Part I - Swan's Song

  Lawrence crashed through the ruined hangar bay. The paneling of his dome cockpit rattled violently—his three-sixty-degree panoramic feed disrupted. Were it not for his linear suspended seat, Lawrence would’ve been human paste.

  A curse escaped his breath as he slammed on the accelerator. His warning systems went haywire—numerous heat signatures lit up his sensors.

  He dashed away as plasma shots tore through the Star Dreadnought.

  An explosive gap exposed the backdrop of the wine-dark cosmic seas; the green little marble planet of Ben Nevis. But it was obscured by the emergence of several gray Tacomas. They were 18 meters tall humanoid mobile troopers, much like the K?mpfer he piloted.

  Lawrence braced his shield; repeater laz rifle brandished. The Tacomas had little room to maneuver in here.

  The targeting solution blared as he pressed the right joystick trigger. His gun belched several green crescent shots and one of them landed on a Tacoma’s gun.

  The pilot had no time to react as it short-circuited. An orange, fiery glow consumed him and half the hangar.

  Debris ricocheted off Lawrence’s shield.

  Just as Lawrence hoped the coast was clear, he reached for the accelerator. The longer he stayed here…

  The dark haze left behind by the ordeal was sliced through by a cherry-red Tacoma, its golden-trimmed armor and emblem on its breast plating made Lawrence’s skin crawl with goosebumps.

  “You!” Lawrence snarled. It was the Red Blitz. It lived up to its namesake and closed distance faster than Lawrence anticipated.

  His entire field of vision was obscured by the blood-red Tacoma. Lawrence shrank in his seat.

  Lawrence brandished his repeater gun again—but it was too late. The Red Blitz sliced it in half.

  “Damn!” Lawrence uttered.

  He reached for his naginata and swung it vertically.

  The Blitz caught the blow with the sword but in the process lost balance, vulnerable to another strike.

  Lawrence capitalized with an overhead swing, but the Blitz already read his movements.

  Their blades met and coiled—and the resulting surge of energy threw Lawrence back with such force that he slammed into the wall. His feed became garbled, longer than usual.

  The Red Blitz zoned in, primed for a spear thrust—but at the last moment swung upward.

  Before he could deflect, his naginata hilt was sliced in half.

  He had no weapons!

  Lawrence steered hard right as the Red Blitz brought it down with the sword—the cherry-red Tacoma rammed the wall.

  Lawrence fired the Kampfer’s head dual vulcans and it was enough to make the Blitz back off without the sword. The Blitz had no shield, a shot landed on the fiery Tacoma’s left shoulder—but didn’t make the Blitz buy the farm.

  Tacoma reinforcements tore open more hulls and surrounded Lawrence.

  The lone K?mpfer pilot flipped his visor to flick away the buildup of perspiration that built up on his brows. His hands trembled as he reached for the joysticks.

  None of them moved.

  The Red Blitz beckoned for one of its subordinates to hand him a new chromium hilt—its long thin red blade took form.

  Lawrence took the other hilt that drifted nearby and answered the Blitz’s bravado.

  He glanced at his ammunition bar for the vulcan cannons; it flashed empty. He surveyed what remained of the Dreadnought’s hangar as more Tacoma poured in. But the rest floated outside. His radar displayed a count of at least thirty heat signatures. Here they were like moths attracted to the light.

  He grinned: Now it’s all or nothing. If the Blitz kills him here, he’d just have to apologize to Benny for failing to avenge him. But on the contrary, if at minimum he dragged the ace killer down with him, well, it’d be a nice present for his old war buddy in hell.

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  Rapid movement spurred Lawrence to stay focused on the now. Two of the underlings charged Lawrence; the rest merely remained on guard. Even the Blitz’s movement suggested this wasn’t his idea.

  The two daring Tacoma flanked Lawrence simultaneously: The right one slashed but Lawrence countered with ease.

  A horizontal arc later and Lawrence’s plasma blade sliced cleanly through the Tacoma’s chest—the pilot was vaporized instantaneously. He missed the reactor core—the Tacoma crashed into the wall behind him.

  The remaining Tacoma faltered; he realized too soon his friend’s demise.

  Lawrence smacked his blade away, and with a twirl sliced off the Tacoma’s arms. He spun again and decapitated the Tacoma—but he made no attempts to finish him off.

  The disabled Tacoma lined the wall with his friend. There was a pop—and the surviving pilot whiffed past Lawrence in a small red ball.

  For the respite he was given, Lawrence wondered if he should jettison in a liberty pod, too. But would they, the killers of the colony Side Sidon, let him go scot-free?

  There were small holes in the wall behind him and he eyed the cylinder colony as it continued its path of destruction towards Ben Nevis, laz line threads and explosions bloomed all over it. He didn’t have the numbers or its projectory on at this moment but he knew for sure it passed the final defense line. If they failed to destroy Side Sidon here, could they still divert it?

  Presently, he focused on the Blitz.

  Lawrence breathed in deeply. He wished he could recite the Zensunni mantras Victoria often did to put herself in a trance, but this would have to do for now. The important thing was keeping his cool even in the face of certain, immediate death.

  Lawrence spun his photon sword and held it overhead with both hands.

  The crimson Tacoma mirrored his posturing.

  “All or nothing,” Lawrence said. He wasn’t about to let the ace killer call the shots; he needed to have the ball in his court. And so, Lawrence reached for the accelerator lever.

  Before he realized what even happened, crescent shots ripped through the bay. The Blitz's monoeye darted in its headpiece as his subordinates were wiped out in rapid succession. Then his back faced Lawrence.

  A flash landed on the roof of the hangar. Lawrence’s K?mpfer was thrown like a discarded toy around in the hangar from the sudden aftershock. Migraines racked him just as badly as the sudden commotion.

  He immediately got visuals on the target—or he thought he did, it pin-balled from one enemy to the other. He held his breath for the whole duration but cut it loose. He knew how who it was.

  “Vic!” He blurted.

  The Red Blitz was distracted by her and it was all the opportunity he needed.

  He charged the ace Tacoma like a bull gone berserk.

  Lawrence grappled the crimson Tacoma.

  His systems shook violently as the two of them blasted out of the remains of the battered Dreadnought. In his rear window, optical cameras fizzled as the battleship exploded. But he didn’t need to worry if Victoria got out or not—she was the Yellow Typhoon, the ace of aces.

  The Blitz thrashed mechanically and Lawrence was forced off. He still had the photon sword but the blade didn’t materialize until now—and the two slashed at each other rapidly, never long enough for the blades to coil and create a strong overpowering force like before.

  But his muscles quickly sored, his breathing strained. His eyes burned from sweat he couldn’t afford to wipe off.

  Adrenaline spurred Lawrence on as he worked to back the Blitz into the thick melee carnage. Their duel was interrupted to dodge the cobweb of laz threads all around them, and the chronic explosions that claimed friend and foe.

  But his sights were always on the Red Blitz and nothing else mattered. All that burned in his mind was the memory of Benny’s radiant grin; his mission to settle the score was what fueled the momentum to take out this ace killer at all costs. The Imperium gassing of Side Sidon was only the cherry on top, the straw on the camel’s back.

  He slew any Tacoma that got between them just as the Blitz made quick work of any allied Shinra MT pilot who braved coming to Lawrence’s assistance. Yet there was no Yellow Typhoon in the action.

  Or so he thought—his head ached and instinctively he flipped the visor open to massage his sweaty forehead; it throbbed aggressively.

  Just as he done so, the golden comet charged behind Lawrence—it was Victoria!

  It was impossible to track her as he continued his one-man onslaught against the Blitz. One moment she dived, and the next she was above them and rained plasma death on the Blitz.

  The Blitz was stuck between them—nowhere to go. A handful of spaced out Shinras kept their Tacoma counterparts at bay; any escape the crimson Tacoma could take was cut off.

  Lawrence froze as they found themselves cloaked in pitch darkness. Something massive, something cylindrical loomed overhead as it cut off light from the star zone’s sun.

  The moment had come: Side Sidon passed the point of no return. It barreled past Lawrence, past the Blitz and all the fighting. They were practically under it, his K?mpfer puny by comparison.

  The colony cut through the wine-dark cosmic sea as it hurtled unopposed towards Ben Nevis. Its muted gray frame glowed a nightmarish orangish red as it entered Ben Nevis’s atmosphere.

  Lawrence lowered his sword. The pain ached his chest.

  The fighting ceased. The adrenaline vanished and he lost the appetite to waste any further energy to fight the Red Blitz, who used the window to retreat. No one tried to pin them—what use was further fighting?

  He unleashed the last volley of vulcan rounds on the Blitz and his allies—but it was more his message, at least in Lawrence’s eyes, that this wasn’t over.

  The tattered remains of the Imperium fleet pulled away for Asteroid Zeta—he glimpsed that rocky fortress as it began to tachyon jump out of the system. Ostensibly, Lawrence thought, for the capital planet of Fasnakyle.

  He drifted beside Victoria and opened his palm to shoot out a communication cable.

  A portrait of her opened on his screen. Strands of golden soaked hair poked out from her helmet; heavy eye bags. Her chest heaved heavily between breaths. And yet despite all that she subjected herself to, Victoria’s smile glowed like a radiating sun.

  “I made it in time, Lawry,” she said, “losing Ben was one thing, if I had lost you too, I…” she trailed off as she in her seat.

  Lawrence sufficed with both a nod and a meek smile. His gaze and optical cameras were trained on the Red Blitz until he couldn’t track it with sensors anymore. “No time to rest just yet, we gotta play a little catch-up.”

  Fatigue clawed at him—and no doubt her too.

  Victoria forced herself up. She focused on a side monitor as the helmet slid off and droplets escaped captivity. “Right behind you,” she said.

  Lawrence made one final glance as Sidon’s massive frame broke apart over Ben Nevis—the last ditch efforts from its defenders to destroy it with atomics just as vain as the fleet’s.

  There was nothing he could do for them now—nothing that is, but show contempt for the enemy on the field of battle. He was going to make the mastermind of this foul, inhuman operation turn to face the music once and for all.

  “Jonathon von Churchill,” Lawrence uttered the syllables under his breath, his rage boiled. “I won’t let you get away with this!”