35: Confrontation
The explosion did what she had intended, and that was to take out the main gate and the guards closest to it. Kern had had some use after all, if only as a diversion. Now smoke filled the space where the main gate had been, and at least four troopers were dead. Of course, now there were more of them spilling out of the compound, most running for the source of the explosion.
From the tree line, Lyssa emerged, a figure of black with the stark blue lights of the Recon Hood's visor the most immediately discernible part of her. She held her Argus rifle in hand, and as she neared the front of the compound, she opened fire on the first handful of troopers who came running for the site of the explosion.
Three of them were cut down within seconds, the automatic rifle firing in short bursts that ensured most of the rounds she fired went where she intended. She advanced steadily, still with the element of surprise on her side, but it was not an element that would last for long.
Two troopers appeared at the remains of the gate, rifles barking. Lyssa cut them both down with ease, before she darted through the opening itself and into the temple's compound proper. The main structure was dead ahead, with overgrown lots on either side, the most prominent of which was the cemetery to the right flank. No doubt Venarus would be inside the temple somewhere, and so Lyssa charged on ahead, with every hired gun in the vicinity now bearing down on her position.
Weapons fire sounded from up ahead; Lyssa somersaulted, diving behind a parked CED car as rifle rounds punched into the dirt near her. There was a sniper, up in the temple's tower. A single shooter, and one who had the vantage point over her. Lyssa brought up her rifle and swept fire across the opening from which the sniper fired. The man let out a pained shout as he tumbled over the low wall in front of him, gravity getting the better of him and sending him clean over the edge. His cries ended abruptly when he landed head first upon the front steps of the temple. The helmet he wore did little to absorb the impact, and the whole thing cracked open at the same time he broke his neck.
More troopers came running from the front entrance of the temple. Lyssa opened fire as the doors swung open and the men came pouring out, sending two of them falling down the temple's front steps. The heat sink on her rifle erupted then, and with a huff Lyssa threw the weapon aside and pulled the Locust submachine gun free from where it had been clipped to her waist.
She darted past the parked car as weapons fire slammed into the other side, tires rupturing. Some of the enemy shots pierced the car altogether, but Lyssa was well clear as they cut through the air behind her. There had to be another four troopers on the front steps, spreading out with guns blazing. Lyssa threw herself past the end of the car and brought the submachine gun up as she landed, peppering the troopers with rapid fire, two of them twirling slightly, jerking with each bullet that cut through them before they simply crumpled to the ground.
As soon as this was done, she jumped back to her feet and swivelled about to face the other two. Rounds tore into the brick wall behind her, puffs of dust erupting with each hit. Lyssa swept the Locust's rapid fire across the two gunmen, sending them falling before she tucked the weapon back upon her thigh and darted for the temple's front doors.
Moving quickly, she pulled the shotgun she had at her back free and racked the pump. She kicked the doors open as she neared, revealing the large hall beyond. It was not too dissimilar to a human church, although some of the seating had been removed to make way for crates of military goods, be they rations or ammunition or the like. At the far end, before what remained of the altar, stood a man whom Lyssa had not planned on seeing again out here. Even so, him being here brought with it the opportunity to simply kill him.
Frederic Taft stood before the altar as if he were a priest himself, albeit one in tactical gear. That included a vest that appeared to be straining to contain his bulk. He was flanked by half a dozen CED troopers, and the man himself clasped a bulky pistol in one hand. As Lyssa charged in, every trooper with him raised their weapons, and the man himself started to speak. His voice, although raspy, carried clearly enough through the acoustics of the hall.
'You are one stubborn girl…' He had little opportunity to say much more. Lyssa, shotgun raised, pulled the trigger and sent a cluster of armour-piercing flechettes in the Chief's direction. They shredded through his vest with ease, before tearing into his ribcage and reducing much of his heart to mincemeat. A look of mild surprise appeared upon the man's puffy features, before he simply spun slightly where he stood and fell into a heap on the floor.
Every other gun in the place sounded off then. It was a sheer cacophony of weapons fire, a hail of bullets tearing into the seats at Lyssa's flanks, blasting chunks out of the wall behind her. She threw herself behind one row of seats, splinters showering over her. Crawling along, wary of her kinetic barriers flaring up, she pulled one of her fragmentation grenades from her vest and armed it. Gritting her teeth, she hurled it over the top of the wooden pew. It clanked somewhere distant, and she heard someone shout before the thump of the detonation silenced every other noise in the place.
Lyssa rose to one knee, shotgun raised as she sighted upon the smoke and dust that had been left lingering in the hall. Three of the troopers were still standing, and she cut one down with a well-placed shot to this one's centre of mass. The other two swivelled about and resumed fire, the altar nearby a mess of broken masonry and shredded timbers. If Taft's body had been there, there was little more left of it than blackened, shredded meat.
Lyssa dived behind a column to her left, bullets tearing into its opposite side. Taking a breath, she stuck the shotgun about the side and fired blindly. More troopers were pouring into the hall now, and one of them appeared at the window at her left, visible through the stained glass. Lyssa wasted no time in blasting him, glass shattering and blood spraying before the mercenary dropped below the windowsill.
She leaned about the column, sending a further trio of blasts downrange. One of them caught a trooper in the side, and he fell into a heap with a gaping hole torn through the armour plating there. The other trooper, now alone within the church with only Lyssa for company, sought cover behind a column not far from the wrecked altar. He was shouting into his comms for backup. Lyssa stepped out from around her column, shotgun raised, the face she wore under the black Recon Hood stone cold. She felt nothing as she paced forwards and shot this latest soldier in the head, blowing away a sizeable portion of his helmeted skull.
As the dust settled, she wasted no time in pressing ahead. Working the pump on the shotgun, she came upon the doorway that opened into a hallway, one that ran the remaining length of the temple. She leaned around the side, peering down the sights of the weapon. Another trooper appeared from a doorway further down, and he let out a cry of alert when he sighted Lyssa. She silenced him with a shot to the stomach, blowing a fist-sized hole through him that sent the trooper slumping lifelessly against the wall behind him.
Lyssa started forwards, ducking as another trooper appeared at the far end of the hallway. A rattle of submachine gun fire tore into the wall by her left, and she returned the favour with a couple of shots of her own. The thunderous bark of the shotgun was almost deafening within the confines of the hallway, and each shot that landed upon the wall and doorway by the trooper resulted in an explosion of dust and timber splinters. The soldier stumbled under the hail of fire, unhurt but otherwise reeling from the volume of fire. He threw himself back into the room behind him, and Lyssa kept on walking forwards with the shotgun raised and the barrel wisping smoke.
There were windows to her right-hand side which looked upon a courtyard and a garden overgrown with creeping vines and alien ferns. A pair of troopers appeared through a door across that courtyard, and they evidently sighted her through the windows for they opened fire in her direction. Glass shattered next to her and Lyssa ducked, bullets pounding into the brick wall by her side. The two troopers took a brief break in their shooting, and as Lyssa rose up from under the window to open fire again she sighted a fragmentation grenade sailing through the air from one of the men outside. On impulse, she shifted her grasp upon her shotgun, holding it like one would grasp a baseball bat. With a swing, the stock of the weapon collided with the grenade as it sailed through the air, and in turn it went hurtling back the way it had come.
She ducked again as the grenade detonated in mid-air, the concussive force of the blast and its relative close proximity enough to make her fall over. The courtyard garden was torn asunder by the explosion, leaves and branches scattering all over the open space. Both troopers had been tossed aside by the blast, with one lying motionless on the path by the garden and the other writhing about where he lay with one leg mangled and the arm on his left side missing. Blood gushed across the pavement, and as the trooper began to slowly crawl for shelter Lyssa came up, sighted in on him and shot the prone, bleeding figure square in the back.
She turned towards the far end of the hall again, just as the door down there swung open once more. The trooper she had sent reeling was back again, but this time he had no opportunity to open fire as Lyssa simply blasted him in the chest. She was moving ahead before the trooper had even hit the floor.
She checked each door she passed by, finding no further hostiles. The doorway at the end, where the trooper lay dead, took her into a kitchen. The place was deserted, as was the adjoining dining area. However, judging from the plates of half-eaten food spread across them, there had been people eating in here until she had showed up. And one plate carried upon it something she figured to be distinctly alien, and a quick sniff of the dried cake-like snacks indicated to her that it may have been dextro-based.
There had so far been no turian CED troopers here, so she had to assume that Venarus was the one these things were intended for. She was close to her target now, and with this in mind she pressed onwards, this time passing through what appeared to be a laundry before she came upon a door that opened to the temple's rear. Out here, the grass was overgrown and the cemetery started proper, the grave markers a mix of simple timber ones adorned with batarian religious iconography, as well as bulkier stone ones. There were more troopers out here, and as Lyssa emerged into the open, she heard the growl of an engine from somewhere to her right.
As she turned her head, an armoured personnel carrier bearing the insignia of the CED and painted in their signature blue and black colour scheme came crashing through the wall. It stopped partway into the cemetery, after having crushed more than one grave marker as it went. The side doors flew open and CED troopers began to rush out, a good half dozen of them at that, all toting automatic rifles and kitted out in full armour. Further ahead, among the tombstones, Lyssa sighted a distinctly turian figure who had turned to face her from well across the cemetery, a gun in hand and a grim look upon his leathery grey features.
Upon setting her eyes upon Calen Venarus, Lyssa felt a surge of anger. The fact that more troopers were pouring into the place did not concern her; she would tear her way through an entire army to get to Venarus and seeing him here only provided all the more encouragement.
Minutes prior, Colonel Calen Venarus had watched Captain Taft head off to face the intruder with a squad of his soldiers. All the while, Venarus had figured that the whole lot of them would likely end up dead if they faced an actual, real soldier. And this Lyssa Raine had years spent in the Marines behind her, which probably gave her an edge over most of these glorified police officers.
As soon as Taft had left the dining room, Venarus had hurried to the armoury nearby. It had previously been a storeroom before being repurposed, and it was here Venarus had helped himself to an armoured vest that he fitted over his military-issue navy blue tunic. He equipped himself with a Vindicator battle rifle and a Carnifex pistol. While he was outfitting himself, the sounds of fighting had progressed closer and closer. When the gunfire was sounding from the courtyard nearby, Venarus had hurried through the temple's rear door and fled into the cemetery that flanked much of the building.
There were a few troopers out here, most of whom appeared more than a little wary not of him, but rather of the ruthless killer now tearing through their ranks. Venarus barked at them to take defensive positions amongst the gravestones, with one of the troopers putting in a call for help that arrived in the form of an armoured personnel carrier that came tearing through the nearby wall.
Venarus' own heart was pounding in his chest now as he took position behind one thick stone grave marker, rifle at his shoulder and eyes peering down its sights. He sighted Raine then, striding out of the temple's rear doors as if the angel of death herself, her outfit black and the visor upon the hood she wore glowing a stark neon blue. She wasted no time in opening fire at the troopers scattered across the cemetery, and Venarus returned the favour as did several of the other men with him. A cacophony of shots rang out from both flanks, just as Raine made a move that saw the man closest to Venarus' left fall down. This one was still alive, if bleeding from a wound by his left shoulder.
Venarus snarled, before he knelt down and grabbed the human by the other arm.
'Get up, you damned fool!' The turian barked, and he forced the man back upon his feet. 'You're not dead!'
As soon as he said that, another shot from downrange saw a large chunk of the human's head explod, spattering blood across Venarus' side. The turian huffed in annoyance before he released the dead man's arm, settling his sights back upon the black-clad figure across the cemetery yard. As she moved, she tossed something, a grenade of some form that landed far off to the turian's left and sent three of the other CED troopers running for cover.
Venarus ducked as the grenade went off, his ears ringing and dirt showering all over him. Two of the mercenaries nearby were tossed aside by the blast, and neither got back up after their landing. As Venarus watched, Raine came up behind a tombstone off to his right, letting fly with a volley of pistol shots. Venarus crouched as multiple rounds slammed into the stone of the marker in front of him, puffs of dust erupting from each impact. Another trooper to his right was cut down by the opposing fire, and Venarus got the strong impression then that his support was being gradually whittled away. Raine was picking them off one-by-one.
'By the spirits, she's just one person!' Venarus was shouting now, his voice laced with anger. He looked back at the other men scattered behind him, seeing the way in which they appeared reluctant to engage, to expose themselves in order to fire. 'She's just one woman! How hard can it be to kill just one woman?'
Venarus was about to speak further when a sudden searing pain tore through his left leg. He yelped and stumbled, hand clutching at the wound. A bullet had torn through his shin, causing that whole leg to simply collapse under him. Now on his knees, he set his sights upon Raine and opened fire, sending the woman darting into cover. Dark blue blood gushed from the wound in his leg.
He was not going to die here, no way. No human was going to be the end of Calen Venarus. He had fought the worst scum the galaxy had to offer after all. Why should some human bitch be the one to kill him? He gritted his teeth, leaning his rifle against the grave marker whilst the men about him continued to engage Lyssa Raine. His leg was gushing blood now, and he worried that an artery may have been hit. The gunfire continued all around, and another of the soldiers nearby was cut down abruptly, a pistol shot having struck his head whereupon it shattered the visor of his helmet. A rush of blood followed, and Venarus watched with some morbid fascination as the trooper simply crumpled where he had been crouched.
Lyssa swept around the cemetery's flank, laying down near constant fire in the direction of the enemy. Bullets zipped by her, tearing into the gravestones and the wall at her back, showering her with dust and slivers of stone. Her kinetic barriers had failed at one point, yet she pushed on, a Carnifex pistol in hand. A shot from that saw another of the CED gunmen drop amongst the overgrown grass. Another opened fire from behind a tree partway across the cemetery grounds, this one's assault rifle thundering rapidly.
Lyssa threw herself to the ground as the rifle fire tore through the air around her. As she went down, she continued shooting, sending the rifleman into a half-spin as multiple bullets tore through him. Ahead, she saw Venarus limping for cover, blood gushing down one leg as he moved. There were about three other men with him, and they all continued shooting in her direction as the turian hobbled away.
Lyssa had no intention of letting him escape. Crouched behind another of the gravestones, she peered about the side of the stone and took aim at the retreating turian. It took her only a few seconds to become confident of her shot, and so she fired, putting a round through the turian's left arm. The impact and the subsequent agony it caused was enough to make him cry out, before he stumbled again and fell amongst the long grass.
Lyssa sighted another of the CED troopers rising into a firing position. She sent a trio of shots his way that caught him in the chest, putting him down. As for the others, there were perhaps two more troopers still in action, and neither of them struck her as particularly keen to die for an unappreciative turian Colonel. She watched with some small satisfaction as both soldiers simply turned and ran, hurrying away towards the distant gate.
This left Venarus, who had risen to his feet again. He held a pistol in one hand, and as Lyssa rose from cover he turned around to face her. They had about twenty metres of space between them, and as Lyssa took aim so did the turian. He fired, and she returned the same; his shot caught her in the left thigh, causing her to stumble. Pain wracked the limb then, but she kept pacing forwards, pulling the trigger again and again. More rounds tore through the turian as he limped forwards, before another round from him caught her in the lower stomach and slowed her advance.
The pain there was incredible, and the blood was spilling from her freely. Nonetheless, Lyssa came upon the fallen, bloodied turian with her jaw clenched and her sheer determination keeping her standing. Venarus had fallen against the side of the armoured personnel carrier, dark blue blood streaking down his chest and dribbling from his mouth. Those intense grey-blue eyes of his looked up at her with a mix of anger and incredulity. The gun he had held lay on the ground near him. Lyssa kicked it aside, sending it flying out of his reach.
'You did all this for Lieutenant Valus?' As Venarus spoke, he coughed, and more blood dribbled out of his mouth. He sounded bemused, and Lyssa could only feel some deep-seated sadness upon hearing the name.
She reached up and pulled aside the recon hood, revealing her sweat-streaked features, her hair tousled from having been contained under the hood for so long. Looking down at the bloodied turian, she kept her mouth a grim line.
'I never thought I would die in a cemetery,' Venarus stated, his eyes darting around to take in their surroundings for what was to be the last time.
'Do you want to be buried, or cremated?' Lyssa's voice was hoarse. She was so tired, and so thirsty. She wavered where she stood, feeling weak. Nonetheless, she continued standing, despite the growing urge to simply sit down and let the weariness overtake her.
Venarus, his eyes distant, muttered an answer:
'Buried.' And then, with nothing more to add, he slumped against the armoured carrier. Blood smeared in his wake, and his eyes remained locked open, now staring vacantly into the distance. Lyssa sighed. She tucked her pistol away, before she pulled the last of her incendiary charges from her vest. She grabbed hold of the turian's collar, dragging him to the open doors of the carrier before she shoved his lifeless corpse inside and threw the incendiary charge after him. She limped away, the charge ticking down as she moved, and she swivelled around just in time to watch it explode.
Flame erupted from inside the carrier, blowing out what small windows were present. Lyssa, a reasonable enough distance away, barely even blinked as the massive rush of flame blossomed forth, blasting away part of the carrier's roof. As the carrier burned, Lyssa spoke aloud, her voice laced with anger:
'You're cremated now, motherfucker.'
