(On a military base somewhere in a hilly, grassy, plain area)

Axel stared, in a daze only possible by what he thought he heard and maybe also due to not sleeping as long as he should have, maybe mostly due to that actually. He said "Run that by me again?", he was speaking to his superior who just told him of his final mission before retirement. "I said that it's just a simple escort mission, run to Grove Outpost while protecting the convoy, especially focusing on the central truck, and check the surrounding area for anything out of the ordinary. Then return to enjoy your much deserved retirement. Can't get more simple than that." Axel squinted his eyes at his superior, searching for a tell that there was something else, something that would make this mission, not so simple. As retirement missions tended to be more important or difficult due to the top brass wanting the ones retiring to do one last very important mission before leaving, so that they would get their money's worth so to speak. Seeing nothing telling, Axel sighed and then bluntly asked "There has to be something else, a catch, this seems too simple for a retirement mission.", his superior responded with one one thing before turning to leave, "Protect that central truck at all costs, it must not ever fall into enemy hands, as regrettable to admit as it is, destroy it as a last resort, only, and i mean it, only if there are no other options available."

Axel was partly curious but mostly disappointed that it wasn't as simple as it first seemed, although it wouldn't be a problem as the enemy shouldn't even be aware of the mission or should even pose a threat. He walked to the motor pool, looking for his tank, the "War Rage" as he had named it, it was not the best or the most advanced. It was a older model that had mixed characteristics of even older tanks, the HSTV-L, M1A2 Abrams, and some ideas from the Strv-103 models. It was a capable of operating with only one operator, had a auto-loader for its main gun which was a ok 105 millimeter smoothbore cannon. The gun was similar to the 105 millimeter M68A1E8 found on the M1128 Stryker's which Axel had seen in various tank museums when he was young. His specific model was the MEAV or Medium Expeditionary Assault Vehicle, it was mainly used in places were a lightly armored vehicle or tank would not be good enough, or where a heavier model would not work. So the MEAV was designed to try and fill that role, which it did mediocrely, which is why they are a dying breed. Axel was fine with them though, so even when offered a newer tank, he refused, was it stupid? Only time would tell if it was a poor decision or not. After checking his tank, he went into a adjacent building to rest and go over their mission before they headed out.

10 hours later, at night time, Axel and his squad were each in their own tanks, rumbling over the dry dirt on their way to the outpost. As they traveled, Axel made small talk with his unit over the radio, seeing as this mission should be easy, they were more relaxed than normal, although they still had their guard up. Their formation had Axel behind one of his units tank, which was behind the central truck. There were 2 tanks behind, 2 in front, and 1 one on each side of the large truck. While more of his soldiers were scattered in the convoy ensuring its protection was spread throughout. Just as they reached the halfway mark and he finished a conversation with one of his fellow tankers, Axel decided to check his surroundings, throwing caution to the wind he opened his hatch to look around, and to get some fresh air. It was then that he heard the unmistaken sound of a rocket motor getting closer, as he turned to look, he saw the warhead streaming towards him, or more accurately, his tank. Before he could even react, it hit his tank, detonating and taking the tanks engine, immobilizing it and setting the engine on fire. He immediately retreated back into the tank as he heard more explosions and the sounds of gunfire and bullets pinging off armor break out, disturbing the generally quiet area. He immediately got onto the targeting system and looked for the hostiles attacking, finding some perched up on a hill a bit away, he had a HE round loaded up, then fired at the enemy. The shell whizzed through the air and impacted, sending bits and pieces of weaponry and organic material everywhere at that location.

"One down, how many others to go" Axel thought to himself, searching for more enemies, which he found in abundance. Calling out over the radio for a health check, he found that 2 of his 18 tank unit, had been taken out, with 4 more having been hit but not completely out of the fight. As he was talking to one of his men, he heard "Leeeeeerooooooyyyyy Jenkins!" over the radio. He immediately recognized who it was, Harvey, one of his men that was a bit too enthusiastic about old memes and media, and loved the phrase that he called out as he would rush his tank at the enemy. Luckily for the numbskull, he had gotten a more heavily armored variant of the MEAV, sacrificing some ammo storage and speed, for protection. He also named it the "Leroy Jenkins", Axel found his enthusiasm annoying, but also endearing, as Harvey would be the "life of the party" so to speak, he was the youngest of the unit too. As Axel watched the "Leroy Jenkins" plow into a enemy position, he saw the carnage unfold, most of the enemy were immediately either crushed or mowed down by the 12.7 millimeter remote controlled machine gun mounted on the top of the turret. Axel was about to turn his attention back to finding more of the enemy when he saw a explosion come out from the bottom of Harvey's tank, launching it into the air almost as if it didn't weigh 55 tons (110,000 pounds/49,895 kilograms). Axel watched it land on its side hard, then flop onto its belly, sitting right side up, Axel expected the tank to get back into the fray, but it didn't move. The tank was very beat up, with one of the tracks having come off completely, the turret seemingly frozen (maybe due to it having not moved at all since landing on its side), and the exhaust ports no longer blowing exhaust which means the engine died.

As he made note of all this, he then had to quickly react to a enemy seemingly trying to get close to him, which Axel stopped with a burst from the remote machine gun. He turned back to Harvey's tank, only to see it swarmed with enemy fighters, he watched as they managed to get the main hatch open on top of the turret then try to get inside, only for the first one to get a bullet through the skull for his troubles. Harvey came out of the turret, bloodied, angry, and looking like he went through the wringer a few times. Harv grabbed the closet enemy and wrestled him onto the ground, knocking down some of the enemy too, he managed to overpower the soldier and slit his throat with a knife. Axel thought that that would be the end of it, the enemy would mow him down and that would be it. Against all odds however Harvey immediately leapt into the midst of the enemy, his mouth wide open as he seemed to scream, either in rage or yelling his favorite phrase. The enemy combatants were stunned, then killed as it became a frenzy of bodies and blood, Harv managed to kill most of them, until he collapsed right after slicing open one of the enemy and literally ripping out his innards with his bare hands. The fear that was instilled into the enemy was so potent that they didn't even shoot his collapsed form, they just stared at him, keeping their distance. Until one of them shot Harv's body, then all of them unleashed a torrent of bullets on his body, ripping him apart.

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They were so scared of Harv's berserk moment that even after filling him with holes, they still kept firing from a good distance. They only stopped when they ran out of ammo, and even then most stood there still pulling the trigger on their firearm's with a thousand-yard stare. They probably would have still been there if not for a 105 millimeter HE round hitting the ground nearby and killing most, with rest cleaned up by the fire of a 12.7 millimeter machine gun. "Hopefully Harv's body can be recovered and sent home" Axel thought to himself, as he continued fighting the enemy forces, with every once in a while he would see or hear one of his units tanks go down, with every now and then their radios broadcasting their fate, their screams of pain, their calls out for help, and a even a few that curse the enemy and try to fight back even while burning alive in their tank. Only very few of the tanks that had gotten hit so badly they were actually almost completely disabled or they are on fire, would fight for a bit longer in defiance of the enemy.

The enemy on the other hand, seemed to never run out of bodies, for every 1 killed, 3 more would appear. Until a convoy of 5 transports, including the main truck, 18 tanks, 2 APC's, and 4 lightly armored trucks along with the 60 men/women in the convoy, were reduced to just 2 transports, 3 tanks, 1 armored truck, and just 9 soldiers including Axel in his tank. He was also starting to run dangerously low on ammo, with just 2 more HE shells and 9 APFSDS shells, and only 2 more belts for the machine gun. As he took stock of the situation, he saw the armored truck's machine gun turret swiveling around, almost always opening fire at the swarming enemy, even from a distance of around maybe 200 yards (182 meters roughly), Axel could see the red hot of the machine guns barrel poking out of the armored cover for the machine gun nest on the top of the vehicle. And as he watched, he saw them stop firing, so that the barrel didn't warp, with the few soldiers left in the vehicle firing their own weapons to provide cover.

They apparently were almost out of ammo and decided to do a final "Hail Mary" as the driver gunned the accelerator and drove the truck into a enemy position, just like Harvey had. As the truck ran over the enemy, they opened the doors and opened fire on the enemy, while they weren't on the level of savagery as Harv had been, Axel saw that they were still as efficient. They went down one by one, until the driver that hadn't gotten out of the truck was the only one left, he apparently decided that he would get more of them by just driving, and so he did, until the truck was riddled with so many holes, the truck was more air then truck. The driver went down doing what he did best, driving, he even got another of them under his tire as the vehicle came to a stop. While Axel was watching the final fight of the last armored truck, 2 tanks were destroyed, and the crew of the transports were killed. Leaving only Axel in his MEAV to stop a enemy force of around a stable 150 combatants, as the enemy closed on Axel and the main transport, he figured that he would follow his brothers and sisters in-arms and send his "Hail Mary"

He had already ran out of all of his ammunition so he was done fore anyways, but he could at least make all of this effort from whoever ambushed the convoy wasted, as they were obviously after the main transport. Remembering how he had indeed also been told to do this as the last resort, which was perfect as this was indeed his last resort, besides trying to run them over with his tank. He gunned the accelerator of the tank, pushing destroyed and burning vehicles out of the way so he could get to the transport, while he wasn't really that far from it, they had been spaced out, and in the fighting, Axel hadn't moved, while everyone else did, causing a sort of roadblock in his way to the transport. He finally broke through the accidently blockade and saw that he had a clear path to the transport, with 10 of the enemy's forces already at it, trying to break into the armored back of the transport. As he gunned the tanks engine, the enemy noticed him, and opened fire in a desperate attempt to stop him, a few RPG rounds even struck him as he hurtled towards the transport, but they didn't hit anything for the tanks movement, his gun was hit though, causing it to not be able to fire or move, but that was fine, it was already useless as he ran out of ammo and he was planning on ramming the transport and crushing whatever is inside it so that the enemy is denied a victory and has to settle for either a draw or failure, depending on how you look at it.

Axel closed his eyes as the tank collided with the transport, killing a few of the enemy who weren't fast enough to get out of the way. As the tank crushed the rear of the transport, a bright white light filled the area, emanating like a explosion with the transport as its focal point. Far away at the military installation, the man that briefed Axel, saw the sky light up and grimaced, "I was hoping it wouldn't come to that, this is going to set us back, a lot. I hope that Commander Bauer did his best, and that he finds peace." Back at the site of the light show, Axel is enveloped by the bright white light and it makes his skin feel like its melting, that his body is being crushed, that his ears are overloaded with sound, and then, nothing. All that's left in the area is a very large crater, with a smashed military transport with most of its rear gone, cut off just a bit behind the cab, the cut being perfect as if the area just stopped existing, or was moved.