We were against the wall, and when the door opened, gunfire erupted through the door. Over a dozen guns erupted through the door, and into the dirt behind us. "Watch for grenades, Nyahdia, when you can start to give us something to work with," I said, and the gunfire continued to rip through the doorway. It did not seem to stop, and the other side of the doorway knew we were here. From now on, we would be moving through people who knew that we were here and prepared.
"Got it, sending smokes and sensors," she reported dutifully, and steady thuds sounded through the gunfire. The first sensor showed us the situation on the other side as smoke filled the room. It was a small room with large barricades and turrets. They continued to shoot, and I knew a panicked person controlled them. No computer would act like this, and I nodded.
"What do you think?" I asked, and Nyahdia chuckled through the comms.
"Only one way to deal with this, swit'hing to sti'kies," She said and turned and began to shoot into the room, and I heard the whine of a bullet hitting her armour, and she grunted over the comms.
THUD THUD THUD
The steady sound of grenades going off and sticking to something. A moment later, blasts resounded, and Nyahdia continued shooting grenades as the gunfire lessened. A few seconds later, a new sensor image came up, the walls had been blasted through, and several unmanned turrets had been destroyed. Not all of them, though. It seemed that Nyahdia missed a couple. The person on the other end began to maneuver the turrets more to outline the door to try and hit Nyahdia, and I wondered why there were no cameras out here.
Who the fuck plans bases things like this?
Then Nyahdia cursed as her armor started to get hit as she continued to fire. "Fu'k, I am hit," she cursed, and I could see that part of her leg armor had been busted. It's fine; I am just going to be slower. My armor is holding."
The next blasts seemed to take out the turret, and Meemee nodded, tossing in her drones a moment later. Then they moved, and we had eyes on, and much to our surprise, there was no more resistance. "Move with caution, Stagger out, I will take the lead," I said, pulling up my assault rifle and wishing I had brought my shotgun. I had it fixed, but I wanted to be a bit lighter this time.
I will never back down from the Arsonal trait again. I wanted to have that flexibility. The flexibility of camouflage was immense with a simple smoke grenade and a sniper rifle. I moved forward and checked my corners, and there was nothing.
Was the last defense those turrets?
The smoke started to clear, and the turrets looked wrecked. I looked around and found that this was a security checkpoint for the terrorists. I moved forward past the security point to the next door. "Meemee, door," I said.
"Moving drones," she replied. I opened the door, and her drones flew quietly through and into the next room.
I smiled as the HUD showed us the other side, which was a decontamination area. This told me something very special was here. I moved in and then I jumped, "HEY~! HEY~!" A voice sounded from somewhere, "Don't go through without decontamination!" A womans voice yelled, "Dont you fucking dare, we cannot risk contamination of the samples!" The woman roared.
I paused and looked around, and saw nothing. "Look, you somehow got here. I am a scientist working with the Green Organization. Please, decontaminate yourself. There are no more combatants here," She said. "The turrets were the last form of protection! Please, just decontaminate yourself!" She pleaded, and I looked to Nyahdia.
My mind worked rapidly, and I decided to work with her. "Then come down here and show that this isn't going to kill us by going through it yourself, and guide us inside, and we will do so," I replied through my armor speakers, and silence for several moments.
"Fine, just please, be careful," The woman said, and I looked to Nyahdia.
"You think they are buying time?" I asked.
"Hmm, what is the risk if they are?" Nyahdia asked.
"Back up," I said as we talked over comms. But we have Emma watching out for us," I continued. We can have you and Emma watch our backs and be able to break in if we need backup, and Meemee and I can deal with whatever is inside."
"Viable," Nyahdia said, and Meemee nodded.
Meemee pulled out a handgun and tossed out a few drones back the way we came. They flew out to the entrance. "I can watch both and will be recording too," Meemee said. I am good at multitasking," she said with a grin.
Is Meemee good at multitasking? That was a fucking understatement. I did not understand how she could do so much at the same damn time. How she rose from such a bad home into the woman she was now was astounding. I lucked out hard, and she fell through the cracks and landed in my hands. She was so calm, too.
My mind turned back, and I raised my gun as the door suddenly opened and a hazmat-suited woman entered. "I am the woman who talked over the intercom. Please decontaminate yourselves," she said, entering and pushing a button on her side. A wall appeared, and the door behind her closed. "Step over here, and I will go through the process with you. However, the labs contain highly dangerous biological materials; we cannot risk you walking in anything but secure, decontaminated armor.
I turned to Nyahdia, and she backed out and limped to assist Emma in watching our backs, and Meemee and I stepped forward. The woman did not even look relieved that Nyahdia was leaving. I put my assault rifle down, brought my handgun out of my suit, stepped forward, and pressed it against the woman's head. "What is happening here?" I asked, and she pressed the button, and the wall that had been there before slid down, taking us away from the world we just left.
"Who are you?" I snapped, and she turned to me as the gas filled the room.
"I am Brittney Waters, a biochemical weapon designer," she said like it was nothing at all. I design and create viruses that can be used in warfare to assist in things like knocking people out or eliminating entire populations, and you are about to enter my laboratory," she said, turning as the door suddenly opened again.
"What the fuck?" I said over comms, and I heard Nyahdia chuckle.
"Now that is an introdu'tion," Nyahdia commented.
The door opened up to a laboratory that seemed to have a bunch of equipment that I had no idea what the fuck it was. She walked around and she pointed out, "Now, do not touch what you do not understand, some of these viruses are some extremely deadly ones or ones that have been extinct for decades. Some will make you carriers and kill certain types of species," She said, "Some will make you live in excruciating pain for a decade as you slowly deteriorate and die. So please, be damn careful," She said and I gulped. I saw her put some things into a fridge and she brought us deeper.
"Where is everyone?" I asked
"They went out to kill some people or something. That front room is just the front lab, I let them use it for their small experiments. They use it for rudimentary investigative research, and the most important lab is mine with my research assistants," she said, moving through another door, and we entered another decontamination room. The gas filled again, and when the door opened, I continued to hold my gun to her head. "You know, we took over this facility, right?" I asked.
"Oh, most assuredly. When the alarm rang out, in the middle of an idea, I might add, they would have been informed. Since they are not back yet, you must have killed the outside team. Their strike force must be dead, and with you making it through those turrets, which I struggled to control, well, it was obvious what had happened. Those morons got themselves killed and I am about to be a bounty hunters dream," She said and turned to me, "All I can do is hope that you are better than the bounty hunter office and sell myself and my assistants to you and to try and convince you to keep us as loot." She said bluntly, and I looked at Meemee.
"That is a s'ary woman," Nyahdia said. I have heard of these types. They are not wrong, but it is like pi'king up a sword by the blade. It is easy to 'ut yourself if you're not 'areful," Nyahdia reported on her side, and I nodded.
"So, I am wondering, do you need a bunch of biological weapon engineers and scientists?" Brittney asked, and she pushed through a door. I saw a dozen people on the ground huddled up in biohazard suits, looking worried. To my surprise, all of them were women, it looked like, and I turned to Brittney.
"I do, but I am going to collar all of you till I trust you and for bounty's sake," I said, and Brittney nodded.
"Absolutely, I would love if you could keep everything here, though. A lot of it is of significant research usefulness.
"What are you researching?" Meemee asked.
"Oh, that, I did not want to give it to those dipshits. They had us researching something to kill the city trees, and not thinking about what that would do. I thought it was interesting at first, and not many are interested in dishonorable discharges from the military, so I got a job with the Green organization. Here I am," She said, motioning around. "It took me five days to figure out what they are, but they were so gullible that I took advantage of them. They had a massive income source, so I just used it for them. I came up with excuse after excuse," She chuckled, "The idiot who runs the place did not understand a single thing I told him. So I got away with it easily." She laughed and turned to me and she grinned, "Want to meet the moron I dupped?" She asked, "He bragged about his massive bounty, so you might get something out of taking him up to the surface," She said, and I nodded.
"First, let's get you all collared, and then we can do that," I said, and she nodded.
"This way," She motioned.
All of them followed her, and I was back to my assault rifle behind them as the Meemee took the front and had her gun to Brittney's head. When we made it to an area where they could take off their hazmat suits, which was another decontamination away, we collared a bunch of them, but we did not have enough. Brittney got one, and she smiled when I told her that she cannot willingly omit information or lie to me and will follow my orders. Then we tied up all the rest we could not collar and told the others they could not move.
What happened after was that we moved through a staggeringly large area and ended up in an office. "There is a quick route to the front from here," Brittney explained and she opened the door and I saw a flabby man with his hands bount behind his back and grunting at me and trying to scream something as he writhed in a chair and I walked up and pressed the barrel of the gun against his temple.
"You are going to shut the fuck up for the moment, not move and answer my questions, understood?" I said slowly, my voice devoid of warmth. Meemee kept her gun trained on Brittney, as I could tell she did not trust the woman.
The man nodded, and I reached forward and grabbed the panties that were in his mouth. "Now, who are you?" I asked.
"I ain't saying shit," He snapped, "You are going to regr-" I stuffed the panties back in and I turned to Brittney.
"Why panties?" I asked, and she shrugged.
"He was having sex with me when you tripped the base alarm; I used what I had around." She shrugged, "The dumbfuck thought I was being kinky till I started to access his computers."
I looked around, and I felt this was all anticlimactic. I was expecting this big push through a base, but I shrugged. "Well, are there any other surprises?" I asked.
"There are a couple of slaves in one of the labs used for cleaning and test subjects, that is about it. Other than that, the main security force was the strike force," Brittney said before asking, "Mind if I start packing up?"
I looked around, and it was my turn to shrug. I made a call, which I was surprised worked, and Ura picked up. "Is everything okay?" she asked.
I motioned for Brittney to follow me as I exited the office where the flabby man was tied up. I waited for the door to close before I replied, "I think we are about to have things hit the fan. We have major loot, so we are going to want to keep on the down low and get back to base without people knowing."
"Like what?" Ura asked.
"Biological samples, Viruses, Diseases. This time, I picked up a science staff; they will all be slaves, so we won't have to pay for them. Their research will cost money, but at least not the equipment," I told her.
Ura froze, "Fuck, this is going to be difficult, I just got the order in. It is in the dark room, and-" she paused. "I am coming down; we need to talk in person about this."
I turned to Brittney as Ura hung up "You are about to make our life difficult, fuck this up, and you are going to be in a worse position than death and you need to show me results." I told her and she smiled.
"I can start with results and show you more in the future. Please hire someone who can check my work, too. Now, let me show you the database. I am sure you are going to love it." She replied, and I sighed as all this ended up on a much different path than I thought when I entered this terrorist's base.
I could only think that maybe it was because this was the tutorial. After all, it was easier than I thought, or maybe because I was being paranoid. But I was double-checking everything about what was happening, and Nyahdia and Emma remained on watch till more people arrived. We had to get the cargo that needed to be smuggled out before we called the looters, and this was a major haul. I could not wait to see what the credit payout would be at the end of this.
--------
Sorry for the massive delay in chapters. I am still struggling with hardcore writers block. I hope to get over it sooner or later for regular releases but the story will continue when I get over it.
Again, my apologies.
Madjic