The boys land on their feet in the whipped up dust. Men that were seen earlier between the walls are seen on the ground firing their guns. Hand guns, machine guns, rifles, and all sorts that Zed couldn’t even recognized were all being fired through the dust toward where the shots of lasers were coming from. The sounds of footsteps march toward them and from out of the dust walked out Cyber Tech soldiers. They were of an average adult height sporting armor colored cobalt blue. Armored limbs and joints were attached to each other via wires. One arm of each soldier was what appeared to be a gun where the laser shots were emanating from. Each soldier had their laser rifle arms lifted and firing, being aimed through glowing red eyes.

“Now those look like bad guys if I’ve ever seen them”, said Zed while holding up his robotic arm. “Shall we get acquainted to our possible parent-knapper?” Psy nods his head in agreement as he begin to unzip his sleeves. “Let’s do this!” Zed and Psy run toward the oncoming robotic soldiers. Zed touches the first stripe of his arm and his fore arm begins to suck in air again. A Cyber Tech soldier takes notice and aims its laser rifle at Zed, but Zed quickly jumps at it, his robotic fist raised in the air. “Have a taste of my pressurized punch!” Before the robot gets a chance to fire, Zed lands his metal fist in its torso. The air built up in his arm is suddenly released, sending the robot’s body hurdling backwards into the other robots marching behind it. “Yes”, Zed said as he triumphantly clenched his fist, pumping it downwards.

To his left Psy pulls of his sleeves, revealing his pale arms. He runs up to another nearby robot as his left arm begins to glow a faint purple. Psy touches the robot’s torso with his glowing arm and with the touch the glowing purple aura transfers over to the robots body, enveloping it. The aura fades away as the robot turns toward Psy, ready to fire its weapon. However sparks begin shooting out of the robot’s circuits before malfunctioning and exploding. Psy doesn’t react to his adversary’s destruction as he moves on to the next soldier.

Meanwhile guns are still being fired from the mercenary men defending Big Shot City. One of the mercenaries’ guns jams and as he tries to fix it he finds a robotic soldier is standing right on top him. The robot points its rifle at the mercenary’s face and begins charging it. The mercenary closes his eyes in fear, awaiting his fate. Seemingly out of nowhere Zed appears and delivers another pressurized punch to the robot’s back, sending it flying away. The mercenary opens his eyes to see a confident Zed standing where the robot once was. “Th-thanks”, said the mercenary.

“No problem!” Zed said as he reaches out to help the mercenary up. The mercenary grabs on and stands up. Behind Zed a large robotic soldier marches and looms over them. Appearing very similar to the other soldiers but much more robust and taller, easily topping eight feet tall. Besides looking tougher this model of soldier did not support a rifled arm, but a wrecking ball instead. The wrecking ball releases and hangs to the robot by a chain and is swung toward Zed and the newly acquainted mercenary. While Zed is unaware of the danger behind him the mercenary’s eyes widen.

“Duck!” the mercenary yelled as he grabs Zed’s head and forces it down. The wrecking ball swings past the top of their heads and crashes into the ground nearby before reeling back into the robots arm. Zed gets up to see the hulking robot looming over him.

“Ha! The bigger they are, the harder they fall!” Zed said as he reels his robot arm back. The mercenary follow suit as he points his rifle at their common enemy.

“Bwa! Ha! Ha! Thanks for saving my boy there you tall hat fella!” A voice boomed from behind the two. Zed turns his head toward the voice to be met with the loud noise of a machine gun firing from above his head, directly at the giant robot. The two cover their ears and duck as the giant robot is filled with bullet holes and slowly falls over backward, deceasing function.

“Geez captain!” yelled the mercenary. “Could’ve given us a little warning!”

“Bwa! Ha! Ha! Sorry about that!” boomed the voice. Zed stands up to see a tall muscular man standing before them. He wore a white sleeveless shirt, camo pants secured by a black belt and large black combat boots. In his right arm he held a large rotating machine gun that was fed ammunition wrapped around his torso. The gun’s multiple barrels smoke from freshly being fired. The man’s face was rugged with beard stubble and he wore a confident smile. His hair was short, brown and buzz cut.

“Holy crap guy!” exclaimed Zed. “Who the heck do you think you are?” The muscular man smiled bigger.

“I’m the captain of all these low class shmucks! Captain Zach!” Zach exclaimed proudly as he pounds his free fist into his muscular chest.

“Some captain!” Zed said. “You nearly took us out there!”

“I took the big one down didn’t I?! Bwa! Ha! Ha!” Zach said. Over hearing the commotion Psy comes to his brother. Zach looks at Psy and laughs another hearty laugh. “Bwa! Ha! Ha! Scrawny thing ain’t cha’?” Psy annoyingly squints his eyes at Zach.

“Come Zed. More fighting to do,” Psy said. But as the two turn to face off against more of the robot menace they are stopped by Zach’s large hands on their shoulders.

“Whoa there you two! No need! Things here should be wrapping up very shortly!” Zach said.

“What do you mean? There’s still robots to break out there”, Zed said as lasers continue to shoot past them.

“We’ve taken out a good deal of them. She should be finishing the leftovers soon,” Zach said. And just as Zach says this a nearby robots head is shot and explodes in response. Then another nearby head shot, then another, and another. Zed and Psy watch, Zed looks surprised and Psy looking quite annoyed to be touched by a stranger, the robots go down one after the other. “Yup! She takes her time but when she shows up we have nothing to fear. Our very own sniping Ace!” Zach points over the wall to the top of a skyscraper. Standing atop the sky scraper was a woman with long blonde hair that flowed in the wind. She wore a blue under shirt covered by a high cut, opened, short sleeved jean jacket. Her bottom was wide hipped, short-short blue jeans and black laced sandals. Her face was partially covered by high tech looking goggles as she took aim with a very nice looking dark blue sniper rifle. She fired another shot, right into the head of another robot soldier. “You see? Everything’s taken care of here so why don’t you two come with me and we can get better acquainted!” Zed and Psy look at each other and follow Zach back within the walls as the sniper continued to finish the job.

Zed and Psy find themselves in a dimly lit messy room. Wooden crates of ammunition dotted the room. The white walls are covered with papers of maps and diagrams. The two are seated at a beat up wooden table accompanied by Zach sitting on the other side, his machine gun is laid down on a nearby wooden crate. Zach kicks his feet up on to the table. “Go ahead! Make yourselves comfortable”, Zach said. Psy squints at him. Zed shrugs and copies Zach by putting his own feet on to the table. “Bwa! Ha! Ha! I like you kid! No fear!”

“Bwa! Ha! Ha!” Zed copying Zach more. “You’re a weird guy but I like your syle!” The two laugh at each other while Psy closes his eyes and puts his face into his hands.

“Hate to interrupt the manly bonding”, a girl’s voice interrupts the two’s laughter. All three boys’ heads turn toward the doorway to see the sniping woman from before with her sniper strapped to her back. The woman continues, “but what are you two doing here?”

“Hey! Good to see you! I was just getting to know these two little rough and tough scoundrels! Why don’t you come meet them too?!” said Zach.

“My name’s Zed and this is my quiet brother Psy. We’re Zed and Psy Shima,” said Zed.

“Oh, I’ve met you two already”, said the woman as she raises her goggles revealing her sky blue eyes. Zed and Psy instantly recognize her.

“Let me introduce you two to our number one sniper!” Zach said. “Trace Ace!” Zed and Psy are surprised.

“Wait so you’re from that Ace family you were telling us about? And what the heck is a fancy pants girl like you doing involving yourself with all this dirty fighting?” asked Zed.

“Bwa! Ha! Ha!” Zach laughed. “You are correct! Trace is from that very snobby family that hired all of us in the first place. She was just a little girl way back when, but as she grew up she really began hating on her parents. She would constantly sneak out of their big ol’ Ace Tower. She found herself between the walls more often than not with a bunch of tough guys like us. When we found the sweet little thing we didn’t know what to do with her, but she would constantly swipe our hand guns and practice shooting our targets! She had quite the knack for it I tell you! Eventually we accepted her as one of us and began teaching her the ways to her family’s own weaponry. Now she’s our number one little sniper! And our number beauty as well! Bwa! Ha! Ha!”

“Tell them my life story why don’t ya”, Trace said as she leans on Zach’s broad shoulders. “I thought I told you boys to get rested?”

“Kind of hard to ignore all the explosions and gunshots”, retorted Zed.

“It is for all these classy idiots called residents”, Trace said. “All they care about is how clean and fancy their city is! Keeping themselves oblivious to their own violent surroundings! I hate being part of the family that’s the cause of all this ignorance!” Trace angrily kicks at a nearby ammo crate.

“Now, now Trace you know no one here looks at you like that”, responded Zach. “Back to you two”, Zach turns to look at Zed and Psy. “I couldn’t help but notice that you guys said you’re last names were Shima? Like the Shimas of Gears Work?” Zed’s expressions picks up.

“Oh, so you’ve heard of us?” Zed said with a snarky grin.

“What’s the big deal?” asked Trace.

“The Shimas were only the best mechanics around these parts!” Zach said excitedly. “You could bring anything to them and they’d fix it right up for you! I was sad to hear the state Gears Works had become but it’s great to see the Shima name is still alive! I knew I saw talent in you guys out on the battle field, especially you there fella sporting that classy arm”. Zach points to Zed’s robotic arm. “And you, you pale guy.” Zach gives his focus now to a quickly annoyed Psy. “I saw your arms glowin’ that purple junk. Makin’ all those robots explode and crap! Boom!” Zach spreads his arms open to imitate the explosions. “You must be one of dem fairy type guys, huh? Ain’t got the pointy ears though so guess you’re human? I don’t know but can’t say I really care. Listen, I brought you guys back here because I want to hire you as fellow mercenaries! The Aces, as ridiculous as they are.” Zach turns toward Trace, “No offense”.

“Oh absolutely none taken”, responded Trace.

“Well they pay real good”, Zach said. “So what do you boys say? Could really use some genuine Shimas fighting the good fight!” Psy turns his head to his brother and very quickly shook his head back and forth. Zed laughs at his brother’s enthusiastic response.

“Thank you for the offer”, replied Zed, “but we actually have other matters to attend to”. Trace smiles.

“Their parents might be held up in Cyber Tech’s base”, Trace said.

“Oh I see”, Zach responded. “So you crazy kids are heading that way? Bwa! Ha! Ha! That’s suicide!”

“We gotta try”, said Zed.

“Well I respect your boy’s decision. I wish you the best of luck!” said Zach. “Real shame though. Could’ve really used those Shima smarts around here. Really give our forces some edge!”

“Tell you what?” Zed said. “The mechanical knowledge was really passed on to me, but not so much my brother here. Before we head on our way why don’t I check out what you got and see what I can do”.

“Bwa! Ha! Ha! That’s very much appreciated young Shima!” said Zach. “Cyber Tech’s forces seem to come more and more frequently now a days so we could certainly use the tune up!” The group leave the cramped room and Zach brings them to the shops. Zed looks at all the mechanisms and weaponry with excitement, and quickly get to work. Psy finds a seat in the corner and sits with his hands in his sweaters pockets as his brother works away. Zed uses the rest of the night showing Zach, Trace and the other mercenaries how to improve their current mechanisms. Before they knew it, morning had arrived, and everyone is alerted by the sound of alarms ringing. “Already?!” A clearly worried mercenary comes busting through the shop doors covered in sweat.

“It’s the worst Captian!” yelled the mercenary.

“Now calm down”, said Zach. “The bots have been showing up more and more, but it’s nothing we haven’t handled before”.

“No Captain!” exclaimed the mercenary. “You need to come see this!” Zach’s face scrunches from a mixture of concern and annoyance. The group follow the mercenary up to a watch tower connected to the first wall, to a telescope surveying the landscape. Other mercenaries hurry all over the place, preparing for another battle. “Just look!” Zach tsks as he leans down the telescope to see what has is comrade in such a frazzled state. Zach looks through the telescope until he dead stops. His facial expression freezes.

“I’ve only heard about these guys in rumors…” Zach said.

“What is it?” exclaimed Trace worryingly. “I’ve never seen you look like this before”.

“It can’t be, but it’s exactly what they said it looks like”, said Zach. “That long, pointed body…” Zach stops looking through the telescope and looks back at the group, and then at the mercenary. “Tell everyone to bring out the biggest guns we got! We aren’t dealing with what we’ve normally been dealing with all these years!”

“Sir, yes sir!” the mercenary takes off down the watch tower. Zach turns toward the oncoming threat. He slams his fists on to a nearby table. Trace looks at him, worried about the frazzled state Zach was in.

“What is it?” Zed asked. Zach turns toward Zed.

“We’ve never seen one of these before, but I’ve heard about them”, Zach said. “There are different classes to Cyber Tech’s armies. We’ve always been able to deal the two most frequent classes, those being the soldier class bearing the rifles and the heavy class that bear those big wrecking ball things…” Zach stops himself. “… but this is a class I’ve only heard about. They’re supposed to only be stationed at Cyber Tech’s base”. Zach turns to face Cyber Tech’s on coming forces once more. “It’s the strongest of the strong! General class!”