Unapologize

By: PricklySare

A/N: I still don't own them. If I did, you know Ranger would have more action. :)

Thanks to everyone who has been reading and reviewing this story. Your support and enthusiasm is amazing. For anyone who I didn't get a reply to, I'm sorry. Real Life has been crazy lately and any spare time I have I'm working on chapters of this story. :) Don't hate me. LOL.

As always, thanks to my M's and to Stayce who without you guys this story wouldn't be quite as awesome.

Sare

Chapter Thirty-five: Ranger Infiltrates the Compound

Ranger's POV

The outside of the compound was eerily silent as I used the codes to bypass security and slipped unnoticed through the heavy metal doors. I slowly pulled them closed, making sure it didn't click shut. "T-minus five minutes until self-destruct," a mechanical voice said. Fuck! No wonder this whole thing had felt off. There wasn't time for stealth, I needed to get the information and get the hell out.

Running through the darkened halls, the only light came from the red flashing lights farther down the passageway. My Glock 22 was in hand and I started systematically searching each room I came to. They were small and appeared to have been offices before they were cleaned out and stripped down. There was nothing of use in any of them, and I pushed forward. "T-minus four minutes, thirty seconds until self-destruct," the voice intoned. At the far end of the hall was a large rectangular window that, based on the blueprints, would overlook a factory workroom. I continued forward, checking each room as I went.

There was one last door before I got to the window. It was the largest of the offices and hadn't been cleaned out yet. The distinct metallic smell of blood hit my nose moments before I saw the body. It was an older man, who would have been distinguished in life. Now in death, he was colorless, his lifeless eyes staring blankly out at the room around him. His blood covered the walls, proof of the wound on his neck. Whoever had killed him had done so with military precision. I already knew that there wouldn't be any information left for me to recover. This mission had been a set up from the word go. The only thing I wasn't sure of was who was responsible for it.

"T-minus four minutes until self-destruct." Plenty of time. Kick it into gear Manoso. Heading toward the window I kept my senses alert, listening for any sound that would indicate trouble. My gut told me that there would be, and it would be like Hell on Earth. Maybe it's the welcoming party, Manoso. You've been one step ahead of the Devil for years. Maybe he's tired of waiting.

The scene before me was nothing less than total Armageddon. Bodies, some whole, some barely recognizable as human beings, were strewn about in various versions of grotesque death. Dozens more were locked inside large cylindrical tubes that would fit right into a blockbuster science fiction film. Their bodies were twisted and contorted in horrid poses of pain, their death dance frozen for all time. At any other time, the sight would have sickened and repulsed me, but as a soldier there wasn't room for emotions. I had a job to do, and very little time to do it. It was clear that I was getting too old for this shit.

Walking through the doorway, I was a soldier, through and through. A walking weapon, I had no doubt that my life would depend on me keeping that frame of mind. "T-minus three minutes until self-destruct," the voice sounded again. A calm settled over me as I crept down the stairs, my footsteps silent. Reaching the floor I swept my gun back and forth, clearing the area around me before proceeding farther into the room.

"We've been expecting you, Nychta." The voice froze me in my tracks as memories of another time, another place, came flooding back. "Memories are a funny thing, aren't they soldier?" I didn't know what to say, I hadn't heard his voice in the ten years since that last mission in Chechnya.

"I watched you die."

"No, you watched me be reborn," he said moving around me like a panther. I repositioned myself, keeping my gun trained on him. "I am so much more powerful now than I could have ever imagined before." While he was speaking, my mind was trying to reconcile the monster in front of me with the man who I had known. John Henry Bunyan had died a hero, a man who had believed in freedom. He'd left a pregnant wife and twin boys without their husband and father. He'd done it because it was not only his job, but what he'd been trained to do. I'd notified his wife, held her while silent tears streamed down her face, and she had accepted without question that he'd died an honorable death.

Now, what I was looking at wasn't human. Aside from his voice and size, the man I had fought side by side with, the man we had called Dux Ducis, our leader, was gone. In his place was a hideous mass of graying flesh. In life his skin had been a shade lighter than my own, now it resembled the flaking skin of a molting lizard. His eyes that for years were filled with determination and understanding, were now flat and cold, showing no sign of the life that once flowed through his veins. "Dux Ducis, what happened to you?" I asked him, keeping my voice devoid of emotion.

For the merest moment something flashed through is eyes, something like anger, before he said, "Nothing happened to me. The government brought me back, made me more than any mere human. I'm not touched by concern, pain, or weakness, anymore. I'm a soldier, powerful and invincible, ready to do as I'm ordered. I'm a killing machine, and I no longer have to worry about useless emotions clouding my judgment." I had always known that our government backed some shady experiments, but I had never considered the fact that they were actually participating in things ripped from Hollywood screenplays.

The emotions my training was keeping in lock down were going to be brutal when they were finally released, but at that moment, the only thing that mattered was getting the job done without getting myself killed. As if the mechanical voice was practicing the ESP that Steph was convinced I had, it's warning rang out again. "T-minus two minutes until self-destruct." I was running out of time. I caressed the trigger of my gun gently with my finger, knowing what I needed to do. He needed to die, permanently, this time.

"I can't let you do that, Nychta. We can't let you do that," he said, once again seemingly reading my mind. I had a moment to wonder whether or not my blank mask was on the fritz, or if maybe the government had actually managed to create mind readers. Neither thought was particularly comforting.

"We?" I asked, choosing to focus on what he'd said, rather than why he'd said it.

"Yes, Nychta. We," he said, gesturing with his arms to the room around us. "Did you not bother to take in your surroundings? Has humanity made you weak?" Shit. Way to be aware of your surroundings, Manoso. While I'd been in shock over the appearance of the man in front of me, I'd been surrounded by five other walking dead soldiers. I couldn't believe I'd been so oblivious to what was going on around me that I hadn't realized that there were others like Dux Ducis.

"You will not get out of this. We accepted our mission, and we never fail," one of the other soldiers said. It took a moment for recognition to set in.

"Michelson?" I asked, already knowing the answer. He smiled a grotesque version of his once human smile.

"Hello, Manoso. Surprised to see me?" Surprise was a little too weak of a word, but I wasn't about to get into that. Time was running out, and I wasn't about to die in Mexico.

"You know, Nychta, not everything is as it first appears," Dux Ducis said.

"I'm beginning to realize that," I told him as I pulled the trigger, shooting him between the eyes.

"T-minus one minute thirty seconds until self-destruct." Piece of cake. Five large, mostly dead, former Special Forces and mercenary soldiers were surrounding me. I needed to make an opening so I had half a chance to get out before the building exploded. This was going to be fun. As one, the group surged toward me, tightening their circle. I swept my right leg across from the hip, connecting with Michelson's knee, dislocating it. As he went down I grabbed his head and slammed it into my raised left knee breaking his nose. Kicking his body to the ground I stomped my right foot to his skull, before rotating on my heel to face the four remaining men.

I blocked a round house kick to my head, grabbing the attacker's leg with my left hand, wrapping my right arm around his calf. Continuing the rotation, I lifted him off the ground, throwing him into the two soldiers flanking me on the right. Spinning around I raised my gun, just as I was tackled around my waist and taken to the ground. Using my attacker's forward momentum I countered with a Tomoe Nage. I wrapped my left hand into his shirt while planting my right boot firmly against his lower abdomen; rolling backwards I maintained contact and landed on his chest, my knees against his shoulders, immobilizing his arms. I'd maintained the hold on my gun and in one swift move brought the barrel beneath his chin and pulled the trigger.

"T-minus one minute until self-destruct." The three soldiers I'd temporarily disabled earlier were in beginning to disentangle themselves. They were between me and the exit, so I planted my left hand on the dead soldier's chest to support my weight, raised my gun and shot a controlled pair at two of the soldiers that were on the ground. The third soldier from the pile came up beside me and managed to kick the gun from my hand. The sound of it sliding across the floor was my only indication of where it went. I was still perched on the dead soldier, so I maintained my balance using my left arm, dropping down to my elbow and sweeping my right leg around my attacker's kneecaps. Using my momentum I continued my rotation while pulling my Karambit from the buckle of my utility belt. I climbed on top of my final attacker, pinning his body beneath mine. Taking the knife, I slit his throat from ear to ear.

"T-minus forty-five seconds until self-destruct." I replaced my Karambit in its sheath and grabbed my gun off the floor. "T-minus thirty-five seconds until self-destruct." I needed to get out of the building, but there was one more thing I had to do first. Pulling a high resolution mini DVR recorder from my cargo pocket, I took inventory of the occupants of the cylindrical tubes as I raced passed them; I recognized a few of the men trapped inside.

I did one final sweep of the large room, hearing my final warning to get the hell out. "T-minus twenty-five seconds until self-destruct." It was time to go. Pocketing the DVR I sprinted across the chamber, avoiding the bodies that littered the floor, gun still in hand. I was still two hundred feet from the emergency exit that was indicated on the blue prints. "Ten. Nine. Eight." I hit the button on the control panel that would open the passageway. Nothing happened. "Seven. Six. Five." Shit. I fired two rounds the into panel. "Four. Three." I watched as the door in the wall began to slowly slide open. "Two." I made a run for it and reached the opening just as the countdown hit one. My world exploded.