Luna, Ada, Groti, and Shinaki worked together to distract Treese while Annie and Thandos guided the rest of them across the massive garage. Treese picked up on their tactic and used his cannons to destroy their cover, narrowly missing Elizabeth, Oichi, and her handmaids.

"It’s a good tactic but I know all your moves!" Treese said as the walker blocked their path. "Why is everyone leaving?! I thought this was a party!"

Treese aimed at Oichi and Elizabeth, but Luna and Groti used freeze grenades against the walker and managed to lock him just enough so they could get away from his range.

Treese managed to break free and opened fire with his rockets, but Shinaki sent out slices of wind which sent the explosives going off in different directions. Luna resorted to using all her smoke grenades to create cover for them, and Shinaki used her sword to make the smoke spread throughout the hangar. Treese fired blindly, hoping to hit any of them while they all hid behind cover and stayed low.

"Shinaki, did you see what was behind him?" Luna asked as both of them chose to hide behind a steel beam.

"The hangar door?" Shinaki sheathed her sword. "We tried it, but it takes too long to open."

"I can give you the time you need. When I give the signal, take everyone across the room and get out of here. I’ll keep all his fire on me."

Shinaki drew out her sword and handed it to her.

"Are you sure?" Luna reluctantly reached for it.

"You will need all the help you can get. And also, no one has to know."

Once Luna touched the sword, both of them expected the glow of the blade to vanish, but rather it only dimmed. Shinaki’s eyes widened, but a bullet whizzed past and both of them snapped out of it.

"I’ll help Luna and keep the fighting with us." Ada said as she joined them on the cover.

"No Ada. You need to protect Oichi, Elizabeth, and Annie. They will need you when they are holding the hangar. I can handle Treese. On my signal, Run."

Shinaki nodded. Luna felt her hands tremble and shake, then she ran out of the cover.

Treese saw her and unleashed cannons, rockets, and even flamers at her, but she was faster and managed to get close, close enough for her to leap into the air, and by putting her augmented strength into the sword, she managed to cut off the barrel of Treese’s cannon. Luna quickly used her freeze grenades to jam the walker’s rocket launcher.

"Go now!"

Shinaki led everyone out of their covers and towards the other side of the room, with Groti carrying Oichi. Luna disabled most of Treese’s long-range weapons, so the walker attempted to use its flamer against them. She used the distraction, got close to the torso and hacked to get through the cockpit.

He focused all the fire on her, but she managed to move to the walkers' back.

"You irritable bitc-"

He moved backwards to slam into a nearby wall, but she leapt off just in time. The walker charged towards Shinaki and their group again, as they were now opening the door at the end of the vehicle garage.

Luna ran after him, and with one large attack, she aimed for the walker’s left leg and managed to bring it to its knees. The walker retaliated by spraying fire at her, which caused Luna to retreat.

“That’s right, run you mutant!" he said as Luna tried to dodge the liquid fire.

She saw that Oichi and everyone needed more time. Using her thick long coat, she charged her way through the fire and charged at Treese again.

The walker managed to get rid of the crystals blocking its rocket launcher. It aimed directly at Shinaki and her group, but he did not see Luna coming from behind him. She hacked at the rocket ports, but Treese managed to grab her and throw her at a nearby wall. He attempted to fire the rockets, but Luna successfully destroyed the launcher.

Enraged, he charged again towards the door, but Luna fired her grappling gun and latched on. She leapt up behind the walker and started slashing at the back of its head but Treese sent bursts of electricity from its coils and electrocuted her.

The pain was screechingly intense as her metal bones burned and shocked her from the inside. As her bones felt like white hot fire, Arm-o quickly woke up and injected her with the amber on her neck. Annie and Shinaki got the door open and were making their way through when Treese started spraying flames at them. But before it could reach them, Luna recovered and threw the sword at the massive vehicle hanging from the ceiling.

Annie, the last one through, leapt out of the way and through the door as the vehicle dropped, blocking the way for Treese and sealing both of them inside.

"That’s smart. But now you are locked in here with me."

Her muscles were extremely stiff, and she could still feel her insides being burned. Luna and Treese charged at each other.

=0o0=

Tinkerton-G never thought he would be doing this again, but he had to admit field work granted him new ways to test his creations. Baldric and their two partners, Elaine and Theo, gave him cover as he sabotaged the jump core. The three humans did not know how a hand-sized GEA could cause such massive explosions with explosives the size of a grain of rice, but they just went along with it.

G finished putting his miniature explosive charge on the airships' jump core, a towering glass orb that allows airships to use the gates, and leapt down while Elaine caught him.

"Take cover!"

The three of them hid as an explosion cracked the orb and collapsed.

"We need to get to the hangars! We are a few minutes behind and no doubt they are there by now." Baldric said this as he counter-fired on Silvus guards attempting to block the exit.

"What about the flares?" Theo asked as he reloaded his rifle. "We need to-"

"Baldric I’m getting a message from Sylvie. I’ll put her through."

Vhlad’s loud voice boomed out of G.

"Baldric! Get to the hangars! There is another Silvus strike fleet inbound and it came from the gate! Two dreadnaughts and three cruisers with gunship escorts! Even for me that’s too many!”

"Vhlad, we haven’t met up with Luna yet!" Baldric yelled as he counter fired.

"You have ten minutes! You need to take out the guns in the hangar! Now!"

Baldric cursed as the communication cut off. "You heard Vhlad we have five minutes to destroy the anti-air guns and get to the hangar, so move it people!"

The ship rocked violently as he felt a glider fighter collide with on the outside.

"He said ten." Elaine replied.

"I know what I said!"

=0o0=

Treese had every advantage in the fight.

He wildly sprayed liquid fire all around him, filling the room with flames and smoke. Luna dodged and used her grappling guns to swing from cover to cover, avoiding the floor that was now being engulfed in fire. The only way to damage Treese was to get up close, but the electric coils created jolts of lightning that targeted her metal bones if she tried.

As she kept on swinging above Treese, Luna realized two things. One was that he used his flamers too recklessly, and the stream of fire was starting to slow down. And second, Luna was running out of grenades and had to make sure each one counted.

She aimed for an electric coil and, once it was encased in crystal, gave her an opening. Luna landed through the gap. Seeing the damage she had done earlier in the cockpit, she charged at it. Treese tried to use his flamer, but as she predicted, his fuel finally ran out and would need a long time for the second tank to activate.

Treese realised this too late as Luna leapt on and struck the cockpit door with her bare hands. With her hands a bloodied mess, she managed to make a wedge, and Luna roared as she forced it to open.

Treese, on the other hand, was waiting for her and aimed his gauss rifle directly at her. At the same time, the ship rocked due to an explosion, and he grazed Luna’s cheek. She fell down and the walker moved to stomp her flat, but she rolled out of the way. Treese fired at her and hit her right in the back. Her coat protected her, but Luna felt the full force of the hit on her body.

"All you’ve done is given me a shooting window!"

Luna ran to cover, but when Treese reached where she was hiding, she was gone.

"That won’t work!"

The electric coils began to charge and release wave after wave of charged lightning bursts. Luna was hiding in the metal rafters when the bursts caused her to fall. She slammed hard on the floor as her bones scorched her from the inside. Her screams gave her away as Treese moved to attack. Arm-o injected her with another syringe of amber as she desperately tried to hide.

The fire was leaving her little room to move. Treese sent out more waves of lightning, which she felt cooking her muscles and organs. She was going through her amber serum quickly when Arm-o alerted her that she only had one left.

Luna saw that the walker was sending out waves of electricity through two electric coils. There were three, but Luna had encased one in crystal. She reached for her high explosive grenade and threw it at the walkers' back, but before it got close, the electricity jolting out of the coil destroyed it in mid-air. Luna pieced it together as her freeze grenades were not triggering the electric shield.

Luna used her grappling gun again and, from above, she used all her freeze grenades to cover the coils on the walker. Her plan worked as Treese attempted to use his electric shield and it failed. She drew out her retractable staff and attacked the frozen coils. She smashed every single one, but the second flamer tank activated and the walker sprayed more liquid flames straight at her.

Luna leapt off to avoid the fire, but Treese saw her. He loaded his new ammo and fired. She blocked with her hat but his shot destroyed her shield, which caught her by surprise.

"How do you like the new shredder rounds?! Perfect for freaks like you!"

Luna scrambled as his new bullets destroyed her shield. She tried to block with her bracers, but the bullets cracked them open. Treese fired one more shot, and it landed in her arm.

The pain was nothing like Luna had ever felt before. Even inside of her, the bullet was alive as it gnawed and ripped at her tendons and bones. A massive hole was on her arm and it almost ripped off. As she hid away, Luna held in her screams as Arm-o used her last amber serum and the hole in her arm began to seal.

She studied the walker again.

No rockets, cannons. The coils are down and it looks like he forgot his walker has a sword. The only weapons he is using are the flamer and his rifle.

She only has one high-explosive grenade left, but it would not cause enough damage. Luckily, it seems even though Treese had the most powerful class of walker there is, at the hands of an amateur, it was still useless.

Luna waited for him to pass as Treese looked for her. The thick smoke of the fires gave her enough cover for her to climb on the walkers' back as she tried to find the flamer tanks. She used her staff to pry the back open. Luna started to cut off the fuel lines, but Treese realized what she was doing.

"Get out of there!" Treese made the walker jump and land hard on its back.

Unknown to him, Luna had managed to get inside the walker and started destroying the mechanisms underneath. From inside the cockpit, Treese fired into the walker to hit Luna, which she expected him to do. His shredder rounds did the work for her as they destroyed the mechanisms, causing the walker to stagger.

Treese finally realized what happened as the walker started to collapse and fall to the floor. He got out of the walker and stood on top of it.

"I knew you were easy to trick." Luna said, from somewhere around him, "But I did not expect you to be this stupid."

She came from the side and blindsided him. Luna slammed him down to the ground while his gauss rifle was thrown away.

With Treese pinned, she pummeled him in the face, but he punched Luna hard in the ribs and caused her to roll off of him. Due to her augmentations, Luna can move faster, hit harder, and take damage that would kill most people. If she ever felt pain from a physical attack, she immediately knew something was wrong.

Treese got up, and Luna found that her attacks did not even make a scratch.

"I have to admit, At first I was skeptical about Chimera but damn! I didn’t even feel anything!" Surrounded by fire, both of them stared each other down.

The amber struggled to fix her wounds and her reaction slowed due to the burns. Treese laughed as he charged toward her. It was an even fight, but it quickly turned into a battle of shadows that she wasn't sure she could win.