Inferno - The Lead

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"... I repeat, all ground forces are to be recalled immediately. All squads, activate your recovery beacons and await evacuation."

Gates did a head count of her team, making sure that they'd all made it into the thicket of foliage that led into the jungles of Tyche. Dimitri stood next to her, his own gaze following hers and glancing back at Bear and Jax while they all regained their breath. The latter was peering through the leaves of their new sanctuary to look for potential threats while Bear simply knelt on the ground, checking the mag counters of each of his weapons and ensuring they were properly loaded.

The anti-air fire was becoming far too strong around the IMC's main compound to risk a bombing run, and now command was pulling everyone back. From the way things sounded over the comms, what had initially been a supposed cakewalk had turned into a bloodbath. Resistance was far stronger than any intel had indicated, and Gates considered her team lucky to have evaded the ground forces stationed here—narrow escape didn't even come close to accurately describing their situation, hence why they were now hiding in the brush rather than trying to tangle with any Titans or Pilots in the area.

"Dee," she said lowly, trying to keep her volume to a minimum, "get me a roster of all active squads."

Dimitri was still for a few seconds, accessing a directory through his HUD and sending the information over to hers. She saw it pop up in the bottom right corner of her visor, and opened it to see a list of active teams that had deployed to Tyche and were currently awaiting extraction. There weren't many ground teams left from what she could see ... there was Charlie-Two, her own team of the 6-4, Delta-Five, and—

Foxtrot-Three. The Heartless.

She instantly recognized it as Four's squad, and a crease formed in her brow. She couldn't quite explain why, but she'd been growing rather fond of the defector—maybe she'd been astonished with his show of selflessness when he'd agreed to fight for the Militia rather than sit out the war, maybe she'd been touched by his obvious care for the Titan that he now called his own, a care that she hadn't often seen before.

Or maybe it's the fact that no one's so challenged me so openly and gotten away with it before. Have to admit, the way he stood his ground was more than a little alluring—

She paused for a moment, reflecting on whether that thought had seriously just crossed her mind. Shaking her head in disbelief, she focused back to the task at hand, and tried to open a comm channel to them. Four's lucky streak had endured this far, she hoped it wasn't about to run out.

"Foxtrot-Three, do you copy? This is Captain Gates of the 6-4, respond immediately."

"... Captain Gates, this is Warrant Officer Vale—we read you."

She breathed a sigh of relief. "Glad to hear it. Vale, how's your team's status? Have you activated your recovery beacon?"

"Uh ... no, ma'am."

No?

"Why not?"

The simulacrum took a few seconds to respond. "Well, Captain ... one of our team members had a plan that I find myself agreeing with."

A team member ...? Who would—oh, hell.

"I'd like to talk with this team-member, if you don't mind."

Another few seconds passed before a voice that she recognized piped up over the comlink. "This is PFC Tobias Four—"

"Four, what's going on?"

"Gates? Is that you?"

"Yes," she confirmed, growing more agitated by the second. "Now, back to the question—your commanding officer says you have a plan that's more appealing than getting evacuated?"

"Right. Security has tightened in a perimeter around the main compound, but has actually declined near the research division of the facility. If a small team of Pilots were to enter the main data-center, they could swipe a sizable amount of classified intel that could help with future operations."

Gates' eyes widened. "Am I to assume you've already requested permission for this undertaking?"

"... Can we have permission to proceed with the undertaking—?"

"No!" she immediately refused. "It's far too dangerous—activate your recovery beacons, and await extraction! That's an order!"

"Sorry, Gates ... getting hard to hear you ... I think we got a bad connection—"

"You know damn well that we don't! You will activate your recovery beacon this instant, or I swear—"

She stopped for a moment, not hearing anything on the other side. She checked the comlink status incredulously. "Unbelievable. He cut the line."

"Captain?"

She turned to look at Dimitri who had apparently listened in on the conversation. "I don't want to be the one to say it, but ... they're as good as dead if they go through with that plan. There's nothing we can do for them."

She pondered his words for a few seconds, biting her lip. It was a bad habit that she was thankful the others couldn't see—one of the reasons she kept her helmet on so often. The weight of his words was heavy, but not without truth—what the Heartless were doing was suicidal, even if Tobias' claims of decreased forces were true. There was no way four Pilots could pull it off ...

But what about eight?

"You're wrong on one thing, Dee," she replied briskly, unslinging her DMR from her back and hefting it up. "They're as good as dead, yeah—but we can do something about that."

He jerked his head abruptly, taken aback by her decision. "You're not seriously suggesting—?"

"Jax, Bear, get ready to move," she ordered the other two. "We're going to give the Heartless some much needed support."

The two of them nodded and complied, but Dimitri grabbed her arm and whispered lowly, "What the hell are you doing? You're really going to risk our lives for—?"

"For what?" she shot back, daring him to finish his sentence. "A few Pilots that nobody else would miss? An ex-IMC soldier who had a change of heart?"

He said nothing, realizing he'd overstepped a boundary that even Gates hadn't known she'd erected. She took a deep breath to calm herself, and glared at him. He stood there for a few moments longer, looking like he still wanted to argue—but he lowered his shoulders in resignation and turned around to step away.

Satisfied that he was no longer a concern, she beckoned to the other two. "Let's go, before they get themselves killed."

...

"This is not what I had in mind when you said 'intriguing', McFarlane."

"Would you have rather I said, 'stupid and dangerous'?"

The four of them and their Titans stood roughly half a kilometer from the research facility, standing atop a ridge that overlooked the valley it resided in. Vale was currently scouting the perimeter of their target, noting the large hangar-sized doors that adorned the southern end of the main building.

"Not really," she admitted. "But that's the truth until we figure out a way to get in there—without immediately drawing the fire of every soldier in there, preferably."

"I don't think that's feasible at this point," Tyra remarked, placing one leg on a rock and leaning against her knee. "We'd only need a few seconds to get in—but we'd need a hell of a distraction to draw that much fire away."

Tobias coughed into his hand. "I think I might have an idea to help with that."

Vale turned to him, tilting her head to the side. "Another, 'the Captain isn't going to like this' kind of idea?"

"Probably," he admitted, walking over to where KT and McFarlane's Titan stood. "Titan chassises are equipped with a default OS system when a data-core's not installed, right?"

"Yeah," Tyra agreed, nodding her head. "But it's not really much more than a basic computer VI—it'll only follow basic commands."

"That's alright," he said, looking at KT with chagrin. "We won't need much more than that for a distraction."

KT suddenly realized what he had in mind, and she narrowed her eye at him. "I'm not sure that I like this idea."

He shrugged. "I can't think of anything else, and we're running out of time. Do you have a better plan?"

She was silent for a few moments before giving a resigned, synthetic sigh. "You owe me a new chassis when this is over."

...

"Hey, sensors are picking up movement."

The IMC rifleman standing next to the equipment officer looked over his shoulder to confirm the strange reading. "Can't be Militia, they're evacuating. Besides, none of them made it far enough to reach us—"

FWOOOM.

Ten meters away, a pile of munitions crates erupted in a pyre of flame. Both men jerked backwards, holding their hands up to cover themselves from falling debris. Turning to look out into the valley, they saw a lone Ion approaching them and firing its precision laser at various targets.

"We've got a Titan!" the soldier yelled, grabbing the other man and practically throwing him back towards the building. "Call for backup!"

It was another minute before squads of riflemen began to swarm out of the large entrance, its doors remaining open to allow defensive forces a clear passage. Unbeknownst to them, four Pilots who had been stealthily hiding nearby in a cluster of bushes chose this time to quickly run inside as the Titan slowly reversed its progress and drew them further away from the facility.

"KT's not gonna be happy when she's back," Tobias panted, her data-core clipped securely to his jump-kit's belt.

"I'm just happy we didn't use my Titan's shell," McFarlane replied, running beside him. "You have no idea how many modifications I've invested in for that thing—"

"Focus, you two!" Vale snapped, sprinting ahead with her enhanced mobility as a simulacrum. "We've got a few minutes at best, so find a terminal fast!"

The research center was quite large, much more than Tobias had been expecting. The walls could reach upwards of twenty five feet high, more than enough room for Titans to maneuver around in. It seemed that they'd been constructed out of steel for that exact purpose, though it eventually transitioned to normal plaster and tile once they reached the human-use hallways.

As they ran, Tobias noticed peculiar signage painted on the walls; SPECIAL PROJECTS. Every so often, there was an arrow that would help one navigate to the correct department associated with the title.

"That way!" he called out, hoping that 'special projects' was IMC-speak for, 'really damn important'.

The others followed his lead, racing down the set path towards a single pair of locked metal doors. Vale sped up, her legs becoming a blur of silver as she built up momentum and launched herself against them. The prosthetic blades of her legs carried more than enough force to break them open, the doors swinging inward and nearly off their hinges from the impact.

A group of stunned IMC rifleman awaited them, hastily working to draw their weapons. They weren't nearly quick enough to react in time before Tyra, McFarlane, and Tobias unloaded their magazines in a widespread arc around the room. One by one, their bodies thumped against the floor.

"What the hell is this place?" Tyra muttered, now taking the time to look around. The room was massive, nearly the size of the Titan halls they'd run through earlier—and for good reason. An enormous holographic projection was displayed overhead in the air via several large rings glowing with power. Blue and orange lights illuminated the chamber, over-saturating the walls as they all stared up and tried to comprehend what they were seeing.

"That looks like a planet," Tobias muttered, pointing to a holographic orb on one side of the display.

"And what about that?" McFarlane breathed, looking at the opposite side.

What appeared to be some kind of energy beam was shown stretching from the planet to ... something else. The structure of it was odd—it wasn't another planet, or a ship; instead, it seemed to be a set of superimposed rings that rotated over one another.

"I ... have no clue," Tobias whispered, furrowing his brow. Looking for some kind of indicator as to what it was, he noticed some floating text on one side of the hologram.

Project Atlantis.

"It doesn't matter," Vale dismissed, turning away and jogging over to a data-terminal. "What we came for is inside their systems—somewhere, anyway."

Vale didn't seem worried about it, but ... Tobias couldn't shake some sense of foreboding as he kept staring at the display. Something about this wasn't right, it wasn't—

"Damn it, this directory's massive. We'll never have time to sort through all this before we're caught—"

Tobias wrenched his gaze away and walked over to Vale. He glanced at the screen as she scrolled through the list of files associated with the special projects center.

"So long as it's classified, it's probably valuable," Tyra remarked wryly. Heeding the Pilot's suggestion, Vale delved deeper into the 'restricted' section of the directory.

"Advanced Combat Prototypes, Bioengineering Procedures, Colonial Experimentation ... god, that sounds awful. Advanced Militant Hardware, Project Atlantis—"

Tobias' eyes widened as he recognized the name. "That one, download that one!"

Her head spun around to look at him in bewilderment. "What? Why—"

She was cut off by the sound of an alarm suddenly activating and echoing throughout the facility repeatedly. Swearing, she stuck her data-knife into a compatible slot and abided by his insistence.

"You better hope that whatever's in here is good, Four."

"Trust me," he muttered, looking back at the holographic display. "I've got a feeling about that one."

A sudden spark of light emitted from the floor as a burst of gunfire from the room's entrance ricocheted off the metal. Tobias jerked away, instinctively keeping KT's core away from the general vicinity.

"Tyra, McFarlane! Cover the exit!" Vale ordered, ducking down behind the terminal and pulling out her pistol. The other two reacted to her command and braced themselves on opposite sides of the doorway, poking the barrels of their guns out and firing intermittently at whoever tried to reach them.

Tobias reached for his own weapon—a V-47 assault rifle—and poked his head over the edge of the terminal to cover Vale. Colloquially known as the 'Flatline', his weapon had far more horizontal recoil than he was used to when compared with the IMC's standard R-201's, but he made do with what he'd been given.

"Hurry!" McFarlane yelled, ducking back behind the edge of the door as the sound of bullets peppered the floor next to him.

"It's almost done!" Vale shouted back, taking several shots at their invaders from her position behind the terminal. "It's almost—"

A blue and silver orb soared through the air, falling right in the middle of their positions. Tobias' eyes widened as he recognized the ordnance—an arc grenade, useful for stunning enemies and shorting out electronic devices.

Without hesitating, he dove over the terminal and rolled next to the grenade, reaching out and grabbing it in his hand. As he came back into a crouched position, he chucked it as far as he could down the hallway towards their attackers. It was in the air for no more than a second before it detonated in the middle of the group of IMC riflemen shooting at them from across the way.

Raising the Flatline, Tobias held down the trigger and watched as the side-to-side movement of the gun managed to send a round into every single occupant of the hallway. Watching as they cried out and fell to the ground, some of them dead and some not, he looked at the rifle in stunned amazement.

"Damn, this thing's not half bad."

"Got it!" Vale hollered, grabbing the data-knife and pulling it from the terminal.

"Let's move!" Tobias yelled, not wanting to waste the opportunity of their stunned opposition. Quickly, the quartet sped out of the room and past the bodies of the riflemen.

Using their jump-kits to boost themselves up and into the air, they angled themselves so they landed on the side of the wall and ran upwards into the larger-scaled hallways.

"Keep moving!" Vale urged, waving them forward with her right arm and gun while her left held the left wall and steadied her.

"Like we have a choice!" McFarlane snapped.

Bullet holes appeared in the wall in front of them as a barrage of bullets barely missed them. Deciding that now was a good time to evade, they all jumped off and landed on their knees, sliding forward with their gained momentum.

As Tyra slid, she pivoted herself backwards and allowed herself to face their chasers. Grabbing a frag grenade from her belt, she pulled the pin and tossed it behind them before falling flat and sliding the rest of the way on her back.

The riflemen behind them tried to dive out of the way, though two were unable to escape the blast and were swallowed in the eruption of orange that followed.

"Nice!" Tobias called, witnessing her feat.

She turned to face him, only for her to suddenly stop her momentum by placing her hands against the floor. "I'm not sure that it helped much, unfortunately ..."

He followed her gaze to see what she meant, only for his stomach to drop. Vale and McFarlane had stopped too, frozen at the sight of two Titans standing in front of them—two Tones, medium-class chassises with a load out consisting of handheld 40mm cannons.

"Well, shit," McFarlane panted, eloquently summarizing the situation.

"We have you surrounded!" one of them called out, a Pilot's voice emitting from its speakers. "Lay down your firearms, and you will not be harmed!"

"Fat chance," Tyra murmured, shaking her head ever so slightly.

Tobias would have once believed otherwise, but now he found himself siding with her. After all those experiments he'd learned that the IMC had conducted on innocent civilians, he wasn't too confident that they'd be opposed to similar procedures on prisoners of war.

In front of him, Vale and McFarlane tightened their grips on their weapons. The Titan apparently noticed, because they quickly raised their own cannon and aimed at the group at large.

"You have five seconds to comply! Five ..."

"What's the play, coach?" McFarlane muttered, darting his gaze from point to point across the room.

"Four ..."

"Don't have one," Vale replied, shaking her head frustratedly. "Just gun down anything that moves, and pray that they're terrible shots."

"Three ..."

Tobias held firmly onto the Flatline's handle, trying to single out which targets to go for first. "Shit. It'll take a miracle to get out of this alive—"

"Two—"

Without warning, two canisters rolled into the center of the room and popped open, releasing smoke into the air. The four of them remained standing there in bewilderment as the IMC soldiers were obstructed from view, and the sounds of gunfire began to ring out in the fog.

Suddenly, a figure manifested before them, stepping out of the gas and into view—a very familiar figure at that.

"Move your asses!"

Tobias stared at Gates for a moment, then shrugged. "Well ... hallelujah."

"Don't sound so grateful yet," Gates growled warningly, turning and disappearing into the smoke once more. "There's still a good chance you'll end up dead after I'm through with you."

Suddenly, he felt as though he'd rather fight alone

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