Execute Mission

After the troops had driven for the past few days with rest they were finally closing in on their objective, the city was only an hour away and the other tank group had split up two hours ago.

Everyone was getting anxious and were waiting for the time the gunfire would start, Atlas was finishing up his drawing of Charlie.

Even with the tank moving around and shaking Atlas had made the drawing perfect in every way.

"Hey Samantha, how did the scarecrow get a medal ey?" Charlie asked from out of nowhere.

"Don't you start" She warned.

"He was… the best in his field" Charlie laughed, Atlas grew a smile and watched Samantha hit Charlie over the head.

Julie glanced up from the map she had in her hands, she sighed and folded the map up and placed her rifle on her lap.

"You guys shouldn't joke around, the other tanks should be getting to their destination anytime now" Julie said, Charlie looked over to her and smiled.

"Who's going to freshen up the mood then if things get bad?" He asked Julie.

"We don't need that" She replied in a stern tone.

"Tank Squad has made it to the opposite side from the city, permission to start the operation?" The radio turned on.

Samantha reached over and took the radio box in her hands before speaking.

"Permission granted, I want all tanks to start pushing into the city" She ordered, the radio had a bunch of replies while the tanks started to move.

"Atlas, you go with Charlie and Julie to start clearing buildings, I want to have the tanks take all the attention so be quick" Samantha ordered.

"Yes ma'am" Atlas replied, the three jumped off the tanks and started to move through the treeline and into the first building.

Atlas looked back once more to see the tanks, he took a deep breath and followed his squadmates through the city.

"We will have contact the closer we get so I'm going to start making the bomb" Julie said when they were five blocks away from their objective.

Atlas nodded and walked over to Charlie who was looking out of a window. Atlas peeked over his friend's shoulder and saw that the streets were surprisingly clear.

Once he was about to move to the back window he heard the tanks starting to make noise, their large cannons boomed through the small city mixed with the sound of rubble and gunfire.

"Stay on point Atlas, shoot to kill if you see any Gyrun" Charlie said to Atlas.

"Y-yeah" Atlas stuttered as the memory of him killing the injured Gyrun in the forest came flooding back.

They watched as everything seemed calm, Atlas continued to scan the streets but something shining in a tower caught his eye.

He pointed his rifle up and was about to decide whether to shoot or not when a shot rang out and a muzzle flashes a quick light from the tower.

"Sniper!" Samantha yelled in the radio, Atlas found one on the last building along with dead Fendel soldiers.

He took the radio with him that was currently strapped to his back, Atlas then realized that the light was a sniper scope.

He took a breath and focused on the long shot that he made many times in basic, as he released his breath he pulled the trigger and watched as a body fell from the tall building.

"Why did you shoot!?" Julie yelled at Atlas who quickly turned back to her.

"B-but he was going to kill our guys" Atlas replied.

"That's what they wanted us to do, they wanted us to shoot so we could expose our position!" She raised her voice more.

"I-I'm sorry, I-I didn't know" He stuttered.

"Doesn't matter, we need to find new cover since they probably have men nearby that will come this way soon" Charlie intervened.

"Good thing I finished the bomb, let's move" Julie ordered, Atlas and Charlie started to move with Julie who was moving through building to building to their objective.

The sound of running came closer to them, Charlie motioned everyone to duck as sounds of doors getting broken came closer to them.

Julie motioned for Atlas to run out of their building when the sounds came closer, the tanks were quieting down but gunfire was still raging.

"You want me to run out there with however many Gyrun are out there?" Atlas whispered to her, and Julie nodded.

"You got us into this mess so you will take responsibility" She whispered back, Atlas knew that this wasn't the only reason she wanted him to expose himself but he didn't want to think about this now since it could get his squadmates killed.

He decided to run outside of the cracked open door and go to the closest building near him.

He slammed the door wide open and sprinted across the street, the sound of popcorn that would normally be relaxing made fear and adrenaline filled his veins as he moved quicker.

Atlas saw out of the corner of his eye that there were about ten soldiers who were trying to shoot him, he looked forward to a small red building with a glass window near the door.

He dove into the glass making it shatter and he tried his best to roll so he didn't injure his arms badly. He quickly got up and ran over to the nearest door inside the building and went into the room.

He slammed the door closed and sighed in relief as he managed to make it alive, he quickly checked his body for any holes and gave one last sigh of relief as he was clean.

The sound of heavy breathing made Atlas lookup, he saw two little girls that were around 9 and 12 years old who were huddled against the wall with tears in their eyes.

They showed only fear as he saw them both, he instantly knew they were Gyrun from their blue eyes and dark hair color.

"Shhh" Atlas put his finger to his lips to try and relax them, they were frozen in shock as he stood there with his rifle in hand.

He racked another bullet when he remembered the Gyrun soldiers who slammed the front door open.

He crouched down and walked a few steps back while aiming at the door with the girls behind him.

"Chercher le soldat ennemi, il n'a pas pu aller bien loin" A voice ordered. Atlas put a grenade in his hand and slowly stalked his way to the door.

He pulled the pin and opened the door wide enough to fit the grenade before he tossed it on the other side.

He shut the door and jumped back to his rifle where he then used his body to shield the girls if anything went wrong.

"GRENADE!" A woman screamed, not a second after the grenade blew up, making the walls feel like they shook.

He turned back around quickly and picked up his rifle and slowly moved to the door, some sounds could be heard out of the gunfire in the distance.

People groaned and screamed in pain as some survived, he heard more people enter the house where he stopped moving.

Atlas closed his eyes and thought about the sounds of the footsteps, he ignored the firefight that was going on at each of the city.

He raised his rifle and when he thought about the exact location of some people he quickly shot the door where he heard three people fall to the ground with a thud.

He opened the door and saw four people on the ground who were injured, other bodies littered the ground with blood spilling out of them.

He knew that he killed at least the ones he saw in his peripheral vision but didn't know if there were more or not, he shot the four injured who had grenade fragments in them and one had a blown off leg.

Atlas looked back to the frightened girls who coward further into the wall. Atlas sighed and walked over to them and they started to cry.

"Please don't cry, here have this" Atlas said in a small tone, he reached into his bag and pulled out some chocolate he brought with him that everyone got on the ship.

The older girl looked at him with tears still streaming down her face, she then looked to the chocolate where she snatched it out of his hands.

She looked back once more to Atlas who was now smiling, she bowed her head slightly and opened the wrapper.

"Regarde nous a donné du chocolat, prends-en un" The girl said to her crying sister.

Atlas gave one last smile until he decided to leave them and made sure to make a plan to come back and get them since they shouldn't be in this place alone.

As he started to walk out when a hand grabbed his shirt, he looked back to see the older sister holding onto him.

"N'y va pas, c'est dangereux là-bas" The girl tried to warn Atlas but he couldn't understand her.

"I'll be back ok, I'm going to take you somewhere safe alright" He promised the girls, he removed her hand and left the room before closing the door.

The sound of soldiers running was quickly making their way to Atlas' location, he jumped out of the back window where it smashed to pieces.

Atlas bolted down the street and decided to make the soldiers leave the girls since they might look around the house so he grabbed his pistol from its sleeve that clutched the weapon tightly.

He drew out the large revolver and pointed to the air. The sound of the air breaking could be heard as he pulled the trigger five times leading to him knowing what trouble he had now caused.