//------------------------------// // Halo Wars, Game 2; Turtle wars // Story: Let's play some games with Leon, Luna, and Eddy // by Fireheart 1945 //------------------------------// Leon yawned as the tone on the Xbox signifying that he'd joined a party sounded. "Don't fall asleep on us now, Leon," Luna teased over her headset. "I still have yet to raise the moon." "I won't," Leon said, and meant it. "Waiting at an airport is one of the most boring things ever without books." "I wouldn't be sure," Luna replied. "I've been to an airport, and all the different kinds of people is always interesting." Leon joined the game in Halo Wars Luna and Eddy had already created. He chose Anders, Luna went for Forge, and Ed went for Cutter. Playing as triple UNSC did have some risks; it was easier to rush UNSC players than Covenant, for two reasons; the Covenant had leaders, and they had shields. However, their units were generally more powerful than those of the Covenant, and even a Scarab had trouble facing down a full army of tanks, especially when it was getting rained on by UNSC leader powers. "You guys sure we should do a UNSC trio?" "It's something new and challenging," Luna remarked. "And we haven't done this for a while." "Yeah, Covenant are easy to play," Eddy agreed. "And I was a little tired of playing them." After all of them had chosen a ready status, the screen stayed the same for a few moments, then an opposing team formed against them. "Wonder who these guys are," he wondered. "Solar Flare 999, Snowfire888, and Stonewall7538," Luna said, reading the names of the enemy team. "Haven't seen any of them before." "Well, whoever they are, they're getting a beatdown," Leon said confidently. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- A few minutes earlier... Princess Celestia walked down the hallway to her room. It had been a busy day. She lifted a hoof to her mouth as she yawned. Many of her subjects thought the hardest part of her job was raising the sun in the morning. The reality was that enough unicorns could perform the same job, and considering that the sun was linked to magic, just like most if not all things in the Equestrian world, it was easier than most ponies thought it was. Granted, she put on a show during the Summer Sun Celebration, which probably added to the false illusion, something that amused her and made her chuckle a little now. Much harder, though, in her opinion, was managing a country. In particular, politics, both internal and external. Although Equestria was an absolute monarchy/diarchy, political parties, or perhaps political leanings was more accurate, still formed bases for those who wanted change, wanted things to stay as they were, or wanted something in the middle. It could be pesky dealing with them. Nobles tended to like having more privileges, or regaining privileges they'd lost over the millennium she'd ruled. She continued to say no, albeit politely. What nobles would call commoners made their own appeals, some of which she accepted and some she had to deny. While she regretted having to refuse some of these, she wasn't about to crown herself or Luna as queen, or declare Equestria the premiere power on the planet. Nor was she about to kick out immigrants who had come to Equestria. Today had seen a lot of the latter issue; angry lower-class ponies were upset that Griffon, Zebra, and Saddle Arabian immigrants were taking jobs that they themselves could have held. Most of the petitioners were from Manehattan and other coastal cities, where most of the immigrants came in. Although she was sympathetic, she refused in all particulars to deport those who came freely to Equestria, often at great cost in money, in order to have a fresh start. Naturally, that got the petitioning ponies quite angry, but they wouldn't dare try to argue with their beloved and supposedly divine Princess, and instead had taken out their anger on the nobility, who they accused of inviting the immigrants so they could hire those who were willing to work for less pay for the same job. The Princess knew she wasn't divinity, despite her powers and accumulated knowledge throughout the centuries. The way she'd handled the problem had been a little less than perfect, or more than a little. After a few members of both parties had come close to exchanging blows, she'd had Guards clear them all out of the throne room, with a threat to arrest anypony who resorted to violence. After that incident, she'd ordered everypony out of the room, with only one pony to appear at a time after that. She sighed. She didn't like losing her temper, or coming anywhere close to it. With over a thousand years' worth of experience, she had practice at making sure that anger was far from her even in situations that would have caused a blood vessel to pulse in someone with less patience. But today had been frustrating. On top of that, Prince Blueblood had come in and asked for another raise in his allowance. She'd said no politely at first, but he hadn't taken the hint, and kept bugging her. At last, she'd threated to actually lower his allowance - which, she reflected, she should probably have done anyway, seeing as he didn't do anything to deserve that which he had - backed up with a stare of her own; although her stare was nothing compared to that of Fluttershy's, she had the power to back it up. He'd withdrawn, backing away nervously before turning and fleeing at a full gallop. After a few minutes' cooldown time, she'd gone to the refrigerator and gotten herself a glass of Sunny Delight. The orange-flavored beverage had caught her eye with it's name, but the taste was what had hooked her. She'd had lots of it imported. It was certainly popular, and not just with her. She'd gone and apologized to the Prince, though she had, in no uncertain terms, confirmed her earlier decision. He hadn't been happy about that, but he wasn't stupid; stuck up, pompous, and generally disdainful of the lower classes, but not - quite - stupid. After a day of such madness, she was ready to do something fun. She could have definitely done something like a hooficure or gone to a fancy restaurant; there was never a lack of either in Canterlot. However, right now, she didn't really feel like going out. "Ah, Snowfire and Flametail, just the ponies I wanted to see," she said to two Guards approaching her. "You sent for us, your Highness?" the white earth pony asked. "I did. And you know you don't have to be so formal," she answered. "I've called you two because I feel like starting a party." The two brothers nodded. They knew what she meant by that. "I suppose today wasn't exactly a good one?" Flametail asked. "You wouldn't believe me if I told you how bad it was," she replied to the bright orange unicorn. She used her magic to open the door to her room. All three of them followed her to a large monitor on a small bureau. "Which one will we be playing, your.... I mean... Princess?" Celestia's eye rolled over the collection of games she kept. While not as avid a gamer as her younger sister, she still liked having them as an option. She disliked the taste of alcoholic beverages; after her first glass of wine, she'd never had another, and she'd never tried any kind of tobacco. While gaming sometimes caused rage, it wasn't the out-of-control, amnesiac kind of rage that beer or whiskey would have brought. Not that she had that much trouble with anger, but today had proven that even she had limits. "I think a good game of Halo Wars would help," she said at last. "That means we'll have to go home in order to play," Snowfire noted. "That's fine; we'll be able to communicate via headsets." She sat down, using magic to turn on the set and the Xbox. "I'll get us home before you know it, Princess," Flametail said. In a flash of orange light, he and Snowfire vanished. Celestia chuckled. She knew that Snowfire didn't like it when his brother pulled off a stunt like that; likely, the brothers would be spending the next couple minutes arguing before going to their Xboxes and playing the game. They were both loyal and brave soldiers. Flametail was the elder of the two, but not by much. Both had fought bravely during the Changeling invasion, though they, like the rest of the Royal Guard, had been taken by surprise and overwhelmed. Both felt the sting of defeat, and were determined to prevent it from happening again. Oddly enough, or so she thought, it was Flametail who was the outgoing, boisterous type, and had to be reined in by his younger brother. Once they were both on, she invited them to a party. "Can't believe we're hanging out with the Princess," she heard Flametail say. "We work with her all the time," Snowfire said, as if to somepony younger. "We know her." "Yeah, but we've never spent time with her like this." "She's too pure; of course we haven't." Celestia mentally snorted. Most ponies thought the same, that she was somehow superior to them in a way beyond rank and royalty. Few thought of her as being just like them; as a pony with dreams, feelings, disappointments and successes. It could be grating sometimes. At least they love me, almost without exception. That was something that sometimes rose to her mind when she started to fall into such thoughts. Luna had been thought of as Nightmare Moon for a thousand years; as the monster, nay, the creator of nightmares. Some ponies were starting to come around, but some wasn't all. In general, Ponyville and somewhat over half of Canterlot liked her; the rest held their opinions carefully in reserve, most afraid that if they voiced their concerns, they would suffer nightmares the rest of their days. Celestia had to admit, as far as suffering went, her sister suffered far more. She'd tried to get others to believe in Luna's good side, as they believed in hers. But a thousand years' worth of tales and obscurity had a grip that she had so far been unable to loosen very far. If only it were possible to issue a book barbeque, as it is in Tropico. She'd watched let's plays of that, and the many antics, especially those initiated by Penultimo, were very funny. Nonetheless, many if not most of Luna's biggest supporters were humans. Luna had been shocked, though pleasantly so, when she learned of the fact that she was beloved by the show's fans. Celestia had pondered this fact for a while, and had then come to the conclusion that, because they were outsiders looking in, they were more willing to forgive her sister for her actions as Nightmare Moon and accept as Luna, Princess of Equestria. "Who should we play as, Princess?" Snowfire asked. "I will be playing as the Prophet of Regret," Celestia answered. She liked using the Prophet, not just because he could fly, but because his special power, the cleansing beam. In effect, the power of the sun was released on earth. Snowfire chose the Arbiter, while Flametail favored the Brute Chieftain. "Why the name Stonewall, Flametail?" she asked. "Because during a battle in the human civil war, one of their generals turned into a stone wall to defeat his enemies*. I wish I had powers like that." It was all Celestia could do not to laugh. While not an expert on human conflicts, she seriously doubted that something like that had happened. Humans had no access to magic, not as unicorns and alicorns did. "Hopefully, we can find a good match up," she said quietly, more to herself than to anyone else. "Whoever they are, Princess, we'll crush them," Flametail said confidently. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Leon waited as the map opened on Frozen Valley. His first concern was sending his Warthog to grab some crates near his initial base. He queued up a supply pad, as well as a reactor and two more supply pads after that, as well as an additional Warthog. "Okay guys, what're we gonna do?" Eddy asked. "The usual; win," Leon answered. That startled a laugh out of the Briton. "I mean as a plan to win," he said, "like the details." "All three of them are Covenant," Leon noted. "D-bombs are going to be crucial. And we shoud have tons of Wolverines, because even if the Prophet doesn't start buzzing around blowing up bases while we're not looking, some other guy is going to go Banshees; you know they will. And as UNSC, our anti-infantry sucks, so we'll be relying on tanks and air power." "Hmm," Luna hummed in thought. "We are some distance apart. I don't like having to run units to one area only to be attacked in the place I just left, which, if they are at all competent, they will be doing." After a moment of silence, she said quietly, as though to herself, "Unless..." "Unless what?" Leon prompted. "Unless we decide to play a super turtle." That gave Leon pause. They hadn't tried to play any version of those for a while. Basically, the whole idea was to build an impenetrable defense and maintain it, with attacking, except in an effort to rank up leaders, being prohibited. The idea was that the enemy would eventually get tired of futile attacks and resign. The problem was, even if the turtle was set up properly, some people were stubborn and willing to be bloody minded; a super turtle game could potentially last for hours. The best map by far on which to play a super turtle was, by far, Fort Deen. Ground forces were limited by the pathways on the map, allowing for a defense based on a predictable attack route. And Luna was right; the bases on Frozen Valley started far apart. It would take units moving from one side of the map to the other about a minute to cross the distance, which meant that a clever enemy could launch a diversionary assault against one side and then, once the defending players had sent units there, attack on the other. It would be difficult to build a proper conventional defense against such a strategy. That is, if one thought conventionally. "That means going for the Bermuda Triangle," Ed put in. Leon nodded, though he knew none of the others could see it. The Bermuda Triangle was a super turtle that was designed for Frozen Valley. Essentially, the players would take a base from the triangular setup of bases on one side of their area of the map, after naturally killing the rebel bases there, and then ignore their initial bases (except, of course, for the player who started in that area) while building up all their strength in that one place. It allowed for easy reinforcement, and there were only two vectors from which the enemy could attack on the ground. While enemy air power could be an issue, the idea was that enough anti-air would be built to handle the problem. Meanwhile, massed cobras would slaughter any vehicle sent to break the defenders, up to an including Scarabs. The main problem was building an economy. The lack of other bases meant that money wasn't going to be coming in massive amounts. Rebuilding units and using leader powers would be crucial; between that and upgrading units, resources would be scarce. Then again, wasn't it a challenge? Just the sort of excitement he and the others were looking for? "I guess we could try it," he said. "Like you have a choice in the matter; I'm an absolute monarch, so you'll do what I say," Luna said in a cheeky tone; he could easily imagine her smiling in amusement. "Well, with that kind of persuasion, I guess I have no real options," he replied, with a hint of amusement in his tone. Luna made a neighing sound, one sounding as usual as that of a normal horse. To the surprised silence, she added a few seconds later, "What? You never thought I would stoop to using that kind of speech, did you?" "No, honestly didn't," Eddy said. "What did you say, exactly?" "Oh, nothing. Neighs and whinnies mean nothing by themselves; ponies usually make those noises when caught by surprise or as a replacement for a sigh. I was just using it as a reference to the whole 'yay or nay' thing." "So..." "No, you don't get a choice, as I told you thirty seconds ago." Luna laughed, though not unkindly. "Okay, I guess super turtle it is," Leon agreed. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Celestia queued up a couple warehouses and a temple as the game started. After sending her Ghost to pick up resources, she started to formulate her strategy. She didn't know what the opposing team would do. However, after looking at the teams, she began to nod. The enemy team was formed entirely out of UNSC leaders... all of the UNSC leaders, in fact. That meant, if they were quick, her team could rush the enemy team and win a quick victory. It would be a triumphant end to a bad day. "I think it might be a good idea to him them as soon as possible," she said. "Snowfire, build us some Suicide Grunts. Flametail, get us Brutes, lots of them." "You got it, Princess," Snowfire said eagerly. "Who do we hit first?" Flametail asked. "Or do we hit all three of them?" Celestia thought for a moment. "Better to concentrate against one of them," she said at last. She pinged the radar on top of the orange player's base. "We'll hit this one first." It would all come down to the leaders, and whatever cheap units they could produce quickly. She waited for the Prophet to roll out, then sent him towards the other side of the map. She queued up a Factory, the Covenant's vehicle producer. She was going to mass-build Wraiths. True, without upgrades they weren't nearly as good as Scorpions - actually, few units in the game were as good as Scorpions, and even fully upgraded the Wraith came nowhere close to it's UNSC counterpart - but they were better than Warthogs, which had only machine guns early on as an upgrade, and the grenade launcher upgrade after the machine gun wasn't very scary either. Only a Gauss Hog was going to do much damage to a Wraith, and their armor was still basically made of paper, and while a Scorpion could outfight a Wraith even without upgrades, the cost was 500 for a Scorpion vs. 350 for a Wraith, so the latter could outnumber the former. The Covenant could warp units directly to their leaders. A Disruption Bomb could stop it, but it cost 450 resources, which was quite damaging early on. The enemy had the choice of building more units or using resources to stop a leader from warping in reinforcements, and other leaders had the option of standing out of range of the D-bomb to warp in their own units. Celestia first chose to upgrade her Prophet to have Fuel Rod Cannons. The starting plasma cannons were awful. The main problem when switching was that, due to a glitch in the game, the Prophet's shields would automatically reduce to about a third or fourth of it's normal strength if the upgrade was completed while the Prophet was under attack. It was annoying, but the upgrade was worth it. She could upgrade the Cleansing Beam instead, but using that cost resources, and she wanted to try having more units than the enemy. "All of you, move up your leaders to the Prophet's position," she instructed. "Whatcha got in mind, Princess?" Flametail asked, no doubt eager to start. Celestia smiled. "I want to overwhelm them... with the power of the sun." ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Leon built up his Warthog squad; so far he was up to five, and he was building a Barracks to train Spartans. He wasn't intending to go infantry, but he had to have Spartans and upgrade them. His intention was to go tanks; people generally expected Anders to go air. While eventually building some Hawks was always good, if for nothing else than for having well-armed, fast-moving scouts, tanks were okay to begin with. In the meantime, Warthogs and Spartans we good enough to start out with. He sent his Warthogs to the red Covenant base to check on what that player was doing. when his units got there, they ran into four units of Brutes. With only machine guns and a ramming ability - good enough in any other Halo game - it wasn't enough to ensure a victory in the skirmish, or at least he didn't want to lose any units right now. He withdrew them. He did manage to get a look at the enemy base; so far, four Warehouses and a Temple. That was interesting. That meant that Red wasn't up to building the usual Hunter or Banshee force. And, with the Brute squads he'd encountered... "Red's going to rush," he announced. "Oh really?" "Yeah Ed; he's mass-building Brutes." "That's kind of obvious; what rank is he?" Luna asked. Leon looked. "Oh, you've got to be kidding me!" "What!?" "Two of these guys are Recruits." "Are you serious?" Luna demanded. "Yeah; Red and Blue. The last guy, Purple, is a Brigadier, so I guess we'll have to watch out for that, though." "How did they even get in a match with us?" Eddy asked, though not derisively. "Blame Matchmaker, as usual," Leon suggested. "As stupid here as it is in World of Tanks." "Even better," Luna said, in a tone that made it obvious she was grinning. "The more fodder for our super turtle." "That's if these aren't alt accounts," Leon tacked on. "Urrrg," Eddy said discomfortingly. "Hope that isn't the case." "You can take this base, Leon," Luna said, pinging the map. "I've cleared out the Rebels." "Thanks!" Leon claimed the base site, and immediately a base began constructing. Leon frowned. He liked strategy games where the base wasn't so centered on one site, and where one could build a structure wherever they pleased. Halo Wars was pretty limited there. If other factions had been put into the game - such as the Rebels and Forerunners - it might have been less of a bother for him. Oh well. He sent his newly-trained Spartans to take out a rebel base. They had enough shielding to get through a turret's fire, and enough to kill off the rebel infantry. "At least it wasn't another MAC rush," Leon sighed. "Yeah; for some reason they always blow up my base," Eddy noted angrily. Leon decided it wasn't the best time to say that once, he'd messaged a player on an all-Cutter team to hit him with MACs. "Oh bother," Luna said worriedly. "What?" "I can see all their leaders... who are all on course for my base." "Aw nuts," Leon grumbled. He sent all his existing units toward Luna's base. On the minimap, he could see that Eddy was doing just the same. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Celestia felt a measure of satisfaction as Regret's Fuel Rod Cannons began pounding the orange player's Supply Pad. She upgraded his Cleansing Beam and would use it once the upgrade was complete. So far, she had two Wraiths out, with another one on the way. Snowfire was a little over-enthusiastic. "Feel my rage!" he shouted as he ignited his energy swords and starting jumping into the base. Celestia could barely suppress a giggle; the Arbiter's Rage Mode attacks looked funny. Flametail didn't bother with special attacks. He just started whacking a Barracks he found with his Gravity Hammer. His Brutes started warping in a moment later, and they started pounding the base as well. She would have sent in her own units, but the blue player on the opposing team provided her with a problem straight off; he sent his Warthogs to harass her Prophet. When she turned to shoot at them, the Warthogs dodged her Fuel Rods and continued firing unending bursts of machine gun fire, which were wearing down the Prophet's shields. She lashed out with the Cleansing Beam; the heavily armed trucks simply moved to avoid it. They simply moved too fast and too unpredictably for the beam to do any more than lightly damage any one of them. She quickly sent her Wraiths to warp onto her Prophet. They came quickly, and she ordered them to destroy the Warthogs. The blue player, sensing trouble, moved them back, out of her line of sight. It was a victory, of sorts. She refocused on the base and unleashed the Cleansing Beam upon the Supply Pad. Although a fully upgraded beam would have done more damage and been much more economically efficient, it got the job done; the pad started burning quickly. Meanwhile, Snowfury had run out of money using rage attacks against the main structure and was now trying to batter down a second Supply Pad. "Snowfury, remember that you're building Suicide Grunts," Celestia reminded him. "Oh, right." A few seconds later, Suicide Grunts began warping in. They fired their plasma pistols; Snowfire had sent them to attack the Reactor. "Don't use them like that!" Flametail said loudly. "What else would you have them do?" Snowfire countered. "Oh, I don't know... use their suicide ability?" "But that would waste the resources I used to build them! Plus, who sends their own guys to kill themselves?" "It would do more damage than hitting it with their peashooters!" Snowfire digested this, then sent a single Suicide Grunt to perform it's special ability. The tanks on their backs glowed bright blue as they ran into the Reactor and exploded, severely damaging the building. The white Guard grunted, refusing to say anything, but acknowledging the point. A moment later, he sent the rest of his Grunts to kamikaze themselves against the Reactor, finally succeeding in blowing it up. Celestia smiled. That put the opposing player at a serious tech disadvantage. With any luck, this might just succeed. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Leon succeeded in saving his Warthogs from the Covenant, but Luna's base was being pounded; not pounded very well, but pounded. She had lost her Reactor, and with it any ability to build anything other than Warthogs. "Could one of you please do something?" the Lunar Princess shouted. "Hold on." Leon targeted the Prophet with the Cryo Bomb, freezing him and two of the Wraiths with him. Eddy unleashed Forge's Carpet Bomb on Red's Brutes; although it wasn't upgraded, it did enough damage to hurt them pretty badly. Luna took the opportunity to pound the Prophet with a MAC round. It didn't kill him, but his recharged shields got taken down quite a bit. Leon's Warthogs went back in, chewing up the rest of the shield and finally starting to do real damage. On top of it all, Eddy dropped a D-bomb on top of him. The tide was turning. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Celestia's usual smile slipped as the Prophet got hounded by the enemy forces. The massive use of UNSC leader powers wasn't something she'd expected. She watched as the Warthogs, now with Grenade Launchers, fired on her leader. "Hey, what the...! Why can't I rage?" Snowfire asked, confused. "They dropped a Disruption Bomb!" Flametail exclaimed. "My Brutes aren't warping in anymore! Wait, what are those?" "Flamethrowers!" Celestia watched as they went straight for the Arbiter. "Snowfire, get out of there!" "It won't let me! Aw nuts, here they come!" The flamethrower marines doused the Arbiter in flames. Although he was fighting back, he was obviously doomed. "I'll save you, buddy!" Flametail said, moving his Chieftain to attack the Flamers. He might have done it... if three Spartan tanks hadn't chugged on down and blasted the Chieftain with their cannons. At that point, the Solar Princess realized that all hopes of a successful rush were gone. "Pull back, now! That's an order!" It was too late. Snowfire's Arbiter, unable to rage, was cooked alive in his armor; although Flamtetail's Chieftain held on for a while longer, he too was defeated before he could pull out of range of the D-bomb. Celestia sent her two surviving Wraiths to attack the Scorpions while her Prophet made his escape, hoping she would be able to get him out of there and formulate a new plan. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- "Get him, get him, get him!" Leon shouted, but it was too late; the Prophet floated between the two Wraiths and safely teleported away. "Nuts!" he said as slammed his fist down on the arm of his chair. "Ah. don't get your knickers in a twist," Eddy said. "We got two of them, and now all that's left is to mop up." "Easy for you to say," Luna grumbled, but Leon could tell she was grateful that her base hadn't been destroyed. "What do we do now, chaps?" Ed asked. "We continue with our plan, as before," Luna answered him. "We can still bring this off." "Alright." Still... Leon sent his tanks and Warthogs toward Red's base. Nothing stops me from going and doing the same to them. "What are doing?" Luna asked him. "Don't go and kill one of them yet!" "I won't," he said. "Just going to blow up every building on his base." ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Flametail wiped his brow with a hard, heavy hoof, which still had nail holes from the horseshoes he'd worn when training. "Well, that didn't go as we wanted." "You think?" Snowfire countered. "We gave them a bit to think about." "We didn't do anything to their units; I think we should be worried." "Oh please, little brother, you don't really think they'd be fool enough to come up here and..." A blue Spartan tank, followed by two others and a small pack of Warthogs, rolled up on his base and blasted a warehouse with canister shells. "Uh, Snow, please forget what I just said; I think I need help." "I'm still building new units, I'm not sure I can do anything." Flametail watched in horror as the tanks blew up two of his warehouses, then targeted his Temple. A MAC blast damaged it to the point where the tanks were able to kill it; they promptly blew up his remaining warehouses. "Princess? Snow? Could either of you please send help?" he asked, panicking now. Just then, the tanks began moving off. They still fired at his base as they moved off, but they stopped once they got out of range. The quickly left, retreating back toward their side of the map. "What the heck just happened?" "I don't know," Celestia answered. "I thought they had you." "This has to be some part of their strategy; we're dealing with a superior intellect." Snowfire laughed. "Somehow I doubt that, big brother. I don't profess to understand it either, though." "What if they come back and do it again?" Flametail asked, suddenly worried again. "We should have units of our own. Just focus on rebuilding your base." "Right." Flametail looked at his resources. "Uh, Snow, would you mind giving me a few hundred bits?" ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- "That's how you wreck a base," Leon said as his tanks reached his own base inside the triangle. "And it will mess up their resource collection," Luna noted, "and they'll have to donate resources to the player you just hit." "Wasn't thinking about that," he admitted. "Just wanted to show them how you really smash things up; I mean come on, the Arbiter was raging on the main building on a UNSC base, for crying out loud!" "They are new at this," Luna agreed. "What happens when they eventually get it in their heads to build six scarabs? That's my worry." "Uh... we die?" Eddy suggested. "That will be hard to stop," Leon reluctantly agreed. "But we can't just give up at that point. Besides, anyone who sees six Scarabs fail is bound to assume he can't win and quit." Eddy laughed. "Yeah, that might be so. So let's do it." Leon went about setting up the super turtle; he placed Cobras in a line (he refused to try to Vulcan them, i.e. drop them on top of each other with Pelicans; he saw that as using a glitch, which would be against the rules) and built the necessary Reactors on his base, upgrading them as necessary. His army, comprised of the stationed Cobras and a core of tanks and a handful of Wolverines, was ready for action; although not yet fully upgraded, it was a force capable to inflicting severe damage on anyone willing to engage it. Luna's army consisted of a similar set up, but without so many Cobras, and more Wolverines. Edward, playing Forge, built a large squad of Cyclopes, along with Grizzly tanks and a very large force of Wolverines, along with a handful of Spartan tanks. The main weakness of this force was that it had a lack of aerial firepower. However, considering air units were generally offensive units, used for raiding the enemy and destroying bases, they weren't very useful, and, given the number of anti air defenses by the defenders, unnecessary. The Cobras and tanks could kill Scarabs, though admittedly not without cost, and only someone who went nuts building and maintaining a massive force of Banshees could hope to break through the anti air defense and do any damage. A lesser weakness was the fact that Hunters could and probably would do great damage to a vehicular force, but Hunters weren't as strong as they were in other Halo games, and Leon wasn't as afraid of them as he was in the FPS versions of Halo. They did have a few scattered air units, but only a handful. It would have to do. "I hope they don't go for Hunters too much," Luna said, as though reading his thoughts. "They might be hard to counter." "Hunters in this are terrible, compared to the walking tanks of Halo, Halo 2, and others," Ed countered. "They can't even shoot at air units, for crying out loud." "Base under attack," came the notification. Leon looked to his original base. He nodded. "It has begun." ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Snowfire looked at his army with satisfaction. It was a massive army of Suicide Grunts and Hunters to back them up. Although he only had access to tech level 2 units and upgrades, he felt it was good enough to get the job done, especially with his teammates to help him. "Are we agreed?" Celestia asked. "Yeah. Blue was the guy who did the most to mess up our plan. He has to die first," Snowfire said, stamping his hoof on the ground for emphasis. "Alright. If you're both ready, then let's go." Their army began to move. Flametail's red Banshees moved at their normal speed, in order to keep up with the ground forces. Celestia had an army of Jackals and Hunters, as lethal combination, along with a small number of Vampires, in case they encountered aerial units. All in all, it appeared to be an unstoppable force. Blue's base came into view quite soon. "Attack!" Celestia ordered. Hunters and Banshees started pounding at the base and it's buildings. It was the start of their offensive. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Leon sent his two Hornets and his Wolverines to defend his base. He didn't expect the force to stop it's destruction, but that wasn't the point of the exercise. His goal was to knock down as many of the enemy's units as he could, hopefully give some of his units some stars that would make them all the more valuable. The Hornets weren't going to accomplish much on their own, but if he managed to kill the Vampires, the only units able to shoot at them would be Banshees and Jackals, neither of which were particularly threatening to air units. "I hope you know what you're doing," Luna said as she noticed the movment. "I think I do." The enemy managed to destroy two Supply Pads before his units showed up. His first targets were the Purple Vampires. Two of them were hacked out of the sky before the other player realized what was going on and drew them back. After that, he sent the Hornets to attack a unit of Hunters. The Red player lost a couple Banshees before he noticed. Leon was worried he might attack his Wolverines - or worse, call in his buddy who had the Hunters - but that didn't happen. Instead, Red just flew them to the other side of the base by using the Boost ability. Of course, that didn't remove the threat to his units. The enemy Blue player sent his Arbiter to attack the Wolverines. Leon moved them, though he tried to keep them in a position where they could bear on the Banshees. However, it was going to be difficult, as the pathway around the base was crowded in by cliff walls, allowing only a few units to pass at once. And if the enemy managed to seal them in by send units to block those passageways... No, it was too risky to try to pursue the Banshees too far. He settled for having his Wolverines Volley the group of Hunters. A massive barrage of missiles flew from his units and struck the enemy, damaging several and even killing one of them. By now, his base had lost most of it's buildings, and the central building was reduced to half health. A group of Hunters detached from the main group and attacked his Wolverines. At that point, he decided it wasn't a good idea to stick around much longer. He'd done what he'd wanted to do, which was bleed the enemy at no cost to his own army. He retreated, although a couple units had suffered damage. It was all part of the game. He allowed the enemy to whittle down his base until it finally blew up. Likely, the enemy thought they'd won a big victory. Well, they were to discover otherwise soon enough. Next, they moved on to Eddy's base. The British player didn't even bother responding, choosing instead to kill a rebel base. The first notion the enemy team had that they were facing something more than they were expecting was when two Red Wraiths were blown sky high on running into the Cobra line. A group of Hunters following them were first volleyed, then hosed down by the defenders' air units. A group of Banshees trying to help was wiped out, one by one. Edward moved his Cyclops force to repair the damaged vehicles. Altogether, a full on UNSC super turtle was harder to pull off, as compared to a mixed team of UNSC and Covenant. However, the assault force was getting decimated. Blue and Purple retreated; Red tried, without success, to punch a hole with Banshees. All of the Covenant air units were shot down, at the cost of one Cobra and a Wolverine, plus some damaged units. These guys have no idea what we're going to do to them, he thought deliciously. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Defeat didn't feel as good as victory. That was the first thought Celestia had as her team retreated. Or, rather, as her army and Snowfire's retreated. Flametail seemed to think his Banshees would be enough to win, and seemed to be surprised that they were not. "Well, it's not like they can do much, huddled up in that corner of the map," Snowfire said, which sounded logical. "We just have to keep them there, and attack all together when we go in, that's all." That was the way Celestia saw it as well. All in all, it would be a siege, but with the enemy having only one base each, she was confident of victory. She rebuilt the forces she had lost, and made sure to take a base in the interval. Flametail built an army of Wraiths, discarding Banshees for the time being. Snowfire expanded to another base, as did his older brother. When the went in again, they hit from both sides. Flametail's Wraiths were obliterated by Cobras long before they could do significant damage, and Snowfire lost most of his Suicide Grunts. Those who survived succeeding in blowing up an Orange Supply Pad, but even as the last Grunt blew himself up, the enemy player started to rebuild it. Celestia lost most of her hunters to canister shells and her Jackals were unable to do much to the defending vehicles without them. They withdrew, having lost a large number of units. By now, she'd researched most of the available technologies, and most of the base slots on the map were filled in. Her team would have a massive amount of money coming in. Compared to that of their opponents, she didn't see how their idea of sitting in a corner was supposed to work. Without the resources of her own team, they could barely be expected to replace their own losses, let alone expand further. "Ready to go in again, Princess," Flametail reported. She needed, though she knew intellectually that he couldn't see it. "Very good. Send your armies against the northern line of their defenses." She quickly moved her units to do the same. Hopefully, this attack would do what the others had not. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Luna made sure to turn of her mic before snarling. The other team had come loaded for bear, with more Hunters than their tanks could deal with. The Cobras weren't going to last long. "Oh for heaven's sake," she said as a Cobra was vaporized by multiple Hunter assault cannons. It was a lesson; never super turtle without adequate air units. She resolved never to make that mistake again. She did what she could; her Wolverines Volleyed the Hunter group, damaging several of them. On top of that, she delivered four MAC blasts down on top of them. It wasn't enough to get all of them, but it severely reduced the firepower the other side had available. Banshees streamed down, attacking the Cobras as well. This time, she grinned a little. This Red player clearly had a thick skull. Or maybe he didn't. Maybe he was just bloody-minded. Whatever the case, the Banshees stayed to kill a number of Cobras before finally being shot down. To her dismay, Red had researched Sacrifice, so his Banshees would crash into the force of Cobras and Tanks sent against them when they died. That knocked out a few more units. And after that wave, another force of Hunters, colored Purple this time, went in after the ruin of the armies that had preceded them. Most of the remaining Cobras were eliminated. They were good against vehicles, including Scarabs, but Cobras were useless against Hunters. This time, Leon came to the rescue. he dropped a Cryo Bomb on top of them, stopping their advance immediately and allowing for the tanks to redistribute some fury against the attackers. Edward mopped up with a Carpet Bomb, obliterating most of the remaining units. Sullenly, reluctantly, the enemy withdrew it's few remaining troops from the battlefield. "Phew," Leon sighed. "They must have left, what? Thirty, forty units dead in this failed charge alone." "We haven't lost much less than that ourselves," Luna answered, looking nervously at the number of available resources. "It was a clever attack, making us expend most of our effort on the first couple of waves. Maybe they're brighter than we thought." "Or maybe their Brigadier is their only source of brains," Leon commented dully. "They lost more than we did... even if I have to rebuild all that junk they destroyed." She mentally thanked him for not swearing, although she knew he wouldn't hear it. "We'll have to rebuild. And we should build more air this time." "Can't leave ourselves vulnerable to Scarabs." "It wouldn't do for those Hunters to tear up the Cobras for the Scarab to push through," Luna countered. She took a moment to think about Leon's tactics. In most strategy games he concentrated on building a powerful ground force, with air units being given second priority... or no priority altogether. In Supreme Commander 2, he loved to build and upgrade massive numbers of Rockhead tanks, which were worth their weight in gold once fully upgraded, with artillery, shield, and anti-missile units backing them up. His fighter and bomber support though, was typically minimal, or nil. He also loved to build a big navy, even more so than an army, but most maps focused on land and air combat. She wondered whether he was afraid of heights in the real world. As a pony with wings, she sometimes had difficultly wondering why anyone would be afraid of that. Other times, she reminded herself that two-thirds of all ponies, or as close to that as made little or no difference, had no wings whatsoever. She could also remember a time as a filly before she had learned to fly. Back then, she'd been as afraid of falling as any other pony. In any case, Leon's tactics were intensely ground-based. In Halo Wars, that was typically fine for a UNSC player if they harnessed tanks with Wolverines. However, that tactic only went so far. A Banshee squadron could easily slip by such an army to raid a base a long distance from it, and an invisible Arbiter could summon reinforcement from anywhere, as could the Chieftain and Prophet. While the UNSC was good at blitzkrieg-style assaults, the Covenant could bypass defenses and attack where you least expected it... or wanted it. Luna decided that she would be the one to build air, as she had less issue with the unit types. As she moved to do so, she wondered when the enemy would get the idea to build Scarabs... -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Celestia looked at the ruins of the army that had been sent in. All the Banshees were down, and the majority of the Hunters had been wiped out; most of those remaining were down to red health. The tactic had almost worked. The problem had been the leader powers. They needed something that could bull through such a blow, and then keep going once the problem had passed. And for that, they needed... "Flametail, Snowfire, how much money do you have?" "About four thousand and a half." "Three thousand and seven." "Good. Build a Scarab, each of you. I'll do the same." She immediately queued one up at her main base. "Wow, why didn't we think of that?" "Because we thought this was going to be easy," Snowfire answered his brother. "We found out it isn't. And if the only unit you ever build is a Scarab, it leaves you with precious little to protect your base." "Point taken." "With these," Celestia added, "we can attack them from that mountain, or plateau." She pinged the map on the area she was talking about. "So one Scarab per attack route?" "Yes, we should do that." "Going to take a few minutes," Flametail worried. "If they go and hit one of our bases..." "Then they do," Snowfire said. "Besides, that will leave their own bases weak for our own attack. I say let them." ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- "Anybody want to hit these guys while their trousers are down?" Eddy asked. "Don't be a fool," Luna scorned, at the same time Leon said, "No!" Luna went on, "That would throw away the whole idea of wearing them out." "Not tryin' to break the super turtle, just want to get a little more veterancy." "No," Luna said firmly. "We're staying here." "And what will you do to me if I don't? Throw me in jail?" "No, but I can MAC you," the Lunar Princess threatened. "Um... guys?" Leon said. "Yes?" "They have a Scarab up there," Leon said, pining the map where the Scarab was perched. It began shooting at his base. "Hold on," Luna said, lining up a MAC. The Scarab was blasted by four massive shells from space. It wasn't destroyed, but it was heavily damaged. Leon's tanks rolled up and blasted it with canister shells. Even so, the narrow space between the ledge and the base allowed for only a few tanks to get at it at once, so it managed to fully melt a turret, a Factory, and a Supply Pad before finally blowing up. "Two more! One on either side!" Eddy announced. Cobras were already firing upon the threat. The Scarabs were both taking heavy damage, but both were able to stop and fire. Leon called in a Cryo Bomb on the one attacking from the north, freezing it in place as Cobras and tanks tore it apart. Ed's own Carpet Bomb on the other Scarab wasn't as effective. The few remaining Hunters the other side had joined the battle as well, but obviously the wave would be made or broken by the performance of it's Scarabs. The one in the north died quickly to fire from ground units and Luna's new Hornets. The one attacking from the other side was still putting up a fight. However, even as the Cobras on that side died, they perforated the Scarab, heavily damaging it in the process. When Luna's air units arrived, the obliterated the Scarab with little trouble. Then they finished off the few Hunters still standing. "That was... interesting," Luna commented. "I wonder if...?" --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- "Well, that decides it," Celestia sighed. "We must build two Scarabs each, and send those in to finish them. Build one each in a separate base; that way, they'll be built simultaneously." "Hopefully it works," Snowfire said quietly. "Of course it will work!" Flametail said confidently. "Six Scarabs has to be unstoppable!" "They stopped us just now." "We weren't using six Scarabs, were we?" "Well, no," Snowfire admitted. "Can't really say this match has been successful, though, can we? All that's happened is that they've been chewing us up and spitting us out; somehow that little nut of resistance has done more than any of us thought it would." "If you hit an anvil long enough with a hammer, it'll break," Flametail argued. "Yeah, but it's the hammer that will break, not the anvil. Our grandfather's a blacksmith in the Guard. You ought to know that." "Are you saying you're a defeatist?" "No! Where did you get that? All I was saying was that this isn't going to be easy." "Please stop it, both of you," Celestia said firmly. Some might have considered it odd, but she viewed the Royal Guard more as children than as her protectors. Sometimes, like children, they needed discipline. Regardless, she liked the brothers, who were competent at their posts, and they were generally friendly, a good quality to have in her eyes. "If this goes well, we'll win," she reasoned. "We'll try the same thing again; two Scarabs on the mountain, two others each attacking on the paths to either side. "And we'll build some Engineers to fix them in the battle. It should work." At least, she hoped it would. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Leon wiped his brow as the last Scarab died. "That was too close." "Oh, come on, mate, they didn't even destroy all that much." "They did get further than I would have been comfortable with, though," Luna admitted. "If they come at us again with even more, I am not sure if we would be able to stop them." "We have to rebuild," Leon said. "More Cobras." "Cobras are too stationary," Luna argued. "We need Vultures. You should have built more Hawks by now." "Hawks don't do as much damage, and they get chewed up real bad." "At least they can move faster! And they don't have to become a stationary fortress just to do any amount of damage!" Leon had to admit that she had a point. "Fine. I'll do Hawks. Happy?" "More so than before." "Yeah, sorry." "That's alright. Let's focus more on the enemy than on each other." He was about to go to work on that when a potential problem came to his attention. "Uh, what if they bring Vampires instead of Engineers or Hunters in support?" "Ouch," Luna winced. "That would hurt. Still, I think there is no reason to assume they would do that. I'm willing to gamble that they'll go with Engineers." "Not all that much better," Eddy noted. "They still make the Scarabs hard to kill." "When they come, have your Wolverines concentrate on them rather than the Scarab," the Lunar Princess advised. "Without a doubt, we'll end up expending our leader powers. The coming contest of arms will be decided by units." The following several minutes were spent in quiet reconstruction. Leon did indeed replace some of his dead Cobras with Hawks, but likely not as many as Luna would have wanted. Well, it was his army, not hers. He replaced the buildings the Scarab had destroyed, as well as switching his turrets from flame and missile-based upgrades to railguns. Likely, the turrets themselves would do little to stop the coming attack, but it would be something piling damage onto the enemy, so it was worth doing. He carefully set up his Cobras on likely avenues of attack; he placed a couple next to his base, rather than in a line across one of the two paths. The monstrous mechanical beasts would be looking to obliterate bases rather than units, if the enemy commanders were smart. They hadn't proved the brightest bunch, or maybe they were just noobs. Either way, he'd faced other matches that had been harder. Still, the current situation wasn't going to be easy, and was all too likely to be close. Leon leaned back in his chair and stretched. It was getting close to an hour or so, and the fighting had been intense. "Been exciting, hasn't it?" "Yeah, Ed, it has been," Leon said, yawning a little. "Oh come now, it hasn't been more than an hour and you two are both getting tired! The night hasn't even come in it's fullest yet!" "Well, we aren't exactly nocturnal, are we?" Ed asked rhetorically. "Have to go to either work or school in the morning, we do, depending on how old we are." Luna sighed. "What I'm sure of is that both of you are missing out on the most beautiful time of the day." Before either Leon or Edward could reply to that, a Purple icon appeared onscreen. "Look out, Prophet incoming," Leon warned. Behind the Prophet, two Cyan Scarabs walked forward. "Uh oh," Eddy murmured worriedly. "Two more on the ridge!" "And two more, from the other side!" Luna exclaimed. Leon heard Cobras open fire, but his main attention was drawn to the two Scarabs on the ridge, which were both firing at his base. "Luna, if I Cryo Bomb these Two Scarabs, can you blow up one with a MAC and kill the other with our combined air force?" "I think I can," she answered. "Though if you had listened to me, you might be able to take on more of that fight yourself." Leon grunted, but refused to concur. "Alright, here we go." He sent in a Cryo Bomb; after both Scarabs were frozen solid, Luna blasted the one on the left (from Leon's perspective) to death while their air units battered away at the second. Frozen and unable to move, the second Scarab suffered badly under the barrage, but it did better than it otherwise might have, as ten Engineers began to repair it halfway through it's health bar. "Aw... nuts..." "I suppose we should have expected no less," Luna commented. "I'd feel a little better if this was the only enemy player doing this right now, but I noticed the other two also have Engineers floating around behind them." Leon didn't really care. "Wolverine them to death, then." "Will do." Leon moved his own Wolverines up and hammered the Engineers. Three of them died before the owner of the Scarab noticed. Even then, the remainder were too slow to get out of the way in time; two more crashed to earth as the rest were bought out of range. The Scarab, once it had become unfrozen, turned it's attention to the anti-air vehicles. "Uh oh." Uh oh was right. A Wolverine's only weapon that could be readily used against ground targets was a weak grenade launcher. He did succeed in Volleying the Scarab, but the damage wasn't enough to kill it, and the mechanical beast was ripping through the anti-air units like a hot knife going through butter, and unfrozen butter, at that. Missiles suddenly struck the monster from the air, blasting through the Scarab's remaining armor and allowing a few seconds further sustained fire to finally bring it down. "You're lucky I kept a few Vultures in reserve," Luna said, a little teasingly. "Alright, I get it; more air units next time," Leon said, feeling chastened. "I should hope so." "Uh, guys, a little help here?" Eddy demanded. "Oops, sorry," Luna apologized. Eddy's army was in shambles. Both Scarabs had survived, though one was severely damaged and down to red health. A single Cobra next to his base was still shooting, and a couple Cyclopes were pounding away at it's legs, but the rest of his forces had been melted by the beam cannons. His base was being systematically reduced. Luna's Vultures quickly took care of the Scarab that was in the red, but she gave a little groan even as it fell. "The other two are attacking my base now," she said in a discomforted way. "Leon, if you could handle the remaining Scarab hitting Edward I would be grateful." "Alright, but I think someone is going to lose a base." She sighed. "I can't deny that, because that's how it looks to me. It looks as if I shall be the 'odd one out,' as it were." Leon set his remaining units to assault the second Red Scarab, uprooting his surviving Cobras to help. "It happens to everyone, and a super turtle has a hard time avoiding it." He also queued up a couple Vultures of his own. "I know, but I hate it when I'm the one who drew the short straw." "Happens to all of us," Eddy said, sounding strained. "I almost got it as is. In fact, I'm still getting it." "Trying to fix that." Leon planted his Cobras again, which started firing. Their upgraded cannons tore into the Scarab, but it was still a ways from dead. It continued to laser the buildings off Eddy's base; he had lost five buildings and most of his turrets. The sole surviving turret plucked away at the Scarab, barely doing any damage at all. "Next time, I should probably upgrade those," the British player remarked sadly. Regardless, the guns brought against it did finally tell on the Scarab, which tried to back away... but too late. It exploded spectacularly, then collapsed as it's legs gave out. "Come on!" Leon said, again ordering his Cobras to unpack and move to Luna's aid. She had put up as good a fight as could be expected. One Scarab was half dead, the other was at 75% health. However, her base was being sterilized of buildings, and her army wasn't going to be able to stop them on it's own. Luckily, his own base had manufactured a few new units, including a Vulture. The Scarab closest to his units was blasted with fire; however, the players who had already lost their Scarabs sent their remaining Engineers to repair those of their teammates. "Can't say they aren't persistent," Luna grumbled. By now, the half dead Scarab was mostly dead. However, it continued to pluck away at Luna's base, despite the damage. The other was taking heavy fire from the side from Leon's units. Eddy's surviving units were hitting it as well. the damage was piling up. Although Blue's Scarabs were taking deadly fire, he didn't bother moving them. They continued to laser down the main building, heedless of the gunfire and missiles striking them. "Please don't die, please don't die, please don't... curse it!" Leon heard something thump over his headset as Luna's base began to explode. He didn't hear anymore; he supposed that she had turned off her mic in order to spare both of them from her anger. She turned it back on a few seconds later. "Well, I'm on the clock now," she said in a surprisingly calm voice. "Move your units away," Leon said quickly. "Get them out of there." If a player lost their final base in the game, they would be set on a loss timer of about sixty seconds. If it ran out, or if all the player's units had been destroyed beforehand or were destroyed during that time, the player would lose. However, the base timer, which started after it's destruction, would allow Luna to rebuild her base twenty seconds after the base was destroyed... if at least one of her units survived until then. "Got it." Luna was no fool, and moved one of her Hornets away; she kept the other units pounding away at the Scarab that was almost dead. It died a few seconds later, and the rage of the remaining defenders fell upon it's companion. The last Scarab didn't try to run. Instead, it blazed away at it's enemies. It wasn't the smartest idea, even with Engineers hovering over it. Wolverines made short work of the Engineers, then added their grenade launchers to the mix. The Scarab never had a chance; it blew up just like the other five had. Luna immediately reclaimed her base. All three of them sighed with relief as the base began construction. It had been a very narrow run. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Celestia watched as the last gargantuan war machine collapsed in ruins. "Well, that didn't go as planned." She didn't hear from the other two for a moment, and wondered whether both of them had gone AFK. Then she realized that both Snowfire and Flametail were probably staring, awestruck, at the screen. "...How is that possible?" Snowfire finally asked slowly. "Six Scarabs... gone..." "They must have cheated," Flametail said. "That's the only way." "They did not," Celestia said firmly. "They played fair, and beat us fairly." "Sorry, Princess." There was a very loud growl. "Um, what was that?" "I think it was my stomach," Flametail answered. "I'm starving." "Me too," Snowfire agreed. "This match has been going on for over an hour. It's close to dinner time." Celestia couldn't deny that. She was starting to feel a little hungry herself. She couldn't help but suspect that the two Guards felt lucky they had an excuse to leave if they wanted. She couldn't blame them; the little enclave had taken everything she and her teammates had to throw at it. Her suspicions were confirmed when Flametail said, "Sorry Princess, I'm going to fill my belly. See ya!" A moment later, his bases all exploded as he quit the game. Snowfire didn't say anything. After a few seconds, his bases also started blowing up, and the message claiming he'd quit came up. She couldn't help it; she laughed. The situation just called for it, despite that victory was now almost impossible. She felt no real anger toward the brothers for leaving they were probably lucky that they wouldn't get to see the results of the game. And, when all was said and done, it was, after all, just a game. The work they did in real life was competent, and both were likable, in fact almost impossible not to like. She built up an army of her own; she was going to get as many experience points out of the battle as possible, and hopefully significantly reduce the time it took her to get a promotion to full general. She knew she could not win. It was insignificant compared to what would have happened if, say, the Bearers had been defeated by Tirek. Still, she wished things would have gone better. --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Leon built up his army with Scorpions and Wolverines after two of the players on the other side gave up. It wasn't anything particularly fancy, but it was a combination proven to work. The remaining enemy player, Purple, had four bases. They wouldn't do him as much good as they would have if there had been no unit limit, or if this had been Deathmatch. Covenant players could only use as many units as their fifty point limit would allow... and the UNSC army rolling his way had a lot more than that. The first base they targeted was on Leon's original base site. That riled him up a little. "He's going down." "With what we've built up?" Luna said. "Certainly." She proved right. The enemy base wasn't guarded by units. Locked-down Cobras destroyed the first turret easily, then moved on to blasting a couple buildings on the base pads. Luna set her Vultures to blasting the central buildings. The base had a single shield generator, but it wasn't going to stop the barrage for long. Sure enough, after about fifteen seconds or so, the shield collapsed, and the base itself started taking damage. A massive volley from Wolverines and Vultures severely damaged the central base structure; unlike UNSC bases, the central buildings of Covenant bases weren't strengthened by other buildings. It died a short time later, with all the buildings blowing up one by one before the base finally died spectacularly. It was only then that the army started taking fire from the side. A single Scarab had shown up. All it did was prove that, without support, super tanks had no real chance. MACs wrecked it even before tanks blew it apart with canister shells. The air units didn't even have time to get at it. A few Hunters showed up about then. They didn't fare very well either, though they managed to kill a couple Cobras before dying. "Why is this person even trying anymore?" Luna asked, surprised. "It's obvious they've lost. Who's heard of anyone winning three versus one in this game?" "I tried once," Leon said, "But I couldn't match their production. Got one of them to quit when his one star Chieftain died." "Proves my point," Luna said. Then, realizing what she'd just said, quickly added, "Not that I meant any offense, but it's almost impossible." "None taken," Leon replied. "Probably wants whatever experience he can get." "Best case for it I've heard," Ed put in. "Still, guy's not the smartest." "How long does it take for people to realize that Scarabs are better if you're winning?" Luna asked rhetorically. "Or at least if you still have three players. If you're being hammered already, the Scarab isn't going to provide much relief. All it is now is a target for our leader powers." "Ask him why he does what he does," Eddy answered. "All I care for is wrecking this guy right now. If other people play less intelligently, then I get to enjoy chewing on more of their units." They moved on to another base on the enemy's side of the map. It went down as easily had the one before it. The game was fast becoming a walkover. Although Purple still fought hard, his units didn't have the numbers to prevail for long in any event; the few times his units stood and fought, they essentially got run over. Leader powers smashed them easily; the only time the attacking force came to grief was when the remaining Covenant player used, or tired to use, a large group of Vampires to lash out at their air units. Even then, the problem didn't last long; a Cryo Bomb followed by an attack by Wolverines put paid to the counterassault within thirty seconds. The third base died. Now all that was left was the enemy player's main base. "Anyone rational would have given up by now," Luna commented. "The points they gain are trivial, considering the ratio of units killed to lost." "Probably set himself up for a siege of his last base," Leon said. "It won't help him much, although the turrets will increase the firepower he has to throw at us." "Let's get it over with," Leon suggested. No one argued with him. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Celestia built up her army, a half Hunter, half Vampire combination, and waited, upgrading her base turrets in front with Fuel Rod Cannons and those in back with Needlers. She didn't have to wait long. Blue's tanks rolled on up and blasted her Hunters with canister. They fired back, roasting a couple Scorpions. Green Vultures hovered in to attack. They got frozen by the Stasis Beams of her Vampires. That was fine... but moments later, MAC rounds landed in the midst of her Hunters, and a Cryo Bomb blasted the Vampires, crashing most of them and freezing the rest so that Wolverines killed all but two of those she had left. Cobras didn't even bother with her turrets, instead firing directly at the base. The shield held of their fire for a minute, after which her base was subjected to their fire. She sighed, sending her Prophet into his final battle. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- "There he is!" Leon yelled excitedly. "Get him!" Luna laughed. "Such enthusiasm." Nonetheless, she dropped a D-bomb on top of the offending enemy unit, at almost the exact same time that Leon and Eddy dropped their own. One of the bombs, landing right on the Prophet, remained, frozen in mid air; the other two landed to either side. Even though his powers were disabled, the Prophet still had two Fuel Rod Cannons and a pair of Sentinels firing away... as well as three stars. Wolverine missiles still knocked his shield down, bit by bit, but not as fast as they would have otherwise. Leon saw the base blow up. "Wow, the Prophet lasted longer than the base." "Oh, really? I wasn't paying attention," Eddy said. "Is the Prophet all there is left?" "I think so," Luna answered. "Let's get him, lest he go around and claim bases all over the map and generally just be annoying that way." "He's not goin' anywhere," Ed noted. Indeed, the Prophet's shield had finally collapsed. Even if he had tried to escape, even he couldn't stand up to the full might of three armies all aimed at him. His chair crashed to the ground. "Faceplant!" Leon cried out. "Bloody painful faceplant," Eddy said sarcastically. "Your team is victorious," the game announced. "Well, that was fun," Luna said. "I'm inviting the remaining player from the other team, this Solar Flare fellow." "Sure, why not?" "I wasn't asking you for your permission, Edward." "Sorry." "Apology accepted." There was a pause, then a loud, annoying sound as the other player connected to the party. "Um, hello?" There was something familiar about that voice, Leon reflected. "Sister? Is that you?" Oh... Leon felt his jaw slowly fall. "Luna?" came the surprised voice of the Solar Princess. "We were playing against you and your friends?" Both sisters were silent for a moment, then started to laugh at almost the same time. "Who were the others playing with you?" Luna asked, trying to control her laughter. "Snowfire was the Arbiter and Flametail was the Brute Chieftain. I think you know them." "Oh, yes. I love talking to both of them. So they were your teammates?" "Yes. I still can't believe you were able to hold out with just one base each!" "Oh, it's part of a strategy we discovered on Youtube and used ourselves. If you want, I can teach you how to use it yourself."* "My thanks. And these must be your friends?" "Oh yes! 'Tia, meet Leon and Edward." "Very pleased to meet you both," Celestia said. "Likewise," Leon answered. "Yer Highness," Ed said. Celestia laughed. "I'm quite fine with just 'Celestia,' but thank you for the sentiment." Then, after a moment, "Too bad we can't play a 4v4 game." Laughing, Luna said, "I think we can transition to a different game. First, though, I'm feeling hungry; I suggest we eat." Celestia laughed, very loudly. "That's the same excuse Flametail gave for resigning. Alright, I can see the need." "I'll see you soon, then." "Yes. And, again, a pleasure to meet both of you." "Thanks!" "Cheerio!" Celestia disconnected from the party. Luna sighed in content. "I'll be back later, you two. Right now, a royal dinner awaits me." "Don't forget to tip your waitress," Leon teased. Luna chuckled. "Believe me, with the salary they receive, it's hardly necessary. Nonetheless, I shall bear it in mind. Good bye!" After Luna left, Leon and Eddy agreed to go offline as well. Leon got up and stretched. It had been a good night so far. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------