MOTF Book I: BOTE Chapter 13

Sullivan stood among his unit, clutching his laser rifle to his chest as he waited for Tech to carve the entrance. Usually it was Dylan who took point and led the way in missions, and Sullivan had decided as soon as Dylan gave him the order that he would cherish this moment and not let the rest of his squad down. It was hard not to be nervous, but as the greatest stealth soldier in the entire squad, Sullivan had learned long ago how to maintain control over himself, even when scared or confused.

The base that stood before them was essentially enclosed in one large building, and they were about to breach its outer wall. Sullivan glanced over at the tech soldiers to check their progress, and saw Chase carving through the wall with his laser as the other two tech soldiers calibrated the hologram projectors to cover up their entrance.

The familiar warble of Chase’s focus beam reverberated in Sullivan’s ears as he glanced at his stealth soldiers. Their faces were bathed in green light from the focus beam, and the longing for battle was evident in their eyes. View and Seph slowly moved forwards and took their respective positions at Sullivan’s side as Chase finished cutting the outline of their entrance.

Once that was done, Chase took a step forward, grabbed the large chunk of wall, and tossed it back over his head as the other two tech soldiers set the holographic projectors along the edges of the gap. Sullivan observed as Chase quickly pressed a button on his gauntlet, and almost immediately the hole in the wall seemed to fill itself in. A holographic mirage expanded within the gap until it clung to it’s very edges. In less than a second, the wall looked whole again, with no trace of what they had done being visible.

Sullivan took a deep breath, gestured with his hand to the rest of his unit, turned on his cloaking device, and stepped through the holographic veil. The air inside of the base felt a little cooler on Sullivan’s face. Despite the fact that the temperature seemed nicer inside than it did outside, Sullivan was still nervous. A slight tremor ran through his body, but he immediately quelled it. This was his objective, and he had to see it through.

At that thought he glanced around him, and realized that he was in the middle of an empty hallway. No, not empty, Sullivan immediately corrected himself. A lone Lightor guard walked down the hallway in his direction, but Sullivan knew the guard couldn’t see him, not while his cloaking device was active.

Ever so silently, Sullivan unsheathed his knife, and held it in his left hand. He could feel the anticipation flowing through him as the guard got closer and closer. Just one more step…

The guard never even had a chance to scream. As soon as he stepped within an arms length of Sullivan, the Stealth Leader thrust the blade of the knife into his throat, leapt up on his back, and wrenched the blade through the rest of the guard’s neck. Without wasting a moment, Sullivan grabbed the guard’s limp corpse with both arms, lifted him over his head, and threw him out of the hole in the wall.

“We’re clear,” Sullivan said quietly to his unit. “We have our orders. We need to secure a decently sized perimeter in the base so that the rest of the squad can enter covertly. View, Seph, you two fall in right behind me, and everybody else fall in behind them.”

Sullivan turned and began to walk down the hallway, with View and Seph flanking him, and the rest of his unit following closely behind. They began to hear voices as they went further and further down the hallway. Soon they approached an intersection between the hallway they were in, and another hallway. From the looks of things, there were seven soldiers standing in the middle of the intersection, talking and laughing, blissfully unaware that their deaths were approaching them.

Sullivan typed up a command on his gauntlet, and the rest of the stealth unit divided into two, heading down either direction of the intersecting hallway. Only View and Seph stayed with him as he approached the group. In perfect synch, they all drew their knives at the same time. They also unslung their respective blasters as they each came up behind one Lightor soldier.

There was a certain tension in the air as every member of the stealth unit placed themselves in ideal positions throughout the hallway. One by one, they each got into position and pressed a button on their gauntlet, transmitting a signal to Sullivan that they were ready. Sullivan’s own blade was held right behind the neck of one of the soldiers. Finally, when a light flashed on his HUD, signaling that everyone was ready, Sullivan pressed the button on his own gauntlet, and every Stealth soldier brought down the blades of their knives as one.

Sullivan reached around his targets neck and stabbed him through the throat with the knife held in his left hand, as he brought up his right arm holding his laser sniper. Before the other Lightor could respond, Sullivan had already perfectly lined up his shot. Without a second’s hesitation, Sullivan pulled the trigger, and a red beam of energy sprung forth from his sniper rifle, and instantaneously burned holes through the heads of two of the other Lightor soldiers that he had lined up in his shot, one right behind the other.

Before the bodies could even hit the floor, Sullivan yanked his knife hard too the left, ripping it out of the left side of the soldier’s neck, killing him instantly. Sullivan then turned to his right and saw Seph with his knife stuck through the back of a soldier’s head, bringing his automatic blaster up in an arc as he held the trigger down, hitting another soldier square in the crotch, right in the stomach, straight through the heart, through the middle of the throat, and finally, right between the eyes.

He then turned his head the other way to see View firing her own blaster at a Lightor soldier, with one already dead at her feet bleeding out the back of his neck. The other Lightor soldier tries to dodge her shots, but the chemical projectiles of View’s “bubble blaster” honed in on their target and penetrated his body despite his best efforts to avoid them. After a few more rounds, the soldier’s body went limp.

Sullivan glanced down the hallway at his men standing over the bodies of several dead Lightor soldiers. The entire exchange lasted less than ten seconds. He and the rest of his unit were now visible to the naked eye, the illusion of their cloaking devices disrupted as soon as they fired their guns.

As his men recloaked and secured a perimeter, Sullivan spoke through the comm channel, “we have secured a decently sized perimeter, and we could use a little company.”

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“So while me, Walton, and Barre are setting things up at the base, I was thinking you and Sullivan could scout ahead and check out the mine,” Dylan said, already planning for what to do post mission.

“Setting things up at the base?” Sangara asked.

“Yeah,” Dylan responded with a smile. “After we secure the base, Walton needs to contact the rest of the Shadikill army for reinforcements, as well as continuing to broadcast an all clear signal, and Barre needs to run diagnostics on the base’s weapons, systems, and mining equipment. As per me, I’ll be supervising everything,” Dylan explained, still with a wide grin on his face. Talking with Shorya tended to have that effect on him. “If there’s anyone at the mine, I need you to kill them, and if there’s too many soldiers, I need you to fall back to the base without being seen.

“You would really trust me with that?” Shorya asked surprised. “I’ve never done anything like this before. What if I mess it u-“

Dylan placed an arm on her shoulder cutting her off mid sentence. “I’d trust you to lead the squad if it came down to it,” Dylan said, staring into her eyes.

They stared into each other’s eyes for several seconds before Walton walked up to them and broke the silence. “Sullivan has made contact, and he has secured the perimeter.”

“Well then what are we waiting for?!” Dylan said as he hopped to his feet, slid his helmet on, and drew his sword. “Let’s bounce!” he cried out with a snap of his fingers.

Two soldiers from each unit stayed with the dropship as everyone else entered the base. Once inside, it only took them a minute or two to reach Sullivan’s position.

“Okay, we can’t stay hidden here forever,” Dylan said to the rest of the squad once they had converged. “I’m starting to get nervous enough as it is.”

“You nervous?” Sullivan cheerfully chimed in. “That’s a first. It’s not like there’s a general stationed at this base or anything, just a commander.”

Dylan remembered one of the fundamental lessons in their training. Lightor generals equipped with their power armor were virtually unbeatable in single combat, at least to soldiers in Dylan’s age group. If ever confronted with a general, Dylan and the rest of his squad were advised to run.

“I’m surprised you’d be so nervous after I did such a perfect job securing a perimeter,” Sullivan continued, walking around with a deliberately exaggerated strut.

Dylan couldn’t help but crack a smile. “Yes well, even given that, I’m not too comfortable standing in the middle of a hostile base. Sooner or later they are bound to find us, so I suggest we take the command center as quickly as possible.”

There were murmurs of agreement from the rest of the squad as Dylan turned his head to face Sullivan once again. “Since you did such an enthusiastically great job of securing this perimeter, I hope you don’t mind taking point point here as we approach the command center.”

“My thoughts exactly,” Sullivan said as he began to walk, or rather waltz, in the direction of the command center with View and Seph right behind him.

The squad came across a few other Lightor soldiers, but Sullivan and the rest of the Stealth soldiers took them out before they could do so much as scream. Eventually they reached the heavy blast doors of the command center. With a silent gesture, Dylan signaled a few tech and stealth soldiers to secure a perimeter around the entrance to the command center.

“Remember, the Comm unit can jam all of their other functions at a moment’s notice, but the all clear signal must remain active, meaning we can’t jam that,” Dylan explained. “There will be a guy manning a console in the center of the room. We need to cross this guy off as quickly as possible so that he doesn’t blow the whole operation.”

Dylan gave his magnum an experimental twirl in his hand as he prepared to press the button on the door console. “I’ll take point, I want Shorya on my right, and I want Walton on my left.” As soon as he saw Shorya and Walton at his sides, he pressed the button, and raised his magnum as the blast doors opened.

As soon as the door was halfway opened, Dylan, Shorya, and Walton all sprang into action, concentrating their fire on the man standing at the console at the center of the room. The yellow blood of the Lightor splattered across the room as his body flew backwards from the force of the impact, slamming into the body of a soldier who looked to be the commander of the base, and knocking him over as well.

Almost immediately, the remaining Lightor pulled out their blasters, and the droids on the edges of the room sprang into action. As soon as they started firing, Dylan and his two companions split up in different directions, with Shorya heading into the right side of the room, Walton into the left side, and Dylan into the center.

Walton held his automatic blaster rifle in his left arm, sending a spray of blasterfire all around the left side of the room as he cut down anyone who approached him with the blade in his right hand. Rather than following Walton’s approach, Shorya fired her automatic blaster rifle in short bursts precisely aimed at the Lightor’s heads and weapons as she pulled out her sword to finish off what remained of them.

Dylan was easily in the most crowded area of the room as several of the Lightor tried to reach the console to turn off the all clear signal. But their efforts were all in vain as Dylan picked them off one by one with his magnum. Every time one would get close to the console, Dylan’s black blade would rend their heads from their bodies.

Suddenly, a figure near Dylan stood up. It was a tall Lightor soldier brandishing a sword that Dylan suspected had an electric charge running through the blade. It was the commander. Not being one to shy away from a challenge, Dylan holstered his magnum, and gripped his sword with both hands. This is going to be fun

After a brief pause, the Lightor commander made the first move and charged straight at Dylan, but Dylan was ready. The commander brought his blade up for an overhead chop, hoping to use his larger size to his advantage, but Dylan was no fool. When the blade came down, Dylan took a step back and caught the end of the commander’s blade close to the hilt of his own. With the advantage of leverage, Dylan pushed the commander’s blade to the side and thrust his leg out, catching the commander in the abdomen with a kick.

As the commander grunted loudly, Dylan was resolved to press the advantage. He came in with a flurry of wild stabs and thrusts as his opponent staggered back under his relentless assault. Dylan was so focused on his offense however, that he failed to take notice of the Lightor soldier standing a few feet behind him with a shotgun.

A loud boom resonated throughout the room as a cluster of blasterbolts struck Dylan square in the back. He felt as if someone had set a fire in his flesh. Luckily for him however, his heavy armor took most of the blast. Stunned and thrown off balance by the blast, Dylan was barely able to block the commander’s next sword strike, and he was completely incapable of blocking the fist that struck him in the gut a second later. The force behind the commander’s punch was enough to send him hurtling through the air.

Dylan fell hard on his back right next to the soldier with the shotgun, and before Dylan could rise to his feet, the soldier kicked him in the chest with all of his might, sending Dylan skidding across the floor. Now on the ground with his entire torso feeling as if it was trapped in a burning inferno, Dylan could do nothing as the soldier took aim at him with his shotgun.

Before the soldier could pull the trigger however, a blasterbolt tore the shotgun from his grip, and several more struck him square in the face. As his body toppled to the ground, Dylan turned to see Shorya holding her blaster in her hands, aiming it in the direction of the now fallen Lightor soldier. She quickly turned her aim towards the Lightor commander, but almost immediately, the commander pressed a button on his armor, and it began to glow as a field of energy surrounded it. This man is wearing power armor! Dylan thought to himself as a devastating realization struck him. But the only Lightor who have power armor are… generals!

As Shorya fired a burst of blasterfire at him, it all harmlessly glanced off of the general’s power armor. The Lightor general, unaffected by Shorya’s barrage, swiftly dashed over to the shotgun, snatched it off the ground and aimed it at her. Dylan tried to rise to his feet, but the general just sent two more bursts of blasterfire his way, striking him square in the chest twice and flinging him backwards across the ground, subsequently slamming his head hard into the ground. As Dylan lied on the ground in agony, he knew that the only reason he was still alive was because of his armor.

As the general took aim at Shorya again, Walton soared through the air at him, propelled by his rocket boots with his sword held out in front of him. Despite Walton’s efforts however, the Lightor general dismissively smacked him out of the air with his fist, and sent him flying into a wall on the opposite side of the room, before turning his attention back to Shorya. Dylan was completely helpless to do anything as the commander pulled the trigger, and a cluster of blasterbolts struck Shorya in the chest and sent her body slamming into a wall. Then, as she lay on the ground helpless, he shot her again, this time in the stomach.

At that moment, Dylan felt so helpless, so weak, so vulnerable, and he hated it. The sound of Shorya’s body taking the blasterbolts and slamming into the wall caused him more pain then the beating he had just taken. He had been shot, punched, and kicked by a Lightor soldier and a general, but he felt no pain. He felt only anger and hate. It was a raging storm inside of him swirling through his body, and suddenly none of his injuries meant anything to him.

With a cry of fury, Dylan leapt to his feet and flung himself at the Lightor general. He immediately kicked the shotgun out of the general’s hand and started swinging his blade at him in a furious onslaught. The Lightor general held up with a much better resolve then he had in their first bout. With his power armor activated, his moves were now faster and had more power behind them, his entire physicality magnified three-fold by his power armor. Adrenaline rushed through every vein in Dylan’s body as he unleashed a vicious flurry of slashes and cuts at his enemy, each one with more speed and strength behind it than the last. The general staggered behind every blow Dylan levied at him, and each subsequent blow got closer and closer to reaching its mark before it was parried.

Dylan fought harder and harder. This man and his soldiers had hurt Dylan, but more importantly, he had hurt Shorya, and for that he needed to die. After forcing the general back several feet, Dylan flicked aside his desperate attempt at a counter-attack and swung his blade as hard as he could at the general’s leg. A crack resounded throughout the room as armor plating shattered beneath the force of Dylan’s blade. Not letting up, Dylan swung his blade back up, slicing through the general’s weapon arm at the wrist.

As the general cried out in pain, Dylan swung his left fist at his helmet with all of his might. The faceplate of the general’s helmet shattered under the force of Dylan’s punch, and he was sent sprawling onto the floor. Yellow blood gushed out of the Lightor general’s face as he lay on the ground choking on it. Though he was sprawled out on the ground before Dylan defeated, it changed nothing. He still needed to die.

With one last purposeful motion, Dylan leapt through the air, brought his sword up and angled the blade downwards. As Dylan’s feet struck the ground on either side of the general’s body, his blade shot straight through the general’s heart. He watched with a certain satisfaction as the light left the general’s eyes and his body went limp. Still with his hands on the hilt of his sword, Dylan gave the blade one last twist for good measure before ripping it out of the general’s chest cavity.

As his bloodlust subsided, Dylan ran over to Shorya and collapsed to the ground next to her, all of his wounds finally weighing down on him. As he sat on the ground in immense agony, he cradled Shorya in his arms, hoping above all other things that she was okay. He let out a heavy sigh of relief when she opened her eyes.

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Walton stood on the far end of the room completely dumbstruck as he stared at Dylan cradling Shorya in his arms, completely unable to articulate the magnitude of what he had just seen. Dylan had just taken down a Lightor general! That was supposed to be impossible for all but the mightiest of Shadikill warriors to accomplish, and Dylan had completely destroyed him.

Walton snapped to his senses as the rest of the soldiers came into the command center. “I need a medkit!” Walton cried out as he saw Barre walk in with a group of Tech soldiers. One of them tossed him a medkit as he ran over to Dylan.

“Dude! That was amazing!” He cried out in astonishment.

“What the hell happened?!” Tactical Advisor Foyle asked as the rest of the squad not maintaining their perimeter crowded around their leader.

“I’ll tell you what happened,” Walton began. “Dylan took three direct hits from a shotgun to the torso, and slaughtered a Lightor general immediately afterwards!”

Many cries of disbelief and astonishment rang out from the rest of the squad.

“You never cease to amaze me my friend!” Walton exclaimed, now speaking directly to Dylan as he handed him the medkit.

“Thank you, but we need to secure the base” Dylan said gratefully but urgently as he tried to rise up to his feet.

Walton quickly stopped him. “Don’t worry Dylan,” he began. “You got us this far and killed a Lightor general. I can take it from here. You should focus on treating you and Shorya’s wounds.”

“Very well then,” Dylan said in response. “I’m placing you in command for the remainder of the mission Walton, and I trust you to secure this base as quickly and efficiently as possible.”

“Sir yes sir!” Walton said as he turned towards the rest of the squad. “Well you heard our high king droogie. We need to secure the base!”

“Yes sir!” the squad responded not quite unanimously, but Walton knew that it was to do with distraction rather than disloyalty.

“I need the stealth and tactical units to fan out across the base and kill every Lightor soldier who crosses your path.”

Sullivan, Weiss, and Foyle nodded in response.

“Actually,” Walton said changing his mind. “Foyle, stay with me, I need you here.”

She nodded and took a step in his direction.

“Chase, I need you to take half of the tech unit out of the command center to disable all of their ships so they can’t escape. Afterwards, I need you and the rest of the tech soldiers to assist the tactical and stealth soldiers in breaking into secured locations to hunt down the last of the survivors.”

“And Herndon,” Walton began. “I need you to take half of Communications with you and assist Stealth and Tactical in hunting down the remaining soldiers by tracking their communication signals.”

“I want to stay here with Shorya,” Herndon complained.

“You have your orders Herndon,” Walton said sternly. “Now follow them.”

As Herndon stormed off towards the half of Communications that would be accompanying her, Walton turned towards Dylan and saw him mouth the words “thank you.”

Walton gave a quick little nod in response, knowing that Dylan didn’t want to have to put up with Herndon at the moment.

“Me and the rest of Communications will inform you of their locations that we see on the security feed in here,” Walton continued. “We all have our tasks, now lets fulfill them!”

As everyone else departed for their specific tasks, Walton was figuring out how to defend the command center, because he knew for sure that it would be one of the first places the soldiers would run to. He glanced around the room and noticed that it had three entrances/exits. There was the one the squad had entered and exited through, and there were two others.

“Barre!” Walton called out.

“Yeah?” the Tech Leader replied.

“I need you and your men to barricade one of these two doors.”

“Why just one of these two doors specifically?” Barre asked confused.

“We cleared out a lot of the soldiers in the vicinity of the entrance we used, so I doubt the Lightor will come at us through there,” Walton explained. “And if we can successfully barricade one of the two other doors, then we can bottleneck them in the third door.”

Sure enough, a few minutes after Tech set up shield generators at one of the doors, they could hear the Lightor soldiers trying to get in through there, until the noise stopped. Walton knew that they’d be on the other side of the other door any second now.

Walton pulled out his automatic blaster rifle and sword, and opened the third set of blast doors. Activating his rocket boots, Walton soared through the hallway on the other side of the door until he ran into a large group of Lightor soldiers. When he came within eyesight of them, he immediately began to spray blasterfire into their ranks before diving in with his sword and cutting several of them down with quick and decisive strikes.

Several more Lightor began to show up, and with the element of surprise now spent, Walton knew he was outmatched. Unwilling to surrender, Walton reactivated his jet boots and took off flying through the air back towards the command center, all the while firing blasterbolt after blasterbolt into the mob of Lightor soldiers.

When he finally made it back into the command center, Walton sheathed his sword, and picked up Shorya’s automatic blaster rifle in his free hand. He then signaled Foyle to go stand by the door. Now armed with two automatic blaster rifles, Walton was ready for them.

As soon as they came into view through the open blast doors, Walton began to spray a constant stream of blasterfire from both blasters into the crowd of Lightor soldiers, felling at least five of them within a few seconds. They continued to get closer however, but as a group of about twenty Lightor soldiers passed through the open blast doors, Foyle whipped out her flame thrower and sent out a huge billowing burst of flames into the crowd of Lightor, catching almost every one of them on fire and starting a raging inferno within the crowd.

Walton watched with satisfaction as panic and chaos overtook their enemies. Without wasting a second, Walton continued to pour two constant streams of blasterfire into them as Foyle pulled out her bladed whip and joined the fray.

In less than ten seconds, there were almost thirty Lightor soldiers dead at their feet, and in less than ten minutes, the last Lightor soldier in the base was gunned down, and the battle was ended. This base belonged to the Shadikill now.

Great job Dmb, the story was great, the characters development was nice, the flow and pacing of the story were incredibly well done, I enjoyed it, Walton seems like a badass, Sullivan is the cool assassin and Dylan/Umbravon was highly impressive during this. Nicely done as always my High king droogie.