Cyberpunk III: 2856A.D. MARS

"Win win." Jack said with satisfaction and Angel nodded when others might have given him the high five.

As the enormous fan blades stopped she saw that there was plenty of room to walk between them. The scale of the place was enormous.

Nero and Karasu approached, looking at the fan blades. With a minimum of comment the group moved on.

Angel looked up as they passed beneath the stilled blades. Her small visor light couldn't reach the ceiling of the shaft. She followed Jack, as he moved cautiously forward, all of them had weapons at the ready.

Dimly, from somewhere up ahead came the sound of the ventilators creating oxygen and spewing it into the ventilation duct that they were now creeping through. The floor was smooth and in the racing beams of their small lights, the walls shimmered darkly.

 

Something in the distance caught heed to Flints observations. Using his gun and red dot sighting he whizzed around ready to fire. Nothing.

Was it the shadows playing tricks with his mind after all he was alone.
A noise.
Movement he was certain this time. He checked his gun and dropped to a crouch covering all angles as he moved keeping his eyes trained for targets. A bead of sweat dripped from his brow. Easy does it he told himself.

Gun fire blazed at him.

“S**t.” He bellowed.

12 gun men dressed in red and black camo.

They fired at him. The shots whizzed and pinged through the air hitting the buildings surrounding. Flint rolled into a series of bins and fired. The first two dropped with clean head shots. Three more came to his left. Flint quickly reloaded and fired killing one with a shot to the neck the other two fired on full auto.

Wasting no time flint rolled again firing he shot both through the legs then fired head shots.

Seven left and all crouching on his position. Flint glanced about saw a broken door, he leapt towards it dodging the stray shots best he could he turned fired killed another. Then slamming his shoulder into the door he stumbled through quickly regaining balance he fired again killing another.

Five remained.

He moved back through the door as gun fire chattered towards him the door split with the hail he moved to a smashed window fired again killing another. He bounced back as a shot took his shoulder.

Pain flared he spun back to face the shop he’d entered. Sliding down on his back against the wall he removed the empty clip took another and slammed it in hard. He took a glance about the shop was once a butchers by the look it was probably a family business. His attention was taken again as gun shots penetrated the walls.

“Damn that was f**king close.” He called ducking down as three shots breached the wall and skimmed past his head.

He jumped up and fired again. Two head shots killed tow and a leg shot dropped one. Leaving only one real threat.

Flint now more confident he would live a while longer stormed back out the broken and shattered door blazing on full auto at the mere sight of the final attack. Both men locked in gun hail Flint became the victor as a storm of bullets hailed from his barrel disintegrated the others head in a puff of blood.

One wounded remained.

Flint hung his gun over his shoulder by its strap and took his double headed axe walked over to the wounded soldier. The man was half cybernetic his flesh melted to his face.

“Unlucky sport.” He said swinging the axe down taking the mans head clean of leaving a spray of blood covering the road as he walked away Axe in hand.

He placed the Axe on his back once more and took his back loading sub machine gun in a two handed grip again and carried on down the road deeper into the empty city.

 

Alpha

While walking around the fan Karasu made sure he was out of the way. Karasu was listening to his footsteps and the surrounding area. When he noticed something. He walked backwards and then forward once again. He walked up to the largest cavern wall and placed his hand on it.
"This side, we can cut this side easily," Karasu said, "The rock here breaks and crumbles quite easily."

 

Charlie Squad

The squad moved through the door, down the hallway, Bull at point. The lights flashed here and there, and water dripped to the ground from the leaking pipes. Bull spat some more and kept moving, happy to not see dead bodies on the wall. They came to a junction and he spoke up: "Which way now, half-pint?" He eyed the other corridors, and didn't hear a response. "Hey uber-gee-" Bull stopped when he turned around and saw that Hot Dog wasn't there. He looked at McShayne and then the lieutenant. "Where's Hot Dog?"

 

"That idiot probably stayed behind. You guys guard this hallway, and I'll go get him." says Ash as she turns and heads back into the main biulding. There he is, sitting in the middle of all of the dead cyborgs, tinkering with their computers. "Hey, uber-nerd. With the stuff you have, will you be able to listen in on the enemy comunications?"

 

"Good job back there Cyrus." Castillene complimented, keeping to the right flank of the formation. Cyrus led, but it was apparent this may have been his first experience in straight forward killfests that the SF are renowned for. He didn't blame Cyrus for his confusion or sheer newness to this type of warfare.

Nero wasn't accustomed to it either, he was usually alone. Posing as someone else such as an advisor or bodyguard, trying to smooth talk and sometimes bribe his way closer to his target, be it information or one person. He had always done well in that field, but his skills at assassination were near useless with squads of troops firing on him. It was all about stealth and cunning, scheming and betrayal to him. This was as foreign to him as the computer loving private.

He kept only a few feet behind Cyrus, trying to see down his scope, at the tunnels ahead. But they were too dark, and this breeze was giving him a chill.

 

Besides the hum of the power lines, and the light footfalls of their boots on the metal flooring, all was silent. Jack moved forward at a cautious pace, not too slow, but not exactly rushing around the bends. In the few minutes of relative silence he had some time to think and reflect somewhat. He thought of what they had already been through, and what they had yet to do. He thought about his life and the events that had brought him. But more than anything his thoughts strayed back to Angel. And besides the obvious reasons, he didn't quite know why. Yes, she was beautiful and intelligent and compassionate, but there had been other women with those qualities. What was it about her that captured him? Was it merely that they had struggled against death together? Maybe.

He rounded the next bend, and was met with a large grate.

"This looks like the entrance to our static room." The grate's mesh was too tight for him to see much of anything through it.

"Are we still getting the fuzz on this area?" He asked Angel.

 

"Well, i'm not one for formal introductions with these things, Nero declared, "Either blow up the gate, or find a way through it, we've already wasted much of our time in that firefight, so we need to cover twice as much ground as before."

He could tell that Cyrus was not paying attention to him, Nero believed he was thinking about something a little different as he followed what Cyrus was looking at. Angel. Castillene seethed.

He moved in front of Cyrus's line of sight, blocking his view of Angel. Nero wrapped one hand around the computer geeks neck, shoving him against the gate.

"I don't think I was clear enough before.. Open the damn gate private. Now! he barked.

 

Flint removed his protective helmet and wiped his brow removing the sweat beads as he did. Placing his beret atop of his head he took in his surroundings again. Surely there must be resistance cells. He thought. Then realised maybe not. Someone must have survived the from the unit. Anyone. Flint even began to wonder Midori’s fate.

He moved on down the empty streets ever looking for hostiles and towards the dome cover above. The sky still a red. Again he found himself longing to return to Earth. Again he placed the thought out of mind and carried on. The streets were long the city tall the dome high and the world seemed very lonely. Attackers right now would be of some comfort to his mind at least. It would symbolise life.

Flint would hope to see friendly’s soon though surely someone survived or even got through. The reports of this place hadn’t been exaggerated after all. The briefings taught them this would be a hard slug of a mission and they we not wrong. But the gate needed closing down and where he was alone or not he’d die trying at the very least.

 

.......No wonder this guy has probably never gotten laid. No girl would even be able to understand him. Hell, I'm been around plenty of gamers and I am one, but he is going beyond any leet speak I have ever heard before......

She grabs a part of the of one of the corpses that line the wall, and drops it ontop of the Hot Dog. "Listen uber nerd, your going to tell me in normal english, do you have anything useful. As in, can you use this stuff to intercept enemy communications or use it to help us on the mission?" says Ash, as she looks down at the incedible hAxOrs man.

 

Alpha

The team followed Cyrus, working their way as quickly as possible through blind twists and turns until they came to a metal grating.

"Are we still getting the fuzz on this area?" Cyrus asked Angel.

She held the plasma pistol in one hand and the Comm in the other, the map glowing dimly.

"Well, i'm not one for formal introductions with these things, Nero declared, "Either blow up the gate, or find a way through it, we've already wasted much of our time in that firefight, so we need to cover twice as much ground as before."

Angel opened her mouth to tell Cyrus that this was the fuzzed-out section of the map when Nero exploded in apparent anger, shoving Cyrus against the grate by the throat.

Her mouth went dry and she watched with wide eyes as Nero ground out his order.

"I don't think I was clear enough before.. Open the damn gate private. Now! he barked.

There was a short stunned silence.

"Sir," Angel said coolly to Nero, trying to drop the temperature between the two men, "this is the objective we were heading for and it is still jamming the mapping function."

She wanted to scream 'Don't hurt him!' but she stayed back out of the way and quiet. The two men would have to settle this between them.

"We...we can get it open quickly, I'm sure." She said, looking from one man to the other. Their gazes were locked and though they didn't move Angel knew that some kind of combat was occurring.

 

Ash grabs the thin nerd by the neck and holds him up into the air. "Listen. Bring along your toys and keep working on hacking into their comm system so that way you could be half way useful. Though if you ever make a sexual advance towards me or Holley again..." She pulls out one of the pistols and fires it, just below his groin. ".....I'll make you into a woman." She drops him and he falls to the floor. "Now come, and don't fall behind." Ash walks back to the others, assuming that Hot Dog is following.

 

Karasu had seen what happened. He walked over to where the action was happening. He had to be careful Nero was a hot air balloon ready to burst. Karasu grabbed Nero's hand away from Jack's neck. And put the hand beside Nero's hip. Karasu got in the middle of Jack and Nero.
"If you must I insist using my neck," Karasu said, "We are team members and I may have no control over your orders, but I don't think killing each other or even choking each other out is the best ideas in a situation like this."
Karasu looked at Nero in the eye, but he didn't look at him aggressively. His eyes were full of submission.

 

Now, I *have* been quietly following along with the rest of the group... shooting at what I'm supposed to, and keeping an eye out for more things that need to be shot at... I even managed to avoid puking at both the crap-filled sewer AND the absolutely disgusting skinned bodies. I'm probably not much more than a fly on the wall as far as the rest of my group is concerned, but holy crap... could they have put me with a worse group? Between the loner Lieutenant who doesn't seem to know how to lead a group effectively, and the uber-nerd goggling over my chest every 5 minutes and spouting gibberish all the time, the only person I trust right now is Bull. And now the Lieutenant has gone back after the Nerd... or possibly his body, by now... who knows. I sidle over to where Bull is standing, still keeping an eye out for possible uglies, and jokingly mutter quietly to him "Wanna make a run for it before they get back?"

 

Ash gets back to the group, assuming that Hot Dog is behind her, and says "Come on, we're moving out. According to the intel, the gate should be further to the east. Hopefully we can get to it, without attracting too much more attention. Bull, take point, and I'll watch the rear. McShayne, please keep an eye on Hot Dog, since I doudt he can take care of himself. Oh, and if you catch him staring at your breats or making a sexual remark, just pisto whip him a couple of times. That should make him stop." The group continues its journey to the gate.

 

"Sir," Angel said calmly. "this is the objective we were heading for and it is still jamming the mapping function." Nero ignored her. Then Karasu moved in on him.

"If you must I insist using my neck," Karasu had declared sternly. He had grabbed Nero's hand and pulled it away from Cyrus's neck, who gasped at the sudden intake of air, falling to the floor and rubbing his swelled throat.

"We are team members and I may have no control over your orders, but I don't think killing each other or even choking each other out is the best ideas in a situation like this." Karasu said, apparently stepping up for his less physically capable members.

"Oh, is that so?" Nero said in his smoothest tones, a tone he only used on targets he assassinated that were close to dead. Castillene eyed Karasu, who seemed to be standing in the way of his business. For an unknown reason, Karasu didn't the look of a cold killer. It didn't change Nero's fierce behavior.

"You decide now that they are your friends? What about when you didn't want to tell them about the interrogation, were they friends then!" the sergeant snarled. He unholstered his pistol with inhuman reflexes, and aimed it square in Karasu's face.

"Step out of the way." Nero replied acidly.

 

Karasu held his position.
"I held information from them because they were my teammates," Karasu said, "I was caring for their well being I know for a fact that it is hard to remember something when you are full of energy."
Karasu kept his submissive look.
"Go ahead and shoot me," Karasu said, "But I won't let you do anything to any one of them...as I said before I may not be able to counter your orders, but I will protect everyone in this team and I will also protect you from yourself."

 

Angel ignored the tension between Karasu and Nero and bent over Jack.

"Are you all right?" she asked him quietly. He coughed a bit and nodded. She extended a hand and helped him to his feet.

"We could use the gel here, too," she said to Cyrus as though the confrontation between Karasu and Nero wasn't happening at all, "not sure what we'll find on the other side."

There was nothing she could do about Karasu and Nero but she needed someone to help her. She just hoped that both Karasu and Nero would emerge from their spat unscathed.

 

Castillene fired his pistol.

A smoky black hole embedded itself on the tunnel wall centimeters from Karasu's head. Nero leaned in, close enough that he was speaking directly into his ear.

"Try and overstep my authority again, and next time, I won't miss." he said, holstering his pistol.

Nero didn't know what was wrong with him. The chain of events that had unfolded up until now had showed that he was a weak man. Unconscious nearly a third of the time, and unable to fully lead or even protect his squadmates. Slowly the self doubt was burying itself in his head, and he feared that his anger might hurt another one of his teammates. Fatally.

He sat against the wall near the gate, his hands covering his face. Nero didn't think he could hold on to his sanity for another day.

 

Karasu watched as the man sat down and then bent down towards Jack.
"Are you all right?" Karasu asked.
Karasu only looked at Nero once out of the corner of his eye.
"Try and overstep my authority again, and next time, I won't miss." The message rung through his head. Karasu wondered if he should. Karasu then looked at Angel.
"I believe he is upset at me and I believe he is upset at Jack," Karasu said, "I think that man needs some comfort could you do it? As much as we have to look after our lives we also have to take care of our minds."

 

Angel slid a glance at Nero as she and Jack worked. Something was eating at her commanding officer but she had to open the grating before he flashed anger again. He had given them a direct order and she was a military private under his command. No matter how she might feel she wasn't his counselor and she had to keep her attention on the matter at hand.

When Karasu gave this amazing speech Angel almost dropped the tube of clear gel. She snapped out a curse word and managed to grab the tube out of the air trying not to squash it. She breathed a sigh of relief when she managed it.

"I...um..." she was blushing deeply. What was the man thinking?

"Do you know how to use this?" she asked Karasu, showing him the two tubes.

 

Karasu looked at Angel, his eyes glint. He was not on edge any more so he could relax finally.
"I believe I do," Karasu said.
Karasu stretched his hand for the tube and he looked at Angel again.
"By the way I'm sorry for earlier and I'm sorry I am making you do this, but we need each other and we need to keep our sanity here," Karasu said.
Karasu smiled at her.

 

Angel tried not to gape. She thought she had Karasu figured out, wrapped up in preconceived notions, and dismissed. Now all she could think was, er...who is THIS guy?

She shot an agonized glance at Jack, hoping that he was ok. Part of her was unwilling to leave him and didn't entirely trust Karasu with the compounds. what if he wasn't careful enough?

Then she looked back at Nero who was still sitting with his hands covering his face. Something was deeply wrong there. She wasn't sure if she could help but she would try.

Taking her pack off and leaving it with the other two so that they could do their job she hesitantly approached Nero. He didn't move. She slid down the wall and ended sitting beside him.

"Nero," she said quietly, using his first name for the first time since she had met him, "are you all right?" She let her shoulder bump his gently and her knee tap his, establishing touching without being aggressive or forward about it. She hoped.

Karasu and Jack were about twenty steps away, working carefully with the compounds.

 

"Nero," Angel quietly spoke, addressing his name instead of rank. "are you all right?"

"I don't know anymore Angel, I honestly don't know" he replied at an equal tone as the comms specialist. Nero didn't feel like himself, his usual calmness completely burnt over from the sheer envy of Jack Cyrus. He could tell now that Angel was a lost cause for him, his outburst diminished his chances, he was sure.

Castillene felt crushed, unstable and embittered. Half of him told him to talk things over with Jack, but his other half urged him to finish the job, end him now, as well as Karasu. The little pricks his brain sniggered, Are you going to let them win? it continued. He had already lost it. His thoughts raced, threatning to take over. His fist clenched but he stayed still, eyes shut tightly.

"Please, just go.." he said to Angel.

 

"Please, just go.."

Nero's voice completely lacked undertones, a sign of severe stress. His fists were knotted and the muscles in his jaw stood out like iron.

"Nero." Angel disobeyed him and stayed where she was, touching the back of one fist lightly with her fingers. "You try to carry too much alone."