Another chapter, so soon? Madness!
No! This! Is! BZPB!
Tales of the Vrai War - Chapter 3 - The Battle Begins
"Our intelligence sources suggest that the Vrai are preparing to begin aerial bombardment of Metru Nui." Miserix said. "We have located one of their airfields in the Protodermis Sea nearby."
A hologram of said airfield appeared.
"Your task will be to attack that airfield and destroy it. Is that clear, Blackout, Starscream, Barricade, Brawl, Bonecrusher, Jerok, Caiaphus and Vamprah?"
"Just one thing. If I'm not mistaken, there's a cruiser guarding that airfield." Blackout said.
"Well no crap, Sherlock!" Caiaphus said, and Jerok laughed.
"Shut up, idiots." Blackout said to the two, then turned back to Miserix. "How do we get there if it's guarded by a cruiser?"
"Well I'm sure you'll use your unique talents to find a way, Blackout. Are there any more questions? No? Good."
Miserix left the room, and the other Makuta followed suit.
"That Caiaphus fellow is an idiot, I can tell." Barricade said quietly.
"Can I take him?" Bonecrusher asked.
"No, me!" Brawl said.
"I hate you." Bonecrusher responded.
"No one is 'taking' him. I can think of a much better way to get rid of him." Blackout said.
As Blackout finished his sentence, a compartment on his chest opened, and a small six-legged robot crawled out and onto his shoulder.
"Reflector, I have a feeling Caiaphus over there might make a fool of himself. Can you.....keep an eye on him?" Blackout asked.
The robot's eyes flashed twice.
"That's code for yes." Blackout said to his fellow Elites.
The robot then crawled back into the compartment.
"Let's go now. We wouldn't want to keep our comrades waiting." Blackout said, and walked into the airship that was waiting to take them towards the Vrai airfield.
As the airship took off, there was only one thought on Starscream's mind.
"Oh yes, it's only the first day and he's already taking risks. Maybe it would be best for everyone if Blackout didn't come back from this mission....."
-----
Inside the control tower of the Vrai airfield.....
"What if the enemy chooses to attack pre-emptively? Our surface-to-air batteries are not yet set up!" a Vrai said to his commander.
"Fear not. There is a cruiser here that will fend off any enemies who may come by. The proper term is not "pre-emptive strike", it is "suicide mission", Jacques." answered the commander.
"Forgive me if I do not place such faith in the abilities of our airborne friends. You saw what happened at Zakaz, Colonel!" Jacques continued.
"Jacques, for the last time, there is nothing to wor-" the colonel tried to answer, but was interrupted by a loud whining noise. "Qu'est-ce que c'est??"
"That's not one of ours.....THAT'S THE ENEMY!" Jacques shouted. He then grabbed a communicator, and yelled into it. "Ils sont la! Vous entendez?! Ils. Sont. La! Tuez-les!"
The cruiser immediately turned towards the gunship, and began firing.
-----
"This is not going well....." Jerok said while frantically trying to dodge Vrai concussion blasts.
"I have an idea. You, Caiaphus, Vamprah and I will jump out now!" Blackout said.
"What?" Jerok shouted.
"Listen to me! You, Caiaphus, Vamprah and I will jump out now, and the others can handle the cruiser!"
"Handle the cruiser?" Starscream asked. "Listen to yourself, you sound like you're talking about a basket full of kittens! That out there is a Vrai cruiser, Blackout!"
Caiaphus laughed.
"Oh shut up, both of you." Blackout said. "Just implement Strategy 117."
With that, Blackout jumped out of the airship.
"Well." Jerok said. "It looks like the plan has been approved." He then jumped out, quickly followed by Caiaphus and Vamprah.
A group of Vrai soldiers were running and shooting at the airship, when suddenly the Makuta landed next to them.
"SAY GO!" Blackout shouted and sprayed a Vrai soldier with poison, leaving him sprawled on the ground while screaming in pain. The other Vrai responded by attacking the Makuta.
During the melee, Blackout's chest compartment slightly opened, and Reflector jumped out, and started watching Caiaphus, as instructed earlier.
"Tu ne vas jamais gagner, Makuta!" a Vrai grunt shouted at Caiaphus.
"We will see about that!" Caiaphus responded, and telekinetically picked up a rock and hurled it at the grunt. The Vrai easily dodged, and laughed.
"Tu pense vraiment que je vais etre battu si facilement? Tu es vraiment un imbecile....." the Vrai yelled, and kicked Caiaphus with unexpected force, causing him to fall down a cliff.
This was exactly the moment Reflector was waiting for. He replayed the film he just made in his memory, and then ran back to Blackout, carrying good news.
-----
The airship was flying around, twisting and turning while dodging Vrai weaponsfire.
"We cannot keep this up for long!" Barricade yelled. "The airship only has a limited amount of fuel!"
"I am fully aware of that, Barricade." Starscream said. "Which is why we too are going to jump out."
"WHAT?!" Bonecrusher shouted.
"Listen to me, you big dumb oafs! We will go above the cruiser, and then bail out. We will then break through the hull, and either take control of the ship or destroy it. Can you understand that plan, or do I have to draw a diagram?!" Starscream raged.
"Plan accepted." Barricade said.
"Plan accepted." Brawl said.
"Plan accepted. I still hate you, though." Bonecrusher muttered.
"Good." Starscream said, and pulled up the airship. "Now go!"
Starscream then ran over to the already-open hatch, and jumped out. "GERONIMOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!" he yelled.
"What a pillock." Barricade said in a Divine accent, and then jumped out as well, followed by Brawl and Bonecrusher. The four Elites landed on the ship's hull, as planned.
"Careful now....." Barricade said to the others. "Brawl, break the hull."
"I finally get to blow stuff up!" Brawl shouted, obviously happy. He then planted his claws into the hull, and fired a fragmentation blast, blowing off a large section of it. The Makuta then jumped in through the hole.
"Yellow alert: hull breach. Yellow alert: hull breach. Yellow alert: hull breach." an automated message repeated.
"Oh shut up." Bonecrusher said, and crushed the speaker with his fist.
-----
Meanwhile, Blackout and Vamprah were fighting their way towards the control tower, while Jerok was following them and pointing out everything that they were supposedly doing wrong. Caiaphus was still lying at the bottom of a cliff. Finally, they reached the control tower, but then hidden trapdoors located around the tower opened and lots of Vrai soldiers came out.
"[i]PUT YO HAND IN THE AIR LIKE YOU DONT CARE" one of the Vrai shouted.
"lol wut?" everyone said, except Vamprah, who just thought it. They then put their hands in the air, at which point a Vrai cruiser appeared above them.
"Well that's not good." Blackout said. He then heard Barricade's voice in his head. "Hello, Blackout? Anybody there? Testing, testing, 1, 2, 3!"
"YES BARRICADE I CAN HEAR YOU! Now, what is this about?"
"We're onboard the Vrai cruiser."
"You got yourselves captured? Why did the Great Beings stick me with such imbeciles?"
"No, we haven't been captured. In fact, we're trying to take over the ship."
"And how do you plan on doing that?"
"Hmmmmm.....I just realized Starscream's plan didn't mention anything about that."
"Idiots. Use stratagem A/B/8."
"Why did they have to give them such complicated names? Anyway, we can't possibly use A/B/8, that only works on Space Pirates!'
"That's because it's only ever been tried on Space Pirates."
"Good point. By the way, what are you doing right now?"
"We.....sort of ran towards the control tower and got surrounded and captured by some Vrai. Nothing important really."
"I see. Barricade out."
-----
Onboard the Vrai cruiser.....
"Alright, people, I contacted Blackout. He says he's been captured by Vrai and that we should use stratagem A/B/8 to take over the ship." Barricade said to the other Makuta.
"I thought A/B/8 only worked on Space Pirates!" Starscream responded.
"That's because it's only ever been tried on Space Pirates, Starscream."
".....Rrright. In that case, let's go."
"Hold on, guys, I'll handle this." Brawl said.
"You? Playing the messenger in A/B/8? I'd like to see you try!" Starscream said, and laughed.
"I don't care what you think, or what you'd like." Brawl growled, and kicked Starscream down the corridor. He then shapeshifted into a Vrai, and ran towards the bridge.
"Monsieur! Ze crew is mutinying!" he shouted to the captain, in a very poor imitation of a Vrai accent.
"Quoi? I shall restore discipline down zhere at once! Officers, with me!" the captain said, and ran out of the bridge along with everyone else in it, only to bump into Barricade and Bonecrusher.
"Hello, we have several complaints regarding the customer service on this ship." Barricade said.
"Quoi? But zis is no passenger vessel, zis is a warship! Get out of my way at once!" the captain replied.
"We'd like to register our complaints regardless. Mon ami Bonecrusher has the most complaints, so he'll start." Barricade said to the captain. "Bones?"
"Yeah, sure." Bonecrusher muttered, shapeshifted himself a blade, and stabbed the captain, and then the rest of the officers.
"I was hoping for more blood, but at least you got the job done." Barricade said and patted Bonecrusher on the head.
"I hate you." Bonecrusher responded, and walked onto the bridge, quickly followed by Barricade, Brawl, and a limping Starscream.
"So do I." Starscream muttered, and took the pilot's seat while Barricade locked the bridge door, ripped out the captain's chair, and used it to barricade the door further.
"Now what shall we do?" Brawl said while shifting back to his preferred form.
"Fire at the Vrai?" Bonecrusher suggested.
"No, we might kill Blackout in the process." Barricade responded.
"And what a shame that would be." Starscream and Bonecrusher both said simultaneously.
"What?" Barricade shouted.
"I'm going to take command here!" Starscream said, and fired a fragmentation blast at Barricade. However, the target dodged, and the blast bounced off the door, and headed right for Starscream, who also dodged. The blast ended up hitting the controls, blowing them up. The ship then began to fall, and all the Makuta were left sprawled on either the floor or the ceiling.
"WHAT HAVE YOU DONE NOW?!" Brawl shouted, and began punching Starscream. Bonecrusher also joined in, while Barricade was trying to restore some semblance of order to the chaotic scene by messing about with random buttons, all of which did many things, but none that were very useful at the moment.
-----
Back on the surface.....
Blackout, Vamprah and Jerok were still standing with their hands in the air, when suddenly the Vrai began running around and shouting.
"Ce vaisseau est controllee par un fou! Echappez-vous!" one shouted, and ran away.
The Makuta looked up, and saw a Vrai cruiser slowly falling towards them.
"Oh dear lord." Blackout muttered and teleported away. Vamprah and Jerok promptly followed, just as the cruiser crashed, destroying the control tower.
Blackout stood on a cliff, watching the devastation from afar.
"We succeeded in our mission.....but at a price." he said, mournfully.
"No you didn't!" came a voice from behind him.
Blackout turned, and saw Barricade, Bonecrusher, Brawl, and a still-limping Starscream.
"I don't know what it is you guys did, but it sure worked pretty damn well." Jerok said.
"Where's Caiaphus?" Brawl pointed out, at which point, a hand appeared on the cliff, followed by the rest of Caiaphus' body.
"I just took a little tumble, nothing to worry about. 'Tis but a scratch.....or two.....or maybe even three....." he said.
Everyone laughed, except Vamprah of course.
"Hey guys, I don't know if I'm just out of the loop on something but.....our airship ran out of fuel, right?" Blackout said.
"Yes." Starscream responded.
"And you guys crashed the cruiser?" Blackout continued.
".....Yes." Starscream answered again.
"And there were no fighters here yet?" Blackout asked.
".....No." Starscream answered yet again.
"Then how do we get off this island?" Blackout inquired.
"Uh.....uh....."
TO BE CONTINUED.....
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