1 – THE PILE

The events leading to the great change that shook the foundation of the universe began on a hill in a field in the center of a rugged canyon. Upon it sat a pile of very peculiar glowing objects. These orange luminescent boxes, about a meter high, were called fusion coils. They would explode when dropped from a significant height, exposed to fire, or when shot. They also had personalities and were quite social with each other on a regular basis, though under normal circumstances only other fusion coils were capable of hearing them when they spoke.

Another fusion coil appeared out of thin air and landed on the pile with a small thunk. One of the fusion coils spoke: "Oh, hey! Guys, we got another newcomer!"

"Yo, 'sup, homie?" a second fusion coil chimed in.

The newcomer replied: "I'm good. What've y'all been up to?"

"Just sitting here, looking glowey," someone in the pile reported. "What else would we be up to?"

"I'm glowier then you are!" the first fusion coil yelled at the Newcomer.

"Not now!" the second protested to the first. "Be nice to the newcomer!"

"Okay, fine!" The first fusion coil again addressed the newcomer: "Dude, how's it goin'?"

The newcomer responded: "Like I said, I'm good."

"May I be the first to say: Welcome to The Pile, my friend!" The second coil exclaimed enthusiastically. "Everyone here will treat you nicely…right, guys?"

Several voices sounded from The Pile in near unison: "Yup. Oh, yeah!"

"But what about that coil over there?" the newcomer inquired.

"Hm?" the second coil responded, and then noticed what the newcomer was talking about, a lonely fusion coil sitting far away from The Pile. "Oh, that's Vincent. He rolled away from The Pile yesterday."

"Stupid gravity!" another coil chimed in.

"Yeah, stupid gravity!" yelled Vincent from where he was lying.

That was when another fusion coil appeared out of thin air and dropped onto the pile. "Whoa, another newcomer!" the first fusion coil cried out.

"Hey, guys!" the newest fusion coil said slowly and casually in her sweet feminine voice.

"Oh, baby!" the second coil called out loudly. "What is up!"

"I'm fine!" the lady fusion coil responded gently.

"Dude," the second coil whispered to a third. "Look at that body!"

"I know!" the third coil said quietly. "See how she glows?" he started to daydream. "Ooooh, if only I'd spawned right on top of that chick!"

"Dude, shut up!" the first coil muttered with an annoyed tone. "Everyone can hear you!"

"Oooh, those screws! They're sooo hot!" the third coil continued while daydreaming.

"Screws?" the lady coil responded. "Those are my balls. Hahaha, you silly coil!"

Everything stopped. "What?" Everyone else cried in unison.

"I said, those are my balls!" the ex-lady coil elaborated. "I'm a guy!"

Everyone sat stunned in silence for a few seconds.

"Well, this is awkward," commented the first coil after a few moments.

The awkward moment was further shattered when an explosion was heard in the distance.

"What happened? What was that?" inquired the second coil with surprise in his tone.

"I think that other pile off in the distance just exploded!" replied the third coil excitedly.

"No, all those poor innocent people!" the ex-lady coil sobbed. Another explosion sounded ominously in the distance. The ex-lady coil cried again: "Oh, how horrible!"

"The piles are being exterminated!" the first coil screamed in fear. "Oh, sweet glowey fusion coil God, we're all going to die. Aaaaaaaaggggh!"

"Guys, it's been nice lying with you!" the third coil sobbed.

"You too, man!" replied the second coil.

"No, it can't end like this! I'm only three minutes old!" screamed the newcomer. "I'm too young to die!"

And so their young lives ended. The pile of innocent fusion coils exploded with everyone screaming, until about half a second later when all were silenced by the explosive fury of death.

Some tens of meters away, atop the entrance structure to his base, Lieutenant Christopher Skope, a soldier and sniper for the Green Army, stood watching the explosion with entertained focus through the scope of his designated marksman rifle. His base commander stood behind him, observing his every move. Skope's armor was flashy green with purple as its secondary color, signifying his specialty as sniper, and the armor of The Commander was completely green, as was customary for soldiers of his position.

For the last fifteen minutes, he had been sniping the many piles of fusion coils that appeared in the canyon. They had been simply appearing out of thin air for the last few days, and no one knew why. But they made for excellent (and exceedingly satisfying) target practice, and the Commander had ordered him to use them as such for a few minutes every day until they stopped appearing. Skope had just taken out the biggest pile of them yet, blowing it apart with a single 7.62 millimeter round. But there was still one final fusion coil, lying off to the side. He aimed for it, steadied himself, and was just about to pull the trigger when an armored hand slapped down on his shoulder and made him jump, throwing his aim off completely.

"Very good, excellent aim!" The Commander said with a clearly impressed tone. "You need to know these things, Christopher. Detonating fusion coils with your marksman rifle is an important skill. You never know when an enemy may walk beside a pile of them, giving you the chance to take them out easily."

Skope turned to face The Commander. "How many times have I told you," He growled, glaring at his commanding officer through his visor, "Never use my first name!"

Seemingly unaware, or just not caring, about Skope's annoyance, the Commander continued: "It is also important to constantly be aware of your duty to the Green Army-"

Skope grunted: "Are we really going over this again?"

Choosing to extend his neglect of his lieutenant's annoyance, the Commander continued: "I still remember when this war began, and there were dozens of different factions fighting brutally for control over this planet, the magnificent X-B-0-X-L-1-V. And now only three factions remain, yet still the fighting has not even begun to end. Remember, though the entire planet is sought after, most of the fighting is centered here on this section of the main continent, called the Halothrii Wilderness, because of its large abundance of natural resources and significant tactical value. Everyone has fought over it, yet no one controls it, and everyone desperately wants to."

"I know!" Skope almost shouted. "I've managed to make it through two years of this war!"

The Commander again ignored him, drawing breath to continue.

Skope looked at him in frustration. "And now, of course, you're going to brief me on the three remaining factions, aren't you?" he said, more to himself than the Commander.

"Your memory serves you correctly," the Commander complemented, continuing onward as if nothing had happened. "Yes, only three factions survive to this day, from the many that started this war. Our most worthy adversaries are the Yellow Army, who rely almost entirely on brute force. They rarely seem to plan ahead; though, they don't appear to need to, as their on-the-fly tactics are somehow enough to survive the day, and often enough to actually win battles."

"Believe me, I know that." Skope muttered. "I've been on the losing side of a battle before. More than once."

"As have I. And then-"

And then there's the Blues," Skope finished, while barely managing to stifle a chuckle.

The Commander almost laughed himself, ignoring Skope's interruption. "Ah, yes, the Blue Army; numerous, and yet, completely useless. All they've ever really accomplished throughout the entire war is to die in the most hilarious ways possible, in amusing numbers, and the only reason they're worth even thinking about is because their numbers do not seem to have an end. They outnumber us and the Yellows combined almost a hundred to one, and yet they are no better for it."

"And the third faction, of course, is us."

The Commander cleared his throat in pride and then elaborated. "Yes! We, the brilliant Green Army! We are the smartest of all three armies, for we always, or at least more often than not, take the time to plan ahead whenever we make a move. Our strategizing has served us well throughout the entire war, and will until the very end, where glorious victory awaits!"

"Nice finish," Skope congratulated. "I don't think I've heard you end the speech like that before."

"Ah, you like it?" the Commander asked. "Yeah, I spent last evening thinking that up. But wait, there is one more thing to talk about: our armor."

Again, Skope groaned. "I really don't need to hear this again. I'm wearing a suit of the stuff right now. I think I know enough about it. I'll even prove it to you." He took a deep breath before giving his best explanation: "A main battle tool employed by all three armies is SPARTAN powered combat armor. This titanium-alloy layered armor employs an electromagnetically contained energy shield around the wearer that can withstand several gun rounds and will recharge to full strength within only a few seconds should the wearer take a hit. It also increases their strength, speed, and has multiple electronic systems to aid the soldier wearing the armor."

The Commander clapped proudly. "That was wonderful! Almost word for word."

"It was word for word. You've given me that exact same speech five times. In the last month. Now, can we just get this done already?"

The Commander scanned the canyon for some seconds and then pointed to a location far away, at the canyons opposite end. A rather large pyramid shaped mass of coils lay next to what appeared to be an old structure. "Over there, lieutenant! Now, snipe that pile!"

Skope shifted his aim from the lone fusion coil to the much larger pile of them in the distance. "I'll just get this over with. After this pile, I'm done!" He pulled the trigger.

On the other side of the canyon, a yellow-armored soldier sat in the bunker on top of the structure leading into the Yellow Army base of this sector. Her name was Amber Stone, she was a Private First Class, and as she was this Yellow Team's sniper, her yellow armor had purple markings. She was quite bored, and was thinking about getting a book from her quarters to help her pass the time while waited through her shift of scouting for enemies. She knew that right now she should be vigilant, but it had been three whole weeks, and she had encountered nothing but a small recon force from the laughably nonthreatening Blue Army, which she had taken out without even breaking a sweat. She got up to head into the base, trying to decide between romance and sci-fi for her reading choice. As she neared the entrance, there was a loud explosion. The blast sounded from right under her, and made the floor below her tremble. Small chunks of rock from the walls skittered around. "What the hell was that?" she cried, all thoughts of reading forgotten.

Private Ryan Hobar, the heavy weapons specialist for this Yellow Base, as signified by his red shoulder pads, ran over from his post on the other side of the building's roof, MA-series assault rifle clutched in his grip. He was supposed to be scouting as well, but like her he had become bored. Any break from the monotony was welcome. "What was that sound?" he asked. "It sounded like something exploded right next to this structure!"

Amber looked over the edge of the building to see where the explosion came from. There wasn't anything on the side of the building, except for a couple shards of metal and a large scorch mark on the wall. "Take a look at this!" she called out to him. "It looks like the pile of fusion coils that was here a few seconds ago just exploded!"

"Which means," Ryan postulated, "that someone must have shot one of them!" Amber, did you-"

"No." responded Amber. "Which means the shot must have come from somewhere around her. And someone had to be there to pull the trigger..." She grabbed her SRS99 sniper rifle from its resting place and raised it to her eyes, looking in the direction where the shot would have had to come from. Her sight led her to another structure far in the distance, way at the other end of the canyon. She looked at it through her scope, and saw…people. In green armor.

"Greens!" she hissed, then turned to Ryan and pointed in the direction of the other structure. "There're two of them on that structure!"

Ryan took the scope from her and looked down its sights in the direction she was pointing. A moment later, Ryan spotted the figures Amber had seen, and shouted: "Greens! We finally found Greens here!"

Amber twisted a dial on her helmet while informing Ryan: "I'm calling the boss!" she waited a few seconds, and then heard the bases commander, Alexander MacArthur Patton, pick up on the other end. "Commander, we've spotted Greens about a third of a click south of here!" she reported. "They haven't spotted us yet. I'm awaiting orders."

The commander's voice was deep and powerful, almost intimidating: "Greens, you say…this is excellent…" Amber could almost hear Patton thinking. A few seconds later she responded: "Take them out, before they discover you, and keep me posted."

Amber smiled under her helmet, and aimed her sniper rifle at the head of the Green in the commander's uniform. "Wilco, boss. I'll let you know when they've been taken care of…"