They didn’t care about stealth. Not anymore, not with lives on the line. Three zombies stood guard outside the entrance to the control room, and Ratcatcher jumped ahead of the group, turning the heads of two of them into pancakes splattered against the solid metal with a double dropkick. She bounced off the wall of the control center and fired her rifle, ending the life of the third shambler. Easy. She didn’t feel much about destroying shamblers; none of them were alive. But the ease with which she killed the undead unnerved her. She could have taken a life with the same ease.
A door opened, and a shambling zombie fell backward with a hole in its chest as Elina fired her Tauros shotgun once. It was a very simple weapon, a remodeled shardgun so favored by the Wolf Tribe. In place of buckshot, the Tauros fired armor-piercing shards, but in a narrower cone than the wide spread of a shardgun and boasted a greater impact. At close range, it was a one-shot, one-kill weapon against most Abnormals. Elina moved in and took down two more in the corridor leading to the control center.
Rowen flew into the control center, facing the zombies as they rose from their seats. Here, within this place, the trainees didn’t dare to fire out of worry to make it impossible to turn off the jamming system in secret. But in doing so, they were inviting the risk of enemies firing at them. And the white-haired boy’s power was a perfect tool to solve this conundrum.
The zombies reached for their machine guns, and their legs gave way, their knees breaking under the massive weight that fell on their shoulders. Rotting hands missed the handles and the corpses fell face down. Their bodies began to splatter on the floor at the trainee’s gesture. Rowen pointed his index fingers at the ground, and six bodies disintegrated under the pressure of his power, spilling pus, rotting intestines, yellow splintered bones, and worms onto the ground.
Elina leaned against a wall and vomited into her helmet, pointing at the control panel with a shaking hand. Ratcatcher left Rowen to watch over her and darted toward the terminals, kicking an operator’s seat aside. The stench within this place was unbearable; mushrooms and moss grew on the walls; parts of the seats were fused with zombies, and their flesh remained on them when the shamblers stood up.
Gotta keep my helmet on at all times. Ratcatcher decided, ripping the connecting chords from a central terminal. The shamblers operated the devices through cybernetic implants, but there was no way she would plug in this filth into her armor. The girl used the locksmith instead, letting the machine break the simplistic code used by Chosen Prince’s minions, and smiled happily at the sight of the jamming system going offline. Through the open window of the tower, she saw red flashes licking the air and bright explosions behind the bastions. The instructor and his team had started as well. She grimaced in disgust as she saw carpets of insects crawling from cracks in the ground, stirred by the tremors.
“Here goes nothing,” she mumbled, and transmitted the codes to the locksmith. These weren’t just general communication codes between Iterna and the Oathtakers, but the ones used for immediate diplomatic contact. “This is Eliza Vong of Iterna. Our rescue team has located survivors within the Ascension Tower. Oathtakers’ Command, I know you can hear me; please respond.”
“Who are you, and how did you get these codes?” An operator demanded to know. She tried to call the image upon the main display, but the damned thing was too rusted, and Ratcatcher didn’t dare establish a direct connection between her armor and this filth of equipment.
“We already told you, ma’am!” Elina came closer, struggling against another urge to vomit. “Iternian rescue team, we have found your wounded civilians and are now pleading you not to fire at the Ascension Tower.”
“And we are supposed to believe your words, why?” the comms operator asked, but Ratcatcher saw that the woman took them seriously. New and new contacts were joining the conversation, listening silently.
“Because we have proof,” Rowen said. The boy came to the terminal, sighed, and allowed his armor to manifest a chord. Squeezing his eyes shut, Rowen pushed the end of the chord into a socket on a terminal, creating a link between his armor and a piece of machinery covered in dried blood.
“This… general, I believe they are speaking the truth,” the operators said.
“Who are you?” An unfamiliar voice demanded to know. The speaker’s voice sounded terrible, as if giant bones were rubbing against each other to mimic human speech through friction. “Shadows?”
“Yes, sir!” Ratcatcher lied quickly. If the Shadows’ reputation would make the Northern Army trust them, all the better. “Shadows, that we are, sir, a junior team, tasked with rescuing our civilians, found yours, decided to call, sir!”
Elina twirled a finger at her temple, and Ratcatcher shrugged apologetically. She was about to admit her lie when Elina pondered a little and put a thumb up, prompting the trainee to continue with her lie.
“Stay in the tower; I shall arrive soon to confirm your words in person,” the same voice said, his speech tearing at Ratcatcher’s ears like knives. “If you have lied to me in any way, I will tear out your spine and eat your marrow before your very eyes.”
The communication was cut off, and Ratcatcher dropped to her knees, giggling a little, and allowed Elina to hug her. The girl’s internal systems had already cleaned up the vomit, but Ratcatcher didn’t care. She was exhausted and frightened, and the troubles didn’t seem to end. What does this man mean by arriving soon? Wasn’t the Northern Army supposed to hit another target before encircling Birchshell?
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“Bye-bye, my spine, I guess,” Ratcatcher laughed. “Any idea what a new one costs these days?”
“Eh, they’re part of universal healthcare…” Elina started talking and cut short.
They heard it. A step above them. The trainees pushed each other aside, and the lines charted the ceiling. Thin cuts enveloped the stone ceiling, and it broke down, pouring stones at the trainees. With it came something else: a long mechanical appendage of segmented, sharp pieces with a cruel stinger at the end. The stinger pierced the place where Elina’s head had been, and the tail swung itself, knocking the rifle out of Ratcatcher’s hands. A figure in power armor jumped down, kicked Elina in the stomach, punched her in the throat, and ripped off her shotgun. Rowen reached for his own weapons, and a single blur of the metal tail left ruined metal in his arms and long cuts across his armor.
Ratcatcher punched at the figure’s back, but it made a graceful pirouette, evading both her punch and Elina’s low swipe, and landed at the back of the control center as stones kept pouring down, making the floor and walls tremble. The trainees found themselves with their backs to the observation window and their opponent, a tall man, bedecked in green power armor.
His suit looked odd; despite the man’s incredible agility, it had no room for joints; metal plates merged into one another. His helmet was round, with four green lenses moving on his forehead, and the helmet left the lower part of the attacker’s face wide open, revealing an ugly grin full of metal teeth and unhealthily pale and sallow flesh in desperate need of water and soap. His hands and feet ended in claws, and the metal tail came out of the middle of his backpack.
“What fun!” the man laughed in a clear voice. “New supplicants for the Pile! Come out, come out; there’s no need to sneak around.”
“You’re the one to talk,” Ratcatcher growled, picking up the mancatcher. She glanced aside, noticing the wreckage of her rifle. “Who are you supposed to be?”
“Hustler, at your service, precious sacrifice.” The man bowed, pressing an arm to his chest and spreading his tail aside with another. “A humble Oracle in the service of his Excellence, the One True King.”
“Hustler?!” Elina cried out. “But you’re dead! The young heroes threw you off Stonehelm’s walls!”
“And that is exactly why you always make a control shot to confirm a kill,” Hustler laughed, but for a second his smirk twitched, and he raised a hand to his metal teeth. “When his Excellency comes back, I’ll have a long and very deep discussion with those little pests. Birchshell’s seedlings will wither yet by my hand, have no worry. But enough dilly-dallying! Lay down your weapons, strip yourselves of this unnecessary metal, and join the Pile! Inhale the blessed fumes and offer your bodies for the resurrection of the ruler of this world.”
Hustler’s lenses shifted, and this time it was Ratcatcher who laughed. She could see! With the interference gone, the suits reestablished the connection. She saw Edward and Esmeralda running away from the artillery fire. A tingle of concern touched her heart, but then she saw through the instructors’ eyes as the rockets and missiles appeared from over the horizon, detonating the artillery on the wall. Their own explosives went next, and Jumail closed the distance to the armory, tossed his own bomb inside, and ran for his life. All around Birchshell, pillars of fire started rising. A burning, cleansing flame appeared in the realm of death and disease, heralding the return of life.
And life came! Armored helicopters and figures in battle plates emerged out of the dark clouds around Birchshell. The Northern Army charged in, and the helicopters’ guns opened fire, creating clearings to land the troops. White and green armored figures landed on the wall, jetpacks falling from their backs. Templars and Crusaders cut deep into the enemy formation, striking the damned with flaming maces and blocking shots with their tower shields.
“Gonna make a hard pass on your offer, pal,” Rowen chuckled and pointed at the window behind. “Your merry band is about to become history, and lest you have failed to notice, there are three of us and only one of you. Be a good little boy and sit down so we can tie you up. You’re done for.”
“Infiltration team, beware!” Augustus’ words were cut off by the sound of combat.
“And you are dead.” Hustler shrugged.
Rowen was the first to react. Ratcatcher couldn’t understand how he, of all of them, had noticed that faint vibration on the ground, but the boy threw his hands aside and sent the girls away with a burst of telekinesis. And the ground cracked under the pressure of a three-fingered clawed hand rising from it. The statue overseeing the gruesome pile came to life, climbed up to the control center, and thrust one of its hands into it. Rowen barely managed to throw a barrier around himself, saving his life from being popped like a water balloon.
The control center came apart, and its section started cascading down, thudding against the statue’s iron armor. Ratcatcher was about to grab the statue’s shoulder when she saw a pincer aimed at her head. The trainee jerked her head away, and the pincer flew past her, changing direction to wrap around her neck. Hustler pulled her down with him, straight to the metal platform below.
She tried to break his grip and slash at him with the mancatcher, only to have her blades blocked by the clawed hands. They fell a distance the length of a small skyscraper, and Ratcatcher hit the metal floor with all the momentum she had accumulated during the fall, plus the thrust added to her fall by Hustler’s tail. The armor saved her from the worst, at the cost of several cracks exposing the nanofibers beneath, but the sheer force of the fall beat the air out of her, making her entire body scream in pain. Her throat hurt the most; the Oracle had tried to twist her neck, and a few bones cracked.
I live still. Ratcatcher struggled to stand on her arms. Adrenaline and painkillers were injected into the bloodstream to help the body combat the pain reverberating in every part of her body, shaking every organ possible. Time to work.
The metal platform trembled but held their weight as Hustler landed nearby, uncoiling his tail off her neck. Her trusty mancatcher fell nearby, and she reached for it with a trembling hand as Hustler’s shadow fell on her. The man landed on both hands and stood unharmed, a smile on his torn lips.
“Weakling.” A kick raised Ratcatcher in the air.
The claws pierced through the helmet, tearing the nostril of her prolonged snout clear, and the force of the kick shattered part of her helmet, leaving the girl looking at Hustler with her normal face. The HUD flashed and readjusted, showing a slightly reduced image to her human eye, still hidden behind the helmet. Hustler laughed, grabbed Ratcatcher by the neck, and lifted the girl up, locking his lenses with her beady eye.
Above them, the statue smashed and punched, trying to end Elina while Rowen struggled for his own life. The HUD showed her the instructor, trapped in his own desperate battle, bleeding out of a horrid wound in his chest. It showed her Jumail, taking blow after blow from several Oracles as the boy tried to retreat to the allied troops. Everything turned around in an instant, and the group found themselves in dire straits. It was all alone against this freak. And she inhaled the disgusting, unfiltered, foul air of the tower.