Chapter Three

It's 4:30 in the morning, and the Bad Company are again discussing the final plan for infiltrating the factory. Viper activates the computer in the table to reveal a map of the area of the factory. The factory is marked with an A and the deployment and evacuation site is marked with a B. Avesta looks around at the team and says

"Viper and I discussed the plan yesterday with each other and how it's going to be laid out." "Our job is to gather intel about the VEI and the newly produced SEDs before we sabotage the factory." "Once we complete these objectives, General Taylor will send his men to the factory and storm it."

"I changed the plan a bit." says Avesta. "Creeper, once you scout the area I want you to come with Mara, Doc and I for insertion." "Viper you'll be on your own for cover fire."

"I can handle that." responds Viper.

"Mara, you'll use a blowtorch to breach the fense and we'll sneak in from there."

"Got it." says Mara.

"Creeper, you'll cover our six when we breach."

"Understood." responds Creeper.

"Doc---" says Avesta before betting interrupted

"I know my job." says Doc.

"Mark." says Avesta holding her fist out.

"Sync." responds the team

The team exits the planning room to meet up with Carter in the engineering room to hear about their weapons. Once they reach they see Carter and Anna behind a bulletproof glass wall. Carter is a tall caucasian man with dirty blonde hair and thick eyebrows. He always seems to

have a smug grin on his face. He wears a dark blue jacket that has an insignia of his rank: Corporal.

"I equipped the suppressors as asked for." says Carter "They won't be detecting you unless you do something stupid."

"Thanks Carter." says Avesta

"No problem." responds Carter.

Creeper was equipped with a suppressed F90 with a GL40 grenade launcher. Doc is equipped with a suppressed G36C with an angled foregrip. Mara was given a suppressed M249 equipped with an ACOG. Avesta uses her custom AR-15 with a suppressor and Viper uses his suppressed R700 6.5.

"I like this." says Mara.

"Let's get to the heli." says Doc.

Bad Company exits the warehouse and heads to the ladder that takes them to the roof. They see 7274-niner and his helicopter at the helipad.

"Sup, assholes!" says 7274-niner.

"We're heading to site Hotel Bravo." says Viper.

The team all enter the helicopter and get ready for deployment. 7274-niner gets in direct comms with Taylor and HQ.

"Voodoo 1 this is 7274-niner, we're ready for take off on your call." says the pilot.

"7274-niner this is Voodoo 1, you're clear for take off." says Taylor.

The pilot gets off the comms and says to the team

"I hope you new guys aren't afraid of heights."

"Funny comment." says Doc

"Let's focus on the mission." says Viper.

"Whatever, Dr. Death." responds the pilot.

They fly over the ruined city. Businesses, homes and lives were destroyed. Skyscrapers toppled like dominos, neighbourhoods were bombed and people were slaughtered in representation of the NAC's power. The NAC would burn books to cover up what the world used to be. Times were much more peaceful and people weren't forced to live in fear. People fear many things nowadays. They fear losing their homes, they fear losing their loved ones to Cleansing. But most importantly they fear Byron Cash's tyranny. Cash was there when the NAC was formed, he slithered his way into power like the snake he is. Now he would do anything to incite fear into his citizens to send them a message not to trifle with him.

A couple of hours has passed since they left the base and they finally reached site Hotel Bravo. VEI and NAC squadrons patrolling the buildings around the site. The squadrons are armed with unmanned drones, armoured vehicles and the newer SED models. Site Hotel Bravo is roughy 2 miles away from site Hotel Alpha

7274-niner lands the helicopter at site Hotel Bravo and Bad Company quickly exits it.

"Thanks for the lift." says Mara

"No problem." says the pilot before leaving the site.

"Ok team, we need to get the site Hotel Alpha. That's about 3 clicks from here." says Avesta "There are bogies in the area, so stay frosty."

The team runs into an abandoned building to remain unseen by the squadrons. The building they entered is an old skyscraper. The building has crashed into another skyscraper and on the brink of collapsing. They walk around the building and there are mannequins and clothing advertisements around the area.

"This was a clothing store." says Mara "I would steal stuff from this place years ago."

They continue to walk around the area checking corners to make sure they don't get jumped on by VEI or NAC personnel. They search around for supplies and Doc finds a small blanket.

"Hey Mara!" says Doc "I think you might want this." He hands the blanket to Mara.

"Thanks Doc." says Mara as she stuffs the blanket into her bag.

Viper is looking around the store and notices something in the distance.

"Creeper." says Viper "Come with me. We're going to scout ahead."

"Ok." responds Creeper.

Viper and Creeper navigate the store until they reach a gaping hole in the building with a NAC soldier standing near the opening. Viper aims in at the soldier to take a shot but Viper puts his hand on Creeper's gun.

"Don't. That's a waste of bullets." says Viper.

Viper pulls out a small Karambit knife and silently walks behind the soldier. He grabs the soldiers head and plunges the knife into the soldier's skull. Blood spews from the back of the skull onto Vipers mask. He pulls the knife out of the soldier's skull and gently places the body onto the floor. He searches the body for some sort of radio so they can listen in on the squadron's conversations. Viper looks at Creeper and says

"Can you help me with the body?" asks Viper.

Creeper rushes towards Viper and the body and they both drag the body inside to hide it. The radio turns on and an unknown enemy voice starts speaking.

"Rogers?" asks a soldier on the radio. "Are you there? Rogers!"

"Smith. What's the problem?" asks a different soldier on the radio.

"Rogers isn't responding." says Smith

"Doesn't matter." says the other soldier "He's expendable. He probably got lost or scavengers got him."

Viper and Creeper meetup with the rest of the group.

"Let's get moving." says Avesta.

Bad Company continues to head towards site Hotel Alpha. Narrowly remaining undetected by the NAC and VEI forces surveying the crumbling area. While moving they observe the environment around them, smoke covers the sky to make it another gloomy day. They make it most of the way to the site before coming across a major obstacle: Snipers.

The team was walking from one building to another and Doc notices a glare on the roof.

"Guys, sniper, two o'clock on the roof." says Doc

Viper heads up to Doc to see the sniper. Viper aims in at the sniper and takes the shot. The body of the sniper falls from the top of the building to the bottom with a loud thud echoing the streets.

"Let's move." says Viper

They continue to walk in the street's shadows remaining undetected by enemy forces. Passing through the streets is like walking through your memories and seeing joy from those memories

sucked out. They climb onto a small building that appears to have the entire top floor ripped off. The small building appears to be what used to be an auto repair shop.

The factory is in the center with thick steel walls surrounding the area, there are four watchtowers built into the walls with one large control center in the middle connecting bridges between the watch and the center. Three soldiers appear to be on top of the platform watching for intruders Inside the factory is a maze with the valve in the open under constant watch. They know in order to sabotage the factory they need to turn the valve which will overflow the systems.

"I'm going to scout ahead for ground patrol." says Creeper.

Avesta looks up at him and nods.

Creeper climbs down the ramp to scout the area.

"I'm heading to the overwatch site." says Viper.

Before heading down the same ramp Viper pulls a small usb out of his backpack and tosses it to Avesta and says

"You'll need this." and leaves the area.

Creeper heads into a building to the right of the auto repair shop to do a complete circle around the factory. While surveying he notices a ground team of three soldiers and two SEDs with a singular unmanned drone. He gets on the radio with his team and says

"Avesta this is Creeper. There's a small team of soldiers with two SEDs and a drone."

Creeper continues to scout around the area and notices there are three snipers on the roofs of the buildings.

"This is Creeper, we have three snipers on rooftops."

"I see that." says Viper "I'm going to get higher ground to take them out."

Creeper heads to a building opposite of where Viper is going to and holds an angle on the entrance of the factory. Viper enters the building checking corners to avoid being jumped by enemy soldiers. When turning to his left he sees two soldiers with his back to him.

"When this whole resistance thing is I'm going to retire and buy a fucking tv the size of a billboard." says one of the soldiers

"Is that so?" says the other soldier

They both laugh. Viper pulls out his pistol and shoots the first one in the leg and then in the head. The second soldier turned around and was about to say something before getting shot in the forehead by Viper. He turns around to heads to the second floor of the building. He heads to the window and sets up his rifle. He aims in at the first sniper and takes the shot. The body drops onto the tower floor. Aims in at the second target and takes the shot, body drops. Third target, body drops.

"Tangos down, you're clear for breach." says Viper

Avesta, Mara and Doc run to the breaching point, later followed by Creeper. Mara pulls out a blowtorch and says

"This won't take long."

Mara takes a blowtorch out of her backpack and starts to cut a four by four foot hole into the large fence. Sparks fly onto the ground and the team can feel the heat emitting the heat of the

torch. Mara cuts through the fence and the team vaults through the hole. Avesta looks up and notices a soldier above them guarding the locked up door to enter.

"Viper! There's a soldier above us, can you take him out?"

Viper aims in at the soldier and says

"Yeah, I see him."

An enemy soldier walks in on Viper with his sniper. The soldier draws his pistol at Viper and shouts

"Hey asshole."

He shoots Viper twice. Once in the abdomen and once in the leg. Viper in pain draws his pistol and shoots the soldier in the upper chest and jaw. The soldier drops dead onto the floor and Viper bleeds onto the floor.

"Viper, do you read me?" asks Avesta on the radio

"Yes, I do." says Viper "Just dealing with a problem."

He gets back up to his sniper rifle and takes out the last guard.

"Visuals clear…" wheezes Viper as he faints from bleeding out.

The rest of the team are just outside of the factory's locked door. The door is a large red metal door with a hand recognition system. The top half of the door has a cage-like appearance with red bars. On the right side of the door is the lock.

"I have a tool for this." says Mara as she pulls out a pair of pliers from her backpack. She then cuts open the lock on the door. They push open the door and check corners for soldiers. Two soldiers are to their right one in front of them with their backs all to them. Avesta enters first, taking out the guard in front of them. Followed by Mara and Doc who take the two soldiers on the right. The factory has a large roof with a towering platform around the entire factory. In front of them sits a large room with a large built in computer console. The room has a large window made of bulletproof glass. Several TV screens are attached to the back wall that show the security footage in the factory. They each enter the room checking the surroundings for other soldiers.

"We need to download intel on other factory locations, transmitters, trains, anything we can get to give ourselves the advantage." says Avesta as she plugs in the USB to the console.

"Doc and I will stay here and wait for the download. You two go look for the valve."

"Got it." responds Creeper

Mara and Creeper exit the room to clear out the rest of the factory. They check around for soldiers until they come across a room with three soldiers in it playing poker. In the room there is a singular light on the center of the room and just below it sits a round table in the middle. In the back of the room is a bulletin board with wanted resistance members such as Taylor, Avesta, Viper and Carter to name a few. The three soldiers laugh and shout in joy over the game.

"I will ante up fifty credits." says one of the soldiers.

"I'll call." says another soldier

"I'll pass." says the last soldier

The first soldier places down a places down a king, queen and three jacks and says

"Beat that."

The second soldier places four aces and king and says

"Just did."

The soldier laughs as he collects his money now seventy five credits richer from the earlier gamble plus the most recent game. As the soldiers laugh and talk, Mara looks at Creeper and whispers

"I'll take the two on the right side, you get the one on the left"

"Ok."

"On my mark," says Mara "Mark!"

"Sync." responds Creeper

They both peak in at the door and take out the designated targets. The bodies drop onto the floor and they both enter the room double checking for any stragglers hiding. They look around in the room for further intel but find nothing in the room. They go to the other side of the room to exit from the other side. They look around to see a wide open area with a large entrance to their left. There is a large, red garage-like door heavily guarded by soldiers and in the middle is a heavily armoured vehicle. Towards the back of the factory are two large exhaust pipes bleeding smoke into the sky. Surrounding the pipes is a platform with a valve attached to the pipes. Meanwhile Avesta and Doc are still waiting for intel to download onto the USB.

"What percentage is the download at?" asks Avesta

"It's at eighty seven percent." responds Doc

"Good. Once we finish the download, we'll meet up with the rest outside…"

As she was speaking an enemy soldier with two cups of coffee walks in whistling and freezes once he notices Doc and Avesta in the room. Avesta draws her gun and says quietly

"Don't move. Doc, tie him up."

Doc gets off his knees and heads to the soldier. He takes the cups out of the soldiers and places them onto a table in the room. He then zip ties the soldiers hands together behind his back.

"Are you going to kill me?" asks the soldier.

"No." responds Doc

Mara and Creeper walk up stairs quietly to the second platform.

"I got the two on the left and you get the three on the right."

Says Mara.

Once on the second platform, Mara pulls out a large combat knife and her suppressed pistol. She walks up to the soldier facing her back and stabs the soldier in the abdomen. Blood spills out of the soldier abdomen making the ground wet and sticky. She then takes the knife out of the soldier's abdomen and plunges the knife into his neck. She begins to carve into his neck, almost decapitating him. She places the body on the ground and aims her pistol at the other soldier. She shoots him and he collapses onto the ground. Creeper sneaks up to the right to deal with his targets. He aims in at the first soldier and drops him. He aims at the next soldier and shoots his chest and head. Creeper then stows his gun and pulls out his machete. He walks behind the soldier and covers his mouth. He swings at the soldiers knee, the machete digs into the soldiers leg. Blood spits out of his leg then it comes clean off. Blood leaks out of his upper leg as the calve flops onto the ground. Creeper then takes his machete and quickly slits the throat of the soldier. Blood spits out and Creeper places the body onto the ground.

"Tangos down." says Creeper.

Mara and Creeper head to the valve.

"I need you to cover me. What happens next is going to be loud."

Creeper picks his rifle and surveys the area for soldiers coming up the stairs and Mara starts to turn the giant red valve. It makes a cranking, scratching sound as the valve scrapes against the pipe. Once Mara finishes turning the valve and loud rumbling noise starts to come from the exhaust pipe.

"We need to get out of here!" says Mara

Creeper and Mara take a rappelling hook out of their bags and attach it to the top of the wall. They climb over it and slowly rappel to the bottom. Back at the hub with Avesta and Doc are waiting for the intel to download. The tied up soldier then looks up at Avesta and says

"I have a family, you know."

"So does a friend of mine." responds Avesta

Creeper gets on the radio and says

"Where are you guys? The factory is about to explode!"

"Waiting for download to complete."

The download very slowly inches to 100% and Doc shouts

"Download complete!"

Doc grabs the USB and rushes out the door they enter through, Avesta proceeds to follow then the soldier shouts at her

"Are you going to just keep me here?"

"Yeah, you have a family to go to." says Avesta then proceeds to shoot him in the leg and run out.

They all run behind cover to avoid injuries Avesta gets on the radio to try and contact Viper.

"Viper, come in!"

Static

"Viper, are you there?"

Static

"Somethings wrong. I'm going to get Viper."

"Ok, we'll cover from here." says Mara

Avesta runs to the building where Viper is at. Around this moment the exhaust pipes begin to fall apart. Fire spits out of the cracks and at the top of the pipe. The pipe shatters and collapses into the factory. A flood of soldiers and SEDs rush out of the factory with their guns aimed up. They know they are here. Avesta enters the building and checks her corners and clears rooms for straggling soldiers. She walks up the stairs to the second floor to see Viper lying there in his blood. She rushes to his body and shouts

"Wake up!"

"Wake up!"

Viper coughs and spits out blood bleeding through his mask. Avesta pulls an adrenaline shot out of her bag and injects it into Vipers chest.

"This should be enough to get us to regroup." says Avesta

She grabs Viper and begins to drag him out of the building. She gets on the radio and says

"We need cover fire!"

"We got you covered." says Creeper

The team peaks over to each fire a flurry of bullets, soldiers fall to the ground, bullets zip through the air. Avesta and Viper hurry to the rest of the team during the skirmish. She drops Viper onto the ground next to Doc and asks

"Can you patch him up?"

"Yeah, just cover me."

Doc drops his gun and opens his back for some bandages. He starts to wrap up the wounds until a booming voice shouts

"Stop! Drop your weapons."

An enemy soldier standing high and with his gun aimed in at Doc.

"All of you! Drop your weapons!"

Each of them places down their weapons with their arms in the air.

"Now, all you going to get up and come wi---"

A bullet zips through the soldiers head, Viper struggling to hold his pistol drops it and faints. The team picks their weapons and gets behind cover in a trench in the ground. Doc continues to patch him up. Avesta gets on the radio and says

"Voodoo 1, this is Avesta, the factory is down and we need backup."

"Avesta, this is Voodoo 1, we read you. We'll send any troops in the area to your location."

"Send them now!" shouts Avesta

She gets off the radio and starts to open fire on the enemy. They hold down the site, bullet zip past their heads. Five minutes of trading fire pass by until backup shows up.

"Where is the backup?!" asks Mara.

"I don't know." responds Avesta

"Avesta this is Voodoo 1, we sent 7274-niner and troops to site Hotel Alpha."

Resistance trucks race around the corner of a street. Dirt flies behind the trucks and resistance troops running alongside the vehicles. The soldiers fire their guns at trucks but they do nothing. Resistance troops fire back, the battle rages as troops try to finish the remaining NAC and VEI soldiers. The VEI armoured assault vehicle turns around the corner of the factory and fires a large cannon at one of the trucks. The trucks explode throwing shrapnel everywhere. It fires it's cannon at another truck and misses. A resistance soldier throws a thermite at the vehicle, damaging it's armour. A resistance truck with a turret starts to fire at the vehicle till it explodes and collapses, leaving fire and rubble. 7274-niner begins to descend about fifty feet away from the team.

"Looks like I'm late to the party." says the pilot "Let's get you guys outta here."

Creeper and Mara rush to the helicopter while Doc and Avesta carry Viper to the helicopter. They each enter the helicopter to be greeted by 7274-niner.

"Looks like Dr. Death is going to finally meet the Reaper."

Viper looks up and and points his middle finger to the pilot and whispers

"...Fuck you…"

The pilot laughs

They fly out of the warzone and head back to base for their next mission. Knowing none will be washed away and that everywhere is war...