Carlos was running for his life. After he convinced some of the other members of his unit to desert the army just three days before, his luck began to run out, just like is chances at surviving this whole ordeal. Right now, together with Flávio, one of the other deserters, he was being chased by an angry mob of green monsters that reminded Carlos of spiteful, vile children in their unscrupulous ways of killing.
After he received the order from his Seargent that they would fight one of the terrifying Land Drakes in a less than advantageous encounter, that being with less rockets than they needed to kill the beasts, Carlos put in play the plan to desert that he was cooking up with the other sixteen guys that seemed favorable to a desertion. He left behind his Seargent, a guy named Silva who, by all means, was a good guy, but was following a suicide order to the letter; a Corporal by the name of Jonas who was a policeman and was beginning to sniff out the schemers; the young Private Gustavo who only misfortune was giving too much attention to Silva’s orders and not his comrades; and that good doer son of a bitch Tomás. Carlos couldn't explain, but he hated the guy from the first time he saw him and his hate only grew as they moved to encounter the Drake. He didn't show fear, he planned quickly, he was a good shot, a good soldier, a good combat medic, he was good at everything and Carlos hated that, but, for him, he couldn't explain, he just felt the hate and let it take control of his reason. And he was now in a knee-deep sea of shit and the tide was only rising to drown him.
By now, he had committed numerous crimes besides the desertion, such as looting houses and stores, but the worst one so far was the robbing of the civilians in the morning of this very day. The group of deserters, now being fully led by Carlos, came across a group of twenty or so civilians on their way to loot a nearby shopping center. The civilians showed their position first, waving their arms above their heads to denote that they were unarmed. By the story of their leader, they received a call from the Provisional Base and we're moving through a designated route towards said base and, in desperation, thought that the deserters were soldiers coming to rescue them. They carried all the supplies they had with them and were loaded with food and water, things that Carlos and his boys craved for.
So, after some backstabbing theatrics, the deserters pulled their guns on the civilians, causing them to startle. After a short discussion followed by a short standoff, the leader of the civilians and some of the men of the group drew their concealed weapons and a short firefight soon followed. The deserters, in superior numbers and with better firepower, quickly overwhelmed the civilians, killing all the men and some of the women of the refugee caravan. Taking all of their supplies and dragging the women and children at gunpoint for some 'later use' as some of the other deserter put, together with some wicked and diabolical laughter, the man resumed their way towards the shopping center like nothing had happened and like they were not dragging along civilians that they planned to use as, for a lack of a better word, slaves.
But, just as the wicked men were about to celebrate their nefarious victory, the green monsters appeared. Initially, Carlos ordered the men to shoot the monsters down, but, with superior and overwhelming numbers, the monsters began to cut them down one by one. Moved by an uncaring frenzy, the vile monsters ate the fallen deserters even while the fight was still hot, biting and chewing off pieces of the wicked men, causing some of the more cowardly ones to drop their weapons and run.
One of those scared runners was Carlos, who simply left the other fighting deserters and the remaining civilians to fend for themselves. Now, he spent all of the last day questioning why such misfortunes had befallen him. Perhaps it was the misdeeds, such as killing unarmed civilians or the robbing, but a man such as Carlos couldn't comprehend why that could bring him any sort of divine retribution. He was a good, upstanding man, ignoring the fact that he beat and cheated his wife, the first and now the second, the last one being a woman that he quickly abandoned with his two young daughters the moment this crisis started; that his eldest son didn't talk to him for the last decade, simply because of the sheer amount of childhood trauma, and that, whenever they talked prior to that, the only thing Carlos talked was that the boy should just 'man up'; and, like a upstanding member of society, Carlos hated on a wide range of minorities, immigrants and foreigners because, for him, all of the problems of his country were born out of the least politically represented groups of society.
Now, with no sense of guilt whatsoever, Carlos wanted to save his own skin no matter the cost, so he was keeping up to Flávio just so he could use the man later on as bait. But, looking for that angle, the man didn't have to know that, right? Ir was all going according to plan.
"I...", Flávio began saying, stopping to catch some air and to look back on their pursuers. "I think we lost them, Carlos."
Carlos wasn't so sure. They entered and passed by alleyways and backstreets in their flight, but he could swear that the monsters guided themselves by something other than simply sight and smell, as they found the two other who fled with Carlos with ease even after they had hidden themselves behind some improvised, but good, hideouts. Because of this, Carlos would have to be resourceful if he wanted to evade the hunting monsters, and that included Flávio as bait.
"Good, but just to be sure, let me have a guarantee.", said Carlos.
Before Flávio could even react to the lack of a 'us' in his phrase, Carlos drew his pistol and shot the man in the knee and incapacitated him.
The man fell hard as the support of his body gave out, screaming in pain as the jet of blood and bits of bone painted the ground red. He grabbed his wounded leg and tried meaninglessly to stop the profound arterial bleeding as the shot had pierced some vital artery on his leg.
"Nothing personal, kid.", said the most wicked of the two deserters. "I am sure you would do the same to me."
Again, before Flávio could even draw his rifle in retaliation to Carlos’ betrayal, Carlos was already long gone, away from his angry and pained screams.
"Carlos!!", came distant scream from Flávio, full of pain and dread. "You son of a leprous dog!! I will kill you, mark my words!!"
Ignoring the death threats and curses, Carlos began the arduous task of establishing mental gymnastics that could justify his betrayal and bring his head to an easiness of mind. The fact that he used, being that Flávio would do the same to him, was probably true and evidently possible, it was just that it brought Carlos down to the level of Flávio, and he wasn't simply a no-good deserter that was drafted in the army from one of the city's jails, he was an upstanding member of society, it was just coincidence that he had to resort to such low means.
'Flávio was going to betray me AND I was doing society some good by killing him right now.', thought Carlos, finally satisfying himself with a lie that would let him sleep at night. "Yes, that it. He got what he deserved, the backstabbing scum.", he completed out loud, completely ignoring the fact that he was the one that backstabbed someone.
Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.
Carlos ran for some minutes, creating as much distance as he could from his bait. When his lungs gave out from the exertion, that wasn't that great anyways, he entered a dilapidated drugstore and hid behind the counter and wished that, hopefully, the monsters satisfied themselves with the wounded Flávio.
Hugging his knees in fear like the whining little worm he was, an insult to all of the worms of the world, Carlos waited some half an hour before putting his precious neck for game. Using the drugstore back entrance, he dragged himself on his fours to see if the coast was free of danger so he could skedaddle out of the danger zone. Looking around for any green silhouettes and not finding any, Carlos decided that that was safe enough and got on his two legs to leave the store.
Going around the street he was in, Carlos walked for some minutes before encountering a convenience store, seemingly untouched by looters. The man got inside and began shuffling the shelves, searching for food, finally founding some protein bars and devouring them on the spot. Carlos got so immersed in his messy eating that he didn’t notice the approaching gang of green monsters armed with clubs and wicked knives. When he finally noticed them, it was already too late.
Carlos tried to fight, raising his rifle, but one of the green monsters quickly kicked it away, making the man defenseless. Before the monsters even began to actively put fear on the man by kicking him and nagging at him with their knives, Carlos had already wetted himself. This only made the green monsters’ laughter grow even more wicked.
With a screech coming from outside, the monsters stopped and recoiled a little, turning to face the entrance of the store. From there came a monster with a plumed helmet who appeared to be giving order to the other ones. He gestured to the man on the ground, to the desperation of Carlos, and one of the monsters got close. The monster, armed with a club, raised his weapon and lowered it, quickly knocking out the pitiful man.
Carlos, by being true to his capabilities, ignored the fact that he should have checked the store for any signs of monsters. If he did, he would find the Goblins’ usual filth and waste scattered around the back of the store, even from a distance. But, because he didn’t, the Goblins now dragged his senseless body out on the street.
And, by running around like a headless chicken in his flight, the man was without any kind of locational skill and all alone in a desolate neighborhood, so, in a pitiful attempt, Carlos tried to localize himself by using the sun, failing miserably. Forgetting the basics, such as the fact that the sun rises on the east and sets on the west, the dubious man got on to the west, towards the overall direction of his encounter with the green monster that he just had escaped, encountering the Goblin trap laid out for him.
Now, the man was at the Goblins’ mercy, and they were free to do anything to him, and they were hungry.
----
Tomás was moving expertly throughout the streets leading to the metro station. The loss of his right eye only made his spiritual senses sharper to the subtle changes in the Presence of the things around him, and, using this as advantage, he was walking calmly throughout the deserted streets using his brand-new halberd as a walking stick. Safe to say, the other members of Tomás squad were absolutely on edge around the nonchalant officer.
“Calm down, people.”, said Tomás from behind his riot police face shield. “I know what is around me, and, besides, Glória and Samantha are taking care of us up ahead.”
The comment didn’t make any of them less worried, especially Tobias, who was beginning to discover why Gustavo had called Tomás a ‘crazy son of a gun who was suspiciously sure about himself all the time’.
Having divided the unit in four groups and having sent the Arrow Squad up ahead to do reconnaissance, Tomás was ruminating his last night encounter with Atena. In his dream like state, the goddess appeared euphoric with the prospect of a coming war that her aspect would participate.
“That is going to be so much fun, little Tom.”, said Atena. “Don’t make me embarrassed by having chosen you as my aspect, got it? Now, this time we don’t have a lot of time to talk so, listen well. You are a craft man so I am sure you will manage, but you should switch to a new weapon, a halberd. It is like this one, see?”
The goddess showed Tomás a master crafted version of the weapon, beautiful beyond measure and just as sharp and useful.
“A warrior like yourself should focus on area denial and those weapons are perfect for that. Improvise something with what you have at hand. I am sure you will come up with something. Now, you will be playing the leader role, right? All of your soldiers are very capable so you don’t have nothing to worry about, you could even let them do their own thig from the sheer amount of competence I feel from them, so let them loose a little, you chose well.
“But that not why I am here. I think we gods can already bestow some blessings upon mortals now, so, if you are in a pinch and need that extra sauce to beat that extra strong monster, you can count on me. Just say ‘Atena, bestow your strength upon me!’, or ‘Atena, give me strength!’, or some shit like that, I don’t care, what matters is the intention, got it? Good. Seek harder battles. Not my final message. Goodbye.”
Tomás understood three things about the deranged message the goddess that he got entangled with left him: that he should change weapon, that he should trust his soldiers, and that he could request her for help. The only one that left him with work to do was the first request.
Tomás quickly improvised a halberd using a what he could find around the Provisional Base. Confiscating a thin wooden support of one of the unused field tents, he made a comfortable haft for his weapon. Taking the jungle machete that he received as a part of his kit, he removed the thing’s handle and fixated the blade upon the tip of the haft with the help of his axe to make a sulk and string and tape to keep it all in place. Finishing up with a tin can he had lying around at the end of each point of the haft, and Gustavo’s fire Magic to weld the thing in place, the makeshift halberd was, at least, presentable. Tomás tested the thing’s and found it incredibly balanced, now measuring close to two meters long tip to tip. He also sharpened it, bringing the thing’s edge to a wicked deadliness.
Having slept more than a whole day, Tomás was energetic. He did all of the halberd making before any of the other members of the strike force were up, and, by the time they started getting up at three in the morning, Tomás was ready to scream orders at them with his whole kit already organized.
Except for a pistol and ammunition for it, Tomás ditched all ranged weaponry and was carrying his trusty axe in his backpack and his brand-new halberd, as well as a whole riot police body armor, his usual kit, together with med kit, and extra ammunition for the members of his squad, all in all his kit was weighting close to forty kilos. He didn’t feel a thing, moving more at ease than any other person in the team.
“Boss, I have visual.”, came Glória’s voice over the radio.
“Good. How far?”, asked Tomás, jumping from his thoughts.
“One kilometer of me, two from you.”, the sniper said. “Samantha and her boys are probably closer, but I can’t see them. I think I see some hostages too, sir, rounded up in a circle. The Goblins are too much, sir, close to two hundred that I can see on the surface. Do you think we can handle them?”
“Never had a doubt.”, said Tomás.
‘Two hundred on the surface, probably a lot more beneath. Not going to be easy.”, thought Tomás.
“Glória, keep your ground, we will pick up our pace here. And keep an eye out for those civilians.”, said the man.
“Affirmative, sir.”, responded the sniper.
“Samantha, if you are hearing this, feel free to cull their numbers a little if you can, but don’t risk yourself too much.”, said Tomás tuning his radio to the channel specified to Samantha, quickly hearing two sharp ticks on the radio that signalized that the woman acknowledged the order. One for ‘no’, two for ‘yes’, as they agreed.
“Attention all Squads.”, said Tomás on the channel of the three infantry Squads. “Scouts have visual of the enemy. I expect numbers between five to one and ten to one against us, possibly more, so be prepared.”
All three of the squad leaders responded affirmatively.
“Possible hostages too, so wait for my orders and watch your fire.”, said Tomás. “All right, Unit, move like you mean it! We got a battle to win!”
