(David Pov)
The three of us, Jorge, Sheila, and I, took the lead after everyone was down from the surface in the tunnel.
The tube was pitch black besides our helmet lights and a couple of weapon flashlights from the troopers behind us. Not all of them had theirs active, as not only did the ODST lights have a certain amount of charge in their batteries, but also if every light was on, then half the task force would be blinded by the constantly moving flashlights.
Bang
"Damn it, ouch," the sound of someone stubbing their foot in the dark echoed around us.
It would have been best if we could have killed the lights entirely and used night vision, but unfortunately possible. Night vision only works based on amplifying ambient light particles and invisible rays. Key word being ambient; if one were in a mine, a closed room, or say a bunker, then night vision would be effectively useless.
Some time passed, and the tunnel ended at the opening of what appeared to be a doorway for a blast door. The doorway lacked the blast door closed and instead led to an illuminated research facility.
"Lockdown didn't trigger," I said aloud as I peeked down the left corridor, and Sheila did the same with the right, and Jorge stayed focused on the center hall.
"Maybe the security forces were able to repel or are still stalling the Covenant?" Jorge offered.
Sheila shook her head, "I wish I had your optimism, Jorge."
I glance down at my TACPAD on my wrist displaying the blue prints for the level, "The main servers are on level 6, and we are on 3," I double checked the route that manifested on my blue prints thanks to my implants, "Elevator is out of the question…. Stairs are three corridors down. Fourth door on the right," the display died as I pointed ahead to the path left of the intersection.
We moved as quickly and as quietly as we could through the halls, or as fast as a platoon and a few super soldiers could.
The facility was unsettling. It appeared as if frozen in time for the most part but was…silent. Papers were strewn across the ground of the hallways with random files lying haphazardly. Random splatters of blood painted arbitrary walls and floors. In a few, I could make out handprints in the smears; the spirals of fingerprints stood out. Meanwhile, on the floors I picked up on the fact that a lot of people and… Covenant had stepped in the puddles. In fact, they were so trodden that it was impossible to tell what, and how many, had tracked through the hallway.
Strangely, we found no bodies until-
"Casualty… male, age unknown," I said as I turned the final corridor leading to the stairs and stopped.
Lying on the corridor floor was a corpse, a small pond of blood below it. The body, besides being covered in dark blood, appeared to be fine with no visible wounds. The head, however, was another case entirely.
The skull of this researcher had been effectively flattened into a bloody mess. Nothing resembling a face or even anything human could be discerned from the chunk of damaged flesh and bone fragments.
"Damn," Johnson spoke behind me. I heard a couple of gags from the rest of the ODSTs but nothing besides that. They'd all been in combat to varying degrees, and so fatal wounds like this weren't far-fetched.
I turned the corridor a bit more, clearing it, and spotted that on the wall, smeared in blood, was HELP. Even stranger, however, was that the smear seemed to lead to the bloodied hand of the corpse.
Johnson stood for a moment examining the scene beside me before finally speaking up, "This is an ONI facility." he turned to me, "I am you wouldn't happen to know what they were researching here, would you?"
I turned my head slightly for my visor to face his, but said nothing. I knew what he was implying.
I was about to move on when I paused and crouched down by the corpse. I moved my hand sharply, feeling around the clothing.
"Hold on, what are you-" Johnson began to reach out to stop me when I found what I was looking for and quickly jerked my arm.
Johnson had a hand on my forearm tightly. Only weakening it and eventually letting it go when I raised a small piece of plastic: A key card.
Without another word, I began heading to the stairs, rifle raised. 'We are still on a clock,' I reminded myself.
"Why bother with a key card when you three can apparently rip any door off of its hinges?" One of the ODSTs snickered.
Sheila loomed over him and leaned in. "Stealth mission, remember?" she remarked before moving back to my side.
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(Daisy Pov)
"Clear"
"Clear"
Since being sent from the rest of the team me and Cal had been moving through this maze of a complex as fast as we could.
David's orders were simple: get the data on level nine, then wreck anything and everything that even remotely looks important in the room, and then regroup with the main task force.
'Breaking things is my specialty,' I couldn't help but smile slightly behind my helmet.
We could faintly hear the thrum of air conditioners and various other electrical devices, but nothing else.
Neither of us paid too much attention to the state of the facility or the various scenes we moved through. 'Dead bodies aren't important, but alive ones are,' as Cal so eloquently said.
"Elevator left," Cal called out behind me, and I slapped my MA5B on my back before quickly prying it open.
I took a moment to look down the shaft, trying to approximate what floor it was on.
"That elevator is rated for holding two tons of weight," Cal said, seeing me look down.
"Huh?" I turned, confused.
Cal paused. "You don't need to worry about being too heavy for the cable," she spoke as if dumbing it down for me to understand.
The elevator doorway crunched as I tightened my grip around it. "Sheila told you to tell me that, didn't she?" I spoke through my gritted teeth.
Cal knew what she was doing. "Yes."
I let go of the frame as a chunk fell down the shaft. "When we are done with this. I am beating both of your asses. Now come on," I jumped onto the cable holding the elevator up and fast roped down it.
I clenched my hands just as I reached the top of the elevator and came to a stop with a jerk. I stepped down off the cable and moved to a service hatch leading to the inside of the cabin.
A moment later, Cal was beside me, and we were ready to drop.
I paused again; this time, both me and Cal could hear alien voices. From what I heard, it sounded like a couple of grunts in a corridor.
I glanced at Cal. "Keep it quiet," she whispered.
"Don't I always?" I scooted to the hatch and dropped before slowly lowering myself down into the elevator.
The lights flickered as I stumbled into a massacre. Bodies of a bunch of different sizes were piled in the elevator. The moment I stepped down I immediately felt the sense of stepping on what felt like a human arm. I didn't bother focusing on the details of the bodies; casualty forms could be filled out later. Instead, my eyes were on the hall leading to the elevator I stood in.
'Guess that answers where the bodies went,' I said to myself as I waded to the corner to the left of the elevator door and listened.
Then I heard it, the chattering of grunts. They were close, not far from the elevator I stood in. I looked up to Cal still on top of the elevator and held up a hand motioning to hold position.
The footsteps became clearer as I tightened my grip on my rifle, a bit eager to take some action.
Sadly, training won out, and the grunts passed by with me watching them until they disappeared. I waved for Cal to come down, and Cal stepped down while I cleared the corridor.
"I thought you would have taken out those grunts," Cal said as she patted me on the shoulder, signalling for us to move forward.
"This is supposed to be a stealth mission, and I can stop myself from shooting them instantly," I said, acting like I was offended.
Cal shrugged, "Coulda fooled me"
Before I could make another remark, I heard a sound two doors down on my side of the hall. I didn't have time to say anything, so I acted instead.
I sprinted forward, drawing my knife from the sheath on my chest piece. The door opened and slowly a Brute shuffled its way out of the undersized doorway.
The moment it did, I rammed it into the wall before hopping up and shoving my knife right down its throat before tearing the blade out through the side. The Brute made a gargling sound before collapsing against the wall as blood ran down its half-severed head.
I drew my magnum from my hip and scanned the door he came from. All I saw was a dark hall devoid of any enemies.
I holstered my pistol on my thigh mag lock and cleaned my knife before stowing it away. I turned to face Cal, pulling my rifle back out. Neither of us said anything but simply nodded, pushing forward to our objective.
…..
….
…
..
.
(3rd Pov)
While Daisy and Cal continued to move through the lower level, a retina watched them from behind.
Above on level five, the security level, a blue and purple floating alien watched silently as the Spartans moved through the facility.
The Huragok watched for a moment longer as if hesitating to fulfill its next action, but in the end, to protect the rest of its kind still in the facility, it did what it was ordered to do.
With a few taps, he activated the facility's emergency lockdown.