Galactic War Ch. 09

[I want to thank my Editor HeyAll for taking his time and making this chapter as presentable as he possibly could. Once again I want to thank my readers, I love you all. And I want to say I'm sorry about the way my first chapter seemed to do; few people that read it expressed inconsistent story but that was all planed. I know it's kind of full of plot holes but I was thinking about further down the line. I promise next stories that I post I'll take extra care of leaving them exposed quite freely like that. Thank you again for all your support]

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Men that saw me bald had some questions and spoke silently, but pretty much ignored my choice of using this haircut for the time being. Everybody probably knew that I had done something that I needed to shave my head, and considering I had my hair up to the point we came on the ship it wasn't hard to deduce that it had something to do with my mate.

Launching sensor drones we waited few minutes until they arrived at the Asteroid belt and start scanning it, letting Captain Battov to open a map projecting the entire solar system we were in currently. Approximately 20 men and women were inside Bridge area where I and Anna could see that there are many, many things that we did not understand. Flying a ship of this size is an achievement few can pull off.

Image was slowly coming forward, first in a pixelated form then further enhancement as more and more drones passed by and further enhanced the sensor strength. The idea is if we could find it and if we could scan the interior of the base itself. 200 tiny robotic drones were flying scanning one chunk of it at a time, careful not to be detected.

The image that we had on screen was repeatedly enhanced until I could see the base entrance with my own eyes in one of the larger rocks. At first the tiny black hole could be seen expanding as one of the robotic drones went further in, it got huge pretty quickly and we could see that there were hangar doors that were slowly closing. Outward appearance of the asteroid was not affected by the sliding door and the exterior remained the same to everyone that might have an eye on this Asteroid cluster.

The screen went black as more and more drones went in the interior and started to project a 3D image for us to see. We could see rooms forming up and down. Slowly we got images of the base as a whole. It was fairly huge, spread into 5 levels. First level had 2 huge rooms probably for storage, which I almost immediately saw, since one of the drones went and scanned the items that were in the room. Iron boxes with weapons, food, armor, and medicine.

Everything was slowly listed in front of me, below the 3D projection every one of the 5 members had a screen that I assumed had the same information as I did. Number of living organisms on the first level, or floor, was 10 including 10 inorganic, probably referring to robots. We could not get any more specific as to not be seen by the people that were there.

Second and third level had many rooms placed that I assumed were rooms for them to sleep in. We did not detect anything from those, the people were probably away for it to matter. The fourth floor had many cages here and there with 2 living organisms detected. I probably found my 2 human captives that my swabs found in the cages on board the Grunt ship. We could not enter inside the Fifth level of the base since few sensor drones that went there just went offline. I had ample information to work with and I started to devise a plan that would probably need meticulous execution.

I used the ship's voice coms to contact my team, "General Kal here I need my unit to assemble in strategy room in 5 minutes." I walked out of the bridge with one final order said to the Secondary. "You got permission to use only and ONLY hangar bay 1. Using every hangar bay would be an overkill and I want to see you learn from this. Primary I would like you to take command once we are safely back on board. In worst case scenario you can use 2 and 3 bay as well."

I went back to my office, to get my new suit I received by receiving this rank. Entering inside the room; doors to my dresser closet slowly swung open, while I undressed standing naked greeted by a giant mirror, oh the inhumanity. The armor suit was behind a glass pane that needed my palm print to open. It was fully white with big yellow shoulder pads, it was strange but pleasing to the eyes; at least from my own eyes. I was glad that there was no other eye candy to drag your attention from the person that it's inside the suit but still white was fairly flamboyant in combat. I sighed, cursing my military bosses that thought it was okay to promote oneself like this.

I removed the suit from the glass and started dressing, the 'armor' was not heavy but it served its purpose, by stopping bullets or energy fire that some of the alien species had in their arsenal. The suit was a snug fit my shoulders were pretty large for the opening so I had to shake left and right to squeeze in. I could see the armor perfectly surrounding my muscles, legs, calves, abs, biceps, shoulders I could even see the crotch area perfectly outlined. Of course a big protective cup that felt cold at first but once I accustomed to the cold feeling I could feel it was sort of metal alloy. I could not be sure.

I took my boots that came with the suit, and started carrying them towards the Grav tube.

Arriving at Strategy room I had a perfect view over my 19 team members, they all had seated around while I placed my boots down and started putting them on. As the rest of the suit they were a perfect fit. Anna already debriefed them about the layout of the rooms and position of the enemies. "At ease, men and women, as you are already aware of the layout the structure ahead is pretty massive, divided into 5 parts we can attack the crucial parts where we know what awaits. The next is the position, and teams as well as the formation we are going in. I think blitz attack would be most beneficial for breaching this compartment here."

I used the 3D map to point the first floor of the base. "If breach team agrees, this is your forte, we will use pods to break in and start a mass confusion, fire few flashbangs and noise distractors and then start securing the area."

Here Suzan of the 5 member Breach team started to nod her head and using her pen started to explain her thoughts, "I would also divide the attacks since there are 2 zones. We breach at the same time, throw as much confusion and noise and start downing targets as we see them." She was on point of what I had planned.

"One thing though, do not use lethal rounds, I want these bastards alive. We found a lot of rooms that they use for sleeping, and there are very few members in that base currently." I took a pause to rearrange my thoughts and I continued saying, "I know this is unreasonable, they do deserve death, but I want them alive. We need to confirm where others are."

"Bedrooms I was talking about are on floors 2 and 3, Fourth floor seems to be prisoner hold. We confirmed at least 2 targets that could be the targets that were missing from the ship on refuge's planet." I motioned to the map and the said areas illuminated while the rest went grey.

I had a long pause to figure if I was missing any point of entry, or was I wrong about using non-lethal rounds. Archer, a soldier I never got to know personally lifted his hand, he was waiting me to call him out,

"Yes Archer what do you need to know?"

"Sir, you said there were 5 levels. What about the fifth floor?" His question was on point, I could not find a correct answer, so I told my honest thoughts and feelings.

"About the fifth floor, there seems something inhibiting sensor drones we sent from entering and scanning the area. We haven't sent any more, the 2 we did send, we lost contact with them. So to prevent them from discovering us I recalled every sensor drone we sent." I hoped that this was enough.

"Again non-lethal rounds, 1 magazine of lethal rounds per soldier is enough in this situation. If anything goes wrong and we are expected, smoke screen the two staircases here, and here" I pointed map in the direction I was talking at this time, "and reconvene on Fourth floor of the base. Grenades and blast torches will be worn by engineers, and only them. Good luck guys and keep safe out there."

I made my way towards the 'Blast Off' site where the pods are being held. Most of my team will be blasted off towards the first floor, while I will personally be launched towards the fourth floor including Starg, Pupa and Archer. My thinking is we were probably more than enough to handle whatever is at fourth floor, Anna was left as my replacement during actual combat. Entering in one of the pods 2 people at a time, we got launched in sets of 3 at precise points we talked previously.

Acceleration hit me square in the chest when we were launched. Spending what seemed an eternity in nothingness listening to Archer's breath, as blood slowly started to drain from my face, lightheadedness was slowly creeping when my suit kicked in and slowly inflated small air pockets at crucial parts preventing me from fainting.

After a while I felt a sudden and violent jolt, if I weren't strapped in securely I would be collecting my teeth from all over the pod. I knew the initial impact was just probing the inner shell of the base and I had to wait for a secondary jolt which happened right after the initial impact.

Almost immediately my harness was sucked off my shoulders and into the seat, Door blasted open; pod was firmly stuck in the ground with its spiky front. Leaving the door safely positioned where we wanted. I exited immediately and knelt in front of the pod throwing a smoke grenade in front while I waited for Archer to get on his feet. My view was obstructed by a hole in the ceiling, slowly being closed by an iron sheet. It was operating as a door of sorts preventing vacuum of space from sucking every bit of air where we punctured holes.

I did not even blink and second pod was firmly stuck in the ground across the room. *Did we land like that?* I thought to myself. Archer came slowly after the second pod landed, and made his position on the other side of my back. The room was full with cages, first set were just in front of me, smoke screen to my left with a large opening to the center of the room. I proceeded to the first set of cages and saw that they were occupied by 2 figures. As I approached I could finally see that they were male and female. Both in separate cages, one on top of the other. I broke the lock of the first cage where the male was with my boot. I could see him inside giving me terrified gaze, filled with uncertainty; who was I, what was I here for? Man started screaming while my hand reached inside. He did not do anything when I dragged him out by his foot. Lifting his left arm as I was preparing to kneel he started shaking. The woman in her cage started screaming as well, pleading not to hurt him.

I could hardly imagine what they went thru, so on my knees with my hand I slowly calmed down the panicked man, "We're here to help," but when I did that he went ballistic and started screaming pushing and hitting my stretched out hand. On his hands and knees he crawled back into his cage grabbing at the bars with his own dear life. I watched this man acting in such a way that it broke my heart many times over.

Noticing that that the both of them could not be helped by me alone, I started noticing that a lot of the cages were clean. Probably new additions. Besides the 2 people's cages, there was one other that looked like it was occupied recently by something. I could not see any other cages as dirty so my next question was, where the person inside was taken?

A set of stairs could be seen in the corner of the room leading to the fifth level, where we could not get any readings with our sensor drones. The logical thing was to go up the stairs and search, but alone was pretty much out of the question.

"Contact!" Starg screamed into my ear while I saw him shooting at the entrance that led back down to lower levels. I saw 12 people returning fire and entering the area while shooting towards my team.

"Starg! Pupa help him, Archer stay with the captives." I issued orders while my hand immediately went on my shoulder holster to get my gun. Four bullets left my gun chamber and hit their mark, breaking a leg of one of four men that I shot at. He lied screaming unable to grab his gun anymore. The other 3 were lied down but immediately stood up and started to shoot their rifles at the Pod, the position taken by Starg and Pupa. They were safe behind it but could not safely fire their guns since they were pinned by enemy fire. Thousand worries came across my head about the current situation.

Was my team on lower levels ok? They should be, they must be.

I kept firing my gun hitting more enemy soldiers, in matter of seconds the rest were fast retreating towards the way they came leaving their unconscious brethren down to their own fate.

"Lethal rounds. Start pinning them down inside that entrance, noise and flash grenades then move in, Archer remain here. You can use lethal option whatever approaches you." I threw my noise grenade inside the tunnel, bouncing of the wall and proceeding to the left exploding with a loud eerie sound. Even 40 yards away I could feel my ears ring. I just imagine how they feel inside that tunnel.

Starg and Pupa threw flash grenades and we started to move. Our training almost immediately evident as Starg knelt on the ground, providing cover fire towards the tunnel, from people that were still shooting at us, while I and Pupa started our run towards the edge of the entrance.

Pupa was next lying down and staring down his own rifle to provide cover fire at a moment's notice, but we could see that bodies were lying down left and right. My gun was in my hands cocked and ready to go lethal round in its chamber, 4 people lied in hallway, and two of them with obvious head wounds. The other 2 were squirming on the ground grabbing the spots where they were shot. I moved in and kicked away their guns, pulling them inside the room with cages, we placed handcuffs on their arms and left them to stew in their pain and misery.

Checking the rest of the bodies I found that they all had a device on his wrist. I grabbed one of the wrists and pulled the device further towards me so I can see it better. Black material was going from the wrist into his jacket. I pulled his sleeves and saw that the device was almost up to his elbow. I noticed strange vial filled with strange viscus green fluid. I took my helmet off that rested on the side of my knees, when I tried to check it out again the liquid disappeared entirely. I was dumbfounded since I just took my eyes off for few seconds.

I checked the device for any cracks and tears. Nothing was visible and my hands could not feel the liquid had been leaking from the wrist device. Body suddenly started to shake, convulse and contort. The dead man continued to spasm while I held his wrist. His hand in my hands now obviously pulling away from me, I had to put up quite an effort to control his hand.

"Boss what's wrong?" Starg called me, "You ok?"

"I don't know something seems strange with these bodies. Check the ones inside." I felt apprehensive about this situation, the body was certainly dead with a bullet thruough its head.

The body suddenly sat up, slow and steady, movement was unbroken and it felt unnatural for a dead person. I dropped his hand immediately and pulled away few feet. His face now contorted and started a strange sound that I haven't heard in my life. Hearing the sound and looking at the sight of a dead man moving, I felt fear I've never felt before. Deep down inside my being I shook at the sight, I pointed my gun and immediately emptied an entire clip of 25 bullets inside his chest. I started to reposition towards the exit where Pupa was lying and looking astonished, I knelt beside him and was staring at the dead body not being affected by the bullets and screaming making grown men shake in their boots. The fear and tension in the air could be cut with a knife, the people on their back started yelling and screaming for some reason, Starg had his mouth opened while he stared at this site in front of him.

"What the fuck is that sound? BOSS?!" Archer was afraid, without even looking at his face I could feel the anxiety in his voice.

The distinct sound of AR1250 rifle that Starg was carrying, he emptied its clip in seconds leaving the body that stood in front of us with holes all over its torso. We expected that the already dead subject will keel over but its voice was unending, he still stood in front of us not moving an inch when we noticed movement in the other dead body. It stood silently unmoving. We all watched in horror while we could see sniveling coming from the cages.

"What the fuck is happening boss? Weren't these bodies dead a second ago?" I heard Pupa ask in a low whisper.

I could not find a correct response to give him with my words, I cursed myself for not thinking of the worst case scenario while planning this mission a magazine of lethal rounds was not enough. The view in front of me more than confirmed that we were in massive amounts of trouble.

"What are those devices on your arms?" I moved closely to one of the targets we captured, while he bled all over the floor.

"I don't know... we were just told by our boss... it will help us greatly in combat. When we encounter people... to not run and just throw ourselves in and this device will help us." He was already breathing heavy barely able to stay conscious since he had lost large amounts of blood.

Suddenly the screams died down. Turning around I saw the 2 bodies move incredibly fast towards Pupa, jumping on him before he could get up and run away. "Pupa!!!!"

Starg opened salvo of non-lethal rounds directly in one of the targets heads, while he tried to bite Pupa that was shielding himself from the sudden attacks.

"GODDAMIT! Get him out of there, Archer help out." I started shooting at the second body, which was already clawing at his armor and taking a chunk with him leaving big bloody trail. Running towards the body I already shot at, out of desperation I kicked him off of Pupa. I thought the kick would have some effect but my kick just made the attack more violent. Pupa was missing, with each grab, huge chunks of his flesh, inhuman screams starting again while smell of blood was luring them to the closest wound on his body. His stomach was ripped open and both of dead bodies started clawing at it taking more and more chunks of flesh, now blood gushing from the soldier on the ground, Pupa's screams breaking our advances to help him, leaving us frozen out of shock and fear.

Starg took one of the cages and smacked them both leaving their arms firmly pined in Pupa's stomach. They landed few feet off of him and as fast as it happened their movement stopped. Pupa was lying on the ground, blood starting to run from his mouth while his stomach was still releasing streams of it down on the ground. He had a desperate eyes, he wanted to live. I started to move seeing his face in pain, confusion and terror.

"Secure those bodies Starg, Grab another cage and lock them up. Archer, break radio silence, contact the rest of the team debrief them on what has happened. Tell them to hack off anyone's bracelet if they have it, with their arm if they have to. Tell Taryn to get over here ASAP." I was on my knees pressing on his wound while the hands of the attackers were still firmly clamped inside.

Both Starg and Archer followed my orders, Starg ripping the arms of the second body with his own bare hands. Placing the both of them in the cage after that just to be safe. The smell of blood was overwhelming, as it was the face of someone I knew on his back coughing and gasping for air. Grabbing my arm with his shaking one, he tried to vocalize something but due to the amount of blood in his throat was unable to. He was crying, a moment later I saw someone running fast from the corridor with bunch of people behind them. It was Taryn, followed by Anna and Valentina. Both of them had pale faces when they saw me buried wrist deep into Pupa's blood with another set of arms right above mine.