…
"I have learned to use the word "impossible" with the greatest caution."
(Wernher von Braun)
…
Aldrin Station, December 16th, 12:42 PM, 2181
…
"Alright everyone, break time!" I announced as we all put whatever we were working on down and headed up the break room. My team today consisted mostly of a few technicians Dr. Mara Ford had brought over from her lab as they tried to work out the kinks with the Plasma Rifle prototype.
A good bit had occurred over the last year. After the successful test of our "Reach System" as it was now being called, everyone had received a huge budget boost, especially Dan, Richard Windham and I. Dan utilized his newfound free time to work on some new device that was supposed to visualize surfaces on the other side of walls, sort of like the classic "x-ray vision" thing Superman had. I had to give him credit, he was determined to make it work. Dimitri kept hinting that he and Dan are working on something "special" off to the side.
Richard had been sharing his lab with Lydia as the two worked together. She had gone back to doing medical research, and was currently in the process of trying to find a true cure for Meningitis, a disease that still claimed many lives to this day. It was also rumored that the two of them were also working on some comprehensive Alzheimer's research due to their specializations in brain chemistry. I imagined she was having a blast.
Of course Dan and his sister hadn't been the only ones to dabble in multiple projects lately. I had obviously begun work on the Plasma Gun with the help of Mara. With her along for the project, we'd likely have a fieldable prototype by the next month. Admittedly, it would be awhile before the weapon would be in a suitable state for the military, right now it looked more like the Gluon Gun from Half-Life than the Plasma Gun from Doom 3. Still, we were stepping in the right direction. Development had been very steady. We had taken trips to the abandoned iron mines below the surface of Mercury to test various incarnations to great effect. The mines were great testing sites for weapons and such, plus they were very well shielded due to their high metal content.
Aside from the Plasma Gun, I had also begun to dabble in the old exoskeleton tech from the early 2030's, where they actually saw limited use in the military before being deemed too "expensive" and "ineffective" with the advent of gene therapy. Gene therapy, despite being a painful process, had become the standard for Alliance marines, but Citadel regulations had put a stop to any "Master Chief-esq" stuff. I was hoping that the possible reintroduction of exoskeletons could change that. Sira and I had dug some of the old exos out of deep storage and began "upgrading" them, essentially. We had already begun extensive testing on our new "Mark III's" as we called them, having volunteers run extensive obstacle courses below the surface of Mercury to help test their full capabilities.
"So…" Mara started, crashing in an armchair with a paper cup filled with water. "…when do you think we'll have a presentable model?"
"Eh, a week or two, give or take." I replied, ripping open a bag of chips and shoveling a few in my mouth. "Why?"
"I'm looking forward to presenting something new to the Admirals." She answered, taking a sip of her water as she looked down at the dilapidated model on the center table downstairs.
"What, creating a new form of FTL wasn't enough excitement?" I smiled, looking over at her as two of her techs walked past.
"You, Dan and Jack invented that, not me." She replied, leaning forward with her eyes still glued firmly to the plasma gun. "I'm looking forward to presenting something I worked on."
I had to give the woman credit, she didn't hide the fact that she wanted to promote herself. While she was a good acquaintance and colleague, she made it very clear that she did what she did on this station for her and her alone. I didn't really mind, to be honest. As long as she cooperated with everyone else and didn't discredit anyone or steal anything, I didn't really care what her motives were. She was a team player.
What made it sadder was the fact that she was a strikingly beautiful woman and I was genuinely attracted to her, but I had serious doubts that any good would ever come from me trying to ask her out on a date, her personality would likely clash violently with mine. I was in this business for advancing the Alliance, like I had done previously for the USA. She was in it for advancing herself. If anything, she likely still saw me an obstacle and was using my project to help further herself.
This was all pure speculation, of course, but a good scientist always looks ahead and forms ideas when unknown variables are involved.
My mind then drifted off to Sira, who I had worked with just as much as Mara. Being an Asari, she was fairly beautiful, but she was a bit… odd. She was occasionally flirty, unlike Mara, but she had this drifty, almost bubbly personality that caused her to do weird things like stare at ceilings or completely break off from regular conversation to talk about the weather on Earth. That, and she was still and alien, not a Human.
I knew that Asari engaged in intimacy by "melding their minds together" to exchange genetic information. To some, that probably sounded awesome. To me, that sounded like some freaky Demolition Man shit. I didn't want someone turning my brain into scrambled eggs, especially someone as "in the clouds" as her.
I shook my head, returning my mind to the world around me.
"Yeah, it'll be fun showing that off." I responded, pushing my thoughts aside for the moment.
"How's that bleed-off problem coming along?" She inquired, leaning forward and staring at me.
"Oh, you'll love this." I started, taking a seat across from her. "I solved the bleed-off from the new canisters by adding a small pump behind the injector that increases suction. Not only does it no longer bleed off while firing, but now it should fire even faster than it did before."
"Impressive." She smiled, leaning on her arm as she looked back down at the prototype. "I'll have to adjust the magnetic field to account for the increased rate of fire."
Right as she finished talking, my omni-tool started playing "Space Monkeys" by The Dust Brothers. Dan was giving me a call.
"Yeah, what's up man?" I asked, slightly perplexed by what he could possibly want this time of the day.
"There's something I've got to s-show you." Dan said in a completely flat, but serious tone.
"Dan, we're working in the lab today, you can't just ask me to kick everyone ou-" I started to say before Dan cut me off.
"I don't care what you're doing, this is something poten…potentially serious." Dan repeated, his voice getting slightly more aggravated. "Close down Delta and get to my quarters. Now."
I grimaced, pinching the bridge of my nose out of frustration.
"Fine, give me seven or so minutes." I finished, cutting the call and looking back to Mara and the technicians she had brought in. I stepped up onto the coffee table, knowing this wasn't likely to go well.
"Alright, I'm sorry to say this people but we have to close down the lab for the day." I announced, causing murmurs of confusion to move through the room. Mara shot me an annoyed glare, which I had anticipated. "Finish up whatever you're eating or drinking and please leave the lab."
Everyone begrudgingly agreed, shuffling out of the lab after a few minutes. Mara was the only one left, and she looked none too pleased.
"What the hell is going on?" She demanded as I closed the doors and locked the lab down with a loud hiss. "We need to work on this thing if we want to reach our deadline!"
"Look, I'm really sorry about this, but Dan is having some sort of personal issue. Something important." I quickly apologized as we walked down the hallway, stepping into the elevator. "We can work on it tomorrow, I promise."
Mara didn't reply, she just shook her head with a pissed off expression as she stepped in the elevator with me.
Once we had made it back to Residential, I waited for a moment as I watched Mara walk away. Part of me was sad that I had genuinely disappointed her, an odd feeling to have given I'd only felt that way with a certain, small handful of individuals. Once she disappeared from view, I walked over to Dan's quarters and rung the bell.
"Who is it?" Dan asked from the other side, grinding my gears.
"Why, it's the gingerbread man of course." I replied sarcastically, crossing my arms. "Who the fuck do you think it is? Let me in!"
Dan quickly opened the door, looking down both ends of the hallway before ushering me in and locking the door.
Dan's quarters were a lot different from mine, to say the least. While I carefully adorned every corner of my quarters with posters, books, or the occasional knick-knack, Dan's was more akin to an explosion of papers, datapads, and trash. Everywhere you looked, there were piles of paper haphazardly scattered around, either plastering his walls, eating up his coffee table, or spilling out onto the floor. His bookshelf was filled with well over three dozen datapads that glowed constantly, giving his back wall an odd orange glow. And the trash… well, let's just say that if Dan had done this while we were rooming in college, I would have killed him. I couldn't even imagine what his bedroom must have looked like.
He picked up a pile of papers and moved them off the couch so I could have a seat, plopping them down on top of his kitchen counter. He and I sat down on the couch, and I decided to be the one to start the conversation.
"Alright, what's going on that's so important?" I said, nearly yelling as Lydia popped up on a projector that Dan had placed next to the couch. "Do you realize I had to piss off Mara of all people to get here?"
"There's a leak." Dan deadpanned once again, catching my full attention.
"A leak?" I repeated with a puzzled look on my face.
"Yesterday, I got bored of waiting for my cultures to grow, so I decided to nose my way into the communications grid to see if there was anything interesting. I discovered that someone is sending small data packets through the system and transmitting them to an untraceable location. " She started, already starting to set off a few alarm bells in my head. "You want to know what was in those packets, Sean?"
I felt my face drop as I came to the logical conclusion.
"Our work?" I guessed, as both of them shot me looks of confirmation.
"Not just ours, b-but everyone's." Dan added, handing me a datapad.
On it were readouts of all the data that had been transmitted, which Lydia had subtly made copies of before they disappeared. It was bits and pieces of everything we had been working on, advanced weapons, propulsion, energy... everything. Now I understood why Dan had been so paranoid when he called me. Lydia could get in serious trouble if the Director found out she had accessed secure transmissions, and I wasn't about to start mouthing off to other people about this.
The obvious question now was who was sending these data packets, and to whom?
"So… what does this mean now?" I asked, looking back at the two of them. Dan just shrugged as Lydia pitched the bridge of her nose in frustration. "We're screwed if we don't report it, we're screwed if we do."
"I don't k-know." Dan replied, running his hands through his hair then scratching the back of his neck in the same motion.
"Well, I know what I'm going to do." I announced, standing up and walking towards the door. "I'm heading back to Delta, I'm going to make a hard copy of every piece of data we have down there, and completely wipe our computers."
"Wait a second…" Lydia immediately said, giving me pause as she looked off into the distance. "No, that's can't be right…"
"What is it?" I asked as Dan and I both looked at her.
"I've just found an embedded message inside one of the newest packets." She said as her face became grim. "Listen."
Lydia snapped her fingers as an audio file began playing.
"Overwatch, someone or something in the station's systems has become aware of our presence." The distorted voice announced, pausing for a moment. "I am formally requesting that Paperclip be initiated, effective immediately."
My eyes widened as the file finished playing, Dan and I immediately stood up and looked at each other with the same dire faces. We knew what Paperclip meant. It must have been a reference to the U.S. operation during WWII to recruit German scientists. Someone wanted us, and they wanted us now.
"Lydia, how long ago was that packet sent out?" I asked, pointing to her as she looked back down.
"An hour, forty-five minutes and twelve seconds ago." She replied, her eyes twitching slightly as she moved through petabytes worth on information a second. "Someone approved it thirty-two minutes and twenty-eight seconds ago."
Dan and I looked at each other, not knowing what to do. We were about to be or soon to be in a lot of shit.
"Lydia, relay all of this to Powell and send out an emergency broadcast." I started putting together quickly, my mind racing at a frantic pace. "Warn the Director first, then the Project Leads, then everyone else. We need to flush our data and proceed to the emergency zones now."
"After y-you do that, get Richard to transfer you t-to one of those cards." Dan ordered, looking fearful as he threw his shoes on. "I'll come for you."
She nodded, disappearing as Dan and I scrambled out of his quarters, running down to the elevator and punching in Delta. We needed to get our gear and protect our research. If someone was in our system as deeply as I thought, they were likely tracking our movements at this point.
Halfway down the shaft, the elevator red emergency lights lit up as a violent vibration shook the station.
We were too late. Whoever it was that wanted us, they were already here.
"Alert! Unknown hostiles detected in docking bays! All intervention teams, report to battle stations! All Project Leads, destroy all critical data!" Powell could be heard through the PA system as the elevator finally hit our floor. We ran inside Delta, grabbing what gear we could carry and throwing on kinetic barriers. They were simple belt devices that gave us a weak, but potentially life-saving barrier of defense from gunfire. Nothing approaching the protection a hardsuit offered, but it would have to do.
"This is not how I wanted to spend my day!" I shouted as rumbles could be felt vibrating through the station, sounding like they were coming from above us.
"Hurry up, we n-need to head over to Alpha and get my sister." Dan quickly responded as that protective look seeped into his expression.
"Don't worry, I don't plan on abandoning her either." I reassured, knowing exactly what was going through his head.
I couldn't blame him, I'd want to make sure my sister was safe.
As i finished loading up on supplies, I looked back at Mara and I's prototype, feeling a true longing for the beautiful weapon.
There was no way in hell I was going to destroy our only working plasma gun. I walked over to it, rubbing my finger along the stainless steel. I started off my hefting the large backpack, which was our current method for storing the plasma. It was about the size of a leaf blower, but it was strangely light. A hose fed directly from the backpack into the bottom of the rifle, which looked fairly similar to my initial design documents.
"Holy shit." Dan exclaimed, looking at the two glowing plasma cells attached to my back. "T-that thing isn't go… going to explode on us, is it?"
"I hope not." I replied, turning on the rifle. It gave off a low, electrical humming sound as it warmed up, causing a small smile to spread across my face despite the circumstances.
Once we had everything we needed, Dan and I stepped outside of the lab activated the purge protocols. It was an emergency system which wiped all electronic data down to the hardware and filled the lab with pure oxygen, as opposed to the nitrogen/oxygen mixture we normally used. Once it was filled to capacity, a spark was lit that flash incinerated everything in the room with explosive force. It was a good system, and guaranteed that everything would be destroyed.
We rushed back to the elevators and hopped inside, quickly going up towards Alpha. Unfortunately, when we reached said floor, the bodies of security personnel, technicians, and maintenance crewmen could be seen around us. The intervention teams had been viciously gunned down, and it looked like the others had been lined up against the walls and shot in the back of their heads.
"Oh God…" I exclaimed, holding back the urge to vomit at the gruesome sight.
"Come on, we h-have to go." Dan urged, tugging ant my shoulder to keep me moving. I complied, but I knew that image would stick in the back of my head long after this was over.
When we were almost there, we heard someone shouting orders from around the corner. It sounded like a couple of the boarders.
"God damn it, one of the eggheads on the other side keeps changing the codes." I heard someone say as the two of us stacked up on the nearest wall. "Get me some breaching charges! If they won't let us in, we'll make our own way in."
"Boss, I just got word that Echo team didn't reach Delta in time." Another person announced as I looked down the hallway. "Michaels and Nemo are gone, and they torched everything."
The four figures down the hallway looked like paramilitaries. They were well armed, moved in a synchronized and disciplined manner, and didn't bear any markings or insignia that I could make out at this distance, dressed completely in black. There was roughly twelve meters of open space between them and our position, giving us plenty of room to relocate if they came this way.
"Damn it, Blackbird isn't going to be happy about that." Their leader exclaimed, shaking his helmeted head. "What about the rest?"
"Raptor team already secured Windham and Winters, and Foxtrot just got their hands on Ford." The second figure answered, standing stiff in the presence of his superior. "Karpyshyn should be inside the lab, but until we take those A.I.s offline we can't ping Michaels, Nemo, or Vsevolod in the station's systems."
I reared my head back, looking over at Dan who was visibly tense already. I had predicted their motives very well, we were their targets. From what we saw back in the elevator lobby, everyone else was expendable. We both knew we had to go through these assholes if we wanted to get into Alpha.
"Alright, I've got a plan." I whispered to Dan, snapping his attention back to me. "You move across the hallway to get their attention. When they get closer, I'll fry them with this."
Dan nodded, getting his serious face back on. He took in a few huffs of air before running out of cover and into the middle of the hallway.
"Hey assholes! Looking for me?!" Dan shouted, aiming his pistol down the hallway at them before running to the other side.
"That's one of them, get him!" The leader shouted as heavy metal footsteps could be heard rushing down the hallway. I readied myself, gripping the weapon as hard as I could.
I popped out of cover, immediately unloading the unstable plasma weapon on the three men that had taken the bait. The first trooper was almost instantly gone, having been vaporized from the waist up by a "start-up" burst. Instead of the contained balls of plasma it would have normally fired, it fired what was more comparable to a "cloud", which was caused by the excess pressure of new, unfired plasma cells. The second took several superheated balls of plasma to the chest, bypassing his barriers and causing massive thermal damage. The third scrambled for cover, but was cut down by Dan's handgun before he could make it.
"Son of a bitch!" The leader shouted, quickly sliding behind cover. "Overwatch, my men are KIA! I need backup at my location NOW!"
Dan and I rushed him, knowing that we could take advantage of his "capture" orders. We made it to his cover only to see him fall onto his back, pointing his lone pistol at us out of desperation.
"Heh, all the teams will be here shortly." He nervously chuckled, the gun in his hand shaking. "You two should just give up now, maybe they'll go easy on you."
"Maybe they will, but we certainly won't." I remarked as Dan shot a round straight through his helmet, instantly ending his life.
"Piece of shit!" Dan yelled, kicking his body before picking up the rifle that he had been carrying originally.
"Get in here, quickly!" Karpyshyn said over the local PA as the doors to his lab slid open. We quickly complied, moving inside the lab as the doors closed behind us with a hiss.
Inside the lab were about a dozen people, most of them techs. There were a couple security personnel that had made it inside too, but other than that there weren't many of us. Karpyshyn looked at us with a terrified look plastered on his face.
"Dear God, what is happening?" He asked, shaking so badly that I could see the frames of his glasses jumping around. "I was working on a sample, trying to test some more brain tissue when there was suddenly gunfire, explosions, people dying… I don't feel so well."
"Calm down, we should be safe here for a while." I reassured, looking over at Powell and Lydia's avatars. They could be seen moving frantically as they struggled to deal with multiple things at once, their processes taxed to their maximum. I slid my plasma rifle off, suddenly becoming fatigued.
I put my back against the cold wall, letting myself slid down and hit the floor. Only now did I realize how hard my heart was pumping as I felt my heartbeat all the way to my hands. I took in a deep breath, processing what I had just done.
"I killed two people." I thought to myself as I could feel the smallest bit of moisture build up around the edges of my eyes. "No no, it was justified, Sean. It must have been, you saw what they had done to all other people… but still…"
I tucked my legs towards my chest and stared into space, still not being able to fully justify what I had just done as I fought to control my emotions. I did this for about three minutes before Dan walked back over. I looked back up at him, still sporting his stoic expression.
"What do we do now?" He asked, his expression turning into one of concern as he looked over at his busy sister.
I stared at him for a few second before burying my head again.
"I don't know." I answered truthfully, keeping my head down. "I don't know, man. All I did was lead us into a dead end."
"No, I'm t-the one that wanted to come here, not you." Dan deflected, kneeling next to me. "I pr…promise you, whatever happens, we'll all get through this."
"Heh, thanks buddy." I replied, forcing myself to crack a small smile as he offered his hand. I accepted it, getting back on both feet again.
As I was about to put my plasma rifle back on, a loud knock could be heard above us.
"Oh, that's not good!" Lydia said out loud, attracting our attention.
"What's wrong?" I asked, looking hard at her.
"They're going to breach through the ceil-" She began to answer as a loud bang resonated above us, sending shards of metal in every direction. My ears rang as I lost all feeling in my left side, sending me falling back to the ground as smoke filled the room. In my dazed state, I looked down to see a shard of metal sticking out of my side, causing it to bleed profusely. I looked at my hand, seeing it covered with my own blood.
My mind was still a total blank despite my obvious critical injury, still too dazed to fully process what was going on around me. I felt Dan tug at me in an attempt to see if I was alright, only fall limp to my side, knocked unconscious. My eyes were glued forwards as another one of those soldier stood over me, saying something into his helmet's radio before I passed out.
…
Unknown, unknown, unknown, 2181
…
Slipping back towards consciousness for a brief moment, I was able to vaguely make out a familiar voice. I was under the influence of some kind of opiates, making it next to impossible to even feel the tips of my fingers. Hell, I was under such a heavy feeling that I couldn't even be bothered to open my eyes. It was like someone had taken all energy from my body.
"I said will he recover from this injury, doctor?" The familiar voice asked, sounding annoyed and slightly muffled in my drug-addled mind.
"I've managed to seal his wounds, but it will be a long while before he recovers." The second, unfamiliar voice answered in what sounded like a German accent. "I cannot tell you when he will wake up."
"The Illusive Man wanted all the Project Leads. If he goes into a coma or so help me, dies, you will not like what happens next." The first voice threatened, sounding even more annoyed and... strangely familiar. "We can't recruit the dead, doctor. It doesn't work that way."
I finally recognized that voice, as a brief feeling of betrayal crossed my drug-addled mind.
"Calm down, Embry. He will not die anytime soon." The second voice reassured, trying to calm her down. "Once the small intestine is finished healing, he should make a full recovery."
"He better. Give me regular reports on his condition until he regains consciousness." Lynda threatened once again as three sets of footsteps could be heard leaving the room.
My mind, unable to keep going, slipped back over towards the dark, unable to keep me going in this state. One last thing did cross my mind before I went back under.
I would kill that bitch the next chance I got.
…
A/N: Death, murder, and betrayal! Things have begun heating up in the story, and I can't wait to start working on the next series of chapters. It'll be interesting, to say the least.
Summer is going well for me, I've had plenty of time to improve my craft and I think it's beginning to show. I hope you all enjoy the story so far as much as I enjoy writing it.
I'd love to read any reviews, I'm always up for suggestions or constructive criticism. Stay tuned!