Chapter 1: Unexpected Circumstances
Lieutenant Erik Kyle hadn't expected to have the mission take such a turn, but for better or worse, he was in the situation now.
Lt Erik and his squad of 5 SEALs had expected to go on a routine grab-and-go mission, but his mission was anything but routine. The details were a little sketchy, but it wasn't the Lieutenant's place to question. His team was sent to infiltrate and capture a HVT (High Value Target) in the middle of Afghan and bring it back to the Forward Operating Base.
He's done a ton of these types of missions, but he was still nervous, couldn't help it, if you weren't scared at least a little bit, you lost your edge. But as Team Leader it was his responsibility to check on his squad first, so he got up in the Black Hawk to check on everyone.
"You ready to go Chains?" Erik probed.
"Yeah, been aching to get back out there for forever Mansion" Chains replied. Chains was Erik's best friend and Erik was one of the sole few who was there when Petty Officer First Class Michael "Chains" Hampton got his call sign. It came from his very first mission. He was stuck in the middle of this Afghan village street behind a wall with 2 M249 SAWs beside him, his squad mates pinned down across the town buildings by 20 Taliban soldiers. So he did the only thing reasonable, he grabbed both LMGs', mounted them on the wall, and rained hell on those poor SOBs down the street. By the time his squad was out of danger and regrouped, he was out of ammo, the only thing remaining were two long, empty ammo chains.
"How about the rest of you? You all ready to kick ass, take names and regroup at the bar?" Erik asked jokingly. He got a few chuckles, some solemn nods, and 5 hardened warrior's faces looking at him.
"Our mission is simple, get in, grab the HVT, and get to the exfil point, any questions?" Erik said. One hand popped up.
"Yes Sir, what kind of defenses can we expect? And what do we know about this HVT?" Rocker asked.
"The only defenses we know of are just a science lab surrounded by walls and a few sentry towers, as for the HVT, we will know as soon as HQ receives the green light when we enter the lab"
"Two mikes to target Alpha 1 -1" The pilot told Erik.
"Roger that Kilo Actual. Everyone get locked and loaded, we're going in nice and silent"
The Black Hawks swooped in nice and low making little noise as they sped towards the lab. Erik knew that getting in would be easy, but getting out with whoever or whatever this HVT is while the whole base was on alert would be much more difficult.
"Boots hit the ground on my mark. Three. Two. One. MARK!"
Erik and his squad repelled out of the Helicopters with the ease that a lot of practice brought them. Setting up the perimeter, Erik quickly did a head count.
"… four, five, six. Alright, we're about 2 miles from the lab. Rocker, you and Blade stay on my six, I'm taking point; Shrubs, Chains, you're going to bring up the rear. Ready, move" Erik commanded. The SEALs crossed the two miles of desert with ease, until finally the lab was in sight. It was a white, sand-blasted looking building with 16 sentry turrets and brick walls surroundin square mile compound. Aside from the lab, the only other structures were crudely built barracks which many of the soldiers were heading into.
"We got here at nap time, our lucky day" Erik thought. He signaled his team to halt. Quickly surveying the area, he told the men to attach silencers to their M4s. They then slowly made their way to one of the 4 gated walls surrounding the compound, careful to not be seen by the enemy they were trying to avoid. Waiting until his back was turned, the SEALs quietly made their way inside the compound past the sentry. Very quickly and quietly, Alpha Company made their way to the lab, entering the building without making a sound. As soon as the last SEAL entered the lab, Erik's radio came to life.
"Alpha 1-1, Foxtrot Actual, how copy?"
"Good copy Foxtrot, go ahead"
"Alpha 1-1, information on the HVT in now marked as high priority. You're looking for the cargo in the blue crate, it's in the engine room, that's all you need to know Alpha, get it done. Foxtrot out"
Before Erik had anytime to ask what was in the crate, Foxtrot had radio silence. All the SEALs were linked to the same radio frequency, so they all hear HQ's instructions. Erik led the team into the larger room of the lab, only to be astonished by what he saw. The floor was mostly gone, a giant hole going down roughly 10 miles and being about 2 mile across replaced the floors would-be position.
"What the hell could have made this hole?!" Blade exclaimed.
"I don't know but it's our mission to find out" Erik said.
An elevator led from the side of the hole down about 7 miles and stopped at the edge cavern the hole led into. The SEALs slowly made their way down the elevator, anticipating an attack that never came. Finally, the Elevator stopped and let Alpha Company continue on foot. After a couple hundred feet, Alpha Company finally came to a hatch. What the hell was a hatch doing 7 miles underground!? Erik stacked up on the hatch and slowly turned the wheel on the front. He breached the door with ease, his rifle coming up to meet the faces of three Russian scientists. Of course the Russians were involved, why wouldn't they be.
Chains put them all in zip tie handcuffs and sat them against the rock wall. Erik left Shrubs to watch over these new prisoners while he inspected the little science lab set up they had just walked into. There was everything here, chemicals with all elements, test materials as well as the middle of an experiment. The rest of Alpha walked through What Alpha Company saw next stupefied every single one of them. A metallic vessel, humongous in size, stood before the SEALs. It had wings at the tail end that had broken off into the walls of the now known, artificially made cavern. There was only one gun they could see, but this gun made even the most tenacious Destroyer the Navy had to offer look like it was fitted with pop guns.
"Holy crap!"
"What the hell is that thing?"
"I don't know but we have to go in it" Erik said. He led the team down the rest of the three miles to the cavern floor into a pierced section of the hull into the ship. Erik though about how Turian it looked thinking back to his favorite series, Mass Effect. Putting games aside, Erik finally entered the ship taking a look around to view his surroundings and prepare for what may have lied next. The emergency lights were on in the ship providing a little vision to the warriors. Erik could either take a left, or a right, not knowing were either one would lead. Eventually, he chose to go left hoping it would lead to the engine room. After about 15 minutes of wandering around, they finally go to what looked like the engine room.
"Alright everyone, spread out, we're looking for a blue crate." Erik said. The engine room was massive, it dwarfed all other engine compartments. The machinery was also so sci-fi looking, lots of glowing lights, a big circular metal ball with blue lights, a soft wum wum wum sound coming from what Erik assumed would be the engine. It was all breathtaking. The floor was covered in crates covered in Russian writing, all of them neatly spaced, some of the tops open, almost like someone was in the middle of examining the contents when Alpha Company busted in.
Erik shivered with discomfort, he felt like something was watching him and his squad. The sooner he could extract this HVT, the sooner he could laugh about this crazy mission with Chains at the bar. Erik moved a few of smaller crates around hoping the Blue crate wasn't too deep in the mess. Suddenly, he heard soft footsteps, like they were coming from a far off distance.
"Let's wrap this up Alpha, we have contacts inbound" Erik commanded. He signaled Rocker to take a defensive position by the forward-most doorway, while he pulled his M4 up to his shoulder. Cautiously, he and the rest of Alpha checked a few more crates.
"I got it!" Chains exclaimed.
"Are you sure?"
"As sure as ever Mansion"
"Blade, help him out with the crate"
"Aye, aye sir"
Blade moved to assist Chains with the blue box, but quickly found that it was almost immovable.
"Sir, it won't move"
"What do you mean it won't move?!" Erik moved to assist his two squad members. Sure enough, the crate wouldn't move. Erik quickly took his rifle and broke the top of the crate revealing what was inside. There was a small grey box and three containers with a blue glow atop straw stuffing.
"Alright; Blade, Chains, you two grab the containers, I'll grab the box". Erik felt that he was running out of time, but he still wanted to find out what this ship was…
"CONTACTS! DEAD AHEAD!" Rocker shouted. All four of the soldiers turned to face the door way as Russian and Afghan troops poured through.
"Damn it, GIVE THEM HELL ALPHA!" The enemy soldiers broke into the room slowly pushing the SEALs back until finally the only choice was to retreat.
"Fall back! Rocker, let's go!" Erik commanded with the intensity and calm that battle brings him. Rocker burst out of his cover headed back to the exit to the cavern. Nearly there, his luck ran out when he was shot in the back. He collapsed on the ground after taking three near his spine, but quickly got up to move near his brothers. How had this enemy known that they were here? They hadn't been detected coming in, what had gone wrong?!
Chains took point as the four seasoned warriors sprinted down the hall to the tear in the ship's hull. Erik brought up the rear emptying two clips into the multiple soldiers that were chasing them; just barely getting into the cavern by the time the full force of the enemy came into view. The three miles leading back to the make-shift science lab that Shrubs was in was brutal, but the hundred soldiers chasing them helped provide ample energy. Chains stopped dead in his tracks as soon as they reached the lab and called out for Erik.
"Mansion! Get up here, now!"
"What is it…" Erik started to say. But he saw exactly why Chains had stopped, in the middle of the floor was Shrubs, throat slit and riddled with bullet holes.
"Damn it, grab his body, all of my team makes it home, ALL of them" Erik said with a hard voice and barely held back tears. Sure he was a hardened spec ops operator, but that didn't mean that he didn't feel every single dead under his command.
"Sir, the enemy is right on our heels!" Blade called out. Erik knew that with this many contacts there was no way all of them would make it unless someone gave the rest time to get to the exfil point. He knew what he had to do.
"We need to go, Team Leader!" Chains declared hastily.
"Chains, you're the Team Leader now, I'll stay back and fight these bastards off to buy you time, now give me one of those containers and get out of here!"
Chains gave Erik a look that gave respect, sorrow, honor and pride to his best friend. Chains knew that this was the very last time that he would see Erik, the very last goodbye.
"Don't think you can escape me that easily, when I finally hit the can, I expect to see you at the bar in heaven, cause you're gonna be paying" Chains choked out.
"I'll hold you to that Michael, now get out of here! Blade, Rocker, it was a damn honor to work with you two" Erik saluted all three of them, and they all returned the salute and went running up to one of the multiple the elevator leading to the surface. Erik set up in a nook in the side of the wall near the hatch, a perfect choke point. He hadn't expected that preparing to die had been so easy, that he felt so at peace, all he could think of was the safety of his team and how many Russians and Afghans he was going to take with him before he died. He waited patiently with his rifle at the ready.
So this was the situation he was in, stuck in a wall, waiting to be killed while his team were going up an elevator to get extracted. He didn't have a lot of time to dwell on it though, because as soon as Alpha Company started up the elevator, the enemy soldiers rushed in. Erik quickly took them down, switching to his 45° iron sights for easier targeting, and as swiftly as they would come through the door, they would be shot full of 5.56 NATO rounds.
Erik had to reload. This let the enemy had a quick advantage while he pulled out a mag from his tactical vest, but this advantage was short lived due to the deadly timing and accuracy Erik possessed. More enemies went down, but they just kept coming, some even using their fallen comrades as meat shields. Erik had to reload again, and things went virtually the same as before, small advantage, more dead enemies, and fewer bullets.
Erik was out of ammo for his M4. So he pulled out his side arm but took time to get it functioning. As soon as he was ready to fire, he looked up to find a fist flying into his face. It connected. Hard. He was knocked to the ground and then thrown out of his little hiding hole by many hands. He was viciously beaten, but not one of them had thought to take his side arm away. All of a sudden the word "остановить" was shouted out, which Erik recognized as "stop" in Russian. A man he assumed was the Commanding Officer walked towards him, lifting him up and shoving him against the wall, giving him a hard punch in the gut and then walking away.
"Do you know how many of my men you have killed just now?" the Russian asked in heavily accented English.
"Don't worry, you'll be joining them in Hell soon" Erik spitted out with as much venom he could put into his voice. His reply was a slap in the face.
"Well I only let girls get rough with me when I know them a little bit better, hehe" Erik said with a bruised and bloody smirk.
"Let's cut to the chase, where are the containers and the gray box!?" the Russian demanded
"Oh, are you talking about this?" Erik reach in his vest and pulled out the canister "Because there is no way you're going to get this" and with that he dropped the canister, and pulled out his colt M1911.
"NO, YOU HAVE NO IDEA WHAT YOU'RE DO…!" The Russian screamed too late.
And with that Erik placed on one bullet in the canister and was immediately blinded with a flash and felt an extreme chill settle into his soul.