We moved forward from our position, carefully examining the territory for any signs that there might be other turrets. In minutes the Determinators had managed to catch up to our progress, but instead of focusing all of our efforts on one spot, we decided to spread out, dispatching defenses as we found them. We knew that the facility was somewhere here, but not exactly where.

Shade could very well have been helpful here, but my aerial vehicle was occupied elsewhere, along with much of the Reavers. It was regrettable, especially since I’d have rather kept them nearby, but we would manage.

“The Determinators have updated the map,” I noted, looking at the available information we had. Much as I’d feared, the turrets only maintained a pattern near the outer edges of the island. Their type, quantity, and distance from one another had become chaotic, and thus the Determinators ended up only marking where they’d identified previous defenses. That would be important, at least, considering we would need to use this island going forward if we weren’t able to move the uplink or its information.

Daniel lifted his arm and fired a burst from the vulcan cannon there, shredding through dozens of meters of jungle and tearing through a turret as it peaked up from the ground. Fran pointed a wing in another direction, a third of the feathers storming through the air like a blender and hitting another location. The rest of us waited, watching for a third, but none rose.

“Looks like thirty so far,” Domino shook his head and sighed, “this is kind of ridiculous.”

“Considering the project it was set to protect, I think this is about right.” Jessica chuckled, “Still, there’s nothing too crazy yet.”

I nodded, agreeing with that silently. There indeed hadn’t been anything too unusual as of yet. The guns themselves weren’t terribly damaging either, likely meant for lightly armored mesh suits, or in other words what would have been a standard soldier from the old world. It was quaint, in a way, to think of certain old world technologies, and the fact that our armaments were so far flung from what would have been considered military-grade.

I shouldered my rifle once more and began marching in tune with Daniel’s heavy foot falls. Every so often I would hear distant weapons fire from the Determinators, each a short retort that almost bled into one single background tone as we closed in on the island.

That continued for a few minutes, our own progress interrupting the smooth cadence with an explosion from Domino’s attached grenade launcher, Daniel’s automatic weaponry, or the sharp whistle of Fran’s feathers. Jessica and I stayed in reserve at this point, the former because nothing was a threat enough to go on the move, and myself for coordinating with the Determinators.

It was then that a Determinator sent an alarm out that it’d taken a hit.

Immediately I brought my mind’s attention to the sensory feed of that specific unit even as I walked with my team. The Determinator had identified in moments where the shot had come from, and quickly brought its ocular sensors upwards, already sweeping the area with thermals.

A moment later several more shots bit into its armor, some missing fractionally and tearing through dirt and jungle around it. The Determinators amongst its team didn’t waste any time, sharing in data and aiming ahead. What looked like hexagonal bunkers rose between one and three meters from the ground, sheltering the turret within. I couldn’t make out what the weapon itself was, only that it was almost six hundred meters away and the fully automatic firepower maintained plenty of destructive capability well inside its effective range.

At the same time, several other groups of Determinators detected similar contacts, and registered superficial damage.

“Heads up!” Daniel shouted as a shoulder gun adjusted on his body, a cannon shot rocking the earth under our feet. Ahead of us, I could see a bunker-tower still in the process of rising suddenly explode in a shower of fire and scrap.

Beside it, three more rose, and instead of going on the offensive, Fran deployed several shielding feathers in front of us. Domino fired another shot from his attached grenade launcher, before also firing with his own shoulder mounted weapon.

Impressively, his grenade was a direct hit, as was the follow up strike, shredding through another of the towers. Two remained, however, and they began firing, sparks and bits of bullets fragmenting against Fran’s shielding.

“On the move!” Jessica shouted aloud before she bolted outside of our formation. She moved wide, keeping from taking a straight path towards the turrets. Almost instantly, one of the towers rotated slightly, tracking her movements. The melee expert of the team was fast, however, even such that I doubted that even Alice could easily keep pace. Her power armor was sleek, and every movement dug into the terrain with precision, always managing to find traction. Her lightweight and balanced form let her glide across the ground.

She might have even been able to outpace the turret’s ability to correct its aim, but I didn’t want to take that chance. I fell into focus as I brought up my rifle, switching it to what I dubbed ‘Metal-Storm Mode’ and sighted upon the turret. Time seemed to fall away as I tightened my grip, my power armor responding to minute tweaks in control in preparation to handle the recoil.

When I opened fire for just a second, the three barrels spat out a tight cloud of bullets, flying at speeds that well surpassed the sound barrier. Outside of water my combative ability was greater by far, and true to my goal the weapon didn’t budge a centimeter during firing.

Most of my bullets, even at this distance, managed to hit the gap in the bunker-tower, a slit for the weapon encased within to fire out of. Instantly smoke belched forth from within the concrete, the squeal of metal and machine parts being torn joined the air at that moment.

The final turret continued firing on our position for another moment before it too began to turn, tracking the target no longer under cover. It barely began its movement, though, before Jessica reached it. She struck with her blade, still five meters away, a distance that was clearly too far for the two meter long broadsword. Partly through her swing, though, the sword extended far past her previous reach. The cut moved through concrete and steel like it wasn’t there, and less than a blink of an eye later she reversed her grip and backswiped, striking upwards through another section of the defense, concrete and all.

The turret ceased moving as the blade shrank back down, moving down to only a half meter in length. Jessica was one of the only people - and certainly the only one that used it as their main weapon - that utilized such a weapon. It was a monomolecular blade wrapped in a powerful magnetic field, even on its own, it could cut most anything, but - contrary to what many of our disappointed Legionnaires had expected - it was an extremely fragile and costly weapon. Only by masterful use and smooth strokes could it be used effectively in combat.

However, Jessica’s training and her suit compensated for this, allowing her to use the blade as a primary weapon, though her power armor suffered in other ways as a result. I doubted she could utilize much in the way of heavier equipment, and her armor was far lighter and less capable of stopping outside blows than our own. In exchange, every movement flowed like mercury, every action contained and precise. Yaga had personally taken an interest in the concept, and had offered his own expertise, but much of it had been Jessica’s own ridiculous fine tuning.

It was all of this that led to the payoff moment of being able to witness her sheath her blade, then turn around towards us nonchalantly as the turret behind her fell away to pieces. The now bi-sected defense’s top half clanged heavily against the ground. Simultaneously, the base of the machine began spluttering electricity as its damaged motors still attempted to load a gun that was no longer attached.

“Nice,” amused, Domino spoke while looking for other other targets. Fran remained focused, ready to move her feathers to another location if necessary.

When it became clear that there were no further turrets at the location, she finally relaxed. “That’s a marked improvement.”

I nodded, “We’ll have to be more wary going forwards.”

At that instant, I heard several explosions sound out, and for a moment I stared into the distance towards the Determinators along with the rest of my team.

“The hell was that?” Daniel asked, suspiciously glaring in the directions of the nearest two sounds.

I snickered, “It appears the Determinators broke out the explosives. They appear to be finished with their sides though. We’ll be hip to hip here soon.” At that, I held my rifle up, taking a quick count of the A.I. and making sure they were in fighting shape. None were lost, and only one or two had taken any damage past their armor plating. One would be a little slower on a leg, the other took a shot across a lens, but had a few other ocular cameras working, so it didn’t matter especially much.

We moved deeper into the vegetation, what would have been hellish to push through for a normal person was little obstacle to steel-shelled power armor, or their mechanical analogue. I kept expecting another burst of fire to erupt from ahead of us, for something to happen, but instead the only thing that greeted me were Determinators. They filtered in from the sides, closing ranks silently while glancing to my teammates and giving uncharacteristically friendly waves and nods.

Daniel laughed, and waved back, while the others did the same but with slightly bewildered expressions. They were used to A.I. enough to not worry about them potentially becoming self aware and such - they were treated well in any case - but it was still odd seeing a battle-scarred machine waving at you with an almost childlike excitement.

They were learning, though. Albeit they were still struggling with some things, particularly their inability to convey anything that required facial expressions.

I dragged my attention back to my surroundings, and realized that I could now see several other Determinators on our flanks. I frowned, wondering if we’d somehow missed the entrance to the facility. I was positive the facility was here, after all the defenses indicated at least something of importance was here.

No sooner than I’d begun to worry about having to comb the entire island again did we notice the jungle simply end. Not just the vegetation, either, but the dirt was replaced abruptly by dense concrete. There, with only ten meters of concrete surrounding it on all sides, was a large cluster of structures, built closely together and low to the ground. Trees had been planted atop of it, however, and dirt and vines coalesced over the edges, obscuring the walls from casual observation. Strung from that rooftop was what appeared to be a mesh canopy, intertwined with naturally growing vines that obscured the concrete beneath it. Across from us on the other side, Determinators had walked around the circumference and already began exchanging measurements.

It was barely fifty meters across to the other side on the surface. We could have easily missed this amidst the jungle were it not for the fact that we were combing the island from every direction. Several Determinators weren’t even here yet, and they would continue combing their sides just in case they found anything.

“I don’t see any more turre-Oh, nevermind, there they are.” Domino began before aiming with his rifle at the building.

A moment later, several ports opened up along the walls while the floor shuddered. Concrete panels opened in several locations, revealing steel-encased turrets. Many of which I realized were much larger bore than what we’d seen previously.

“Cover!” I shouted, dropping to a knee as Fran instantaneously moved hundreds of feathers into place in front of us and around us.

Even so, when the first cannon shot erupted from the automated defenses, I knew that they might have finally stepped up the defenses enough to do some real damage.

‘Time to work,’ I took a breath and drew myself deep into the Reaper’s Eye.