Placing the Lure
The bullet exited the barrel of the M107 with explosive force, kicking up a trail of dust from the aged stone rooftop Raymond laid prone atop as it traveled over the courtyard and the battle raging below. Red Talon’s head stood well within its path of trajectory, but the general was more than wise to the results of a target’s head when up against firearms, and dipped as soon as he saw the cloud of dust appear across from him.
“Shit,” Raymond spat out. The Raufoss round narrowly missed Red Talon’s helmet, smashing into the wirebox attached to its side and tearing through the sensitive systems before hitting the cragged wall behind him.
“Your weapons won’t save you here!” Red Talon shouted, grasping at his helmet before realizing that his technological advantage had been destroyed in his effort to evade death and bellowed angrily into the sky.
“Time to bug out,” Pastor said, tapping Raymond on the shoulder as he slowly fell back. Raymond packed up the M107, stuffing it back into its carry case and was immediately behind Pastor at the ladder, nodding at Bloodfury and Leret to follow. While the griffons simply glided to the ground, the Ghosts had to use the ladders; the creaking as they descended was thankfully obscured by the sound of battle.
Talbot took the general’s moment of reprieve to swing out his revolver, planting a round straight through the general’s partially-exposed wrist. The death grip on him released, and he took the opportunity to roll toward Mendoza, who hid behind a stack of hay bales, as several loyalist griffons landed on the battlements and bought valuable time for Talbot to reach safety.
“You okay, sir?” Mendoza said, pulling Talbot into his hiding place and checking him over for injuries. “Can you breathe?”
“I can breathe,” Talbot said, swatting away Mendoza’s hand as his camouflage kicked back in. He holstered his revolver and switched the grip on his MR8 back to his right hand. “Just give me time to catch myself. Shell, do you copy?”
“I copy you, sir. We’re on our way to reach you, but the whole courtyard’s filled with soldiers. I’m going to try to get Bloodfury and Leret to fly us to your position.”
Talbot coughed violently as he finally calmed down enough to steady his nerves and catch his breath. “Negative, we are pulling back. We can’t take Red Talon here on these walls, he’ll tear us apart. Lure him out into the combat, use the battle to our advantage.”
“I confirmed a hit on the helmet before we had to bail,” Pastor said, equally nervous as Talbot could see his crosscom position hiding away in the alley with Raymond and the griffons behind them. “The box came off, but I’m not sure if those were the magnetics. It might have just been a flashlight.”
“Either way, Red Talon’s absolutely pissed.” Talbot peeked out the side of his cover to see Red Talon engaged in close quarters combat with three loyalists. Between the flurries of movements and strikes, he could see a monster of a rifle—less of a rifle and more of a long-barreled griffon-portable cannon—and a greatsword on his back. “And it looks like he has the firepower to match his temper.”
The griffons engaging Red Talon were clearly outclassed by the better breed of soldier: despite the general’s larger size, he had no problems navigating the rooftops, using his wings in conjunction with his own movements to dodge and strike at the loyalists where they were unprepared for an attack. The loyalists themselves were easily pushed to the defensive, circling around Red Talon as the general, fighting unarmed to the unease of the loyalists, smiled with confidence.
A wave of smoke trailed in, leaking over the walls and lessening Talbot’s visibility of the fight as it progressed, and the occasional falling feather as the griffon air cavalry duked it out in the skies warned Talbot that relocation would soon be needed. “Switch to magnetics. I think we have something,” Mendoza said to him.
Talbot’s visor shuttered to an abyssal dark blue, and allowing him to see what Mendoza saw: while the general had the sense to use magnetics of his own, certain parts of his own armor had faint light-blue markings of equipment on them, enabling them to track him in turn. It was a zero-sum game so long as both sides had the vision mode, and Talbot wasn’t willing to bet on winning if they played their cards right at that moment.
As Red Talon continued to flail around, deftly countering a thrusting strike from one of the loyalists, a pop rang out in the air and a bullet struck him in the shoulderplate. Eyes from both the human and the griffon frantically searched around, landing upon a tower to the southwest: loyalist forces bore battle-scuffed rifles as the bodies of imperial soldiers lay unmoving behind them.
“We got to move,” Mendoza said, laying a hand on Talbot’s shoulder and pulling him back behind cover. “Can you stand?” A shower of crumbling rock fell on them as a cannonball collided with the side of the tower, following by dozens more. “Shit, they got the cannons set up. We have to go!”
“Fellwyre’s got you guys, just hang tight, he’s sending some your way to take off the steam,” Pastor interjected. Loyalist forces bounded over the rooftops approaching the battle, shifting the odds with another set of appropriated rifles. A line formed up at the rooftop where Pastor and Raymond had been, with the squad leader synchronizing their shots before letting them loose.
The soreness in Talbot’s chest flared as he attempted to upright himself, and he latched onto Mendoza as they made their way for the wall furthest away from the tower. The sky’s sanguine glow was pockmarked by the rising columns of smoke in the distance as cannonballs arced over the walls and into the castle of Fortress Helmguard.
Mendoza looked over the wall, shaking his head at the sight of soldiers pouring into the courtyard from both sides. “Shit, we can’t make it down there. Maybe we can try to find another way.”
“Fuse, Bloodfury and Leret have just entered the battle,” Pastor said. “I’ve lost track of them, but they should be heading your way to bail you guys out.”
“Negative,” Talbot said. “Target is in sight. We have to take him out.”
“The guy’s built like a tank. We shouldn’t risk it until we can leverage the kill in our favor, sir. If worse comes to worst, we can use Fuse’s rocket launchers to turn him into a red smear on the ground, but those are assets we shouldn’t commit to using just yet.”
“If I can find another vantage point, I can set up and attempt to neutralize the target,” Raymond offered. “A direct hit, even just one, should be enough to penetrate his armor and wound him. That’s all we need.”
The battle between Red Talon and the group of loyalists reached its first milestone: a cry of pain escaped from one of the loyalists as Red Talon with a draw and a deadly slash with his greatsword, a pool of blood spreading beneath the hapless soldier. “Insolent humans!” he shouted, grabbing his helmet and tearing it off in a fit of rage. “You will not escape me! I do not need your toys to win this war, unlike the curs that think that they can take my fortress!”
Red Talon grinded the blade of his greatsword against the floor, feinting charges against the two remaining and causing them to flinch. The line of rifle-griffons fired another volley, but he crouched down low before taking to the air and delving straight for their formation.
The rifle-griffons reacted by scattering, switching out their weapons for swords. Red Talon made short work of the closest griffon to him, who fumbled with his weapon, clipping a wing and kicking him off the roof. The body landed behind Raymond and Pastor. “Damn it... Fuse, is the wall clear?” Pastor asked.
“It’s as clear as can be,” Mendoza said, watching the two remaining griffons on their wall joined their brothers in the courtyard below. Only he and Talbot remained on the walls now, and he peeked over the wall again. The battle was now in favor of the loyalists, pushing Red Talon’s army back towards the keep.”
Two shadows zipped past his face, pulling high into the sky before coming down for a landing; Bloodfury and Leret landed softly behind them, throwing up enough dirt for their forms to register against the cloud of dust. “Oh, there you are,” Bloodfury said. “I’d say we should move you, but...” He nodded towards the altercation on the roof.
“Mind if you can grab our two other Ghosts?” Mendoza said. “We can set up here, and if you can keep him occupied enough, we can bring him down.” He pointed at Red Talon in the distance, who grabbed a griffon soldier by his legs and tossed him into a descending attacker. “Just keep him busy over there, and we’ll try to set up a shot.”
Bloodfury inhaled and let out a heavy sigh. “Alright, then. We’ll go get Scope and Shell, bring them to you, and then we’ll see if we can’t keep him busy.”
“Is he that bad?”
“Bad?” Leret said jokingly. “Red Talon is unmatched in combat. Most griffon generals are.. He will kill many of our own soldiers before we finally take him down, but it is considered an honorable death. Likewise, besting a general is an honor in itself.”
“But can you take him?” Talbot asked. “I don’t want to risk your lives if we have to.”
“We are the Imperial Guard, the finest in all of the Griffon Empire and trained as well as any general,” Bloodfury said with a sure slam of his fist against his chestplate. “Don’t worry, we can handle him.”
“Alley-oop!” Leret said, releasing his grasp on Raymond as he watched the Ghosts fall to the floor and break into a roll.
“Good luck!” Bloodfury said, waving Leret along as they circled around and redirected to Red Talon. The general had built up for himself quite the crowd, being the focal point for a battle that involved loyalist and imperial forces alike, and was fighting them roof to roof. The regrouped Ghosts convened as Pastor handed a set of binoculars to Talbot.
“It’s a clusterfuck out there,” Raymond warned. “Red Talon’s blocks away from here, and it’s just too hot to move through the streets.”
“Well, we could always move into the tower,” Mendoza said, jabbing a thumb over his shoulder. His rocket pods clicked and beeped, angling over his shoulder as his visor calculated his payload’s trajectory. The red-tipped rockets returned to their holster; Mendoza nodded as the tracking completed. “You might get a clean shot from there.”
“The tower might not be empty,” Talbot said, screening out the horizon. The congregation that Red Talon had acquired was far too variable to land a clean shot, much less attempt to use explosives without collateral damage. Though he could see Bloodfury and Leret joining them, the major presence on their alliance was mostly regular loyalist soldiers, distinguishable by the royal blue colors on their cloaks to contrast the imperials’ red. “We need somewhere to set up the M107...”
Handing the binoculars back to Pastor, Talbot looked to the tower. Though not the largest building in Fortress Helmguard, it remained physically close to the keep, having several levels of entranceways that connected the two. From where he stood, he could see the balconies that Pastor had seen, all facing away from the keep and towards the rest of the fortress proper, and another escape venue if they find themselves in a bind.
All of which made it an excellent spot for them to set up. “Let’s get up to one of those balconies,” Pastor said. “Higher ground should help our chances of delivering the shot.” Motioning towards the darkened alcove where Red Talon had landed at, the Ghosts moved in two columns to stack up at the simple double doors.
Mendoza took point, kicking them down with no resistance as the rest of Anvil followed him in, peeling away to check their angles. A rush of air ran through the room, kicking up a trail of dust that led up the staircase at the far corner. Flames of old torches wavered with the flow, producing a faint light that did little to enhance the brightness of the room.
“Cozy,” Mendoza said, kicking aside a pile of rotting timber at his feet. “If I didn’t know better, I’d say we just walked into a crypt.”
“Up the stairs,” Talbot said, taking the lead and beginning the trek up to the higher floors. Mendoza sighed dejectedly and took up the rear of the group, exaggerating his panting by the time they’d reached the third floor.
“PT time, everybody,” Pastor said. “I swear we’ll never see the end of these.”
“Everybody gets one,” Raymond said, controlling the pace of his breathing as they continued higher. “Grueling stair climbs. It’s a Ghost tradition.”
Every floor they passed held an empty hallway, the tower unoccupied as its garrison been called to arms. Most floors had a lonely stone wall at the end with a window guarded by grated bars where a balcony normally would have been, and from what Talbot judged from a glance, the first balcony wouldn’t be for another—
And there it was, a flash of red off the corner of his eye. “There,” he said, recounting his steps back to the doorway and sizing up the hall from behind his iron sights. “Hall’s clear. Move in.”
They stuck to each side of the hall in twos, passing by open rooms: quarters, a library, an armory, and even a kitchen. The balcony served as a surveying point for astronomy, with papers detailing star systems and celestial bodies in the griffonic language on a table of papers, complete with a telescope.
“Setting up,” Raymond said. Mendoza covered their flanks with a lengthy toss, planting a sensor grenade above the stair doorway; the resulting ping from the sonar detected no enemies.
With the bipod sturdily held in place on the railing, Raymond positioned the M107 and stared down the scope. Next to him, Pastor set up the D-kit, and hundreds of neutral and enemy signatures appeared on their crosscoms, the size of ants against the greater landscape below. “Hold tight, searching for Red Talon now...”
“No need, I see him,” Raymond said. A greater red diamond appeared in the center of the fortress grounds, and he leaned into the rifle as its barrel inclined lower.
Talbot mentally tallied the floors: the balcony was ten levels above the walls, but he’d sworn he’d seen cannons higher on the tower. Red Talon had no wish to fire upon his precious fortress, no doubt, and couldn’t engage the loyalists without knowing where they were, which he only learned too late. Being able to use them was out of the plan: nobody in Anvil had the experience firing a cannon, despite the appeal of being able to do Red Talon in with a well-placed cannonball to the face.
“Do you have a clear shot?” Pastor asked, eyes still staring down the sights of his D-kit. Beyond the smoke that continuously ebbed on and off into their line of sight, the general haze would have made it nearly impossible to maintain the crosscom profile lock without the D-kit. “Red’s moving west, check your sights.”
“I got him,” Raymond mumbled. Red Talon was hopping from roof to roof, keeping his mobility high to avoid being pinned by the rifle teams, not to mention launching his own attacks against them. The loyalist army shifted around, chasing him in circles as the Imperial Guard were the only ones able to keep up with him. “Negative on clear shot.”
“Come on, Bloodfury,” Pastor said. “Keep him still, at least. I think we might have better luck trying to poke holes in this bastard at point blank.”
“He’s pulling out his gun now,” Raymond said. The cannon of a rifle that Red Talon brought out coerced soldiers, on both sides, to seek cover immediately. A poor griffon caught behind a wall in its aim turned to feathers and red dust when the weapon discharged. “Damn, I can’t get a shot here. He keeps moving around even with that gun of his.”
Talbot flicked through his crosscom, unsure what to do. “Maintain the watch here, Fuse and I will head downstairs.”
“We will?” Mendoza asked.
“Yes,” Talbot said. “And we’ll be the ones to keep him still long enough for Scope to put a bullet in him.”
“Well, what the hell are we going to do?” Mendoza said. Following Talbot down the stairwell, repeated inquiries to Talbot’s plan had gone unanswered, and his frustration only grew with each step they took. “Bloodfury and Leret are trying right now, and they don’t look to be succeeding.”
“I don’t know,” Talbot said honestly, waving Mendoza right as they checked each floor again on their way down “I’m thinking this through as I go. We need to off him soon before his reinforcements show up and chase us out of here. Tesseraka is only just north of here, and they’ll certainly have noticed our attack by now.”
“We could just do what Ivanir’s team did in Russia,” Mendoza said. “Run interference, lay out some impromptu ambushes, and hope our legs don’t give out when he comes chasing after us.”
Talbot stopped. “Ivanir’s team... hmm...”
Mendoza’s eyes widened, and he tried to wave him off. “Whoa, whoa, I didn’t mean that seriously... I mean, we all know what happened to Chuck on that one, and I don’t think I want to join him on the other side like that.”
“Chuck died trying to defuse a nuclear warhead,” Talbot pointed out. “Not because he tried to lead an armed assault drone through the lanes of an abandoned factory on foot.”
A sudden clank at the foot of the stairs caused them to stop. Talbot and Mendoza braced against the wall as heavy footsteps began to climb up the steps. Eventually, the bulky size of an Imperial Guard carrying a torch entered their vision, nervously mumbling to himself as he began to call out, “H-hey, Ghosts! Are you in here?”
“Yeah, we are.” Talbot’s hushed response caused the soldier’s body to go stiff. “Don’t panic. We’re standing right here with you. What do you need?”
“Uh... they... we got a message straight from headquarters,” he said. He sheathed his sword, pulling out a small knapsack and holding it in the empty air in front of him. “Here. This parcel comes straight from Princess Luna. She says that the contents of this bag will help you.”
“Help us how?” Talbot asked.
“They’re enchanted medallions, or so the message went. They supposedly have shield enchantments on them, to protect you from any harm that might come to you in case the imperial soldiers get too close to you.” As soon as the guard felt a tug on the bag, he immediately released his grip and recoiled his arm instinctively, eyes looking around in the darkness.
“Thank you,” Talbot said, gripping the bag in his right hand as the bag joined him in his illusory mirage. “You’ve done well. You’d best get back to the battle. Sergeant Bloodfury could use your help.”
“The sergeant!” the soldier exclaimed in reminiscence. “I’ll go help him right away. Good luck, sir!” He disappeared back down the stairway. Talbot dug into the bag, retrieving one of the medallions and eyeing the inscriptions along its circumference.
“So... shields, huh?” Mendoza said. “Do you think we get double the effects if we wear two at a time?” he continued, watching as Talbot withdrew four medallions, one for each of the Ghosts.
“No idea,” he said, but handing two to Mendoza anyway. With Pastor and Raymond up at their perch with the sensor grenade overwatch, they wouldn’t be needing the shield medallions any time soon. “But this just increased the survivability factors more in the case of the plan I have in mind. Assuming that these things work, that is.”
“If it’s from the Princess, I see no reason why it shouldn’t...” Mendoza said, scratching the alicorn head on one of his medallions. “But these things look... old.” He sniffed one of them and gagged. “Smell old, too.”
“I think you’re missing the point of ‘ancient magical artifacts’ here, Fuse,” Talbot said, exchanging an amused glance with him as a faint blue shimmer flashed over their camouflage, then faded as suddenly as it had came. “Well, I think that means something, doesn’t it?”
“Right, well... let’s hope we don’t have to rely on these, huh?” Mendoza said with an uneasy laugh.
“You and me both,” Talbot said, continuing down the steps. “Shell, sitrep on Red Talon.”
“Target’s jumping still, sir, doesn’t look like he’s going to stop anytime soon. Wait, hold on, he’s headed back down our way. Right on the mark, Scope, downwind three hundred meters. Fire when ready,” he said, followed by a crack from the M107. “Negative on hit, struck the floor behind him.”
“Has he noticed you?”
“I don’t think he has. Must be the fact that he’s surrounded by griffons with rifles, kind of makes it hard to pay attention to another bullet flying at you. Scope, steady now, let’s pace our shots here. Might just hold off until Bloodfury can get him to hold still.”
“Good. I’d rather not—”
Talbot froze. On the stretch leading back to the doors and outside was the body of the Imperial Guardsgriffon that had delivered their package only moments before. Shuffling quietly, he and Mendoza took up spots at the doorway, looking out at the corpse as blood began to pool underneath it.
“You went quiet, sir, what’s going on?”
“Trouble.” Talbot reached down and activated the sensor grenade on his belt, then crouched down and aimed straight down the hallway. He panned left and right, eyes remaining glued on shimmers of air downrange, but hoping that his assumption wouldn’t be correct.
It was.
“Madre de dios...” Mendoza whispered. Profiles of rifle-armed griffons, four in total, appeared where nothing once stood, examining the corpse of the guardsgriffon and talking to each other. “These guys have adaptive camo?”
“Red Talon had EFEC equipment,” Talbot said, looking at him. “They might have gotten more than just magnetics. Clearly, these guys don’t have any.”
“What makes you say that?”
“They’re not wearing fitted helmets.”
“You’re kidding. The griffons have cloakers now?” Pastor broke in.
“Oh, this is going to be fun,” Raymond growled. “Send them my regards.”
“Swap to magnetics, sync for headshots,” Talbot ordered. The closest two, squabbling over the split of the dead soldier’s belongings, had two lines traced on them as he and Mendoza synced their shots. “Go.”
A pair of bodies dropped onto the floor; the other two griffons looked up in surprise as they rushed over to check on their comrades, seemingly shocked to find they were dead. They suffered the same fate, inexperienced with the nuances of camouflage, even when Talbot and Mendoza had broken their own by taking their shots, heads and rifles still poised for more targets.
“You think the Enforcer Corps are working with the griffons, sir?” Mendoza asked.
“No evidence to say for sure,” Talbot said, killing the crosscom feed of the defunct neutral target reticules by shutting off his sensor grenade. “But if the EFEC is present, it’s bad news for us if they’ve got their own soldiers here. The last thing I want to worry about right now is Kommandos breathing down my neck.”
“Well, let’s look on the bright side,” Mendoza said, a smile underneath his balaclava. “At least we might have a way home now, right?”
“Well, that changes a lot,” Talbot said. “There.” He pointed at the mass of feathers and steel clamoring towards them over the roofs as the whole flock altered direction. “He’s changed his course again.”
“How’re we going to get his attention?” Mendoza said.
“Oh, that’ll be easy,” Talbot replied. Behind them, several barrels marked with the symbol cautioning explosives sat in a neatly-arranged group next to the wall’s unused cannons; they snuck over and he pointed to the griffonic writing. “We give him a big signal to look for. And our point of detonation will be their armory, which, according to the map we got, is only just north of here, in its own walled off compound.”
“Think the armory’s got more?”
“Plenty more, maybe some of that infused stuff like in Kruvem if we’re lucky.” Talbot tapped the side of his helmet. “Did you get that, Shell?”
“Loud and clear. We have a good shot to the armory from here. Place is like a small castle: keep with a nice flat roof to keep him occupied on, surrounded close by walls and towers on all sides. Looks like they’re pretty busy themselves since the loyalists are pushing on it hard.” Pastor painted the route from the walls to the armory: though the fighting had died down—and a special marker showed Fellwyre leading the charge against the armory—small skirmishes still littered the fortress grounds. But Talbot noticed patterns, and plotted out a route through the alleyways to avoid the worst of it.
“Back down, Fuse, move fast,” he said. They skirted west, moving down a flight of stone stairs and weaved through the path, eventually catching the tails of a losing battle. Loyalists had taken up refuge behind a bombed-out building, aiming their rifles in every direction as they were suppressed by unknown assaulters.
“Sensor on?” Mendoza said, receiving a nod from Talbot. The bottom corner of the wall didn’t give them much visual capability, but the sensor picked up targets: more cloakers, discernible with their light armor and lack of helmets. They shuffled around, regrouping to attack at a flank the loyalists assumed to be safe: on the building behind them, up high on the roof.
“Tangos moving, ten o’clock, up high, move to intercept,” Talbot ordered. “Keep them painted, Shell, do you read?”
“Copy on move to intercept, will update as needed. Red Talon has diverted course again, and—targets moving up the tower. Will engage if needed, camo is still up.”
“Roger,” Talbot said, splitting off from Mendoza as they took separate routes up to the roof: himself, a ladder to a rooftop overlooking the flanking position, and Mendoza following the griffon cloakers from the rear to ambush. When he pulled himself up and took cover behind a chimney, it was a clear block or two from their position to the armory. He was at least grateful for a short trek. “Fuse, you set up?”
“Coming up behind them now, ready to engage.” Again, Talbot noticed that this group operated with a number of four. He wondered if it was reflective of the nature of special forces, gleaned perhaps from the EFEC members that they may have encountered and received their equipment and knowledge from. “In position, on your mark.”
Mendoza was set up behind a knocked-over portion of what had once been a chimney, on what had once been a second floor, roof mostly destroyed but with most of its flooring still intact. From his view, Talbot looked down and saw the griffons communicating, using claw signals that mirrored ones used by the human military. “Line up targets, starting at the rear.”
“Roger.” The cloakers reached the edge of the roof, peering down below and setting themselves up for their ambush. Mendoza picked the rearmost cloaker to himself, on the roof’s far side from Talbot’s point of view. Talbot took the other, watching him slowly sneak forward oblivious to the mark drawn upon his head.
“Mark.” Splatters of blood coated the roof as the temporary confusion from the deaths granted them the window they needed to switch targets. Talbot’s next target was dead before he could react, but the other turned around in time to see Mendoza staring him down from behind the barrel. The pause in that moment before he raised his rifle was coupled only with his slight recoil, as if he’d seen death itself before Mendoza fired.
“Roof is clear,” Mendoza said. “Makes me wonder how many of these guys they have if they’re running around loose like this.”
“Targets down,” Pastor confirmed. “We had some griffons snooping around here, don’t really know what they were looking for. They bugged out a few minutes ago, and we heard them talking about the bodies they found in the entrance.”
“We lost an Imperial Guardsgriffon,” Talbot replied. He slid off the roof and landed two stories down, letting the exoskeleton cushion his fall. His cloak fizzled for a moment, nearly catching the attention of the loyalists who had successfully fought their way out of their position with the Ghosts’ help, but he dived aside quickly enough to avoid suspicion, aside from one griffon giving a halting glance down the alley before his comrades urged him on.
“The cloakers got him,” Mendoza said, descending from the pile of rubble to join with Talbot. “Don’t mean to treat the guy’s death any less, but that might have been us bleeding out down there. We had no way of knowing these guys had camo.”
“They’re working their way through our arsenal.” Talbot frowned. He knew that the advantage given from using human equipment would be too large to ignore, and they already had the basics: rifles, cloaking, and magnetics, although the last seemed to be more of a loan than actual reverse-engineered technology. How much had the EFEC given them, he wondered? He’d have to speak to Scarclaw about this. “They might be able to match our loadouts.”
“They have some of our kit, yeah,” Pastor agreed. “But I would expect that they’d get more than just the know-how to make their own rifles and basic cloak tech if they were working with the Federation.”
“It’s a bit strange.” Talbot and Mendoza checked over their magazines, both sitting at half capacity as Talbot directed them to a higher roof nearby to the north of the blown-out building. “Last I recall, Maynard may have gotten the data on constructing the portal from somewhere. Given the Federation’s standing with cutting edge technology, it’s possible that he may have stolen it from them.”
“So you’re saying that the Federation might have sent soldiers to this place before us.”
“It’s not ‘might have’, they definitely did. Red Talon has human equipment, and we need to know how the griffons got their hands on it, but we have priorities. Redirect the D-kit onto the armory,” Talbot said, climbing up stairs squished between two buildings that exited to a roof with a clean view of the armory next to it. He and Mendoza went prone, edging closer to the armory walls: there were no guards, and what ones they could see were on the towers, bodies laying lifeless. The sounds of heated battle carried on behind the walls.
“Wow, Fellwyre works fast. There used to be dozens of guards on those walls minutes ago.” Pastor dropped a waypoint on their map: in the alley between the buildings and the armory walls, there was a breach in the walls. Bodies of dead griffons lay around it, with a number of explosive barrels used to effect the entry knocked over or broken open on the other side of the walls. “The buildings aren’t that tall. I can at least see that much, but you’ll have to find where they’re keeping the stockpile inside yourself.”
Hearing shouts on the wind, Talbot looked below and was graced with the sight of Fellwyre leading a squad to the breach. The griffon supervised his group, ordering them to fetch the barrels and bring them elsewhere for usage: the keep, the other gates, and the towers on the northwest side of the fortress. The griffons under his command hurried, each claiming a barrel or scooping up as much blackpowder in bags as they could before setting off.
As the last loyalist left, rolling the barrel away as he did so, another squad arrived, which Fellwyre ordered through the breach and into the battle. Fellwyre paused for a moment, checking over his map and discussing positions with his own squad before they, too, entered the armory compound. Realizing that Fellwyre had no intention of staying still, Talbot tossed a rock, waiting tensely as it bounced off of the wall next to Fellwyre’s head.
“What in the—” Fellwyre pulled out his sword, turning and looking up and down the alley. “Who’s there? Show yourself!” he demanded.
“Psst,” Talbot uncloaked, waving at him from the roof. “Fellwyre. It’s me. Captain Talbot.”
“Talbot?” Fellwyre said, scanning the alley again before he drifted closer. “What are you doing here? Aren’t you supposed to be dealing with Red Talon?”
“We ran into some problems,” Talbot said. “Red Talon isn’t keeping still, so we’re looking to make a distraction to draw his attention.”
“What did you have in mind?” he asked.
“Blowing up the powder stockpile in the armory,” Talbot replied. Fellwyre raised a brow to this. “Only the powder stockpile. We’re trying to draw him here for a massive battle, keep him rooted in place while his attention is distracted. Bloodfury and Leret were supposed to keep him stationary, but that hasn’t been turning out well so far.”
“Actually, sir,” Pastor said. “It doesn’t even look like they’re trying to keep him in place anymore. They’re just trying to straight up kill him now. Seems like a better idea given how well we’ve done so far. Scope’s taken two more shots since then, both went wide because the asshole just keeps jumping.”
“Thank you for that, Shell,” Talbot whispered into his mic, before continuing to Fellwyre with, “We’ve taken three shots already, and all three missed.”
“I forget,” Fellwyre said, sidestepping to a stack of boxes as figures darted back and forth at the mouth of the alley. He looked upwards, standing directly underneath him now. “The size of your projectiles is larger than the imperials’, correct?” he asked.
“Correct,” Talbot said with a nod. “They’re armor-piercing, designed to inflict grievous damage upon the target after penetrating the armor. All we need to cut Red Talon down to size is to hit him once. After that, taking him out would be trivial.”
“And if we can do that, we’ve won this battle,” Fellwyre agreed. “Well, that’ll be outstanding. The reinforcements will definitely follow suit once they’ve seen Strongbeak’s finest cut down to size.”
“Reinforcements?” Talbot asked, looking up at the skies trying to discern whether or not the population of griffons in the area had grown by any considerable amount. “Just how much backup are we talking about here?”
“Strongbeak has had patrols running beyond the walls of Tesseraka since the war began, consisting of nothing but his elites, who hold the capital hostage with an iron fist. The moment the patrols get wind of the attack on Helmguard, they will certainly rush to its rescue, but if we can kill Red Talon before they get here, they will flee. The loyalists will have shown their power by eliminating one of the Empire’s greatest generals and taken its largest bastion.”
“I must have missed the memo on this,” Talbot muttered. “And we didn’t cover this in the briefing why?”
“There was no need to concern ourselves with it,” Fellwyre replied calmly. “If the reinforcements arrive before we can eliminate Red Talon, then the battle is lost anyway. We simply do not have the numbers to fight against both the garrison and the reinforcements simultaneously. Scarclaw knows this, and designed the plan to hinge upon your success.”
“Fantastic,” he said. Talbot threw a look to Mendoza, who merely looked surprised and gave his best noncommittal shrug, and followed with his own exasperated sigh. “Okay. Shell, did you catch all of that?”
Pastor snorted over the comm. “Yeah. No pressure, huh?”
“We wouldn’t be here if we couldn’t do it,” Raymond said assuredly. “Now hurry it up. My trigger finger is getting itchy.”
“Copy that.” He was about to reply to some of Fellwyre’s squad returned, wondering what had happened to their leader. Blending back into the scenery, Talbot looked over the compound once more, trying to discern which entrance would serve best for his and Mendoza’s insertion. The stockpile had to be kept somewhere far from immediate access...
“...to get inside, and find the powder stockpile in the armory,” Fellwyre finished. “The extra munitions could prove useful, and I already have secondary targets standing by for destruction. Am I understood?” His griffons saluted and made their way into the armory, leaving him alone again. “Well, there’s our plan, then... we wait for them to report back. My soldiers are in the process of storming the building, so it’ll only be a matter of time before they find it.”
“Thanks,” Talbot said. “You might want to stand back a bit.”
Fellwyre looked up in confusion, doing as Talbot asked until he saw two pairs of boots appear on the edge of the roof, falling towards him. The two Ghosts landed with a thud, bending their knees to cushion the fall as the exoskeletons did the rest. Talbot looked eye-to-eye with Fellwyre for a moment until his form disappeared into blurry transparency, and the griffon smirked.
“I don’t think I’ll ever tire of that...” he said. “Can you keep up in that form?”
“We can walk,” Talbot said, nodding until he realized that Fellwyre couldn’t see him. “Just get us into that room and we’ll handle the rest.”
“Good. Follow me.”
“Sir! The stockpile—I’ve found it. Building on the northwest side of the armory, looks like a regular barracks, but the doors on the outside are fake and the walls are heavily reinforced. The only way to get into it is from an access door inside the armory, down below.”
Fellwyre looked aside in the darkened hall, clearing his throat as the soldier stood patiently, waiting for his answer. “Well done, soldier,” he congratulated him. “We’d best get to it as soon as possible. Have you encountered any resistance along the way?”
“Plenty, sir, but we managed to break through their defenses. Most of the armory guard have been eliminated, and the others have been sent running. We’ve taken a few casualties in the battle, though. Any organized counterattack will be sure to route us.”
“It’ll have to do,” Fellwyre said. “Take me to the stockpile: I need to make sure it’s the genuine article we’ve stumbled upon. Afterwards, we’ll return to the main floor to gather your brothers: we will be deploying elsewhere shortly, after I detonate their stockpile here.” He waved his claw in the air, beckoning the soldier to lead him to the stockpile, and followed him down dusty steps. The invisible stymie curving the air’s flow behind him let him know that the Ghosts were still following him.
“Sir?” the soldier asked, looking over his shoulder at Fellwyre. “We aren’t taking their stockpile?”
“Not this time. We can find more powder anywhere in the Empire, but for this instance, we will need to destroy the stockpile. The Imperial Guard cannot contain Red Talon, so we must draw his attention here to the armory, so that they can properly surround him,” he answered honestly. “Or so the plan now goes.”
“And what guarantee do we have that this new plan will work? That Red Talon will fall for it?”
“We have none. But our options are limited, Red Talon isn’t playing along, and it’ll only be a matter of time until reinforcements arrive. Short of blowing up the keep, which could take hours to do given its size and defenses, this is our next bet. What else have you found here?”
“Most of the squads have armed themselves with these ‘rifles’, as we have heard them called, and as much ammunition as they can carry. These new weapons are powerful, sir. We can make good use of them in our war against Strongbeak, but we still do not know where they originate from. Before we destroy the armory, though, there are a few objects of interest here that we couldn’t bring with us, perhaps you would like to see them first?”
Fellwyre slowed his pace, turning his head so his ear awaited an answer. “Go ahead,” came the hushed response.
“Let’s see these objects, then,” he said. The soldier nodded, leading them down another snaking stairwell and exiting to a simple room, no larger than a jail cell, adorned with two torches and what remained of a door. An adjoining hall led down to the rest of the floor on their right.
“It’s in there, sir,” the soldier said, walking inside. “I’m not sure what the significance behind these objects are, but I think General Scarclaw might like to see them.” He stood guard next to the room’s only adornment: a table with its contents laid out neatly on top.
Talbot accompanied him, clenching his jaw as he examined them himself. Mendoza was next, letting out a quiet curse as Fellwyre walked around the table.
The remains of a gray uniform were on the table, the complete dress with both the upper and lower body remaining mostly intact, but with cuts and burn marks at the edges of its sleeves. Its urban camouflage was unmistakable on both the uniform and the helmet that sat next to it. The EFEC patch was still starkly blue on the shoulder, and the nametag and flag denoted clearly who its original owner once was: G. Kessler, of Germany.
The helmet was strangely devoid of the electronic suites that would normally have been attached to its side. Talbot edged closer, taking note of removed visor and the caved-in portions of the inner helmet where the wires would have been.
“You found this here, by itself?” Fellwyre asked.
“Yes, sir, just this table. But, as you can see,” the soldier said, gesturing around the room at the marks of removed receptacles, “there used to be more here. I can only guess that this object in particular must have been a uniform of some kind. Maybe minotaur in origin, given its bipedal nature, though it seems too small, and doesn’t seem to match their style.”
“And it was just this uniform, no weapons or anything else with it?”
“Just the uniform, sir.”
“Hmm...” Fellwyre looked underneath the table, pulling out another bit of equipment: the combat webbing that would have gone along with the EFEC soldier’s uniform. He poked a talon through one of the holsters, noting that its shape copied the Ghosts’ equipment. “This might be important, yes... I’ll take these and report to the general with them later.”
Fellwyre and the soldier busied themselves with storing the evidence in their bags, leaving Talbot and Mendoza to huddle together and converse in whispers. “The guy’s dead,” Mendoza plainly stated.
“Highly probable,” Talbot agreed. “So the EFEC were definitely here before us. If they were the first to run tests with the portal technology, it’s possible that a miscalculation or malfunction may have brought them here.”
“A miscalculation... Harvey said that Maynard’s portal had never been tested.”
“Exactly.”
“Alright, then, soldier,” Fellwyre announced loudly, throwing the bag over his shoulder. “Let’s get to the stockpile. Time is of the essence.” He sauntered towards the exit as the soldier rushed to take the lead again, and the Ghosts skulked behind. They exited the room, heading straight into the hall on their left.
“Right this way, sir,” the soldier said. “We’re on what seems to be a secure containment floor, but as the plan said, the lockbreakers we brought were able to make short work of the doors here. Most of the rooms on this floor had the rifles and some of that new magic-infused powder that we saw back at Kruvem, so we found it odd that the first room barely had anything in it. I guess they must have taken all of the important stuff out before we attacked.”
The passageway grew increasingly cramped as they proceeded, no doubt intended as a security measure to prevent any wayward thieves from making an escape by having soldiers block their only route out. Blood and feathers lined the floor, making Talbot wonder where the bodies all went... until they passed a room with all the casualties of the floor piled high within, second to the stockpile room at the end.
“Here it is, sir, the stockpile,” the soldier said, stopping at the door and going no further. “Should I return to the main level and relocate the squads?”
“Do it,” Fellwyre said with a nod. When the soldier reached the end of the hall and walked around the corner, he turned around and pointed over his shoulder. “Captain Talbot, it’s all yours.”
“Thank you,” Talbot said as Fellwyre walked past him for the exit, and he into the room. He uncapped some of the barrels, tossing their grainy contents across the ground and coalescing them into a pile, following up by surrounding it with infused powder from purple-marked barrels. “Fuse, plant a C4 here.”
“Yes, sir,” he said happily. He pulled out the oblong package, priming the explosive before gently placing it on top of the pile and stepping back to observe his handiwork. “Look at that. It’s like a gunpowder cake with an explosive candle.” He looked up, staring down the lines of shelves with dozens of barrels, nearest ones marked conventional with the furthest half being infused. Hundreds more hung above as the shelves towered into the darkness, and scaffolding led their way to the storage’s main entrance at the faux barracks above. “Hope Red Talon’s ready for the fireworks show.”
“Heads up to the both of you,” Pastor interrupted. “I think Red Talon might have gotten some idea of what’s going on... maybe it’s all the smoke and fighting going on over there, I don’t know, but he’s heading for you right now.”
“He’s gunning for us?” Talbot asked.
“Well, the D-kit’s been a bit spotty with its audio pickup, but I think he may have said something to the effect of ‘puny humans’ when he noticed, so I’m pretty sure he thinks you’re stirring up the shit in his backyard. Either way, he’s heading down to you guys, so either get out or hunker down, because he’s bringing a whole lot of trouble with him.”
“Hunker down we shall, then,” Talbot said. “You ready to lay out the red carpet, Fuse?”
Mendoza returned with a thumbs-up, remote detonator in hand. “Showtime.”
Stats
Page generated in 0.049 seconds
Total duration
1,078 users online
1,860,112 hits today, 2,004,447 yesterday
FIMFiction
My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic Fanfiction
Designed and coded by knighty & Xaquseg - © 2011-2024
Follow & Support Us
Support us
SubStar
Chat!
Discord
Follow us
Twitter
MLP: Friendship is Magic® - © 2024 Hasbro Inc.®
Fimfiction is in no way affiliated with or endorsed by Hasbro Inc.®
*ahem*SQUEEEEEEEEEEEEEEELLLLLLLL!!!!!!
2807090 And now I have finished the chapter.
You're not dead!
I had to go read the previous chapter to remember what was happening in this story. Keep up the updates!
2807328 it's takes a lot more to kill a ghost
2768141 Chemical weapons have the same problems as the nukes, although biological weapons can if and only if they become rampant and spread infection beyond their intended target. (And only if they effect all types of people, it won't take high percentage who have immunity to keep the species going.)
2807458
Not really. I just have to make one call.
Excellent...
One error detected: The regrouped Ghosts convened as Pastor handed the a set of binoculars to Talbot.
2807788 Fixed.
Well, at least human tech being there means potential ammunition resupply.
oh boy, I wonder if we'll find th russians. looking at this latest chapter, I'm hopeful they'll be some more humans to help (or hinder) the ghosts. Let's face it, they seem pretty lonely. Give them some 'company', Bad Company.
2808495 I can imagine group of different Spec Ops soldiers from each faction running around Equestira
Why do video games always portrait Europe and it's surroundings as either a little, defenceless baby sheep or a prime vacation spot for Satan's wife and kids?
RIP G. Kessler
You shall be avanged.
What a bombshell!
Ah, an update. My day just got 20% better. And the plot thickens!
RIP G. Kessler. We will... miss you?
I wonder if any of the Kommandos are still alive. I haven't played EndWar, so I don't know if it would be possible but Anvil Squad and a Kommando working together would be cool.
Also, reading Anvil's lines in Delta Squad's voices from Republic Commando. Fun!
I have to ask... did Delta influence you when you created Anvil Squad?
2844508 In a way, yes, Anvil was partially inspired by Delta. It seems that most special forces squads in popular media (or rather, just videogames) tend to follow their own cliques.
Future Soldier, Republic Commando, and Bad Company (and more, but I can't recall any at the moment) all seem to follow the general 4-person setup with variable differences in the personalities of its members. There's always the experienced leader, the gun nut and/or sniper, the comedic guy, and that one mostly-normal guy who the player usually ends up as. In the story's case, that would be Shell/Lt. Pastor, with Marlowe in Bad Company and Kozak in Future Soldier as further examples.
I suppose it's needed, though. It's not much fun for either the writer or reader to write a squad full of professional stone-cold killers.
damn getting intense! cant wait till this update again! >< the General is a pain in the ass!
err mah gawd i love this story sudden plot twist the characters (WOOO SCOPE) everything is pure melted down edible gold it's perfect. And R.I.P G.Kessler (hopefully) you shall be revenged.
moar plzz
So in the next missions the Ghosts will have to face...
And Project Eclipse may actually be...
i.chzbgr.com/maxW500/4393316608/h6D37C429/
Please, please, pleeeaaaassseeee make Anvil and the still-alive Kommandos and hopefully Spetsnaz's Wolves or Bears work together for Equestria.
Maybe some of the Kommandos were actually just captured and the Ghosts freed them?
Hopefully Scope can find a replacement for his M107 ammo (or better yet, another .50 cal anti-materiel rifle
), or the next general may be a victim of Fuse's shoulder-mounted Derpy-level fireworks delivery. 
Not that I wan't to dictate how the story goes, of course. It's all up to you.
Whatever happens this story is now officialy graduated from "Read Later" to "Favorited" in my books.
2844587
Heh-heh, the four man setup, eh? And "the comedic guy" is almost always an explosive expert. Addition to the whole "funny but insane" part I guess.
3322783 Everything's in the works still, of course. Lots of details have changed from how their original premise was conceived and altered to things I thought were better or fit the story; as for more humans, that might change as well, though I am not entirely sure how willing I am to expand the group given how the other two factions do rely more heavily on other languages, which I am not too keen to use due to my inexperience.
And it would be straight cop-out if they could all somehow speak English. I imagine a few, perhaps, and certainly the Europeans to a large extent. But to have all of them, including the Russians, speaking English? That remains to be decided upon.
In any case, thank you for reading my story. If you're confused at the lack of updates, real life currently has me weighed down with both classes and work, so progress has been slow.
3324585 Hehe, it's just that I have this warm feeling in my chest when I see soldiers from warring countries actually work together for the cause of universal peace, but yeah the technicality is a very significant problem (Portable Google Translate for language issue!
No, I'm just kidding).
Temporal contamination detected