Chapter Twenty-Two: Doomsday
Vargas braced himself against another tremor that shook the compound. "Well then, what are we supposed to do!?" he shouted. "How can we fight the Cluster!?"
"We can't!" Daniel replied. "All we can do right now is fight the Children of Homeworld, and pray that the Crystal Gems have this under control."
Vargas glanced over at their Flamethrower-clad opponent, which had yet to be harmed by their bullets. "Yeah, I'm not even sure we can do that," he groaned.
"Just follow my lead!" said Daniel. He jumped out from behind cover, firing a spurt of bullets at the flametrooper to get its attention. When said trooper retaliated, Daniel rolled out of the way of the flames. As the enemy took a brief moment to react, Daniel once again opened fire, this time on the fuel tank on its back. It wasn't enough to destroy the tank yet, or even cause any leaks, but several noticeable dents did appear?
"Now why didn't I think of that?" Vargas asked himself. "Keep him distracted, I'll aim for his weak spot!"
In truth, Daniel was hoping that they would take turns distracting it, but Vargas did have the bigger gun, after all. Once again firing to get its attention, Daniel hurried behind cover. The searing heat from this thing's flames brushed against him; he wasn't sure how long he could hold out here.
Worse still, the tremors were still going. They weren't too powerful yet, but they still were semi-frequent enough to cause problems for the two agents. In addition to making it much harder to aim, it seemed like the facility was being rocked pretty hard by the earthquakes.
Making matters worse, the flames were engulfing the entire room. With nowhere for the heat to go, the entire room became like an oven. And the flametrooper just kept on spewing flames in every direction; it was almost like it realized that the humans weren't as fireproof as it was.
"Hey, boss, you got any other ideas?" asked Vargas. "It's like the surface of the damn sun in here!"
Daniel looked around. The only way out of the room was to walk through the fire. But, seeing as their only other option would be to destroy the source of the flames, this was the best choice. Not to mention, blowing up the fuel tank would likely only create more fire. "We have to make a run for it!" he said.
"Are you outta your mind!?" said Vargas. "I don't know if you noticed, but there's a ten-foot wall of fire blocking our path!" Ten feet was exaggerating a bit, but still. "'Fire bad,' remember? It's like, the leading cause of human death, or something!"
"If we stay here, we get roasted alive!" shouted Daniel.
"We get roasted alive regardless!" Vargas shouted back. "If it's all the same to you, I'd prefer to take my chances with the problem that I can shoot! You can't shoot your way out of fire!"
"Follow my lead," said Daniel. "We'll run on three. One…"
"Captain, that's a bad idea!"
"Two…"
"Don't do it!"
Mere moments before Daniel could say 'three,' the door on the other side of the room burst open. Luke and James ran in, armored up and weapons hot. Well, James had his weapon-Luke's was slung over his back, as he was carrying a fire extinguisher in his hands.
As James distracted the flametrooper by opening fire on it, Luke got to work putting out the flames. "Come on, let's get out of here!" he shouted. Daniel and Vargas were quick to oblige. With James holding the enemy at bay, all four of them were able to safely escape from the burning room.
"What's the deal with that guy?" asked Luke, once they had all made it out.
"Who knows?" said Daniel. "The important thing now is that we made it out. How did you get around to that side, anyway?"
"Uh...we went around," said James. "Now, shouldn't we head to the Director's office now?"
"Probably," said Vargas. "Let's get moving before-" With a burst of flames, the door to the previous room was blasted off its hinges. The green-clad robot strolled out of the inferno, aiming its flamethrower at the soldiers. "-that happens…"
Before the flametrooper could let loose with its flames, a shot rang out; a particularly loud one, at that, like the kind from a sniper rifle. The bullet pierced directly through the flametrooper's fuel tank, causing a jet of flame to shoot out of the hole. It only had a moment to react before it exploded: fire spread across the hallway, and everyone shielded their face from the heat and shrapnel.
"I'd say that takes care of that, huh?" Hester stepped forwards, a sniper rifle slung over her shoulder.
"Oh yeah, and we ran into these two on the way here," Luke said.
The other one in question was Ichigo. He walked up carrying, of all things, a rocket launcher. When confronted with curious glances from the four, he defended himself. "What? I figured we could use all the firepower we could get!"
"I get that, it's just that you're the last person I'd trust with the heavy artillery," said Vargas.
"Is that so?" Ichigo seemed to notice something that the others hadn't, his focus on the blaze behind them. Once more, the strange robot walked out from the fire, this time without its robes. It was identical to the one that they had encountered back when Mr. Echo stormed the base: extremely spindly, with a bulbous white head. The bizarre being charged at them, only for Ichigo to fire a rocket at it. The machine was blown to kingdom come, raining bits of plastic-y material and unknown ehite goop on down on everyone. "Do you trust me now?"
"No!" yelled Luke. "You almost hit us, you maniac!"
"But I didn't, did I?"
"Enough arguing, we have to go, now!" said Daniel. "There's no telling just how bad this invasion really is. And I, for one, would like to stop it as soon as possible!"
"The man's talking sense," said James. "Come on, let's go!"
Fireteam Victor took off running down the hallways of the compound. Everywhere they looked, BAINE troopers were fighting with either cultists of Gem mutants. They helped when they could, but for the most part, their mission was purely to get to the Director.
But really, this wasn't a good situation. The Children were throwing everything they had at BAINE, at so far, BAINE was losing. Fighting back as hard as it could, of course, but still losing.
"You guys! Over here!" When the team was passing by the labs, Gina called to them from inside. She gestured for them to enter, which they did. She, Farouk, and Rhodes were all holed up within.
"Good to see you're all safe, at least," said Daniel.
"As safe as we can be, with all hell breaking loose out there!" said Farouk.
"Yeah, it's pretty bad," said Rhodes. "Morgan wasn't able to call for backup, so we're on our own for now. I'm sure someone will be able to get through to somebody before too long, but there's no telling how long that could be…"
"At this point, I'm wondering if we should just wait here," said Vargas. "With these guys out here, and the Cluster on its way out, there doesn't really seem to be much we can do…"
"Hang on a second, Rhodes," said Daniel. "You said that Mills couldn't call for backup. Why is that?"
"You mean you haven't heard?" said Gina, her expression turning to one of concern. "The Children's leader guy and a bunch of his thugs stormed into his office and took him hostage! I tried to fight back, but they had him held at gunpoint, there wasn't anything I could do!"
"Last anyone saw, he was taken topside," said Farouk. "We don't know where he is currently."
"So then, let's go find him," said James. Everyone turned towards him.
"Look, I want to save Morgan as much as anyone, but you can't just run in without a plan," said Daniel.
"We already have one," said James. "It'll be just like we did with that fire guy back there. Most of us will distract him, and one goes in to rescue the Director when they aren't looking."
"That's it?" said Vargas. "That's really all you've got?"
"What, do you have any better ideas?" asked Luke.
"Good plan or not, the Director's in danger," said Hester. "I vote we should at least head outside and see what the situation is."
"Me, too," said Ichigo. "A team's only as good as its leader. Daniel, you're a good leader, so you can bet that we're a good team! And BAINE is like one big team, with Mills as the leader...so let's go save him, team!"
Gina shrugged. "Works for me!" Fireteam Victor set out on their rescue mission, accompanied by herself and Farouk. "You coming, Eddie?"
"I'm not really a fighter," he said. "I'll see what I can do from here. Best of luck to you all, though!"
"Thanks, we're gonna need it!" said Gina.
Fighting their way through the adversity, the eight soldiers now made their way to outside the base. The Children of Homeworld were never going to make this easy for them-to them, this was the endgame. Win or lose, this was where it all ended. But BAINE had to be sure that they lost.
If it was even possible, the siege was even more vicious from outside the base. Masses of heavy assault vehicles pounded the facility's defenses, obliterating anything that put up even a bit of a fight. The air was thick with helicopters, each one armed to the teeth, opening fire on the ground resistance.
However, the first thing Fireteam Victor saw upon exiting the base was not a vehicle, but a collection of figures. Two Children stood, armed, their guns at the ready. Between them, the Radiant One held his staff across Morgan Mills' neck, a gun pressed to the latter's temple.
The BAINE soldiers pointed their weapons at the Children, who aimed their own in turn. Nobody shot, not wanting Mills to be caught in the crossfire. "Salutations, heretics!" said the Radiant One, his voice eerily calm. "I take it that things are going well for you?"
"Drop him," said Daniel, his shotgun pointed directly at the Radiant One's forehead. He would probably hit Mills as well from that angle, but it was more about intimidation at this point.
"And what good would that do anybody?" the Radiant One said. "The Cluster is about ready to emerge! Surely you have felt it as well? Before long, this planet will be nothing more than a broken husk; a testament to all those who would defy the will of the Diamonds!"
"All of you, go back inside!" said Mills. "You have to help the others!"
"Silence!" said the Radiant One, pressing his gun harder into his head.
"We can't abandon you, director!" said Ichigo.
"Oh, but you can!" said the Radiant One. "You see, like it or not, you cannot save your beloved leader. Simply because there is no one to save you."
The low drone of a helicopter filled the air, as the wind picked up around them all. The aerial vehicle hovered into view above the trio of cultists, its machine guns pointed at the BAINE troopers.
"Oh, for frick's sake!" exclaimed Ichigo.
The chopper opened fire, sending streams of bullets down on the unfortunate soldiers. Everyone dove for cover, hiding behind anything from destroyed trucks to concrete barriers. With them preoccupied, the Radiant One, along with his entourage and hostage, made their way off towards a tower in the distance.
The helicopter didn't seem to be letting up on its barrage anytime soon. "Vargas!" shouted James. "Get that thing's attention!"
Vargas groaned, but nevertheless opened fire. Sure enough, the chopper focused its fire on the larger threat. Doing his best to make sure he wasn't spotted, James then made his way out from cover, and passed the copter.
"James!" yelled Luke. "What are you doing!?"
"What does it look like!?" he said. "I'm saving our boss!" James turned back around, running off after the Radiant One.