As they approached the entrance to the dam, the MP cleared his throat and addressed them.
"Engineers will be able to assist you in the dam. I must go to my post and report on what you have said."
"You're not coming inside with us?" Kai asked in surprise.
"Nyet. We are not allowed inside, only over the top of the dam and the area surrounding it. Has been bought up before and we were told to stay outside." The MP curtailed further discussion by turning on his heel and walking off, leaving the group standing outside the door.
"Well, best go and find this engineer then, I suppose." Kai waved towards the door and Hunter pulled it open, striding though into the room beyond, head turning as he took in the environment.
Marius looked up at the sky and around the area, checking the density of the power cables and transmission equipment, then sent a command to his drone, back at the tilt-wing. Systems started to come online and prepare for launch, and he set a target track and patrol path for the aerial vehicle that should keep it well clear of all of the overhead obstructions – fortunately it was far smaller than the tilt-wing, with much finer tolerances. When his command set was complete, he followed the rest of the group into the building.
Inside, the group had gathered in the small lobby area and were looking around at the dated and archaic décor. Plastic chairs and cheap laminated plastic desks lay to the side of the door, with some truly hideous potted plants adorning some shelves, which looked like they had been thrown at the wall rather than carefully placed. A small, very uncomfortable-looking sofa was positioned opposite the desk, presumably for visitors to wait on, but otherwise the room was bare and unwelcoming. A single overhead light fitting hung from chains, casting a dull and even light on the badly-painted walls, giving the room a rather grim air, which wasn't helped by the security door that was the only way out of the room. A small, mirrored pane of plastic was set in the middle of the door, allowing someone on the other side to view the waiting area, and a clunky-looking mag-lock reader lay to the side of the door. The only other thing they could spot in the room was a small telecom unit on the desk, with no labels or directory visible.
"I guess we use the phone and call someone?" Tads suggested.
"Or we can get some practice in and just have that mag-lock apart and go for a wander" Kai responded. He turned to look at Marius.
"I would much rather not start taking the facility apart and risk breaking things, or annoying the security staff or engineers. I agree with Tads." He none the less wandered over to the door and gave the lock and housing a quick examination. It looked to be a fairly standard fitting – reasonably secure and robust, but without any of the fancy gadgets or protection that would make it difficult to remove. Looking up and around the room he confirmed that there weren't even any cameras here – not pointing at the door or covering the lobby in general. He shook his head and sighed – when would people learn that budget security was little better than no security at all!
"Well, while you decide what to do, I'm thinking I should go and check the outside of the dam. Can someone hold me up, please?" Hunter reached over and tucked a large muscular arm around her waist and felt her body go slack a moment later as she projected up and out, drifting out of the room and back to the western side of the dam to go and check for astral threats.
They waited in silence for a few moments, until Kai realised they were all looking at him to make a decision.
"Fine, fine, whatever, I'll call then." He headed over to the phone and lifted the receiver, then looked around somewhat blankly. None of the buttons were labelled, and there was no documentation around to give any hints as to what he should dial. He could hear a tone from the phone so at least it was working."
Tads meanwhile flitted over to the edge of the water and looked down, squinting as she did so. The water was bright, glowing with a radiant energy that was unusual. She studied it for a moment, then realised that the passage through the dam not only agitated the water considerably, aerating it and accelerating it considerably, but also warming it slightly. Compared to the flow of a normal river, it enriched the water considerably and made it capable of sustaining significantly more microbacterial life, which lead to considerably more fish and other creatures in turn that fed upon them. All of which meant it was teeming with life, all of which showed up on the astral plane, making it even more difficult to see through than normal. She plunged into the water, and worked her way along the back end of the dam, her passage leaving swirling vortexs behind her as the creatures moved around in the astral eddies she left behind.
Kai stabbed the '1' key and heard the phone tone change, then start to ring. After a dozen slow rings, it cut over to a badly recorded message with the sound of people talking in the background and random office noises. A middle-aged female voice told him that he'd reached the HR and Payroll team, that their office was closed and that all calls needed to be made between nine and five, and accompanied with completed paperwork and management authorisation in triplicate. He put the receiver down and shook his head at the rest of the team, who were still watching him carefully.
Having found nothing on the backside of the dam, Tads flew up and over to the reservoir side, once more heading down to the water surface. It was colder and less hospitable, but just as difficult to see through, as the flow of water churned up mud and silt, and drew in the life floating around in the water into the massive intake pipes placed in the four concrete towers that thrust out into the lake. Once more she descended into the gloomy depths of the water, swirling her way through the dim water dancing with life, peering into the shimmering depths.
Kai picked up the receiver again and tried the zero key instead this time. It rang twice, then with a click it transformed, the ringer changing to a different tone as if the call had been redirected to a separate phone system. After three rings, the call was answered, and over a loud droning rumble a male voice spoke, abruptly and somewhat impatiently.
"Da?"
"This is Special Inspector Kai. We're waiting in the lobby, and need to speak to the Shift Manager."
"Inspection? I wasn't notified. What inspection?"
"Well, it's a surprise inspection. But we're waiting for someone to come and meet us."
"Harumph. Wait there, then." The phone was hung up without any further chance to speak. Kai wasn't sure if that indicated that someone was coming to meet them or not, but decided to give them at least a few minutes.
"I think someone is coming, but it sounded like they were in some machinery room or something, so they might be a little while." The team relaxed slightly, their body positions subtly changing – apart from Hunter who was still holding the limp form of Tads under his massive sinewy arm.
The shaman moved through the water, towards what should be the bottom of the dam and working her way through the water like someone suddenly caught in a dark room. The environment was confusing and chaotic, with very limited visibility and she moved cautiously through the unfamiliar environment. Suddenly out of the morass, three large sinuous shapes emerged, darting forward with speed and lunging towards her. She tried to move backwards and keep them all in front of her, but they moved with the speed of natural-born predators, and they were on her in a moment. She thrust with her spear, fending off the first one and keeping it at range, but while she did so the other pair swept in on her flanks. They lunged in to attack her before she could recover from her first thrust with her spear, striking at her astral form.
The awakened pike tore at her astral form, knocking her off balance and she flailed under their attack as the mouths ripped and tore as her essence, trying to feed on her life energy. As she lost focus on the first one, it evaded her spear point and swept in, eager to feast upon her, too. A set of jaws loomed large in her vision, serrated teeth filling her view as the mouth closed around her face. As she passed out, her essence disrupted by their attacks, he spirit was thrown forcibly back to her body, the excess damage she couldn't absorb with her mind manifesting suddenly upon her body. Hunter gave a shout of alarm as the body twitched violently in his arms and blood started to pour out of her nose, dripping down her chin and falling to the floor below where it rapidly pooled on the cheap and tattered lino.
He swung her body up and around, laying her on her side on the plastic seating and ensuring the blood continued to drain out of her nose and not block her airway. Kai and Shimazu swarmed over her, pulling out their medkits and checking her out. She was unconscious, but fortunately the physical damage seemed quite light – a bunch of burst blood vessels at the top of her nose had given her an impressive nosebleed, but that seemed to be the extent of the damage to her body – though they had no idea what happened to her mind. After a moment's discussion, they decided to risk trying to rouse her, and broke an ampule of incredibly strong smelling chemicals under her nose. A moment later she stirred, her face scrunched up in a pain and then she blinked, as the concerned faces of the team swam into focus above her.
"You ok there, Tads? Trip over something?" Kai asked her, trying to keep his voice light.
"Just…just a bunch of fish. Some kind of awakened predators, about a metre long each. Very quick."
"Fish? Just… fish? Not enemy fish?"
"Ahh, owie. Sorry. Yes, I think so. I didn't see anything that made me think they were under control." Her speech tailed off, and she mumbled a little, then sagged, exhausted by the effort of trying to speak coherently. "Fishes did bite me lots though."
They checked over her body, but couldn't find any physical marks or lesions, so their attacks must have been astral in nature, designed to attack her psyche and not her flesh. Unfortunately that meant that there was nothing more they could do for her – now she just needed time to recover from the assault – time they really didn't have.
Further conversation was interrupted when the security door swung open, revealing a middle-aged somewhat portly man standing in the middle of the doorway, his brown coat buttoned up neatly, with a few tools visible in the deep pockets to the side. A large bushy moustache decorated his top lip, and his bottom jaw seemed to protrude slightly, exacerbated by him working his jaw forwards and backwards as he stood and looked at them, hands on hips and his eyes glancing over their motley appearance.
"What's the meaning of this? I wasn't notified about this."
"One of my team has just slipped and fallen – do you have a doctor?"
"This is a power station, not a hospital." His words were not helpful, but the sarcastic and condescending attitude said more about his frame of mind than what he said. Marius' patience ran out abruptly, and he swiftly pulled out his Ares Predator from the holster, aiming it at the man's forehead.
"I suggest you find a first-aider then." Marius's voice was flat and hard, and his clear blue eyes stared at the engineer coldly. The engineer though, turned his pudgy little eyes to Marius, and if he was worried about the 12mm barrel aimed at his face, he didn't show it. In fact his entire attitude if anything shifted to become more resolutely hostile.
"Do you know who my father is?" Once more contempt dripped from his voice, and he continued to stare at Marius, almost daring him to pull the trigger. Marius stared back, but despite Marius having the gun, it was hard to say who was winning the contest of wills. Kai took a deep breath, then spoke.
"Get back inside." His voice modulated, cutting through the engineer's conscious mind and forcing him to take a step back before he recovered control. "Shimazu take him out!"
Shimazu started to move forwards, hand on sword hilt ready to draw and strike as a single smooth motion. Aswon though dived in front holding up his hands.
"Whoa whoa whoa, just hang on a moment. There's no need for this. Come on now, be reasonable." He glanced over at Kai, then stared down at the engineer, whose face was going a motley red colour as he realised he'd been manipulated. "Listen, the dam is almost certainly going to come under attack. We've uncovered intelligence that indicates that the enemy forces are going to target you, probably tonight, and attempt to blow the dam. We're here to stop that, and save lives. Just co-operate with us."
"Blow up the dam? Ridiculous! This dam is not some flimsy barricade, and has stood for decades. Do you know what kind of pressure it holds back? You know nothing of my dam!" The man spat the words out, little flecks of spittle forming on his lips. "You people need to leave, now!" He started to step backwards, into the corridor behind him.
As he cleared the doorway, and the security door started to swing closed, Hunter stepped forwards smartly and punched him directly to the face, his arm striking out like a cobra and delivering a sharp jab to the nose. The flesh rippled and deformed, his nose smearing across his face and the head snapped back and to the right. Kai dived in to follow up – which was perhaps not the wisest decision.
As the engineer flailed backwards, his hand grabbed at his radio, clipped to his belt. With the unexpected punch to the face, he missed the body of the radio, and only managed to grab the aerial, his fingers reflexively tightening upon it. His backwards motion made his arms rise up, and the radio swung up in an arc, impacting Kai under the chin with a solid thunk. It didn't break the skin, but it was all the sign that Shimazu needed, and he dived forwards, tackling the engineer to the ground and swung an elbow into his temple, driving him into unconsciousness. With a thud, the man's head impacted upon the thin carpet in the corridor, and then he lay still, while the team looked up and around for any further movement.
Aswon sighed, then swung his rifle round, and ejected the clip, then worked the action to remove the round from the breech. He pushed the loose round back into the top of the clip and carefully stowed that, then pulled out another clip from a different pocket.
"Gel rounds. I'd rather not kill anyone in here. And I suspect that there's lots of machinery that we would rather not destroy or risk breaching. You may want to do the same." With the magazine swapped, he loaded the first round, then returned the rifle to his shoulder and hefted his spear again. While Aswon had been swapping ammo, Hunter had moved over the body of the unconscious engineer and checked out the corridor. It was about two metres wide but nearly four or possibly five metres high, lending it a very surreal quality. Long chains hung from the ceiling leading to light fittings that were industrial rather than decorative. Though the walls were painted, high above the paintwork was decidedly patchy and haphazard, fading off as you got closer to the ceiling. At the far end of the ten metre corridor was a closed door, and a side passage on the left side was positioned about halfway down.
"Well, I see we've got a couple of options here. We can call on his radio and I can try to fake his voice and get someone else up here, who might be more pliable. Or we can take the radio and just go for a wander around and if we're challenged go with the inspector story." Kai waved the radio around in his hand as he spoke, but looked at each of the team in turn.
"I suggest calling on the radio and telling them we're the inspectors, and we need someone here, or we need to talk to security. Maybe find out if there is a deputy engineer or someone that we can try something more diplomatic with." Aswon responded. Kai shrugged, then nodded. While he adjusted the radio in his hand and worked out where the transmit button was, Hunter started to frisk the unconscious body and pull out the contents of his pockets.
"This is specialist Kai, I need to talk to the head of security". He released the transmit key and waited. As Hunter roughly moved the body around to gain access to the pockets of the coat, Shimazu noticed a small pool of blood seeping from the man's head, and he grabbed his medkit and busied himself with patching up the wound. Annoying as the man had been, it probably wasn't going to be good if he actually suffered a long-term injury, for any of them.
"What's that, who's there?" The voice that came back was slightly garbled and distorted, and there was a lot of background noise carried with it. Marius frowned as he listened carefully, glancing at the top of the radio to see if there was any way he could fine tune the frequency or clear up the signal – but the radio seemed very basic.
"This is Specialist K, inspection team B. We need to speak to the supervisor."
"The supervisor is not available - hang on, are you at the front door?"
"Yes, we are."
"Oh, well, he's on the way to meet you then. Just hang on." The radio channel cleared and the person at the far end didn't seem to wonder how or where they'd got the radio from. Clearly security was not anyone's objective here. Kai waited for a few seconds, but when there were no further transmissions, he shrugged and then clipped the radio to his belt. Aswon padded forward to the junction in the corridor, then turned and held a finger up to his mouth to ask for quiet, then cocked his head slightly to the side and listened carefully. They waited, trying not to move for half a minute, until he turned and came back to them.
"The door at the end, I can hear a whistling noise. Not someone whistling – it's a fairly constant high pitched noise, probably from air movement. The side passage though, I can hear rumbling and machinery, fairly constant low drone. No metahuman activity either way." Kai considered for a moment, then gestured down the corridor straight ahead, towards the whistling noise. The team moved down in single file, Hunter and Shimazu at the front, Kai and Marius supporting and guiding Tads, with Aswon bringing up the rear. Hunter gently checked the door, and with rifle ready pushed it open and swiftly entered the room, gun up to cover the front while Shimazu followed up and swung to the side to cover his flank.
The door opened into a large concrete chamber, as high as the corridor and perhaps ten metres to a side. As the moved in, they could sense a flow of air past them – the room had a positive pressure, and looking around they could see a number of vents high up on the opposite wall, with some cobwebs and stray scraps of plastic fluttering in the current emerging from the mesh.
The room had an assortment of gear scattered around it, piled up in various areas. On a battered plastic pallet there was a mound of industrial size cans of paint in various pastel shades – the lurid and disgusting shades of pink, green and blue that seemed to plague large institutions and government projects. A welding torch and rack of supplies, strips of bar metal and some sheets were piled up against another wall, covered in grease and grime. A stack of plastic shuttering and modular frames was in the far corner, and concealed another door out of the room, opposite to the way they'd come in, and in the fourth corner were a number of mobile rolling toolkits and carts, carrying spare parts and random tools. The room appeared to be a dumping ground for bulky items or things that didn't fit elsewhere, but there was no sign of recent activity.
They checked the other door, and found a little dirt in front of it, but not too much, and they could see the arc on the floor where it had been opened – so it looked to be in use, but not constantly. They carefully checked it over and found that beyond the door was a small landing and a set of concrete steps that descended down at least five metres before leading off down a corridor and out of sight. Kai waved them back through into the store room, and then got the team to help him move some of the paint cans over to half block the door – including balancing some precariously so that if someone pushed the door open from the other side, they would fall and make noise.
With the first room cleared at least to a certain degree, they headed back to the T-junction and then went down the short passage to the other door, and towards the lower rumbling noise that Aswon had heard. Pushing this door open revealed a very different room – a huge hall perhaps fifty metres long, thirty wide and the same high. They came in half-way up the wall, onto a gantry or catwalk, and could look down into the area below them. In many ways it was reminiscent of the water treatment plant they'd entered the night before – the bottom of the room was full of machinery that stretched up several metres, with monitoring equipment around the walls, and several ladders or stairwells that came up to their level. Above them they could see large windows along one side that looked to face out down-river. This probably then was one of the generator halls, with each of the massive pieces of equipment being an individual hydro-electric turbine generator, generating several megawatts of power for the region. Down on the level below them they could see three people moving around, wearing ear defenders and carrying out monitoring or maintenance on various parts of the equipment – the team stood and watched them for a moment, but they seemed intent on their jobs.
The room was incredibly noisy, of course, and the gantry resonated very faintly – as they looked down they could see rubber buffers holding it onto the wall, presumably to isolate the vibrations from the structure. The air felt slightly damp in here as well, with a faint musty smell that indicated that water leaks or spills happened at least on occasion, though there was no sign of such at the moment. At the far end of the room they could spy three tunnels leading out to the north – a small one at each side of the room and a larger one in the centre. There were also some smaller doors located between each massive turbine in the east wall.
"Shimazu, check out the engineers please, see if any of them have any astral tells? Marius, Hunter, Aswon – let's start to edge around on that gantry and check the room and the machinery out a little, see if we can spot anything odd. If any of the engineers spot us, I'll try to deal with them." Shimazu was already gazing down at the engineers, giving each a good long hard stare, trying to gauge their emotional state and looking at their body language and mood.
"They look fine, Kai – all calm, focussed on their work. No real feelings of guilt or worry, no sense of time pressure or anything like that. Can't pick up any real emotional content – certainly none of them have strong feelings or expectations as if they'd set a bomb or were expecting an attack or anything."
"I'm not picking up any foreign smells or anything alarming." Hunter took another slow sniff, waiting for his spectrometer and chemical analysis program to run the numbers. "Lots of solvents, greases, sealants, all the kinds of things you'd probably expect in an area like this. But not getting anything particularly explosive or volatile."
"I'm not picking up any kind of mobile or radio network for setting off a device, or any command and control signals – that's the good news. But on the other hand, I'm not getting any signal in here at all. I can't reach the chopper, and I'm getting very intermittent access to the drone outside. The whole building looks to be made from densely packed rebar ceramacrete, and it's like a shield room. Even the windows aren't particularly transmissive – I'm not sure if it's the small frames and cross pieces, or if they've used wired glass. But that means if someone is setting off a bomb, they're probably doing it from in here, not remotely."
"All the turbines look identical to me. I mean, I don't know what a lot of the stuff does, but unless there's four identical bombs, I'm not spotting anything out of place, or anything unique about the turbines. There are signs of access on all four, but nothing that stands out as particularly new, recently changed or has markings or signs of recent activity. Nothing that looks like the bio-bomb we found in the water plant."
"Huh?"
"It's ok Tads, you just rest." Kai patted her on the shoulder, then gently moved her round the gantry, leading the team further around the edge of the room and working their way towards the tunnels at the far end. As they moved along the edge they could see a staircase down at the far end that would drop them right next to one of the small tunnel ways. They made their way along the catwalk and down the ladder, without any of the engineers paying them any attention, as they carried out their tasks – which suited Kai just fine.
Getting to the ground floor they discovered just how small the tunnels were – which made them pause for a moment. The tunnel stretched off arrow-straight as far as they could see, with inspection lights pinned to the left-hand wall about every five metres – creating patches of light with dark areas in-between, receding into the distance. The tunnels were a little under two metres high and only a metre across, with an arched roof, two heavy bundles of electrical cable running down each side of the archway. As Aswon peered down the tunnel, assessing how much he was going to have to stoop, he caught a faint sound of rushing water and thrumming equipment, distorted and echoing down the passage.
"Ok, I'll go first, then Shimazu, Hunter, Tads, Marius and you bring up the rear, Aswon."
"Don't you want one of us first?" Hunter asked.
"Tempting – but no. If either of you go first, none of us are getting past you. I can try diplomacy if I go first, and if it all goes wrong, I'll drop prone – you just have to get over me." The others nodded, and they set off down the tunnel, walking in single file. With the size of the tunnel, Kai could see fine, but Hunter struggled to see past Shimazu at all, and nobody could see past him. Aswon ended up doing a weird crab-like sideways scuttle, bending his legs to bring his head down and stop his afro just collecting up all the moisture clinging to the roof, but also letting him keep an eye on the route back.
About a hundred metres along the tunnel they came to a cross passage. The route to the left, down-river, seemed quite short and ended at a ventilation grill after a few metres, but the passage to the right was much longer. It seemed to go into another cross passage after perhaps ten metres, and a larger cross passage another ten metres after that. Kai glanced up and down each one, and slowed, letting each member of the team give the passages a once over before leading them on down the rest of the tunnel.
The second half of the tunnel was another hundred metres long, as Kai could see a lit portal growing steadily larger as he approached. By the time he was about twenty metres short, he could see what looked like a mirror image of the first generator room, and he guessed they were at the northern bank of the river now. As they walked forwards they emerged into the concrete hall, confirming that it looked just like the first – but unlike the first room, one of the engineers spotted them and headed over. As he approached, he gestured to the ear defenders he had on, then pointed at the team, to which Kai responded with a generic shrug that could have expressed anything from 'I'm sorry' to 'so what?' They saw the man sigh, and he continued to approach them, slowing somewhat as he saw the weapons on display.
"Hi there! Inspection team, working for the general. We've spoken to the lead engineer already, out by the entrance. Just doing some checks."
"Ekharts let you in?"
"Well built fellow, excellent moustache?" Kai asked, and got a nod in return. "Ahh yes, we spoke with him, told him that we're just doing some safety checks."
"Well, you should have your protective gear on. All of you."
"Unfortunately we don't have any. Where do we get some?"
"You're supposed to bring it with you!"
"Well, we'll talk to the General and let him know we need some for our follow up checks. But well pointed out." Kai made a fake notation on his data pad. "So, otherwise is everything ok. Nothing unusual happening, no strangers in the plant, no broken equipment?"
"No, nothing." The engineer paused for just a moment, and the team wondered if he was going to add 'except for you' to his statement, but he stayed silent instead.
"Good, good. Excellent. Well, we'll head back to where we came from then, and we'll see if we can get some ear protection and such like. Good work, carry on!" Kai gave him a smile and a breezy wave of the hand, then made several large ticking motions on his datapad, as if signing off on several items. "Come on everyone, let's let the man get back to work." He ushered the team back to the tunnel, where they entered in reverse order.
"Kai – he's having some kind of internal conflict. I'm not exactly sure. But I get the sense that he feels he should do something about us. But against that, it feels like he just doesn't want any trouble… Shimazu watched the man carefully as he waited for the others to file into the tunnel. "He may try and call the guy we punched out. Maybe not. No wait, he's decided he can't be bothered, and he's going back to his work." Shimazu saw the man's aura flare for a moment as he returned to the maintenance of some arcane machinery that made up part of the massive turbine.
The journey back down the tunnel to the cross passage was equally uneventful, and they broke out into the slightly larger cross section, moving up towards the first cross roads they had spotted. Two smaller passages lay off to the sides, with very heavy-looking doors blocking them off. Hunter pushed his way to the front and examined the closest, examining the door frame as much as the door itself.
"This is a waterproof bulkhead. Look here, see all this bracing – this is designed to hold back significant pressure from the other side. And look around the edges – there's a recessed gasket and an oversized flange all the way around. The door is designed to resist pressure, a lot of pressure, but the more pressure there is, the more tightly the door is sealed." Aswon gestured for them to swap places, and listened carefully at the doorway for a moment.
"I can hear water on the other side, running water – or more like rushing water. But it sounds contained in some way, or remote. I don't think the other side is flooded. Doesn't sound right."
Kai gestured for them to proceed, and they carefully swung open the heavy hatch, swinging it gently into the room and then filing in. The room was octagonal in profile, and ran at an angle, aiming downwards at a noticeable slant. In the centre was a massive pipe, and all of them could hear rushing water within it now, even without enhanced hearing. More recessed lights set into the walls cast their soft yellow glows on the pipe and the catwalks that ran in terraces alongside it.
"I think this is one of the outflow pipes." Hunter looked behind them at the grilled area and darkness beyond, then turned to look west again. "I'm guessing the water is concentrated here after going through the turbines, and is dumped out into the river down that-a-way."
"Any reason that an inspection hatch should have been left open, then, do you think?" Shimazu asked, pointing down the room perhaps two thirds of the way, drawing their attention to the hatch which was propped open on the side of the pipe. Hunter didn't bother shaking his head, instead bringing his rifle up to his shoulder and snugging it in tight – giving them all the answer they needed.
Aswon approached the wall and his gecko tattoo flared under his clothing for a moment, then he climbed up the wall, his legs and hands sticking and then peeling off the moist surface as he worked his way up to the centre of the roof and started to work his way along the length of the room. The rest of the team started to move down the catwalk, heading towards the open hatch.
A sudden movement caught his eye, and Aswon swung the rifle up to his shoulder and shouted.
"Freeze! Do NOT move!" A man was hunkered down in the space underneath the catwalk and by the side of the pipe, shielded from the rest of the team's position. He looked up in shock to spot the huge Nigerian, standing upside down on the roof in flagrant disregard for gravity, pointing a rifle at him, and his mouth dropped open in surprise. On the other side of the pipe, Kai grabbed Tads, holding her close to him and freeing up the others to pick up speed with weapons drawn, moving to outflank whoever or whatever Aswon had just spotted.
There was a second or two of standoff, then Aswon saw the man tense. He wasn't sure what he was going to do, but he'd seen enough combat to recognise someone about to attack, and reflexively pulled the trigger. The shot was loud, the explosion reverberating through the tunnel, echoing back and forth several times, and they heard strange harmonics as the gunshot started to fade away. Aswon watched as his round struck the man in the centre of his forehead, blasting him back off his feet as the gel round squished outwards, spreading until it was over 50mm across. The pressure was reduced enough not to shatter his skull or even severely damage the skin, but the kinetic energy transferred was just the same, blasting the man back off his feet and sending him sprawling on the floor.
"One target down, sweeping forward," he called out, then started to swarm across the ceiling, moving away from the rest of the team to get a better angle on the body laying prone on the floor of the tunnel. His senses tingled a moment later and he flinched, side-stepping quickly and almost losing his grip on the roof of the tunnel. Another figure had appeared further down the pipe, from behind the next support structure and had raised a hand towards him.
The blast of sonic energy raced past him and struck the ceiling, blasting loose water, mould, parts of the ceiling and dust in a spherical blast-wave. A thunderclap sounded as it impacted, and the deafening noise made a mockery of the gunshot from only a moment ago, redefining what 'loud' was. Water leapt from every surface all up and down the tunnel as the sonic energy blasted back and forth across the confined space. The blast wave struck his back, knocking the wind out of him a little and he felt the impact of debris slam into his rear armour. There was pain – so something must have made it through the armour plates – but it wasn't so bad.
On the other side of the pipe, Shimazu crouched and then sprang, making a prodigious leap towards the top of the pipe. He landed, and immediately started to slide, discovering that the pipe was covered in a fine layer of algae. Rather than trying to correct, he made use of the slide, letting his momentum carry him onwards, and he flexed his legs again, ready to jump to the catwalk on the other side of the pipe, trying to get to the same side as Aswon to back him up. They heard the clattering of feet as Hunter and Marius broke into a run, hammering down the metal gantry with all attempts at stealth abandoned, now trying to get to the flank and assist.
Tads wasn't quite sure what was going on, but was determined to help. She ploughed forwards, catching Kai by surprise, and he was dragged along with her as she followed Marius and Hunter along, trying to concentrate enough to weave her mana shield around them. Kai, after a moment's thought, let her continue forwards rather than trying to restrain her, but made sure his taser was ready as he instead tried to guide her down the middle of the catwalk, and stop her from falling.
The enemy mage was drawn to the movement as Shimazu appeared, sliding and leaping across his viewpoint, and the hand was raised again, fingers curling in arcane gestures as they gathered power to fling another sonic blast through the air. Unfortunately for them, they leant out just a little too far, exposing their head as they tried to draw a bead on the rapidly moving swordsman. Up on the roof, Aswon took a deep breath and commanded his heart to pause, just for a moment. In between the beats he squeezed the trigger and another perfectly placed round blasted the mage's head, driving him into unconsciousness, too.
The team advanced rapidly, with Shimazu racing past the first body to close on the mage, his sword in hand ready to do battle. He slowed as he approached the second figure though, staring at the man in confusion. The facial features were twisted and distorted, as if trapped half way between man and beast. Large, liquid, black eyes stared up unblinking at the roof, and the neck and head appeared to be subsumed into a single entity, covered with thick rubbery skin, while large whiskers poked out of either side of the nose.
"Seal shapeshifter, I think." Aswon called out, as he glanced over at the body. He swapped from his rifle to his spear, lowering the point and being ready to stab at the first body if it showed any sign of magical activity.
"I've got a bunch of stuff over here. Hang on." They heard Hunter climb over the rails at the side of the walkway, and then slide down into the bottom of the concrete tunnel, crouching down to get in under the pipe. "Looks like a bunch of drysacks, tops popped open and they were sorting out the gear. Got some overalls, ear defenders, a few tools… oh, and some bombs. Some fucking bigass bombs. I think this just became your department, Aswon."
"I think we ought to call in the Russian demo experts, then. My experience is basic."
"Well, you're what we've got right now."
"Allright. Shimazu, swap with me. I should be able to keep an eye on the mage and be close enough to see what Hunter has found." The two men swapped places, and just as Shimazu got into position, the first body started to stir. He checked the forehead, and when he saw no sign of the bullet strike – not a dent, not a divot, not even a discolouration, he pulled out his taser and aimed carefully at the neck then pulled the trigger, being rewarded with a convulsive set of twitching and the body lapsing back into a heap.
Aswon worked his way under the pipe, staying close enough to the mage to give it a good stabbing if required, but so he could see what Hunter had carefully moved away from. There were four of the large munitions, painted a dull olive green and covered in serial and model numbers. Hexagonal in design, each was a good forty centimetres across and about twenty deep, with several plungers or pressure plates dotted around. Some additional strapping had been added afterwards, and it looked like they were designed to be fasted on to or around something, held in place. As he carefully looked at them, he saw that the primers were in position and live, though fortunately the manual timers hadn't been activated.
"Ok, best not to touch them if we can. Those are live munitions by the looks of things, though not actively counting down. But things like that can go off with a knock or a shock, so be careful."
"How nasty do you think they are?"
"They look like heavy anti-tank mines, converted to strap on bombs. So they'll take out a hundred ton armoured tank without a problem. Shaped warhead inside, when they go off, the core is turned into a self-forging munition that's blasted upwards on a jet of plasma. Seriously, treat them with respect."
"No problem. I have found a few rifles in this rucksack by the way. Colt water carbines. Even have the air reservoir attached. Someone wanted to make sure they could use weapons and fight underwater." Aswon looked around as there was a slithering noise, but relaxed when he saw Shimazu dragging the first body around the support to lie next to the second, so he could guard them both at the same time. Aswon checked over the demolition charges a little more closely, moving with extreme caution – and decided that it just wasn't worth the risk to try and move them. If they went off, their personal body armour might as well not exist, and it would likely vaporise anyone nearby. At least it would be quick…
"Hold it!" Shimazu spoke quietly, but firmly, and Aswon turned to see the second body stirring. The features morphed slightly, back and forth for a moment as if the being couldn't decide whether to revert to being a seal or transform back into a human. Aswon was just about to speak when he saw the tell-tale build-up of mana starting to form around the mage as it prepared to cast a spell – only to spasm, twitch and then collapse as Shimazu quickly tased it.
"We've got to move on this. Strikes me this might not be the only team in the dam. And despite what engineer dickhead said earlier, while a dam is incredibly resistant to pressure and force from the reservoir – it's designed to do that. You hit a dam in the wrong place with even one percent of that force, in just the right place and you'll crack it like and egg. And all you need it one little hole, and the water will eat away at that hole like a cutting torch." Hunter clambered back up the side of the tunnel, passing up all the loot except for the mines which he left well alone.
"Even if they just used these charges to blow this pipe, it would take the dam out of action with regards to power, and that's going to mess the city up. But if they plant them well – and jam open those watertight doors to breach containment – then you could be looking at an explosive event that would rupture the back wall of the dam and flood the station. And that's likely to lead to an overall collapse, just from the shockwave. And if my internal map is right, the other end of the crossroads we came in by – well there was another watertight door, just like this one. So who's to say there's not another team in there right now, planting these charges?"
Nobody could fault Hunter's logic on this one – and they had learned to trust his instincts on such things. A quick discussion followed, as they debated trying to restrain both targets, made more difficult by the fact that one was a mage and from their startling recovery rates both were clearly shapeshifters. Restraining them would be tricky, and they didn't have much in the way of resources.
"Put a bag on his face. Pull it down over his body and one up his legs, like a roll of thingy." Tads mumbled, pointing at the rucksacks that were lying in a sodden heap, having contained the dry-sacks. "Don' matta wha' shape he is, then." She was still struggling to string together sentences, but the team got the intent of what she was saying, and soon they were manhandling the mage into the rucksacks and lashing them together tightly, using almost a roll of tape to secure them in place as an additional measure. Cramped, confined and with their arms trapped to their side, unable to see and with their other senses obscured, it would make things very difficult for the mage. That left them with nothing left to secure the first target though, and Shimazu moved over towards him and raised his sword, then looked at Kai.
After a moment's consideration, Kai nodded and the blade flashed down, separating head from torso with a single powerful stroke. A sharp flash of mana on the astral plane accompanied the blow, and when they checked the body, they saw the essence slowly fading away – the magical sword had overcome the regenerative magics of the creature, and the gross damage of the beheading was too much to recover from.
The team dragged the mage away from the bombs, using the rucksack straps to bind it to the catwalk and try to immobilise it as far as possible, then Hunter lead the way back towards the crossroads, his rifle aimed steadily at the second watertight hatch, and who knows what that lay beyond it…
