A handful of privates were assigned to guard duty at the broadsword storage hangar. While the Sabers and Stiletto were housed in smaller cases spread out around the city, the size and ordinance of the Broadswords demanded they be placed in a hangar within the base. The facility itself was almost entirely automated: self-maintenance kept track of every shell and scratch; the automated response system, alerted by the Sabers, would deploy them.
With most of their job taken up by robots, the privates played darts instead. The Pantheon was just about the cushiest posting possible with the most public prestige. There have been more drills than usual lately, but that was it. They were supposed to be on alert for an attack, but they’ve been on alert since bomb boy.
They heard the bathroom door swing open and heavy stomps passed by them. Only after a moment did they realize that none of them had gone to the bathroom. They saw a bone golem survey the rows of drones in the hangar.
Bullets bounced off the golem that pulled out a black canister. He pulled the pin off, threw the canister, and unleashed a tongue of plasma that lapped down an entire shelf. He continued with the rest of the shelves like he was tossing breadcrumbs at birds.
Since conventional arms were ineffective, they fired their cryoguns to freeze him. They managed to freeze an arm when one of them was dragged away. Another was suddenly launched into the ceiling. The rest were mauled by the air as slashes from nowhere tore them apart. One of the last ones holding his wounds saw it: from thin air manifested a winged, bug-eyed beast that licked its bladed tail.
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At the first gunshot, Garrick sent out the alert. At least it should have been sent out. Every soldier on the base was ordered to the drone hanger while the guards in the lobby and the dorms kept the inhabitants sheltered from whatever was outside. Beyond that, however, some kind of interference blocked his connection. The guards confirmed that their commlinks were not functioning outside of Garrick’s messages.
If it was a simple jamming signal, then we should have been equally affected. If my mutation can combat it, then it must be another mutation.
The first unidentified entity was some kind of golem that seemed to have enhanced strength and brushed off small-arms fire. The golem focused on destroying equipment: drones, vehicles, explosives, and cryogenic weapons. It used some kind of grenade that left molten pools.
The second entity has not been identified. It was focused on attacking those with explosives or cryogenic weaponry as they were the only things effective against the first entity. It must have some kind of camouflage and flight that is used to maneuver and strike with impunity while the first entity drew all the attention.
To attack in the middle of the base, WhiteOut must have been correct about their teleportation capability. For now, they were ordered to focus on the second entity that Garrick would track with Sabers.
Then there are the civilians in the lobby and the mutants in the dorms: if the attack is just in the base, then this area could be evacuated, but with teleportation on the table who knows what could happen.
What’s going on in the other areas: Hannah, Max, Kenny, Aaliyah, WhiteOut. If he sent someone out, they could message the others and return, but they don’t know the range of the jammer or their whereabouts. That would have to do, so he sent out a group to drive until their communications function again to have the vigil evacuated and Hannah recalled.
Delsin and Todd could also appear, then there is the jammer whose whereabouts are unknown along with whatever else the enemy has. With the LittleBoy, Garrick could put out this fire himself in a moment but—
'don’t let him out of his cuffs, and don’t let him leave your sight.'
That is what WhiteOut said. Though he rarely understood her, Garrick never took WhiteOut’s suggestions lightly. Most of the other guests were visibly uneasy, shaken at the echo of gunfire. But the man of honor was calm as could be. He’s in his cuffs and he has his guards and drones to watch him.
'If I’m as dangerous as you say, then it would be best to kill me.'
No. He was in custody. If he became a threat to lives, then they would do what they must. But for now, he was just a detainee, owed as much responsibility as anyone else, and he would answer them once this was over. That was the correct thing to do. That was the right thing to do, as laid out by the rules of civil society.
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'And if they get it wrong? Would you be able to accept that?'
Heroes existed to prove what was right. Yes. It would just take a moment. He opened one of the windows and took his stance. When the second entity was cornered the way he wanted, he would swoop in to neutralize it and then let them handle the first entity while he returned. The guards here could hold it down for that long, while a detachment of Sabers would search for the jammer, assuming that they must be nearby.
That was the plan until the door to the kitchen behind the secretary's desk was kicked open. The caterers that were inside filed out with their hands up, and behind them were a handful of bulky, armed intruders wearing black armor. The guests screamed at the sight and the guards trained their weapons on the intruders. The intruders had patches with a gaudy skull, their guns were slung at the waist, and based on their strange heat signature there was more under their fatigues and body armor than there appeared to be.
One of them carried an axe, but it seemed to be too heavy for them as had to move it like a walking stick. They were outnumbered, but their means of teleportation and other capabilities were unknown.
“Listen up ‘ere, we’re the Immortals. I know you’re excited to play with ya fancy toys. But you got to put ‘em away now, lovelies, you might hurt someone,” an intruder said as she elbowed a caterer in the rib. “I mean it's dangerous to have civies here ‘innit? You should get them outta here. No objections to that roight?”
“You want to… evacuate them?” asked Garrick. The one with an axe struggled to climb the stairs to his office. That can’t be good.
“If you want to start a fight, I’m game, but the way we’re both hard the one who’ll first bleed will be them.” She fanned the barrel of her gun across the lobby, to the gasp of the audience. Was she the jammer? No, the suit should be able to detect the excess radiation emitted by her body if she had an active mutant ability. They're claiming the name
‘Immortal’ for themselves, is it the same for the entities outside, or do they have a different name? Perhaps their original plan was to use the first two entities to draw attention away from guarding the prisoner. But then, what was the axe-wielder going to the office for, and why do they care about the civilians? Was it just to buy time for whatever else they need to do?
It didn’t matter. They could not start a firefight that would risk innocent lives if they could help it. It seemed like the outside entities were on the defensive now. The second entity was stunned by a pike and revealed to be something otherwordly before being rescued by the first. These things would have to be dealt with as they come.
He agreed to their terms, to the surprise of the guests, while he whispered through the user interface of the Knights’ helmets. Two of the guards stayed with the detainee, but the Immortals paid no mind to him.
The caterers and guests were nervously escorted out of the building through the stairwell by an even more uneasy alliance. The Knights were coordinated to position themselves for maximum advantage as soon as the last heel is out the door as both they and the Immortals were being spread throughout the building. The guests were requested to help transport the caterers away. All under the haunting sound of gunfire coming from across the fence; a specter of things to come.
In the conference lobby itself, only seven remained in a standoff: Garrick himself, the two guards, the cockney lady immortal, another unidentified immortal, the axe wielder in his office, and the detainee who was still calm as can be. Garrick awaited for the last heel to leave the front entrance’s doorframe. On his command, the Knights would draw against the Immortals and he would subdue the one in his office, then he would swoop through the building to help take down the rest of the intruders.
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Ever since he was a boy, Khalid had been asked to carry the weight of others—literally, as he was born the strongest of his brothers. At first, his family saw him as a blessing, and he was proud of his strength. But as soon as it was claimed that his strength was the work of a jinn, his family cursed his birth, and all he loved fell away.
He wouldn’t say he was proud of everything that has happened since then. The work of jinns was far different from what the people in his hometown had imagined, but they were certainly jinns all the same. However, the weight he carried gave his life meaning, and today he carried a heavy honor: the moon axe of the Uncle. The axe has felled whole forests. Today, Khalid was entrusted to cut down a single tree.
He was in Garrick’s office now, he stopped to take a breather as this axe was heavy indeed. There was a desk, a creepy ant farm, a mini-fridge, a workbench, and the big computer-looking thing that Khalid was sent for. He was told to “hack into the mainframe”. This would hinder Garrick’s long-range technological manipulation and allow Auntie to download the schematics for Tartarus. Khalid was not the best with technology, yet even he thought that did not sound right. He followed her orders regardless.
He took the axe to the air with both hands but he stumbled and had to adopt a wide stance to wield it. Stabilized, he crashed the axe down through the computers and cratered the floor.
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Garrick felt a nail get hammered into his brain. He held his head with one gauntlet and cracked the tile beneath him with the other. The Knights opened fire, which forced the two immortals to take cover behind the secretary’s desk. The Knights kicked over tables to ramshackle their own cover from the return fire.