Larios watched as their commandos carried the 8 Stormtroopers in pitch-black armour out, Kalee warriors whom Jorux brought with him, 12 of them. They were large, towering over most other rebels, and their skill with weapons was nothing to scoff at.
Especially close-range weapons, as most of them wielded some sort of bladed weapon. Swords, knives, glaives. And they wielded them expertly.
The Stormtroopers had been taken on strolls, as the warriors escorted the 16 rebels that carried the 8 Stormtroopers, 2 per person.
The Stormtroopers were carried out of the room, and he smiled slightly. A second haul with Stormtroopers, with a few minutes between them. A noteworthy achievement, perhaps a time for a promotion.
Sure, I won't earn more, but a promotion is a promotion.
____________________________-
Lancer lay on the stroll, his equipment keeping him awake. Even as he'd appear unconscious to everyone else, it was a mix of the armour giving him a dosage which lowered his vital signs to barely conscious but would appear unconscious.
And naturally, the armour protected him from the toxin.
A sudden message appeared on his HUD.
'Now'
And without further ado, Lancer stood up. Slamming his fist into the nearby rebel and grabbing the weapons.
For some idiotic reason, the rebels had those who carried the prisoners also carry their weapons.
So he grabbed the TL-50, sharply turning around as he unloaded 5 rounds at point-blank range into the second rebel. Only for his rear-camera to catch a glaive swinging directly at him.
With instincts honed over decades, he ducked beneath the strike, rolling away. But the Kalee was on him, the glaive swinging left and right without hesitation, as Lancer was forced to dodge between the strikes.
Almost brought him back to Order 66. Ah, good times.
Lancer decided to counter, dodging a strike to the left before throwing his gun into the air, upwards above the Kalee, which drew the man's attention for a few seconds. Which was all that Lancer required as he withdrew a knife and jumped forth.
The glaive was a long-range weapon, and Lancer had gotten in close.
The man was strong, but Lancer was bio-enhanced. And he managed to overpower the towering Kalee, pushing him back slightly and giving Lancer the opportunity to slam his knife into the man's right arm, dropping the glaive.
Common sense would be to step back, retreat. But the Kalee didn't, as he pounced on Lancer. And Lancer permitted him, rolling backwards with the Kalee. But he placed both his feet on his abdomen, and as Lancer rolled backwards, his back touching the ground, he kicked with both his feet.
The Kalee was thrown off him and against the wall, giving Lancer the much-needed time to roll over to his TL-50 and unload 5 lasers into the man's body, leaving 5 black patches on his chest.
Lancer turned towards the battlefield in the corridors, and similar views as his previous fight appeared throughout the corridor, with Wraith Troopers engaged in hand-to-hand combat with the Kalee.
And they were winning.
Utilising the brief time which Lancer had, he began patting down his defeated opponent, his brothers beating the insurgents while he did so.
And he did indeed find something interesting. On the HoloPad of the Kalee, he found the map of the entire facility. Not especially discreet, he realised.
Once he found it, he realised almost everyone had defeated their opponents. And Boil had set up guards to watch the corners.
"Lieutenant, look," Lancer called out as he handed the DataPad to him.
He took a quick look over it before nodding to Lancer. "Good find, brother. Return to your squad."
And return Lancer did, though his team got a task soon after.
They were tasked with capturing and breaching the IT Room, a small room a few corridors away from their current position. All messages and locations went through the room, and one of his comrades had brought a special cyber-hack droid.
A small probe-like droid.
And with that, Lancer and his 3 fellow troopers began heading for the cyber department, while Boil took the remaining back to the E-3, as they were to clear it for the Stormtroopers.
Lancer looked over the map as they walked, and he was surprised by its sheer size.
Tens of thousands of rooms, multiple meeting rooms and auxiliary rooms, but what stood out was the massive living quarters within the base. And although it was separated from the main portion, it was still massive. And Lancer realised this must have been a forward base for the insurgency for quite the time.
But Lancer refocused as they neared the IT Room, as he was at the very front, wielding his TL-50.
They had encountered few enemies, perhaps due to the active warzone above them, or perhaps a confidence in their defensive structures, but Lancer appreciated it. For it made his job all the easier.
According to the map, the IT Room was relatively large. At the very front was the IT-Management Room, with some relatively few guards. Further back was a massive storage room, where they stored information and data.
A pair of guards was stationed outside, and to avoid alarming those inside, they were to use their knives.
It was most certainly not difficult, but not easy either. Luckily, the pair of guards stood only 7 meters away from a nearby corner. The 4 men leaned against the walls of a nearby corridor, as Lancer peeked a camera around the corner, which revealed that there were indeed just 2 guards.
On the right wall of the corridor, facing the left wall.
Lancer sealed his helmet, and his radio crackled to life.
"A-1 and H-1 will take the one at the front, A-2 and H-2 at the back. Use knives." And with that, Lancer strapped his TL-50 to his back, bringing out his Imperial Super Commando Pistol, or ISC-1, and his vibroblade.
"3"
"2"
"1"
"Go."
Lancer sprinted first, followed by A-2. They had to handle the one furthest away and therefore the most difficult.
3 meters into the sprint, they were spotted.
"W-what?" one of them said as he turned towards us, but it was too late. A knife flew through the air and planted itself in his forehead. And before he could scream, a mouth was clasped over his head, as A-2, Lancer's teammate, had jumped on the man, holding his mouth.
Lancer was right behind him, jumped over them, and slammed into the second guard, his knife slitting the man's throat before they even touched the ground.
After having cleared both bodies, they formed up outside the room, 2 on each side of the door.
"Formation B-4-12," the Sergeant, A-1, commanded, and Lancer nodded.
"3."
"2."
"1."
The Sergeant used a stolen keycard, as the blast doors opened.
Lancer and the other heavy stepped forth, their blast shields flaring into life as they stepped around the corner and turned either left or right around it.
Their guns flared up with laser, as green bolts slammed into the 2 guards on either side of the door, followed by those who lined the walls on both sides.
The workers in the room froze up, but they too did not get to relax, as the assault troopers stepped in, their E-22 Blaster Rifles laying devastating fire to the workers in the middle of the room. Though they carefully avoided any equipment.
It was a matter of seconds before the entire room was cleared, 8 armed and 13 unarmed insurgents lay dead on the ground, yet the Wraith Troopers never halted.
In a coordinated maneuver, the Sergeant planted the cyber infiltration droid on the local droid-connect, while Lancer and an Assault Trooper moved on towards the storage room.
The last heavy was to guard the corridor and move the bodies inside.
As Lancer stepped into the room, his gut flared in worry, and he instinctively took a step back from the door, saving him from a grazing blaster shot. Though the deflector shields on the armour would have held up.
Lancer took a second before pushing into the room, jumping and turning his shielded blaster rifle right, towards the source—a teen by perhaps the age of 17, sitting in the corner with a blaster pistol. And sadly for the young child, Lancer did not hesitate as he laid waste to the figure.
A-2 headed in after him, clearing the left side, before the pair began walking through the rows of stored data, as they were repeatedly ambushed by rebels left and right. Yet, their futile efforts were just that. Futile.
___________________
Boil slammed his E-22 Blaster Rifle's butt into the nose of a rebel before grabbing his pistol and firing 2 shots into the man's head.
Boil had overheard his name—apparently named Larios.
He turned around and watched as his 3 squad-mates cleaned up the bodies and deactivated the kill zone, opening all doors and shutting off the toxin emitters.
"W-4 to command, designated entry point in Sector A-03 has been cleared. Suspected main rebel base," Boil spoke through his inter-helmet comms, and the voice of Colonel Lux came through.
"Report received. Hold position and await Stormtrooper reinforcements. Gather all and any data possible. 4 Sentinel-Class Transport Crafts are en route to your position. ETA: 3 minutes," Lux said before the feed shut down, and Boil turned towards the men.
"Form a defensive position outside the booth. H-3 and H-4, hold the position at all cost," Boil said, as the pair of heavy weapons Wraith Troopers marched out of the booth, grabbing the 3 dead bodies to place as fortifications.
There were no other materials, and both knew that such a fortification could be the difference between life and death. And the bodies were dead; they wouldn't care.
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