Chapter 7: Aftermath

After what seemed like forever, the assault finally stopped. The crater and wreckage were decimated, and Vega was left staring at the crater in disbelief. Trillions upon trillions of shrapnel from the marker were scattered throughout the hole. The mutated Tom was nothing but a charred pile of flesh, and Drak was nowhere to be seen. Vega stepped forward, slowly descending into the crater. He looked around at the damage, and it was catastrophic. Charred bits of Necromorphs littered the crater from the Camilla, along with shrapnel and chunks of the building and vessel everywhere, some still on fire, the rest smoking and singed from the final attack. He was looking for a sign, even the tiniest hint of hope. "Drak…there's no way in hell you're gone." He scanned the piles, trying to find anything. He rummaged through the piles of debris and scrap, his suit's gloves slowly becoming more damaged as he grabs scraps that were radiating heat and tossing them aside. After around 5 minutes, he saw what looked like a boot under a few chunks of the vessel. He quickly ran over to move the debris out of the way, his hopes high. "Hang in there General! I got you!" He managed to toss the piece covering the body aside, scanning the body, his hopes crushed as he saw it was one of the other members of Delta, Chris, who was killed in the ambush on Camilla. The shredded torso and broken limbs barely recognizable from the burns of the fire, but Vega noticed his dog tags. With a heavy heart, he grabbed the tags, softly saying 'Rest, Soldier.' before turning away from the body. As he continued scanning the area, Vega heard the sound of the Shuttle from Rosé growing closer. Accepting the truth, Vega stood facing the burning wreckage, and shouted with all his anger. "Hey, you senile old geezer! I followed your orders, not to die! So who the hell are you to not do the same?! You think just because you're in charge you can just roll over and die, just like that?! Now get your sorry ass up, and let's get back to the Ship!!" Vega's words echoed around the crater, but eventually grew silent. The sound of the shuttle landing a few feet from Vega made him look towards it, seeing the researchers Delta saved scanning the area with their rifles. Vega let out a deep sigh, then walked towards the shuttle, when he suddenly felt something grab his ankle. Vega jumped in shock and fell backwards, the researchers aiming their rifles towards an arm sticking out of a pile of debris next to Vega, the Onyx black armor covering it battered and busted. Vega felt his heart racing as he quickly moved to get the debris off the body, finding a battered and bloodied Drak laying there, gasping for air through his bloody coughs. "G-General! You're alive!" Drak weakly glared up at Vega. "And who the…hell said…I was dead?" Vega and a few researchers carefully picked up Drak as they carried him to the shuttle and back to the Rosé, quickly getting him to the medical ward. After what probably felt like an eternity of pure nightmarish hell, the 2 surviving soldiers were finally back, the Rosé activating its engines and headed back to Heaven's Gate where they could give their reports, and have some much needed R&R.

As the Rosé warped out of sight, a few seconds later, another ship entered the Glorithol System near the Ice Planet, shooting a beam down to the crash site as dozens of soldiers scoured the area. The last to walk out of the beam was a woman in a suit and heels. "I want every piece of that Marker onboard ASAP, understood?" Her voice was demanding, and all the soldiers hurried to collect every shard of the destroyed Marker. "Ma'am, what about the bodies?" "They're worthless to me. All I need from this rock are the shards. Even those pieces have enough power to excel our plans by leaps and bounds." As the soldiers worked, she walked over towards the charred corpse of what used to be Major Tom. She then looked towards one of the soldiers. "Sergeant." "Yes Ma'am?" "Collect this one." She looked at the corpse, a sly smirk forming; "I do believe this one is of great scientific value." "Right away, Lady Laura, Ma'am."

A few months passed after the incident with the Camilla and the Marker. Drak made a full recovery, a few more scars to add to his collection, and Vega was promoted to Lieutenant General, serving under Drak as his second in command. After word got out about what happened, Drak and Vega trained a batch of elite soldiers for responses to Marker sightings called New Delta. HQ took the papers and the flasks of strange fluids Tom injected himself with as evidence, hoping to keep it from happening again. Finding some interesting leads, HQ called in Drak and Vega for a mission briefing on a new potential Marker sighting. The two of them were led in the building by 4 men in suits. As they are led into the main room, they are greeted by a room filled with armored soldiers forming 2 parallel lines leading from the door to a big desk with a chair behind it, the chair looking away from the door. The wall it was facing had a big window that was looking out to see the breathtaking view of the space system. Drak and Vega walked up to the desk, saluting towards the chair. "General Drak and Lieutenant General Vega reporting." Drak dropped his hand to his side after the introduction; "You have a Mission for us?" The chair slowly turned around, revealing a woman in a dark red suit. "Indeed, General. We've studied the fluids you recovered from the Glorithol System incident, and found out there is more of this substance in a system 4 lightspeed hours from the Glorithol System called the Forthik System. You are to go there and check to see where it is, and if there's another Marker." She looked towards Vega, then back at Drak; "I'm sure you've trained your new squad to be capable of this mission?" Drak glared at her hearing this. "You think I'm not fit to train this squad?" "On the contrary. You two are the only 2 that can trustfully train these soldiers to survive." She then turned the chair back towards the window; "You have your mission, General." Vega saluted the lady as Drak rolled his eyes, turning and heading out. "We'll see to it, Lady Laura."

As Vega moved to follow Drak out, the door closed, Laura looking towards the door, smirking as she took out her com link, turning it on. "This is Laura. The subjects are on their way…Of course not." She took out one of the tubes of fluid, looking at it with a smile on her face; "Afterall…they can't stop it, even if they tried…" She let out a chuckle hearing the other person on the com link; "Tom was an egotistical fool, but his dna will lead the way to a perfect specimen." She stood out of her chair, looking down as she watched Drak and Vega enter their ship, resting her hand on the window; "And the perfect host for the specimen, is heading right to you." She let out a soft chuckle, staring at Drak and Vega as they took off in their ship, knowing they have no clue what's to come next.

The End…?