I could see him talking, but my mind was somewhere else. I didn't hear him, it was all still too real. I thought back on how I got here..... so much was unclear. I remembered, running, hard, relentlessly. My heart pounding in my chest, the feeling of my head not getting enough oxygen, it was all happening too fast. I thought I would pass out, but hearing the man's voice kept me awake.
"Stop! You're only making this harder on yourself."
I heard a sound, and a laser shot past my head, barely missing its mark. I bent low and sprinted faster, my breath coming out in short huffs. It was hopeless, no way to contact them, nowhere to run, eventually I would be caught. With the knowledge I had, there were two options for me, death or escape, the latter seemed so far out of reach. As my mind snapped back to reality I realized I had run into a dead end.
"If only I remembered the layout of Manhattan better." I thought to myself.
The two Liberty Security Force officers were right behind me, their weaponry aimed at my face. It was my last chance, I jumped like an animal at one of them, and quickly disabled him faster than I thought possible, taking his weapon. As I shot him and killed him instantly, a pain went throughout my body, almost unbearable. I realized, the other officer had shot me, and quickly rolled out of the way. As I thought I was missed by mere inches, by another shot fired by the officer whom had previously shot me. I quickly took aim and fired, the man slumped over, and I knew my shot had connected.
I took a few minutes, back against the wall, breathing, which was made even harder by the wound on my side. I lifted my jacket to find a nasty flesh wound, but nothing fatal if I got it cleaned soon. The pain was unbearable though, I needed to get help and fast. I crawled over towards on of the officers, and took out a comm device. I shakily spoke into the device.
"This is Raven to Phoenix. I repeat, this is Raven to Phoenix. I'm injured and need immediate. extraction, my coordinates are, 2s0y-fj76-0."
I slammed the device down as I heard someone coming into the dark alley, I stood up back against the wall, ready to pounce. I was standing on the edge of my toes as I saw his shadow moving closer. My vision was getting blurry from the pain, the man stepped around the corner and quickly ran towards the LSF officers on the ground.
"What the hell?" He mumbled, inspecting the bodies.
He turned around and saw me, but it was too late, I slammed my fist on the side of his head, causing him to pass out. If someone else came, I would need a live hostage. I didn't know how long I would be here.......
"Get up. Get up!" my mind was telling me, but my body was resisting.
I began to rise slowly, not knowing how I was doing it, but it was extremely painful. Lifting the hostage on my back with a badge that read "Lieutenant Abshire" was the most painful part. I felt as though my bones were on fire. I was about to walk to the landing zone, when I heard what sounded like a stampede come around the corner. To make things worse, Abshire was stirring, I set him down and watched him regain his senses, all the while the stampede getting closer.
Before he could realize where he was or what was going on, I pulled the side-arm up to his face, and forced him to start climbing a ladder on the side of the building. As I followed a river of blue suits had seen us. Their weapons pointed at me, I signaled towards my hostage, they stood down, but began to slowly follow. As I climbed the cold ladder, my hands already numb in my barely conscious state, I was constantly fearing I'd lose my grip.
I looked down to see a side-arm aimed at me again, I took aim at Abshire, who was looking down at me. The object of death must've finally became a reality to him, as he began to slip. The LSF were using this opportunity to close the gap between us on the ladder. I was now faced with a choice, I shot Abshire and he fell off the ladder. On his way down he grabbed my side, and something fell out of my pocket, I didn't look down to see. When I heard my name I realized I dropped my identification.
Luckily the LSF were more interested in saving him than capturing me and followed him back down.
As I finished my climb up the ladder, I was greeted by a flat surface high above Manhattan. I laid there, flat on my back, trying to rest my injured body. It was at this moment I realized the LSF hadn't given up on me. Right above my head was a Liberator, and I could hear it hailing me.
"It's time we put this silly chase to an end, Mr.Phelps."
I only continued to lay down, not expecting to be saved by a miracle this time. I sat there waiting, anticipating, death's cold hands.
I sat watching, waiting for the burst of laser fire that was soon to come. The Liberator was closing in, it's weapons pointed at me. I knew that a single shot from one of those would incinerate me. At that moment, there was the loud noise of something flying through the air very fast, and the Liberator exploded into a thousand pieces. I turned and saw where the missile had come from. Some kind of fighter-like ship, that looked something like a a Sabre, flew over my head. Clearly the one who had fired the missile. A Dromedary hovered next to the building, and several men ran out and helped me into the open hold. I sat down, collapsed against the wall as I heard the ship gaining hight and saw the cargo bay close, and knew no more.
I was taken a way from my recollection by a cold shoulder on my hand, which caused me to look at the man who was speaking to me.
"As I was saying, we'd like to welcome you back." He said, obviously annoyed he had to repeat himself.
Mectan bas had changed so much since the last time I was here, everything had definitely been upgraded. I don't know if I was hallucinating, but I'm sure I saw a new gunship, and man she is beautiful. I stopped letting my mind wander before I was scolded again, waiting to be briefed on the current situation.
The man in front of me, Captain Aethelu, and I heard a crowd gasp in a room near us. I tried to remove myself from the bed, with little success, my body still recovering from my ordeal. Aethelu helped me to my feet, and slowly led me into a tiny room, filled to capacity. There was a screen in front of us, it was showing the view of a ship.
It seemed as if they were on Manhattan, all of a sudden the screen flashed a bright light, and voiced could be heard. "We just lost Mori dammit! evacuate, now! I repeat our secondary objective failed, no survivors, evacuate."
The extraction ship made a hasty retreat from the planet, Aethelu slamming his fist on the wall and muttering a serious of foul words. The rest of us looked on in complete horror. I felt helpless, having just only returned to see the man who brought me into the Legion, killed in action. I thought about the time my father said that, there would come a time in life where I wish I could go back in time. This had to be it.
My grief-filled thoughts faded into nothingness as Aethelu turned me by my shoulder, so that we were face to face.
"We need to speak. In private." Aethelu said looking around the room.
Aralie followed him out of the room as best his limp body would take him, receiving no aid this time.
One... last thing... Find Yarisa... take care of her for me, my sunshine... please...
"Kestrel, You listening?" He startles me, pulling my mind from its memories, away from Father's voice...
"Aralie's given you time to talk to him, better take it before he calls the Captn' Back, or you'll just have to wait." Right.. focus on the present. My eyes focus onto Kale, his face with shaven beard and roughened appearance. A real testament to how a man can defy years of aging only to become stronger through it still at the age of 58. The sound of a cart of supplies wheeling behind me in the corridor distracts me only for a second before I look back to Kale, nodding to him once as my gratitude for requesting that I may talk to Aralie.
"Thanks, And sorry.. Just a little distracted."
Kale nods back to me and places a hand on my shoulder as he walks to the end of the corridor where it splits into two.. one way left, one right. I, on the other hand, go the opposite direction towards a door to where Aralie was talking to Captain Aethelu. Just a few pressing of a key-code lock mechenisim with the beeps that follow and the door slides open before me, revealing a room with a few monitors showing Mactan's hanger, cargo rooms and the sort. Aralie himself is sitting in one of the only chairs in the room, looks like he got into a good scrape with liberty, too... Good, I hope he gave those bastards a good one..
I give Aralie a little smile, waving my fingers once at him in a little hello.
"Hey, I hope I wasn't taking you away from anything, I heard what happened on Manhattan..."
Aralie looks directly to Kess, and shakes his head slowly.
"N-no..."
He simply looks at me, as if he had seen a ghost, thinking... eventually he finnally smiles weakly.
"Its good to see you, Kestrel... My god, It would take alot more than a few LSF Goons to end your travels, I see?"
I nod, walking over to him and kneeling down to be more at eye-level with him. I glance at Aralie's battle wounds, looking up at him inquisitivly.
"Glad to see you as well, Aralie."
I look at Aralie for a good while simply, actually hugging him... relieved that Liberty hadnt' gotten to him like they did to...
"I knew you were always out there, somewhere... Welcome back, Aralie."
Aralie hugs back for a second,
"Hell, You have to tell me what happened back at the prison, I only had enough time to escape, not to snoop around to find out whats what."
I leaning back to my previous position of kneeling to eye level of Aralie, and I giggle shortly.
"Well, If your so eager to hear right now... I guess I could indulge you. You see..."
"'Tis a shame to escape from death once, only to inevitably land right back in my hands!" My cheek starts burning suddenly.. wh, that bastard slapped me!
"Your just a coward, ambushing us from the shadows, attacking unarmed peoples, Just like you-"
He slaps me yet again... my cheek must be red by now.
"Shut up, ---ch! If it wasn't for Kusari you would be long gone... But then again, I wouldn't have you here now if they didn't 'save' you... Here for me to do whatever I want with you. Just like old times, right dear?
My face turns crimson with hated - With my wrists bolted to the wall of my cell, i do the only thing I can, spit right into his face, panting furiously at him. The man doesn't even bother wiping it off, using the butt of his rifle as a weapon to whack at me face with - pain surging through it as my nose cracks and breaks. He gets ready for another swing when one of the guards puts a hand on the butt of his rifle.
"Enough! You can kill her when we get our response from HQ."
The man looks at the guard furiously as if he's going to take a swing at him too. He backs down anyway, looking back to me with a hatred as he wipes the saliva off his face red with anger, looking at me for another second before turning and out as the guards open the cell door for him - stepping out with him and closing the cell doors. I yell out to him,
"You'll still pay for what you did to my family! You'll pay for what you've done to every person you have come into contact with you a--hole!"
I start taking deep breaths, trying to control both the burning pain and hatered before I start plainly puking from stress.
"You'll pay for mother, father, everyone. . ."
I let out a deep sigh, its not worth it. They've had me bolted to the wall for more than half of the time i've been in this hell-hole, I probably won't live to see daylight at this pace...
No, think on the positives. Our pods sent out a distress signal before all power was cut from the pods, theres a chance someone on our side caught the signal and-
My thoughts are interrupted by blood building up at the back of my mouth and nearly breathing it in, forcing me to cough blood out, causing a nasty bit of pain each inhale to cough. After recovering, I take a look around my modest little cell. A toilet, if you can call the barely-functioning peice of garbage that, and a drain at the bottom of the cell. Nothing else, Joseph's specail little cell for his specail 'guests'... my god, I hate that man so much. He has murdered so many people just for the progression of his petty little career and the 'wellfare of Liberty in general'... Hrmph. I look down at my cut and tattered clothes, They diddnt bother even giving us inmate clothing - expect a execution by next week at most, from what "Lt.Major Joseph Callings" has told me. I hang my head down to the floor. Hopefully, Aralie is getting better treatment than I am.
A shockwave is all I remember of the breakout, I can't even remember hearing the explosion it all happened so fast. A huge ammount of gun firing, yelling, screaming and cries of despration are heard to the right of my cell, far off in some other section of the builidng, I believe the 'local' prison cell area, while i'm in the 'private' cells. Before I can even look up to see if my guards have gone to check out whats happenening, or even for me to guess whats happening, I hear a much more localised explosion to my right as well. Sounds like someone blew up the door, since when I finnally look up I see my guards blood everywhere but in their bodies - crushed by the 6 inch thick door. A command is shouted from the right...
"Find Aralie, He has to be in here somewhere! Kestrel will most likely be with him as well!"
They recieved the distress call! If there really is a entity out there like god right now, I'm sure as hell glad he's on our side. I yell out to get their attention.
"Hey! I'm over here! Heey!"
A few people run down stairs from the sound of it, the sounds of battle ever more loud to the right, closer than before, and then two people dive under the fallen door for cover - laser fire flying just over their heads. One of them looks to me and gives me a thumbs-up sign... That must be Kale! I try giving him a thumbs up as well, unable to move my arms which are bolted to the wall.
"Hang tight, We're busting you out of here!"
The other one yells into a comm.
"Eric, We got Hostles, Four of 'em! Position near the Panther at 4-5Beta Six!"
The two fire at whoever is firing at them - whoever is firing back is giving them some good suppressive fire.
Kale reaches to his belt, primes and throws a grenade, just barely keeping his hand from being incinerated by enemy fire.
"One, Two.. Three!"
Right on three, a explosion is heard and the supressive fire halts.. Concussion grenade - I can feel the shockwave from over here, Nearly made me want to puke. Kale and the other guy go to a kneeling position to fire at the unknown enemy, screams from the left being heard, four seprate voices.
Kale stands up and takes out a fusion torch, melting and weakening the lock so he can break it off - opening the gate. He pauses at the large ammount of blood sprayed at the walls, floor and ground.. most of it all being nothing more of a week old, my blood.
"I Hope some of that blood is whoever did this to you, Eh?"
Kale does the same to the braces keeping me on the wall, freeing my arms and legs. I let out a deep sigh.
"Sadly no, Joseph made sure I'd never have the chance"
Kale's eyes widen for a second, "Joseph, You mean that-"
I Nod lightly, standing up and rubbing my wrists.
"Enough of this, I need a weapon, We have to get Aralie!"
Kale nods, giving me a spare pistol of his. Kale's backup waves us over,
"Hey, Lets get a move on! Oh, and my name is Larus.. Now lets go!"
As if to exclaminate Larus' command, the alert-system of the jail finnally turns on, the classic "Beep beep beep!" noise to accomidate with it. Larus suddenly looks around.. then explodes in a flury of blood and cinder, automatic stationary turrets having stuck at him from both left and right with repeaded fire. Kale curses loudly,
"Damn it no, LARUS!"
He curses again as he takes out a comm, yelling into it angerly,
"We have at least two freaking sentry emplacments active down here at 4-5Beta Six, I thought you shut off the damn security?!"
Kale listens to the response of whoever is on the other side, and sighs loudly, turning back to me.
"Damn it... The security guns are off. Larus is right, we have to get to Aralie ASAP And evacuate, someone on LSF reactivated nearly all of the security systems, and its only a matter of time before-"
I inturrupt him, grabbing his free hand with my left hand and running out of my cell, looking left and right.
"Then lets get going already!"
"Yes, We need to go to the right, Got an update from Eric and he said we have to push ahead... Things are only getting worse while this LSF Techie and ours are battling it out while we-"
I start running towards the four dead prison guards.
"Yes I get it, big trouble!"
We run up stairs and towards pure anarchy.
Screams, gunshots, explosions, machinery, blood, lasers, flying debris... This prison room is a hive of utter anarchy, seems like half of the prisoners have escaped and are fighting anybody that gets near them, too. I look back to cale as he listens to the Comm, and now he is the one to lead me.
"This way, We've finnally got Aralie's cell position, it isnt far!"
I take a look around the room, Theres so many people fighting.. Many floors seem to have sentry guns twitching, firing and twirling around as the LSF and hacker techs battle it out in the virtural world. We seem to be on the second ledge, a good 9 feet above the floor below us, and acros the hall I can see at least 6 floors. Clink-clink-Click
My eyes travel downwards to a metal sphere in front of us, I try and act fast, shooting at the grenade to propel it off the ledge, falling below as it explodes in a brilliant cyan color, spraying plasma around its radius. Kale thanks me quickly, suddenly turning and running up stairs, dragging me along for the ride. Kale stops as the elevation stops and the corridor turns to the right, his back against the wall.
"Position 23-Delta One, Disable any and all defenses here, pronto."
Exactly two seconds later, automatic sentry fire is heard tearing apart at least four people, and a response from the comm that sounds like 'Done'. Kale continues his run.
"We're allmost there! Just have to go down another set of stairs and we'll be to the cell area where Aralie is.. Cell Gamma 15."
Gamma 15 was empty.
Where Aralie was supposed to be was replaced with two dead guards inside the cell - both shot in the head, and both relieved of their weapons. Kale lets out a loud groan and turns on the comm.
"Abort immediately, Aralie has escaped from Cell Gamma 15. We can't risk any more casualties, Abort!"
*Static*
Kale's face turns red with frustration.
"AAGH DAMNIT! Eric, Respond! ERIC!!!"
*Static*
Kale switches channels,
"This is Blood Dawn, We have lost Eric Ralthenson, We need immediate Evac, NOW!"
"...Roger, Evac at Position 23-Alpha Zero stay on the ledges, we will blow open a LZ. - Father on ground floor. Comm us when ready."
Kale nearly throws his comm to the ground in pure anger, stuffing it into his belt.
"Damn it, I don't believe this..."
I let out a slight sigh, patting Kale's shoulder.
"K-kale.. there was n-nothing you could to to assure the s-safty of the m-m-mission.." I'm stammering? I haven't stammered in...
"Right, Come on, we have to help anyone in the center of the room get to the ledges of the floor ASAP, 23-Alpha Zero is the room we passed by."
I nod, bursting into a run with him to get back into anarchy. We run down the stairs when a LSF uniformed man runs in front of us. Kale leaps at him, using the momentum from running down the stairs to knock the LSF grunt off his feet and down to the floor below us. While I help Kale up, I try and get a good look around the room... The sentry guns seem to be firing at inmates and LSF personnel only now, our people all seem to be gathering at the floor already. Kale speaks mostly to himself
"Great, at least something is going our way this mission."
Kale turns to me.
"Alright Kestrel, lets get the hell out of here! We can use the stairs over there."
Kale points to his right, and I look to a section on our floor where there is a bridge leading from our side to across the room. Suddenly, a explosion echoes throughout the room, the 'top' bridge collapsing onto the one below it, causing a vertical dominoe effect.
"...Right... Have any other ideas to get to the floor Kale?"
He looks around, then looks down - seems some debris on the floor can be used as stairs to get the floor. I Nod to him and hop to the first step, then to the next one and the one after that until we reach the bottom of the steps. The fighting in this room has seemingly died down, but the other room that was left of my cell still sounds chaotic - none of our men come out from it. I yell out to everyone,
"Alright, Everyone to the walls on the ground floor! We're getting out of here and they are blowing the roof off, so get ready!"
All heads turn towards me, then do as I said them to do, running down and to the walls. I nod to myself, satisfied, Kale now by my side. We both run to a wall ourself, Kale taking out his comm, looking around, and yells, "Everyone secure and ready for Evac?!"
Everyone gives a confirmation, not one voice saying they are not ready, nobody in the middle of the room...
"This is Blood Dawn, Evac when ready!"
And with that, the bloodied, torn room flashes with a brilliant white light.