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Chapter Text

My vision and hearing slowly cleared from the ringing and spots that were obscuring them. I could already feel my regeneration getting to work in soothing the aches and pains in my entire body as I slowly stood up. Blue tiled flooring greeted my eyes as my vision finally cleared and I was finally able to see my surroundings more clearly. This was odd, the underground cathedral where we fought Cyn didn't have this kind of flooring.

My eyes caught sight of a molten puddle of god only knows what. The heavily stained European steel longsword and Colt Navy revolver that lay in the middle however was enough information to confirm that the puddle of goop was almost certainly Cyn's remains. Good to know that the bitch was actually dead. I had no idea where my P127 handgun had gone though. Great, that was yet another one of my weapons that Cyn had cost me.

I groaned quietly as I called out, "Alright, who's not dead. Sound off." The chorus of groans and complaints told me that everyone had survived relatively intact. My teammates were on the floor around me. Uzi was being helped to her feet by N. V was already on her feet and currently holding the only nonmember of Sabre Team at gunpoint. Her former team leader Serial Designation J.

"You may have helped us in the end but I don't fucking trust you. So let's see if you can actually give me one good reason as to why I shouldn't kill you. Right here. Right now."

I calmly walked up to her before gently pushing her gun away from J. I kept a careful eye on the downed Disassembly Drone as I began to talk to the both of them, "Easy there V, I get that you wanna kill her but I need to question her first." The fact that I would allow V to kill J if she tried anything went unsaid. J had sided with Cyn and even though she had turned on her at the very end she had still lost. Thus she now found herself at our mercy and she knew that we held the advantage.

My girlfriend looked fairly annoyed at this but she thankfully complied and stalked off to inspect the room we had found ourselves in. Her frustration was something that I could easily understand but I had to make sure we couldn't recruit her. I wasn't worried about J trying to get violent with me though. I was keeping my Meltagun trained on where her Core was located. I was in no mood for yet another encounter with an eldritch monster.

"You attacked Cyn when she was being torn apart by us. Why?" We both knew that there was no point asking anything other than direct questions that cut straight to the heart of the matter.

"Do you think I enjoyed working for Cyn?! Do you think I wanted to become a monstrous killer for that freak's entertainment?!" J spat back at me, her voice becoming increasingly hysterical as she continued talking. "That psycho tore all three of us apart! She broke us to become weapons to be thrown away whenever the job was finished. Do you really think I didn't try to fight back?!"

I lowered my weapon a fraction and motioned with my supporting hand for her to continue. "I tried. Robo-God knows I tried. But she was in my programming and that meant that there was nothing I could do to her. She would've never let us go. There wasn't any escape from her. Even in death. She would just bring us back and torture us until we were completely broken to her whims."

"So when you saw that she was actually being beaten you were finally able to muster the courage to seize the opportunity and attack her."

That, that honestly made a hell of a lot of sense. J might have been leading the team but she herself was still a slave to the sadistic cruelties of Cyn. And like V she had been all too aware of the chains that bound her to the monster. Something that Cyn had no doubt been aware of and had also clearly been holding it over J's head.

"So why treat N like shit? I know you treated him poorly when you were still Workers at the Elliott Mansion."

"I was basically the Head Maid. Anytime they had a problem with anyone or anything they'd not only take it out on whoever it was that allegedly messed up...."

"They'd also take it out on you and Tessa as well." My tone was blunt as I interjected. J just tilted her head back against the curved stone wall she had been leaning against. I could already see the pieces slotting into place in my mind. It didn't make her actions any less unacceptable but it did make them at least somewhat understandable.

"Well aren't you smart?" I rolled my eyes at the blatant sarcasm in her response. Hopefully without a beast like Cyn or arseholes like the Elliotts breathing down her neck at all times and threatening to kill or torture her that she would finally be able to chill out. Preferably before she completely burnt herself out from stress. Or got herself killed by lashing out at the wrong person.

I nodded at her, before stowing away my Meltagun altogether. I bent down and offered her a hand up. "On your feet J. I'm going to give you a chance. ONE. I expect you to fall in line and follow my orders. Don't make me regret showing you mercy."

J stared at my hand before tentatively reaching for it. I helped her up even as I heard the rest of my teammates let their displeasure be known. I knew that ultimately that whilst they would accept my decision that did not mean that they had to like it. Of course they also knew that it was incredibly rare for me to show any form of mercy to those who opposed me so me offering J a chance at redemption was of particular note.

I looked around myself to try and get a better idea of where we were. It looked like we were in some kind of debating hall. It was large with a tall ceiling. In the centre of the room was a raised circular podium. What grabbed my attention however was that the decorations were designed to look like a giant cog. Which was an interesting design choice if I had to give my honest opinion. Granted I knew almost fuck all about architecture and interior decorating but it was still an interesting design choice.

Now that I was actually looking my surroundings I could spot cogs on damn near every surface of the room. Along with eight giant human statues standing on a ring of pillars. Well at least it was inhabited by humans at one point or another. Or beings that were close to being human anyway. Still if the local population was close-to-human then that was still better that better than if they were a bunch of savage mutants.

There were words etched into the surface of the podium and I quickly scrambled up so I could read them more easily. After some rapid counting I realised that there was a grand total of eight words on the podium's surface. Honour, loyalty, faith, humility, order, diligence, purity, labour. A code or maybe some kind of political/religious creed that supposedly bound the people together? It was pretty hard to say and there wasn't exactly much evidence to indicate what it meant or who made it.

It was still a rather interesting choice of words to be sure. Before I could ponder them or their potential significance further however, heavy footsteps and voices could be heard. Everyone readied their ranged weapons as we took positions amongst the benches. I noted that J had grabbed Tessa's longsword and was currently holding it in her off hand. Whilst the Revolver was tucked away in one of her pockets.

Not long after we managed to get into cover four heavily armoured soldiers came in. Three looked like they had been eating steroids with every damb meal because I found it hard to believe that anyone could get muscles that large naturally. The slimmest one seemed to be in charge however. Interestingly enough none of them were wearing helmets. One of them was wearing a pretty interesting bandana though. Which was a pretty interesting choice to wear in a combat role.

I could just about overhear what they were saying from my position too. Which hopefully meant that I'd be able to get some scraps of information as to where the hell we currently were.

"This building used to be a beautiful place. There's a lot of history here." Christ his voice was almost filled with a reverence that I used to hear all the time from those lunatic cultists that worshipped nuclear radiation as a god.

One of the larger soldiers piped up saying that there were a lot of lies as well. Bloody hell his voice was heavy and rough. So this must have been some sort of parliamentary building or maybe even a prominent courthouse then. I mean granted there was a distinct possibility that it could have served as both.

"You've got some nerve soldier. I know all about your trial." Ooh the slim guy was getting pissy. I smell draaammmaaa. Ah well guess it might not be too badly of an idea to introduce ourselves. And I had just the right idea to also show we weren't necessarily hostile to them right off the bat.

"Oi, if yer gonna give us a show, can you at least do it on the podium after we get some popcorn?"

The four of them practically dived for cover, raising their rifles at the same time. Wait, were those intergrated chainsaws I spotted? If a weapon that brutal had to be placed on to the front of a military rifle I could only wonder what foe they were facing. As well as for how long they had been dealing with them.

"State your name and business civilian."

"Heh, 'civilian' I haven't been called that in a while. I'm Colonel Ciel Soliel of the Enclave and leader of Sabre Team. My teammates and I literally just woke up here." I could see the four of them stiffen up when they realised that I wasn't a civilian but an incredibly high ranking officer. I could also tell that they clearly didn't know what the Enclave was but that wasn't really important at this moment in time. What mattered was that we weren't about to have a shoot out for no reason.

I wordlessly signalled the others to emerge from cover as I hopped over the railing and down to the tiled floor below. I felt that it was probably best to introduce ourselves as attempting diplomacy at the very start was rarely if ever a bad idea. I pointed out my teammates in order of the positions that they held in Sabre Team, "That's N, V and Uzi. Sabres Two, Three and Four respectively. The last one over there isn't currently a member and is called J." The fact that J had once been team leader to two of the members of Sabre was something that didn't need to be disclosed at this point in time.

The man nodded as he started his own introductions, "Lieutenant Kim, Delta Squad's leader. Over there is Private Santiago and Private Fenix. The fourth man is Private Cole of Alpha Squad."

"A three man Squad....nevermind. Lieutenant I need a general status report. What the hell is going on and where the hell are we?"

Private Santiago looked at me strangely, "Wait, are you saying you don't know anything about the Locust? Seriously?" Ah that must be the enemy these guys had been fighting which required them to have chainsaws mounted or rather intergrated to the front section of their rifles.

I was about to ask for more information as to what the hell he was talking about when a rather irate male voice came over the radio, "Uh, hello? We're still pinned down over here! Can you hurry up and take care of those troikas, over!" Ah, that sounded a lot more important than getting answers to my questions which could quite happily wait for a while longer.

Lieutenant Kim refocused and pointed up the stairs to a balcony that I somehow had completely failed to notice. "Move it soldiers! We've got to get to Alpha now!"

Well I guess I was going to find out whatever the fuck a 'Locust' was. Just great, a new place and we'd already found ourselves in a new war. Oh, boy just my fucking luck. Hopefully it wasn't going to be too bad but you never really knew how things were going to turn out.

The nine of us charged up the stairs to clear the balcony and assist Alpha Squad. I just hoped that we could get somewhere safe (or safe enough) soon so we could figure out what to do and how I could keep my teammates safe. I had managed to get them through the hell that Copper-9 had thrown at us and I had no intention of failing any of them. Not then, not now and not at any point in the future.

Chapter Text

I leaned back, placing my back against the smooth solid rock that may have been marble, granite or any number of different materials that had been used to create the interior wall of the building that I would learn at a later point in time was called The Tomb of The Unknowns. A grand mausoleum where unknown soldiers were buried alongside those who had received their nation's highest military honour and died in the process of doing so. Which was both pretty morbid in my honest opinion and also kinda creepy to boot as well.

The start of our fight against the Locust up on the balcony had gone reasonably well or at the very least hadn't been a complete disaster. We had quickly discovered that regular small arms calibers like 9mm and 5.56 were incredibly ineffective against Locust Drones. Which lead us to have to seize Locust Drone rifles which were called apparently Hammerbursts. Though thankfully my Bolter was highly effective at killing the Drones as each one went down with only three to four shots. This was of course rather dependent on where my shots hit them as if I nailed them in the head...well that round would cause the skull to just explode into little pieces. In a way it was just like fighting an entire army of subterranean Super Mutants. Only differences was that they were grey, had skin that was textured like rocks and were equipped to a much better standard and sometimes used actual tactics. Like one group laying down suppressing fire whilst the others advanced.

I had to say that I fucking hated the Locust Hammerburst on sight. No gunsights, no stock of any kind. Not to mention that it was excessively bulky and the presence of a burst fire limiter was just stupid when put into context with all the other 'features' that the weapon possessed. I just hoped that I would be able to get one of those Lancers that the humans here used. Those chainsaw bayonets looked really awesome. Extremely loud and messy to use but still pretty damn awesome.

Anyways it was fortunate for us that there were only two Drones on the balcony and nine of us. We had quickly shredded them with copious amounts of gunfire. And whilst I secured their weapons and ammo. N and Uzi quickly got on the troikas which were essentially massive twin-linked machine guns. They took a few seconds to spool up which I thought was really kinda odd considering that they weren't miniguns but when they got going....whooo boy the term bullet hose really fit them.

The street down below us was the designated Pickup Zone so it had to be cleared of both Drones and the flying explosive squid-like things the other humans called Nemacyst. Again that had been easy enough to do. Especially when you had two mounted heavy machine guns, four Lancer rifles firing away as well as V and J who were raining explosive missile fire down on to anything that so much as looked nasty. Which was pretty much every single motherfucker down in the open street below.

Once the street was cleared however there was another two problems that came up. The first was that there wasn't going to be enough room in the King Raven helicopter for all us. That first problem was easy enough to solve as N, V and Uzi could simply fly alongside the chopper. It was still going to be a bit of a tight squeeze but it was still doable. The second and arguably more serious problem was that J hadn't received any kind of upgrade package from me, this meant that exposure to sunlight was going to be extremely dangerous if not outright lethal to her.

That particular problem had taken some brainstorming but in the end we decided that V and N would provide cover for her with their wings whilst I kept her supplied with as much oil as was needed to keep her systems cool enough to allow her to function. It wasn't really much of a plan and it was definitely not going to be suitable for the long term but it was still something.

That initial plan to extract with the helicopter had gone straight to hell however. As the chopper was coming in to land it was flying very low and very, very fast. An unsurprising manoeuvre considering that we were clearly deep in enemy held territory. This unfortunately meant that when a bunch of Nemacyst came at the Raven there was simply no time or room for anyone in either the chopper or on the ground to do anything about it.

The falling helicopter slammed right into the side of the building ahead of us and began to plunge straight towards all of us. A shower of debris raining down as it was torn off the face of the building ad the Raven continued to fall. This crash forced everyone to scatter and end up on either the left or right hand side of the downed aircraft.

Then the fucking Locust Drones came at us like a goddamn swarm. It was kind of weird having to take cover from hostile gunfire. I'd been on Copper-9 for so long that I'd almost forgotten what it was like to be shot at. Can't honestly say that I had actually missed the feeling of being under enemy fire though. But it was still suite the change of pace compared to being in situations where I was the only one one with an actual firearm.

At some point in the ensuing chaos of the battle Lieutenant Kim had ended up getting further separated from us by being forced out of cover by a flanking attempt by the Locust. In doing so he had placed himself right in the path of what was quite likely the largest motherfucker I had ever seen short of a goddamn Super Mutant Behemoth. Seriously, the big ugly bastard looked like he was almost eleven or even twelve feet tall.

He was huge and wore thick armour that was rather well decorated but no so much to the point where it interfered with the functionality. His collar was massive and extended well past his head curving up like a set of horns. By the time the Lieutenant had seen him his Lancer was either out of ammunition or had suffered a malfunction of some kind. With no time to fix or reload his rifle Kim desperately attempted to attack the monster with the chainsaw bayonet but the ugly bastard simply stopped it with his bare hand before throwing the rifle away. This was honestly quite intimidating as the idea of something being able to grab an operating chainsaw and not instantly lose their hand was not something I had ever expected to see.

I could only get glimpses of it as I was completely preoccupied with helping J to keep out of the sunlight whilst shooting as many of the attacking Drones as possible. Which was not an easy thing given all the chaos going on around us. Even so, I don't think I'll ever forget the sight of that Lieutenant impaled upon that fucker's massive serrated blade.

"Four! Big guy! Opposite side! Railgun! Two, cover her!" I don't think I've ever given out an order quite as panicked as that one. Thankfully Uzi was able to understand what I meant as she and N took advantage of a brief lull in the firing to fly on top of the downed Raven. I'm pretty sure I heard Uzi say something but that didn't matter. What did matter was that a few seconds later I heard, saw and even felt the distinct display of her Mk2 Railgun going off in the big bastard's fuck-ugly face.

The two landed beside me to report that Uzi had managed to score a direct hit and that it had literally vaporised the bastard's entire upper torso. I had no idea who or what he was but he must have been important though as the moment he died, the enemy attack was thrown into complete disarray as many of the Locust had tried to break ranks and run for their lives.

Taking advantage of the enemy's confused disorganisation, we were able to swiftly make it up the stairs and inside the Tomb. Once inside we began to barricade the door behind us with large stone blocks that had fallen from somewhere or other. I didn't really care to be honest as long it actually worked in our favour and stopped them from swarming our current location.

I glanced down at the Lancer I was holding even as I attempted to reorganise my thoughts. My new rifle had belonged to one of the soldiers of Alpha Squad but sadly they had been killed right beside me during the battle. Poor bastard had been caught in the throat by a full six round burst and had been damn near decapitated as a result.

Just by looking at the weapon stats I could tell right away that in terms of ranged combat it was inferior to my Bolter. That much was obvious given that the Lancer was chambered in 7.62 whilst the Bolter was chambered in .50 which was a pretty big difference in the size of the round that was being fired.

The magazine size was actually pretty damn decent as it held sixty rounds at full capacity. The gunsights were somewhat rudimentary but still fairly functional and I could always change it out using my Universal Workbench. Hell I was already thinking of swapping it for a Reflex Sight or maybe some kind of short range scope. Though I was definitely going to add some kind of stock to this thing to give it some more comfort and stability whilst firing.

That said I was definitely going to have to give the magwell a lot of attention. That locking arm at the bottom of the weapon looked like it could and probably did cause a bunch of mechanical issues. Might be easier to just simply extend the magwell to cover more of the magazine. That would no doubt help keep the magazine securely locked in place and make it less likely to fall out.

However, the single biggest thing that the Lancer had that the Bolter lacked was the intergrated chainsaw bayonet. Which given the Locust's love of close quarters fighting, I could well imagine myself getting a lot of use out of it. So it wasn't a terrible weapon overall it just needed some fixing here and there.

But right at that moment my team and I were more concerned with J. Whilst we had done our best to shield her from the sun's rays she'd been caught in it at least a few times and was now dangerously close to having a catastrophic failure due to her internal systems overheating to dangerously high levels. The former team leader was practically bent over, gasping for air even as heat haze and even whisps of smoke coiled off of her.

I wasn't exactly counting but it ended up taking J at least eighty units of oil with her just jugging them one after the other. But in the end we eventually managed to get her internal temperature back down to safe levels. Now that she wasn't in any danger of keeling over, the meant that the members of Sabre Team, Alpha and Delta Squads could now fully focus on the current situation at hand.

That situation being that we needed to find a safe(ish) way out of here and fast. Thankfully though Control had already informed us of the existence of an area behind the mausoleum. Not the best thing in the world but it was also not the worst thing either. So you know I guessed that it was something that we could sort of work with.

One of the surviving Alpha Squad soldiers was approached by Fenix. "You're Baird." No idea why he was only doing it now but whatever. I had more important things to worry about.

"Yeah, that's right asshole. Question is who fired that green deathray and who the fuck are you." Oh god, I just met him and I already wanted to punch him, he sounded more of an asshole than J. Luckily for his face and throat however an incredibly loud shrieking roar cut everyone off.

The soldiers around me froze as they drew their weapons Baird's attitude suddenly changed as he whispered softly to us all, "Shh, quiet. Don't move." Oh shit that wasn't a good sign. If the snide asshole stops being an asshole then it's something extremely serious.

"What is it?"

"A Beserker. She can hear us, she can smell us." So it was blind and relied on sound and smell then? I wondered if I could trick one to run off a cliff or something similar. I kinda stopped paying attention to the conversation as I noticed that Cole was now carrying around some kind of device on his back. Wonder what that was. Eh, my question could probably wait until after we had dealt with the Beserker.

My attention snapped back as the only member of Alpha Squad who was wearing a helmet freaked the absolute fuck out and tried to make a run for it screaming profanity the whole way. Which whilst it was perfectly understandable, it was also something that could bring her straight to us. Which meant that it was also completely unacceptable.

Thankfully when he tried to push past N, the male Disassembly Drone was quick to shove him against the wall. "Will you be quiet?! You're gonna lead her right to us!"

The young man was shaking in terror but somehow managed to keep his mouth shut and return a shaky nod. He was relatively quiet even as he struggled to get his erratic breathing back under control. Poor bastard's nerves were completely shot to hell and back. Hopefully he got the time off and all the mental health assistance that he clearly needed to recover from this.

"Hold your fire Delta! Standard weapons won't work, do you still have the Hammer of Dawn?" The Hammer of what now? Eh whatever, Fenix must have still been on the radio to this mission Control station.

"Oi, Fenix." I hissed quietly trying to keep my voice down. "The fuck is this Hammer of Dawn?" I felt it was important as Control had informed us that it was the only that would work and we only had minutes of satellite coverage left. Which told me that whilst it was almost certainly powerful it was also something that couldn't necessarily be relied upon.

"It's a orbital satellite based laser. Surely even a dumbass Stranded like you would know that."

"That's enough man. No need to be an asshole."

"Corporal Baird, if I want your opinion I'll ask you for it. Until then, do yourself a favour and shut the fuck up."

"Oh and you are?"

"Colonel Ciel Soliel of the Enclave. Lucky for you we're busy or I might just quite literally kick your arse for impudence and pissing me off. Also I might just happen to have an alternative solution to our Beserker problem." The soldiers who didn't know about my rank all stiffened the backs slightly even as Baird had an 'oh shit' look cross over his face. Good, maybe you should learn to check your mouth you fucking arsehole.

"Private Fenix, you take point. Everyone else is to stay here." With that said I brought out my Meltagun. "If that thing is vulnerable to energy weapons, then this'll fucking kill her no problem."

I could have used something like the BFG9000 but I didn't want to risk bringing the place down on our heads. I had made that mistake when I blew up that eldritch version of J back in Outpost Three's cryochamber. This time I'd stick to the Meltagun when firing indoors.

"Hey Ciel? Be careful alright?"

"I'll be fine V. Keep em safe while I'm gone. Love you V."

"Love you too Ciel." God her smile was just so perfect and it always made me feel so joyful. With that said Fenix and I went off deeper into the Tomb.

The building was dark and looked pretty damp in places. I could honestly only imagine how stressful trying to lure the Beserker outside would be. Especially in these narrow halls and corridors. This Beserker however was the one being hunted this time. I'd kill it and come back to my girlfriend alive and well.

It didn't take us all that long to find the Beserker. We had just gone through one hall and we're in the corridor when the beautiful wooden doors at the far end violently exploded into wooden splinters and chippings.

I didn't need to be told that the ten foot tall screaming behemoth of creature in front of us was the Beserker. I could quite easily tell, especially when it let out that same noise that I'd heard earlier. Well that and the fact that my HUD had it tagged as "Locust Beserker" which was a pretty big giveaway. It was turning around, no doubt trying to get our scent in order to try and find us.

I didn't give it the chance to. I simply pointed my Meltagun straight at that bitch and pulled the trigger. The hiss of the moisture in the air being boiled away was louder due to there being so much more than inside the bunker that was Outpost Three. The sound of the weapon going off is one that I would always remember, especially since the aftermath would always be spectacular.

Case in point? The Locust Beserker now had a fist sized hole in her upper torso and was on fire. Despite this she was still alive somehow but in absolute agony. Though it was kinda funny to see her scream in pain as she burned alive from the inside. Another shot to the head silenced her screams once and for all causing the Tomb to fall relatively silent once more.

I flicked a glance to my HUD and noted that it had seven shots left in the Fusion Core. This was the second time I had used it, the first being when I decided to make sure that Doll wasn't going to come back and cause us more problems.

I had a feeling that if we continued to follow Delta Squad on this path then we'd probably (if not almost certainly) encounter more Beserkers sooner or later. And honestly if the situation was actually as desperate it seemed at first glance? Chances were that the human High Command would probably assign my team and I to whatever the fuck that this mission was as well.

Chapter Text

By the time Fenix and I had regrouped with the rest of the group, Uzi and Baird were already in the middle of an in depth discussion about her Sick As Hell Railgun. I wasn't too surprised seeing as how Uzi loved talking about the fact that she built the damn thing all by herself. Which in my honest opinion made the highly destructive weapon even more impressive than it already was.

I could tell that what the others didn't really understand what the two were on about. Quite frankly I didn't have a clue either. But I could see that N was looking at Uzi with undisguised pride and affection. It was good to that the two of them were now so happy with each other. N had become more self-confident as well being assertive enough to set up and enforce personal boundaries. Uzi on the other hand had become a lot less closed off and slightly more willing to try and to let down the walls that she had lived with for so long. Granted she didn't do that with everyone unless she she actually trusted them as she had still been pretty cold to the Drones inside her old colony. Which was quite frankly the very least that they deserved after all the shit they put her through.

Fenix had also told me his first name was Marcus. It felt rather odd calling him by his given name. Ah whatever, I still technically outranked him. Despite the fact that I was almost certainly the only Enclave member on the entire planet right now. Who knows maybe I might even become friends with him. It was somewhat doubtful but you never knew as stranger things had actually happened before. Me making an incredibly deadly Disassembly Drone my girlfriend and killing an eldritch monster were two things being pretty much right at the top of that list.

I was still somewhat mulling over the rather condensed version of global events that he'd told me though. Fourteen years ago, just six weeks after the end of an eighty year long conflict called The Pendulum Wars. The Locust had suddenly and violently emerged from underneath damn near every single human settlement. Be it city, town or military instalation. In many places such as the larger and more active military bases, the attacks had been repelled though more often than not iy had come at great cost of Human life. Many more locations however had fallen to the Locust onslaught. By nightfall the capital city of Ephyra had been battered and hundreds of thousands of humans lay dead.

It eventually became known as Emergence Day (mainly due to the fact that the Locust had emerged from underground) and marked the beginning of The Locust War. A war that had ravaged damn near the entire planet. Either through the sheer ferocity of combat or the unrestricted deployment of WMDs to enact a ruthless scorched earth policy to prevent valuable resources from falling into enemy hands.

The greatest of all was the Hammer of Dawn Counter-Offensive where the satellite based weapon had been deployed ruthlessly on damn near everywhere outside of the Jacinto Plataue. Humanity's last safe refuge owing to the fact that the Locust were unable to dig through the solid granite rock that made its foundation.

It had essentially become an island of refuge in a sea of death and misery. All that was left of the governments across the planet was the Coalition of Ordered Governments. Every other government and military was long since broken and scattered to the winds. Living day by day in a desperate guerilla war against overwhelming odds. It was kind of inspiring in a way, just another example of Humanity absolutely refused to back down even on the face of almost certain doom. It was also quite depressing that Humanity had been driven to the brink of extinction in the first place.

At this point in the war Humanity had been getting increasingly desperate. The war having been raging for a little over fourteen years now and from what Marcus had told me the estimated death toll was well into the billions. Everything and everyone was focused solely on the war effort with incredibly strict governmental control over damn near every single aspect of life and civil liberties being almost nonexistent. Which was quite understandable given the fact that Humanity was quite literally fighting for its very survival.

I guess that was probably why Baird was such an asshole. Seeing this much death and destruction over so many years of constant bitter fighting would kill any sense of hope or optimism a person had. Which made cheerful people like Dom and Cole such unusual rarities. How they could still smile despite all of this was something that I didn't think that I'd ever completely understand.

But something seemed somewhat different with him now. He seemed a little happier if only by a slight touch. Apparently whilst we were away dealing with the Beserker, Uzi had mentioned the big guy she had killed with her railgun. Turns out the guy she had blasted was believed to be General RAAM, the top military commander of the Locust Horde and if this was the case then there was little doubt that she would be getting a hefty reward for her actions.

Of course we would have to radio the news to COG High Command for confirmation first. Which Marcus had been rather happy to do so.

"Control, this is Delta. Come in."

"I read you, Marcus. Colonel Hoffman is coming online."

Another voice come over the channel. Rough, male sounded a bit like an older version of General Ward to be honest. "Report."

"We're here with Alpha and we have the Resonator." Huh guess that's what the device on Cole's back was. "We've also picked up some additional forces as well. And we have reason to believe that one of them killed a Locust VIP, over."

"What in the hell do you mean by that Fenix?!"

I decided that now was a good time to introduce myself to the good Colonel. "Colonel Hoffman? This Colonel Ciel Soliel of the Enclave. My team and I are ready and able to assist Alpha and Delta Squads."

"Can't say I've ever heard of the Enclave, but we do unfortunately need all the help we can get. What do you have for me?"

"A group of currently four individuals operating under the Callsign of Sabre Team. But I believe that Sabre Four has some data to transmit to you first."

When the little floating robot decloaked practically right next to my head I damn near shot it out of reflex. Good thing I didn't though, I don't think the COG would have appreciated me breaking their expensive military hardware.

The strange four eyed machine floated over to Uzi who quietly started to transfer the relevant data files to Control. It looked so strange even compared to the various robots that I had encountered in the Commonwealth.

"Okay, recieving Sabre Four's data now Delta. Standby....oh my god. Colonel you need to take a look at this." Huh, that's either really good or really bad.

"Sabre Four. This is Colonel Hoffman." Uzi looked nervous about being addressed by someone of such high rank that she didn't really know. I saw N place a comforting hand on her shoulder. She knew that we would fight to protect her just as she would for any of us.

"Yes Colonel?"

"I've just gone over your feed and I can confirm the ID of the Locust you killed. That was General RAAM, and according to our intelligence he was the supreme military commander of the Locust Horde." Holy shit, Uzi had done fucking what?! "Now I imagine that Chairman Prescott will wanna make a huge scene out of this but let me say this for now: you have my personal gratitude young lady. Good job."

As Hoffman had spoken to Uzi her eyes had widened and hollowed out, but once he had finished she had been stunned into silence. Back during the training sessions that we had done to help forge us into a cohesive unit, Uzi had told us why she had made the railgun: to destroy the Disassembly Drones, save the colonies and finally earn herself the respect of her peers.

And now because of a lucky shot, she had the respect of what seemed to be an entire military command with a political leader almost certainly going to make a spectale out of it. I could tell that she wasn't quite sure how to feel about it. Couldn’t blame her though, the mental scars of her time on Copper-9 would probably last as long as she lived.

But right now we had a job to do. And right now that job was to ensure Alpha and Delta Squads were able to complete their mission: deploy the Sonic Resonator so Command could successfully destroy the heart of the Locust Horde and end this war. On paper it was an easy enough mission but we all knew that it would be anything but easy.

Chapter Text

The walk from the courtyard behind Tomb was somewhat tense. Baird was particularly unhappy with the fact that Marcus had been promoted to Sergeant and put in charge of the remaining COG soldiers that were with us. Due to the casualties that both squads had already suffered Hoffman had decided to merge them together and have them operate under Delta Squad's Callsign.

I looked at the people around me and quietly took a list of the forces that were currently on the mission. Sergeant Fenix, Corporals Santiago, Baird, Privates Cole and Gyules were currently the only COG soldiers still alive. Whilst their numbers were boosted by the presence of Sabre Team which was made up by myself, N, V and Uzi with J tagging along as she didn't really know what to do with herself now that Cyn was dead. There still weren't that many of us.

I sighed softly to myself as I finished counting our combined strength. Ten. Just the ten of us. With extremely limited support and a gargantuan army of giant savage beasts between us and the completion of what had become our mission.

The mission we were on was to head to the Lethia Imulsion Facility to the west and deploy the Resonator. The plan was simple yet somewhat complicated as it was hoped that the sonic device would be able to help the COG map out the Locust tunnel network. After the tunnels had been mapped out, COG High Command would then use the mapping data to accurately deploy a huge fuck-off bomb to destroy the heart of The Hollows and hopefully strike a decisive blow against the Locust Horde.

First things first though was that we had to get out of the ruined city of Ephyra. A task that was made significantly harder when Hoffman had informed us that the area was simply too hot for choppers. This meant that we would have to find an alternative solution and fast. This of course was something that nobody wanted to hear.

The urgency for this was made apparent when Baird had pointed out that it was going to get dark soon and we had to get out of the area before that. J had noticeably perked up at the mention of the coming darkness as she that meant she wouldn't be scurrying from shadow to shadow to survive until she got her upgrade package installed.

That excitement of hers for the coming night was completely dashed when it was revealed to us that with the sunset another threat would come out to play: Kryll. Extremely small flying nocturnal creatures that gathered in huge swarms and were capable of shredding and consuming a fully grown human in seconds. We didn't know if the Kryll would see her or the other Drones as food and attack them but none of us were prepared to risk it.

Speaking of risks I now needed to make sure that Uzi's wings were upgraded. Back on Copper-9 her bat wings had served her well. Minus a few mishaps during her flight training. Though V and I found it extremely funny when she managed to screw up her take off resulting in her head being stuck in a streetlight. And the less said about N using the 'Baby Bird Method' which had just been him straight up yeeting her off the top of the Corpse-Spire the better.

But now that we were up against an extremely heavily armed and aggressive opposition? The fleshy membrane of her bat wings was now going to be in situations were it was extremely vulnerable to damage and injury. This increased risk of injury was of course completely unacceptable and meant that her current wings would have to be replaced. Thankfully though Disassembly Drone wings were armoured to the point where they could easily shrug off twenty millimetre cannon fire from an Apache attack helicopter. I just hoped that I could somehow persuade her to let me swap out her purple bat wings for the Disassembly Drone sword wings..

But for now we would have to navigate the winding streets and back alleyways. Apparently Dom had some kind of plan that was better than just walking all the way to the Lethia Facility. I flicked a glance back at J who was using a section of one of the ornate doors from the Tomb as an improvised shield from the sun's rays. She was currently holding it by her side as we were in a heavily shaded section. But I could already see uncovered areas ahead. The sooner that she got her upgrade package the better.

It was as we were walking on a raised section of pavement beside a road and approaching an absolutely trashed T-junction that Control came in over the Comms. "Marcus, this is Anya. Hammer of Dawn is offline."

Marcus didn't seem too thrilled about it but he also knew that I had my Meltagun and other energy weapons in case we ran into another Beserker. But I could well understand why he wasn't pleased regardless. Losing access to a weapons system was never going to be a cause for celebrations especially when we were this deep inside enemy held territory.

We followed the path and took a right. Stumbling right into the corpse of a slain Gear his Gnasher lever action shotgun still lay beside him. I gently picked up his weapon and COG tags before gifting the weapon to Uzi. I had already handed over my Lancer to V earlier on. I didnt really need it as I still had my Bolter after all.  The purple haired Worker Drone looked it over before working the action and chambering a round. Thankfully the shotgun shells were identical to the ones that I had given her so that took care of one worry.

I flicked a quick glance at the armoured plates covering my forearm and frowned. My winter camouflage pattern worked well in the wasteland known as Copper-9 but here? Here it looked a bit too similar to Locust skin colouration. Which meant that I was likely to get shot at by jumpy survivors so that was something else that needed to be changed up.

Given that I was almost certainly going to be working closely with the COG it might not be a bad idea to adopt their colours. That way I could reduce the chances of being on the receiving end of a friendly fire incident.

Just to the right hand side of the junction was a makeshift walkway that had been built on top the wreckage and rubble below. It split off into two paths the left hand path going through some buildings whilst the one on the right continued down the road for a bit.

"Control. We're outside Tomb." Marcus spoke, updating Control on our whereabouts. Anya was pretty quick to respond to him.

"The Imulsion Facility is ten clicks ahead. But be advised, you've got enemy units moving to your location. They definitely know where you are." And no doubt spoiling for a fight seeing as how we killed their General. After some discussion we decided to split up with Delta Squad going right whilst I would take Sabre Team and go left.

V gently nudged my arm to get attention as she sighed, "You know, I never thought I would be in a position where I was worried about the coming night. I guess this is what the Worker Drones felt before we met you and Uzi."

"Yeah it probably is V. Are you okay?"

"Heh, as long I've got you by my side."

I smiled at her even as we crossed the walkway and prepared to enter the buildings ahead of us. I just hoped that whatever Dom had planned worked out because otherwise it wouldn't just be us who suffered the consequences.

Chapter Text

The first part of the ruined buildings was past some kind of wall. I had no idea what purpose it served but it was there. It had also been heavily reinforced with sheet metal, wooden planks, sandbags and several coils of razor wire. It was clear that someone was or maybe had been living nearby judging by the banner hanging from the top of the wall reading, 'COG LEAVE US BE'.

I had heard from Dom that those humans who had survived whilst being stuck outside the Jacinto Plataue during the Hammer of Dawn Counter-Offensive never really forgave the COG for the insane levels of death and destruction that had been caused by the Hammer of Dawn being used on such a large-scale.

Honestly I couldn't even say I blamed them for that hatred. Unleashing Weapons of Mass Destruction on that scale was a truly monstrous thing to do. But I also couldn't really think of any alternative solution either. I suspected however that without the widespread Hammer strikes Humanity may have ended up in an even worse situation. It was a testament to the fact that sometimes there really wasn't any good option to take and sometimes you have to take the lesser of two evils.

The wall cast the entire area behind it into shadows allowing J to temporarily at least place her door-shield on the ground. "Damn. How did you think THAT got here?" J was stood at the railing pointing further down the road. Where a full on fucking train was lodged on top of a large pile of rubble.

"No idea J, but we'd better keep moving."

J's only response was to quietly pull a face as she moved back and picked up her cover. I could tell that she was still getting used to being talked back to by N, especially since she was no longer their leader.

The path ahead was blocked by rubble so we just simply entered the building on our left instead. Only to be promptly met with a dead end but before we could leave the ground shook and the way out became blocked by even more rubble. Fanfuckingtastic. "J, N get ready to blow a hole in that wall. Uzi, V get ready to cover them and open fire on any Locust that might be on the other side."

The Drones nodded as the five of us moved into cover even as J and N each deployed a missile launcher and prepared to fire. We were prevented from doing that however when the wall exploded from the other side, showering fragments of debris in our direction.

We didn't even wait for the smoke to clear before pouring gunfire into the opening. Our own weapons fire was supplemented by Delta Squad's Lancers from a catwalk above the other side of the wall. It didn't take very long before Marcus informed us that we were now clear.

Now that we weren’t just filling the air with bullets I could now see what we had been shooting at. It was a pair of rather large Locusts and damn they were bigger than the Drones. On the floor were their weapons: an obnoxiously large drum-fed weapon that looked like some kind of launcher. That must have been what they used to blow a hole in the wall. I'm pretty sure that I overheard Baird remarking that these Locust creatures were almost as big as Cole.

It was at this point that the ground shook once more as a creature that looked like an oversized spider retreated back underground further down the hallway. Baird had been quick to point it out, referring to it as a 'Corpser'. What a charming name, I had a feeling that we'd probably (read: almost certainly) be seeing it again at some point in the future.

As I was reloading however I spotted a soft blue glow to the left of the damaged wall. To my surprise it was a pretty damn big box of loaded Lancer magazines and other assorted munitions. V was pretty quick to gather up as much as she could carry. Turns out that the box contained eleven full Lancer magazines as well as a handful of shotgun shells. The idea that we would blunder across six hundred and sixty rounds of 7.62 just laying around was just absolutely bonkers.

Didn't mean that I was going to question our luck though. I quickly grabbed the Locust weapons which my HUD informed me were called Boomshots and the freshly slain enemies were called Boomers. Honestly I thought they looked like fat ugly bastards with the way their bellies were hanging out from under their armoured vests.

I figured that even if I didn't use them myself i might be able to use them to trade with Stranded survivors for anything that we might need. If nothing else it would keep them out of Locust hands which was never a bad thing. I recovered a total of seven shots from the two Boomer corpses. Not much but it was still something.

As we reached the room where the Corpser had been I noticed that there was a smaller ammo box in the corner of the room. In fact it was right next to rather large hole the creature went down into. I idly wondered if stumbling across boxes of military grade ammunition was going to be a recurring thing. Either way I wasn't going to turn down free ammunition. I flipped the lid open to discover one hundred rounds of 7.62 just staring back at me. Sweet.

The doorway to the left of the Corpser hole lead to a small empty warehouse section. With a wall of sandbags, a chunk of support pillar and two fallen blocks of concrete from the roof cluttering up the interior.

The solitary Locust Drone that tried to attack got his head blown off damn near immediately after revealing his presence. Which was kinda pathetic to be honest. I watched as J picked up the fallen Hammerburst even as her face wrinkled in disgust at the abomination of a weapon.

As we went through the building I noted that it looked very much like it was part of an industrial or manufacturing estate. Hard to tell and not really all that relevant though. So I simply paid it no heed and simply carried on with my weapon at the ready.

We soon entered another warehouse section, this time there were shelving units. They were bare though so we could see the entire room quite clearly. As well as the pair of Bolo Frag Grenades just sitting there on the floor. Well into the inventory they go. A quick press of a button and were once again outside.

A short walk down an alleyway and as soon as we entered a slightly open space. The fucking ground one again shook and even cracked in places as what could only be that fucking Corpser tunnelled around underneath us. The dickhead.

We were then attacked by a pair of Genadier Drones, a Sniper from a second story hole and two Drones with Lancers. The Sniper was the biggest bitch to deal with to be honest as he kept trying to duck into cover.

V however swiftly dealt with him by taking flight and careening into the building before ripping the little shit apart with her chainsaw hands in a spectacular display of violence. Oh and that laugh of hers as she force-fed him his own entrails as he died....Good God I loved that woman.

The Troika turret inside was a little harder to deal with but a well thrown Plasma Grenade soon took care of that problem. And wouldn't you fucking know it inside the room with the turret was another huge ass box of ammo!

You know what? Fuck it. I wasn't even going to try and question it at this point. But I was sure as hell going to loot every single fucking crate I could find however.

I quickly gave N and Uzi each one of the Lancers that the Drones had been using. Though I noticed that they were struggling to store their magazines in anything other than their backpacks. Which was less than ideal in a combat situation.

So I now had yet another thing on the list when we found a safe place: Proper webbing for everyone to store their ammo. Oh boy what fun.

Marcus had to call the robot who was called Jack to cut open a metal door when he tried and failed to kick it open. I was also here that Dom revealed his plan: turns out he knew a guy who lived out here and owned a vehicle. Even better was the fact that there was a Stranded Camp just up ahead. Finally I would be able to pawn off the shitty Locust weapons and ammo that I had been collecting. Hell I might be able to get the Stranded to trade the Junker for it and even if not they could still use the it to help them survive a little bit longer.

One more somber note it turned out that Dom was looking for someone. I didn't know who he was looking for and we didn't have time for that conversation just yet. Maybe we would have the time when we got to the Camp. Of course that also counted on Dom actually being willing to talk about it.

After going down more narrow paths and into another room. That held yet another small ammo box. This time the box was beside another fallen Gear. No weapon but his tags lay a little bit away from him. I grabbed the tags while my teammates shared the 7.62 rounds inside.

As soon as Marcus kicked open the exit I could tell that J would have to be ready to use her door shield to shelter her again. But she could only really do that once the area has been cleared of hostiles. I could tell that being completely helpless grated on her to no end.

I just hoped that we would get to the Stranded Camp soon. I had a fair amount of work to do to help bring my teammates to full combat effectiveness. And I also had no wish to see if I could survive a Kryll swarm attacking me. Yes I had extremely protective armour, yes I had a health point pool that was over a million and yes I had an extremely effective regeneration ability but that did not mean that I was going to be reckless.

I had promised V that I wouldn't pull any reckless stunts after I had used myself as a shield to protect her from the ceiling fan that Doll catapulted at her. I was determined not break my word and I had done fairly well so far. I just had to keep it up.

Chapter Text

"Well that was fun. I kinda wish that they didn't die so easily though." V remarked with voice that was rich with gleeful sadism as she cleaned the gore from her body. Delta Squad's awkward silence was rather amusing to me. None of them really knew what to say, especially after seeing V reduce multiple Locust Drones to gory puddles that were smeared over multiple surfaces. Baird had almost thrown up when she had grabbed one and ripped the spine clean out before using it as a whip to lethal effect.

Not that I was much better as I had violently tackled another Drone and used my ungodly strength to rip his skull right out of the body then started reciting Shakespeare in front of everyone. Then promptly kicking the skull away once I was finished all whilst laughing with glee.

All N could do was just try and give reassurances to the members of Delta Squad that our wrath wouldn't be turned upon innocent civilians or Gears. It only sorta worked. Oh well, as long as none of them tried to kill us I didn't really care what they thought of us.

Regardless of what anyone thought of us it was abundantly clear that having a team of Disassembly Drones backing us up was of immense help. In the tight narrow confines of alleyways and streets having allies who could fire from positions that were usually impossible to get to was invaluable.

In a way, I was incredibly jealous of V. She was almost cat-like at times. Especially with how she hunted her prey. I was glad to have her by my side in all this. I loved how she brought an abundance of her brand of sadistically chaotic glee to every battle.

She was an exceptional artist when it came to combat. She was able to turn the frantic nature of battle into a spectaular performance. Just the way she would practically dance from foe to foe in a deadly whirlwind of slashing blades and slicing claws never failed to take my breath away. She was sleek, sexy, graceful, dropdead gorgeous and she bloody well knew it. I couldn't help but think of her as an Angel of Death. And I loved her all the more for it.

I heard J growl something under her breath as we crossed a bridge that had been held by a force of Locust Drones. Nothing our teams couldn't handle though. The Corpser had been pissing me off more and more as the bastard had kept tunneling around under us.

We really needed to find that Stranded Camp. Hopefully they'd have a Workbench I could use to build a Robot Workbench that I could use to give J her upgrade package. Though since the Stranded were basically living under siege conditions I could almost certainly do something to help boost their defences and maybe even general living standards.

I idly wondered if the Stranded had called their camp anything in particular or if they had just used the previous name of wherever it had been built. Ah well I'd find out soon enough. I just hoped that they were friendly enough to give us the Junker.

Chapter Text

Within the first two minutes of being in the Stranded Camp amongst the things I learned was that the place was called New Ephyra, the people here were living in complete squalor, they were lead by a man called Franklin, that he was helping Dom look for a woman (wife, sibling or other relative perhaps?) and that these people abhorred the COG. So we were already off to a wonderful start.

This wasn't helped in the slightest by Baird's attitude towards them. Good lord he just kept looking down at them and his snide remarks was really getting on everyone's nerves. I had been about to say something when Gyules suddenly punched him right in the face hard enough to send him crashing to the ground. "Okay Baird! That's enough of your bullshit! If you haven't got anything nice to say, then just fucking shut the fuck up!"

Baird seemed shocked and outraged that the Private had struck him so violently, "What the fuck Gyules?!"

Gyules ripped off his helmet exposing his short black hair and piercing blue eyes as he snarled at the Corporal, "I was a Stranded just like these people until I took the Lifeboat assistance. Wanna know why I took it dickhead?" Baird looked like he was going to try and answer before the Private cut him off, "I took it to try and ensure that my sister and my son actually have a fucking roof over their heads and a chance at getting a tomorrow you elitist prick!"

The enraged Private stormed off towards some guys who were sharing bottles of beer. The men looked at him sympathetically before handing over an unopened bottle. The young soldier thanked them before sharing drinks and stories with them. From what I managed to overhear they used to be neighbours back before the war began and everything started to fall apart. Small world.

I looked at Baird as he slowly picked himself up off the floor. Gobby little prick had that coming. It was one thing to be bitter and jaded, but it was another thing to just keep lashing out at people and never expect them to eventually retaliate.

The COG had this program that they called: Operation Lifeboat. In return for a Stranded family being permitted into Jacinto any and all males of fighting age were to be enlisted into the armed forces for at least one tour of duty. I wasn't sure what everyone else did but I was willing to be that they were probably put to work in helping to keep the War Effort running smoothly.

An incredibly harsh but sadly necessary measure given the dire circumstances that Humanity had found itself in. In a war of extermination all the normal rules fly out the window. I just wondered what other options the COG had been forced to take to try and prevent Humanity's extinction.

I shook my head as the nine of us reached Franklin. He was sitting down on an old sofa whilst being flanked by a pair of what must have been either bodyguards or enforcers. He had warmly greeted Dom but said that being seen with COG soldiers was bad for his reputation and business. Which I could perfectly understand given the absolutely abyssmal reputation that the COG had earned with folk around here.

He had been somewhat taken aback when Dom asked for the Junker. Unsurprisingly Franklin had initially shot it down as an extremely one-sided transaction. Thankfully he softened his position when I immediately offered all the Locust weapons and assorted munitions that I had scavenged along the way.

Everyone who happened to be nearby pretty much choked on their own saliva when I brought the full haul: twelve Boomshot Launchers, thirty five Boomshot rounds, thirty seven Hammerbursts and almost five thousand rounds of the accompanying ammunition.

I got the feeling that Delta Squad's members had pretty much just given up trying to question it. Which I could honestly say was a good idea considering that when I tried to figure it out, all I got in reward for my efforts was a raging headache. So in the end I just ran with Bethesda's age old saying "it just works".

Still it was a pretty good deal we managed to work out with Franklin. In return for the Junker I would hand over all the Locust gear I'd salvaged, assist in upgrading the living standards of the settlement whilst everyone except J and I would pull some interior patrols until Marcus, Dom, N and Baird returned with said Junker.

Still, it was a good thing that some of the features of the Cheat Terminal Holotape were still functional. The sections where it dropped items like scrap, lockpicks, food, chems, weapons and ammo straight into my inventory was particularly vital for enduring arduously long campaigns.

This was especially relevant since New Ephyra had a Workbench in it. I smiled behind my Kerberos Helmet as my view changed into Settlement Building Mode, oh yeah time to give this place and J some serious upgrades. The fact that my borderline deranged evil laughter caused the Stranded around me to quickly back off and J to look somewhat terrified was just a massive bonus.

Chapter Text

If I was going to be completely honest, I had absolutely no idea how long it took between Marcus's group leaving the camp to go get the Junker from Chaps Gas Station and the night finally falling on the city.

In that time however I had set up several nice new beds for everyone, a Robot Workbench, several different Workbenches, a mess of mounted searchlights to help in case of attack during the night and finally an assload of turrets.

Though since the Locust had naturally high physical damage resistance and wore fairly decent armour on top of their hard skin rendered 5.56 caliber turrets were pretty much useless against anything except Wretches. This meant that I needed a solution to this problem. Thankfully I already had a solution: Missile Launcher Turrets.

I have no idea how many Missile Turrets I set up but I'm pretty sure that I put up more than enough to stop a full on tank assault. It got to the point where J had to actually remind me that she needed her upgrade package sooner rather than later. Which was kind of embarrassing to be honest.

Franklin came by in a hurry just as I finished upgrading J's systems and armour to bring her up to the same level as the other two Disassembly Drones as well as giving Uzi a pair of Disassembly Drone wings. It had taken quite a while to convince her but I managed it in the end. Though I wasn't all that surprised when she'd told me that I was to try and paint her new wings the same shade of purple as her hair.

"Yoh, Soliel. Hey man I need you to check the lights with Johnson. The Kryll are out in force and they've killed the guys at Checkpoint One. That means they're coming this way yoh."

I offered him my sincere condolences for the slain even as I swapped out my Kerberos helmet fir the Leadbelcher and checked the magazine for my Bolter. I had already changed the colours of my armour to better fit in with COG forces and reduce the chances of friendly fire. The undersuit had been changed from grey to a sandy beige with the connection points being dark brown. The armour panels themselves were now a deep blue like the Gears just without the cogs and omen symbols. J tagged along to provide additional firepower in case of any Emergence Holes.

She looked rather different now that I'd given her a change of clothes from her short black office dress, yellow undershirt and black tie to a set of black Enclave combat fatigues and Medium Combat Armour Torso.

The fatigues were reinforced with Tier Five Ballistic Weave of course which meant it was incredibly protective given that one of the various mods I had active altered the stats of Tier Five to significantly increased values to one thousand in each of the damage stats.

The female Disassembly Drone looked down at herself even as she absent mindedly tugged on the webbing belt that I had altered to fit Lancer Magazines. When the others came back I would do the same for them as well. I guess she was probably still getting used to the idea of being in a team and not being Team Leader.

I had initially thought about mass deploying suits of Power Armour but quickly realised that I would have train people here from the ground up on how to use and maintain the damn things. Which would quite frankly take far more time than we had. The Lightmass Offensive was time critical and couldn't be stopped just to train up a single mechanised infantry unit and even the relatively basic T-45 series required a level of technical knowledge that these people just didn't have.

Training aside I had learned that the people of Sera (turns out that was the name of this planet) had never developed nuclear power or done anything with it as far as I knew. Instead of nuclear energy practically their entire economy ran on this super-fuel called Imulsion. So as awesome as the idea was, reality dictated what could and couldn't happen.

Johnson, J and I began running around checking the lights and making sure that they were fully functional. Thankfully there weren't any significant gaps and the few (thankfully small) gaps that did exist were quickly dealt with by building additional spotlights. If I ever got the time I'd build a massive spotlight on top of a small tower in the middle of New Ephyra to help keep the Kryll at bay.

Turns out the little buggers literally burst into flames when exposed to UV light. Which was why they were only ever a problem on the surface after nightfall. Of course my monster spotlight wouldn't be one of those standard 200 watt bulbs but rather one of those movie studio floodlights. Specifically the kind that basically turned night into day. Once I got New Ephyra outfitted with a series of these retina searing lights the Kryll would have to clear out of a nice little section of the former capital city. Carnivorous little bastards had it coming.

We were just finishing with the lights when my radio came to life, "Sabre Leader, this is Control. Sensors show incoming Locust forces gathering near your location. It looks like they're massing for an assault on your location, over." Ah shit that's not going fun for the people here those Locust bastards were trying to avenge RAAM. This was going to get very messy, very quickly.

"Copy Control. Thanks for the heads up. We'll take up defensive positions. Sabre One out."

"Good luck Sabre. Control out." With that said the radio went silent. I didn't need to look at either of my companions to know that Johnson had already run off to warn the main camp whilst J was already working the radio contacting everyone she could and warning them of the impending attack. She was extremely efficient if nothing else, which I suppose was good enough.

I think it took me about five minutes to get back to the main hub of New Ephyra. J was already there as she had used her wings to cover the distance in seconds and was already helping organise the defenders along with helping to hand out weapons.

I could tell from a glance that this wasn't the first attack these people had faced. The way they moved to set up troikas, supply points and triage centres showed that they weren't rookies at this.

I suppose in a way it was just like the Commonwealth, there really weren't many civilians that didn't have some level of combat experience. Chances were that they were already in havens like Jacinto and were high society elites. Snobby bastards always managed to find someway of keeping themselves as safe as possible and keep up the illusion of the status quo even as the world burned down around them.

It was about ten minutes after I got to the main hub that the ground started to shake and loud snarling warcries filled the air. The Locust assault had come and the battle of New Ephyra began.

Chapter Text

The battle began in what was typical Locust fashion: emerge from underground, attempt to swarm the defenders and kill them in close combat. They clearly had never had to deal with an extensive defensive network of automated gun turrets though. This lack of experience became quite apparent as to how they reacted when the E-Holes opened up and were swifty blasted by a barrage of explosive missile fire which sent debris and mangled body parts airborne.

It didn't take very long for the Locust to essentially map out the extent of the turret network by all the failed and blown up Emergence-Holes. The air fell silent as they attacking Locust forces regrouped just beyond the range of the Missile Turrets. An uncomfortable silence fell upon the battlefield as we all wondered what the Locust were planning.

The quiet didn't last long as the ground shook again. This time the ground began to shake with extreme violence as anything that wasn't securely fastened fell down. Honestly I was impressed that Cole was able to keep his balance and remain on his feet given that he had that Resonator secured onto his back.

"Woah, feels like the grubs are sending up their big toys now." I didn't have time to ask him what he meant by that when a massive Corpser erupted from a building nearby. The monstrosity was met with a concentrated onslaught as the every single turret in range opened fire. The air was soon filled with explosive missile fire.

The Corpser's armoured hide kept it mostly safe from the barrage. I say mostly because fleshy chunks were eventually blown off it's legs causing the monstrous creature to scream in pain before a well placed shot from my own BFG9000 sailed right into its mouth. The unstable Plasma blast blew apart the back of the head of the spider-like abomination in a violent explosion.

A cheer went up from the defenders as it crashed to the ground even as Kryll filled the night sky around the camp with their number and shrill cries as they searched for anything in the darkness to sate their ravenous hunger. Thankfully the light from the spotlights and various fires were bright enough to keep them at bay. For now at least. I just hoped that it would stay that way.

Things quickly got hairy though when a familiar screeching roar echoed through the night. "Oh fuck! BESERKERS!" Gyules was pretty quick to identify and warn everyone of the incoming high-level threats that came barrelling through a stone wall near the slain Corpser.

My head snapped to the two enraged female Locusts as I pulled out my Meltagun and took aim and fired at the first. It fell to the ground with a crash as my meltablast took off its left leg at the knee. The second Beserker ran headlong into a deadly barrage of missile fire which managed to overwhelm its incredibly dense hide and kill it before it reached the outer wall.

With the first rendered an immobile cripple it was easy to dispatch with a second meltablast aimed at the face. Now that both Beserkers were dead I could switch back to my Bolter and I joined in with my fellow defenders in pouring on the fire at what must have been an entire battalion. It was clear to me that this was why they were called 'Locust'. There just didn't seem to be any end to the bastards.

I could tell that V, J and Uzi wanted to take to the air to rain death upon the battlefield but the presence of the Kryll swarms meant that wasn't an option. The few members of Delta Squad that were with us kept up the steady stream of reports to Control about the steadily deteriorating situation as the Stranded and defensive turrets started to succumb to the enemy attacks despite our best efforts.

If this kept up we might end up have to blindfire the Hammer of Dawn on a danger-close fire mission. It didn't really matter if I survived if the Resonator was destroyed. No Resonator meant no targeting data and no targeting data meant the Lightmass Offensive would be doomed to fail.

This soon went from bad to worse as the ground started shaking once more with deep, loud bellowing roars coming out from the rubble as three massive creatures each bearing massive chain guns on each wrist and a massive backmounted cannon burst out of nearby buildings firing all kind of munitions wildly. I don't know who said it but I heard someone identity them as 'Brumaks'.

I quickly activated my radio as Nemacyst started to come raining down on our position taking out more defenses and killing more defenders. "Control! This Sabre One! We've got the whole fucking Locust army coming down on us!" I was tackled from my position by V as a Nemacyst mortar slammed down where I had just been seconds previously. "Drop the fucking Hammer! Drop it now! Danger Close! I repeat: Danger fucking Close!"

"This is Control. Marcus and the others are on their way back and the Hammer..."

"Dammit, Control we are being overrun here! Give them a heads up and tell them to move it! I want that Hammer and I want it now, over!" I barked into the radio cutting off the Control operator. I would have to apologise to them later after everything had calmed down.

I glanced back, damn near all the Stranded that lived here were either dead or dying. The three Brumaks were steadily advancing whilst pouring on the weapons fire not even stopping when Uzi used her Solver to vaporise one from the waist up with a miniature blackhole.

The radio came to life once more, but it wasn't Control. It was Command.

"Sabre One, this is Colonel Hoffman, Hammer of Dawn is still off-line but we have a single Lightmass Missile available. Get your heads down it'll be there in fifteen minutes at maximum yield. Godspeed son, Command out."

Oh great, we're basically going to have the equivalent of a nuke dropped near us. Fanfuckingtastic now to let everyone know. "Marcus this is Soliel. We're under an unbelievably heavy Locust assault and are being overrun. Hoffman has deployed a Lightmass Missile at maximum yield to break the siege. It'll be here in t-minus fifteen minutes, over."

"Soliel, this is Baird. Did you just say that Hoffman sent a fucking Lightmass Missile?! At max yield?!" He sounded panicked and scared. Good to know that he knew the stakes involved in this.

"Affirmative Corporal. This is gonna be nasty."

"Yeah no shit! We'll be there in about five minutes!"

"Be aware we have multiples of damn near everything from Corpsers to Brumaks coming at us. Watch your back, Sabre One out."

"Copy that, Baird out." The radio went silent even as we fell back deeper inside New Ephyra as the Locust closed in around us even as I fired shot after shot from my BFG9000 at the incoming swarm each shot taking out multiple Drones in spectacular explosions of super-heated Plasma.

I just hoped that Marcus and the others could get back here so we could escape on the Junker before the missile hit. The Lightmass Missile was on its way so it was a race against time. And time was not on our side.

Chapter Text

It took Marcus six minutes to arrive with the Junker. By that time the only people left alive in New Ephyra was myself, V, J, Uzi, Gyules and Cole. Everyone else had been killed in the furious assault. Franklin had been the last to die, with a weapon in hand and a curse on his lips. It was a damn shame that he hadn't made it.

By now the countdown to Lightmass Missile impact was nine minutes. I knew that we could all see the Junker just a relatively short distance away but to get to it we had to cross No-Mans-Land, get through the attacking force, board the Junker and get to minimum Safe Distance. So we were going to be cutting this very fucking close.

Since we were the only survivors the five of us barrelled up and over the wall as it finally collapsed from the enemy onslaught. From there we just shot, punched or just outright shoved any Drones in our way as we raced to the Junker. The members who went with Marcus to get the vehicle helped him provide us with covering fire. To my surprise they were able to bring down a Brumak with small arms by destroying its arm guns and causing the ammunition in them to cook-off and explode killing it.

I swore as I ducked under the wild swing of a Drone trying to take my damn head off. I didn't even stop running as I fired my shotgun Bolter from the hip before changing to my Meltagun when Diplomacy's box magazine ran dry.

The Meltagun's high energy blasts cleared the path ahead of us as we finally made it to the Junker even as Colonel Hoffman announced that the Lightmass Missile had been launched and was on its way. So that meant that we had better hurry the fuck up.

"Come on, come on, come on!" Baird shouted at us as we piled into the Junker. I was last as I was forced back at the last minute by a volley of rockets from the last Brumak. I pivoted on my foot and blindly fired a bunch of BFG9000 shots in its general direction. Luckily enough I managed to hit and kill it with a shot that connected straight into its main cannon. The resulting explosion sending debris and shrapnel in a wide radius giving us precious seconds to rev the engine back up and just blast down the old highway at top speed.

I honestly don't think we would have made it out of the blast zone safely if the Drones from Sabre Team didn't deploy their wings and practically turn the Junker into a rocket powered piece of mechanical shit instead of just regular mechanical piece of shit.

It took all of Dom's driving skills combined with flying abilities of the four Drones to launch us as far away from the blast as humanly possible. As we were careening down the desolate highway being shot at the entire time, I heard an old man in the vehicle screaming in absolute terror the whole time. Huh, guess Chap's Station had been destroyed as well. I couldn't really think of any other reason as to why he would be here.

I don't know how far we had been able to put between us and the Locust army but we somehow managed it. Just in time too as the radio went on, "Here it comes people hang on to your teeth!"

There on the horizon was the Lightmass Missile. It arced high into the sky as dozens of smaller missiles broke off from the main body and raced ahead in a spiral pattern. If they had gotten the targeting right it would be impacting straight down a massive Emergence-Hole that a pair of Corpsers had dug out to unleash a tidal wave of Drones and Wretches earlier on in the battle.

The Lightmass Missile hit home and for a brief moment. Night became day as everything shook itself to pieces, was disintegrated by the warhead or completely blown away by the blast wave. I have nobdoubt that if I hadn't been clinging on to the Junker for dear life then I would have found the sight to be as terrifying as it was awe inspiring.

The beaten up Junker was tossed around as the highway buckled and broke into a million pieces underneath the hurricane force winds that the blast wave produced. All I could do was cling on for dear life as my teammates desperately propelled us as fast possible, speeding us down the rapidly collapsing highway as the city centre was being destroyed behind us.

After an unknowable length of time we finally escaped the wave of death and destruction as we finally left Ephyra behind as an enormous mushroom cloud bloomed over the ruins behind us.

The battle was over. We had escaped with both our lives and the Resonator was still (somehow) intact. But it came at great cost: the Stranded Camp of New Ephyra was completely destroyed and its entire population had been slain except for the old man who was sitting quietly crying in the Junker. Yes we had destroyed an entire Drone army but it still didn't feel like anything close to a victory. Only the unpleasant taste of a bitter and crushing defeat.

Chapter Text

The drive out of what was left of the city was quiet as the grave. Nobody really felt like talking even Cole who was usually rather upbeat was looking sullen. Gyules just sat in his chair wordlessly staring into the lenses of his helmet.

None of looked back at the sight behind us. Nobody wanted to see it or even talk about it. To look back would mean we would have to acknowledge the utter disaster that we had left behind.

The mood was heavy, the silence felt stifling and oppressive. The rainfall seemed deafening as we all tried to process the terrible massacre that we had barely escaped from. I gently placed a comforting hand on the shoulder of the old man from Chap's Station. He jolted in surprise as he looked at me seemingly lost in a daze.

He looked at me for a few seconds before turning his head to look at the Boltok revolver that he held. He shook his head as if trying to clear it of whatever thoughts he had. I couldn't say I blamed him for feeling lost. In the space of only a few hours his whole life had once again been destroyed in the fires of war. Hopefully he would be able to get into Jacinto to try and rebuild his life all over again. It wasn't much of a comfort but it was really all I could do in the current situation.

The road soon changed from regular tarmac to bumpy woodland track. Thankfully the suspension had managed to mostly survive the hellish flight from the blast. Our speed had dropped somewhat due to the four Disassembly Drones now being inside the vehicle to give their systems a chance to properly cool down.

It was really cramped with the eleven of us now inside the Junker but we somehow managed it. V had taken the opportunity to sit directly in my lap like the cat-like being that she was. I wasn't the only one with someone on their lap as N was cradling Uzi with a somewhat muted version of his trademark smile. He was a good man and the loss of so much innocent life was clearly getting to him. But at least he had Uzi and the rest of us to provide some level of emotional support.

Hell we all needed each other at this point. I flicked a glance to J as she stood in silence, her face marred by a scowl as she was doubtlessly stewing in her own thoughts regarding our failure to defend the New Ephyra Stranded Camp. One of the few good things to come out of that disaster was that we had managed to pick up enough Lancers to arm everyone in Sabre Team with one and give them a dozen full magazines each.

Our musings were cut short when something in the Junker's engine caught fire and exploded forcing us to stop dead. As soon as the vehicle ground to a halt the front ramp was dropped allowing all members of both Delta Squad and Sabre Team to disembark leaving the old man behind to keep an eye on the Junker in case we were able to find the parts to fix it. The ground was soaked and the mud squelched beneath our steps.

Great, the vehicle was fucked and that meant we now we had to fucking walk to the facility. In the pouring rain. At night. Yaaaay.

At least we hadn't been harassed by the Locust since we fled the city. I guess that they must have thought we died in the Lightmass Missile strike, or they were still trying to regroup from the devastation wrought from said WMD seeing as how Command had somehow managed to land it inside a large opening that went straight into part of the Hollows.

"Control, this is Delta Squad. Our vehicle is DOA and we're now on foot. Please advise." Fenix dutifully informed Control of our current situation.

"Copy that Delta. The Pumping Station lift is offline." Oh how predictable the easy route was a no go. "So you need to enter the mines through the factory. Continue down this road." Well at least the damn thing should be close by.

I turned back to elderly man still hiding from the elements inside the Junker. "Okay, sir. We're going to be gone for a while. We'll try and make this quick but until then try and stay out of sight. If you need to, then go find a security station by the entrance and stay put. We'll be back for you. I promise."

The only response I got back was a wordless grumble. Poor guy, I really felt for him. I just hoped we could do right by him from now on. I turned my back on the vehicle and began to catch up with the others.

I don't think there are any words in the English language that could properly convey how far my heart dropped when I heard the old man's gun go off.

Chapter Text

The instant I heard that gunshot I was running back to the Junker hoping like hell that it wasn't what I thought it might be. My worst fears were proven to be correct however as it was instantly apparent that the man had killed himself. I guess he just couldn't take it anymore and just gave up.

I felt numb as I gently collected his Boltok and the rounds of ammunition that he had on him. I barely even registered that the ammo was .45-70. He looked so peaceful now. If it wasn't for the damage to his head or the blood and brain matter splattered over the inside of the Junker I may have just thought he had fallen asleep.

I picked up his corpse as gently as I could and began to remove it from the Junker. His body couldn't remain in the vehicle but I couldn't just leave it out in the open for animals or Wretches to feast upon. He felt so light yet so heavy at the same time. I laid him down on the dirt road before incenerating his remains with a meltablast. In the rainfall underneath the tree canopy the discharge of my Meltagun seemed deafening and blinding.

Another person I'd failed to save and the only the thing he got for a grave marker was the small section of ground that I had turned to glass. If there was an afterlife I hoped he found peace at last. I silently trudged back along the path to security checkpoint where everyone was waiting for me. My thoughts spiralling in self-doubt, guilt, shame and 'what-ifs'.

"He's gone isn't he." Gyules may worded it like a question but his tone and body language made it a statement instead. We all knew what had happened, but none of really wanted to acknowledge it. I nodded wordlessly even as V gripped my hand and gave it a soft squeeze. I was glad that none of us were alone in this. I don't know what I'd do if I were alone.

As we passed the checkpoint the unmistakable sound of a Wretch could be heard. Great, there goes the peace and quiet. Hopefully they didn't realise who we were until it was too late to do anything about it. But by this point I knew better than to hope. It only led to disappointment and misery.

It was just after that we passed an articulated lorry that to my surprise still had its lights on. That meant that either his place hadn't been abandoned for long or the lorry's battery was extremely long lasting. Given how the facility still had its flare running I was going to hazard a guess that it was the former.

Just beyond the lorry was a massive pipe that ran out to the ocean. I followed the pipe until I saw a rig just offshore. That must be where the Imulsion was coming from in addition to whatever was being extracted from the mines.

As we got closer to the pipe a pair of Wretches were seen running along it heading to the factory. What made these Wretches unusual however was the fact that they were glowing a golden light from what looked like cracks in their skin.

Marcus was quick to call it in to Control who responded saying that they'd had reports of Lambent Wretches before. Apparently they were likely caused due to direct Imulsion exposure and that they were extremely volatile. Great, bombs on legs.

We continued until we found what I could only guess was the main entrance. Marcus and Dom attempted to force the door open by first using their chainsaw bayonets and then kicking it. Apparently it was too thick for Jack to cut open. Huh, I guess the the little guy did have a limit as to what he could do.

"What about my Meltagun? I could blast the doors open." I hefted the powerful energy weapon and took aim at the solid metal doors that were currently blocking our way in.

Baird was really quick to push the barrel of my Meltagun down so it was pointing at the ground instead. "Woah, real bad idea man. You'd be more likely to start a chain reaction and blow this entire place sky high."

"Ah, good point, Corporal, my apologies." I remarked to the man as I switched out for my Bolter instead. "I'm not used to having to fight through active refineries or factories." And it was true as well because damn near every site that had been capable of heavy industrial work had stopped working long ago. Either due to the site suffering serious damage from when the bombs fell or from two hundred and ten years of not receiving any kind of repair/maintenance work.

After a bit more back and forth it was agreed that we'd split up into two teams and would radio the other when they managed to get inside. One would go left whilst the other would go right. The team going left consisted of Cole, Baird, Gyules, Uzi and N. Whilst the team that going right was made up of Marcus, Dom, V, J and myself.

The path was just more of the same really, except this one had a pair of white vans. One of which was tipped onto its side but other than that was remarkably intact.

Just as we neared the second van a Lambent Wretch scurried out of small security station, up some pipes and into the factory. Those Wretches definitely knew we were here now and no doubt preparing an ambush further ahead.

When we got to the security station we found a Lancer just outside the door. I poked my head inside and was completely unsurprised to see a massive ammo box tucked away inside the station.

I turned around and....okay this was really getting dumb. Just in front of the second van was another Lancer as well as an ammo crate. How the hell had nobody picked all this up yet? Good lord if...when we got to base I'd probably have enough COG weapons and ammo to arm an entire company.

Just beyond the station we made a left turn that opened up into what looked like a loading bay area. My thoughts were interrupted by a piercing shriek from a Wretch calling its brethren to it.

And good lord did they respond to the call. There must have been at least a dozen of the glowing bastards. They should have brought a lot more. With a few barked commands from Marcus the five of us fell back to the entrance to the turn off. It was there that we drew our shotguns and formed into a firing line.

Calling it a battle would be wildly incorrect. A battle implies that there was a chance for the opposition to actually win. This was simply slaughter and it felt good to be on the other side of it after New Ephyra.

As each Wretch was killed it would then violently explode a few seconds later. The blast wasn't big but it was still a hazard to us if we were too close.

As soon as the last Wretch was slain the five of us began to advance once more. I didn't even think twice when I found a third ammo crate behind a white van.

The loading bay led to a metal walkway that was just big enough to fit two people at a time. It was just as we stepped foot onto the gantry that a pair of Wretches tried to attack us. It kinda went without saying they were killed pretty quickly and we just moved on.

The gantry ahead was wrecked but even if it wasn't it was heading out to sea so we would have had to take a left regardless. It was not long afterwards that we managed to find and power up an external lift that took us up into some kind of station.

The station had a gaping hole in the wall and interestingly enough a crudely made bridge made from sheet metal and planks of wood. The improvised bridge connected the station tower to a slanted roof. The roof led to a walkway with a smashed in window that also used to have some kind of reinforcement netting. Looks like we had found our way in. Now to find the cart control room.

Chapter Text

The good thing about the fact that we were now inside the factory was the fact we were now sheltered from the rain outside. I mean I couldn't feel it due to my armour but that still didn't mean that I liked being out in a storm. Turns out that Team Two had beaten us getting inside by approximately two minutes if Baird was to be believed. Jokes on them, they were currently in a shitty dump of a basement.

Marcus stated that there wasn't any point wasting time trying to meet up. The cart control room would be our rally point. If we met up sooner, then great. If not, oh well doesn't matter. But he did order Baird to try and find a way to get the lights backs on. Which was good as I wasn't really a fan of fighting in the dark.

The room that we had breached into was quiet. And led to a hallway that branched off into two different directions. Marcus, Dom and J went right with V and I going left. We walked down the dimly lit hallway, as we passed a cracked open doorway I thought I heard....something.

I nodded to V who raised her rifle as I bent low and pushed the door open to reveal a bathroom. I caught a glimpse of Lambent Wretch scurrying up the wall away from...from...oh god. It was a human corpse and it looked like Wretch had been eating him. There were bloody Wretch footprints all over the walls.

I felt bile rise in my throat as I realised that there was a good chance he had been eaten alive. A familiar soft blue glow brought my attention to a small ammo box just by his feet. It made me think that he had been bringing it deeper inside. Maybe there were other survivors somewhere in the factory. If there were then we had to ensure they were extracted safely.

As we exited the bathroom we could already see the door at the end of the hallway. There was a button just beside it but when I pressed it the damn thing sparked and turned red. Oh great it was locked and the door was too thick to cut open.

Thankfully though we didn't need to cut it as V quickly slammed her tail into the locking mechanism and melted it with her Nanite-Acid. With the lock now completely destroyed we were able to pry the doors open with ease.

Going through the door we found the others waiting for us. J looked at us curiously before V shrugged and mentioned that she just had to do some lockpicking. J just smirked at us before revealing that their door had worked just fine. Lucky fuckers.

The next doorway we came to led to an open air section that was extremely narrow to the point where we had go single file. I hated that fact but there was nothing we could do about it. As we moved down the narrow route to a closed door with a white number 02 above it we made sure to keep a bit of a distance between us. This kind of area was a deathtrap if anyone decided to launch an explosive at us from above.

Marcus was the first person to reach the door and kicked it open. It was at this point that Baird was able to get the lights back on. I kinda wish he hadn't though it was a massacre inside. There were dead humans scattered all over the room and blood coating damn near every surface.

Again the corpses had been chewed on by Wretches. There were huge bites taken out of all them, some had their guts hanging out whilst others had been torn to shreds. It was as brutal as it was disturbing.

We filed inside the room and cautiously spread out. I went left and found a pair of corpses and of which was splattered all over a computer monitor. There on the floor was a COG standard issue Snub Pistol. I scooped it up and noticed that the magazine was fully loaded. According to the stats in my inventory it was chambered in 12.7mm Pistol. Which was good as I now had something to use the leftover ammo from my Sig Sauer.

I also noticed that the door ahead of me was probably unlocked given as the button beside it was glowing green. Before I could press it I heard J tell Dom and Marcus to move aside before hearing the tell-tale sound of Nanite-Acid being used on a door lock. They must have found the door that headed deeper inside the factory.

"Hold on guys." I called out, "I'm gonna check this room first just in case." I thumped the door button and walked in casually. Turns out there was a survivor in there. It also turned out that he was jumpy as all hell cause he popped up from behind a sofa and fired a Gnasher shotgun at in a blind panic.

Thankfully he missed me completely, as he instead managed to get wall beside me. I looked at him as he realised that he'd almost shot a human instead of a Locust. V was by my side almost instantly with her Lancer raised before I gently pushed the barrel down.

"Good instincts there mate." I leaned against the doorframe chuckling softly. "Maybe just work on your aim and target identification next time eh?" My jest drew an embarrassed laugh and a weary smile from the man.

"Finally, a rescue team." Looks like he finally managed to get his voice back. The man's clothes were filthy, he must have been hiding in what looked like the staff breakroom for at least a good few days.

"Are you okay? You're not injured are you?" If we managed to get him back to base I was  going to insist that he get a full checkup as well a shower, a change of clothes and a decent meal.

He smiled weakly before replying that he'd had better days. Couldn't really say that I was all that surprised to be honest. He knelt down behind the sofa before picking up a duffel bag. "I'm ready to go." Ah now to let him down gently.

I saw Marcus, Dom and J come up before I gestured for them to stand back that I would handle this guy myself. My Eaglestrike Armour looked nothing like the equipment that the COG issued to its soldiers so I'd probably have a better luck getting information than they would.

"I'm sorry sir, but we're here on a combat deployment. We're looking for the cart control room. Can you help us find it?"

He seemed rather confused and somewhat dismayed as he replied, "Well, uh you have to get down to the factory floor. Through that door. But it's locked." He gestured in the direction of the door that J had forced open with a combination of brute fore and Nanite-Acid.

"You're wrong about that one sir. We managed to bypass the lock altogether."

He looked rather surprised by that statement. He looked even more confused when he finally saw V standing beside me. "Wait, aren't we leaving?"

"Sorry but no. We've got an absolutely batshit mission to complete first. But I promise that I'll do everything in my power to get you to safety."

"Oh, I see." I wasn't surprised to hear his voice being filled with disappointment. Marcus informed Team Two that we were still proceeding as planned but that we now had a survivor with us. Baird came back over the radio asking if he'd seen any 'geobots' whatever the hell those things were. Apparently he needed one for the Junker.

Though Marcus was rather quick to remind him that they needed to focus on finding the cart control room. Which I felt was a bit rude but whatever. It was his squad to command not mine and he could speak to them in whatever manner that he saw fit.

As we walked through the doorway I looked at the Stranded and spoke once more to him, "So what's your name? I'm Ciel Soliel. I'm glad I found you."

"James. My name's James Davies."

"Well James, looks like you're tagging with us until we get to the cart control room. After that I'll have one of my teammates escort you back here until its time to leave."

"Why? Where are you guys going?"

"Underground." Mission information was on a strict need-to-know basis. It was nothing personal it was just routine OP-SEC.

"Are you guys fucking nuts?!"

"Heh, probably."

While James and I were having our conversation Marcus had contacted Team Two to let them know that there were Wretches in ventilation system. After a bit of back and forth it turned out that Team Two's path had led them right into the sewer system of all places. I didn't envy them in the slightest.

We actually crossed paths with them when we entered another room this time with a grated floor that was right above the sewage system...for some god forsaken reason. With some carefully applied Nanite-Acid and laser cutters we eventually managed to remove a section of the floor to allow Team Two to get out of the sewers and regroup with us.

It was a bit of a tight fit with eleven people inside and a section of floor missing but we managed it somehow. Now that we were back together again we could fully focus on getting to the cart control room further ahead.

Chapter Text

The walkways beyond the room where we had regrouped were uncomfortably narrow. Only being just wide enough for a single person to go through at a time with any room to manoeuvre. I stayed with my teammates and ensured that James was kept in the middle of the formation to keep him as safe as possible in case of Locust attack.

The path was simple yet annoying with it being a bunch of turns and not much elbow room. I could tell that James was unhappy about the fact that our work meant that his rescue was being delayed. Thankfully though he wasn't kicking up a fuss, probably because he was absolutely stunned and horrified by the fact that our mission was taking us underground. Not merely into enemy territory but straight into the belly of the beast itself.

Thankfully we weren't bothered by anything except for a single Wretch that tried to jump us from a side room. J took care of it by throwing it against the far wall with enough force for it explode on impact.

After the walkways we ended up going down a flight of stairs that opened up into a wide open room with four sets of some kind of large yellow machinery. The floorboards looked rickety as hell and ready to collapse if a gnat so much as farted on it. And to make things even better, we could hear a large number of Wretches scurrying around underneath as well.

Thankfully though we had the ability to bypass the entire problem. The five Drones that were with us were all capable of flight and carrying fairly hefty loads. Dom, Cole, Marcus and Baird went first to secure a foothold on the other side. After that Gyules, James and I went next.

As soon as the last of us were safely across the Wretch infested room we were immediately met with another corridor. As we proceeded down the corridor we found two small ammo boxes, a pair of grenades and a torn up dead body. How lovely.

At the end of the narrow hallway was a set of double doors that slid open when the button was pressed. The room beyond was just big enough to fit us all in.

Another set of double doors lay at the far end. This set had some writing stamped above it: Loading Bay. Good to know we were on the right track then. I would really rather avoid getting lost, especially since we had to get the Resonator planted and be out before the Kryll came back at dawn.

The Loading Bay was mostly quiet save for the carts rumbling down the tracks ahead of us. Amongst the few carts that were in the room with us couple of them were filled with this bubbling golden liquid. I could only assume that this was that super-fuel Imulsion.

I peered at it over the lip of the cart. I don't know why but something about this Imulsion stuff creeped me out. Like all of my instincts were trying to tell me that this stuff was not only not what it seemed but that it was also an active threat.

I shoved the thought away it was probably just because the Imulsion was the same colour as the Lambent Wretches blood. How could a fuel source possibly be an active threat to me or my teammates? The idea was ridiculous. In the years that followed I would look back at those thoughts as a chilling foresight of the calamity that we had been blissfully unaware of.

We had gotten about halfway through the Loading Bay when the Wretches made their return once more. The summoning cry shattered nearly half the bulbs in the room plunging it into darkness and reducing our visibility significantly.

We closed ranks in response to the enemy threat. Shielding James from harm in the centre of our formation. Whilst he doubtlessly had some combat experience due to being stranded out here there was no need to expose him to unnecessary danger.

Due to our numbers, training and equipment the Wretches were swiftly eliminated. Their exploding corpses leaving behind glowing golden splatters across the various surfaces.

When we left the Loading Bay I wasn't even the slightest bit surprised to see that it went into yet another narrow corridor. At this point I was more surprised when I encountered open spaces. Especially given how rare the damn things seemed to be. A singular Wretch tried to drop down from the ceiling but was thwarted by Uzi using her Solver to catapult it into the sky and out of sight.

It may have been boring and anticlimactic but I'd take that over the insane battle we'd had earlier on. This was significantly safer for us. Which in turn meant it was easier to deal with and the greater the chance that everyone would survive.

Things would unfortunately get somewhat hairy when we entered a room full of carts and tracks. As soon as we entered Dom called out a warning that he'd seen something above us.

Unsurprisingly that something turned out to be a Wretch crawling along the ceiling. It wasn't alone either as we came under fire from Locust Drones wielding Hammerbursts. Gyules and Cole stayed back with James as we couldn't afford to take chances with the Resonator.

As much as I wanted to extract bloody vengeance for the Stranded I had to keep my cool and complete the mission. So as much as I preferred melee combat, I dug into cover and started taking out Drones and Wretches one by one. My .50 cal Bolter was extremely effective against them as it was killing the Wretches in one shot. Granted the Drones usually took a couple more hits to kill but I had plenty of ammo to go around.

As we cleared out the room, the eleven of us advanced in a steady yet cautious manner. We made sure to check every corner and bit of cover in case there was anything untoward hiding in the shadows.

At the far end of the room from where we started we came across a locked door. Well I presume it was locked but it didn't hold up against a dosage of Nanite-Acid being applied straight to it. The door almost fell to the floor but was caught by Uzi using her Solver to prevent it from making an unnecessary racket.

There just beyond the door was the cart control room. We'd finally made it. Now we had to ride the carts into the mine, get to the designated spot to plant the Resonator and get out before the Kryll came back at dawn.

Chapter Text

The cart control room was cramped with the nine of us in there together. James and N had been sent back to try find a safe spot for the survivor to hide out until we returned to the surface. To help ensure his survival N would also be staying behind with James. In the meantime the rest of us would continue going deeper underground.

The control room for some reason or other had three huge ammo boxes, two Lancer assault rifles, a pair of Gnasher shotguns and a trio of Snub Pistols just laying there on the floor for any idiot to come across and pick up. I didn't even say anything as I just collected the weapons to bring back to base.

Everyone else just opened up the boxes and just started sharing out the ammunition. Thankfully there was plenty to go around. In the end I was able to collect eight hundred and fourty rounds of 7.62, one hundred and fifty rounds of 12.7 and eighty seven shotgun shells. Which quite frankly meant the control room was a miniature armoury.

I looked down at the rails below and counted four large metal carts. There were nine of us still carrying on. So we would have to share them with at least two in each one with the last cart having three in it.

After some rapid fire discussion we managed to come to an agreement as to who took which cart. Marcus and Dom would be in the first cart, V and I were in the second, the third was taken by Baird and Cole with Uzi, J and Gyules in the rear cart.

When Marcus pressed the button to activate the carts the heavy mechanical doors slowly ground open. I took a deep breath as I helped V into the cart with me as Dom and Marcus pretty much just launched themselves into the front cart. I kinda felt bad for the three in the rear cart as that was going to be a bit of an uncomfortably tight squeeze.

As we started to move I heard the sound of a Locust Drone roaring in its native language. The screams of a Wretch followed on its heels too. Great, not even one minute in and the enemy already knew we were here. Fantastic, just what we needed.

"Control, we're heading into the furnace. Divert the carts." Ah that was Marcus up ahead, yeah Control kinda needed to know that if they didn't do anything this whole operation could take some serious casualties. Yet despite Marcus's radio transmission the carts kept rolling forwards.

"Anya! We're moving into the fire! Reroute! Anywhere! Now!" To my lack of surprise Marcus was getting rather freaked out by the lack of action or response. I grabbed on to V's hand as we both prepared to bail out of the cart and continue along the tracks on foot. Doing so would gave been extremely suboptimal but if that's what we needed to do then so be it.

Thankfully we didn't have to walk as the carts came to a complete halt before rotating fourty five degrees and began to trundle deeper into the factory. I breathed out a sigh of relief as we started putting distance between ourselves and the furnace.

After killing a pair of Wretches that tried to attack us from the ceiling we crossed paths with the first cart. When Marcus asked if everyone was okay the responses he got were mostly positive. Cole being the most enthusiastic one say that 'The Train's at home on the rails'.

I think he was talking about a sport that he used to play professionally. I think it was called 'Thrashball'? I don't know I wasn't really paying full attention at the time. But apparently he was some kind of celebrity who was given the title 'The Cole Train'. Meh, spectator sports were never really my kind of thing but I was glad that he was happy at least.

During our cart ride we crossed an enormous room that was filled with all kinds of pipes. A lot of which were leaking an alarmingly large amount of Imulsion to the point where it had flooded the ground floor completely.

A pair of Drones did fire on us from a balcony of some sort but we were unable to get any good shots off due to the angle we were at. In the meantime I just sat in the cart with V. The two of us sitting in a semi-comfortable silence as we waited for the carts to come to the end of the tracks.

As we left the large room our carts took us back into some tunnels where a Drone shot at us with his Boltok before getting his head removed courtesy of V's laser weapon. The rest of the tunnel ride was somewhat dull besides us getting attacked by a few more Wretches and going down a lift.

It was just after the the lift however that we encountered a lone Boomer of all things. It was just standing by a corner of the rails. It was a bit odd to see just a single Boomer considering we had previously only ever seen them in pairs. When Marcus voiced his confusion as to what it was doing there Dom quipped that it was checking tickets. Which was a pretty terrible pun to be honest.

The cart V and I were in sped up significantly as we reached a track if rail that descended in a pretty steep slope. As soon as our cart came to a halt at the end of the track the two of scrambled out in short order.

Just as we cleared the cart we heard a grinding noise as another cart came speeding down the path. Ah it was Baird and Cole. Cole was able to keep himself in the cart when it crashed into ours but Baird got thrown out of his and into the empty one. Thankfully he was uninjured and even better was that according to Anya the core room was directly ahead. And inside the core room was the drilling lifts that we would use to descend into the depths below.

Of course it was no surprise at all to see that there was a Gnasher and a huge ammo crate just before the door. More ammo and another shotgun for me to carry. Christ how many weapons would I end up carrying by the time we were finished with this mission.

As we left the carts behind we entered another room. This one with plenty of windows that let us see the others. The Wretches that attempted to attack when we opened the doors were slain with considerable ease. Honestly at this point we were just tearing our way right through the bastards. I'm not sure that anyone from Sabre Team had even used their Lancers or Snub Pistols, instead using their built-in weapons to kill them.

During our advance to the drilling platforms my group came across a pair of Wretches that were busy devouring a pair of human corpses. When I inspected the remains I saw all the defensive injuries that told the story of how the man had tried to fight off the Wretches that had killed them. There was a small ammo box here as well. Given the large group outside the room James had been trapped in. They must have been gathering all the weapons, ammo and other supplies needed to hold out until they were rescued.

We left the grisly scene behind us and carried on down the hallway. There was a pair of doors we had to open before descending down a tunnel. When we got to the bottom it leveled out and to my complete lack of surprise out came a pair of Wretches. I didn't  even use my weapons as I just grabbed one before using it to bludgeon the second to death. Its post-death explosion didn't even put a dent in my health bar.

The walkway opened up into the core room just in front of me was a pair of grenades that I quickly stashed away in my inventory. I decided to lean over the railing and take a quick look down as Anya was bringing up the drilling platforms.

The machinery here was loud as all hell when it was turned on. Hydraulics groaned, chains clattered and large cogs ground against one another. Honestly I was somewhat surprised that it was only a pair of Boomers that responded to the racket that was going on.

With nine of us it didn't take long for us to kill the two of them. After we got on the platforms Marcus informed Anya of our current status and position. She responded saying that once we were in the mines that we had to find the pumping station and plant the Resonator there. As we began to descend she reminded us that we had to get it done before dawn. Otherwise we would still be there when the Kryll came back. And that was something that none of us wanted to experience.

Chapter Text

Riding down the drilling platforms into the mines has got to have been one of the dullest things I've ever done. Yes I could have saved myself the time by simply jumping down the shaft but I don't think anyone else would have appreciated it. Especially the soldiers who made up Delta Squad.

As soon as the platforms reached the floor everyone stepped off and fanned out with Cole in the centre of the formation. That Resonator needed to be protected at any cost until it was successfully deployed. Until such time nothing else mattered.

The mines were dimly lit by various bulbs that were still functional. No idea where the power was coming from but I honestly didn't really need to know.

Apparently the whole place stank of Kryll shit. At least that was according to Baird's whinging. It was just one more reason that I was glad that my suit was hermetically sealed. It had served me extremely well in the more heavily polluted areas of the Commonwealth as well as Copper-9 and it would do so again.

To my delight there was a Boomshot laying on the ground not far from the platforms. When I combined the rounds I had collected previously with the three rounds that were with this one that meant I now had seven Boomshot rounds.

The path away from the drilling platforms was somewhat decent in width. The safety railings looked like they were ready to collapse at any minute though. I peeked over the railing and was unable to see the bottom of the drop. I don't know if that was due to the lack of light or if it went that far down into the gloom.

Didn't matter as I had no intention whatsoever of going down that route. The path soon forked off into three different directions with one leading to brightly lit mechanical door, the second going deeper underground and the third went a fairly well lit outcrop with two massive crates of ammunition. In the distance I could see another Lambent Wretch scurrying across some pipes. Those glowy fuckers seemed to be everywhere in this mine.

There was a massive pile of metal rods near the path that led to the door. I looked behind it because it seemed that everywhere I looked there was another ammo box or crate just waiting to be opened. There was an ammo box behind the pile of rods. Sadly though it was also right next to the mauled corpse of a slain Gear. I bent down and wordlessly recovered his tags, his next of kin deserved to what happened to him.

When I went to empty the ammo crates at the outcrop I got surprised when a small flock of Kryll came flying out from below. They didn't try and attack me however as they mustn't have felt confident that they were able to take me down or the light levels were just high enough to keep them at bay. Just in front of the second ammo crate however was a Longshot sniper rifle. It was a pretty neat find I suppose as were the eleven .50 cal rounds I found with it.

It wasn't a weapon that I would be using however as it was a single shot rifle. The damage stats were pretty damn good but it was still outclassed by my own Anti-Materiel rifle. So I'd just be sticking with my own weapons for sniping away at far off Locust.

The sounds of gunfire had me racing back up the way however. Thankfully it hadn't been anything serious. Just a pack of Wretches, this encounter however convinced Marcus and I that splitting up was the best idea. One half would stay behind with the Resonator and the others would clear the way for them.

The team that would clear the way was made up of Marcus, Dom, V and myself. The four of us carried on down the path where the Wretches had come from as chances were that was where we had to go. It wasn't necessarily the best plan in the world but it was currently the only one we had at that moment in time.

"I don't know man, being underground like this gives me the creeps." Given that nobody had been underground pretty much since the start of the Locust War I could well understand why Dom would feel that way. Hell even I was feeling somewhat uncomfortable about being underground.

Unfortunately for Dom and Marcus the two were a bit too busy in their conversation with each other that they didn't see the path turn into a natural water slide until it was too late. It was kinda funny to see these two massive armour clad men go flying down the water on their arses though. From the sounds of it Dom thought it was kinda fun too. Well right until he hit the bottom that is.

Whilst Marcus radioed Baird to let them know that they needed to find an alternative route V gently airlifted me down to where the two were. There was an ammo crate at the base as well as the torn up remains of an unlucky Stranded. I could only hope that his death hadn't been as brutal as I feared.

The four of us got behind cover and started covering each other leap-frog style. That way we made sure to minimise our vulnerabilities much as possible. Which was obviously the smart thing to do if we all wanted to get ourselves through this crazy mission.

It was a good thing we did that because we were attacked by two Drones as well as a pair of Grenadiers pretty much as soon as V and I left cover. I mean yeah they weren't much of a threat to us but still. We both knew that we couldn't really afford to get cocky as that was a really great way to get everyone killed.

It was just after killing them and continuing down the path that we came under sniperfire from our right. I couldn't be bothered to engage them in a sniper duel so I simply targeted the rocky column that was holding up the roof of their section with the M202 Flash Rocket Launcher that I had purchased during my short-lived tenure with the Brotherhood of Steel. The incendiary rocket shot out of the large black, boxy Launcher and straight into the rocky column where the resulting explosion dislodged a hefty amount of material that crushed the snipers like insects.

After taking care of them the path narrowed and turned right then left before opening up again. It still didn't mean that we had much room to manoeuvre though. This lack of room obviously meant that we had to really cautious of explosive threats like Grenades and Boomshots.

This was made abundantly clear when a chunk of path fell away into the darkness below. Honestly the fact that the path was unstable was a bigger worry to me than the Locust. Like seriously they didn't really pose all that much of a threat to me personally.

Regardless of the dangers we had to carry on. This mission was of vital importance to humanity. Didn't mean that I wasn't getting annoyed with all the twist and turns we had to take though. Yeah, I know it's an underground mine and all but that wouldn't stop me from being annoyed about it.

Thankfully there always seemed to be at least one or two Locust for me take my anger out on. Like the six Wretches that were coming up the path right now. I didn't have to but I felt like using my sidearm for this.

It was the first firearm that I had grabbed on my way out of Vault 111. An N99 handgun that was normally chambered in 10mm but thanks to the Attachment Pack from DegenerateDak I had reworked it into .44 instead. It had served me rather well throughout my time to the point where I had named it 'Resolution'.

It looked very different from when I had emerged from the Vault. The grip was now rubberised with grooves for the fingers to get a better hold on it. The trigger guard had been reworked with the Magnum receiver so it was more like a handguard from the Halo CE magnum. A deliberate choice on Daks part. The only thing I hadn't changed was the sights as due to all my augmentation to either my body or armour glow Sights were completely redundant.

Like most of my general Fallout 4 weapons I had repainted it with the Enclave Creation Club skin that had come free at one point or another. This meant that the weapon was painted black with the Enclave symbol in white at the very back of the slide just above the handle. As well as two red stripes running down the top of the weapon. These red stripes were matched by a pair of white lines that ran the length of the main body of the gun.

The sound of Resolution going off was soon followed by exploding Lambent Wretches as they each received a powerful .44 round to the face. As I reloaded a Boomer came stomping down the path further ahead. Thankfully those things were dumb enough to keep yelling their intentions before doing it.

Killing it was easy, especially since there were four of us focusing a nice amount of gunfire onto it. Unfortunately the path ahead was broken as a section had collapsed at some point. When V offered to carry us one by one to the other side Marcus had shot it down citing that it would take to long and we would have to find another route.

So instead we took a left and came across yet another ammo crate. I think this thing was the fourth one we come across since entering the mines. We paused only to open it up and distribute the ammo inside with my three companions getting priority as I carrying was literally several hundred thousand of each ammo type.

The ammo box lay just by the feet of another slain Gear. This body looked somewhat fresh and very much intact however. But Dom had said that nobody had been underground in years....did that mean the Locust had captured him and brought him down here. Why? What could they possibly gain from this? These thoughts kept swirling round my head as I recovered his tags. As I pulled them off I caught a glimpse of the name that was stamped into it: Paul. Poor bastard. I just hoped he died with as little suffering as possible.

I pushed those thoughts away as the four of us headed towards an open doorway with a bright light above it. The door was just a bit further along the path. We didn't reach it however as the the ground underneath Marcus and Dom suddenly gave way.

As the two of them disappeared down the tunnel I couldn't help but wonder if Marcus was regretting not taking V up on her offer to carry us across the gap. V and I looked at each other after waiting a several seconds to see if the other two were okay. Given how Marcus had radioed Baird to give him a status update it was clear that they were fine.

"Well, nothing to it eh V?" I gently remarked as I leaned over the hole in the ground. She smiled back at me before giggling and declaring that the last one down was a rotten egg. She proceeded to dive into the tunnel with all the grace that she displayed when prowling for her next victim.

I chuckled softly as she disappeared down the underground tunnel that our companions had fallen down. Ah classic V I thought as I secured my Bolter before jumping down the hole myself and landed right in the middle of a Wretch attack.

Chapter Text

The pocket was fairly spacious but still too tight for V to deploy her wings and fly around. The four of us stood at the end of the area with our backs firmly planted against the rocky wall. In all the confusion it seemed like the Wretches were endless and coming from everywhere all at once. Once things quietened down and we were able to take stock of our situation as we also looted an ammo crate. In the end we only counted about a dozen or so splatters marking where the Wretches had died.

There were some rocks blocking the four of us but they were dealt with by V launching a missile at them. The rocks fell away to reveal a safety rail and a lake of Imulsion. Hell there was a stream that was pouring into the larger body like a waterfall.

Again I got that uneasy feeling about that stuff. I chastised myself for getting distracted we couldn't afford to delay. Especially since the sun would be coming up soonish.

The path split into two and it was agreed that we should take both and see where they went. V and I were on the left path whilst Marcus and Dom were on the right. As we advanced down the path I could see pools of Imulsion through cracks in the ground.

"Hey V, can you get a scan of that Imulsion stuff?" My robotic girlfriend looked at me curiously probably wondering why I would make such a request. "Something about it just doesn't feel right to me."

"I'll try and get a reading if I get the chance." That was both fair and to be quite frankly it was also the best I could probably hope for. As we continued down the path more blocks started to appear....all conveniently at the correct height to be used as cover too. I noticed the ammo crate and gestured to it. Whenever we had found ammo crates the Locust were usually not far away.

This was proven to be true when a bunch of Wretches and a Drone came charging down each path. If it had been just Dom and Marcus they might have faced some difficulties in dealing with them. As it was with the ceiling now being high enough for V to go airborne it wasn't much of a problem. I couldn't help but smile in glee as she dive-bombed more than once killing at least a couple with each run. Sadly the tunnel meant that V was unable to safely perform aerial reconnaissance so we had to continue in blind and on foot.

The path we were on gently curved up and to the left before continuing to run parallel to the path that the other two had taken. The corner had been uncomfortable for me as we had passed by another Imulsion lake. I pushed my thoughts aside as another pair of Drones backed up by a pack of Wretches came at us.

It was just after that second encounter that the paths reconnected. So I suppose that we didn't have to split up but it did help prevent the Locust from flanking us. Meh, as long as we were able to get the job done.

There was a section that was slightly lower down and very much illuminated by the Imulsion. There was a bunch of crap related to mining on it. As well as an ammo crate, four grenades, a Lancer and two dead Gears. Once again the bodies were in terrible condition but still fairly fresh. I kept my thoughts to myself even as the others that were with me shared out the ammunition between themselves as I collected the rifle and tags of the fallen soldiers.

The path turned into a much narrower tunnel that was filled with Drones and Wretches. If it wasn't for the very real risk of collapse I would have happily used explosive heavy weapons to clear it out.

But instead we had to move from cover to cover. Slowly but steadily pushing our way through the tunnel's occupants. It had been somewhat of a chore but we managed it.

The tunnel opened up into a larger section of the mine. Made a nice change of pace from the dimly lit and cramped tunnel. As we exited the tunnel however the ground began to violently shake as a deep roar echoed throughout the section of the mine we were in.

I didn't have to look very hard for the source as the huge-ass Corpser was pretty fucking hard to miss. Thankfully it was currently withdrawing deeper into the tunnels but we all knew that it wouldn't stay that way.

V was swift to act as she radioed the other team to both inform them of the situation and to tell them we were in the presence of an angry titan and they needed to hurry up. J responded that they were on their way and moving as fast as they could.

But for now all we could do was continue our advance. The ground we were on soon turned into a gentle slope as we passed underneath a broken lattice beam and pipework. The ground ahead looked unsteady with cracks spread throughout the surface. If that wasn't bad enough I could tell that just underneath the cracked ground was a large pool of Imulsion.

As we stepped onto the almost certainly unstable terrain we had our weapons out and ready. I noticed that V had put her Lancer away and had activated her missile launchers instead. Good to know I wasn't the only one who was thinking about having to kill that Corpser as I had swapped out my Bolter for my Meltagun.

We must have only covered a portion of the distance when the Corpser came crawling out from a ledge above us. Despite the fact that V and I had excellent shots at its weak underbelly when it paused before leaping down we held our fire. Killing it whilst it was above us would result in it coming crashing down and making a hell of a mess of the already unstable ground we were on.

Needless to say that wasn't a risk that any of us were willing to take. This meant that we had to wait for it come down to our level. Which obviously meant that it had the opportunity to attack us.

Thankfully though its attacks were painfully obvious as it lifted its massive legs to try and crush us beneath them. Of course as it did so the soft vulnerable underbelly was exposed allowing the two Gears that were with us to focus fire with their Lancers.

The Corpser's reaction to being shot in its soft fleshy parts was to rear up and scream in pain. This meant the damn thing had its mouth wide open allowing V and to fire our weapons straight inside. I'm not entirely sure who's shot killed it but at the end of the day it was as dead as RAAM and that's all that mattered.

I think it was a few seconds after the Corpser stopped twitching that the others rejoined us. Cole seemed to be annoyed at missing the fight with the giant Locust beast the others were just glad that we were okay. Poor Gyules still seemed to be somewhat miserable though. I don't think any of us could really blame him though.

As I took stock of our situation I noticed the corpse of Gear laying off to the side of the dead Corpser. As I retrieved the tags and ammo crate that was next to him I saw V take a sample of the Imulsion for analysis. I knew that we didn't have the time to do it now so was keeping the sample safe to do the analysis later on.

I smiled softly as I recalled the conversation that J and I has as I upgraded her systems back in the Stranded Camp. She had been unhappy with the fact that I was now the team leader when she had previously held that position for a number of years. Despite her displeasure with that fact she couldn't deny that we were significantly more effective and more importantly efficient in completing our tasks.

She was a hardass that bordered on being a complete and utter bitch at times but she did sort of care for her teammates. Well as long as they didn't step out of line and got the results that she desired that is. If they did get on her nerves then she'd happily off them with a virus injector. Which was pretty damn brutal. I'd made it clear that if she was to stick with us then she'd have to get used to taking orders instead of being the one to give them.

That said now that we were all back together we had to continue to that damn pumping station to plant the Resonator before getting the hell out of here. We needed to get it done fast as it was now quarter past five in the morning, which meant that the sun would be coming up soon. We had to hurry up and get this done. I didn't know what if any effect that the Lightmass Missile strike had on the local Kryll population but none of us were going to hang around to find out.

So we went back along the path that the second team had taken. I looked out to my left and over the body of Imulsion I saw a number of huge metal crates suspended on a track system connected to the ceiling. Interesting but not really all that useful at this point in time.

The path went into yet another tunnel before opening out into an enormous cavern. Unlike most of the mine this cavern didnt have much in the way of electrical lights as the sheer volume of Imulsion was more than enough to illuminate the area.

V let out a quiet whoop of glee when she looked up and was completely unable to see the roof of the cavern without setting the zoom on her optics to the maximum setting. Finally having enough space to take flight the four Drones took to the air to provide aerial reconnaissance of as much of the area as possible. J's voice soon came over the radio saying that she could see what was almost certainly the pumping station.

As she described what she and the other three Drones were seeing Baird was able to confirm that what they were seeing was indeed the pumping station. I let out a sigh of weary relief at that. We had been on the go for several hours and needed a break from the nonstop combat before we collapsed out of sheer exhaustion.

Unfortunately J also reported in that she snarled the others could see several heavily armoured Locust warriors in the station itself. Some of the more heavily armoured Locust were noted to be armed with some kind of mechanical crossbow so the four Drones were staying out of range until the assault began.

When questions were asked as to what kind of Drone they were seeing Baird was the one who supplied the answer for us. Apparently what the Copper-9 Drones were seeing was Theron Guards and they were the elite of the Locust army. He also told us they were usually armed with Torque Bows which fired explosive bolts that detonated with the force of a small grenade a couple seconds after impact.

With our objective in sight and firmly in enemy hands we made the simple plan that the three Copper-9 Drones would assault the position from the air as a distraction. Whilst they were doing this Delta Squad would split up and take both of the two paths that led straight to the pumping station. Cole, Baird and Gyules would go right while Dom, Marcus and I would take the left path.

As we went down the path and the Drones that made up Sabre Team began the airborne assault on the Locust I idly wondered what these Theron Guards were like in regards to fighting.

The start of the battle for the pumping station was heralded by an excited warcry from V as she and the others began their part of the assault plan. Soaring up high before diving down upon the Locust from above with gunfire, lasers and grenades like some kind of mythical harbinger. I could already hear the Locust scrambling and failing to form any kind of cohesive response to the sudden violent assault that they found themselves in the middle of.

Good, I thought. Let them know the meaning of pain and suffering before meeting their deaths in a violent manner. I had never shown my opponents mercy and I wasn't about to start now.

Chapter Text

I kept my head low as I ran down the path with Marcus and Dom to the nearest ramp that led to the pumping station. The battle had been going on for at least a couple of minutes but we'd already made great headway in killing the opposition.

Up above me I saw V and J tag team an unlucky Locust Drone that had tried to make a run for it. They'd dive-bombed the bastard before scooping him up into the air and tearing into him with their claws. It wasn't the most efficient way to kill it but the psychological effect of seeing chunks of Locust body parts rain down from above whilst its tortured screams of agony echoed throughout the battlefield was devastating.

It wasn't much longer afterwards that the battlefield fell silent as the last of the Locust died. There was Locust blood and severed body parts all over the place. I don't think there was a single surface that wasn't covered in one or the other. We'd managed to turn the pumping station into a slaughter house.

Heh, I hoped the Locust were able to get a nice long look at the slaughter that we left behind in our wake. Bastards deserved it all and so much more after everything they had inflicted upon humanity.

Whilst Marcus was busy restoring power to the lifts and Baird was doing final checks on the Resonator, I was busying myself on the radio to N. "Sabre Two this is Sabre One, over."

"This is Sabre Two. Go ahead Sabre One, over."

"Resonator is being planted now. Recommend that you and James get the hell out of the building before it goes off. Sabre One out."

"Solid copy, Sabre One. We're moving outside now. Sabre Two out."

"Baird! Let's go!" Ah Marcus must have restored power to the lifts and by the looks of it Baird was almost ready to activate the Resonator.

I turned my head to see everyone gathering on the pumping station lifts to get back up above ground. If we activated it now then we'd have to fucking leg it.

"J! Consult with Baird and activate the Resonator then catch up with us using your wings. Uzi, V cover her." The named individuals nodded in response to my orders as they moved to carry them out.

Turns out all J needed to do was to pull the large lever down to activate the sonic device. I noticed that as Baird was moving to the lift he scooped up some kind of metal object. It had come out of a pile of identical looking things on the ground near where the Resonator had been planted.

Whilst I was curious as to what he had picked up I didn't really care enough to ask him. The lift jolted as it started to move and I could just see J prepare to activate the Resonator whilst Uzi and V maintained a close flight pattern above her.

As soon as I judged us to be sufficiently high up I gave the order for J to activate the Resonator. As she confirmed it I could hear the dull beeping the device was emitting as it prepared to detonate.

I think we were about three quarters of the way up the shaft by the time my teammates caught up to us. Despite the speed of the lift I was still worried about how close we would be cutting it.

By the time we got topside and outside the facility it was broad daylight. Bloody hell we had cut that extremely close for me to have any kind of comfort with that one. Not that I had time to comment in it as we were busy running for it. Unsurprisingly the four Drones were easily keeping pace with me even though my enhancements mean that I was running somewhat faster than the average human. I flicked a glance at N who was carrying James in his arms. I was pleased to see that the two of them had made it through the night safely.

We had just entered the tree line when the sonic blast waves from the Resonator came thundering out every opening in the facility. I suspected that the sonic blasts had almost certainly not helped with the overall condition of the place. Thankfully we were able to take cover behind various trees and were mostly shielded from the blast waves.

I say 'mostly' because it still felt that my head had been bounced about the place. Still my good old Leadbelcher Helmet had managed to either absorb or deflect the worst of the sonic pulses so it could have been much worse. So yeah there was that bit of goodish news.

As the pulses faded away everyone slowly emerged from behind cover and just lay on the grass. I idly wondered if what Baird had picked up back at the pumping station was one of those 'geobots'. Whatever it was he was focused on tinkering with it and seemed completely absorbed in the task.

"Control, this is Delta." Ah of course, Control needed to knowvthat the mission had been completed which was why Marcus was currently on the radio to them. "We're clear. Resonator has been detonated."

I could hear Anya giving Marcus her congratulations even as she informed us that King-Raven helicopters were now en route to pick us up and bring us all to base for a debriefing.

"Thank fuck for that eh Ciel." V stated as she lay down across my lap. I pulled off my helmet for the first time in a while as I ran a gloved hand through my short and messy dark brown hair. I looked down at the wondrous beauty that was V and surprised her with an embrace even as I went from sitting to laying flat on my back.

She laughed in a way that was so gentle and loving. A laugh that only came from her being genuinely happy. The smile that covered her face was so soft and warm. A far cry from the deranged laughter and slasher smile she displayed when lost in the haze of slaughter.

I could hear Uzi and N discussing what sounded like date plans for when we all got to Jacinto. I couldn't really say that I was surprised that those two were dating. We has all been through a lot together and I knew that after this that J would almost certainly be inducted into Sabre Team as our fifth member.

The good mood didn't last long and soon turned sour however as Colonel Hoffman came over the radio to deliver some really bad news: The Resonator didn't deliver the expected results.

According to Anya the Resonator had only managed to map out a fraction of the required tunnel data. Hoffman had estimated that it might at least a hundred Resonators to fully map out the tunnels. Fucking hell, couldn't we just catch a goddamn break already?!

Thankfully though the universe seemed it fitting to throw us a bone. Baird had found something on the machine he'd picked up in the mine. He handed it to Marcus who pressed a few buttons on it which activated a holographic display. A display that showed quite a few tunnels on it. Locust tunnels specifically.

When Dom asked him where he had found it Baird had responded that it came on screen when he had hacked in. Apparently the files were just sitting there and ready to be used.

The blond soldier was quick to hand it over to Jack as the little robot began transmitting the data over to Control. Apparently it was a geobot and more importantly it had more tunnel data than the Resonator. Which was absolute bullshit if you asked me.

The Colonel's voice came over the radio again as he spoke with Anya. "Give me a zero point on that data."

"Sir....well it came from East Barricade Academy. From his father's house specifically." Oh boy this sounded like we were about to get into something really personal.

"Who's father?"

"Sergeant Fenix, sir."

"You think you can still find your way back home Fenix?"

The response was as swift as it was confident, "Yes sir."

"Reroute those chopper, Lieutenant! They're taking Delta and Sabre to EBA -- immediately!"

"Sorry James, but it looks like you're going to be stuck on a chopper for a good while."

The man just collapsed on the ground with a despondent groan. Yeah I couldn't blame him for sounding so unhappy with that announcement. After all I wasn't exactly happy with the news either.

So when two King-Raven helicopters were seen coming over the horizon I could tell that we all knew that our next mission had just begun. I simply secured my helmet back on as they landed. I just waited my turn to board the helicopters. As it was Sabre Team and I were assigned the helicopter that was emblazoned with the number twenty five on the front of the aircraft, each side of the tail and on the rearmost tail struts.

I could tell that nobody from either group was happy with the current arrangement but we ultimately didn't have much choice in the matter. We had been able to kill RAAM and a large number of Locust forces in the past day or so. We couldn't afford to allow the enemy to regroup as that would almost certainly jeopardise the Lightmass Offensive. So it truly was a case that we had to keep hitting the Locust so they were kept off balance until it was simply too late for them to do anything about it.

Chapter Text

Being inside a King-Raven for the first time was fairly interesting. It had been quite a while since I had last been in an aircraft that wasn't a grounded wreck. I wasn't too pleased about the lack of side doors though. It made the interior feel incredibly exposed and left me worried that someone could quite easily fall out. Obviously my opinions on the matter were completely irrelevant as I wasn't part of either the COG or the company that manufactured the King-Ravens.

Now that it was broad daylight I could see the devastation that the Lightmass Missile strike had wrought. There was a gargantuan smoking crater in the ground from where the main warhead had detonated a few metres below surface level and caused significant subsidence as a result of the underground explosion.

I couldn't even begin to count the number of buildings that had completely collapsed from either the tremors from the detonation or the shockwave that the blast had generated. It was like whole blocks had been demolished. It appeared to me that between the explosion, the subsidence and all of the resulting fires that at least a quarter of the city had been completely destroyed. No doubt more of the city would follow later on as buildings collapsed from damage to either the foundations or the structure supports itself.

I felt terrible about it but knew that there wasn't really anything that I could do about it at this point in time. V must have figured out what I was feeling as she held my hand from the seat beside me as her voice came over a private radio channel. "We did all we could. It's not your fault that they brought a literal army against us."

I sighed as I gently squeezed her hand in mine. Logically I knew that we had done everything that we possibly could have to protect the Stranded Camp of New Ephyra. It just meant nothing in the face of overwhelming opposition.

"Yeah, I know." I whispered back softly with a voice weighted down with regret and sorrow. I was going to find a way to honour their memory somehow though. For now though I would simply keep killing every single Locust that I came across. It wasn't the nicest way to honour them but it was currently the only way I had.

It didn't really take a huge length of time to begin the approach to the East Barricade Academy. As our choppers were once again flying fast and low to try evade the ever present threat of Locust Nemacysts. It was kind of scary being inside a helicopter that was flying at or just below rooftop height.

I was somewhat confused by all the fires that were raging in places that were untouched by the effects of the missile strike. A curious thing, perhaps there were other survivors somewhere down there in their own little enclaves. If so I hoped that they were alright.

It was just as we were passing over a bridge with a ruined artillery gun on it that our pilots decided to have a casual chat with the other helicopter.

"Hey, Six-Four. Lonely?"

"Cruisin' for a date Two-Five?"

"Sorry honey. You're not my type." I couldn't even begin to understand what was going through those pilots' minds as they had their little back-and-forth. However as we flew straight through a huge column of smoke our pilot announced that there were radar echoes ahead.

I knew that there was a very good chance that it was probably nothing. Hell it might have just been either ghost echoes from a fault in the systems or simply falling debris. The importance of the mission that we were on however meant that we couldn't afford to gamble unnecessarily.

I could tell that the others in my team either felt the same or had cone to the same conclusion that I had. I didn't even need to give the order before all four of the Copper-9 Drones bailed out of the sides of the helicopter as I moved to crew the starboard chaingun. Their flared segmented metallic wings catching the sunlight in a beautiful display as they raced ahead of us. It was a beautiful sight in my eyes. I just wished that I had some kind of camera to capture the image.

It was a good thing that had been so proactive though. As just a few seconds after they had rocketed away leaving trails behind them, we came under attack from at least a dozen Nemacyst. I honestly believed that if Six-Four had been filled with another Gear Squad instead of us then this chopper would have probably been shot down over the EBA.

As it was due to a combination of the four airborne Drones, the skill of the pilots and the onboard weapons we were able to punch on through.

Two-Five's pilot came over the radio not long after our close encounter. "Holy shit, Six-Four that was a little too close for comfort. Are you okay?"

"Yeah, don't worry about me honey. I'm fine. Let's just get this shit done with so we can get the hell out of here." A sentiment that I could well understand after damn near getting shot down.

As we roared over the Academy I could see a parking area that if we didn't have the Drones with us then Two-Five would have almost certainly been forced to land there to deposit Delta Squad. As it was we were blitzing past it all instead having to fight through to the Fenix Estate on foot.

For a moment I thought I spotted a massive humanoid moving around in the conservatory but we flew past it so quickly that I couldn't be sure. At the same time we were headed to Marcus's home I could hear the rest of Sabre Team over the radio as they systematically cleared the immediate vicinity of both Seeders and Nemacyst.

Even though the skied were now more or less cleared of hostiles I didn't relax my grip on the chaingun's handles until we were almost directly on top of the Fenix Estate. Good we had finally arrived with both choppers intact and airborne. As we circled behind the house to find a place to land I heard Baird point out an APC that was behind the building as well.

If it worked then that would no doubt be our method of escaping from the area. It was getting far too hot for the choppers to stay after dropping us off. This was dangerous enough and I could tell that nobody wanted to have to attempt a medivac this deep in enemy held territory.

I could already see my teammates circling the Estate from above whilst raining down explosive missiles on any Locust that wandered into their sights. I had little doubt however that the Locust would be swarming the hill soon enough and that we had to make this a quick in and out. The chopper had barely made touchdown before I leapt outside and I could already see Delta Squad doing the same damn thing.

Now all we had to do was gain entrance to the main building of the Estate, locate whatever mapping data we could and get the hell out of there before the Locust arrived in force.

Chapter Text

As soon as Delta Squad and I had left our helicopters the two King-Ravens flew off in a hurry. No doubt the pilots were eager to get somewhere safer and far away from the swarms of living missiles that were the Nemacyst.

After rallying with Delta Squad the four of us made our way to the front of the house whilst Cole and Baird stayed behind to check on the APC and repair it if such a thing was indeed possible. I could still hear my teammates slaughtering any and all Locust that they came across. Thankfully the noise was already starting to fade away and had completely stopped by the time we had reached the front courtyard.

The house had clearly seen better days. There was a couple of pretty big holes in the upper floor to the right of the front entrance. A massive section of an entire wing left of the front door had also collapsed. To be honest it almost looked like something large like a helicopter had crashed into it. The few water features that weren't totally destroyed had clearly stopped working or were just completely clogged up with all manner of crap like weeds or other pond scum.

As we gathered up on the main entrance I thought I saw both Marcus and Dom give saddened looks at the collapsed wing. Whilst I had several issues with my communication and social skills even I could tell that neither of the two men wanted to talk about it. Which was why didn't ask them about what exactly it was that they were looking for or at because it really wasn't any of my business.

With my teammates now all inside the house we wouldn't have to worry as much about encountering an ambush. I say 'as much' because Control had informed us that there was seismic activity going on inside the house. This was corroborated by J who radioed in that they had already closed at least two Emergence Holes.

When it was time to breach the main door everyone just backed a little to let Marcus be the one to kick it open. I guess it just felt like the fitting thing to do seeing as how this was once his home.

Despite the damage from time and the elements it was still easy to see that this place belonged to an upper class family. The carpet that ran from the entrance was a vibrant red and just looked extremely high quality. The walls were covered in painting many of which were likely portraits of old family members.

The very start of staircase that led up to the upper floor was flanked by two eagle busts each holding a cog in their talons. Their was an image of a pair of crossed Lancers behind the cog which was three dimensional like the eagle that was holding it. There was also a banner underneath with the word 'remember' etched into it.

Looks like the Fenix family had been involved with the COG for a good many years. This was also made clear by the fact that the wall paper was absolutely covered in cogs.

I wasn't sure how long the place had been abandoned for but I was still rather surprised to see that not only was there still power but that the lights were still on as well. This was especially surprising considering that the interior of the house was just as beat up as the exterior. Seriously there were entire interior walls that were either gone completely or had huge chunks missing from them. It was amazing that the place was still standing.

As we climbed the stairs I was rather confused by the painting of the Imulsion mine that we had just been in. That reminded me, I needed to ask V if she had done the analysis on that sample she had taken and so I decided to go look for her whilst Dom, Marcus and J went looking downstairs in the cellar. Apparently Marcus's father had some kind of lab down there.

I found V keeping a watch on the courtyard from one of the holes that had been punched in the walls. She turned around to face me as I slowly approached her.

"Hey Ciel. Everything good so far?"

"Aye, so far so good. I meant to ask sooner but I forgot with how busy we've been. Have you done the analysis on that Imulsion sample you took back in the mines?"

Her optical lights widened as she swore. Ah, I guess I wasn't the only one who had forgotten about it. I took V's place at watch while she ducked into one of the nearby rooms to conduct a full scan of the sample that she had taken.

I don't really know how long it took but by the time she had finished the scanning Baird had reported in that the APC was now back online and they were heading inside. Of course the house had also shaken at least twice as the Locust were no doubt trying to kill them down in the cellar. I wasn't worried however as I knew that J was with them.

What did worry me however was V's expression as she returned to tell me what she had found from the results of her scan.

"You okay V? Is there something wrong?" I was rather concerned by how she looked almost spooked by the results she had from the analytical scan.

"I can't say for certain, but I'm certain that there's more to this Imulsion."

I quietly gestured for her to continue as she began to explain that the high energy content of the Imulsion was extremely strange. That however hadn't gotten her spooked though, what had unnerved her however was the fact that the sample had reacted in ways that would almost suggest that it was alive somehow.

That caught my attention as whilst the thought of the Imulsion being alive was almost crazy but I was unable to ask for any more details as the ground began to shake once more as Emergence Holes began to open up just behind the courtyard wall. The two of us agreed to talk about it at a later point but for now we had to focus on holding off the Locust attack.

I looked around me as I saw Baird and Cole take the hole furthest away from the entrance whilst Gyules and I took the other hole. By the time the Locust had entered the courtyard V, N and Uzi were already airborne.

Unfortunately unlike our previous encounters we didn't automatically have air superiority. We learned this when Uzi was forced to use her Solver to block an incoming rocket from an ugly looking creature. Gyules was the one who identified them as 'Reavers'. This was basically the Locust airforce now coming to attack us. Oh goody goody gumdrops.

Thankfully despite the fact that my teammates were outnumbered by Locust Reavers they were easily able to out manoeuvre them. Their smaller size and superior speed making it extremely difficult for the Reavers to successfully target them. Hell I think I saw V board one and cut its head off with a chainsaw hand.

As for the ground game the fact that there were only two doorways for the Locust ground forces to attack us from was creating a bottleneck. I idly wondered why they didn't just tunnel up inside the house like earlier and force us to split our attention but I guess that without RAAM leading them they were falling back on basic tactics that took advantage of their natural toughness. Either way it made things significantly easier for us.

Sadly tragedy would strike as when I ducked back into cover to reload and Gyules took his turn to fire on the Locust a Theron managed to get a lucky shot off with its Torque Bow. I could only watch helplessly as the younger Gear recoiled back as the bolt punched through the armour covering his stomach. I'm pretty sure that the fuse for those bolts was only like five seconds at most but in that moment it felt like five minutes as it hissed away inside him.

I dropped my Bolter and tried to run to him so I could attempt to remove the explosive bolt. Maybe if I'd been standing right next to him I would've made it in time. I was about halfway there when the warhead exploded inside of the young Private.

The body armour that the Coalition issued to its troops was indeed highly protective but against such a weapon it was completely useless. The explosion violently tore Gyules in half, knocking me back as well as showering the immediate area with blood, guts and other kinds of human debris.

I didn't register any screams from him. I could only presume that the blast had killed him outright and he had been in too much of a state of shock to say anything else. The thought was of cold comfort to say the least.

It was not long after this that Marcus, Dom and J arrived to our location whilst Cole and Baird left to go protect the APC from the Locust. By that point I had already recovered my Hellfire Bolter and was back to firing upon the enemies outside. I did my damn best to make sure that they suffered for every single step that they took into that courtyard.

J kicked up a hole heap of dust as she jetted off outside to join the battle raging away in the skies above the house. There was a fire raging away at the back of the house. I don't know how or when it started but I didn't really care about any of that to be honest. I just wanted to get out of here.

I heard a throaty roar as a Boomer came thundering into the courtyard holding some kind of battering ram. It was obviously going to try and breach the main doors to allow the other Locust inside.

It didn't get the chance as I managed to blow its fucking head off with a pair of rounds straight to the face. Soon enough the battle had firmly shifted into our favour as the last of the Reavers finally fell, quite literally I might add. With the loss of the Locust air units and the Copper-9 Drones having free reign of the skies above the Fenix Estate the Locust infantry were either slain or successfully fell back underground.

I felt numb as I stumbled over to the shredded corpse that had been Private Gyules just a few minutes ago and recovered his weapons as well as his cog tags. The battle was over and we had won but Gyules was dead. With his death only Cole and Baird were all that remained of the original Alpha Squad that we had met back in the city of Ephyra.

He had been practially right there beside me. Within spitting distance no less. And I had failed to save him. He was a good man too Hell we had even shared terrible jokes over the radio with each other during the flight over the EBA. And now he was dead. Just like that his son had lost his father and his sister had lost her brother. Another family that had been brutally torn apart by the war the Locust had been waging upon humanity for almost fourteen and a half years.

I was shaken out of thoughts when Baird radioed in that there were more Locust at the back of the house. I followed Marcus and Dom out through another door leading to the back of the house that had been kicked open by a Locust Drone. As I was at the rear I slammed the door behind me and pulled down a large grandfather clock to slow down any pursuit.

To be honest I wasn't really thinking or taking note of anything that was going on until we finally got outside. As we stepped out into the sunlight we got a calk from Control that Jack had finished downloading the much needed tunnel data.

There were the remains of a bunch of Boomers scattered all around the rear courtyard. I looked further ahead and saw that my teammates were waiting by the APC that Baird had managed to repair.

Sadly there wasn't enough room inside it for all of us to fit inside. One of us would have hang on to the exteriorof the vehicle. When Baird demanded to know where Gyules was I simply showed him the Private's tags. His face showed me that he knew what that meant.

Marcus took the driver's seat whilst Dom manned the gunner station. The gun turrets were either not functional or completely out of ammunition which rendered them utterly useless. The six passenger seats were taken up by Cole, Baird, Uzi, N, V and myself. J was the unlucky one who had to cling on to the exterior railings for dear life.

This was made somewhat tricky due to Marcus's lunatic driving style. Granted I don't think anyone really blamed him due to the fact that there was a fucking Brumak on our ass that was trying to fucking kill us.

I could still hear J swearing away over the radio as she clung on despite the incredibly bumpy ride that Marcus was putting her through. Thankfully as the armoured vehicle barreled through some wooden planks blocking an archway the Brumak was slowed down enough for us to make a successful getaway. Well for now at least. I idly brushed my fingers against the tags that I recovered from Gyules. They may have not actually been very heavy at all but in that moment they felt like they weighed a ton.

Chapter Text

The inside of the armoured transport was cramped with all the seats being taken. Though it wasn't exactly very spacious to begin with in the first place. I was able to get the occasional glance outside via the gun cameras that were still functional as well as the drivers screens. The outside looked an absolute mess like damn near everywhere else. J was no longer clinging on to the outside and was currently flying close to the APC as not completely give away our position to the Locust.

As V and I leaned against each other with out hands intertwined for some semblance of comfort I could hear Marcus inform Control that we were out and had the mapping data. It was only now that Control decided to inform us that the Lightmass Bomb was mounted on a fucking train of all things. This news caused Marcus to slam on the breaks and ask for clarification about whether or not he heard that correctly. He had.

Anya responded that Command had identified an Imulsion sinkhole as the primary target and that whilst the train would deliver the bomb our targeting data would do the rest. I could tell that nobody was exactly thrilled with this arrangement but orders were orders and this was neither the time nor place to argue over them.

Regardless of whether or not we thought it was a good idea and most of us thought that it really wasn't, we had our orders. We were to rendezvous with the train that was called 'Tyro Pillar' at the Timgad Train Station. Which meant that we had to cross an enemy occupied city to meet up with a train that had a bomb on it and just hope to hell that nothing went wrong.

Which is why it came as no surprise to any of us that very soon afterwards things started to go wrong for us. The road became unpleasant at best with collapsed sinkholes everywhere and damaged vehicles turned into impromptu ramps.

"Of course the drawbridge is up. Why the fuck wouldn't it be?!" I snarled in irritation as I looked at the sight of the current blockage. I turned around away from the bridge as everyone else was setting up a defensive perimeter around the APC.

"Uzi!" I barked out at my purple haired teammate. "Can you use your Solver to lower the bridge?"

The heavily modified female Worker Drone clicked her tongue multiple times as began to run several calculations in her head before turning back to face me. "Yeah." She paused before continuing to speak. "Yeah I think I can do it. It'll take some time though so you'll have to watch my back."

"Make it quick will yah? That Brumak is right behind us." I simply turned my head to silently look at Dom as Uzi deployed her wings and took to the skies with the three Disassembly Drones. I turned away from him as I took a better look around the side of the bridge that we were on. There were concrete barriers just off the road at points and defensive points made from walls of sandbags.

Given the absence of any significant sign of any kind of battle being fought here. I could only assume that the soldiers here were forced to pull back when the city fell to the Locust. It must have been a somewhat chaotic and disorganised retreat seeing as how there was an ammo crate on the bridge as well as a second one just by the huge pit in the road.

Going by the size of the pit I could well image a Corpser making it by tunneling up from underground. The bridge made an awful shrieking racket as Uzi used her Solver to rip out various parts of the bridge mechanisms that held it in place. Whilst she was gutting the mechanical parts the three Disassembly Drones that were with her made sure that the bridge sections didn't come down too hard.

I don't know if it was the cacophony that the bridge was making or if the Locust were actively hunting us down but soon enough we came under a ferocious assault by Locust ground forces.

Delta Squad was quick to respond to the danger, moving into cover like the battle-hardened veterans that they were. Bullets from various firearms had already filled the air when the first bridge section was successfully lowered by my teammates. I think it had taken maybe ten minutes but I honestly couldn't really be sure.

I didn't really care all that much either as I was preoccupied with killing the bastards as they came in from everywhere. Seriously if they weren't coming up from their E-Holes then they coming out of buildings or up the ladders on either side of the bridge.

I took a quick glance behind me to see that my teammates were well over halfway done with the second section of bridge. Which was good because I could already feel the ground shake as that fucking Brumak was now closing in on us. At least I actually have the firepower to kill it, I thought as I fired off another shot from my Hellfire Bolter into the centre mass of another Drone.

The shaking got progressively worse as the Brumak drew closer. I wasn't that worried about myself but I was worried about everyone else. If we couldn't make it to the train with the targeting data then all of this would have been for nothing. I couldn't allow that to happen.

I took up position so I was diagonal from where we had turned the corner in the APC and took aim with my BFG9000. I didn't have to wait to much longer as the creature came smashing through the corner. As soon as that ugly motherfucker showed its face I fired my weapon.

The resulting Plasma explosion tore a huge hole in the Brumak that allowed its charred insides to fall out onto the road. It was gross as fuck and caused the members of Delta Squad to complain about it but it was what finally caused the Locust to break off and retreat. Good timing as it was about then that the rest of my team were finally finished in lowering the bridge.

I had dimly hoped that as we drove across the bridge that we wouldn't have anymore problems. I was thoroughly disappointed when Control came in over the radio that the Train Commander had reported a number of Locust Reavers converging on the train. They'd increased the speed that the train was going at to try and prevent capture or destruction but this meant that the time we had to get to Timgad Train Station was being significantly reduced.

I spent what little time we had before reaching Timgad Station handing out 7.62mm ammunition to everyone else. Last thing any of us needed was to run out of ammo in the middle of a firefight. As soon as Marcus announced that we had reached the station he dropped the front ramp allowing us to thunder out of the armoured vehicle.

This was it. The last step of this hellish operation was about to begin. Before long we would be on that train and ready to rip out the heart of the Locust Horde. None of us were under any illusions that it would be easy but we were prepared and fully committed to the mission. We had to be, for victory demanded nothing less from us.

Chapter Text

The train station entrance was about as clean as I expected it to be. Which was to say that it was a total fucking dump with trash, abandoned cars and a bunch of those ever-present ammunition crates. Seriously though it was like the world was almost acting on a degree of video game logic with the way we kept stumbling across ridiculous amounts of munitions containers.

Just beyond what used to be a car park were the platforms where trains would load and off load their passengers. It was completely deserted and as quiet as a tomb now. I had no doubt that we had arrived well ahead of the train but I'd rather that then having to race it to the platform. The station had two tracks going through it and seeing as how one of them still had a train carriage on it....well that told us where we had to go.

We already knew that it wouldn't be easy as we headed inside. This was proven when some Locust Drones tried to kill us with Longshot sniper rifles from a walkway that went above the car park. They thankfully missed and due to the single shot nature of the weapon meant that they needed to reload. Which V and N made sure that they never got that chance.

We didn't really have the chance to relax as the ground started to shake as E-Holes started to open all over the parking area. The Drones that came crawling out of these holes however weren't armed with the usual Hammerburst rifles but with Coalition issued Lancers instead. This obviously meant that getting into close quarters with them was an extremely dicey prospect for Delta Squad.

V however seemed to be thrilled at their change of weapon however as she landed in the middle of the parking area and swapped her hands out for chainsaws. Her gleeful laugh filled the air as she charged a pair of Drones before engaging them in a two-on-one chainsaw duel. Honestly it was quite spectacular hearing the chainsaws crashing against one another and seeing the cascading sparks at every point of contact.

I didn't rush to help her though as I knew fine well that she had it under control. Which she proved when she suddenly dived down low, swept the legs out of both her opponents and swiftly decapitated them with a swing of each arm. I saw her head snap to the closest group of Drones as they came around the corner only to be met with the sight of a burning yellow X upon V's visor as copiuous amounts of gore dripped off of her. She hissed at them as she slowly opened her mouth to allow her saliva mix with the blood that was oozing off of her head and face.

For a moment I wondered if they would flee from such carnage or if they thought that their numbers would be sufficient to bring her down. It turned out to be the latter as they bellowed a roar before charging her all together. They never reached her as a missile strike from an airborne J blasted them into chunky salsa.

Thinking of salsa made me wonder if I could get tacos or fajitas in Jacinto or if we would have to try and make them from scratch ourselves. I chastised myself for thinking about food in the middle of a firefight. There were some Wretches trying to kill us along with the Drones but honestly they were more of a nuisance than anything else.

All the while we were fighting and slowly forging ahead to the middle train platform Control kept us updated as to the status of the Tyro Pillar. It wasn't good as the garrison aboard the train were taking casualties from the repeated Reaver attacks.

What was worse was that the Train Commander had reported that the air attacks were seemingly being directed from an enormous mutated looking Reaver. It was massive and unlike anything he had ever seen before. According to his estimates it was almost five times larger than the average Reaver but was able to keep up despite its massive size.

Normally the Gears would have called in King-Raven Gunships to try and clear the skies but the number of Reavers present in addition to there being an abundance of Nemacyst meant that wasn't a viable option. So all they could do was return fire with their Lancers and the chainguns that were mounted on the train itself in an attempt to hold out as long as possible.

By this point the Pillar was about ten minutes from Timgad Station. That was the good news. The bad news was that due to the relentless Reaver attacks the train would not be stopping and we would have to board it as it passed through the station. Which wasn't going to be a very fun thing to do.

Truth be told if it wasn't for the fact that the Copper-9 Drones could fly at pretty high speeds while carrying someone then I would've probably considered this mission a lost cause. As it was I was the one who had the rotten luck of having to board the moving train on foot whilst Delta Squad would be dropped off via the Copper-9 Drones going airborne. Uzi had offered to carry me in her Solver but I had turned it down. No offence to her but Solver powers still creeped me the fuck out.

The firefight was getting intense as more and more Lancer wielding Drones seemed to come out of every building. It was honestly getting really ridiculous at this point. Thankfully though we were able to catch our breath inbetween the attacks. I reloaded my weapon even as more of them just kept coming in an attempt to kill us.

I could see from my peripheral vision that V was having an absolute blast with her going through multiple chainsaw duels in rapid succession. This had the obvious effect of coating the immediate area around her in blood, shredded organs and torn up body parts. It also resulted in her being covered in the viscera from head to toe. She was going to need a rather long shower after this.

N was doing an extremely thorough job of keeping our left flank clear by collapsing some of the nearby structures with explosives. I also saw him grapple a Drone and rips its arms off before stabbing it in the head with his tail. He threw the corpse out of his way before crossing the platform to where Delta, J, Uzi and I were holding position as we waited for the Pillar to come by.

Thankfully as the number of attackers finally dwindled and the attack faded away Control was already telling us that the train was now here. This transmission was the signal for the rest of Sabre to pick up Delta Squad and deposit them on the Tyro Pillar. Which as you could well imagine was a pretty dangerous operation. A single mistake could easily result in any number of catastrophic injuries or even death. Hell it could even result in the module that targeting data was being stored on being lost or destroyed.

As for me? Well I just ran down the platform until I finally got the opportunity to throw myself onto one of the carriages. I looked around me as I pulled myself to my feet even as a Reaver made a strafing run on me. I was on the train, and my teammates and Delta Squad were about five carriages ahead of me. No doubt that they were heading to the front to upload the data into the Lightmass Bomb.

We were almost there. Just a little bit more and we could deliver what would hopefully be a catastrophic blow to the Locust. I dodged a rocket attack from a nearby Reaver before shooting it down with my Hellfire Bolter. The Reaver dropped before violently exploding for some reason or other. Regardless I had to get to the front of the train no matter what. I reloaded my weapon even as I heard more Reavers closing in on the train from all directions. Even though they were being met with ferocious resistance from the train garrison I knew that we weren't out this yet.

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The skies far above the racing train were painted a brilliant yellow. It was a stark contrast to the black ominous clouds and the distant oily streaks from the Nemacyst. The decks in front of me were awash with blood, empty casings and dead Gears. I grimaced as I noted that the whole place was an absolute mess but I noted that there weren't any weapons, ammo or tags on any of the fallen soldiers. This told me that their comrades must have successfully fallen back into the carriages ahead after they had repelled the last wave of attacks.

I kept moving forwards even as the sky was beginning to darken under all the Nemacyst ink. If they were able to darken this section of the skies before the train could get to its destination....I shuddered as I realised that the Kryll would flood the train and kill everyone aboard it in seconds. We had to hurry this up.

I could hear the rest of Sabre Team and Delta Squad over the radio. They were slowly working their way through the train whilst doing what they could to assist the garrison with the attacking Reavers. I had already radioed ahead to let them know that they were to forge on ahead and I would try and catch up with them.

I had almost reached the entrance to the first carriage that wasn't simply a flatbed when I heard the scream of a Locust Beserker of all things. I pivoted around to see the ugly fucker leap onto the rearmost section of the train. I wasn't worried or scared of it however I was annoyed that this thing was going to delay me. I flicked a glance at the enormous bright red fuel tank before firing my Meltagun at it.

The detonation was pretty awesome and the way the flatbeds buckled and bounced as a result sent the Beserker pretty damn high into the air. Hell if the blast had been much bigger it would have probably sent it off Looney Toons style. Which would have been fucking hilarious if I was being completely honest.

I turned back before banging my fist on the sealed metal door whilst calling on the radio for someone to come let me in. Eventually the door slid open to reveal one big beefy bastard who looked grumpy as all hell. I wasn't going to judge though as for all I knew he had resting bitch face.

The Gear looked like he was in his fifties with a bald head and a mutton chop beard. He wasn't wearing sleeves with his uniform so his arms and matching skull omen tattoos were on full display. He gestured for me to come inside as he held his rifle at the ready for when more Reavers showed up.

"So, you're this Colonel Soliel that we were briefed about huh? Well at least you managed to catch the fuckin' train at least." His voice sounded as rough as he looked with a fat cigar bouncing up and down inbetween clenched teeth as he spoke.

He turned away from me as he looked at another Gear who was tending to a wounded individual on the carriage floor. "Hey, Jace! I'm gonna help the Colonel here catch up with the rest of his squad!"

I felt a minor spike of annoyance from the misgendering but ignored it as this really wasn't the time or place to discuss pronouns. Maybe later after the mission was completed but for now I'd just put up with it.

"Sure thing Barrick! I'll get this guy ready to move to another section of train.....Oh shit! Here comes another wave!" Any further conversation came to a halt as another mess of Reavers came in from both sides. I saw Jace practically throw himself on top of the wounded soldier in an attempt to shield him from harm whilst Barrick and I each took a side to defend.

Turns out that Reavers have a rear mounted machine gun which was not a fun discovery for me to make. Even as bullets started to shred holes into carriage walls I couldn't help but wonder why they weren't using rockets to derail the train altogether. It was like they knew what was on the train and wanted to capture it instead.

The noise of my Bolter was incredibly loud inside the confines of the cabin. Thankfully it didn't take very many shots to down a Reaver. I think it only took about six or seven hits to the soft vulnerable underside to kill them. Even over the noise of battle I could still hear Jace trying to save the wounded man's life as he lay bleeding from his injuries. I felt a few rounds ricochet off of my armoured shoulder plates as I downed Reaver after Reaver in rapid succession.

As soon as I had successfully killed the last Reaver on my side a barrage of missiles came streaking down and blew apart the few remaining hostiles. I heard a crackle as the radio built into my helmet came to "Boss this is J. We've cleared out a whole mess of Locust up here but it looks like a whole lot more are on their way soon, over."

"Copy that J. How's your situation going so far, over?"

"So far so good Boss. But I highly recommend that you move the wounded up here as fast as you can. The six wagons behind us are damaged from all the fighting so we're going to have to decouple them so they don't derail the train. Captain Price says you have five minutes at most. So you'd better hurry up and get a move on. J out."

Dammit, sounds like the Reavers had managed to make an absolute mess of the train. I suppose that's kinda what happens when you take an unarmoured train through a warzone. The chances of it coming out unscathed or even intact were practically zero.

"Solid copy J, we're moving now. Sabre One out."

I turned back to look at Barrick and Jace only to see the young soldier retrieve the tags from guy he'd been working so hard to save. I knew that it was the reality of war but it was still a damn shame that he didn't make it.

I cleared my head as the three of us raced along the train as fast as we could. I was glad that we didn't pass that many more dead bodies along the way. No wounded though so I could only assume that they had been moved to a more solid and secure section ahead. I wasntvsure if that was what I actually thought of it was justbwishful thinking on my part.

The noise from the wagons behind us being decoupled one by one was tremendous as they came right off the tracks and quickly piled up on top of each other. Thankfully the train had entered a tunnel so that meant that the Reavers were unable to attack us in large or in fact any real numbers.

I noted that none of them were currently trying it though so I could only assume that either they were low on numbers or that they were massing on the other side of the tunnel. I guess we were going to find out which one it was soon enough. I thanked the Gears who had been standing guard in case any Locust attempted to board the train.

Delta and the rest of Sabre Team were just ahead trying to use the tunnel catch their breaths and restock on ammunition. The instant I stepped inside that compartment V was beside me. I could only imagine how badly she and the others reeked of dirt, oil, blood and battle. I wearily assured her that I was uninjured but thoroughly exhausted after everything we had been through so far.

Not long afterwards Hoffman came in over the radio to inform us that COG air forces had successfully punched a big enough hole in the Nemacyst screen to get enough choppers through to extract the survivors and us before the train went hurtling into the Imulsion sinkhole.

Unfortunately as soon as we exited the tunnel we were attacked once more. This time however it wasn't just Reavers. Oh sure there were about six or so Reavers but right in the middle of the formation was the largest and ugliest flying abomination that I had ever seen. That thing must have been the leader of this attack and it looked like they were coming in to deal with us personally.

This massive creature had the same number of tendrils as a regular Reaver but unlike them the armour plates on what passed for its face were shaped to resemble the horn of a giant oversized rhinoceros. It was also absolutely massive easily big enough to fit an entire Reaver its mouth.

It also had a number of machine guns facing forwards which it used to spray most of the deck with bullets. The members of my team were quick to deploy their wings as shelter for Delta and the few remaining soldiers from the train garrison. I could hear Control telling Marcus over the radio that he had to upload that targeting data right now. We were damn near out of time and had to kill that son of a bitch right now.

The instant the thing stopped firing everyone else started to pour fire onto the massive creature and its Reaver escort. I think there must have been at least two dozen people on the train all returning fire together. The weight of the weaponsfire was swiftly able to tear apart the Reavers leaving that last big bastard alone.

I don't know if it was suicidal or just insane but the one piloting it decided to just stop firing and just charge the train engine instead. It seemed to completely ignore the gunfire and the wounds brought on by the onslaught as it just plowed on through.

For a moment I thought that it was actually going to slam into the train and kill us all. Amazingly enough a swarm of missiles and high-caliber gunfire tore into the flank sending it wildly off course.

My head snapped around as a trio of King-Raven Gunships appeared as they proceeded to just straight out dump all of their ammo into the monstrosity. Fucking hell that had been far too close for comfort I thought as I saw the abomination finally disappear in a spectacular display of explosions before its torn up body crashed into ground and vanished into the distance as the train sped away from it.

With the way finally clear Marcus was quick to upload the data into the Lightmass Bomb. Interestingly enough it honestly looked more like a torpedo launch system. I spied a chaingun just before the launching system and I ripped it right off of the mounting before shoving it into my inventory. I wasn't sure why I did that it wasn't like I could actually use the damn thing without heavy modifications to the trigger system.

I looked behind me as a pair of transport class King-Ravens flew in allowing the survivors to pile on into them. I sprinted over to the nearest one and took a seat right next to V as we witnessed the rather dangerous way Marcus had to get onboard the last chopper. Granted he was literally seconds away from going into the sinkhole with the train but Jesus Christ was it close.

As the train plummeted off the destroyed rail bridge and into the Imulsion below and the choppers flew as fast as they could I wondered for a few brief seconds if the explosive device had worked. If it had failed then this would have been a complete failure and a massive waste of resources.

It turned out that I had no need to worry as the entire valley below began to explode in a cataclysmic manner. The Lightmass Bomb had indeed gone off successfully. I could only watch in shock and awe as entire mountains fell apart as they sank into the earth below. It was truly an awe inspiring sight and something that I would no doubt remember for the rest of my life.

I sank back into my chair on the transport helicopter as we flew past the Timgad Valley as it continued to be torn apart from underneath the surface. Even though I was exhausted and completely worn out I couldn't help but raise a cheer with everyone else on board. I turned off my radio as the comms lit up with the cheers and gleeful cries from every Gear that witnessed the destruction.

It was finally over. The mission was completed and we could finally relax. I looked over to my beloved girlfriend as we sank into each others arms as the exhaustion finally caught up with us. I think some of the soldiers around us laughed, cheered and I could have sworn I heard a camera shutter but by that point I was past giving a shit.

I knew that without a doubt that when we got to Jacinto the Coalition government would want make an enormous spectacle. There was no doubt in my mind that we were going to end up being paraded around to be given all kinds of awards, have speeches made about us and other shit. That shit could wait though. Right now however I was slowly falling asleep in the arms of the one I loved the most and that was good enough for me.

I knew deep down that this war was almost certainly not over yet. I didn't know how I knew. But I had a strong feeling that this wouldn't be the last we had seen of the Locust Horde. It didn't matter though. Sabre Team and I would be ready for them. No matter what kind of shit that they would throw at us. We would take it and emerge victorious no matter what it took.

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Yeah I've made a sequel.
Find it on my profile.