know l've left some loose ends in the air, but they will get covered next chapter. I've held this one off long enough.
To answer some preemptive questions:
Mio's defenses re that good, and the attakcers are that numerous. It's actually kind of ridiculous, and only the raw, unfiltered panic of the Ethereals is preventing them from shifting targets to something that isn't Mio's little holdout bunker, and part of that is that Satori literally dragged their air support out of the sky with raw Force. Kind of hard to top that without putting in direct appearances.
Virgil and Ritchie are rather obvious references for those who are in the know. Admittedly I swapped things around slightly, as Ritchie should technically be Kid Win if I was really going to dig the knife in, but it was easier to use U&L for this instead.
And sadly, Uber is not Black, despite the reference.
As for the Stryker/Bradley misidentiication? A combination of Ritchie being under stress, mis-IDing the vehicle, and Satori doing enough mods on the damned things by request to get them in the fight and mobile as SAR while the alien tanks are reconfigured for use by the Armor teams. It was faster than trying to make the Ayys IFVs work for Humans, and Satori could rig a power supply out of the materials on hand from the wrecks
Finally, Eidolon is still alive and will be mentioned next chapter, so don't panic. I just didn't feel like adding him in here. Expect to see the rest of the Triumvirate put in an appearance as well.