Chapter 24
Boot Camp

As the weeks carried on with more unusual military training for Pokémon, I was getting concerned about Alex and I was losing sleep over it. I understood the training was necessary, but they still felt going in there without preparation was suicide, even despite the urgency.

I was really beginning to wonder if we'd ever see him again.

In the meantime, we were worked hard. Running, shooting, climbing, and even swimming were part of this harsh training. Running for miles was something I always hated, but now I had to do it on this tiny track. And one mile for a human is like five miles for a Pikachu and a Pachirisu. Both of us were showing improvement with using Firefangs will Blazewing seemed perfectly comfortable with the Flamelance. We had to learn how to climb rock walls, metal fences, and removed a type of barbed wire, which looked like circular pizza cutter blades on a string.

Blitz and I were also trained on how to use Torchclaws, the rifle variant that were usually reserved for bigger Pokémon. They made us learn how to use them as heavy, mounted weapons in case our own Firefangs were broken, jammed, lost, or simply ran out of ammunition.

Being a part of this Silver Rebellion wasn’t easy…

While I was trained to ride Blazewing and work alongside her, Blitz had to raise his own mount from Pidgey to Pidgeotto to Pidgeot. Usually, it took Pokémon trainers a bit of time to accomplish that, but the Silver Rebellion had mount training worked down to a science. It was grueling, tough, and even dirty at times, but I figured if they all used the same mount, coming up with the perfect regimen must have been a lot easier.

Besides the various ranks of Storm Rider squads we were about to enter, there were many other weapons and machines of war that the Silver Rebellion used. While the aerial division were referred to as Storm Riders, the armored ground division was referred to as the Thunder Battalion and ground infantry were referred to as Thunder Runners. When it came to armored vehicles, they had their own style of warfare.

One of them was a heavy metal tank, called the Colossus. These tanks were even bigger than ones used by humans, completely clad in heavy, metal armor, and painted a white and silver, traditional Silver Rebellion colors. On the front there was one, giant chrome cannon, as well as two smaller ones on the side and a caliber rifle on the top by the square metal hatch. There were also four small, rectangular ventilation holes for infantry to fire from. I had never been inside one, but a fellow Patrat who used to reload the cannons told me it gets awfully hot in there.

And then, a really cool device I was trained to use was the Land Splitter. They looked like mini dragsters with a machine gun, and boy, were they fast. Again, covered with light armor and protected the driver with a cage like structure. Like before, I was trained with these only just in case I was dismounted and needed to use them. Learning how to fly and fight at the same time were my main training areas. From what I could tell, the Silver Rebellion didn’t have planes, so they used flying Pokémon mounts instead. And since they were experts on how to breed, care for, and raise Pidgeys, Pidgeottos, and Pidgeots from the moment they were born to the moment they were made combat-ready, they stuck with what worked for them. It was rare to see a Silver Rebellion Storm Rider soldier use something besides a Pidgeot.

It had been nearly two months since Blitz, Blazewing, and I had been in Kivistal now. We had spent those many days training our butts off, and we were pretty experienced now. I could only hope that Alex was still alive after all this time, but I still had no clear indication. I hated to leave him in that dark prison of Macomb for so long, but I had no choice. I couldn’t come walking to their front door and ask to have him, and we weren't combat ready to take on a strike that had already claimed so many Silver Rebellion lives.

We were also trained to know how to react to the weapons and machines of the Crimson Stars. Apparently, they use all caliber weapons of varying sizes. The small, sub-machine guns they reserved for smaller Pokémon were called Scabs. I wasn't sure what metal these were made from, but it was made from a strange black and maroon-tinged metal and seemed to have a very jagged look to it. Unlike Silver Rebellion rifles, to fire a Crimson Star firearm, you had to press a black, metallic button in the place where a trigger would have gone. Also, their ammo magazines were block or box-shaped.

The next step up were Leadhammers, the Crimson Star equivalent to the Torchclaws. The chances of us having to use one of these were low, but we were trained on them anyway. Lastly, Sluggers were the big, heavy machine guns that bigger, heavier Pokémon would use. Only Blazewing would ever be able to use one of these. For Blitz and I, it was simply impossible.

When it came to Crimson Stars troops themselves, Wind Strikers were Pokémon flying Skarmories, as Sever had explained earlier. Just like the Storm Riders, only Pokémon who stood upright and had hands could fly them. Halen told me that since Wind Strikers are actually quite small and lightweight, they are designed for quick maneuverability. However, if they got shot just a few times, it was usually fatal. All the time, the rider was dismounted and could do nothing but plummet hundreds of feet in the air toward the harsh terrain. Unfortunately, this wasn’t too far off from what a fellow Storm Rider like me could go through.

Somehow, the Silver Rebellion managed to get their hands on a Crimson Stars Talon, which looked like a three rider motorcycle, probably either through stealing it or finding it left behind from a previous battle. The first cab, which was in the middle, was the largest, with two smaller ones on its side. It was jet black, with violet windows on each of the cabs. The riders fired their own caliber Leadhammer rifle, while the center rider fried two at the same time. On the back was an anti-air gun called a Skythrasher for a forth rider who would be on the back, only there they were fully exposed. Honestly, I didn’t see this as an effective fighting tool, but Halen told me they were very vicious and very fast. I wasn’t about to doubt her word.

A third nightmare of the Crimson Stars were the Versatile Armored Transports, or VAT’s for short. Halen had shown us only a model of it, and they looked like moving buildings nearly two stories tall with four giant metal wheels and a body like a trapezoid. I had no idea how I would even go about stopping that thing. Halen told me a Storm Rider had to go under the whole machine and tear apart as much of the pipes, pumps, and other machinery under the VAT. The only other way of stopping it was to use the environment to have it get pushed into a ditch or trench. Both cases looked quite risky with all those gun emplacements all over the whole thing. But she told me that was the only way to do it.

“VAT’s are constantly being manufactured at Macomb,” Halen warned us, letting the two of us know to expect them there. “You have only one advantage, and that is they won’t be loaded with any Crimson Star troops once you get there. You would be better off to destroy their manufacturing facilities before you try and get the prisoners out.”

“Wow…” Blitz replied in sarcastic disbelief. “Can’t wait…”

This sure wasn’t going to be easy. Halen showed me more weapons that the Crimson Stars used, all designed to fire ammunition. I just grimaced at all of them, not wanting to imagine what would happen if I got shot by one. Not to mention the fact that they were really loud as well in the test firing range…

“Well, that’s about it,” Halen told the two of us, feeling confident about what we've been exposed to during this training session. “They’ve wanted us dead for eons now, and they’ve come pretty close to it. Already, many of our cities, such as Cyphex, The Bend, and Ashmarch are been torn to pieces. We’ve lost thousands of good soldiers out there. Each day, we keep losing our forces and it hasn’t been getting that much better. We’re down to only two major cities left, Symarix and Kalen.”

Kalen was a supply city, the Silver Rebellion’s equivalent of Macomb, only Kalen wasn’t even half the size. It was true though, the Silver Rebellion was fighting a very losing war against these guys. If it kept up at this pace, I could expect Symarix to be completely overrun in very little time.

“Sure doesn’t look pretty,” I told Halen and Blitz, seeing how easily things were getting desperate…

"Well, there are some who think you're here to fix all that," Halen told me, obviously referring to the whole Divine Prophecy. "I'd say you make a decent soldier, but I don't see all that much of a difference. I'd say you're upper 80th percentile, but you're definitely no one-man army."

I couldn't argue against that. I was honestly happy she felt confident I was good enough to be a soldier in the first place and took me from being totally inexperienced to at least being somewhat prepared to deal with combat at its most ruthless level. And it was different now. Pokémon wouldn’t just be fighting each other, they would be killing each other on the same hideous scale that humans used. It was a disturbing thought, but as time had shown again and again, words and negotiation only go so far.

A month later, after more rigorous training, they finally believed we were ready.

I had heard only a small squad was going to be deployed to attack Macomb, myself included. They told me it was all they could afford to send. I had seen albums of pictures that showed the horror after each terrible conflict. I had even seen it myself with my own two eyes, the city near Black Bay prison was torn to sheds, a graveyard of buildings and society. I can easily expect something similar if I laid my eyes on The Bend or Cyphex. Further and further the Silver Rebellion was being pushed back, and here they were making their last stand against an enemy that couldn’t even respect itself.

Tomorrow, we would be flying to Macomb. Randy and I as well as four other Storm Riders were going to have to take on that entire facility all by ourselves, hoping to use stealth instead of a front-on invasion. Instead of going with a head-on assault, we were going to try and sneak our way in, disable as much as we could at the facility, release its prisoners, and try to get out alive. Just the sound of it already made my heart twist in anxiety.

Already, an enormous amount of expectation was placed on me even though Halen tried to explain that I was simply a soldier like any other. Given my past experience and expectations, they had promoted me to Ensign, though there were many that felt I was a special case. In truth, I didn’t want them to think I suddenly became a miracle worker here…

Blitz had been making every effort to improve his skills. Even though he had a rough start, as time went by he got drastically better. Even his Pidgeot mount was now ready, and he was confident he could handle this delicate mission.

We had no idea how big Macomb really was, or what kind of force they really had, but from what we had heard, it sounded like a lot. I was hoping it would be quickly in and quickly out, but I had no idea where to head to first, since the Silver Rebellion had no layout of the facility to go by. The only thing I could go by was the architecture of the buildings. That was it. Every scouting mission against this place had failed, and the lack of intel really showed. We were definitely going to need to know how to improve solutions.

Regardless, Randy and I tried not to show fear, even though deep inside we were nearly scared to death about this. There was no other way to get Alex out of there if this is where he was really being held. We needed his support as soon as possible, and any Silver Rebellion prisoners were greatly needed to join the ranks of soldiers already prepped for combat. We needed to take apart Macomb’s assembly lines and production facilities if we wanted to cripple the Crimson Stars’ war effort. Of course that was far easily said than done.

We had trouble sleeping that night, just trying to think about how we were going to handle this. I could only hope that I would be back in these barracks by tomorrow’s end…