[I’m sorry, Teddy is currently occupied and cannot answer your call. Please call again later.]
“Don’t hang up on… motherfucker!” Celestia hated when things didn’t go as planned, so having one of the Samurai she was working with die within five minutes of engaging the Antithesis, and having her group split up, had put her in a bad mood. It got worse when that diminutive samurai started firing a siege gun around, it was irresponsible to fire that thing anywhere near the main supports, even if it did work. Now Teddy was firing it again AND ignoring her calls. Celestia was going to throttle that girl the next time she saw her.
“Relax Sis, I’m sure Teddy had a good reason to fire that gun. She is distracting the Antithesis so we can get rid of the hives.” Celestia shot her sister an angry look. Atlantica was holding her massive weapon in one hand, and looking off into the distance. A massive pillar of smoke was rising from the approximate direction that Teddy was situated.
Across the room Humboldt shifted, “Look, I haven’t known Teddy for much longer than either of you, but I know she wouldn’t just fire something like that off without a reason. If she's not answering all we can do is work towards our objective, instead of worrying about what she’s doing.”
“Yes! Let us move on!” Everyone turned to look at the team’s last member, Magpie. The woman had shown up out of nowhere a couple minutes ago, and after explaining where she’d been to Celestia and Atlantica she’d almost instantly become distracted by a random device she’d bought out of her extensive catalog collection. She’d been relatively quiet, and distracted, since arriving so having her suddenly focused on the conversation was a little bit surprising.
“Right, well the hives are a priority, but I’m a little worried about the damage that girl is doing.” Celestia said.
“Psshhhh. I’ve met the girl, if she’s firing that gun it’s because she needs to. And, if for some reason THAT fails, she’ll figure something else out. She’s not the type to back away from a fight.” Maggie threw the device she was holding over her shoulder, causing both sisters to flinch.
“You seem to have a lot of confidence in that girl,” said Atlantica.
“She’s good at adapting. Sure, the bear thing is cute, but from what I’ve seen she’s not afraid of trying new things. From what I’ve heard when you were all split up she sent you the majority of her forces,” Magpie gestured to one of the bears performing overwatch, “but she still decided to try and lure the Antithesis to her location in order to cover your advance. By the time I arrived at her location she’d built an entire fortress, blocked off every approach, including the sewers, and even had devices in place to automatically clear the Antithesis biomatter up so it couldn’t overwhelm her defenses. She's holding the line, despite the overwhelming number of Antithesis throwing themselves at her position. It was fascinating. You two," she said, pointing at the twins, "could learn a thing or two from her.”
This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.
Celestia sighed, “Maggie, please...”
“When’s the last time you used something other than your orbs, or even a new type of orb? Hmmmm? So set in your ways. Effective, for the most part, but when you run into something you can’t deal with,” Magpie huffed, "all you can do is run away.” The woman turned on her heel and started walking across the catwalk towards the next tower.
There was a moment of silence as the three remaining women watched her go. “What exactly was that about?” Humboldt asked.
“She's always preached having options, and adaptation, but that undertone is because she's mad at us, REALLY mad at us. Maggie thinks we never should have left the city, even with all the problems we had with Sonic and his team.” Atlantica said in a quiet voice. “She’s right, we put our personal interests first and the city suffered for it.”
Across the room Celestia looked away, clenching her fists tightly, but she didn’t say anything.
“You know, Magpie may be right, you never should have left because you disagreed with some of the other local Samurai,” Humboldt started, causing both twins to shoot her angry looks, “but you came back and that means a lot. Show her that you’ve learned from this situation, do better in the future, and you’ll earn her respect again.”
The twins exchanged a brief look, then nodded before standing up a little straighter. Humboldt started turning towards the door to follow Magpie, then paused. “And try to give Teddy the benefit of the doubt. I know she just looks like a kid, but she’s done a lot to prove herself to myself and others. We wouldn’t be making such good progress without her help.”
Celestia frowned as Humboldt stomped off, the giant suit shaking the catwalk with each step, her sister a few steps behind. She was about to follow when she received a message in her Augs, all it contained was a single picture. The picture was shot from above, and showed a street that had been devastated. There were some heavily damaged metal walls, a building half collapsed, even the street had been ripped up, but in the center was the huge Antithesis which scattered their group and threw her plans into chaos. Dead.
At the bottom of the picture was a single line. ‘You’re Welcome’
Celestia smiled, despite herself. “Fine, I guess you get a pass this time.”