New Age Chapter 33, a Zoids fanfic by Sh33p

Hats off to this fic. It tops most fics I've read....including most of the ones I posted here. Tim Seltzer, seltzer@seltzerbooks.com

Sh33p Disclaimer: I do not own Zoids. I do own all the OCs in this story, either by association or actual creation.

The dull blare of an alarm clock. It was dark. The sun hadn`t even come up and the alarm clock was already going off. With an annoyed grunt, driven more by the Wild Eagle than Jamie himself, the teen straightened up, one eye half-shut, the other squinted and blurred with sleep, a sticky, dry feeling from having breathed in humid, cold air through his mouth all night. His ears hurt too, and to top it all off, his nose was almost painfully dry in one nostril, thickly clogged beyond breathing in the second.

"I hate my life," he concluded in an instant, nonchalantly backhanded the alarm clock from above. Normally, he would have bothered noticing the feel of his skin breaking against the bits of metal that made up the frame and circuitry, or the shattered plastic-based imitation of glass that formed the display, but at present, Jamie could have cared less. The alarm clock rang one last time, and didn`t ring again after that. Lazily and tiredly, the youth rose up, wiping away bits of clockwork from his now bruised, semi-cut right hand. The skin had been broken but nothing else.

Slipping on his bedroom shoes, Jamie groggily stepped out of the room with a yawn, staggering down the cold, dark hallway, past Steven`s room, past what had once been Leon`s room, past Leena`s room and past Brad and Bit`s rooms, heading on a byline down the path of the hall. After a short while, he turned to the right, straight into a closed door. A brief stumble back and a following swish of air and metal, and the teen stepped inside, grabbing a plastic cup and pouring himself some tapwater to drink.

"Why the hell are we up so god damned early?" The Wild Eagle asked in a disgruntled tone, obviously disdainful over having been stirred so abruptly.

The Wild Eagle sounded something rarely indecisive, silencing right afterward. It was especially rare for the two to converse outside of thoughts, even more so for it to happen on the base. It was also rare for the Wild Eagle, naturally more dominant, naturally more confident and naturally more prone to stay through any arguement until he got his way, regardless of whether or not he was right or wrong. For Jamie to win, that meant that the Eagle was either too tired to fight back or genuinely afraid, and neither were exactly common events.

"I hate you," Jamie muttered, throwing a passing glare into his own reflection on the door of the microwave, turning back into the hallway only to pause and step back into the kitchen, glancing at the clock since he`d destroyed his own. It was 5:50 in the morning, he`d slept for ten hours and none of it had been peaceful. A nightmare, perhaps? No. A nightmare would`ve meant at least a vague memory of what the nightmare was about. He hadn`t even dreamt in his sleep. He absently noted now, four minutes after waking up, the facts that his clothes stuck to his body from a cold sweat and his right hand was by now partially covered on the outside with blood. The cuts hadn`t been serious, they`d just been left completely unattended.

Sipping down the entire cup of water, Jamie continued down the hall, chucking the emptied piece of plastic over his shoulder, unknowingly landing it off a wall and back into the doorway of the kitchen, where the door crushed it in half while closing. The sound of crumpling plastic didn`t even register for him, he had bigger questions in mind, which was even more out of place for him. Jamie was almost obsessively clean, in fact, without him, the base would`ve likely been filled with foot-high piles of trash at least once a week.

Chief among his concerns though, was the situation he faced for a battle set to take place in the late afternoon:

He would have to determine whether his words to Brad were true. Who`s side was Jamie really on, anymore? If you`d asked him the question even two weeks ago, it would`ve solidly been answered with 'The Blitz Team.' A few years before that, it would`ve been 'my friends and family.' But now, the normally timid, pacifistic(when it came to matters outside of official battles) and oftentimes obedient teen was forced to consider the true place where his loyalties were located: With his own interests - a possibly romantic(if difficult) relationship with Leyla, the chance at becoming a freelance battle analyst for any number of news agencies and the possible shot at independence from everyone in his life, both financially and psychologically - or the interests of his team mates - which seemed to offer only a life of what seemed like reliance on just about everyone around him for everything.

And then there were the Wild Eagle`s loyalties. 'Will' had shown himself to be ruthless and homicidal in getting what he wanted, multiple times no less. He`d killed at least a few hundred people, maybe even a thousand in total, and Jamie had yet to get an answer as to how many women that the Eagle had taken unprotected sex with. Contrary to popular belief, unprotected sex wasn`t something that came with no consequences. Jamie didn`t know if there were children out there who had been born of his counterpart`s uninhibited attempt at a secret lifestyle, he didn`t even know how long the Eagle had been lurking around in the back of his subconcious. He`d only shown himself to the others a few times, what if he`d actually been around for far longer?

Entering the bathroom after who knows how long, Jamie finally realized that he had been carrying around a change of clothes gathered at some point in his internal debate. It was his flight outfit, complete with gloves and the lightly made flak vest that fit the requirement of at least one piece of armor for every aerial Zoid pilot. His first suspicions were clear as he pressed the button to shut the bathroom door, firmly remembering to press in the lock in the process. His change of clothes soon found it`s way plopped onto the countertop shared by the sink and a stack of rags. A towel was absently chucked onto them a second later before Jamie started to remove his clothes, sneering angrily all the while.

Finally, his body froze, just as he finished removing his clothing. A change started, but it was fought back. The entire left side of his face shifted to an angle, as if trying to complete a transformation into a different human being. Even the hair to that side of his head shifted, slicking up into one side of a low V, but it couldn`t seem to move past that. Both sides of the teenager`s face contorted into a warped look of wills clashing, both sides assaulting each other for control.

In most cases, the Wild Eagle could have won easily. Jamie was too weary to put up a good fight in his present condition, at least that`s what the Eagle thought.

"What the hell is your problem?!" The Wild Eagle spat, though most of the sentence came out of the left side of the mouth. No answer.

"I don`t know where your loyalties lie anymore Jamie, but you know you need me," Will grit out, trying to reach the rational side of the other personality`s thoughts. "I`m looking out for both our needs, now give me control or else I`ll take it from you!"

A burst of raw emotion, the left side contorted back to normal in an almost violent manner. Inside of the mental link between the two personalities, what equated to the end of a vicious power struggle saw it`s end - for the moment at least. The image that Jamie saw was of himself yanking out of a test of strength and abruptly belting the Wild Eagle across the side of the face, then promptly slamming a door shut on his skull until blood sprayed across a floor that didn`t exist. It was the psychological equivelent of attempted murder.

A survival mechanism withdrew the Wild Eagle from the fight before Jamie could finish the deed. When the image snapped to reality again, Jamie found himself hunched halfway over the countertop, his gums nearly numbed from how hard his jaw was clamped shut, breathing as if he was hyperventilating, drenched with even more cold sweat than before. Slowly though, his jaw unclenched, lips that had been open in hard, gasping breaths slid shut slowly, neutral at first.

And then they curled into a feral smile. He had been staring at the countertop until then, and when he looked up, almost ready to laugh, he was completely disgusted at the look in his own eyes. Disgusted enough that less than a second later, the lights in the bathroom went out, flipped off for the time being.

Jamie had decided to shower in the dark this time. He couldn`t stand the sight of himself anyway.

"Markie! Get the door!" Abbie yelled from the bathroom, even though Mark could hear the banging of the knocks with relative ease compared to her. He grimaced lightly, feeling entirely too comfortable to move at all but after the thirteenth or fourteenth slam into into the door, he changed his mind about being too comfortable to move, if only because it sounded like the pounding on the door threatened to jar it loose from the frame.

Standing up lazily with several scratches to the small of his back, he was comparitively slow to step around the coffee table, hiking up a leg and instead just going over it. Most people would`ve felt at ease getting the door in their pajama pants and a t-shirt, but Mark didn`t. Sure, Garamian culture had a 'who gives a shit?' attitude when it came to people walking around in odd clothing(it was almost normal to see people waltzing around in their underwear during the middle of the day at summer), but Mark wasn`t Garamian. He still had his modesty.

"I`m coming, damn it," he grumbled at the door, finally stepping up to it and glancing into the peephole. A man stood there, at the edge, only his back visible. "What`s this?"

That made sense. Stepping back and unlocking the door, the pilot lazily pried it open a second later. There was no one in sight.

Slowly, Mark poked his head out of the room, and it was only the fact that he looked to the right first that saved his life. Most people tend to look left first, it was a little known fact because so few people actually paid attention to it. Assassins were among the people that did.

With a jerk and a yell of surprise, Marcus stumbled back out of the way, narrowly avoiding decapitation at the forward curved blade of a familiar longknife. Arihmanes` Khukri.

On a knee-jerk reflex, he threw the door shut and gained all of a quarter of a second to gather his thoughts into a vague jumble resembling coherency, a period of time just long enough to realize just what he`d dodged, and what it meant.

"Mark?! What`s going on?!" Abbie yelled from the bathroom, sounding as if she was about to come and see. By the time her words had finished registering though, the door`s hinges and the locking mechanism had been taken out in two swift cuts, gouging the tip of the knife into Mark`s view for a fraction of a second each time. There was a loud thud and the door toppled over, a dead body now laying atop it with Arihmanes standing in the hallway, plainly in sight.

"Can`t you have the decency to at least bleed to death when someone blows half your face off?!" Mark demanded, his sarcasm coming as just about the only thing he could think to carry out. Arihmanes twitched several times in a row.

"A little more than half, actually," he stated with an unusually casual, matter-of-fact way to his voice, his functioning eyebrow twitching with the words. "Shit, I liked you better with the mask," Mark grumbled out, still relying on his sarcasm to give him a second or three more to try and gather his thoughts.

A lunge forward, Mark jumped back instinctively and stumbled right over the coffee table, perhaps the only thing that saved his life was the fall that followed. Arihmanes made two slashing cuts as this happened, the first being the one that Mark jumped to try to avoid, the second being the one that the fall had saved him from.

The knife turned into a half-blurred circle for a split second, and Mark threw his legs up, catching Arihmanes` wrist and kicking him in the gut. The coffee table broke between their combined weight and the assassin went onto his back with a flip over his would-be target, who had mistakenly failed to try and disarm him in the process.

Mark was on his feet with the speed of a man fighting for his own survival, Arihmanes was on his feet with the speed of a murderous demon from Hell intent on ending that survival, and as the two paused for an instant, Arihmanes` cybernetic eye glowed a disturbed red.

"You took my face," the assassin growled. "Today," a pause, he shifted forward, turning broadside to Marcus with the part of his face that wasn`t mutilated hidden from view. "I TAKE YOUR LIFE!"

A swift throw, a panicked dodge and a dropkick. It had all happened in the course of a second. Arihmanes had thrown his knife for Harlock`s face, the other had ducked to the left in a frantic motion and the assassin had taken full advantage, practically flying forward and planting one foot into the other`s chest, his second foot finding it`s way into Mark`s stomach.

The black haired pilot toppled over backwards, rolling away not from instinct or skill - both of which he lacked - but from the sheer force of the two attacks, even as Arihmanes landed with the grace and poise of an acrobatic gymnast, swinging down from his one handed landing and skidding along on the floor to the very wall that his knife had lodged in. By the time Marcus was even halfway back to his feet, Arihmanes had torn his knife loose, charging forward with even more speed than before.

This time, like the others, Mark wasn`t ready for him, but even with that disadvantage, he was able to catch Arihmanes` slash by the wrist and flip him over again from his own momentum, right over the countertop and into the kitchenette. The assassin slammed violently into the second countertop, his legs smashing into the cabinets above and upper body contorting disturbingly in the middle of the impact. His free hand again came into play as it had during his first landing, rooting himself to the edge of the countertop and then shoving him upright with a breakdancer-styled spin, landing on both feet. Again, the knife went flying, and again, Mark made a panicked dodge.

Arihmanes tried for the dropkick again, Mark twisted out of the way, dodging the legs but falling victim to a punch across the cheekbone in the process. Even harder, he spun out from the impact, landing on his stomach with a groan of pain, this time though, it was pain he couldn`t ignore. While it was true that Mark had built up an excessively high pain tolerance through the years, for various reasons, it was also true that he needed to actually expect an event to ignore the pain it caused.

He hadn`t expected this at all, and as a result, he was hurting like hell and then some.

Arihmanes again landed with an acrobatic swiftness, skidding along the carpet on one hand and both feet. He came to a stop, as intended, at the wall, springing upright and literally tearing his knife from the wall once more, just as the bathroom door yanked open.

"What the hell is going on out here?!" Abbie demanded, causing Arihmanes to pause in mid-step, shifting an obsessive glance her way. It made the young woman`s blood curdle, inspiring a mixture of fear, disgust and concern, the last of which was reserved for Marcus.

"Just helping you dump some garbage, honey," Arihmanes finally stated after several seconds, turning towards her completely and thus exposing the half of his face that hadn`t been burned, bringing even more fear and disgust in the process. "I know you! You`re Aram!" She exclaimed instantly, remembering all too well that sickeningly benign smile of his. It was made again, too, even more disturbing this time.

"Don`t worry love, we`ll be together soon," he stated with a lunatic calm, only to yell out in surprise when Mark literally rammed back into the thick of things -

"No way, no how, no chance, in HELL! is that happening while I`m around ya fuckin` gnomish pinko pixie-assed psychopath!"

- slamming his entire body into Arihmanes` chest, shoulder first. The two crashed into into the ground with the assassin taking the full brunt of the impact, followed by a punch to the burnt side of his face. Any normal man would have either screamed in agony or at least tried to defend himself, Arihmanes only laughed, the surface nerves in that side of his face almost burned away to the extent that he could only blink and make expressions anymore, never actually feeling them when he did so.

Mark`s attack stopped at that punch though, as the butt of Arihmanes` free palm smashed into his chin and threw him back, the assassin`s feet finding their way to his armpits and shoving him off completely, driving him into the floor at the same time. Mark rolled away again, Abbie yelled out a curse and grabbed the nearest heavy object, flinging it at the downed assassin. Arihmanes almost effortlessly sliced the clock in two, the sheer force of the cut throwing the the two pieces over him.

He was back on his feet almost instantly, charging at Mark with the knife held back to make another vicious lunge.

About half of the coffee table`s remains ensured that much, jetting up and almost sinking into the assassin`s crotch, the result of Mark playing possum and deciding to fight dirty. It followed the simple logic adhered to by any person in a life-or-death battle: If you can`t beat `em, cheat.

Arihmanes stumbled back in pain, his grip on the knife tightening until blood started to drizzle from his palm, Mark`s arms slamming into a pair of uncoordinated punches across his upper back, his knee crashing into the top of the back of one of the assassin`s thighs. Arihmanes stumbled some more, then fell forward when Mark harshly kicked him right in the rear end, sending him to his face as a result.

The former `Staver wheezed exhaustedly, stepping back and then jumping forward, landing with a pair of stomps on the small of his would-be killer`s back before walking forward, leaned against the sliding glass door that lead to the balcony.

Abbie was still too frantic to do anything other than to try and call staff, the police, anyone who could come and help to even try to be remotely calm. Arihmanes though, seemed relatively unconcious, but still alive.

At least he seemed unconcious. Mark was again saved by the fluke of turning around a second too early, reflexively ducking under the assassin and this time twisting out of the way completely. Arihmanes flew over him, crashed through the glass and went diving over the edge of the balcony with an angry scream.

"Fucking psycho," Marcus finally managed to gasp out, ducking onto the balcony as Abbie darted back into the room, phone in hand.

"- Hejustjumpedoutawindow, I think," she said, so frantic that her words almost blended together as one every few seconds.

Arihmanes on the other hand, was more determined than most sane people, probably since he wasn`t one of them. The cord wrapped like a leather belt around his free hand snapped loose, revealing a pressure activated grappling line from within, which was promptly cast back to the very safety rail that Mark was leaning over.

"SHE`S MINE!!!" Arihmanes declared, recoiling back towards the balcony and catching Marcus completely unprepared, locking his legs around the former trucker`s waist and dragging him up from the room, letting their combined momentum carry them up even further than before, though Mark was struggling to hold Arihmanes` knife hand back the entire time.

They came to a dead stop after a few seconds, turning upside down as the cable reached it`s limit, some eighty feet from the balcony, four floors from the top of the hotel.

At this, Arihmanes stopped trying to hold Mark in place, starting a spin of his knife at the same time. Reflexively, Mark let go of his hand, and Arihmanes let go with his legs, throwing the trucker up another forty feet from what was left of their earlier momentum, one hand barely catching a grip on a flagpole that chancingly extended from the side of the top of the building. It bent badly, snapping in two after a second or so, but it had served it`s purpose, swinging Marcus up onto the roof with an agonizing roll along the gravel to the smooth concrete, the snapped flagpole still in hand.

He was bleeding all over, he was hurting, he didn`t know if he had any broken bones and his head was spinning furiously, but he was alive. The real question now was what Arihmanes would do next; Go for Abbie or try and finish him.

"I am so tired of this shit," he groaned out in pain, sitting up and trying to determine the answer to that question almost an instant later. He wouldn`t have to wait long.

With a loud screech of tortured cord, Arihmanes swung up into view, as graceful as ever. His black pants and the loose fitting long sleeved shirt flowing in the winds, the blonde headed assassin started to descend rapidly, Khukri held high to make the killing blow.

"I fucking HATE PEOPLE WHO CAN`T TAKE A HINT!" Mark screamed irately, taking advantage of the fact that Arihmanes couldn`t twist out of the way at his current speed. The young man merely side stepped out of the way, winding the flagpole up like a Louisville slugger and speaking again.

And with that, Arihmanes came right into striking distance, making a frantic attempt at attacking to his left, failed since he could only use his right arm at the moment. Because of the mistake, Mark sent him flying into another world with one swift *THWACK* between the eyes with the broadside of what had been a flagpole, the cloth having been shredded and torn off at some point during his roll along the gravel.

Arihmanes didn`t even scream as his face completely caved in across his eyes and the bridge of his nose, bone cracking like a flimsy piece of wood in a hurricane, though Mark was almost yanked right off of his feet, and the flagpole was torn from his grasp, leaving a shallow cut in his palm in the process. Arihmanes` body landed on the ground with none of the grace it`d shown before, his knife tumbling loose along the gravel and the line he`d used to move around so acrobatically seeming to try and drag him back but failing miserably now that his body`s momentum had completely stopped.

"That clear enough for ya?" Mark asked dizzily before collapsing into a jumbled heap on his knees, breathing hard and utterly exhausted. In just five minutes - at most - a wonderful trip to Garamos Island had turned into the vacation from hell.

Crackles of sound, like shattering glass, filled a half-empty hangar within a specific green Whale King, high in the stratosphere. The crackles were of an energy stasis field collapsing, one that looked like a perfectly angled pyramid of a neon blue and blood red mixture in color, with each corner lined in black. Bits of what looked like energy continued falling, landing on the hangar floor and evaporating instantly in puffs of colored smoke, eventually revealing the result of days of toil and effort, not from just one Organoid, but two.

Spectacle appeared like a demon from a flash of green, standing beside the one he considered a partner. He was unphased by the strain it took to force an evolution, mainly since he was one of the more powerful known Organoids, and he had also only bee working in the supplemental role. This time.

A flash of blue and red, Borealis dizzily towered over Bill Chapman for all of a second, then fell forward onto his stomach in what could only be described as the Organoid equivelent of exhaustion. The former-Royal Cup champion said nothing, only trying to use his emotions to comfort the downed Organoid, unable to even pet the creature since his hands were bound together with ten pound shackles held tight by a three pound chain. The collar around his neck had yet to be triggered, he was smarter than to get himself killed, but the expression on his face could only be described as raw contempt.

Bill Chapman was more like Bit Cloud than either of them knew. Both enjoyed one thing above almost all others: Freedom. Freedom to be a lazy slob, freedom to eat too much, freedom to use all the hot water when showering, freedom to blare music so loud that it made people`s ears bleed, freedom to go where, do what and live how they wanted.

Bit Cloud was a distorted mirror image of what Kale Obscura had turned into mere months earlier.

Kale Obscura was what Bill Chapman was slowly becoming now, held in chains with a bomb attached to his neck and a stungun practically laid out on the base of his skull.

"We`ll be out of this soon," he promised to Borealis, meaning it more than almost any other promise he`d ever made in his life.

For the time being though, Bill sat down next to the fallen Organoid, shifting his eyes malignantly over to Vilhelm, who was too busy observing something else to notice. Guards clustered around the captured pair, Spectacle flicked his tail absently and almost made the mental equivelent of a dulled laugh at Chapman`s threatening glares.

Borealis struggled to get his feet shifted forward, laying like a dog now, rather than an unconscious dinosaur. The Organoid didn`t answer though, it`s blue eye focusing in on Bill vaguely before dimming as if it had passed out.

Vilhelm on the other hand, was oblivious to the conversation. He wouldn`t have heard it anyway, telepathy wasn`t exactly a common trait among humans and he valued his own safety far too much to go through sensory modification surgery to get them. The only Organoid that he could speak with was Spectacle, because the two were Bound to each other, and Spectacle was too amused to do anything about it.

"I always wondered what one would look like," Vilhelm finally admitted with a curious interest in the Zoid before him. "I can`t help but to say that I`m impressed," he said with a mocking, ruthless smile.

The Zoid before him was like a blast from the past with a few new twists and turns. It`s optics were blue by nature, rather than the red associated with the Zoid it was modeled on. Power practically dripped from every inch of it, and despite it`s bulk, it could easily be told that this was a fast Zoid, perhaps able to keep pace with the Berserk Fury so long as it had an Organoid to even the odds.

For Vilhelm, this was only a small piece in the chess board of his plans, the equivelent of a Knight, useful but still expendable in the long run.

The Zoid in question was the same type of Zoid that had put the world on notice centuries earlier, now threatening for a repeat of it`s infamy and legend.

It was also the initial can of gasoline that Vilhelm was going to douse the world with and set ablaze.

In a room on a vehicle that had once served as a presidential transport in long-gone, and mostly forgotten times, a man was sitting alone. Most of the lights were off in this room, aside from one lamp that dimly lit a desk. The only other light was provided from the screen of a desktop computer, a custom built one no less. Not only that, but this custom, civilian rig was as powerful as most Guardian Force computers that cost fifty times as much, required maintenance into the extreme, daily reboots and several dozen top secret anti-virus programs per computer to remain in functioning order.

In comparison, this one`s programming was so complex that no modern computer virus of any kind could even crack it`s surface workings.

On the unused side of the desk sat several things. A perfectly stacked tower of empty soft drink cans, a half-empty beer mug currently containing a random grape flavored soda and three plates with nothing but leftover crumbs on them, and on the opposite end from those, nearer the lamp, sat two CD holders, one of which was open and empty.

//Access Code required:
5K-0310-PX-BDGP1A
//Access Code accepted.
//Please state username...

Harvey
//Improper username.
//Please try again...
Stigma Stoller
//Improper username.
//Please try again...
Wicked Visor Dude
//Improper username.
//Please try again...

Pong0rtehl33t
//Username valid.
//Accessing infromation...
//Access granted.
//The Five Kings Program:

//The Backdraft Group`s first stable attempt at raising pilots capable of taking on Guardian Force-level elites and winning. Replacement for the failed Checkmate Project(Now designated BDGP1-FP), designed around the five most promising candidates from the Zoid Educational Simulator Training units(1-5): Kale Obscura(Group 1, age 7 upon entry, age 19 upon disappearance), Vega Obscura(Group 2, age 2 upon entry, age 11 as of last entree), Rayth Takahori(Group 3, age 9 upon entry, age 21 upon disappearance), Randal Clark(Group 4, age 12 upon entry, age 16 at death), Alfred Torson(Group 5, age 13 upon entry, age 22 upon death).

//Tests show an extremely high aptitude for combat training in all fields for all test subjects. Each have been trained in a minimum of two forms of hand to hand combat, and one form of using every weapon commonly available. Vega Obscura(King 2) displays the highest natural ability for Zoid piloting, followed by Kale Obscura(King 1).

"This is all stuff that I already I know," he thought annoyedly, spotting a piece of information that finally caught his eye sometime later.

//All subjects show a naturally high tolerance for pain and prolonged fighting. Kale Obscura and Rayth Takahori are the best of the group, followed by Alfred Torson and Randal Clark. Vega Obscura shows promise but is still too young to accurately gauge.

He skipped ahead again. Nothing he didn`t already know. No advantages, no disadvantages, it was all information rehashed that he already knew, and he didn`t have the energy to peek through the psychological profiles. At least he thought he didn`t, but then the caffine started to kick in...

//Subject: Kale Obscura
//Age: 19
//Height: 6'1"
//Weight: 160 lbs
//Date of Birth: February 29th, CC 381
//Known Talents: Subject shows an innate ability to 'read' his opponent`s next moves, even when never having seen said-opponent. Possible telepath. Note the presence, also, of 6.25% unknown DNA. Similar anomaly located within younger brother, Vega Obscura(6.25%), and mother, Sarah Obscura(12.50%).
//Psychological Profile: Subject was once relatively cheerful, laid back and semi-humorous at times. Held a natural empathy for the Zoids seen in use during the deathmatches, though cared very little for the pilots. Subject also notably protective of younger brother. At present, subject is showing severe signs of mental trauma from an overdose of battle stress, along with the recent death of Alfred Torson and the vanishing of Rayth Takahori. Believed to have started with the removal of Stigma Stoller from the Five Kings Program. Shows rare signs of murderous bouts of anger. Also shows severe signs of contempt for his mother(Sarah Obscura), as well as other sources of authority.
//Related\Supplemental: Attempted murder of Backdraft Overseer, Altiel Vernon, attempted murder of Major Palta. Death threats made to the Count.
//Subject also shows signs of inherent mental instability. Should be considered highly dangerous, but has displayed one minor weakness in the past: His younger brother, Vega. Whether or not the weakness remains in his current state is unknown. Subject vanished before any attempt at discovering this could be made.

"So, this is what makes you tick, you little bastard," Steven Tauros mumbled to himself with determination, eyes narrowing as he scrolled down and began to read into Kale`s past for any other possible chinks in the killing machine`s armor.

The Thunder Team base, located just a few dozen miles from a city on the exact opposite end of the the neutral zone that served as ZBC territory. At present, everyone inside was still trying to figure out what to do with the recent loss of Bill Chapman. Even Sloan Tendro, easily the equal of Steven Tauros and Leyon Martin when it came to figuring things out, was completely clueless.

The problem was that the Thunder Team wasn`t going to have the time to make up their minds, because the base was being targeted from low orbit by a passing Judge Satellite. It would be passed off as a complete fluke mistake in the firing systems, providing the opening blow in the media to order the decomissioning of the orbital weapons platforms that were currently the only things capable of hitting anywhere on Zi at almost anytime, and at the very least, leave the orbitals down for several days as crews sought to figure out what went wrong.

In short: The Thunder Team had unknowingly been designated as the sacrificial pawns on the world`s chess board.

A second passed. There was a white glow in the sky, followed by an intense shriek of tortured atmosphere as an orbital strike-level charged particle beam tore through the cloudless heavens, stabbing into the very top of the base, blowing through the roof and gouging straight into the main hangar, where an unwitting Jeffrey Halsworth met his end in utter shock, not even having the time to let out a scream of surprised horror, or even fully register the emotion that the end of his life would have caused.

The rest of the base went out in the hundredths of a second that followed. The attack had been so quick and so fierce that the beam had literally burnt the atmosphere around the base into a vaccum, delaying the sound of the explosion for several seconds and leaving only an eerie, windswept silence to play out to the visual of a sub-nuclear explosion visible from a mile or more away.

Hundreds upon hundreds of miles away, in Nyx, a hacker elite turned around and shouted the news up to his commanding officer. What was to be considered the first shot by the Rommel organization had just been fired.

The second shot wasn`t too long after that. It was the shot that killed the hacker. He`d only been working under a threat of death after all, and if he had outlived his usefulness, why bother keeping him around?

In a hangar, situated miles off the ground, in the belly of the great Whale King Foxchild, Bill Chapman winced involuntarily, glancing in the direction of the explosion. He hadn`t heard it, he hadn`t felt it, hadn`t seen it and hadn`t been informed of it. He just knew. He knew that the lives of four people had just been ended in a singular fireball and he knew that he would be joining them if he made even one mistake too many.

"I`m sorry I let you down," he thought dimly to his newly departed team mates, holding his head down and leaning back against the support for the safety rail that bordered the wall-mounted catwalk from a twenty-five foot drop to the level of the hangar that the Geno Breaker was standing on. Borealis didn`t reply.

"Are you Harabec Davids?" A militaristic voice asked as the 46 year old ex-champion leered over his shoulder, a brow arching up as he saw the four men standing rather intimidatingly across the counter from him. It had caused a slight scene, several people were watching now. Most were giving passive glances, a few others were watching with nothing short of a cold sweat. The men were in fully military uniforms, the symbol of the Guardian Force emblazened into the shoulder patches of every one of them. The leader was obviously a high ranking Major, probably Imperial since it was custom for Imperial officers to carry their swords with them whenever they were in full uniform.

"That`s the name, don`t wear it out," he replied finally, putting down the glass mug he`d been about to fill.

"I am Major Conrad Robertson, with the Guardian Force. I`ve been sent here to deputize you into the Force for the specific purpose of stopping Kale Obscura," the Major stated. Harabec`s brow rose slightly. "That snot nosed punk is still causing trouble?"

"He`s been personally responsable for the deaths of at least five to ten thousand people," Conrad answered. "All of them borderzone patrol officers, Guardian Force task force members, former members of the Backdraft Group and convicted prisoners and their guards."

"The point is that you`re the only one who`s been shown to have the power to actually stop him," Conrad answered. Harabec shook his head.

"I beat Kale Obscura so easily the last time because I had the element of surprise, wouldn`t be so easy now. There`s also that minor technicality that he has an Organoid now," he explained plainly. "And until he starts slaughtering civilians, I have no reason to go after him again."

"Won`t work," Harabec stated, halting the movements of three of the four men instantly. "You`re all Imperial officers trying to draft in an unwilling Republican-born, neutral citizen," he explained bluntly. "Now, I don`t know too much `bout military procedures, but I do know my rights."

"This borders on treason," Conrad growled. "Treason? Hardly. I may be Republican by birth but I`m neutral by law, and the only law I have to answer to is the local authorities, not you."

"Sure it does, in times of open, active warfare. Last I checked, that ain`t the case."

Silence. The two exchanged a staredown, the intense Robertson trying in vain to intimidate the older man. He lost miserably.

"Very well then, I`ll just come back later with local authority to draft you, if that`s how you feel."

"Fine by me," Harabec shrugged, turning back to his business as the four men left without another word.

Most would`ve mistaken his actions for cowardice, but in truth, the reasons were far more complex. Farentown was one of the two largest, most populous places in the neutral zone, outranked only by Romeo City in the northwest. A population of close to two million, and it had no military defense, nor were there any quick response units nearby. Bandits weren`t entirely uncommon, but with things starting to heat up all over the world, Farentown stuck out like a sore thumb.

Harabec was currently the only person in the city who actually owned a combat Zoid other than the police. If any attacks came to the town, he was going to be there regardless.

Brad snuffed his cigarette out, and Leena cracked her neck to either side. Jamie was as silent as he had been throughout the majority of the day, and it had been roughly an hour since the lot had set out from the Blitz Team`s base. All three had launched without any of the usual banter, nor did they have any sort of strategy for the match. Jamie hadn`t spoken enough to even bring up the possibility of creating a strategy for the team to use, and Brad had made quite sure that Leena wasn`t really counting on the other teen`s assistance. Brad sure wasn`t, thus there wasn`t much of a point for Leena to, either.

A loud blast of super heated air filled a small space somewhere off in the distance, just out of sight. How far off, only Jamie actually knew - he was the only one high enough from the battlefield to actually see everything on it.

Across from the team stood a lone Zoid. It was about the same size as the Liger Zero, the same color scheme as well, bar it`s shape and a few other differences. It`s stabilizer 'caps' were colored a light blue-green, it`s white armor covered more of the body, it`s claws and teeth were silver rather than gold, and it was obviously a Zoid based off the frame of the Command Wolf, evidenced by the two smoke canister launch units on it`s back legs. A double sniper rifle was folded in half on it`s back, and a visor unit obviously intended for a combination of cockpit protection and optics enhancement was folded behind the ears, waiting for use. There were also a pair of blades extending down from the collar, sharp and just outside of the range of movement of the head, easily useful for discouraging an enemy in trying to run up under the Zoid.

It was a Konig Wolf, one of the rarer Zoids in use on the tournament circuits. Behind it sat a Gustav, towing two trailers - one latched to a container that had been adapted into a mobile home-away-from-home type of thing.

"I was wondering when you guys`d show up," Leyla`s voice finally came in. "What took ya so long?"

"What he said," Leena added with a dry tone. The Gunsniper skiddishly stepped up to the Scout Fox, standing next to it with no further exchange made. The Konig Wolf`s mere presence was intimidating for Leena, it`s pilot even more so. After all, she still had to deal with her own vanity, and Leyla already sounded prettier than she did, how much better did she look as well?

Such a relatively petty concern was far from the minds of both Leyla and Jamie though, all five of them. Leyla herself was paying more attention to the green blur overhead, and Jamie had yet to even give a hello, just circling up over the battlefield without a word.

For a girl who had already been stressed out over the prospect of battling a guy who had basically become her first boyfriend, her best friend and several other things(mainly due to Connie and Will`s little trist), his silence was almost enough to drive her mad. As it stood, that potential madness was averted at the last second as a fairly dreary, stress-worn voice sounded off over the comm.

"The area within a five mile radius is a designated Zoid Battlefield. This zone is now restricted. Only competitors and personnel have authorized entry. Danger! All others must leave the area at once. Area scanned. Battlefield set up. The Blitz Team versus the Tsun Team. Battle Mode 0982. Ready..."

Tension filled the battlefield. Seconds passed in an eternity as the four combatants set their sights on their respective targets.

Up in the sky with a bird`s eye view, Jamie was completely unsure of who to aim for. Thus he didn`t set his sights on anyone. There was an eerie silence in his thoughts, the usual background chatter of the Wild Eagle`s voice missing entirely. Had the alter ego finally ceded? Jamie didn`t feel different...

Aside from the growing sense of disgust for himself and mistrust of his own instincts, but that really wasn`t the point. His loyalties had yet to be decided, but now was the time to make his choice.

Author`s Note: Ahhh! Cliffhanger! :P Sorry if it seemed a bit rough towards the end, I ran into some major freaking writer`s block. And if the scene changes are rough(aka the breaks don`t work), blame FF.net and it`s current habit of screwing up my HTML.

EndlessAdventure: It`s cool. Not everyone has no social life like me, after all :P And yes, Mark and Abbie had quite the rude awakening, huh? Hopefully I`ll be able to build her character some more soon, she`s one of the people who have a fairly important role to play in the coming story. Glad to see how well received the Pierce and Oscar scene was... And to be honest: I actually did/am toying with the idea of tossing Pierce and Leon at each other. It`s one of the few couples that hasn`t been tried in anything I`ve seen so far >_>; And I was considering the idea of sticking Tauros and Sarah together, but decided against it. If such a thing does happen, it`ll only be lead into in NA/ROC(the next story`s initials, in case you`re wondering), not actually played out.

DJ Wolfwood: No need to apologize for anything o_O; Don`t see how you thought I`d be offended, really... *Tosses a cookie to DJ Wolfwood. One of the 8521735821758275210870954284765298717654127561512837564875168735618354645135135+infinity cookies that ZeonReborn has bombed me with.* :P

Illidan: Yes. I`m quite evil. So evil in fact that I`m cliffhanging you people. Brutally. And I don`t mean this chapter. *Mwahahahahaha* Just ask Zinou, I can be downright 3v1l l33t, more so than The Great Teacher Largo >_> As for Mark and Kyle... Expect more comedy from them when they see each other again, expect more brutality between Vega and Kale, expect serious development for Bit, Leon and just about everyone else, and expect Jamie`s embarrassment and bewilderment to stop being so quaint. This chapter was only the beginning of what I have intended for him...

And for anyone curious, ROC is not the name of Roc. It`s the initials of the next story, which I sha`n`t name until I`ve driven you all sufficiently insane. And if you do figure it out, don`t say it in a review. I`m kinda proud of having found a name untaken in the Zoids section...

That`s all for now folks. Expect the next chapter to be out when it`s finished, which may be anywhere from a few days to a week or two, or longer. But it won`t be months. I hate when authors take months on end to churn out a single chapter. *Twitch.*

New Age by Sh33p

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New Age

Chapter 33

Knife Walking