"You boys ready? I got a green indicator light on the bridge on Golek." Burdak typed away on the console. He's gotten pretty adept with this weird gate portal tech running it back and forth between Kyozist and Earth. Especially in delivering reinforcements to try and help contain Nossa, though she's been in the wind and having left everyone in a state of constant tension. The Antarctic facility had become much more familiar to him as had Area 51 long before.
"Ready as we're going to be." Vaukt answered through his armor's vox caster. A plasma rifle at the ready, having flown in yet again from the ranch after Kazak told him the expedition to Golek was ready. It was only his second time there, having come in months before to have a look around and pick up others to help Tak. What used to be a place of contentment had turned into a miniature SpecOps outpost with several Invaders searching for the best of the best over the past six months.
Kazak himself readied his trusty Vortian mass drivers, he's grown quite accustomed to them since the second trip on Vort, especially his battlefield pickup sniper rifle courtesy of Ghost Scribe. The very same rifle that nearly killed Sula. He then made sure Dib's own gear was on him and secure, having inspected it all several times too.
Dib, meant more to stay near the two SpecOps Irken. Had a US military issue MOLLE vest with magazine pouches, various accessories, but in his holster and in hand were Vortian issue mass drivers, a pistol and a carbine. At least Kaz could satisfy some of the young man's curiosity in procuring him some alien weaponry, albeit of older technology. Aside from a suit of his own based off the same tech the sniper wore. It would mean Dib could more easily interface with various panels, but also meant Kaz had to keep a closer eye on him, lest he push a proverbial big red self destruct button.
Despite the many weeks of mentorship, guidance, and a touch of world-class training courtesy of Agent Adams and the company he kept, the young man clearly held reservations. Nerves of the great unknown and the outpouring arsenal at their disposal. This wasn't like the trip to Kyozist and the meet-and-greet with so many wonderful people of various backgrounds and species.
"This place we're going to…Golek, was it?"
"That's right." Burdak answered of the lad, making final adjustments at the console, its panels changing in hue and the ethereal, azure light beginning to manifest within the gate's ring, accompanied by a growing whine of building energy. "Unless our intel's outdated, it's a remote, mineral-rich mining world within Imperial space. Far off then well-traveled lanes, but most of its ores are destined for Devastis for refinement and processing."
"R-right…mining world…with miners, right? Not soldiers?" Dib nervously swallowed.
"Can't say for sure. Drones or soldiers, Imperial is Imperial." Burdak shrugged, patting his own holstered pistol at his hip. "Not eager to sling plasma with them but we won't be caught with our pants down, either."
He turned his attention to the young man fully.
"What's the matter? You scared?"
"I'm not scared!" He defended with a huff, attempting to remain composed.
"Really?" Burdak blinked, giving a pursed expression. "You should be. Fear keeps you alive."
"Courage isn't being free from fear, kid," Vaukt continued. "It's keeping a cool head and pushing forward despite it."
Burdak huffed a small laugh. "Relax, boys. Just giving him a hard time. Cliche and trite as it sounds, Dib, stick close to your "uncles" and you'll be fine. We aren't looking for a fight on the other side of this thing, just doing some recon and mapping out this…" He paused, looking to the other Irken present, gesturing to the spooling up construct. "Did we ever officially decide what to designate this thing as? Is it a portal? Gate? Space magic?"
"I don't know the logistics, but as far as anyone else is concerned, it's a secret of the utmost importance." Vaukt answered, "But, yeah, recon, map out the facility, see if we can find anything important."
"Hey, at least it's just a mining world and we're not dealing with backwoods Appalachian mountain men, right Burdak?" Kaz decided to throw some right back at him.
"Tongue my cloaca," The local scientist chided in kind, a brilliant flash of blue light sparking the threshold to life in full. "Door's open, gents. Who wants first honors? What 'bout you, Dib? One small step for man, one giant leap for mankind?"
"Probably…not a good idea," He hesitantly reasoned with apprehension. "I'll leave it to the experts. I'm essentially a glorified key here, aren't I?"
"We went through to Kyozist before, Dib." Kazak answered. "Do I need to hold your hand or something?"
"That was different-" The young man began, realizing it was a losing argument. "Y'know what? Fine. I'll go first. Hope you have a good explanation for my dad when I d-"
"Oh, quit being melodramatic and go already." Burdak interrupted, unceremoniously shoving Dib forward through the threshold of the gate against his will. "See you gents on the other side." He concluded before stepping through himself.
Vaukt and Kazak followed, the portal spooling down behind them. The two SpecOps men activating their night vision as they entered a dark portal room on the other side. Burdak turning on a flashlight and having a look around, their advanced night vision compensating for the added light source rather than instantly burning their retinas as human models would.
The first thing Kaz noticed was a bunch of boot prints in the dust of the room. Definitely Irken, looked like standard issue boots, typical of Elites, Internal Affairs, anyone military, basically, and some civilian prints, scientists? Either way, they were definitely not the first ones in the room lately.
"Lovely, who knows what this place is going to be crawling with."
Burdak scanned the room, craning his head up toward the high, vaulted ceiling looming overhead. The cold, damp chill of the still air, according to sensors, showed them to be in some sort of underground formation.
"Looks like an old cavern of some sort," He commented aloud, taking it all in as he moved further from the gate. "Until we get our hands on some local information, hard telling where specifically on the planet we are…or how deep, for that matter."
"What kind of information?" Dib queried, steeling his nerves and doing his best to remember what everyone had taught him.
"Basic stuff. Subterranean scans, geological surveys, atmospheric telemetry. Anything to "ground" us for points of reference." Burdak casually explained through expertise. "Be amazing if the Empire has any sort of communications array or satellite network on the surface we can tap into. Not holding my breath as remote as this place is…but looking at all these boot prints, there's more than just miners here. My guess is they discovered the gate and passed word up the chain of command."
Dib's brow furrowed beneath his own visored helmet. "What makes you so sure?"
Burdak paused, looking back at the young man as he spoke before gesturing to the damp, silted floor of the cave. A combination of naturally-occuring sediment and the slurried residue from mechanical digging creating a soft, sand-like consistency full of perfect indentations.
"Aside from the volume of traffic? See how different those ones are compared to these." He pointed to two distinct footprints. "Drones wear pretty simple footwear. Literal low men on the totem pole in the Empire, bare essentials and nothing more. If they could get away with issuing them no footwear, they probably would."
"...so those other ones there are soldier boots?" Dib concluded the man's miniature lesson.
"Bingo. Troopers have deeper treads, but those ones there are definitely either Elite or IIA. Their boots have segmented armor and toecaps. Tread pattern's different too."
"That's…impressive. How did you figure all of that out?" The young man pursued at Burdak's inquisitiveness.
"Decades of boredom and access to cable television. Humans are fascinated with forensic science."
"We snipers pick up on similar clues of our own enemies sneaking around enemy lines as we do." Kaz added, "You tend to keep your eyes open and head on a swivel way more when it's just you; a spotter is admittedly handy for a second set of eyes."
"Wouldn't surprise me at all to have Internal Affairs poking around if there's something unique they found. Grimm and Xilch want to win the war just as much as we do." Vaukt moved to a door built into the cavern wall. The lock mechanism itself wasn't activated, and the forced entry point became apparent, a hole cut and kicked open, allowing entry for whoever first made their way in. "They built a door into the cavern walls somehow, without managing to compromise the integrity of it? That's astounding."
Vaukt's night vision, looking through the hole in the door, found the walls smoothed intentionally. This was artificially done, that much was apparent. Work lights mounted on the walls but they weren't on. Lights and no power? How odd.
"Kaz, riddle me this, you're running an active dig site down here. Wouldn't you want the power on?"
"Yeah."
"The power's out."
"That's weird."
Dib apprehensively swallowed, staying close to Kazak with a vice-like grip on his weapon. "Maybe we should go back through and call it a day. The gate works, we know where it goes, come back later, yeah?"
"With the foot traffic down here? I'm not opposed to calling in a few helping hands if I'm being honest." Burdak concurred as he brought up the rear. "Not to mention, this is the part where I point out how lucky we got there was no one standing on the other side of this thing when we showed up."
"Motion tracker's not picking up anything," Vaukt chimed in over comms, before ducking through the hole in the door and going to have a look around. "That's what concerns me more."
"Yeah. That's bugging me too. Lights off, nobody's home. Even if this is a remote mining world you'd still expect somebody to be down here on guard duty, right?" Kaz added, looking around. "Burdak, maybe it's a good idea if you go back through, see if you can get our Vortian friends to send us a squad of Marines or something."
"Don't need to tell me twice. I'll leave the soldiering to the experts." He reasoned, looking to the young human between the two Irken. "C'mon, let's head back."
"I'm staying." Dib protested lightly. "They might need me here if we find any more of this Precursor technology, right?'
"...unfortunately." Burdak sighed at his logic. "You're a smart kid. Stay close to them and do whatever they say. I'll be back with friends shortly. Don't have too much fun."
Dib watched Burdak backtrack for the gate, preparing to travel through once more before turning around to catch back up to Kazak. "If we already figured out the gate works and where it goes, what else are we doing here? You two don't plan on fighting off an entire army, do you?"
"We're SpecOps, we're more ambushers than anything." Kaz set after the hole in the door, ducking through, intent on catching up with Vaukt, following the waypoint on his HUD. The General, meanwhile, was busy checking and clearing various rooms in the complex. He came to a stop in one, spotting something on his motion tracker.
Kaz's words did little to sway Dib's apprehension. Impossibly far from home under dubious circumstances, isolated, and near-infinite variables to go wrong struggled to remain tempered under resolve. Mentally reminding himself these two men he was with were highly-trained experts and knew what they were doing. They wouldn't intentionally lead them into unnecessary risk or imminent danger.
That kernel of truth steadied him, reaffirming his grip on his rifle. They wouldn't have brought him along if he weren't ready, critical to the mission or otherwise. Kazak believed in his training, he needed to as well. Staying focused, he relied on what was practiced and drilled. Where they did not search, he would cover, moving step-for-step, and hoping for no surprises. Unnerving as silent, subterranean corridors in pitch black darkness under the aid of artificial illumination were, he wasn't alone.
Vaukt pressed through the threshold of the nearest adjacent door from the corridor. Another unlocked, unpowered, door. The trio cleared as practiced a thousand times before. A few dozen in Dib's case, but nevertheless he took his corner and posted up, scanning the room. It held the appearance of what used to be an armory, adorned with empty weapon racks, armor stands, typical armory, devoid of contents long ago. Was this a military outpost of some sort? Questions soon came to an end as some crystalline insects emerged from behind the racks. Examining the new entry with some initial curiosity.
"What the heck is that?!" The human decried, sights shakily snapping to the source of skittering shadows in the near-complete absence of light.
Something Dib was quick to violate as he fumbled for the mounted light attached to his rifle. Thankfully their advanced HUDs didn't blind them, adjusting for the white light source fully illuminating the unknown activity. An angular carapace of violets and blues not unlike gemstones sparkling and refracting light from living armor with a quartet of similarly crimson orbs near fearsome fangs and mandibles of an arachnid-like creature.
Vaukt leveled his rifle out of reflex. Looked like an exoskeleton but they were covered in crystals? How curious. He was about to lower his rifle when Dib decided to introduce light to the equation. He saw the creatures rear up in a move to attack, prompting Vaukt to quickly seek cover as Kaz pulled Dib behind some himself. Spitballs of acid flying where they had previously stood. The General let loose some plasma blasts, finding the creature totally unharmed.
"What?!" He didn't miss, the shots connected, and yet it didn't even put so much as a scratch on it.
The indigenous alien did not take kindly to Vaukt's transgressions as it unleashed a howling screech and leapt from the wall, knocking over empty shelves and lockers in a cacophony of metal scraping and banging. Possessing impressive agility and speed for its size, it tackled Vaukt to the deck, prepared to finish off its quarry with its razor-sharp forelimbs and acid-dripping maw.
"Shut that fucking thing off!" Kaz yelled at Dib about his light as he swung to face Vaukt, SMG shouldered, firing several bursts at the creature with his mass driver.
Vaukt, squirming for dear life as he held the creature at bay with both hands firmly grasping its piercing limbs with all his might. Kaz's weapon illuminated the room with each pull of the trigger from its muzzle discharge. Rounds struggled to peirce the crystalline body of the creature, but chipped and cracked. Shards of the gemstone-like growth flew from each impact like shattered glass before finally breaking through into its thorax just behind the head. Something the arachnid-like creature did not take kindly to with another hearing-rending screech before leaping off of Vaukt for a rapid escape from apparent danger.
The sniper was quick on his feet, firing some more rounds towards the fleeing assailant. It seems the other two took the same cue and decided discretion was the better part of valor, taking their leave of the dangerous situation as well. Vaukt rose to his feet after running a quick check of his armor integrity. Some etching in the plates, but Vortian military plating held up just fine under the circumstances.
"What the blazes was that thing?"
Dib finally managed to overcome the terror of the moment, getting the light turned off. He stood there, the adrenaline dump causing a full-body quivering having witnessed it all. About that time, similar screeching and shrieks distantly resounded. Now every unknown, strange noise sent a shiver up his spine with a hostile and dangerous entity they knew little of and held little reservation in attacking them on sight.
"Whatever it was, we may have angered the hive." Kaz was quick to swap magazines on his weapon, keep it topped off. "We should probably get topside, pronto."
"Yeah, we can likely tap into Imperial comms up there too, get maps downloaded. Doubt they changed frequencies in a place like this."
"There's more of those things?!" Dib exasperatedly exclaimed. "W-we need to go back!"
"And let them through the gate behind us? Yeah, brilliant idea." Vaukt switched to a secondary of his, an Irken mass driven machine pistol, since it appeared his plasma rifle was useless.
"Or have their acid spit possibly ruin our way out of here." Kaz added.
"Escape and evade, kid, part of what we do." Vaukt seemed particularly calm despite having been in a near death situation. "In fact, rifle, hand it over."
"What? Why?" He began, incensed as he was confused before Vaukt took initiative and stuffed the SMG into his chest to hold while extraditing the rifle from his grasp.
"Because your failure of light discipline caused this little ordeal." He began extracting the rifle magazines from his gear as well, replacing them with those of his machine pistol. "Better off in my hands than yours now moving forward."
"Wh- How was I supposed to know they'd react?"
"We have night vision too, Dib." Kaz chimed in, "You didn't really need to do that."
Sighing in defeat at his own shortcomings nearly compromising the whole operation, he threw his hands up. "I didn'-...okay…so what do we do now then? Get to the surface? How deep are we even?"
"Quite frankly it doesn't matter how deep we are, only that we go up until we hit the surface." Vaukt took the lead out of the room, keeping his eyes peeled for elevators as they moved through the halls. Where there's elevators there's bound to be stairs. Kaz took the rear of the formation, Dib in the middle.
Despite their arrangement, Dib didn't feel anymore protected or safe. Their brief altercation in the barren armory with the local wildlife alerted their presence. The continual high-frequency calls and skittering across metal and rock alike within the walls did little to assuage his gnawing fear. Kyozist was a fun experience, meeting so many new, friendly people and learning about a universe beyond Earth's atmosphere existed. This was pure terror and he wanted nothing to do with it.
To Vaukt and Kaz, on the other hand, it was business as usual. Their type always dealt with something hostile of one form or another. As the old saying goes, "if it bleeds, you can kill it." It seems these things bleed. As they moved on, writing in Irken started popping up on the walls, directional indicators. Where various "finds" were down below. More importantly, the exit was marked.
What wasn't welcome, however, was more signatures showing up on Vaukt's HUD as well as Kaz's…and on top of that…IIA and Elite IFF signatures. Any question as to their status was quickly answered at the distant thunder of weapon reports echoing down the barren corridors carved from rock and stone. They were not alone down here and they, too, appeared to be at-odds with the lifeforms that called Golek home as they clattered through the ventilation ducts, utility piping, and vacated shafts toward the new source of noise.
"Arm the blasted miners or we're going to DIE down here!" Irken comms started filtering through the radio sets of the two Irken. "Screw the Imperial Standard! This is literal life or death!"
"I'm reporting that once we're out of this mess, Kog!"
"Report it directly to the greenest part of my c'hurta!"
"Make yourself useful and report the idiot who stirred them up again!"
"GET OFF THE RADIO AND WATCH THE DOOR!"
"That…doesn't sound good…" Dib muttered, chilled by the ongoing bursts of garbled transmissions growing stronger as they approached the source of the noises. "Aren't…all of these guys against you guys though?"
"Technically, yes," Vaukt answered.
"Only problem is that's towards the exit." Kaz noted based on the directions on the wall.
"...and they're under attack by more of these things." Dib concluded uneasily. "...that's the only way? No other options?"
"Doubtful." Vaukt concluded, sighing. He watched through the walls, the signals of the Elites dropping back, presumably towards another room. Leaving the few Internal Affairs signatures in the room.
"Kog! You coward! Get back out here and help us fight these things off!"
"Nope! Barricading in here with the miners! Good luck out there!"
"Kooooooooooog!" A scream soon came over the radio before silence. A lack of gunfire followed.
The sniper paused, listening for anything else. A sickly rending of flesh making its way through the halls…possibly the Internal Affairs Irken being consumed by whatever these were. "I still count three Elites. Who knows how many civilians; don't see any of their transponders on."
"If they're right in the way of where we need to go, what do we do?" The human asked, doing his best to remain composed despite the disturbing sounds of what could be best described as a brutal feast emanating from further down the hall and around the corner.
"We could wait until they stop eating, or we can try and sneak past them." Kaz figured a plan, "We got cloak modes in these Vortian suits of ours."
"That's all well and good for you but my power armor doesn't have optical camouflage in it yet," Vaukt chimed in.
Dib pondered briefly, anything to take his mind off of what was directly transpiring before snapping his attention to Kazak. "What about grenades? They didn't like the light, right? Use a flashbang, then throw a frag while they're blinded. Plasma didn't hurt them but high-velocity metal did something."
"Only issue with that is being in an underground cavern. Otherwise I like the idea."
"These walls look like they're feet thick, if not more. I wouldn't worry about a little frag grenade in something that's basically as robust as a bunker."
"Got any flashbangs?"
"Incendiary grenades, got a number of them."
"That'll do."
"Whoever keeps hot-keying comms, STOP IT!"
Dib froze, eyes darting between Vaukt and Kazak. "...can they hear us?"
"Hey, fuck you." Kazak tried replying.
"GET OFF THE RADIO!"
"We can hear them…maybe it's just static for them with our channels?" Dib reasoned, attempting to put two-and-two together.
"That's it. Kog, do your job and beat whoever's clogging comms up to death!"
"Uh…guys…" Kog's voice came through next, "It's not any of their miners. All their comms are in the pile here."
"What? Now the Crystalids evolved to hack our communications? Fat chance."
"I don't know! I'm definitely…oh…dookie. Look to your left. I'm picking up….General Vaukt's transponder? How? Looks like a couple Vortian IFFs too."
Kaz shot a glance at the Generalissimo.
"Really?"
"How else are you two going to be able to track me down here? I could ask you two the same question."
"What do we do?!" Dib hissed, realizing they were all but compromised.
Kaz was about to answer before some blood curdling, warped Irken screeches filled the radio, and the IIA signatures…started moving again…and right towards them.
"Fuck," Kaz readied himself, aiming down the one tunnel they could approach from, along with Vaukt.
The trio held their ground as the stampede of hardened digits drummed across cut stone and metal decking, growing closer. No sooner than they had a visual of the rapidly-approaching creatures, a fusillade opened up. Mass-driven slugs from all three chipped, cracked, and shattered the crystalline structures they smashed into, eventually downing the lead alien arachnid and crippling another with a severance of limbs. The advancing tide of dripping, gnashing tines and awful noise grew closer and closer despite their losses. The last of them fell, scraping to a halt mere inches from Kazak's feet.
A collective breath of relief and attempt to reload nearly-depleted magazines was violently interrupted as an adjacent ventilation panel rocketed off of its fasteners and smashed against the opposite wall is a gnarled heap of scrap as more crawled out from the rear, leaving the way forward full of freshly-killed targets their only avenue of escape as they exercised some level of intelligence.
"Go!" Kaz switched from his depleted SMG to his sniper rifle, using a canted side optic to take a few well placed shots at those emerging as Vaukt and Dib took off down the corridor. With Vaukt reloading on the move. Three IIA transponders stood in their way…and three highly disfigured Irken, as the sniper made his way up behind them.
Jutting growths of flesh-splitting crystal similar to the creatures encountered pierced through despite their lifeless eyes. Shambling husks of once was, a morbid coincidence considering the current state of the Irken race as they became a shell of what they once were twice over. This time far more graphic as each second they became less flesh and bone with the awful accompanying noise of snapping bone and wet chunks of tissue falling to the cavern floor with each step.
Dib could only scream in terror once his eyes processed what he was seeing coming for them, wildly firing past Vaukt and Kazak at the encroaching lifeforms mid-metamorphasis.
"I heard more gunfire out there, they're still alive!"
"Don't open that door!" A more muffled voice came in through the radio, one of the miners yelling in the background.
Kazak and Vaukt, not even hesitating seeing three practically zombified crystalline infested Irken before them, fired until they fell over before taking up a defensive position. Dragging their human ally along by the back of his webbing, their tactical maneuvers of the room kept distance between them and the advancing reanimated Imperials. Tactics that bought them time and nothing more as they soon found their backs to the sealed door.
"They're right outside, I hear them! We have to let them in!"
"You can either open that door or I'm kicking it open! Up to you!" Vaukt yelled, quickly reloading his rifle as Kazak covered with his sniper rifle. He then drew a pair of grenades, one incendiary and a frag grenade. He first primed and cooked the former and threw it, following a few seconds after by the latter. If Dib's guess was right, it might buy them some much needed breathing room.
As Vaukt sent the ordnance back the direction they had came into the writhing mass of approaching creatures, the sealed airlock at their back actuated with a pneumatic hiss. Before any of them could respond or react, several hands belonging to multiple Irken seized hold of whatever they could grasp upon their equipment and gear. Anything staying to pull with all their combined might and all but throw them backwards off their feet. The trio and their apparent saviors of the moment collapsed into a pile of bodies across the deck inches away from the open door.
"They're in! Lock the door!" One of them bellowed over the cacophony of screeching and gunfire.
Kazak and Dib found themselves pulled inside; Vaukt, harder to pull, quickly slipped inside as the door slammed and locked behind them. A hollow thump for the fragmentation grenade going off outside and renewed, panicked calls of the creatures not taking kindly to the incendiary's illumination. A moment's reprieve bought. He spun around, examining the lot they had to deal with. Miners, mostly, but a few Elites.
"Oh…dookie…that…that's Vaukt." Kog, now revealed to be a lower ranking Elite, spoke, absolutely shocked to see the General. A realization that put several others present on edge.
"D-don't move!" another haggard Elite barked hoarsely, likely one of Kog's squadmates and few remaining subordinates being a touch shorter.
"Not moving!" Dib panted, looking up and back at the upside down gathering of surviving soldiers and miners pointing their weapons at all of them.
Kaz had moved onto his side, looking at the motley crew gathered before them, blinking in surprise. Vaukt, having no patience, let out a singular laugh.
"You're not really in a position to give anyone any orders, buddy." His vox caster sounded, red optics looking right at the Elite in question. "This is clearly beyond any of us."
"For all we know this is your fault!" He challenged, reaffirming his grip on his rifle at the man in question. "Traitors! Both of you…and whatever that thing is with you!"
One of the bolder miners stepped forward, placing himself between the Elite and Vaukt, arms outstretched to block his aim. "I don't care who is responsible for what right now, Hur! You're gonna get us ALL killed!"
"Yeah, the miner's right," Kaz slowly pushed himself up to his feet.
"This "miner" has a name." He challenged, turning his back to the bewildered Elite to look at Kaz. "Tor…and this is what's left of my crew and our security detail after those…things showed up."
Despite the uneasy tension lingering in the air, Dib took the opportunity to rise to his feet as well, keeping his hands far away from his slung weapon as he stood near Kazak. "What even are those things?"
"Don't know. Don't care. We drill rock and mine ore, not study the local wildlife." Tor shortly answered the young man. "What little info our resident xenobiologist concluded before being turned inside out as Patient Zero called it a Crystalid. Parasitic lifeform that was laying dormant in the strata down here. You already saw what it does to anyone infected by the parasite. Safe to assume it'll do the same to you, too."
Dib blinked in disbelief and horror, hesitantly looking back towards the door they were drug through before returning to Tor. "Those things were…Irken?"
"You were probably too busy runnin' Vaukt and I gunned down those guys with IIA transponders on. Turning into crystalline zombies right before our eyes." Kaz answered Dib, "They didn't eat 'em, they turned 'em into whatever kind of weird insect thing they are."
"That's how they make more. Far as we were aware, anyone else down here before the lockdown ended up as one of them." Tor summarized, furrowing his brow at the realization. "...how'd you three get here in the first place? We're sealed up down here."
"I'm telling you, they're responsible for this!" Hur insisted, huffing. "How else did they get down here? It's sabotage, they're rebels!"
"Kog."
"Yeah?"
"Take up the slack in Hur's leash before he hangs himself with it."
"They attacked us the same as you, why would we be responsible for nearly getting ourselves killed anyhow?" Vaukt added.
"Enough." Kog dictated, attempting to maintain order as he pushed Hur's muzzle down to deescelate. "I don't care who did what when or where right now. We're all in the same mess and no one is going to save us but us. Focus….now…one of you were about to explain where you came from?"
"It's complicated. It's related to these things you guys stumbled on while you were down here. That's all I can really say." Kaz answered as best he could. He wasn't about to let these Irken have a bunch of information they didn't need to know, not Imperial loyalists.
"He's talkin' about the weird ring construct we found down here." Tor concluded, much to Hur's dismay. "Surface access is cut off and nobody knew how that thing worked before all of this mess started. Safe to assume it's some kind of method of travel."
"All the more reason to secure it." Hur concluded, glaring at Tor. "If it can't be secured, we destroy it. No more traitors come through and those things aren't leaving this planet. Period."
"Last I checked, I outranked you." Tor unceremoniously jabbed. "I'm not keen on following any split-antennaed schemes that'll get the rest of us killed in horrible fashion."
"What? Now you're colluding with the traitors?" Hur incredulously countered with a sneer of contempt. "I'll see to it IIA hears all about this once we're out of this mess."
"Keep it up and I'll make your untimely demise look like an unfortunate accident."
"Maybe he also wants to add up like those three Internal Affairs types outside and turn into one of those crystal things." Vaukt let out a huff, the armored general looking over the lot. "Though there's an important matter to consider first. That surely can't be the only thing you found down here. Whatever else you found down here, other ingress points that may be an issue to us. And we need to know what we're dealing with."
"Tor, Hur, enough. Both of you." Kog mediated once more, sighing in exasperation as he turned his attention back to Vaukt. "We hadn't got that far yet. Our last attempt to get word to the surface ended outside that door. If there are pockets of survivors anywhere else, we're not aware of them. I've lost track of how long this has been going on but we've been watching the vents and doors in shifts for any signs of movement."
Dib pondered briefly before speaking up as the tension settled once more.
"What about blueprints or schematics of this place? Do any of you have those? Maybe not the doors but there have to be utility or maintenance access shafts, right?"
"Great idea." Tor deadpanned, gesturing behind them. "All that's in the foreman's office out there with all those things. The IIA officers were attempting to go there before you three showed up and riled them all up again. Thanks for that, by the way."
"They really seem to hate light." Kaz mentioned, remembering what ended up setting them off to begin with. "Didn't seem initially hostile when we first ran across them in using our night vision."
Tor's weary gaze drifted about the metal-clad room of stifling heat and ever-stale air growing worse by the minute. Their sanctuary was on borrowed time, either through hostile action or the atmosphere becoming their undoing. Resolved, he looked to the trio of new arrivals.
"You three are better equipped to deal with those things out there than we are. You get those prints, I'll find us a way outta here or at the very least past the surface access lockdown."
"What's to stop them from leaving us all behind?" Hur interjected, unconvinced.
"I am." Dib stepped forward, reading the room as he looked to Kaz. "I can stay here, with them. Help however I can. I'll…probably just get in the way out there."
"Works for me," Vaukt nodded, looking at Kazak, "These three Elites aren't in any real shape to put up a protracted fight. Couple SpecOps types like us will work better on our own. Besides, you got that fancy suit cloak."
"Yeah. Dib, just…don't do anything stupid, all right?" Kazak put a hand on his shoulder. Didn't want to leave him here with a bunch of Imperials but they didn't have much of an option.
"Promise. To not do anything stupid, that is." The young man assured him with a nod and uneasy swallow. "I'll be here, with them, waiting."
A quick motion tracker scan outside revealed nothing moving. The door opened, allowing Vaukt and Kaz to step out into the room full of crystal shards and burned furniture, some more flammable items being nothing but ash by the time they emerged. The two followed the painted on wall markings, leading to the foreman's office, searching for the plans.
After Kazak and Vaukt departed, the sealing door cycled shut in their wake. No sooner than it was secure once more, the litany of questions began to come forth. The miners' apparent leader was the first.
"Dib? That what they call you?" The human turned to face him, hearing his name.
"Call me? Yeah, that's my name. I'm Dib."
"What're you? Some kind of servant? A pet?"
Dib strongly resisted a roll of his eyes, tempering his emotions. He was alone with several others unknown and under duress. Lashing out in any way, shape, or form would do him no favors under the circumstances.
"Neither. I'm a human. From Earth."
"Hoo-man?" Kog blinked, "Look like you're rather squishy under that Vortian looking armor of yours. How do you know those traitors?"
The young man gave an uneasy laugh of nerves. "It's…a long story. Complicated, but mostly long…do any of you know Zim? Wait, that sounded wrong. I didn't assume you knew-knew him because you're Irken, too…"
He sighed, closing his eyes in embarrassment beneath his visor to recenter his focus.
"...I know he's a bit of a celebrity for the wrong reasons is why I ask. It's tied into how I got mixed up with those two. Zim was sent to Earth, my planet, as a…joke? Punishment? Not sure what you'd call it."
"What gives?" Kog seemed rather insulted judging by his tone. "What, you think we're all associated with that good for nothing, Tallest killing slimeball?"
"What? No, no, no, that isn't what I meant." He quickly defended. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean it like that. Trying to think of how to explain is all. I'm…my people haven't left our home system yet on our own ability. I'm, to the best of my knowledge, the only exosolar member…trapped here…with you. Zim's why Kazak…and Tak…and Vaukt…and Zha…and a bunch of other Irken have came to Earth…and how I'm here…now…with you."
"Earth?" Kog motioned to one of the other Elites to start writing some of this stuff down. He definitely wasn't stupid for an Elite, just seemed more interested in self preservation. "Hm…so you're a backwards bunch of people who never seen space before?"
Relieved he hadn't committed an interstellar faux pas, Dib's posture relaxed, focusing on the conversation at hand as opposed to the terrifying chaos of the situation around them.
"Nnnn…sorta? We've launched satellites and sent people to space. Usually quick up-and-down trips. Once to our only moon. Before everyone showed up, they've been talking about visiting other planets in our solar system." He went on to elaborate. "Guess when compared to the likes of the Irken and everyone else out here…yeah, we are a little backwards."
"Extremely, and defenseless. I guess that's why you're wearing some borrowed…fancy Vortian armor? I think…Tor, haven't you seen something like that before, back on Vort?"
Tor nodded, he had seen something like that before. "All black though."
The young man's head dipped down, looking at the hardsuit encasing his vulnerable form in question. "Something like that, yeah. There's a lot more to it and Kazak told me not to openly speak about things. Something about "operational security" and "classified information". Makes sense, I guess, but everyone out here is super advanced when compared to Earth and my people."
Kog nodded, "No wonder why the Tallest decided to send Zim to that backwater to get lost."
"Yeah, we heard before Red and Purple disappeared that he stopped calling." Tor added, "Rumor mills travel fast. Word was he's dead."
"But if he's not dead…that's not good."
Dib's brow furrowed in confusion behind his visor. "Who? Zim? No, he's not dead. He lives down the street from me. His…strategy for conquering Earth was to go to my school to try to learn about all our weaknesses. It hasn't worked out for him thanks to me…and his own stupidity. Probably how I got mixed up in all of this stuff in the first place when the rest of them started coming to Earth looking for him."
"Looking for Zim, the traitors? That's funny." Tor chuckled.
"Yeah, Zim's stupid but he's so loyal to the Empire that some Internal Affairs types blush with envy. I don't know what they were hoping to gain trying to get him." Kog continued, "Unless they were going to try to kick him into knocking off Red and Purple like he did before."
"The opposite, actually." Dib clarified much to their suspicion and surprise. "After they came to Earth looking for him and a bunch of crazy stuff happened, I ended up in Kaz and Tak's…custody? I wasn't really a prisoner, but they didn't want me going anywhere, either. I got bored and started sifting through information and documents they had access to and pieced a bunch of stuff together."
Hur eyed the human with masked contempt as morbid curiosity won out in the end. "...what kind of information?"
"That it wasn't coincidence your leaders kept ending up dead and Zim was the culprit, intentionally or otherwise." He answered, carefully choosing his words and what to share lest he suffer the wrath from both directions. "I noticed that pattern and one guy in your command structure who kept benefiting from it. Promotions, lateral movements, etcetera…It's the same one that now calls himself Tallest."
"Wait, wait…Grimm? Grimm was behind the demise of the Tallest?" Kog blinked. "How can that be? Red and Purple were kidnapped on Vort and the Warmaster was killed by the traitors." At least, that's what the word was that went out. It seemed Grimm and Xilch were quite keen on covering up their own actions.
"You LIAR!" Hur hurled at Dib in staunch opposition. "Typical traitor propaganda trying to sow dissent!"
"It's the truth! I swear!" The young man attempted, realizing the very raw nerve he apparently touched on. "What do I have to gain by lying to you? Have none of you ever stopped to think about how things have changed since Grimm came to power?"
"Well what did they tell you about how things went down with Grimm?"
"Kog, you can't seriously be entertaining such a load of-" Tor interjected, before being interrupted.
"No, no, let him talk. Kinda curious as to what the traitors said went down on Vort over what we heard."
Dib gave a sigh of relief, swallowing his nerves to proceed warily. "Grimm's used Zim in the past gainst Miyuki and Sp…ork? Spork? Hope I am saying that right…and was going to become Tallest after that but Red and Purple hit a growth spurt and overtook him again. Zim throwing an entire factory's worth of wrenches into your Impending Doom One plans and getting "assigned" to Earth hampered his own ambitions. He's attempted to use other Invaders but they weren't quite as…overzealous as Zim or easily fooled into doing his bidding."
"...and you know all of this because of the traitors telling you this?" Tor pursued, unconvinced. "Are all of your people this gullible?"
"No, just most of them." Dib sarcastically fired back, immediately biting his tongue to not antagonize further in frustration. "Whether you believe me or not is irrelevant. We're all stuck down here, together, and whatever happens across the universe at this very moment doesn't matter. Especially if we never make it out of here…now…as I was saying, Grimm's manipulated his way through Zim and either has taken advantage of situations or created them to his favor."
"I'm still waiting for the part where this stops being lies and slander." Hur challenged once more, growing ever-irritated. "I've shot Drones for lesser things, let alone aliens."
The implied threat steeled the young man with a hardened glare of brown eyes at the Irken soldier. These people couldn't be reasoned with, not the same way humans or even the free-thinking members of the Coalition severed from the Control Brains. They would always fall back on predictive programming and logic not entirely of their own creation. His extraterrestrial friends managed to break that cycle through willpower and manipulation of their own, surely there had to be some semblance of the same across other members of their species.
"The part where Vaukt and the Federation saved Red and Purple from certain death. I don't know the intricacies but I do know they were still technically the Tallest and he couldn't become the Tallest with them in the way. Burgg….the old Warmaster? Grimm wanted him out of the way to promote Xilch. I'm sure I can ask everyone else here not in the Armada what they think about that and you wouldn't like the answer."
"I liked Burgg." Kog mentioned, nodding. "I know Grimm's rather…overzealous with lethal discipline. Tor served under him on Vort. I got stuck sitting on my c'hurta on Praxxus. I'd rather have Burgg over our current leaders." Kog seemed the most at ease around the lot. Perhaps that instinct of self-preservation overrode the indoctrination and propaganda. "What he's saying definitely sounds plausible. But wouldn't that mean Grimm and Xilch are defective? It doesn't make a whole lot of sense to me. Real weird logic."
"It makes perfect sense. Genius, even." Dib acknowledged much to their surprise, the ongoing conversation distracting all of them from their perilous situation. "From what I've heard and read about Internal Affairs, everyone is terrified of them, right? They make the decision on whether or not someone is defective or acting against the Imperial Standard. Sorta like law enforcement, but with even more authority. Why fear Internal Affairs and your questionable actions when they become an extension of your actions and part of your plan? Grimm didn't have to take Burgg out of the picture. He chose to and I think Xilch was encouraged to help him. Why else would you have Internal Affairs watching over you while you dig in the ground? What threat are you to the Empire down here? Easier to dictate and control with absolute authority."
"That'd mean Grimm's entire rise to power lately was an entire inside job. He…hasn't sent out any rescue parties or search parties looking for Red and Purple. Wouldn't that be his job if he was just filling a vacancy?" Kog looked at the other two Elites, "That's his duty, right? Preserve the whole system? Even if it means getting bumped down to Warmaster?"
Hur did not immediately answer through his scowl at Dib. Several uncomfortable seconds passed before his attention drifted back to Kog. "...no. No search and rescue parties. Word from the top down has been Tallest Red and Purple were taken prisoner by the traitors and believed to have been executed."
"They're not dead." Dib answered, suddenly finding all undivided eyes on him once more. "Why would the resistance-"
"Traitors."
"Resistance." The young man reiterated sternly, finding his backbone. "It's only treason if they lose…and ask yourselves, especially as a soldier…what would they gain by killing Red and Purple? Martyring your leaders would only bring renewed fury and focus down on them…no…they're not dead."
"You got any proof that they're not dead?" Kog looked at Dib with a confused expression. "From all the word we got, they were captured and killed."
Dib hesitated, mentally mulling over his next few words carefully. He was at no obligation to speak in detail but avoiding the matter would entice their ire and he was outnumbered, isolated, and very far from home.
"...I do but Kaz and Vaukt would probably skin me alive if I shared it with anyone they didn't trust themselves." He concluded logically. "Maybe after they come back, you can ask them yourself…but I do know they are very much alive and hidden away from the Empire…not that it has done much good to hamper Grimm after using Internal Affairs and Xilch to circumvent everything that tied his hands."
Kog sat down on a supply crate, a bit dumbfounded. "If he's right and Red and Purple are alive this is a real kick in the head." The soldier shook his head, "I can't be positive without proof but if what he's saying is true and they're alive, and the rebels actually saved them from an inside plot…are…are we the baddies?"
"I'll be sure to note your doubt in my report to IIA once we're out of this mess." Hur noted of Kog's commentary. "...and I think I've heard enough out of your noise tube, hoo-man."
"Do I annoy you or is it because I speak the truth and you don't like what you're hearing?" Dib challenged. He had made substantial progress in speaking openly to these people. This was how minds were changed and friends were made.
"Oh go choke on your own hubris, Hur. If we make it out of it I think IIA's more a concern to you than to me. You didn't stay outside and die with those three idiots. They'd probably charge you with cowardice before the enemy and just shoot you. Wouldn't give your words the slightest bit of credence."
Kog's words did not settle well with Hur. Instantly on his feet, he glared intensely at the perceived slight. Body language clear as day, Dib looked between the two Irken, raising his hands.
"Guys, c'mon, nobody is telling anyone anything. Not until we get out of here together. Alive, together." He emphasized, trying to redirect their flaring tempers. "Let's just…relax, take a deep breath, and calm down."
A response from Kog was cut off by a knocking at the door, the sound of metal on metal.
"Got the plans, open up." It was Vaukt, back from the foreman's office.
Relieved as he was elated with their return, Dib scrambled away from the awkward tension towards the door. Taking several seconds to figure out how the mechanism worked, he gave it a wretching twist before swinging it open.
"Oh, thank God you're back. Did you find what you needed?"
"Yeah, we got the plans. Holographic generator's on me."
Kaz, behind him, watching their backs, asked over his shoulder. "So what's these notes we saw about a belt and some weird alien tech you boys found down here?"
"Uh, yeah, in the armory, there were a couple weapons and some kit leftover. Some things in the other rooms. The nerds were supposed to go through it but, well, the drones are all dead."
"Kog. You want to tell them everything while you're at it?" Hur asked, irritated.
"Blast it, Hur, if we don't work with them we're not getting out of here. If it saves our skin we may as well work together."
"I mean, you guys can do whatever, I'm just going to sit here in this room where it's safe."
The young man's attention wheeled around at Hur's declaration, shaking his head. "No, no, no, you can't stay here. It isn't safe. You need to go with us. We all need to go together! Strength in numbers!"
"And aid and abet the enemy? What do you think I am, stupid?" He challenged, stepping forward towards Dib. "I don't know how things are done on your backwater mudball of a rock you call a planet, but I'm not risking my c'hurta helping traitors!"
Nerves already frayed beneath ever incinerating pressure, the human did not back down from the Irken soldier. Instead, he stepped forward, nearly eye-to-eye with him. "Do I think you're stupid? Yeah, yeah, I do. You stay here, you will die! You've seen what those things can do AND will do. It's only a matter of time before they find a way in this room!"
Hur's maroon gaze narrowed to venomous slits with a snarl. "Get out of my face, worm."
Dib's heart frantically pounded as he fought against better judgment. He heard enough of the Empire and it's soldiers. To be staring one down in close proximity shook him to his core but he couldn't falter. Not here, not now, not under the circumstances.
"Kaz?" Dib queried, never sparing a glance away from Hur. "You and Vaukt see any other Irken out there? Is there anyone else alive down here?"
"Nope, not a fucking one," the sniper answered. "Anything that popped up on the motion trackers were more of these crystalline things. We keep things nice and dark though and they leave us alone well enough it seems."
Allowing that bit of harrowing information to sink in, Dib refocused on Hur. "Your Empire left all of you to die down here. If surface access was locked down to keep those things from leaving the mines, they thought all of you to be expendable. The Tallest? The Control Brains? None of them care if you live or die…the same you are choosing to defend by staying here and throwing your life away for what? Honor? Duty? What good does that do you to throw your life away for a regime that doesn't give you the time of day?"
"Look, you two want to stay here with the drones, be my guest." Kog stood up, readying a mass driver shotgun. "I'd rather get out of here alive."
"Us "drones" aren't staying, either." Tor assured, unkindly moving past Hur with a gesture for his remaining crewmen to follow suit. "Hur wants to die on this hill, let 'em. Ain't no skin off my face. I don't care who is shootin' who across the universe, we mine rocks."
Quickly realizing he was in the minority under undesirable circumstances, Hur choked his pride with a displeased scowl as he relented. "Fine. We all leave together."
Relaxing as Hur obliged, Dib resisted a smirk of pride at his accomplishment. A solid bit of diplomacy firing from the proverbial hip and he wasn't even old enough to drive yet! The young man turned around to face Vaukt and Kazak.
"Think it's decided now. We're all going together. Ready when you guys are."
Kazak gave an approving nod to Dib. Vaukt looked over the holographic plans. "We grab whatever it is these guys found. Head back to our way in. Wait for Burdak and our backup and then we get off this rock."
"Sounds good to me." The sniper turned to Kog. "You know the way?"
"Yeah, I can get you guys to the lab where we had the stuff. My keycard should still work."
"They have Elites guarding labs now?"
"Yeah, tell me about it, should be a Trooper's job." Kog flipped on his weapon light, making sure to dim the beam and flip to a red lens to keep the brightness down as much as possible to give him some bit of vision in the dark. He didn't have night vision HUDs like the SpecOps duo and the human. "Warn me if you see anything on the trackers, yeah?"
"Yeah. We don't want to fight these damn things again."
Having caught their second wind with a shakily-made alliance beneath the common banner of survival, the group pressed on from the evaporating sanctuary of the room they had been hiding in. Back into the terrifyingly familiar network of corridors and halls between veins of ores and desirable stones. Stale, cold air lingered through the uncomfortable silence, interrupted by the pungent stench of freshly-spilt Irken blood. Viscera and gore from mutilated bodies playing host to parasites or downed from the ensuing struggle for survival littered the way ahead.
Quickly reminded of their predicament, Dib did his best to remain composed. His haste in reaction and lack of self-control made things worse before. That didn't change the stunning impact of the graphic visuals outside of his suit. In close proximity under the high-fidelity of advanced low-light magnification, every minute detail of the fates of those from before filled his vision unwillingly. Lifeless, hazy eyes. Flesh rend from bone. Spilled entrails beginning to bloat with early stages of decomposition. Scenes he could only compare to a horror movie from back home…but this was real. He knew it to be so, experienced it, and saw it with his own eyes.
Their slow-and-steady approach while maintaining discipline all around paid off. The group left the tunnel network, entering the main mezzanine over a shimmering, reflective sheen of liquid metal. High above them, a natural cistern long-eroded eons ago vaulted the cavern ceiling hundreds of meters. A formation interrupted only by the presence of Imperial architecture in its traditional hues of magenta, violet, gray, and black in a construct of pre-fabricated modules interconnected by airlocks and passageway tunnels.
"A literal sea of quicksilver?" Vaukt blinked. "No wonder why this place is otherwise uninhabited."
"That's right, General, only the meanest, nastiest, crystalline things live in the rocks. Give me a second to get this door open."
As Kog walked over to the door to wipe some blood off a console and get the door open, the sniper's attention turned to Dib. The three of them had linked displays of vital signs and Dib's were very clearly elevated.
"Hey, you good? You're seeming frazzled."
The human wheeled around, startled. "Huh? What? Yeah?"
"Take a breath, relax, talk to me."
"R-right, deep breath…relax…" Dib reiterated, closing his eyes to focus. "I didn't expect…anything like this to happen today. Being here, the danger…the…bodies." He shuddered involuntarily at the chill up his spine from the recent images awash in his mind, giving an uneasy laugh of nerves. "I didn't even think I'd need to shoot my gun. I'm…terrified."
"You're doing well enough so far." Kazak tried to be reassuring, "You're here, you're alive. Just stay close."
Dib shakily nodded, steeling himself with a deep exhale to compose himself. "Stay close, got it."
A beep and a voosh as the sound of success from Kog's work sounded nearby.
"Got it, come on." Kog led the way inside, past some administrative office and to a lab where several items rested on a table. Some very apparent old weaponry of a bygone era, as well a belt that had small emitters around the perimeter. Strange, but all the same it was stuff that Burdak and Klarb would want to look over. Kog even went as far as to hand Vaukt a copy of the science team's notes as Kaz and Dib walked inside.
The surviving staunch supporter of the Empire quickly intercepted Kog's "gift". Unkindly snatching the data slate mid-transition, the same hand thrust a finger at him. "We agreed to get to the surface, not hand classified information to the enemy."
Dib looked to Kazak with apprehension at another out of flaring tension. Obviously others were more willing to cooperate than some, but reality remained the same. These were soldiers of the Empire and their servants. The conversation in the storage room fresh in mind, he stepped forward, attempting to get Hur's attention to de-escalate.
"What's so important on that tablet?"
Hur sneered at the human. "What part of "classified" did you not understand? Is that not part of your lexicon or are you too primitive for the concept?"
"Advanced enough to tell you all of that stuff on that table is useless to you and the Empire." Dib challenged, gesturing to the artifacts arranged on the table before them. "If it's useless to you, why don't we use it to help us get out of here?"
Vaukt quietly sighed, allowing his helmet to retract into his armor as he withdrew a pack of smokes from a pouch, tapping out a cigarette and lighting one for himself. As he lit it, Kazak looked over the items.
"Looks like something similar to a plasma rifle if I ever seen one. But nothing to take power cartridges…interesting."
"Which is why they need to take a look at those notes, Hur." Kog gestured to the items. "Maybe they can figure it out."
"The egg heads said it's all a hunk of junk anyhow, they can't activate any of it." One of the miners mentioned, "Overhead it in a conversation. None of it works."
"For you." The human added much to Hur's ire.
"You know something we don't, hoo-man?"
"I know a lot of things you don't." Dib jabbed back, stepping forward towards the table. "Like how we got here in the first place…"
Before Hur or any of the other Irken could intervene, the young man picked up the nearest artifact. One of the belt-like devices of lightweight, flexible alloys with a low-profile, rectangular buckle with a mirror-sheen polished finish. Quickly throwing it around his waist and snapping it together, the belt automatically tightened to the young man's waist, the front of the buckle emitting the same azure energy and fractal patterns as the gate.
"Oh, neat…it worked. Not sure what it's doing but point proven." The human commented, looking to Hur through his visor. "The gate and this stuff came from the same source and it likes humans apparently. Hence why I'm here. I'm the only one that can get any use out of it here."
Shortly after, Dib's HUD flickered before him briefly as a new meter popped up. A small visual indicator in the shape of a shield popped up, filling an empty void with a solid color, matching the rest of the Vortian style HUD before him. This old tech was even able to interface with Vortian software. Their technical advancements had truly not fallen far from the tree.
"Okay, so this is a shield…barrier…thing…I think."
"How can you tell?" Vaukt asked, taking a drag of his smoke.
"This new icon and status bar popped up on my visor." He gestured to his face, inspecting his hands and person as if trying to see what was different or new. Visually, nothing had changed. "I could be wrong, but maybe it's a readout for-"
Vaukt casually just picked up a nearby core sample from another table and threw it at Dib, wanting to test his theory. The cylinder of dense stone and ore collided with the unsuspecting human. Rather than be thrown off-balance by the kinetic impact, a similar blue, glowing field shimmered, dispersing the energy of the core sample as it crumbled and fell.
"Hey!" Dib cried out in surprise, realizing a moment later what Vaukt was doing. "Okay, definitely a shield. Useful. Very useful, especially right now." He uneasily chuckled.
"Like handing nuclear missiles to a zoyra..." Tor commented with a bemused huff.
"What's a zorya?" Dib inquired.
"An extremely stupid, flightless bird yet to evolve thumbs…or a frontal lobe, depending on who you ask."
"Look, the guy made the thing work, that's a lot better than having a useless hunk of junk." Kog rebutted.
Kazak, meanwhile, picked up one of the weapons out of curiosity, it hummed to life. A small display on it flickered to life, impressive after eons. But it flashed red with a lock symbol, some things never changed. "Yeah, Vaukt just has thick armor plating and this muscle suit's armor mode of ours doesn't exactly work against acid. He passed the powered up weapon to Dib, hoping some sense can be made of it.
When the human took hold of it, the indicator turned blue, the lock unlocking, and a charge indicator slowly increasing to full, but the numbers were in the same precursor glyphs as in Antarctica, a whirring from within as it charged. An electrically powered weapon?
"I…don't know if I should be holding this." Dib hesitantly spoke, looking to Kazak. "Yeah, it reacted to me but-"
"It could be extremely powerful and dangerous in untrained hands." Tor concluded, shrugging. "Could be a superweapon for all we know."
"All the more reason why they should not have it." Hur chastised, scoffing. "I'm sure whatever it does may kill all of us before we realize what has happened."
"Maybe." Dib sarcastically responded, wary of his trigger finger and the…muzzle? Barrel? "Beats the slow, agonizing death out there to the parasites though, yeah?"
"Yeah, no kidding," Kog nodded, watching Kazak gather up the other weapons into a duffle he found. Better to let them have it and leave with his life.
"So…we got what we came here for and are almost out of here. That means we can go home now, right?" Dib inquired of Kazak as he made quick work of the artifacts on the table disappearing into the bag. "No more subterranean nightmare fuel?"
"Yeah, we'll just seal this surface entrance behind us and go back the way we came in." Kazak nodded, throwing the bag of goods over his shoulders.
The young man's brow furrowed in confusion beneath his helmet as he tracked Kazak's movements. "Seal the entrance? After we get everyone to safety first, you mean?"
Vakut watched as Hur grabbed Tor and started talking with the other miners, concern mounted. He knew what they must've been thinking. "Kog, interest you in a smoke?"
The Elite blinked, "Yeah, I never smoked but, uh, thanks, General." He made his way over, taking an offered smoke and light from Vaukt. The sniper, nearby, and the General, traded knowing looks. They knew what Imperial loyalists would do next. A pair of exchanged nods soon saw the duo raise their mass drivers and open fire, gunning down the mining drones, Tor, and Hur who was in the midst of preparing his own plasma rifle. Kog, meanwhile, stood dumbfounded with a lit cigarette in his mouth.
Dib's confusion was met with an explanation of horror. The calm, calculated resolve of Vaukt and Kazak demonstrated a coldness unlike he had ever seen. Both raised their weapons in unison, premeditated, and promptly cut down the rest of their impromptu party in a hail of automatic fire. Startled screams, yelps of surprise, and cries of pain filled his suit's audio receptors backed by the staccato of weapons perforating them a dozen times over in a brilliant, strobing show of light and smoke.
Unarmed survivors of this mess with the exception of Hur and a handful of others, all now lay on the deck in respective, bleeding heaps. The labored, gurgling gasps of those unfortunate to succumb to their wounds immediately replaced the still silence as their weapons went cold once more. Dib stood in shock at the scene as he mentally processed what had just happened, frozen with fear that soon melted beneath a bubbling fury as his ire turned to his supposed friends and allies.
"What the FUCK?!" He hoarsely cursed, voice cracking angrily with a wild gesture of his hands to the mass casualty event in the lab before them. "They were HELPING us! WHY would you do that?!"
"They were never going to let us walk out of this room with that stuff, Dib." Vaukt calmly answered.
"You don't know that! You-"
"No, he's right." Kog finally broke his self imposed silence.
"That why they spared you?! What about your friends?!" The human incredulously queried, anger on the verge of tears. "They could've joined you against the Empire! I talked to them, I-I-I was getting through to them!"
"Let me tell you what was going to happen if your little plan went through," Kog started. "You three would've absconded with all that back to wherever you came from. Hur would've sent a message right to Internal Affairs about all this. Tor, that poor drone, that's a mercy compared to what they would've done to him. If he's lucky he would've been sent to Dirt to mop the topsoil. More likely? He'd be on the way to Judgmentia with me for a flat out deactivation. I would've been sentenced to non-existence. Do you understand that? Do you even comprehend that sort of thing?"
"The Empire really doesn't like the self-interested types like him, Dib." Kazak added, "They want you to always put the Empire over and above yourself. Even if it means throwing your life away fighting a machine gun nest with your bare hands."
"And you know all Hur would've got out of it? A pat on the back and a transfer to some other front line station to go die against the General's resistance efforts for the Empire."
"So that…justifies murdering them? No chance? How do you make allies if you kill everyone?!" Dib challenged incredulously.
"Would you rather have shot your way out of it if they started shooting first?" Kog fired back, "I can tell you for a fact Hur was one of the best shots of our outfit. He wouldn't have missed if he aimed right between your eyes."
The young man glared at Kog through his visor. Posture tense, teeth clenched, brown eyes darting daringly. He wished to refute Kog's claims. To be optimistic and hopeful that real change could have taken place. How could they claim to be the "just" side if they committed equally horrendous acts in the name of their cause. What were they doing?
What was he doing?
Rather than dwell on it further, Dib pressed past Kog toward the same door they entered through, defeated.
"...whatever, let's just go home."
Vaukt's helmet extended once more. "Want a job, Kog?"
"I'm in need of a new employer right about now, yes, General."
"You're hired, let's go."