Chapter 7: Old Hatreds
Friday, 10th March – 00:09
Temple of the Visitors
The normally dim lights were now also constantly flickering, signaling that the building's emergency power supply was about to fail.
As if this place couldn't get any creepier already Gaston thought. Truly, the temple was an odd and unnerving sight to outsiders. The ceiling, the floor and the walls were composed of one and the same kind of polished marble that reflected the lights over and over again, with the resulting impression making it seems as if one was suspended in the middle of an endless void. The blood-red carpet on the floor and a narrow strip of textile wallpaper of the same shade on the walls were the only things that looked material in this strange building.
A few moments later Gaston realized that this was exactly the point. The temple was built to project a likeness of outer space – the cold, dark space where the Cult kept searching for its alien masters.
"Yakubik, got anything on scanner?" Homburger looked behind the receptionist's desk. Judging by his lack of reaction, there was nobody there.
"Lots of interference, sir, I still wonder how come the whole place did not just collapse. The screen is just white and hell if I know if it's debris or survivors."
"They still know their shit when it comes to building a nigh impregnable fortress." Homburger remarked.
"The scanner being as useless as ever is not a surprise either." Sata chuckled.
"So where to now, sir?" Gaston asked.
"I think both these doors lead to the same place." Homburger pointed at the two sets of automatic doors in the wall opposite to the entrance. "Probably some kind of sermon hall. If there's a first line of defense, I'd mount it there."
He approached one of the doors. When it failed to open, he waved his hand in front of it. "Hm, looks like the motion sensors are dead. Yakubik, see if you can find the manual switch."
"Already done." Yakubik opened a small, barely noticeable panel on the wall next to the side of the door. A suitable precaution for just such an occasion.
"Alright. Yamanaka, get to that switch. Stack up on the side of the door. Yakubik, you're first in. Gautier second. On my mark… three… two… one… go!"
Sata flipped the manual switch, causing the doors to open instantly.
"Woah shit!" Gaston stumbled as something large and loud flew right through the open doorway. A teeth-rattling explosion that followed a split second later confirmed Gaston's guess that the object in question was a missile.
Ultimately he was forced to silence the analytical side of his mind for now as he charged inside after Yuri.
He immediately saw the cultists taking cover behind rows of plastic pews. Unfortunately for them, the pews provided poor cover. A blood-curling scream quickly turned into a gargle as the unlucky missile launcher operator's chest was perforated by Yuri's rifle.
The remaining cultists were momentarily distracted by the sight of their comrade crashing through two rows of pews, and Gaston used the distraction to take cover behind a large pillar some distance away from the door. Yuri joined him in a second.
The cultists were not easily broken and Gaston's heart skipped a beat as a hail of bullets bore deep into the column he was hiding behind.
"I'm going in."
The gunfire was rather abruptly cut short by the bark of Homburger's autocannon. The sheer devastation unleashed by the weapon designed to disable armored vehicles could easily put the preceding part of the firefight to shame. At least two enemies dropped down dead immediately.
"Gautier, Yakubik – runners!"
The cultists finally realized their mistake and made an effort to dash for the columns similar to the one Gaston and Yuri were behind. Two or three of them, quite different from the others in the sense that they wore military light body armor and full helmets, attempted to take Homburger down.
The corporal – a man of significant size – did not even flinch as the first few bullets bounced off his armor, instead directing the flow of destruction in his hands at the upstarts. A few loud and very nasty-sounding cracks could be heard in a rapid succession even through all the gunfire as the cultist's ballistic vest simply shattered into pieces, with his torso exploding into a cloud of bloody vapor mere moments later. Another guard slowly fell flat on his stomach, with the small hole in his forehead still sizzling. The last adversary was unceremoniously cut down by Yuri, who chose the right moment to emerge from cover.
That still left the five lesser cultists. The sight of an armored juggernaut shrugging off their gunfire and dispensing twice as much in return was too much for them to bear, and panic quickly set in. Rather than stay in cover, they attempted to run to the other exit from the hall.
Needless to say, there were promptly shot in the back, with the last of them being quite literally smashed into a wall by Gaston's burst. The rookie shuddered in disgust as he watched the cultist slowly slide down the wall, leaving a large bloody trail on it.
"Clear!"
"Squads Bravo, Delta, Charlie – Alpha has alie… enemy contact. First floor, eleven tangos. All down."
"This is Delta One. Hold position, Alpha, reinforcements inbound."
Gaston looked around. The room they were in was once a sermon hall… until X-COM came around, that is. If what he heard about the raid's objective was right, then the building would be a smoking ruin by the time they left.
"They had some impressive firepower." He saw Yuri pick up a large, revolver-styled handgun. After stressing his memory for a bit, he recognized it as Megapol PA-22 plasma gun – an expensive, deadly and extremely rare weapon that was produced on a very small scale, mostly for private collections. The fact that it was practically banned for the grievous and almost always lethal injuries it could cause did not help its production run at all.
The same could not be said about its actual usage. Generally, every militia, army unit or PMC worth a damn could not possibly care less about NWC regulations.
X-COM always followed the "ends justify the means" philosophy, so Yuri obviously did not think twice before shoving the weapon into the empty holster on his thigh.
"Too bad they did not know how to use it." Gaston said. While Homburger was studying the dead body of one of the elite guards, Gaston helped himself to a missile launcher dropped by the first cultist to go down.
This technological marvel of Marsec origin was the ultimate in man-portable destruction. Miniaturization and adoption of alien blaster bomb and disruptor pulse launcher technology finally allowed Marsec to combine the versatility of a rocket-propelled grenade launcher and the potency of an anti-tank guided missile in one weapon.
"Looks like this idiot forgot to switch the guidance system on." Gaston shrugged as he slung the weapon over his back. The smart clamp system recognized the weapon in question, making sure that it would be firmly fixed on the user's back until he needed it. The cultist still had two missiles on him, so Gaston took them as well.
A loud sound of several people running made the squad train their weapons at the door they just came out of. Fortunately, it was only Delta.
"Wow, you guys did all this?" One of Zurovec's troops spoke up, Gaston's HUD immediately identifying him as Private Ernesto Achuleta.
"…why, what's the matter?" Homburger and the rest of his squad were puzzled.
"Possibly the fact that you took out a dozen tangos without taking even a scratch." Zurovec pointed out. "Nicely done."
"I just wish it was aliens instead." Yuri sighed. "This is the first time we fought other humans."
"Incorrect, Private. X-COM has a very long and bloody history. It's not exactly public knowledge, but I'd recommend spending some time in the archives after this mission. It will shed a lot of light on what we're doing here today." Buchard's voice came in. "Now move up. We've encountered some resistance upstairs. It seems that they are diverting their… remaining security forces."
Did I just hear gunfire? Gaston looked around.
"Alright then. Let's move. Yakubik, take point. Gautier, behind him." Homburger reloaded his autocannon and spun the barrels slightly. The squad finally left the hall, moving into yet another hallway, this one leading to several private rooms and an elevator at the end. Squad Delta followed them shortly.
"Check those rooms. If there's anyone hiding in there, shoot them." Homburger ordered.
"Civilians, sir?" Yuri asked.
"There are no civilians here. There aren't going to be any survivors, either." The corporal cut off angrily.
"Sir, I do not like the way you think." Apparently, Yuri wasn't going to drop the matter.
"If it bothers you so much, Yakubik, you can lodge a formal complaint after the mission. For now, follow the orders and shoot every son-of-a-bitch you see. You can blame their undoubtedly well-deserved deaths on me if it makes you feel better. Now check that goddamn room."
Yuri just sighed and approached one of the doors. When it didn't open, he simply he kicked it in, only to freeze in the doorway afterwards.
"Sweet mother of mercy."
"What? What's in there?" Gaston peered over Yuri's shoulder and immediately regretted it. A huge chunk of the concrete ceiling collapsed during the missile attack, falling right on top of the two unlucky cultists beneath it. The sigh of a crushed body with its innards spilling out was so disturbing that Gaston chose to back away immediately and focus on fighting the coming nausea.
With the corner of his eye he noticed Yuri carefully approach one of the cultists and pull a small object out of his arm.
"Psiclone. He probably didn't even notice that he died." Yuri remarked.
"Good for him." Homburger's voice was solemn for once. "Hold on to this thing. It may come in handy."
Searching the other rooms yielded a few more Psiclones.
"Wonder if these are necessary for reaching complete enlightenment?" If Sata could make that remark any more venomous, it would burn right through her faceplate, Gaston thought.
"Hm." The corporal commented. "Looks like it's mostly empty."
"It's middle of the night. Shouldn't be anyone except security left." Zurovec replied. "The only way to go now is up."
"Are you sure there's nobody below us? In the hangar?" Homburger asked.
Zurovec shook his head. "It's a complete mess down there. They must've stored enough munitions for a whole fleet in there." As if confirming his words, a violent explosion rattled the building. "See? It's still cooking off. Whoever had the bad luck to be there is vaporized, suffocated or burnt to a crisp. Take your pick."
Eventually, the troops arrived at the elevator.
"Wait, it's a grav lift? Of this size?" Gaston peered up the elevator shaft to see that the grav lift did in fact go to the top of the building. "But… that's so… wasteful."
"Yeah, this little cult has a lot more money than it can spend, it seems." Yuri added.
All of a sudden, the power cut out completely. Startled by the darkness, Gaston stumbled away from the lift just in time to hear something land with a sickening crunch right where he was standing a few seconds ago.
"Woah!" He barely regained his balance as Homburger turned on the searchlight in his helmet to reveal that the object in question was a dead cultist.
The power came back on, and the body awkwardly floated up a bit along with numerous droplets of rain from the outside, suspended in mid-air.
The agents stared at the macabre sight for a few seconds in complete silence before the power cut out yet again.
"Alright. Unless any of you are feeling suicidal today, we're taking the stairs." Homburger said.
Friday, 10th March – 00:37 (20:37 local time)
Zander Air Force Base, Cydonia, Mars
Supreme Commander Jens Steinbach sighed and cast a glance at the window. The sandstorm outside kept howling and battering on the facility's walls for days and showed no signs of relenting.
Cydonia was one of the few remaining deserts on Mars, most others having been replaced by rapidly-spreading grasslands. It was also the largest, owing to the fact that all terraforming operations within a five hundred kilometer radius of the base were strictly prohibited.
There was a reason for all this – Zander AFB was built right on top of the ruins of the alien base destroyed by X-COM strike teams in 1999. The raid was such a success that surviving Ethereal forces abandoned both the planet and the entire system faster than anyone could have expected. For years, the site was considered safe until the mysterious disappearance of an exploration ship, the UGS Patton in the orbit of the planet in 2062.
The official version was that the Patton suffered a drive failure and crashed into the planet. A huge crater occupying roughly half of what used to be Cydonia base supported that version.
X-COM and a few select others, however, knew that shortly before all contact with the Patton was lost, a massive power surge was detected at the site of the base. The absence of any debris at the site of the explosion raised a lot of questions, and during the colonization of Mars the entire Cydonia area was declared quarantined for security purposes.
Right now, however, the mystery of the Patton was the last thing on Steinbach's mind. There were far more pressing matters to attend to.
He sat back in his chair and began running the events of the past few months through his mind again. Mysterious portals on Earth – Earth of all places! Past every line of defense the NWC and X-COM had. Sure, there was Mars Fleet, but NWC would never risk leaving what essentially amounted to humanity's last stronghold unguarded even for an hour. Frontier? X-COM's terribly outnumbered navy is tied down, trying to untangle the mess of corporations, pirates and local independence movements that are constantly at each other's throats. Marsec? Asking them for aid would be asking for trouble. The second largest megacorp (first one would be Transtellar, but at least it didn't have its own private army) began flexing its political and military muscles a bit too often lately. Fortunately, they were still kept in check through means best left unknown to the general public.
Steinbach shivered as he thought about the very precarious position humanity was in. The future was not yet secure. The official figures of the casualties of the T'leth disaster were so huge that not even NWC could cover them up. Nine billion people died during the first decade after the war's end, leaving entire continents virtually uninhabited. Sadly, only the richest nations like the NAA and the Eurasian Hegemony could afford to keep their population safe through whatever means at their disposal and even then it wasn't enough. According to the latest estimates humanity was pushed back to one and a half billion mark and had only recently begun climbing up again. About half of that number was on Mars, the other half was evenly split between those stranded in the few remaining hospitable regions of Earth and those scattered among the colonies in the Frontier.
For a few especially dark years it seemed as if the Ethereals won even in defeat and that the human race was sentenced to slow, agonizing death. However, that was a thing of the past, and Steinbach had to focus on the present.
Said "present" consisted of finding something, someone to help Buchard defend a lifeless, depleted graveyard planet that was once home to humanity. In all respects Earth was a liability that should have been forgotten the moment the last human would be uplifted from its surface, but mankind was never known for being pragmatic. It was at that point that everyone, from farmer to corporate CEO fully grasped the concept of what they were leaving behind. They never realized what they had lost, until they had lost it.
And so, man left Earth… but vowed to never abandon it.
Evacuation was not an option. Surrender was not an option. Idleness was not an option.
Steinbach needed to commit more resources to the fight, and he had them right here.
"Are we gonna sit here and watch you stare at the window all day?" The booming voice returned Steinbach back to the real world.
"Colonel, your lack of respect for subordination is-" Steinbach started to reply.
"Oh spare me the lecture, you care about this crap about as much as I do." The huge man with an equally huge, fiery red beard that probably violated every X-COM regulation related to facial hair and common decency interrupted him again.
Steinbach rolled his eyes. "You're insufferable, Russell."
The man laughed out so loud that the Supreme Commander was deafened for a second. "And that's why you love me. So, whatcha got for us? It better be important."
"I'm canceling your current mission. You're not going back to the Frontier." The Commander sat back to study the reaction of Russel's team.
The colonel himself and four other attendees barely raised an eyebrow. However, the jittery, nervous-looking man with a ridiculous handlebar mustache (probably violating fewer regulations than Russell's beard but violating everyone's tender aesthetic tastes instead, Steinbach thought) quite literally dropped his jaw.
Satisfied with this minor victory, Steinbach continued. "You're being assigned to Section Commander's Buchard unit on Earth."
This time he drew a whistle of surprise from Russell. "What did we do to deserve that? Was it that bar brawl at Xanadu Station? Come on, they started it first!"
Steinbach groaned. "Yes, a team of six elite X-COM operatives came under vicious attack by twenty drunken dock workers of whom only three got away without getting any limbs broken. As much as I'd like to assign you all to some God-forsaken asteroid, I'll have to do that some other time."
"So why are we assigned to that backwater hole again? And wait, you said Buchard is in there?" Russell continued.
"The old man just won't retire already. Eighty years old and still pretending he's twenty." The mustached man interjected.
"Shut your trap, Weasel. You know well that Buchard will retire only when he's dead." The confident-looking Arab by the window said.
"Hey, up yours, Burnout, I-ow!" Weasel nearly fell off his chair, having received a smack on the back of his head from Russell, prompting a quiet chuckle from a normally indifferent Japanese man of diminutive stature sitting next to him.
"Quiet down, both of you. That means you too, Goblin." Russell turned back to Steinbach. 'Sorry about that, chief. Now, what's in there?"
Steinbach made a small dramatic pause before dropping the bomb. "A confirmed alien invasion."
This time everyone's jaws dropped, except for the tall, pale and extremely unnerving fellow by the door who seemingly never changed his facial expression at all. But even he changed his posture slightly, giving away his agitation with the news.
The only other person to notice this was a bespectacled man with a goatee (Steinbach thought not for the first time that violating facial hair regulations ran deep in the squad) who studied his squadmate with intense interest before finally saying "Well I'll be damned, you actually got Silencer's attention."
"That's definitely something that happens once in never, Hacksaw, but please stop interrupting the Commander." Russell seemingly couldn't keep his squad quiet for one minute.
"Of course sir, my apologies."
"Now then" Steinbach continued, "Buchard has already engaged the invaders several times and it is obvious that without reinforcements he won't last long."
"Who has he got there?" Russell suddenly became serious.
"Twelve agents on active duty. Mostly rookies. He lost three yesterday and his surveillance grid has been compromised due to active sabotage by Cult of Sirius."
"Shit. Scale of their presence in the city?"
"Unknown. Our estimate is at several hundred militants... minimum. Possibly something worse, they have a foothold in the city almost as large as on the entirety of Mars."
"And… it's just twelve agents. And three of them are dead already. What. The. Fuck."
"You know that we are not the Pacifier Corps, right?" Steinbach decided to cut off the colonel.
"Yeah yeah, our strength is not in numbers, heard that one before. But twelve agents? The Cult can simply throw hats at them till they're buried. And that's not even factoring in the aliens." Russell remained unamused. "Are they hidden at least?"
Steinbach nodded. "The location of the base is a secret – for now, at least."
"You know it won't stay that way for long."
"Correct. The place is a fortress and should be protected enough but… look, Mark, I'm not asking you to go there and win the war by yourself. We may be stretched thin, but we're not helpless, I will get some backup for you, I- we just need some time. You're the best we have, you were trained for this, hell, your entire team is worth more to me than that entire city. And I need you there holding Buchard's unit together until we're prepared for war. Or at least until GSC figures out a way to send a Nova bomb through those damn gates."
"You know, we do kind of realize that this isn't a penalty assignment by now." For the first time, Russell did not sound snide even if his remark was.
"Information on the aliens." The tall man, referred to earlier as Silencer had a strange way of asking questions.
"Right. They are not the Ethereals. Their science team sent some of their preliminary reports yesterday."
"Technology. Tactics. Extent of the invasion." Silencer didn't have much in the way of manners, but he was valued for a different set of skills anyway. His nickname did not leave a lot of room for interpretation as to what could that be, either.
Steinbach scanned the datapad in front of him. "We haven't got much. They seem to have mastered dimensional travel."
"Is that bad?" Weasel spoke up.
"Yes, corporal Andrews, it is bad. In layman's terms, GSC understands dimensional travel only at theoretical level – barely, I might add - and is decades away from putting that knowledge to any practical use. Our new alien friends however show unbelievable mastery of it. They even based their weaponry on it. According to the field report I got yesterday, it's… destructive, to say the least."
"Destructive, you say…" Russell flashed an evil grin, prompting alarmed looks from his entire squad, except Silencer of course.
Steinbach knew their cause for concern. Russell was originally trained as a demolitions expert, and he was good at this job – way too good sometimes. Fortunately, not even the most paranoid conspiracy theorists could make the connection between X-COM and the most famous (and utterly devastating) bombings of seemingly unrelated targets during the past two decades.
And now he was about to be set loose in a densely packed urban environment. That couldn't possibly end well.
Steinbach chose to continue speaking rather than allowing this increasingly awkward pause last any longer.
"We do not have sufficient information on their intentions and scale of their infiltration of the city. This mission is highly classified and must stay that way for as long as possible."
"From what I see," Russell said while peering into Steinbach's datapad, "these dimensional gates are hanging right there in plain sight. UFOs appear regularly and fly all over the damn city. How do you cover that up?"
"They're written off as harmless. For now. UFOs generally appear at night, when they do so during the day they are non-hostile unless provoked. Buchard's fleet shot down some a few days ago."
"Can't be all that bad then." Russell relaxed in his chair.
"They were later confirmed to be unmanned scouts." Steinbach added. "And earlier reports did in fact say that these are the smallest things to come out of these gates. The only thing that is preventing a full-blown panic is that they don't attack openly. There's just the regular panic."
"Hm, I see." Hacksaw interjected. "Citizens are abandoning the city en masse and there is no telling if they could be under alien control of some kind. While quarantining the city would require admitting that an invasion is in fact underway. Cue NWC paper-pushers shitting their pants."
"Yes, that is in fact what I mean. But enough talk. You'll receive the full version of everything we know so far. I want you to be ready to depart to Earth in four standard hours. Remember to check out the armory. I've stocked it with some top-of-the-line equipment in preparation for your arrival."
"How are we going to get there?" Weasel asked, the prospect of actual action seemingly having calmed him down somewhat.
For the first time in days, Steinbach smiled as he noticed his newest acquisition descending into one of the base's launch tubes even through the sandstorm. "Just in time… and it's something with more guns than the entirety of the Kabron Pirates."
Temple of the Visitors
The cultist took a few steps forward, each slower than the previous one, before collapsing at Homburger's feet and expiring mere moments after.
Gaston flinched as the corporal aimed his autocannon at the dead cultist's head. After a tense few moments, Homburger chose to simply kick the body away.
The two squads kept their weapons trained at every nook and cranny they could make out during the flashes of light, but so far this mortally wounded man was the only living enemy they met since the shootout in the sermon hall.
"We picked the right time to attack." Zurovec commented. "Nobody but security and the occasional janitor. Might be that we got them all already."
There was clear logic in his claims. The cult did not have much of a reason to maintain a large security force at a relatively minor temple.
Thinking along this direction, Gaston relaxed for a second, staying a bit behind the group to better examine the dead cultist, only to be interrupted by a deranged scream from one of the side rooms.
"Die, unbelievers!" was the only warning before another missile came flying their way.
"Hit the deck!" Homburger bellowed as the agents ducked for whatever little cover the bare hallways afforded.
Gaston saw the missile coming for him of all people and leaped backwards, intent on landing on his back. The trick worked, the missile initially followed him as he jumped, but then it was too late for it to change course again.
Then two things went wrong. First, Gaston realized that he still had a missile launcher on his back, and it wasn't going to make his fall easy. Second, the missile did not overshoot him like he hoped it would – it hit the ceiling instead.
Whatever unpleasant sensations he could've received from landing on a large metal tube were now amplified by the fact that the blast wave practically smashed him into the floor. Armor or not, a concussion at this range was practically guaranteed.
The world started spinning around him and for a second Gaston was afraid he might actually pass out. But even in his confused state he knew that doing it in the middle of a Temple of Sirius was a bad idea, and probably the last one he would ever have.
He heard gunfire, yet it seemed… distant?
"Alpha squad, sitrep!"
"I'm up!" Sata replied first.
"I'm up!" Yuri came in second.
"I… ugh." Gaston tried to report, but had a bit of difficulty grasping words at the moment.
"Alpha Four is down! Yakubik, drag him into… where the hell?"
"Return fire!" Zurovec's voice chimed in.
Gaston finally rolled over on his stomach, his senses coming back to him.
"What the shit, where's Gautier? Gautier? Rookie? Where the hell are you?"
"I'm a… I'm…" Gaston started to reply as he noticed a pair of green boots next to him. "Oh shit…"
"He's on the other side of that pile, we can't reach him!" Yuri said with alarm in his voice.
Pile? What pile? Gaston thought as one of the boots in front of him kicked his rifle away.
"Bitch!" was the only coherent response the agent mustered as he simply reached forward, grabbed the offender's ankle with his left hand and pulled it.
Not expecting this from a dazed and downed trooper, the cultist fell on his back. Gaston quickly seized his knee with his other hand and yanked the ankle upwards, grinning as a snap followed by a scream could be heard.
Convinced that the cultist was too preoccupied with his newly-broken leg, Gaston crawled over to his rifle. The dizziness had almost faded by now, and after a few failed attempts he managed to finally stand up.
The cultists tried to reach for his own weapon, which he dropped during Gaston's sudden counterattack. A single shot to the head put an end to that. After scanning the area and seeing no more immediate threats in his vicinity, Gaston finally remembered what the frantic chatter in the background was about.
"Corporal, I'm up, had to fight off a tango here… what the…" Gaston turned around to where Homburger was last seen, but the explosion evidently caused the ceiling to collapse, forming an impenetrable pile of rubble between him and the rest of the squad. "Corporal, I'm separated from the rest of you."
"Damn it." Homburger made every effort to remain calm. "Quickly, use the other staircase. Go up as far as you can, you'll run into Bravo and Charlie eventually."
"Sir, the scanner is picking something up on his side…" Yuri said.
"Ah, shit, they know you're there! Move it, Gautier! Come on, go!"
He didn't have to say it twice, as Gaston was already bolting for the stairs.
As much as the rookie hated to admit it, he was scared more than ever. He was separated from the rest of his squad, and he had no idea where he was going. Not to mention the constantly flashing lights that wreaked havoc upon his night vision, forcing him to either give away his position with the searchlight or stumble around in the darkness.
"You will not lay your hands upon the prelate, unbeliever!" The cultist's religious drivel gave Gaston the warning he needed to take cover in time to avoid the incoming gunfire.
"Brothers, I have him cornered! Fire!" the cultist kept ranting at the top of his lungs, and not for the first time Gaston felt grateful to his drill instructors for helping him develop his selective hearing skills. This in turn allowed him to separate the actually useful bits of information from the mind-numbing stream of zealous rants that came from the cultists' direction.
Safe in cover, the agent attempted to concentrate on figuring out how many adversaries was he up against. A few careful peeks later he placed their number at about nine. Way more than he could handle. Even with his armor and superior training he was outnumbered and outgunned to the point where cultists could keep him pinned constantly while they advanced to his cover.
"Our brothers come to our assistance! Let us finish off the unbeliever!"
And they still had reinforcements? How much security did this building have, anyway?
Gaston had to think quickly. The only wait of here was past the cultists. They were bound to get reinforcements soon and then he'd simply be swarmed. So he had to get past them…
An answer presented itself rather quickly as he reached for the missile launcher on his back. All he needed now was the right moment.
Finally, a lull in the enemy gunfire appeared as the cultists paused to reload and creep forward to Gaston's position.
The agent stepped out, steeled himself in front of the many, many weapons that were aimed at him, locked on to the target closest to the middle… and pulled the trigger.
It felt glorious when the missile left the launcher with a resounding "whoosh". The enemy didn't have X-COM's reaction times, so the unlucky target could only stand and watch as the missile blew him to gory, flaming bits. The rest managed to avoid most of the blast, but even they were stunned momentarily.
Using this momentary distraction, Gaston let loose his second surprise – an armed smoke grenade that detonated as it touched the floor. As soon as the smoke covered the entire corridor, Gaston sprinted forward, ignoring the sporadic gunfire. He bumped into – or rather violently crashed into someone, considering his armor and all – on his way out.
"The unbeliever is getting away, brothers! Avenge our own!" The cultist clearly needed to pick up a few lessons in effective communication, Gaston thought as the smoke in front of him began to clear. Now that he was sure he wasn't going to bump into someone again, he started reloading the launcher – fortunately, the process was easy enough to go through with even while running.
"Contact! Open up!" The unusually concise manner of relaying orders led Gaston to realize that the new arrivals from one of the side corridors were the Cult's more experienced troops.
The rookie made one final dash for the doorway in front of him, already formulating a plan on how to throw off his pursuers. His heart sank when he heard shots behind him. A few bullets chipped the marble around him, a few more bounced off his armor.
Just as he crossed behind the wall, one lucky shot managed to penetrate the plating and lodge itself in his left shoulder.
"Merde!" Gaston gasped in his native French as the force of impact nearly threw him off his feet, making him drop his missile launcher. It would take him a few moments to actually feel the pain, and he used those to reach for the manual controls and shut the door in front of him.
Normally the cultists would just reopen the door from their side, but Gaston staggered away from it and let loose his second and final missile. The explosion did not cause much destruction, but undoubtedly jammed the door.
Breathing heavily, Gaston collapsed with his back against the wall and activated the medi-kit. After a few moments, the pain subsided, replaced by a numbness in his left arm. He would need to visit the medical bay once back home, but for now he was out of danger.
"Alpha squad, reporting all clear. Proceeding to rendezvous point. We'll have to take a detour."
"Roger that, Alpha. We're currently holding position near the prelate's chambers, they just stopped coming. Are you guys ok there? We got pinned here but we can push forward to you."
"We lost Alpha Four, Delta Three is injured, but otherwise we're fine."
Gaston decided to cut in. "This is Alpha Four. I had about fifteen cultists in pursuit, but I think I lost them. Took one in the shoulder, but I'm okay. Coming up to rendezvous with Bravo."
"Gautier? You're alive? Oh thank fucking God." Homburger did not even attempt to hide his relief. "Where are the hostiles now?"
"I'm not sure, sir. I jammed the door behind me and…" Gaston looked at the massive, engraved doors in the distance. "I think I'm at the… prelate's chambers, was it?"
"Right." Zurovec's voice appeared. "They are going to take the long way to the chambers. We and Alpha can hit them in the back."
Gaston watched with interest as Zurovec's hastily drawn plan appeared on his HUD. Then another set of red crosses appeared as Krause spoke up.
"We'll meet them up front. They'll be caught between us so we can cut them down in a matter of seconds."
"Alpha Four, stay put. Or rather, find cover and then stay put." Homburger's final order came in.
Find cover? Where? Gaston mused, as the corridor was pretty much bare, except for the doors to the prelate's chambers.
Left with no other choice, Gaston first slung the empty missile launcher on his back, before reaching for his rifle. Armed and ready to face the enemy once again, he slowly approached the doors. The audio sensors in his helmet picked up some sort of conversation behind it.
"…last time I'm telling you, Felker, we can't send any help. Pray for deliverance and know that your death will not be in vain. X-COM will not get away with this."
"But, my lady, these unbelievers, they are trampling upon our holy ground, desecrating our…"
"I don't know what they're after, but they're not going to find it in your temple. You know what you must do. Do not fail the Benefactors, Felker."
"I… I understand, my lady. They will not take me alive."
Oh yes we will Gaston thought as he barged inside the chambers without considering the consequences.
Fortunately for him, inside was only a middle-aged, short man dressed in flowing white robes who was reaching for a lawpistol on his desk.
Without second thought, Gaston shot him in the arm, wishing he had brought his stun grapple along for this one.
Howling in pain, the man recoiled away from the desk, before losing his footing and collapsing.
"Nice shot, puppet." Gaston looked around, looking for the source of the voice, before realizing that it was coming from a large screen mounted on the wall behind the desk.
The screen in turn depicted a rather attractive young woman. Only a few wrinkles by the eyes betrayed the fact that she was a lot older than she looked.
The woman brushed aside a strand of blond hair before continuing. "Once again, X-COM proudly steps in to wreak havoc for its own, mostly idiotic reasons. Congratulations. You have wrecked a temple, murdered dozens of devoted worshippers and will likely loot everything that isn't nailed down to the floor. So much for stalwart defenders of humanity. What have you got to say about that, eh, puppet?"
"If you're going to spout your pseudo-religious nonsense, Kate, you could at least have some decency to pick on someone your own size. Although few will match the size of your lying tongue." Another new voice, heavily distorted by a vocoder, came in. Gaston turned around, aiming his rifle at the arrival – who turned out to be the X-COM agent replacing Eric Seidler in Bravo squad. What was more peculiar is that Gaston's HUD identified him only by his callsign – "Neptune".
"And who the hell are you supposed to be, grunt?" The woman replied, visibly irritated.
The agent simply laughed as he lifted his faceplate.
"Your worst nightmare, Kate." Armand Buchard said. "It's been a while since I had fun with your lot."
"Ah. The famous Command Buchard." The woman continued in an impassive voice, although her face was red with anger. "Came to abduct more little girls?"
Buchard only grinned. "That little girl has a bigger body count than me, honey. I couldn't possibly let her best the old man. This is not why I'm here, though."
The blonde scoffed. "Typical X-COM. Twisting other people for your own desires."
"You should worship us for that, considering how often your alien friends do it." The commander retorted.
"We won't let this slide, murderer. We got powerful friends. We got Reis. We got-"
"Shut the hell up already, Thryn. Your drivel did not impress me in the slightest in the thirties, you cannot possibly fathom how much fuck I do not give about it now. Point is, for every attack on my men like what you did near Bakunin Block I will level another one of your nests."
"You want to intimidate us, you old freak? You have no idea who you're messing with." The cultist laughed.
"Quite the contrary, I'm the only one who knows what it takes to stop you. And you can be damn sure that I will repeat the lesson. Time and time again."
"What makes you think you can get away with bombing buildings in the middle of the city? This will be all over the headlines tomorrow." The woman calmed down a bit, her voice becoming snide.
Buchard smiled as he crossed his arms. "My men are already setting the demo charges. In an hour this place will be a huge pile of rubble. And the only thing Megapol will find will be this." He produced a small pendant from his belt pouch, shaped like a red capital letter "I" with two silver skulls on its sides. "We were never gone, you know."
"You motherf-" The previous outbursts were benign compared to the expression of rage Thryn adopted at the sight of the pendant.
Buchard was obviously satisfied at the reaction as he walked to the table and shut down the link. "That should give her a few good nights of sleep" he said, turning to face Gaston, who was still standing there, unsure as to what just happened. "Sorry you had to witness this shit flinging contest, rookie. I suppose you have questions, eh? Well, ask away."
"Who was she? And what's this?" Gaston pointed at the pendant.
"Her name is Kate Thryn, she is the apparent leader and spokesperson of the Cult of Sirius for the past twenty-five years or so, ever since Reis Markus disappeared. As for this little thing – it's a memento from my not quite glorious youth. Mark of the Inquisitor. You heard about the Jihad, right?"
"Yes, but I thought the Inquisitors were wiped out… and you said "we were never gone", so that means…?"
"Yup. I was with the Inquisitors, but fortunately the S.O.R.E.S.O. recruited me just before the Jihad ended, so I avoided the fate of most of my comrades."
Gaston could only stand and watch as Buchard continued. "I lied to her though. The Inquisitors never resurfaced as a cohesive organization again. This was just to throw her off our trail."
Finally, the rookie nodded. "So… you just spread this rumor of Inquisitors resurfacing to…"
Buchard nodded. "To lead the Cult on a wild goose chase while they look for traitors in their own ranks and Inquisitor cells in the city. We were quite adept at subterfuge, which is why the Cult remains convinced that they never truly stamped us out. In fact, this is not the first such false flag operation, but you don't need to know that. Not yet, at least."
Gaston nodded in return, understanding that Buchard already disclosed a lot more than a private was supposed to know anyway. "Yes sir. What do we do with this guy?" He pointed at the prelate…
…who spent the last few minutes crawling to the shattered window. Before Gaston or Buchard could react, he pushed himself over the edge, falling to his death.
"Ah shit, we could've taken him in for questioning." Buchard sighed, undisturbed at all. "Well, we have what we came for anyway. Come on. Let's take everything worth taking and then blow this place to bits."
The rookie nodded. This was a strange day for him, full of trials and revelations.
But who said anything about life in X-COM being easy?
Excerpt from Hypernews Network Daily Feature, "Mars Fleet Fully Operational", dated February 2082
Today was a grand day at Transtellar Orbital Shipyard Three as the final ship of the newly-formed Mars Fleet, a Patton VI-class cruiser Ajax finally joined its nineteen sister ships and the five majestic Zhukov-class battleships in their noble task of safeguarding Mars from any sort of incursion, alien or otherwise.
Although proceeding slowly since 2074 due to a constant lack of funds that were being diverted to the Mega-Primus project, the project was completed only two years behind the original schedule. Unfortunately, the Admiralty Board did not disclose whether there are plans to revisit the concept of a separate Earth Fleet, abandoned a decade ago due to above-mentioned scarcity of resources. Transtellar officials politely refused to comment on the issue, citing non-disclosure agreements with the Navy.
Nevertheless, to commemorate this grand occasion, Ajax and one of the battleships, the Halsey will spend the next three days docked at the New Washington orbital elevator, open to all visitors. See for yourself the finest examples of the might of NWC navy!
I originally planned to upload this chapter right before Duke Nukem Forever came out in order to make a cheap joke at its expense, but unfortunately a sudden hard drive failure made me rewrite it all from scratch. Combined with my usual motivational deficiency, this obviously took me a while. Sorry guys. And gals, if there are any on the Internet.
Oh, and I do hope that you will like the new "lore" segment near the end of the chapter. Considering how many things I have to make up or reimagine, I thought that would be the best way to explain things that aren't a part of the main story.
