Err, fixed the formatting…sorry about that.  –Josh-

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Zakharov could hear the guns from the Mandelev College Defense Force as they silently crept their way towards the base. The mindworms had never been expected to last more then about thirty minutes…they had figured that Meskha had a good amount of trained troops at their main base. According to their monitors, however, there were still four demon boils left, and the defense was dwindling. Their plan would be in vain if the mindworms got to Meskha before they did.

Salem was the first to spot the perimeter defense that surrounded the base. He nodded to his groupmate and they ran across the open field toward the walls. They stopped as they reached a security checkpoint, which was a small control panel on a large metal door. The two waved the rest of the group towards them. Shila was the first to access the control panel and nodded, thinking.

"It's a security card lock. Watch for patrols…this'll take a second."

Shila reached into her pocket and pulled out a blank security card. She made sure the rest of the group was looking away, and then activated a link to the control panel through her programming. She seemed to go into a trance for several seconds, and then placed the blank keycard in a small slot in Zakharov's Datapod. The little pod reacted, and several seconds later the card had a long black stripe seared into it. Shila smiled as she pulled the card out and swiped it against the security lock. The door clicked and slowly slid open. Salem smiled.

"Good work, Jane. Let's go, team."

The six members of the group flowed into the doorway. In the distance, they could see a small door opening into the base. Salem nodded towards it, and the group ran across the open area. One by one, they entered the dark doorway.

Zakharov quickly gazed around the room they were now in. The room was dark, but they could still make out some figures. In front of them were hundreds of tables, each clothed and equipped with silverware and glassware. To their right was a large kitchen area, and to their left was another doorway that exited out. Shila's eyes darted around the room like a bird.

"This must be their version of a café…or a cafeteria, for that matter. A restaurant, maybe. Not that it really matters. There has to be a monitor around here that's connected to the base. Spread out."

The groups complied and split into their pairs. Salem and his groupmate made his way into the kitchen, and the last team ventured towards the open hallway. Zakharov and Shila made their way into the dining area, gazing up and down the aisles. Shila chuckled.

"How is it this easy to sneak into a base? I'd expected at least some resistance."

Zakharov shrugged. "There are still mindworms out there. I'm fairly sure that Meskha has everyone who can handle a gun out there fighting those beasts."

"We got one!"

Salem's voice was heard behind them. They turned to see the Spartan carrying a small monitor that they'd received from the kitchen. He handed it to Shila and stood back.

Shila looked the device over. "First we need to send a message to Yang." She handed the device to Zakharov. "You'd know more about sending encrypted messages. Would you like to do the honors?"

Zakharov inwardly smiled as they both knew Shila could've done the job just as easily as Zakharov could've, but it wouldn't be worth some suspicion growing in their groups about just how much Shila was able to do. He punched in an encrypted number he'd memorized before the mission, and slowly typed his message:

Abort, Retry, Fail? (a,r,f) R

Move C:/Eagles Nest/Pen~/Mesk.exe E:/Custody

OR

Delete C:/Eagles Nest/Pen~/Mesk.exe

Exit

Zakharov sent the message and shook his head as he handed the monitor back to Shila. "I certainly hope Meskha never took lessons in early DOS. Let's patch our way into the map system."

Shila nodded and quickly typed buttons into the device. On the screen, lines indicated a large room and surrounding hallways. She pointed to the screen. "We're here. We need to go up the penetrating hallway and down another adjacent one, then we'll be close to the entrance of the tunnel system."

The group made their way out into the hallway…but froze as they began down the path. Voices were coming in their direction. There were no doorways to duck into and no pillars to hide behind. They were sitting ducks. Salem looked around frantically and noticed a large power panel next to him. He took out his handgun and smashed it against the panel. The lights in the hallway went dead.

The voices down the hallway grew irritated as they stumbled about in the darkness. The group was equipped with night-vision for the situation and crept down the hallway unnoticed. Shila pointed to a door at the end of the hallway. On a small plaque next to the doorframe read "Mechanicals. Do not enter!" Salem spoke in hushed tones.

"This is where we part. You two must make it to the control room defense grid and destroy it before we can attack with force. We will enter the room when we hear word of its destruction. We're counting on you."

Shila and Zakharov nodded and opened the door. Inside was a large room with computer terminals and pipes…nothing out of the ordinary. Their target, however, was a large grate near the edge of the wall. Shila moved it out of the way, and climbed down to the abyss, Zakharov behind, only stopping to nod to Salem. Then he descended into the darkness.

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The two emerged into a large tunnel, big enough to fit an entire control center in it if one needed to. Shila punched some buttons on the monitor, and pointed down the hallway. "It's about a mile that way, Zakharov. We should get moving."

Zakharov nodded and the two began to walk. Zakharov sighed.

"It's been quite a journey, Shila."

She continued to look ahead. "Yes, Prokhor…a long journey as well."

Zakharov shut his eyes as he walked. "If we win this, maybe that journey will be over."

Shila looked at him. "Will it be, Prokhor??"

He turned to her. "What do you mean?"

"We've put all of our hopes into this mission, Prokhor. What if we're unsuccessful? It's such a depressing thought, but what if this is all in vain?"

Zakharov sighed. "All we can do is hope that's not the case. If we can win, we will. If there's no way, then we won't. But those people are depending on us, Shila…as well as all the future generations of the University of Planet."

Shila leaned against him. "What do you mean by future generations, Prokhor?"

Zakharov blinked. "Wha-?"

Shila smiled. "Well…once we get married…"

Zakharov blinked several times. "Shila-"

"We're here," she said, cutting him off. She walked across the tunnel to the control panel on the opposing side. "This is the control panel for the defense grid. Start setting up the explosives and I'll access the security system."

Zakharov nodded and reached down into their sack, pulling out a small black box. He carefully placed it against the wall underneath the control panel, pushing a few buttons on it to reveal a small timer. He decided not to start the countdown yet. Shila reached into Zakharov's pocket and pulled out her Datapod and pulled a small memory chip out of it. She placed it into the open slot of the control panel and stepped back.

"Is the device ready, Prokhor?"

He nodded and patted it. Shila smiled and pointed to the control panel. "This is going to access Meskha's base network and see if she has the link to Deirdre saved onto her Datalinks. If we can get it without reaching Meskha, we can avoi-"

Shila suddenly stopped talking as the face of Meskha appeared on their monitor. She seemed to smile wickedly. "You can't destroy the defense grid with that little explosive, Zakharov. It just won't work. I've already fortified that section of the tunnels tenfold to prevent any serious explosion damage."

Zakharov's heart fell as he swallowed. "How did you know?"

Meskha shrugged. "I'll tell you, but I want to get to your program before she pulls her link. Excuse me." She pushed some buttons on her monitor then leaned back. Shila suddenly cried out and fell to the ground. She screamed in pain.

"She's accessing my memory port! Zakharov, the Datapod! Remove the memory chip!"

Zakharov lunged for the control panel, but gasped when he saw that the control panel had retracted the memory chip contained. He couldn't retrieve her pod. Panic set in as Shila's screams grew louder. Zakharov pulled his hand weapon out of its holster and aimed it at the control panel, then fired.

The buttons fried, and the lights on the panel went dead. Shila gasped, then lost consciousness. Zakharov walked across the tunnel and picked up a small spare rod that was lying there, then walked to the control panel and smashed it. The memory card slot opened, and Zakharov put the card back into the Datapod. He then turned to the monitor.

"What have you done, Meskha?"

Meskha sighed. "I wasn't trying to hurt your pretty little friend, Zakharov. I just needed to get some information from her, and my way seemed a lot easier then interrogation."

"You still haven't answered-"

"How did I know?" Meskha laughed. "Why don't you ask him?"

She turned the monitor to her side. Zakharov looked at into the face before him and shut his eyes sadly.

"You betrayed us, Salem?"

The dark-skinned man shrugged. "Don't take it personally, Zakharov. I've always worked for Meskha as a spy in the Spartan government, and when Santiago assigned me to this message, I couldn't have missed the chance to do the impossible…send an already dead man to his death."

He turned the monitor back to Meskha.

"I offered you a last chance, Zakharov, back at Deep Sea Lab. I didn't want to put you inside the punishment sphere. I wanted you to become one of the greatest scientists of the Remnants of Earth…who knows, maybe one day I would've promoted you to governor of some base."

Zakharov growled at the monitor. "Your stolen faction is mine! You used a fairly innocent faction leader to destroy me, and then build your own faction from the remnants of mi-"…then something popped into Zakharov's head. "Remnants of Earth. Your faction, lead by a Planet-born child, is built upon the ashes of an Earth-based faction."

Meskha smiled. "I think Billy's learning, momma. Tell us some more of your insights, Provost."

Zakharov shook his head. "This never really was about me, was it, Meskha? It's about Earth. It's about all the faction leaders born and raised on humanities first planet. You want to wipe out the Earthborn."

Meskha shrugged. "Starting with you. You just seemed like the easiest target. No defense…simply research, wonderful research. That's why I wanted you to become my scientist…I would've let one of the Earthborn survive because of his amazing brain."

"I don't get it. Why Earth, Meskha? Why do you want to destroy the Earthborn?"

"You and your greedy companions. You destroyed your own planet, and now you made your way to Chiron and decided to muck this place up too! I refuse to let that happen, Zakharov. Soon Deirdre will destroy the other factions, and by then my army will be more then sufficient enough to overtake her. Planet will be run by a true Planetborn leader!"

She tapped some buttons onto her monitor. "I've gathered enough information from your program, Zakharov. Ground Level Sea Base…brilliant, just damn brilliant. You seem to have outwitted me, for once. Well, enough is enough. The University will be completely and utterly destroyed." She moved to turn the monitor off. "And by the way, Zakharov…don't get too comfortable down there." Then the screen went dead.