Gunmetal Crusade 7: A Turn

Gunmetal Crusade
Chapter 7: A Turn

-VB-

The Purification Arsenal arrived in droves. The public and most capes had assumed that the PA had, at most, a hundred members. To be fair, a hundred capes in any one organization made that organization a powerhouse. For reference, the National Hero Registrar - an apolitical civilian-run registrar that kept data of all recognized heroes -  only had three hundred fifty Protectorate heroes on its list. Those five hundred fifty capes were responsible for the battle for justice for the sake of three hundred million Americans. 

To say that each Protectorate hero was responsible for a little over half a million people was a statistical fact, even if it was arguably false once actual legal responsibilities were demanded and questioned.

So a hundred capes?

It was already an astounding amount of firepower. 

It may be less than that of the United States of America, but it was still a power equivalent to a national military.

But when the Endbringer Siren rang and the Purification Arsenal arrived in droves to protect Boston, PRT Boston grimaced in shock after they counted hundred fifty, paled when they counted two hundred, and knew that they were doomed against three hundred.

And knew that American lost its control over violence when the last fifty of the four hundred PA parahuman clone soldiers arrived not in the scrap metal armors they were known for but giant flying snake-worm they called a “fortress carrier.” 

The PA clone soldiers jumped into the frey right away… and became immediate targets for Leviathan. Their weapons - guns, spears, or swords - punched and sliced through Leviathan. 

No one had been able to penetrate through Leviathan before.

When the first hundred PA clone soldiers fought, they did so with the staccato of thunderous gunfire only a hundred guns combined could muster. It sounded, even to Legend, like a stream of cannon fire. The level of volume certainly matched the descriptions about their weapons of choice; that their smallest gun, dubbed “bolter” by the internet, fired small artillery shells. 

Leviathan screeched and tripled its water echoes. All three echoes assaulted the PA soldiers, and they … survived?

Even as water echoes exploded with enough force to shred tank armors with ease, they survived. They didn’t survive for long but they did.

Then the second hundred arrived, and Leviathan began to fight defensively. It ran from the weapons of the Purification Arsenal. It used previously unrecorded forms of attacks like draining its victims of all water in a single instant from more than a hundred yards away. 

It’s been pulling its punches.

And the Purification Arsenal as a whole was powerful enough to cause it to stop doing so.

The PA clone soldiers surrounded Leviathan, prevented it from running, and closed in.

And then the fortress carrier arrived.

Weaving through the skies like a snake and decked out in layers of armor even at its joints and four propeller-flippers that it used to maneuver, it was a terrifying sight to behold. Legend stared down at it and knew that to take that armored carrier down would require firepower not just from the PRT and the Protectorate combined but also the military. At the same time, he was glad that such a massive target was here to distract Leviathan. 

And it opened its serpentine maw, brandishing a cannon within its jaws, and fired.

It was too fast.

Leviathan took a hit to the lower back.

The Endbringer fell over.

And stayed silent.

It laid unmoving.

All unnatural water phenomena ceased.

As one, the Purification Arsenal clone soldiers ceased shooting and formed up its own group. 

And then they left as the whole world cheered.

That cheer turned into horrified screams as the Purification Arsenal turned their guns upon the villains who joined the Endbringer Battle. 

In the wasted waterfronts of Boston, the clone soldiers of the Purification Arsenal fired upon the villains among the Endbringer volunteers. Shocked, the heroes retaliated. 

What should have been a grand celebration turned into a bloodbath. The Triumvirate fought and downed the flying fortress, but not before it dealt a serious damage to Alexandria, leaving her fate unknown to the public after she was teleported away for medical attention. 

In the end, a ceasefire was called. Purification Arsenal agreed to stop killing the villains, but 

The Marshall of the Purification Arsenal released a video two days after the “Bloodbath of Boston.” In it, he said only two sentences.

“The Endbringer Truce is no longer necessary. The Arsenal is coming for you, the corrupt and villainous.”

When it should have been a week of celebration, the world instead received a declaration of war.