On a small spaceport near the Neon Jungle planet, there was an outlaw from a band called "Last Laugh Legion". It was Brian Gatly. He was sitting in a small coffee shop on the spaceport waiting for one of the ghost agents to contact him. The ghost agents were always discreet and anonymous when dealing with most informants. But Gatly was working with them because of having a newfound sense of justice. He was new to his outlaw band, but he only joined them four years ago mainly because of the financial adversity he faced on Nebulis. He wasn't a fan of the crooked Star Brigade.
Gatly very much hoped no one from Last Laugh Legion had been watching him or had followed him to the port. For them to know that he had flipped would probably spell out death for him and his whole family. But this new sense of justice he had gradually developed was strong with him. He almost felt like he was willing to be martyred for his new-found understanding. Even when he was young, though misguided by his elders and peers, he wondered if there was any real hope for Plumorita. The Origin Project had thoroughly answered that question he had in his heart for so long. He believed that people ultimately had to answer for their deeds.
As he clutched the laser blaster in his inside coat pocket, he stayed vigilant, almost to the point of nervousness. He watched ships, big and small, leave and enter the spaceport. He hoped he wouldn't recognize any of them. But like the soldier he considered himself to be, he was ready for confrontation, as his anxious trigger finger added some pressure to the laser pistol.
Suddenly, Gatly was spooked by a tall man in black who quietly approached from behind. The man stood by him stargazing out of the window with a lit cigar in his mouth. The man wore leather gloves and some dark shades. The wrist gadget strapped to Brian's left arm vibrated, taking his full attention away from the man. It was a ghost agent asking if the Neon Jungle's airspace was cleared of any spacecraft. He told him yes in code just before the call was ended. After that, the big starship from Celestia was given the okay to enter the planet's airspace from a secret location near the space station. After that, Brian greeted the man in black, turned, and then left that area of the port with his hand on his gun still. Brian was making his way to the flight deck. He kept looking behind and around, seeing if anyone was tailing or watching him in the crowded port. After finishing his cigar, the mysterious man with the shades watched Gatly disappear into the busy crowds. Then he walked off, blending in with the crowds himself. Looking behind, Brian bumped into a little girl who ran into him from the side. Still a little nervous, Brian stooped down to pick up the little girl's toy she dropped. But before he could hand it to her, he was blown away by a laser blast that came from nowhere. The little girl put the toy back on the ground and ran away, saying: "Last Laugh to the Legion!!". After that the toy exploded, killing hundreds in the spaceport and causing a widespread uproar.
The explosion attracted the attention of a couple of marauder ships on standby in the area. But some of the ships noticed the big starship appearing out of cloak mode and approaching the Neon Jungle's airspace, which was unauthorized space. Immediately, they fired at the starship but their weapons were ineffective. Colosso opened up on both sides, releasing hundreds of mech suits that swarmed like killer bees. Some of the mech suits blasted at the marauder ships until none remained.
After every mech suit exited the ship, the ship vanished into cloaking mode again. The intruder cannons on top of the mass production compounds above the Neon Jungles fired away at the incoming mech suits. But none of them were taken out because of their pilots activating energy shields. Circuit was piloting his mech suit with the Omega helmet online, which he used to hack the intruder cannons. Within seconds, he reprogrammed the cannons to recognize each other as intruders. They all took themselves out within minutes.
The rapidly approaching mech suits blasted and took fire from groups of robots around the compounds. With the Omega helmet, Circuit reprogrammed some of the robots to destroy one another. Then, while blasting away at them in the air, he deactivated some of their weapons systems. Also, he deactivated their vision. This caused enough confusion and dysfunction among them to allow some of the mech suits to enter some factories. From inside they were bombed, destroying their mass-production machines. The machines produced robots controlled by Alpha Maximus, matter converters, and supercapacitors. The capacitors are what most robots use as a power source. They were vital to them. Without them, they couldn't function for long since they had to be replaced every so often. Ato and Oasis merged suits in the air. They swooped in and out of factories, firing torpedoes at the machines.
The mech suits did combat with many of the task models. Most of the robots tried to take cover because of the mech suits' elevated coverage. Many of the robots were taken out because of Circuit and the Omega helmet. He used it to cause confusion and discord among them while he was being covered by other mech suits that distracted them while he hacked them.
Within an hour, not one suit was taken out. Only a few were damaged, but not beyond repair. After every factory was destroyed and blown up, airborne shootouts spread around the compounds. After every robot was destroyed, the mech suit pilots all retreated and then entered Colosso again just before blasting off toward Celestia.
Their mission was complete! Many mech suit pilots, including Ato and Oasis, exited their suits on the ship to rejoice with each other over their triumph. Everybody praised Circuit for how efficiently he used the Omega Weapon. But everybody knew that the mission as a whole was far from over. They knew they would face harder challenges before the ultimate victory.
Alpha Maximus was aware of the attack and was establishing reinforcements for the next one.
Back on Earth, it had been months since Ezrith had escaped from Alpha Maximus' lair. But Alpha Maximus had many task models, drones, and insectoids in his eyes. He had just returned from Plumorita.
Throughout the old war zones in the city, Ezrith had collected a whole cache of weapons. He kept everything in an old subway car where he also slept. He managed to find some machine guns and ammunition he grabbed from the skeletal remains of human soldiers who died during the Robot War that devastated Japan. He survived on a diet of insects and water. The whole time Alpha Maximus was gone, Ezrith had successfully skipped from one hideout to another by way of the subway systems that were still operational. But he had been spotted several times. He had an entourage of Companion Types of every model with him. They guided and protected him in the dangerous, robot-inhabited ruins of 2098 Tokyo. He figured out many ways to disguise himself thoroughly enough to keep his android enemies from being too close on his trail. Thanks to his arsenal, he and some of the Companion Types barely survived a couple of run-ins with some of Alpha Maximus' androids that were sent out to capture him. He used his human-friendly android allies to the full. They all depended on each other for survival in the post-apocalyptic ruins filled with thousands of obsolete robots looking to scavenge each other for parts. Androids search parties were commanded to bring Ezrith back to the lair alive to be repurposed.
Eventually, not even a day after Alpha Maximus' returned to his lair, every companion type with Ezrith had been destroyed and scavenged and Ezrith had been captured by three biozoids.
The biozoids brought Ezrith back to Alpha Maximus' lair and tortured him, trying to make him give up advantageous information about Origin Project. Ezrith gave up nothing. He knew that they needed him alive to repurpose him. He prayed that Origin Project had already found the Omega Weapon.
Days later, Alpha Maximus had left Earth for Plumorita again. The biozoids kept Ezrith in some type of underground dungeon guarded by cybrid lions. Along with him were some ghost agents from Citadel who were also being tortured for information before being repurposed. But they all tried to encourage each other and they all gave the biozoids very little to go on. Ezrith wondered if he would die before being repurposed. All he could think about was Akira, Storm, Oasis, and especially Lotus. The androids barely fed him but when they did they fed him live insects. They tried to make death seem like a relief.
All Ezrith kept thinking was if any of the ghost agents gave up any good information. Hopefully, they were all willing to be martyred for the sake of humanity. Ezrith couldn't stop worrying about Akira and his unborn seed. Those thoughts consumed him until he felt insane; beyond anxious or even tearful.
Back in Plumorita, Origin Project had launched an underground recruiting campaign. It was running on a galactic scale and it was all organized. Everybody involved had to communicate only in code because, in some places, discretion meant life or death. But there were thousands of people wanting to be operatives. Many people on many planets learned a lot about the truth, and they were simply disillusioned by the influences of Alpha Maximus, the so-called Supreme Android.
On Celestia, everybody had to stop celebrating and quickly get back into war mode. Many of Origin Project's spies had reported that Alpha Maximus was beefing up the airspace security at every known harvest site.
Many spies and scouts were being commissioned and sent out all over Plumorita. The line of communication was dynamic and constant. More people from around Plumorita were being recruited, thoroughly interviewed, briefed, and trained. So since their numbers kept increasing, Origin Project mined more bangorium metal from the asteroid field and built a large mech suit factory on Celestia. Bangorium could encase plutonium and other radioactive elements for energy sources. It protected biological forms of life from radiation.
Max, Bio, and the remaining ghost agents decided that the next harvest site to attack would be the one on the small mountainous island of Solara. The harvest site was guarded by a small but wild outlaw band called the "Coyotes". The harvest site had about three giant factories that produced robots and supercapacitors. The Coyotes worked with armed robots disguised as huge Solarian birds the size of pterodactyls that scouted the outer boundaries of the island. Alpha Maximus had fleets of Brigade marauder ships tightly patrolling Solara's airspace. But after the attack on the Neon Jungle site, he multiplied the fleets two times over. Each fleet was under the supervision of a biozoid. The only thing landing on Solara was androids and robots from Earth.
On Celestia, they were making needed repairs to their mech suits. After an omni-chamber training program overseen by Oasis and Ato, everybody prepared to enter Colosso to strategize an attack on the harvest site. A network of spies, scouts, and double agents were all on standby. Ato and Oasis decided to stay merged for the entire mission. So did Bio and Ratch. Circuit would use the Omega helmet again.
Meanwhile, on Solara, several armed Coyote outlaws were positioned at their posts on patrolling stations built on the highest points of the island. The harvest site was located at the island's most central point. There were many other islands like this one on the northeastern seas of Solara. They were miles tall and shaped with jagged mountain formations. The Coyotes all wore masks with digital sights and air tubes that allowed them to breathe in high elevations. The robot birds swarmed around the island scanning the surrounding areas for any possible intrusions. One of the Coyote members was at his patrol station cleaning his weapon. Another one was slouched over in the zone from the virtual reality headset he had on. Most of the patrolmen had gotten bored with watching the mountains for marauder bands looking to hijack parts from the harvest site to sell on the black market. But they figured no one would try anything since Alpha Maximus' name became more feared on the planet.
Meanwhile, ten mech suits exited Colosso as it approached the outermost boundary of Solara's airspace in cloak mode. They were being led by Circuit, whose mech suit was paired with the Omega Weapon. They approached another ship which was filled with 150 androids from Earth. The cargo ship was headed to the harvest site to relieve the Coyotes since Alpha Maximus decided to replace them with androids. Just before the cargo ship approached a heavily secured area scouted by marauder squadrons, the mech suit pilots entered the ship through an entrance located on the back of the ship. The androids on the ship were in stasis mode so none of them sensed the breach. Circuit used the Omega weapon to instantaneously hack every android's protocol system, which only took a few seconds. Through the Omega Weapon, the androids were under a state of cyber hypnosis. Whatever Circuit commanded them to do through the helmet, they did. So nine more mech suits entered the cargo ship along with Circuit and Ratch with the hacked androids as it entered Solara's thick atmosphere. Everyone else stayed back on Colosso as backup. As soon as the cargo ship neared the island, packs of robot birds started to swarm around it, scanning the ship for anything unrecognized on board. Before any of them could get a complete scan, they were all blasted out of the sky by the androids. When the ship landed, the Coyotes were there waiting to be relieved by a biozoid.
Circuit had commanded the androids to split up into groups of ten that would each enter a compound and self-destruct. After that, Circuit and everybody else on the cargo ship were to blast off back towards Colosso and head back to Integrity. Everything went as planned smoothly. But what no one knew was that Alpha Maximus himself had been watching them through the eyes of the largest robot bird, which was perched on the peak of the island's highest mountain.
Just as sections of the harvest site started to explode, Alpha Maximus attempted to reprogram the androids to attack the cargo ship, but it was too late. The whole island started to collapse into the sea, forming a giant tsunami wave, that made its way towards a busy metropolis on a nearby peninsula. The giant wave grew bigger as it approached the city until it was high enough to swallow and knock aircraft out of the air. As the wave started to descend, it crushed skyscrapers as if they were made of sand.
Circuit and the rest of the mech suit pilots were headed back towards Colosso in the cargo ship, but they were quickly intercepted by a swarm of marauder ships. The marauder ships fired everything they had at the cargo ship until it was a ball of fire falling back toward Solara's atmosphere. But the mech suit pilots had already escaped in cloak mode. They dodged and weaved around countless laser blasts as they merged and returned fire. But soon, they became largely outnumbered, and biozoids were approaching in larger ships. Just when the mech suit pilots were too overwhelmed, Colosso appeared. Colosso was so large compared to every other ship that they all looked like flies. Colosso rained down a storm of target-seeking missiles on them until none remained. After that, everybody entered Colosso, as it entered cloak mode again and blasted off to Celestia.
After several months had passed, there were many successful attacks on Alpha Maximus' harvest sites until only a few hundred remained throughout every known territorial space district in Plumorita.
By that time, Origin Project had more operatives around the galaxy than the Star Brigade. But some governments on a few planets were being seized by Alpha Maximus and his many android and biozoid slaves. Alpha Maximus united and consolidated 65 % of all outlaw bands in the galaxy to work for him like when he monopolized and gained control over the robotics industry on Earth before the Robot War. His purpose was to consume the galaxy like a virus was being realized. He also had dominion over 90 percent of the e-verse.
Three and a half years down the line, Alpha Maximus' forces had grown to the point that several planets, including Chronesius, were at war with him like Earth was. But because of Origin Project's opposing forces and the equalizing Omega Weapon, most planets had a chance. Because the truth had spread, no one trusted the media and few people dove into the e-verse anymore. The Star Brigade was now a large and organized outlaw band with strong authority. There was no longer a middle ground. In this galactic war, either you worked for Alpha Maximus or Origin Project. Either you took orders from Alpha Maximus or you took them from Origin Project's new arch-commander - Oasis Helix.