"He'll be coming. And we must be ready." Raynor said as he checked the radar within the ship. Indeed... a large organisim was apporaching them at high speeds. It would be here in about two hours.
"With that... machine?" Armin asked as he looked at the Thor. "This should be easy..."
"I would expect so..." Raynor said as he looked at the thing. "I built that but of course... we shouldn't ever feel like we got this too easily... I will be damned if at least SOME of those mean lizards didn't survive that Volcano."
"If only Slade had." Sanya commented as she sat down with the rocket launcher in her hands, the weight of such a large weapon would have easily been able to exhaust one, maybe even two physically fit men that were probably twice her size.
"Damn right..." Steve agreed as he looked over at the assault rifle. Armor piercing rounds, grenade launcher underneath... man... Slade had a lot of goodies he had kept in that van. Magnetic mines... regular proximity mines, smoke grenades, a sniper rifle... you name it. It was his stuff... yet in the end... he won't be needing it. Perhaps that was what really added the guilt about it all. Looting not just a dead man's, but a friend's armory.
"So... ve kill ze dragon... und ve vin?"
"Yeah." Raynor said. "That... or it turns us all into human barbeque and then takes over the world.... god... I feel like I am reading some children's bedtime story."
"We all do..." Steve said. "Though, I think the time for sunshine and rainbows is long over."
He cocked the assault rifle for emphasis on the last sentence before picking up his shield. If he was going to be honest... he actually never really liked killing people. He never wanted to kill anyone, not even people as bad as HYDRA. But... when the situation called for it, when the lives of others, when the freedom of a world was at stake... and now a dead friend... it was time he got his hands wet again.
A few for you Slade... a few for you... Cap thought to himself as he slung his shield and checked the estimated time for Feynaltdrog's arrival once again before looking over at everyone else. His fists clenched.
"I'll kill them... I'll kill them all..." Steve grinded through his teeth as his brain smoked of the same hatred he had felt the day of Bucky's "death". Mentally... he envisioned himself the day he slew the dragon by bashing out it's brains with his shield. He imagined doing the same to the rest of them... their dreams of conquest and domination would die with their shattered grey matter.
"For Slade?" Sanya asked as she held Steve's hand. For comfort? For consolation? For strength? For anything? It didn't matter.
"For Slade." Steve said as he knelt down and ruffled through her hair. "Are you ready?"
"I am." Sanya said as she recalled the one-eyed assassin. The first day they met resulted in Slade getting a broken chestplate and Sanya almost having shattered bones. Funny. Despite that meeting, they... they...
What was it about Slade? The fact that in the end, despite his attitude toward being here, that despite his motivation by greed, that despite they way he seemed to treat everyone else... he always did the right thing in the end. No matter how rough around the edges the man was, in the end, no matter how many times he threatened it, he came for Armin, and then for Sanya. He carried her out of that volcano and died doing so... what was it that motivated a man of his... character to do so?
What is it a mercenary's honor of getting the job done? Or some hidden code of loyalty that he had followed? From how he acted, Slade treated loyalty as a bad thing... until she realized. It wasn't loyalty Slade frowned upon. It was blind loyalty that Slade could never bring himself to bring through... but was loyalty to a friend truly a blind thing? Not even a friend actually... someone he had barely known. Was it that the mercenary was sympathetic and opened up eventually? This last action... was it to atone for his lifelong sins... the countless murders, motivated not out of loyalty, but out of mere greed?
She couldn't know, and perhaps, she never would. It only occurred to her then how much Slade resembled her grandfather who had perished during the first Neuroi war in 1914 to 1919 on an unspecified date. Story was... he had died covering the rest of the Orussian military's escape during one rather disastrous encounter with the Neuroi. The only remainder that their family would ever have of the man would be a lone painting.
Wherever he was... whatever he had done... may he rest in peace. As the sky began to darken... Sanya, and everyone else knew exactly what was up. Feynaltdrog was here.
The magical antennas came out, signaling the heavy flapping of large wings as the king of a dead race descended from upon the skies, a flaming hatred burning within his eyes.
"Hi. .. hi lost al dii joriin! Dii reyliik! Pah evenaar! Toz wah hin dren. Hi fen pah saluk daar sul!"
It hadn't occurred to anyone that Feynaltdrog may have been just as grief-stricken as they had been. Did it truly matter however? Who the hell cared after what happened to Slade?
"And... you know what?" Steve replied as Sanya whispered the translation to him. "Go back to hell where you belong."
"Zu'u fen. Nuz diist, aav hin fahdon til!" The large dragon cried as he opened his mouth. "Meyz! reyzan fron! Nahlok hin zeymah! Krii niin pah!"
"Bad news guys!" Raynor called over his radio as he climbed into the Thor. "We got tons of dragons incoming!"
"Cover us!" Steve said as he fired his assault rifle, causing the king of dragons to retaliate with a wall of flames. Thankfully for the captain, the ether shield was erected just in time to save him from becoming roasted human. "Medic! You know what to do!"
"Jawohl." The doctor replied as he took out his medigun and began to overheal Sanya. "Ready?"
"Ready!" Sanya replied as she took up the Fliegerhammer. He popped critubers that very moment.
Now... four crit rockets are pretty scary... so... imagine nine.
ON THE SAME TARGET.
Feynaltdrog was blasted back, his wings torn and ripped from the blast as he looked into the skies, one of his brethren was torn in two by the javelin missiles of the Thor.
Taking out a rather familiar gem... he opened his mouth as the literal "glow" from the element of harmony began to go into his mouth the same way a vacuum sucked up dust.
His wounds healed, and he dove straight down right for Sanya and Medic. His mouth opened as he said the words.
"Yol... Toor...SHUL!"