CHAPTER 3
1815 Hours, Guardian Headquarters, Haven, Somewhere on Angel Island, 40000 Feet Above Sea Level.
Blinding light. Blinding light, a monotonous beeping and overwhelming feeling of pain. That's what he first felt when he awoke. Above him, through blurry eyes he could just about make out the seven bright lights on what he hoped fleetingly was a surgery bed light platform. He caught a glimpse of some movement in the far right of his eyesight and tried to turn his head to look. He couldn't and for a second he panicked.
"Don't be alarmed, your neck isn't broken, you're just secured to the bed to stop any further injury" The voice was soft and helpful.
Finn tried to talk and found he couldn't do that either, there was a pipe in his mouth and he could feel it in his throat. He moved his right arm painfully instead and someone took hold of it and placed it back on the bed. A female blur appeared from the right side of vision and looked straight at him.
"You are a very, very lucky individual Corporal Finn" she beamed. "You should be dead"
Finn rolled his eyes as much as possible. He felt like he was.
"Ive just put some more painkillers on for you; your going to fall back to sleep now but you will feel much better"
Finn closed his eyes and tried to nod which he couldn't do. He felt better already.
The single gunship skimmed over the desert flats and then came to a slowing halt. It hovered on the spot, its desert camouflage making it invisible from above. After a few moments a grinding noise filled the air and a large trapdoor in the ground opened up. The gunship descended steadily into the ground and then the trapdoor began to close with a hiss, shutting off the rest of the world.
Slowly hovering to the ground, occasionally jinking unsteadily as one wing tilted upright it landed on a premarked landing pad and cut its engines. With a whine they slowly stopped rotating and then became silent a few seconds later. The hangar lights cast earthly shadows across the aircraft as it cooled.
The ramp on the back of the gunship lowered, the amber light inside strobing as it did so. It clanged to a stop on the metal landing pad. Emerging from the darkness of the aircraft, they disembarked.
First to come down the ramp was Jacob, the Commander, dressed in the tight fitting body suit all of his team wore. He carried his weapon over his back and was busy entering a report into a handheld computer on his wrist. He still wore his skull mask. Major Julie-Su and Lieutenant 'Delilah' Da-May the other two officers, both female, stepped down the ramp directly behind him, they had removed their masks and both instinctively brushed their spines from their faces as they hit the colder wind in the hangar.
A bag flew through the air and landed at the bottom of the ramp with a crunch, narrowly missing the three at the bottom. Julie-Su turned to look back into the transport. "You know what that's full of right?" she asked almost knowing the answer.
Sergeant Drake Surewind appeared at the top of the ramp, alongside his friend Corporal 'Mexican' Carlos. He rolled his eyes and smiled. "Yeah, of course, they aren't armed"
Julie-Su looked at him, at the bag again and then shook her head. "Right, whatever"
"Make way boys" a gruff voice interrupted and then Sergeant Frank 'God' Harmer barged them out of the way. "Someone needs to get to the range and zero this thing back in, its out" he stroked his sniper rifle like a baby. "Yeah, cause that's exactly where were going isn't it Drake" Carlos smirked and nudged him in the ribs.
Drake smiled evilly. "Yeah, no intention whatsoever of heading straight to the bar"
"Drink will make you annoying…"
Drake turned to look back into the transport and nodded. "Yeah right, im annoying anytime, you just notice it more when im steaming" he chuckled.
A large figure stepped out of the transport and took a deep breath of air. His face was stern and part of it had been implanted with technology, above, around and under his left eye. Knuckles, the Guardian of the Floating Island took a long look around and then stepped down the ramp, heavy footsteps clanging of the descend ramp. He stepped off the ramp and onto the landing pad with a thud and stood next to Jacob who removed his mask to speak aloud.
"Okay guys, ten minutes to stow gear and weapons…debrief at the table" Jacob ordered. "Foods already been organised"
"Outstanding service your family have here Guardian" Delilah purred in her delicious voice. "Defecting was well worth it"
Knuckles smiled wryly and took the device from Jacob when he offered it to him. "We live to serve…" he replied coolly. He looked at the computer for a moment and then began to pace over towards the armoury, the others in tow. "What did we do about the drop troopers who saw us?" he asked to everyone without turning around. Jacob replied. "Same as we always do, move them around a little"
"So I would be expecting to bump into one at some point, in Haven?"
"More than likely"
Knuckles nodded and smiled. "If we take any more people on, im going to have to get this place expanded" he moved his hands around as if to accentuate his point. "The council will love that…"
"It's either employ them or mind blank them" Delilah replied.
"I agree it better to employ them, but don't you think twelve in one month is getting a little silly?"
"They are fine troops" Drake butted in with his Australian accent. "You couldn't find better"
"We should take a leaf from the companies back in the city and start being equal opportunities employers, who knows we might even recruit some ex Legionnaires?" Knuckles chuckled as he watched Julie-Su, Delilah and Jacob all glare at him. "What?" he continued.
They reached the armoury a moment or two later. Julie-Su, who hated having to wear the restrictive armour, was the first to remove it as always. She literally threw the skull mask onto its holder and then like a cat she wriggled her way out of the heavy body armour, her slender figure just about managing it. She let it rest on its side whilst she leant down to remove her thigh holster and belt with delicate fingers.
Drake wolf whistled. Julie-Su rolled her eyes. It was a standard joke.
The others followed suit getting unarmoured. They all placed their rifles on the armourer's desk and stood around for a moment. Julie-Su and Delilah had both unzipped their skin-tight suits down to the waist and let the top half sag. Julie-Su rubbed her shoulder under her vest top casually as she waited.
Knuckles let them finish before he placed the two heavy pistols he carried onto the armours desk. The armourer wasn't around at the moment but would be soon. He unclipped his heavy belt and dropped that onto the desk as well. As he did so he looked down at his hands, noticing something. They were stained with blood and oil. He sighed and just stared at them.
"Guardian, you coming?" Jacob asked as the others disappeared through a blast door.
Knuckles turned around to face him and held up his hands. "Ill be along, just going to get cleaned up"
Jacob looked at his hands, nodded, and then followed the others.
"How many this time?"
Knuckles turned around suddenly to see Julie-Su leaning against the wall, her arms crossed and a look of genuine concern on her slightly tired eyes. He crossed over to a sink that was nearby and sprayed his hands with disinfectant spray before beginning to clean them in the boiling hot water. "Two" he sighed heavily, his shoulders sagging. He watched as the blood and oil mixed with the water, turning it a murky red colour, the oil floating on the surface. "How many more before…"
"You did what you had to, no-one will question that" she didn't flinch. "Get cleaned up and ill meet you at the bar for the debrief, it will be better then"
Knuckles nodded, his heavy spines slightly rocking. "Ill be there in ten" he replied.
Julie-Su, as silent as a predatory tigress, nodded and disappeared again.
Slowly, and with forced effort, Knuckles crossed to his own armour bay. He took a piece of chalk and then marked another two lines on the running total.
Jacob took a sip of his drink and then took a large bite of a burger. He looked around at the others, seated around the circular debriefing table in the bar. It was a strange thing, there were over twenty other rooms in Haven that he knew of that could be used for this task, all much better equipped. However, the bar was always the first choice. It suited the team well.
"He's coming right?" Jacob asked once he had finished eating.
"Yes" Julie-Su replied. "Begin anyway"
Jacob nodded. "Okay guys. We have a worrying dilemma. Why the hell were Legionnaire Destroyers doing at that target? And more importantly what were they guarding?"
"Well we know that the legion only deploy them when they are hiding something really important" Julie-Su replied.
"True" Jacob nodded. "Any ideas?"
No-one said a word, they were all completely stumped.
"What about the hard drives we managed to recover?" Carlos asked almost as an afterthought. "They must have had something important on them that warranted that much protection".
"The 'stiffs' are collating the data as we speak. It could be interesting" Jacob replied.
"Id prefer if you didn't speak about my ancestors that way, commander" Knuckles smiled as he walked into the bar through the open door. "Though the description is probably accurate"
Drake smiled and handed Knuckles his drink as he sat down next to him.
"Point noted Guardian" Jacob apologised. "Basically until we get any further information, its stand down"
"How long?" God asked.
"A day or two maybe"
Knuckles reached across and stole half a burger from Drakes plate. He took a bite and then began chewing. "I reckon ive got another week at best before im out"
Delilah looked up from her wine glass that she held and then looked over at Knuckles. "It's been three weeks already?"
"I think so, this last one took a lot out of me, and I feel like shit"
Jacob nodded and took another drink of his beer. "We need to cater for that on the next few raids"
"What we need to cater for Commander, is some of those Destroyers turning up again. That's five in two months. How many more have they got?" Drake quizzed.
"They produce them like armoured vehicles and they are never short of candidates. Unless by some miracle they stopped, they are probably just producing them as quickly as we are destroying them"
Drake whistled and leaned back in his chair, taking a long pull of his cigarette and downing alot of drink.
"We need to carry something heavier next time if Knuckles isn't going to be with us, just in case" Julie-Su pipped up.
Carlos smiled heavily and tapped the table. "Ive got just the thing, ive just been waiting to use it"
"Does it go boom?" Drake asked almost salivating.
"Boom is much too small a word to use" he replied. "More like Kaboom!"
Delilah rolled her eyes at them both. "Get married to it Carlos, you'd suit it"
"I Might just do that, I might just…"
"Anyway, back to the point in hand" Jacob interrupted before the whole thing got blown away. "In two days time, were going back to the surface, we need to find out for sure what the hell is going on, I don't like being blind and im sure neither do you guys, we are going to poke our noses in and see what bites back."
"Two days is a long time" Julie-Su smiled. "Im going to head back to the city for the day to relax.
"Ill come with you" Delilah butted in. "It's been too long since I saw real people"
"What are we then?" Drake asked puzzled.
"You my dear, dear, gorgeous friend…" Delilah purred and got out of her seat, wrapping her slender arms around Drakes neck and kissing him on the cheek. "You are a predictable, foolish animal…"
Drake smiled as she kissed his cheek. "Damn straight…" he replied.
Lieutenant Orin had seen some incredible things in his life that was for sure. He had seen strange sunsets, weird and wonderful wildlife and he had seen ferocious battles that claimed many lives. Now he was lying down in a hospital bed, looking across a pristine medical ward and at the one occupied bed in front of him.
"Ah I see you are awake Lieutenant"
Orin looked to his right and found himself confronted with a beautiful female Echidna that wore a lab coat that should have been sinful. She was stunning. Her glasses just rested nicely on the end of her nose and she was carefully biting the end of her pen as she walked towards him.
"My first question would have been where was I?" he coughed through raspy lungs. "But I already know now…"
"Oh really?" the female replied not really paying much attention to his blurred speech. "Where are you then?" she asked whilst placing a cold stethoscope on his chest.
"Heaven" he sighed.
"Nice try Lieutenant, if only I had a penny for every time I heard that" she purred. "You were close though, not Heaven. No, you're currently a guest in Haven. Courtesy of the Guardians"
Orin choked with shock and leaned up in the bed, the sheet falling away for a moment down to his waist. He was completely naked. "Haven…what, like the real deal?" he almost cried.
"My name is Hazel" she replied, gently pressing him back against the bed. "The real deal" she fiddled with some dials next to him. "You've been unconscious for nearly a day, you took a plasma hit to the helmet and it knocked you out, it really should have snapped your neck but apparently there is muscle there that didn't agree" she pressed his neck with her pen and he felt slightly dizzy as a result. "Its still tender though so we decided against waking you up early, let the body heal itself that's what I always say"
He took in her words for a moment and then got a quick recollection of the second before he was hit. It had come out of nowhere; he hadn't even seen the attacker. "Im not alone here, who are the others?" he almost demanded.
"Ooooh less of the officer speak Mr Orin" Hazel gently chided. "Your not on any battlefield you can win at the moment, I call the shots here and this is my warzone"
"Fair enough, who are the others please" he asked politely.
"There is only one, Lieutenant, directly opposite you is Corporal Finn, I believe you know him"
Orin nodded in reply and smiled a wry smile. The bastard had survived against the Destroyers. Hed promote him as soon as he got a chance. "What about the others?" he asked.
"They have been shipped to a different hospital, a military one, some of them will survive"
"How many did we lose?" he asked almost not wanting to hear the answer.
"I wont lie to you sir, out of the twenty that made up the mission, I hear that the current figure is twelve killed and three seriously wounded"
Orin went quite for a moment and then thought of the repercussions of the figures. Hed lost that many men for nothing and they had gained nothing. What a useless waste of life.
Hazel realised what he was thinking quicker that he would have liked. "You and the Corporal over there are included in the casualty listing; you look quite fit for a dead guy"
Orin looked at her and realised she wasn't joking. "Im not dead" he quizzed.
"Oh but you are Sir, I forgot to congratulate you"
"What for?" he seethed, not liking how confused he was getting.
"Congratulations on joining our little family" she replied wickedly.