“Well, I would like some action,” Danny said, “so I'll be going with Bravo 3.”
“Have fun,” Zach said.
He looked up toward the other levels. Slowly, surely, all of the other companies were starting to deploy into the tunnels. It looked like they would have just enough troops to cover all of the routes leading out of this place.
That was assuming, of course, that none of the tunnels branched somewhere they couldn't see them. Or that a squad didn't get ambushed and wiped out.
“So, what do you think is down here?” Ethan asked to no one in particular after the rest of Black Wolf had dispersed.
“There has to be a base down here,” Zach said. “Something has been attacking Barghest Company inside the subway, and they have to be coming from somewhere. It's either this place or from further down the tunnel.”
“Ah. I think this place makes the most sense. Wouldn't the Eagle Creek district come under attack again from the south? I mean, I think it should have already happened by now.”
“But it hasn't,” Zach said. “Do you think that it means something?”
Ethan gave a thoughtful look, partially obscured by the darkness around them. The floodlights could only do so much.
“Well, what if the tunnel to the south is blocked off?” he suggested. “That could explain why we haven't come under attack from the south.”
“But would they really block off the path south?” Zach asked. “That makes it really tough to take some of the other districts.”
“Maybe one of these tunnels leads past the blockade?” Ethan mused.
“Well, we probably should have had Barghest explore farther south in the main tunnel,” Zach said. “Though I think Karen's concerns about being ambushed from here and cut off were very valid.”
“Yeah. Maybe. But if there was a base down here, wouldn't you think that the enemy would have attacked us by now? Why wait until we've gotten in position?”
“They could be trying to split us up into small groups,” Zach suggested. “Then they'd pick us off one by one.”
“Then we played right into their hands,” Ethan pointed out.
“We really didn't have much of a choice,” Zach replied. “The terrain makes us split up anyhow, and we know next to nothing about them. How they fight, how they act, what they ever are, everything's a mystery.”
Someone buzzed him over the radio. “Wolf Lead.”
“Wolf Lead, this is Bravo 2. We found something, and you need to see it for yourself,” Javy said.
“I'm headed down your tunnel,” Zach said. “Do you need any backup?”
“Negative, we didn't run into any resistance. But we found another meat locker.”
“Another one?” Zach asked. He had his gun in hand as he entered the tunnel, just in case.
“Yeah, only this one is a lot bigger,” Javy told him, “And there's some stuff that you might want to see in here.”
“I'm moving. I see your position on my HUD,” Zach told him. He quickened his pace.
There were a pair of guards on the door that signaled him through when he approached.
“Don't trip,” one of them said.
“Thanks for the heads up,” Zach said. He proceeded to stumble on the steps down anyhow.
“Well, that was dignified,” Javy laughed as he walked up.
“That never happened.”
“Sure. Here we are,” Javy said. “Like I said, another meat locker, and it's much bigger than the one we found before.”
Zach looked around. Like the other one, there were creatures hanging from hooks; chilus, ryches, feral dogs, and snakes. He also noticed that there were quite a few human bodies mixed in among them.
“OK, so we know we're dealing with the same things that attacked Barghest,” Zach said.
Javy nodded. “I think that it's pretty much confirmed. But there's some other stuff.”
“Hmm?”
Javy motioned for him to follow. “Just take a look at this.”
He lead Zach to a particular group of bodies hanging from the ceiling. Unlike some of the others they were still relatively intact.”
“What about them?” Zach asked.
“Look at their clothes. Do they seem familiar?”
Zach shined his light on them. They were wearing military fatigues. One of them was dressed like the NPC garrison that held the city.
“So they're not a part of the garrison, then?” Zach wondered aloud.
“That's my guess,” Javy said. “We may have another faction inside the city. But look at the others.”
He did so. Their fatigues were different from the garrison, though they looked somewhat familiar.
“Oh, no way,” Zach said as he suddenly realized what he was looking at.
He looked at their left shoulder to confirm his suspicions. Sure enough, the others had the Barghest Company emblem on their uniform.
“We may have just stumbled into the viper's nest,” Zach said.
“I know.”
His radio buzzed. Karen was on the other end of the line. “Wolf Lead.”
Her response came, but there was intense gunfire in the background, so the message came out garbled.
“Sorry, say again, Black Lead?”
Karen's voice came on, though it was very spotty. “Heavy contact. I say again, heavy contact.”
“Where?” Zach asked, but by then the message had cut out.
“We're in trouble, aren't we,” Javy stated.
“Get your guys ready to move out,” Zach ordered him. He activated his radio to contact as many of the others as he could.
CHAPTER 16
Heart of Darkness
A stalker rose in front of her, screaming an inhuman howl and swinging an axe. Nora toggled her carbine to full auto and shot it dead.
Stalkers. That what her codex had called them, after she had scanned the body of one they had already shot dead. They were humanoid, but with grey skin, almost skull-like faces and a mouth full of sharp teeth.
Thought they looked feral they weren't monsters, strictly speaking. They seemed to be organized and they used weapons; crossbows, axes, hooks, and knives. They weren't the equal of a gun, but they didn't need to be, especially when they were deployed en masse.
Another stalker charged at her. She shot it dead, but her gun clicked empty.
“Loading!” she yelled over the din.
Nora had been one of the first in line advancing down the tunnel when the stalkers had attacked. The person in front of her had been cut down by a crossbow bolt, and she had found herself at the front of the squad facing down a horde of angry mutants. Luckily, they could only attack one at a time.
“What do we do?” Simon asked over the link. “Should we withdraw?”
“No,” Nora told him. She finished reloading and brought her gun back up.
“But they've got us heavily outnumbered,” Simon replied.
“They can't use their numbers to their advantage in this tunnel. If we fall back there's a good chance this turns into a rout, and then everyone below is dead meat. We keep advancing and push them back.”
“OK,” Simon agreed, though he sounded reluctant.
“Have Lewis move up with the flamethrower,” she ordered. “Fast!”
“Roger,” Simon replied, this time with some more conviction.
Another stalker came barreling down the tunnel, swinging a massive cleaver and bellowing viciously. Nora shot it twice, but it continued to charge. She flipped the selector switch to full auto and pulled trigger. The stalker staggered but didn't fall.
“Crap!” Nora exclaimed and fired a longer burst. The stalker managed to absorb the damage without falling, but then the last bullet went into its skull. It fell like a stone.
“Switch with me,” she ordered the trooper behind her, an assault class.
Nora moved back in the tunnel a bit to catch her breath and to regroup. The attacks had caught her and the rest of the squad off guard. Now they needed to find so
me way to get out of this mess.
It wasn't just them. All of the other squads in Barghest Company had run into trouble on their level. Spectre Company had walked into an ambush and was stuck in a close quarters brawl. Squads from Redd Foxx were dueling with the enemy as well, playing a cat and mouse game through the twists and turns of the tunnels. Black Wolf hadn't ruin into any resistance, but they were too far away to provide any immediate support.
Nora could tell that her troops were rattled, and she was only doing better than them because of her experience. The enemy was ferocious and just wouldn't quit. As if to punctuate her point, another stalker charged down the tunnel and was cut down by a long burst.
“Don't waste ammo,” she said. “Simon? Where's the flamethrower?”
“It's coming,” Simon told her. “But it's bulky.”
“Then he needs to move faster,” Nora insisted. “We're going to be overrun if we don't get it up here soon.”
“OK, I'll tell Lewis to move faster,” Simon told her.
“Switch,” Nora told the trooper in front of her. She complied.
“Simon, we're going to start pushing forward through the tunnel. Hopefully we can drive them back,” Nora said through the radio. “I need to have the squad behind me. If this opens up then I'm going to need support to hold the width of the tunnel.”
“Got it,” came the reply.
The rush of stalkers had abated for a moment. Nora took the opportunity to press forward, carbine ready to fire. Right now she wished she had something with some extra kick like a shotgun or a grenade launcher. But she would have to make due with what she had on her person.
At least she wasn't going to run out of ammunition any time soon; Nora had already stripped the dead soldier in front of her of ammunition and grenades. She had a feeling that she would need every last bit of it.
Nora continued to move forward through the tunnels, meeting no more resistance. She thought that maybe they had fought off the attack for a moment, but then that imagining was shattered in one swift second. At a point where the tunnel widened slightly a pair of stalkers attacked her.
She hit the first one with a full auto shot, killing it almost instantly. Nora hit the second one, but this one wouldn't go down so easily. She had to empty her entire magazine before it died.
Nora started to reload, but then another one came charging out of the far side of the tunnel toward her. Thinking quickly, she yanked her pistol out of its holster, racked the slide and opened fire. The stalker was hit by five bullets, one in the head, and dropped. But there was no room to breathe. Another one attacked, and Nora was forced to empty the rest of her pistol magazine into it.
“Oh crap,” she said to herself when she saw what was coming next.
She could see at least five more stalkers coming down the tunnel, and both of her guns were empty. There wasn't enough room for her to throw a grenade, and her knife skills could charitably be described as abysmal. Nora was dead meat and she knew it.
“Duck!” she heard from behind her.
Nora threw herself flat, and a moment later a spear of flame shot over her head. The stalkers in the tunnel were turned into torches. They shrieked and died quickly.
She stood up and gave Lewis a look. “Took you long enough,” she said.
“Sorry.”
“Never mind. Stay up front with me. We're going to push them back some more.”
Nora tried to avoid stepping on the charred bodies as she moved forward, though it was almost impossible in the confined space. She tried not to think about what was going on beneath her feet as she walked.
“Wolf 2, Wolf 2, please respond. Wolf 2?” Karen's voice called out over the radio.
“I hear you, Black Lead,” Nora replied. She continued to advance.
“Wolf 2, we've pushed the enemy back through the tunnels. But now we've come across another area, and there's tunnels branching out from this place as well. We don't think it's completely underground either. We can see daylight.”
“Copy that, Black Lead. We're still fighting our way through the tunnels, so I can't offer much insight into that,” Nora told her.
“Understood,” Karen replied.
“I'll let you know when I... Hold on just a minute,” Nora said.
The passage ahead was expanding rapidly. Nora and Lewis moved forward, and suddenly Nora knew exactly what Karen had been talking about.
The chamber in front of them was expansive. In some ways it looked like an underground parking garage, with massive pillars holding up the heavy ceiling. But it was too worn down to truly tell. Nora also noted that it looked like it was inhabited. Small structures that looked like huts dotted the inside of the chamber. Up ahead, toward the far end of the cavern, she could see the daylight that Karen had been talking about. There was a ramp that went up to the outside world.
To the outside world? Then where the heck were they at right now? Hydra hadn't discovered this in the Eagle Creek district, and there was no way that they had missed it. The ramp and the massive hole in the ground were far too obvious to overlook.
Nora heard gunfire coming from the right. That could only mean one thing.
“Karen, I can see a ramp going up above ground. Can you see that as well?” she asked.
“Yeah, we can see it.”
“Where are you relative to the ramp?”
“It's in front and to our left a bit. Where are you?”
“We're to the left of it. I can see the ramp off to my right,” Nora told her.
“OK then, we have some progress. Get your platoon and let's take this chamber.”
“I only have a single squad with me,” Nora replied. “I'll try to rally the yellows as best as I can, but it might be a while. Or not at all, depending on what happens to the other two.”
“OK, Blue Platoon is going to keep attacking. We'll see what we can do to keep the enemy on their toes,” Karen said. “Good luck on your end.”
“Thanks, same to you.”
By now the rest of the squad was in the cavern, and not a moment too soon. A horde of stalkers were charging toward them, brandishing their weapons. Nora ducked behind a hut to avoid a crossbow bolt. She put a bullet through her attacker's head.
“If you can, aim for head shots,” Nora ordered the rest over the radio.”
“Roger,” came the reply, and the yellows started to go to work.
Nora was pleased by what little she saw. Her platoon's marksmanship had improved considerably since she had first joined them, and now they were putting their newly acquired skill to good use. Between them all they managed to take down around twenty stalkers that were charging them. Nora tossed a grenade into the mass of bodies to add even more carnage.
Maybe this was what she needed to gain more enjoyment from the game. If she could take satisfaction in teaching her troops how to fight, then maybe the magic of this world could come back to her.
“More of them,” Simon said over the radio link.
Nora looked up to see yet another horde of enemies charging right at them.
“Just how many of those things are there?” she muttered to herself.
Complaining wasn't going to do much good. She settled in and started firing off shots, aiming for the head. Nora dearly wished for her burst rifle at the moment, but it was currently in the hands of Miko, who had gone with Black Wolf Company for this mission. It would have allowed her to make far more accurate shots at a distance. On the other hand, its lack of a full auto setting probably would have gotten her killed in the tunnels.
“There's too many of them,” Simon told her.
“Keep fighting and just hang in there,” Nora ordered. She snapped off another shot.
The rush of stalkers was growing larger and larger. A bigger one joined the horde, a large brute wearing metal armor and lugging a huge hammer. One swing of it, and whoever was on the receiving end was going to get pulped.
The armor made it effectively invulnerable. Bullets clanked off its torso. No
ra took careful aim with her carbine, aimed it at the stalker's head and pulled the trigger.
Her first shot missed, but the second one hit it in the head. Whether by skill or by sheer luck, the third shot went right through the stalker's head. It was dead before it even started to fall.
But still, they were heavily outnumbered. Someone threw another grenade, scything down stalkers in the explosion. Lewis washed the area in front of them with his flamethrower, immolating a dozen more. The rest of them piled on, blazing away with anything and everything. But still, it wasn't going to be enough. There were only a dozen of them against scores, hundreds even. And no matter how heavily armed they were, they weren't going to be able to overcome odds like this.
But then something happened. The stalkers toward the rear of the horde started to turn, and then were cut down. More tried to fight but met the same fate. Nora and the squad took the opportunity to pour on more hurt. She could see troops in Barghest fatigues moving out of the tunnels now.
“Sorry we're late, Wolf 2,” Allen's voice said over the radio.
“Just in time,” Nora told him.
“We have April with us as well.”
“Good. Let's crush them.”
Within the span of a minute all of the stalkers were dead. Nora thought that was quite the impossible feat until she saw who all had fought. Allen's reinforcements didn't just consist of the rest of Yellow Platoon; there were also squads from Red Platoon, and a few teams from Redd Foxx as well. Nora found one lead by Liz and greeted her.
“Right in the knick of time,” Nora said. “I'm surprised that you guys got up here so fast.”
“Well, we were the closest ones, and we weren't engaged. So we got up here as soon as possible to provide backup,” Liz told her.
“Aw, I feel so loved,” Nora commented.
Liz smiled back. “We aim to please. Looks like you needed the backup as well. That's quite the fight that you got yourselves into.”
Nora looked over at the heaps of dead bodies. “Of all the possibilities, I was not expecting to run into a horde of axe wielding mutants. Or maybe crossbow wielding would be a much better description.”
Fang: A World at War Novel (World at War Online Book 3) Page 17
