The Cougar Review

By B.E. Summit

The city stood alone in the middle of the vast expanse of the Mojave Desert, surrounded for miles by wasteland. The ground had cracked from many battles, fissures split open in the earth, and craters from artillery strikes covered the landscape like scars. Despite those scars, the city of Vegas stood. Humanity stood. Earth stood in the face of the Scourge.

The city had lost all of its splendor. Enormous walls now protected Vegas, standing taller than its tallest skyscrapers, defended by gun turrets looking back and forth for their next target. The once-dancing neon lights of the Strip were extinguished so that the power might be put towards powering great war machines. Artillery batteries like mountains stood throughout the city where casinos and luxury hotels once stood. Colossal battle tanks that dwarfed those from the 21st Century stood at the ready to defend the vicinity of the city, armed with quake cannons, ripper mortars, and other weapons that would have been considered nightmarish overkill before the invasion. Gunships with enough firepower to level a city block within minutes circled the city, watching for abnormalities. Thousands and thousands of marines had been deployed to protect the ground, armed to the absolute teeth with so much firepower they could overthrow a small country; in the face of the Scourge, they would find themselves hopelessly outmatched.

However, the greatest weapon in the arsenal of the city defenders was only just arriving. Overhead flew a massive aerial aircraft carrier. It was the size of a true battleship and kept aloft via gravity-defying technology. Five gunships accompanied the vessel, along with multitudes of fighter jets and attack helicopters. An alarm echoed through the air as the hatches on the warship opened up. Three enormous war machines crashed to the ground. They were humanoid in shape, with massive mechanical arms and legs. They were impossibly heavily armored and carried colossal weapons fit for mass destruction. Each stood between 60 and 70 meters in height. They were utter behemoths, mammoth war machines that defied the imminent terror. 

Praetorians — mechs built by the remnants of the human race to defend themselves from the Ferroderm Scourge.

“Amity and Minotaur reporting for duty.”

“Phoebe and Wyvern reporting for duty!”

“I-Isla and Moray reporting for duty!”

The Minotaur, Wyvern, and Moray were the names of their Praetorians. Inside each hulking engine of destruction was a human pilot in a spacious cockpit. Each was controlled via a neurological link – essentially, the pilots could move the machines as if they were their own bodies merely by thinking about it.  

The Minotaur was a relatively lightweight and powerful machine. Though it was still monstrously large, its lighter armor plates enabled it to move more quickly than the other two mechs. armed with hydraulic fists and titanic shotguns mounted on its wrists, designed for melee combat. It had a shining brass paint job with golden accents. 

The Wyvern, on the other hand, was designed for fire support. It carried a massive laser cannon designed to obliterate foes at long to mid-range. If foes got too close, it was also armed with shoulder-mounted radiation cannons. It had a paint job of cobalt with fiery orange accents.

The plain gray metal Moray had only recently rolled off the production line. Designed to be easy to operate for Isla, it was armed with a heavy assault rifle and auto-tracking missile launchers, making it a solid all-rounder.

“Get into position and wait for the swarm to come,” Amity ordered as the captain of the squad. Her voice was as distant as a horizon sail. 

“Yes ma’am! We’ll get the job done,” Phoebe said with a warm tone.

“Terra Fists! Took you long enough!” A Global Human Preservation Command mission control operator spoke over the radio, hailing the three.

“Wyvern here. We got here as fast as we could. This operation is vital; after all, if Vegas falls, we could lose the whole Nevada region. When is the attack projected to occur?” Amity responded.

“Within the next hour. Seismic activity has been high– earthquakes and everything. No doubt we’ll be flooded by ferroderms any moment now.” The operator said.

“Alright. We’ll stand guard.” Amity declared.
“I should mention two Anomalies recently hit Hoover Dam and are likely still in the area.” The operator added.

“What are the codenames?”
“Softshell and Sabertooth. One’s a powerful psychic organism, the other a brute with razor-sharp teeth. They always seem to travel together. Sadly, we can’t provide any more details– haven’t observed ’em enough. Just be on the lookout.”
“Roger that.”

“…S-So we’re really supposed to do this? Just us three? Really?” Isla whimpered, fear evident in her voice.

“Yep. Just us three. Command couldn’t spare anyone else,” Phoebe replied.

“…Stay cool. Happy place. Happy place…” Isla began to breathe heavily.

In the cockpit, Isla could feel her hands trembling. Her silver eyes were stricken with fear. She ran her hands back and forth through her jet-black hair to try and calm her nerves, but it wasn’t working. She knew they were coming. She had seen what they were capable of. The desolation, the carnage. She had watched Praetorians fall to the Scourge and knew that her odds of surviving this fight were slim. She knew this would be where she would die, and it terrified her. Her breathing turned to hyperventilation as she pictured those claws and mandibles smashing through the cockpit and skewering her.

“Hey.” The video feed inside the Moray’s cockpit came online. Phoebe was on the other end. She had amber eyes and long hair as blazing orange as the accents on the Wyvern, along with light brown skin. She had a confident grin on her face, seemingly in spite of the overwhelming odds.

“Y-Yes?”

“I can tell over the comms you’re terrified,” Phoebe said.

“…I’m terrified, yeah..”

“This is your first operation, right?”

“Uh, y-yeah. I’ve got a hang on the controls of this mech. Got a chance to shoot plenty of those…things in VR, but…I dunno. It feels different when it’s real.”

“I’ll admit, my first operation wasn’t this daunting. But the fact you’re sitting in that cockpit right now, ready to face down ferroderms, takes some major guts. You’re braver than you think.”

“Not like I had any choice…I just wanted to be a songwriter, not a soldier.” Isla said.

“Funny you mention that, I was gonna be a guitarist before they learned I was able to pilot a praetorian. I still do practice, though. Nothing’s stopping you from continuing to pursue that once we’re out of here, though.”

“What makes you think we’ll be out of here? This is a suicide mission!”

“I dunno, I’ve got a good feeling about this.”

Tremors suddenly shook the ground.

“Waaah!” Isla shouted as the Moray stumbled a little bit, but the other two pilots fully maintained their footing. 

“You good?” Phoebe asked.

“Yeah, I’m fine! Thanks for asking!” Isla began to take deep breaths to control her nerves.

“Good, good. Man, sometimes I wish they’d just come at us instead of teasing us with these tremors and earthquakes. Sometimes, the suspense is a bit much even for me.” Amity’s video feed popped in next to  Phoebe’s. She had light skin and a large, grisly-looking gash across the right side of her face. She had striking copper-colored hair. and a piercing glare that Isla could feel examining her soul through the video feed. “Isla. Phoebe.”

“Captain!” Isla saluted Amity.

“Captain,” Phoebe said casually, without lifting a finger.

“Since we’re chatting now, I figured I would give you two some advice. Do not underestimate the Scourge. You might be gunning them down and feel invincible until one sneaks up behind you or erupts from the ground beneath your feet. And then you’re dead. The enemy we face has wiped out over half of humanity, and they will not stop until we are extinct. Never forget that we are fighting death itself. Come bring an end to the experiment of sentient life,” Amity said.

“If you keep thinking like that, you’ll just lose hope. These things are dangerous as all hell, yeah, but they can be beaten. That’s what a praetorian exists to do: beat the Scourge at its own game.” Phoebe replied.

“It’s thinking realistically. There are a million lives on our shoulders, and we can’t afford to treat this like some kind of turkey shoot,” Amity said.“I’ve seen too many soldiers get cocky and wind up as bloody paste buried under a mountain of scrap that used to be a mech. And you’re acting awfully cocky lately, Phoebe. We need to stay focused to win this and know our limits.”

Phoebe rolled her eyes. “Yeah, yeah, I get it. Some master of high morale you are.”

“I’ll ignore that insubordination for now. We have far bigger problems on the horizon.”

“Y-Yes Captain…” Isla whimpered.

The Terra Fists stood still with vigilance. No matter how long they waited, the Scourge wouldn’t show up. Isla could see Amity over video feed. Even though her expression was stoic, Isla could make out some sweat forming on her forehead. She felt herself sweating, too. Without warning, another tremor hit. This time Isla was ready and maintained her footing, but the tremors were only making the wait worse.

“Ugh! Why won’t they just show up already!?” Isla shouted.

“Maybe they’re toying with us,” Phoebe replied.

“Doesn’t matter. We’ll be ready for them when they arrive.” Amity raised the Minotaur’s fists into a brawling stance.

The tremors began to grow in intensity, causing the ground to begin cracking further out in the wasteland.

“I’m seeing considerable subterranean activity on the radar, Captain!” Phoebe shouted.

“That means they’re coming! Stand your ground,” Amity ordered. “Don’t let any breach the walls!”

The tremors reached the crescendo of a full-on earthquake as a colossal fissure split open in the wastelands. It swallowed what remained of human civilization in the distance, as if the Earth itself opened its great and terrible hungering maw. A deafening screeching sound like billions of cicadas singing in harmony rattled the skies. Dozens of ferroderm abominations began to swarm out of the fissure. The horrors of the Scourge came in many shapes and sizes, and this species of small-scale ferroderm, dubbed “rippers” were all the size of a school bus and looked insectoid, covered in gray flesh. Their bodies were heavily armored with plates of “metallic chitin,” the biomechanical armor that gave the ferroderms their name. Each had twelve spindly spider-like legs. They had enormous snapping jaws that took up most of the front of their bodies and six empty white eyes, three on each side of their head.

“Ferroderm contact! Engage the enemy!” Amity shouted as she stomped forward. The Minotaur raised one of its fists, and the armor plates around its wrist shifted out of the way to reveal a large cannon. With a cracking sound like thunder, the shotgun cannon fired. In a fraction of a second, the shells rocketed and made contact with the ripper, shattering its metallic chitin armor and dashing it to pieces. The blast so mangled the creature’s body it was hard to tell it was ever insectoid at all, merely some bloody paste and organic bits dripping red blood smeared against the landscape. Amity raised the Minotaur’s foot and stomped down on another ripper, smashing it underfoot with a crash and a disgusting crunch sound.

Isla screamed as she began firing her heavy rifle. Though the rifle’s rate of fire was relatively low, each round that flew from its barrel was powerful enough to total a battle tank. The round pierced the flesh of the ripper and killed it instantly, blowing apart most of its body in the process. Despite her abject terror, Isla was quite good at handling her gun, and was scoring kills left and right. Missiles flew from the hatches on her shoulders and locked on to the ripper. When they made impact they dug into the creature’s flesh before detonating, sending the chunks that were once their bodies flying sky high.

“Hey Isla, wanna see something cool?” Phoebe asked, grinning.

“S-Sure I guess!”

“Check this out.” The laser cannon carried by the Wyvern began to crackle and glow red as it came online. A loud whining sound could be heard as the cannon launched a massive red laser that hurt to look at. Ten rippers were incinerated by the blast, and the beam left a scorched trail in its wake. “Ye-yeah! Now that’s what I call a gun!” Phoebe laughed.

“Holy moly-“ Isla marveled at the destructive force of the weapon. 

“Yeah, the Wyvern’s pretty impressive if I do say so myself!”

“Save the bragging for later! I’m picking up some creatures on the radar! Two large-scale ferroderms!” Amity reported.

Two ferroderms much, much larger than the smaller organisms that had been swarming them crawled from the fissure. They were followed by even greater swarms of small creatures that began skittering towards the wall.
“Two large-scale ferroderms, a reaper, and a stampeder at twelve o’clock! We’ve also got swarms coming at us!” Amity relayed.

The two large-scale ferroderms, or LSFs towered over the small-scale organisms. They were so massive they stood at the same scale as the Praetorian mechs. The reaper resembled a colossal praying mantis, although it had dozens of legs like a centipede and a chittering spider-like head. Its massive scything claws crackled with blue energy. The stampeder looked like a colossal rhino beetle covered in heavy metallic chitin armor that rendered it a living tank. Its massive horn protruded forwards like a lance, primed to impale its foes. The stampeder made a loud screeching noise like grinding metal mixed with a dying cat screaming for its life before charging down the Minotaur head-on. Amity stood her ground and grabbed the monster’s horn, and punched it square in the face with the force of 43 tons of reinforced metal. Amity relentlessly smashed it in the face, causing its head armor to crack.

“Roger that. Launching artillery now. Just focus on the LSFs, our guns will take care of the swarm.” Mission control confirmed.

“I’ll handle the beetle! You take out the mantis!” Amity shouted to her squad.

“R-Roger!” 

“You got it Cap!” 

The artillery batteries behind the walls launched concussive shells at the swarms. Each time a shell landed, a pillar of debris and usually ferroderm gibs rocketed into the sky. Isla’s nerves were not helped by the hammering of the artillery, but fire support was fire support.

Isla launched her missiles and began pumping the target full of 400-millimeter rounds as Phoebe launched another laser blast at the reaper. The reaper swiftly moved out of the way of the beam, though it could not fully avoid the automatic fire of Isla’s rifle and missiles. Either way, most of the rounds did negligible damage to its armor, though the missiles managed to crack it in a few places. It darted past Isla towards Phoebe with murderous intent.

“Oh no, you don’t!” Phoebe shouted as she fired the Wyvern’s radiation cannons which emitted a sudden blast of microwave and gamma radiation. The microwaves did massive heat damage while the gamma rays would mangle the innards of the target, completely melting them on two fronts. After being blasted, the reaper was devastated. Several of its legs had been incinerated, its entire torso had been scorched. Its guts bursted with flames and turned into molten fluid which spilled out from its stomach. The left half of its head had also been cremated, revealing a skull underneath the exoskeleton. Its formerly razor sharp left claw had melted into a slurry of slag and molten biomass, dripping onto the ground. It screeched in apparent agony as it writhed in pain.

“Finish it!” Phoebe shouted.

“Right!” Amity fired a decisive burst of rounds into the reaper’s exposed skull. The bone shattered as its brain matter spilled out. The reaper screeched in agony one final time before collapsing to the ground, dead.

The Minotaur’s fist had nearly shattered the head armor of the stampeder by this point. As the Minotaur wound up the finishing blow, one hand gripping the beast’s horn and one beating it utterly senseless. Without warning the stampeder made that same awful, grinding shrieking sound as it summoned all its strength. It flung its horn up and hurled the Minotaur into the air. The sight of the enormous machine hurtling through the air was nothing short of spectacular. With a crash and a tremor the Minotaur landed on its back, sending debris flying.

“Argh! I’ve been thrown! Cover me!” Amity called out in pain. Because she controlled the machine through a neural link, she was able to feel as if she had actually crashed into the ground. Her entire body had flared up with pain.

“You heard the woman! Get that bug!” Phoebe launched the Wyvern’s laser cannon once again, although the stampeder was facing away from her and the beam only served to scorch the back of the monster’s shell. Isla’s rifle and missiles seemed similarly ineffective. The stampeder slammed into the Minotaur with its horn and rammed it straight through its upper torso. The sounds of clanging and shattering metal reverberated through the air as the bug gored the machine. It flipped its horn up and ripped off the Minotaur’s left arm, catapulting it away.
“Gotta keep fighting…gotta keep fighting…!” Amity snarled as she tried to ignore the pain, winding up another punch with the arm that still remained. She delivered a decisive blow, shattering the armor on the stampeder’s head and exposing its soft flesh underneath. She blasted its exposed face with a shotgun round. Then another. Then another. Then another. Soon enough, the stampeder’s head was a bloody pulp and it had stopped moving.

“I’ll…live…” Amity groaned out. “Help me up.” She held out the Minotaur’s hand.

The Moray stomped over and grabbed it, hoisting the Minotaur back onto its feet.

“Are you sure you can keep fighting?” Concern grew on Phoebe’s face.

“I’m not completely sure, but retreat is not an option. I’ll keep fighting till the end. I’ve still got one fist and one shotgun. That’s all I need.”

“If you say so Cap. I just…don’t wanna lose another soldier.”
“Losing people is part of war, Phoebe. I may make it out of here, I may not.”
“No, you’re gonna make it out of here. I’ll make sure of that. Nobody dies today.”

“Thank you, Phoebe. You’re a good squadmate,” Amity said, a small smile crossing her face.
“I try,” Phoebe replied, smiling back.

“I got another big one on the radar! It’s coming in fast!” Amity’s expression turned back to one of dead seriousness.

Another Ferroderm scrambled out of the fissure. It looked like an oversized, humanoid reptile. Its body was covered in scales and leathery hide, with grotesquely oversized muscles. It had two broad, powerful legs and six arms ending in sharp claws. It had the same metallic chitin armor that coated the other ferroderms, like a suit of armor, with its shoulders heavily reinforced.

“I’ve never seen a ferroderm like that!” Phoebe observed. It didn’t match any records of commonly observed ferroderm species she had seen. The monster squared its shoulders and hissed before getting into a tackling stance. It began to charge forward with frightening speed, each footfall sending shockwaves through the ground and cracking the earth even further.

“Stop it in its tracks!” Amity commanded.

All three Praetorians fired on the ferroderm, but it wasn’t enough. Even the laser didn’t slow down its charge. Phoebe began to notice that the ferroderm wasn’t aiming for any of the praetorians.

It was aiming for the wall.

“THE WALL! IT’S GOING FOR THE…” Phoebe attempted to call out.

With a thunderous crash, the ferroderm smashed through the walls and breached the city. Debris flew in all directions like shrapnel. Some of the rubble smashed into buildings; some totaled battle tanks or killed unfortunate soldiers and civilians. The ferroderm continued its relentless charge forward, crashing through buildings as if they weren’t there and trampling tanks and soldiers. The streets were a canvas of rubble painted red with corpses in the behemoth’s wake. It soon reached the largest artillery battery, and body slammed it with full force, crashing through it and causing the artillery shells inside it to detonate. The blast was biblical, leveling all the buildings nearby and cremating everything in a crucible of fire and shockwaves. A million people were killed in less than two minutes.

“A kamikaze attack!?” Phoebe said. In what seemed like an instant, a battle that had been going so well had turned into a disaster, it was now clear that the ferroderms wouldn’t stop coming. Phoebe felt that nagging fear rise to the surface. She could not fight, and she could not flee. So she froze in shock and terror.

“Oh…Oh my god.” Isla stuttered in disbelief. They’d never seen a ferroderm conduct a kamikaze attack before. She didn’t know how to react. Cold sweat poured down her face as the realization of what had happened sank in. The sheer loss of human life, the fact this was likely her death sentence…Isla vomited into her cockpit.

“Isla! Are you alright!?” The sound of her vomiting jolted Phoebe from her shock. 

“A-All those people! We could’ve saved them if we could’ve just stopped that thing! Oh god! Those people!”

“There was nothing we could do…we had no way to see it coming.” Phoebe’s expression turned grim. Isla picked up on her despair and fear and couldn’t help but feel it was contagious. Amity stared at the devastation in silence. She was shocked by what had just transpired, but she had watched too many die to be as affected as the other two. She simply gritted her teeth. “…Fuck!” She cursed to herself. She shook her head. The mission had to continue. “Come in, mission control!”

No response.

“…FUCK!” Amity cursed louder.
“What is it!?” Phoebe asked.

“Mission control’s offline! The blast must’ve smashed their headquarters! The troops on the ground will have trouble organizing!”
“They-They’ll find a way! Just focus on what’s in front of us!” Phoebe responded. She was hardly hiding her fear anymore.

There was no time to mourn. Amity picked up another two signatures on her radar.

“Two more LSFs, plus a hell of a lot more swarmers. Buckle up, this fight’s not done yet.” Amity glared at the fissure with the grim determination of a dead woman.

It was late evening. Against the sun setting on Vegas, that same roaring sound like billions of cicadas rocked the earth once again as a colossal organism erupted from the ground. It was far larger than any of the ferroderms that emerged previously, towering head over shoulder and casting its shadow upon the Praetorians. Its body was reptilian in appearance, similar to the ferroderm that breached the wall, covered in plates of metallic chitin armor. Despite being ostensibly reptilian, the creature was also covered in shaggy fur that ran down its back and came off its armor, giving it the impression of a hunter wearing the pelts of slain beasts. A massive tail covered in fur trailed behind it. Its four massive, muscular arms were covered in thick scales and metallic chitin and ended in razor-sharp claws.  Its six eyes looked catlike, blue with sharp black slits for pupils. Its most notable feature, and no doubt its namesake, were its massive saber teeth. It let out a deafening roar like a lion bashed together with a cicada song and grinding metal and smashed its fists together as if challenging the Terra Fists.

The second monster that emerged from the fissure was a large, vaguely cephalopod-like organism. It levitated out of the fissure and floated high into the air, seemingly aided by gravity-altering technology. Dozens of tentacles coated in metallic chitin dangled below it in a cluster. Its body was conical and topped by a mantle like a squid. It had four glowing blue octopus-like eyes that each moved independently, observing the city and all three Praetorian pilots simultaneously.

“Those must be Sabertooth and Softshell! Hold the line. We can’t let them reach the city!” Amity shouted. “I’ll hold off Sabertooth. You neutralize Softshell, and then we can focus fire and finish this!”

Sabertooth roared and charged forward. The Minotaur plowed in the same direction and slugged Sabertooth in the jaw. The behemoth staggered backward and roared in pain, gripping its bruised jaw. She blasted it in the chest repeatedly with her shotgun. Blood poured profusely from the wound, but the damage was hardly anything to Sabertooth. It attempted to grab the Minotaur, but Amity was quick, and the Minotaur leaped out of the way. Even with only one arm, she was putting up a serious fight.

Isla aimed her heavy rifle and opened fire on Softshell. The rounds pierced its relatively light armor easily, causing blood to spurt from the wounds. Softshell emitted a low rumbling sound that sounded like a deep growl mixed with a whale song in response to the pain. Another of Isla’s missile salvos did considerable damage to the beast.

“I’ll finish the job!” Phoebe powered up the laser cannon once again. With a whir and a crack, the laser blast launched toward Softshell for a killing blow. Before the blast connected, however, Softshell held up several tentacles covered in what looked like solar panels. The panels absorbed the laser blast completely, and Softshell’s body soon began to glow the same red hue as the laser instead of blue.

“W-What…!?” Phoebe puzzled.

“What’s it doing!?” Isla shouted.

“I think it just…absorbed the laser!”

Softshell began to pulsate as it raised another tentacle that ended in what looked like a massive cannon, like the one Wyvern carried,which it then aimed at Isla.

“Isla! Look out-”

Crash.

The blast completely shredded the Moray apart. It punched straight through the cockpit and killed Isla instantly. She had been completely vaporized, along with most of the Moray’s chassis. What remained of the Praetorian burst into flames and collapsed to the ground in a slag heap.

“Isla!” Phoebe shouted.

She looked down at the bottom of her cockpit in despair, realizing she had inadvertently shot that blast and killed Isla. A pilot dead on her first mission. A travesty. Phoebe felt responsible, after she had promised to protect Isla. Phoebe screamed at the top of her lungs in rage and despair.

“What’s going on!?” Amity shouted. She was too busy brawling with Sabertooth.

“Moray’s down! Isla’s dead!”
“Shit! Keep fighting! Avenge her!” 

Another cicada song shook the battlefield as a massive horde of rippers began rushing out from the fissure. The two Praetorians were too preoccupied with the irregulars to fight them off. They swarmed past the two mechs and began to flood into the city through the breach in the wall left by the kamikaze ferroderm. The city’s marines fought against the swarms but were losing, getting ripped to shreds and devoured by an endless tide of huge beasts. The Praetorians were helpless to stop them.
“Rippers are flooding the city!” Phoebe shouted.

“If we don’t stop these irregulars, the city will be destroyed even faster! Focus, Phoebe!”

Amity delivered another mighty blow to Sabertooth’s face. The beast spat up blood and snarled in pain. With a sudden burst of energy and rage, it charged forwards and grabbed the Minotaur. Amity tried to break free from its grasp, but Sabertooth was too large and too powerful. It let out a roar that made the skies quiver in fear and then, Sabertooth chopped its head down with all its might, embedding its saber teeth into the Minotaur. They ripped through it and cleaved off its right arm, leaving the Minotaur defenseless.

Amity shrieked in pain as her other arm went limp. “It got my other arm!”

“Hold on!” Phoebe charged the laser cannon, preparing to shoot Sabertooth, but Softshell extended its tentacles and grabbed the Wyvern. It lifted her into the air and began to pull it towards itself. 

“NO! No, let me go, you scourge bastard!”  Phoebe felt her despair boil into rage. She thrashed against Softshell’s tentacles with the rage of a dead woman.
The Sabertooth plunged its fist deep into the Minotaur’s torso and ripped out the cockpit. Wires snapped and sparked as Amity disconnected from the Minotaur. It fell limp to the ground. She was now trapped in a metal coffin in the grasp of this mammoth abomination.
“I knew this day would come eventually,” Amity lamented through the searing pain. “Do your worst, you kaiju fuck.”

With a single flex of its hand, Sabertooth smashed the cockpit, crushing Amity to death. The Minotaur was down for the count.

“AMITY!” Phoebe and the Wyvern continued to thrash against the grasp of Softshell, but the battle was lost. 

The rippers continued swarming the city, toppling buildings, ripping apart battle tanks, and slaughtering thousands upon thousands every minute. Sabertooth saw that the Wyvern was helpless and began stomping towards the city to join the fight. There was no way anything in the city would have the firepower to stop something that colossal. It was over.

Despair gripped Phoebe’s soul, and for the first time in a long time, she began to cry. As she grew closer and closer to Softshell, a giant, circular, lamprey-like mouth opened up beneath its eyes. Flailing tentacles emerged from the mouth, grasping at the Wyvern hungrily.

At that moment, a radio transmission came through.

“This is the GHPC command. The mission is a failure. Las Vegas is lost. Detonate the city’s nuclear warheads and kill as many of these things as possible.”

“Damn it. I’m sorry, everyone,” Phoebe cried.

“Ejecting you now. We’ll send an extraction team to pick you up.” The GHPC command operator said.

The back plates of the Wyvern shifted. Phoebe’s cockpit launched out of the back of the praetorian and rocketed into the distance with its jet-propelled systems. It flew over the city away from the setting sun as Softshell destroyed the Wyvern, and the city was overrun.

Phoebe’s body and mind were battered as shame overtook her. The three promised to protect each other, knowing the odds were against them. But she had faith in Amity and Isla– maybe more faith in them than she had for herself. That’s what they gave each other. Hope. Now, it was gone, just like Vegas. Phoebe quickly checked her wounds to see if she was bleeding out anywhere. Just scratches and a couple of deeper cuts. She was hurt, but alive. As Phoebe ripped the edge of her sleeve to make a bandage for her thigh, she heard the monsters roaring in the distance. The ones that killed her teammates. And she had no idea how she would be able to move forward living with this shame.  She watched from a safe distance as the entirety of Vegas was blown sky high, the nuclear warheads stored deep below it detonating to obliterate all of the attacking ferroderms. The scuttling of an entire city. Phoebe watched as the mushroom cloud of atom fire stretched high into the stratosphere, and the sky became orange. They were all just more casualties in a war against extinction that knew no end.