Darling in the FranXX: Insurrection

Chapter 45 - The Indomitable Foe (Part 1)

Hello everyone, thank you for your patience! I started a new job just after last chapter's upload and things have taken some time to settle in. I won't hold you long, just wanted to explain the absence. Below you'll find a link for the general layout of VIRM's base and the surrounding area for reference as you read. Looking forward to your feedback as always!

Link: imgur[]/a/KaLT7oH

Don't forget to replace the brackets with dot and com!

Dusk falls on a secluded coastal mountain range, the waning sun only just visible over the horizon. 80 rebel FranXX slowly and silently creep through a forest of conifers to the range's northeast on their way to their target. Somewhere within the largest of the five peaks, the Virtual Intelligence Reputable Monitor hides.

This will not be a smash and grab mission as the resistance force is used to conducting. Tonight's objective is to raze the facility and destroy VIRM. With it out of the picture, the Nines would be APE's only ace. Removing those psychopaths wouldn't be easy, but as long as VIRM continued to exist it was impossible. As a result, all rebel forces on the lower half of the island have converged on this location.

Twelve hours ago, an attack had been made on one of APE's largest supply and transport depots in the center of the island to act as a diversion and draw away any forces it could. Unfortunately, it doesn't seem that any of VIRM's guards were called away. However, the reinforcements it would inevitably try to summon once the battle began would be unable to respond as quickly, if they were able at all.

Valkyra observes the facility, her pupils dilating as her vision shifts between levels of magnification. It is truly a fortress. First there is an outer wall, equipped with an assortment of manned cannons and automatic rail turrets controlled by VIRM. From the briefing she knows that behind it there is another wall that is nearly identical, with just enough space between them to create a kill field. Further still are the supporting facilities of the base surrounding the mountain itself. Only once each of these obstacles had been cleared could the assault on the interior of the mountain, which would be completely blind, commence.

Kyo sighs. "They never make things easy, do they?"

Valkyra smiles at her partner. "No, they don't. Have a little faith, you and I have been through worse."

"Worse, yeah," he chuckles. "I don't remember the Garden being worse."

There is a pause in the conversation as Valkyra issues orders via hand signals to some of the rebel line. They are passed down to each squad spaced roughly every hundred yards along the forest's edge.

"I got stabbed multiple times," the mech answers coolly.

"Right," Kyo places his right hand behind his head. "I'll try not to let that happen again."

A low rumble emanates from within the unit, Valkyra's laugher. "I appreciate it."

The pair look one another dead in the eye via the feeds of the FranXX's internal monitor.

"Are you ready for this?" the lieutenant commander of the resistance asks her partner.

With a nod, Kyo replies, "I'm ready when you are."

Valkyra steps out of the tree line and into the two-mile flat surface between the waiting rebel forces and the mountain range VIRM hides itself under.

"To the defenders of this facility, you are about to fall under siege. This is your one and only chance to surrender. There will be no quarter."

The transmission is met only with silence. On the battlements of the first wall, the cannons and automated turrets menacingly align themselves to meet the oncoming attackers, and a force of FranXX 90 strong steps out to bar their advance. They position themselves close to the facility itself, between the fortified walls and the rebels.