Chapter 7 – Adversarii
September 21st, 2529 - (09:12 - Military Calendar)
Sol System, Earth
Australia, Old South Wales
Topkapi Training Grounds
(23 Years Ago)
:********:
Pulling back the slide, Carisa listened to the subtle click of the first TTR round cycling into the chamber of her magnum. The M6 was capable of packing a much stronger punch than the handful of polymer clips she was carrying on her BDU. The instructors weren't ready to trust them with those as yet.
Four years with the program's fourth generation and even then, they were keeping a wary eye out for runaways, troublemakers and saboteurs. She barely got a chance to be any of the three for her first year at Topkapi. It took a few months to break her, along with everyone else. The instructors used harsh wake-up calls at the barracks, throwing kids out of their beds, shouting for them to stand at attention. Then a gruesome crucible of calisthenics, obstacle courses she once thought were playgrounds, morning runs across the semi-arid grasslands of what she learned was a continent called 'Australia', then classes about all sorts of things. Most important were lessons on why loyalty to the 'Office of Naval Intelligence' was paramount. While it was never said outright, loyalty to the wider UNSC was inferred to be a secondary priority.
Early wake-ups, constant workouts and classes. Wash, rinse, repeat. The repetitive combination never stopped.
The guards rarely had to worry about runaways or the likes as they patrolled the perimeter. The instructors proved to be the first line of defense against such things. The rigor of their daily regime kept the Janissary candidates from ever having so much as time to think about relaxing, yet alone resistance.
Still, a few tried. Those that actually managed to get past the guards had to look forward to an impossible stretch of wilderness lying between them and civilization. The minority that made it that far had to look forward to Sol boiling them in the day, Luna freezing them at night, as well as a pursuit party of tracker dogs, Warthogs and Hornets armed with infrared sensors. And of course, the local wildlife.
From the stories Carisa heard from those the guards brought back, it was better if they caught you than the creatures lurking beyond the walls. Sometimes the guards were too late. She had her doubts about those stories. So did Giana. Regardless, the two of them factored them into their plans for when they would ultimately make their own attempt.
But days turned to months, months to years. Before long, the idea of escape was relegated to the back of their minds. The instructors' strategy worked for the most part. There was no time to ponder on possibilities other than whether their strategy would finally work against Team 1's defenses.
Carisa released the slide, sealing the first round into the chamber. She eyed the ammo-counter in the upper-right corner of her head's up display: '32'.
"That should be enough." She thought. Whether it was or not depended on how well they executed the plan.
Her BDU, a cutdown version of the type ONI operators used in the field, was formatted to match her size perfectly. However, the layers of titanium and ballistic shock absorbent materials were killing her more than protecting her. Her humid surroundings were the main culprit.
Overhead, an artificial sun peeked through the foliage. No more than a couple of stray rays managed to puncture through the dense blockade of the canopy. Nevertheless, the heat that was trapped on the forest floor threatened to cook her alive in her own armor. The suit's temperature regulations could hardly keep up. Ten minutes into the exercise and she was already sweating rivers, an annoyance made into an absolute torment by the fact that she couldn't take off her helmet.
Team 1 loved using snipers. She'd heard of what happened to a guy in Team 5 who took off his helmet in the middle of an exercise to wipe his face. A Team 1 marksmen put his bare head in their crosshairs. A week later and the news was that Topkapi's medical personnel were still fighting to wake him up out of his coma.
She stayed low as she swept the trail ahead with her pistol. It was a small dirt path that wound through the undergrowth. A Nav point marked their target at '30m' north of her squad's position. She peeked back to check on them. To her rear, the other four on her patrol line were keeping relative pace while maintaining a solid meter of distance between themselves. They were holding fast to the discipline Instructor White spent the last few months drilling into Team 4. The two boys closest to her sported MA5K Carbines, cutdowns of the standard MA5B more suited to their stature. The pair, twins known by their non-names '185' and '186' were the most qualified for the heavy-duty work if they ran into a frontal ambush, hence why she kept them so close. The closer they came to the objective, the more likely Team 1 was to try something sneaky.
With 20 meters to go, their objective came into view. The forest in front of them abruptly descended several meters then leveled off into a large clearing. Aside from the regular pines spaced out here and there, there was a single abnormality that stood out, a giant Redwood tree smack in the middle of the clearing. The over 60-meter-tall behemoth was in a class all its own. While it wasn't her first time seeing it, it never ceased to boggle her mind at how ONI could procure something so massive. All the more reason with which to inspire fear in the Janissaries, all the more reason for them to stay loyal. That said, the center of her fears wasn't the tree itself but what had been built across its lengthy trunk.
From the base up, every ten or so meters there was a ring of treehouse structures built on the bark. The constructions of decorative mahogany and defensive titanium were the stuff of children's dreams and Carisa's nightmares. She spotted four dozen of these treehouses overall; machinegun bunkers, fire-control stations, barracks and observation platforms, interconnected by bridges, winding staircases, ropes and elevators running the full height of the tree.
The collective creation of Topkapi's engineering division, officially called 'Forest Simulation Zone' was known colloquially among the class as simply 'The Tree Fort'. Everyone loved it when it was their turn to defend. The same was never said of those on the offense such as Team 4. During their pre-mission briefing, she remembered none of the squad leaders were eager to head off the assault, not even herself. Not where Team 1 was concerned whose leader had an unbroken track record of wins on the installation. The job ultimately fell to Giana, 4-Actual, to be the first into the action.
Carisa focused on her part of the plan. She sighted the sector of treehouses that ran up and down the redwood's southern face. They were the sections of the rings assigned to her squad. On each ring save the lowest which was rather bare and partly under construction, she would have to secure bunkers, barracks, fire control stations and more. They would all need to be cleared before they reached their main objective.
The data center itself hung near the very top of the tree, clustered beside a few others like a group of acorns. There, the whole team would have a good chance of finding and extracting the 'high priority data'. Once acquired, it would lead hypothetical UNSC task forces to an Insurrectionist weapon's cache, an important slipspace coordinate for supply routes or even the exact location of a rebel leader. In this exercise, like any other, intel was king. It was why if even one of their number reached the exfil point with that intel it would give the entire team the victory.
To make things interesting, the instructors routinely gave the defending team a say in where that data would be stored. The data centers' servers were not always the right place to look. In recent times, she'd heard of Team 6 going up against Team 1, somehow pushing into the Tree Fort just to discover that none of the data centers held the intel they needed. After they lost the match, they found out it was actually stored in a machinegun bunker that no one had managed to knock out. 1-Actual, Team 1's leader, was a sneaky wolf among foxes like that. The instructors justified it by saying the enemy they were training to fight would be just as unpredictable in the field. Carisa tended to doubt that.
She spotted the route they would take to reach the top. They would utilize several separate staircases to the final ring. She tended not to trust the elevators since they could and were often rigged with polymer traps, neither did she trust the rope ladders which made them sitting ducks if someone chose to fire down on them.
The fields of fire were plain to see; the machineguns held the advantage of the open ground, 200 square meters of it with little cover aside from the trees and the low shrubs. But once they hit the first stairs, Team 1 would be limited to small arms. Team 4 would need to 'grab them by the belt buckle' as the early military historians they studied had so argued for.
Movement to the right caught her eye. She ducked behind a nearby bush and looked to the east end of the clearing where Squad 1 was supposed to be. Sure enough, they were there. Giana and her five-man team were already pushing into the clearing. They were crawling forward using the low-lying ferns for cover. One of them must have maneuvered wrong because she saw a fern snap back and forth.
She switched on her comm. "S-4 to 4-Actual, we're in position to the south. I've got eyes on you. Spotted a break in your cover. Might want to be a bit more careful."
"4-Actual to S-4, copy." Giana replied. "We're within 30 meters of the first staircase. 4-Actual to 2 and 3, you in position?"
S-3's comm crackled. "Right here. We've got a good vantage point from the north. Our range should overlap with 4's to give you the cover you need."
"S-2, how about it?"
A brief silence passed before the answer. "S-2 here. We're 30 meters out as well, closing from the west."
Carisa checked the western end of the clearing. Below the carpet of green she made out the occasional flash of black and gray.
"Good to hear." Giana said. "Anyone seen any sharpshooters on your way over?"
"Nope." S-3 replied. "Nothing."
"Nada." S-2 agreed. "It's like they're not even here."
"Same." Carisa said. "Wouldn't 1-Actual have posted his guys in the canopy further back? I know he has a thing for delaying action."
"My thoughts exactly." Giana said. "I'm not sure why but he's not playing his usual divide and conquer card this time."
"Maybe he decided to quit while he's ahead." S-3 quipped. "A change of strategy? That's what I'd do if I played the same hand too many times-"
"What it means is stay quiet and be on your guard." Giana scolded. "We don't know what tactic he'll throw at us next. Keep your eyes out for anything out of the norm. If you miss something, it's bound to pop up later and nail me or S-2, you copy?"
"Yeah-yeah, copy."
Carisa tuned out of the conversation at another sign of movement to the northeast; a fern that waved about less subtly than the others. She scoped in with her sidearm. There was nothing there but green. Still, it was unusual. She hesitated. She needed to be sure a threat was involved before she took any action. One misplaced shot and she could alert the enemy to their presence. The movement wasn't serious, but it was 35 meters away, meaning it could not possibly have been caused by Squad 1. They were too far away for that.
After not finding the cause, she speculated on another. Her attention moved up, past the canopy to the hazy blue sky overhead. Clouds drifted lazily by, affecting the scenery below by sometimes blocking out the sunlight. It was so realistic that it was hard to believe the entire thing was one big simulation. For what it was worth, it was a nice ceiling and a sunny day. The installation's pre-mission weather report suggested a relatively breezy morning. By what she could see, that was exactly the case. She chalked up what she saw to the artificial wind patterns being generated by the ventilation systems.
Carisa switched to her squad comm. "Boys, how're we looking?"
Though she could not see them, she knew 185 and 186 were already positioned in the bushes to her left and right, their carbines scanning the fort.
"Ugh, hey, we got a problem here." 186 said.
Carisa detected the concern in his voice right away. "What is it?"
"There's no one to shoot at." 185 finished. "The machinegun bunkers, they're empty."
She perked up at that. "Which ones?"
"All of them, at least the ones we can see."
Carisa scoped in on the nearest bunker. To her surprise, there was no sign of anyone aiming out the gun port. She checked a lower bunker covering the east. Nothing. She checked an upper bunker oriented westward. Nothing. As if the problem wasn't sufficiently strange, she took notice of a far more startling fact.
"Their turrets," She murmured. "They're gone. Where are they?"
"I was just about to ask the same thing." 185 said, nonplussed. "Also, where's anyone? I've got zero movement on all the treehouses from our side. It's like they all up and left the place."
Carise felt a lump building in her throat. She moved to contact S-3 when he beat her to it.
"S-3 to 4, you spot any movement on your side, over?"
"No, nothing. The bunkers are empty and their machineguns are missing. How about you?"
"...Same over here."
A feeling of dread descended on Carisa at the thought that they were walking right into a trap. But who would lay a trap without everything they would need to set it off?
Unless that wasn't the trap.
By then she noticed the faint crawling of Squads 1 and 2 had reached within 10 meters of the first staircases. "S-4 to 4-Actual, me and 3 can't find movement anywhere. The fort looks abandoned on purpose. Recommend you hold up, over."
"No time." Giana replied. "Check the mission timer. We either do this now or risk White giving us the buzzer."
Carisa looked to the timer at the top of her HUD: '7:36'.
"Yeah, I know that but you-"
"No time."
"Gia, you know something's not right. First, we don't run into anyone on the way here and now this?"
"She's right." S-3 agreed. "It's almost been 13 minutes and we haven't lost a soul yet. Team 1's being way too hand's off about this. I say we regroup and track down their position first."
"No way." S-2 argued. "You see the timer. If we pull back now, we lose for sure. Team-1's not the objective, the intel is, and so long as they stay out of the way, we'll be-
A three-round burst echoed through the forest.
"Shots fired from above!" One of Squad 2 shouted. "S-2 is down! S-2 is down!"
"Got movement!" 186 replied. "Top observation post, western face!"
A swift barrage of return fire shot up from Squads 3 and 4. Carisa angled up to scan the highlighted observation post. It was one of the railed platforms furthest to the top of the tree. As red polymer rounds peppered it, she spotted a muzzle flash and instinctively ducked. Three TTR rounds struck the tree at her back. She rolled away and honed in on the platform, barley catching movement in her crosshairs as the sniper retreated from the railing. She squeezed off two shots. Neither found their mark and the target disappeared.
"So much for cover," She grumbled. "How long was he-"
More BR fire sounded from the northside of the fort.
"This is S-3, we've got another sniper on a northside platform! Looks like they're both packing BR-55s!" There was a grunt, like someone dodging a blow. "Man, that was close!"
"They're targeting the leaders!" Giana said. "Squads 3 and 4, keep them suppressed! Watch out for a secondary attack, move in once you're cleared! Squads 1 and 2, engage!"
Beside Carisa, 185 and 186 kept a constant stream of burst-fire leveled at the first observation platform while the other two members of her squad watched their backs. She added a few shots of her own to the mix in the hopes of keeping whoever was up there pinned.
Squad 1 and what remained of 2 rose out of the underbrush and sprinted for the base of the redwood. They were still 5 meters away, good targets for the machineguns, so Carisa scoped those out as well, then remembered there were no guns there to begin with.
The sole occupants of the fort seemed to be the two snipers. She tried to wrap her mind around their strategy. What was 1-Actual trying to accomplish with only two guys? The feeling that they were being played for fools made her check the surrounding tree-line. There was nothing discernable other than the shooting from Squad 3. She called to the two behind her.
"Our 6 is clear." One of them reported.
"Yeah, we got nothing back here." The other added.
Their answers merely amplified her doubts. There was a trap, there had to be. Their enemy wasn't so foolhardy as to send the rest of his team on a break. That left her gambling on a solid possibility.
She comm'd Giana right as Squads 1 and 2 commenced their ascent up the first staircases.
"S-1, you can see his play, right? They have to be waiting for you upstairs."
"Don't worry." Giana said. "We'll have to clear out every room in our sector to be sure. You focus on yours. Once we-"
The BR fired returned with a vengeance. The snipers reemerged simultaneously, this time from different platforms, and fired down at the groups ascending below. They didn't miss, striking out two recruits, one in the knee, the other in the head. The former stumbled on the steps as the latter reeled back and tumbled over the railings. Squads 1 and 2 returned fire, forcing the enemy back into hiding.
"S-3 and 4, hose them down or we won't reach the top!" Giana ordered. Carisa watched as she handed her wounded squadmate over to another that could carry him back down.
"Copy!" Carisa replied. "Guys, take a platform and keep watch! You see anything, nail it!"
Her squad didn't need to reply. She saw the barrels of their carbines twitch this way and that within the bushes. She released her pistol's empty clip, slapped in a fresh one and aimed at a platform 50 meters up that had yet to be used. A second later a head popped up. She fired once then twice. The head ducked down then reemerged slightly to the right and fired back. A couple of TTR bursts shattered twigs off the shrub she was using for cover. She shifted over to a sturdier looking birch tree and squeezed off two more shots. The last struck the sniper in the shoulder and he reeled out of view.
"I got a hit!" She cheered. "Shoulder wound though, he's not down but I made life a little harder for him. Can you guys see his position?"
"Copy." Her two riflemen answered in uncanny harmony.
Carisa scanned the lip of the platform. A heartbeat later, the enemy was back in her sights. A quick muzzle flash and the patter of rounds against her tree told her she was in his as well. She returned the favor along with 185 and 186. Bursts of red polymer spattered off the sniper's armor and hurled him backwards, out of sight.
"S-4 to Team 4, we took out one of their snipers. There's just one left."
There was a general air of relief in the replies, most coming from those well into the fort. Reaching the first ring of treehouses in their sectors, they broke into binary teams, stacked up on the doors and kicked or blew them inward. Boots connected, breaching charges detonated and they slipped inside, clearing the first of the bunkers and fire control stations. It would have proved a far more daunting task if Team 1 relied on their usual strategy of holding out from a distance.
That got Carisa thinking. The sniper they eliminated wasn't that good a shot. He'd missed her several times. It had to be the other one racking up all the kills. She sighted up to the highest observation platform which was nearly clear of the canopy itself. The elevation offered anyone there the clearest view of the situation on the ground, not only to take potshots but also as a good commanding position.
A flutter of movement on the lip of the platform drew her eyes closer to the edge. The position, the skillset, the tactical maneuvering gave her the signature MO of the most dangerous person on Team 1.
"So, he's up there is he." She thought. "Movement on the highest OP, '85, '86, cover it."
They sounded off their eagerness for another kill as they set their attention on the target. Ten seconds passed in relative silence save for the methodical progression of Squads 1 and 2 as they cleared the last of the lower structures on the east and west. Carisa tracked their advance on the edge of her periphery. They disappeared into the barracks, cleared them without incident then reemerged to climb rope ladders and ascend elevators without issue. No opposition to be found but the last sniper and his downed partner, no way to account for 18 missing hostiles.
"4-Actual to S-3 and 4, we've gained a foothold. We'll cover you from here. Move up."
"Roger." S-3 said. "On our way."
"Keep an eye out for the highest OP." Carisa warned. "That's where we saw the last sniper."
"Will do." Giana said. "Now hurry while we've still got the upper hand."
Did they really though?
Carisa stifled the thought and pointed her squad onward. They slipped out of the bushes and slid down the sharp decline to the floor of the clearing. She took point, scanning each tree and fern along their route while 185 and 186 covered their flanks. Not caring that the rest of Team 4 had the upper hand, there was always the chance that their enemy had yet to show all of his. She ordered the squad to keep their heads down, to move as close to the ground as possible without losing speed. One wrong move could alert the target waiting high above. She feared no cover in the world could save them from that kind of position.
They reached halfway to their designated staircase when...nothing happened. Carisa could hardly believe it. She was tensing up for the shot that seemed to never come. The sky-high OP remained silent.
Squad 4 arrived at the southern staircase virtually unopposed. Though she couldn't see them, she heard the footsteps of Squad 3 moving up the northern staircase on the opposite side. No gunfire yet. And it was the silence that worried her more than anything.
They rushed up the wooden steps and hopped off onto a platform to storm the first of their side objectives: a machinegun bunker. A quick stack-up on the rear door and a solid kick to its frame later, they were clearing the space inside. The interior of the mahogany pillbox was nothing special. There were a few ammo-boxes, an opening from which to shoot as well as a seat for the gunner to perch. The sole abnormality was the machinegun, or rather the useless tripod standing in its place.
186 moved over to it. "They took the gun but not the pod?"
185 looked out the opening to the clearing below. "They couldn't have gone far. Those 486s aren't something you can just move around."
"That means they're still close." Carisa sighed. "Eyes up, we've still got more to clear. 185, 186, you two pair-up and follow the staircase. We'll check out the barracks across the way." She checked their timer:
'6:07'.
"Let's move."
They headed outside and split into two groups. 185 and 186 continued up the stairs to the fire control station. Carisa led the other two across a rope bridge to the next checkpoint. It was a small barracks, the pretend quarters for the absent defenders. The windowed tool shed-looking structure really appeared as empty as everything else they had seen. A kick to the door revealed a handful of empty beds and weapon lockers. The two groups rendezvoused at the fire control station and headed up the stairs. Their journey continued in a similar vein to the next ring of structures, sifting through more barracks and observation posts while 185 and 186 handled the bunkers and control stations.
20 meters, cleared.
30 meters, cleared.
40 meters, cleared.
At 50 meters, there was little difference. The chatter on the radios reflected the same reality: the fort was mostly abandoned. Mostly, not entirely. There was still the last ring of structures that the whole of Team 1 was yet to reach. The data centers were built on the final 10-meter stretch before reaching the highest observation platform. Carisa watched the ladders leading up from the data centers to the final OP. Their ropy supports swayed in the wind. No sound came from the platform at the end. Whoever was up there, he was cornered and he had to know that.
Carisa considered what his next move might be as her squad pushed up the last staircase to their chosen data center, one of the larger constructions of the fort. Its rectangular build reminded her of a trailer. Amidst the walls of reinforced titanium there were tinted strip windows that ran its length. They would have made a good holdout position had Team 1 not decided on...whatever strategy they were imploring.
"4-Actual to all squads, converge on your DCs now. We've got three minutes on the clock so make it fast."
"Copy that." S-3, replied. "Moving in. Keep an eye out for traps. If they put them anywhere, this'd be the smartest place to do it."
"Moving." Carisa said and nodded her squad to the door. They readied themselves to either side of the threshold. She took a deep breath and pulled out a breaching charge. She moved to tie it around the handle but the door moved with her weight. It was open. She winced. "Hey...hey-hey, hold on. Anyone else' door already unlocked?"
"Same here." S-3 said.
"Yeah." A member of Squad 2 added. "Gotta be boobytrapped, right? No way they'd leave these open for us."
"Unless they really did." Giana pondered. "Move slowly. Check for wires and call them out, but keep going."
Carisa shouldered the door the rest of the way and leveled her pistol. Darkness lay beyond. She reached around the wall for a switch. She found it and flicked it on. The room lights activated. On the other end of her gun sights was a maze of data servers. Aisles upon aisles of the boxy devices lay ahead. Possibly in response to the ceiling light, their own indicator lights switched on row after row.
She searched for signs of a wire. One cautious step followed another into the room. Her squad came up behind. None of them dared to step off her path.
Soon she was close enough to stand beside one of the servers. She pulled out a tiny data chip from her pocket and inserted it into an engagement port. The light on both devices dimmed. They vacillated for a tense 30 seconds before the sequence ended with a three-toned beep. She pulled out the chip and stashed it in her pocket.
"Got it."
"Good." Giana said. "S-3, how about it?"
"Almost...there...and...done. Good to go."
"Squad 2, report?"
"Already outside, 4-Actual. Ready when you ar-"
A crack of thunder rolled through the comms. Carisa heard it outside and recognized it for what it was, the collective sound of hundreds of TTR rounds striking the fort. She and her squad snapped back to the door right in time to see muzzle flashes in the foliage of the neighboring trees. Polymer rounds flew through the door and swept the room.
"Cover!"
They dashed behind data serves, all except one who was thrown back by a hail of fire. Carisa saw him collapse onto the floor in a heaving sprawl. She struggled to hear the greater conversation over her comms against the constant bombardment.
"This is Squad 2!" Someone said. "We're pinned outside! There's two of us left! I'm looking at hostiles perched in the trees to our..."
"Which directions!?" Giana demanded.
"All of them! They're all over the-" A crack of thunder, a pained gasp and the comms fell silent.
"4-Actual to 3 and 4! Looks like 2's out of action! Can you still move!?"
"Yeah!" S-3 said. "Geeze, they waited for us to get in, get the data and think we could waltz right out just to trap us here!"
"This is 1-Actual's doing!" Carisa noted. "This has his signature written all over it!"
"So what do we do!? We can't stay here and fight, there's no time!"
"And that's what he's counting on!" Giana said. "He was leading us in to pin us here until we run the clock!"
"He's trapping us like rats!" S-3 growled. "Man, I hate that guy!"
"The feeling's mutual! Right now, we need to go! We've got three minutes! Toss out some flashbangs as far as you can get them and prepare to make a run for it! At least one of us has to hit the finish line with these chips! We do that, we win!"
Carisa leaned out towards the door. A burst of fire splattered the floor at her boot, forcing her back. "I don't know, that fire's heavy! You sure the range will be enough!?"
"We'll only know once we try! And at this rate, we're all out of options!"
Carisa felt that same lump from before hardening in her throat. "Okay!"
"On three!"
Carisa pulled out a flashbang and hooked her finger into the pin.
"One...two..."
She nodded to her squadmates. They held their weapons at the ready.
"Three!"
She pulled the pin, stepped into the doorway, tossed the grenade as high as she could then leapt out of the way. A TTR-storm blazed through the space where she'd been standing.
She waited.
There was an explosion and a burst of illumination that ebbed as quickly as it came.
"Go! Go! Go!"
She rushed out first, M6 raised. The 'sunlight' was right in her face. She strained to see the targets. Movement in the treetops directly ahead of her signaled their presence. A force of half-a-dozen figures shuffled along the highest branches. Their armored frames blended in and out of the surrounding foliage thanks to their camouflage of leaves and paint.
Carisa barely got a chance to think about how they got up there when the effects of the flash wore off. Responsive fire started as a sporadic trickle before evolving into an organized salvo. However, the squad was already rushing for cover behind the railings. As rounds raced over their heads, they crawled over to the nearest staircase. Carisa was closest. She reached for the next rail but a three-round burst beat her to it, splashing across the top of the steps.
Alarm bells immediately rang in her mind that the shot came from above, not from their front.
"Shooter, above us!" She threw herself to the ground and rolled aside, barely dodging another burst. The others did likewise and followed her to the safety of the data center's overhang roof. She had forgotten all about the last sniper.
185 tucked his legs in close to his chest while red polymer bathed the walls a handbreadth above him. "The one up top, he's got to be using the guys in the trees to pin us here!"
"So he can pick us off!" 186 finished. "Hate to admit it but 1-Actual's thinking three steps ahead of us here!"
Carisa watched the timer. "We have to keep moving!"
"To where!? The stairs!? He'll have a bead on us there too!"
"What about the elevator!?" 185 asked, flinching at a few glancing shots near his helmet. "We didn't take it to this floor, but the switch is close! If we send it down to the ground floor, we could zip down the rope!"
"Good idea!" 186 said. "Only problem is whoever runs out there has to take the shots! You interested, bro!?"
"No-no, not me, I've got the carbine!"
"But it was your idea!"
"I'll do it!" Carisa said. She looked over her shoulder back in the opposite direction of the stairs, across the platform, to the elevator port. There was next to no cover around the switch. The lift itself was still a level below, meaning it would be some time before it reached the bottom. From there, they would have to run like hell through the undergrowth and to the closest exfil point over 100 meters away. Though an unpleasant idea, it became more palatable as the timer counted off another minute. "Cover me!"
"No!" Her last squadmate shouted. "You've got the chip! If you take a hit, we won't be able to recover you! I don't have a carbine either, I'll go!"
Carisa felt a pang of guilt. She swallowed it down for the sake of the mission. "Okay, we've got your back! I've got the sniper, you guys take the trees! Ready!?"
He nodded.
"Go!"
He got to his feet and dashed for the elevator switch.
185 and 186 stood and fired into the trees. Carisa rolled back out towards the stairs, aimed up at the observation platform and found herself staring visor to visor with the sniper. They both fired. She traded two shots for a surprised burst from her foe. Both of them missed. She re-centered her aim but her target slipped back behind the rails.
"Come on!" She fired a goading shot. "I'm right here!"
An answer came from elsewhere; an increasingly fast 'TICK-TICK-TICK-TICK'.
"Down!" 185 cried.
She saw the pair crouch behind the railing just as a spray of TTRs skewered the air. But the barrage remained constant, splattering the walls of the data center with an unrelenting fury, sweeping left towards her then right. Towards the elevator. She was helpless to watch the rounds as they found their target, striking the back of her squadmate. His body crumpled under the volley then collapsed onto the wooden planks.
"He's down!" 186 said. "God, we found where they put the 486s!"
185 shook his head. "How'd they even get those things up there!?"
"No idea!" Carisa replied. She sighted the elevator. It was now descending at a steady pace. "Looks like he got to the button in time! You two focus on getting down! We're almost the-"
Her comm-unit buzzed with static. "This is S-3, I'm hit! We got halfway down before they drilled the last of us! Be advised, they've got 486s in the trees! 4-Actual, S-4, it's your show now!"
"4-Actual copies!" Giana replied. "We were able to break through, almost to the bottom, taking fire from the forest floor! S-4, what's your status!?"
So they were waiting for them on the north side as well as at the clearing, were they? Carisa gritted her teeth and stared at the elevator line. "We're still up top! They pinned us with a machinegun! We're down two guys but we can zip to your level in a few seconds!"
"Don't take long! We're starting to take some heat from the canopy too! Get moving!"
"Roger!"
Carisa checked the elevator. "Progress!?"
185 gave her the thumbs up. "Good to go!"
"Then let's move!"
They crawled towards the elevator port on all fours. She snuck a glance at the observation post along the way. Not seeing the sniper, she felt safe enough to make a dash for the descension line. The machinegun tried and failed to hose them as 185 grabbed the rope and slid down, followed by 186. Carisa went last.
Squad 4 zipped down the upper heights of the redwood. The machinegun in the trees tried to trace their path alongside those hiding in the canopy. A steady stream of pistol, carbine and rapid fire pinged off the bark of the trunk both above and behind them, striking off the wooden and steel walls of the structures on the highest rings. None of them hit. The barrage slowly faded the further they dove out of range.
Carisa gave silent thanks for the gloves they were wearing. Without them, the length of wire passing through their hands would have roasted their palms. They passed the first ten meters without issue. At the 50-meter mark, they noticed the shooting below. A firefight raged on the ground. Camouflaged elements of Team 1 were active on the forest floor, moving from tree to tree and firing from behind them. There was at least half-a-dozen of them, sufficient to suppress Squad 1. The other survivors of Team 4 had taken their own cover behind the railings and structures of the lowest ring, using them as shields from which to return fire. Carisa singled out their squad-leader at the lowest platform. Giana looked ready to lead the breakout across the westward side of the forest. Whilst she reloaded her carbine, she peered up and saw the three of them. Carisa noticed that she suddenly perked up and aimed at them.
No, not at them. At something above them.
Carisa looked up.
Confusion was her first thought as to why someone was flying down towards them. She quickly realized they weren't flying, but rappelling down the tree with so much speed that they might as well have been falling. But it wasn't so much a fall as it was someone running down the bark of the redwood itself, their rappel-line trailing behind them like a descending spider. She noticed the BR on his back and the twin-pistols held in either hand. She eyed his course; a straight shot to them.
"Guys, above us!"
Giana struck first.
Several bursts glanced off the bark at the sniper's feet. He showed no hint of a reaction besides his determination to cover the 20 meters between them in a full sprint. And he was gaining.
"S-4, is that who I think it is!?" 185 asked, his voice wavering.
Carisa risked taking a hand away from the line to whip out her sidearm. "Just shoot!"
She aimed and fired. Below her, 185 and 186 did the same with their carbines. Their pursuer's path gave them a straight line of sight. However, the sniper switched tact and leapt from side to side, dodging close-calls, always bounding forward while returning fire.
Carisa felt a ricochet pass close to her neck. She tucked her body in closer and mag-dumped the rest of her clip. It was of little use against her target's constant evasion, each of his steps seemingly predicting the path of their fire.
"Screw it!" She holstered the gun and pulled out a grenade. She popped the pin and tossed it up at such an angle that it struck against the trunk and bounced directly into the sniper's path. She grinned.
Rather than hesitating like she expected, he leapt up into the air, away from the tree. His downward momentum carried his boots just above the grenade. At the last second, he folded himself into a tight ball. As he arced ahead of it, the grenade detonated behind him, the pressure-wave reaching him before the polymer blast and propelling him after them like a cannonball. His arms unfolded from his sides like wings, revealing his pistols which snapped in their direction like metal talons.
Carisa's grin vanished. "GO!"
Her squadmates loosened their grip even more, increasing their descent to a near uncontrolled fall. She followed close behind. So did the sniper. He fired but his shots fell short of his quarry who were now practically free-falling along the line. Seeing this, he ran far to the left then jumped in order to swing himself rightward across the width of the tree. He landed with a run and continued on a parallel course. Free of having to maneuver around as many platforms, he pushed harder than before and managed to line himself up with them. He fired two shots.
One of them struck 185 in the leg and he cried out. Carisa aimed across the way. Knowing it was empty and unable to be reloaded, it was more a threatening gesture to keep him at bay. Only 186 still had the capacity to shoot back and he did so one-handed, unleashing a fully automatic assault of TTRs and death threats. They traded shots, most of them striking the structures that flew past. However, as they fell past a bunker, the sniper fired a single round, scoring a hit on 186's shoulder. The limb immediately stiffened and he lost a hold of his gun. Carisa watched helpless while their last hope fell away into the foliage. 186 wrapped his limpening arm around the rope and issued more disoriented threats.
This seemed to be enough.
Their pursuer suddenly broke off. He ran further to the right until he was out of their sight. Carisa saw why. Sensing that his intent was to reload his weapons, that the ground was quickly approaching as well as the end of their timer, Carisa clamped her hands and boots around the line. 185 and 186 did the same. They lost sufficient speed to not risk breaking their legs once they landed atop the elevator. However, the impact was no less jarring than if they had.
Carisa led them down to the safety of the railings on the lowest ring, 186 shouldering 185 with his good arm. She peered over at Squad 1's position. It was clear they had attempted to move down onto the forest floor. Three of them lay strewn beneath the ferns, motionless. One or two hostiles were missing from the enemy forces firing from deeper within the forest. They were in the middle of a heated exchange with the last pair of Squad 1, Giana being one of them. Altogether, Team 4's platoon's worth of forces was reduced to a squad. Even that was debatable; 185's groans as he held his leg and 186's growling at his arm made it clear to Carisa that they would not be leaving in one piece.
"S-4 to 4-Actual, we're groundside!" She dropped a Nav point on their position.
Slapping another fresh magazine into her MA5K, Giana turned and spotted them. She signaled her last squadmate and they covered each other from tree to tree, moving towards the new rendezvous point. Soon they hopped over the rails and ducked down beside them. Immediately, the ambushers in the forest picked up the pace. A fresh wave of suppression fire crashed into the structures around them.
"Sitrep?" Giana queried.
Carisa pointed to her squadmates. Their conditions spoke for themselves.
"Your chip?"
Carisa patted one of her pockets.
"Okay. It's looking like a race to the finish. I'm thinking we make a feint; show them we're pushing west then turn north. That way they won't have time to reposition."
"That'll take longer though." Carisa said. "The North exfil point is 150 meters out."
"Better than running straight into them." 185 groaned.
"The sooner we start, the better." Giana declared. "It'll take us about 45 seconds if we sprint."
At that, Carisa checked the timer:
'1:43'.
"Sounds like a plan." She admitted.
Giana turned to 185. He nodded understandingly and held out his carbine to 186. "Try not to lose it again, would you? These don't grow on trees."
"No." 186 took it and slapped him on the shoulder. "But they sure can fall out of them. See you on the other side."
"Copy that."
"On your go, 4-Actual." Carisa said, reloading her pistol and preparing herself for the mad-dash.
However, Giana was no longer staring at them but up at something in the foliage. Carisa followed her gaze to a set of trees to the north. Their leaves rustled as boots stepped along their broad branches. She recognized two distinct groups of at least three figures, each one navigating the thick network of branches using pre-established safety ropes. She glimpsed a long, metallic device being carried by both parties; each one possessing the cylindrical silhouette of an AIE-486H machinegun.
"They're flanking us." Giana said, giving voice to everyone's fears. "Let's go. 1-Actual must've fi-"
"Figured it out? Yes."
The voice was fluid, menacing and familiar yet not one of theirs, spoken outside their comm-network, out-loud, right above them. They turned. Standing atop an unfinished bunker nearby was the sniper: 1-Actual.
His pistols at his side, his BR on his back, he stared down at them with muted interest.
No one moved.
Then 1-Actual cocked his head and leaned toward them. "Shouldn't you be running?"
The shock of the moment dissipated. Weapons were raised and fired. 1-Actual ducked back.
"Move!" Giana ordered.
Carisa, 186 and the last member of Squad 1 vaulted over the railing. She was terrified that the enemy had gotten so close that he probably picked up on their comm-frequency. He had listened to their entire plan because he was well within comms range. He knew everything now.
The order of the plan quickly fell apart in the face of a renewed salvo from the west. In seconds they abandoned the feint and shifted north. With her feet pounding across the ferns, Carisa struggled to avoid stumbling over the downed members of Squad 1. It instinctively made her look around for Giana.
To her right, 186 held his carbine one-handed. He fired from the hip, sending bursts into the trees further on their right in the hopes of delaying the machinegun crew there.
To her left, the last of Giana's squad made a similar move at the crew up in that direction. His efforts were rewarded with a line of tracers that stabbed a trail of destruction up the forest floor. The crew separated this way and that, abandoning unity for the shelter of the tree-trunks.
Carisa shut her eyes against the ferocity of the fire that thudded into her cover. She looked back to the base of the Tree Fort.
There was Giana, trading shots with 1-Actual. The enemy leader had hopped down from the top of the bunker and was keeping her pinned around the other side of it. Returns from her met with miss after miss. From that distance, Carisa heard her carbine give an empty clack. Giana pressed her back to the bunker's front. She switched her grip on her weapon, held it like a club and waited.
1-Actual seized the opportunity and rushed toward her. Just as he turned the corner, Giana lashed out, swatting away one of his pistols. 1-Actual dodged a follow-up aimed at his head then caught the third swing with his forearm. He raised his last pistol but Giana swiftly pushed the barrel aside to grab his wrist. They struggled against each other in a battle of strength. 1-Actual forced her back a step then just as quickly yanked her forward, throwing her off-balance to deliver a strong knee to her stomach. She gasped for air yet refused to let go. As he attempted another knee, she twisted his wrist hard and it yielded with a loud pop.
He didn't scream. However, his damaged hand slowly released the last sidearm. Giana kicked it away. She released his now useless hand to grab him by the collar of his BDU. She raised her carbine for a powerful overhead strike. Before she could deliver it, the same useless hand shot down to the pistol holstered on her hip. 1-Actual ducked beneath the finishing blow then threw himself in close to her, close enough to jam the pistol barrel into the underside of her helmet and squeeze the trigger.
Giana's head snapped back. She toppled onto the ground, her helmet covered in red polymer.
Carisa watched him holster his pistols. He briefly turned his attention to the form of 185 lying against the railing. Her squadmate returned his stare, stoically nonchalant. Perhaps recognizing that his paralyzed foe was no longer a threat, 1-Actual rounded about and set his sights on her. He took out his BR, tried to aim it and found that his hand with the twisted wrist was no good for the trigger. He returned the weapon to his harness and unsheathed his sidearms.
A loud cry turned Carisa to her left where the last of Giana's squadmates keeled over, his entire front reduced to a mess of angry red polymer.
"S-4!"
She turned to the caller. It was 186. He was sprinting out into the open, zigzagging left then right while firing full-auto at the machineguns. "Keep moving!"
Carisa snapped out of her stupor. She ran out from the tree in a rush for the edge of the clearing. Looking back, she glimpsed 186 still shooting despite the crisscrossing trails of machinegun fire that chased after him. She also saw 1-Actual. He was now running at a full sprint. He didn't turn to the left or right, not even when rushing close to 186. Instead, he passed him by, never taking his eyes off of her.
Carisa forced herself to look straight ahead. She reached the edge of the clearing and hurled herself through the shrubs. Behind her, she heard the clack of a spent MA5K. The machineguns continued shooting for several seconds longer before they too fell silent. There was nothing left save the sounds of her frantic breaths and her footsteps crunching across the undergrowth.
And 1-Actual's.
He was right on her, probably no more than 5 meters behind. She pounded the ground with each step. She leaned forward to try to force herself to move faster. It was no good.
A shot rang out. A TTR round splattered a tree ahead of her. She tried to evade, running right then left, not daring to stick her head any higher and chance making his chase any easier. Her attention coalesced around three things alone: The chip, staying low and reaching the exfil point.
A second shot rang out and struck a bush off to her left.
"Carisa!" She heard him shout out his helmet speaker, no longer relying on any comms. "Carisa, hurry up! You've only got 30 seconds left!"
She hated him. Still, his words made her eyes flicker to her timer. The digits flashed bloodred in her HUD:
'0:29'.
What felt like a baseball bat struck her square in the back of her arm. She felt the muscles in the limb go numb as the anesthetic effects took hold.
"Hurry, Carisa!" He shouted, almost playfully. "You're almost out of time! Go!"
She pushed herself harder. She whipped out her M6 and fired over her shoulder without caring to look back.
"That's no good! Don't get distracted! If you do, you won't make it! And if you don't make it, your whole team loses...again! So focus!"
A pair of rounds zipped right over her helmet. She fired back again.
"You sure are hard-headed! I just said focus!"
Something punched her in her gun-arm and it immediately went limp. Her grip on the M6 loosened and the weapon fell out of her fingers. She ran awkwardly through the forest, willing her legs to pump harder and push farther. Her vision fogged. There was nothing wrong with her visor. It was the tears welling up in her eyes that made it hard to see. There was no way to clear them without risking a headshot so she pushed on regardless.
"Now come on, you're almost there!"
More tears flowed. Teeth gritted, arms paralyzed, she fought to hold in what was bubbling up within. She sensed the burning pressure building in her muscles at the strain. Her mouth was so dry that she felt like flakes were scraping the inside of her parched throat. Her stomach burned. Her steps lessened then picked up with a second wind of energy.
'You're almost there'.
He'd told her everything she needed to know. She was headed in the right direction.
"Go!" He shouted, his voice growing more distant but no less excited. "Go! Go! Go..."
Soon she could no longer hear his footsteps behind her. Even more relieving was the sight that appeared ahead. Like some apparition conjured up by her desperate mind, a door appeared where the forest transformed into a wall of simulated nature. It was sufficiently distinguishable from the rest of the environment for her to know for sure.
She bolted straight for it. She felt the outline of the chip in her pocket and her grin returned, anxious at the last 5 meters between her and victory.
At 3 meters, she slowed to an exhausted trot.
At 2 meters, she thought she felt something like a wire pressing against her boot.
At 1 meter, her world exploded.
:********:
Blurry lights.
Strange noises.
Voices. Too many to count.
None of them were speaking to her.
Carisa came to slowly. She cracked her eyes open and immediately regretted it. A wave of sterile light sent a surge of pain through her head. She regained more of her senses and realized she was still wearing her armor. Everything except her helmet was in place. She strained to lift her head.
Her first thought was that what she was seeing was an optical illusion. Her next guess was that something was wrong with her eyes. Her vision was blurry, but as it cleared, she saw it was no illusion. Her armor was absolutely coated in hardened red polymer from the neck up.
Movement stirred around her. She made out a metal cylinder, a TTR baton, coming towards her. A hand held it above her neck then gradually worked its way down. Beneath it, the hardened polymer crackled and sizzled as it melted and evaporated. Soon Carisa noticed that she could move her arms again, then her chest and finally her legs.
She sat up. She saw that she was sitting on a medical examination table, one of dozens that surrounded her. The tables were all occupied with Janissary candidates with TTR-covered armor, some limping into place with the help of a friend, others being carried in by teammates on stretchers. Not everyone was partly covered in leaves and pieces of plants like she was. There was a variety of environmental signposts on their gear that told her which teams had trained where. Boys and girls that she recognized from Teams 2 and 3 had sand seeping out of their armor from the Desert Simulation Zone. Casualties from Teams 5 and 6 looked half-frozen thanks to the snow that was left on them from the Tundra Simulation Zone, and 7 and 8 were soaked from the waters of the Sub-nautical Training Zone, amongst many other signs from many other teams. They were laid down while one or two of Topkapi's med personnel attended to them. The latter waved the batons over them like wands. A crackle or sizzle later and the devices finished working their magic, reanimating the frozen limbs and bodies like the dead resurrected.
A hand rested on her shoulder. She turned to the EMT standing at her side. The older woman smiled down at her from behind her protective face-shield. "How are you doing, honey?"
'Honey'. She remembered someone else used to call her that. Their face had grown hazy over the years and so had the name she used to call them by. There was a genuine warmth to this woman that she quietly appreciated.
"Um, where-…"
"You're in the Combat Simulation Center's Medical Station. You got knocked up pretty bad by a trip-wire detonation during your training session." She turned to a set of monitors, one of which displayed an X-ray of a head. Carisa guessed it was hers. "Good thing you don't have a concussion. Whoever planted the explosives used just the right amount of bang, not so little to keep you standing but not so much as to blow your eyes out of their sockets."
"And I walked right into it." Carisa sighed. She thought back to the moment before she reached the door. She remembered feeling the wire as well as the way her surroundings suddenly blew up. She journeyed back to the way 1-Actual chased after her. He goaded her to keep going as he shot at her. At any point in those seconds that he was on her tail, he could have put one in her head or chest or anywhere critical. Instead, he shot her arms to stop her from shooting back while he shepherded her on to the explosives he had waiting, shouting enthusiastic nothings the whole way. She hated herself for not seeing it sooner. Her desperation to win had clouded her judgement.
"You sure did." The EMT continued. "And believe me when I say that we see worse cases from kids who go up against Team 1 every now and again. So be glad that that's all you're walking away with, kid."
Carisa arched a brow. "Just Team 1?"
She nodded. "Them specifically. They get up to a lot of trouble but I chalk it up to whoever's leading them."
"...Yeah." Carisa exhaled. The defeat was certain. There was no way they could have won so she tried to accept that Team 4 had yet another loss to Team 1 under its belt. "So can I-"
A door slid open directly ahead of her. Three persons stepped inside, all three of which she recognized. Leading the way towards her was Drill Instructor White. Being the man in charge of Team 4's personalized training, it was no surprise that he would turn up here to look for her. Even with a few more white hairs to satisfy his namesake, he was still too young to have something so old. He pressed through the aisles of medical tables, ignoring as recently recovered Janissaries sat up to salute him. His gaze was steely, locked solely on her, his face an unreadable mask.
The other two walking behind him were equally as unreadable because of their helmets. However, she knew Giana well enough to identify her with her face hidden. It was obvious she was tense. It was also obvious the reason why.
Carisa recognized the last person by his care-free walk, the way his hands stayed buried in the pockets on his waist. He acted as though Giana weren't staring hard at him judging by the slight tilt of her helmet. Carisa knew him by his call-sign '1-Actual', as well as his real name, though she was unsure why he would show up here. In fact, he was the last person she wanted to see.
The three of them stopped at the edge of her table. White glanced at the monitors then at her. He cracked a rare smile. With White, she'd long since learned that rare meant genuine. "How're you feeling, recruit? Are your brains still in one piece?"
A minor giggle broke through Carisa's façade; the poker face she wanted to maintain around 1-Actual. "Y-, yessir." She rapped her knuckles on her forehead. "It's all still in there." Her eyes betrayed her and darted to 1-Actual, as did her speech. "Not that someone didn't try their hardest to blow them out."
The person in question did not utter a word.
She and Giana both stared at the unwelcome visitor. Even White looked him over after catching on to the tension. "Well, about that. 1-Actual here was concerned about your wellbeing so he asked if he could tag along with us to come check on you."
"He wants to pretend he has a heart, you see?" Giana quipped.
White gave her a look. "Listen here, 151, there's no need for hard feelings against a fellow classmate. He's a comrade. He's on the same team as you in the grand scheme of things."
"Oh, he's got a grand scheme going alright, and it got me-"
"151."
White's firmer tone and the sharpness of his glare shut her down. "Keep it professional. You three are security assets and agents in training. That means here, you're comrades. If you didn't beat him today, there's a chance you can do it some other time."
"If there's still time left."
The last words had slipped out of the EMT's mouth and she seemed to startle herself at her own mistake. The not-so-subtle reference to the UNSC's newest war was not lost on anyone, not even to the hundreds of children ferreted away to a place that no one would ever know about. White's glare shifted to her. She motioned to leave.
"Excuse me." 1-Actual said, stopping her. He pointed to the screen with the X-Ray. "Is that her skull?"
The EMT peered between him and the screen. There was a bit of relief on her face; gratitude that someone had changed the subject. "Ah yes, this is 108's. Why do you ask?"
"Just curious."
Carisa squinted at him. "Why so curious?"
"Because there's no fractures." He reached behind his helmet and gripped the release latch. He pulled it off and saddled it against his hip.
Black hair in no need of a buzz glistened under the sterile light. Jaw always set in a casual grin, not a smile but not a smirk, gray eyes ever curious and suspicious, Dimitri ogled the X-ray. Just above the top of his neck-seal, the old scar that used to line his throat had almost faded completely.
"You see, it shows we finally perfected it." He said. "You have no idea how long it took my demolitionists to mix the right amount of explosive material and polymer, to not override the one or overemphasize the other. It's easier to break someone's skull open with these or just annoy them. It takes tons to find that sweet spot in-between, right instructor?"
White nodded. "That's right. It's a show of skill. You guys in Team 1 have really grown. Soon you'll be operating in the field, leading spec ops groups like ODSTs on the real version of that kind of operation. I'm sure Mahmud's proud of you."
"Thank you, sir."
Carisa glowered at Dimitri. He wasn't here to check on her, that was just his excuse. What he really wanted was to know how well his team had performed.
Giana drew a few eyes her way by violently yanking off her helmet and tossing it to the ground. With her own dark hair, a bit over regulation length, the lowcut was her sign of accustomed uniformity. Her olive skin shone white in the light which made the faded imprint on her cheek of the Janissary insignia, the two-sword wielding eagle, stand out more than she probably wanted it to. The underground temporary tattoo industry among the Janissary candidates was a close hobby of hers, so Carisa knew she had to be pretty angry to chance exposing herself like this. And it showed in the the deep-seated scowl leveled at Dimitri.
"You've got to be kidding, sir. You're praising that guy?"
White rounded on her. "He's an efficient leader, and perhaps you should take note of that. I'm not complimenting him; I'm making an observation."
"What's the difference? He's the leader of the team that keeps busting our balls, sir. How many wins do we have against them again? I think zero. How many losses? Five?"
"Six." Dimitri corrected. "Remember, that Sub-tropical op?"
Her venomous gaze connected with his unphased one. "I'm not talking to you."
"No, but you are talking about me. Besides, it's not my fault you decided to club me rather than use your sidearm. And what was the sense of that anyway?"
Giana shrugged. "I wanted to crack a few things and I knew TTRs wouldn't do the job."
"Yeah, well, it cost you the match so I'm not complaining."
"For now." She grinned. "Speaking of cracking things, how's your wrist?"
Dimitri held up the twisted wrist of his right hand for them all to see. It was bruised and bent at a slight angle.
Giana's grin deepened. "Guess you won't be using it any time soon then. Oh well, you could get a medical rollout if you need it. In fact, I recommend it."
Dimitri planted the hand on the side of Carisa's table, placed his other hand over it and began to press down.
The EMT took notice. "Oh my, that looks like a dislocation. Would you like me to-
There was a loud pop. Dimitri raised the same hand again. While the bruise remained, the slight bend in his wrist was gone. There was not a hint of pain on his face. "You were saying?"
The girls and the EMT gawked at him. White looked mildly impressed. At length, Giana balled her fists at her sides, restraining them there. "Sir, all I'm saying is he's a real piece of work that should get checked on his tactics from time to time."
"You think the enemy out there is going to care about the rules of engagement we use in here?" Dimitri interjected. "You just need to think outside the box a bit more often, that's all. Maybe it'll help your team not get annihilated so much."
"Sir, he makes our life hell on purpose."
Dimitri cocked his head. "I didn't make your life hell. It already is. I just gave you a good reminder."
There was a twitch in Giana's eye that told Carisa she was about to go off. Giana started for Dimitri who stood there, unconcerned.
White's hand fell on her shoulder. "Stand down, 151."
Giana stopped briefly, then started again, only to cease once White's grip tightened. "I said...stand...down."
The cordialness in the instructor's expression had disappeared. What remained was the closest thing to a death glare Carisa had ever seen on his face. It chilled her. She imagined it was something he reserved for real enemies, people whose names she and everyone else would never know because he made sure of it. Giana ground to a halt. Under the pressure of his stare, her hostile demeanor froze over and cooled. Even Dimitri averted his gaze, appearing slightly uneased.
Giana took a cautious step back. The moment she did, White released her from the grasp of his hand as well as his glare. The kindness from earlier did not return. Instead, something like wariness dawned on the instructor.
"You two can work out your differences the next time your teams butt heads. Not here. Is that clear?"
The two stood at attention. "Yessir."
"Good. I'll hold you to your word."
"Yessir."
White returned to Carisa and the EMT who quickly straightened up. "Is 108 cleared?"
The medical technician nodded emphatically. "Yes-yes, everything checks out. She's good to go, sir."
"Perfect. 108, come on. We're returning to the debriefing room. The rest of Teams 1 and 4 are already there. We were just waiting on you." He looked between Carisa and Dimitri. "It seems we could all use a debriefing, whatever will help us unwind."
The pair snuck a glance at each other but stayed quiet.
Carisa hopped off the table. She thanked the EMT for her help. To her, the woman looked relieved to see them leave. The group headed back towards the exit. On the way, Carisa made sure to test the waters. She placed a comforting hand on her team-leader's shoulder. Giana didn't look back at her. However, she placed her own hand over hers and gently squeezed, a silent "thanks for asking but I'll be fine".
Carisa smiled, pleased.
She looked around for Dimitri. A bit surprised that he was no longer beside them, she peered over her shoulder. There he was, trailing close behind. Their eyes met and Carisa felt yet another chill. She averted her gaze. There was a lesser intensity behind his eyes than what she saw from White, but she discerned that it came from the same place. However, the difference was that there was an intent behind Dimitri's and she sensed it revolving around her and Giana. It unnerved her.
Near the doors, she dared to peek at him again.
The look was gone, replaced with his casual smile. This time he kept his attention straight ahead. Carisa, a tad unnerved, chose to do the same.
Adversarii - Opponent