Meeting M4A1 Again
“M4A1, you have nowhere to run to now.”
Executioner coldly surveyed Griffon’s former communications station that was in ruins. M4A1 had her back against a mud wall and panted. She removed her empty cartridge. Her damaged finger made it harder to reload her gun. She took in a deep breath and stayed on standby.
M4A1 used up all of her ammunition after several back to back skirmishes whilst leading Team AR. It was impossible for her to move at high speeds with her damaged joints. Executioner’s team caught up to her. Griffon’s doors reinforced with concrete and three-millimetre thick metal boards granted a sense of security. Nevertheless, it was an ostrich operation, in essence. Executioner had her trapped inside the door.
The thick mud and reinforced walls crippled her communication devices. She was at a communication station, but she needed the signal tower outside to communicate. She wasn’t capable of rebooting the shut-down communication station. Put simply, she was helpless.
“How nostalgic…” remarked M4A1.
M4A1 leaned on the mud wall and looked at her hands as she calmly recalled the last time she was captured. She was locked in a lead trailer with no signal, electricity or anything for that matter. She had to bear with it until that man rescued her.
“Will someone come to my rescue again?” wondered M4A1. “Stop, stop, I’m 16Lab’s T-Doll. My mission is to report back what I learnt this time. I need to think of a way to reach out, not fret about myself. I can’t be afraid, but… but… if I can’t be afraid, why did Persica install an emotional component in me…? What is the point of it…?”
M4A1 stood up again. She pulled the backup power brake, but it didn’t do anything. Sangvis Ferri presumably destroyed the place very thoroughly. M4A1 gave up. She sat against the mud wall and spaced out, holding onto her joke of a weapon to await her end.
“Will someone come to my rescue?” M4A1 asked herself again.
*Rumble!*
The three-millimetre thick doors trembled. The entire building quaked as if an elephant was rampaging on toy cars. M4A1 covered her head from the falling rubble and chips. An explosion soon followed, blasting the metal door open. The door slammed into M4A1. She took aim from behind the wall.
“It’s futile, M4A1. We know your predicament.”
Executioner placed her shield down and coldly scanned the dark interior. Executioner understood would consider it filthy to hunt a rodent down once she found where it nested. The best method would be to force it out of hiding. There was no need to personally fight a trapped beast; they didn’t need to capture M4A1. They just needed to make sure M4A1 couldn’t deliver the documents she stole back to Griffon. A destroyed robot couldn’t send the documents. Thus, Executioner only needed to disable M4A1.
“M4A1, I’m reluctant to see you go, but our game of cat and mouse should end here. Goodbye. I hope you learn the lesson to keep your hands to yourself from now.”
Executioner took out a few grenades and tied them together with her hair. She would blow M4A1 to fragments once she threw the collection of grenades in. The other scenario would be M4A1 rushing out, and they would just gun her down with a barrage of bullets.
M4A1 knew what the enemy’s strategy was. There was another excellent way to catch a rodent, and that was to blow up the rodent’s hiding hole.
“I’m done for. I’m either going to be blown to bits or gunned down. I can’t find any escape routes no matter how hard I think. There’s no hope left for me. Is this… the end of the line for me…? Why did they appoint me as AR Squad’s leader…? AR15 and M16 can do better than me, can’t they…? Why must it be me…? I… I’m just a fragile T-Doll… Why… did they have to choose me…? I… I’m scared…” thought M4A1.
*Bang! Bang! Bang!*
A sniper hiding in the forest to the side suddenly fired a shot at Executioner’s hand. Startled, Executioner spun around to see Griffon’s reinforcements charging over from the forest. The T-Dolls threw several smoke bombs to cut off the enemy’s advance. The smoke bomb wasn’t designed to be used against humans. Its most important feature was the micro metal fragments that invaded robots’ gaps in their joints, thereby damaging their joints and vision. Executioner was cognizant of the fact that T-Dolls couldn’t enter the field of smoke, so she was safe in her immediate surroundings. She couldn’t see; however, her aim-assist system would be fine. As long as she could use suppressive fire, then the enemy couldn’t close in on her.
“Fire!” commanded Executioner.
To Executioner’s dismay, the majority of her combat robots were disabled. She wasn’t the T-Dolls’ commander; she was merely a powerful T-Doll. Most of the combat robots depended on the command centre’s instructions.
“Familiar? You’re skilled in close-quarters combat, so I assume you’re aware of what happens when you’re caught by surprise.”
Executioner was immobilised in place. She wasn’t panic-stricken. She just couldn’t move. I yanked my knife out of Executioner’s neck. Sangvis Ferri’s robots’ control system was located where I thrust my knife in. I then drilled multiple bullets into her head. Not even metal couldn’t stop bullets fired from point blank. I gunned down Executioner with my M1911 before she could make a single utterance. Taking down Executioner was many times easier than the agent I fought last time. Executioner would probably never realise that the venom she used was easily countered with humanity’s gas masks.
I couldn’t tell you if it was because I was worried about my team or because I heard M4A1 was involved, but I couldn’t sit still at the command centre. I noticed the reinforcement squad wasn’t in their best shape after two clashes. I, therefore, substituted for the damaged T-Dolls at the airport and infiltrated the wrecked communications base.
A dark-green figure slowly stood up from behind the mud wall. She held onto her right arm with her left. Maybe it was because she was a T-Doll, but she couldn’t set down her rifle.
“Command-… er?”
“Ah, M4A1, long-time no see,” I said with a smile, scratching my head.
M4A1 looked blankly at me. She cautiously walked over to me and fell onto my chest.
In my mind, I exclaimed, “Hey, hey, hey, you’re a T-Doll, not a human!! It doesn’t feel nice to have a metal head slammed on your chest!”
M4A1 gently quivered on my chest no differently to an ordinary girl… I reactively hugged her, but she felt hard as… metal…
“Help us… Commander… Please… help us…”
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