63 years ago.

The discovery of the Gun changed everything.

Mayla had ingeniously created Nighthawk to leave the resource depleted planet, and the pirate colony called the Jackals, behind. Unbeknownst to Samuel and Mayla until a recent intelligence briefing, the Jackals had created a Gun hidden within one of their buildings, large and powerful enough to knock them out of the sky before they could escape the grip of the atmosphere.

It was a trap laid by the Jackals.

Now, Samuel was briefing his officials on what had to be done. A suicide mission, led by the bravest and best to disable the Gun at the very moment
Nighthawk took off. If they disabled it too early, the Jackals may send all their war machines upon where they thought Nighthawk was being constructed, and she wasn't yet complete.

John Gaiathal and Ffion Oddisy, Samuel's best soldiers and officials, didn't hesitate to volunteer. John was short in stature but his confidence and skill more than compensated. His short hair and black eyes fit him perfectly, quick and to the point.

The officers looked on in utter disbelief, giving uncomfortable chuckles at the black comedy of the situation, as John and Ffion flipped a coin for the opportunity to give their lives to save the people. Ffion called 'heads' as John flipped it, but he grinned at her when he lifted his hand.

He gave the golden coin that he flipped to Ffion, and she took it in her hands, her usual stern face was filled with disappointment and sadness, that a dear friend of hers was about to give his life for the people and that she couldn't match the sacrifice. John hugged her, and whispered something in her ear that comforted his comrade.

Samuel watched in admiration, despondency, and pride as his two peers and mentees were so willing to sacrifice themselves for the good of the people. It was a sentiment he was desperately trying to instil in everyone. He was clearly successful with these two warriors who stood in front of him.

Ffion came to Samuel after her exchange with John, and said, "After we are safe from the Jackals and I've served you as best I can, I will be stepping down as an official. With all due respect, sir, I was ready to die with John, and I believe it is our best chance at survival if you send us both to disable that Gun."

Samuel, surprised but understanding, responded, "Of course, Ffion. We all know you are just as willing as John, but please understand I cannot lose you both. I disagree with you. John will get it done. He always has. And the people may need you one day, when we are rid of the Jackals."

Ffion nodded again in disappointment, but conceded to her leader's commands.

"What will you need?" Samuel asked John.

John rubbed his face thoughtfully. "We'll move fast, can't risk detection. I'd say ten of the best you can give me. If we leave immediately, cutting through the mountains, take the train half way up to the mountains, taking the rest of the way on Shantle back... we could get there in less than a week and half, alternating sleep shifts."

Shantle's were slower than the Jackal's new arsenal of war machines, but they could scale rocks easily while the machines could not, and they could run about as fast as a human but rarely tiring.

John looked to Mayla. "We need weapons. Advanced weapons. Can you weaponize your Field technology into something hand-held?"

Mayla sighed. She wanted to do anything in her power to protect the people, but she knew the implications of building such devices and allowing them to fall into the wrong hands, potentially affecting other colonies of humans the Jackals could invade next after they blasted the people from the sky. This was a point she had tremendous difficulty relaying to soldiers like John.

"Mayla, this is a suicide mission. We all know it. Whatever you provide me, it'll remain on this planet to rot alongside the Jackals. Set aside your ethics and help us survive."

Mayla replied as calmly as possible, "If I were able to weaponize our Field technology, which I can't, bright blue beams of light aren't exactly stealthy, John. Secondly, if I were able to, we can't risk the Jackals obtaining that technology."

While most thought Mayla was an incredibly moral person, she in fact was extremely principled. An important distinction, Ffion always thought to herself.

"He will obtain it when he shoots us from the sky," John yelled, furious with his scientists who he perceived as sanctimonious and overly bureaucratic.

Samuel grabbed John by the shoulders, looking into his eyes. This apprentice of his, sharing the same fierce passion that Samuel had for protecting the people, which Samuel admired greatly. He knew how to focus John, challenging him and bringing out his best – and the people needed his best right now. "It's not happening, John. And you better succeed with what we've got, for all of our sakes."

John gritted his teeth. "Fine. Give me a butter knife and tell me how to shut the Gun down. They won't stop me."

Samuel smiled at John and patted his shoulder. It was hard not to be inspired by this man, and Samuel could see how much the people appreciated him.

"I can do you one better," Mayla said to John. "I can give your team silent and rapid-fire weapons, which will be effective at range and deadly in close quarters. I have no qualms about this because I know the Jackal's already have these. They would gain nothing from collecting them... should we fail."

Mayla radioed back to the cavern of Nighthawk to bring up existing hunting rifles with specific modifications as quickly as possible, and for the ten best available soldiers to come up to the mouth of the mountains. Her team of scientists diligently devised a way to disable the Gun, radioing back to the Research Division onboard Nighthawk. They appeared to have a solution.

Within an hour, ten soldiers arrived along with scientists from Nighthawk, riding in on Shantles.

They had bags of food and canteens of water, rifles, and pitch back clothing. The scientists dropped off a metallic looking device with Mayla, and the soldiers made their way to John and exchanged handshakes.

Mayla briefed John on the device that would disable the Gun. She held up a shining metallic sphere. "We've come up with a solution, a rather crude one. You'll need to get this into the barrel of the gun, located in this building," Mayla said, handing over the ball and marked map to John and his team. "When they try to fire, the whole Gun will blow," Mayla continued, and ballooned out her hands. "By then we should be in the air and out of the atmosphere. Remember, when you get this into that Gun, they can't know you did anything to it. Try to sabotage as close to two weeks from now as possible, it's when we will be taking off. It's when Nighthawk will be fully functional for liftoff."

The team began loading the battered train on their border with their Shantles and equipment, to return to the hell the train had come from once before. John stayed behind for a moment, and hugged Samuel.

"I need you to promise me something," he said to Samuel, and Samuel could tell he was fighting back tears. This surprised Samuel, John usually being so dutiful and terse.

"Anything," Samuel replied, knowing that he and the people owed these eleven soldiers anything and everything.

John looked groundward for a moment. "Sam, I'm doing this for our people, sure. They aren't perfect. But their heart – I've seen it firsthand," John said, thinking back to the people that died alongside John and Samuel when rebelling against the government that sold them out to the Jackals. Brothers, sisters, mothers, and fathers. "If we aren't willing to give our lives as they do for us just because we are labeled as more important - maybe there's a kernel of truth to that - then we aren't worthy of their love."

Samuel had tears in his eyes and tried to hide them from John. His most trusted soldier unabashedly reciting the creed he had been instilling into the people since he took over leadership from the corrupt government.

"The truth is, Sam, I'm giving my life for you. Because I know you'd do the same for me. And I am worried the people will eventually lose sight of that, when you're on some new planet and making a better world. And Sam, your hope in them... I am worried they will disappoint you faster than you think. Promise me you won't let the people elect you out. Don't let the people rid themselves of the best leader we've known."

Mayla heard John say this as she readied his equipment, and appeared to absorb it, while Samuel was speechless. He was appalled by the prospect of becoming a dictator like the government he and John had deposed of together. John was coming from a position of love, but Samuel knew it was misplaced and wrong.

"I promise," Samuel lied to John after a long pause.

Even the honorable Samuel did not want to disappoint this patriot that stood before him right before he was laying his life down for the colony.

Samuel could see on John's face genuine relief, contentment. He was at peace. He was ready to die, knowing that Samuel would continue leading and his life would not be given wastefully. John released Samuel's hand and boarded the battered train along with his team. He looked back at Samuel and raised a fist in the air, bringing it to his heart.

"For the People," John said the words of the colony, as the doors to the train slid shut and it lumbered forward picking up speed, rolling faster and faster towards the Jackals.

Mayla and Samuel turned to return to the cavern, to finalize their plans to evacuate. They would have enough time to prepare for take off, but with the Gun still operational, it wouldn't matter. Everything hinged on John.

"Two hundred thousand lives in the hands of eleven patriots," Samuel exhaled to his sister.

Mayla grabbed his hand in her own. "He'll find a way, Samuel. He always does."

***

After a week and six days of climbing through the mountains, John and his team had reached the northern outskirts of the Jackal's settlement where the train normally arrived. They only ran into one sentry crew, which John had taken care of almost entirely by himself with five swiftly shot bullets, living up to the legends the other soldiers and the people had heard about him. This instilled confidence into his team, who truly believed they could accomplish the mission with John on their side.

It was now dusk at the outskirts, and John and his team waited anxiously. They would penetrate the Jackal's city in complete darkness and the time had almost come. Thousands of miles away they knew Nighthawk was stirring to leave, while the Gun they had to disable waited restlessly to blast it from the sky.

John sat with his legs crossed, cold and eating from a can of food with the broken-off lid. He scolded a team member who offered to make a fire, and told him to bundle up instead of waving a welcome flag for the Jackals. "Once we are running into that city, trust me, you'll be warm," He told them.

John noticed one of his members sat close to him, tears rolling down her cheeks in the moon light. "What's your name?" He said to her, knowing he had to quell any sense of fear among his members before they left for the city. They had to be unified and clear headed.

The woman looked up at him. "Anja, sir."

John shuffled closer to her, passing his canteen of water and put his arm around her. "Anja," he repeated to himself. He paused for a moment while he rubbed her shoulder, and through his cracking black war paint he said, "I've read your file, I know how good you are. We did not force you to come, yet here you are. Why cry?"

Anja wiped the tears from her cheeks. "They are not for me, sir," She said to him, but John already knew this. They were cut from the same cloth, Anja and him. They were soldiers, and they had a duty. Only one thing frightened them both.

"If we fail, sir. My husband, our kids, our people on that ship, snuffed out in an instant..."

John interrupted her. "Do I look like the kind of guy who fails?" He asked her, as she looked up at him blinking. "And I know you – I know all of you – as not ones to fail. We have all failed in the past, but tonight I can assure you, we will not."

The whole team was now huddled around, clinging onto every word of his and clinging to each other. It was a surreal experience of more than brotherhood. All knowing they would not see the morning sun, all knowing countless lives depended on them, all knowing their mission was minutes away. Each of their heart beats felt like a grain of sand passing through a dwindling and cracking hourglass.

"This I can promise you all. Whatever happens, you did not fail. You have made the ultimate sacrifice. That, to me, reverberates through time and space. As long as I have a breath in me, I will disable that Gun. For you. For us. For your families. For the People."

His team around him sniffled and rubbed their eyes, but in them John saw confidence. A lack of courage and conviction would not be the reason he and his team failed tonight. He looked to Anja, and her face was now fierce and dry, as she nodded curtly to him and the others.

John's watch beeped at him and his team. Two weeks was up, and midnight had arrived, blanketing them in pitch darkness. The team loaded their weapons and repaired each others black war paint which was cracking along their faces, donning their jagged night goggles.

They assembled at the outskirts of the Jackal's city, concealed by the dark green brush of the mountain range. John laid a map before his team's feet in the gravel and needles and frost.

"Here is the building with the Gun," he pointed to a building in the left quadrant of the Jackal's settlement along the main street on the map. "We will move through the back alleys here, where we expect optimal cover and minimal contact," He said as he traced a path leading to the building. "I want all ten of you close to me, because if I'm killed you will have to take this to the Gun yourself." He held the metal sphere intended to go into the barrel of the Gun up for all to witness. Their people's survival, compacted into a what resembled a shining bowling ball.

"It is crucial to not be seen. Once we get into the building, you ten will cover the entrances as I climb the stairs to get to the barrel. Our job is far from complete once we disable the Gun. If Brandon's forces find us lurking around the Gun, our cover is blown, and we risk them finding our sabotage. After we plant this, we will travel individually to here," John now pointed to Brandon's facility, the leader of the Jackals, where John had been two weeks ago attempting to assassinate him and failing. "Here is where our last stand will be, and it will look like we are an assassination attempt on Brandon. By the off chance he is there, we take him out. Clear?"

"Sir," his team responded to him.

"Good. Lock and load. Anyone sees you, you drop them and hide the body. Don't shoot unless necessary. Let's move."

John and his team sprinted down the field towards the settlement, crouched and along a bush-line in the cover of darkness. No bullets or rockets fired upon them, the Jackals all hopefully, arrogantly, asleep.

A minute of running passed, and John slumped into a worn-down concrete wall out of breath on the perimeter of the settlement. His team soon slumped next to him, trying to mask their panting.

After they caught their breath, John motioned to continue into the opening of the alley way with a slice of his hand through the air. They hugged close to the walls, avoiding garbage around their feet to not raise a sound, guns raised to their shoulders, scanning their surroundings through their green-filtered world.

John heard a noise at the front of the team as they neared the end, and held a fist to tell everyone to stop moving. The team went to the ground, sucking themselves into the darkness of the alley corners.

Laughter and the shuffling of feet grew louder. Everyone in the team realized it was a group of six or so, speaking in a Jackal dialect that only John, an educated official, could understand. They were getting closer to the alley way. The team held their breath, praying that they would pass by and not turn in.

The figures now stood outside the alley visible in the moon light, and to the team's utter misfortune, the figures turned inwards towards them, seemingly kicking a ball around with their feet.

In the cover of darkness, John held a fist up to tell his team to hold their fire. The group approached, the laughing growing louder as they playfully chatted to themselves in the foreign language and drank from glass bottles. They would soon be right on top of the team.

John motioned his hand forward, and a whiz of bullets streamed past him as his team pulled their triggers, silencing the laughter and kicking and shuffling and eliciting sudden muffled cries of pain. Bottles shattered as the group hit the ground, John wincing as the noise carried through the alley way. The team waited a moment with their rifles at the anxious ready.

"Hello?" a voice shouted from three blocks to the right which John could translate from Jackal. Panic swept through the team which now tried to remain calm. John gathered them in.

"We need a change of plans," He whispered hurriedly to his team. "Any ideas?"

Anja raised her hand. "Us ten proceed on Brandon's facility, draw attention to us while you get to the Gun. It will look entirely like another assassination attempt. No time to argue."

The team nodded as this seemed the best and the only idea, but waited for John's approval. John nodded abruptly. "It's been an honour," He said to them, saluting and grimly smiling at each.

With no time to lose and no time for prolonged goodbyes, the team ran out the alley way to the right and towards Brandon's quarters as John ran leftwards towards the building of the Gun. Before exiting the alley way, he looked down at the group that him and his team had killed. Kids, he thought to himself. Have I become the monster I'm fighting?

As John ran by himself towards the Gun building, sirens began to go off behind him, followed by gun fire. He would not have much time. He tucked into a dark doorway, as Jackals in helmets with guns streamed past him back towards the alleyway he had come from and towards his comrades.

He waited until the stream of Jackals stopped, and he continued his path to the building, unseen.

He arrived, and he looked up upon the tallest building in the colony which stood seemingly into the clouds.

With sirens now going off throughout the city and the people inside the building on high alert, John slung his weapon and the metal device behind him as he began scaling the outside walls instead, from windowsill to windowsill, improvising their now blown cover.

He was half-way up and looked down below, realizing now one misstep would be the death of him and all his people. But he climbed on. Windows to grab onto were now sparse, and he realized he would have to break into one.

As quietly as possible, he smashed a small hole into a window, and unlocked it from the inside. He slid the window upwards, and pulled himself through. He found himself in a stairwell, luckily with no one around, dimly lit by a dull yellow light emanating from the top.

He ran upwards, upwards, quietly and scanning for anything moving in the darkness with his gun, running out of breath and potentially time.

He came to the very top of the concrete