[right][sub]Underground tunnels on Zeta-5[/sub][/right]

Twelve heavily armed men and women moved quietly through a large, seemingly abandoned underground junction. Maya sent two men to check on an abandoned vehicle, hoping they could get it operational and make faster progress through these creepy tunnels. The place was strangely quiet and the fact that they haven’t encountered [i]any[/i] resistance yet was highly suspicious. Especially since this place looked perfect for an ambush.

“Guys, watch out,” Maya warned the rest, aiming her flashlight up onto the boxes held mid-air by large cranes. There were some brief reflections. Was it an enemy? Or was it just part of the crane hydraulics?

Suddenly, one of the crates fell down and exploded on impact. A bright light flashed into Maya’s face, blinding her temporarily. Years of training saved her life because instead of standing in spot disoriented, she threw herself to the ground. She roughly remembered a direction towards the nearest cover and quickly rolled there, still half-blind. Countless bullets pierced the place where she had been just moments ago, followed by three robotic warforms that jumped down from the ceiling. Maya used the overlay on her exoskeleton helmet to check the line of fire for friendlies and then leaned from her cover, returning fire on the robots. The air was filled with smoke, bullets, and laser shots. “Aim for the joints!” someone yelled as one of the warforms collapsed to the ground, its leg cut off. It didn’t stop it from shooting, but with its mobility decreased, it became an easier target and soon the holes covered most of its body and it finally shut down.

Two remaining robots spread out, taking cover behind structures in the room. “Butchers left flank! Yoyos cover fire!” Maya radioed orders and watched as half of the men separated and carefully started moving towards the left side of the room near the entrance to one of the bigger tunnels. “Jim, what is the status of that transport?”

Before she could get a response, the hair on her neck stood up and she jumped to the side, almost avoiding another warform jumping on her from the ceiling. The thing grabbed her ankle and pulled her closer, raising one of its arms. Maya briefly noticed that his hand was in fact not a hand, but a huge drill, ready to dive into her body, before using her free leg to kick him slightly away. It didn’t do much, but it gave her time to reach for her sidearm and empty half a magazine into the robot’s head from up close. The warform stumbled and fell directly on her, the drill missing her helmet by just a few inches, delving deep into the floor. “Shit,” she mumbled. “Watch for the clankers from above!” she yelled as soon as she could reach the comm activation button, using all the hydraulics of her exoskeleton trying to push the dead robot’s weight away from her.

“We got multiple new contacts, east side,” someone reported. Maya didn’t recognize the voice, so it was probably one of the Butchers.

“Fall back, regroup at the western tunnel entrance.” Maya finally managed to push the warform away from her and rolled to the nearest cover. The room was quiet now, but some metallic noises were coming from a large tunnel entrance to the east. “Status?” Maya moved to the rest of her men.

“Four men down and Avery there can’t walk.”

“Fuckin clanker crushed my leg with some huge clamp,” man lying on the ground gritted his teeth. “Crumpled my exo-suit into my leg.”

“Just hang in there, mate.” Maya nodded at him. “Jimmy, what about that transport?”

One of the men standing around a small hovercraft, or whatever that thing was, turned to her. “Well, I got interrupted. But I should have it operational in maybe… twenty minutes?”

“Make it ten.” The noise was still coming from the western tunnel, but it wasn’t getting any closer. What the hell were they doing in there? “All right, guys, the clankers are in the western tunnel, so we will head east. You go check if the way is clear.” She gestured to three men who immediately moved out, going carefully from cover to cover, working in well-coordinated pairs. “And move those large boxes out of the way.” One of the men stopped, using the full strength of his exoskeleton trying to push some big containers in the tunnel entrance out of the way. Maya let them do their thing and moved to Jim. The transporter was already hovering two feet above the ground and men helped Avery up on the small cargo platform in the back. “Do you need any help?”

“Ye, move out of my w…” He didn’t get to finish his sentence. A powerful shock wave came out of the tunnel, followed by a huge ball of fire. Some of the crates must have been booby-trapped, and as the men tried to move them, they exploded, killing everyone in the tunnel. Fiery hell burned behind them now, consuming three of her men and showing the silhouettes of the rest perfectly. Maya just now realized that the enemy in the eastern tunnel was just making some noise to force them into the trap while waiting for the right moment to attack. A swarm of figures poured into the room and once again the air filled with bullets. Maya hit one enemy twice and he immediately fell to the ground. Wasn’t that a bit too easy? She moved closer to get a better look. They were humans! Well, mostly human, majority of them had some mechanical enhancements, but still, big parts of their bodies were human. And human bodies were incomparably easier to kill than huge robots that couldn’t feel pain. “Aim for the human parts! Let's make them BLEED!” Finally. Have they run out of robots? Who cares?

Two huge cones of fire lit up at the center of the room, pinning two of her men down. While a woman with artificial arms forced them to take cover, a man with a second flamethrower circled around them, ready to attack them from the side. “Oh no, you won’t, bitches,” Maya mumbled. “Cover me!” she yelled and started running, jumping up on a container, leaping forward, and grabbing a crane hook. She then swung forward, letting go at the furthest point, landing straight [i]on[/i] her target with a very satisfying sound of bones cracking and intestines squelching. “There you go, cunt,” she stepped on the woman’s head, just for good measure. 

Before she could rush over to the guy with the second flamethrower a bullet grazed her shoulder plating, throwing her off balance for a moment. The shot came from a weird angle, seemingly from above. Maya looked up, but couldn’t see anyone. “Somebody take care of the fucking sniper!” she radioed. She had no time to deal with snipers right now, she needed to take care of the flamethrower guy before he could do some serious damage. Horrible screams revealed that it was too late. The Zetan moved around her men’s cover and was now giving them a full blast from the side. The soldier closer to him was completely engulfed in flames, the other one tried to roll to safety, exposing himself to other enemies that were shooting from distance. “HEY!” she shouted to get Zetan’s attention. It worked, maybe a bit too well, now the cone of fire was pointed in her direction. Against all odds, her suit was still holding together, even though it was getting hot really fast. She jumped towards the man holding the flamethrower, watching the surprise in his eyes. Of course, he would expect people trying to run away from the fire, not move into it. Maya twisted the hose out of his still very human hands and turned it against him. “Burn in hell, bastard.”

“Top clear for now,” someone reported.

Getting up from a screaming Zetan burning alive, Maya turned to her own burned man. He was quiet now, no more desperate screeches coming from his dead body. His exo suit was still bright red from all the heat and Maya shivered. She could hardly imagine a worse death. The second soldier had made it to cover a few meters away and then died quietly, his suit punctured in several places. “Bloody hell,” Maya cursed.

The Zetans were now being more careful, not wanting to go hand-to-hand against the Undefeated, but it wouldn’t last long. They formed a line around the eastern side of the room, taking cover and waiting for reinforcements. Unlike the remaining Undefeated, they had all the time in the world. Maya tried the radio, but the signal was being jammed, or maybe it just couldn’t reach so deep underground. The possibility that there was nobody left to answer her calls was just a bit too scary to think about right now.

“Mayo, clear the way for us, will ya?” By some miracle, the transport was still intact. It was parked in the corner of a room and shielded from a direct blast from the western tunnel, but still, it was a miracle it was operational.

Maya didn’t have time to think about the wonders of Zetan engineering. “Copy.” Two grenades fell into the Zetan improvised trenches and two more cleared the eastern tunnel entrance. Maya ran over right as the grenade exploded, finishing enemies off. The hydraulics of her suit was getting a bit glitchy, probably due to the fire damage, but so far it hasn’t given her any major problems.

“Incoming!” Jim shouted into the comms.

Maya glanced back, started running, and jumped just in the right moment to land on the passing transporter. Jim was piloting it and injured Avery was sitting in the back, sniping any Zetan head that popped out from cover. “Matthews and Lorne?” Avery asked her but she just shook her head.

“Dead.” She didn’t want to explain to him [i]how[/i] exactly they died. 

“Fuck.” His rifle fired a couple of shots. “BOOYAH! That’s eleven. Come at me, you assholes!”

It was just the three of them. Well, two and a half, speeding through a dark tunnel. For now, it seemed they managed to outrun the enemy. “Do you even know where you are going?” She yelled at Jim.

“Are you kidding? I have no idea what half of these controls do. I just figured this would be the throttle and that one a steering wheel. SHIT!” The transporter took a sharp turn left because a huge gate suddenly slid down from the tunnel ceiling, blocking the way. “They don’t seem to want us here!”

“No kidding!” Avery called from the back. “We got company!”

Maya jumped back at the cargo platform and lifted her rifle. The transporter they stole was a sturdy thing designed to slowly move cargo around. The Zetans - both humans and warforms chasing them however had some sort of hoverbikes, much faster and more maneuverable. “We cannot outrun them!” Maya aimed and shot a couple of times, but with their vehicle moving and trembling and the Zetans zigzagging behind them, it was nearly impossible to hit anything.

“There is another gate! Shoot the servos, don’t let it close!” Jim yelled at them.

Maya blasted the mechanism on one side of the door, but before she could aim at the other side, their transporter got a direct hit. The world turned into one fast-rotating blur. They got thrown off and sent flying across the tunnel, hitting the walls. Maya heard some of her bones crack and then a soft thump of the gate sliding into place, sealing them off from whatever was on the other side. Before she could ask if anyone survived, she heard Avery’s rifle, yelling and maniacal laugh, as he was shooting at the warforms that followed them through the tunnel. After a short exchange, his rifle went silent. Shit. “Jim?” The overlay display in her helmet pinpointed his signal just a few meters away from her and Maya half rolled, half crawled there, using every inch of her will not to scream in pain as the sharp ends of the broken bones rubbed against each other. “Jim!” As she was already suspecting, he was dead, probably got thrown off the transporter straight into the wall headfirst and snapped his neck. A nice quick death, considering the circumstances.

A few bullets bounced off the wreck she was using as a cover. Maya shot back a couple of times, just to get some more time to think. Even though there was nothing to think about. She wondered what was behind the gate that they fought so hard to protect? Entrance to their city? Some vital infrastructure? Not like she would ever find out. The warforms were trying to flank her, she shot in their general direction to slow them down and looked at Jim’s body again. They went through the academy together, all their missions. He was always a bit crazy, a big fan of technology, mechanics, and… explosions! Of course, he had a bag filled with plastic explosives they planned to use on closed doors. She had no idea whether it would work on the gate, it looked sturdy, but at least she would take some of the clankers with her. And that would be worth it. She quickly searched the backpack, trying to find a working detonator. The enemy was getting too close.

“Hey, assholes!” she yelled at them, her numb fingers failing to attach the detonator. “HEY! Stop shooting, dammit!” The gloves went off, but the shaking fingers still refused to cooperate. “Do you want to know a secret?”

The tunnel went quiet for a few seconds. “You do not possess any information that would be useful to us,” a metallic voice responded.

“Are you sure?” FINALLY, the stupid thing went inside. Maya armed the detonator and put her finger on the trigger, taking a last deep breath. “There is one thing you clankers probably don’t know. There is no SILICON HEAVEN!” She closed her eyes and squeezed the trigger.