War...
What is war, really?
Is it just a warlike way of reaching political agreements...?
Or is it the tragic outcome of a misunderstanding between nations?
Edmund, only sixteen years old, had asked himself that question many times. He had grown up in an endless conflict between three nations: NeoAmerica, EuroNova and Unionia. That war had not only claimed untold numbers of lives, but had also ravaged small countries caught in its merciless crossfire.
The damage was immeasurable, but more frightening was its duration: half a century. They called it "The Fifty Years' War." Half a century of destroyed families, of broken dreams, of cities reduced to ruins. A conflict without truce or end.
At the beginning, it had been fought with modern weapons: assault rifles, machine guns, tanks and airplanes. However, technology and warfare evolved in tandem, and from that sinister union were born the "mechs", combat robots of various sizes and models, designed to be piloted from the inside and multiply the destructive power of each soldier. The mecha became the symbol of the conflict and the suffering of an entire generation.
Ever since he was a child, Edmund had had a deep fascination with mecha. He dreamed of flying one, not to destroy, but to end the war that had taken his parents from him. His mother and father had been soldiers until the war caught up with them too soon. At the age of seven, Edmund was left in the care of Sara, a companion of his parents, and grew up on a military base. That environment only fueled his desire to join combat and end the conflict.
However, there was a problem.
And it was no small problem.
Despite years of training, Edmund had never managed to fly a mecha for more than a few seconds without failure. That night, he decided to try one more time, in secret. If anyone saw him, they might fail him out of the next day's pilot exam, but he was desperate.
The hangar, vast and gloomy, greeted him with the echo of his nervous footsteps. The mecha lined up like sleeping titans, each connected to the ceiling by thick cables. Edmund approached his mecha, the only one that wasn't plugged in, a five-meter tall robot with a cockpit designed for the pilot to plug directly into. It wasn't the first time he'd tried to join it, but each failed attempt left him feeling a little more incapable, more helpless.
"Come on, buddy... let me connect to you," he muttered, a bitter plea. He settled into the cockpit and began frantically pushing the buttons on the dashboard, fighting the fear that someone would discover him.
"I need you to throw the wires fast, before someone realizes I'm using the test chamber without permission," he whispered. His feverish gaze swept the darkened hangar, searching for any sign of alarm, and his breathing quickened as silence seemed to rumble in his ears. Finally, white wires fell in front of him, brushing his face. Edmund smiled, tense and trembling.
"Finally!" he exclaimed softly.
With fingers that barely managed to steady themselves, he picked up the wires and connected them to his skin, one on each limb and on his head. A tingle immediately ran through him, and he felt the mecha begin to respond. The connection was active.
"Time to start the show," he whispered with a mixture of excitement and nervousness. Without hesitation, he pushed the lever on the cockpit floor. Instantly, all the mecha in the hangar lit up, their eyes shining like beacons in the darkness.
"I'm going to show them what I'm capable of!" he shouted, gritting his teeth as he moved the mecha forward, ready to prove himself. The brain connection allowed him to feel the movements of the mecha, as if that colossus was an extension of his own body.
He advanced towards another mecha and raised his arm to throw a punch, with all the force he could muster. It was time to demonstrate his control. However, as soon as he began to move his arm, the mecha responded with brutal resistance. The weight of the robotic arm was crushing, inordinate. He felt as if his own muscles were on the verge of breaking under that inhuman pressure.
"Why is this so heavy!"
His whole body trembled, and veins stood out on his forehead as he tried to hold his fist up. Suddenly, a warm sensation rushed across his face. Reaching up, he saw that his nose was bleeding; the pressure of the connection was taking its toll, draining his strength. He could barely stand.
"No!" he muttered, trying to reduce the force. But at the very instant he relaxed the pressure, the mecha lost his balance and fell heavily to the ground, taking him with it. The impact shook him from head to toe, and the pain wrenched a choked gasp from him.
"I can't fail now... Please, react!" she forced herself to get up, though her body protested. Trembling, he mustered all his strength to stand up. The weight seemed to give way, and a glimmer of hope crossed her mind.
"Yes!"
But his joy faded in an instant. The mecha was off. The weight reduction was only evidence that the engine had been switched off.
"No! Please turn it on!" he shouted, and began pounding on the dashboard in a desperate attempt to reactivate it. Each thump echoed in the empty cockpit, intensifying the sense of defeat that was suffocating him.
"If I show up tomorrow like this, I'll never pass the exam..." he muttered, his chest tight and his head in his hands. That failure meant much more than another failed attempt; it meant that his dream of piloting a mecha and ending the war was fading before his eyes.
It was then that a robotic voice brought him out of his thoughts.
"Combat mode activated. "
He raised his head, stunned. The mecha in front of him had come to life, and was preparing to attack.
"Wait, no!" he shouted, raising his arms in an attempt to protect himself. He barely managed to pull away when the glass of the cockpit shattered into a thousand pieces; the enemy mecha's foot brushed past his face. Edmund fell to the ground, gasping, his skin cut and his ears ringing.
"I must stop this quickly!" he muttered, panting. He reached for the lever, but as he touched it he realized it was broken. Panic engulfed him.
"Definitely... I'm dead..." he whispered. Suddenly, the mecha's robotic hand reached out towards him and, before he could react, caught him by the torso and began to squeeze him with inhuman force.
"ARGH!" The grip was unbearable. Mecha held him as if he were a rag doll, his bones creaked under the pressure, and a sharp pain shot through his back.
Then, with a mechanical coldness, the robot raised its other hand, grabbing Edmund by the legs and arms, and began to pull in opposite directions, as if trying to break him in two. The pain was indescribable. He felt as if his muscles and tendons were about to tear; a piercing scream came from his throat.
"Let go, please!" he screamed, feeling the pain consume him, his tears mixing with the sweat and blood on his face. But the robot kept increasing the pressure, ignoring his cries. Edmund felt like every second was ripping a piece of life out of him.
Desperate and in a state of absolute panic, he realized he was alone. He screamed at the top of his lungs, no longer caring if anyone discovered him. The only reason he had at that moment to fight was the hope that someone, whoever it was, would come to save him.
In the midst of his shrieks, another robotic voice echoed through the hangar.
"Combat mode activated."
He could barely open his eyes, but he made out the flash of a burst of bullets. The mecha holding him exploded into pieces, and Edmund fell to the ground, stunned and barely able to breathe. As he fell, the impact knocked the air from his lungs and left him gasping for breath, trying to pull himself together. Every fiber of his body was on edge, aching and exhausted, but the threat was not yet over. As he looked up, his eyes widened in terror: he was surrounded by other mecha, all pointing their guns at him, ready to fire.
"I'm finished..." he thought, his mind a chaos between pain, fear and despair....
It was then that he remembered the automatic intelligence system: that little device that was used only for training.
And so an irrational impulse of survival and pride took hold of him, drowning out any doubt or questioning. Edmund felt he was one step away from death, and in that instant, the only thing that mattered was to try something, anything, to prove his worth. Even if he didn't make it out of there alive, he couldn't give up without at least trying to prove that he wasn't just another failure. Deep down he knew that if he didn't make it, he would be finished; and if the mecha caught him, he wouldn't even have a chance to die trying.
He gritted his teeth, a flash of determination crossing his mind despite the hopeless situation.
"It's now or never!" he shouted, and with the last breath of strength he had left, he launched himself towards the rubble of the mecha. Bullets began to fall all around him, shattering the metal and peppering it with sparks and steel fragments, but he didn't stop. He barely managed to slip through the wreckage of the robot, gasping for breath and taking cover from the gunfire.
"Where are you... Come on, it's got to be here!" he thought frantically, sifting through the broken pieces, his hands groping for it. It was then that he heard a faint buzzing sound, a hint of the device. Heart pounding, he ran toward the sound and pushed aside a piece of scrap metal. At last, there it was: the little automatic intelligence system, about the size of the palm of his hand, just as he remembered it.
"Got it..." he muttered, feeling a mixture of relief and despair as his trembling fingers clenched his fist over the device. As soon as he put it away in his pocket, he prepared to make his escape. However, just as he was about to move, he noticed that the enemy mecha stopped firing and began to advance towards him, their shadows growing as they approached with heavy footsteps, blocking him from any possible way out.
Seeing them so close, panic overcame him. He had nowhere to go. All he could do was throw himself back to the ground, but now they were surrounding him and raising their weapons, aimed directly at him.
Edmund squeezed his eyes tightly shut, waiting for the end, his thoughts drowning in a tide of fear and frustration.
"HAAAAAAAAAAAAA!"
His scream was drowned out by the roar of gunshots that went off almost at the same time, but surprisingly, no bullet hit his body. Slowly he opened his eyes, not understanding what had happened. In front of him, a figure stood, blocking the bullets with a shield of energy that generated a bright, protective light. The figure, agile and determined, protected him from each burst of ammunition.
It was Sara, his guardian and only familiar figure. She wore her robotic combat suit, with a light shield that deflected every bullet into the hangar walls. Sara deactivated the shield and generated an energy sword in her right fist, which emitted a high-pitched, deadly buzz. With lethal precision, she advanced towards the mecha and began to dismantle them with quick, powerful slashes, leaving a trail of smoking scrap.
Finally, Sara removed her helmet and advanced toward Edmund, who still lay on the ground, dazed and exhausted. His face reflected a mixture of amazement and confusion; she couldn't understand how he had survived.
"Edmund...do you have any idea what you just did?" her voice was icy, and her blue eyes stared at him with an intensity capable of piercing him. The anger in her gaze was unmistakable.
Edmund opened his mouth to respond, but no sound came out. Exhaustion enveloped him like a heavy cloud, every muscle in his body was on the verge of collapse. He tried to apologize, but his eyelids were growing heavier and heavier.
"Yes... of course..." he stammered, his voice barely a whisper. Gradually, darkness enveloped him, and his body slumped backwards, falling into unconsciousness.
"Edmund! Are you all right!" exclaimed Sara, leaning towards him with a face full of concern.
In spite of everything... that was Edmund: the weak boy who dreamed, against all hope, of putting an end to the war that had left him all alone.