He dashed up the street and became more unnerved along the way. Each street, each patrol he expected to render lifeless was oddly missing. With the Teretha evacuated through the tunnel under the Doc, the encampment felt ghostly. As he ran, he began to strategize on what this could possibly mean. A coward would have pulled all their soldiers to guard themselves personally, but the baron was no coward. They must be in the town proper.

  The sounds of explosions echoed down the street. True to their word, the sewing circle had cut power to the security gate here as well. No guards were standing close, and the gate itself swayed loosely wide open. There was gunfire and an explosion up ahead. He heard an energon rifle and the roar of Quip's engine. Alec pushed more Aamaranth and began to run as a blur to the human eye. He passed alley after alley following the sounds of battle. Finally, he caught sight of movement. It was a group of soldiers setting up a heavy turret. Beyond them on Main Street, Alec could see the silhouette of Quip. Maywil sat atop it, firing her auto-fire weapon, which Alec had given her.

  Alec crouched and wished his feet fell as softly as the Teretha warriors. His spurs did the job he intended but did not want on this particular venture, and caused the soldiers to turn in his direction. Alec began whistling tones to the ammunition as he fired haphazardly while dodging the group's bullets. They were the same bullets that the more elite soldiers had used below. One stung Alec's shoulder, and he dropped a revolver. He pushed Aamaranth to resolve the wound as he rolled backwards over the gun to retrieve it. He free-handed the last shot at the guard who had struck him. The body fell over the rest of his troupe in a bloody heap.

  Alec walked up to the heavy turret and, with the aid of his mechanical form, crushed the barrel and bent it on his way to the courtyard. He spied a building with a terrace ahead on the corner. He jumped an Aamaranth jump two stories into the air and landed on the balcony. The bloodfire rifle slung over his shoulder, and he began to fire strategic shots as he saw would be most effective.

  The shots he fired landed well away from the Teretha and Quip. It seemed the battle had culminated here in the broken fountain square in front of the final push to the mansion. Tusong had a band of warriors working their way adeptly up the left side of the square. Maywil and Quip consumed the right-hand side but were slowly being pushed back. Alec couldn't target the ones closest to them. Still, he sent explosive fire down the centre of the square, scattering mecha-soldiers, baronhood elites and ordinary soldiers alike in a spray of limbs and vital organs.

  He was making progress towards the end of the battle, but it was not immediate enough to help Quip or Maywil. At this distance, his pistols would be useless, and the rifle was too powerful for friendly fire. Alec could do nothing but pave the way for Tong's crew and wear out the number of baronhood loyalists in the square. Alec felt his heart sink. He knew there would be casualties, but Quip was not one he felt ready to lose.

  In the moment it seemed all was lost, Alec saw two bright green shining eyes emerge from an opposing alley. It was a preacher, and behind him was a battalion of townsfolk, women and men alike, holding whatever implements they could find to bring pain to the soldiers. Some died quick, but they managed to turn the tide. The Preacher themselves was at the head of the carnage. The android held no weapon but instead deliberately and brutally slammed its much more rigid synth flesh body through the real flesh of the humans. There was no finesse to it, just pure brutality.

  Alec breathed a sigh of relief as Quip found room to back out of the square and rush down an alley with Maywil hooting a victory cry from atop its back. She followed parallel to Tusong's warriors and was closing the distance quick enough that they would arrive at nearly the same time. Only a few mecha-men remained, and Alec jumped down to the ground to deal with them. He willed elixir into his legs, but it did not work. He was out of this vial. The impact suit took the damage, but Alec stumbled nonetheless.

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  He used the momentum to push forward, popping his second-to-last vial of the pure Aamaranth into his arm slot. He pushed hard and dashed. Along his way, he gripped and ripped pieces and parts off the soldiers in his path. He left a wake of spraying blood that the townsfolk and remaining Teretha jumped on. As he dashed up the centre road, Alec could hear the final shot of an energon rifle ring out; they had at least won the battle of the square. The mansion would come next, and by the count of soldiers Alec had made in the square, the baron had kept a significant amount in reserve, not to mention the apocalypse crew.

  Alec entered the area where he had parked Quip the two times he had been at the mansion previously. As if they had rehearsed it, Tusong and Maywil entered from the east and west. It was silent, and all but the interior lights were cast in darkness. It was far too quiet, and from the door itself, Doc Death walked out with a collection of nearly ten elderly women. Each was outfitted with technical gear and were clearly adept hackers and slicers. This must be the "sewing circle" Doc and Preacher had spoken so highly of. Why were they exiting from the baron's mansion? Where was the violence and the battlefield? Something had indeed changed.

  Preacher entered the area from behind Alec, arriving at his shoulder as Doc began to speak. "They ain't here. Well, not the ones you're wanting." He looked at Tusong as he closed the group. "Don't know where he or the soldiers are, but we got one of the interlopers, well, sort of."

  "Like you just got part of one of them? As long as its still breathing I can give em som pain." It was the Preacher's voice behind Alec that broke the silence.

  "Who yet remains inside?" It was Maywil this time; she clasped her firearm with purpose.

  "More importantly, my friend, what has gone wrong?" The last was Tusong, who was paying more attention to Doc's expression over his words, and Alec leaned in, now noticing it too. There was something horrible, off-plan or wrong, and Doc was having a hard time saying it.

  "Out with it, man, time is precious." Alec's words finally broke the spell.

  "She's got the mothers in the top room. We've managed to crack the doors." Doc gestured back to the grey-haired technicians behind him. "But she says if we step through the door, she'll drop T'sala."

  Tusong looked up at this, and there was a devious smile on his face. "Take me to her." He stated boldly, and Doc nodded in reluctant agreement. They followed Doc up the way Alec knew well. The long staircase that led to the baron's special room now held a cramped group of Teretha and Townsfolk alike. They pushed their way through to where a door stood open. Beyond it, standing under T'sala with her control panel was Madam Zelsim. Her eyes met Alec's, then Tusong's, and blanched.

  "That is simply far enough". The madam's accent punctuated the air like the gunfire Alec had just left. "If you step any further, I shall blow us all to kingdom come." Surrounding her were the Teretha mothers, all with tear-stained eyes. Alec saw no child in sight. "I thought I told you I wanted to discuss with all of you traitors. The baron has a very special message…" Zelsim let her words hang as she stood on her toes trying to see behind Alec.

  "Preachers in the back," Doc offered. Clearly, the madam had given a roster of people she wanted present. But why? Why go to all this when clearly she had nowhere to go and the man she was fiercely loyal to had left her behind to die?

  Alec's brain was screaming an alarm at him, telling him he felt too slow to put things together. A fiercely loyal soldier would only have a list to eliminate. Alec put the puzzle pieces together in a heartbeat as the madam smiled in acknowledgement of Preacher and punched some buttons on her control panel. Behind her, the Aamaranth woman T'sala was freed from her antigravity bonds. The living bomb that could level half the planet was about to wipe them from the face of it. Alec and Tusong acted in unison, both lurching towards the woman. Tusong was slower, and Madam Zelsim turned a small single-barreled revolver towards him. He lurched, and a volume of blood released itself from the Teretha leader's chest. Alec dared not stop his momentum. The rate he was burning Aamaranth would have this vial done in mere seconds. Those seconds stood between Alec, the people he fought alongside and for and the very planet itself. He had one option, and he hoped that, against all odds, it would work.