All I Can Do

-1:27 P.M.-

"Surrender and die... easy?! You got me fucked up!" Cody shouted out with all the pain locked away in his chest. He wiped the blood off of his head and unsheathed his two daggers.

With no delay, Cody started running at soldiers, jumping off of their shields and slashing around with his daggers. I couldn't count how many throats were being cut right now. Cody was practically sliding around in blood while killing as many soldiers as possible. The rope had hit the bottom of the hole a while ago, but Cody was being rapidly surrounded, killing as many soldiers as I had seen anybody do so yet.

In his one second of free time, Cody slipped the stim-shot out of his chest pocket and stabbed it straight into his neck with a smile. He injected all of it and threw the syringe to the side, charging back in without delay.

"Robby! Charlie! Tyler! We have soldiers coming! Prepare for defense!" David shouted out.

"We can't leave Cody!" I yelled back to David, but he turned to me with tears in his eyes.

"We made a pact... before we came to this fight, we said that we'd go out fighting if the time ever called for it... his time calls for it, now let him die freely! Defend those we've set this base up for!" I paused as David shouted back at me one last time.

I was selfish... I wasn't respecting Cody's wishes to die fighting... but why would he die doing something as meaningless as that?! I couldn't accept that... I didn't want to... why is he being so noble when we could go down there and rescue him?! Why did he make this pact?!

I wiped away my tears, drew my sword, and gripped it tightly. They cornered my friend... THEY'D ALL PAY!

I jumped into combat, just as Cody did, and I started to kill as many as I could see. Jumping between everyone. I threw my shield and dagger as an offense, picking them up as I came across them again while killing as many as possible.

The rage within my bones had become so intense that on my final swing before I stopped myself, I cut straight through somebody's skull. Their brain slipped out and splattered on the floor. The blade of my sword was no longer sharp.

"Charlie... good work out there. Everybody! I want a secure perimeter down here, and I want that trebuchet gone!" David yelled out. We all agreed, and several members of the original force stayed behind to defend the base, while David, Tyler, Robby, and I went to destroy that trebuchet.

The location was confusing, as it was up the hill that we placed the first base near the bottom of, but it was easy to access. We just had to climb up some ice and then we could take it down... but what would be able to destroy it? I looked at Robby and found out which weapon we were using.

David and Tyler ran in first after climbing the ice to kill the soldiers on the trebuchet. They did it, and the only person who took damage was David. Even so, it was only a small cut on his arm because of how careless he was.

"Robby, use your hammer to destroy this part right here." David pointed toward one of the wooden beams supporting the bowl on the very end. Once Robby hit it, the whole trebuchet rocked forward and the stopper on one of the wheels had popped out.

It slowly started to drift downwards on the hill. If it drifted too far downwards, the trebuchet would roll into everyone at the bottom of the hill and wipe out the frontline! Shit!

I rose my shield and slammed it into the wheel. I bent it really well, but that didn't stop the trebuchet from rolling. Only one side of it had permanently stopped.

"Robby! Hit that wheel with your hammer!" I yelled out. Robby nodded and rose his hammer. Before he could slam it downwards, somebody behind him grabbed the hammer he held and prevented it from swinging downwards.

I noticed far too late, but the next time I looked at Robby, he had a sword sticking through his gut and a smiling soldier behind him. He wasn't wearing any armor... he looked important! Could we fight him?!

David pulled out his glaive as the man walked past Robby. Tyler snuck behind him, but the trebuchet was still moving towards the slope that led to our base. How can I stop it?!

I pulled out my sword and threw it with pinpoint accuracy, destroying the wheel on the left side. The trebuchet came to a stop while scraping through the ice, but the guy was still standing here. Who was he? Was he truly cocky enough to stand against us? How can we deliver Robby back to the medical area?!

As if they were waiting to reveal themselves, both Tavian and Ellie jumped down from a great height and put their blades against the mysterious man's neck. "We got what we needed out of that tower. Now, what the hell are you doing here?" Ellie asked the man. I was surprised to see a child in Tavian's arms. Whose child was that?

"What am I doing here? I think that's easy to answer, I'm-" before the man could finish, Ellie swiped her sword through his neck and turned to Tavian.

"I'll take Aegis and sail over... are you sure you'll be alright without me?" Ellie asked Tavian.

"Come on, we've already won this war. Take Aegis and go, make sure you protect her with your life. She's still young enough to raise right... Charlie, Tyler, David, help me take Robby to the medical area, they should've moved up by now." Tavian said.

"Where have you been Tavian?!" I asked him, happy to see him.

"Ellie and I were suspicious about Orion's children being left behind because they were cocky about winning. We've been watching everything until the black smoke rolled in. Everybody fought their respective sides of the battle, and we have about a mile left until we get to the docks. We went up that tower to go find and rescue Aegis and Nathan, but Nathan was nowhere to be seen. We'll take Aegis and run with her, but Nathan is another high priority. We might be fighting this war as the offensive people, but we're still not monsters." Tavian told me.

We all hurried to Robby's side and Tyler offered to stay back and make sure the trebuchet didn't go anywhere. Once we made it down the slope, we saw a lot of familiar people all grouped up at our new base. More people were coming in, but the last few to make it were Sky, Dani, Carl, and Mandi. Lia came up before any of them, and Noboki was even still with them.

"What the hell happened to them?! How are they all injured like that?! How does Sky even have injuries?!" Tavian asked, running to each one of them. Noboki was covered in blood, but she was still nonchalant. Standing near her gave me chills...

"Dani finished Moon. We brought them both back." Noboki said. Dani... really? Holy shit... I looked at Dani and could see her in the worst condition out of the others. Dani had a portion of her eye cut out, a cut through her head, a severed left arm, a twisted knee, and several cuts over her body. Carl was similar, but he was awake and could explain all of his injuries and his fights to me. I was most worried about Mandi, who was out cold.

"Sky... something was wrong with him. I think Sky manipulated the ground or something. Sky rose the ground and saved a ton of people... then the strings shot out of his arm and he fell over." Lia explained.

Ullr came in running next, looking at everybody, but stopping at Sky. "Bossman! Hey, is everybody okay?" Ullr asked.

"Yeah... but they have injuries like no other. How much further do we have to push?" I asked.

"Oh! Orion is here... he's around, he has some sort of illusion power, but he can't use it too often, it has a high cooldown, like Sky's abilities. He used it a few seconds ago, but he was thrown into the throne room. Ellie, are any of your tunnels connected to that throne room that Orion could escape out of?" Lia asked Ellie. I was surprised she was still sticking around.

Ellie turned to a person behind us in the base and handed her Aegis. "Lisa, you take Aegis and sail over to Scorched, that way!" Ellie said, pointing westwards towards the ocean.

I looked past everybody, down the path Cody fell in to see a blood-covered arena. Cody was lying stiff in the middle of it, but every single soldier he fought had perished there... not a single one remained, no blood spots leading up the path, no footprints, nothing. Cody killed every single person who ambushed him... I'll definitely praise him.

"Nice job... Cody..." I said.