Earth Year 2840. The Mystic Jungle.
The Next Day, Five miles away from the FOB, Commander Jordan Maroon and N032 navigated the massive interlocking branches of the bone wood trees to avoid the mana snare vines and predatory fauna below.
"Watch your footing on these branches,"
Maroon muttered, scanning the foliage for thermal signatures.
"We need to ensure the route to the Aegis isn’t choked with assimilated crew,"
Maroon explained as N032 moved like a silent shadow beside him.
"Take five,"
Maroon signaling a halt as they reached a clear view of the sprawling jungle.
"You carry yourself like a man who has buried too many,"
Maroon voice cutting through the ambient hum.
"I have seen enough veterans to recognize that kind of silence,"
Maroon added.
N032 slowly turned his head to the Commander.
"War only has one guarantee, Commander, The casualty list."
N032 stated flatly.
"I know that look,"
Maroon sighed.
"Even behind a visor, I know the weight of it, You’re looking at those kids, Zeon, Ruby, the rest of them and you’re calculating how to trade your life for theirs, You think your sacrifice is the only acceptable tactical play here, don’t you?"
Maroon challenged.
N032 simply rested as Maroon flexed his own cybernetic fingers.
"Twenty years ago,"
Maroon said, his voice dropping to a uncharacteristic vulnerability.
"I was a Lieutenant on the Outer Rim colonies when a localized spatial rift opened,Nothing like this, just a small alien parasite to slip through but it hit the civilian sectors first, It happened so fast we didn’t even have time to establish proper quarantines,"
Maroon whispered, looking up at the shattered violet sky.
"My wife, Freya and my daughter... they were in Sector 4 while I was leading the evacuation in Sector 1,"
Maroon confessed.
"I followed the protocol, I held the line and by the time the fleet arrived to glass the colony... I was standing on a mountain of ash holding a scorched ribbon that used to belong to my little girl, I did my duty but I lost my entire world,"
Maroon choked out.
N032 remained silent listening to the horrific confession.
"You wear your armor,"
Maroon continued looking at N032’s suit.
"I wear mine, I built a wall of protocol, rank and discipline so high that nothing could ever hurt me like that again, But when I look at Zeon, at those recruits, I see the exact same terrified kids I couldn’t save twenty years ago,"
Maroon revealed.
Walking over to N032, the Commander no longer saw a weapon but instead saw a tragic mirror of himself.
"I don’t care what your name is, I don’t care what black ops ghost division you deserted from,"
He insisted.
"But I know a fellow soldier mourning loved ones when I see one,You’ve lost your world, haven’t you?"
Maroon asked gently.
"In my time i lived through ,I couldn’t save them, I was too slow, and I was too weak, I watched my world burn to ash and I was the only one left standing in the ruins, Every face I see now is just a ghost I failed to protect,"
N032 mourned turning to face Maroon.
"When you lose an entire world, Commander, You realize the only thing left to fight for is the people standing next to you, I will not let the Abyss take them,"
N032 swore.
"Not in this life."
"Then we stand together, ghost,"
Maroon replied extending his right hand.
N032 reached out Maroon’s cybernetic hand in a soldier’s grip forged in mutual loss.
"BEEP,"
Maroon’s cybernetic eye suddenly red.
"Movement,"
Maroon hissed to breaking the handshake and dropping to a crouch with his rifle raised.
"I’m picking up massive thermal signatures,"
Maroon warned.
"Three klicks dead ahead which means we’re close to the Aegis,"
He calculated.
"Get your sword ready, because it looks like a slaughterhouse,"
Maroon warned.
They moved swiftly to a high rocky ridge overlooking the crash site discovering a apocalyptic three way war instead of a simple mechanical screech.
The Abyss attempted to consume the Aegis but thousands of azure mana snare vines and armored quadruped beasts violently pushed the Eldritch Horrors back by tearing into the eldritch flesh.
Maroon in awe watching a native warrior summon a magical hurricane to rip an eldritch horror to shreds.
"The flora, the fauna, the natives... they’re coordinating,"
Maroon realized as hundreds of seven foot tall native warriors rained concentrated lightning arrows and crescent wind blades upon the Abyssal horde.
"I’ve never seen an entire ecosystem weaponize itself like this,"
Maroon added in sheer shock.
"The Abyss is a cosmic virus that consumes realities and it doesn’t matter if it’s technology or magic,"
N032 explained.
"This world recognizes the rot and it refuses to die quietly,"
N032 noted looking down at the sprawling magical battlefield.
"This Planet is alive,"
N032 declared.
"And we are watching its immune system fight the infection,"