"This is getting faster!!" Howard shouted as the lights lined around the tunnel got faster and faster. Most of the group aside from himself, Cole, Marcus, and the Chief were no longer able to stand up, the shaking and speed of the platform falling and further down into whatever awaited them at the end.

"Does this thing have-" a sudden jerk tossed Baird into the air, and slammed him back down," ow! Shit- an emergency brake or something!?" he spat a spray of blood, which actually soared across the 'floor', the air flow actually moving it easily around.

"I see one over here!" Mark started scratching to a spot on the platform, which was near one of the four attachments to four metal chains.

"Well, try it out," moaned Richard, his eyes closed and his face green. "Just make it stop already!"

Mark crawled over to the small button, each push he made as if he was chained to the floor. Finally, after shoving himself further, he lifted up his hand, and smashed it down onto the panel, and the button was pushed. Gears sounded, but the floor kept falling.

"I just love this thing!" Dom shouted, trying to push himself up. He spotted the chief. "You got any ideas big guy?"

The Spartan shrugged.

"Chief, look right," Cortana said, telling him to turn to the walls still rushing past him. He stared, the blurred image occasionally blurred by the lights rushing by, the air screaming by them. But with the hardened eyes of the Spartan, he saw that just under the glare of passing lights was a constant smudge of dark; a deep indention in the tunnel. "find something to wedge this thing to a stop!"

Turning back, he saw one of their lancer rifles. The guns were far too weak to stop something this heavy and fast, plus the weight of them all even a smidgen; it would most likely shatter into pieces and fly back at them. The he spotted a weak section of the platform. A long metal pole melded into the platform was rattling, and was then likely loose enough to be pulled off.

Walking step by step to the metal piece, the Chief bent lower, and pulled it up, staining at it's fantastic weld. But the grey material eventually came loose, and was the width of a rifle but had the length of four meters. Turning back to the passing side, he stepped closer and closer, counting time between each light as it passed.

The chains on the sides, that apparently used to hold the platform in control had a large welding that held the chains to hang free, a sphere that looked strong enough for the weight of the platform. Sticking the pole into the large sphere roughly, he prepared for the lights to pass twice more.

"That- won't work!" baird yelled at the Chief, who ignored the comment. One passed. Two passed, and then he thrust it two seconds after it passed, right on time with the third light to pass by.

The pole snapped, flying out of his hands, one piece flying up while the other slammed into the helmet of the chief, bouncing off of the personal shields. However, the attempt was not in vien; the chains began to rattle to life and turn and spin. The platform began to screech as it slowed.

"I guess not-" Baird said, smiling.

The chains on one side snapped and fell to the platform, just as the others began to slow down, the platform began its free-fall again.

"I take it back, it sucked!" the angry blond shouted as he grabbed the floor, only to have something green and yellow splatter in his face. Feet away, Richard's mouth was open and a strange wet puddle had smeared the area around his face.

"I think I got something!" Marcus shouted, walking over to the now loose set of chains. "I bet all these chains are tied together at some point. If we connect these, it should slow enough to get an easier landing!"

"Lets get going dawg!" Cole shouted as he stomped over, and helped Marcus pull the chain over to the closest set, while the chief pulled another set that was loose to the closest to him and Howard. "Great, what're we doin' next?"

"Put it inside the actual chain! It will grab hold-"

"Dude! You see how fast them chains are moving right?" Cole said to Marcus, who then tossed the end of the link into the larger, still rattling and soaring upward set hard enough that it passed through with enough slack to be caught by him and Cole.

"Do the same other there!" Marcus shouted to the Spartan and Howard, who had mimed the action and had now grabbed hold of the 'lasso'.

The chains did keep soaring up, and the insert links where being brought up with them. The slack being held by the four got thinner and thinner, and on the other side, the same slack began to fly up with the soaring chain. Finally, the beginning of the lasso caught, and the four were jerked up with the sudden force. While not immediately tossed up, they where pulled closer to the still flying chain, which acted like a saw at the speed it was going.

"Shit! This thing-"

"It's slowing!" Carey shouted, beginning to stand once again up, closer to Dom. "Keep it up-"

What happened next they could not have predicted.

The walls suddenly vanished and a gigantic cavern opened up, spanning in a huge open space all around. Dark-brown in color, the walls and ceiling of the natural cave were lit with yellow light, and showed that the place spanned on for a long time. Still falling but slowing still, they couldn't see the bottom, but around them stalagmites and stalactites stood dwarfing them like sky scrapers.

Mark had bravely moved closer to the now completely open edge, and spied down. "There's some sort of platform come up… get this thing slowed down and we might be able to jump without dying!"

"What about just letting this thing slow down until we hit solid ground?" Marcus replied, straining at holding the chain in his hands.

"I still can't see any solid ground!" Mark shouted back, his head over the side. "Slow it down!!"

The Chief finally getting an idea, held the chain as hard as he can, and pulled back, letting his weigh and strength force the chain to slow down, along with the platform.

"I'm not sure that's a good idea-" Cortana warned, just in time for the second chain to snap, and the Chief to be flung off the platform.

He was lucky enough to grab it with both his hands, but the platform was beginning to pick up speed once again. Howard tried to get closer, but the Spartan's weight was now brining the platform off balance, and was turning over, pushing them all to one side, sliding without friction closer to the chief.

"Oh shit!" Dom and the entire group ran for the other side, aside from mark, who was still watching below.

"We have to jump soon! It'll be here in a few seconds!" he stood up, feeling the imbalance. "We have to!" turning, he saw them on the other side of the platform. "Get over here or we die!"

"Oh I really don't like this!" Marcus shouted as they all ran, having the platform get completely off-balance and flip over, just as they leapt, and landed on a large flat cliff. The Metal platform seemed to finally give in, and snap the last two supports, and groan as it flew downward, uncontrolled.

The Gears moaned as they all slowly recovered the impact. Richard simple lost whatever else he had in his stomach, and Baird seemed to think that was a good idea, as he then followed example.

Cole was first up, and helped Dom and Marcus up. "You dudes good?"

Marcus punched his shoulder. "No thanks to you, yeah." He turned, spying the surrounding area. The cliff had a winding path supported by a thin column of earth that lead down the bottom of the massive caves. Below the cliff seemed to be various holes of darkness and occasionally yellow light. But as he stood up, he noticed something- the group felt much larger.

"Where's the chief?" Marcus said, looking further past the cliff to the path, but found no evidence of a hard landing. Realizing something terrible, he turned back to the sheer cliff, his face toned of realization. "Oh man."

"No way- he couldn't be-" Baird stood up, along with Mark to the cliff with Marcus. Stopping short, they leaned over. Darkness; a massive hole was all that was to be seen as they glanced over. No signs of the chief, only the remains of what the platform smashed on its final descent.

"He's dea-"

A large armored hand shot up from under the sheer drop, having Baird and Mark to jump back in surprise, while Marcus smiled and lifted down a hand.

"You have a way of really surprising us, you know?" the grizzled soldier said as he helped pull up the chief, who literally jumped back up rather than climbed. The chief, again back with them, nodded in thanks.

"All accounted for?" Richard asked weakly, kneeling against a large boulder. His face still was green.

"We're here, our weapons are-" Dom started, and then realized he was one rifle short," Oh crap!" starting for the cliff, he stopped, and the others feel the impact of the situation they were in. One weapon less, far underground, no sure of getting back up, and underground, they were right in a bad spot all over again.

After all, anything underground was enemy territory.

"Great. So, what the fuck we do now?" Baird shouted to the open, his words echoing around from the walls. "I really don't see how it could get any worse!"

"We're alive, aren't we?" Dom replied, looking around the caverns for some sign of getting back up. "I guess we should find some way of finding out where we are, right?"

"Sounds like a plan," Marcus growled, pulling out his shotgun. "We're going down that path," he pointed at the winding mid-air zigzag of earth that looked like it would allow one person at a time to pass," and then we're finding a way out of here. Let's move."

"Sounds just like before, minus the actual objective," Dom said, grimly shrugging as the all pulled whatever alternative weapon they had out. Marcus, Dom, Howard and Cole had out their Gnasher Shotguns. Carey had a 'salvaged' Hammerburst gun out, while Richard and Baird had pistols out. Mark was lucky enough to have saved one of the smaller SMG's from earlier at the ship, and loaded it with one of the three clips he still had. The chief had his Battle rifle out, and checked the scope as he did, realizing he was one of the last ones to have anything that could actually aim effectively.

Walking down the path wasn't as easy, or as hard as some predicted. The worst was either falling to a almost certain death or being caught in an area completely in the open with nothing to effectively respond to far weapons fire. Nothing happened as they walked, but the occasional crumble of pebbles kept them on their feet.

Finally after a good thirty minutes of silent walking, they one by one stepped into the complete ground, which seemed unusually flat and smooth, which was not in contrast to the higher areas above them, rocky and uneven.

"This place really feels weird. These holes aren't emergence holes…but what are they?" Mark asked, getting close to one but staying a good distance away, as the smooth ground he stood on curved at the edge of the hole.

"Those are empty Imulsion rivers."

The Chief turned to Baird. "Imulsion?"

"Our source of energy is Imulsion," started the private as they walked around the large hole, which was mostly dark and void of light," which is essentially compressed energy and heat into a glutinous form that can be harvested and broken down into pure, raw energy." They finally got past the first hole, only to find a larger one, at and angle, seeming to grant access into a tunnel.

"Sounds important," The Chief started, looking into the tunnel.

"Yeah- it replaced Nuclear energy, Fossil fuels, almost anything it has the ability to replace. The only problem is that it's dangerous in just about any form you can get because of it's heat and radiation. Something that's been compressed for…we don't know how long has dangers to it." Baird continued his lecture, drawing the stares of most of Alpha squad.

"We know it's found only naturally in a semi-liquid form, normally useless unless purified, and that it kills almost anything organic that falls in it very quickly. We also know that it has quality to it-"

"Wait, you sayin' that juice can be better than normal?" Cole asked his close friend as they all walked down the dark tunnel, which shone bright yellow light at the very end, slanted down but at a horizontal angle.

"Four known classes of Imulsion, ok?" Baird listed off, counting off with each of his fingers," D class, or average stuff. Oxygenated and less pure from contamination, usually found in places like this. C, which is better, stronger and more dangerous- about twice the value and energy per square liter than class D. B, is the best found, which is rarely exposed Imulsion. Best there is to date, almost five times the efficiency of class D. Also very dangerous."

"Class 'A'?" The chief asked, sure that it must be the best.

"No class a. After B, it stops. We haven't found anything better than B. Only E. dried and hardened Imulsion, which are crystals that are sharp, fragile, and are very light reflective; they don't do anything else but shine light at you," Baird said as they got closer to the end, now everyone listening in on the information.

"There is a Class A."

Baird stared at Carey, who was expressionless and dark as he always was, but stared back at Baird. "Hypothetically, yeah there is-"

"Imulsion Class A; Sepharium, God's Gold, and Coopers Hypothesis. All are names for it." Carey began his usual staring ahead, watching the light get closer, as another cliff loomed ahead.

"Wait, I heard of Coopers Hypothesis," Mark said, his eyes wide," that was an argued topic for methods quantum mathematics, the plausible substance so powerful that it could actually ignore some rules of physics. That right?"

"What they hell- is that even possible?" Dom gasped as he listened harder. "Isn't it impossible to do things like that?"

"Imulsion A is theoretical. It's Helen Coopers prediction that if Immulsion was gathered and crushed constantly, and repeatedly, gathering more and more substance to it, but was not exposed to oxygen, it could reach a level of purity that if harnessed could pass hypothetical Matter-anti-matter power, by about three times."

"No way." Marcus turned around, stopping at the entrance of the tunnel to face Baird. "I know about that stuff, anit matter, and that is the strongest form, no question about it."

"They also say," Carey continued, ignoring the others, which gathered their attention," that Class A when exposed would produce radiation on three sections of the electromagnetic spectrum. Visible Light, gamma radiation, and low-frequency radio waves. It gives off music."

"Which is ridiculous, because," added Baird," this thing shouldn't be able to exist because of mining of the last eighty years and the discovery of the mass of tunnels under the crust. Aside from the time, pressure, heat- everything to make this is just-"

Screech.

In a flash movement, the entire group re-focused back on the new open cavern, which was similar to the last, only it had the yellow light of a very small Imulsion lake at the bottom. Small figures where hopping around natural bridges that crossed the lakes of light, looking like glowing apes.

"Great. Wretches are here." Marcus started leaning close to the edge, but was suddenly pulled back by Baird. "What?"

"Don't get close to the edge. Look-" the blond pointed to a steady flow of steam jetting out of a tunnel not to far away. The steam was bright yellow.

"What's that exactly?" Dom asked, also staring at the vent.

"I… think that's Imulsion," Baird stated.

"You said Imulsion was a-" Cortana started.

"Class F, another hypothetical form of Imulsion. If something super-heated this stuff, the juice would boil up and expand, evaporating and having the energy blast out, but leaving the other stuff behind, namely a little substance called Soelstain. Completely useless, and dangerous is inhaled." Baird nodded to the right, away form the vent. "You know what Soelstain is?"

Everyone shook their heads.

"Do you?" The Chief asked, now wondering something to the point where it distracted him. Baird was a private, an average grunt soldier sent to kill and die. But he so far knew more than the rest of the group put together did- in the tunnels about Locust, in the ship about technology, and now about Imulsion.

Baird snorted. "Doesn't matter. Lets move."

With that the others seemed to simply forget about the strange vault of information and continue on. The chief stayed back brief thinking.

"Cortana." He whispered to the AI.

"Yeah?" She responded.

"Baird- what do you think?"

"Well, he certainly seems to know about what he's talking about. I wouldn't put it past him to have been a good student at some point chief, just that."

"Maybe." He still couldn't shake yet again, another feeling. Rather than fear, it was uncertainty and suspicion.

Walking down a curved and slanted slope, the finally found themselves at where the Wretches had been running off from. The low levels of Imulsion on either side glowed hot as they passed. The occasional jutting up and down had them again on the tope of their toes, not wanting a bath in the terrible substance on either side of them.

Yet at the end of this natural bridge, a wall stood in there way. No tunnels, no ways of getting around, the wretches had disappeared completely.

"Where… where to?" Richard said out loud, unsure of what was next.

He earth shot up, blasting dirt into the air as the men all stumbled back. A group of wretches had leapt up, clobbering Richard, who had stumbled up against the wall, avoiding the claws of the small beast as the others avoided the attack.

"Underneath!" Howard pointed the other mounds he was sure where submerged wretches, all waiting for the moment to attack.

"On surface!" Baird shouted back sarcastically as he smashed one of the beasts with his pistol.

Richard had recovered and dodged a lunge from one of the wretches, landing uncomfortably close to the ledge of the solid ground and close to the Imulsion. Seeing that the same wretch was coming again, he aimed his pistol and got several shots in it just as it leapt at him, and fell right past him, spilling into the hot substance below. The hot material splashed up, and narrowly missed Richard's face, smashing next to him, which was more than enough to encourage him to get up.

The shotguns, which ironically where the only option after loosing the majority of long ranged rifles, were doing a marvelous job of blasting the Wretches apart and into the hot liquid. Only Carey seemed to be having a problem, as he was constantly evading attacks and not smashing them back with a quick swipe of his gun. After a lucky dodge which had the wretch topple into Imulsion, he was able to help the others with his perfect aiming.

Even as more and more wretches cam up, the group seemed to be handling themselves, most of the work by the shotguns and the Chief, who was able to just attack them without his weapon- his hard armor doing enough damage as it was. Then the ground shook, a loud, low, and terrible moan shook the cavern itself.

The Wretches no longer seemed to notice the gears or the Spartan, as they turned and fled, climbing up the wall to escape whatever it was they tried to. After a moment, the soldiers stopped their attacks, realizing something had actually scared them off.

"Ok… what now?" Dom groaned as again the terrible moan shook the ground, the last fleeing Wretches crying in panic.

Baird stared at the other side of the cavern, from where they had come from. Concentrating, he still stared. Again, the roar sounded.

"A Rock Worm." Baird's face was sweating, and he looked pale. "Anyone know what they are?"

"Little worms right?" the ground began to vibrate after Mark's snide remark. "Ok, please tell me they aren't as big as I think they are."

"This is not good," Baird said, again staring at the wall as the shaking got worse.

Then the wall they all faced crumbled like dust, and something behind the dust screamed as they all held their ears. All but the Chief, who stared at the largest living being, aside form the grave mind, he had ever faced.


Yes. that is it for now. You happy guys? I am. I got more info, and then some action at the end which will continue for most of next chapter.

Oh, and for you guys who are interested in the Gears of War 2 that's coming out soon, maybe you should o some research… you might get some clues on where I am leading…

But for now, I leave off this chapter, satisfied that again I have returned with a longer chapter than the previous, jam packed with info and action. Hope you're satisfied!

Seeya next week, no not Monday, next Friday! And I'm going to Frostburg university for a week, so sorry if next ones are either late of crappy.

Yeah, so seey- (Orahime from Bleach walks up, holding a leek) ... can i help you?

Orahime: (begins singing Loituma Techno remix, twirling the leek around)

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO(Gets turned inside out)