Shadow Slave

Sunny remained motionless for a while, until eventually there was a sound of footsteps approaching him. Turning around, he looked at Sergeant Gere with a blank expression.

The soldier tensed, habitually expecting dreadful news.

"...What? What's in there?"

Sunny lingered for a bit, then simply shook his head.

"Order the convoy to drive inside. You'll see soon enough."

Before too long, the column of battered vehicles drove past him, disappearing into the dark tunnel. Once they were all inside, Sunny glanced at the falling ash one last time, then walked into the darkness himself. The blast doors closed behind him with a reverberating hum, cutting off the bitter cold and the chilling wind of the polar night.

Just before the two plates of armored alloy touched, Master Jet's crow flew between them and landed on Sunny's shoulder. The bird glanced into the tunnel with curiosity, then stared at him and cawed a couple of times. For a change, those were simple caws, and not mangled words of the human language.

A pale smile appeared on Sunny's face.

"...Yeah. Good job."

With that, he walked down the tunnel, soon reaching the underground garage.

The convoy was parked in the empty corner of the vast chamber, and excited soldiers were already moving around the pristine military vehicles, evaluating their state. Someone else was busy opening alloy crates that were stacked along one of the walls, full of all kinds of supplies.

the gate using his command authority. The ventilation systems were also online, filling the underground space with the familiar,

in deeply and waited

"So? How is it?"

made Sunny realize that he had never seen the dependable sergeant

division between battles, if there's no convenient opportunity to reach a fortified stronghold or if the

paused for a moment, and then

inventory yet, but you can already see that this is far more than we need. There are different types of machines, too, from armored personnel carriers to

robots were about six meters tall, on the smaller side compared to their larger cousins, but they still packed a heavy punch.

Creatures, but had troubles dealing with the Awakened ones, even with the

just one

gave Sergeant Gere a dubious

even have anyone capable

soldier coughed and awkwardly scratched the back

"Oh... no, not really."

remained silent for a few moments, then

Those vehicles that we can drive are much faster than the civilian transports, too, have better armor, and can navigate more difficult terrain. Not to mention that there's more of them than we can possibly use, or everything, really. The infrastructure between here and Falcon Scott is also

of the beams of the support framework near the ceiling of the depot,

days, to let the people rest and give us time to get acquainted with

the logistics of settling in hundreds of refugees in an underground storage bunker that was not really meant to