United We Stand

by Christian Messe

  The Queen destroyed two more fighters, “Fine. Do what you have to do; just don’t get yourself killed down there.”

  Claire nodded. She got up out of her seat and stood on the airlock floor. A door closed in front of her, to seal the rest of the ship from the vacuum of space, then a drop door opened underneath her. She was sucked into space, in a pencil formation, arms crossed tightly. She could breathe, and she felt warm, even though she wasn’t even wearing a spacesuit.

  Spacesuit. She didn’t think about entering the atmosphere. Space was cold and unlivable, and she could still be millions of miles away from a star without being burnt to a crisp, but she had a good feeling that she wasn’t going to be able to resist the heat from an atmosphere. She imagined the kind of high tech, metal armor a special operative soldier would wear. She envisioned a helmet, high tech, sleek, and of course, heat resistant. She didn’t know if it was resistant enough to resist the heat of a planet’s atmosphere, but, she had a gut feeling it was. She fell through space, towards the surface of Mars, thousands of meters below her.

  She barely had to imagine the details of the suit; the Meta-Core did it for her. Her Meta-Core hand expanded, and broke off repeatedly, sending pieces of the suit to different parts of her body like a puzzle. She wasn’t scared of the fall. She knew that she had a power, that would keep her safe.

  She felt, for really the first time in her life, not just confident, but… powerful. The entire suit was made, except for the helmet, and she was getting closer and closer towards the atmosphere, Meta-Core thrusters on her feet pushing her through the gravity lacking void.

  She looked at the red rocky surface of the planet, then at the city, Insignia. She’d never been there, but she’d heard stories. It was supposed to be beautiful, but dozens of skyscrapers were on fire. Some had even collapsed. She could see that the oxygen generator had been destroyed as well. Rage filled inside of her, as the helmet finally covered her face. She was wearing a high tech, thin, yet heavily armored, Meta-Core suit, that was resistant to the heat and extreme cold in the atmosphere. It would even keep her from being hurt from the fall. A day ago she would’ve called something like that completely impossible.

  She entered the atmosphere, and at first, it was cold, then, fire started to spread across her body, and soon she was a ball of fire, falling through the sky, about to slam into the red surface of Mars. She couldn’t feel any of the heat. She wasn’t tired yet, not too much of her energy had been used. She got close enough to the ground to see the Tri-Tanks. She had just burst through the clouds.

  What the hell are those? She thought. She thrust herself into a full dive, then, did something that made her feel like some sort of… superhero. She positioned herself with her Meta-Core thrusters, lifting her legs, one higher than the other, then clenched her Meta-Core hand into a fist. She went into a striking position, while in midair. She was going to punch the closest Tri-Tank to the ground.

  “Sir, they’re getting too close!” A soldier yelled at the Commander, “We have to retreat!”

  “And go where? Go where dammit!?” The Commander screamed back, “They’ll trample us either way!!” The Tri-Tanks were in a triangular formation. One was in the front; while the two others were slightly behind it. They were only yards away from the trenches, the shockwaves of each step were hitting the soldiers, sending dust into them. Some were running away, even though they weren’t supposed to. Others were manning laser turrets, shooting relentlessly without any effect. The Commander shouted angrily, the front Tri-Tank about to stomp on the trench. He fired at its command center relentlessly.

  Then the faint sound of a whistle echoed through the battlefield, and suddenly Claire smashed through the command center of the Tri-Tank, completely destroying it in a massive explosion, sending all three legs into separate directions, each slamming into the ground, the front one landing on top of the trenches. Claire slammed into the red, rocky dirt, making a giant crater. She wasn’t even slightly hurt by the fall, because her suit was made out of Meta-Core. She was almost invincible. She got to her feet, full of energy, and looked around. She landed far away from the Tri-Tanks, but that didn’t stop her.

  She used the suit to energize her joints and muscles. She felt a surge of power from her activated Meta-Gene flow through her body. She felt more than alive. She felt unstoppable. She went into a full sprint, then used her leg thrusters to propel her to the top of one of the Tri-Tanks.

  “What the hell is that?!” The Commander asked.

  “No,” The female soldier gasped, “Who is that?!”

  “Well, don’t just stand there; help that thing!” The Commander yelled. The soldiers fired at the Tri-Tank Claire wasn’t on, trying to distract it. The Tri-Tank fired an Ion burst at Claire, making her have to lean against the back of the Ion cannon she was next to to barely dodge the burst of energy. She breathed out heavily and grabbed the Ion cannon. Her Meta-Core could lift anything, far as she knew, and it was all she needed to move the gun, and aim it at the other Tri-Tank.

  She positioned it, then made her Meta-Core hand generate a mass of energy. She touched the cannon, grabbing the metal, and had the energy zap into the gun in a fraction of a millisecond. The power reacted with the cannon, releasing the Ion burst without the gun even having to be activated by a Jupitain inside the command center. The reaction was so strong that it fired the gun, but at the same time blew itself up, launching Claire backwards, off the Tri-Tank, and into the ground.

  She landed on her back, and looked around, her vision hazy from the Ionic explosion. The cannon fire blew the other Tri-Tank through the middle and caused it to split apart, the front side falling forward, the other backwards. It hit the ground, covered in fire and smoke.

  “Go see If that guy’s ok!” The Commander ordered, “And somebody bring that last walker-thing down!”

  The soldiers fired at the last Tri-Tank relentlessly. It was unarmed now, but still heavily armored. A dozen people climbed out of the trenches and started to sprint towards Claire. When they reached her, they stood around her crater, completely still. Claire was sitting upright, rubbing her head. Her helmet was on the ground next to her. She looked up at them, shocking herself, almost shooting one of the soldiers with her Meta-Core hand. She put her hand down and started to breathe slower.

  One of the soldiers finally said something, “Who are you?” He asked.

  Claire looked at him, and smirked, “I’m just an asteroid clearer.”

  Another soldier didn’t think her comment was funny, “Bullshit, you just crashed from the sky, and destroyed two of those giant… things! You did it w…with your bare hands!”

  “Are you like, Jesus in disguise or something?!” Another soldier asked. She sounded completely serious.

  “Guys!” Claire shouted, stopping their chatter, “I’m one of you. I’m human. I’m here to help,” She stood up, “I don’t have time to explain my power to you, but I do have time to make sure that this city stays alive.”

  The last Tri-Tank was almost on top of the trenches.

  “One second,” Claire said. She pushed through the crowd and shot down a piece of Meta-Core into the ground. It spread through the red rocks and created support beams and a barrel. She made a high-powered laser artillery piece, took control of it, aimed at the Tri-Tank, and fired. It recoiled and made a loud creaking sound. The burst of energy slammed into the Tri-Tank’s already damaged command center and blew up the right side of it. The massive war machine collapsed on its side, right in front of the trenches.

  Claire let go of the artillery piece and turned to face the crowd. She looked casual until she saw the group’s stunned faces.

  “You-you… you just made something, t-that, out of thin air, like it-it expanded from- from nothing! How’d…” The recruit couldn’t finish her sentence.

  “We have work to do, and no time to talk about… that,” Claire said, “I’ll explain it later…” She pointed at the city. “How many Jupitains are in there?” She asked.r />
  “Maybe ten-thousand,” A soldier shrugged, “Twenty-thousand? We killed most of em. Those giant tank things were our biggest problem. After a few hundred, the dropships just started to pass us and drop them into the city.”

  Before he could say anything else, a loud, ear-piercing roar erupted from the sky. Claire looked up and saw the dragon-like creature flying in the air above the city. It was swooping through skyscrapers, and destroying floors.

  “Skyframe,” Claire cursed.

  “What the hell’s a Skyframe?” A soldier asked, frantic, “The Martians never told us about those…”

  “The Kelisians never told us about a lot of things…” Claire corrected, “Where are they anyway? The flying saucer’s supposed to be above the city at all times.”

  “They left,” The female Recruit said.

  “Left?!” Claire asked, stunned, “Wha-what do you mean left?!”

  “They evacuated most of their own, then made a Hypotonic jump, and fled,” A soldier confirmed.

  “They did the same thing to us that they did to Karalus…” Claire guessed, quietly, “Well we don’t need them, we’ve got each other… start getting into the city. Clear it of every Jupitain force, show them we’re not going to be just as easily beaten as last time. Give em’ a fight they’ll regret starting.”

  The group cheered, and as soon as Claire started to run for the city, the others followed, “Why’re you following me?” She asked.

  “You took charge,” Someone said, “You’re the Commander now… plus you just took out all three of those war machines.”

  Claire nodded and led them back to the trenches to regroup with the other battalions.

  “Who the hell are you?” The Commander asked when Claire ran up, “You better have a great explanation for…”

  “We don’t have time for any explanation,” she said. She pointed at the Skyframe that was tearing through buildings, “That thing and thousands of Jupitains are trying to repeat the same destruction that happened on Arrival Day. They’re trying to bring us down, again, and I’m not gonna let them.”

  Claire extended her hand, for the Commander to shake it, “Help me save our people, and whatever’s left of the United Worlds after all of this,” Claire said. The Commander looked at her, confusion showing in his face.

  He grabbed Claire’s hand and shook it, “I don’t know if you have a tint of military experience, but the way you came in like a goddamned space Jesus and destroyed those walkers… I’ll follow yer’ ass every step of the way.”

  Claire smirked, then started to give orders. The battle of the Lore had prepared her for this, “Listen up people, I need three groups, to split up, and clear different parts of the city, storm every building and every corner until every single last Jupitain is a puddle!” She looked around at the soldiers. Every one of them was beat up, scratched, bruised, or covered in red dirt, but none of them were frowning. “Well? Tell everybody else and move out!”

  They split up, and the soldiers left the trenches and moved through the streets. Jupitains had cornered civilians and killed them. They were still mobbed around their corpses. When the soldiers came through, they’re disgust and anger fueled their fight. They overwhelmed the Jupitains and took back the city, street by street.

  Claire made it to the skyscraper that the Skyframe was attacking. She looked at the ground. There was a burned out exo-suit, that looked like it was almost dug into the cement. There was also a Jupitain tank, smashed into the side of the building, and a destroyed U.Ws hover tank in the middle of the street. There were three corpses, and each looked like the Skyframe had dived into them, and had torn them apart. A man with a laser sniper rifle, and two others. Their remains were split open in places, torn open.

  “Savages,” Claire grumbled to herself. She looked up at the Skyframe. It dug into the skyscraper, causing a woman to fly out of the broken window. She screamed during the entire fall. Claire couldn’t do anything to save her. She could only watch her from the other side of the building. She grimaced, disgusted, and turned her Meta-Core hand into a laser cannon. She yelled and shot the beast in the stomach. The metal creature looked down on her immediately and swooped down towards her in a fraction of a second.

  It flew faster, and faster, right at her. Unlike last time though, Claire, was ready. She made two metal beams, leaning sideways on both sides of her, and, the second the Skyframe was about to swoop down and kill her, she launched them both into its body, making it get stuck. It roared and fired a ray of energy at her from its mouth.

  She blocked it by making a Meta-Core shield. She transformed the shield into a laser cannon and fired a beam directly into its mouth. She kept the laser firing for ten whole seconds until the Skyframe’s metal insides melted, and the Meta-Core exploded. The Skyframe disassembled into millions of tiny pieces. Claire looked around, and sat down, panting. Then, she exhaled loudly, collapsed, and fell asleep.

  “Auuugh!!” Karalus cursed for almost an entire ten seconds straight. “Three?! All three, gone?!?!” He held his head, screaming silently, “I’ve had enough of this. The Meta-Gene can have that battle… but I’ve won the war already…” He chuckled to himself, insanely, “It’s time to do what we came for, start charging the Tesla Amplifier,” Karalus growled.

  Even with the Lore’s help, the United Fleet was still losing the battle. The Jupitains had only lost a hundred warships out of their four thousand. However, Karalus didn’t care. He wasn’t taking any more chances.

  “I don’t want that Meta-Gene anywhere near my ship, or my mission,” Karalus growled, “She’s the only one that could change anything.”

  “How have you still not broken through this yet?!” Mark asked Douglas. He was trying to get through the third security terminal’s firewall, and they were getting harder and harder to break.

  “You wanna try?” Douglas asked sarcastically, “This isn’t just simple hacking, I have to break through highly classified, Cyrisian code, and those nut jobs were almost as high on security as they were on war. Almost.” He fed it some more passwords, and the door finally opened. Douglas sighed a breath of relief.

  “Um, guys…” James started.

  “What?” Douglas and Mark quipped grumpily at the same time.

  “My visor’s picking up Jupitain signals… and there’s a lot of them.”

  “How many?” Douglas asked, frustrated.

  “Ten thousand…”

  Douglas’s eyes widened, full shock showing on his face. Suddenly the faint sound of roars and screeches started to echo through the hallway.

  “Shit boys, shit!” Douglas said, “Run!” He started to run past the opened security doors, and into an empty hallway. “Don’t just stand there! Run!!” Douglas burst into a full-blown sprint. Mark and James followed behind him. The Jupitains saw them and started to roar, filled with pure rage.

  “H-has this ever happened to you before?!” James asked, panting.

  “No!” Douglas shouted back.

  The hallway they were running through was enormous, wider than an aircraft hangar. There were Dark matter pipes attached to the walls, flowing through the entire hallway.

  Douglas looked at them while they were running, “I’ve got a plan!” He shouted.

  “And what would that be?!” Mark yelled back.

  The Jupitains were behind them now, roaring like savages, ready to rip them apart.

  “I’m gonna shoot one a’ those pipes!” Douglas shouted, trying to be louder than the ear-shredding roars of the Jupitains.

  “Shoot the pipes?! Isn’t that stuff like…” James didn’t have to finish the sentence. He knew what Douglas meant.

  They sprinted for the end of the hallway, the Jupitains getting closer and closer. Douglas got to the end first, his hand hovering next to the door’s controls.

  “Come on, come on!!” Douglas yelled.

  James was panting, trying hard not to collapse. Mark was sprinting, controlling himself in a deep focus. Mark ran through the do
orway, and stopped, standing in the middle of the hall’s intersection. James dived through the doorway, breathing hard. Douglas looked at the mob of Jupitains. Too many to count. He closed one eye and aimed his laser pistol at one of the Dark matter pipes. As soon as he pulled the trigger, he slammed the door’s control button, and it closed, trapping ten thousand Jupitains inside one hallway.

  The blast hit one of the pipes dead on, and it instantly exploded, causing a chain reaction that only lasted a second. Every pipe on the right side of the hallway blew up, destroying the wall they were attached to. Every Jupitain in the hall was instantly pulled into the vacuum of space. The explosion was loud, and then a split second later, silence.

  “Holy…” James trailed on.

  “Keep moving,” Douglas mumbled, “Karalus knows we’re here.”

  Karalus stared at a holo-screen, showing the damaged part of his ship. Red emergency lights were shining everywhere, blinking on and off repeatedly. Sirens were blaring, but Karalus was so shocked he didn’t even notice.

  “They have no idea, the pain they’re about to go through, for interfering in my mission,” he said, finally. He turned around, and started to walk out of the bridge, until he heard… the faint sound of an engine booster in the distance. It got louder and louder, until Karalus turned around, and realized that it was the Queen’s fighter, headed right for the bridge.

  Karalus gaped for a second, then dived for a nearby control console. The Queen’s fighter flew through a gap in the mothership’s shield, and smashed right into the massive bridge. The fighter screeched while it scraped against the metal floor. It destroyed some of the bottom sections of the bridge, crushing dozens of Jupitains. The vacuum of space started to suck the air out of the bridge, but an emergency particle shield quickly formed to cover up the large hole the Queen had made in the bridge’s glass windshield.

  Karalus got up slowly, infuriated.

  The Queen used her Meta-Core staff to blow a hole through her fighter’s windshield. Then, she jumped out, and landed on her feet, yards away from Karalus, slightly below him. Two Jupitains rushed her, but she destroyed both of their visors with ease, shooting one with and energy burst from her staff, and slicing another through the top of the head.