Chapter 34
Night of Blood.
Part b.
Capella
23rd August, 3025
Reynolds ran for all he could as the soldiers tried to hold the line, they were woefully under-equipped for such an undertaking. "This is Reynolds! Mechwarriors, prepare to fire on anything leaving the building that doesn't bear an FoF tag!" He ignored the chatter as he vaulted an adept that tripped, at the end of the corridor a pair of troops with laser rifles opened fire past him and he didn't even turn to look back. A warm wet spray spattered the side of his face and he could taste the hard coppery tang of blood on his lip, but even that didn't make him turn as the scream died behind him. Breaking between the two riflemen he emerged in the mechbay amongst the ruined mechs, the sight feeling almost prophetic as he tried to climb up his King Crab's ladder.
Three of the monsters burst out of the door, and burst the riflemen with flurries of furious hand to hand before the snout of the Firefly stuck itself into the mechbay from the Courtyard and sprayed the door with medium laser fire buying Reynolds the time to mount up.
"Fall back!" Reynolds ordered as he fired up as quickly as he could, already ten of them were in the courtyard, and the infantry were all but destroyed in the advance for all too few dead. Even with the Crab's systems he had difficulty tracking them and instead of trying for precise fire he simply blasted at the largest group of them he could draw a bead on. "I said fall back!" He snarled as he began marching backwards for the gates, firing the AC/20s once more only to feel the cold grip of terror as the shells failed to take down any of the monsters as they avoided the fire having been made aware of the Crab's capability.
His blood was cold knowing that none of them were properly equipped for this.
"This is Reynolds to DS-C. I want Long Tom fire on the facility."
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17th Floor Truscott Hotel, 3 Blocks away.
"Sir, they've tripped the program ten minutes ago. Casualties are high, their light mech has undergone extreme damage." One of the analysts reported as they watched the events taking place.
"And the two that were removed?"
"We've broadcast the time-delayed activation codes." Another operative said.
"Good. How many of them are left?" The commander of the operation moved towards the window, their choice of observation post being high enough to see the target facility.
"Fourteen, the mechs have done a lot of..." an explosion silenced them all as the powerful shell plunged out of the sky, highlighting the ComStar units retreating from the gate as the artillery strike landed. "Six."
"Six survived that?" the Commander said frowning back at the operative.
"Four have left the facility perimeter, we've intercepted local enforcement distress signals. The other two are in critical condition, .. they just self-destructed." He agent looked worried, "What do we do about the four escaped?"
The commander waited for a moment.
"Let them Rampage. The boss wanted to instill fear, let Liao get a taste before self destructing them." Glitch grinned. This was going to be fun