THE REMNANTS of Unit 17 had just finished a quick word over their fallen comrades when one of the soldiers on watch called out in warning, firing off her weapon. Her volley was answered by the blinding illumination of energy lances. From a position southwest, three hard beams etched themselves in the black of night, vaporizing chunks of earth and corpses alike.

All heads turned as a stream ripped out of the night to destroy one of the hovercarts. Men and women screamed, their bodies flung into the night with the cargo of weapons and parts.

Den cried out, gripping his left shoulder. Kensuke pulled him from the second cart and covered his friend with his body. "Are you alright?!" He screamed over the noise of encroaching battle.

His friend nodded. "Shrapnel. No big deal." But the sweat on his brow and the pinched expression of his face said otherwise.

"Sasagawa samurai!" A went up a cry from one of the men, his battlevisor having identified an enemy combatant on the field.

Surprise attack!? This late in the evening? How insane were the Sasagawa? Just how desperate or mad were they to see the fall of the Tachiyama that they would risk attacking at night?

Den swore, knocked Kensuke off him, grabbed his weapon and started to charge with them.

Kensuke grabbed him. "Wait, you fool! You're wounded!"

"The Sasagawa are here!" Den replied mindlessly.

Kensuke grabbed him by the tunic. "We have orders. We're supposed to retreat! Let's get out of here! Leave the Sasagawa to the monsters!"

"You coward! BC Tachiyama is still out there!" A soldier named Hikaru spat at him. "I'd rather die than run from the Sasagawa scum!" And ran off into the dark, half the group in tow, warcries on their lips.

Den nodded to his friend and followed the others.

"Den!" Kensuke screamed. What the hell? Hadn't they had enough death for one day? They'd come so close to actually surviving, and they wanted to run out into the dark!?

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Tachiyama was samurai, with a full complement of weaponry on the mecha she could take care of herself. Unit 17 wasn't properly outfitted for battle; they would be slaughtered!

More to the point, if this were a second attack by the Sasagawa, surely it was their duty to get back to the castle and report the oncoming forces, not throw themselves to the wolves like so much meat. There was nothing mere footsoldiers could do against an augmented samurai. Except die.

He cursed. And then he winced as the sound of his comrades calls to combat and vengeance turned to blood-curdling death knells. Add to that the roar and screeches of the monsters around them, and the world sounded as if it were coming to an end.

Part of Kensuke yearned to run after his friends and comrades, his body fidgeting involuntarily. He was caught between joining them and following the BC's orders. She had said to evacuate. The field was her responsibility now. "Get lit." He spoke to aloud to himself. "They're being slaughtered. One more man isn't going to make a difference." It was a comforting lie. But what about the BC? Did she know enemy samurai had stepped onto the field?

He scanned the field where she had been previously. Through the battlevisor, the outline of her Demigod immediately lit up in a friendly orange, while around her, a pack of small to medium sized creatures nipped and jumped at her. Their roars were followed by yelps of surprise and pain as the BC made quick work of her foes. The power of the six-meter tall power armor was tremendous, and formed the core of patrols about the castle and the fiefdom at large. Without them, the castles and the towns they guarded would be nothing more than open buffets for monsters, muties, and marauders alike.

He considered informing her of the Sasagawa approaching, but it was not the place of the lower ranks to advise their superiors of situations. A samurai was supposed to know the battlefield intimately. If she did not engage the other augmented, it was for a reason. Still, he was uncomfortable with his situation.

There came a panicked cry over the comm. Instinctively, he took a guarded crouching stance, his weapon at the ready. Returning his focus to the battle between his comrades and the approaching Unknown, he winced as a blinding fanfare of laser brushed the area, eradicating the swarm of friendly orange auras around it in a cacophony of blood-curdling screams.

The ashigaru's guilt-ridden conscious bordered on panic as the distance between himself and the unknown target closed. Should he call the BC for backup? There was no way he could engage it alone, and if he waited any longer for her to notice, it would be too late. Kensuke shut his eyes for a moment and made up his mind – he had to inform her. It was his duty.

But as he reached to activate the commsys stud on his battlevisor, out of the dark, a second blue dot flared to life, and then transformed into the flashing red of "INCOMING PROJECTILE".

Kensuke wouldn't have had time to dodge the broken corpse of the monster as it plowed into him, even if he had wanted to. The dead beast was mammoth; its sprawled limbs and tail knocked him off his feet, slamming him into the hovercart.