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===[CHAPTER 45: BROKEN TRANSMISSION]===
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With the evening sun chasing their backs, they drove briskly through the streets of Helena. Eventually the concrete blocks of Renewal faded away and morphed into the neglected tenements of the city. The people were either gone or hidden inside of their sheltered hiding spots. Eli could hardly tell. What he did know was that he was exhausted. He refused to blink for fear that letting his eyelids touch for even a second would seal them shut. But eventually the rocking motion of the truck got to him, and he drifted into sleep.
It had been a long day after all. He deserved at least a moment’s rest.
He awoke not too long after to Sparrow elbowing his shoulder. When his groggy eyes opened, he saw the sight of a palm tree passing slowly over his head. Its ferny crest flanked by the increasing dusk of the evening sky. The ULA base was within view, yellow stucco walls like an ancient Spanish Missionary.
Slowly the jeep lurched forward, the engine sounding as if it would give in at any moment. Yet it held firm enough to cross the last few meters.
“Sleeping on my watch?” Sparrow asked him with an impish grin as they approached the base.
“It’s been a long day.”
“There’s still plenty to do.”
“I know,” Eli flatly said. Even he could hear the exhaustion in his own voice though. He hoped that there would be at least some chance for him to get an hour or so of rest before they embarked on their next job, but it seemed dashed by Sparrow’s insistence on being hasty. Not like Eli could blame him, they were pressed for time after all. If anything, it should’ve been Eli trying to rush Sparrow for speed, but alas, he was under Sparrow’s command. For now.
“I need you to stay awake long enough so we can get a message through to your commanders. Now that their Anti-Air missiles are down, we can do what you came to Helena for in the first place.”
Eli nodded, “No rest for the wicked.”
Sparrow chuckled, “First time I’ve heard that one.”
“I think it’s from the Bible.”
“The what?”
“It’s an Earth thing… a religious book.”
“Ah,” Sparrow hummed, “You’re a believer?”
Eli shook his head. Sparrow frowned as he turned back to the road.
“You need to tell me more about Earth when you get the chance.”
Eli chuckled, “I’m sure Overwatch will do that enough on their own.”
“I want to hear it from the perspective of a prisoner, not from the generals.”
“Maybe one day,” He repeated, “So long as you tell me about Narva.”
Sparrow looked satisfied with the answer, “You have yourself a deal,” his peppered hair blew in the wind. Through dark sunglasses, Sparrow seemed deep in thought. The glint of the setting orange sun shining off the dark brown lenses which cast shadows over his eyes. Eli thought back to Otaes. He remembered her warnings about Sparrow. Eli couldn’t say that he trusted Sparrow fully, but he trusted him enough to keep him alive during a fight. At least, if Sparrow’s safety was on the line too.
He felt tempted to ask what had happened between Sparrow and Otaes that she felt it dire enough to literally grab onto Eli’s sleeve to stop him from going with Sparrow. But at the same time, would asking Sparrow ruin what could otherwise be a good shot at gaining his trust? He looked like a worthwhile ally, someone who had a lot of soldiers at his disposal and a lot of sway within this new world. It’d be wise to remain on Sparrow’s good side. And even if Sparrow did tell, whose to say he’d tell the truth? Whose to say he wasn’t a liar, perhaps a reason why Otaes was so untrusting of him? Perhaps Eli had already been duped by the man and he hadn’t realized it…?
He kept his lips sealed. Now wasn’t the time or place. But he wasn’t sure if either would come to ask before it was revealed to him. One way or another.
“Speaking of Earth…” Sparrow started again, the sunlight glinting off the glossy metallic frame of his aviators as he gave Eli a quick glance with his hazel eyes above them, “You’ve got family back home?”
Silently Eli shook his head. Sparrow raised his eyebrow in almost disbelief, “None? Really?”
“Lost them when I was a kid.”
“Ah…” Sparrow nodded along, “Close friends? Lover?” He added a mischievous inflection in his voice when he said the word lover, and gave Eli a nudge on the shoulder. It made Eli chuckle a bit.
“Aw come on-“
“Well spit it out,” Sparrow gave Eli a playful punch in the shoulder with his free hand, “Tell me, who’s your darling sweetheart waiting for you back home? Eh? Who’s the girl? Or boy?”
“Dude, what?”
“Look Eli, it's 1240 here on Narva. Being gay's quite common in The Commonwealth, that’s completely fine-“
“No, it's not that,” Eli chuckled to himself, "Just... there's nobody."
“Aww come off it. You seem dead set on getting back to Earth, you’ve gotta have somebody back home. Mother? Father? Close friend? Romantic interest? Anyone?”
Eli pondered the question for a bit, craning the question to watch the landscape pass by them. He of course had friends. Briefly. When he was a kid the friendships he made were valuable to him but unfortunately, they could never last long. Either he was relocated or the other kids were. When he was in Korea things were a bit more stable with his squad. He had close friends in that ill-fated squad of soldiers during the outbreak of war, and if he was willing to ignore the literal torture they were subjected to, he could clearly remember the good moments spent with them. A few of those marines he'd even classified as close to his heart. Really close. Romantically? Probably not. But as close to that as he felt with just about anyone...
Only for him to abandon them all in a nuclear explosion. The very people who had his back through the worst moments of his life were all dead. Betrayed... the memory of Seoul brought a disgusted scowl to Eli's face, and he fiercely shook his head, "Nah. Not really," He answered with finality to Sparrow's question. Silently, he dreaded the idea of having to reveal the true reason why he was imprisoned to Sparrow, when he realized he hadn't even told Misfit the full story of what happened yet. Juma's warning rang in his head...
“So, you’re just alone? That’s it? How come?”
Eli shrugged, “Between having my home washed away by a storm and spending most of my childhood moving between refugee centers by myself I just… never had the time to really make friends. At all. Or I guess I never learned how to.”
“You don’t need to learn what’s natural. Nature just finds a way with that kind of thing, you know?”
“Yeah, well it never found its way with me,” Eli sighed, “Thanks for reminding me that I’m lonely too, I’ll add that to the list of reasons why I hate myself.”
“Fucks sake, now you're making me depressed.”
"You asked."
Sparrow chuckled, "I guess I did... but what about Misfit?"
The question sent a twinge of dread through Eli's core, "What about them?" He asked.
"You all seem close. Like family, you know?"
"Well yeah, I mean, they're good friends of mine. Of course. But, that's just because of the circumstances. We don't have a choice but to at least tolerate each other, you know? I promised that I'd get them back to Earth. And I uh... I've gotta stick by them. I have to. But there isn't anything deeper beyond that. I'm just doing my job."
"Is that right?" Sparrow asked him.
"They look after me."
Sparrow frowned again, accepting that as a final answer...
There was activity in front of the base as they drew near. Rebels rushed to the outer plaza – guns in hand – ordering for the truck to stop. After all, they were in a Riverlander truck. But they calmed down when they saw Sparrow raise his hand to assuage them, and they stood aside to let them enter.
They came to a stop and hopped out of the truck, making their way towards the headquarters. Rebels opened the doors ahead of them, and Eli braced himself for the trek through the ocean of refugees. But when they took a step into the dimly lit hall, he realized that it had grown noticeably quieter. The people were all still there, if anything there seemed to be more, but everyone was silent – more or less.
When Eli tried to find Sparrow, he realized he’d been pulled off by a group of rebels who were chatting about something. They handed Sparrow a sheet of paper that he quickly flipped through. Sparrow frowned, muttering something to them, before following the rebels somewhere deeper within the base leaving Eli alone.
“Yo, Eli!” His attention was piqued when he heard his name through the air. Dutch waved him down from across the room. Only discernable from the bright orange piping of the prisoner’s uniform – otherwise he would’ve just blended in to the background.
Drawing past the row of makeshift beds and first aid stations, the two Phantoms drew near. Dutch’s face was straight, taking his stride towards Eli as if he were about to punch him right in the jaw, “Eli! Jesus dude we were starting to get worried!”
Dutch’s expression softened for a moment right before he drew too close to be within punching distance, he outreached a arm and the two shared a brotherly hug before drawing away, “I told you I’d be fine. We’re Misfit. We’re damn near invincible.” Eli said.
“Sure. Look, we’ve got bad news. The rebels are running out of supplies to help the people here, and out of all of us, Matteo's the only one who has any useful medical experience. We're just extra hands for the most part. We tried to help out the rebels while we could but there’s hardly any food or water anywhere,” Dutch said.
“There are stores everywhere, still have their goods inside. Why not grab what’s there.”
“We tried, but most of the city is still under the enemy’s control. There’s not a single market around here that hasn’t been drained already. Please tell me you’ve got a way to talk to Overwatch,” Dutch begged him, his eyes wide in hidden fear.
“Relax. I’m working on it with Sparrow. He says that they've got something that can break through the Avonian signal jam. Once we can get that up and running, we’ll call our ride out of here!” Eli said with the best smile he could conjure up, but it didn’t seem to cheer Dutch up that much. Just behind his usually friendly demeanor, Dutch still looked scared.
Eli lightly punched Dutch’s shoulder, “C’mon man! Cheer up! We’re getting the hell out of this place. When we complete our mission, Overwatch might even reward us. We can get our sentences shortened for this one!”
“Eli, it’s not us I’m worried about,” Dutch muttered, leaning in close. He gestured his head to what surrounded them, “It’s them. What are we gonna do about the people?”
Eli looked. All around them was of course the refugees. The wounded. The sick. The innocent.
“They’re phantoms, Eli. We can’t just leave them here!”
“Dutch-“
“And before you say that there’s nothing we can do, there is! There is something we can do!” He pointed to the monitor on Eli’s wrist, “Look. Fuck Matteo. Fuck being practical! We can at the very least ask Overwatch, I know that they have more than enough space! Four of us went out into an alien jungle alone to go and rescue the rest of our squad, and we made it back alive.”
“Except for Cato.”
“Except for Cato,” Dutch affirmed, “Look, I think Cato was an asshole. Alright? But he died fighting for what he believed in. And that’s more than most in the Penal Unit can say. Am I wrong?”
Eli again took a look at the crowd. Sighing to himself, “I’ll… I’ll ask Overwatch. But I – We – can’t do anything more than that. I’m sorry but it’s just not possible. There’s only six of us, and we’re just prisoners. I’m sorry, Dutch.” Eli admitted.
Dutch caved in, looking like he knew that would be the expected response from Eli, “Yeah… well at least ask. It’s the least we could do.”
“I’ll try my best. I will get us out of Helena and Narva. Alive. I promised you that when we got out of solitary, and that still holds.”
Dutch coyly smiled, “Good. If you abandon us, I’ll shoot you myself. Better yet, I’ll get Badger to torture you first for the hell of it.”
“The horror,” Eli said, words blunt like a wet towel being thrown to the wall.
“Gentlemen!” A voice chirped in from behind. Sparrow’s. He’d returned back from whatever he was occupied with to confront the two squadmates, “Hate to break the reunion, but you and me, we’ve got business to attend to. Come on then!”
“That’s me,” Eli sighed, looking back at his friend, “I’ll get back to you, soon as I can!”
Dutch nodded, “I’ll tell the others! See you around, Free – man.”
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Sparrow led him through a set of doors on the far side taking them to a massive staircase. Mahogany steps were guarded by cast iron railings, intricate in design. Large windows let in the sight of the city, the Renewal district was burning in the distance. Fires highlighted by the increasing darkness of the sky, yet vibrant red and purple skies were tempered by an armada of angry clouds closing in from the east. Dark, massive, and ripping with thunder. It had gotten even closer to the city since Eli had last spotted it, now perhaps right on the edge of the city’s furthest limits, threatening to shroud them all. Gunfire sparkled in the night sky on the far edges, illuminating the night with their distinct colors. Helena was on fire.
“We’ve got word coming in of a gas attack in one of the residential areas,” Sparrow said to them as he climbed the first set, “I tried to tell them we don’t have the capacity for it, but they just keep bringing the refugees here. I don’t have enough doctors, and I barely have enough supplies for my shooters. We’ve only got five of those rockets left. Down from fifty when we started.”
“They have that many sentries?”
“And dozens more if we’re just counting just the ones the Riverlanders have here. Plus, it’s not just the sentries. That’s why we were counting on the help of the Coalition. They outgun and outnumber us.”
“You have those rocket launchers, right? The ones that kill sentries? Where do you get them from?” Eli asked, “You made them yourselves?”
Sparrow shook his head, “They’re Ostralander weapons. Most of the ones we have are leftovers that the Commonwealth abandoned during the last war. Some are smuggled. And a few the Commonwealth sold to us. Under the table.”
“Why the secrecy?”
“Like I said, the last war was disastrous. For everyone. The Commonwealth and Avonia threw bombs, soldiers, money, and weapons out here for almost a decade. All they ended up with was a ceasefire. They’re hesitant to do it again, and without the Ostralander Congress voting on it – it’s technically illegal for them to intervene. Besides, the Ostralanders aren’t the only ones with glitterbombs anymore. The Avonian’s have been testing theirs, and a direct confrontation with those types of bombs…” Sparrow whistled, “It’ll make the Sacred War look like a firework show.”
“The Sacred War?”
“It was the most destructive conflict in this planet’s history. There were three Orderist empires, the Valdacian Order, The Oranian Empire, and the Heavenly Dragon Empire. Their regimes were built on the supremacy of magical elves and dragons at the enslavement of everybody else. Within five years, most of Farewind and almost all of Drakaria had been conquered by their armies. It forced the other free nations of the world, the Ostralands and Avonia ironically enough, to align with each other in order to defeat the two. The Allies managed to destroy the Orderites here on Farewind. But in Drakaria, the Heavenly Empire was never fully defeated. When the war ended, the two allies split. And now, we’re caught in a Cold War between the three remaining superpowers. The Commonwealth, the Empire, and the Dragons.”
“The Sacred War…” Eli mused.
“The Commonwealth's spies sold us these guns conditionally, but it can hardly match a fraction of what we need,” Sparrow said, steering the conversation back on track, “Besides, we don’t exactly have the money to keep buying from them – and they don’t have the cover to keep the secrecy up. If their Congress ever found out about the deals we’ve made well… it could be a political nightmare for them, and a noose ‘round the neck for us. If the Ostralands and Commonwealth won’t support us, we’re hoping that your Coalition will. And we could really use the support right now.”
“So, you have a way to break through the communications jamming? Right?”
Sparrow nodded, “It’s far from ideal. We’ll have to use the Energy Lance.”
“What’s that?”
Sparrow surmounted the final flight of steps, and looked back with a brief grin of recognition, “You’ll see.”
Two rebels guarded a door with their weapons in hand. One elf and the other a human. The elf was mean mugging Eli, a glare which Sparrow noticed and stuck his hand out in warning, “Stand aside comrades, he’s with me.”
Though the elf was hardly impressed, he did as told. Holding his gun tighter when Eli approached to go through the wooden door.
“I apologize for all the hostility. They think you and your comrades are Ostralanders.”
“I thought they were your allies?”
“Our relationship is complicated. They’re imperialists – just like the Avonians. And at times they’re downright evil. It’s just that their kind of evil isn’t the one that’s bombing us. For now.”
“So, they’re a useful enemy?”
“Everyone is an enemy to the revolutionary. We fight the status quo. That doesn’t make you a lot of friends. Not in this world,” He smiled though as he turned to Eli, “But we’d be willing to make an exception to you and your squad. You’re convicts right? Phantoms would make fine revolutionaries.”
“My friend Rafael would take you up on that – probably,” Eli chuckled, “But… I’m no rebel. I just want to stay alive and go back to Earth. Same for Misfit. Most of them at least.”
“We’ll see,” Sparrow said, “A lot can change.”
“You’re preaching to the choir on that one.”
Sparrow seemed satisfied with the answer, leading him through yet another door. This time, it led them into a large open room, the previously meticulous wood and stone carvings built as walls had been covered by metal panels. He felt a draft filter in through the room, and looked up to see that what was supposed to be a glass skylight had been torn out. Leaving a giant hole in the ceiling, where the remainders of sunlight trickled in and shone into the room.
It led his eyes down to the obvious, large, thingamabob in the center of the room. Metal rings surrounded a long thing barrel, pointed towards the skylight’s center as it emerged from a metal core of computers, components, and engines. It seemed dormant. Where there was supposed to be light, at least to Eli’s mind, was darkness. A switch flipped off to turn the device into slumber, “The Energy Lance,” Sparrow pointed at it, “It’s the reason why we chose this building as a garrison. The Junta used this old police station as a communications center. Used it to tap into calls and block magical energy. But we’ve repurposed it.”
“So… I use that to talk to my base?”
“No. It’ll break the Avonian signal jam temporarily. The Avonians don’t just use technology, they use magical technology. Almost all of their weapons are built and powered by ekron, it’s how they do engineering. It allows them to bend reality to the will of their scientists and engineers. But it also creates weaknesses. Ones that we can exploit with another magical counter,” He gestured towards the machine, “The lance will scan the area to find a weakness in the Avonian blocking magic. Once it finds one, it’ll shoot a beam of energy to punch through. It's poking a needle through cloth, if the cloth were made up of invisible magical particles. Once it punches a hole through, the magic will hold it open, denying them the ability to re-seal it with the same spell.”
“But that’s temporary?”
“Unfortunately, yes. The Avonians – despite their hubris – are quite smart. Their computers can sense when their magic goes down. Once they figure it out, you’ll have anywhere between fifteen minutes or thirty seconds before they seal the hole. It all depends on how fast the Vampire Behemoth can sense that their signal jam is being interfered with, and how quickly it can come up with a spell to reseal it.”
“Well, why can’t you just do it again? Put in a new spell or whatever so the Avonians can’t keep the signals jammed?”
“Because we don't have enough ekron to power this machine. This is why we needed to wait until after the missiles were destroyed before I could reveal this. The signal disruptor was installed by the Republican Guard back when this place was still one of their main precincts of control. A communications bunker. There's only enough ekron within this whole building to power one burst. After that, it's done."
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Eli sighed, figuring that much should've been obvious, "Alright... so we power the machine up, and then what?"
“Then you get your radio. But you have to be quick. Remember, you won’t have enough time to have a pleasant conversation. You tell them where we are, that you've made contact with us, that the missiles have been destroyed, and that you’re ready to be extracted. No more, no less.”
Eli was about to agree to that when he stopped. Dutch’s words nagged at the back of his mind. A morally driven weight to tell Sparrow exactly what needed to be communicated. He knew what Sparrow’s response would be, but the burden was too much for Eli to simply ignore. There were people downstairs, innocent people, phantoms. And what of the rag-tag cluster of rebels who defended them?
Would they all be left here to get killed while Misfit turned its back? Maybe Dutch was just rubbing off on Eli too much. He had to be practical. As much as it hurt to compromise what he believed was right, their lives and the mission, took priority. The rebels could sort it out themselves…
‘Right?’ Eli thought. He swallowed, taking a breather to calm his mind before speaking. Every word had an impact now. And to be honest, it really shouldn’t be him making this sort of call. Why, why on Earth – or rather Narva – had Overwatch chosen Misfit to do this? Why had Ani and Otaes been so adamant that they come out here at all? They should’ve been back in the Nexus’ factory, not only where it was safe, but where the people who could make the right decision could act. Not a squad of prisoners who hardly knows what to make of this alien war. A Cold War on a faraway planet. And they just so happened to be plunked right in the middle of it.
Then again, were Overwatch and those blood hungry spec-ops brutes in the headhunters really the “right” people to make the “right” decision. They probably wouldn’t ever consider the prospect, knowing how the Coalition worked. If anything, Misfit – and by proxy Eli – were the right people for the task. Here, they could actually make a difference for once.
A positive difference.
And when push came to shove, it wouldn’t hurt to ask.
“I’ll also tell them to bring extra for the refugees?”
Sparrow’s face immediately soured, which surprised Eli, “What?” Sparrow demanded.
"The people! The ones your 'comrades' are taking care of downstairs? I have to ask if we can get a ride for them-"
“But that’s not the point! Those people aren’t the focus here! You have a job, and that’s to extract my rebels to your base. That’s it!” Sparrow tried to prove his point by taking a threatening step towards him, “Your base probably doesn’t even have the capacity to ferry close to one hundred people.”
“You said it yourself; the energy lance is going to act like a beacon for every single soldier to target this building. What do you think is going to happen to all those people when the Imperials get here?”
“There’s no room for them, Eli! That’s it. There’s no chance, we can’t waste time on a pointless request.”
Eli refused to take that as a answer, instead taking a step himself towards Sparrow, “I thought you were fighting for the sake of those people. Isn’t that what you said the ULA was fighting for?”
“What we’re doing is for the sake of the people!” Sparrow argued back, “But here, you're just wasting time and resources.”
“I can at least ask! Damn it, I’ll just ask once! Is that too much?” Eli shouted at Sparrow. He could feel the blood in his veins boiling the more he tried to argue with Sparrow. Perhaps he was being unreasonable. Maybe Sparrow was right that it was stupid and only a drain on resources that neither the Coalition nor the ULA had.
But would it really hurt just to ask? They’d probably say no, but at least they could’ve tried to help. If they abandoned the people here while also holding the power to ask for help – but choosing not to – wouldn’t that mean they sentenced the people to whatever fate awaited them?
And besides, shouldn’t Sparrow be grateful that Eli was asking? Those were his people. Why was he putting up so much resistance to the mere suggestion of rescuing them?
There was a rustle at the door as the guards from outside entered in. Their hands firmly placed around the guns, they looked concerned. Their eyes immediately shot towards Eli. Accusingly…
“We heard commotion,” Said one of the guards, “What’s the issue?”
Sparrow dismissed his concern with a wave of the hand, “Nothing. Just disagreement between comrades,” Sparrow stared at Eli as if conjuring up his next sentence. The guards closed the doors shut behind them, but they did not leave. Instead, the two stood watch at the far end of the room. The butt of their guns resting on the floor, as they observed the two from afar.
“Alright,” Sparrow conceded, his hands flung into the air, “You win.”
He turned on his heels pointing towards the two guards at the rear of the room, “Comrades, get the lance operational. We’re breaking through the Avonian communications block.”
“But sir,” whined one of the prisoners, “If we do that, they’ll know where our base of-“
“I’m aware, Comrade. But please, get on with it,” Sparrow muttered.
The two guards, “comrades” of Sparrow, briefly looked at each other before getting to work. They rushed towards the far end of the room where the crate containing the necessary ekron lay. They donned gloves and goggles, before hovering over the latch containing the glowing red rock. One of them grabbed a metal tool that would allow them to latch onto it, and together they opened the crate.
Again, it was much darker of a light than the one from normal ekron stones. That is if Eli was remembering correctly. In a bizarre fashion, the stone was small. Roughly the size of a coffee cup if Eli was looking correctly. It had been cut into a diamond like shape. A burgundy-colored halo glowed around itself as the latch was opened and the rock lifted out for all to see. They both carried it with the metal tool as a clasp, while either guard held opposite ends with the rock between them. Sparrow had already departed to hover over the machine, pressing a series of buttons and turning dials until it was fully powered. Electrical energy surged through wires, making the steel parts of the machine move.
A valve opened near the base of the machine to which the ekron was inserted, and once the machine had accepted the stone, everything within it went dark.
Something nagged at the back of Eli’s mind that the technology used was somehow… familiar.
An electric buzz filled the air. His hair stood on end at the back of his neck. He felt weightless, but only for a split second.
And then, a burst of light. Red plasma filled the interior of the machine as it roared to life, an engine inside powered up! An electric whining sound rose and soared, climbing until it reached a crescendo that was nearly unbearable. And when it hit the crescendo, a ray of right light connected, and the machine began to move.
His mind tried to remember what was so familiar about watching the machine in action. This was, of course, the first time he had ever seen anything like it. But, that was a lie. It must’ve been.
Until it dawned on him.
“The Portal,” Eli remembered its terrible red glow, opening like the jaws of a dragon to lead them into this unknown and hostile world. It had been nearly the exact same process to start both machines.
That could only mean the Coalition was in possession of Ekron... somehow...
He pondered the question, almost ignoring the dizzying lights of the machine as it arched its way upwards towards the opening in the domed roof. The increasingly purple skies over Helena were still saturated with the smog of warfare as the cyan hue of daylight retreated underneath the horizon. The machine continued to whir, groan, and shake. Dark red energy ebbed from around it scanned the skies.
Sparrow called out Eli’s name and gestured for him to stand back, and he did so. Stopping right when the energy built inside of the machine finally released.
It was like another missile being fired into the dark skies. More like a flare. A pulsating red orb rocketed upwards from the barrel of the device, flickering as it traced its way straight upwards.
“Woah!” Eli felt a rush of wind blow from the device, rippling through his uniform and hair. He stretched out a hand to shield his eyes from the burn of the initial blast, but soon could only help but follow the orb as it shot straight upwards. A red flare climbing higher into the darkness of the encroaching night.
It climbed higher and higher, shrunk in size, and appeared to fizzle out into the stormy atmosphere.
He kept an eye on where he had last seen the orb. Had it failed? His eyes scanned the skies for anything that would resemble its reemergence. Yet nothing materialized. He frowned turning an eye to Sparrow.
The revolutionary understood Eli’s looks of confusion, pointing to the skies, “Watch the sky.”
His eyes again trailed back. The flare had disappeared, but Sparrow sounded confident that it hadn’t failed. And yet, he could see no signs of activity beyond that.
Until he saw what looked like a glow. A mild one at that. An unnatural red glow from beyond the encroaching clouds of the storm. Dark. Brooding. Sinister. It was like an inferno had exploded in the heavens above, obscured from the ground by the clouds through which the afterglow of the fiery blaze permeated through. Something rumbled in the air, thunder.
And the sky was set on fire.
Bright red energy swarmed the dark skies, a thunderous clap filled the air with an explosion of magical sound! Eli felt the distant boom rock him in his core. Particles swirled and flowed, ebbing and twisting, back and forth until the skies resembled skies no longer, but rather a massive hole. The clouds and the red light circled around, rushing with the burst of wind, like the eye of a hurricane. Like the mouth of a whirlpool. All matter in the skies circled the epicenter, spiraling in orbit to the void of bright red that sat at the center of it all.
“Jesus…” Eli whispered, awestricken by both the mesmerizing beauty of the lightshow, the raw power of the magical ekron, and the terrifying might of what they had just unleashed into the skies.
He could feel a gust of wind fall upon the base, rocking it, blowing dust and loose objects flying.
A secondary beam was fired from the machine, right through the epicenter. The red beam connected to the storm. When they met, the energy burst and exploded outwards. A wave of red light travelled in a circle away from the epicenter – a shockwave. The red wave glistened as it travelled, shooting across… and out of view.
When the shockwave scattered, all that remained was the spinning vortex of clouds. The eye of the storm hovered over them, blowing wind back through the small opening of the dome. The light from the machine cast into the dark hole, holding strong, like the blade of a sword punching through armor.
Eli saw his monitor suddenly come back to life. The screen of his monitor flashed bright light. He raised his arm to look at it, and found – at last – he had a signal.
“The blocker’s down! I repeat, the blocker is down!” Shouted one of the guards, “Signal strength is at One-Hundred Percent! Send it!”
Eli wasted no time, using the precious few moments to finish what had been started. He pawed at the monitor, raising his hand to finish what they had started. He found Captain Juma’s signal, and raised a hand to his earpiece.
“This is Eli Freeman, Misfit squad. Over!”
He practically shouted the words through the earpiece. His heart frozen as he feared that he would be met with the same static as he had when they first crash landed into this warzone. The fear that all of this would’ve been for nothing buried deep in his mind. His words hung in empty silence. But no static.
Just when he thought that his fears had come true, there was a crackle on the other side. And then, a voice!
“This is Captain Juma’s Chief Communications Officer, Lieutenant Harrington,” The voice flatly read, “What is your message?”
Eli had to suppress the urge to yell in excitement and relief and billions of other emotions swirling through him. But he had to remain calm. There were lives depending on every word he said, and every second he took, “This is Eli Freeman! 17th Penal Battalion, Misfit Squad! We were sent in on a mission to make contact with the ULA’s forces in Helena! We are requesting extraction, immediately! Over!”
Sparrow and the other revolutionaries looked to him as he spoke, with Sparrow even taking a step closer as they awaited the response from Overwatch.
“Negative, Freeman. Airspace is blocked –“
“We have disabled the enemy surface to air missiles! I repeat, the airspace is clear! Send extraction!” Eli repeated.
The commander seemed perplexed at the statement from Eli, as told from the fact that he could hear the lieutenant whispering to others near him. They waited an uncomfortably long time for another response, only interrupted by the sound of brief – though terrifying – static.
One of the guards poked his head up, “Signal strength has deteriorated to eighty-five percent! They’re already working on a counter!”
“Scrap!” Sparrow took several steps towards Eli, and in a fury, grabbed Eli’s wrist monitor – and by proxy his arm, “This is Sparrow! I’m the leader of the ULA, I’m the guy you want to meet with! Your troops have found me, and I can verify that we’ve destroyed the Avonian Anti-Air ! We need to get the hells out, immediately! We do not have time to wait!”
“Please standby,” Was all the voice on the other side of the monitor said.
“What? No!” Eli shouted back into his earpiece.
Another wave of static.
“Signal strength has deteriorated to seventy percent!”
“Oi, you. Shut up! Don’t tell me until it’s at fifty percent! Alright?” Sparrow furiously snapped at the guard, who immediately corrected himself with a slight bow.
They had no other option but to wait. Eli could only feel the beating of his heart as it raced within his chest, staring at the monitor as if that would give him an answer faster.
When the commander finally did speak, he felt a slight burden relieved from his shoulders when he heard the familiar voice of none other than, “Captain Juma,” She introduced herself, “Who am I speaking with?”
“Eli Freeman! I’m one of yours-“
“Freeman? You're still alive out there? Where's Banno-”
“Bannon is dead! All of the regulars have been killed by the Imperials!"
"Wha-" It sounded like Juma was trying to keep herself from vocally lashing out at Eli. If she was getting ready to accuse Misfit of murdering the Regulars that were sent to escort them, Eli really couldn't blame her. It was a bad look that all of the regulars were dead, yet the prisoners - somehow - remained alive. He nervously glanced at Sparrow's rebels, seeing their frantic movements to keep the signal alive. He knew he didn't have enough time to debate this with Juma. They needed to get out. Now.
"I don’t have much time! If you want to, you can interrogate us when we get back to The Nexus! Send an extraction immediately, we’ve got Sparrow. I repeat, we have the rebels!"
Silence from the other side though it was layered with the growing sound of static. It was deafening to listen to the white noise. The possibility of Juma immediately tossing their calls for help bore heavily on his shoulders... Every second she spent in silence, the signal continued to deteriorate, and Misfit's only chance at getting out of Helena alive slimmed. He bit his tongue, refraining himself from crying like a child, begging Juma to send something - anything - to help...
Until finally, after what felt like an eternity of waiting, Juma responded, “Understood,” Was all Juma said.
Eli closed his eyes, knowing what he was purposefully putting off for last.
“There are refugees here. We need an evacuation for them back to the Nexus, they’re in harms way-“
“I’m sorry, how many people?” Asked a confused Juma on the other end of the line.
Eli looked over to Sparrow, and back to his monitor, “Close to one hundred…”
“Ninety,” Sparrow mouthed to him.
“Ninety. Total.”
There was nothing on the opposite side for a moment. At first, a hope burned that maybe – just maybe – Juma was considering their evacuation as a possibility! That maybe they hadn’t all been doomed to be ensnared in the path of the advancing armies.
“Negative Freeman,” And then Juma shot dashed his hopes, scattering them away to the wind, “That’s too many people. Too little –“ There was more signal static that obfuscated part of her speech, stronger static than there had been before.
“Signal strength below fifty percent! It’s draining fast!”
“Con-mation – only Sparrow and rebel forc – extract – soon as possible,” the deteriorating signal managing to meter out a few barely tangible words. But Eli understood enough.
“I understand Juma, but the Avonians are going to launch a full scale assault on our position soon! Send another evacuation team if you have to, if you don't the people here are gonna get flattened!”
“-ay again? Repeat last – unclear. Over.”
“The refugees need an exfil, dammnit! Refugees! Need! Exfil! Over!”
It sounded like Juma was trying to speak, but the static only increased in both volume and density to the point that it made whatever she was saying completely unintelligible.
“Twenty percent!” A guard shouted.
“Damn it! The Avonians are about to break our hold! Pull out every trick we’ve got, hold that scrappin’ signal open!” Sparrow shouted. The guards obeyed instantly, pouring over the machine and scouring its interface to wrestle control over every button, switch, and dial. Their faces were panicked, sweat pouring down their clothes as they fought to hold the signal open.
"Come on!” Eli was basically screaming into his earpiece at that point, but all he could hear was static that carried the vague hint of a voice every now and then.
However, through some miracle, Juma’s voice managed to break through the fog of static, “Negat- You have y – orders. You will obey our instruct- standby,” her voice then relapsed back into the field of static, swallowed whole until nothing was tangible through the web of the broken signal.
“Network status has deteriorated down to five percent! The Avonians are about to-“
There was a whistle that pierced through the air. All of their eyes turned upwards, the eye of the breach hovering just above them. The red glow of light had dimmed considerably. The storm had quieted. The clouds no longer circled. The storm was closer than ever before.
And then, from the distance, another red ball of light rocketing skywards – straight into the eye. When it connected with the magical energy within, all hell broke loose. Like two stars colliding, the two sources of energy met and exploded into a sparkling barrage of white and gold particles, shooting outwards from the eye. The entire structure rapidly collapsed, with the dark red energy being obliterated by the forces of chaos surrounding it. The eye shrunk, the head of the explosion swallowing it whole! The red beam from the machine faltered and vanished…
And then nothing. There was no secondary explosion. No loud burst. No glimmer or array of lightworks and fire. It simply dispersed. Clouds scattered to the prevailing winds like dust. And the skies were normal once again.
Eli was still mesmerized by it all. The final glimmers of the lightshow pattered out in the skies like golden firecrackers, trailing their way through the oncoming twilight of the dark sky. Shooting stars in the midst of a storm.
“Well… at least we got the important parts through,” Sparrow said with a shrug and a sigh, looking away from the fading spectacle and focusing on the here-and-now.
“I’d consider the refugees as important too,” Eli said.
“Idealism has a time and a place, comrade. If you want to survive in this world, you have to learn how to be practical.”
“If sacrificing the lives of innocent people is practical to you, then I don’t want to be practical. I want to be an idealist.”
Sparrow shook his head, wagging his finger at Eli like a annoyed parent looking to guide their younger, “You… I quite like you. You’ve got a vision; and a lot of people don’t have that. Especially since you’re a prisoner. Keep that with you,” and then, rallying his “comrades”, Sparrow turned heel and walked away. Leaving Eli alone to ponder the stars.
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>>>[Verifying...]
>>>[Loading SitRep A-17...]
>>>[Going through File Directory]
>>>[Standby...]
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image [https://i.imgur.com/cOW86tR.png]
April 19th, 2050
===> Company Report: z100264867-BL
===> Outgoing Terminal: Lambda Prime (Blue Mountain Test Facility, New Mexico)
===> Receiving Terminal: Gamma Citadel [REDACTED]
===> Encrypted Transmission Established
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==[BLUE MONDAY 1972]==
image [https://i.imgur.com/CW9XdAE.png]
Blue Monday 1972, was a joint American/British/Soviet scientific project launched during the thaw in relations seen during The Cold War. Blue Monday was among the first in a wide variety of joint scientific ventures between The East and West, many of which would become hallmarks of human achievement - like the International Space Station which would launch nearly twenty years after the beginning of Blue Monday. Despite its groundwork achievement in becoming a common ground for scientific progress in the opening stages of Detente, Blue Monday would ultimately fall apart as priorities shifted and politics changed yet again...
However, that isn’t to say that Blue Monday was completely without use. Blue Monday advanced the cause of theoretical portal research by close to a century, proving that portals were truly possible and within the grasp of mankind's technological ambitions - just not quite feasible at the time. The ACRA of course was selected as the USA’s primary representative, and as we worked with British and Soviet scientists, the tests and research gained from Blue Monday would inevitably lead us to pursuing portal research later down the line - well after the end of The Cold War.
Our results were simple. Together, our ACRA scientists were able to gain hold of an extremely classified material. One that is found in extreme scarcity not only on Earth but in the physical universe that Earth resides in - however - one that is found in abundance on Narva. This material contains properties inexplicable to modern science, that allows us to engineer the very reality we reside in. The unenlightened (You, the unenlightened one reading this) might call this manipulation of our world “Magic”. We call it science!
The material in question has been classified as NM11210, or, “Ekron”. Specifically, a sub-material of ekron known as NM11210-B “Dark Ekron”...
image [https://i.imgur.com/CZ9vqN1.png] image [https://i.imgur.com/fJSaLCm.png]
PICTURED: Symbolic representations of NM11210 and NM11210-B, note that due to the highly anomalous nature of NM11210-B, and the fact that humanity has only discovered less than .05 grams of the substance throughout all known Entropic zones on Planet Earth, knowledge of the material is extremely limited. Even more so than its more abundant and stable counterpart.
Humanity was first made aware of Ekron in 1976, after Soviet and British scientists made the broader scientific community aware of Trinity Particles that occur rarely in our universe. The Blue Monday team built monitors to track the presence of Trinity Particles in our broader universe, and localized clusters were found in extremely minute quantities here on Earth’s surface. Likely deposited during asteroid impacts and space debris deposition over time. Select quantities of accumulated Trinity Particle elements, dubbed “Ekron”, were recovered at the Kola SG-3 superdeep borehole in 1977. Broader information of this new element was kept isolated from the larger scientific community as Blue Monday was strictly classified by the governments involved. The Soviet Union gifted the Blue Monday team a small amount of their recovered sample, and from there we unlocked a much larger understanding not just on the nature of the Trinity Particles, but on the possibility of portal technology.
The material was purely something out of this world! By applying electric charges to the rock, we could “Program” an effect into our reality. For example, using ekron, our scientists were able to lift a two-ton car! Laser-based weapons could be generated by focusing the glass-like shards of Ekron that far surpassed the capabilities of typical light-based lasers known at the time. Ekron was even used to generate fields of energy that allowed Russian and American scientists to talk directly to each other, in their own native languages, and understand one another completely without the need for a translator. The nature of how this glass-like material was able to manipulate our own base cognitive presets had completely upset our understanding of the world! It was mind blowing, and Blue Monday scientists wasted no opportunity to further research this material...
Quickly, new research sites were opened across The Continental United States in areas where there was an uptick in universal entropy. As predicted, at these borehole sites, tiny quantities of ekron matter were located. Though the total quantity of the matter was miniscule (As of today in the year 2050, humanity has only been able to extract about 25 kilograms of the material from all possible locations on Earth within our current technological reach), it was enough that with careful management of the resource, we would have enough to research for an indefinite period of time. Testing on Ekron went into a sharp decline following the closure of the Kola super borehole site in 1994 and numerous other extraction points within The United States being mothballed shortly before hand. Testing was put on hiatus entirely in the 2000s, after ACRA priorities shifted to more pragmatic research solutions on behalf of the Department of Defense, and Blue Monday was shortly after classified and sealed away...
Yet, with pressing issues surrounding the climate and future of our planet, ekron was placed as the object of our focus once more...
And so, we are ready to unveil the latest abomination innovation that our boys in engineering have come up with! All to save the human species! For your classified eyes (enforced by ACRA Non-Disclosure Agreements and the infinite fury of our legal team), we reveal to you the culmination of decades piling on top of the Blue Monday research! Meet, The Portal:
image [https://i.imgur.com/IkCK5H2.png]
So... how does it work?
Who the hell knows? But what we do know is that it does work. Somehow. Every time we ask the engineering department about it they bring up Clarke's Third Law. This confirms our suspicions that our engineers might secretly be wizards belonging to a creed of global demonic sorcerers and summoners. Let me take the opportunity to remind everybody (Especially you, our dear investors) that witchcraft and the dark arts have been strictly banned from ACRA research, not just in our dimension, but in all dimensions where an native ACRA establishment is present. We are truly sorry for violating the laws of nature, if the engineering department has indeed been contacting the underworld for assistance in the creation of this portal. Yet, if they are, we can't really do anything to stop them...
Err, anyways, is the portal safe?
Yes. Probably. Actually, we're not sure. You have a high chance of not immediately being disintegrated upon entering into the portal - roughly ~78% give or take a 20% margin of error. Those are good odds! However long term exposure to ekron energy has not been studied nearly at all, and we are unsure if the extreme amounts of gamma radiation should be cause for significant concern. I have been assured that it is "Probably not anything to worry about" and that "The theoretical physics team is looking into a remedy".
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==[END TRANSMISSION]==