War Robots: Springfield

3/4: Kill Circle

The Spectre soared into the air, higher than any robot Eli had ever seen. Eli braced for the attack, the devastating impact of rockets, but at the last second he charged forward, making a beeline for the spot where the Spectre had once stood. If he got under the robot, there was no way it could hit him!

The Spectre was reaching the apex of its impossibly high jump now, and was on the way back down. There were only moments before Eli could be hit again!

Seconds before the rockets came, Eli leapt into the air. It wasn't the same awe-inspiring height that the Spectre had somehow managed, but the jump was enough to carry him away from most of the attack. Eli sailed into the mining district, landing behind a small building.

Safe.

He would not make the same mistakes Mathias made.

Eli braced himself, expecting an attack any second, but the Spectre ignored him, landing it's jump and firing on Commander Bright and the rest of his squad.

His comms crackled.

“Fall back! Fall back to the farm!” Bright was shouting. “Get the bridge bottlenecked and hold it!”

Eli could no longer see the battle from his position, but he knew for certain that he was trapped within the mining district. Behind enemy lines. If he couldn't get back to his squad, he was surely as dead as Mathias.

One bridge was blocked. He couldn't return the way he'd come, not without running into the Spectre. Crossing the dam's front was out of the question- the raging torrent of water would sweep him away. Even if he could somehow survive, the Spectre would still be in range to take him out.

That left one option.

The second bridge, located on the far side of the river, was still open. However, it meant a long run through enemy territory was necessary to escape.

Eli didn't have any longer to consider, because at that moment rocket fire impacted his robot, shaking him around, and he broke into a sprint towards the source. The Natasha awaited him on the other side of the mining district, lobbing round after round of artillery over his head. Eli shrugged. That meant the only way out was through.

The Griffin broke into its equivalent of a run, moving as fast as it’s reinforced joints would allow it. Missiles still rained from above as the Natasha tried to slow his approach, but they flew wide and missed impacting him for the most part.

Springfield’s mining district was divided by an emergency channel- a stone box filled with steel drainage gates. The river waited within, lapping at the rusted metal hungrily.

Eli had almost made it to the emergency channel when bullets struck his back, hollow impacts reverberating off the Griffin's armored back. Eli growled and spun his robot around in place, firing blindly backwards. As far as he could tell he hit nothing, because seconds later another barrage assaulted him from his other side.

Two Cossacks weaved back and forth between buildings, ducking out of cover in time to unload their Punisher, but fast enough to avoid retaliation. Eli ground his teeth. He hated being slower than his enemy.

The Cossacks flitted this way and that, gliding effortlessly around him. Whenever Eli had a clean shot hit target would leap behind cover and the assault would begin anew on his other flank. Eli growled, despite himself. He missed his quick, dependable Jesse.

Then again, his Jesse couldn't jump.

The Cossack's body pivoted, weapon firing wildly as Eli cleared the building his pesky foe was hiding behind. The Cossack hadn't been expecting any form of aerial retaliation and had nowhere to hide. It turned tail and sprinted away, making it only a few steps before a lucky shot blew apart the back end of it's cockpit. The battered Cossack tripped, falling forward in a shower of sparks, and was still, looking for all the world like a swatted bug. A cricket.

Sudden impacts, like explosions, rocket Eli in his seat. He couldn't see any smoke. Whatever had happened wasn't directed at him.

The second Cossack hopped away from him in a panic, firing desperately behind itself to cover it's tracks. Eli wasn't about to let it escape him again so he turned, marching back around the building he'd leapt over.

When he turned the corner he was face-to-cockpit with a massive Natasha. However, this wasn't the same panicked missile-lobbing robot that he'd chased away. This was a new robot, and it was much better equipped for a fight.

It's shotguns certainly seemed to say as much when they fired point-blank, smashing one of Eli's smaller Punishers to fragments.

The explosions he'd heard? Not explosions.
Impacts. From War Robots.

The Russian reinforcements had arrived, and Eli was smack-dab in the middle of their dropzone. Four Natashas and a Rogatka loomed in front of him, completely undamaged and ready for a fight.

Eli, damaged Punisher leaking spent bullet shells from its bent barrel, turned tail and ran.
Or, would have, if he'd had anywhere left to go. Eli stood, trapped between the edge of the emergency channel and Springfield’s river. Around him, blocking every angle of escape, were six new robots, fresh pilots ready to tear him apart. A kill circle.

Eli's comms crackled and Commander Bright's shouting burst through the static.

“Eli! Blasted comms, Eli can you hear me now? There are multiple new enemy signatures in your area and the Spectre is on it's way back! We're holding the bridge, but you need to get out of there, now!”

“The comms were down, Commander,” Eli said.

The robots loomed before him.

“Also, I found your new enemy signatures. I'm surrounded.”

Eli felt his Griffin tip, just slightly, as one of its feet reached the edge of the mining district. Below him was the waters of Springfield, a raging river that would short out his robot if he fell, drowning him in a metal tomb. The kill circle parted and in marched the Spectre, Orkans ready. His executioner, it seemed.

Eli turned his robot's body. He could see his squad on the other side of the river, waiting for him. Nobody fired a single shot. One bullet from them and he was as good as dead when his enemy retaliated.

His comms crackled again. The Spectre pilot wished to speak once again.

“You're on the wrong side, soldiers,” the Spectre pilot intoned. “Russia is innocent. You've been fed lies by the Transatlantic Military Corporation. You fight for their gain only and you don't even know it!”

Eli said nothing. The Spectre's pilot seemed desperate to end the fight, and it didn't seem like it was because they were losing.

There was an audible sigh over the comms.

“I'm sorry about your friend,” the pilot said. “He attacked first. It was reflex.”

Eli became very aware that his next words would likely be his last. The river raged beneath him.  The Spectre stared back, red camera lenses conveying the feeling of unblinking eyes.

Eli coughed.
“Listen, I don't know if you're telling the truth, or-”

BOOM!

The Spectre staggered backwards, a burning, twisted pile of metal marking where one of it's Orkans used to be. Eli turned, stunned into silence. Across the river, the Fury stood, one Kang Dae cannon smoking.

Behind it, many robots fell from the sky. Americans pilots, reinforcements. Or were they TMC pilots now? Eli didn't know if the Spectre was telling the truth, but at that moment the Russian robots began to fire on him. Shotgun spray and rocket impacts marred his robot as he turned, ready to die a glorious death.

But the Spectre never fired a shot.
Eli realized he couldn't shoot it. He didn't want to. The Spectre's pilot was telling the truth. He was the invader, here. The Russian Empire was defending itself.

Eli was on the wrong side of the Iron War.

With the kill circle closing in on all sides his, Griffin's armor integrity dropping like a stone and one Punisher lying broken on the ground, Eli only had one option that didn't involve fighting his way out.

He turned towards the river and leapt high into the air, hoping that somehow he would make it to the other side intact.