Assault (Red vs Blue)

31: The Fight For Armonia, Pt. 1

31: The Fight For Armonia, Pt. 1

Present Day: Downtown Armonia (The planet Chorus)

York stood in the street with the others as they looked at the prison ship that was looming over the city. Troops were dropping from the open hatches at an alarming rate, and the streets were quickly filling with Charon's soldiers. He noticed some of the black clad soldiers had colored accents on their armor; of course the members of Project Independence were there, too. It was bad enough that they were going to have to battle through the waves of Charon's typical troops, but now they had the members of their sister organization to deal with. Things were going to be considerably more difficult with them involved.

"Why is this happening?!" Tucker demanded as he grabbed his rifle off his back.

"I thought you guys said Charon wouldn't try attacking the city?!" Simmons hollered as he armed himself as well.

Doyle backed up slightly in terror as a group of space pirates landed just down the street in front of them. "I . . . I never thought they'd be so bold as to attempt something like this! They'd take on too many casualties!"

Wash stepped forward, placing himself between the advancing soldiers and Doyle. "Well, clearly the Chairman decided he doesn't care how many people he loses. They have one of the Keys. If something happens to Doyle, the amount of people lost won't matter. They'll be able to kill us all."

Sarge pumped his shotgun, racking a round into the chamber. "Then it's up to us to make sure they lose all their men! We need to take action!"

"Mwahaha! Yes, finally! Time to forget about this stupid counseling session! Bring on the blood bath! Give me violence!" Doc exclaimed in O'Malley's voice.

"We need to get out there! Let's stick it to 'em, gang!" Donut said as he prepared to take off running, gun in hand.

"Guys, wait!" Church said, causing all the Reds and Blues to stop. "I, uh . . . I came up with an idea. A better one. But I don't think you guys are gonna like it too much — if at all."

"Let's be real here; it can't be much worse than our current plan," Grif pointed out.

Church took a deep breath. "Kimball had a point when she called Armonia a death trap. But it doesn't have to be that way for us."

Tucker looked at his team leader. "What the hell are you talking about?"

"Look, we're not gonna be able to save everyone. We knew that already," Church explained. "But maybe there's a way to make sure Doyle stays alive and we save as many people as we can. There's a nuclear reactor in the middle of Armonia, right?"

"That is correct," Doyle replied hesitantly. "But what does that have to do with anything?"

"If we could evacuate as many people is possible while keeping Charon's forces trapped within the city, we could set the reactor off and take them all out at once," Church said.

"But that would destroy the city!" Doyle protested. "Everything we've been working so hard to protect would be gone! We'd have nothing left!"

Kimball shook her head. "That's not true. Armonia isn't specifically what we're fighting for. The Capital can always be rebuilt. But that means we need people left to be able to rebuild it. If we evacuate the city and set off the reactor, Charon will suffer the biggest amount of casualties. It's gonna be our best chance at making it out of here alive."

York looked at Carolina and Tex. "What do you think, bosses? Think they're onto something?"

"Actually, they might be," Tex admitted. "We take that risk and it pays off, Charon won't be able to recover. Not very quickly, anyway. I say we go for it."