We fight for our freedom

The sun was half way across the sky when I heard my dad call me back into our shack, the tone in his voice was that of unease, like something was wrong and that I had to be there to hear what could be bad news. I was only sixteen at the time and I had just celebrated with my family when I had finally got accepted to work as an intern for Hammond Robotics, even though it was working as a janitor it was still for a major company that has helped boost the economy of several star systems and luckily the planet I was going to was one of those lucky places.

Putting down the spade that was being held in my left hand I turned away from the small vegetable garden that we hard growing out back to help ease the need to spend what little money we had on food when we could easily grow it our self. We would still need to buy some poultry and meat on occasion but now we could save and cut our spending on groceries by half and seeing that I got a job over at Hammond Robotics even though it would consist of me mopping the floors and scrubbing out the toilets but hey, its a good paying job...well if it follows what it said on the pamphlet.

"Hey Anthony! Come on there is something you need to see on the telly!" my older brother shouted from the second story window before closing it, the sun was beating down hard on me as I wiped the sweat from my brow with a gloved hand and with a glance at the sun I can only shake my head before jogging back inside the house, pushing the metal screen door before feeling the relieving cold blow of a fan as the icy winds caress my face and with that gentle feeling I saw that my family was looking at.

Playing on the screen was a news reporter, and right behind her was a scene, there was a building on fire and it belonged to the IMC, the Interstellar Manufacturing Corporation for those that have not been keeping up with the daily news, and we have found out the cause of the fire was from an electrical fire on various floors and the perpetrators was the Frontier Militia, a group of renegade soldiers, pirates, smugglers and terrorists that are fighting the IMC to 'liberate' the star systems out in the frontier away from the core worlds.

"Do you believe in this crap Anthony? I mean come on! They are doing way more harm then good and they are going to bring the wrath of the Core Systems down on us cause of their actions!" my father, Erin, said as my mother walked in from the front door holding some grocery bags and I immediately went over to help her and that was when two of my younger sisters followed in behind her.

The first sister to walk in was Elizabeth, she was nineteen and was working as a nurse at the local hospital and the youngest person in the family was Sarah, she was only six years old.

"Anthony! Look at what we found while we were at the store!" Sarah said as she ran past our mother and Elizabeth and she was holding something in her hands as she rushed over to me.

When she came up to me I looked down and saw that she was holding up to me a small book, it was an old 'Winnie the Pooh Bear' book and it was mostly in a pristine condition with a few rips and tears on the cover and back but it was still whole and intact.

"Wow, I thought those books were discontinued, can't believe there was one in the old grocery store down the block." I said in genuine surprise and like that she grabbed me by the left hand and started to drag me to Elizabeth's and her room which was by the way the most girly thing I have seen. That room of hers, it had salmon colored wallpaper and on Sarah's bed was almost overflowing with stuffed animals I won for her whenever the carnival was in town.

"Come on Anthony! Read it to me!" she shouted in glee and before I could read it to her I felt the world shake violently and everything started to blur and as I reached to grab Sarah to hold this place together I saw both my arms change from their tanned colored skin to a olive green colored cloth that covered my arms that were thick looking padding and that my left arm held a data pad of sorts on the forearm and as I looked down I saw that my body was covered in brown and olive green thick looking Kevlar padding and when I tried to hold her close to me I felt nothing but a soft marshmallow like object and when I looked at it I saw nothing more then a off-white pillow.

It dawned on me that I having another dream and when I blinked again I saw that everything was dull grey with the one light in the room I was in was flickering on and off.

"Christ...it happened again." I mumbled to myself as I slowly slid out of my bunk and let my feet touch the dirty metallic floor and with a sigh I pushed myself up and over to the edge of the bed, my heavy leather boots softly coming into contact with the grates as I let out a sigh of sadness.

"The Titan Wars had nothing on this war....recruited to help free the oppression on the planet, my home ends up as collateral damage...my family slaughtered by the Spectres....Sarah is in a coma and her legs were melted off....why did all this happen...where did it all go wrong?" I spoke softly to myself, my eyes not once leaving the grime covered floor but when I heard the intercom snap to life that was when I knew that the day of reckoning was here.

"Pilots, all of our fight, all of our sacrifice...has bought us this one day. Every ship in the Militia's fleet is marshaling for the Battle of Demeter, it is the refueling station that connects the frontier to the core systems and its endless supply of enemy reinforcements. It falls to you pilots to destroy the Demeter base, I swore I would never climb back into these things. I would never order you into the fire that I would not go in myself, I will personally take command of Sarah's covert assault squad, and initiate a chain reaction of the IMC fuel cells . I ask you pilots to engage the IMC Infantry, if you could win this battle on the ground you would alter the course of history. Pilots, prepare for titanfall."

"MacAllan out."

Sighing I looked to my nightstand to see my helmet, the camera faced round bush helmet, the central camera flashed a bit in the low light as I shook my head and slipped it on, feeling the snug soft fabric mold to my head to ensure a perfect fit. Once my helmet was on my head I felt the pliable metal plates at the neck region connect itself to the rest of the neck armor provided by my body armor, ensuring that everything is connected and that when my invisibility cloak provides maximum stealth to me whenever I would need it and in this case, a gift to all the best sharpshooters the in the Marauder Corps, a very powerful stealth generator that if what Sarah at covert operations says is true, this will grant me permanent invisibility as long as I don't open fire and if I do just wait a few seconds for it to turn back on.

And...I may have abused that gift once or twice....in the locker room...but it was because I was curious about something and not because I just wanted to take a peak!

As most people that know me I am a loner and since I was younger then most people to become a pilot and join the resistance against the IMC, they told me to go home and wait a few years before joining the Marauder Corps but, how do I return home when it was burned down and shot up with explosive rounds.

Walking solemnly to the hanger bay I went over to the impromptu armory that was quickly erected there just for this mission everyone in the Militia is about to partake in. I went over and grabbed the Kraber AP sniper rifle and grabbed the explosive ammunition that I had requested earlier from Sarah, and she came and delivered it to me. This hefty sniper rifle only takes one shot to kill a man sized target, human or robotics, and the large bullet is heavy enough to put small dents in any titans armor besides the Ogre, the thick hide on that thing would make the Kraber more like a peashooter.

"Hey Anthony! Wait up brudda!" a deep voice said from behind me and with a glance back I saw that it was Sargent Rhok, that beast of a man is built like a friggen tank, I don't know what he eats or how much or how often he works out but that man is a solid wall of muscle. I saw him once lift up a discarded 40mm Cannon and fired a few shots off before dropping it and running to cover. That man has the biggest balls that any pilot in the existence of humanity, I seen that man charge at incoming titans and not get killed, hell I saw him beat a dragon to death with his bear hands, and that took a lot of balls just to do while he was being shot at from both sides.

As I heard the thundering foot steps come from behind I felt the world go weightless as I am lifted off the ground and lifted up three feet into the air as I felt the strength wrap around me, Rhok was giving me one of his traditional greetings of shaking the hell out of me. He started to laugh in his usual deep baritone as I struggled to break free but it was no use, this man was impossible to escape from once he has you in his grasp.

"Dang you two, I swear that if it wasn't for Rhok being a single child and you Anthony for being a lighter tan then him, I could have sworn that you two are brothers." a snarky voice said from behind the two of us, Rhok placed me back on the ground as I shoke my head to get rid of the stars swimming in my vision, my eyes rattling about from the aggressive bear hug I had just received.

Once I could see again I saw that it was Ingrid, this girl used to work in the metalworks that constructed Atlas Titans for the IMC and when she was fired for being late only once she got hooked up with the Militia and helped them make their Atlas's more efficient. She later became a pilot when she kept asking to join the fight, and once she gave the Militia everything she had on the IMC's construction methods, and she passed with flying colors. Now that girl honestly scares the fucking shit out of me, six times she scared the crap out of me, one time almost quite literally. She uses the EVA-8 shotgun and every time she went to scare me she would turn on her cloaking field and sneak up on me, popping up from the side or from above me and also getting up in my face, and she is always pressing herself against me just for a reaction, a reaction I always show because of how crude she is.

"Ingrid, what did I tell you about sneaking up on me?"

"To keep doing it cause it keeps you on your toes and to keep yourself from having your neck snapped by the IMC Pilots?"

I shook my head at her before walking around her, she only laughed at my darkening face as I stormed off to the Goblin Dropship, the rear hatch opened up as I walked forward, my Kraber strapped to my back since its pretty heavy to be holding all day.

"I hate you sometimes Ingrid, you know that right?"

"Oh please honey, if you hated me so much you would have already reported my behavior to Sarah and we both know that you wouldn't do that cause we all know that you love it when I tease you." she says coyly before following up behind me and dragged her hand around my neck, her fingers were cold against my skin but it was pleasant enough to send shivers up my spine.

Growling a bit I tried to worm myself away from her touch but she just kept following me until I finally got tired of it and grabbed her by the hand and forced her arm into a lock and slammed her into the side of the dropship.

"Ingrid, I swear one of these days I will get you back...I don't know when...but when I do...I will." I said through gritted teeth, this girl was pushing all of my buttons and she knows that I hate being messed with and yet she does it anyways.

From the left of us we both heard someone cough and we saw that Rhok was standing there with a grin on his face and standing next to him was a skinny looking man, he wore something similar to me but it matched his frame so it was lighter looking and I doubt that I could even fit in it.

"Be gentle with my younger sister Anthony unless you want to lose that other arm of yours like you did the first time." he said as I snarled at him, my temper flaring as he brought up that painful moment.

The day he was talking about was during the battle for the Odyssey, I was watching Ingrid's back when three pilots came from no where, she managed to kill her attacker while I was having trouble with mine and when I finally got the barrel of my Kraber to the underside of the assassin's neck I squeezed the trigger and blew his head all over the place but what I didn't see coming was a Spectre sneaking up on me and lifting me off the floor, the third assassin had his own shotgun out and took aim at my head. He was stopped just in time when Ingrid snapped his neck like a chicken bone but his body spazzed out and his finger pulled back as the shotgun was aimed at my arm and blew it off at the forearm, my right arm was bleeding profusely and as I screamed out in pain I was dropped to the ground with the Spectre pulling out his R-99 Compact SMG and was knocked over when she leapt over my kneeling body and stabbed the machine to death. As soon as it was dead she had to help me stop the bleeding but by the time I was stabilized from the blood lose the battle was over, and Ingrid was watching over me as I was loaded into a Goblin and taken to a med-bay and got a new forearm, the mechanical limb serves its purpose well, even the replaced skin that covers it almost makes it look normal again.

Before I could lunge at the bastard Ingrid pulled me back and scoffed at my strange behavior, my anger usually dissipates quickly but he simply pushed it pretty far.

"Easy there Anthony, just take deep breaths, calm down, I swear it feels like I am the only thing keeping you stable around here."

Grumbling a bit I went over the front of the dropship and grabbed the right handlebar and held it tightly, knowing that the trip to Demeter will be a bump ride.

Ingrid moved behind me and took the behind me as Rhok took the one opposite of hers to the left and the guy that spoke to me, George, he took the one to my left as a militia soldier grabbed the rear hatch and closed the door and once it was sealed tight the dropship lifted gently off the bay floor and made its way to outer space.

System: Demeter, Planet: Demeter, Location: Merchant Ship Pub Crawler

The ride to Demeter's surface is...bumpy would be an understatement.

"Brace for impact!" Wilson shouted as I looked to my left to see a Militia ship explode into a fireball as the concussive wave shook the entire craft.

"Everyone hold on!" the grunt shouted as I tightened my grip my eyes still looking at the window and when I saw a piece of debris go overhead I turned my head back forward out of fear that one piece will go straight to us cause I was looking for it.

As I held on tightly to the handle we all lurched forward as the ship dove to avoid another explosion which shook the hull, George dropped on his knee before quickly getting back up and grabbed his handle.

'Oh god we are all going to die up here!'

"Wilson get us the hell out of here!" the man behind is said as another explosion rocked the ship along with us, I nearly lost my lunch from that shake as I dropped to the ground before being tossed up into the ceiling and when I land back on the floor I grab the handle and shake the dizziness from my head.

"Sir, the jump calculations haven't finished yet!" Wilson called back as another dropship that was next to us got hit and exploded everywhere, a body smacked into the window next to me as I stepped away from it to not see the carnage.

"I don't give a damn just do it! Jump now! Now damn it now!" he shouted along with myself and Rhok, the ship shuddered again and soon enough everything started to turn blue and sparkly.

"Jumping in 3. 2. 1. Mark!" and with that Wilson hit the button and just like that we zipped out of the atmosphere and straight to the planet's surface without a scratch.

I checked myself out to see if any part of me was missing, my arms were still whole, my legs unscathed, my chest and back not melted or malformed in anyway, it was a success.

"Jump Control we made it, on route to Reactor Core 5-" Wilson said before I turned around to look out the back ramp but out the corner of my eye I saw missiles flying in the air followed by our partner ship get snagged by one.

'Oh fuck me with a rusty spoon.'

"-2 been hit!"

"Brace for impact!" Wilson shouted to us as I grabbed the handle for dear life as all four of us pilots and the soldier at the rear get tossed into the air but the soldier was unlucky.

"Mayday we are going down!" was all that Wilson said that the soldier heard as he got sucked out the back with his rifle, I saw his body flail for a moment before disappearing from view, I think the impact with the ground killed him.

I held on for dear life but the violent shaking that was going on made everything much worse. I felt my body slam onto the ceiling, the wall and the floor repeatedly as I saw broken glass and pieces of random debris fly through the cabin, slamming into everything before I saw the ship crash into the ground from the rear and my vision turned black.

"Misfit this is MacAllan, hang on I am on my way." I heard through my headset as my vision was disorientated and blurred, nothing was even as I slowly picked myself up, breathing was painful as a rib or two might be broken.

As I looked up I saw a titan fall from the sky and when it landed right in front of me I saw that it was an Ogre, and when it opened up to reveal MacAllan himself my jaw nearly dropped, I heard that he would join us in this battle but I never thought he would drop in right here! His Ogre reached back and pulled into view a Quad Rocket before talking again but this time I can clearly him.

"Were getting off this hill! Come with me!" the man of legend shouted at everyone that was on the field, all of us snapped to attention and without a single word uttered we followed him.

"Holy shit its MacAllan!" a grunt said as the turrets at the perimeter wall opened fire at us and that moment I saw bullets tear up the ground around and between us, but I saw bodies get torn to shreds as the large 30mm rounds went through us like wet tissue paper.

I grabbed the Kraber from my back and slid it off before running behind MacAllan, hoping his titan can withstand the pelting.

Running behind the hulking mass of metal and weaponry I saw him open fire on the turrets, destroying them in the process to let more of us land down in the field to provide support to the crash landing party, but sadly his right arm got blown off forcing him to take a drastic chance at breaking the door down, and he did so by turning himself into a battering ram and I saw the doors get torn apart as they get blown wide open.

As soon as he broke through the front doors the Ogre couldn't take it anymore and finally broke down, his body caved in and I saw MacAllan open the hatch before leaping out with a R-101 Carbine in his hands.

"Move out and secure the hardpoints!" he shouted before sprinting off to the main section of the reactor, the giant reactor itself in the center of the fifth reactor station.

"This is a hardpoint battle, hold all points of Alpha, Bravo and Charlie to overload the reactor core to trigger a chain reaction and whip out Demeter. We pull this off and it will take years for the IMC to send ships back to the frontier." Bish said before closing the transmission, my cloaking field crackling to life as my body faded from view to become nothing more than a distortion of air to everyone.

As I watched pilots and grunts alike spread themselves out so they are not mowed down so easily I watched Ingrid tap me on the shoulder before pointing to the pipelines then to the tall building in the middle of the area, and I gave her a nod before running off to it, my feet kicking up dirt before I leapt up and grabbed the ledge of a first floor roof before hauling up on it, a stray bullet from a shoot out ricochets off a steel plate in front of my face, the bullet scraping my helmet but did nothing to disrupt my cloak.

"Hardpoint Charlie is under our control." Bish said as I turned my head to see Rhok run on the wall with a Spitfire in his hands and as he ran he opened fire on four IMC grunts that were running across a catwalk heading to Charlie, the short burst of gunfire killed them, the bullets finding their home and running directly under Rhok was Ingrid as she turned on her cloak before snapping an unsuspecting enemy pilot's neck, I saw the head do a complete 180 and I thought I heard the bones in his neck cracking from here.

Running up another wall I grabbed the ledge before reaching the top and leveled my weapon to the edges of the roof, looking for anything hostile and before long I saw my target, it was a pilot and he was limping badly, he took several rounds to his torso and legs but was still going but before I could shoot him in the head there was an explosion below me followed by two more and I knew what it was, satchel charges, and whoever they were meant for got blown all to hell.

'Okay, calm down, calm down now....Ingrid is still alive...she is still alive...'

When I opened my eye through the scope I saw the same pilot but this time he was dead, his head was blown off but my finger was on the squeezed trigger. Pulling back the bolt I slide the next bullet in its new home before switching to a different target, a Spectre holding an Archer Heavy Rocket and it was aiming at a friendly Atlas, the beast of a machine was shooting at a small group of hostile grunts and with a deep breath I zeroed in on its head before pulling the trigger and a moment later its head exploded into a shower of sparks and metal fragments.

As I switched targets a few bullets came my way and when I turned to face my attack I saw that it was a pilot with a Hemlok BF-R and a few more bullets bounced off the metal pipe over my head and since my invisibility cloak didn't get disrupted or dispersed I aimed back at the attacking pilot to see that he has popped his back out from a wall and fired another two bursts of five rounds but I stood there waiting for him to pop back up again to kill him.

'Nothing personal, its you or me and I just want this war to end so I can go home.'

And as soon as I saw his body poke out I fired two rounds in rapid succession, the first one hit him in the upper left thigh, the bullet going right through it and blowing it off, the second one hit him in the neck, blowing it all over the place.

"Mac, I don't know what's wrong but the hardpoints aren't routing enough power to the core. Between that and the fleet taking a pounding we might have to abort the mission." Sarah said as I ran off the roof and moved to another tall building, my field of vision is much more clear as I have a better chance of finding a target and getting lost in the background to blend in.

"I didn't come all this way to give up Sarah." Mac said as I ducked underneath a friendly Atlas's foot as it lumbered on by, my breathing was slowing down a bit as the broken rib started to irritate me but I started to control my breathing as I set myself back up and looked back down the scope before shooting a pilot in the back of the head, watching the display of gore in disgust but sadly I have to do this if I am ever going to get back home, the family farm may not be there but at least mother and Sarah are still alive...I can not let them down.

"Mac I uh...I think she might be right. The reactors are much more shield then the intel indicated, the pilots on the ground might not make it go critical as we might have planned." and as Bish said that all I could think of was how the hell are we gonna do this now without getting fucked over or killed.

"I said were not giving up! Pilots, keep those hardpoints under control and give me a little more time we'll figure something out."

'Well at least the man is thinking up of something to help us get through this cause if he doesn't then we have just threw away a bunch of lives for nothing.'

'I can do this...I can do this...just a few more dead IMC...that's all it takes to get home. Just a few more lives to end...'

Pulling back the bolt I slammed the last bullet into its housing before discarding the ammo box and replaced it with a fresh one before firing the last round, the bullet finding its new home inadequate as the Spectre took it like a champ to the heart, which its chest blew out like a water balloon.

Once the empty shell was ejected from the chamber I pushed the cartridge inside, pushed the bolt in along with its new explosive buddy and went back to searching for a way home.

"Okay your titan is prepped for launch, call it when ready." Sarah said as I let out a sigh of relief.

I watched George from a distance get the drop on a group of pilots, there was four of them in total, one had a Spitfire LMG, another had a EVA-8 shotgun, a R-101 Compact Carbine and the last one held a silenced Mk. V Smart Pistol, as he fell behind them the one with the carbine pushed the one with the shotgun and pistol out of the way but he took a buckwall of death before falling over in a bloody heap but the man holding the Spitfire managed to turn around in time and let George taste fifty caliber rounds, and I knew he was a goner because he got cut crudely in half with that burst of gunfire.

'Oh man...Ingrid is going to be pissed when she hears this....'

"Its on the way, standby for titanfall." and before I know it I heard my titan come down but once it made contact with the ground I saw heavy sniper round explode a chunk of plate metal above my head, a sniper missed his chance as I jumped off the little support strut I was using for stability then slid underneath the undercarriage of the Atlas and was picked up in its graceful fingers and gently put into the cotton chair and the screen turned on to reveal everything in front of me in a crystal clear sight.

"Were running out of time here and the fleet upstairs is in bad shape, if your going to do something MacAllan you'd better do it fast." as they talked about what is going on for the plan to win the war, the plan for the battle down here is getting scarier.

"Bish, give me something I can work with."

'Ya, cause if you don't Bish then everyone down here will get killed while all of you up there will jump to safety and leave us behind to die.'

"Mac if you can find a way to trigger a manual overload that'll work even if they manage to shut down the reactor core. Except there is one problem, there isn't a titan in the world that can protect you against that kind of radiation."

'What the hell is this guy thinking! We need him alive so we can beat the IMC and free ourselves from their oppression! Yes they may have helped a few planets grow economic wise but they destroyed the landscape of a dozen planets for fuel.'

"You let me worry about that, were not giving up, not yet. Pilots, your doing great, keep up the fire. MacAllan out."

'Yes...were doing great...sure I may have just punted a pilot into a fuel cell and watched him explode into fiery bits and punched an Ogre so hard in the face that I ripped the pilot from his seat before tossing him like a football into a solid wall...and watched him leave a splat mark all over it....it makes me sick.'

As I strode through the carnage of a small pile of dead IMC grunts I let my Arc Cannon charge up to twenty five percent before letting it loose on a pilot, reducing him to ashes as I heard a single scream before going poof then a pile of ashes.

Discharging a weak electrical buildup I zapped another group of grunts and spectres, the arcs of ionized power coursing through their bodies made the living burst into ashes while the machines overloaded before exploding. The moment an enemy Atlas came into view I unleashed an unguided salvo of rockets, letting them distract the driver as I built up my Arc Cannon to maximum power, the electrical buildup sent sparks flying everywhere and when I saw them connect to the Atlas I saw its bodyshields sputter to life to reduce the damage but three rockets came into contact with the right shoulder and I laughed inwardly as I heard the shrieking whine of the Atlas losing its protection.

"Ride the lightning you bastard!" I shouted through the intercom as the bolt of overly charged ions disrupt and scramble the Atlas's cameras and as its distorted vision was up I rammed into the confused pilot, the mech didn't have a chance as I began to wail on it until I knocked the X0TBR-16 Chaingun from its hands before I planted the four prongs directly onto its central camera, resting it on the cockpit and once it was fully charged again I let it have it, frying the pilot inside forcing the hulking beast die without its host.

"Sarah, Bish I got this, get the fleet out of here."

'Wait we won? What is he planning? What is he even doing that requires us to leave him behind?'

"What the hell are you talking about Mac? Mac! Come in! Bish get him back on talk now!"

'Did he just hang up on our spy master? Damn this guy got some balls on him to practically hang the phone up on her.'

"He's transmitting just not to us. I'm patching into his feed."

'Oh...well then...wait a tick, who the fuck is he talking to then?'

"Open your eyes Marcus, you could have stopped me fifteen years ago aboard the Odyssey, instead you gave me the ship."

"Sir! I got the bastard in my sights, I'm going after him standby!"

'Run motherfucker run! That psycho bastard is going to kill you!'

"Blisk hold your fire, your going to rupture a cooling circuit and blow the place to hell. Hand-to-Hand Combat only, move." so this is the voice of Marcus Graves, the Vice Admiral of the IMC Fleet....sounds like my grandpa.

"With pleasure sir." oh damn...I heard that Blisk was a scary man to fight against but up close and personal with a knife? Forget that.

"He's going to get himself killed."

'No shit Sarah, he is messing with someone that is born to kill everything in front of him.'

Eventually I hopped out of my Atlas and went back to fighting on the ground, I set my Atlas to guard mode as I stopped and rested against the side of a freight crate, my heart was beating fast and my breathing was matching it in rhythm and tempo, I was scared, and I bet the enemy knows it for the sight of me hiding behind a crate just to ease the pressure off of me.

Pulling out a syringe from my med kit I pressed the needle into my neck until it punctured the skin and I pushed the plunger down, the calming drug inside of it being forced into my veins.

My vision soon exploded into a rainbow of colors, the very air itself was colorful and the sounds too had color matching to it, the crackle of gunfire and eruptions of explosions but soon enough the euphoria of colors and feelings ended as a calming sensation crawled through me.

"Uh...Bish, I'm picking up a spike in the reactor core. Hacking in now."

"Oh no....", "Damn it Mac you crazy son of a bitch, what the hell are you doing?

"Vice Admiral, MacAllan has locked himself in the reactor core chamber."

I kept on fighting, the calming agent running in my blood was helping me cope with the feeling of regret and disgust, allowing me to keep on killing but I know it is only a temporary solution but for now it should work until we win the war and I can leave all of this behind me, and if I can't get rid of these horrible memories...well I heard alcohol and drugs could hope to cope with it.

Another pilot fell victim to my Kraber, the bullet found his gut and it blew it out, the colorful spectacle brought a smile to my face, the serum was working like a charm. Following the pilot was three grunts, the bullet went through the first two before stopping in the third. It was funny as hell to watch as I started to laugh with glee, even when a Spectre stood next to me with a shotgun pointing at my head but it was killed when it got its body crushed by a foot.

Ant, meet titan boot.

"Pilots, the core is going critical. We're sending evac ships to your location. Find MacAllan and get the hell out of there!" as they said that evac is going to save us I got back in my titan to ensure that my survival is protected, I didn't want to die on the surface of some planet that is under the control of the enemy.

"Negative!" I heard the war hero cough badly, the radiation must already be effecting him. I thought for a moment he said no...why would he say no to have everyone saved?

"Fleet, this is McAllan. I've triggered the reactor core overload manually. Clear out as fast as you can. Do not wait for ground forces. Repeat: There is no time for evac." as he said that I shouted as loud as I can at how stupid that sounded, then realized that I was on the ground still.

"Marcus, they trusted me as an ex-IMC officer, and they're going to need someone after I'm gone." he coughed again violently, but when he hinted for the enemy vice admiral to join us I immediately thought he was asking him to be his successor.

"You told me fifteen years ago, on board the Odyssey, to take the ship. Now I'm giving you the same choice." as he kept on speaking I just stupidly walked into the middle of the battlefield, both pilots and grunts on both sides are just staring blankly at the sky, their hopes of being saved from a terrible death dashed as they are left behind to die just for their respective fleets to get away from a surface explosion.

I walked up to an enemy titan and tapped his shoulder, and as soon as he turned around I had my Arc Cannon on my back and I just raised my arm in a 'well, were boned' arm wave, and he did the same before we just stared at one another.

'Well, we might as well have some sort of friendly banter before we all die a very horrible and quite possibly agonizing death.'

"Pilots...this is MacAllan. If you're still on the ground out there...it's been an honor serving with you."

As he said that me and the other titan decided we might as well get one last hug in before we die, cause hey, we might be enemies in real life but if since were going to the afterlife we might as well make peace then war, and hell we would probably be meeting on the same grass fields in heaven. Off in the distance I saw ten titans trying to flee from the blast, I wished them the best of luck, if anyone could escape this place it could be them.

What felt like an eternity the explosion happened, we both looked at it as he sagged, I just stood still but that was when the immense heat and pressure hit the both of us, and in a moment of a brief flash of pain it was over.

Unknown World

'Hello darkness my old friend, I've come to talk with you again.'

I felt something touching my body, I thought at first it was Death coming to take me away from wherever I am to the afterlife but the feeling wasn't boney or cold, in fact it was quite warm and very thick. When I opened my eyes to see what it was I was pleased to see that it was my Atlas, he was kneeling over me and was poking me with a single digit.

"Okay...okay...you can stop now...I'm up man, I'm up..." I mumbled as I slowly peeled myself off the floor which didn't feel like the unyielding metal plate or the softness of a bed and when I looked down I saw that it was dirt, actual dirt, gravel, rocks and grass.

As soon as I turned my head to see where I was I saw that I was sitting in the middle of a forest, there was trees that looked all twisted and gnarled, grey bark with dead leaves everywhere. This wasn't Demeter, not even by a long shot. So where the hell was I?

"Okay Anthony...we were on Demeter...there was a battle, we won I think, I can't remember but the reactor exploded so Demeter must have been completely wiped clean of IMC property...so I think it will take years for all of the IMC to even send a response team to save those left behind. The tables have been turned...but that leaves me wondering where the hell am I? Sure as hell doesn't look like Troy or the Boneyard...that's for sure." I again mumbled to myself, getting to my knees before standing up, my vision blurs as I stood up way to fast but my titan helps me by giving me something to grab onto as the stars in my eyes dissipate.

Taking another look around I saw that this place could be Troy but just in a part that wasn't explored yet or somewhere near the colony that was put to the torch and the flames just past onto the trees nearby.

"So big guy...is there any civilization around here?" I asked and hoped that he knew the answer to it, and surprisingly enough he did. The Atlas gave me a nod of sorts before pointing in what I think was to the east and with a shrug I tried to climb back in and he assisted me by giving just the barest of nudges with his fingers and once I was in the chassis it closed up tight but almost sensing that I was tired he started to move on its own, heading towards life.

"Wake me up when we get there." I said as my eyes gently went off to sleep, my snoring was quickly picked up by the OS as it gave a shake of its central eye as if expressing shame of sorts at my tiredness.

Zecora's Hut

Zecora's POV

Tonight was a strange occurrence as the night sky rippled and cracked with red and blue thunder. Swirling around the Everfree Forest was a thunderstorm unlike anything in Equestrian history, and what defines a thunderstorm here is that it is always within the deepest parts far from any type of civilization but this one, it starts at the very heart of the old trees and ends at the very edge of the new sapling, bordering right on Ponyville. If it was not for Princess Celestia coming to me and asking if this is any sign of dark magic at work, something that I find odd since most dark magicks would not require such a display of madness, but then again this is the first time I have ever seen or heard of this happening.

As soon as the solar goddess left my humble abode I went back to my cauldron, experimenting with a new type of poison joke, the plant itself is like its original version but this one seems to last longer and that it can't be cured with a bath but instead the afflicted pony must wait it out, and that the joke is much crueler then its weaker cousin.

'And here I found you my poison friend...resting around a tree acting like a parasite.'

Trotting over to the swirling pot I watched the contents of it bubbled and popped, the scent rolling from it was strangely pleasant to say the least, poison joke smelled like dry hay but this...this cruel joke smelled like lavender oil. Placing a similar planet between the pages of an old book I closed it shut but when as I placed it back into its place on my shelf I felt the ground shake for a few seconds, an earthquake I thought but usually it lasts for a couple of seconds to a minute but this was just three seconds of rumbling before it stopped so I quickly ruled that out.

'Maybe it was a diamond dog clan digging a new surface pit?' I thought and at that lone mental distraction the storm started to die down, now that is considered strange.

Looking out my window I saw that the storm was starting to slow down from its spiral, the raining was starting to lessen but it was still considered a downpour, even the thunder was starting to become less common with its constant appearance.

'I wonder what could have created such a storm that could create an earthquake?'

Shrugging to myself I just ignored it for now and went back to the cruel joke brewing in my cauldron, the mere thought of what it could do in its liquid form on a pony, but for now that would have to be put aside for the time being as I would have to ask little Applebloom for assistance on this one.

As the rain started to die down I stirred the black cauldron, the contents of it now completely in liquid form and was now ready for testing, but for the time being I left it alone, trotting to the shelves to grab a small jar to place some of it in for storage as the rest will be kept heated for a much later use.

It was during the time I was getting ready to turn it in for the night did the ground start to shake again but it was not in the form of an earthquake as it was a constantly rolling shake, no this one was irregular, almost like something was stomping on the ground and it was getting steadily stronger, as if it was coming this way.

Quickly galloping to the front window I poked my head out to see what it could be but due to it being dark outside and that the night mist has shown itself everything was shrouded and was hard for me to see anything beyond a few hoofspaces away.

Cocking my head a bit I tried to focus on a distant shape but soon the thumping stopped short of my humble abode and the shape was vague at best, but it was large, much larger then a manticore, and it didn't move on four legs like the dreaded monsters did, and it wasn't a minotaur as it did not have any horns on its head, nor was it a dragon for I saw no wings or its long prehensile tail.

As I started to wonder what it could possibly be, the mysterious figure got to one knee before what I think its torso moved and something dropped from it, maybe its child or baby, but whatever it is it quickly stood back up and moved back a bit but when I went to the front door of my home I heard something begin to talk, I couldn't quite understand what was being said but I think it was between the child and its parent.

Poking my head past the threshold of the door I saw the two were having an argument or maybe a one-sided argument from the look of it.

'What could possibly be going on between the two?'

Before I could possibly try to reconcile the family the large one lifted an arm and seemingly pointed in my direction and when the younger one turned to look over at me I saw seven bright icy blue eyes stare at me and I immediately closed the door and retreated to my bed room, whatever it was is not a diamond dog nor a minotaur.

'Please leave me alone...please do not come inside.'

Sadly my prayers were not answered as I heard the front door slowly open up, as if the monster was afraid of what it would find, but once I heard the steps slowly come into the main area it was growing louder then quieter and back to loud, it was circling the cauldron. Whatever it is it seems to be interested with what is inside of it. What felt like an hour it soon left the cauldron alone, and moved onto somewhere else but it eventually left my home, as if it didn't like the fact that somepony was living here or that the décor wasn't up to its standards. Either or I am just glad that it left me alone.

At the sound of my front door being closed I slowly and steadily trotted to the window, and when I peered over the edge I saw it climb back to its mother, I think, and with its child safely back in her grasp the mother retreated back into the forest and soon after I lost sight of the pair I left the safety of my home to see what tracks it might have left behind and what I saw both astounded and scared me.

Its track was easily my size, it had a large almost rectangular pattern for the back part and as for the front part, it was two smaller squares but at a different angle, and it was only what I think was two toes.

Whatever this type of creature is, it can easily ignore the moss that repels manticores and timberwolves so whoever it could be, must be looking at its territory.

Anthoy's POV

'I couldn't believe that my Atlas found a random hut in the middle of this cursed forest, the creatures here are strange, I saw wolves made out of wood and hellish looking beast, a lion with a scorpion tail and bat wings, and now I thought I just saw a zebra living in a hut in the middle of this place.'

My mind was busy trying to comprehend what I had just seen but when I saw the zebra, an actual zebra but wearing gold neckrings, a few gold rings on a foreleg and two gold earrings, and this zebra had a Mohawk. At this point I would just say that it was the calming serum making me see thing that would be lying to myself and that it was my Atlas that found this zebra, the fact that it was staying in the middle of the forest is confusing. I honestly thought that they loved the rolling grass plains cause of the abundance of food, a forest is hardly a fitting place for that species let alone be able to make a hut, have African tribal masks and other knickknacks, and to have a cauldron with some strange goop bubbling in it, everything about it all screamed 'witch doctor'.

"Atlas...find a good place to stay for the night, let me sleep for now...I'll...i'll try to deal with this in the morning...my head is hurting something fierce." and with that I passed out from the shock of everything finally kicking in.

I feel too old for this shit.