The town council of Desham was in complete chaos, with frantic members running across the entire building which hosted all of their arctech phone lines, none of it which was working.
“What’s going on? Why can’t we call Tenar for help?”
“Sir, the radios are working fine when tested at short range, but any long-range communication out of the city is completely unusable!”
“Someone or something is interrupting our communications. Could it be-“
“Do not panic! Officer Gabriel will soon have the town under control and –“
“Idiot! The battle is already lost! We need to evacuate before the Yual Dominion starts to invade us! We need to run!”
The panic began to spread through all the members slowly, wondering if they were the first town to have been hit by the imminent war. Based on their location, they should have been well protected by the Keru Forest, serving as a large natural blocker. However, they could not ignore the fact that the Yual Dominion could easily send a force through to destabilise them first.
“Officer Gabriel was right about the external intervention! The Yual Dominion is riling up the locals and using them against us.”
“Our food supply has been crippled: soon, even the upper class would turn against us!”
“We need to evacuate immediately! Send a messenger to Gabriel to lift the martial law at the exits!”
“But sir, that would defeat the purpose of the military encirclement of the slums. What if those responsible managed to evacuate with us –“
“If you want to die as a prisoner of war, suit yourself!”
The council began to execute their evacuation and emergency procedures prepared in the event of war, telling their family and loved ones to prepare. A messenger quickly sprinted out of the council building, running straight for the last known command post of Gabriel in the slums.
Before he could even turn the corner, a burly man was standing right in front of him, machine gun in his arm. With a click of the trigger, a storm of bullets blasted the messenger into pieces in seconds, while the burly man immediately ran off, disappearing from view.
A mad rush to pack up and flee Desham as word of imminent war began to spread like wildfire, every citizen grabbing all their valuables and belongings. They ran out onto the streets, only to join a never-ending queue of arctech wagons which were stalled at the gate to beyond Desham.
The wagon drivers at the front shouted angrily at the soldiers who were blockading the gate. “Why aren’t you letting us go? Do you want all of us to be captured by the Yual Dominion?”
“What? I never heard anything about that. There is martial law applied now; please return to your homes!” The soldiers never received the message due to the communication blackout, having stood guard at the exits for the last few days as part of the military encirclement.
“Shut up! I am a proud citizen of Desham – I funded the council and military, and you’re telling me you won’t let me escape war? Fuck you!”
“Yea, we pay your salary! Let us through!” Another driver chimed in.
“Sir, if I flout martial law it will be punishable by death!” The soldier tried to explain.
One of the drivers pulled out an ornate arctech handgun, aiming it right at the soldier. “Well if you are not going to let us go immediately, then you can die here!”
“Sir, put down the gun now!” The soldiers at the gate reacted strongly, aiming their own repeaters and machine guns at the crowd. “Put down the gun now or I’ll shoot!”
“Just let us go!”
The stream of evacuation refugees began to crowd around the main exits of the town, there only being three. Each suffered from the same lack of communication, resulting in misunderstandings and tensions between the military and the citizens.
As they jostled and fought against the blockade, the sound of a whizzing projectile soared over the town’s buildings, hitting the exit gate squarely and exploding. The soldiers cowered from the mortar strike as the arched gateway began to collapse on itself, the wall guards on the time screaming as they fell and were dashed against the rubble of rock below, blocking off the exit completely.
A cacophony of screams erupted from the refugees as they fled from the ensuing collapse of wall rock, some of which rolled and crushed them with impunity. As the collapse ceased, the refugees turned and peered through the smog of white rock dust, only to see an insurmountable slope of pure rubble, one which they would not be able to clear out anytime soon.
“How-how are we going to get out of Desham now? We’re dead!”
“No, there are still other exits! Let’s go, quickly!”
The refugees swarmed towards the other exits, but the same thing was happening at all of the other gates.
Each of the exits was somehow systematically hit by the mortar strikes, collapsing them in turn and preventing both soldier and citizen from leaving Desham. Even the military stairwells that led to the top of the well were suddenly occupied by slum dwellers as they charged up, fighting the wall guards in a straight line fire-fight, battling for control.
Gabriel stood in shock at his command post, able to see the fighting spread onto the walls. Defeat? In my own town? When the war has not even started…?
“Sir! The slum dwellers are pushing our position! They’ll reach us in five minutes at this rate – we’re running out of ammunition!” A sergeant desperately grabbed Gabriel by the shoulder, shaking him. “Sir? Your orders? Sir!”
In the distance, Gabriel could see the intense skirmish, arctech bombs and gunfire slung between two sides in a harrowing showdown, where blood ran through the streets as both soldier and slum dweller fell. However, with no garrison barracks left and their ammunition store completely destroyed, there was no chance even to fight back.
“Sir? Orders, sir!”
The eyes of the slum dwellers were ferocious, all looking straight at the command post as they pushed on relentlessly, undeterred by the suppressive fire the soldiers tried to put out.
“There’s the officer! Kill him!”
“Lynch him!”
The calls woke him up from his stupor, realising what would happen to him if he were to be caught by them. “Sergeant. Have all the soldiers evacuate the town immediately. Use our secret tunnels immediately. Go now. Save everyone you can.”
“Yes, sir!” The sergeant was more than happy to get out of this hellhole, immediately relaying the order. The soldiers began to retreat, abandoning the command post. However, Gabriel himself did not retreat, even as the slum dwellers got closer and closer, with Diya leading them.
“Sir, what are you planning on doing?!” The last soldier tried to drag Gabriel along with them.
“Don’t worry, just go now!” Gabriel shrugged his arm off, motioning for them to leave. It burnt a memory into the retreating soldiers of an officer who was willing to fight for his soldiers as they left him alone. However, Gabriel was not going to be as noble.
Instead of fighting, he pulled out a handgun and aimed it right under his chin. He did not want to let his soldiers see him committing suicide. I will not let them have the satisfaction of capturing me alive!
Before he could pull the trigger, a single shot pierced through his right arm, causing him to scream in pain and drop the handgun, the friction from the projectile burning his nerves.
“Nobody said you could choose when to die,” Diya spoke as she walked up to Gabriel, delivering a strong punch to his face and knocking him down onto the ground. “You lost that choice when you chose for others. Tie him up! We’ll need him for later.”
The retreating soldiers attempted to use the secret tunnels, only to find out that a few council members in the know were already there, though they were moving extremely slowly due to the sheer amount of belongings that were being ferried by the servants down the tunnel.
“What the fuck is this?” One of the sergeants remarked as he noticed a servant of the council member carrying an opulent blue velvet carpet, attempting to stuff it through with his body in a small tight tunnel. “This tunnel is meant for escape, not for all your stupid, worthless belongings!”
“Shut up! That carpet is worth more than your entire platoon.” A council member rebuked the soldiers, causing them to be even angrier at what was happening. Officer Gabriel sacrificed himself for this cunts?!
A knowing look was exchanged between the soldiers, prompting them to grab the council member by the limbs. The servants immediately brandished their knives but were stalled by the soldiers, who all held arctech repeaters. “Do you really want to sacrifice yourself for this shithole of a master? Huh?”
“Let me go this instant! This is treason!” The council member struggled against the restraints. “If you just wait half an hour, the tunnel will be free to use!”
“Like hell, I’m going to wait!” The sergeant executed the council member on the spot with a gunshot right to the head. “Clear out the damn fucking tunnel!”
The soldiers fired shots into the tunnel, causing the servants who were still ferrying goods within to scream and speed up their pace, clearing out the length of the tunnel. “Good, let’s go. If we can get out of Desham and get the message out to the military, we can exact revenge for Officer Gabriel!”
“Yes, sir!”
But just as they began to enter the tunnel one by one, a loud scream could be heard at the front, along with what sounded like the slashing of flesh. The servants began to cry out in horror one by one, dropping the items they were carrying and running back, trying to squeeze past the soldiers.
“What? What’s going on?” The sergeant in the lead stared at a bloodied servant who attempted to squeeze past him, only to notice a black obsidian blade suddenly jutting out of his guts before the servant was torn in half, the blade slicing vertically upwards to reveal a warrior mineral ant.
“Shit!”
The sergeants and the soldiers raised their repeaters on instinct, prepared to fire. “It’s just one ant! Fir-“
The walls on the side of the tunnels burst, simultaneously collapsing parts of the tunnel onto the screaming soldiers and running servants, while two more mineral ants burst out, overpowering the soldiers in an instant as they were no match for them in such tight, enclosed spaces.
Not all the retreating soldiers moved to the tunnels, some groups having headed over to other parts of the city to loot and pillage what they could, all led by the various sergeants.
“This town has gone to shit! We need to find a new base to entrench ourselves in, snatch all the food we can and hold out as long as possible!”
Just like that, the various retreating groups became deserters, vying for scraps of what was left. Some of the stupider ones went straight for the houses of wealthy individuals, believing that they could use the luxuries to barter.
The more apt ones headed straight for the food storage area, intent on salvaging what was left of the explosion and the raging fire that was still going, illuminating the sky with an orange hue. As they approached, they could hear blood-curdling screams and sounds of gunfire from within the grain storage area. “The original attackers are still here!”
Each group spotted one another, agreeing to band together to enter at the same time, though internally, they were already planning to betray each other for total control of the food storage area. Forming a temporary alliance, they rushed into the food storage area with guns readied, only to stop in fright.
Not a single one of them could describe it as anything else other than utter carnage, with the entire main area between buildings littered with body parts, strewn flesh and a pool of blood. A single surviving guard was still hiding behind the corpses of his dead comrades, firing wildly in fear at a lone man who was stained with blood all over his body.
In one swift leap, the lone man pounced onto the surviving guard, punching him right in the face and caving in the entire front of his skull, killing him instantly.
[System Message]
Killed [Desham Guard], +50 EXP
Kyle turned to see the new group of soldiers staring at him in horror.
“Idiots! What are you waiting for? Kill him!” The sergeants roared, prompting the soldiers to fire their repeaters at him quickly.
The projectiles never made it to him, pounding the dead corpses with barely audible thuds as Kyle jumped and leapt through the messy battlefield, using every damaged crate, wagon and collapsed building to serve as cover.
“Spread out! Surround him!”
