Somehow everything had gone from bad to worse. In hindsight, the others had already had so little faith in this—admittedly insane—plan that maybe they weren't even disappointed. Trust couldn't have gotten them this far, anyway; desperation did. Of course.

But it still stung more than the several 50mm shells embedded in Yasha's side to admit that escaping from the clan that had raised them as disposable cannon fodder really had changed very little in the end. They were still just a handful of weak little tanks who were just going to be someone else's free spare parts the moment they crossed paths. Except this time, they had no guidance; no one was around to tell them what to do now to survive when it seemed like everyone out there just preferred them dead. Amidst all of the lies and scare tactics, that part had turned out to be one-hundred percent true. Regrettably.

On the topic of lies, though, Yasha hadn't expected to find out just how much he wasn't cut out to be the leader he had pretended to be in order to get his brothers to join him in running away. He had claimed to know the roads outside their territory... They didn't even make it past the first crossing before he had realized that whatever maps he had been able to steal weren't the ones they needed. At the point where they had lost their first member, he should have admitted to the others that he had no idea what he was doing. There had been no time to do that while they had been running away from what seemed like a never-ending supply of adversaries, of course. No one could blame him for that. But maybe he should have done it afterwards as they had been cowering in some burnt-out ruins. Or when they had been looting the scraps of an even unluckier team for a few drops of fuel that hadn't already been taken by whoever had killed those. Or at the very least when they had been chased into this godforsaken forest by a pack of medium tanks, for—what only could be described as—sport. If they had been serious about it, the pitiful rest of the band of fugitives would not have stood a chance.

But the fog was getting denser now. And the sun had long disappeared from the treetops. They had managed to shake off the hostile tanks, at least so Yasha hoped. Or rather, it seemed like they had to flee themselves. From what? Surely not boredom with the chase. Some even fiercer threat, most likely. Yasha wasn't sure if he even wanted to think too hard about what could be following their track marks instead right now. Of the six brothers that had still been left by the time they had somehow made it across what was apparently considered the border to "the West", only four made it this far. Now they were marching on in uneasy silence. No, it was way too late now to announce his failure. There was no need anymore. It was already painfully obvious. The others weren't saying anything because they didn't need to. Even if they made it out of the other side of this forest in one piece, what were they going to do next? Yasha sure as hell didn't know. Was this really their lot in life? To just keep running from death every single day until they were eventually caught?

It seemed like he wasn't the only one thinking this at the moment.

"I'm not going any further," their brother Iva said and simply stopped. Yasha didn't acknowledge him. He kept going. One of the others tried to reason, telling Iva not to be ridiculous. It was pointless, of course. The young tank had planted his tracks firmly into the soil and refused to move a single centimeter from there. Evidently, he had realized that going on would only postpone his inevitable fate. His diminutive form soon disappeared in the fog that filled the space between the tree trunks behind them. With how low all of them were on fuel, it wasn't even unlikely that he'd starve before their pursuers caught up to them. Yasha felt awful for the brief moment where he seriously wondered if it was okay to take Iva's remaining fuel. He let his tracks carry him away from these ideas a little more quickly than before.

Now, there were just three brothers left and they trudged onwards. It was already getting so dark too that they normally would have stopped and settled down for the night. Not when there was a strong suspicion of someone following them, though. Despite feeling like their tracks were being held back by the forest itself somehow—every root seemingly trying to entangle itself with their running gear, every stone rearing up to make the drive as bumpy as possible—they also couldn't shake the strong feeling that stopping and resting was not an option. Even ignoring a possible pursuer, something about these woods themselves was... hostile. Branches took the shape of cannons pointed at them. Their headlights reflected themselves in what looked like sinister optics tracking their lack of progress.

No creature made a sound, only the obscenely loud noises of the tanks' engines and their destruction of the underbrush echoed through the darkening air.

Except for when the crack of a cannon nearby announced that their hopeless journey was truly about to, finally, come to a terrible end.

* * *

Yasha wakes up with a start at an all-too familiar sound. For a moment it's difficult to tell where he is, and his core struggles to make any sense of his surroundings, expecting a foggy forest. But that's not what he sees. He's sitting beside the remains of a shack next to a pond, the sun piercing through some gloomy autumn clouds making it clear that he's been sleeping at an unusual time for him.

The realization sets in, and he is wide awake at once.

He wasn't meant to be asleep right now. He was meant to keep watch.

Oh no...

Somewhere nearby, a cannon is fired. It sounds different from the one that woke him up. He's able to put two and two together, but doesn't have any time to fully regret his carelessness. Daytime is when it's his turn to be the guard. Nighttime is when it's Talon's turn. Unfortunately, Yasha can't help but want to spend time with his leader, and even more unfortunately, his leader hasn't been as adamant about denying him this opportunity to lose sleep lately.

Yasha curses himself for his stupid, irrational wishes, and kicks his engine into gear even though he doesn't know what he's hoping to achieve. And in fact, all he does achieve is stalling it. 

Damn it, damn it, damn it! Not now!

It's only been a few days with this entirely new body, and he's not even close to used to it yet. He wouldn't dare to express this struggle, obviously, fearing it would seem like he was ungrateful for the generous gift. But as he frantically restarts the new engine and clumsily drives off on the new tracks, past the shack to at least get a better look at what's going on, he can't help but miss the familiarity of the body he was assembled with. He didn't know it would literally feel like piloting a stranger's corpse to upgrade his frame.

He tries to reach Talon on the radio to ask about the situation, and when there's no answer, frantically starts apologizing for being so careless, but even then, the line stays silent.

Despite hearing more cannon fire in what seems to be in a completely different direction, he isn't able to see anything or anyone. A spike of anxiety makes him look behind him, to the sides, in front of him, everywhere. He drives faster, desperate to get a better idea of what he's dealing with. How many enemies? What kind? 

And where the fuck is Talon...?!

Yasha's new turret spins around, but all he can see is the pond getting farther away as he headlessly rushes forward through a row of trees and thicket. The roar of a cannon, now behind him, chases him. Yet, his tracks carry him less effortlessly than before his upgrade, almost making him feel like he's moving on the spot more than he's advancing despite the attempt to run faster.

Behind the thicket, the ground suddenly stops—he half-drives, half-tumbles down the side of the hill. Coasting to a stop sideways, dumbfounded and startled, he's suddenly surrounded by a sea of thick fog and an even thicker tangle of trees and bushes. He tries to get moving again, but the ground underneath his tracks seems extremely uneven and loose. He just barely manages to crawl forward a little, and tries to carefully keep going to not lose his footing while also avoiding the treacherous foliage.

It takes him a couple minutes of focusing mostly on not getting stuck until he realizes that the strained sounds of his engine are actually the only sounds he's picking up now. There's no more shooting.

Another shaky attempt to reach his leader via radio yields only quiet static.

He doesn't know if he can stop now without getting stuck after all, but stops dead in his tracks immediately anyway when he looks ahead and sees the silhouette of a tank in the fog. It can't be further than a hundred meters away. And it's facing him. It takes entirely too long until he realizes that it's not moving at all and makes no sound. Cautiously approaching it, Yasha feels an ice cold shiver in his core when he recognizes the model of the wreck as the same type that his previous body was.

But...a frame of that make...? Here...?

His optics lose focus, but that draws his attention to something behind the wreck; further ahead in the fog, another figure looms. That one is larger, much larger. It moves almost imperceptibly, but Yasha still knows that a cannon is being pointed at him. The rattling sound of damaged vents fills the air that he now realizes smells oily, like spilled machine innards.

He stares, the cold fog penetrating his entire frame and making it tremble like the sinewy body of a freezing creature. His core knows, as if by some kind of synthetic instinct, some collectively shared memory, that he not only needs to stay away from what's over there, but in fact leave as quickly as possible. But for some reason, somehow, his engine and tracks have actually resumed carrying him forward.

But then there's movement and a shadow behind him all of a sudden. He wants to stop and turn his turret around to defend himself, but it's already too late. Something hits him really hard, and everything goes dark.

[Meanwhile, a day's travel westward of Tow...]

Sixteen days have passed since we departed from Tow, also leaving it to its tragic fate. The tiny group of travelers that were my company when I entered the town has grown into a group that is unfortunately now too large for me to keep track of. It's a good thing that I'm not in charge of this group, and I have to wonder how their leader is doing it—he must be extraordinarily talented at archiving and recalling the identities of his fellow tanks.

There's at least four or five new, determined hunters joining us each day. But since the scouting and investigations they do seem to be carried out most recklessly, there would be no way to keep their ranks filled otherwise, I suppose. I don't recall seeing many of the group's members return from these missions. It's almost always new, unfamiliar ones.

Case in point: at this very moment there's three strangers approaching our temporary encampment, but they're accompanied by the informal second-in-command Ace, so it's safe to assume they aren't hostile raiders. Just yet another batch of new recruits. He left the camp together with a small platoon of his fellow hunters just this morning; I'm not sure what they were trying to investigate this time, but I can make an educated guess. It seems like every single "promising lead" about our target so far turned out to be just rumours. All the rovers have started seeing ghosts.

At least we stopped the pointless goose chases for now. Setting up this encampment as a base for our operations is something that I was able to persuade their leader of. It is generally rather easy for someone like me to come up with arguments that to the average tank appear like incredibly profound, prudent, strategically sound advice. But the actual reason why I suggested it in the first place was a lot more...pragmatic. I got tired of running myself ragged trying to keep up with their aimless driving around the area. The weather has become very typical of the nearing winter season, which is to say, wet, foggy, dark, and generally unpleasant.

The most ironic thing about it all is that despite the still rampant rumours and frequent alleged sightings, I don't think anyone has actually encountered or even seen the fearsome Black Death since the incident at Tow. I'm not insinuating that there is any direct connection, and I assume that Yasha made it out of the town alive. But why was he there in the first place? 

Thinking back to our brief meeting, I can't help but wonder if he, too—like the entire West at this point—was looking for Talon.

The two of them seemed very eager to harass me around the clock before that. It only stands to reason that something must have happened to that rogue MBT that either physically incapacitated him from stalking me since that night, or that simply has been giving him something more important to worry about for the time being. (I still don't consider him coming to his senses and dropping this nonsensical feud being a realistic possibility, simply because it would be too good to be true.)

But, maybe I'm about to find out more about these mysterious circumstances than I thought I would... Less than two hours after Ace's return to the camp, the hunters are all suddenly bustling about and incredibly excited about whatever news he brought.

I stick my turret out of the just slightly too small makeshift garage they made for me to ask what all this sudden anxiety is about, but get completely ignored in the rush of activity. With a heavy sigh, I maneuver myself outside to go find the hunters' leader and ask him if something that I should know about has been reported. 

The camp isn't really that big, just a cluster of about a dozen tents and a makeshift storage, surrounded by an intentionally fragile fence, sitting nestled snugly between a cursed forest and unkempt meadows. Such a location isn't one I would normally pick for my retreats, but I can see how Jericho would like the idea of staying in a place that scavengers and raiders prefer to avoid. He also enjoys routine and simplistic camp layouts, so the larger 'command tent' in the middle of the other ones is where I look for and reliably find him.

Despite his usual grim outward appearance, he seems in high spirits right now—upon me entering the tent, he greets me instead of just silently acknowledging my presence like he normally would. Outside, two tanks who are carrying a bundle of metal poles scurry past.

"What's going on?" I ask, just getting straight to the point.

"A local platoon found his accomplice," Jericho replies matter-of-factly, while stuffing some heavy duty chains into his stowage. "A mechanic tipped them off. They said they caught it, and Ace was able to make a deal with them to deliver it directly to our camp." 

He gestures at me to follow him and leads me to what looks like a big cage that's being hastily constructed by the camp members at the moment. 

"They'll arrive tomorrow afternoon if everything goes well, so we better have this here ready by then," he goes on, nodding at the half-finished structure. I can't help but notice how the whole contraption looks needlessly sturdy considering what I assume they're planning to keep in there.

"It...," I murmur while giving Jericho a pointed glance from the corner of my optics, "...being a superheavy tank? Did they make sure they caught the right tank and didn't just, for example, kidnap the scariest looking guy they came across?"

He returns my look with an uncomprehending frown as he goes about tying the chains he brought to the cage door. "An accomplice to a dangerous MBT can't be much less dangerous than the MBT himself," he states, his tone implying that he's disturbed by how I could be confused about something this obvious. 

"A fair assumption, I suppose. It would be ridiculous to think something like a weak little light tank could be an MBT's travel companion, after all," I rumble in response, realizing at this moment that I'm probably one of the only two tanks on Earth who have knowledge of Yasha's identity. Sure, I know that even though he's very feisty for sure, the only thing that truly makes him dangerous is his status as an MBT's protégé. Unfortunately, no one else does. At least, for now. If he really was caught, then this rotten can of worms is going to be burst open very soon...I cannot imagine this being the case, however. In fact, Jericho's next statement makes it sound even more unlikely.

"The platoon said they never had to deal with something that feral before. One of them got hurt badly just trying to restrain it...and that was after they already disarmed it. I'm sure they aren't some rookies fresh out of the factory who wouldn't know how to handle an ordinary tank. So, I'm not taking any chances."

"Does their captive perhaps have a fuzzy brown pelt and big claws?" I attempt to joke, but I guess I should have expected someone like Jericho to not be all that receptive to humor.

"They didn't mention anything like that, but as far as I know the model matched the description that the mechanic gave them," he replies deadpan.

Nodding politely, I decide that further conversation won't reveal any more about this mysterious hostage. "Don't mind silly old me. I hope whoever they bring here will be helpful in your investigation."

With that, I leave Jericho to his high security prison construction site, returning to my little shed to wait and see.