That day a red light shone out above the republic. The warm red light that was visible in all of the republic came from on of the republic"s most treasured relics, a magic tool referred to simply as the beacon. The beacon was made by a genius magic engineer, but it was quite simple in function, it created a single magic flare that could be seen all across the republic, to telegraf a single message: We lost, ghatter at Homestead.["So this is the monster"s den? Heads up, I"m getting a lot of interference."]
"Interference?"
["Radio, long range and short range, broadband, infrared? And radioactive? Holy s.h.i.+t that"s a f.u.c.king perfect s.h.i.+eld."]
"Dax"s you"re talking in codes."
"He"s talking about the building, he can"t see into it. At all. And that is why he"s freaking out a bit."
"Ah okay."
With Dax in his own little world Terra explained for Solaris while Alice just listened to the conversation from inside her exoskeleton.
["There"s no I am not going in there for all I know that building could be booty trapped, h.e.l.l there could be a f.u.c.king anti.. Matter.. Fuel..- like that."]
As Dax talked a single small girl walked in a heavy fur coat holding a small orange vail in her hand without a care in the world.
"Hallo."
"How are you doing?"
"I don"t really have a name."
"So just call me whatever you like."
"But please don"t get closer."
"Or I use this."
Speaking in a strange fas.h.i.+on the young girl played with the orange vail like it was some sort of toy, but Dax imeitaly recognized it for what it was.
["Holy s.h.i.+t is that live?"]
"live."
"And armed."
"So don"t move."
["Why? That veil is designed to self kill when the containment field runs out of charge."]
"So it does."
"It was the first thing I noticed."
"That"s why I bypa.s.sed it."
"With another power source."
"And then I recharged it."
"Then fitted it with a fast acting collapse system."
"The core will go critical in about 0.1 seconds."
"0.01 seconds."
"Sorry I"m not quite agreeing with myself on that point."
"Antimatter annihilation calculations are hard."
"When no concept of anti matter existed before I found this."
["Okay we really need to stop moving.."]
"Dax?"
Apparently understanding what the monster was talking about Dax started getting a bit nervous, which his pupil Terra immediately picked up on
["You take a single step towards that young girl and we all die before we realize it."]
[CONFIRMED ANTIMATTER MIRV STRIKE CORE #522, WEAPON HOT.]
"Seems like you know what this is."
"I am intrigued."
"Really intrigued."
"But first get all the AUGU"s and AUAV"s out of the area now."
["You"re the boss, ICI move all autonomous unmanned ground units and all autonomous unmanned aerial vehicles out of the operational area now."]
[DIRECTIVE CONFIRMED, CLEANING PRIMARY BLAST ZONE.]
"Good."
"Now toss away all your weapons."
["Do as she says."]
"Dax why are you following along with her!?"
When Dax tossed away his rifle Solaris was understandably confused.
["Solaris drop your spear now or I"ll make you."]
"Why!?"
["Because if the young princess here feels bored and/or annoyed she"ll wipe out us, this town, the area around this continent and most likely knock this dirt ball panet off its axis and end all life, and that"s just the primary blast wave."]
"What, really?"
For a second Solaris was sure Dax was joking, but being met with silence it soon dawned on her that he was not pulling her leg and tossed away her spear.
"Good."
"Now why are you here?"
"I mean other than to kill me?"
"Us."
"Sorry. Other than to kill us?"
["Kill you? Why would I do that? I"m here to recruit you."]
"Recruit us?"
"Why?"
"That doesn"t make any sense."
"Completely illogical."
"I don"t understand."
"I don"t either."
"Why would you do that when we threatened to kill you?"
["Well I get threatened all the time, besides that fuel cell won"t really kill me from this distance."]
"I"m sure it will."
"99.5% sure."
"Even your XMRA won"t save you from getting vaporized."
["It properly won"t no. But in the time from you deciding to use that device to it blowing up I can get far enough away from it that only most of my body will vaporize, but most importantly my sup processor will survive. After the blast ICI will find locate and recover it, then it"ll just rebuild my body with the backup information stored inside."]
"That is fa.s.sinating."
"Extremely fascinating."
"Please tell me more about that sup processor."
"I would very much like to know more."
"Is it linked to your own brain?"
"It"s located in the spine right?"
"Or it replaces your spine right?"
"It"s a cybernetic implant right?"
Firing questions off at a record pace the small girl ran up to Dax with a light in her eyes.
["Woah calm down, I"ll answer all the questions you want if you become my subordinate and disable that fuel cell."]
"Okay."
"If I disable the cell will you answer all my questions?"
"We have a lot."
"So many in fact mom and dad stopped speaking to us."
"Rest of the clan too."
"We still don"t understand that."
"It was the strangest thing."
["Sure."]
With a single straight forward answer Dax placed his hand on the young girls head and ruffled up her hair a bit as she for the first time showed a facial expression by blooming into a full smile.
["But first we need a proper name for you, can"t go around calling "that" when you"ve become my subordinate. Anyone have a proposal?"]
crouching down to get a better look at the so called monster of the Northern Republic, Dax gently pulled off her heavy fur hood to reveal short silver hair which matched her red eyes perfectly.
["Hmmm I feel like you should name her yourself Dax"]
"Yeah I support that opinion."
"Yeah you find a name for her, after all she"ll be your responsibility from now on, as I know nothing about kids."
Having been delegated the task to his own judgement Dax took off his helmet to get a better look at the young girl that looked at him with wonder.
"You"re not a demonkin are you?"
"If so I don"t recognize the race."
"Well ain"t you a bright one? I"m what"s called a qiton, and my name is Dax."
"Interesting name."
"And we"ve never heard about that race before."
"Are you perhaps not of this world?"
"That would explain your knowledge."
"And the XMRA you"re wearing."
"Oh my~ She really is a sharp one huh?"
In response to the small monster seeing through Dax"s ident.i.ty in a split second Solaris looked like a proud mother for some reason as she carefully patted the monster on her head.
"Hmmm a name huh? Been a long time since I did that…"
Carefully looking at the small girl with a happy smile on her face in front of him Dax closed off from the world as he thought about a name.
"What about Iris?"
"Iris?"
"The name of an old G.o.d that acted as a messenger of the G.o.ds to mortals, just like you have bestowed knowledge to the republic. And Iris is also the name of an important pace of your eye that you inspect the world around you with such interest and curiosity that are the connor stones of invention."
"I like it."
"Me too."
"That"s a good name for us I think."
having accepted her new name Iris put on a large and warm smile that uncocunally made Dax pat her head.
"Ehehe~ Your hand is so w" *SPLAT*
[RIFLE FIRE, 10 METERS.]
As Iris" head was pierced with a high caliber rifle round Dax"s mind went into overdrive. Closing his eyes to avoid being blinded by blood splatter Dax s.h.i.+fted slightly to the side as he kicked Terra that stood to the left of him out of the way from a round that was meant for her head and pushed Solaris that kneeled to the right of him away from another round as Dax himself was. .h.i.t in the neck with a round himself.
(f.u.c.k!)
Feeling the round price trough his skin and heading towards his only remaining lung Dax quickly located the shooter.
"CONTACT ABOVE."
Without confirming as his eyes were still closed Dax shouted out as he jumped to the ground and grabbed Solaris" spear which he tossed in the direction of the rifle fire.
(s.h.i.+-)
"ALICE EJECT NOW!"
Hearing Alice"s exoskeleton bring hit with another round Dax screamed at the top of what remained of his lungs as he scrambled to his feet.
"Eh?"
Still confused as Iris" copse still haven"t hit the ground yet, Alice didn"t react in time. As the impact fuse on the 40mm AD-LBD HEAT ignited, it created a plasma cone that punched a hole directly through the exoskeletons armor and burned a hole directly through Alice"s chest as she was cooked alive.
"f.u.c.k! ICI PURGE XMRA!"
Not even waiting for ICI to affirm his command Dax tore open Alice"s trashed exoskeleton as he bit open his own pulse vain in his left arm and pressed it towards what remained of Alice"s charred head.
"What is happening!?"
"GET AREA SECURITY NOW!"
The first one that recovered from her daze was Solaris, and understandably she responded with panic from seeing Iris" head explode.
"ICI PRESERVE BRAIN ACTIVITY AT ALL COSTS!"
[DIRECTIVES CONFIRMED.]
"GET ME A f.u.c.kING MEDIVAC NOW! PRIORITY f.u.c.kING OMEGA!"
[CONFIRMED, FORMING DATA BRIDGE TO KINGSTEAD FOB… COMPLETE, NOW FARST SCRAMBLING CAS-A7 STINGER FOR CASVAC, ESTIMATED TTA: 10 MINUTES.]
In that moment to the south outside the capital city of Kingstead something came alive.
[DUST OFF REQUEST RECEIVED, TAKEOFF IN 15 SECONDS.]
As the twin 14th generation advanced VSIMR electrothermal propulsion engine roared with purple flames as they warmed up for the first time in over a hundred years the onboard computer plotted a ballistic trajectory while running through its pre flight checklist.
[PRE FLIGHT LIST APPROVED AND CLEARED. TAKEOFF NOW.]
Roaring with a sound felt in the stomach of most citizens the Stinger lifted off the ground almost vertically as it used att.i.tude control thrusters all over the hull to turn the central fuselage skywards as it pulled in its wings and the wingtip mounted engines ignited their afterburner.
[MAX Q.]
Reporting maximum aerodynamic pressure the aircraft moved away from the ground faster and faster as it broke the sound barrier with a sonic boom that was heard all over Kingstead.
[MARK 1.. MARK 2, ATMOSPHERIC PRESSURE DROPPING: NOW REDUCING AIRCRAFT Ma.s.s, ANTI GRAV DRIVE ONLINE AND CLIMBING TO 90% Ma.s.s REDUCTION.]
Having climbed above the more dense atmosphere the aircraft reduced its ma.s.s to accelerate even faster, and after about 10 seconds of running its engines with afterburner they cut off.
[PRIMARY BURN COMPLETE, NOW CONDUCTING ADJUSTMENT BURNS AND UPDATING COMMAND ON ESTIMATED TTA..]
Having mostly exited the atmosphere, the CAS-A7"s wings once more extended as smaller thrusters all over the hull lit up to fine tune the descent trajectory.
[CONFIRMED, FORMING DATA BRIDGE TO KINGSTEAD FOB… COMPLETE, NOW FARST SCRAMBLING CAS-A7 STINGER FOR CASVAC, ESTIMATED TTA: 10 MINUTES.]
"Terra keep Alice safe, I"m going after whoever did this."
"Okay."
Holding back her tears Terra gave Dax her sword as she herself picked up a rifle.
"Give them h.e.l.l."
"I will."
Leaving with those short words Dax jumped onto the roof from where the shooter had ambushed them and quickly tracked down the direction they had moved in.
(Oh you better f.u.c.king run far, far away.)
having found the direction Dax ran and jumped from rooftop to rooftop until he had reached the edge of the city and spotted a single figure running across the ice away from the city with his enhanced vision.
"YOU"RE NOT f.u.c.kING GETTING AWAY!"
Setting off with such force that he cracked the building underneath Dax quickly caught up to the shooter and tossed Terra"s sword that hit them in the leg.
"YOU"RE SO f.u.c.kING DEAD NOW!"
In a fit of rage Dax ran up to the collapsed figure and punched in the head, cracking the persons visor and finally snapping Dax out of his rage.
"What the?..."
Tearing off the visor Dax"s face turned to despair.
"What? Come on! Do it! Steal my life away like you did the weaponry of my fallen comrades!"
"Lux?"
"Wh Is that my name!? How do you know it!?"
Having recognized her face Dax"s expression turned bitter.
"Of course I know you, I practically raised you myself."
"BUT I DON"T KNOW YOU! WHAT IS HAPPENING!? WHY CAN"T I REMEMBER!?"
Turning to confusion, then rage, Lux tried to escape Dax"s grasp.
"You can"t remember because you"re already dead."
"What? that can"t be-"
"You where right next to me when we were ambushed. I saw a metal fragment tear right trough your head."
"Then why am I clearly still alive!?"
"You"re not alive, only the ICI unit that accidently fused to your spine after you died thinks so. Its resurrection syndrome."
Born from merging a flesh and blood body with cybernetics, sometimes glitches happened. In extreme cases a omboard ICI unit can miscla.s.sify a copse as a critically injured person, and accidently revive them.
"The syndromes are extreme itching, especially around the head, memory loss, as the less used neurons are beyond repair and brake down, loss of senses like you not feeling the blade in your leg, and decomposition of the body as the processes keeping the body alive are non functional after resurrection."
With a pained expression Dax looked down at the decomposing body of his former second in command.
"There"s nothing I can do for you except to end your suffering, and make sure you"re buried at home."
Pulling out the sword from Lux"s leg tears of blood formed in Dax"s eyes. Lux too, with what remained of her active neurons she recognized what Dax had talked about, as it had been practically burned into her memory as she had trained to recognize the condition.
"Before you do it please tell me who I was."
"Lux, daughter of James, my first real friend in the marine core. After James and your mother died I raised you to become an excellent soldier, master armourer and someone I trusted with my life."
Crying tears of blood Dax placed Terra"s sword on Lux"s chest, right over her ICI unit that had falsely brought her back to life.
"You"re… Dax, right? I remember a bit now, please release me from my suffering."
Recognizing her step father in her final moments Lux put on a warm smile as Dax priced her chest with the sword and put her to rest out on the cold ice sheet she hated so much.