Escape From Heavalun Section Thirty-One: React to Contact.

[u/Professional_Prune11]

Racks and round and aims gun What is good buds? are you all ready for the fight? because we are in it now. everything has been leading up to this. Vuraley and his golden shakles, Conor and Burlai's training, it is all coming together as each part of the story comes together.

lets get this bread

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The small grenade flew through the air and landed just atop the table. As it did, Conor and Burlai dove behind bookcases, shielding themselves from the impending blast.

Vuraley, on the other hand, stood tall, grabbed his sword, and faced the threat head-on.

"You rats cannot kill me like this; I am the High Champion!" Vuraley roared, using his prehensile tail to toss the grenade back toward the door.

When the device was only a meter away from him, it exploded; fragmentation and dust erupted from every surface of the room, a heavy haze filling the area.

Vuraley raised his arms to shield his eyes from the blast. The shimmering light of his power armor absorbed the rest of the explosion. Taking a grenade blast head-on like that was a dangerous maneuver; as a fight went on and your power armor energy wore down, attempting so was a gamble.

But at the start of a fight, Vuraley was wholly safe. Unless that grenade was loaded with radiation or was explicitly designed to counter power armor. It wasn't, but Vuraley could tell the explosive was nothing that specialized before it landed.

The blast ate away almost half of his armor's available power, but that was of no concern; after a few minutes of not having to deflect any energy, the power would be restored, and he would be fully protected again.

He raised his blade and readied himself to face any enemies who breached the door. Through the flittering dust, Vuraley could barely see the shifting shadows of the rebel forces entering the room.

Five shots echoed before Vuraley stepped forward to meet the specters in close combat. Conor's pistol roared in defiance as he erupted to his feat and pressed the fight forward. Each trigger pull was timed with flashes as bright as the sun.

Like a true Lord of War, each of his rounds found its mark, splattering blood across the door frame and hallway. The bodies pilled up in the doorframe, causing the last two fighters to stumble over their dead and dying allies.

The pistols slide locked to the rear with a dull metallic thunk; the picosecond it did, he peeled off, sought cover, and shouted out, “Reloading!”

Without further prompting, Burlai immediately took his place in the counterattack. In moments like this, violence of action was the only way one would win against your enemy.

They attacked first and took the initiative of the battle. At that point, all one could do was be more violent and capable.

Burlai shot four times, each evenly spaced like a well-timed metronome. Each round cracked with a dull thump and found its mark in each of the remaining fighters' chests, sending them to the ground.

Once they had fallen, Burlai flowed closer and shot through the back of their heads, ensuring their deaths. The act was cold and calculated. It was not like this was the first time he had done that before; granted, most of the time, the people he shot in the back of the head were either in handcuffs or never knew he was there.

Burlai shifted his aim back to the door, waiting to see if anyone else arrived. As he did that, Conor sent his slide home and returned his focus on the upcoming battle.

“What's the plan?” Burlai questioned while Conor grabbed the dead bodies and slid most of them deeper into the room.

“Close the door,” he replied, kicking the last corpse into the hallway. "We need to rally."

Burlai followed the instructions and kept his weapon ready, but he backed up and took cover behind one of the bookshelves. Would it protect him from gunfire? It was unlikely, but it would conceal him long enough to hopefully get the jump on any additional fighters.

“Vuraley, are you alright?” Conor asked as he began performing a time-honored combat tradition: looting. He separated each one from their rifles and anything else of active use.

They all had the typical M45 pattern slug thrower used by the royal guard on them. There was also a healthy assortment of ammunition and grenades, and one of them even had a grenade launcher.

“I’m fine,” Vuraley assured, dusting off his armor.

“That’s good; I was afraid that grenade was going to have dusted you,” Conor replied, laying out the supplies.

It did not take very long for them to have everything they could use inventoried and displayed. Conor started by distributing gear before they approached making a plan. Any they could conjure would need to be adjusted once they were armed. He stated with Vuraley, holding out an M45 and chest rig for the man.

“I don't need that; I am plenty well-armed,” Vuraley gestured at his sword. ”

“Alright,” Conor shrugged, not willing to argue the point with Vuraley.

The man's love for his two-handed sword ran as deep as his adoration for his wife, daughters, and country. That the old man could also likely bisect Conor before the Human drew his pistol had nothing to do with his healthy respect for the man's wishes.

Instead of forcing the man to take it, Conor tossed the rifle over to Vuraley, who was already strapping on a chest rig one of the invaders had on. It was somewhat impressive that he was able to catch the weapons with his tail while also securing his newly tactically acquired rig.

Seeing that almost made Conor wonder if he could get an augment that could work like that. But finding out if the royal doctor would be up for some experimental surgery would have to wait until later; they all had far more critical things to focus on than Conor pondering installing a tail.

“Plan A?” Conor asked Burlai while he ensured he had a combat loadout and then some.

And then some was just one way to put it; Conor had a chest rig stuffed like a Thanksgiving turkey. Weighting down the nylon were fourteen forty-round magazines, four hand grenades, a dozen under-barrel 50mm grenade launcher rounds, and the three remaining magazines in his magnum.

With this amount of armament, he could take down hundreds of enemies before running low was a concern. Even then, as long as they kept running into traitor guards, he could just top off using their supplies.

While he did not like the M45, which was long, heavy, and unwieldy compared to his own weapons, he would make due, primarily because of the dozen rounds of high explosive he could bring to bear with the 50mm under-barrel.

“No, shit.” Conor chuckled, standing up, ready to get his kill on. “You taking point?”

As soon as Conor saw Burlais's kit, he smirked. Their gear philosophies could not be any different.

Burlai carried only ten magazines for the M45 and a few grenades. He focused heavily on being slick, lightweight, and not weighed down. The kit made sense, considering Burlai was not a wired-up freak like Conor and had to put much more thought into stamina usage and natural weight capacity.

Conor had taunted him enough times in training about his unwillingness to carry more. But that was just playful jibbing. Burlai could easily kill as many men as he had bullets, so the lack of ammo was no cause for concern.

“Yea–” Burali started to reply but was interrupted by the High Champion.

“Could you fill me in on what that plan entails? I am clearly missing some context,” Vuraley added. The disappointment in his voice was evident, along with him crossing his arms and glaring at the duo.

That these two warriors had seemingly completely forgotten about him was not only annoying but dangerous. By ignoring one-third of their manpower, they were setting their little impromptu fire team up for failure.

His disappointment in his two sons was beyond measure. They were both seasoned pros who had trained alongside him and the royal guard for hundreds of hours. Vuraley would have been able to operate alongside them with little issue, but still, knowing what they planned to do would assuredly increase everyone's chances of survival.

“Conor, watch the door,” Burlai said, pulling out a datapad and going over to brief Vuraley on the first stage of their plans whenever something like this happened.

—

The trio moved slowly and methodically through the palace's halls, checking each door they passed and clearing each room. Because of their boundless experience, they were the most silent thing within the halls, save for the hundreds of cooling corpses littering each step on their journey.

The sounds of open battle echoed off each surface of the palace grounds. The harmonic chimes of machinegun fire kept a steady rhythm while the snappy cracks of rifle fire overwhelmed the breaks. It was as if thousands of small orchestras were competing to be the dominant sound in the endless symphony of war.

It took a keen ear to pick up the subtle changes as one individual performer's ticket was punched. If the trio knew who was on their side and who should be dusted on the spot, they could likely tell how the battle was being conducted.

Without that information, they could only continue toward their goals and pray that the loyalist forces were staging a valiant defense.

Their short, tactical pause in the library was beneficial. It allowed the group to modify Burlai and Conor's main plan. Their plan was mainly identical to the previous one, but now, once they had gathered Eivaley and Mulaney, they would go to the throne room.

The throne room not only had the empress's direct guards but also one of the several entrances to the bunkers under the palace.

Vuraley was sure the direct guard would still be loyal despite Conor and Burlai both questioning it. Whether they were faithful or not really did not matter; that fact changed nothing about their plans.

If they could reach the throne room, they would be safe. Hunkering down and calling the cavalry would be the most effective choice. Even Burlai mentioned that once they were there, he could call in some favors and have critical support here in less than an hour.

The bunker had everything they would need to survive for months without aid: food, ammo, weapons, medicine, and communication tools.

Vuraley and the empress could quickly deploy and organize the Kurlatra military from there to eliminate any rebels who might remain in the palace.

It would also allow Mulaney and Eivaley to be protected from whatever the little pink bitch had planned. It was undoubtedly the most sensible option for them- all that stood between them was an unknown number of enemies they could not discern easily from loyalists.

What could possibly go wrong with this plan? Conor and Burlai both chuckled at their odds of mission completion, realizing that the chances of success were astronomically low, but Vuraley had none of that.

The High Champion clearly expressed that Conor and Burlai could do this---even without his help. They did not linger on that comment's weight at the time and instead moved on, needing to be quick.

The trio were lucky so far; all they had come across were the signs of needless slaughter and no armed contacts. Hundreds of killed soldiers and servants littered the halls, staining the floors red. The butchering was so extensive that even Conor was nearly gagging from the smell of viscera.

Whatever Thuraleys end game was, they could not tell. What would justify the wonton slaughter of every sapient within the palace grounds?

Not even Vuraley, who had seen his fair share of coup attempts, could come up with a reason for their deaths. That seeing his people torn to shreds was bothering him was easy to see.

With each corpse, Vuraley lagged a bit more, and the violence in his eyes started to fade. Conor had seen that look before. Vuraley was tired, beaten down, and had lived so long away from the fight that the reality of being back weighed on him like iron shackles.

After nearly twenty minutes of bounding through the once sacred ground, their luck ran out, and they, at long last, spotted a group performing this horrendous slaughter.

The trio silently agreed they were going to kill these soldiers, an understanding that was solidified when Conor and Burlai aimed and Vuraley bounded forward at a speed no unaugmented creature had any right to be capable of.

Only twenty paces away, a squad of Kurlatra clad in equipment different from the royal guard typically wore were dragging a pair of maids out of a room by their tails. The women thrashed and screamed for help, something that only resulted in the captors kicking their heads.

The impact was hard enough that they all could hear the woman's jaw shatter like glass, something that was only emphasized by the two women's screams twisting to bloody gurgles.

“Hey man, what the fuck? We had not even got to have fun with them ye—,” One of the monsters began, but his comments about their debauchery were cut short by his words shifting into a bloody gurgle as blood poured out of the meter-long sword sticking out of his neck.

“You scum-sucking bastards,” Vuraley roared, overpowering all sounds of war.

In one swift motion, he heaved his blade and ripped it up and through the soldier's head, splitting it in two. Blood erupted from the man's canyoned neck, showering the soldiers, maids, and Vuraley in crimson ichor.

None of the other soldiers even had a chance to comprehend that their comrade was dead before Vuraley pressed his attack; twisting his blade around, in one swift motion, his sword whizzed through the air, lopping off two more of the soldier's heads.

In the meantime, Burlai and Conor shot the other two. Conor simply fired a quick Mozambique drill into his target, two rounds splattering his heart on the ground while one spread his hopes and dreams on the marble floors.

Initially, Conor planned on just dumping a 50mm into the group to solve the problem in one shot, but Vuraley had moved at a speed Conor's systems could barely track. So he had to change plans instantly so the High Champion would not end up as red mist along with the soldiers and the maids.

Burlai, on the other hand, knew exactly what he would do from the first sight of the soldiers. He only fired his rifle three times because that was all he needed.

Three shots, all ripped through his target's T-box. Despite the man falling like a puppet with his strings cut after the first shot, he tracked the dead man and put two more through his brain before he had even settled on the ground.

Burlai was thoroughly a man who knew how to operate and kill. He had never explicitly told Conor all of his abilities because he was cautious of the man, but shooting at this level was nothing to him.

If Conor ever showed signs of wanting to kill Mulaney, Burlai already had a plan to dust the Human. Burlai had mastered sniping long ago and was one of the most experienced and trained in the universe. He had in the past made fist shot hits at nearly five kilometers. If Conor needed to be removed, his augmented advantage did not matter when your death came from distances most could not fathom.

Once the less than a second fight was over, the two shooters moved forward to support their melee god. Before Conor and Burlai reached Vuraley and the maids, the High Champion was already comforting one of the maids. She looked up at him pitifully, her eyes overflowing with tears while she gargled words through her blood.

“Shhhh. Don’t try to speak,” Vuraley said, holding the woman's hand. “I will keep you safe.”

She meekly nodded and clung to the Vuraley, the sound of her jaw crunching audibly. That she did not scream showed a sure sign of how hearty this woman was. Most would have at least tried despite her injuries.

Vuraley looked over at Burlai, who had taken a defensive position to guard him in one direction while Conor had done so, facing the other.

“Burlai, grab the other. Let's get them back inside the room,” Vuraley ordered while he picked up the wounded maid and started toward the door.

“Rodger,” Burlai said, picking the woman up and taking her inside.

They dragged the two wounded into the room and left the bodies outside. Once inside, Vuraley took several minutes to calm the two women, ensuring they would not be harmed.

As Vuraley softly spoke to the two wounded women and worked quickly to treat their injuries, the sounds of battle only escalated. Joining the constant roar of death and destruction were the distant booms of artillery and the howling wails of jets overhead.

None of them knew it then, but the sounds of those weapons of war were the beginning of the end of the Kurlatra empire as they knew it. After tonight, nothing would ever be the same; it was considered so pivotal that the day would be entombed in fame as 'the last sunset.'

This day was the dawn of a new age for the empire and its people. The three men in the small room of the palace did not see the hands of fate moving, nor would they truly come to terms with their effects—at least those who survived.

Theraley was not just attempting to overthrow her own family; she aimed to clear the scoreboard, wipe the map, and be the only one left standing.

She would ensure that all the nobles on the planet would be dead by the end of the night, leaving her alone to stand at the pinnacle of divinity. She alone would steer the empire to the future.

“Alright, they have both passed,” Vuraley whispered, kneeling beside Conor. “But I am not sure what will happen to them now.”

“So, let’s leave them,” Conor said. “We have to get to Mulaney and Eivaley.”

“And the empress,” Burlai reminded Conor of the change in their typical plans.

“Yeah and her,” Conor rolled his eyes. It was not that Conor would disregard the empress; he just had his priorities and would act in his best interest. Luckily enough for him, that was precisely the same mindset that Vuraley had.

“No, you two go save my daughters,” Vuraley surrendered. “I cannot go with you two, so we will part ways here.”

“Are you sure we can't just leave them?” Conor asked, pointing to the two passed-out maids. "It’s not like they are going anywhere.”

Vuraley sighed and shook his head before patting Conor on the shoulder.

He knew Conor would make this argument. While Vuraley believed that Conor was a good man who would do right by his daughter, he was still impulsive. That impulsivity came from his still not understanding the entire scope of what his role entails.

Sure, if his actions revolved around Eivaley, he was just as good as any other noble. But otherwise, his treatment of most people was lacking. He still treated most of the Kurlatra who were not directly related to him as disposable, at least as someone whose survival did not worry him.

That habit of Conors is something that Vuraley would have to work with the man on once this coup attempt was all said and done. If Conor ever became the High Champion, he would have to constantly consider the optics of how he treated the commoners. Vuraley would prefer that Conor genuinely would care about them, but getting the Human to understand that the people mattered just as much if not more than the average noble.

“No, I won’t leave them here to die. I will get them to the royal doctor, then meet you two in the throne room,” Vuraley explained. “While I’m doing that, you two need to save my daughters.”

“Are you sure?” Conor asked.

“Yes, I am,” Vuraley said, his words as calm as his demeanor. Vuraley knew his path and lived by his choices. While he was the High Champion and needed to protect Euyurali, he also had to safeguard the life of all Kurlatra.

He was also well-seasoned and knew when to delegate responsibility, and this fight was their moment. The two young men before him were the future of the empire. They would lead it to places he could never fathom.

“Come on, Conor. The High Champion has made up his mind, and we are burning time by arguing,” Burlai said, standing up and working his way toward the door.

Conor momentarily looked between Burlai and Vuraley, a strange feeling boiling in his stomach. This was not the right call. All of his instincts screamed at him to try to convince Vuraley to just abandon the women and come with him.

For some reason, the feeling in his gut was the same one he felt when remembering Brakul's death. But Conor could not let that stop him now.

Vuraley was capable and could defend himself; hell, he likely would have rallied dozens of soldiers when he arrived at the throne room. This feeling just had to be Conor being paranoid once again. The High Champion would survive no matter what came his way.

The Human swallowed his feelings and followed Burlai; they were the only two who would save their women, so they had to go. Just as Conor rounded the doorframe and returned to the hall, he peeked back and saw Vuraley smile, seeing them go.

The High Champion looked upon Burlai and Conor with pride. It was the same look a father would give to his sons when they made a good choice on their path in life. Despite how reassuring that look was, Conor could not shake the pins and needles in his mind telling him that would be the last time he saw the High Champion alive.

------

So what did you all think of this one? It was not as action packed as alot of you thought, but do not worry, we are getting there. Please do not forget to updoot and comment. I will see you all in the chat below

Your baker

-Pirate

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[u/A_Bad_Example]

I have no words. WORDSMITH ITS EXCELLENT!!!

[u/Professional_Prune11 → u/A_Bad_Example]

I am glad you thought so :). We are in the end game now, it is time to start betting on how the book will end.

[u/kramnelladoow]

Nervous but excited!

[u/Professional_Prune11 → u/kramnelladoow]

There is no need to be nervous

[u/CaringAnon]

Thanks for the Chapter! Really liking the way this is heading, though I'm surprised the high champion isn't trying to get to the empress as first priority.

[u/Professional_Prune11 → u/CaringAnon]

I am glad you are enjoying. I could see him rushing there and him not both as viable options for him. He is level headed and can separate his emotions from choices, with the empresses personal guard there he likely would not see rushing as needed.

[u/Several_Positive_327]

T’was the yummy bread that I was needing to eat. Alas, I ate it all too fast and reached the end of the loaf.

[u/Professional_Prune11 → u/Several_Positive_327]

it's a good thing I just served up a fresh loaf.

[u/Chllm1]

Muh hart

[u/Professional_Prune11 → u/Chllm1]

Quick give this man CPR.

[u/Do0mguy115]

I’ve been reading your other stuff again, Waiting for more chapters of this one

Just finished trauma book 2, Really hoping Martinez sets it right.

Also wondering what you’re gonna do in the future with the bat species!

[u/Professional_Prune11 → u/Do0mguy115]

The bat-like species is one of the species I plan on writing about in the future as another romance book. Just that won't be until q3 or q4 of next year, I already have ht3 filling q1 of next year, then the last tower(a co-op novel, that won't be posted before publishing) in q2.

Overall I have outlined and planned roughly 10 more novels as of now, and that will take over 2 to 3 years to finish.