CHASE 6: RESPITE (part 3)
Minutes later, Covarn’s A.T., the “Clever Camel,” appeared with heavy, dull footsteps.
It was an old-model A.T., rusted in places. Its massive, flat legs thudded as it approached. Covarn sat cramped in the open cockpit. The headrest must have been set far back, because he slumped into the seat.
I leaped into Berserga’s cockpit, which I’d lowered close to the ground, and stood it up.
Covarn closed his hatch. The camera eye on the Camel’s head tilted downward, and simultaneously, the head opened. The twin-winged sensors extended, rotated once or twice, and the head returned to its original shape.
I had input the terrain of this maintenance area beforehand. The Camel began running toward Berserga. I closed the hatch and started Berserga running too. Its legs tilted unsteadily. Was it the weight, or the armaments?
Camel swung its massive arm upward. The arm, a complex assembly of cubes, resembled human muscle. It brought its clenched fist down in a crushing blow. I shielded myself with my left arm — but Camel’s arm descended too fast. A half-hearted impact jolted through my left arm. By a hair’s breadth, the tip of the shield stopped it. Another split second slower, and the camera eye on my head would have been blown clean off.
Without pause, I thrust my right arm forward, aiming for Camel’s chest. But his left arm, thrust out a split second earlier, deflected it.
THUD! Camel’s left arm slammed directly into my cockpit. Simultaneously, he swung his right arm, rotating it in an arc to punch Berserga’s left shoulder. Originally, Camel was an A.T. from an era with few weapons. It excels in close combat. Covarn’s aggressive attacks continued, showing no sign of age. Heavy thuds echoed from various points on my machine as Camel’s fists collided.
My finger reflexively reached for the arm punch activation button. Startled, I pulled it back. Activating the arm punch at this range would destroy him. The moment I used it, I’d lose.
I backed my machine up a few steps.
“What’s the matter, Kaine? Can’t fight without using weapons?”
Camel lunged in with the sharp edge of its pentagonal shoulder. To beat it, I had to make Berserga move faster than it. Could I do that with just my right arm?
Camel closed to within three meters. I slammed the right side pedal and pulled up the control yoke. Berserga’s right arm swept up, scooping Camel’s left shoulder. Using the recoil, he thrust his right arm upward in an uppercut motion.
I switched to the left side pedal and swept the control yoke inward. With a high-pitched clash, Berserga stopped Camel’s right arm with its left elbow shield. Instantly, Camel regained his footing with his left leg and swung a right straight punch.
I turned Berserga’s left shoulder toward the fist and pressed down on the left side pedal. My left arm deflected the incoming punch. With a roar, I switched side pedals and pressed down on both the accelerator and brake pedals. Berserga spun and unleashed a right fist.
“Hold it!” Covarn shouted.
I halted Berserga’s motion. The fist stopped dead, mere inches from Camel.
“You roared, Kaine.” Covarn said in a pleased voice.
“That’s how it should be. Berserga isn’t like a Mid-class unit; it’s inherently heavy. Reinforcing its armaments makes it even heavier. But that black one possesses speed surpassing Mid-class units. To win, the pilot’s own skill is what’s needed.”
“Yeah, I get it,” Covarn answered. “No, I knew it all along. If I got crushed by you over something like this, I’d lose all face.”
Hearing Covarn’s voice say that, I dismounted Berserga.
Mima, who had been silent until now, stepped forward and said, “Blue Knight, you’re finally ready to fight.”
“At least, you’re better than you were the last two or three days.”
“You knew?”
“Who knows?” Mima grinned. “I still have information to organize, so I’ll be leaving now. You’d do well to spend some time getting used to Berserga again.”
With that, Mima slowly disappeared from the maintenance bay.
“Mima said that, but we can’t afford to take it easy,” I said to Covarn.
Covarn made a sour face. “You mean, go look for a sensor and a pile bunker?”
“I’ll go with you,” Ronni said from the edge of the maintenance bay.
“It’s the shop Monete uses, right?” I asked. “I know where it is.”
“All right then, Kaine, we’ll do that. You can’t go alone anyway.”
“With you?” I made a clearly disgusted face.
“Not ‘me’. I’m delicate, you know.”
“Then what are you talking about, barricade girl?” Covarn retorted.
“Hmph, well, wait for me, I’m going to change.”
Ronni left the workshop. Watching her go, Covarn murmured. “That system built into Berserga…we didn’t remove it. We just cut the circuits. We’re going to use it to train a bit more.”
Covarn’s mouth curved into a smile.
Inside the elevator, descending from the first level to the second level of the building that ran vertically through northeastern Arg, I was overcome by a strange sensation. No, it started when Ronni showed up at the maintenance bay to take me there.
What was strange was Ronni’s outfit. She was wearing a small man’s pressure suit. Pads were stuffed into the shoulders, and stiff underwear must have been tightening her chest, because at first glance, she looked like a man wearing baggy clothes. On top of that, she wore a deep under-helmet that covered her ears. And the suit itself reeked of sweat. A distinctly male body odor.
“Oh…curious about this outfit?” Ronni asked with a laugh.
She continued in a tone that sounded almost masculine. “Women earn better in battles, but when you’re out and about, you gotta dress like a guy. Otherwise, in Arg, a woman would end up pregnant with five men’s kids in half a day. More importantly, Kaine. Mima left town.”
“He left the trailer behind though.”
“He said he only took the data. And there’s a new muscle cylinder in the trailer he wants you to use. But there’s only enough polymer Ringer’s solution for ten hours.”
“One chance, huh? He left me enough for just one match.”
“Yeah. Mima wasn’t like military. He was a good person.”
After saying that, Ronni fell silent. A display lit up showing 200 meters to the second-level surface.
“Listen… Kaine,” Ronni stammered. “The truth is…I came with you because I wanted to apologize.”
Still looking down, Ronni continued in a faint voice. “I’m such an idiot…I was alone in Balarant. But after coming to Gilgameth, I made friends like Covarn and others. So I should’ve been grateful to you. But I didn’t even realize that. I just hated being treated like a kid by Covarn, and I messed up everything you were trying to do…”
Ronni pressed her forehead against my chest and began to sob.
“Now that I think about it, the reason I contacted Covarn was because I really wanted to help you. In a place like this, I wanted you to have at least one person you could rely on. But I heard you lost someone like that…”
“Did you hear that from Mima?”
“Yeah.” Ronni nodded, rubbing her forehead against me.
“I thought you were just chasing that Black A.T. for the bounty. I never thought it was revenge. I’m sorry, Kaine. When Mima told me, I wanted to apologize right away, but you weren’t human back then. After you fought Covarn and finally seemed like yourself again, I…”
“I’m still not human.”
“That’s a lie. I can hear your heartbeat clearly. And you don’t have that intimidating aura.”
“No, I don’t…”
Inspired by Ronni’s direct display of emotion, words spilled from my mouth.
“When I returned to Melkia, I was definitely nothing more than a combat machine, knowing nothing, barely possessing any emotions, simply acting on orders. But then I met Sha Bak, and I started to change. Little by little, I became able to express my emotions. To laugh, to trust my comrades. He was trying to bring me back to being human. But he was killed by the Black A.T. At that moment, everything was lost. All that remained was the original killing machine.”
”No, that’s not what I mean,” she said. “I’m saying that the Kaine back then was bloodthirsty. But Mima said it. He said you were the most human. That no one else pursued the Shadow Flare with such relentless determination. Sorry, those aren’t my words.”
“That’s about when I took revenge. Right now, there’s no proof of that.”
“Kaine, from now on, I won’t get in your way. No, I’ll help you…”
Just as Ronni said that, the elevator reached the surface. Pulling away suddenly, Ronni held out a gun to me. It was the Armor Magnum taken from me during the match with Radolf.
“Here, I’ll give this back.”
With that, Ronni leaped out through the open doors. Following her out of the building, I saw a military truck speeding away down an alley.
“Kaine, the buses are running. Martial law must be lifted. Let’s use that.” Ronni started running. “Let’s get ahead of it.”
Ronni turned into a side street. Following her for about 50 meters, I came out onto the main road. A military truck was approaching from the distance.
“This is where we make the big turn.”
Saying that, Ronni raised her hand. The truck stopped right in front of us. She leaped onto the covered cargo bed from behind. Ronni put some change into a metal box near the driver’s seat.
“I put it in enough for both of us.”
As she said that, the truck slowly started moving. About 20 kilometers per hour. I slipped my fingers under my bandana and wiped away sweat.
“Is that a habit? Always the thumb, huh?”
“This truck’s slow.” When I said that, Ronni chuckled softly.
“You’ll see soon enough.”
She perched on the makeshift seat, barely there. There were two other passengers: an old man in light brown clothes and a vagrant-like man in tattered running gear.
“Guys like that usually use counterfeit coins. Same as me,” Ronni whispered.
For a while, we were rocked by the truck. The ride was extremely rough. But the light streaming through the tarpaulin, dotted with holes, felt pleasantly familiar after so long.
Ronni, who had been peering outside through the gap in the tarp, suddenly said, “Kaine, move to the edge of the truck bed. We’re getting off.”
But the truck showed no sign of stopping.
“Now! Jump off!”
As she pushed me out, she leaped off the truck bed herself. I took a defensive stance instantly. But I landed awkwardly, rolling on the ground.
“This bus will pick you up, but it won’t drop you off. That’s why it’s going so slow.”
Ronni grabbed my left arm and pulled me up. “Your arm’s cold.”
I reflexively clutched my left arm.
“Sorry.”
Ronni stuck out her tongue, tilted her head, and slipped into an alleyway beside us.
“This is the place, the shop Monete often uses. They have pretty much everything.”
She opened a small door set into the side and entered the shop. Battling suits for players were hung up, covering an entire wall. Custom-made, seemingly fresh off the production line. Each featured flashy gold embellishments, some in two-tone red and blue, others with tiger-stripe patterns. All perfectly suited to satisfy a Votoms pilot’s desire for self-expression.
“My pressure suit was made here. The fabric’s top-notch, you see.”
Ronni opened a door at the back. Instantly, she let out a gasp, like she’d caught her breath. Beyond the door, Radolf Discohma waited, wearing a defiant smile. Her hand reflexively went to the gun at her waist. A split second faster, Radolf drew the Armor Magnum from his waist.
“Hold on. I’m not here to kill you now. I’ve been waiting to give you this.“
Radolf tossed over a bag he held in his left hand.
”A Quent-made sensor. This man risked his life to acquire it.“
Where Radolf’s gaze fell, a heavyset man lay bound, his entire body tightly wrapped in rope.
”Monete!” Ronni shrieked, collapsing to the floor.
“Too bad. He just drew his last breath.” Radolf said, his expression unruffled.
“Go back quickly and attach that to the Berserga. I have no use for you if you’re not in the Berserga.”
“Kaine, let’s take Monete home.” Ronni said in a raspy voice.
That was the moment. Radolf’s Armor Magnum erupted in fire. Monete’s head shattered into pieces without leaving even a fleeting afterimage. Only a cloud of blood remained.
“Ugh… that’s… that’s awful.” Ronni groaned.
“In about thirty minutes, the Votoms pilots hired by the Shadow Flare will attack your hideout. If you hurry now, you might avoid having your A.T. destroyed for nothing.“
”Why are you telling us this?“
”Because I’m joining them. This isn’t settled yet, is it? But fighting Berserga with incomplete equipment won’t be worth the effort.”
Radolf grinned and aimed his gun. “Get moving!”
Glaring at him, I grabbed the Quent sensor and pushed Ronni out of the shop first.
“You get moving too!” Radolf shouted, losing his patience.
Dodging Radolf’s gun barrel, I slipped out of the shop through the back and quickly shut the door.
The moment we returned to the hideout workshop, Ronni shouted, breathless.
“Covarn, it’s bad!”
“The Shadow Flare’s minions are going to attack here in about 30 minutes…no, 20 minutes!”
“I see. We’ll have to hurry the preparations.” Even as he said this, Covarn showed not a hint of panic.
“Prepare… for what?” Ronni asked, looking puzzled.
“We’ve found Mudi Rokor’s location.” Covarn turned to face me. The cape draped over his shoulders made a crisp, dry sound. “Kaine, get out of this city with Ronni. Head for Bowhe, Arg’s satellite city.”
I lowered my voice, trying to silence Covarn. “I intend to stay here and intercept them.”
“No, you absolutely must go. To regenerate the pile bunker. That’s why.”
“The pile bunker?”
“That’s right.” Covarn insisted desperately. His mouth was dry. “Rokor’s Grey Berserga is equipped with a pile bunker, too. There’s no other way. We have to get that pile bunker spear from him somehow.”
My resolve hardened. “But they’re coming. We can’t just let them slip away. This might be our last chance.”
“But Kaine, if you’re not going to be controlled by the weapon, it’s better to be fully prepared before going into battle. Besides, there’s no more time. Replacing the muscle cylinder and sensor that Mima left behind will take time.”
I clenched my right fist. I swallowed the scream rising in my throat. “Are you absolutely sure that man is piloting a Berserga? I can’t believe there’s a Quent-made A.T. left in Melkia.”
“But there is,” Covarn answered calmly. “Rokor appeared in this city about three months ago. It was right around the time I got kicked out of the third tier. He saved me when I resisted the military police and was about to get caught.“
”So, you managed his matches?“
”No. He never fought in this city. But he asked me to remember its form, and showed me his machine. It was definitely a Berserga, its steel skin completely exposed.”
Covarn pulled a cigarette from his pocket and lit it.
“You know why he showed me the A.T.? He said this: ‘If there’s a man riding an A.T. that looks like a Grey Berserga, let him fight me.’ He’d bet the pile bunker on it.”
“Who the hell is this guy Mudi?”
Covarn answered, spitting smoke. “He’s a Quent pilot. He fights battles regardless of his own gain or loss. His opponent is always an A.T. that resembles a Berserga.”
Vilpeg rushed into the maintenance bay.
“Covarn,” he gasped, “the trailers are ready. Both units are loaded into the containers.”
“More importantly, the black ones are coming. Hurry and get Kaine and the others out of here!”
Atodo and Bakuel rushed in.
“The atmosphere around the garage is weird. Get out now!” Atodo shouted.
Covarn dragged three bazookas out from the corner of the room. “Take this. Use it to cover Kaine and the others! I’ll use the Camel.”
“What are you guys planning to do!?”
“We’re leaving this city. We’ll keep watch so we can contact you no matter where the black ones go. Ronni should know Rokor’s face.”
Covarn bolted from the maintenance bay like a rabbit. We followed. As we sprinted down the long corridor, Covarn said, “Kaine, once you get the pile bunker, get back here immediately. We ain’t young enough to hole up in here forever.”
We reached the entrance of the garage. From within, the heat of several A.T.s was flowing out.
“Stop, Covarn!”
Spinning around, Covarn halted beside the passageway.
“They’re here.” I muttered. Everyone held their breath, pressing their backs against the passageway walls. Sharpening our senses, we searched for their presence.
Suddenly, a blinding light flooded in. They’d turned on their searchlights. In the glare, a massive shadow rose. Three A.T.s.
“We know you’re hiding there. Come out. Or we’ll bury you alive, tunnel and all!”
They aimed their heavy machine guns up the passageway.
“Cover me,” Covarn said to Vilpeg, then leaped out into the garage. The A.T.s’ gun barrels all swung toward Covarn at once.
At that moment, Vilpeg fired his bazooka, shattering the searchlight. Darkness enveloped the area. Only the creaking of machinery could be heard in the eerie darkness. Covarn climbed into the Clever Camel parked closest to the passageway. He closed the hatch and stood up.
Sparks flew from the Camel’s feet. The gliding wheels spun rapidly, and the Camel began to run, creaking. It charged toward the two machines in front. Slamming both arms around their heads, the Camel instantly knocked the enemies down.
Vilpeg and Bakuel fired bazookas at the fallen units. Amidst the rising flames, Ronni and I headed for the trailer.
“Leave the driving to me.”
Just as I said that to her, a crack suddenly split the garage wall. It shattered into dust, the heat blasting violently inward. From the ash-filled smoke, the rounded shoulders of an A.T. emerged. One of them was blood red.
It swayed as it approached. A Scopedog Red Shoulder Custom.
Though it carried a six-barrel missile pod on its right shoulder, it was unmistakably Radolf’s machine. He advanced, trailing several A.T.s behind him.
“Blue Knight, get in the Berserga.” Radolf said over the mic.
“Don’t do it, Kaine! Get out of here now!”
Reacting to Covarn’s voice, the A.T.s held in reserve behind Radolf split into two squads with a sharp movement, blocking the front and rear of the trailer. Three units in front, four in back.
“Get Berserga out here now,” Radolf demanded in an intimidating voice.
I opened the rear door of the trailer and leapt inside. Leaving the door open, I walked toward Berserga. I jump into the cockpit and started it up.
“Ronni, get the trailer moving!” I barked into the comm. Simultaneously, the trailer’s engine roared to life.
Reacting to the sound, the A.T.s began gathering near the open door. All four of them.
I grabbed Berserga’s dedicated heavy machine gun from the jeep’s cargo bed, shouldered it, and opened fire. A massive reverberation echoed through the trailer. The clatter of spent shells hitting the floor could be heard. Just as the resonance died down, the cockpit hatches of all four A.T.s blew open simultaneously, scattering apart. The pilots were all reduced to nothing more than objects, their heads and upper bodies a mangled mess of blood, bone, and flesh.
As the four A.T.s hit the ground, the trailer’s body swayed sideways. Bullets ricocheted through the walls inside the trailer.
— Sideways?! —
I slammed my foot down on the accelerator pedal. Berserga leaped out of the trailer. With a screeching roar, Radolf’s machine appeared before me.
“Let’s settle this, Blue Knight…”
As Radolf spoke, his machine crept closer. Gunfire was concentrated on his machine from the side of the passageway. But he paid it no mind, unleashing his heavy machine gun into the passage. With a thunderous roar, the passageway collapsed. The three inside were surely dead instantly.
Covarn’s Camel latched onto Radolf’s machine. But he didn’t flinch. He smoothly knocked the Camel away. Then he closed in on me.
That’s when it happened! Gunfire rang out from above the garage. I frantically spun my machine, but it was too late. A bullet hit the seam of the cockpit hatch and shattered. But the bullet’s inner core penetrated the cockpit and suddenly exploded. Fragments ricocheted around my cockpit, some grazing my body, others embedding themselves.
An A.T. burst in from near the garage exit. It resembled a Fatty in shape, but was larger. Moreover, it had a Gilgameth-style surface treatment. Its paint was glossy black. It was in Kevec’s data — Pot Belly.
It closed in from above. I activated the pile bunker. With a shockwave, the broken spear thrust out. But it only struck near its hatch, knocking the machine back without inflicting damage.
Pot Belly swayed upright and closed in on me again. It lifted slightly off the ground and charged. At that moment, Radolf’s A.T. fired all six missiles from its launcher. Missile after missile struck, engulfing Pot Belly in crimson flames before it shattered into pieces.
“Radolf — Why?”
Radolf’s deep voice came over the comm. “I said I’d kill you. From what I see, your pile bunker is broken. Are you trying to escape Arg to repair it?”
I spoke with unwavering resolve. “Yes. Once that’s done, I’ll return to this city.”
“Then I’ll wait here for you to come.”
“Betraying the Black A.T., huh?”
“I fight as I see fit. I always knew I’d have to face him eventually…”
Covarn’s voice cut off Radolf’s words. “Kaine, hurry up!”
A.T.s swarmed out of the hole Radolf had blasted open. Radolf spun his machine around and charged straight at them.
“Make sure you come back.”
I could hear Radolf’s voice. I loaded Berserga into the trailer.
Ronni started the truck. We climbed the slope, emerged onto the surface one level up, and raced toward the west service gate. Then, twenty minutes later, the trailer broke through the checkpoint and left the city of Arg.
To be continued