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Night had fallen by the time Raiden closed in on Shin's position, that glowed as a blue beacon on his main display. Keeping an eye on the overlaid map and radar, Raiden guided his Juggernaut through the city ruins they had chosen for today's engagement.
The surrounding hills had given the sniper squad the advantage of the high ground, while the urban landscape, with its narrow streets and alleys, had limited the Legion's mobility and numbers, forming chokepoints and thus ideal kill zones. Being forewarned, they had done everything they could to stack the odds in their favor. But one day, sooner or later, it always happened. Explosions. Screams. Silence.
Even with their Reaper leading them, whatever wise guy had claimed that no plan survived contact with the enemy had been right.
Living to see another sunrise wasn't a matter of skill. The deciding factor was attrition. No matter how many battles ended with this bitter and hollow thing the white pigs behind their Gran Mur dressed up as victories, the Republic would lose the war.
They had won this battle, sold their lives at a premium, but he was so damn fucking tired of sorties ending with Undertaker and Wehrwolf as the last ones standing. He just hoped between the two of them his own number would be up first. It was selfish, sentimental, plain weakness, but Raiden refused to consider Shin dying while he himself lived on.
Raiden rubbed at his burning eyes and yawned until his jaw cracked. "Shin?" he tried again. "Come in."
His only answer remained that vague sense of not being all alone out here in this ghost town, thanks to the open Para-RAID connection. Raiden clicked his tongue and shook his head, tamping down on a frisson of unease.
He passed by the desolate buildings of the former city center that framed a sweeping fountain plaza, dedicated to Saint Magnolia. Her statue stood headless. No doubt it had once been a busy and beautiful place full of proud Alba history. All he could recognize now was the steeple of a church and the blown out glass front of a shopping mall. Raiden had to move slowly, past scorched craters and small obstacles that might trip up his Juggernaut, damaged as its leg was. The machine fought against the controls, making his wrists hurt from the constant need to compensate for the left pull, in order to stay on the shortest route to his destination.
The battlefield was illuminated by the cold light cast by a full moon. It shone silver on the wreckage of destroyed Ameise, Grauwolf, and Löwe units, and the aluminum coffins of their fallen comrades, lending the horror a dream-like quality.
Another graveyard no one but us will remember, Raiden thought with bone-deep resignation, wondering at the dull pain beating behind his ribs. Railing against the fate of the Eighty-Six was a waste of energy.
Raiden straightened in his seat, shaking off his fatalistic mood with a roll of his shoulders that eased some of the tension. They had made a promise. To hold onto their pride. To stand tall, defiant to the end. To move forward, despite the cruel reality of their situation.
"Next is..." Raiden squinted, scratching at his scar as he tried to recall the last briefing where all deployed Processors had shared intel about the war theater behind their Handlers' backs. "Spearhead Squadron, huh?"
A second blip appeared on the scanner with a shrill alarm that had Raiden's finger hover over the trigger, before the influx of data resolved the IFF question with an all-clear signal.
Fido's boxy form plodded into his field of view. The bot raised one manipulator arm in greeting. "Beep-beep."
"Good boy," Raiden praised.
Fido waved with a low trill and Raiden watched as the Scavenger disappeared around the crumbling corner of an apartment building, intent on retrieving more small pieces of metal that bore Personal Marks.
The light changed as the stars and moon vanished behind an amassing army of scudding clouds. It began to rain as Raiden disembarked. His uniform was soaked through at the shoulders and back before he reached the cover that the garage beside a bombed out service station provided.
Raiden shivered as the wind picked up, flattening his wet hair against his ears and temples. The barrage of water droplets hammered a frantic rhythm on every surface, drowning other sounds. On the plus side, it also diluted the biting stench of propellant and blood that hung over the area.
"Shin."
Giving in to his sense of foreboding, Raiden skirted at a run around inspection pits and work stations. Coming closer he could see that the Juggernaut's canopy was open, the cockpit lit by stand-by markers. Not a smoking hunk of metal, no sign of a close brush with death, just powered down.
Raiden released the air held in his lungs in an explosive rush and slowed his pace to an easy stroll. Outside, lightning struck with the boom of heavy artillery. Thunder followed in a rolling wave. In that second of brightness, Shin was highlighted. He was sitting unmoving in the pilot's chair, staring through Raiden into nothing with his flat, blood-red eyes.
Raiden's steps faltered at the sight and the dull pain behind his ribs got more intense but he kept his feet moving. Grabbing a handhold, he scrambled up the chrysalis-shaped fuselage.
The cockpit of a Juggernaut, just like its flimsy armor, was a mere afterthought added to its design when autonomous or remote operation had turned out to be a pipe dream. It had never been meant to hold one pilot, far less two. But Raiden managed the feat of squeezing himself inside with no higher toll paid than a couple of bruises.
It wouldn't have gone half so well if Shin had fought against being manhandled until he sat on Raiden's lap. But even their fearsome Reaper couldn't defend himself when his spirit went wandering outside his body, and the thought that Shin might lose his way never failed to scare the shit out of Raiden.
Hell, their last Handler had listened to the Legion's voices for one mission, too panicked to cut the transmission, and committed suicide that same night. Shin was the toughest bastard Raiden knew, but his ability to read the living and the dead, to hear them, day and night, with no reprieve but distraction, had whittled their Reaper down, the same way erosion ground mountains to dust.
"Hey," Raiden murmured into Shin's ear, "come back here. You know better than to chase ghosts down the rabbit hole."
He counted the seconds of silence that followed, forcing himself to be patient. Raiden let his chin rest on Shin's shoulder, breathing in the smell of stale sweat and old blood that rose from the scarf brushing his cheek, and stared out into the night, watching the storm rage. When he reached three hundred, Raiden started to hum a lullaby that the old woman at the orphanage had sung to settle the scared little ones. He couldn't remember a single word, but he found the tune soothing.
It was a funeral night but the two of them were still alive. And so Raiden gave himself permission to imagine all those tender, futile things those in love always had: That he would make Shin happy. That Raiden could somehow give him a moment of utter silence. That for him, Shin would live past fulfilling his purpose of putting his brother to rest. That they would leave the battlefield behind and return to being civilians, live in peace, grow old together.
Raiden tossed wishes into the night like grenades, with the bleak certainty that only explosions would follow.
Shin stirred, sucking in air like a surfacing diver. "Raiden."
"Yeah."
Raiden smiled at the lack of reaction, even mustered the energy to feel smug that his invasion of Shin's personal space was welcomed. He kissed Shin's ear, lips brushing the cuff.
"Welcome back."
"I was never gone," Shin pointed out in the mild tone that told Raiden he was being teased for worrying too much. "I just needed to confirm something."
Mouth gone dry as ice settled into his veins, Raiden swallowed the curse on the tip of his tongue. His voice was steady when he asked, "Your brother?"
Shin tilted his head, their eyes meeting. "Hn."
Raiden sensed his ocean-like calm over the Para-RAID connection, the only other node left of a whole network. Shin's determination, that hid the wild, all-consuming rage that churned underneath the surface. The truth was that Raiden had nothing to match that threatening flood once the dam broke.
Raiden clenched his fist, nails digging into skin, suddenly running hot, furious that what little time they had left together would be wasted on playing hide and seek.
"We don't have to."
Raiden blinked, needing a moment to catch up. He sighed when he did. Sometimes, the Para-RAID was a pain in the ass. Raiden pulled Shin into a tight embrace with a grin that was meant as a challenge.
"You'd let me hold you like this in the barracks." Raiden winced at how skeptical he sounded. "Really?"
"Really." Shin shrugged. "I trust you."
Raiden shook his head with a chuckle, giddy with the sensation of warmth that bubbled through him as their frequencies matched up where their words were too awkward.
"Love you, too."
A message from HQ relayed by Fido arrived on the main screen in a crawl of green writing, breaking the moment. They glanced at it, then back at each other. Shin sent the Scavenger the coordinates of a nearby rendezvous point and acknowledged their new orders.
"Return to base."
Well, I have something to look forward to, Raiden thought with a wry smile as he made his way back to his Juggernaut. "Roger."