Eagles in Gear

Chapter 2

Alarik clutches onto something as he looks out and sees movement moving into the compound from where the explosion happened. He tries to regain balance as he hears gunshots across the camp and men screaming and cursing out their Germanic dialects. Alarik reaches into his bag and pulls out a pistol, a little older than the newer designs the Empire has issued to other battalions.

Olrin is struggling to get to his feet as he clutches his side. Apparently when he fell, his right side slammed into the side of a table. He groans with pain but he is now filled with adrenaline and ignores the pain for now. The men in the tent were startled or thrown out from how big and how powerful the explosion rippled throughout the camp. An officer was outside Alarik's window, spitting out orders for every man capable of holding a weapon to defend before being shot in the head. His head whip lashed back into the window and slumped and slid down. Alarik can't see through the thickness of blood the corpse left behind.

The two men who were already awake tried getting everyone up to speed on what's happening. "Do we know who we are up against?" says Louis, a peppy newcomer who joined the company after the operations.

A much broader and older man was directly behind Louis. This person is already putting on his pilot jumpsuit as he answers Louis.

"It is probably the local resistance fighters. they have been acting up ever since we took the rest of France. Nasty little fuckers and too stubborn to know that the war is over."

Louis looked behind him to respond. "But Raymond, these guys are too heavily armed to be Resistance."

Raymond sighs and grabs Louis by the hair and forces him to one of the filth-infested windows and shoves his face against the glass for Louis to see more "clearly".

"Do you see those ragtag, unorderly blue and brown shit stains on their clothing? DO YOU, ENLIST?!?!?" Raymond growls angrily as he squeezes Louis's hair tighter and he yelps in pain.

"Y-Yes i do...please fucking stop this pain!..." Louis cries out. Orlin pats Raymond's shoulders to signal to stop and Raymond lets go and walks away, slightly fuming. A mechanic runs into the tent, holding the company issued rifles. "All walkers are ready for combat, pilots! get to it. they are after the Resistance prisoners that we have captured and are ready for execution so get to it, lads." The mechanic salutes the pilots and he sprints out of the tent and fires at the enemy to give the pilots time to get ready.

After they have gotten their gear in-check, they all grab a weapon from the case the mechanic brought with him to supply the pilots. All standard carbines. Classic weapons and more versatile than a pistol could in a pro-long engagement. Alarik leads the way to the garages and each pilot diverges to their own walker. Alarik looks up at his walker, sighs, and climbs the ladder to get into the seat. He uses his precautionary system checks before turning on the beast. He feels the walker come to life as he wriggles his fingers around the two joysticks. His mind is racing from the layout before him, of which press of a button to push in case of every scenario. A radio turns on in his headset.

"Is all systems checked and ready, Pilot?" a voice is sounded in his ear.

"Affirmative, all systems are a go." Alarik replied into his microphone.

"Alright pilot, the amount of enemies we have here are highly equipped. They have anti-armor so i would best keep that smokescreen at the ready. Give them hell, Komrade." The Mechanic replied.

Alarik grins in a new thrill of excitement. He urges the throttle and he feels the sudden speed of his walker strengthen this adrenaline.