Runners - Chapter 1
The moon stood dominant over the stars in the night sky as it looked down upon a small line of head-lights move slowly up a small dirt track in the Challis National Forest. There were five vehicles in total; all white with no markings. They chicaned in between cliffs and trees, narrowly avoiding large gullies and endless drops that could easily end their lives.
They steadily made their way up into the densely wooded, more hazardous terrain higher up in the mountain range. The vehicles made their way down a steep ravine under the watchful eyes of two camouflaged snipers sitting high above the small convoy within their little concealed den. The pair watched as the vehicles trundled down the narrow road until they stopped next to a large, rugged outcrop. One of these snipers peered down his night vision scope to see one of the passengers of the lead vehicle step out. The man quickly made three hand signals before picking his radio from his ballistic vest.
"Guardian, this is patrol group Kilo-37. Request clearance for entry to 'Home Nest', over" The soldier lowered his radio and just stood there watching the rocky outcrops around the area where the snipers had made their nest.
The one of the snipers flicked through Challis National ForestAddress:Challis National ForestAddress:Challis National ForestAddress:Challis National ForestAddress:a small notepad, looking through his night vision goggles and checking the hand signals against the patrols until he was satisfied the patrol was legit. He nodded to his comrade who pressed his transceiver as his radio sparked to life.
"Patrol Kilo-37, this is Guardian. State intentions at 'Home Nest', over" The soldier startled and dropped his radio onto the gravel below. As he scrambled, the snipers chuckled at the rare humorous occasion in their dull, regimented job.
"Guardian, we have three tier-0 assets for delivery, over" At the term 'tier-0', both soldiered smiled and pounded their fists together as the one with the radio replied "Affirmative Kilo-37, you have green light to 'Home Nest'. Will radio ahead to entrance Romeo-1. Guardian out."
The soldier climbed back into the shotgun of the lead vehicle as the driver forced the accelerator pedal to the floor. The vehicle lurched forward closely followed by its companions as they sped off at a much faster pace down the ravine. It manoeuvred down the narrow road up until the tight, confined canyon opened up to a small plateau
The road the vehicles were following lead to a small collection of metal and wooden structures to the rear of the plateau surrounded by a tall metal fence lined with barbed wire at the summit. They crossed what seemed to be a much larger dust track as they approached the enclosed compound. A large sign was attached to the fence net to the gated entrance; it read 'USCF Mount Challis'. The entrance had a small wooden hut to the left where the guards usually sat, and there was a solid, metal barrier placed firmly in the centre of the road.
A guard watched with apprehension as the collection of vehicles grow closer. Grabbing his M4 carbine, he moved towards the barrier that covered the entrance. He held his hand up to signal the vehicles to stop at the checkpoint as he walked cautiously towards the lead vehicle. He pressed the button on his flashlight and shone it into the lead vehicles windscreen. The driver squinted as the sudden light and the soldier next to him muttered something under his breath and got out of the vehicle to confront the guard. He identified the 2 chevrons on his shoulder as the rank 'Corporal'.
"What is the meaning of this Corporal" he roared. The occupants in the lead vehicle smiled and leaned back in their seats; comfortable to watch the show unfold. The corporal noticed the vertical bar on an epilate on his ballistic vest; he immediately stood to attention and saluted.
"Sorry Lieutenant, but this is a restricted compound. I need to be shown clearance for access sir" His tone was slightly nervous and his voice trembled slightly. The Captain sensed this as he moved in for the kill.
"You want clearance? Follow me, NOW" The Corporal quickly followed the officer around the back of his vehicle and opened the boot. Two soldiers in similar ballistic armour to the officer sat in the back of the vehicle with their weapons shouldered and pointing at an object under a DPM basha. He grabbed the nearest corner and threw it back to reveal a large, scaly face.
It was a Dragon!
"This is a Tier Zero Asset! This is my clearance!" He screamed "And if that gate is not opened in ten seconds, I will make you clean every toilet on base with you tooth brush. Am I understood?"
The corporal was shaking in fear of the Dragon and the Lieutenant; but mainly the Lieutenant. He looked could have fallen over from shock. He then looked back at the lieutenant who was counting up to ten on his fingers. He had forgotten about the threat up until the officer reached ten. He was in for a world of hurt.
"WHY IS THIS BLOODY BARRIER STILL CLOSED CORPORAL!" He screamed in the NCO's ear. He stumbled back and tripped over a rock imbedded in the ground. He immediately scrambled to his feet and ran as fast as he could towards the barrier. He activated the mechanism and the barrier lowered into the ground to allow the convoy to enter the base. The lieutenant re-entered his vehicle and looked back at the small troop in the back seats. They were all laughing their heads off at the Lieutenants antics.
The vehicle slowly started to roll into the base, driving in between barracks, mess halls and the motor-pool until they reached the cliff face. A large metal door cut into the rock face sat in front of the column of vehicles. It was locked in tight with heavy, steel pins and heavy metal bars locked it down tight. Anything that wasn't meant to get in, or out, had no hope. The lead flashed its head lights and two orange lights lit up in the top corners of the door. A siren wined into the night as the huge bars slowly began to retract. Slowly, the large lock in the centre of door released the opposite side and the door retracted into the wall. Once there was a small gap in the centre of the large, concrete doorway, a small group of heavily armed soldiers walked out. Armed with experimental armour and weapons, they scanned the surrounding area and the skies above for any hostile forces or spy agencies, trying to get a sneak peek at secret US arms developments. Once the door was opened fully; it revealed two modified M1A1 Abrams main battle tanks behind defensive barriers of some sort of metal and the traditional sandbag. As the final vehicle drove into the tunnel, the protective soldiers re-entered the tunnel and the heavy doors closed to leave the base quiet and peaceful once again.
In the tail humvee of the convoy, a weary and bored army section watched the dull walls of the tunnel. Captain Logan Winters gazed out of the passenger door window of his vehicle and watched the regular and regimented lights that lined the tunnel pass by as his driver, Gunnery Sergeant James Webster, had his sleepy eyes fixed on the vehicle in front. Logan broke his gaze from the repetitive scenery to look back onto the rest of his small team of Rangers. Corporal Richard Heffron sat behind his seat, deep within his own world of sleep. He twitched slightly and scratched his nose before letting his hand drop lazily to his lap. On the opposite side of the vehicle was a glum looking Private Edward 'Shifty' Powers as he watched the repetitive world slowly pass by.
"You alright back their Shifty?" The sound of Logan's voice startled Ed slightly but immediately regained awareness of his surrounds.
"Huh?" he replied sleepily; it was obvious he wasn't fully with it.
"Nice of you to re-join the land of the living Ed; How are things holding back there?" He asked. Ed took in his surrounds and peered over the back of his seat into the boot of the humvee.
"Not a lot is happening at the minute sir. Doc is asleep in the boot, I have no idea how he got back there so don't ask me; Heffron is also sleeping over there and the FNG is on the " Logan averted his gaze up to the hatch where a pair of legs dangled into the vehicle.
"How's it going up there Malarkey?" Heffron said in a loud voice, but quite enough not to disturb his sleeping comrades. Malarkey's hand popped out of nowhere and clenched his gloved hand into a fist with his thumb protruding from the top. It sat there for a few moments before it unclenched and returned to its owner.
"I'll take that as an 'I'm okay thanks'" Heffron said flatly. Logan turned around and looked onto the vehicle in front. Unlike the camouflaged humvee they were in, these spec ops guys were in plain, white SUVs and their approach on things were, … different … , and that was just a understatement. They were slightly hostile to his team when they arrived and told them nothing about the mission in hand, but only to follow their final vehicle. It was bad enough getting up in the dead of the night to do a mission, but not knowing what the mission was really got to Logan. He had never accepted a mission he didn't know anything about so he didn't put his men and friends unnecessarily in harm's way.
"What do you think of all this secrecy of this facility Sir?" James asked to gain the Lieutenants attention. Winters looked over to the weary driver and just shook his head. "Come on Logan, we've been here for 7 months now and I believe this our first time past those doors back there."
Logan rested his heavy head in his palms and sighed "I have no idea, but I defiantly don't like this place. I have that feeling that something big is going to kick off and we might be in the middle of it"
"Well we'll get out of here as soon as we can" he said confidently "Looks like we're near the end of this tunnel. Hey Shifty, wake up the other two back there"
"Roger that Gunny" Logan peered into the rear view mirror as he watched Ed raise the barrel of his M16 and start poking the sleeping Heffron in the arm as he slowly started to poke higher and high up his body until he was poking his face at a rapid pace. Heffron suddenly jerked into life as he tried to stand up, only to have his head collide with the roof of the humvee; fortunately his helmet took the brunt of the damage.
"Ouch" was the only words to escape his lips as he settled down into his seat and removed his helmet; inspecting the damage he had caused to his equipment. Heffron then turned his attention to Doc.
As his name suggests, Private First-Class George 'Doc' Moore served as the combat medic to the group and the main peacekeeper between the members when the soldiers started to get edgy and aggressive at one another. Shifty went around the business of waking him up in the same way he had done with Heffron; using his M16 as a poking stick.
Unfortunately for Shifty, Doc was awoken by the first few pokes and his sleepy face could now be seen over the top of the seats.
"Ugh, what did I miss?" he asked while rubbing the back of his head and taking in his surroundings.
"Not a lot" Heffron said cheerfully "it seems were about to enter the main complex, so you're up in time"
The humvee slowed down considerable as Webster hit the brakes. Logan rolled down his window and stuck his head to see the column was passing through another checkpoint. Soldiers wearing the same type of armor as the soldiers back up at the main gate stood behind some sort of bunker armed with what seemed to be a heavy machine-gun, but it looked different that Logan and his team were issued. Once the team of Rangers reached the checkpoint, these new soldiers regarded them as raw recruits, hostile glares and a sense of superiority emanating from the guards.
"I bet if we had the same kit, we would kick their ass from here to Mexico" growled Webster "Just because they have the fancy guns and cloths they think their better than us" He continued to mutter and curse under his breath as the team drove past some sort of buildings that had been built into the rock with random armoured vehicles and white SUV's dotted around.
"It is like a whole new base down here" Doc exclaimed "Why don't we get this new stuff?" Logan was about to answer when the vehicle broke out of the confined tunnel into a large, open space which was bathed in moon light of the night. It took a few moments for the Rangers' eyes to adjust to the new lit location, but when they did, they were amazed at the sight.
Before them was what seemed to be a very large cavern, big enough to fit the surrounding base they were used to multiple times over. At the peak of the cavern, protective energy fields covered what few holes existed in the solid rock. The energy started to rupture slightly until a CV-22 Osprey screamed through the energy in a near vertical decent. The VTOL aircraft slowed down significantly as it tilted its rotors until it started to hover above the ground. It slowly descended towards the tarmac as small hatches opened and its landing gear quickly deployed. The aircraft touched down within a yellow circle painted on the floor with a large, yellow 'H' in the centre. The engines then tilted forward and the Osprey taxied towards a line of brightly lit hangers carved into the wall where numerous CV-22 Ospreys and AH-64U Apache Longbows sat lifeless as the odd mechanics went about their business with tools in hand.
Logan once again looked skyward to see what seemed to be a control tower that stretched all around the oval shaped cavern with various activities going on through each of the different windows. Numerous platforms and buildings accompanied the control 'ring' to make the entire 'hanger' look like something out of Star Wars or Halo.
"Doesn't this look awesome?" exclaimed Doc
"Yeah" replied Malarkey. All eyes on the vehicle with the exception on Webster turned on the FNG who only just shrugged and continued to survey the cavern.
"Well there is another word we can add to his vocabulary" chucked Shifty as he took out a small notepad with a scruffy writing that read 'Malarkey's Dictionary' and a pen from a pouch on his ballistic vest and wrote the word down somewhere inside before stowing it away and turning his attention back to the surrounding surroundings, but by now, the team had left the cavern and were now heading down a different tunnel.
The line of vehicles continued to drive for another 5 minutes until the lead vehicle drove down into another side tunnel which had a large, hand painted sign which read "4th Tactical Response Unit".
As the humvee was about to turn down the tunnel, a guard wearing a white helmet and armband with the letters 'MP' written on walked out into the road signalling them to stop. He motion towards another one of these men and Webster realigned the steering wheel and drove towards the parking space alongside the next soldier.
"Sorry Sir" The military policeman stated "We've been ordered to hold you here until the rest of our guys complete their mission; then they will be able to escort you back to the blast doors. You are not to move until they get here. Am I understood?"
"Crystal clear Sergeant; we'll hold at our current position" Logan said in a dull, hard voice. The policeman saluted and carried on towards his counterpart. "Dick!" he muttered causing slight amusement from his weary team as they began to small talk to pass the time. His thoughts then turned to the actual mission, what was it all about? He pondered through his memories of the mission trying to make sense of, well, anything. He knew where his answers were, down that tunnel, but he couldn't get there. What were they doing down there?
The small convoy, minus the humvee, slowed to a halt in some kind of motor-pool before the entire task-force dismounted. They quickly grabbed their precious cargo and threw them hastily onto carts before dragging them down a corridor leading away from the vehicles. They followed a series of signs until they reached what served as a detainment centre. A line of four cells sat on the left side of the bleak corridor, giving a rustic look to the otherwise advanced facility. One by one; they opened up a door and threw one dragon inside until each one was in a different confinement cell. Locking the doors behind them, the soldiers quickly retreated back down the hallways for some much earned rest. They had done their job; whatever happened to their catch next was not their problem
A couple of hours later, one of dragons' eyes slowly cracked open to see a dark and gloomy room. The only light came from a small window in the door, casting dark shadows across the room. Fighting the pounding in its head, it sat up and slowly took in its surroundings, desperately trying to make sense of anything.
"Where am I?"