"Shit!" Link yelled, slamming his fist on the hood of the Hummer. They had stopped as soon as Aria had discovered Sanchez had been missing. The team was huddled around the hood of Link's Hummer, and there was a map sprawled on the hood.
"How did you lose her?" Link asked Romero. Romero looked down sullenly.
"I didn't notice she fell off." Romero murmured. He walked off and started to reload the .50 caliber gun. Link walked over to him. "Hey, it wasn't your fault. If you had stopped, they probably would have gotten the rest of the people in the vehicle." Link said, putting his hand on Romero's shoulder.
Romero stopped putting a new belt in the receiver and looked at Link. He regarded his leader's thoughts for a moment, and sighed. "Yeah, I guess." He said quietly.
He walked back over to the group. They were arguing loudly amongst themselves.
"You should have known she would fall off!"
"I wasn't driving!"
"Who knows what they're doing to her because of you!"
"HEY!!" Link yelled, stopping all arguments between the team.
"I don't give a damn whose fault it was, we'll deal with that later," Link said, looking around at the team. "You're acting like little five year olds instead of Ghosts! Look, " he said in a hard tone, "we've got a team member, no- a friend, out there depending on us for rescue. We need to get her back. We can't kill Ganondorf without her help."
The team started to gather their weapons. "Alright," Vegas said when the team had returned to looking at the map. "The moblins stopped chasing us about here." He said, pointing to a highlighted section of the map.
"I think they knew we were going to be here. There is no way they could have responded to our presence with that many troops that quickly. So, I think we need to find out how much they know about us." There were murmured agreements between members.
"Yeah. However," Moran said, pointing to a part of the map that was also highlighted. "I remember that Rom had to stop suddenly when a Moblin truck pulled in front of him. Is it possible that she could have fallen off when he braked?"
"That's right," Aria cut in,"and about five minutes later, I noticed she was gone. I think we should formulate a plan to search the area." She said, looking around.
She didn't receive any argument, so she continued," Now, I'll take Squad Two and search for Aria."
"And I'll take Squad One and secure the underground base." Link said, having returned to the group after talking to Rom.
"Alright, let's move out!" Link yelled to the team. As Aria was approaching Squad Two's Hummer, she felt a hand on her shoulder. She turned around and saw Link looking at her sadly.
"Be careful out there. If anything happened to you......" Link said. "I know. Don't worry, I'll be fine." Link nodded, and a honk from Squad One's Hummer drew his attention.
"Yeah, I'm coming." He breathed as he jogged off towards the vehicle. He got into the passenger seat, and set the GPS to the location of the base.
"Alright, Rom, let's ride." Link said, chambering a round on his M4.
They pulled onto the main highway, and when they came to the base's intersection, the two Hummers split up.
Link motioned for Rom to stop, and Link got out, followed by the rest of the Squad. They were back at the parking lot where they had been ambushed just minutes before. Bullet casings and dead Moblins littered the paved ground. A glimmer to his right got his attention.
There was a rifle lying there. Lita's rifle. Link walked over and picked it up. A sigh escaped his lips, and he brought the gun over to the Squad. "Oh, shit." Connely said as Link sulked up to them.
"My first assignment, and I've already lost one. My first day." Link said quietly. He had started to feel confident in his leadership qualities. He had felt that he could lead these men to victory. Now he wasn't so sure. Link felt a tear roll down his cheek. He quickly wiped i5t away, and looked into the eyes of his men.
"If they've done anything to her, I swear I'll kick their asses so hard all their relatives will feel it." Link said between gritted teeth.
"Link, we all feel the same way, but we have to get that out of our minds. We need to secure the base." Tomilson said, putting a hand on Link's shoulder.
Link shook his head to clear his thoughts, and started thinking how to get inside.
If I wanted to hide something, what would be the best way to hide it? Link asked himself. He looked around, and spotted a sign that said 'SatCom entrance'. Bingo.
"Alright, let's move to that building. Keep your eyes open, shoot first, ask questions later." He began to move towards the building, weaving in between cars. When he was roughly a hundred feet from the building, he motioned for the Squad to stop. Everyone kneeled down and scanned the perimeter.
"Hanec, I need you to go thermal and see if there's anything moving inside, over." Link said.
"Copy that, going thermal, over." Hanec flipped a switch on his scope, and a high pitched humming sound emanated from the scope. He peered through, and was nearly blinded by the setting sun. "Fuck." He cursed, looking away from the building, blinking a few times.
"Link, I can't see shit. The sun's in my eyes. I'll have to move to a different position, over."
"Copy that, watch your six, over." Silence permeated the air for the next few moments, while Link waited for Hanec to report. Link could have just busted in heads first, but he wanted to go quietly and with as few casualties as possible.
Hanec was peering through the scope, waiting for a visual inside the building. When he had a clear view of the inside of the building, he scanned the floors for any shapes that were giving off heat. Upon finding none, he radioed Link. "Nothing is moving inside, sir. It's totally deserted from what I can see, over."
"Let's move out, over." Link said. He shouldered his rifle, and stalked forward, ready for something to pop out and ambush them. They reached the front building, and Link motioned to Austin Connely to see if there was anything in there. Connely slid under the vision of the windows, and poked his head up. He briefly scanned the room.
It was a small room, there was a metal detector that still had blinking lights on it, and there was a reception desk right next to that. A hallway led past the metal detector, and Connely gave Link a thumbs up.
Link pointed to Rom and Von, and pointed to the opposite side of the building. They nodded, and crawled the same way Connely did under the view of the windows and stood at the other side of the door. Link nodded, and they busted in, and made sure nothing was in there.
"Clear."
"Clear."
Link and the rest of the team entered and went to the metal detector. Link examined it, and tried to find some way they could pass through without making any noise. He saw a gap in between the ceiling and the top of the device. He slid his weapon on top of the metal detector while walking through.
The machine stayed silent.
Link breathed a sigh of relief, and waved the rest of the Squad forward. They rushed through, and took a position across the hall, pointing down the hall. Link and Tomilson walked slowly down the hall, their weapons shouldered. Adrenaline pumped through them, and they simultaneously kicked open a door. There was a series of doors down the hallway that they had to clear.
They cleared all the rooms in a few minutes, going in teams of two. When Von and Rom cleared the last room, they came to a staircase. It read "Welcome to SatCom." Link proceeded down the stairs, with Hanec covering the rear.
Link was about halfway down the long staircase, when a step cracked underneath his foot. He started to fall through, but a huge hand grabbed Link's and single-handedly pulled him up.
Link sat on the stairs, bewildered by what had just happened. There was a large groaning sound, and the rest of the stairs collapsed, falling down the pit, and landing with a large crash. Link gulped.
"So much for the quiet entrance." He sighed.
"Great." Tomilson said sourly, "We'll have to find another entrance." He started back up the stairs, and the Squad started to follow him.
Link stood, and started to follow Tomilson, but something stopped him. He turned to find the source, and saw that one of his backpack's straps was caught in the railing. This gave him an idea.
"Maybe we won't need to find another way." Link said up to Tomilson. They all turned to see Link wrap a rope around the railing. He let the rope dangle down the shaft, and he grabbed it.
"We can slide down." H said with a smirk. Everyone chuckled, and Link slid down the rope.
He landed at the bottom with a thud, and looked around for the door into SatCom. He spotted it hiding underneath the wreckage, and lifted the piece of the stairs off.
Von slid down next to Link, and armed his weapon again. The rest did the same, and then Rom and Tomilson busted through the door, followed by Link, Hanec, and Von.
What they saw shocked them.
The Moblins most definitely knew the place existed. Dead bodies were strewn all across the small room, and the two feet thick steel door was lying on the floor, having been blown off its hinges. The room was covered in blood, and there were a few bodies of Moblins lying on the ground.
"What the hell happened here?" Tomilson wondered aloud.
"Smells like a bad night of beans." Connely said, waving his hand in front of his face.
The Squad remained silent, despite Austin's joke. Link and Tomilson started to walk down past the blown-up door, and checked down the hallway.
"The lights are still on, there must be someone home." Link said.
"Yeah, and you'd think they would have had a guard or something. There weren't any bullet holes or signs of conflict upstairs. It doesn't make sense." Tomilson said as they walked down the corridor, weapons shouldered.
The rest of the Squad began to follow, and stopped at a large door that read "JOC".
Link motioned to Von for the reading on the motion sensor, and Von responded by holding up his fingers to his head in the form of a handgun. That meant that going in the room would be suicide.
"Shit." Link cursed, thinking of some way to get in without mass casualties. Link tapped the side of his head. Von held up three fingers, and made a zero with his hand. Then he made a plus sign with his fingers.
More than thirty bandits? Damn, we're going to need explosives. Link gestured Connely to his position.
"Sir?" Connely addressed Link in a whisper. Von was watching the motion sensor again, ready to alert the team if any of the Moblins in the next room approached their position.
"We need to get inside, but we need to do it quietly. So, I need you to go inside and flash bang their asses. Then we'll come in and blast them. Got it?" Link said.
"Yeah, I'll open the door while they aren't looking and toss flash bangs in there." Connely moved right next to the door, and looked through the little space under the door.
He motioned Rom over.
"You want some cover?" Rom asked before Connely had a chance to explain.
"Yeah, I need you to open this door when I tell you to, and don't let it close."
"Don't let it close?" Rom asked skeptically.
"Yeah, the noise might alert them, and I'll move too quick for them to notice it's open." Connely explained.
Rom nodded, and Connely looked under the door, waiting for the right opportunity.
After a few minutes, Connely waved his hand, and Rom swiftly opened the door. Connely hurried behind a large computer mainframe, being careful not to make any noise.
The room was probably the monitoring room for the entire facility, as there were numerous TV's with cameras feeding them info on the main sections of the building. There was a whole mess of chairs and bodies scattered around, bloodied from being torn up by the Moblins' invasion.
Connely noticed a Moblin asleep in front of a whole setup of monitors displaying various hallways. One of the monitors displayed the staircase that had collapsed on the Squad. Connely noted to let Link know about that.
He suddenly remembered what he was supposed to do, and pulled two flash bangs from pockets on his vest. He pulled the pins and released the clutches. After three seconds, he rolled the bangs down separate paths, and turned away, closing his eyes and plugging his ears.
A deafening boom resounded, with a blinding flash, stunning all the Moblins. Rom was the first to bust in, his SAW mowing through the scores of stunned moblins.
Link and Von were next, picking off targets. Link had just dispatched a moblin when he noticed a door across the room open, and moblins began pouring in the room, shooting in all directions.
Link took two down, and ducked for cover as 7.62x39mm bullets whizzed past his head.
"Bandits, twelve o'clock!" He shouted amongst the gunfire. He pointed his weapon towards the barricades the moblins had made, and took three quick shots at a moblin who poked his head up. The thing's head exploded in a flurry of red blood, and it's friends sprayed link's position with bullets, angered by their comrade's death.
"Grenade!" Romero yelled, flinging a grenade across the room. He ducked for cover as the grenade detonated, shrapnel ripping through the ranks of moblins. However, more of the creatures replaced their comrades, shooting in Romero' direction.
He popped up from his position, ignoring the bullets whizzing past his head, and let go a long burst of 5.56mm into the moblins behind the overturned desks.
The creatures didn't have time to comprehend what had happened, as they were ripped apart by Rom's accurate fire. A resounding boom echoed through the room, and Rom looked over to see Hanec with his powerful rifle smoking as he picked another target. He squeezed off a round into the moblin's midsection, and the creature was severed into two halves.
Hanec ducked to load another magazine, and saw Rom jump across the sea of oncoming bullets and land right next to him.
"What's up?" Hanec asked, smiling.
"Oh, there are just a hundred freaky things after my hide, nothing new." Rom said, returning his friend's smile.
Rom pressed the talk button on his radio, and got Link's attention.
"Link, we're going to need to take care of some of these guys quick, or we're going to get overwhelmed. Shit! Connely is in trouble at nine o'clock!"
Connely was leaning over the limp body of Josh Von, and he didn't notice the moblins sneaking up on him from behind.
"Austin! Heads up!" Rom shouted at his teammate. Connely drew his Desert Eagle, and turned to the moblins. At that moment, they pounced, landing on a pissed off Connely. He blew the leg off of one of the creatures, the .50AE bullet ripping clean through the shell and bone. Connely had no time to retaliate against the other one, as the creature stabbed through the shoulder of his gun arm, disabling his ability to retaliate.
Rom had seen the moblins pounce, and raised his SAW to shoot them off, and pulled the trigger, only to have his gun click empty.
"Shit! Hanec, Connely needs help!"
Hanec looked over at Connely, and saw the moblin raise its blade to slice Connely's throat.
Hanec raised his rifle, and squeezed off a round in the moblin's direction. The creature's hand blew off upon impact with the .300 Magnum bullet.
It screamed in rage, and turned to Hanec. This allowed Connely enough time to draw his sword from its sheath on his back. He screamed a battle cry, and swung the magically enhanced sword at the moblin, cleaving it in two. The two halves of the creature collapsed on the floor, and burnt up into a fine dust.
Connely watched with fascination as the corpse burned and blew away into the air. Then he realized the way to defeat them.
Ignoring the growing pain in his body, Connely got Link on the radio.
"Link! Our swords! We have to use our swords! It's the only way to take them all, we don't have much ammo left!" He shouted as Hanec's rifle clicked empty.
"Shit, that was my last mag." Hanec said, drawing his sword and slashing any moblin that got close.
Link was starting to run low on ammo, so he decided to try Connely's suggestion.
He pulled the Master Sword from its sheath and stared at it for a moment. He was holding time itself in his hands. This was something the Goddesses had created. It had the power to kill anything in its path. Link noticed that it was as light as a feather to him. He was jarred out of his thoughts by a moblin that had screamed in rage right next to him.
In the blink of an eye, Link's sword was piercing the skull of the moblin, it's brains dripping off of the sword protruding from its skull.
Link pulled the sword free, and the corpse burned away into dust.
"Ooh." Link smiled, staring at his reflection on the bluish metal. "I like that."
Link became a rhythmic machine, slicing and dicing his way through countless moblins. They were falling to his blade one by one, and soon he had carved a path of destruction past their barricades. He saw that his Squad had had similar success, and were happy to have discovered a way to effectively kill off the moblins.
He ran through another moblin, and slashed through one to his right. He feinted left to avoid the blade of a moblin, and sliced its head off. He turned to find a moblin in two burning pieces on the ground behind him.
"What's up, Sergeant." Rom said merrily. The Sheikah moved extremely fast for his size, and was punching and slashing his way through the scores of moblins.
As Link slashed the last moblin, the team gathered around him.
They stared at each other for a few minutes, surprised and happy at the same time that they had survived the battalion of bloodthirsty creatures. Suddenly, someone clapping broke the silence.
Link and the Squad turned to see a man standing there, with long black robes draped across his body and his head obscured from view by a hood. He was holding a long staff with a translucent crystal molded on the top.
"Well done." The mysterious figure said, walking over the corpse of a moblin that was riddled with bullet holes.
"You are clearly the men that General Garrison has sent to me. You are truly graced by the Goddesses." The figure approached Link, and and continued speaking.
"You have destroyed a base, killed countless of my troops, and have now cleared out this base of troops. For this I congratulate you. You have passed the first test." The figure lowered his hood, and he appeared to be a man in his early thirties, black hair, about 5'5", and black eyes.
"Who are you? Are you an enemy commander?" Link was extremely confused. This man had referred to the moblins as his troops, but Link felt no evil radiating from this person.
"I am Colonel Moretti. It is an honor to meet you, Hero of Time."