Chapter: January 16, 2026 — 7:48 AMAbove Laguna Province — Operation Sunfire, Phase One
The morning light stretched thin across the rolling hills of southern Luzon, filtered through wisps of cloud and ash. From above, the once-green sprawl of Laguna looked scarred and wrong. Patches of blackened ground radiated out from grotesque, pulsating Bloom Nests—biological tumors of flesh and vine rooted deep into the earth. They were spreading—too fast.
"Overwatch Command to Sunfire Group. You are clear for engagent. Repeat: weapons free."
The command echoed through encrypted radio channels as three squadrons streaked through the sky, slicing past clouds with jet-roaring defiance. The vanguard: four F-16 Fighting Falcons, sleek and fast, flown by Overwatch's top air-interceptors. Behind them, a tight wedge of three A-10 Thunderbolt IIs—slower, heavier, ard to the teeth. And flanking the operation from altitude was a lone shadow: the AC-130U gunship Spooky One, high above the battlezone like a reaper in the sky.
Inside the lead Falcon, Captain Rivera gripped the stick with steady fingers. His helt HUD displayed topography, threat markers, and coordinates from Reaper One-One, which had mapped the largest nests overnight.
"This is Viper-One," Rivera radioed in. "Visual on objective Alpha. Massive bloom cluster. Looks... alive."
"Copy that, Viper-One," ca the voice of Phillip from MOA Command. "Target confird. You're go for ordinance."
"Fox Three," Rivera called out.
His F-16 bucked slightly as two guided JDAMs released from his belly hardpoints. The smart munitions scread downward, riding laser designations from Reaper One-One's uplink. The mont before impact, the ground seed to ripple—like the Bloom sensed danger.
The explosion was imdiate. Dirt, viscera, and black sludge erupted into the air as the bomb cratered the central nest. But even as the dust cleared, thick red tendrils burst from the crater's edge, regrowing, curling upward like at-colored vines.
"Jesus Christ—thing's regenerating!" Rivera called.
"That's not regeneration," another pilot barked over the comms. "That's birthing."
Below, humanoid shapes erged from the nest's base—Bloomspawn, twisted monsters birthed from the pod's ruptured mbrane. Their limbs were wrong. Skin translucent in places, glowing faintly with infected bioluminescence. A screeching cry went up like a signal.
"Ground contact. Bloomspawn confird," Phillip radioed in. "A-10s, you're up."
"Copy, Vulture Group engaging," ca the grim reply from Major Sandoval, the A-10 flight lead.
The Warthogs descended into the fray, their unmistakable profile gliding slow and low. The lead A-10 nosed down gently, its pilot toggling the master arm switch.
"Guns, guns, guns!"
The GAU-8/A Avenger rotary cannon spun to life with its terrifying brrrrrrrrrrrt, spitting 30mm depleted uranium rounds at 3,900 rounds per minute. The slugs tore through the Bloomspawn like wet paper. Blood, bone, and spores misted into the air.
A second A-10 laid down a line of AGM-65 Maverick missiles into a secondary nest sprouting near a farmland cluster. The explosion lit up the fields in a rolling fireball that sent Bloom creatures scattering.
"Kill confird," Sandoval called. "Nest Bravo neutralized."
But even as the Warthogs banked, new contacts appeared on radar—dozens of fast-moving airborne targets.
"Spooky One to all units," the AC-130's sensor operator called. "We have Reapers in the air. Repeat: airborne infected confird. Engaging."
From the heavens, the AC-130 lit up the sky like a wrathful god. A 105mm howitzer bood from its side, pulverizing a hillside nest in one strike. Then the 40mm Bofors opened up in rhythmic bursts, hamring airborne targets before they could close in.
Infrared caras painted a grim picture—dozens of Reapers, the winged infected type, soaring in from Mount Makiling's southern ridge like a flock of nightmares.
"This is getting hot," Rivera gritted. "Too many bogeys, not enough firepower."
"Maintain formation," Phillip ordered. "We've got reinforcents scrambled, ETA twelve minutes. Hold the line."
On the ground, what had once been Los Baños was a battlefield. Civilian evac had cleared out most of the town weeks ago, but now the roads were shredded and overgrown. Bloom tendrils wrapped around lamp posts. Crashed buses served as makeshift nest husks. And out of one such overturned vehicle burst a new threat—
"Eyes on a Mawbeast! Big one! Repeat, target is armored, four-limbed crawler. Heavy contact!"
A-10 Three wheeled around, lining up for a strafing run. The pilot depressed the trigger.
BRRRRRRRRRRT.
Rounds hamred the creature's back—but it didn't fall. The Mawbeast surged forward, leaping like a toad with the weight of a wrecking ball. It slamd into a supply depot just west of the airfield ruins and vanished in a blast of concrete and smoke.
"Negative effect! Target's still active!"
"Spooky One, this is Vulture Three—we need a 105mm strike on my mark!"
"Roger, paint the target."
A laser designated the impact zone as the beast crawled up over broken asphalt toward a fallback periter lined with automated turrets.
Then—BOOM.
The 105mm shell struck the Mawbeast dead center, obliterating it in a fiery cloud of smoke and black blood. Cheers rang out through the comms. The turrets survived.
But they weren't out of it yet.
From the forests east of Calamba, more nests ignited with internal pulses—three, four, five of them at once. Bloom expansion was accelerating beyond prediction.
"Thomas, this is Phillip," ca a voice through the encrypted channel. "We've got a serious problem."
Thomas Estaris stood back in the MOA Command Center, watching the aerial feed in grim silence. The command room lights dimd automatically to emphasize the dozens of red markers now populating the tactical screen.
"I'm seeing it," Thomas said. "They're learning. Responding to attacks. This isn't a scatter defense. This is coordination."
"They're converging," Phillip added. "We hit two nests, and now seven more are waking up."
Thomas's jaw clenched.
"Divert Spooky One's fire to the eastern flank. Have the A-10s focus on cutting off movent toward San Pablo. And prep the F-16s to intercept airbornes near the ridge."
"Copy all," Phillip replied.
In the air, Rivera pulled hard left as one Reaper nearly clipped his tail. His F-16 rolled inverted and climbed before unleashing a short burst from his cannon.
"Splash one," he muttered.
But even as the Reaper fell in a spin of shredded wings, two more took its place.
"Too many," Sandoval radioed. "We'll thin 'em, but we're getting sward."
Down below, the Bloom nests were now pulsing in a synchronized rhythm—like a heartbeat. Pheromonal signals, electromagnetic waves—whatever this virus used to communicate, it was doing it now. Loud. Fast. With purpose.
And then, as if summoned by that call, a tremor shook the hillside.
Not from an explosion.
But from sothing massive... moving.
Thomas watched it appear on the feed from Reaper One-Three—a heat signature the size of a five-story building erging from the mountainside near the dormant geothermal plant east of Bay.
A Goliath.
"God help us," Thomas breathed.
Phillip's voice ca through with quiet dread. "Command, we have visual confirmation. A Goliath-class infected. East of the Los Baños sector."
The monster's silhouette—humanoid, hulking, with thick vines for limbs and a torso that pulsated like an exposed heart—lumbered into the clearing.
Every man and woman in the air fell silent.
Until Thomas's voice cut through.
"All air units: prepare for Phase Two. We're not retreating. Not yet."
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