Ch. 1: Night Raid
A small group of speeding planes with a distinct red cross on their sides, flies above the ruins of a massive city, with nothing below but the remnants and ashes of small and large buildings alike. The eerie silence is then broken by the quiet engines as the fleet starts to drop their large cube-shaped supply crates with parachutes and flares attached to help them get to those who need them across the desolate landscape...
As the planes leave the airspace of the city under the cover of the night sky, and the crates have finally landed, a slightly soft thud was heard near one of the landing sites where three cargo are located.
After a minute or so, more loud thuds resonates through the dead of night, as if they are made by something running towards something. And indeed, that something is running towards the cargo...
Later on, a slightly rusting mech, towering at a height thrice that of a person, patched together by metal scraps and wire, reached the crates with its arms made of incomplete and damaged parts around them.
"Whoo, made it," a young woman piloting the mech in its chest, controlling it with her limbs inside metal tubes, which in turn let her control the mech's limbs, whilst standing, whispers with a smile on her face.
Next, she glances at a green screen on the right side of the mech, which looks like a radar screen.
"Oh well, since no one around wants it, may as well take it, one's trash is another's treasure, after all," she whispers as she turns the flare off by making her mech's right hand pinch it until it's no longer releasing any sort of light.
"Hmm... They're too big to take in one go..."
So she uses her mech to slowly lift one of the crates and began to make her way back to the path she took. Before anything else, she looks at her radar screen and saw two big circles in the distance coming her way, and in the darkness, she hears the sound of vehicles arriving nearby, and also the many footsteps coming for the supplies.
"Oh crap, oh crap," she whispered as her heart starts to beat faster and faster. She glances at her radar screen and saw four circles wandering the area near her. Afterwards, she inserts her arm back into the tube.
"Damn it, guess I won't be coming back for the other two... Oh well, the jackpot was short-lived, at least I'll be having dinner tonight," she silently tells herself as her mech adjusts its grip on the crate to run faster.
Afterwards, as she gets far away from the site and had the circles on her screen disappear, she turns on the two headlights on the side of her mech by pulling her left arm out of the tube and pressing a nearby button, with the one on the left flickering every couple of seconds. However, as she's making her escape while not only piloting a robot but also keeping a lookout on her screen unlike before, she noticed two circles behind her have appeared, coming her way and fast.
She starts to breathe heavily whilst trying to calm herself down until a couple of thumps behind her are heard as she tries to make her mech accelerate further. Seconds later, explosions erupts behind her, and the shock makes her mech fall to its knees. Nevertheless, the mech immediately gets up, but some of those who are chasing her start to fire their rifles at her.
Before they catch up to her, she pushed a button after taking her right arm out, that would release some small metallic containers from the mech's behind. The containers explode a couple of seconds upon hitting the ground, releasing both a thick black smokescreen and a flash of light that lasted for a fraction of a second, i.e., a mixture of flashbang and smoke grenades.
The ones chasing the lady are immediately blinded, and she jumps to the side as her enemies' vehicle approaches at high speeds. Seconds passed while she tries to escape, she slightly turns around to see what came out of her grenades, only to see a dark military truck hit something on its front. However, thanks to her radar screen, she is able to see another vehicle that is near the crashed truck as people are beginning to abandon it, and in turn, reinserts her right arm as she focuses more on the path ahead.
Though a threat has been handled for now, another object enters the radar's view near the crashed vehicle, and it's catching up to her quickly, and instead of the sounds of rolling wheels, loud footsteps are coming from behind.
"Damn it, a mech? Hope this works," she tells herself, as she attempts to push a button beside the lever she pulled earlier which released the grenades earlier, but the thing chasing her fires a blast that explodes near the right side of her mech.
Her mech continues forward, but the woman lost her balance and could not do anything except command her mech forward. The bombardment continues behind her, and her mech is hit twice, in the back, and on the heel, yet she persists, until, according to the radar, the enemy managed to catch up behind her, only a few meters away. Thereafter, the enemy leaps upward quietly and lands in front of the woman's mech.
What's now in front of her is a slightly larger, humanoid mech, made head to toe with smooth metal plates welded together professionally compared to hers, and upon other things, a cannon attached to its right arm aimed directly at her.
"Put that down and exit your vehicle peacefully and quietly, you don't want to take this fight, trust me," a man confidently says via speaker as soldiers surround the mech in a semi-circle behind it, with guns pointed at the mech.
"Okay okay, I'll give it back, I-I'm sorry, j-just don't hurt me."
Without any other choice in sight, the woman starts to pilot her mech slowly to put the crate down, and while she thinks that no one has a clear view of her, she slightly pulled something inside the tubes where her arms are in.
Halfway before the crate touches the ground, small parts of her mech, from its arms, back, and legs fall off, reaching a suspiciously far distance from the mech, which alerts the enemies as they take a step back. The arms of the mech also got stuck, as the woman acts confused and struggles to make her mech move.
"Oh shit, uh, sorry, quite an old mech I have here, hehe," the woman apologizes.
Without hesitation, the enemy mech fires a net towards her, but the pieces that fell off the mech earlier explodes. Both robots lost power as all their lights turn off, and immediately afterward, something starts to ignite behind the woman's mech. In retaliation, the soldiers tries to squeeze the triggers of their rifles, yet they too lost their power.
Soon, they realize that the remnants of the mech on the ground are disguised EMPs, but before they can meaningfully respond whilst aimlessly meandering in the darkness, the area is lit by what seems to be rockets attached to the back of the woman's mech.
Afterwards, the mech is thrusted forward up to the stygian blackness of the sky, and thanks to the locked arms and the grip of the mech, the crate is secured... After the power returns seconds later, she looks back at the enemies she escaped from with an exhausted and blissful smile while they disperse back to the darkness where they came from...
Moments pass, and while still in the air, the rocket begins to lose fuel, thus their speed dwindled, until they eventually ran out, resulting in a rough trip until the mech just fell. Luckily, she prepared for this occasion because as soon as the mech fell, a parachute with many stitches came out of its back.
"Oh my God, it actually worked!" She yells as she pulls both her arms out and raise them high whilst breathing heavily. Afterward, she sits down on the mech's cockpit, closes her eyes, and sighs in relief.
Meanwhile, the soldiers that she stole and escaped from are marching down a pitch-dark road, whilst two trucks with giant metal claws on their backs are carrying the remaining crates, and are keeping pace with the soldiers.
"We're literally just a gonna let whoever that is take our stuff, huh? Again... Some invasion this is," a man sarcastically asks.
"Yeah, there's no point venturing deep into unknown territory just for supplies. We don't have that much, plus I know you guys are tired, so we're not going to risk it," the robot marching at the back of the group replies.
Then the man who asked throws his gun onto the ground and angrily walks up to the robot.
"Like hell, I'm gonna let this shit keep happening. It's been weeks since we got another batch, then someone will just take it?! Even then we lost a lot during our first month in this expedition, and I know you know that, Dan!" He shouts and points at the bot, and at this point, everyone stopped. "You know we are that desperate when we're taking fucking charity supplies!"
"Carl, I feel that you're angry, but we really have to keep going, we can discuss this back at the camp," the mech pilot responds.
A fellow soldier walks up to Carl, putting their left hand on his shoulder, but he just pushes them away forcefully.
"Man, 'angry' is an understatement! If you aren't such a coward and pulled the trigger of that weapon of yours, we could've gotten our supply back, but no! You had to be a good person and shit! What's that weapon good for, huh?! You said that's here to protect us, yet you can't even get yourself to kill?! We are going to die if you don't get yourself together!" He yells as he repeatedly kicks rocks and dirt onto the mech.
Afterward, the soldier he pushed stood up and tried to calm him down.
"Carl, calm down, let's get to the camp and get some rest, okay?" The other soldier tells him in a low voice.
"Hell nah, I'm not done. How can you call yourself a leader when you would prioritize your enemy rather than your squad, huh?!"
The argument continues as literally everyone except for one remains silent. However, in the heat of it all, the pilot notices multiple circles in all directions on his mech's radar screen, displayed in front of his right eye.
"PSI? Ready the side guns," the pilot orders.
"Roger that, sir Daniel, hold for just a moment," the mech's A.I. responds in a soft robotic tone.
After this, the man stops shouting as he and everyone else are alerted.
"We're surrounded, call for reinforcements now," the pilot says as everyone prepares for the fight while a message was sent from the mech's head screen.
"Damn it, we're deep in uncontrolled territory, reinforcements ain't gonna arrive soon!" The man who was shouting earlier yells.
"Shut up, please!" The soldier near him whispers as the mech's shoulder pads opens and releases a forming gun turret on each side, and would later be ready for combat.
What came next is a deafening silence in the tense and dark environment. The dusty wind blew across the road, and for a brief moment, all of the unidentified objects on the radar seems to disappear after a peculiar electrical sound was heard by everyone. Afterward, the night vision of every soldier is turned off, thus they turned on their mounted flashlights, and it cannot be ignored that most of them feel afraid and intimidated whilst they tighten their grips on their weapons.
"Scan for heat signatures," the pilot orders.
"Affirmative, sir Daniel... Sir, there seems to be an unexpected error."
"Error? Explain quickly," he asks as his heart starts to beat faster and faster.
"An electromagnetic device has tampered with our ability to make the scan, and also, the error affects all of our vision and targeting systems. I will try to get them back online, in the meantime, you will need to manually aim wit-"
The A.I.'s sentence is interrupted by a sudden barrage of bullets seemingly coming from all sides. Soon, explosions erupt, coming from the soldiers and the attackers, desperately trying to fight for their lives. The street is lit up by their weapons, it truly is like hell on Earth.
Daniel is trying to precisely shoot his mech's guns, yet there's no confirmation whether he hit someone or not, all the while his men are either trying to find cover and retaliating, or have already dropped dead on the cold pavement. He's suffering the same, yet ultimately worse fate than his comrades after most of the explosive and heavy fire is targeted towards him, but fortunately, the mech's armor was able to support him, but he soon would be knocked down and has already taken considerable punishment.
More chaos ensues, and afterwards, Daniel is alerted that a group of attackers are getting closer to the supply crates, and the soldiers on the mounted guns have already been shot dead, so he stands up slowly while, again, under a heavy barrage of bullets and explosives.
"Sir, all systems are back online," the A.I. reports as the head-window's screen of the mech gains its radar and infrared sensors. "And it would seem that enemies are all around us, sir, I suggest we leave immediately to try and guarantee our safety."
Daniel didn't respond, rather he glances at the soldier who raged at him earlier with his comrade actively fighting, even if they are wounded, and then looks at the supply crates...
"Sir, we are taking heavy fire from all conceivable directions; we are completely surrounded. If I am to follow my primary directive to preserve you and the mech's well-being, I suggest we retreat. The street itself is relatively unguarded, so we need to act now!" The A.I. yells in a distressed tone.
Without hesitation, Daniel drives his mech towards his comrades, disregarding the supplies and the suggestion of his A.I., all the while being hit by bullets and even a handful of explosives.
"Sir, have you gone mad?!"
"PSI, they're not only my subordinates, they're my friends, I would never leave anyone behind!" He replies as he runs and starts to fire back, now more precisely.
"... Understood, engaging using the side weapons," PSI replied before the guns on the mech's shoulders begins to fire autonomously.
Through the hail of the enemies' attacks, he manages to reach the soldiers, trying to shield them and returning fire. All the while, the punishment that the mech has received is getting clearer and much more worrying as parts of the mech's armor fall, accompanied by flashing lights and electric currents appearing on some points.
"So, what the hell now?!" Carl shouts as the other soldier tries to take a peek before shooting, and narrowly avoids being hit by a projectile in the face.
"I uh, am wondering the same thing, sir! Almost, uhh... Everyone's dead, no ground reinforcements are close enough to us... Why the hell did we even risk it all for just 3 fucking supply crates?! Everyone's dead! Sam was shot in the eye, I saw Terry try to save one of em, but was mowed down by a God-forsaken amount of bullets! And-and... We're next!" The female soldier yella, and starts to loudly cry.
"T-try and stay put, we're getting out of here," Daniel says in a desperate tone.
"And how will we do that, huh?!"
"I should've stayed in the scrapyard with my dad," the female soldier weeps.
"Don't worry, Katrina, all we have to do is-" Daniel replies, trying to give a shed of hope, but is interrupted when multiple flares lit the sky and falls to the ground.
The fighting almost entirely stopped when everyone noticed the flares, some are confused, and others started to hide, but to the 3 surrounded soldiers... They are petrified of this sight.
"No... I can't believe out of everything that I was afraid of... This is how I'll... We'll go..." Katrina whispers to herself...
And after a hellish moment, a fleet of friendly bombers arrives from above who've already dropped their payload. The bombs that made contact with or came close to the buildings where the hostiles are detonates, and their sheer power crushes everyone's morale even more.
Daniel desperately tries to defend his remaining squad by either manually firing at the incoming bombs, or PSI helping him with the side arms. However, their endeavor would prove to be meaningless, as the buildings around them start to fall on them...
Back to the girl from earlier, her mech just reaches the ground after a couple of minutes in the air, feeling drowsy and hungry, all the while, feeling and hearing the explosions from where she is.
"Man, they're ramping up the chaos around here. It's just like the war a decade ago, oh well, at least I have food for a week or so," she says as she pilots her mech onwards.
The woman's mech, along with the crate she stole earlier, arrives at a relatively intact house in a suburban area, near the outskirts of the remnants of the city, littered with hundreds of land mines, which she navigates by going through a path filled with dummy mines as they do not explode after being stepped on. This particular house only has a couple of holes in the roof and a large one on the right side, exposing the living room. Thanks to its size, as it's the largest house in the area, the lady was able to pilot her mech towards the garage and drop it down to the floor, where the only light is a single lightbulb hanging from the ceiling.
"Augh, God damnit, this baby needs a lot of repairs before I could use it again without breaking down," she says as she exits her mech slowly and cautiously, feeling tired.
She then yawns widely, and drowsily walks towards the crate, drops to her knees, and hugs it.
"Oh well, whatever, at least I have you guys to eat for a while. And maybe even a quick buck when I sell you all."
After a while with her arms around the crate, she decides to get a crowbar nearby and struggles to open the top.
"Oh c'mon, not this again..." She whispers as she keeps trying whilst vocally expressing discomfort.
Minutes filled with desperation passes until the sweaty woman finally decides to use a hammer and a chisel that she found just now.
"Huh, I forgot I have these... Whatever, time to open up, buddy!" She shouts as she aligns the chisel, and acted to pound it with all her might, but in reality, she used half of her strength in fear of damaging the contents of the crate.
She repeatedly did this until the crate finally opens. She drags the lid off gently, placing it on the ground, and finally, dove into the crate itself, grabbing something and pulling it out.
"Alright, let's see what we have here... You gotta be kidding me, beans?! Canned beans?! It's all canned beans?!... Damn it, they even sent the worst flavor!... Calm yourself, Claire, calm down, at least it's a lot more than I expected, and..." Then she dives into the crate once again, this time, she pulls out something other than canned beans. "Huh, first aid? Now, this, I know this'll sell for a lot in Town, and there's a lot of them too! I did hit a jackpot, it's like my birthday came early," she rejoices by jumping. "Whenever my birthday is, I don't know anymore..."
Later on, Claire, along with an opened can of beans, and has changed clothes, is now upstairs, presumably in her bedroom, which looks like it hadn't been damaged by any means, it's even spotless. The walls are covered by maps with lines, checks, and crosses, while the room is illuminated by a single ceiling light. She sits down on the ground in front of a TV connected to a car battery, with her back laying against a clean white pillow that is backed on the wall. In her hand is a remote control, which she used to turn the TV on.
"Take it away, old man," she depressingly says before she started to eat her beans with a spoon.
"Hi, my name's Professor Vein, and welcome to Robotics 301, where we'll discuss how your robots are able to function, no matter if it's a tiny little lad or a large pilotable mech," the man in a white coat in the TV greets cheerfully. "Ok, so, first of all, let's start with a refresher, here's an example of-" then a small girl comes running towards the man.
"Daddy, can we eat outside today?" The child asks blissfully.
"Ah, Claire, daddy's doing a video for his class. Maybe just go with your mother for now, okay?"
"But daddy, I want you to go with us, pretty please. I've behaved all day."
"Sorry, bud, but I have work to do, I just made enough time for this video," he explained, and the child was saddened, therefore, the professor picks her up and carries her. "Tell you what, I'll finish this later so I could take you and your mother out, but you'll have to sleep early and finish your homework, okay?"
"Of course!"
"You guys couldn't stop recording first, huh?" The Claire watching asks silently, and then, the video ends. "Too soon... Too soon."
Afterward, she uses the remote control to change to another video, and simultaneously, a bomb explodes near her house, and she is startled by it.
"Darn dogs, quit meandering into my mines!" She shouts as loud as she could. "Better make new ones just to be safe."
Some time passes, and after finishing her food, she slowly fell asleep, even with the TV left on, and before completely losing consciousness, a shed of tear came from her left eye...
