21/Kryo/2467 R.S. 01:11:10
Central Highway District 4, Centralia.
*Fifteen Minutes After Detonation.*
The sound of gunshots and explosions wake 51 up, the dark street corners of Central Highway District 4 have turned into a contested warzone with UMCA forces closing in from the western Districts and from Kalderag while Millitant Soldiers hunker down in Central Highway Districts three through four. The nearby traffic lights faintly illuminate the Highway's crumbled underpass, a large, faint figure can be seen on the ground surrounded by rubble. Closing in on the silhouette, a dim orange light blinks on and off, it is Michael.
Crushed against the floor he remains immobilized as the suit runs its reboot sequence for the thirty-first time, he regains consciousness. From inside the helmet the User Interface gives off a scrambled image of its elements.
The thirty-first attempt of the suit to reboot both, its critical systems and Michael to functional standards is successful, an adrenaline injection is administered to get him back on his feet, he gasps for air, finally aware of his surroundings he tries to crawl out of the hole he had created when crashing into the concrete.
//BARRIER ONLINE//
51: "Vera, can you read me?... Vera?!"
A garbled voice replies, the helmet attempts to clean up the transmission, repeating it on every new "chunk" cleaned.
It repeats: "I h *KZZT* u! *KZZT* are you *KZZT*?"
After the whole cleaning process has finished, Vera's message says the following:
"I hear you! Michael, where are you located?"
He groans as he stands up, reaching into his waist straps for a metallic cylinder. "Setting up a beacon now." He says. Pushing the cylinder into the ground, it locks in place and opens up, turning into a small radar dish. This is a mechanism that allows Troopers to set up a "Beacon" that appears on the visor of any surrounding squadmates, in this particular case, 51 sets up a Beacon for 20 to see. Allowing her to track him to his current location.
She replies, but the same process of cleaning up the garbled transmission begins, after three cleanups the message is clear.
20: "Got it, on my way!"
As she finishes her SatCom transmission the Beacon appears on Vera's visor, providing her Michael's current location. "Understood, so, I guess this is war now huh?" Michael asks while checking his wounded right shoulder.
20: "With the conflicts in Caloris, the proxy war in Katanaska and now this, I'm sure it is time for Dovyo to put his foot down, although long-range comms are down so there's no telling what's happening at Central."
Michael reaches for his knife, only to feel nothing, it had stayed impaled on the hood of Sagras' Sedan. He retracts his hand and holds on to his right shoulder, "Where are my weapons?..." He thinks to himself while looking around in search of his rifle.
51: "I still cannot believe what just happened."
20: "I'm just glad to know you're not dead, had me worried as hell."
51: "Yeah, me too..."
20: "Hold on. I've got eyes on a damaged broadcast antenna, wanna meet half way?"
51: "Sure."
He kneels in order to recover his Beacon, once he reaches towards it, a loud explosion erupts behind him, he turns his head around and sees how the rubble from the building falls onto the streets. After watching the area for a couple of seconds he grabs the Beacon and hooks it to his waist strap.
He stands up and walks towards the rubble, he begins to investigate. With the sounds of the war raging on behind him, as he grabs a chunk of a concrete wall he notices an unburnt line that spans across three pieces. He measures the width of the light area, he notices that it is identical to the width of a rip-line and it instantly clicks in Michael's head.
Support the creativity of authors by visiting the original site for this novel and more.
"This was a breach!"
Suddenly a scream coming from above disrupts his silence. "AAH!"
A Millitant Soldier falls on top of Michael and tries to hold him down, the impact hurt Michael's shoulder but he continues regardless. In an attempt to shake him off, 51 turns erratically in all directions. Then, again coming from above, a second Soldier jumps off the third floor. 51 notices what they are trying to do so he grabs on tight to the Soldier's hands and runs directly to the wall next to him, before crashing against the wall he turns his body around and crushes the Soldier on his back. The second Soldier falls to the ground and rolls to cushion his fall, instantly recovering from the roll he pulls out a U-2 Pistol and shoots at Michael, the barrier becomes active, redirecting the bullets away from 51, upon seeing the bullets fly away from the yellowish haze of the Barrier, the Soldier is struck by awe.
However this is nothing new to Michael, he quickly grabs a chunk of rubble and hurls it at the Soldier, he tries to cover his face but the concrete crushes his forearm, along with the ferrite arm guard.
He falls to the ground in pain, 51 approaches him and takes the U-2.
51: "I'll keep her safe."
He tells the Soldier as he reloads the pistol.
20: "Michael I've arrived at the rendezvous point, setting up the beacon now."
51: "Understood, I'm on my way."
Now armed, Michael is falling back into himself and getting used to being the relentless Trooper he is.
The beacon pops up in 51's visor and he immediately bolts towards it.
He runs through the empty streets, riddled with trash and rubble. Gunshots and small explosions go off in the distance but he continues, as he runs around a corner he sees the destroyed highway depressed on top of a shallow crater and leveled buildings not so far away, this was ground zero. On the crater's rim, Millitant forces established a pillbox that uses suppressive fire in order to keeps Marines from pushing up the crater, since 51 has little firepower he decides to continue his path towards Vera. As he approaches the beacon two Dropships fly overhead, heading towards the warzones, he sees the broken antenna, along with Vera and two male Marines and walks to them.
20: "51, just in time, these Marines might be able to fix this up."
51: "Marines do you have any comms with Central?"
M1: "Negative sir, we were tasked with the reestablishment of communications in the sector, our squad got wiped out within minutes of landing, we're what's left."
M2: "It could take some time, since it's only us."
51: "Waste not a moment, Marines."
M2: "Yes, sir."
M1: "Understood."
The Marines get to work as they unpack their utility bags on the floor. One of them stands on the antenna and opens the transmitter's box.
They begin to dialogue about the antenna.
Meanwhile, Vera leaves them to it and walks a couple of paces to the north. Next to an abandoned marketplace, she reaches to her head and depressurizes her helmet *TSS* *TSS*, she sets down her helmet on the nearest table and sighs in frustration.
Seeing this, Michael approaches her and puts his hand on her shoulder, but she keeps looking down at her helmet.
51: "Hey, you alright?"
20: "Yeah... It's just that we failed."
51: "We couldn't do anything about it, Vera."
20: "Who knows, what if we were a tad bit earlier?"
51: "I know, but he had explosives strapped on the car and the detonation was under his control at all times."
20: "But we failed! Hundreds of innocent people got evaporated in seconds!"
51: "Vera, listen to me, we did not fail, Sagras was going to blow up regardless, he confessed to have ''set the plans in motion'' or something like that."
20: "You don't understand..."
51: "If I hadn't pressured Sagras to prematurely detonate the Sedan, we'll never know who or what the original target was."
Vera remains silent, her black hair covering the side of her face. Michael backs off to give her thinking space and turns around.
20: "Wait, Mike-
Michael stops.
-I am sorry..."
51: "Don't be, we'll get to the bottom of this and hold them accountable."
Michael continues to walk and stands beside the Marines. One of them is giving instructions on how to replace destroyed parts to the other.
51: "Any progress?"
M2: "Yeah, comms should be up any time soon, hang tight."
51: "We don't have much time, Marine."
The Marine sitting on top of the antenna closes the small Transmitter box and flips a red switch on the side of the box, the top of the antenna glows red and waves of radio chatter flow through their comms.
"Everyone get into your designated channels, I'm going to try and contact Central." Michael orders the Marines and Vera. He starts shuffling through the many communication channels and opens Dovyo's direct line. Once the suits notify 51 that they are successfully connected, he begins to speak.
51: "This is UMCAMT zero-zero-five-one, General, we are under siege in district four, Diplomat Sagras Nohem was the epicenter of the detonation, therefore integer no longer, if you're getting this please come in!"
Complete silence follows the transmission, 51 looks at the Marines, and the black visor of his helmet stares them down. The Marines look back at him, sure that they had done everything correctly.
21/Kryo/2467 R.S. 01:40:22
Central Highway District 4, Centralia.
* Forty-four Minutes After Detonation*
The distant sounds of automatic fire shroud the District, Soldiers against Marines, they battle each other for mere inches of territory within the District. Centralian Dropships ferry Marines in and out of the battlefield, casualties are in the thousands.
Running out of patience, Michael walks closer to the antenna and retries to contact the General.
51: "This is UMCAMT zero-zero-five-one, anyone getting this please co-"
A garbled transmission bursts through his ears, unintelligible words overlap the next and the next. The connection with the Centralian Battle Net is stronger than ever. He begins to isolate the channels that were automatically opened but was interrupted by the General himself.
"Michael, we've received your transmission, Ankiros and Jacklyn are on their way to your location, State of emergency has been declared, this is war."
Vera puts her helmet back on and walks to the antenna, standing next to Michael they wait until their reinforcements arrive. Meanwhile, the Marines stand by for any new orders.