“Alou who?” Said Burble Hekelot, the small toad-like reploid in the room.
“Alouette is her name, she sticks to Ciel and Zero like glue” Harpuia answered as Leviathan projected a picture of another child reploid. Blond hair flowed down to the child’s back, big blue adorable puppy eyes complete with two reploid earpieces. It was one of Alouette herself in simple garb, one given to prisoners of the government. The last known photo Neo-Arcadia had of her.
Harpuia spoke, “From the information I gained from the resistance in my previous “visit” there, this girl was rescued by the resistance four years ago and has taken a great liking to the doctor. As I said before, she sticks to Ciel and Zero like glue following them around wherever they go. She acts like a little girl and carriers a ripped stuffed animal around.”
Harpuia gave a slight “heh” before continuing. “I can’t believe a reploid of such magnitude could have slipped right through my fingers like that. Until this point, I had just assumed she was just a simple reploid child.”
“Wait a second…” Fefnir interrupted, “We should be celebrating, if this girl blows up, she’ll destroy the entire resistance, Ciel, and more importantly that bastard Zero!” he said as he slapped his armored leg, along with his thought coming together fully.
“We should be celebrating instead of worrying. It’s not exactly my preferred method, but in 4 days the entire resistance will be blown to kingdom come and that’ll be the end of them.” said Fernir
“But it’s not that simple. Even if we decided to let another nuclear explosion happen,” Said Harpuia, reminding Fefnir of the words nuclear explosion, “the ramifications of such a event can be disastrous.”
“Exactly Harpuia” Levi confirmed “Somehow, we must get this SR-X2, Alouette, out of the resistance base and bring her somewhere safe; from there we prevent the reactor inside her from malfunctioning or detonate her someplace where no or minimal damage can occur”
“What about killing her? Will it set off the bomb?” Fernir asked
The Green Falcon inside the room, Aztec Falcon, spoke up. “I don’t know if it might, but I believe the risk is too great to “retire” her.” he said. He sat firmly in his seat, his wings reclined behind him, hands calmly down on the table. His bird like head was clear and focused. “Lady Leviathan, what are your thoughts if she is retired?”
Instead of Leviathan answering, Harpuia interrupted and answered the question. “It’s a risk we will not take.” He said firmly, “Aside from the obvious dangers of contaminating another whole region of land, giving Zero a reason to launch another assault on us, and aside setting off the resistance, killing her will get us a lot of negative media attention for letting such a thing happen again.”
“Plus, the nuclear clean-up units already have their hands full with one cleanup, which I might add could have been a lot worse if not for the quick action taken.” Said harpuia, his eyes glancing on Leviathian for a split second as he continued “Dividing the clean up will cause a lot more problems to come in the future with how much damage it could do. Ontop of that if the media found out that we let a nuclear bomb go off or helped cause one go off, it would cause a massive uproar among the populous quickly followed by our heads on sticks.”
“And lastly, killing her will make us look like barbarians, and will attract more to the resistance cause.” He placed his hands firmly down on the table, his words reaching them all. “Under every circumstance, killing her is not a option. Understand?”
“Yes, sir” replied the rest of the board, except for one.
Burble Hekelot thought out loud, “Man Harpuia, can’t you ever give us a break? All this for one little girl? It’d be so much simpler to just kill her then do this. Hell you work us harder then Copy-X ever did.”
“…..”
It only took a few seconds to realize what he just said for Prime Leader Harpuia to hear. His eyes widened.
It took him a few more seconds to realize he was sitting right next to Prime Leader Harpuia. His eyes cracked in terror.
Before Harpuia could inflict pain on him, the oversized reploid toad opened his mouth to apologize. Yet, the moment he opened his mouth, Harpuia’s hand shot forward and clamped onto Burble Hekelot’s tongue.
“Hekelot… tell me….is that what you really think about me?” Harpuia asked in a murderous tone as death glared from his eyes into the fearful metallic frog’s.
“It-it…was a glitch S-Sir” the stuttering frog reploid mumbled out, as much as one could if you’re holding their tounge. “Ye-ye-yes, I-I-I’m sorry about what I said. Y-You really don’t work us that hard, and you’re really kind when compared to him.” He said, pleading with Harpuia.
Harpuia wasn’t flattered, but it was good enough of a response for him. “Thank you Hekelot.” Said the green war machine as he released Burble Hekelot’s tongue. He whispered one more thing to Hekelot as he regained his composure. “Don’t do it again.”
“Ta-That Thank you sir” Burble Hekelot said in a loud voice, his eyes darting around him nervously as he sat back down in his chair.
Harpuia was not a man to be trifled with.
----An island unknown: 1 year ago----
Laying deep in his leather, comfy chair, Herein Glorie took a sip of his wine in wait of his guest. He was dressed in a causal clothing, comfy pants with a extravagant top and black slicked hair.
Soon, the double doors opened up and a servant reploid clad in uniform walked in.
“Federal General Glorie, Guardian Harpuia is here to here to speak to you.” It said without emotion.
“Ahh, sending me to my island, then coming to see me? Ah, what’s that bastard thinking?” Said the General of Generals, thinking while rubbing his goatee. “Send him in. It’s about time we talk” He said, reaching for his glass of wine and taking another sip.
The servant reploid left the room, and when he returned, a man not in armor, but in a man in fine black slacks and a matching black longcoat, Harpuia walked into Herein’s chamber.
The servant reploid quickly left, leaving the two alone.
“Ahhh, Mr. unofficial Prime Leader, I’ve been waiting to speak to you. I’m quite disappointed that you booted me out of my own meeting and forced me to stay here at my island for the past few days” Glorie begun “Although, I’m not complaining much about the later.” He said complete with him taking a sip from his glass of wine.
“Who would?” Agreed Harpuia “Living in a tropical paradise, able to drink and enjoy your money to your heart’s content, lying lazily in the lap of luxury. Although I do say, you did get this place for quite a steal. I am curious, how did it happen again?
Glorie bragged his answer to Harpuia “Copy-X de-commissioned this base and sold it. Some company bought up the island, put it up for auction, and I happened to be the lucky winner of the bid.”
Harpuia stood there, a faint smile on his face. Enjoying the false answer he received. “I’m glad that’s how you romanized it. How about I rephrase that with what really happened?”
Said Harpuia with displeasure under his smile.
“The Neo-Arcadian Military” He begin “run by you, sold off one of their billion dollar military island bases, dirt cheap, to a “mysterious” company which turns out you own. Said company then raffled off the item in an auction, an auction in which you were the only bidder, buying it for near free.”
“That’s such a mean way to put it Mr. Ex-Guardian.” Glorie said smugly “None of that sounds illegal to me”
“What about Immoral?” Harpuia replied
“Hmmm” Glorie sounded before he answered “That’s such a biased word, it’s all in the eye of the beholder honestly, if one person thinks that’s not right, there’s another who does think it is right, thus it’s wrong to judge anyone’s actions based on a biased opinion like that. Such as whe…” He said before he was cut off by Harpuia
“I came here to talk, not to listen to one of your long-winded dodges.” Said Harpuia harshly “I’ve herd enough of those when we worked with you.”
Glorie complained “That’s just mean”
“And true.” Harpuia quipped “So why not just answer my question with a yes or no.”
“I really can’t give you a true answer with one word” Glorie answered back
“You’ll have to try. It’s not that hard.” Harpuia said, asking again such a simple answer to a simple question. “Were your actions immoral?”
“Fine, I’ll give you your imperfect answer. No.” He said, but quickly snapped a rebutal before Harpuia could reply “But Fefnir’s the one responsible for selling it to my company. I had no idea my company even bought it, when I did I swooped up the island. It’s your friend who’s the one to blame for it all.”
“Nice try. But shifting the blame on my friend here won’t work.” Harpuia answered back to the accusation “You ordered one of Fefnir’s subordinates to do the sale, that way if it hit the fan Fefnir would take the blame and you’d walk away clean. Glorie, you should have wised up and not wrote memos that detail all of this.”
“So what? You don’t like it. I played the system and I won.” Glorie said back.
Harpuia, moving on made his second case. “And there’s a female former subordinate of yours who claimed to have a “deep relationship” with you, if you know what I mean.’
“I don’t. That woman was a failure of a officer and I demoted to private as such.” Glorie said back, swinging it back to Harpuia.
Harpuia kicked it back with his response. “Only after you found out she was pregnant, where days later she was tragically killed by friendly fire incident the day before the testing would identify the father of her child and her maternal leave was approved. Might I add, the accident was caused by the same subordinate who sold that island to your company.”
“It was a tragic accident, which I had no part of.” Glorie simply said back. Clean, for the most part.
“I seriously doubt that.” Harpuia said, ignoring Glorie’s trap, but instead continued his attack on the man “But most importantly, who was it again ordered the Neo-Arcadian military to use high-powered bombs and level Area X immediately after Copy-X’s death? While Fefnir, Leviathan and myself were still inside might I add. I’ve always wanted to know what fool made that decision.”
“It was the same subordinate of mine who sold the island” Glorie said in his way to clear himself. “I demoted him 3 ranks for that.”
“Wow, you really don’t do anything do you?” Harpuia said with a fierce venom in his tongue. “It’s always everyone who works under you huh? You’ve never to blame, you do everything perfectly and neatly as everyone would wish, it’s just everyone else around you who makes those fatal mistakes that always seem to benefit you.”
“Of course.” Glorie replied with a simple smile. “I don’t do anything wrong. It’s my subordinates who are the problem.”
“Really?” Harpuia said. His façade fading, his real feelings surfacing. “So let me ask you this one last, final, time. And I expect a god damned Yes, or No. Were you the one responsible for ordering the Neo-Arcadian military to destroy it’s own base of operations, Area-X?”
Glorie repeated himself like a broken record “Not one ioda. It was my Subordin…”
“Bullcrap.” Harpuia fiercely said. “I’m done playing this stupid little game with you. You knew Zero was there. You knew that copy-X was there, and you had believed Leviathian, Fefnir, and myself were still there. And I know that you knew, because I was the one who told you. Yet the bomb was still dropped, which would have killed us if we were still inside. And if all of us did die, that would leave you next in line to become the Prime Leader.”
Glorie was silent.
Harpuia continued.“To take the place of the prime leader after he dies, the 4 guardians, along with the Federal General must vote onto who should replace the prime leader. If 4 of those 5 parties are dead, then the surviving member votes for himself and instantly becomes the prime leader. As you hoped would happen.”
“You tried to kill us. You realized you could become prime leader if we died before anyone could vote. You took it, and by chance you missed. ”
“Are you indicting me on something?” Glorie said.
“If I did Mr. Glorie, It’d take all day to list all the crap you’ve gotten away with.”
“That’s Federal General Glorie to you.” Herein said in angry tone
“Quite honestly, with my new administration, I’d rather not have someone like you running my armies. I don’t want you around anymore.” Harpuia said back.
“Tough luck. I have tenure, I’m here to say” Glorie said.
“heh-heh”….Harpuia lightly chuckled at Glorie’s words. “You have no idea how right you are.” He said, a sinister smile on his face.
“Heh, I have no idea what you means, but you couldn’t get rid of me if you tried.” Glorie shot back “The 7 Gentle Judges must approve of my dismissal, to which the slant always leans in my favor, 4-3 always, you know. It’d also reveal that you’re running the government and not Copy-X, forcing a special election by the Judges in which you’d most likely lose. And if you even consider to harm me, you will be labeled a maverick for assaulting your superior officer “General Harpuia”. The Federal General has immunity from acquiring a maverick status. If I die it’s your head that rolls.”
Glorie gave a boastful laugh upon finishing. “There is absolutely no way you can get rid of me. None whatsoever!”
Harpuia just looked at him and smiled. Harpuia knew what was coming. Glorie didn’t.
“Actually, it’s 8 now.” He said “I personally saw to it and reactivated Tretista Kelverian and “Copy-X” reappointed him to the position.”
Harpuia then dropped his bomb in gentle words. “Immediately after an emergency session of the judges followed, concerning the approval of your removal. With a 4-4 split, Hellbat Schilt oddly made a useful “heel face turn” and decided to vote my way, tipping the scale in my favor…and approving your dismissal.”
Glorie’s jaw dropped “…what did you just say…”
Harpuia answered simply. “By order of the 8 Gentle Judges, you are being removed of your position as Federal General. To say it bluntly, Herein Glorie, You’re fired.”
“You can’t do that.” The fired General replied.
Harpuia gave a smile as he said.“Oh, but I am.”
Herein Glorie regained his composure for a moment. “You can’t just get rid of me, I know Neo-Arcadia’s greatest secrets, if you get rid of me I’ll tell everyo….
“You have a very grand retirement ahead of you, Former Federal General.” Interrupted Harpuia “One which Neo-Arcadia has greatly provided for you and insists you take. One that I will not allow you to disapprove of, citizen Herein Glorie. This is what I’m telling you.
“you….” Glorie said gritting his teeth
Harpuia locked eyes with the human “When I leave here, I will be reporting one of two things Glorie. Your retirement, or your obituary. You choose.”
A weakened smug attitude of Glorie shot at Harpuia “What’s your aim Harpuia? What the hell are you trying to do? I’m the best general that Neo-Arcadia has and I know I’m not the first person you’re trying to getting rid of.”
Harpuia answer was painfully direct. “Like I said, I don’t want people like you in my new government. As such, I’m getting rid of parasites like you. “
“Parasite!? Glorie gritted his teeth. “You’re…calling me the parasite?!” He shouted at the prime leader, his face timming with the built up of shame and anger..
“That’s all you are, and nothing more.” Harpuia said coldly.
And the last straw broke. Glorie exploded.
“How dare you, you worm! I’m the only reason why that fool managed to take over this damn planet! I’m the only reason why you’re in the position of power that you’re in now! It's me! It's all because of me! You think that imbecile Copy-X could have led his own armies!? Do you think he could have taken over his own god damned planet without my help! NO! OF COURSE NOT!!!
It was me and me alone! I’m the one who deserves it all. How dare you even try to take away what rightfully belongs to me!
You’re the parasite! Look at you! You’re a filthy little faggot that Copy-X hired on a stupid drunken bender! You were a problem for everyone around you, a worthless failure in every regard! Even your filthy faggots of parents left you behind a dumpster!”
Harpuia’s hand clenched in anger as Glorie’s right hand stretched out and pointed all his blame at Harpuia, his finger leading the way.
“You're the true parasite Harpuia! You’ve been a thorn in my side since you came here, disobeying my direct orders and messing up everything that I do! You’re nothing but a disposable piece of trash that sucked on the teat of this government to get to where you are now! But in the end you leave nothing but failure! It’s no wonder why they left you behind in the dumpster!
Oh wait, they didn't ditch you, They blew up!"
And those were the worst words he could have ever said.
With speed, Harpuia’s hand slid inside his coat and gripped his weapon from it. With a single motion he whipped his Beamsaber out of his coat and ignited it, it’s magenta ignition became a slash of energy as one of the Sonic Blades tore through Herein Glorie’s hand.
With his murderously majestic slash Herein Glorie’s blood splattered as the former Federal General’s right hard fell down on the floor hard.
Glorie’s eyes grew wide in shock and pain and he watched his own hand fall off from his body. The prideful Glorie stopped in his tracks.
Harpuia’s anger subsided back down bellow the level of homicide. His words were as cold and grave as Glorie’s expression.
“You’ve pushed my patience to it’s limit.” Harpuia said “I’m done dealing with you. You’ve been a hindrance to this government and I’ve had enough of your bullshit twice over. “
Harpuia locked eyes with the man “You will remain on this island permanently, forbidden to leave. You will spend the rest of your days here on this island. The moment you try to leave, you will be branded a maverick and immediately executed with extreme prejudice. I’ll have you killed before you even touch land again.”
Harpuia’s foot raised itself, and maliciously stepped on Glorie’s fallen hand, the symbol of his conquest over the man of pride and hubris.
“And if you try to reveal our secrets, I will ruin you, I will destroy you, and I will lob off your head myself. And I’ll make you scream all the way through it as I kill you.”
Harpuia pressed his foot with strength against the fallen hand. They could hear the bone crunching squash as the right hand of Herein Glorie was crushed under Harpuia’s might.
Harpuia only had one last thing to say to the defeated man as he watched his own hand be destroyed. “Let this place be your tomb. Enjoy the rest of your days sipping your wine through a straw.”
With that, Harpuia had nothing left to say to the man. Taking his bloodied foot off what was once a hand, Harpuia turned his back to the scene and began to walk to the double doors to leave.
The defeated man stared what was once his hand, his whole world had just collapsed upon him. All taken away by the man leaving his presence
“You…you can’t do this to me…” He said.
He turned to Harpuia as the Prime Leader walked to the exit.
“You can’t do this to me!” He yelled
Harpuia paid no attention.
“You can’t do this to me!!!” He cried once more.
The double doors opened. Harpuia cared no iota as he walked through them.
“You can’t do this to me!!!!!!”
One last time, the man yelled with all the strength left in his human lungs.
Harpuia’s back and coat still faced the man, as Harpuia turned his head to the side, one eye looking was all that was needed as he looked the defeated man straight in the face and said only one thing to the man, in a tone calm as the wind.
“I just did.”
The double doors closed.
----end flashback ----
7:11 A.M.
Back at the boardroom, everyone was thinking of a plan to work on that could succeed. One person would normally expect that a plan could be formed easily by then when you throw Neo-Arcadia’s elite of the elite together in one room. Unfortunately, that one person doesn’t know this cast of characters that well. But Harpuia did. For the past hour, they’ve been going through multiple solutions, all of which they realized would not work. Or for Burble Hekelot’s proposal…not feasibly possible.
Sitting in his chair, Harpuia viewed his subordinates across the room.
Burble Hekelot and Fefnir sat in their chairs in the same thinking position. The genius Leviathan continued to overview the data over and over of the situation, digging for the light of inspiration to strike her. Herculious Anchus passed the basic map that Neo-Arcadia had of resistance base to the other Anchus, who then passed the data-tablet of Resistance weapons to his brother. Panter began tapping his claws in succession on the table, which snapped Phoenix Magnion out of his train of thought…again. Aztec Falcon was no longer sitting in his chair, but sitting on the floor deep in meditation.
Gazing at them, Harpuia remembered again why he drinks.
The room was silent until the large firey mystic reploid bird known as Phoenix Magnion spoke. His wings on his sides, sitting strong.
“You know, we could just tell them that she will blow up.” Phoenix said, completely out of ideas that would not get shot down by Harpuia.
“We will save that for a last resort, we might have the ability to turn this bad situation to our advantage, and I do not want to pass it up. Besides, do you really want to tell the resistance that they have a walking nuclear bomb.” Said Harpuia.
It only took a second “Good point” Phoenix said
Harpuia’s eyes turned to Leviathan’s face “Levi, why can’t you think of something like you always do?”
“I did Harpy. You shot them all down” Leviathan replied in annoyance, not facing him.
“And most of them involved hacking the resistance base. We all know what happened last time you tried that.” Harpuia replied, his eyes slowly sinking from her face.
Levi made her comeback. “How could I know that that blond had such good counter hackers at her disposal? I would have steeped up our defenses if I did. Either way, you know I’ve….” Leviathan stopped mid-sentence and frowned, noticing where her commanding officer’s eyes, and attention were at.
Shifting, she moved her head down to meet Harpuia’s eyes with her annoyed eyes. “You know I’ve upgraded them ever since.” She said in an increasing annoyed tone. “There’s no way it could ever happen again.”
“Until Zero destroys the firewalls again. Leaving our systems open to another attack.” Commented Harpuia, steaming Leviathan even more.
She stood back up off her chair and crossed her arms, giving a beaming stare at Harpuia. Harpuia, accepted her challenge and glared back. And thus the staring contest of Green eyes vs Blue eyes began once again.
And just as it began it ended when Fefnir spoke up. “You guys” he asked, “Where’s Nora? I know she’s not a military type, but I know she can probably help us out here.”
Harpuia jumped on the opportunity to change the subject. “Yes Levi, where is she?”
Leviathan looked at them. Apparently her idea fell silent on death ears again. Instead they wanted to know where her subordinate is. Sighing in defeat, she answered.
“She’s everywhere I can’t be at.” Levi said, reaching for her coffee cup. “Right now she’s in India trying to explain this whole thing to non-government news networks that’s covering the story.” Finished Levi as she took a sip from her coffee.
“With those bloodsuckers? Ouch.” Fefnir commented.
“Tell me about it.” Levi added “I hate those nosey news reporters.” Taking another sip of coffee after speaking.
Aztec Falcon’s eyes finally opened, and he began to show signs of life once again. “If I may speak.” Aztec Falcon said out loud, catching the attention of the other people in the room. “I believe I have a solution”
“Um, aright Aztec you have the floor.” Harpuia said, clearing the room for the electric reploid.
“I believe we should launch a frontal assault on the resistance base…” Aztec was saying until Panter interrupted him.
“That was my idea, and we already said it wouldn’t work.” The black panther reploid said.
Aztec looked at the panther reploid, but continued none the less, “Mr. Flauclaws., I was not finished. Anyway, my suggestion is that we bring out a small frontal assault force and place it on the resistance base’s front step; leading it, someone who would call out Zero to a one on one battle to as they would say “to minimize the loss of life”. In response the Resistance will little choice but to send Zero to that battlefield, followed by his fellow resistance forces to cover his back incase we try anything.
Of course, said person will have to face Zero. But this will be a distraction to the real objective of the operation. While the resistance is distracted, a small team will then infiltrate inside the resistance base and retrieve this Alouette girl and then escape out of the base with the girl. After the team retrieves the target they will meet up with our forces and be extracted from the field, just as our “frontal assault” retreats. By the time the resistance realizes what we were really after, it should be too late. Does this sound good Master Harpuia?”
“So” summarized Herculious Anchus “We fake a attack and challenge to the resistance to a battle to draw out Zero”
Kuwagust Anchus finished the thought “While someone breaks in and snatches the girl”
Aztec confirmed their answers. “Yes indeed. That is the idea.”
“Smart, good plan my friend.” Harpuia said with a smile.
"Good? That's a great plan!" Fernir shouted out in excitement, pumping his left hand up in the air with all his glory.
“Clever thinking Aztec, I think we should go with it.” Levi spoke as she sat in her chair.
Harpuia put it up to a vote. “Alright then, by a show of hands who else agrees that we should take this solution?”
Everyone raised their hands. The wise Aztec Falcon proved his wisdom again.
“That’s perfect. We’re all agreed on it then” Said the prime leader.
Harpuia continued “Fernir, Aztec, Burble, Panter, and Phoenix will lead that frontal assault; Leviathan and myself will break into the resistance base to retrieve SR-X2. The Anchus brothers will assist with our extraction. Fefnir, I want you to get as many forces as you need. Herculious, Kuwagust, Leviathan and myself will prepare for the extraction. Does everyone understand their roles?”
“YES SIR!” Said all the other members.
“Good.” Harpuia snapped his finger “Then this meeting is over. Let’s get to work.” He finished.
Saying that, everyone got up and left the room, all knowing what they must do next.
End of chapter 2.