Fighting Fire with Fire

Methoataske, or Metho as she preferred to be called, fought to get her breathing under control as her hands trembled on the plane’s yoke. They...she knew that this mission wasn’t going to be easy. That the Death Bringers would definitely fight back with everything that they had. That this mission was likely to fail.

But knowing something was possible was different than seeing it actually happen.

“Focus Metho!” shouted Zano through the radio, though Metho swore she could hear the sorrow in his gruff voice as the remnants of Oran’s plane fell towards the earth, leaving trails of fire behind them. “Remember the mission! Remember why we are here! Why you are here!”

Metho swallowed the pain of screaming Oran’s name down her throat as memories raced through her mind, sounds of gunfire and missiles filling the air outside.

Vague memories of learning how to ride a bike from parents wearing beaming smiles. A less vague memory of her house burning to the ground, her mother’s lifeless body still inside. A memory of her father brushing her hair before suddenly yet finally succumbing to starvation and illness. Memories of the Death Bringers hurting and killing both people and animals because they believed death was inevitable.

Metho shuddered as her hands tightened on the yoke, guiding her plane forward to their destination. Towards the Death Bringer’s new plant.

Because the Death Bringers were nothing more than a doomsday cult. It was strange for some of the older members of Metho’s rebel unit to think that all of the people to bring the world into a classic dystopian society, it would be a doomsday cult. Though unlike the surviving dystopian books that Metho liked to read between training sessions, there had been no big battle, no calamity, before they came into power. They just did. Whether they were already part of the cult before they were elected into power or became members afterwards... no one knew.

But what everyone did know was that Death Bringers, as they liked to be called, didn’t want to wait for the upcoming apocalypse anymore. They did everything they could to bring about destruction and death, from spreading man-made illness and famine, to purposely polluting the earth and the ocean.

But humanity kept on surviving, kept on fighting back. Unwilling to die just because the Death Bringers were miserable and wanted company in death. And now, after years of rebelling against the Death Bringers, the war was going to end tonight. Whether or not they won or died.

As it was, Metho and Zano were the only ones left out of a troop 0f thirteen.

Against who knows how many Death Bringers.

They just kept on coming.

Metho couldn’t help but gasp when she saw on her scanner that a missile was heading right towards her. She started to veer to the right, but she already knew that it wouldn’t be in time. The missile was too advanced, too fast. Her plane couldn’t afford to move quickly.

If it did, then everyone around her would die, and then the world would end once and for all.

“Not on my watch!” Suddenly, the missile in Metho’s scanner disappeared at the same time an explosion went off behind her. Metho breathed a sigh of relief.

“Thanks, Zano!” she shouted as she veered back on course.

“Don’t thank me ye-”

When a loud round of gunfire was followed by a small explosion, Metho, despite herself, turned her head.

One of Zano’s engines was on fire.

“Za-”

“Don’t focus on me! Focus on the mission! On living! Live Metho!” Zano exclaimed. Then, with a wordless yell of courage, Metho saw Zano charge at the plane that had probably shot him, bullets blazing. The enemy plane got hit with some bullets as it tried to dodge. However, in its panic, it unwittingly put itself on the trajectory of its allied plane, which had come to help.

It subsequently got blown up by friendly fire.

And Zano flew right through the fire and smoke and crashed into the other enemy plane, blowing them both up.

Then the only sound Metho could hear was her plane.

...Were there no more Death Bringers? Were there really no more coming?

Was...she really the only one left?

Metho wanted to cry.

Then suddenly, the dark clouds shifted just enough so that she could see the Doomsday Plant.

It was right there. Fifteen seconds more tops, and she would make the mission’s destination.

“Live Metho,” she muttered to herself as she willed her tears to wait. She urged her plane forward, unable, unwilling to fly any faster despite her impatience to win this war.

Thin Man might not be able to take it.

Then the Earth and its people would really die, all because the Death Bringers made a plant that was going to pour radiation deep into the Earth. So deep that the scientists back at the rebel base surmised the Death Bringers had somehow drilled all the way to the upper mantle.

No one wanted to know what exactly would happen if they managed to succeed. Which was why they were risking everything for this one mission. To be willing to cross a certain line one more time because there was no other alternative. This plant was just too formidable.

But according to Metho’s watch, it wouldn’t begin operating for another minute.

And she was only five seconds away from-

She could hear the Death Bringers’ plane right as her scanner picked it up.

Four seconds.

Metho took a deep breath as she dared to climb. Extra height wouldn’t hurt the Thin Man’s mission. In fact, it might even help it.

Three.

Metho could both hear and feel gunfire clip her plane.

Two.

Metho took a deep breath and fired.

One.

The burning enemy plane now falling, Metho smirked as she pushed the button. Immediately, she felt the plane become lighter as the atomic bomb followed right after the last Death Bringer plane.

“Here comes the sun.”